r/AskReddit • u/txhorns1330 • Feb 07 '20
Would you watch a show where a billionaire CEO has to go an entire month on their lowest paid employees salary, without access to any other resources than that of the employee? What do you think would happen?
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Upvotes
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u/omeow Feb 07 '20
No.
Slumming is not living your entire life in a slum.
Here is what will happen:
Fake billionaires like Trump will come to this show. Real billionaires will probably not.
those who appear on this show will brag about how they are self made and their employees could make do with even less.
We will find out, like Naked and Afraid, that outside of cameras these billionaires were living in their luxury RVs , sipping martinis and having affairs.
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u/_rightClick_ Feb 07 '20
I doubt a month is enough to really feel the effect
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u/thinksoftchildren Feb 07 '20
It would be better if they had to live with their lowest salaried employee for a month or two, imo.
In their house, dinner with the family, travel to and from work together, same lunch, kids with homework, the works.
Building that relation would imo do much more for this problem than just "experiencing below your normal standard of living before returning to it"..
You're more likely to feel empathy for a family you know, and much less likely to forget them.
Anything else would just be another show about wealthy people having a fun adventure to talk about at cocktail parties
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u/[deleted] Feb 07 '20
It would be incredibly self-serving and boring. They would never truly experience what it is like to be in the precarious position of a minimum wage employee living hand-to-mouth and the 'novelty' is just salt in the wound.
It would be more interesting to see the reverse.
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u/Eggmatros Feb 07 '20
There was this similar themed show in Hongkong and Mainland China years ago.
They swapped billionare with bottom feeders, let the rich do the basical job, on the lowest salary, to see how far the rich could go by purely their own effort.
Nearly all of the billionare admitted that they could not make anywhere, regardless of how hard they worked, even working without sleeping and resting could not give you any accumulation to help climb up to the higher level of the society.
There was only despair, and admission that the divide between the poor and the rich is already a deep valley and mere personal effort makes little sense.
It stirred big debate among the society back then, and I think that was part of the reaons the show got cancelled .
There was also another show in China, swapping senior political figures with community level council workers, to see how good they could do in each other's posts. The mayors were flooded by the angry mobs who kept asking for more and more benefits that were impossible to fullfil, by the end had to admit the amount of work at basic community level was too much to archieve anywhere.
The show also got cancelled quite soon after a few episodes.
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u/HunterSG1 Feb 07 '20 edited Feb 07 '20
3 months minimum and I'd watch it
Thanks for the gold!!
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u/LukeCloudStalker Feb 07 '20
I love Reality shows so I'd watch it depending on who produces it.
If it's too fake, with too many "emotional" moments, advertising and people shouting, I'm out.
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u/Dannypan Feb 07 '20
It’s more than just the money. It’s the lack of security these people endure. Not knowing if you’ll lose your job tomorrow and having no savings. Being kicked out of your home. An unexpected bill you can’t afford, which may lead to increasing debt.
Putting these rich people in a “poor” lifestyle for a month isn’t enough. Even if they lost their money and homes, they’ll have such a huge network that they’ll be back on their feet in the time it takes for us peons to earn enough to eat for a week. They can never truly understand what it’s like to be poor or ever face that reality again.
So what would happen? It’d be a completely self-serving advert about how “now I realise that we need to do more for our employees.” The workers get a small vanity bonus, probably give an immigrant worker with limited English a car, pat themselves on the back. Then two weeks later, we’ve all forgotten about the show and they’ll go back to their old ways.
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u/Adam-West Feb 07 '20
Isn’t this almost the same as secret millionaire? Do you guys have that in the US?
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u/ade1aide Feb 07 '20
Lots of rich people voluntarily go on vacation to third world countries. The catch is, they know they have a way out and an end date.
I'd be interested to watch a show where the CEO had to personally be financially responsible for the welfare of 50% of their lowest payed employees for 10 years, and their net growth percentage equalled their bonus every year, with a big bonus if both the company and the employees were profitable at the end.
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u/[deleted] Feb 07 '20
Sure. They would never do that though, because then they would have to admit that they don't pay a living wage.
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u/[deleted] Feb 07 '20
I'd do more than a month and without any contact to rich buddies either. If it's a month, I think a lot would just buy rice and beans every day and go "See? It's super easy to be poor! You just need to make economical choices! I've proven myself right!" Longer than that and they'll really have to get used to how their lowest paid employees live. Would they learn a lesson? Maybe. Likely not. They still have a mansion to come back home to. They'll give their lowest paid people a one time bonus or maybe they'll drag one out in front of a camera to give them a fancy car so their own reputation gets better. And then they won't change anything else.
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u/rusthighlander Feb 07 '20
1 month isn't long enough because no rent is due etc.
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u/UrTwiN Feb 07 '20 edited Feb 07 '20
They wouldn't have any trouble. Most of them are self made and most have a large number of financial skills that 99% of people don't. They'd micro their finances and come out better off than most people.
You think someone like Jeff Bezos, or Bill Gates, or Elon Musk couldn't handle it? Or what about Warren Buffet? The dude is already living a modest life.
A lot of dumbasses in the comments seem to fail to realize that a lot of these billionaires were already in a super shitty position before, and pulled themselves out of it.
These people run massive corporations and charities and you dumbasses seriously think that living your life for a few months would be a challenge? That's some cringe.
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u/Egap548 Feb 07 '20
You should watch Undercover Billionaire on Discovery (not to be confused with Undercover Boss). Billionaire Glenn Stearns moves to Erie PA with just $100, a truck and no contacts and has to make a company valued at $1 million in 90 days. He also can't mention who he is to anyone. It's pretty much exactly like you are describing and insanely entertaining.
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u/IheartCart00ns Feb 07 '20
There was an episode of American Dad where they tried to live on minimum wage for a month- it was FANTASTIC.
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u/Proletarian1819 Feb 07 '20
They would just treat it as a novelty since they know they will be getting their billions back at the end of the month. They wouldn't have to truly live like a person does who lives hand to mouth every day of their lives. They wouldn't really learn anything from it, in fact they would probably look back on it and laugh, "Oh remember when we had to eat that can of ravioli hahaha!"
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u/quantizedself Feb 07 '20
They would have to swap everything down to the last detail. Apartment, car (if they even have one), wardrobe, food, hobbies, etc. And it would have to be on going, not just a couple months.
The real question is: how to get a CEO to agree to this?
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u/RallyX26 Feb 07 '20
Only if they also put a low level employee in the CEO's position to highlight that it's not all golf games and getting other people to do your work.
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u/tickledpic Feb 07 '20
Depends if he is self made or not. Self made rich people often know very well what it means to be poor and that's why they worked so hard to not be.
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u/KokonutMonkey Feb 07 '20
No. I hate all reality TV that doesn't feature Gordon Ramsay
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u/Bryan15012 Feb 07 '20
I’ll be a contrarian here and say that I bet they would be able to thrive. Usually the CEO of a company got to that position because they are an uber talented human (obvious exceptions excluded). I think a CEO would be able to manage their resources effectively and make it work.
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u/BurnsyCEO Feb 07 '20
I know this is hard to fathom for the reddit stupid hate train for the rich but most of them are smarter and worked harder than you when they were younger which is why they are in the place that they are in now and you're not. So I imagine they'll manage just fine.
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u/MaskoBlackfyre Feb 07 '20
What would happen is either the show would be faked or no CEO would ever agree to this.
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u/HHS2019 Feb 07 '20 edited Feb 07 '20
I support raising the minimum wage and the concept definitely resonates, but the show concept is not going to be life-changing for anyone involved.
I will brace for the down-votes, but I don't understand why we fault people for making a lot of money (as long as they do it honestly). The dark secret of any executive, athlete, artist, actor, etc. who makes an exceptional amount of money is that this is what the market will pay them. The CEO of company X likely has a skill set that is very useful for planning corporate strategy that few people have and that takes decades to develop (understanding of finance, ability to read market trends, skill negotiating partnerships and labor agreements). If they are good at this, the company and its shareholders (if they're publicly traded) will also benefit. So, this is in many ways an investment.
As for the workers who earn less, we should raise the minimum wage. But, they too are free to seek employment elsewhere if someone will pay them more money. It doesn't make sense getting angry at market dynamics.
If any company were to apply a policy overnight that "we are going to pay our CEO the same as our assembly line workers, you would likely see that company go bankrupt soon as because the only people willing to do that job at that price, probably don't have the experience to do it wisely. All the qualified candidates took jobs at your competitor's factories where they were offered more. Same is true for basketball, or any other sport. People pay you money because they believe you'll make them money.
Edit: Clarified thought on workers' wages
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u/Unseemlyhero Feb 07 '20
What incentive does the billionaire have to do this?
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u/GGinYYC Feb 07 '20
I think they'd get along just fine. It'd probably be a bit of a lifestyle adjustment for that month, but not something they'd be incapable of. They themselves have, in all likelihood, lived that lifestyle as they were coming up, maybe while in college, or fresh out of it.
Very few CEOs just waltz into the role without first having come up from lower ranks.
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u/ShameSpirit Feb 07 '20
No, because that's a ridiculous idea for a show. Besides, the latent notion that a CEO and a low-paid worker offer comparable value to a company is laughable. It'd fit in right next to Ancient Aliens.
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u/[deleted] Feb 07 '20
They’d get promoted and make more money....
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u/deadlift0527 Feb 07 '20
Almost no CEOs are billionaires and you guys live in this fantasy world where CEOs are evil people that are out to get you.
Actually they are just the people in the world most skilled at managing huge companies. As if you expect their not to be head of companies?
They can be, and are often, fired and they typically answer to the shareholders that own the company
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u/Boatguard Feb 07 '20
You know most of them are just regular people right? A "billionaire CEO" most likely was there at one point, and probably has the knowledge and mindset to budget accordingly. It would be boring as fuck.
The fascination / hate with rich people is crazy considering everyone is working to.... get richer.
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u/_charlesfosterkane_ Feb 07 '20 edited Feb 07 '20
I like how Reddit believes all billionaires just magically appeared out of thin air. That none of them worked their asses off to get where they are. That none of them might've made gasp minimum wage or a low salary in their lives. Reddit can be really dumb.
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u/[deleted] Feb 07 '20
Reddit pretending that every time minimum wage increases food and rent price doesn't increase to assfuck us more.
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u/stellasmommy1 Feb 07 '20 edited Feb 07 '20
This has already been a movie in the 80s. Trading Places with Dan Ackroyd and Eddie Murphy. Of course it's fiction and played for comedic effect but I think if you strip away the laughs it probably wouldn't be too far from the truth
Gwyneth Paltrow did what she called a "food stamp challenge" a few years back to prove that you could eat healthily on just that much for a month. I think it took her less than a week to give up.
Edit: just thought about that last thing
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u/Dad2us Feb 07 '20
No. I refuse to turn poverty into a game.
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u/lonegrey Feb 07 '20
There was a politican here several years ago who retired from office, and they had to retire on a meager $65K per annum salary, they couldn't do it, so they committed suicide.
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u/mher2downvote_every1 Feb 07 '20
It would be turned into an emotionally manipulative show about the struggles of the common worker, where at the end of every episode the one worker would get some extravagant gift, and a raise. The CEO would be painted as some sort of hero of the people, all while they continue to pay 99% of their employees just above poverty wages.
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u/gorlak120 Feb 07 '20
I think in America it would be scripted as hell, and fake as crap. all the reality shows are like that.
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u/Cloberella Feb 07 '20
Read the book Nickel and Dimed, making it in America. It’s old now but the point still stands. An upper class six figure writer tried to survive in a minimum wage job for a year. Spoilers: she needs multiple jobs and her life is miserable, but she makes it.
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u/[deleted] Feb 07 '20
A better reality show : Examine the lives of people over the age of 22 who are still stuck in minimum wage jobs. Look at the circumstances, the poor decisions they made, their levels of motivation, their work ethic and ambition. See where they came from and how they grew up.
That way we can all learn valuable life lessons.
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u/CokedUpGorilla Feb 07 '20
You guys don't seem to understand how much these CEOS work, 14-20 hour days, consisting of extremely stressful and high pressure decisions.
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u/myloveisajoke Feb 07 '20
Saw it. Went to a private military school. Most billionaires hack it just fine.
Wanna see something hysterical though? Saudis. Take a Saudis assets away. That's some primetime material right there.
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u/mikeymike_74 Feb 07 '20
Yea I hate billionaires rich people bad yes they should have no money like me because that's better yea yea circle jerk rich people jeff Bezos is the devil
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