#careerism

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Don’t tell a proud impostor that they have “impostor syndrome”

Western democracies spruik their hopefully meritocratic qualities. The belief that through hard work and talent you can reach the upper echelons of your profession or work place. Careerism: Self-interest’s acceptable public face exists on this basis. Striving for success in any field is encouraged and culturally rewarded. Many bemoan the ever present dangers of nepotism and cronyism within our societies and nations. The elite private schools and old boy’s networks which operate in counter to any ideas of equal opportunity and fairness. Those of us with any pragmatic awareness of how the job market actually works know that it is largely driven by who you know and not what you know. This makes a mockery of any meritocratic ideals believed to be operating within Western democracies.

Privilege The Pathway To Careerism

In the United States of America, the world’s democratic superpower, the top 1% outnumber the rest of the population in their presence at Ivy League universities. Prestige and influence are bought by wealth and legacy policies governing who gets in and who doesn’t. Privilege does everything in its power to ensure that passes down to future generations. Similar behaviours and trends occur in other Western democracies like Australia. Witness the rise in the number of private schools and the increase in the number of Australians attending them. “Private school enrolments have soared for the third straight year as parents leave the public system in record numbers in favour of independent or Catholic schools. The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) has released new data for 2023 that shows the trend to private schools is growing even as interest rate rises and cost of living pressure eat into budgets. Across primary and high school, private school enrolments (Catholic and independent) grew by 2.5 per cent. Meanwhile, public schools grew by just 0.3 per cent, a small improvement from last year when public school enrolments actually fell.” - (https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-02-14/public-school-private-school-shift-continues-cost-of-living/103465026) Wealthy nations like Australia have good public schools but the narrative spruiked by elitism is that these are not good enough. Segregation around wealth, which puts all the kids from wealthier households together and strips them out of the state school system creates class divisions. It, also, damages the standards of the public schools by taking many of the best students with existing advantages from birth out of these schools. Leaving behind those kids with more challenges, like poverty and being from migrant backgrounds.

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Buying Career Opportunities For Their Kids

The expectation upon kids from wealthier families who have purchased private education is much higher. Careerism is more clearly defined here at earlier ages. The old doctor, lawyer or accountant thing remains true to this day. Although, it may include engineer and other computer related professions on the modern day wish list. Parents want the best for their kids and are willing to devote big chunks of their income and wealth to achieve that. The Societal Perils Of Careerism’s Impact Careerism is a problem for us on a societal level, however. The narrow focus on self-interest does not serve the community well in most instances. So, mummy and daddy may well be happy that their offspring is doing well but the merit accorded to the individual is no guarantee of the public good. An example that springs to mind In Australia is the negative impact of careerism on the integrity of journalism here. Australia is the home of economic duopolies and the media landscape is particularly effected by a dearth of competition. Murdoch owns most of the newspapers in the cities and a dominant radio network. In addition, he has Sky News Australia and Fox News on TV screens. Nine Fairfax is another corporate media presence of size involved in multiple platforms. Journalists in Australia are careful not to burn their bridges with News Corp, despite the fact that their coverage is blatantly one sided and miles from any semblance of objectivity. Careerism has them keeping an eye on their next well paid job in a concentrated labour market. I have observed the journalists working in the corporate media sector now are younger (less well paid) and less willing to call out bias in their own industry. Most of the older journos have moved to smaller niche publications, online. The Fourth Estate is a very important democratic institution and the fact that it has been poisoned by deregulation and oligarchy does not serve us well. People are asking why we are heading toward authoritarianism and this is one of the contributing factors – our media has been silenced by greed and self-interest. Careerism: Self-interest’s acceptable public face is a part of this too.

Politics & Public Service Careerism Careerism is a much bigger problem in our political and public service spaces. The corruption of the revolving door, where public officials take up lucrative jobs with the private companies they were once supposed to be regulating is endemic around Western democracies. The corporate sector is ready and waiting to endower these individuals with a golden parachute upon their exit from the public service. Careerism, seemingly, makes this practice an acceptable one for these individuals. This grey area makes a mockery of anti-bribery rules and regulations. Surely, the government must include non-compete clauses in the contracts of these public servants to prevent them taking their knowledge and influence over to the other side. Politicians need to have the same provisions included in their contracts as MPs and cabinet ministers/secretaries. That this has been going on for eons proves that you cannot have the foxes guarding the hen house. Politicians will not close lucrative loop holes for their future careerism without determined and sustained  push back from the voting public. Neoliberalism & Careerism Neoliberalism has been the cover for the deregulation which has allowed oligarchic control of our media to coalesce like a dark cloud over facts and truth. Careerism has fitted like a glove over the hand of neoliberalism. The individual out for private success and the wealth that brings is not primarily looking out for the greater good. Integrity has been sold to the highest bidder in many professions across the board. Corporations have been allowed to merge and take over competitors despite government bodies like the ACCC – which were supposed to be guarding against such things. Toothless tigers are what these monitoring agencies turned out to be  - regulatory capture occurred with such frequency that anyone paying attention would have to embrace cynicism as their response to such blatant ineffectuality. This has been going on for decades and is just getting more obvious each and every year. Standards and expectations have been lowered as corporate power has its way with government. Nearly 10 years of LNP Coalition government at the federal level in Australia accelerated this weakening of the state’s powers, as the public service was slashed and outsourced to private consultants in multi billion dollar deals. PwC, KPMG, Ey and Deloitte have grown fat on the outsourced work of government, without the natural transparency inherent within the public service. Australians have been shafted under the guise of neoliberalism and the mantra of greater efficiencies. Insider mates of the government have grown very wealthy on the back of this transfer of assets from the public to the private sector. We the people are poorer for it. Careers in consulting have been looking very attractive for some time of late. Careerism: Self-interest’s acceptable public face fills the ranks of these consultancy firms.

The Decline Of Civic Duty The decline of civics has been going on for decades around western democracies. ‘Greed is good’ became the buzz words of the late 20C. Ordinary working people were encouraged to become ofay with the economics of personal finance. Property prices began to climb like they never had before. It is estimated that if inflation was measured on residential property price increases in Australia over the last 30 years it would be around 382%. “While housing values move through cycles of growth as well as declines, the long-term trend is undeniably upwards.  Nationally, dwelling values have increased 382% over the past 30 years, or in annual compounding terms, rising by 5.4% on average since July 1992.” - (https://www.corelogic.com.au/news-research/news/2022/the-long-game-30-years-of-housing-values) Young Australians can no longer afford to buy their own home, as they cannot afford to save the deposit to get a bank loan large enough. The bank of mum and dad is an essential in 2024 for those fortunate enough to get a leg up. Civic duty and community work was left to elderly volunteers in the main. Many of the rest of us were too busy or too focused on earning enough money to get ahead. Former PM John Howard told Australians to become investors, as the wheel of fortune turned and workers and consumers become second class citizens behind CEOs and shareholders. Wage growth stagnated for decades, as the impetus was on corporations and their investors at the expense of wages. Record profits for the banks, the mining multinationals, and the duopolies which killed competition and consumer power.  Inequality grew downunder like never before, as income and consumption was taxed but not capital wealth. The capital gains tax discount and negative gearing made property the number one thing in Australia for wealth creation. All those folk who weren’t paying enough attention to the changing face of the nation soon found themselves on the outer. Obviously, there were winners and losers and many Australians are chuffed at their new found wealth over the years. Others say it is not real wealth because if you sell the million dollar family home you just have to buy another million dollar home somewhere else. Renters are the real losers in this game of inflated asset accumulation. The current housing shortage crisis in Oz has pushed rents through the roof. In combination with the high inflationary CPI last couple of years, poorer Aussies have been doing it tough. Community becomes more important when your wages cannot cover your expenses. The neoliberal vision is OK if you are winning and can afford to pay for everything yourself – then the small government BS may fly for some.

(200907200070HQ)Google Moon Press Conference by NASA HQ PHOTO is licensed under CC-BY-NC-ND 2.0 Corporations Not Paying Taxes Corporations are not paying enough taxes in Western democracies around the globe. These multinationals employ legions of accountants and tax specialists to minimise their tax requirements. We saw with the PwC travesty the government being betrayed by those it had outsourced to work up greater taxing solutions for companies like Uber and Google. This was corporate skull doggery at its finest and once again the white collar crime free zone was on display in the halls of power in Canberra. These folk do not ever pay for their crimes unlike blue collar criminals. 60 Minutes can get on their high horse about bikies and the CFMEU but never seem to worry about the corporate fraud and malfeasance going on all the time at the pointy end of power downunder. These acts are too complex for the media and the police much of the time. Billion dollar frauds and corrupt proceedings carried on with impunity. Greater civic awareness would cast a brighter sunlight on the dodgy practices of accountants, lawyers and pollies. Careerism is at work here too, as young professionals are initiated into the activities of their corporate masters. Whistleblowers are regularly prosecuted in Australia, which does not encourage insiders to speak out.

The NACC & Robodebt The NACC has been a great disappointment so far. It seems that its remit is woefully inadequate. Robodebt, the most heinous illegal betrayal of Australian citizens by its then Coalition government, has resulted in no prosecutions despite vulnerable victims killing themselves. A Royal Commission and now the NACC have both failed to deliver justice for the half a million Australians wrongly targeted by Robodebt. Robodebt was an ideologically motivated attack on welfare recipients by the Coalition federal governments of Tony Abbott, Malcolm Turnbull and Scott Morrison. It was predicated on the inaccurate belief that there were hundreds of thousands of Australians ripping off Centrelink. The Coalition demonised these often poor and vulnerable Australians attacking them in the media for being welfare cheats and dole bludgers. In what may be a foretaste of an AI future, an automated algorithm conflated data from the ATO and Centrelink to accuse 500, 000 Aussies of owing substantial amounts of money to the government. The calculations were incorrect and these people were wrongly chased by debt collectors with the onus being on them to prove they did not owe this money. In many instances, we are talking about thousands of dollars. In despair some individuals committed suicide over their financial situation. Robodebt was found to be illegal and yet senior public servants and politicians kept the scheme running for some 6 years. A settled class action by some victims cost the government $1.8 billion in reparations. No one has paid the price for Robodebt except those wrongly victimised in the first place. Australia repeatedly fails to deliver justice to its citizens with the political class weaselling their way out of it again and again. The political parties of government look after their own backs over all other considerations.   Political expediency gazumps any meaningful social justice time and time again. Careerism in politics is Teflon coated, it seems by the available evidence. Careerism: Self-interest’s acceptable public face sees ongoing omissions and failures by governments of both the main parties. The never ending two party squabbles put paid to most efforts toward progress on issues like climate change, money laundering via international property investment, FOI and whistleblowing law amendments. The consensus they do share is done in backroom deals to protect each other’s arse. The political class are very much into self-preservation downunder. Robert Sudha Hamilton is the author of America Matters: Pre-apocalyptic Posts & Essays in the Shadow of Trump. ©MidasWord