Money doesn't grow on trees

It's true what they say... Money (sadly) doesn't grow on trees. And although there are people in this world with the capability to do so, most of us average working people can't print our own money either. At least, not to a convincing degree of quality. (Not that I've tried or anything)

But before we make such a bold statement like 'Money doesn't grow on trees' let's take a step back and think about things.

Now I don't live under a rock. With unemployment rates at 10.2% (as of today, November 10, 2009) and an actual unemployment rate of almost 17% (figures in things like underemployment) money is not easy to come by. Moonlighting jobs serving drinks and appetizers to hungry bar-goers aren't even available anymore. Being on the wait staff at a restaurant was always a great way to make a few extra bucks when things at the day job got a little hard. But no more.

Landing a "run-of-the-mill" retail job around the holidays has turned into a fiercely competitive game of resumes, experience and plain old luck. When you have to "know someone" to get a job as a part time, weekend cashier in the mall, you know things out there are pretty tough.

But sadly, money doesn't grow on trees.

There are plenty of cost cutting measures a person or family can take to help streamline their finances. Buying generic brand food at the grocery store, using things like pre-tax Health Savings Accounts to curb the out of pocket expenses of medical care (like over the counter drugs, and co-pays), carpooling to work or (if possible) walking or riding a bike to work. Eating out less is a big one too.

But these cost cutting measures create a problem. A revenue problem. If you and I go out to eat less then the neighborhood pizza shop will need less employees, which means less jobs, which leads us back to the original problem of finding a job in the first place. It's a Catch 22 really.

But money doesn't grow on trees. Or does it?

Well no it doesn't. But tell that to the young boy who lives in one of the houses down the street from the office building where I work. Today, as I was walking from the parking lot he came running over to me with a rake and a box of 30-gallon contractor garbage bags in his hand. He wanted to know if we needed our leaves raked.

Now I'm just an account executive. I don't make the big decisions like where we get the water cooler water from, what kind of paper towels we buy, and who rakes our leaves. So I told him to wait a moment and I talked to one of the guys inside. I took 20 bucks out of the petty cash drawer and went back down to the parking lot.

I told the young entrepreneur that we would pay him 20 bucks to rake the leaves from our walk way and parking area, bag them, and leave them by the dumpster out back. His eyes lit up.

I remember when I was a kid I mowed the lawn of the guy down the street. He paid me 20 dollars to do it once a week. Eventually his neighbor asked if I would be willing to cut his lawn. He would even supply the gas for the mower! Before I knew it I was 11 years old earning 40 bucks a week to walk around my neighbors' lawns for a few hours on Saturdays. I worked hard all summer and eventually saved up enough money to buy myself a snowboard. Now that I finally owned my own board, I didn't have to rent one from the ski slope every week. Life was good.

I saw that same look in the boy's eyes when I told him we would pay him 20 bucks to take care of our leaves. And that he did. He raked up the entire parking area, stuffed it all into bags and 3 hours later he was 20 dollars richer.

So when people say 'Money doesn't grow on trees' of course they're right. It doesn't, it never has, and it never will. Money is something that is earned through hard work and dedication. It's the fruit of our labor, not the fruit that grows freely in the back yard. It's something we strive to make more of, something that hurts us when we don't have enough, and something that dictates not who we are as people, but in some ways how we live as people.

No, money doesn't grow on trees... but talk to the young boy down the road. Right now I can see him outside of my office window raking the leaves of one of the other businesses down the street. For him, opportunity grows on trees... and that's worth way more than the 20 bucks we paid him.