Workers thriving at 70, 80, and even 100 (CNN.com) {F*** Social Security!}

[eppur_se_muova]

By Jason Hanna
CNN

(CNN) -- Jack Borden would like you to consider working well past retirement age. As a 101-year-old attorney, he has the credibility to encourage it.

Borden, who has been practicing law for the better part of 70 years, still spends about 40 hours a week at his office in Weatherford, Texas, handling estate planning, probate and real estate matters.

Retire? Not while he's able to help folks.

"As long as you are capable, you ought to use what God gave you. He left me here for a reason, and with enough of a mind to do what it is I'm supposed to be doing," said Borden, who also has been a district attorney and Weatherford's mayor.
***
Not everyone who works past 65 does so because they want to. In a survey completed last month, 38 percent of respondents working past the age of 62 said they may have to delay retirement even further because of the recession, according to the Pew Research Center's Social and Demographic Trends project.
***
more: http://www.cnn.com/2009/US/09/28/older.workers/index.html?iref=mpstoryview

Woohoo! Let's all work till we drop dead! Oh, if only our corporate masters would allow it! Thanks, CNN, for softening the target for the next neocon attack!

[Mari333]

1. yes, just what I want to do when I hit 65, be a walmart greeter

even better, stand on my feet all day and take orders for french fries.
I dont *think* so.

[Ozymanithrax]

2. My mother worked as a waiters in Vegas until she was 83.

After the Showboat hotel was bought out, she could not find anyone to hire her, even in a union town.

My grandfather continued to work into his 90's.

If you are in good shape, can do the work, and can want to, you should be able to work.

[lapfog_1]

6. Working is often something to live for

keeps the mind sharp, provides for function to feel useful in life, and an opportunity to socialize, and a physical activity (even if it's just getting up in the morning, getting showered and dressed, and going someplace).

And older workers have a wealth of experience to share, are often more punctual and more focused than their younger counterparts.

All that being said, work should be something that one chooses to do after 65, not forced to because of economic survival circumstances.

[Deja Q]

13. Pity the opportunities aren't there...

What does our country value, anyway?

[RagAss]

3. Great idea...keep the next generation out of the work force....jeeez

[county worker]

21. Where does that attitude come from?

I the next generation prepares itself well enough to compete in the market place they will get the positions.
Me working past 65 will not keep anyone out of a job. Why? Because I have skills they haven't acquired yet. When they do then come compete with me.

Jeez! That victim attitude will ensure you remain un-hired! Take responsibility for your life. Get a skill and go market yourself!

[Raineyb]

23. Where?

Because there's not a lot of hiring going on.

Although I suspect that most employers aren't really interested in older workers and avoid hiring them when they can it does make it harder for younger people to negotiate better wages for themselves.

The more people who are in the labor market the less the employers want to pay those who are in the labor market. (That's why Republicans like having undocumented aliens working even as they rail against them.) A glut of workers in the labor market pushes down wages. Which is not a small part of the reason why this country is in such trouble to begin with but that's another topic.

[county worker]

25. You have to get a skill. Sure there are a lot of unskilled workers and if that's what you are

you'll have a hard time.

[Raineyb]

27. And with what nonexistent money would one get the skills?

Obtaining skills requires money. Or do you think money just grows on trees and falls to the ground when its ripe.

It's fairly easy for you to say, "get a skill." You think people out there are so stupid that they don't know this? It's one thing to pull such rather obvious (and in the end useless) advice out of one's nether regions, it's another to actually pull it off without resources. Resources you've not bothered to address with your rather flip answer.

[county worker]

30. I believe if you think positively about getting a skill the things you need to get there will

be there. I know it sounds hokey to most but the millions of people get where they want to go and they stated with no money.

I do know this. If you are defeated even before you start you'll never get there.

Just between us, read the book "The Secret." You don't have to accept what it says if you don't want to but there isn't anything to lose if you don't have anything to start with.

[Raineyb]

34. Hokey? It's not hokey it's idiotic

And I would NEVER waste time taking advice from someone who thinks "The Secret" is helpful life advice.

I live in the real world. One where things cost money. But your flip advice doesn't actually address the real life issues involved in taking your "advice." Your comment on "The Secret" shows that you're not to be taken seriously at all.

Is that your advice on health care too? If you think you'll never get sick you'll attract health to you?

You cannot be for real.

[county worker]

38. Fine, it's you life to live. bye.

[Raineyb]

45. Next time save your advice for someone who asked for it. n/t

[Go2Peace]

75. County Worker, you sound like someone who is out of touch with this era

As an "older" person as well I am very fortunate to have a good job and a skill base that should carry me into retirement. But I have my eyes open to the fact that the economy and opportunity is NOTHING like what you and I grew up in. If you are in a place where you can make your own job and make enough to live on should your existing work fall through than you are a minority.

Most people can pick up "skills" and find some work if they cannot find stable work otherwise, but being able to actually make enough to live doing that and not hit a brick wall before you can bring it all together is very diffcult in this age. And if you don't have a support system with a place you can fall back on doubly so.

[Oak2004]

49. Just between us, read this:

http://www.livemint.com/articles/2008/12/14214834/Just-world-hypothesis-Truth-o.html

Because "The Secret" is one giant argument in favor of the Just World Fallacy.

And yes, there's a lot to lose -- the concepts of justice and compassion, for starters.

[Raineyb]

54. A very interesting read. n/t

[Gabi Hayes]

57. My last GF became obsessed by that frickin' book, and it was the major factor

in our split.

she took it completely seriously, started putting pictures up all over the place of her 'dream home'.....stuff like that

I made the mistake of trying to point out a few things about that huckster, and she did take too well. interestingly, sorta, she became very involved in a big box church--rediscovered her 'religion' in a big way, which made it two for two AFA I was concerned, and that was it.

feel sorry for her now, cause she's still apparently all wrapped up in her morass of delusion

[girl gone mad]

61. Thanks for that.

I was trying to figure out why it got under my skin so much.

She's like the anti-Rawls. Reading A Theory of Justice is hard and takes thought. The Secret is like the literary equivalent of cotton candy. It just melts right into your cerebral cortex and leaves you with a sugar high.

[Oak2004]

77. It is awful in so very many ways

Take for example what would be true about physics if the ideas promoted in The Secret were true.

The Secret isn't advocating for garden-variety "karma"-- that what you set in motion will eventually come to affect you. It advocates a kind of super-karma: that only what you do influences you. Given that having information about another has an effect on them, if The Secret's super-karma is true, then I cannot even have information about the existence of anything or anyone else at all. This stuff is not just the anti-Rawls, it's the anti-singularity (or some such really strange state of space-time). I once had the privilege of having a conversation with Paul Dirac about a lot of his late in life wilder ideas about physics, including that the universe contains precisely one electron, but I think even he would have drawn the line at a universe without information.

The metaphysics of Secret-Universe gets equally bizarre, for something promoted as a "spiritual" work. I ("I" being the only meaningful pronoun in Secret-Universe) would be a demigod in a bubble, an isolated ego playing a game with myself where I conjure up cravings and then satisfy them. If indeed this is true, why should I bother with silly ideas like "love" and "ethics" -- in fact, is there any meaning to such concepts in Secret-Universe? In Secret-Universe, cravings are all. Hmm... maybe I need to retract that description "demigod", and replace it with "demon", as the traits I've just described are not those of a half-god, half-human, but are those traditionally attributed to lower entities.

The Secret is so very bad you can pretty much pick a field of interest at random and show how The Secret is at odds with what is known, or how it leads to bizarre conclusions, or how it leads to ugly, immoral conclusions. But I guess that's what happens when you start from a position of radical opposition to reality.

[bobbolink]

48. So, you are advocating we import the unskilled braceros?

Is this Tancredo?

:rofl:

[bobbolink]

28. You did a great job there!

You got all the RW talking points all neatly lined up.

Except the taxes.

YOU FORGOT THE TAXES!

[Raineyb]

32. Pat "answers" without any considerations as to HOW it would get done.

Yup, sounds just like the right wing.

"Get a skill"

"How am I supposed to do that? I'm working so many hours and can barely keep a roof over my head?"

"Well you'd make better money if you just got a skill."

"But how am I supposed to make this better money if I don't have the funds to pay for schooling to get this skill"

"Work harder"

And on and on in a circle it goes.

Sometimes I really have to check to make sure I'm on the right website sometimes.

[bobbolink]

35. Yup, you got the circular logic. There was also a dog whistle there...

"Personal responsibility"---kinda like the "state's rights" thing....

"Listen with your heart" is a good way to improve our pathetic society. People who argue in that way are blaming because they HAVE no heart. Just pat answers.

[county worker]

36. I told you. Stop defeating yourself and start thinking that you can get somewhere and you will.

It isn't right wing but a lot of Republicans think they can get somewhere and do. I did also and I'm not a Repub.

[Raineyb]

50. Do yourself a favor. Save your advice for someone who ASKS for it

I never asked for your advice. You don't know me and have NO clue as to what I am or am not doing and what my station may or may not be. I am merely commenting on an article and the comments that come after. That you insist on turning this into Countyworker's personal advice hour is not only unwelcome, it's condescending and offensive which I've also mentioned which you seem incapable of comprehending.

No one wants pat answers without thought of the details even when they ask for it. I damn sure don't want it in a discussion and I don't want nor need your advice.

[HughBeaumont]

66. Same here. Reality slaps Horatio Alger in the balls.

Believe it or not, I got a few 7000+ post DUers in the Red X Toilet who make this one's compassion look mountainous in comparison.

Free-Trader supporters,
Steadfast Friedmanites,
Job-offshoring supporters,
"Bootstrappers" that come from another century while being blinded to the way this one works,
Totally off-the-charts condescending comments that sound like the WORST right-leaning Libertarian douchebags ever,
Ripping on other people's professions (which I would NEVER do) stating American workers should be getting paid a pittance for complex degreed work that they consider easy . . .

It's absolutely AMAZING none of these idiots are banned yet. It really is. No matter HOW many times I alert on these over-the-top Repukesque comments, they're still THERE.

[juno jones]

70. Having a 'skill' (in this case a degree seems to be implied) may not save you.

I've commented before here about how the current downswing has brought some pretty odd job applicants in, namely older people (and kids as well) with degrees who say when interviewed 'hey, I've done such and such all my life, but, gosh, I've always wanted to learn how to cook'. Your college education is no guarantee you aren't going to wind up trying to do heavy kitchen work in your 60's and even then you might not get the job because you have no experience in the field.

I already got a skill.
It's not a big woo-woo skill like lawyering because we must always look down our noses at the people who actually work with their hands and bodies but it's taken me years to hone it, I'm damn good at it, and it sure comes in handy. Frankly, I don't want to be doing it twenty years from now at least not as my profession. I probably couldn't physically. I want to communally retire with a bunch of liberals, share resources and enjoy life. I'd gladly use my skill then to keep our nutrition as optimal as possible.

It's nice a laywer can work into his second century. But many of us just want to retire and do something else for awhile before we die.

[Raineyb]

74. That is also a good point.

A point which would be lost on the person we were talking about. His or hers pat answers really doesn't address your point or even the point that not everyone can go to school be it for academic or monetary reasons which was one of the points I was making in this thread. However, in that person's world all you have to do is think positively and things will go your way.

Gee, why didn't I or anyone else think of that? Right! Because it's simplistic childish nonsense.

The number of people who seem to think that bad things happen because you somehow have it coming to you is frankly rather frightening.

[juno jones]

81. And yes, you make a good point as well, many can't afford school to begin with.

I was lucky enough to get in on the tail end of the apprenticeship system in my field. Many of the master chefs who trained me in turn learned the craft from other master chefs as well. Now, it's hard to get entry level in a decent kitchen without a certification of some kind, most of which (in my opinion as someone who has had to hire and train such graduates) aren't worth the paper they're printed on. A lot of 'training' especially thru tech and voc schools is just another moneymaker for the private sector and another financial hoop for someone to jump thru to get a job that pays a living wage of sorts. (Not to mention the 'internship' parts of the program where you work for someone for free for a number of weeks...)

I'm all for positive thinking and outlook, but sometimes life happens and shitty things happen to good people and there's no sense in blaming them for it.

:hi:

on edit: I still remember with sorrow the second woman killed in this stupid war. She was in the army to get money to go to school for cooking. For Cooking. In my day (I feel so old at 46), all she had to do was go and do the work, instead she got killed for a piece of paper that was unecessary 20 years ago.

[county worker]

33. That is another one that really gets me.

Common sense isn't right wing of left wing.

So many times ideas are dismissed as right wing. They are just ideas, they are not owned by any political party.

[bobbolink]

37. If you saw comon sense in that, I'd like to borrow your microscope.

Many of us have been around long enough to know the talking points.

And, yes, they are definitely of the right wing variety.

Just like "state's rights" and other charming canards.

[county worker]

40. Sometimes it just isn't worth it.

[bobbolink]

46. You got that right. BYe bye now....

I'm sure you can find a more "pliable" group you will find to your liking, which will make your efforts "worth it"

Don't trip on your microscope on the way out.

Bye...:hi:

[HughBeaumont]

65. This advice is about as helpful as saying "Here's a pile of bricks and wood. Build a house"

"Bootstrappers" on DU. That's what was missing. :eyes:

[RagAss]

67. Victim attitude???? I'm 50 years old....made my money....I was speaking of the young folks.

[Romulox]

4. Reminds me of an episode of the Simpsons where OFF visits "the Slaughterhouse"

(a steakhouse where even the menus are printed on pressed whole chickens!)

Lisa, a vegetarian, frets at the fate of the cows killed for dinner. Marge answers, "Maybe they like being the center of attention!"

[lapfog_1]

8. "Meet the Meat!"

at the Restaurant at the End of the Universe.

One of my favorite books of all time.

Well, I just spent the year dead for tax purposes...

[Avalux]

5. An attorney. Of course he can work 101. A skilled laborer cannot.

When you've worked hard physically over years and years and years; you look forward to retirement where you can rest.

This man doesn't have a clue what that means and neither does CNN.

[eppur_se_muova]

7. MUCH LESS an unskilled one.

If he's not suffered debilitating injury by retirement age, he's worn out.

[Avalux]

18. Very true.

I was thinking about my Dad in particular; worked as an electrician in a plant for years and years. He retired a couple of years ago. Couldn't do the 12 hours shifts and plant shut-down anymore.

I wasn't thinking unskilled but those are in the same boat.

[eppur_se_muova]

78. Hey, my family comes from coal country ...

so I've seen what that kind of labor does to people, and why almost all of the family moved away. I've come to regret that I never took a photograph of my Grandfather's hands -- the missing nails, half-missing nails, black nails, scars, the severed fingertip -- that's what life in the mines gets you. Not to mention Black Lung, which took so many of his neighbors.

[Vinca]

9. I can't imagine not working and we've kind of planned to keep on keeping on.

Everyone in my family who "retired" ended up dying only a couple of years later. I guess it depends on what you plan to do with your time. Just rotting on the edge of a golf course sounds frightening to me.

[Cleita]

10. Well, I think I would be thriving a lot more if I made enough SS and pension

so I didn't have to work. I could bypass a lot of the caffeine and pain killers I need to function. I think most seniors feel like me. I know there are those out there with prestigious jobs like Supreme Court Judges who like to work until they drop dead, but most of us don't. I also feel that the 30% unemployment in my area among 20 and thirty year olds might be a result of so many of us old farts working. Companies don't need to pay us as much, nor give us full time employment or benefits so it's a big disadvantage for young people who need more to survive.

[Cha]

11. Not everyone is the same..some people thrive on their

vocation until they've left the Planet and there are those who have other plans.

I'm retiring next year and looking forward to no schedule..it's getting a wee bit routine after all these years.

I wanna go do something wild:bounce:B-)

[Nay]

59. Zackly, Cha. My admin job is not hard, but I'm getting tendinitis from

being on the computer all day. I'm sick to death of my RW coworkers, tired of the corporate bullshit, sick of the constant "change for change's sake" attitude, and I simply wish I had the day to do what I want. I find that work sucks the life energy out of me so thoroughly that I don't have the oomph to pursue my many hobbies after work. Sad, but true. I'm so looking forward to retirement.

Then again, I have a coworker who can't imagine ever retiring. Ever. She loves to work. :wtf: Now, I HAVE noticed that people like her invariably have no hobbies or outside interests. It seems that work is their main fulfillment. People who die right after retiring are probably those types of people. Me, I've got so much I want to do I will drop dead amidst my paints, quilt fabric, and photo books.

And yes, I do resent the spate of idiot articles extolling the virtues of working until you drop. Now the powers that be want to make you feel guilty for RETIRING. They can go to hell.

[Cha]

68. We're going to have fun when we retire..

I'm determined to have those Golden years be ever so GoldenB-):fistbump:

[Warpy]

12. I'd like to hear what he'd have to say

if he'd spent his life doing hard, physical labor.

Our bodies break down even if our minds don't. Desk jockeys don't see the point of retirement.

The rest of us do.

[SoCalDem]

14. "practicing law", and "spends about 40 hours a week at his office"

jump out at me..

Too bad "most" oldsters are not as "lucky" as that guy..

micro v macro..always

[Obamanaut]

16. Perhaps "luck" didn't have as much to do with it as "planning for

the future", or "going to school" or "working 80 hours a week as a young lawyer so he could work less later."

It isn't a crap shoot, or a day at the dog track. Luck, good fortune, the tooth fairy - none of these play a part.

[Raineyb]

20. No everyone CAN go to school! So they're supposed to take

back breaking work and an attitude of "work 'til you drop" as punishment for not doing the "right" things?

That's the problem with people in this country. For all the talk of rewarding work we don't actually respect the people who do said work if they're not in the "right" fields with the "right" amount of study.

[county worker]

22. It is a bit like supply and demand.

There is a large supply of unskilled labor and there is getting to be less and less of a demand. If you don't want to compete with unskilled labor you must get a marketable skill. That's life and it isn't going to change.

[Raineyb]

24. You don't seem to have much understanding of supply and demand

based on your other post for you to be lecturing people on what supply and demand is.

Your condescension not withstanding, it's also a fairly simple fact that not everyone CAN go to school and these people should not be penalized for being unable to attend college whether the reason is insufficient ability to keep up with the work or inability to keep up with the bills.

And one's work should not be used as punishment for not having done the "right" things as declared by some twit whose father paid for his or her education. (Which while a bit broad is generally how most of the elites come by their education.)

[county worker]

26. You can rail all you want but the situation won't change.

The fact that you see what I say as condescension says a lot. You get born into a world and you have to make the best of it. The world isn't going to change to accommodate you. That isn't condescension it is just plain common sense.

[Raineyb]

29. More condescension.

Who the hell is talking about me? You don't know shit about me and what I am and am not doing for myself for that matter. I'm talking more broadly because we should be looking out for our fellow citizens. Your "I got mine screw you" attitude is EXACTLY what is wrong with a good number of people in this country in the first place that they'd see any attempt to help others as "socialism."

If you don't like being called out for being condescending perhaps you might try not being condescending. Of course that will preclude your rather annoying preaching which you seem rather attached to but at least you wouldn't hear the oh so dreaded "c" word in people's answers. At least in my answers anyway.

[bobbolink]

42. "The world isn't going to change to accommodate you."

DAMN!

That Martin Luther King was a REAL fool!

We won't even START on Jefferson, et al.

:evilgrin:

[Mixopterus]

47. Frankly

You sound like a selfish prick.

[bobbolink]

41. Thank you for your "wisdom", Professor.

Call back when you acquire some compassion and understanding.

[eppur_se_muova]

79. I wonder how many would-be 100 YO lawyers got struck down by disease or accident?

Or lost all their posessions to flood or fire? No luck involved there, nosiree. If nothing really bad ever happened to him, that's because he's a Good Person. "There, but for the grace of God, go I" is just a meaningless, empty phrase to some people. (I'm not one of them, and I'm an atheist.)

[bbinacan]

15. Since both my grandfathers

and my father died a year after retiring, I plan to work forever.

[slackmaster]

52. One of mine did that too

He happened to die of colon cancer, which had certainly developed years earler, but he was miserable trying to be "retired". He loved his work as a pharmacist, and even worked for free to fill in for his former coworkers when they had personal business to attend to.

[lib2DaBone]

17. I know how happy older worker are.. I dont want to load trucks when I'm 80...

[laughingliberal]

19. Some types of work are a little harder when you're older than other types of work

My husband and I are not that old. Him-62, Me-54. But we are both about worn out with the work for which we are trained. I'm an RN who crapped out 2 years ago (a little ahead of myself, most RN's last til about 57). He is an antique restorer, furniture and cabinet finisher. It is breaking my heart to see him keep pushing as he is the only source of income we have right now and it is wearing him down. We continue to look for solutions but they are not in abundance these days.

[Trillo]

31. Unrec.

Wonder if a 90-year-old ditch-digger, who digs ditches by hand, can can work as "hard" as a recent high-school grad. If not, good luck gettin' that job.

[Mixopterus]

44. Or conversely

Those in skilled areas who are young having to deal with old timers who should be in retirement or semi-retirement still taking up a position that could be filled, thereby preventing multiple people from advancing or even having a job in their field.

How is one supposed to gain the skills an older individual has gained by being in the field when the experience is getting sopped up by hanger-ons? It simply isn't ethical.

[Obamanaut]

55. There are back-hoes in Kansas now, Dorothy. You can come home. nt

[retread]

39. More bullshit Calvinism. n/t

[bobbolink]

43. .

:applause:

[eppur_se_muova]

85. Zackly. nt

[slackmaster]

51. If someone enjoys working and wants to do it, what's the problem?

:nuke:

[Mixopterus]

53. Depends on the macro economic system and situation

In some situations and systems it would be alright, in others having the very old still in critical positions and certain fields (especially if there are a glut of that generation) are going to hurt the future workforce.

[slackmaster]

80. I could contemplate compulsory retirement only if there was rock-solid government-provided care

For all retirees, including housing, food, and health care.

[Mixopterus]

83. Yeah

That would obviously be a necessary requirement to mandated retirement, anything less would be unethical.

[pipoman]

56. My coworker and mentor

just turned 80. She has taught me more in the last 18 months than I could have learned through trial and error in a decade. She works around 30 highly productive hours per week. Another of my employees is 78, she works around 15 hours per week baking pies and making desserts...she is a true pro, her product quality is outrageous and her output is fantastic. Se bakes 12 pies (all different kinds), makes her own crusts and pie fillings...no frozen crusts or canned fillings, in around 4 hours every Friday.

I dread the day that they decide to retire...they will be very hard to replace.

Retirement is the quickest way to the grave for many.

[treestar]

58. What client wants a 101 year old attorney?

It is tough to keep up with the constant "development" (arbitrary rules chances and undue complication) in fields like estate planning and real estate.

Either he didn't do well enough to retire or he's obsessive.

[Liberal_in_LA]

64. My cat's vet must have been 75+. He hired a new young vet but everyone wanted the old guy

He had the experience, could look an animal and tell you what was wrong. great 'bedside manner' that came with experience.

[slackmaster]

72. My dentist is 75. He's the only dentist I've ever been to. My first visit was in August 1963.

If I live to see the day, his retirement will be a traumatic experience for me.

He's a great dentist. The thought of trying to find another one frightens me.

[Liberal_in_LA]

76. I hear ya! Nothing replaces experience.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

60. Work is highly overrrated as a pastime.

Hell, I didn't "thrive" on any of the jobs I ever held and I'm jubilant since I retired and started doing something useful with my life.

[Ishoutandscream2]

82. "Work is highly overrated as a pastime." Brilliant

I want to use that. May I?

[wroberts189]

62. And here I was hoping to get a few weeks off before I died..silly me. nt

[bemildred]

63. Some jobs are better than others.

If you want to be working at your job at McDonalds at 101, speak up.

[varelse]

71. "If you want to be working at your job at McDonalds at 101, speak up"

I'm hiding this thread just on the off chance that someone will - I don't think I could take it :crazy:

What's not mentioned much here is that quite often, retirement isn't an option, it's forced. The only way to remain in the work force for many older folks is to become, say, a hotel maid, Wal-Mart greeter or perhaps a security guard.

Way to rub salt in the wound, OP. :(

[Odin2005]

69. Why are people being outraged by this? Older folks are healthier than they used to be.

Increasing lifespan + better health in one's later years beans one can work more. Most people died around age 70 when SS fist started.

[WillowTree]

73. My father worked until he was 79, by choice

And he only retired then because his doctor said "You're 79 years old and you don't need the money. For God's sake, SIT DOWN!!". He could have quit years earlier and would have drawn 2/3 of his salary from his pension, but he enjoyed what he was doing. 63 years with one company!! I kid you not.

[Ilsa]

84. Until you lose your job and no one will hire you because you will cost their insurance too much. nt

[Demobrat]

86. This is all well and good

for people who derive their identities from work, and there are lots of them. But there are just as many who are forced to spend their lives in life-sucking, soul-destroying, meaningless positions, and they deserve better than to die at their desks - or their cash registers.