Another one of my female friends is also a school teacher. She is only 3 years away from paying off her house. Has a lot of toys, motorcycles, but no husband nor children. She does however have a nice pension and has also never known unemployment.
A third of my female friends is actually a colleague of mine who unbeknownst to me recently had a 1960's muscle car. She works in the public sector and in the past 12 years of knowing her she has always had the same job. Never married, no children.
A fourth one, also public sector, never known unemployment, decent job, no husband.
Now I could go on, but in general what all of these ladies have in common are six things;
1. They work in the public sector.
2. They've never known unemployment.
3. Even though they don't make a TON of money they make it so consistently and without pause they are all in much stronger financial situations than I am.
4. They have nice things and toys and finances.
5. They have health care and pensions that I could only dream of having.
but the most interesting one is #6;
6. They're all looking for a boyfriend/husband.
Now, this is not going to be a tirade against the path women have chosen and blah blah blah and choices have consequences, blah blah blah, it's the career or the family blah blah blah type of BS.
It's actually quite the opposite and it does beget some pity for them.
Understand that because of what women major in, they typically are over-represented in the employment ranks of the public sector. Teachers, social workers, etc, attract more women than they do men. Again, not terribly high paying jobs, but really reliable employment and exceptional benefits. Additionally, because of the strength of public sector unions, they are more or less inoculated against the effects of the recession. No offense to them, but they really don't know what it's like having to worry about, "Geez, I hope I have enough money to afford gas." Or "geez, I have to find a job or else I'm going to be in real trouble in 3 months."
Now, over the decades, if they are slightly good stewards of their finances, they build up tidy little nest eggs and strong, stable finances. Their male counterparts however, have an uphill battle in this regard, especially given the disproportionate effects this particular recession has had on men. They have nowhere near the nest egg or retirement plans these ladies do. They have nowhere near the stable employment these ladies do. And they have nowhere near the strong, stable finances these ladies do. This presents a risk for the ladies, because as the economy fails to genuinely recover and the public sector continues to grow and crowd out the private sector, men are going to be forced or at least "tempted" to consider using some of these nice ladies for their finances. Worse still, because of pride, men are less likely (I'm guessing) to go on the public dole and may instead psychologically convince themselves of a compromise between pride and starvation, permitting themselves to some gold-digging.
My one friend in particular is very aware of this in that she is afraid (and I think justifiably so) of men once they find out her house is more or less bought and paid for, as well as all of her toys and she has a nice pension AND HER SPOUSE/PARTNER CAN GET FREE HEALTH INSURANCE.
It's like the Foghorn Leghorn cartoon where he shacks up with the widow hen because winter's coming.
Of course the irony of this is how the roles have been reversed. Previously on "An American Life" the men were the bread-winners and had to look out for the gold diggers. Now with much-celebrated growth in the public sector (and thus a crowding out of the evil and completely unnecessary private sector);
it's those nice, stably employed public sector women with their nice pensions, free health insurance, and tidy-summed bank accounts that have to look out for ulteriorly-motivated men.
So why did these three never get married?
ReplyDeleteAt this time, I'm fortunate enough to have public sector employment with the state of Texas.
ReplyDeleteI figured since the engineering consulting jobs I was doing years ago were nominally government work anyway, I might as well get the benefits. I hate to say it, but there is no real incentive to 'do better' right now.
I've been unemployed and between jobs with little money. It really sucks. I went ahead and took the unemployment sooner the second time around. I'm paying for it anyway and it is just enough money so most people won't go beserk.
Sadly, my dad used to tell me that if I got a government job he would kick me in the ass since he retired from civil service.
Oh well, might as well milk it while the milking is still good.
"... stably employed public sector women with their nice pensions, free health insurance ..."
ReplyDeleteGosh, I hope nothing happens to suddenly deprive these women of their cushy jobs, pensions, and insurance! But I'm being silly ... there are no clouds on the public sector horizon, and we'll be able to support an ever-growing parasite class indefinitely.
Are any of them chubby chasers?
ReplyDelete- I noticed this thing too. From my highschool class, majority of women work in public sector jobs. But in contrary to the USA public sector !still! is not well paid in many cases. And there have been some cuts last year (10%) and this is not final. Our aging population hand in hand with state only pension system requires much more drastic cuts.
ReplyDelete- The nice pensions and stable government jobs are just illusions and anybody knows it. They are delusional if they think it will last forever.
It used to be that secondary school teacher was considered the "ideal" job for a mom because her schedule was similar to those of the kids.
ReplyDeleteSugar Mama, that pretty well says it all.
ReplyDeleteYou could almost argue that the US lost the Cold War. Russia is now a capitalist country (although corrupt), and America is a socialist paradise. Of course we all know what happens to a socialist paradise, they became a bankrupt basket case.
Perhaps today`s S&P debt warning will be a wake up call. Na, I doubt it.
Let the government debt party continue!!
I wouldn't mind the standard of living of public school teachers, except for the fact that a fair percentage of them are shitty teachers, and the administrators are just brutal. My kid goes to the top elementary school in the top public school system in the state. His teacher is a nasty harpy who seems to hate boys, and the recourse from the administrators is... "well, we can always put him in special ed, or you can always go to the local Catholic school." Catholic school isn't an option because the local Catholic schools are a bit weaker in math & science education, and damned if I'm going to turn my kid into a literate barista. Interestingly, the teachers don't get the same info about the school's IQ / aptitude assessments that the parents get from the assessment councilors, and we know our kid is borderline gifted in math & language abilities, yet his homeroom / English / social studies teacher has explained to us a couple times that he's a dummy, a limited kid, who has trouble learning and he probably suffers from a behavioral disorder and ADD, and we should discuss this with our doctor and consider putting him on meds. She is a remarkably stupid and unperceptive woman... The boy doesn't appear to be suffering any permanent harm from this, he's actually developing a critical skill of being able to recognize when he's dealing with a moron, and his specialty teachers - the math & science chix - have told us he's one of the top kids they've had the pleasure of teaching, and he's well behaved in their classes, a real sweetheart. So we've left him in his current homeroom / english / ss class because we figured he's going to have to figure out how to deal with hostile female teachers if he hopes to stack up educational credentials, but - (1)as he gets older we're going to stress that credentials are important to have to get in the door but useless after that; (2) we're stressing already that it's his job to learn, and the teacher's personality is irrelevant, it's between him and the books, an important lesson for any student; and finally, (3) what the fuck is wrong with the administrators that they close ranks rather than dealing with a ridiculously bad teacher like this?
ReplyDeleteBTW, the kid is 8 and it's been a wrenching year for us, and tough on him. I think he's too young to be exposed to this kind of treatment. Congratulations, heirs of Mr. Dewey, you won the battle over education in the U.S. Enjoy the decline, you sick fucks.
"...Gosh, I hope nothing happens to suddenly deprive these women of their cushy jobs, pensions, and insurance! But I'm being silly ... there are no clouds on the public sector horizon, and we'll be able to support an ever-growing parasite class indefinitely."
ReplyDeleteIronically, it was a woman (Margaret Thatcher, 1980's British Conservative Prime Minister) who said it best:
"The trouble with socialism is that it eventually runs out of other people's money."
Its not a gender thing per se (some of the edgy males of the blogosphere are themselves esconced in cushy bureacracy and are leaning more socialist; and some of us females are far from that), it's about seeking safe slacking. Basically, the kids who spent college in the humanities department and having 3am pot parties (complete with loud bass music and drunken discussions of how society should be organized) while the rest of us worked, have united to extract resources from the rest of us.
ReplyDelete