I like whatever Mike White (a friend of Jack Black) does. Ever since "Chuck & Buck," "Orange County," "The Good Girl," and "The School of Rock" I've been a fan of his writing, which is always quirky and amazingly original. And his new series on HBO "Enlightened" is fantastic: honest, insightful, filled with an incredible array of complex and realistically fucked-up characters. On a human level, it makes me laugh, cry, sigh in recognition, squirm from awkwardness, nod and shake my head – all within the same episode.
Yet, the economist in me cannot stop being constantly mad at the show's protagonist, Amy Jellicoe (played by always fabulous Laura Dern, who shares the show's executive-production credits with Mr. White). And it's not because I don't believe in the phony enlightenment through expensive retreats and self-help books. It seems that the creative team shares my opinion on this issue - the persistent cracking of the artificial facade exposes the impossibility of achieving peace in the realm of contemporary American existence, plagued by social and monetary fights for survival. What really makes this CFO frustrated is the fact that this woman DOESN'T PERFORM ANY WORK, BUT STILL GETS PAID.
There is nothing wrong with coming to realization that there are important things in your life beyond the job. Take if from me, most people work for a paycheck, not for self-realization, including those at the very top of the business hierarchy. That's a sad truth about our lives. However, "WORK" is an operative word. Coming to the office whenever, occupying yourself with personal matters throughout the day, and then waltzing out smiling before anybody else, like Amy does - there is only one word to classify that kind of an attitude: STEALING.
If the job heavily bears on your psyche and you feel that you will not be able to tolerate the meaningless work for one extra second, leave and quit getting paid. That's the honest thing to do. And Amy does find a job, which agrees with her newly-acquired outwardly predisposition. Guess what? It pays only $25K a year and she "cannot survive on that!" If only she could continue getting the regular direct deposits from the bad-wolf corporation, while contributing her time at the shelter – that would be a blissful combination!
Amy seems like a person who wouldn't be toiling for eight hours in front of a computer screen even for the most noble purpose – it's just too much for an "enlightened" person. But she especially despises the fact that her department analyses the employees performance metrics. I am not going to judge here what the corporation does with the results – there is not enough information in the show to do so, only vague hints. Yet, I can definitely say that there is nothing wrong with productivity analysis per se. Companies of all shapes and sizes must to do that, if they want to survive and prosper.
Socialist countries provided most people with work (albeit at incredibly low salaries), regardless of their efforts. Many people there would come to places of employment without any impulse to attend to their jobs. Look what happened to those economies! It's people like Amy Jellicoe who end up at Zuccotti park hanging out and screaming about the disappearance of the middle class, while the real members of that class continue going to work, doing their jobs, helping their businesses to survive. Those, who don't want to work are the reason why the quality of products and services continuously goes down, why the economy deteriorates right in front of our eyes.
The Frustrated CFO 