I don’t know how people can afford not to own where rents inherently grow and are merely the landlord’s mortgage payments in disguise. As I look toward retirement I can’t imagine paying rent against what I might receive in social security. I paid off my home some years ago. I threw all my income at paying it down, and thus I have no other income and my HOA dues are quite high reminding me of rent, but rent in my area is $3000, where I used to rent for $550. Work under COVID in my line of work meant doing almost anything I was asked, but while it changed the nature of what I was doing, it revealed how hard I was working and that the employer was basically paying me nothing because his profit margin was so high as to cover my wage and benefits with the sale of one item, a cocktail, for example. Literally, for most of the period of COVID, my employer was not providing benefits. Another source was covering them, which made resigning all the more palpable. The system, as it is, is a big lie. Labor is free and even pays the employer given all the services it provides. That has to be fixed not that people have to give up buying and engaging in relationships. Moreover, as a creative, both as a writer of literature and music, compensation in those areas is non-existent, where payments to join writing forums or music sites is more than one is paid for content. At some point this all has to change. But, I do realize that I cannot afford to pay for like products produced by other creatives as with the amount of news I consume or music I listen to to produce content. In other words, I am not contributing financially to my own industry. I also see that the money for products I buy, like Apple computers and phones, go to Apple. We focus our consumption on one or a few sources and those sources become monopolies. Industries that provide our infrastructure would not necessarily have jobs we could or would want to work and thus the market inherently excludes us and shifts away from us and thus resignation from our true passions and purposes implies enslavement. Existence becomes soulless and empty. The economy is a cyclical process that eventually leads to hopelessness and death. The Great Resignation is the realization of that process and rebellion against it, but until our economy supports individual purposes and dreams, more and more of what is human will disappear and people will slowly die. I understand youth and maybe this is mother nature’s way of diminishing the population. Work is killing me and my relationship is being seen as an experience I cannot afford. I prefer silence and recovery to eke out an existence. I am not going to live my life as a proviso for someone else’s happiness, or is that the true nature of life?
