Too much money?

[HobokenSweat]

I like my characters to have jobs. Real ones. Not just as flavor, but as anchors. I kind of expect them to, honestly—it’s one of the first things I decide, usually even before they get a line of dialogue. Carrie works at CVS. So does Valeria. Squirrel is an accountant, buttoned-up and precise in ways that mask chaos. Zach moves boxes in a warehouse and likes the silence. The CVS itself—fluorescent-lit and stocked with mundanity—has served as a stage more than once. A confessional, a battleground, a place where shit happens.

(Unpublished) Lena is a meter maid. I'm not even sure if we have those any longer. Lottie was an author before she died, or more accurately, Greta was an author. Amy P and Amy H work in some office. Even Eudora, (Very) Minor Goddess of Scheduling Conflicts, is technically at work when she's fucking with people's Outlook calendar and Teams invites.

I do have an unpublished story about two women who are so outrageously wealthy that Europe functions more like a house to them. Rome to Berlin is as big a deal as a walk to the kitchen. They flit between cities the way I move from couch to desk. But even with that kind of money, their wealth isn’t an escape from the everyday—it’s a trap that makes the everyday feel fake. The point isn’t that they’ve transcended life’s nonsense, it’s that the nonsense doesn’t even register anymore. Their boredom is a luxury I envy and mistrust at the same time. I guess what I'm saying is, the one time I've used financial security wasn't a crutch, but a story element in and of itself.

 

[old_prof]

The MC in my current series are looking at coming into a great deal of money shortly. Dealing with it and people's reactions to it is a major subplot throughout.

But they both intend on working anyway.

 

[Djmac1031]

I've written at least one rich character off the top of my head.

But I also wrote 30 chapters of The Jenna Arrangement which featured an average guy with an average job, and a college girl struggling to pay for school.

and then there are multiple stories where jobs and money don't come up at all because they're irrelevant.

 

[pink_silk_glove]

Obviously, you haven't read his work. But why bother when you can presuppose what you want?

I have so read his work, but obviously you presuppose what you want.

 

[pink_silk_glove]

Please note, my offering for discussion was not critical of rich protagonists per se. I was only suggesting that many of us use it as a lazy way to resolve story conflicts, rather than being creative and coming up with interesting solutions that don't involve tossing bundles of cash at them. If you want to write a story about a MC who happens to be wealthy, by all means do so, but beware of making that their answer to every problem they run into.

Absolutely true. Like a group of college student friends who drive expensive shiny cars and have orgies in their convenient Jacuzzis. Where does the affluence come from? Doesn't matter. We just want hot tub sex and fancy cars so the wealth is simple convenience for the author. Poor people can still have and do these things but it takes imagination to make that work and imagination requires effort. Let's just make them be rich. Hurry up and give me my red H.

 

[Actingup]

Posted this as a comment to a story, and it occurred to me it might make an interesting discussion topic here.
I've noticed a LOT of stories here-including my own, oops-have main focus characters who are sufficiently independently wealthy to be able to afford whatever they need, or think they need, to be happy. In contrast to the real lives of most of us, who, if not struggling to just survive, don't have that kind of massive financial oomph. I guess it's because it taps into everyone's fantasy to have such economic power. Unfortunately, it operates as a sort of deus ex machina in our stories, allowing our heroes to just buy their way out of any predicament they find themselves in, instead of finding more realistic and/or creative solutions. I gotta work harder on that aspect of my stories.

Yes, it's lazy, and a bit boring considering how overused the billionaire trope is. But there is a place for escapist fantasy.

It’s a trope in the genre in general. Lots of kings, princes, billionaires, and supernatural creatures who can just take what they want.

Not so many love interests who dream of good dental care and pray that the mill doesn’t shut down.

"Trouble at Mill..." - there are so many great stories (and comedy sketches) that lean on economic factors and work situations as plot points. Where would we be without them?

So I think my answer is really "Too many stories, but not all stories..."

 

[StillStunned]

Some stories about poor people:
Rulk the Rat and the Demon Dagger
The Only Flower On Rose Street
What Scabby Saw In The Bathhouse
The Swallow and the Demon

"No money" often equates to "a plot driven by the need for money". If you don't want your story to be about that, then money becomes just another factor to handwave so you can focus on other things to drive the plot or character development.

 

[Kelliezgirl]

I don't really run across many stories where everyone is rich on this site. Perhaps I'm not looking in the right places, but at the end of the day so what?
It isn't laziness, or a lack of creativity, or a mad desire for a red H that drives those decisions. It's a function of the story that you want to tell.
Good stories need conflict, but there are conflicts that are far more interesting than money woes.
You want to write a story about rich college kids, have at. Does creating a back story that Becky's mom comes from old money, and Tabitha's dad is a retired Major League Baseball player require a huge amount of creativity? Nope. If it doesn't advance the plot who cares?
For the most part we are writing short stories, your characters don't need huge backstories, they need enough to feel real, and the details that advance the plot.
One of my middle class characters works in an office. I've never said what she does, because it doesn't matter. She's scheduled things around work, used her Christmas bonus to go shopping, but her actual job is irrelevant because nothing happens at her office. None of her coworkers are part of the story. It just doesn't matter.

 

[pink_silk_glove]

Obviously, you haven't read his work. But why bother when you can presuppose what you want?

I have so read his work, but obviously you presuppose what you want.

I'll take your silence as an apology.

 

[MillieDynamite]

You can take it however you like. But I haven't been on the site since Friday, Saturday was my son's birthday, and Sunday I wrote my brains out. It's simply that I didn't find your statement credible. I've read his work. @Duleigh, the old dog's work has similarities, but they're not the same stories repeated ad infinitum.

I have so read his work, but obviously you presuppose what you want.

 

[feel_the_beast]

I don't really run across many stories where everyone is rich on this site. Perhaps I'm not looking in the right places, but at the end of the day so what?

Not so much everyone in the story, but usually the MC, who uses his money to fix whatever the problem is.
And I run across a lot of them, especially in Romance, for some reason. Three of the last four stories I have selected to read,

Sketches of You
Her Fairy-Tale Life
The Shepherd of Ashburn Court

all have this feature. Good stories all, mind you, but they do fit the stereotype we're discussing. Some of them do use the money another way, as an obstacle to romance in itself.

 

[Duleigh]

You can take it however you like. But I haven't been on the site since Friday, Saturday was my son's birthday, and Sunday I wrote my brains out. It's simply that I didn't find your statement credible. I've read his work. @Duleigh, the old dog's work has similarities, but they're not the same stories repeated ad infinitum.

Thank you @MillieDynamite It's true, it takes a special kind of imagination to say that a retro future Sci-fi space battle between the Martian Space Force and Asteroid Belt Pirates is the same as a male witch and a female wizard without two pennies to rub together becoming so beloved that they end up being crowned king and queen of a tiny mountain kingdom after protecting the world from a planet eating spacebeast and guarding the kingdom from an invasion by dwarves. Where does the May/December mafia murder mystery fit in?

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Now some people will say that there's similarities between Andi's Dream and Stormwatch. That's only because the similarities are intentional.

 

[Kelliezgirl]

Not so much everyone in the story, but usually the MC, who uses his money to fix whatever the problem is.
And I run across a lot of them, especially in Romance, for some reason. Three of the last four stories I have selected to read,

Sketches of You
Her Fairy-Tale Life
The Shepherd of Ashburn Court

all have this feature. Good stories all, mind you, but they do fit the stereotype we're discussing. Some of them do use the money another way, as an obstacle to romance in itself.

Well, perhaps it's because I'm not in the Romance category overly much.