Diary of a future rentier (60)

These times of social demands in France make me question my own concerns a lot. I have been complaining about the world of work and its excesses for years. In some ways, seeing the misery in which those on minimum wage live, my little worries as a Swiss worker can seem quite trivial. And from a certain point of view, it is true that they are. I have no trouble making ends meet, I do not need to calculate every franc that comes out of my pocket, I do not depend on any kind of assistance and I do not live in a tiny and/or unsanitary home. Frankly, from this point of view I am lucky. I understand the people who go out into the streets and demand (peacefully) better living conditions. It is not normal that these days we cannot live properly when we work properly, all because the State takes everything in passing. When I see that in France the government sucks up almost half of the GDP, I am not surprised that workers and small entrepreneurs are not getting by. In Switzerland, we are luckier. The State, and its representatives, are much more modest. This allows a very large majority of us to live decently, although we also have our share of working poor.

That being said, even if my complaints as a Swiss worker may seem insignificant compared to those of our neighbours, they are based on the same observations: globalisation has not improved the living conditions of the middle class. I have been working for over 20 years, and for just as long I have heard more or less the same old story from my employers every year: times are tough, we have to save money, salaries cannot be increased. As a result, my remuneration, as well as that of my colleagues, has very often remained unchanged, sometimes increased by 0.5% and rarely by 1%. In real terms, adjusted for inflation, we can only consider ourselves lucky if we have been able to maintain our purchasing power. During this same time, while we were rightly told that the economic period was tight, we saw corporate profits most of the time increase, sometimes stagnate and rarely decrease. Only one of the companies I have worked for over the past two decades has suffered a loss, for a single year. When we asked our employers why our salaries were stagnating while profits were rising, we were always given this well-worn excuse: "It's true that profits have increased this year, but the next few years are looking very difficult" or "This year's profit is due to extraordinary revenues that will no longer be relevant next year". But the following year the scenario repeated itself, as well as the one after that... At the same time, this pseudo-difficult context was also used to put more and more pressure on us. The final result: a real salary that is stagnating or falling, working hours that are getting longer and that are coming home, as well as stress that is ever more burdensome and present.

If we look at the progress of stock market indices over the last twenty years, we realize that despite a difficult first decade, companies have managed to generate profits and therefore create value for their shareholders. This wealth creation has been largely done on the backs of workers, who have only reaped a few crumbs, and even then. It is not surprising then that these same workers are taking to the streets to shout their anger.

I have often said that movements related to the search for financial independence are a bit schizophrenic. They are mostly born from the observation that the liberal economy does not allow workers to flourish humanly and financially. They criticize the capitalist world and globalization with some force. However, on the other hand, its followers use the weapons of big business to improve their conditions. They invest to benefit from income that will allow them to supplement their income, reduce their working hours or even stop working. Although their approach is based on certain right-wing political values, linked to freedom and personal responsibility, they also hold a Marxist discourse on the alienation of the work of the proletariat by the bosses. They use the tools of the capitalist system, not as an end in itself (the accumulation of capital), but rather as a means to enhance their condition as workers. This is, in my opinion, the one and only objective that should be assigned to capital. Unfortunately, some leaders in our political and economic spheres have forgotten this. They confuse goals and means.