Most lucrative college degrees

[opebo]

Do the per hour salaries and opportunity costs of forgone overtime due to professional exemptions the picture doesn't look so rosy.  The building trade unions torch all of these if those calculations were done.

Hah, I bet they do.

The funny thing about the new downsized 'middle class' is that they have only been able to purchase reasonably well paid jobs by spending enormous amounts of money on their own educations.  In the 50's, 60's, and into the 70's, workers were simply paid that much because the unions made it so, and the worker didn't need to purchase the job.  As Flyers points out this is still true in a few unionized trades in a few union states. 

[opebo]

Do the per hour salaries and opportunity costs of forgone overtime due to professional exemptions the picture doesn't look so rosy.  The building trade unions torch all of these if those calculations were done.

Flyers, you are failing to take income potential into account.

Honestly, I'd much rather get the bonus I get than get paid overtime.  Your narrow way of looking at this makes me want to whack you in the head....

Only a very small minority of persons in Flyer's shoes will attain your position, dazzleman.  At each level of 'advancement' more and more are winnowed out and left behind.

[opebo]

The funny thing about the new downsized 'middle class' is that they have only been able to purchase reasonably well paid jobs by spending enormous amounts of money on their own educations. 

Exactly right, Opebo. There have been a lot of articles lately about the huge amount of student loan debt that the average American has to bear to graduate from college.

Then, even if they get a decent paying job, they are often restricted from moving up in class due to a huge amount of debt they need to pay off. Hell, I am 28 years old and still paying off student loans and credit cards from when I was in college (and I was fairly frugal as a student).

For many college graduates, they are merely "running in place" due to the huge debt burden they carry.

Correct as usual, Schoonie, but probably more college graduates than not get nothing like a 'decent paying job'.  A lucky few of my friends in the 25-38 age group are just now making $28-30,000.  But most of them are still waiting tables and cannot find any job at all, others work down at the public library and can't afford to keep the heat above 60 in their apartment. 

I'm currently - temporarly - broke, having spent all my money in my usual careless but enjoyable way over the winter, but at least I have a free house, utilites, car, and gas, and a few hundred a week from the parents.  I quite honestly don't see how my friends survive.

[opebo]

I'm currently - temporarly - broke, having spent all my money in my usual careless but enjoyable way over the winter, but at least I have a free house, utilites, car, and gas, and a few hundred a week from the parents.  I quite honestly don't see how my friends survive.

By not being careless with their money, duh. When you actually earn your own money, you tend to spend it differently.

No, no!  My point had nothing to do with the money I spent overseas, but with the costs of living here.  I would say that to replace the free house, car, gas, utilities, allowance, etc.  I get from the family, plus save a little to escape the Bad Place, I'd have to get a job that payed $1,000/week! 

Most people of my aquaintance are lucky if they make half that.

[opebo]

I'm currently - temporarly - broke, having spent all my money in my usual careless but enjoyable way over the winter, but at least I have a free house, utilites, car, and gas, and a few hundred a week from the parents.  I quite honestly don't see how my friends survive.

By not being careless with their money, duh. When you actually earn your own money, you tend to spend it differently.

No, no!  My point had nothing to do with the money I spent overseas, but with the costs of living here.  I would say that to replace the free house, car, gas, utilities, allowance, etc.  I get from the family, plus save a little to escape the Bad Place, I'd have to get a job that payed $1,000/week! 

Most people of my aquaintance are lucky if they make half that.

I repeat, they spend their money more carefully than you do - they would probably be more careful over there, and I can pretty much gaurantee you that they do so here.

Yes, for example one of them keeps her thermostat set at 60 degrees in February!  I'm not saying they aren't surviving, I'm just saying their lives are so miserable I'm not surprised at all that they are suicidal.

[opebo]

I'm currently - temporarly - broke, having spent all my money in my usual careless but enjoyable way over the winter, but at least I have a free house, utilites, car, and gas, and a few hundred a week from the parents.  I quite honestly don't see how my friends survive.

By not being careless with their money, duh. When you actually earn your own money, you tend to spend it differently.

No, no!  My point had nothing to do with the money I spent overseas, but with the costs of living here.  I would say that to replace the free house, car, gas, utilities, allowance, etc.  I get from the family, plus save a little to escape the Bad Place, I'd have to get a job that payed $1,000/week! 

Most people of my aquaintance are lucky if they make half that.

I repeat, they spend their money more carefully than you do - they would probably be more careful over there, and I can pretty much gaurantee you that they do so here.

Yes, for example one of them keeps her thermostat set at 60 degrees in February!  I'm not saying they aren't surviving, I'm just saying their lives are so miserable I'm not surprised at all that they are suicidal.

They're not suicidal because they're made of tougher stuff than you - your parents made you a weak piece of fluff that can't take the harsh realities of the world. Blame them for raising you to be a coward.

No, Dibble, as usual you aren't bothering to read.  My friends are mostly suicidal, to varying degrees. 

Yes, for example one of them keeps her thermostat set at 60 degrees in February!  I'm not saying they aren't surviving, I'm just saying their lives are so miserable I'm not surprised at all that they are suicidal.

"Miserable" by whose standards?  I would wager not theirs.

No, no, nearly all my friends tell me they are miserable every time I talk to them.

[opebo]

I seriously doubt that their suicidal tendencies revolve around their financial situation.

No, their financial situations are the source of their suicidal tendencies.  According to them.  Certainly I never feel unhappy about anthing myself other than insufficient funds.  What else could their possibly be to be unhappy about?  Well other than the religious making it impossible to buy what you want even if you have the money.

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Yes, they do - they have very small apartments, cannot eat out often, and one even cannot keep the heat up to a liveable level.  They also cannot spend time visiting me in Thailand (though one did manage to come, just once).  So naturally they are deeply, profoundly depressed by this grinding, hopeless poverty.

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No, its not that they have 'moods', they just look at their lives of grinding poverty and no possibility of improvement and say 'well, suicide is darn reasonable'.

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Sounds like more idiotic propaganda.  I find I'm giddy with happiness when I can hire prostitutes.

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In fact it can, Dibble.  As usual you are misinformed by ridiculous studies which analyze the reactions of typical retarded/brainwashed (i.e. religious) americans to stimuli.  For those of us who are not afflicted by the nonsensical desires of the typical bourgeois, the classic libertine lifestyle is a source of great enjoyment.

[opebo]

I know people who sound to be in similar situations to the ones you describe who are happy and not at all suicidal. Your friends have other problems.

So you are saying it is impossible to mind poverty?  One cannot possibly be bothered by it, get tired of it, etc?  Interesting. 

I think the first thing the police look for when investigating a suicide is 'financial problems'.

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So you are saying that it is not allowed for a person to dislike their own situation if someone else might be in a worse one?  That doesn't really make any sense, Dibble, as the party of the first part might not even know about  your exemplary miserables.

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No, it buys my happiness just fine, Dibble.  I'd rather accept my own experience about myself than some study!

[opebo]

No, it can't. Secular science has shown that it doesn't, that happiness is the result of other things. You just don't accept science when it doesn't fit into your belief scheme, so as I said go join the Religious Party or STFU.

I actually saw an interesting study on a subject like this that was very interesting.  What they did is they distributed $1 bills to a whole bunch of people on the campus.  Half of these $1 bills were accompanied by a note explaining exactly what this was about: that the $1 bills were distributed through a study intended to gauge people's happiness upon receiving them.  The other half were accompanied by very cryptic messages that would not at all explain where the $1 bill came from or who left it there.  What they found is that the people in the latter group were a lot more happier upon receiving the $1 bill than the people in the former group.

Though the study stated that more research was obviously needed, it theorized that what makes humans happy is not material possessions, money, or the like, but rather, more non-physical things such as intrigue, unsolved mysteries, or discovery as a result of persistence.

I have a feeling that opebo considers himself "happy" merely because he doesn't really know what real happiness is about.  I certainly would not be happy were I in his position; I am quite happy in my current position, however.

I'm quite happy in my current position, Gabu, and you are too stupid to realize you are miserable.  See - I can do it too.

Anyway, what money buys is freedom, Gabu!  I absolutely hate material possessions - I consider them annoying and a burden.  However I love having money to travel and to avoid the bondage of work.  Give me $30-40K per year and I won't own anything other than a couple of bags of clothes, but I'll have a wonderful time.

[opebo]

My experience shows me that most people can be happy and not at all suicidal in such situations. Your friends' problems go deeper than their mere financial troubles - their situation(which based on your description, while not preferable, isn't horrible IMHO) is possibly a trigger for those deeper problems to arise, but I doubt the problems would simply go away if they got a bigger paycheck.

NO doubt! If they still had to work I'm sure they'd still be miserable.  But if they were to, for example, inherit an adequate income, they would no longer have any miseries at all, other than the usual avoidance of the police state strictures in spending their funds.

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I'm sure those 'disorders' are caused by poverty, Dibble.  In any case, what kind of person is so dumb that they are unaware of the option of suicide?  I beleive any thinking person would realize it is one of their options, and quite often a very good one.

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No, I said that their financial situation was on which caused them misery, and caused them to consider suicide.  One need not be homeless and starving to dislike a meager existence!  For example they must work some 50 weeks of the year!  And they cannot afford to spend a large portion of the year outside the Bad Place.

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I'm not a philanthropist, Dibble.  I would never give anyone 'my' money.   However I would advocate that the State redistribute money from one class to the other.  Individual acts are meaningless.

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The sort of 'science' you like to chat about is just propaganda.  Of course the right wing would like poors to believe that money (aka power) doesn't make one happy.  What laughable rot!  But if the poor saps will believe it, I suppose it helps keep them in their place.