On Wed, Feb 5, 2014 at 9:47 AM, Srini RamaKrishnan <[email protected]> wrote: > Most educated people today earn enough by 35 to live simple but comfortable > rural lives for the rest of their lives. Not a lifestyle unlike what their > ancestors lived three generations ago. > > I think people should grow the habit of taking years off from professions > to explore their inner selves. Most can afford it.
I don't know if I can be called educated, but I have a reasonably good job. I'm 41 now and I can say with certainty that I couldn't afford to take years off. My lifestyle is not spartan but it's not particularly luxurious either. In simple terms, I have mortgage payments to make and kids to educate. But maybe that's not the simple lifestyle you talk about. My grandfather had to quit school at 10 and start working because his home burnt down -- they didn't have insurance or even fire services in those days. His mother was my great grandfather's second wife. His first wife died after a minor injury became infected. The nearest hospital was several days journey away. My grandfather was one of six siblings who reached adulthood. I've heard of at least two others who died in infancy, there may have been more but people didn't really note infant deaths those days because it was so common. Many things we take for granted are products of our industrial civilisation. There are certain costs to that civilisation. The right thing to do is to be compassionate in our daily lives in order to balance out the essential cold-bloodedness of how a market economy works. Push for regulation to rein in money power, for a proper social safety net for those in difficulty. Yearning for a mythical rural idyll is just a way to whine without trying to make a change in the real world. Don't even get me started on the selfish self indulgence of exploring inner selves. -- b
