I hate gambling. I think it preys upon the poor and the impulsive. It reveals a deeper problem.
When I saw a young man in the convenience store putting dollar after dollar into the "skills game" machine, I tried not to wince. No, it's a gambling machine, not a skills machine. That would be the arcade games I played, for a few bucks in quarters, 40 years ago.
This was not just a few minutes of harmless fun. He was playing to win, round after game.
The House always wins, kid. You can read about the state legislature's latest bill on this subject, if you wish.
I try to avoid the political here, but it saddens me to see what I regard as a urban problem flower out here, where lots of folks still work with their hands or work the land.
The fellow punching buttons on the "skill game" was strong-looking, the sort I'd pay 20 bucks an hour in cash for manual labor, plus feed him lunch and give him gas money. My late father-in-law would have said "I'll find him work to do." I have 300' feet of fence to put in and last weekend, I was lucky to get a former neighbor to help me pound in 30 T-posts. Yet I cannot find folks I trust to pay to do that. One lad who came out--in shorts and tennis shoes--lasted one whole day and never returned. I'm three times his age and wore him out.
We are picky about who we invite onto our land. We don't trust day-laborers unless we know them already. It's a sad reality of a time when too many people lead precarious lives, make bad choices, and have substance-abuse issues. Trust must be earned, not assumed.
In any case, at the store I wanted to tell the young man "put 50 bucks down at Charles Schwab and get a share of Tractor Supply. In six or seven years it will be worth 100 dollars."
He'd think I came from Mars. His addiction to that one-armed bandit shows that he's not one to wait for returns.
American life exists now in the age of instant gratification. It's changed the labor market since COVID.
My friends who run a local Chinese place are closing shop after this week; they can no longer find any help to provide table service and they are worn out. The husband runs the kitchen alone; the wife runs the bar and their daughter handles the take-out orders. Their son runs errands. I hear from lots of restaurant owners the same complaint: no one wants to work their hours at any hourly rate. Of course more folks may soon be on the job market. Our server at a pub in Williamsburg, VA had a career as a graphic designer until AI replaced her; she's the second designer I've met who. had to leave the field.
But back to "skill games" and magical thinking. What started this craziness? One hunch: buying on credit began our trend of living beyond our means and expected "what I want right when I want it." My parents' generation avoided credit cards like they were poison. Every adult I knew, as a kid in the 60s, felt that way about "charge plates" and any debt save a mortgage or, maybe, a car payment.
Now we have all sorts of bizarre financial instruments and the based-on-nothing Crypto market. I recently told a broker that I wanted no Coinbase in our retirement portfolio. We did sell it when the stock, just a few hundred dollars worth, was at its peak, but good riddance.
I sound like an old fart, but I feel that there's something to the idea that social media and what Sherry Turkle calls "always-on, always-on-you" technology have made us a nation of emulators, who want to party like influencers and live like high-rollers. We were already consumers. Now, in short, we want all that stuff and that lifestyle without waiting to earn it.
This magical thinking continues even as we fight a war of choice, a war that I feel is going to end terribly, a war that I fear that we'll ignore save for high prices at the gas-pump. We did that same for the needless 2003 Iraq War, when it may took time for us to experience loss. I recall a student who supported Bush's folly and Cheney's lies, until she changed her mind when a good friend died in combat. It took that to wake her up.
Our inability to see evil around us now, even in the highest office of our nation, may come from being worn out like my Chinese friends. They can quit. we can't. Our inactions may simply be from no longer caring in an increasingly angry nation. Meanwhile, too many of us believe in miracles that will get us rich quick, rather than what we Lebanese-Americans refer to as our "side hustles." We make a bit of money here, a bit more there, and sock it away.
If there's hope, and I think there is, it comes from a recent student who, at 21 years old, puts $25 dollars away monthly in a mutual fund. She knows what it will be worth in 40 years. The son of the restaurant owners wants to become a mechanic. He knows it will pay well and provide a lifelong career, and he loves cars as much as I do.
I wish there were more like them. I would wager--yes, wager--that they'd let me hire them to hang fence on T-posts any day of the week, even if they lacked the stamina to pound those posts into the ground.
That's reason to hope. As Spring unfolds here, and chores get done, I'll keep hoping for other changes on the wind.
Creative commons image courtesy of Pennlive.
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