Thursday, December 05, 2013

I am a rich man. A super rich man. Is that my problem?

"It has been a long time since I came to your counter" I told her with a smile.  "With you being all possessive, I didn't want you to get upset with me" I added.

She laughed and tapped on my hand.  "Yes, I get jealous sometimes" she chuckled.

The previous customer, a woman who had more than a decade on me, was collecting her bags.  She paused and said "I know I cannot go by any other counter if I come here with my grandkids."

"So, how are things?" I asked her while she scanned the groceries.

"They have me down to four days a week" she replied.

Now that I am older and wiser, I know enough not to assume that anything that people say is good or bad, and that it is better to ask for clarification.  I suppose I have been reading one too many old parables!

"Is that a good thing or a bad thing?"

"Oh, very bad thing."  She paused.  "I can't live on 300 dollars a week."

I had no idea how to respond to that.  Fortunately for me, she continued.  And, as always, she used humor as a cover.

"I guess I will have to stand at street corners and ask for money" and she laughed.

That was a couple of hours ago.  I am trying to make my peace with her situation.

With her situation alone, and then about the many, many others who are in her state.

In the US, what I earn will place me in the upper middle class income.  If I compare myself to the world, I know I am one of the top one percent of the world.  When she tells me about living on 300 dollars a week, I am easily sent on the guilt trip that I have been traveling right from my young age.

I have no idea how others make their own peace on these kinds of issues.  For me, it has been one heck of a struggle.

Yes, there are all those intellectual battles that I can engage in.  Even the Pope and the President have recently weighed in on these income issues, and I have been so tempted to blog about those.  But, there is a wide gulf between the intellect and the emotion.

As I noted in that essay from almost a decade ago, "perhaps academic life means a continuous attempt to redraw the line that separates what I teach from how I live."

4 comments:

Prats said...

I think about the same thing a lot of times and feel guilty about it. Being in India where the contrasts are far more often and far more stark it kind of bothers you.

I still remember me and the wife went to a nice place and ordered a good meal. The final bill which was presented for two was more than we paid our house maid for a month. I still am not able to shrug that thought out of my mind.

Ramesh said...

Methinks there is a wider gulf between intellect and action. For the "solution", I need to look no further than Bill Gates. Give away the riches, and donate my time and energy. But then, I am not Bill Gates and therefore find it difficult to put the intellect into action. I can, but , try .........

Truly, Bill Gates is the epitome of what to do. Not Warren Buffet, who has also given it away, but Bill Gates. Actually both Bill and Melinda Gates.

Sriram Khé said...

I suspect that it is relatively easier to give away one's money when you have that much money. If we exclude those kinds of way-out-there outliers, and instead look at the vast majority of us, who fit into the pattern, then the issue is immensely complex. (Not that I don't applaud the work that the Gates couple does, or what Bufett does .. )

We are three of us commenting here because we think about such issues on our own. While our respective actions might vary, I am confident that what we do comes after some thought into this. There are lots more like us, yes. The world will be a much better place if more people thought about all these ... my suspicion is that they don't, and prefer not to ... :(

Ramesh said...

@Sriram - Actually it is easier to give when you don't have too much. Its actually harder when you have a lot - the percentage of wealth donated I suspect disproportionate to the quantum of wealth. That is because the feeling of "enough" I think, diminishes with rising income. That is why I believe that Bill Gates' actions are those of a Saint. Sure he is an outlier. But he is an example for all of us to follow.

I have a feeling that in life, you need a "tragedy" to make you think. If all goes relatively well, man tends to sink into a thoughtless existence. Its people who face great hardship, who rise to the highest levels of thought and action. Isn't it an irony - the objective of Utopia could be the biggest curse of all.