Poll of the Day > Controversial Opinion: Common workers deserve a living wage.

(+) Yeah! (+)

LinkPizza posted...

Waiting for the world to force you would probably be ok, though. You do what you do until you cant anymore, then make the risk because theres no other choice. If you make the risk on your own and fail, its worse because you could have still been ok. If the world forces you, you didnt change until you had to. So you went as far as you could. Who cares about the pride of switching yourself if you fail?

I'm having a hard time following you here.

You're in a bad situation, but you don't want to make any changes that might improve your situation because you might fail, so it's better to not do anything until you're forced to do it? It just seems like a convoluted way of trying to avoid taking any personal responsibility for what happens.

Hospy posted...

I'm having a hard time following you here.

You're in a bad situation, but you don't want to make any changes that might improve your situation because you might fail, so it's better to not do anything until you're forced to do it? It just seems like a convoluted way of trying to avoid taking any personal responsibility for what happens.

Because the risk for making a worse situation is so high, that you stay the safer situation until you have to change. In the first situation, its bad, but youre able to survive. If you change, you have a chance of failing. Even if you dont fail at the class, you may not find a job. And since you took the class, you also have less money that you needed to survive. It has a high risk factor. On their own, someone might be fine doing it. But many people dont want to put their kids though a bad time, when the chance of failing can happen ok so many levels. At least without a backup plan. And many people may not have one. So, its better to wait until you have. If you change early, and fail. You couldve killed your whole family ok something risky when staying where you were would have been fine for longer. And couldve given you more time to come up with a back up plan. Thats why I say its safer to wait until youre forced. Because you have longer to live (if failure is in the future), or more time to come up with a plan. Unless you have no doubt youll pass and get the job, it super risky for everyone involved...
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LinkPizza posted...

Because the risk for making a worse situation is so high, that you stay the safer situation until you have to change. In the first situation, its bad, but youre able to survive. If you change, you have a chance of failing. Even if you dont fail at the class, you may not find a job. And since you took the class, you also have less money that you needed to survive. It has a high risk factor. On their own, someone might be fine doing it. But many people dont want to put their kids though a bad time, when the chance of failing can happen ok so many levels. At least without a backup plan. And many people may not have one. So, its better to wait until you have. If you change early, and fail. You couldve killed your whole family ok something risky when staying where you were would have been fine for longer. And couldve given you more time to come up with a back up plan. Thats why I say its safer to wait until youre forced. Because you have longer to live (if failure is in the future), or more time to come up with a plan. Unless you have no doubt youll pass and get the job, it super risky for everyone involved...

There's risk to doing anything, that's just a basic fact of life. People go to school without guarantees of a job (or even graduating), people open businesses without guarantees of making profit.

Yes, there are risks to making a change. There are also risks if you don't make a change. You could lose your job at any given point, and you'd end up in the same crappy position if you were living paycheck to paycheck. You're equally screwed, the only difference is whether you made the decision or someone made it for you.

Waiting and saving up for a back up plan works but I was under the impression we were talking about people living paycheck to paycheck which implies they aren't making any headway in savings.

Time is basically never on your side. People have roughly ~50 years of work in them, and the more time you spend doing entry level minimum wage stuff is time spent not doing something better paid, not to mention the fields that are going to stop being available to you once your body is no longer capable of doing them.

Hospy posted...

There's risk to doing anything, that's just a basic fact of life. People go to school without guarantees of a job (or even graduating), people open businesses without guarantees of making profit.

Yes, there are risks to making a change. There are also risks if you don't make a change. You could lose your job at any given point, and you'd end up in the same crappy position if you were living paycheck to paycheck. You're equally screwed, the only difference is whether you made the decision or someone made it for you.

Waiting and saving up for a back up plan works but I was under the impression we were talking about people living paycheck to paycheck which implies they aren't making any headway in savings.

Time is basically never on your side. People have roughly ~50 years of work in them, and the more time you spend doing entry level minimum wage stuff is time spent not doing something better paid, not to mention the fields that are going to stop being available to you once your body is no longer capable of doing them.

That's true that there's risk to everything. But people tend to like low risk. And to keep doing the same thing until you can't is a little lower risk than trying to maybe get a new job with money you don't have, and with time you don't have. You could lose you job at any point, but it's not so different from quitting it to pursue the other career. The major difference is the time. And waiting until you literally can't anymore gives you more time. And that extra time could be a lifesaver. Even if it's just a little extra money for that final push you need... That's why I say wait until you can't anymore...

And you can save very little with paycheck to paycheck, but just not much. The savings is very slight, but could give you the extra you need while training. And it can disappear in an instant. I was living paycheck to paycheck for a short while. And it wasn't fun. Though, had I waited instead of jumping the gun, I could have actually gotten a better job. That's why I also advocate waiting... But that situation was a little different than this...

And time isn't on our side, but that doesn't mean to just rush in. That might just kill you a little faster...
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Well yeah, if you can save money every paycheck you should absolutely do that before doing anything drastic.

The situation I thought we were discussing was for people who are constantly living paycheck to paycheck and making no progress anywhere. If you're in a position to be saving up money to make the jump to a different position, I wouldn't really describe you as being stuck in a job.