# Dollars Per Existence By:: [[Brian Heath]] 2023-11-28 Many can easily recite or at least calculate their hourly wage. Either one is paid hourly for one's time, or one can calculate it from one's salary and total hours worked. We utilize this dollar-per-hour figure to represent all kinds of things, including whether a job or activity is worth it. It's part of the mental, economic calculus ingrained into how we perceive and estimate value in our capitalist society. It has benefits that one sees all around us. However, it has costs. Some are noticeable, like wealth and income gaps. Others are not noticeable, like unhappiness and pointless work. However, the paradigm of treating time as a bucket full of widgets to be traded for money is limiting well beyond the systemic value choices and models. While one has limited time, it cannot be bottled up, as implied by the time as a resource paradigm. Time is infinite and continuous. One's time is merely the language one uses to represent one's existence. Thus, one is trading away existence for money. So, is the money earned worth one's existence? This subtle shift may cause one to pause because our society has appropriated and normalized the trading of time for money but has little to say about existence. This is intentional. Existence is until it isn't. Existence is something. Existence is what you make of it. Existence causes dread. Existence asks questions without answers. Existence brings about something beyond the work through the work. These are not the thoughts of the robot workers sought by industry titans. Hence, give them one's time and ignore the rest. #### Related Items [[Work]] [[Salary]] [[Purpose]] [[Existential]] [[The Human Condition]] [[Organization]] [[Capitalism]] [[Models]]