The Wife Gets a Job within a Few Days? - The Company Men (2011) Discussion

[–] rob_sawyer 13 years ago

I think she already had a aprt time job as a nurse. She simply toojk on more hours.

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[–] bobwal2-1 13 years ago

So why did they have to move in with the parents? A nurse makes at least $75,000 in the Boston area, and with the money he was making doing construction they should have been able to afford a nice apartment somewhere

"It is so hard to get good help these days!" -Al Swearengen

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[–] 13 years ago

[deleted]

[–] archer1267 13 years ago

I won't dignify the gender-baiting nonsense, but I will say that having an MBA means bupkis in a town like Boston. You can throw a rock and hit ten people with an advanced degree in this city. Unless it's an MBA from a "name" school, it doesn't carry much weight.

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[–] eastcoastguyz 13 years ago

"When God created Adam & Eve..."

I see you are a fan of fiction too. :-)

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[–] dollfacecrafter 13 years ago

wow! you are a complete douche-bag to think that. not all women use their cootchies to get what they want, especially employment. she was a nurse, that is a very good field to be in and very employable, actually a shortage, she probably kept her foot in the door so she could work whatever hours she wanted.....

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[–] anakah55 13 years ago

I'd be embarrassed to have written that first paragraph if I were you. Oh and you forgot to add A$$hole to the list. Why can't women be independent? Does that lower your self esteem? "laws of nature" oh man I think I died a little inside reading that. You're such an idiot it hurts to read your post. Disgusting.

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[–] daimposter 13 years ago

First, there are different types of nurse. Some nurses make $75K and some make $40K. we don't know her situation.

Second, she picked up a couple of more shifts....it means she was already working part time. Lets assume she went from part time to full time and assume she is a higher paid type of nurse, she probably doubled her salary..an increase of maybe $37,000 at most. The Husband went from $160,000 ($120 + bonus ---- at the end of the film his new job of $80k was 'half of what he earned') to probably $30K.

So at the beggining of the film they probably had a combined income around $190k and in the middle of the film it was probably around $100-$110k. That's roughly 60% of their salary....they won't be able to afford a million dollar home's mortgage let alone the Porsche and Country Club.

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[–] dnarasimham 13 years ago

http://www.imdb.com/board/bd0000082/nest/188406675?d=188406675#1884066 75

This post goes on to prove my theory. Scroll to the bottom of the link and notice the divergence between the unemployment rate for men and women since 2009.

"I went to a college were Ivy-Leaguers aren't fit to mop the floors" - homeopt

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[–] hardwood53 13 years ago

The link does not seem to work, but maybe it is just that one of my Firefox add-ons blocking it. Too many people use credit to buy things they don't want, to impress people they don't like.

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[–] DCI77 11 years ago

She was working part-time. I doubt part-time nurses, unless they had seniority and has a specialization - would be making $75K. Before he was fired she was a house wife -- remember when she said that she can go back to working, and he said "No no no"? Plus, Affleck was a new hire, basically an apprentice, so I doubt he could keep up the mortgages on both their salaries. I take the reason they moved in with their parents was because they wanted to really save their money ... but it is an interesting point. The director/writer probably just wanted to drive the point that their current lifestyle was not sustainable and they had to tighten the belt on their expenes. I too wonder why they just didn't rent a two bedroom apartment until a bank allowed to take out a loan in order to buy another house

2014: Whiplash, Cold in July, that Terrence Malick project set in Austin

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[–] KMPINTJ 11 years ago

It left the impression that they were severely in debt with car payments, club dues, etc. Representative of all of those who, despite high salaries, overspend and live beyond their means. And if they needed to get back on their feet, having $0 in rent gave them a cushion to start an upward trend again. It already said they were underwater on that house.

Still, I did think the part about them living with parents was a little melodramatic.

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[–] johnston.scot 13 years ago

In the real world, there really is a shortage of qualified nurses. The movie actually alludes to this: the Craig T. Nelson CEO character talks about the company moving toward health care as one of the few possible growth areas.

The same is not true of MBAs. The main character's background and history are actually fairly limiting, as his experience isn't very diverse, and he's "over qualified" for most jobs.

As for their economic situation, the moving in with the parents does seem a bit over the top. I guess it could be explained by the fact that they were clearly way overextended at the beginning of the movie, and are probably still heavily in debt.

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[–] lockon_stratos 12 years ago

The wife already had a nursing job working part time because the husband made great money with his full time job. This movie is pretty similar to Fun with Dick and Jane. The husband gets promoted so he told his wife to quit her low level job so she could spend more time with their son.

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[–] idiotkid610 11 years ago

Yeap as others have said she already had a job, she said something about how she could "pick up more shifts." And I don't think it's that he couldn't get a job, it's that he couldn't get a job that he felt was worthy of him. It's very possible that he could have been hired for that $60K job that he went on that first interview for, but it wasn't as much money as he expected and it involved traveling. He was being selective. I'm sure he could have gotten SOME job, but it was a matter of latter go of some of his pride, which he eventually did by taking that job with his brother in law.

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[–] Trackmaster 11 years ago

The wife: nurses are notoriously in high demand, and they don't have to go through a lot of red tape to get qualified RN's a job, or just more hours. They can usually work as much they want, or as little as they want.

Bobby: He had a pretty high opinion of his self-worth and he was holding out for a job of commensurate value to his old job. MBA's with high powered executive jobs are usually lucky to get where they are, so if they're removed from that position, it will take a strong stroke of fortitude to get back to where they were. That's why often times the best solution is to start your own company, like he did.

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