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September 24, 2007
More on The Trap
Read Kevin on Daniel Brook's The Trap. Kevin points out another thing that bugged me abut the book, namely, Brook's apparent belief that anyone in the corporate world trudged there, death march style, after being priced out of working for a rewarding non-profit.
I know lots of people in the for-profit world. They like their jobs pretty well -- just as well as Hill staffers and non-profiteers. And a lot of them like having money! Brook paints for-profit work as a loathed fallback to every young person's natural ambition to work for Amnesty International, but not only does that fail to track with my experience, it's sort of insulting to folks who have chosen a different career path than I have, and thus probably not the way to build political support for a program that will reduce their salaries.
September 24, 2007 in Books | Permalink
Comments
Count me as someone who was only in the for-profit world after I couldn't find a job in the non-profit since my competition for foothold jobs all could work for free since they were trust fund kids. I only have now been able to do what I love after blogging as a hobby while working for a living for years.
Posted by: Amanda Marcotte | Sep 24, 2007 8:49:57 AM
"Hill staffers"
are not exactly (as a group) aiming to emulate Gandhi.
They might not be making tons of money now, but often selling out is part of the plan from the beginning.
Posted by: Christopher Colaninno | Sep 24, 2007 8:59:15 AM
Thanks for this - I think there's a tendency to look askance at liberals who choose the private sector, from those who choose other routes ("selling out" and "not really progressive" chief among them) - just look at some of the responses Kevin's getting. Really, I was there too for the whole discussion of the Dirty Capitalist System... but I also believe, firmly, in doing what you love. My white collar, corporate, ad agency job was something I loved doing, and I left it when it stopped being something I loved to do, for something else, also for a corporation. I'd love to have the interest and passion needed to do non-profit work, to work for the cause. It's not, I'm convinced, the place where my talents lie (I'd love even more making the full leap to starving artist... but that would involve literally starving at this point without another job).
I am thankful that we have people who do have those talents and skills, and we should celebrate and support that. But we don't have to do that and also give private sector workers a hard time. Everything I've read about The Trap has me thinking that it's an interesting, but ultimately unnecessary, way to frame arguments for affordable housing, addressing student debt issues and changing our healthcare system - those things are needed for everyone, not just for starving artists, the socially motivated and the whole boho culture. I want those things so everyone can do what they love, even accountants. :)
Posted by: weboy | Sep 24, 2007 9:03:25 AM
Chris: I know a lot of Hill staffers. Most -- at least on the Dem side -- start out plenty idealistic.
Posted by: Ezra | Sep 24, 2007 9:06:58 AM
"since my competition for foothold jobs all could work for free since they were trust fund kids."
Were college loans a big problem, or was it only living costs?
My theory is that universal healthcare and heavily government subsidized college tuition would greatly ameliorate the problem.
Posted by: Petey | Sep 24, 2007 9:19:58 AM
Even worse is that Brooks claims that when "we go into the corporate world, enduring long, meaningless hours," this is somehow an environment different than working at a non-profit.
The people I knew working for non-profits were typically overworked, underpaid, and underappreciated. They might have gained a lot of psychic benefits from their work, because they felt that, at the end of the day, what they were doing was valuable, but I'd hardly describe them as living some idealistic work lifestyle.
Posted by: Tyro | Sep 24, 2007 9:25:45 AM
It's hard for me to give a fuck about these places. They are little more than welfare for rich people. Just like the conservative welfare machine, most of these people have jobs that don't matter, that aren't open to the general population, and that they use to build their resumes to go on to more prestigious work. This is just part of how the Elite deny opportunity to everyone they didn't grow up with.
To put it bluntly, I could give a fuck less about a bunch of whiny rich brats.
Posted by: soullite | Sep 24, 2007 9:38:06 AM
"To put it bluntly, I could give a fuck less about a bunch of whiny rich brats."
Of course, the point is all about how to allow whiny non-rich brats to work in non-profits...
Posted by: Petey | Sep 24, 2007 9:39:50 AM
I love how people think federal student loans actually pay for college. They don't. If these people got 'Student loans' they weren't student loans at all. They were non-guaranteed educational loans that banking institutions like to call themselves 'student loans'. Most of them got these loans on the strength of their parents credit established on the back of their parents bank accounts.
Posted by: soullite | Sep 24, 2007 9:41:35 AM
Petey, and allow them to build their resumes for political or governmental work later. Don't act like they are doing it out of the goodness of their hearts.
Posted by: soullite | Sep 24, 2007 9:42:35 AM
"Petey, and allow them to build their resumes for political or governmental work later. Don't act like they are doing it out of the goodness of their hearts."
Again, the point here is how to allow non-rich kids to build their resumes for political or governmental work later. Broadening access to non-profit work will broaden tomorrow's elite.
Posted by: Petey | Sep 24, 2007 9:44:59 AM
Petey, fuck no it won't. There's no difference between one group of rich people and another group of rich people. Go cry me a fucking river.
Posted by: soullite | Sep 24, 2007 9:50:30 AM
The wealthy will always look out ONLY for the interests of the wealthy. This session of congress has proven that. Rich liberals just lie and pretend they want to help other people.
Posted by: soullite | Sep 24, 2007 9:52:06 AM
Petey, non 'rich' people don't get to go to the kind of college that gets you hired by these institutions. You seem to be missing a fairly large part of the socio-economic picture here.
Posted by: soullite | Sep 24, 2007 9:55:03 AM
Hell, lower class people have next to NO real access to college. Perhaps they could afford community college to get an AS degree, but even state schools are well out of the bounds of most Americans.
It's amazing how often even upper middle class people manage to delude themselves into thinking that less than 1/2 the post 25 public has a Bachelor's because they didn't want one or simply made the wrong choices.
Posted by: soullite | Sep 24, 2007 9:59:03 AM
soullite, honestly, there are people working on Capitol Hill who have been working as hill staffers for 10-15 years (sometimes working for the same senator) with no plans to run off and join a lobbying firm.
Granted, the large number of staff assistants and interns are just there before leaving to attend law school or work for a non-profit, but a lot of them are middle class kids who are going to settle into middle class careers.
the point is all about how to allow whiny non-rich brats to work in non-profits...
Meh, I told all of my non-rich friends to avoid non-profits like the plague. If you're really living close to the edge and didn't grow up with a lot of social advantages, the best strategy is to focus on making money in order to build on the educational successes you had in life.
Posted by: Tyro | Sep 24, 2007 10:14:32 AM
"If you're really living close to the edge and didn't grow up with a lot of social advantages, the best strategy is to focus on making money in order to build on the educational successes you had in life."
Sure. But this adage applies triply so in a society with an insufficient safety net.
Without the burden of college loans to repay and health insurance to worry about, smart and ambitious folks who didn't choose their parents wisely would be more able to consider non-lucrative career paths.
Posted by: Petey | Sep 24, 2007 10:20:40 AM
I love how people think federal student loans actually pay for college. They don't. If these people got 'Student loans' they weren't student loans at all. They were non-guaranteed educational loans that banking institutions like to call themselves 'student loans'.
Depends. There are federal subsidized loans and the government pays the interest while you are in school. There are federal unsubsidized loans which accrue interest but are doled out by the government. There are private loans which also accrue. Ideally, there would be no need for the latter 2, but costs have gone up so much they have become sadly necessary.
Posted by: Joshua | Sep 24, 2007 10:21:50 AM
joshua, huh? I mean, are you even disagreeing with me there, or are you just trying to put a softer face on it?
There's no reason why congress couldn't raise student loans to the point where they COULD pay for college for anyone who got accepted in one. That wouldn't solve all the problems, as there are still areas in the college application system that favor the wealthy (particularly factoring in how 'good' the students high school district was, but it would certainly help. Congress doesn't do this because it doesn't want to. It doesn't want to because it only seems interested in preserving the status of our elite. That, and it makes the army a nice bribery scheme to force poor Americans to join if they decide want to go to college. It's not like those non subsidized loans are going to go to the people who truly need them. They won't be able to pass the credit check involved.
Posted by: soullite | Sep 24, 2007 11:10:48 AM
all of this is, basically, a pretty good reason for most people not to care about this issue. I get that Ezra does, but he's not going to find a very large constituency of people who want to make building a good resume even easier for the wealthy or near wealthy.
Posted by: soullite | Sep 24, 2007 11:12:39 AM
"Chris: I know a lot of Hill staffers. Most -- at least on the Dem side -- start out plenty idealistic."
So do I, and I wouldn't disagree with that in a want to change the world sense of idealism. I do not think hill staffers (as said before 'as a group') have reduced their life time earning capacity by taking hill jobs. Hill jobs are elite jobs. You could list a lot of negatives about working on the hill, but I suspect you find they are either offset by other factors or not unique to hill jobs.
Posted by: Christopher Colaninno | Sep 24, 2007 12:58:41 PM
It's easy to sneer at the "problems" of very well-educated, privileged youth. I didn't like Brook's emphasis on this group either. However, there is a real problem here, namely that we're burdening young people with huge educational loans, at a time when housing is unprecedentedly expensive and health care coverage is harder and harder to find and afford. These factors are going to influence these people's career choices, in ways that may be very bad for society. Unlike Brook, I'm less concerned about nonprofits than I am about whether we'll have enough teachers and nurses.
Posted by: beckya57 | Sep 24, 2007 1:53:59 PM
The "trap" of our economy (as I see it) is that for most of us there are no alternatives: you grind or don't work at all. Not much in-between in my experience, which is what sucks.
Of course, some people don't even have that choice, and that sucks even worse.
Posted by: a-train | Sep 24, 2007 1:57:40 PM
I think the book is getting at a larger problem, in one of the only ways possible in the current market: why can't Joe and Jane Middle-Management's kids do the same thing the CEO's kids can? Namely, pursue a/the good life. I really don't think the point is feeling bad for kids who graduated from Harvard and can't support themselves working for Legal Aid.
The point is: if *they* can't do what they want, what chance do the rest of us have?
Posted by: Paul | Sep 24, 2007 5:24:45 PM
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