The most depressing new term ever: Working-Class Millionaire

I was out to dinner Saturday night with some friends who were discussing how subjective money is in the Bay Area and New York: What seems like "good money" in some parts of the country is unworkable in the City. Then this morning I read an article in The Times that backed this theme: One person's nest egg is another person's chump change. Apparently a million bucks just isn't such a big whoop anymore. At least not in Silicon Valley.

I moved to San Francisco from NYC with some idealistic notion that while the terrain was massively hilly, the playing field was not. This was true in large part; while having a good resume is important, it's really about what you've done that gets you noticed, not who you've done it for.

But every place has its stratification, even the Mom Blogosphere, as I found out last weekend moderating a panel at BlogHer07. I realized there actually IS a pecking order around here, and especially the Valley, which I had naively thought was the least stratified. I mean, how political can a bunch of geeks be? It could be nothing like the politics involved in trying to get a bartender to serve you first in the Marina--oh but Honey I was thinking small. My cleavage would never factor into the equation in Palo Alto. The currency looks the same out there, but it ain't. It has little to do with your boobs and everything to do with your brains. In some ways this is a Utopian Hierarchy. A true paradox for the few that can stomach it, unless you are kind of dumb, like the majority of people. Then it's a suburban form of hell; a place where people clamor in order to out-unimpress each other.

Those that see the madness "get away from it all" by moving to Berkeley, where they do it again, or go a little crazy and move where the cost of living matches their means. You know, where other dumb people live. 

What makes the oh-so-subtle people in the Valley so smart is that they don't clamor for headlines; you'd have to follow them to the parking lot before you knew they owned a Lamborghini. They know that if you have enough money, you get your own whispering press corps. They don't even have to pay for it!  Many of them are programmers or product developers who put up a pretense that they don't need material things; they just need their 6-cylinder engines out of a child-like love of technology. Like this gal interviewed in The Times, they often fall into their money, working hard, but not clawing their way up like the little Anna Wintours I experienced in New York. They more or less endure in cubicle-land and get very lucky when their company goes public. WIthout any dirt or others' hair under their fingernails they almost feel unworthy of their wealth and work as a way of justifying their great luck.

In some ways my predilection for the East Coast way was a prophylactic of sorts against the communicable envy that people experience out here. I had never owned a car, for instance, and was never tempted to buy a vehicle that I would feel compelled to wash. While in NYC the first thing I did when I had a modicum of disposable income was buy clothes, and lots of shoes; when you walk everywhere your shoes are the first discernible sign of a promotion.

Here the first things people buy are toys/gadgets, very nice cars, and loads of RAM. Whip out your new iPhone and we now know several things about you: 1) You were crazy enough to wait in line to buy it, and hence have one of those cushy leisure-class consulting schedules, and 2) you could afford to chuck your old phone for one that cost twice as much. You don't just have gadgets, you have DISPOSABLE gadgets.

(This reminds me of a discussion I had with my NY pal at AOL, Lisa LaCour, who, when I complimented her on her gorgeous outfit said, "H&M baby. I'm taking on a new concept: Disposable Fashion!" Yes, in NY you know you are doing well when you don't need to repurpose your outfits from season to season. Out here you're doing well if you don't need to maintain the same mobile device/car/co-location facility/start-up. These things are disposables.)

It's a different kind of pressure, out here, the need to continually upgrade your personal technology. People thought that I was kind of weird for not springing for a data plan in my Treo (as if splurging on a Treo wasn't enough already). I finally succumbed this weekend, after missing an appointment due to someone cancelling.

I asked this person: "You knew I was out of the office. Why didn't you call me on my cell?"

Her response: "I just couldn't imagine that you didn't have a data plan." Cause, you know, only Luddites (aka: POOR people) don't spring for the latest. I thought I was being responsible by keeping my 3-year-old laptop, which worked perfectly well if you had a lot of free time. All that time that it took to load was time away from working, sure, but it was also hugely embarassing being on calls and in meetings with people who could load much quicker. The embarassment is tantamount to being called into a big meeting in NYC and forgetting to cut the TJ Maxx tags out of your new suit.

But I digress, as I tend to. Back to the ridiculousness of the Siliconians. Apparently there are a class of them who have $1 to $5 Million in the bank and still feel the need to work themselves to the bone, like they did when they were 25-30 and justified their lives by promising themselves that they wouldn't have to work like this at 50. Now they are 40-50 years old and don't have a glimpse of retirement in sight. Why? Several reasons:

1. It's freaking expensive living in the Valley. And the sad irony is that though they are paid more than most people in the world, they still must run like hamsters on the salary treadmill. They are still living hand to mouth, though the hand is operated by more a societal pressure to be like the Joneses--or Jobses--than it is by actual NEED.

2. Many of these folks made money during the first Internet boom, then lost much of it, and need to keep up the appearance of wealth, only now they have to actually work for it.

3. Because moving to places where the cost of living is much more reasonable is a sign of defeat. I used to buy into this notion myself, back when I was living in NY and thought that giving up my rent-controlled apartment and teensy weensy place in that world would shoot me into meaninglessness. It's fun, coming back to that place, now able to afford protein, and realizing that big ponds are sometimes big bogs. It takes leaving them to appreciate that we weren't living in a place where only the elite survive but rather in mudwater.
 
But let's get to the real story here. How do these people's plights affect ME? As a certified, non-recovered workaholic, it certainly put things into perspective. These were the people I wanted to be when I grew up, these supposed closer-to-retirement types whom I figured were working, but keeping it real--not still living in fear of financial ruin. At first I was scared--what does that mean for someone like me, who still has 30 good years of work in her? Will I never know what it's like to truly enjoy the fruit of my labor?

But then I chose a different lesson: Honey, it ain't necessarily going to get better, so stop and extract a few moments of pleasure from time to time. I think I've told myself this before, but this time...this time...this time I mean to mean it. And as soon as I finish the work I've lined up for this Sunday I will get right to the business of living. And fold some laundry in the process, and maybe return a few phone calls.

Comments

[jen]

Hope you did something more exciting than fold laundry. That's a task saved for when you're watching some tv show (unless you don't have time to do that either). I try and go by the motto 'Work to live, not live to work.'

[genevieve]

Jory, firstly congratulations on yet another terrific BlogHer - it finally got coverage over here,
in the IT pages (I will email it to you when I've downloaded it from the archive, unfortunately it's now offline).
And secondly, if you can get hold of it, the film 'The Rage In Placid Lake' starring Oz pop star Ben Lee (who used to be attached to Claire Danes) will make you laugh while you fold the laundry, and reconfirm your clear-eyed sanity once more. Hang in there, your recovery is an ongoing process.

[Susanne]

The life-styles you're describing all sound very alien to me, but finding leisure time, phoning friends and even folding laundry (which I find quite contemplative) sound good.

The plan of postponing life until retirement has a major flaw: one never knows how much there will be. And, frankly, I have yet to see somebody who does that to savor his life once he is retired.

[Dawn Cardon]

As a transplant from rural Washington State, who grew up in a town with a median income of $17,000 I was amazed that 70% of my classmates at Stanford could afford the entire $42,000+ annual tuition. An income of $40,000 would have made you wealthy in my hometown, and look at all these families who had that much to spare! As I approached graduation and learned the logistics of life outside the hamlet I spent my childhood in, I realized how little $40,000 was in many areas of the country. Now, as a recent college graduate living in San Francisco, I earn more than that amount myself and still am carless and living in a smallish, older apartment. Where do all those extra dollars go? They go to food (working 50, 60, 70 hours a week means no time for grocery shopping and preparing meals in my mini-kitchen, transportation (bus, cabs when I indulge on the weekends, maybe... hopefully a vespa eventually!), rent, internet (comcast is a monopolistic beast), laundry, et al. I have more bills than I have dishes in my kitchen. yikes. Basically, poverty is relative and though the idea of a working-class millionaire is tragic, I may myself end up one. If I'm lucky that is.

[miffy]

Jory, this is so timely, thank you. Just finished re reading a wonderful book, my FBF (first boyfriend)gave to me way back in 1974...BE HERE NOW...
timely because as I am officially post menapausal (so the blood test states), I want as many tools as possible to remember where I am...
Here & Now
If this treasure has not yet passed your desk (or been downloaded on your TREO, can you do that on a TREO? not sure what a TREO is, just a quick glance makes me think of OREO...yum)take a look between folding and phone calls.
xo
Mif

[Priscilla Palmer]

You have been tagged for The Personal Development List. (See my site for details) I would love for you to participate.

[John W. McKenna]

Jory

You’ve been tagged for the “Does Most Leadership Suck Challenge”. Check the link for details.

Take care...

JWM

[Erin]

Hi Jory,
After Priscilla Palmer's self development list Jenny and I have decided to try to help build the self development community. So we are holding a little contest. I would like to invite you, and anyone else interested, to find out more details at jenny-and-erin.com/2007/09/win-a-25-gift-certificate/

[Purse Lover]

I can't even begin to fathom
$1 to $5 Million in the bank and feeling any real need or desire to work anymore. I can't imagine what sorof money love drives an individual to keep working simply for more and more. Move and retire.