Earthly Riches

Businessmen say lives 'empty': A study of 4,126 male business executives reveals widespread dissatisfaction with the corporate experience. Forty-eight percent of all middle managers said that despite years spent striving to achieve their professional goals their lives seemed "empty and meaning less." Sixty-eight percent of senior executives said that they had neglected their family lives to pursue professional goals, and half said they would spend less time working and more time with their wives and children if they could start over again. The question that men are asking today is: "What am I doing all this for?" Before, the payoff was security and long-term employment. But corporations don't return loyalty as they used to, and men today are saying they don't see the investment as being worth it.

So says Jan Halper of the Palo Alto Consulting Center who conducted the survey.

-San Francisco Chronicle