Interesting article.

What that tells me is that $80K removes you from frantic scurrying about for survival, and adding more money to that is of no extra help.

I have at times been surprised at some of the things they have left for me to see. However, I build relationships with my ladies. I love them and they love and trust me. In fact when I got sick last year and could not work for a month after surgery, all of my ladies gave me cash to help me get through. Two of them were for $500.00.

to someone who did these things.

The OP seems to be trying to pretend all rich people are inherently flawed or that their sexual preferences are somehow something to point at and sneer with a holier than thou attitude.

I work for both rich and poor people and some of the rich people are the nicest people you could want to meet. They have bought my children presents at the holidays or kids magazine subscriptions or gone out of their way to help me get something done when I needed something.

My wife recently ran into something with our car and a client of mine who owns a body shop fixed it like brand new for nothing. Would not let me pay him.

This article reads like an attempt to pretend you are better than rich people simply because they are rich and that that somehow makes them deviant.

I don't work for a company. I get all my clients by referral which means that the people I work for are responsible for sending me new clients. My job is to help make their lives easier and I make damn good money doing it (between 20 and 40 an hour) depending on how long it takes me to clean a home. I don't think any of the people I work for think I am beneath them nor do I think they are deviant in any way. They are busy women with busy lives for the most part. Many are older people just trying to maintain their independence and I am the only person that comes to their homes on a regular basis. Their eyes light up when they see me and often don't even care if I clean. They're happy I'm there to share a cup of coffee and chat for a while and many of them have given me so much more than just a paycheck.

I have 16 homes I clean on a bi-weekly basis and I'm usually done for the day around noon. One of my ladies came home a couple of weeks ago while I was still there and I let her know that I had cleared her bath tub drain that was slow going down. She looked at me and asked "is there anything that you don't do?"

But never would I ever stoop so low as to go through their personal belongings and write about them in the manner of the person who wrote the article did.

And joy in serving others, and those who are humiliated by serving others therefore have to make themselves feel better about their humiliation.

Anyone who takes advantage of those who pay their wages is low in character.

one is a position of power, one isn't.

that these sad things could happen to poor people. Having a miscarriage or losing a spouse or child.

Having more prescription bottles meant they could afford the medication. I suppose the idea is the stress gave them more illnesses.

She and her husband founded a medical technology company in the seventies that took off. She is as nice as can be. Her husband is okay, but a bit of a tool. Of the four kids, two have multiple divorces, one is a recovering addict, and one turned out relatively normal. Interestingly, most of the grandkids seem to be relatively down to earth.

I wouldn't hire this person for any job.

She's excited that her writing is finally getting out there after 20 years.

Yeah, Stephanie Land, you've just fallen into the clickbait world of dishonest bullshit hateful crap. Embellishing, exaggerating, hyperbole for the clicks. It's sickening.

The sad part is she seems like a really good person. Odds are 90% of that stupid article are exaggerations and stupidities.

Unprofessional, unethical, just plain wrong. Makes me wonder if who she works for or worked for will see what she wrote.

It reads like someone with a sad life who needs to make themselves feel better by mocking the sadness in other people's lives.

beats the heck out of being poor and miserable.

- Sophie Tucker

By "rich" I mean 6-figure income (in the 1970s) and a big house on the hill. By poor, I mean living in a dumpy one-room slum apartment, divorced and alone on minimum wage (in the 1980s).

My experience was that I was happier, and had more real friends when I was poor. I was working manual labor that keep me physically fit, and supplied with just enough money for rent and food, and I had neighbors who all knew each other, and pitched in to help each other whenever any need arose. In the house on the hill I was surrounded by insular snobs who had no use for neighbors beyond fodder for gossip.

Now I'm at the low end of the middle, (technically, below the poverty line, but not really) retired and living with no income other than Social Security, with the advantage that I own my small 2-bedroom home free and clear. That lets my SS go a long ways, so I am by no means impoverished, in spite of my tiny income.

And again, in my current lower-lower-middle class neighborhood, I'm surrounded by super nice neighbors who all know each other, and are quick with the helping hand.

Rich people just suck, either as "friends" or as neighbors.

about that, my friend.

I do disagree with your generalization about rich people, however - some of them suck, some don't. Some poor people suck - like you, my opinions represent 'my truth', and I'd never argue either that my opinions are 'correct' nor that your opinions are wrong.

I like that Sophie Tucker quote, because it does succinctly sum up my experience.

Mostly because, in general, they are not always true. And in some cases, not often true. So I stand corrected. My experience shapes my attitudes, and attitudes are not facts.

especially if they are wealthy.

People with a moral compass do not have to think twice.

So if her own conscience doesn't stop her, the possibility of nanny cams might do the trick.

its a good thing I'm not wealthy!

As a surprise my husband hired a woman to clean our house a few times after our first baby was born. But, I wound up doing more cleaning before she came because I was embarrassed for her to see the house in its natural state at that point. Lol! I'd just rather do stuff myself, especially clean toilets -- yech, the thought of a stranger doing that ... no thanks!

I have on who comes every two weeks cuz I don't do toilets, bathtub, floors or vacuum where this cleaner does. It is the best money spent.

It isn't possible to do that for years and not "snoop" (notice highly personal facts in plain sight), and that is far from being the defining factor of one's "conscience". There are far, far worse things that one can do. Polls on the issue indicate, that an overwhelming majority of people will "snoop", if given the opportunity.

I thought the tone of the article was ridiculous, as if the things she noticed and cited about her clients in her article, were unique to rich people or 'bad' in some way. I didn't care for her implied claim to moral superiority, either.

No worries.

She specifically said that instead of just straightening up a pile of papers she would look through it. Also, I doubt any part of her cleaning duties included counting the number of pills someone had or looking through someone's nightstand or going through an overnight visitor's luggage.

There is a difference between being in plain sight and what she claims she did. I work in private homes and have never looked through piles of paper, opened nightstands, searched for stashes. I see piles of papers out in the open and don't look at what is on them unless that is a specific part of my job.

And besides cleaning I usually ended up talking non-stop with lonely elderly people. Needless to say I did not make much money.

I had an elderly woman refer to me as "her friend",and she and another client always had lunch for me. I made enough money for the weekend fun during college and I liked cleaning because I did it all on my own time listening to music and it kept me fit.

mothers and I would never have violated their trust by snooping and pawing thru their things!

and who have made it a point to stop in every other place they've worked to tell us not to go there. For one thing, you spend nearly all your paycheck renting a little studio apartment or you spend it commuting from 50-100 miles away. For another, most of your patients need to be detoxed for a week or so before their medical problems can be addressed.

When you've got enough money to buy anything you want and no fear that the wolf will ever show up at your door, you're left with yourself and for too many people, it's just not enough. When they're younger, they try to fill the empty spot with more and more hoarded money. That doesn't work, so as they get older, they collect prescriptions and eat pills like candy.

People are supposed to want to get rich so they'll end up on easy street and life will be good all the time. I have been deeply grateful to my dad since his death that he left me enough to live on but not enough to ruin my life. There are still a few things far out of my reach.

I read this one and was not impressed.

That's kind of messed up.

My comment was a rhetorical one directed at the narrator of the OP.

I find the pill checking to be odd.

when someone a woman told her she miscarried. How difficult is it to say, for someone who is articulate, "I'm so sorry". And I can't believe she actually published under her own name. She seems is have no clue as to how reprehensible it is to snoop and then be so brazen as to write about it.

....and if I were checking the author's resume online and came on that article under her name, she would not get the job, no matter what her training at that point.

the residents talk to me, I listen, they confide in me, I keep my mouth shut. they seem to like me.

last year when my wife was diagnosed with cancer they gave me over $6000.00 in cards and envelopes.

I don't care what they do among themselves, I have a job to do and I respect their space. I don't touch anything
except for what I work on.

These hateful angry people who do nothing but spread their negativity don't realize it, but they are the real losers in life.

I am a home health nurse and sometimes that is pretty much a maid and personal attendant.

I consider myself an advocate for my patient. I don't snoop, I dont judge. I give the best care I know how to give. My job does not entitle me to higher wages because Mrs. P. spends triple the amount on cosmetics than my salary. I give the same care and concern to my wealthy patients as I do to those who are only covered by government subsidy.

Im neither rich nor poor, but I wouldn't want this person working in my home.

this gal has some serious issues

even if she worked for nothing.
Disgrace.

I just filled in for their regular housekeeper who was having a baby and took a maternity leave. I will never do it again, but it was good for the experience. They were rabid Republicans, had photos of themselves with Reagan and Nancy at one of his inaugurals. They must have given him loads of money to have all the personal memorabilia that they had of the Reagans. The wife was an alcoholic so I was always cleaning up her messes. Otherwise, I enjoyed their beach front views on my breaks. But I will never do it again.

A tight lipped friend has done pest control for decades. One day on the golf course he remarked that people think they are very clever in the ways they hide their secrets, whether it be mounds of cash, bags of dope, weapons, and even love letters. He loosely said: My job is to think like a bug and to hide where no one is going to look for me - that is why I am good at what I do. At the same time it makes me good at finding what they're trying to hide.

I didn't ask for details and he didn't offer. Someone without bad intent could and would be finding those little secrets of your life; if it isn't locked up it isn't so much of a secret.

I don't buy lottery tickets, or enter Publisher's Clearinghouse drawings. And if a Nigerian Prince offers me millions, I turn him down. I don't want to take the chance of becoming wealthy and ruining my simple, happy, uncomplicated life with money.

As a beneficial side effect, being non-greedy makes a person pretty scam-proof, since so many scams are based on the greed of the victim.

First, to be clear, we pay a competitive wage, including our FICA obligations. Everything paid directly; no front man taking a cut. Nothing under the table.

Second, there would be nothing you'd find in our house to suggest that we weren't living a happy life.

I'm the guy who manicures those lawns and builds all those gorgeous hardscape features into the landscape. I would never spy or look into anyone's belongings, phones or diaries.

I hope this person gets over this. Some of the rich people I work for, including my boss, paid for their success with blood and sweat and tears and came up the same way I'm trying to come up. There are others, however, with trust funds and right wing entitlements.

The world is a tough place. I decided to count my lucky stars for good health and a numerous family to offset the idea I might not ever be rich. Besides, being a lustful and gluttonous individual, its better I make crap for money. I'm in my place and I know where that is and enjoy it.

The more you have the more you have to worry about.

In Palm Beach, FL the "old money" which has been handed down for generations are gracious and generous (albeit patriarchal) with their household help while the "new money" are the most snobbish and show no responsibility for those they hire. That seems to be the reputation around here. Noblesse oblige?

like my boss and I know he's just using me for a draft horse. In the meantime, like you pointed out, the old money in town that's been in town for generations, from the pioneers can be generous. I've been tipped 500$ twice now for jobs done for them on the side. They want me to slow down, enjoy the work and offer cocktails after work, reminding me, "the boss isn't here now."

I try not to discuss politics with her because we're liberal Dems and she's a GOP supporter. But a few weeks ago she started telling us how much she loves our wacko Tea Party governor LePage because he won't waste money feeding poor kids of lazy parents. This is a woman who lives in a trailer, to whom we give a $200 bonus every Christmas, and she's mad about freeloading poor kids. Hubby told her, "We disagree, so let's not talk about this again," ending the conversation.

I just thought it was weird that we're the Dems and she's the one supporting the GOP. But we'd never fire her because she's been with us so long.

and I was always in the house when they cleaned. I did not like the possibility that they might be snooping into things that were none of their business.

"So if money can't buy happiness
I guess I'll have to rent it"

LOL from his song "this is the life". It's a rare original from him.

I guess the "client" missed when she reached out, just as she miscarried her baby. And the author didn't know what to say? That's cold. That's really cold.

My most regular client had me come twice a week for a few hours. Along with cleaning, I folded the laundry of a mother, father, and two young sons and put it away. The mother came out from her office once to pay me, and asked if I knew of any midwives in town. "I'm pregnant," she said. "I can't believe I'm telling you this; you're the first person I've told besides my husband."

We talked for a bit while I cleaned her stainless steel appliances and granite countertops in the kitchen. ....

A week or two after she told me about the pregnancy, I noticed spots of blood by the toilet. She told me about the miscarriage when I left. I acted as if I didn't already know. She slouched. I wasn't sure what to say.

If this is true, she's an awful person. But, the weirdest thing about the article is that she never goes on to describe in any way why what she saw suggests that money lead to any unhappiness for these people.

An old man whose wife had passed away? Drug addictions? Sexual dysfunction?

Based on her premise that she would "never want to be rich", you have to assume that she's saying these situations were caused by money...They clearly aren't.

Yeah, that's going to lead to some great insight.

What garbage. A woman reaches out to another after her miscarriage and she can't say anything? Rich people can afford pills. I bet a lot more poor people would take a lot of pills too if they could.

I guess her decision to get a creative writing degree made her bitter towards those that didn't.

and did it for years. Most of the people were middle class but worked full time and needed helfp with cleaning. Some were wealthy but there has to be some trust on both sides and it's so WRONG to do such a thing when these people are trusting you in their home. I would never have violated their trust or privacy in such personal way!