SCAMMING YOUR WAY INTO A FIRST CLASS SEAT

The headline on a Comcast Internet article I saw this morning read, "Trick Your Way On To First Class". An airliner was pictured in the background with a note that indicated the article contained tips on how airline passengers could finagle their way into a first class seat. Flying somewhere is not in my foreseeable future, so I didn't read the article, but the headline made me think about a topic I've been mulling over for some time – our society's affinity for get-rich-quick schemes.

At a time when our nation is experiencing severe economic distress, lotteries have grown more popular by the day. Games with the highest payouts attract the most players despite the fact that the odds of any given individual winning are infinitesimal at best. Casinos and gaming parlors are spreading like wildfires with promises of new found wealth and riches. Almost daily, our newspapers reveal that another Ponzi scheme has been uncovered. What do they all have in common? The promise of riches for next to nothing in return!

Whatever happened to making money the old-fashioned way – by working for it?

I remember the first time I stepped into a jet airplane and started walking down the aisle toward my seat in the rear of the plane. I glanced at the "suits" sitting in the first class section and wondered what kind of work each of those passengers did to earn the kind of money necessary to afford a first-class seat. It didn't occur to me to scam my way into first class or think such a seat would fall into my lap. No, I wondered how much work it would take to earn my way there.

It's not like that anymore. It seems like a lot of people are more interested in the scam than the work, which is regrettable, because society suffers when a day's worth of labor is ignored and devalued. The truth is a nation of workers can become wealthy quicker than a nation of scammers, but it takes effort and appreciation of labor to do so. Those things have been in short supply lately, and unfortunately, our nation has produced little fruit because of it.