The Rich According to the Guardian

[Judy1234]

www.guardian.co.uk/money/2008/aug/04/workandcareers.executivesalaries

But I don't agree that people who succeed feel no social obligation to others. I am content with the welfare state. I do want state benefits at current levels available to the poor. I don't know any conservatives who don't also agree with that. What I don't think is a good moral aim nor is there any point to it and it's unachievable is making everyone the same in terms of wealth and disposable income. I can't see the moral imperative for making that so.

As for why I am where I am etc... my mother made a lot of herself from a very poor background. I earn quite a bit more than my siblings who had the same background and education so I don't think you can entirely say I am the product of my environment rather than my genes. I was handed a pretty good set of genes, I look quite good, the IQ is supposedly over 150, I get on reasonably well with people, I enjoy the work I do. I seem to have been born with a capacity to work hard, to put off what I want today for what there might be tomorrow, and I seem to have very robust mental and physical health. That combination of all those things is not that common.

The current Government is pretty much conservative - Labour only got in all those years ago when they adopted conservative policies. We don't really have two proper different parties these days just a sort of fairly right wing-ish socialist type middle ground. There is no desire within Labour to tax the rich and confiscate their wealth or any other radical agenda to make things more equal apart from a bit of non workable non working social engineering at university level.

I do take offence at extreme right wingers like yourself, suey. I believe that we should decide what a living wage is, have zero tax below that and then a standard rate of tax above it. I have read the whole thread and you have repeatedly stated that you want the rich to pay their taxes and not engage in any legal ways that would reduce their tax burden. Apparently because they have enough money already.
I was being flippant with the comment about making everyone the same. What I meant was the dumbing down of a levels so that many more people get straight as and the desire to make 50% of people go to umiversity.
In Scotland when I sat my standard grades they graded by top 10% a, next 20 b, next 20 c so that if there was an easy exam one year, it would be corrected for.
I just think that not everyone is academic but that most people have a talent so they should be encouraged to find and pursue that as a career, rather than undertaking a course at uni that will leave them thousands of pounds in debt and that many are now dropping out of.
Not all people with well paid, fulfilling jobs have gone to uni, after all.

fair enough, nooka. I forgot to acknowledge that. And I think it is probably true in some cases. But I also know many people who are very involved in charity

Have just read (most) of this thread from beginning to end. Dittany or MsD, will you marry me?

Xenia "I was handed a pretty good set of genes, I look quite good, the IQ is supposedly over 150, I get on reasonably well with people, I enjoy the work I do. I seem to have been born with a capacity to work hard, to put off what I want today for what there might be tomorrow, and I seem to have very robust mental and physical health. That combination of all those things is not that common."

You forgot to add your gentle, self deprecating nature to your list.

snort at swedes last line

I know you weren't looking for sympathy, Riven, but I've got it for you in spades. You're right about luck being the magic ingredient that people forget about. You can try your darndest (people talk about making your own luck, and you certainly tried), and then...Anyway, I really hope things pick up for you.

Yes, hear hear, Lady Thompson.

well said, ladyt. Riven, far from lacking in good luck, you have been spectacularly unlucky. I too hope that things improve for you and that in the long run, you will be glad you worked so hard.

I know, SWC. It was the subject of much laughter at my friend's hen night - she is a family law barrister, and a pupilmistress, and several of her former pupils were also at the hen night. It was very funny!

Riven - I agree with Lady T. Luck is an immense part of how people end up where and who they are.

To some extent but when I was about 13 I was looking at which jobs I would enjoy and which would earn more and which parts of the country people earned more in and then I worked much harder than most people and when things have gone wrong which they often have I've then risen above that. So I am not so sure we can say everything is down to luck.

With respect, Xenia, I don't think you've been dealt the kind of hand Riven has. Your father was a surgeon and your mother was...can't remember now, but you were hardly living in women's refuges.

Xenia the fact that "when I was about 13 I was looking at which jobs I would enjoy and which would earn more and which parts of the country people earned more in" goes to show the kind of environment you were brought up in, one where you were even thinking about this.

At 17, during A levels, i had decided i "wanted to work at heathrow airport as i like the airport", another time "something to do with driving, i like driving".

zero career guidance or exposure to people in various professions.

luckily i had a school which guided me to university. i went to one of the best which then resulted in me going into a profession, as everyone else did, i just followed the herd tbh.

I said above on the thread I think 50% genes, 50% environment and I stand by that. I never said 100% genes, no way. So we probably aren't disagreeing at all. My siblings had the same upbringing and don't earn as much etc.

But yes my father was a psychiatrist and we had a stable home life although my parents weren't very happy together and there were lots of problems which didn't seem to affect me in the way they affected my sister which is another fascinating issue - why one child is affected by a circumstance at home and another isn't within the same family.

I don't know why I was interested in work etc. I spent lots of time in libraries and most teenagers don't. It was partly my personality I suppose. I remember writing to universities to find which ones offered scholarships and prizes on entrance for example not something the school knew anything about and not something my parents mentioned.

But the riven/ Xenia contrast is interesting. Sounds like we had similar qualifications at the end of the day. We both married young and had babies and although I think that for me was because I love babies it may also have been some kind of refuge too but I carried on working full time. So is that the only difference between riven and Xenia at the end of the day - that where women continue to work in good careers whilst they have babies (ie. be working mothers) they have a lot of money but where they stay at home and be housewives (unless they marry a rich man) they are then poor? Does it all come back to women working in good careers?

There's the difference between you and me Xenia. While you were thinking about how much you could earn and where, I was thinking about what I would enjoy and find challenging & fulfilling and where I would like to live. And you know what, as long as we can continue to eat and keep warm I wouldn't change anything. I have a job I love, time with my DS, a nice house in a gorgeous area. I wouldn't swap it for a hellish commute, a 60 hour week, and living in the hell hole of Britain if you paid me. BUT that means that in my view of the world I am successful, very successful. And yet according to those who measure success by pay I'm under-achieving.

Xenia - what's your MBTI personality type?
If you are in high flying busniness, I'm sure you know. This may explain a lot

My personality type is ENFJ (see www.humanmetrics.com).
Is that the same as MBTI?
But I wasn't just thinking about careers as a teenager. I was very into babies and child birth and that sort of stuff too. I think I've always been a fairly rounded sort of person as anyone with an interesting career and nice large family usually is.

Still interested in the riven/Xenia differences. Obviously she went to a poly because of her background and I went to a university and that's just because of the schools we were at which were different etc.

I do think acceptance of sexism is part of the differences between us. I would just never have lived with nor tolerated a sexist man. WHy any woman in 2008 would accept that women particularly where both work shoudl do an iota more childcare and housework than a man I just don't know. Is that a class thing - do working class women accept the sexist and middle class women come from a culture where men pull their weight or you don't marry them?