Thoughts on chillun and vocations

[Ralphie ★]

Daughter #1 is visiting and she is able to do her usual Friday work routine as a psychiatrist and she seems to really have found the perfect niche. She works as an independent contractor in a great practice so she can easily determine her own schedule. 
 

Daughter #2 followed more in my footsteps as an engineer, and in comparison she chafes ( ) a little more in working directly for the man. 
 

Same for me. It has been a good career but I wonder if something else may have been a better fit for me. I am not really a nerd so there is that. Well, not the super smart type anyhoo. 

[Razors Edge ★]

10 minutes ago, Philander Seabury said:

routine as a psychiatrist

So she can get us all the meds we request? Nice hook up, Phil!

[MoseySusan]

20 minutes ago, Philander Seabury said:

but I wonder if something else may have been a better fit for me

Writing for Pitchfork? 

[Zephyr]

42 minutes ago, Philander Seabury said:

Daughter #1 is visiting and she is able to do her usual Friday work routine as a psychiatrist and she seems to really have found the perfect niche. She works as an independent contractor in a great practice so she can easily determine her own schedule. 
 

Daughter #2 followed more in my footsteps as an engineer, and in comparison she chafes ( ) a little more in working directly for the man. 
 

Same for me. It has been a good career but I wonder if something else may have been a better fit for me. I am not really a nerd so there is that. Well, not the supers smart type anyhoo. 

My brother is an engineer (Geological) but after tiring of big construction companies wanting to bribe him to alter reports he went back to school and became a teacher, working almost 30 years running 'tech' courses for high school students (basically Intro to Engineering fie high school students)

He enjoyed his teaching career but it was not his passion.  He wished now he had of done mechanical and worked in a more dynamic field.

My job turned out way better than I had ever dreamed so no wondering for me.

[Ralphie ★]

43 minutes ago, MoseySusan said:

Writing for Pitchfork? 

I do love music, but if it was a job it might not be so good. I was a fairly good sax player as a kid, but elected not to pursue that. My daughter went to school with a kid who was WAY more talented on sax than me, truly a phenom, and even he elected to go unto engineering. 

[Ralphie ★]

28 minutes ago, Zephyr said:

My job turned out way better than I had ever dreamed so no wondering for me.

I can’t complain, but sometimes I still do.

 

[Zephyr]

28 minutes ago, Philander Seabury said:

I can’t complain, but sometimes I still do.

 

Yeah..., me too

[bikeman564™]

being a train engineer would be fun

[Thaddeus Kosciuszko]

2 hours ago, Philander Seabury said:

Daughter #2 followed more in my footsteps as an engineer

Lucky for you the statute of limitations has run its course, and Child Protective Services can't lodge charges against you for that.

 

 

 

[MoseySusan]

53 minutes ago, bikeman564™ said:

being a train engineer would be fun

My dad was a freight conductor with the now defunct D&RGW through the Colorado Rockies. Railroad work is not fun. It’s back-breaking, knee-killing, sleepless, time-bound drudgery. Anyone who says otherwise is selling something. The current conditions for railroad work need to change, but the government ordered rail workers back to the grind without entertaining their needs for better. 

[bikeman564™]

4 minutes ago, MoseySusan said:

My dad was a freight conductor with the now defunct D&RGW through the Colorado Rockies. Railroad work is not fun. It’s back-breaking, knee-killing, sleepless, time-bound drudgery. Anyone who says otherwise is selling something. The current conditions for railroad work need to change, but the government ordered rail workers back to the grind without entertaining their needs for better. 

but oh the benefits

[MoseySusan]

1 minute ago, bikeman564™ said:

but oh the benefits

If your body doesn’t fall apart before you can enjoy the pension…

[Razors Edge ★]

20 minutes ago, MoseySusan said:

The current conditions for railroad work need to change, but the government ordered rail workers back to the grind without entertaining their needs for better. 

My Amazon stuff takes priority over all else! 

[MoseySusan]

11 minutes ago, Razors Edge said:

My Amazon stuff takes priority over all else! 

Capitalism will take care of us. 

[Razors Edge ★]

2 minutes ago, MoseySusan said:

Capitalism will take care of us. 

Well...some of us 

[MoseySusan]

32 minutes ago, Razors Edge said:

Well...some of us 

As it must be. 

[12string]

1 hour ago, MoseySusan said:

the government ordered rail workers back to the grind without entertaining their needs for better. 

To be fair, they did entertain SOME of the needs.  Not the sick days.  Or staffing levels.  The company won, so they get to keep making ridiculous profits.

Supposedly, they'll try again.  It's ridiculous that congress even needs to get involved in this!

 

[Razors Edge ★]

12 minutes ago, 12string said:

To be fair, they did entertain SOME of the needs.  Not the sick days.  Or staffing levels.  The company won, so they get to keep making ridiculous profits.

Supposedly, they'll try again.  It's ridiculous that congress even needs to get involved in this!

"Inflation fighting!"

[12string]

3 minutes ago, Razors Edge said:

"Inflation fighting!"

If they had gone on strike, "Inflation" wouldn't have been a big enough word.

It's insane that workers who could have such outsized  impact on our economy are treated so poorly.

[Ralphie ★]

2 hours ago, Thaddeus Kosciuszko said:

Lucky for you the statute of limitations has run its course, and Child Protective Services can't lodge charges against you for that.

 

 

 

An old cow-orker said there was no way he was letting his kids go into engineering. I guess he was a better dad than me.

[MickinMD ★]

6 hours ago, Philander Seabury said:

Daughter #1 is visiting and she is able to do her usual Friday work routine as a psychiatrist and she seems to really have found the perfect niche. She works as an independent contractor in a great practice so she can easily determine her own schedule. 
 

Daughter #2 followed more in my footsteps as an engineer, and in comparison she chafes ( ) a little more in working directly for the man. 
 

Same for me. It has been a good career but I wonder if something else may have been a better fit for me. I am not really a nerd so there is that. Well, not the super smart type anyhoo. 

When I was working as a research chemist, they turned me loose and I hardly had to meet with superiors more than an hour, once or twice a week.

Then I got promoted to chief chemist and there were a few meetings a week.  That was still tolerable because I was meeting the time and cost goals required to make and sell chemicals.

Then, literally tasting the chemicals I had worked with during the week when I went for a run on Saturdays, I decided I'd live longer as a high school teacher.  THAT was when the only pressure I felt was that which I applied to myself - outside of having to work within idiotic programs like "No Child Gets Ahead."

I was observed for a teacher rating 2x every other year and, since the sports and chess teams I coached did well, I was never questioned about my methods by superiors.  A fellow teacher said, "You're in with the administration. They know they can turn you loose and you get the job done and you coach sports, too. You don't create any student or parent complaints. Ideal for the administration!"

[Thaddeus Kosciuszko]

14 hours ago, MoseySusan said:

Capitalism will take care of us. 

I sense some sarcasm there, but in a way the statement is correct.  Capitalism does not take of anyone; in a capitalistic system people are responsible for and take of themselves.

And by being self-responsible and taking care of oneself, a person can then advance as far as his talents and ambition will carry him.  And by doing so he (or she, or whatever pronoun one wishes to use) can then in turn provide and care for those around him, whether that means his immediate family or others in the community at large.

Of course, capitalism is not a perfect system; it has its flaws.  No system designed by and operated by man will ever be perfect because humans are imperfect themselves.  But of all the social/political/economic systems capitalism offers the best opportunities for people to care for themselves and improve their economic standing in society. 

Unfortunately, we don't have a truly capitalistic system in this country.  It is a mixed system, labeled as 'capitalistic' but in reality is capitalism diluted by aspects of other economic systems. 

Take this very thread for example.  In a capitalistic system the railroad workers would have been allowed to strike.  Assuming the strike was successful, the workers (consensus seems to be) would have been better off, gaining at a minimum greater benefits.  But since we don't operate under a capitalistic system, the government stepped in and threw a sabot into the gears of the capitalistic process to the workers' detriment. 

A clear example, I should think, that would cause one to advocate for capitalism in preference to the system we have or other systems, for why would someone advocate for an alternate system that - as demonstrated in this case - yields people less than what a capitalistic system would have offered?

Of course, the answer to that question is that people believe that under a mixed system or other economic systems, they will become the recipients of the distributions promised by those alternate economic systems; that they won't have to struggle or work as hard, or that they can 'get' some of what people wealthier than them have.  A seamier side of human nature, but we've already reviewed how humans are imperfect.  Sadly, it never works out as those people expect, because those other economic systems never deliver on the promises made.

[BuffJim]

My daughter has done well in her twenties, working as a customer service supervisor at a Fortune 500 company. I wish she would have plowed through and finished her bachelor’s degree, but not yet. No idea what her future will bring, time will tell. 

[MoseySusan]

4 hours ago, Thaddeus Kosciuszko said:

that they won't have to struggle or work as hard, or that they can 'get' some of what people wealthier than them have.  A seamier side of human nature,

Yes, I was taking a snarky tone.  I do agree with most of your comments, especially that government interference with the labor/industry negotiation process skewed the results toward industry. In this case, the big picture of a stalled materials economy was too high a risk. However, I take a different approach to the part about “seamier side.” Railroad work is hard; my dad enjoyed that aspect. It tore his body down, though. Rest and more people to do the hard work may have helped. I don’t consider a worker’s appeals for more humane conditions disreputable. 

[Thaddeus Kosciuszko]

21 minutes ago, MoseySusan said:

I take a different approach to the part about “seamier side.” Railroad work is hard; my dad enjoyed that aspect. It tore his body down, though. Rest and more people to do the hard work may have helped. I don’t consider a worker’s appeals for more humane conditions disreputable. 

If you read my post carefully, you'll see I never made reference to wanting better working conditions as a trait of the seamier side of human nature.  So, perhaps we can agree on that too.

[MoseySusan]

6 minutes ago, Thaddeus Kosciuszko said:

reference to wanting better working conditions as a trait of the seamier side of human nature

What does “that they won’t have to struggle or work as hard” mean? No snark. Just seeking to understand. 

[MoseySusan]

What I'm getting at in my point about working hard is within the spirit of the original post, which is that we (parents) want better for our children, whatever that might look like.

My dad's career paid well, and he felt accomplished in his work, but he didn't want my brothers to seek railroad careers. The "hard work" was relentless, especially winters when he'd have to walk the train in thigh high snow at times. Even though the UTU negotiated mandatory periods of "rest" every 8 hours, it wasn't enough in the long run to protect workers. Just one example:  my dad used horse lineament on his back muscles to get some relief from the strain at times. 

And it wan't just the physical nature of the work. Managing freight cars, brake systems, and rail traffic takes some concentration. If someone in the family was weighing heavy on his mind, that was also a potential hazard, and it's not that easy to just turn it all off and get lost in the work. There was no FMLA when he was working, so he'd have to get on the train even when my mom was in the hospital, when my siblings were leaving for their military enlistments, when the blizzards left us without power at home. He had ulcers and other GI effects, sucking up stress out there on the train.

So, I'm ok with people who want less struggle, who want the hard work to be acknowledged and supported with adequate paid time off for the body to recover from the effort. Who want full-coverage health care (including mental health) for themselves and their families, stock options, pension, etc. I don't see it as "'get' some of what people wealthier than them have". I see it as fair compensation for potentially destroying their body so that the shipments get where they need to go. I see it as learning from the previous generation so that those who follow have it better.

And isn't that what this thread is about? Wondering what could have been "better for" us? ...what's better for our children?