Contagionomics and Its Implication to the House Maids (a case study) ;)

I’m free to create a new term. It’s a free country, isn’t it? :P

Let us start with the definition. Economy is a study which subject to the behaviour of a human creatures to fullfill their needs by a scarcity of resources, while contagious is a tendency to spread anything from one person to another..

And the combination of them? It’s called.. CONTAGIONOMICS!

It all begun with the biggest change in my life. From a single guy, who always thought about three things (myself, myself.. and myself only.. ;P), and suddenly right now those three things change into myself, my wife (can I say Wives? Hey Honey, don’t look at me like that! :P) and my kids (or the future ones), and we’re all living in a our own new-small-and-far-from-big-but-it-is-OK home. And, such change creates a very biggest problem in finding the most precious treasure on earth..

THE FULLY HOUSE MAID!

And, what does it have to do with Contagionomics?

Well, please look at these two cases:

1st case:

In honoring the theory of recommendation, I contacted my mom’s maid (let’s call her.. Mbak). Mbak has been working to us for 7 years. She directly contacted her nephew of 17 Years old in Salatiga (a small town in Central Java) and asked her to work for me. Then, her nephew rejected our offer. She just wants to be a worker in a factory around her neighborhood. We had a chance to argue her by phone. We offered her a salary of RpX (sorry, I really have to keep this in a secret, in order to keep my bargaining power.. ;p) by realizing that the factory offer her of 1.3 times than RpX. But, we also revealed such facts that she doesn’t need to spend money for her own meal and the other groceries needs, not to mention that we will cover her medical expenses, fully. In a short, we offered many things that she has to fulfill by her own should she choose to work in factory. At the end, I ended my argumentation by a conclusion that we offer greater NET annual income than the factory does. So, what did she say?

“I just wanted to work in a factory even I know that job can’t offer the things as good as you’ve offered. But, I need to work around my hometown, like most of my friend. And, I still need to socialize with them, to keep up date with them, and also I just want to have a job like them who works from 9 to 5, the working hours that I’M DEFINETLY SURE you can offer to me should I accept the job as your fully house maid..”

Girl, I’m sorry to tell you that you’ve been the victim of ‘Contagionomics’. Please blame your ‘contagious’ friend.. ;P

2nd case:

Failing in persuading her nephew, Mbak moved into someone else. Still, around her hometown. And, she got a candidate, her relatives, a woman of 18 years old. At the first time, she said yes to our offer. We smiled, but later on the smile didn’t last long when she contacted us two days after, “I’m going to Jeddah and will have a job as TKI (TKI is a term of Indonesian Expatriate who operates in a third or fourth class job there)”. To my surprise, I also argued her stands with the Spirit of 45! I told her that the risk of working there is big, not to mention it is also far away from her homeland. You know what she said? “You have to face the risk to have big return, Sir.. High risk, high return..” Was she trying to mock me? I didn’t care. I didn’t stop until that. I also argued that even the salary offered is big around there, I told her the fact that life economic index will reduce her salary and she has just nothing much to be saved for building her life in her hometown for the future. Did she give up to me? No! In fact, she continued:

“My neighbor works there too. She said, she just could save around 50% of her annual salary, but she can afford to build a nice house and owning two motorcycles for her brothers. I’ve been told by her that the value of our currency is weak, therefore you have to work more than 10 years in Indonesia to have a house and the other assets you dream about. But, working as TKI gives you a benefit of saving by using that currency advantages. Not more than 2-3 years, you can have such things, and after that, is up to me, will I continue my adventure there, or should I stop and come back to Indonesia? Oh, by the way, Sir, the life index in Arabia is not as big as you described. Big Mac is only USD2, and I got the net monthly salary of USD700. If I’m working in Indonesia, how much will I have as a starter? I’ll bet it will be not more than Rp700.000 a month, and the Big Mac is around Rp20.000 here. So, will you say yes to the salary of 35 Big Mac and say no to the salary of 350 Big Mac? I don’t think so… (note: Read this by imagining Mac Culkin said it in ‘Home Alone 1’).”

This girl, she doesn’t need to go to Harvard or Oxford to tell me about the concept of high risk high return or Big Mac Index or Currency Economics. All she needs to do is listening to her ‘contagious’ friend and follow her in return. And, here comes the 2nd victim of Contagionomics.. ;P

I haven’t got any fully house maid yet, and still doing every house hold works by our own (off course, my wife is also with me, for better or worse ;P). Any help that you can offer? Anyone?

All of sudden, I remembered, when I was accepted to work in this institution, my relatives said, “It’s a good place, I envy you.” I just smiled and said, “You can’t say anything now. Let’s take a look for the next three years or more.” So, after those longing years, my relatives looked at myself. They looked at my achievement in having such assets (the ethical codes suggested me not to reveal truthfully about those assets in details here.. sorry.. :P), and said, “Mas, how could we apply to your office? Do our Bachelor Subjects suit with your office’s requirement? I want to work in your institution. Please tell us and give any directions of how we should do that.”

My oh my, I’ve just realized that I’m the agent of ‘Contagionomics’ too..

You can run.. but you can’t hide..

;P