Let's face it: Society as we know it is just about over.
It's time we accepted that whatever's on the other side of this worldwide financial crisis will look very different from today's landscape. And it's time we adjusted our expectations accordingly. There may still be a few conservatives out there crowing, "If they really want to work, there's always jobs flipping burgers!" But that's not really true anymore — those positions have all been filled by humanities majors and former Borders employees, and the chains are going out of business anyway.
But don't fret, professionals: You don't have to leave your industry. You will, however, have to adjust your perspective on what kinds of positions are going to be available after The Fall. Welcome to the New Global Economy!
If You Were: A Pharmaceutical Researcher
You Could Be: A Pharmaceutical Research Subject
We're not going to be thrown all the way back to the Stone Age; the masses will always need their opiates of the people (which will almost certainly turn out to be not religion but rather, you know, opiates). Unfortunately, Big Pharma won't be paying lofty salaries to university-trained scientists, especially with a long line of folks ready and willing to have their bodies turned into proving grounds in exchange for something vaguely flammable or maybe a tasty rat on a stick. But with your background, you could probably get bumped right to the front of that line! At least you'll be able to make educated guesses about what those experimental substances are going to do to you.
If You Were: A Real Estate Developer
You Could Be: A Slumlord
The deal for that 26-story condo on Mexico Beach won't ever come to fruition. On the other hand, plenty of forgotten tenements will need someone to keep trickles of semi-potable water running down the slimy outsides of the disused pipes, and the electrical generators full of homemade corn alcohol. In exchange, huddled families will gladly part with whichever of their remaining valuables you fancy. And if they don't, well, there are always others looking to upgrade from mean streets to overcrowded shelters.
If You Were: A Respected Community Leader
You Could Be: Shaman for Your Local Bloodthirsty Future-Primitive Tribe
It doesn't matter if you were a reverend, a City Council member or just the person who ran the non-profit after-school program. If you want to hold on to that power and influence, it's time to sew the bones of your adversaries into your new dreadlocks and go tooling around the neighborhood standing up through the sunroof of the only car within 30 miles that still runs. Sure, kickbacks and respect have been replaced by blood tributes and fear, but look at it this way: the covered-dish socials and regional sporting events are going to be a hell of a lot more ... interesting.
If You Were: A Journalist/Film Director/Author/Musician/Actor/News Anchor
You Could Be: A Wandering Bard
You guys get a comparatively sweet deal in the post-apocalypse economic climate. If you're not immediately harvested for your tender, milky muscles — which have never undergone the gristle-making transformation that comes with actual work — you'll travel the blasted lands, singing songs and spinning tales of The World That Once Was. Your entertaining legends of a time when people drove cars that were also apartments and threw away the parts of the vegetable that didn't taste as good as the other parts will enthrall nomads and territorial warlords alike. (Film producers, however, are fucked, as they couldn't tell a story if their delicious cheek-meat depended on it.)
If You Were: A Lawyer
You Could Be: Dinner
Sorry, esquires. In the near future, no one is really going to be interested in arguing either the letter or the spirit of the law. Semantics that serve as the foundation for a just contemporary society tend to take a backseat to more pressing problems, like fending off radioactive tumors that have learned how to think or the biweekly thunderstorm of ash and skulls. If you really want to help the downtrodden, though, you can always ensure that a few more families have a few more weeks of sustenance. Public service, and all that.
But hey, it's not all bad. Some vocations never go out of style:
If You Were: A Butcher
You Could Be: A Butcher
Every society needs somebody to get the meat from the wild to the fire. You'll just have to bone up on some different types of game — squirrel, pigeon, lawyer...
Read more Scott Harrell at lifeasweblowit.com and dailyloafblog.com.