I got an email this morning from a guy I used to work with in St. Paul. He moved to Montana a few years ago because his wife was transferred there. Now this fellow is a conservative chap but he is not the fire-breathing type that is heard so often on talk radio. In other words, he probably wasn't fired up over Michelle Obama touching Queen Elizabeth the other day.
My ex-colleague was all a twitter this morning, however, over the fact his wife got a bonus check of $19,000 but, after taxes, only netted around $11,500. His anger was twofold: 1) The amount of taxes being taken out. 2) What that tax money was being used for.
I understand all that but I felt I needed to (gently) remind him something. I have been out of full-time work since mid-October. Without getting into specifics, it would take me roughly 35 weeks of full-priced unemployment checks to match his wife's after taxes money from her bonus check.
I don't begrudge her the bonus for a second. I am sure she "busted her ass off" (as her husband put it) and deserves every penny she got. Good for her.
It's just that a lot of us folks would love to "bust our ass off" for just about anybody. So, having sympathy for folks complaining about the size of their bonus check is tough to do.
If, in some people's eyes, this makes me a bad, selfish person for thinking (and writing) along these lines, so be it.
Nobody ever said life was fair.
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