If you're a young person looking for your first job, congratulations! You're about to participate in capitalism. The hours of your labor are probably the first capital you've owned. Treat that capital as a valuable resource that employers should be eager to buy from you.
Take good care of that capital, and do everything you can to make it more valuable, as you would nurse a small flame into a roaring fire. Those hours of labor belong to YOU. Treat them like the valuable property and precious investment they are.
Will you view your employers as customers renting those valuable hours from you, approaching them with good honest salesmanship and customer service? Will you view them as senior partners in an enterprise you have chosen to join?
Or will you look at your employers as tightwads, exploiters, and abusers, treating your work as drudgery you are forced to perform under threat of poverty and starvation? Will you tell yourself every day that your employers "owe" you so much more than they're willing to give?
Will you just punch the clock and collect your money, or will you become personally invested in the success of the enterprise, knowing that you are part of that success for as long as you choose to work there? Will you view work as a miserable chore, or a challenging investment?
This is one of those times when perception can shape reality. No matter your background, this is the moment when you finally command a precious trove of capital, and all the responsibilities that come with ownership. How you choose to view that capital will influence its value.
Now, to the employers, the adults, the people who command most of the wealth in our society: how do you want young people to view their capital? Do you want them to see it as valuable, to see themselves as partners in enterprise rather than drudges or dependents?
It's on us, the older generation, the owners and employers, to make America a place where young people entering the workforce look down at their hands and see gold waiting to be mined from clay. It's on us to build a society where the next generation is eager to be our partners.
It's on us to make the penultimate step into adulthood the glorious discovery that each and every one of us commands great value and has opportunities to invest it - and the responsibility to choose wisely. Make everyone's capital a treasure to be polished until it shines.
And what's the final step into adulthood? Well, that's when you realize the next generation of proud owners brimming with treasure is going to come from YOU. /end
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