Thu 29 May 2008
Would you spend a year locked in Wal*Mart for $2 million? Condition: you are alone, with no contact with outside world (including news), but you do get electricity and full reign over all the goods in the store.
Posted by starman21 answers so far!
Okay, let's hear it.
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I take issue with the basic premise of this question. Is the WalMart still fully operational? If so, then I would surely have contact with the customers who would have news from the outside world. (Although, now that I’m considering the average WalMart clientel, perhaps not). I would hope it would still be operational to keep fresh (“fresh”?) produce in stock (it sure as hell had better be one of those superstores with real food instead of one aisle of potato chips).
But for $2mil? I’ve had boring jobs that paid a lot worse. I could work out on the equipment, watch movies, read books and magazines (current magazines?). I would get really, really bored. And maybe a little homicidal if I had to deal with WalMart customers all of the time. I get a little homicidal having to deal with them in 15-minute incriments.
Assuming that basic utilities are left on and paid for (electricity, water, sewage), even if no fresh produce, etc., most definitely, yes.
This question really centers around how much the respondent needs contact with other people in their daily lives …
Sorry, no, you are the only one there. It’s like they fully stocked it and everyone left. The produce would eventually go bad, you’d probably have to move the meat to the freezer, etc. You aren’t working, just hanging out alone there.
No way. The only thing that could keep me in a store (or indoors generally) for an entire year would be a full-blown zombie apocalypse outside.
Can I have heavily embargoed internet access? Can I bring instruments and supplies? Can I pretend for the purposes of this question that I’m not married?
Because being paid $2 million dollars to spend a year trying to write a novel and record music sounds like a better deal than most people get.
In this imaginary world you can be single without any dependents but no Internet and only the instruments that are in the store.
Not as the current me, because I would miss my husband and kids too much. And I can’t think of any time in the past when I would’ve done it — even angry, punk, single me needed zines to survive. I like the idea of a year to write, but my writing requires a lot of research — and WalMart doesn’t carry books on obscure 15th century shipwrecks, as far as I know.
So… I guess not.
Can I pretend for the purposes of this question that I’m not married?
Yeah, that’s the deal-breaker for me, too. I wouldn’t spend half-a-year away from my wife (with no way to communicate with her) for fifty million dollars.
Were I single, though, I’d do it in a heartbeat. Don’t tell starman, but I’d do it for half a million.
$2 million is Fuck You money to me. So ya, I’d be up for it even though it meant no family contact. The trade off for more family contact under much more secure finacial conditions when I got out would make it worth it.
Okay, I’ll take the alterna-universe single loner me provision and forget about the internet access and bringing my own instruments.
Wal*Mart sells computers, and shitty keyboards, and shitty guitars, and shitty microphones, and if there’s one thing that’s true about recording an album it is that if having shitty equipment to work on is the biggest challenge you have to face in recording it, you’re in great fucking shape.
One hopes there is some sort of basic multitracking software either preinstalled on a computer (does Wal*Mart sell Macs?) or boxed up somewhere in the software aisle.
I’m sure they sell hotpots, so given running water and electricity there’s no shortage of clean water even if there are not workable heavy appliance hookups to run their floor models in that section. Cooking is doable, bathing is doable. Laundering clothes? Out of rustic boredom, maybe; I could just switch over every couple days to a new outfit.
There’s the question of excrement. Can I assume the employee toilet works? Sink too, at that point, which is nice.
New music every day, on great big stereos. Movies on great big televisions if I’m in the mood. Really, for that matter, the existence of the video game section kind of puts into danger the idea of it being a *productive* year at all.
Hm. Is there enough non-perishable food in a Walmart to last a person one year?
If I was single I’d definitely do it. As said above, $2M is “retire now” money for me.
Guess I had better get used to reading the collected works of Limbaugh and O’Reilly over and over and over and over. And, wait, no internet? I guess the ladies underwear department and assorted manikins will regret my internment, seeing as Walmart doesn’t stock any “interesting” magazines…
I’m in the “no” camp. I mean, $2 million buys a house or a stable retirement, but a year??? I couldn’t spend a year in any building for less than $6 million. Oh I have my prices for everything, to be sure. A whole year is just too long without birdsong, swimming, mattresses, movie theater popcorn, SEX, fresh fruit – all the things that are at the top of my list of loves, which large amounts of money can’t really buy me afterward. I would just be crying a lot in that big fluorescent insanity factory.
$2 million isn’t enough. For about $7 million I’d do it.
I ask people a variation on this question: Would you spend a year in prison for $100 million? There are some caveats: somehow the risk of death or permanent physical injury is nullified (but not the risk of temporary pain/injury or permanent emotional injury), it’s a medium- to high-security prison (not a supermax but not a minimum security-prison either, and you didn’t actually commit a crime to get there and no one on the outside thinks you did either.
My price for the prison scenario would be greater than for the Wal-mart scenario, but I’d say still say yes. Maybe as low as $25 million for the year in prison.
For $2 million I’d do it in a heartbeat if I were single. Price would go up to $5 million if I were married. The separation would be worth it to provide a secure retirement for the mister and myself.
Is there enough non-perishable food in a Walmart to last a person one year?
Wall mart sells canned food (fruit, beans, vegetables, soup, etc.), Ramen, ice cream, frozen pizzas and stuff like instant rice and potatoes. You only need ~2500 calories a day, I can’t imagine there being less than a million calories in non perishables which would more than do you. Even stuff like milk and cheese could be taken from the cooler and frozen. Frozen milk products will last 6 months easy. It wouldn’t be the greatest diet, especially towards the end. You’d probably want to pop a multivitamin daily I’d imagine but I doubt you’ll be malnourished to any degree if one worked at it abit. I might actually manage to loose a few pounds.
You could also preserve some of the fresh produce during for first days there, as I’m sure WalMart sells canning supplies. I would do it in a heartbeat if I were single. The only real difficulty would be the shitty reading materials. Reality show anyone?
I couldn’t do it. If I weren’t married with a kid, it would rational to do it, but I’d miss my family, and I’m too antsy anyhow.
Those of you who said you’d need, say $6M instead of $2M to do this – how did you come up with those numbers? I guess with the larger numbers you might be able to live off the interest.
Sure. I’m excellent at amusing myself and with all the stuff in a regular Walmart, I’d have a ball. Probably be a little nutty when I got out, but I’m ok with that.
$2M @ 5% is $100K a year. Or, say, you pay cash for a $500K house with some of the payment, that’s still $75K a year on the balance. With no real major expenses, you can probably comfortably live on less than that, even, so your money might even grow over time.
So one year of weird misery for the opportunity to spend the rest of your life doing what you like, within reason–no commuting, no cubicles, no asshole bosses, no weird coworkers, all of that gone. In four years you’ll have spent the equivalent amount of time at work–and that includes the time you’ll spend sleeping at the Walmart.
Hell, you could spend the year writing a journal of the whole experience and have not only a worthwhile project but something else to earn money from when you get out. You’d also, assuming you had some discipline (I’m not sure I would), have the chance to really concentrate on acquiring a new body, new musical skills, whatever–I’m sure there are probably dozens of things you could do within a wal-mart. It would be like “junkyard wars” except everything would be shrink-wrapped. Don’t forget they sell guns and ammunition, so you’ll be able to use those Limbaugh books for target practice.
Plus you’d immediately become caretaker of dozens of tropical fish–maybe even a few more interesting animals, I can’t remember if they’re in the “small and squeaky” pet business.
Heck, I’d think about doing it now, married or not. It would be very hard, but people touring Iraq courtesy of our government have gone through worse with far less reward.
let’s see… that’s round-the-clock-work without sick leave or vacation time, not to speak of ‘going home at the end of the shift’ … so that means you’re working 8,760 hours for US $2,000,000. that’s US $228.31 per hour. deduct about a third for taxes, health insurance and all that jazz and you have around US $152.21 left. that’s kind of low considering the requirements and we haven’t even talked about your future employability (aka how long this cash has to last you) after the inevitable media scrutiny (I am imagining this to be some sort of truman show here).
so no, I wouldn’t.
I would volunteer though that money is highly nonlinear. US $152.21 per hour has a larger effect on someone currently making $5,75 at around 30 hours weekly. that person would do well in taking your offer.
You know, I was in a Wal-Mart today… and I was looking around at all the stuff I could do and food to eat. Gotta say, it would be fun. I’d do it for a lot less than $2 mil.
To those would would also do it: would you do 2 years? How much $$ would it take? What’s the longest amount of time you’d be in?