Brown Envelopes With Wages
“Grampa did you keep the envelopes?”
“What envelopes?”
“Brown envelopes you got on pay day.”
Some old movies have scenes where the foreman gives laborers brown envelopes with their weekly wages. This happened on construction sites and factories where machinists ran the marathon with their feet, churning out clothes, bags, sheets or anything that needs stitches.
You cannot image the brown envelope deposit because your salary zooms straight into your cheque account every two weeks, but is is a historical fact.
Depending on where you are in the world, people used to get paid with real cash in little brown envelopes. They also stood in line, waiting for their turn to collect it.
It might look funny now but life depended on those brown envelopes. Families could for one day have meat or fish, instead of the usual cabbage or potatoes. There was money to repair kids’ shoes.
Mothers could afford to buy yarn to make mittens and sweaters for the harsh winters in Europe. The brown envelope also made it possible for working class men to indulge in a pint or two at the local pub. Their bosses, the aristocracy ate brisket and drank port in gentlemen clubs.
The brown envelope is gone, and workers are paid electronically but one thing remains, they live from hand to mouth, especially with kids that demand phones and other digital toys that are updated annually.
By: Nonqaba waka Msimang.
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