Would you like a day off from work? Say, a Friday all to yourself, in which to do anything you’d like? The only catch is that you’re not paid for your day off. As an employee of the state of Oregon, I had my first furlough day last week. Like most of my coworkers, I will have 14 of them by the end of 2010, furloughs being part of the state’s effort to deal with its shortfalls in a hard economy.
The reason my household is untroubled by mandatory furlough is that we live well below our means, happily. That means that the small reduction in income isn’t painful to us. We have a smallish house, one small car, and like to cook and have friends over for dinner. They have us over for dinner. It’s community. We hang out; conversation is our recreation. Thor and I don’t buy or hanker for much stuff (not watching any TV helps with that). I still love to clothes-shop at Goodwill. Friendships, family, volunteer work, bicycling, reading and singing in my church choir entertain us royally.
A colleague and I discussed furloughs recently. “I’d rather take furlough than have one of my coworkers lose their job,” Randi said. “Me too,” I said fervently. “Everyone needs a job.” I ran into an old church friend when I went running in Mt. Tabor park last Friday. He reads the news and swiftly guessed that I was on furlough.
“If you’re going to make a sacrifice, enjoy it!” he smiled. “I’m happy to make a sacrifice,” I smiled back. But I misspoke. While I believe in making sacrifices, Thor’s and my combined income is good-sized enough that we’re not really making any sacrifice (Thor does not work for the state, and earns twice as much as I do). The people for whom furlough means real sacrifice are the single-income families, particularly where that single salary is a small one. It takes living wages in the first place to then live below your means as my household does, and not everybody makes a living wage. But everyone’s wages should be enough to live on, not lavishly, but with dignity.
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