This is what class rage feels like

[Anonymous]

I don't know. I found the whole article annoying and whiney. Just crazy that this woman took 40 years to realize that there is such a thing as generational wealth. Some people are born with it and are lucky in that sense. To me, there will always be someone richer than me, prettier than me, etc. So I make the best of what I have and work hard for things that I know I would have to work hard for. That doesn't bother me. I mean, the lady was complaining about being poor in publishing so why the hell did she pick that field? She can also leave and find something else. Stop being mad about what you weren't born with.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Intriguing. I think the point PP's father wanted her to grasp was that she should work very hard at something. Whatever she worked very hard at would be her true passion manifesting. I find it hard to believe that there is nothing you enjoy putting a great deal of effort into doing, especially given your impressive parents.

I am the PP. In rereading my post I can see why others might have interpreted it differently.

There are things I enjoy doing but not everyone is going to be the next Ina Garten. It's not a question of being afraid of work. I wasn't afraid of long hours. I had the discipline from academia. But the field I'd more or less stumbled into was a field where you could work very long hours and be at the top of the field and still not even crack 100k salary unless it's one of those rare government jobs and you've accumulated enough steps over the years.

Most creative sector jobs fall into this category. We can mock the liberal arts graduate who ends up a Starbucks barista to the point that it's now a cliché, but there's a kernel of truth to it too. And I've also belatedly discovered that most people aren't going to work at jobs they genuinely love, it's having an occupation that gives them both a salary and sense of purpose, but the work itself is almost meaningless. You don't go into architecture unless you have a genuine passion for it, but the industry is also filled with former architects who burned out and switched to other jobs because the pay is terrible and they couldn't survive on it. For all their passion for architecture, it didn't lead to a better quality life outcome. It's too easy to get caught up in the idea of a passion when you're 18 or 21 without realizing only the top 1% or even less than that actually get to live a upper middle class lifestyle.

The class rage exhibited in the article is due to that she was capable enough to have done better, financially, but she chose to follow a calling rather than the money and is enraged while people who followed the money, people who were no better nor smarter than her, end up doing much better. But they made that decision. Very few people go into banking with a genuine passion for spreadsheets. They went into finance because it pays well. Law firm partners rarely love what they do, but they love the money. Corporate VPs rarely love what they do, but they do love the money.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wow I can totally relate to this article! Especially during the pandemic. “Public schools are closed? Hired a nanny! Send your kids to private, that’s what we’re doing!” Ummmm I don’t have $100k lying around?? You do? And so do several other neighbors on our street?! How??! I thought we were all in similar boats… apparently not. “We’re all in this together” got really old really fast.

Well the pandemic is a special case of elites abusing the rest of society. Closing schools are the ultimate example of elite cluelessness.

Elites didn’t close your schools.
A virus closed your school.

[Anonymous]

I think this article was particularly compelling for me as I can really relate to much of what ails the author. I too went to private school, an Ivy caliber college and studied English Literature and chemistry. I was one of the smartest students in class, and and idealist. I left college with a profound sense that I wanted to make the world a better place. I grew up comfortably with my parents providing everything I could dream of, and in my sheltered naivete it never occurred to me to think of logistical matters such as salary, cost of living and earning the UMC existence I grew up in.

A bright eyed dreamer with a big head full of goals and dreams, I joined the well regarded foreign policy world in DC. It was mesmerizing, the ideas, the important people, the inescapable sense that what we talked about in our discussion groups mattered not just in DC but around the world. I was star struck by the smart and famous people who frequented our think tank and the other interns and I spent many a lunch hours dreaming and planning for our bright futures.

After a year of this I realized that none of us were going to get hired. Almost everyone started applying to graduate school or if they already had a graduate degree, they applied elsewhere.

I did not have a trust fund with which to pursue a graduate degree, especially as I realized the jobs those graduates were qualified for would pay 50k to start!

I decided to find fulltime employment without an MA from SAIS or Hopkins and found an entry level program admin job at a nonprofit starting pay of 37k.

Most of my colleagues had MAs or were pursing them. I also noticed all of them came from well off families with their parents or grand parents funding their nice DC apartments, buying them, expensive jackets and paying for further education.

I felt lost and demoralized. The poor pay and lack of advancement affected my mental health and years later, I work as an admin at another non=profit. In hindsight, I am glad I did not go to SAIS and put myself in 200k debt only to qualify for jobs paying 60k.

I feel lost and angry at being so stupid. Most of my cohort are still in non-well paying jobs in the non profit sector and a few got MBAs and joined the corporate sector.

Not having their family money, I feel like I got myself stuck in a dead end route.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wow I can totally relate to this article! Especially during the pandemic. “Public schools are closed? Hired a nanny! Send your kids to private, that’s what we’re doing!” Ummmm I don’t have $100k lying around?? You do? And so do several other neighbors on our street?! How??! I thought we were all in similar boats… apparently not. “We’re all in this together” got really old really fast.

This. The 'just send your kids to private' sent me over the edge. So now their kids are going to have yet an additional edge - they were in in-person school for 18 months; mine in fully virtual.

Stop complaining and get busy. No one is stopping you from making more money. People are dying to come to America. Some become multi millionaires within one generation. Their kids go to private.

NP and agree. This original author of the story, I would assume, is not the child of an immigrant. Immigrants' kids often have all this hard wired into us - work while in school, try to get as much scholarship as possible, and the two big ones: 1) choose something practical for work (ie make a decent living) and 2) don't go to a private university unless you are going to be an MD or JD. Obvious choices to anyone *without* a big safety net.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:As a child I remember being told many times by my parents to pursue my passion, with all the implications that if I did so then everything would fall into place and I'd have a successful life. This was a common mantra among the boomer generation, and for someone like my father it was very easy to say, as he had a clear passion for a certain field and and he worked extremely hard at it. His hard work was second nature to him and one that must have been effortless as he genuinely loved his field. He did achieve quite a bit of success, which allowed him to provide very well for his family and we had the comfortable upper middle class life of the 1980s-1990s with private schools, a nice house, European vacations, Volvo station wagons and elite colleges for the kids. It allowed my mother, when she decided she wanted to go back to work, to be a history teacher at a nice girls' private school where her income was secondary to the point of having something to do that she enjoyed, and admittedly was very good at. And my parents now have an extremely comfortable retirement.

But there are two problems. The first is that not everyone has a clear passion or the drive to succeed in it, and not every passion pays well. I received a superb education but I never really had any strong calling to a particular occupation or profession. I more or less drifted through college without a purpose, majored in a soft liberal arts subject, and then found myself wondering what to do, and because I just didn't know, I randomly fell into a graduate program in a field that was mildly interesting but without a real clue as what I'd do afterwards. For my parents, it almost didn't matter as long as I was getting a good education at good schools, and they continued to assume everything would fall into place.

In my second year of the grad program, I started to panic as the reality of the future hit me. I was going to have to get a job. And live. And the salaries of the industry the program was training me for was not... great. I started looking much more closely at the long term outcome of the program's graduates, even in mid career 20 years later they were not living the lifestyle I'd grown up. Meanwhile, around me I was watching friends coming out of professional schools or MBA programs walking into six figure salaries, and wondering why I hadn't done the same. I was just as intelligent, yet somehow I'd missed figuring out what they'd clearly long realized.

I ultimately lucked out because I took the old fashioned way to success. I married well. But I still occasionally wonder what life would be like if I hadn't. And I still do wish my parents had been much more proactive in sitting down with me over the years and being frank about career choices and the tradeoffs you make rather than blithely assuming everything will work out as long as you do what you love. I will not make that mistake with my kids.

This.

I always wonder about how “smart” people actually are if they get so much education that they dig themselves deeply into debt and don’t have a job at the end which pays a lot.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:As a child I remember being told many times by my parents to pursue my passion, with all the implications that if I did so then everything would fall into place and I'd have a successful life. This was a common mantra among the boomer generation, and for someone like my father it was very easy to say, as he had a clear passion for a certain field and and he worked extremely hard at it. His hard work was second nature to him and one that must have been effortless as he genuinely loved his field. He did achieve quite a bit of success, which allowed him to provide very well for his family and we had the comfortable upper middle class life of the 1980s-1990s with private schools, a nice house, European vacations, Volvo station wagons and elite colleges for the kids. It allowed my mother, when she decided she wanted to go back to work, to be a history teacher at a nice girls' private school where her income was secondary to the point of having something to do that she enjoyed, and admittedly was very good at. And my parents now have an extremely comfortable retirement.

But there are two problems. The first is that not everyone has a clear passion or the drive to succeed in it, and not every passion pays well. I received a superb education but I never really had any strong calling to a particular occupation or profession. I more or less drifted through college without a purpose, majored in a soft liberal arts subject, and then found myself wondering what to do, and because I just didn't know, I randomly fell into a graduate program in a field that was mildly interesting but without a real clue as what I'd do afterwards. For my parents, it almost didn't matter as long as I was getting a good education at good schools, and they continued to assume everything would fall into place.

In my second year of the grad program, I started to panic as the reality of the future hit me. I was going to have to get a job. And live. And the salaries of the industry the program was training me for was not... great. I started looking much more closely at the long term outcome of the program's graduates, even in mid career 20 years later they were not living the lifestyle I'd grown up. Meanwhile, around me I was watching friends coming out of professional schools or MBA programs walking into six figure salaries, and wondering why I hadn't done the same. I was just as intelligent, yet somehow I'd missed figuring out what they'd clearly long realized.

I ultimately lucked out because I took the old fashioned way to success. I married well. But I still occasionally wonder what life would be like if I hadn't. And I still do wish my parents had been much more proactive in sitting down with me over the years and being frank about career choices and the tradeoffs you make rather than blithely assuming everything will work out as long as you do what you love. I will not make that mistake with my kids.

How did you meet your husband? What do you do now?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We don’t hide the help. I am very clear with friends, so they know we aren’t wizards.
We inherited money for a very sad reason.
The money is not much consolation, but at least there is something good to come out of a bad situation.

As for the article… that lady is responsible for her circumstances. She could have made better choices.

Many others endure "very sad" or "bad situations", but without "something good" coming out of it in the form of money. Get over yourself; no one cares.

You sure sound like you care…

A friend of mine inherited enough to pay cash for a house and for a fancy wedding. She got it when her dad killed himself. He was a Holocaust survivor as a child.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We don’t hide the help. I am very clear with friends, so they know we aren’t wizards.
We inherited money for a very sad reason.
The money is not much consolation, but at least there is something good to come out of a bad situation.

As for the article… that lady is responsible for her circumstances. She could have made better choices.

Many others endure "very sad" or "bad situations", but without "something good" coming out of it in the form of money. Get over yourself; no one cares.

You sure sound like you care…

A friend of mine inherited enough to pay cash for a house and for a fancy wedding. She got it when her dad killed himself. He was a Holocaust survivor as a child.

How lucky she was to have gotten a chance to know her father.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think one of the biggest things people with money are often lacking is consideration and perspective. They need to remember that those around them, even those in similar jobs, don’t always have the same amount of money. So be conscience of that. If you do go out to lunch or dinner, don’t just split the bill evenly when someone ordered fillet and someone ordered a salad. This happened to my sister. She was temping and trying to network so was part of this women’s group. All the women had jobs, some had very good jobs. They went out to dinner one night to discuss a book. It was a pricey restaurant. Not crazy expensive but way more than my sister was accustomed. She ordered a salad and no alcohol. It was like $16. Everyone else ordered full meals and drinks. They split the check evenly. My sister paid like $75. She was so upset that she spent so much and barely ate. No one bothered to notice that she ordered the cheapest thing on the menu, was temping, and didn’t order anything to drink. Everyone just assumed that everyone had the same thing and could spend the same. This type of thing has happened to me too. People will want to go to trendy and expensive place for drinks but I can’t afford that. Or they won’t have cash to tip so ask you to put in their share and they’ll pay you back. But they never do because for them $5 or $10 doesn’t mean anything. Be thoughtful and cognizant of those around you. Be aware that not everyone is as fortunate financially as you. That in itself goes a long way.

this needs to be reiterated.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Debt for an MFA is insane. But here's the thing, if everyone else is acting as though they don't have much money either, you don't realize how insane it is until after you're stuck in a low-paying career path. I have friends who are .001 percenters, from a famous family with buckets of money, and they will complain to me about their budget woes or brag about the Costco food they served at their kids' birthday party. Then it's spring break in St. Moritz or the VIP Disney tour. Sorry, friend, we're not in the same boat.

There are so many people in DC like this - they can afford to pursue policy careers based on interest rather than money because there's a trust fund or a master-of-the-universe spouse. I can't tell you the number of colleagues at my left-leaning nonprofit whose kids are Sidwell/Maret/GDS and who live in $2m houses. They're great smart people, but sometimes I want to smack them.

The thing is, this isn't harmless. I worked in public policy and I remember vividly the non-profit trust fund baby who was explaining to me that it was a good thing to require anyone who sells a home to spend up to $100,000 to upgrade the energy efficiency of the house. They pointed out that this was just a fraction of the total value of a house. They seemed stunned -- and incredulous -- when I told them that there are large portions of the United States where you can buy an entire house for less than $100,000. These are the people in DC who are making policy for the rest of us. (This was about ten years ago, and these same ideas is now popping up in the "Green New Deal.")

These are people who talk to their friends about how they could never live in "Flyover Country" because they want to live in a "diverse" area. What they really mean is that they want to live around rich people of all races and nationalities.

Oh yes^^ Absolutely

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:<We have choices.> This is class war. This is a class struggle, a community struggle against institutions that do not foster the positive growth of children or adults. The work needing to be done is significant, requiring community education and organizing.

Keep in mind that most of the people around you are well-meaning but indoctrinated. You can't expect them to understand that they are enslaved. Build small movements which can create new, democratic institutions.

Marxism is a college major for people from wealthy families.

[Anonymous]

“There are so many people in DC like this - they can afford to pursue policy careers based on interest rather than money because there's a trust fund or a master-of-the-universe spouse. I can't tell you the number of colleagues at my left-leaning nonprofit whose kids are Sidwell/Maret/GDS and who live in $2m houses. They're great smart people, but sometimes I want to smack them.“‘

This. And this is the problem with having rich kids intern and work for congress. Congress pays zero or very little so the only people who can afford to do it are from wealthy families who subsidize them. And they have no perspective. They are completely clueless as to how real people live and how much life costs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote: In general, I feel sorry for the generations younger than me (I am young Gen X) because of debt, economy, etc. But I just can't believe this 40yo could be an innocent naif for so long. I was a very, very stupid smart person as a youth. I think it took me 2x as long to learn practical life stuff. My parents were not rich or "savvy," but my dad did know which fields I might actually make a living. He was not just thinking of me, but of himself (he probably wasn't going to let me go homeless, but would not be paying for any rents).

I went into the field of my choice anyway. It wasn't such a poor choice, and I have done well, but it also was not NYC, but here in DC. Yeah, I have insisted on living in a city. But the difference is, I made it. I had enough income by 30 and really felt secure by 35. Had I not, I would have readjusted in some way, by moving, changing careers, etc. I would not persist in world's most expensive city, getting ragged mad about other people's supposed trust funds.

The article author bugs me also by her assuming about these other people. Yeah, maybe they got it all handed over, but maybe not! I am close to some adults whose parents are rich, but the parents do NOT believe in helping. They get to enjoy the vacation house but no handouts. That's another conundrum, but you can't just assume! I mean, stop looking so hard at other people. If you are unhappy, it starts with you.

Free vacations IS helping though. You know how much we spend on vacations a year? 50-60k. Yes, that is our choice and you don't have to spend that much but it's good for kids to see the world and build those fond family memories on vacation. We'd spend a hell of a lot less if we had access to a FREE beach house and ski chalet.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This is definitely how I feel when I find out people have significant parental help in the form of house down payments (or full purchase price), tuition, completed 529’s, free trips to Hawaii, etc. It’s all very hush hush because they want it to seem like they aren’t getting that much help.

The worst part about these people is:

- they actually look down on those of us who worked to earn everything we have.

Yes - I’m talking to you McMansion dwellers who used mommy and daddy’s money to get there.