The American Dream

Every time I travel to a third world country, I experience a huge culture shock with respect to work ethic and drive. I am indifferent as to which work ethic is "better"-- the die hard, animalistic drive of America or the lazy and oblivious work ethic of third world counties. Nevertheless, going to a third world country never ceases to shock me to the point of questioning the way the American society functions. 

As a recent college graduate who has blindly walked the plank into the ocean filled with killer whales, I have a new found respect for working parents. I barely have enough time to take care of myself during the week. I cannot even to begin to imagine how draining it would be to come home to a house full of kids in desperate need of attention and food. 

When its broken down, there are 168 hours we have to spend in one week:

• 40 hours of which are spent at work (24% of our time)
• Assuming a 30 minute commute to work, we spend another 5 hours just driving to work, leaving us with 123 hours 
• According to doctors orders, another 6.5 hours a week (30 min/day) should be spent exercising, leaving us with 119.5 hours
• Taking into the consideration of all the time we spend on everyday life obligations (eating, showering, shaving, dressing, going to the bathroom, etc), we are down to 98 hours 
• (30 min/meal * 3 meals/day) + additional 30 min for dinner
• 1.5 hours/day showering, shaving, dressing, going to the bathroom
• Lastly, we need sleep. Pretending we have enough time to get the full 8 hours of recommended sleep each night, we are left with 42 hours

42 hours of freedom. 25 hours of which are spent on the weekend, leaving us with 3.5 a day during the week. And mind you this does not include household chores such as laundry, grocery shopping, washing dishes, getting gas, going to the doctor, etc. 

For every hour we work, we earn one hour of free time, which begs the question: what are we really working for? Are we working to live or living to work?