We had an interesting question occur in one class this past week.  A student anticipated moving to the accounting dept in his present company. When I asked if anyone wanted to work for a CPA firm, the response was, which pays more money?

Such a question is imposible to answer, and besides that is not the point of finding your ideal job.

Let’s take the fact that the question cannot be answered.  Who makes more money, Reba McIntire or someone at the local watering hole singing on the weekend hoping to be discovered?  Who makes more money, the head of Goldman Sachs, or your local Edward Jones broker?  Obviously Reba and the guy at Goldman make the big bucks.  The point is, one cannot predict the future or how things will play out.  The best one can do is arm oneself with an array of skill sets and then pick the field that interests you.

I visited with Greta Davis our Student Development Officer about this.  Greta quickly noted that many students confuse money with picking the right job.  Here is an example. I had a female student at Texas State. She had a six year old and had recently re married. They lived north of San Marcos in Kyle.  That is 50 miles from downtown San Antonio.  I suggested she consider working for a local CPA in San Marcos. Her first reaction was, what does it pay?  My reaction was, what does that matter?  To me the issues before her were involvement with her son ( working in San Marcos it would be easy to go to a school function) and her new marriage.  Let’s spend some quality time on Mr. # 2 after the first marriage failed, right?  Wrong, she took a job in downtown San Antonio for more money.  This requires long hours, a long commute, and less time with her new  ‘family.’  A bad lifestyle choice if you ask me.  The probably $10,000 difference in money will be eaten up in money spent on gasoline, dry cleaners, and most important, the opportunity cost of not being with her new husband.

Okay, we don’t know the future.  But we do know this.  Pity the  poor soul whose office or cubicle sports the now famous sign, Thanks Goodness It’s Friday.  The implication here is that he or she trudges all weeek long through dreary tasks just waiting for the weekend and presumably the chance to do something else-enjoyable that is.  Folks, this is no way to live.  Happily I have landed at UNT Dallas, and I love it.  I genuinely like what I do. I come in on days I don’t have to because I would rather do this than just about anything else.  That makes life worth living. 

And, show me someone who is doing a job for the money only, say working on an offshore oil rig with no friends or family in site beacuse the job pays well,  and I will show you someone who is miserable most of the time.  The chance that you will make more money is heightened when you are doing something you enjoy.  Hence you do more of it, think more about it, and try to improve.  You will not mkae more money simply waiting for Friday no matter what the job pays.

Studies show that most follks are reasonably happy making $50,000 per year. That pays the bills.  And you should hit that level in pretty quickly assuming you really do exit college with a skill set, you are working on the skill set, right,?  I mean when the interviewer asks what you can do for the company you will have a ready answer, right?

DLE

The Saturday9/23/06 Dallas Morning News DMNrepots on page 2D that one Jim Phole has managed to unioinize the first eleven drives as preisdent of the American Union of Pizza Delivery Drivers Inc at a Pensocola franchise of Domino’s.  The franchise refused to pay the minimum wage saygin the were tipped employees.  This may well open the foor to other organizing attempts. 

The way this works is that one petitions the National Labor Relations Board for recognition as a  union. Then one petitions to hold an election. If the workers vote for union representation, bingo the union represents the workers.

This is no small matter.  Union membership has been declining for decades.  The entire auto industry has migrated from union shop states ( where a worker can be requried to join the existing union whether he votes to or not) to right to work states in which union membership is not compulsory.  Previous to this, such jobs as fast food could fill their ranks with other young workers.  However as these jobs are increasingly taken by older and often dispclaced workers, that trend is changing. 

Mr. Pohl is apparently not a UNT Dallas candidate.  He delivers pizza because and I quote ‘he likes to sleep late, smoke on the job, and listen to the radio.  But then how many Mr. Pholes are out there?

With auto ranks being thinned, this may be the unions next best chance.  Most of you are too young to remember the days in the 1960s when George Meany would appear on the Sunday talk shows threatening to shut down entire industries with a strike.  Those were the glory days for unions. This may be the first re awakening of opportunity.

DLE

To the Class of 2008!

Welcome to my blog.  I realize that all of you are busy working, raising families, going to class, studying, and hopefully having some fun in between.  I wish that each and everyone of you could have had the residential college experience that I had, on the other hand, you won’t be eligible for the draft so maybe that’s a far trade off!

Here is what I hope to do with the Blog.  As you may have noticed, I like to relate the class to what is going on in that famous cyberspace known as the REAL WORLD.  In that regard I will quote from the Wall Street Journal, Business Week, Forbes, and maybe poke fun at Willie Nelson getting a ticket for Mary Jane.  It is my aim to bring us all together in cyber space so that we can visit much more often than just on class days. I am delighted that many of you have chosen to subscribe to the WSJ, I have already had many constructive questions and observations from those of you reading the WSJ.  Great, this way we can correspond seven days a week, but don’t expect much from me late in the evening, late for me would be if Leno has started his monologue…

Okay, do not hesitate to post your thoughts, as long as they are constructive I have no objection.  Which reminds me to be constructive also.  I will have my digital camera at school so I hope to document our first semester togther in photos as well.   WEB CT is good but this allows all of us to go to one spot and I don’t have to log on to four different WEB CTs.

Okay, more later, this is the first post, I will see you at the Help Session Friday 9/22 at 10:00 AM

DLE