Well, it looks like I'm done with the corporate world.

[DFW]

18. This is a fascinating thread for me

Being overseas, the American job scene is far removed from me, and I’m glad I don’t have to contend with it. The closest I came was about 20 years ago when a relative with a job with a contractor doing sensitive stuff for the US government was let go at about age 50 in a « minor restructuring. » Well, it took them about a year to figure out that they needed him more than they thought, and they hired him back. He retired at 67 four years ago, and they were sorry to see him go.

Jobwise, I find I have painted myself into a corner. When I started out, I was one of the oldest (at 23!) of maybe twelve 20-somethings, near Boston, having a good time traveling a lot, and enjoying a narrow niche field. This was 1975. I asked for more time off to visit a fantastic German girlfriend I had met the year before. The forward-looking top guy said, “tell you what, make it work jobwise, and take all the time over there you want.” Well, here we are, exactly fifty years later. I’m still working for the same outfit, same guys running it. Only: now we are 900 people worldwide, based in Dallas, with offices in six European countries, Japan, Hong Kong, Canada, both coasts of the USA, as well as the Midwest and our HQ in Dallas. It’s still fun, and I still love the travel (was in Spain and Portugal last week). My German residence has led to a 73% total income tax rate—with zero German health insurance or pension— which I am trying to dispute, so far with no success.

That fantastic German girlfriend that I met in 1974 is now my fantastic German wife—I have at least 3 DU witnesses—and frankly, I’d like to envision retirement in the future. Men in my family tend not to live beyond 80, and I’m 73. The pay is good, the vacation is a minimum of 6 weeks, and even that is stretchable if you can get stuff done. But I brought, even at 23, a special set of skills to the table, and refined and expanded them over the years. I can’t find a replacement, despite what Clemenceau said (the cemeteries are full of irreplaceable people, all of whom have been replaced).

The bare basic requirements needed are an ability to detect counterfeit money of most forms dating back 2500 years, a willingness to travel a LOT, an EU work and residence permit, and written and spoken competence in English, Spanish, French, Italian, Dutch, Russian, German and at least one Scandinavian language (the three main ones are very similar). That’s about it. We don’t care about your age, gender, color or planetary origin. You’d think the line of eager applicants would be stretched around the block, right?

Where is Georges Clemenceau when you need him?