There is a growing tension between a generation’s aspiration for a meaningful career and the stark reality of modern living costs. In many countries, including Australia, the soaring price of housing has become a dominant financial pressure. This pressure is increasingly shaping career paths, potentially forcing bright individuals to pursue high-income jobs in sectors like finance, IT, law, and cyber security, not from a place of passion, but from sheer financial necessity.
This trend is more than just a collection of individual compromises; it has profound implications for a nation’s economic productivity, innovation, and the overall motivation of its workforce.
The Passion Versus Paycheck Dilemma
When the cost of fundamental shelter consumes a significant portion of a person’s income, the calculus of choosing a career changes. The freedom to explore a passion that might offer lower pay but greater personal fulfilment becomes a luxury few can afford. Instead, the decision becomes a rational one: select the career path with the highest possible financial return to secure a home and manage a mortgage.
This creates a workforce increasingly motivated by extrinsic factors (money) rather than intrinsic ones (passion, curiosity, a desire to make a difference). While this approach may secure an individual’s financial footing, it can come at a high cost to the individual and the economy.
Passion is the Engine of Productivity
People who are passionate about their work bring a different level of energy. They are the ones who give 120 per cent, not because a manager is watching, but because they are genuinely engaged in solving the problem at hand. They live longer, lead more meaningful lives, and are the driving force behind innovation. They go “above and beyond” the minimum requirements, creating new ideas, refining processes, and building a better future.
Conversely, a workforce of “crank-turners”—intelligent people who are simply doing the minimum to keep the handle rotating—leads to stagnation. If a large portion of the brightest minds are in roles they find unfulfilling, the result is a “flat” economy. Productivity wanes, new business creation slows, and the national competitive edge dulls.
The View from the Cyber Security Front Line
At Vertex, we see this trend first-hand. We interview hundreds of people looking for jobs in cyber security, a field known for its high earning potential. It is often easy to distinguish between those driven by passion and those focused primarily on the salary.
The passionate candidates are those who spend their own time learning, building home labs, and participating in cyber security communities. They are in the field because they love the challenge. Those who are not passionate often have the basic qualifications from university or TAFE but expect all their learning to be filled by their employer. It is a job, not a calling.
In a field like cyber security, which demands constant learning and vigilance to stay ahead of adversaries, a “minimum effort” mindset is not just unproductive; it can be dangerous.
Why is This Happening? The Imbalance of Incentives
The problem is particularly acute in Australia, where housing is exceptionally expensive. A key reason for this is that the financial system and tax incentives are heavily skewed towards property investment over business investment.
Policies such as negative gearing can make it more profitable to invest in existing housing than to fund a new business. This funnels vast amounts of capital into the housing market, continually pushing up prices. It also starves the rest of the economy of those funds, making it harder for entrepreneurs to get the capital they need to grow.
This creates a cycle: high property prices force people to take on large mortgages, and those large mortgages make them risk-averse, trapping them in high-paying jobs they may not enjoy and making them unable to take a chance on starting their own business.
This system also creates a difficult intergenerational conflict. The wealth being generated from housing speculation is not created in a vacuum; it is effectively a transfer of wealth from the future to the present. The profits realised today come at the direct expense of the next generation’s ability to afford basic shelter. This poses a difficult question for today’s investors: is a financial “win” from property worth undermining the future security and career freedom of their own children?
Re-igniting the Passionate Economy
The high cost of shelter is taking money and motivation out of the market for productivity and business growth. When young people cannot afford a home and are only looking for jobs that pay well, we have a huge problem that we must take action for our country, our community, our businesses, our future and our children.
To address this, the incentives must be fixed. A potential start could be to adjust tax incentives, such as remove negative gearing, starting with for future investments. Other policies could be designed using tax incentives to encourage the construction of new buildings and adding taxes to discourage speculation on existing property. An example could be a tax on all investment property that is more than 10years old, it just needs to be phased in over a number of years to avoid economic shock.
If we can bring down the cost of shelter, we might create a future where the next generation is free to follow their passions. This would unleash a wave of excitement, creativity, and new business creation, fueling a more productive and prosperous economy for everyone.
At Vertex, we are committed to building a team of experts who are truly passionate about protecting businesses from cyber threats. If your organisation wants to partner with a team that goes beyond the minimum, contact us to learn more about our services.