The USA is not the best place to earn money.2 My own experience suggests that at least Japan, New Zealand, and Australia can all be better. This may be shocking, but young professionals with advanced degrees can earn more discretionary income as a receptionist or a bartender in the Australian outback than as, say, a software engineer in the USA.
As a side question, when did a receptionist or bartender become a “professional”? Is “professional” just used as a class marker, standing for something like “person with a non-vocational 4-year college degree”?
Or is the idea that one is a professional because one is in some sense a software engineer (e.g.), even while employed as a receptionist or bartender?
I read it as “young people employed as professionals can make more money by being not-professionals in the Australian outback”.
But to many, “professional” merely means “someone who is paid to do something”. I think that usage came into the popular consciousness via “professional athlete”, though I’m not sure if that’s the first instance of the popular usage.
ETA: according to OED, the relevant distinction in this usage is “professional” vs. “amateur”, and it was used somewhat in that sense as far back as maybe 1806 (I assert that their earlier citations were meant ironically, or merely by comparison to actual professions).
As a side question, when did a receptionist or bartender become a “professional”? Is “professional” just used as a class marker, standing for something like “person with a non-vocational 4-year college degree”?
Or is the idea that one is a professional because one is in some sense a software engineer (e.g.), even while employed as a receptionist or bartender?
I read it as “young people employed as professionals can make more money by being not-professionals in the Australian outback”.
But to many, “professional” merely means “someone who is paid to do something”. I think that usage came into the popular consciousness via “professional athlete”, though I’m not sure if that’s the first instance of the popular usage.
ETA: according to OED, the relevant distinction in this usage is “professional” vs. “amateur”, and it was used somewhat in that sense as far back as maybe 1806 (I assert that their earlier citations were meant ironically, or merely by comparison to actual professions).