I haven’t written about Occupy Wall Street here, and honestly this post isn’t actually about Occupy Wall Street, but it is about one of the issues they are trying to talk about, and I want to give them credit. On some level, the Occupy movement has already been a great success because it’s changed the conversations we’re having.

This is also inspired by a post by Derek over at Buck$ome Boomer. This is not meant as diatribe against Derek. I have complete respect for what he’s saying. Conventional wisdom has become conventional for a reason. But like the folks in the Occupy movement, I think it’s time we change the conversation.

To be fair, the title of Derek’s post is “Get Stinkin’ Rich”, and I have no desire to become stinkin’ rich, nor, I imagine, do most folks. My goal, a goal I think that’s shared by a reasonable number of people, is to be able to retire one day, to be able to retire and not have to worry about how the bills are going to be paid, to maybe even be able to afford to travel and spend more time doing the things I love. I will admit it’s a modest goal, a common goal, but I don’t think it’s a mediocre goal. What I do think is that it’s a goal that has moved out of reach for a major part of the American population, and that’s both sad and scary.

The conventional wisdom is that in order to truly gain wealth, you need to be an entrepreneur. You need, as Derek says, to start a business that doesn’t need you. Even C agrees with this ideology. Many times, he has looked at property, specifically being able to afford rental property, and mentioned that in his mind, that’s the path to wealth. I am not denying this.

What I am saying is that the majority of us will never own rental property. Some will never own any property. Most of us are not cut out to be entrepreneurs, and honestly, if everyone stopped working for anyone else and just ran their own business, our economy would completely collapse. Our economy is built on the need for workers. I don’t believe that the only people who should get to retire are the ones that started the businesses, or even the workers at the very top of the business (because even Jack Welch was working for someone else).

I do not believe that I am doomed to a mediocre life because I work for someone else, and no one should be. With the collapse of pensions, with the idea that everyone’s retirement should be invested in the stock market (which yes, over 30 years has good returns, but what happens when it’s time for you to retire in a market like the one today?), we have endangered the retirements of the vast majority of our population. Working a job should not mean that you must work that job forever.

The purpose of Social Security was to prevent our seniors from living without heat, from going without needed medical attention. However, it wasn’t meant to support people for over 20 years, and yet, it is what so many folks are depending on.

Do I have the answers? Do I know what we need to do so that the average Joe has the opportunity to retire? Honestly, no. But I do know the answer shouldn’t be that only those who got lucky with their own small business (and trust me, I know more small business owners who will never be able to retire than I do worker bees) should be the ones who have the opportunity for financial freedom.

As a society, we need to be having the conversations. We need to be able to talk about finances on a macro and micro level. That’s really one of the reasons I started this blog- to talk about finances, to help remove the vacuum that seems to exist around personal finances.

And this is one of the reasons I support Occupy Wall Street, because the conventional wisdom is no longer working, at least not for most of the people in this country. It’s time to change the conversations, to say, this is not the way it should be, and let’s figure out together what the new conventions should be.