BL> The real danger is what I was trying to explain to Paul - that
 BL> if you stand still while the others around you earn more and
 BL> spend more, you are driven backwards into poverty. ..[chomp]..

 BV> Yes. I can certainly understand this and I can see the problem
 BV> from your point of view as well. I don't know what the answer
 BV> is though.

  My answer is the same as yours - a dip back into the labour market
occasioanlly to earn a lot quickly, and then use that money to swap
for time. It is very difficult to be a nonconformist in the economic
sense. The entire system is set up to make it difficult for someone
who only wants to earn "enough" and measure his life by other than
money. You keep getting pushed down all the time.

  This is new in the last 20 years. Before that, the poor were
encouraged with tax breaks rather than welfare, and women were
encouraged to raise children rather than clog up the labour market to
no good purpose. Now we have most women working, a million unemployed
and another million part-time. The size of the economy has not grown 
faster than the population, and the same-size cake is being cut two
ways as before, except that now women have to work, and the ones who
choose not to work are basically cutting the family income by 40%...
which is then passed on as welfare to the bludgers and riches to the
yuppies. Where once a single full wage was plenty to raise a family
with a graded tax scale, it now takes two wages or excessive welfare
to raise kids, and tax is designed to help the rich.

  The guts of the country is the middle, and for the last 20 years the
middle is under increasing pressure to either put the wife to work and
be rich, or get screwed by tax and be poor.

 BV> True, although I think you know that my expectations are not
 BV> quite as low as some peoples. In fact, I think my expectations
 BV> are rather high. I can't quite see the sense in doing what Paul
 BV> does, not that I'd criticise him for it, but it's to easy to
 BV> get hit by a truck. :)

  I can't take the truck argument seriously, and in any case, the
money you save is always useful for hospital fees.

  It's a question of time, really. At Pye, I worked 60 hours a week
and when I dumped that way of life I went the Paul route. Since then,
I have averaged about 6 hours a week in work, and I use this to top up
my retirement. If I want a new car, then I have to work 500 extra
hours... as simple as that. What really shits me, is that I have to
earn $50,000 so I can buy a $35,000 car that *also* includes $8500 in
tax and charges. At my level, I have to earn $2 to spend $1. If I were
in work, or rich, I'd get the car at a discount.

Regards,
Bob
___ Blue Wave/QWK v2.12
@EOT:

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