What if you had a choice of being either a royal in the 1400s or a janitor at Costco today. Which would you choose?
There would be a lot of benefits to being a King or Queen in 1450. You would be at the peak of society. Everyone you meet would be your subject or servant. All your wishes would be your government and treasury’s top priorities. You could make your friends and relatives rich or give them noble titles they could pass on. You could punish any enemy. People would fear and revere you.
But there would be downsides. You would likely suffer from parasites, especially tapeworm. You would need to worry about contracting tuberculosis, dysentery, typhoid, the plague, and dozens of other infectious diseases now treated with antibiotics. A scratch from a rusty nail or a sore tooth could be fatal or lead to amputations and a lifetime of deformity. Likely one or more of your children would die in infancy. Your wife would have a similarly high chance of dying in childbirth or shortly thereafter from infection or bleeding. But you would be the top of society, and your name would go down in history. Your family would be prominent, potentially forever.
Alternatively, you could choose the life of a poorly paid janitor today. You would likely live what feels like a hand to mouth existence, with every dollar deposited on payday seeming to flow directly to pay a bill. Any unexpected expense, for medicine, a broken taillight, new eyeglasses, etc., could mean you overdraw your bank account or must pay with credit card fees each month higher than you already pay. Your children too would struggle to make ends meet. They would likely live much like you: hand to mouth. BUT, you would have much better medical care. You would be much less subject to random attack or violence. You would have guaranteed rights and access to a fair legal system, and you would not have to worry about random or malicious actions by your government. It is a meager existence, but potentially longer and healthier for you and your descendants.
So, which would you choose? Though most may say they would rather live a safer, cleaner, healthier life, my guess is that when they walked into the choosing machine and picked their life, they would want to be king or queen at the top of society and let life decide if they and their children live happy or long lives.
(all opinions expressed by guest contributors are theirs and not necessarily reflective of views of MyLLife)
