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Money vs. Happiness

Discussion in 'Journalism topics only' started by thegrifter, Apr 28, 2008.

  1. Rosie

    Rosie Active Member

    Story of his life.
     
  2. Joe Williams

    Joe Williams Well-Known Member

    There was a study recently that found that people, above a certain level of income, don't get appreciably happier with increased compensation. But the key is, above a certain level of income. I don't think a lot of newspapers are paying us enough, given the hours gobbled up, to reach that level.

    To me, more money isn't things I can buy. It's security and, in time, the freedom to do what I want without thinking about the money. Newspapers rarely pay enough money to feel secure and, nowadays, they sure don't make you feel secure in other ways. Some boss some day is going to show up and make you start covering preps/writing obits/working the rim/(fill in the blank with something you would dislike), partly because he or she doesn't give a crap about you and partly because they want to shed your salary.

    Come to think of it, that's what's so stupid: Newspaper people don't exactly break the bank in salary, and yet publishers are going after our salaries as this great cost-savings to them and their stockholders.

    Guess I vote for more money in a non-newspaper job, which might be redundant.
     
  3. scalper

    scalper Member

    Here's another problem with the whole happiness vs. money situation. At a lot of papers, a handful of people rake in pretty good money -- some earn it and some don't -- while everybody else gets paid shit. That's guaranteed to leave people doing good work feeling pretty unhappy about their lousy salaries.

    This business is forever providing the worst of both worlds.
     
  4. buckweaver

    buckweaver Active Member

    Joe Williams said it best: I want to make enough to have the freedom to do what I want without thinking about the money. I have that now, and there's nothing better. Could always use a little more, because I still can't afford a house, but my quality of life is very high and i have everything I need. ... So my answer is: happiness, and enough money to keep you there.
     
  5. Joe Williams

    Joe Williams Well-Known Member

    Thanks, brother Buck. But you really need to start thinking about getting a roof of your own over your head. Especially at today's depressed prices.
     
  6. buckweaver

    buckweaver Active Member

    Clearly, you don't live in SoCal. They gotta "depress" a lot more than $425,000 median (and that's a LOT lower than they used to be) for me to afford a house out here.
     
  7. Joe Williams

    Joe Williams Well-Known Member

    Yeah, I felt bad after I posted that, knowing some markets still (and may always, in terms of price) suck. To me, though, this is almost a yardstick with which to measure a job/industry. If you can't afford to own a home (we're talking 5-10 percent down, not some dumb-ass gimmick mortgage or mom's and dad's help) by time you're into your 30s, then you're probably giving a lot more than you're getting from that job. That's about the time you're ready -- in a business that often involves frequent market-hopping -- to put down roots for a few years anyway.

    I think that's kind of a basic expectation. Part American dream, part adulthood, part living a fraction of the life that the CEO or publisher or exec editor gets to live.
     
  8. buckweaver

    buckweaver Active Member

    Yeah, but that's a problem my generation faces entering our 30s that nobody else has: The ratio of wages/costs for "common expectations" like buying a house -- or, especially, going to college -- aren't anywhere near the reasonable levels that my parents faced, or their parents before them.

    The costs have skyrocketed. And wages haven't come close to keeping up -- in most lines of work.

    Less than 25 years ago, my parents could afford a starter house in a suburb of an Eastern Shore major metro on one income of about $10K.

    At the same age, making between 4-5x as much as they did then ... I don't have a chance. Granted, part of that is the specific area where I live, but that's my choice. Still ... it's going to take a lot more for that to be a realistic expectation for me. It's not a journalism thing. It's a societal thing. Making ends meet costs a lot more today than it did in 1988, and it doesn't matter how much I get paid or how disciplined I am, it's still going to take a few years for me to save up enough to buy a house (... in an area that won't get me shot. 8))

    Point being ... I think only my generation can understand how unrealistic these things are now, because it's only changed in the last decade or two. If you're in your 40s now, you probably struggled like everyone does at 25 ... but owning a house was realistic, in the foreseeable future.

    For us, not so much.
     
  9. captzulu

    captzulu Member

    I have to disagree a bit. I'm not quite 30 and have been a homeowner for four years. I bought my house when I was single (one income), still working in newspapers, and making a salary in the upper 30s. It's not a huge mansion, but has 3 bedrooms and is more than enough space for two people, and it's in one of the nicer neighborhoods in my town. And I was able to afford it without some shady mortgage or having to eat Ramen noodle every day. Granted, I also don't live in SoCal or DC or somewhere where real estate cost ridiculous money, but I also don't live in a depressed, podunk town either. It's a vibrant, rapidly growing area, great for young professionals. Several of my friends (not in journalism) who are my age have also bought nice homes in the area. So yes, while the cost of living has gone up a lot, I don't think home ownership is unrealistic for people of this generation. Now, a journalist who starts out in the mid $20ks out of college would likely not be able to afford a decent house in this economy, considering the comparatively pitiful pay even as they climb up the ladder. I know I was fortunate in where I started in journalism and how much I got paid relative to my years of service in the biz. So it is partly a journalism thing.
     
  10. Joe Williams

    Joe Williams Well-Known Member

    And that's what we're talking about here. If journalism doesn't pay as much as a non-journalism job, do you settle for the lesser pay because you enjoy that work more? Well, I draw one of my lines in the sand at this housing crossroads. If I can enjoy my day job, get by on less work and still purchase a home, then I can be happy. If the price of enjoying my day job is renting for the rest of my life, then no, I cannot be happy. At which point I'll choose more money, thank you.

    If all jobs nowadays make it tough to buy a home, that stinks, but it doesn't relate to the choice this thread poses.

    Which reminds me: I'm waiting, as more displaced journalists hit the job market, to see a thread about the difficulty of finding a job in any other field that pays as well as his or her newspaper job did. Hey, it could happen -- this economy does suck and some folks have left behind union wages.
     
  11. buckweaver

    buckweaver Active Member

    Not denying that this shitty industry plays a part in it, zulu. And if I were making what I'm making now, back home ... I'd be singing a different song. (Not that I ever want to live there again, but I digress.)

    But I think the situation is still the same. Used to be, people's incomes were a reasonable percentage of what it cost to go to college or buy a home. Now, not so much.

    Everybody's situation is different, though. Just because it doesn't apply to you -- and congrats on that, by the way -- doesn't mean that it's not reality for a lot of us.
     
  12. captzulu

    captzulu Member

    I definitely agree that it's not the same situation for everyone, but the trend has been that more and more people are buying their first homes earlier in life, and the census bureau stats bear that out. I think that indicates a trend, and it sucks that a lot of journalists can't be part of it b/c their crappy pay. And yes, location and corresponding cost of living is part of it, but if your pay doesn't match up to your area's cost of living, then it is crappy pay, even if it would look great in another region. $45k may be pretty solid pay in my area now, but if a company in NYC offered me that, it would be a slap in the face.
     
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