Holding down a job (Toltz)

The worst thing you can say about someone in a society like ours is that they can't hold down a job. It conjures images of unshaven losers with weak grips watching sadly as the jobs slip free and float away. There's nothing we respect more than work, and there's nothing we denigrate more than the unwillingness to work, and if someone wants to dedicate himself to painting or writing poetry, he'd better be holding down a job at a hamburger restaurant if he knows what's good for him.

Steve Toltz, A Fraction of the Whole