How much is enough?

The other day I was innocently consuming a sandwich at the sub chain Jimmy John’s, when I came across this interesting poster:

How Much Is Enough?

An American investment banker was at the pier of a small coastal Mexican village when a small boat with just one fisherman docked. Inside the small boat were several large yellow-finned tuna. The banker complimented the Mexican on the quality of his fish and asked how long it took to catch them. The Mexican replied: “Only a little while.” The banker then asked why he didn’t stay out longer and catch more fish. The Mexican said he had enough to support his family’s immediate needs.

The banker was puzzled and then asked, “But what do you do with the rest of your time?”

The Mexican fisherman said, “I sleep late, swim a little, play with my children, take a siesta with my wife Maria, stroll into the village each evening where I sip wine and play guitar with my amigos. I have a full and busy life, Señor.“

The banker scoffed, “I have an MBA from Harvard and could help you. You should spend more time fishing, and with the proceeds you could buy a bigger boat. With the proceeds from the bigger boat, you could buy several boats. Eventually you’ll have a fleet of fishing boats. Instead of selling your catch to a middle man, you would sell directly to the processor, eventually opening your own cannery. You would control the product, processing and distribution. You would need to leave this small coastal fishing village and move to Mexico City, then Los Angeles, and eventually to New York City where you will run your expanding enterprise.”

The Mexican fisherman asked, “But, Señor, how long will this all take?”

To which the banker replied, “Five to ten years.”

“But what then, Señor?”

The banker laughed and said, “That’s the best part. When the time is right, you would announce an IPO and sell your company’s stock to the public and become very rich. You would be worth millions!”

“Millions, Señor? Then what?”

The banker said, “Then you would retire, move to a small coastal fishing village, take siesta with your wife, play with your kids, stroll to the village in the evenings where you would sip wine and play your guitar with your amigos.”

I think this poster really hits home, and sheds light on the fraud known as “the American dream.” It seems as if, everywhere I look, there are massive hierarchies enforced for the purpose of enslaving the American people.  Mega-corporations pay workers minimum hourly wages, while the people at the top of the pyramid enjoy luxuries that we could never dream of. All the while, the workers at the bottom are tricked into believing they are “making something of themselves” by working. After all, if you don’t accumulate wealth and assets in this society, what else is there to live for?

I recently ventured employment at a local clothing store in order to engage with the public a bit more, as well as make some extra money for my upcoming wedding. I was shocked to find that the store paid its workers only $8.00 an hour (which we all know gets whittled to about $7.50 after taxes and Medicare), and not only that, it works them to the bone. The “associate handbook” was filled with rules dictating the minutiae of its employees daily schedules – one break for every 3 hours worked, 1/2 hour lunch break, on-call shifts during which you may or may not be required to work.

You may read these things and think, “So what? That’s not so bad. In this country, working hard is a value, I work hard every day” and so on. But that’s the whole point; the fact that we accept these working conditions as normal and expected just goes to show how little we understand about the disastrous affects of hierarchical work environments.

As written elsewhere on this site by the admin, “in modern civilisation, individuals must work to earn money to pay rent, mortgage, taxes or to buy food. For most on the lower rungs of the hierarchy, there is little choice but wage slavery. It is a crime not to have money (vagrancy). The reward system of ‘money’ makes it all the easier to enslave the masses without flagrant violence, especially as nowadays the bottom rungs of the ladder are occupied by other peoples in other lands, where open violence is more commonplace.”

Aren’t we all just like the investment banker in the story – tricked into thinking that we have to accumulate wealth in order to be happy? And don’t we then devote our lives and spirits to corporations?