The "Haves" and the "Have Nots"

Last night I was arguing with my friend Elmo. This is not an unusual event. If someone were to past life regress me, we’d probably discover that 400 years ago Elmo was my older brother or my father or something. I adore him, but he inspires my argumentative nature to climb to the tops of the sorts of mountain peaks typically ascended only with family members.

Anyway, I was arguing with him that those of us in the publishing business should just accept the fact it’s going to be harder and harder to hire truly good, experienced people unless we’re willing to let them telecommute. This is especially true for publishers thinking about publishing their materials in electronic formats. Try telling that rare person you find who actually has programming and editing experience that, sorry, she has to move to Nowhere Ville, USA, because she can’t, otherwise, possibly learn your peculiar computer systems. Mr. Competitor will snap her up in a heartbeat and offer to buy the house for her from which she will telecommute, while encouraging her to revamp his own outdated computer system. (I know a tiny bit about this, having a sister who both edits and programs. Don’t ask me why those programming genes wouldn’t have anything to do with me. They must have gone off clubbing with the artistic and musical genes that also wanted to avoid me once they discovered they weren’t part of the lucky crowds invited to my other sister’s and brother’s places.)

Driving home from this relaxing evening I’d created, I had this other thought. Telecommuting is going to be the wave of the future as far as defining the “haves” and the “have-nots” in our world. (This is probably just a variation on Thomas Friedman’s World is Flat, which I have yet to read, but which people are constantly telling me all about.) I was beginning to envision a world in which all the high-paying, professional jobs were for those who worked from home. Only the lowly “skilled” workers would still have to be away 9-12 hours a day, commuting to do things like building homes for all the telecommuters.

Right about now, you should start imagining all of my multiple personalities freaking out. My bleeding-heart self was chiding me for setting myself up to become one of the “haves.” I should get out while I can, sell everything, and go do something truly meaningful, like caring for sick children in Guatemala. My wannabe hipster self was thinking, “Cool. You’re actually on the cutting-edge for a change. Now don’t blow it. We have an image to keep up here.” My materialistic, imperialistic self was in complete agreement about not blowing it, telling me I had to work ever harder to ensure I maintain this status while wondering what I’ll be worth ten years from now. What will I be paying the “have-nots” to go to the post office and do my laundry for me? Will I have my own submersible parked in the garage of my little ocean-view vacation getaway on the island of Saba?

I calmed them all down with a new thought. Maybe Phillip K. Dick could have figured out a way to create doctors and lawyers who never had to leave their homes for work, but, somehow, I don’t think they’re coming in my lifetime. And Ursula K. Leguin could write the how-to manual on turning them into “have-nots,” but that won’t be happening on this planet anytime soon, either. We all watched as my little “tele-ocracy” spun off into space.