Risk Takers Slapped in the Face

[silverback]

It sounds like the reason your Dad wasn't ready to share the farm yet was because he maybe knows your sense of entitlement is way ahead of your work ethic. Parents have a way of knowing when their kids aren't ready for something.

My nephew is making over $300 per day working for a small service company in northern alberta. He has a grade 11 education and works like a dog. He loves it. When he cashes those big cheques he puts way too much against a brand new truck, but he is also banking more than his college educated brother.

Why do you suppose you are able to do as many odd construction jobs in Calgary as you want? You could probably do more if you wanted to right? Did you ever stop to think it is because of someone making some good wages who can then hire you to do the work they don't have time for? Did you ever think to ask those homeowners who they work for? When times were slow in Sask., was there much work like that there for you to do? I bet there is now.

Nobody I know ever said life was fair. What they did say was that if you work hard and treat people with respect, success will follow.

What is your definition of what these companies should be allowed to make? Do you advocate government control of oil/gas production? Wage and price controls?

[ado089]

Maybe my dad doesn't want me farming because he knows that even though it's what I love doing he doesn't want me to have to work my a$$ off my whole life to make a meager pittance of a living. My work ethic...I make half my income from projects away from my full time job as as agronomist/marketing manager. You probably have a fair idea of what an agronomist makes double that, do the math, I'm not poor. It would just be nice to be able to call it quits after working 50 or 60 hrs/ week instead of 80 or 100. Four years ago that 60hrs a week was lots to get by, have some fun and put a little away. Has my value to society depreciated in last four years because that's the message I'm getting...funny because people still need to eat. This isn't even the point...the point is that oil and gas are reasources belong to the government of Alberta, the government has a responsibilty to it's people-education, health care, infrastructure... The industry itself never mind the additional people it requires has put a strain on the infrastructure. Like it or leave it, there is still a pot load of money made by oil and gas regardless of a royalty increase. Who has the problem with what they think they're entitled to???

[silverback]

Why did you move to the fastest growing city in canada if you couldn't afford to live there?

Working 80 - 100 hours a week just to support your drinking and housing expenses doesn't sound all that intelligent. Why don't you move to a smaller town or city that has cheaper housing so you aren't so upset that gas patch workers are making more than you are?

We're sorry that the government in Alberta never promised to take care of all your problems.

[ado089]

Whatever. I'm set for the long run, I'll continue to be successful no matter what happens in the future. Just don't expect my sypathy, if, or more likely when, energy prices back off, or as third world countries become more politicaly stable therefore more attractive for investment and all of a sudden the few hundred thousand people making the big bucks in Alberta now, suddenly find themselves unemployed. Not that I want to see that happen but things that grow too fast built on a poor foundation tople over. I'm not old but I've seen it happen before and I'm not foolish enough to think it won't happen again and I know for a fact it will be the kids with a grade 11 education making $300/day, driving the expensive trucks with a quad and a boat behind it that will be the first to feel it. Investing in the future is never a bad thing but people these days don't see that anymore. History has shown that governments/societies don't topple in the bad times but rather by how the manage the good times. This "wealth" impacts all albertans, the same way the disappearance of it will. It doesn't make sense to me to go into that situation with as sh!t load of bills left as a result of it and not have any money in the bank accout to pay for it.