To Live Simply So Others Can Simply Live

Joan Dugan has had some high paying jobs, and received a large payout when she sold a company of which she was the co-owner. But she was happier when she made 20% of what she had made previously at her corporate job. The reason was, she knew she was helping others through her work, and she felt she was living out a vocation through the business that she was doing. Often it seems that no matter how much we make, we can find ways to spend whatever we make. It has recently been shown that more than 40% of those earning $300,000+ live paycheck to paycheck due to what is called ‘lifestyle inflation’! Joan chose to make much less and make her services affordable to her community, and then to give much of what she made to worthwhile causes.

Discussion Questions

1. What are ways you could live more simply in order to help more people? What keeps you from living that way?
2. What are the challenges which make it difficult– especially coming out of college– to make decisions to live simply?
3. Do you ever feel like you are pursuing a path of business which will help you maintain a certain standard of living and wealth, rather than doing what you would really like to do? If so, how do you wrestle with that dichotomy?
4. What does a decision to zero out profit at the end of each year imply about a decision to grow the business?