Breaking Bad Was Realistic
Allison Heyser
Baker College

Breaking Bad Was Realistic Perhaps some of what was written in Breaking Bad was over kill. A story of an average now middle class family, with a full time mother, and a father that works two jobs, goes haywire. Walter discovers that he can cook meth and make more money in a short time than he could in a full career as a chemistry teacher. Setting a dollar amount on his new career choice, telling himself he will quit when he reaches that amount. Yet every time he has a new reason to continue. All the while keeping his new life hidden from his family, essentially living a double life. It can be said that Breaking bad accurately portrayed today’s society in regards to families suffering from the economic decline, health care system, money laundering, greed and self-destruction from power. Success is sometimes measured in different ways and Mr. White’s story is an example of this fact. He started out as a successful scientist and business man with a promising future. He was persuaded to believe that the company he owned with is partner was failing and he decided to sell his portion to get out only to find that he would struggle to replace his former income. Working two jobs to support his family, neither of them what he imagined he would be doing with his master degree in Chemistry. He was over qualified by his standards to be a Chemistry teacher in a local high school by day and a car wash cashier by night. Mr. White became angry and bitter, he like so many others in life that have had to downsize their income ended up working two jobs just to keep his home. They refer to this as “Underemployed”, in 2008, over 35% of college graduates were underemployed, by June of 2013 the Federal Reserve Bank of New York reported that 44 % of graduates were underemployed (Bowyer, 2014, para 3). . This is something we struggle with currently, although they claim the economy is picking up we still feel the financial hardships of a recession. Now factor in the idea that the main provider of the family is diagnosed with an illness that will ultimately crush them financially. Once Mr. White was diagnosed with a form of lung cancer he discovered that his insurance only covered a portion of the medical treatments, ultimately he became someone else, angry with the system that would do nothing for him, so he would try to take his own life. Believing that this was the best action for his family that his life insurance policy would provide for his family better than he could alive. People experience these hardships every day, thousands of unnecessary deaths occur because the health care providers put caps on their coverage, or the premiums are unaffordable. This country is being over taken by cancer as the primary killer and yet insurance companies will raise the premiums to make more money. According to the Oxford Journal of Medicine, data from the 1995 Medicare current beneficiary survey were used to analyze out-of-pocket expenditures and their burden in relation to income, the result was 19% of their income was used for their health care coverage, even more shocking those in poor health the cost was 28% of income, (Gerontol, J.B.,2000, para 1). What happens when you can’t afford to pay the out of pocket expenses are you expected to go sit and wait to die, do you take your own life as Mr White almost did. Is there nothing left that you can do? Mr White did something about it when he saw an opportunity to make money. His answer was simple, he would start a new business, kind of, one where he would use his degree in Chemistry to cook the purest crystal meth to ever hit the streets, with the help of his new partner Jessie who would soon be the sales end of the business. Walter was making so much money he had to come up with a plan to hide his earnings. At first he found a shady lawyer, Saul who would later serve to be useful in laundering Walters’s money into a business. Walters decided to buy the car wash where he once worked. This would be the perfect cover story as he had once worked there no one would question his reason for buying the company. Money laundering is a financial transaction that conceals its identity, source and destination of illicitly-obtained money, criminals achieve these objectives through a shell company (Legal Information Institute). In 1970 Congress passed The Bank Secrecy Act to be unknown as the BSA. They created the paper trail to track untaxed dollars and millions of dollars being laundered through financial institutions, much like the Car wash Walt bought. Still he does not get out of the business, what amount was enough money in Walters mind to make him leave his criminal life behind him. Now that Walter had fulfilled his financial needs by paying for all his medical bills, he was able to save enough money that his family would be well taken care of long after he died. But Walter could not walk away from the money, each time he would try there would be a new reason why he would continue to cook, and eventually having all the money along with the knowledge of how to produce the crystal put his family in grave danger. At this point Walter was not willing to give it all up there was still money to be made, much like the greed you see in corporate America. Walters’s greed would destroy him, just as it does in the corporate world with major companies. The definition of greed is an extreme or excessive need or desire for resources. According to Richard F. Taflinger (1996) Taking Advantage The Sociological Basis of Greed “[excessive is possessing something to such a degree it’s harmful]”, (para 3). It was greed that caused Walter to continue cooking meth but power would push him to his limit. Walter’s crystal meth, better known as “blue sky” was the purest form of crystal meth said to ever be produced. He had the secret to his process and he was not willing to share it. Walter created a new identity for himself, he would be known as “Heisenberg”. In the beginning Heisenberg was simply the guy that cooked the meth. But when Walter started to transform into Heisenberg he a man not only of superior intelligence but one that should be feared, that could not me over powered. Heisenberg was more Walter’s alter ego, this ego would eventually destroy him. He lost the love and respect of his son, his wife wanted nothing to do with him. His own brother-in-law a DEA agent who made it his sole goal to capture the famous “Heisenberg” would eventually figure out that all along it was Walter only to pay for that knowledge with his life. The DEA was not the only ones that wanted to find Heisenberg every drug cartel, or crystal meth distributor wanted him dead. If they couldn’t profit from his product than his product had to go the only way to get rid of it was to get rid of Heisenberg. This all played into Walt’s power in the end, and the end is what would soon come. Power can be seductive because it allows us to get what we want, it builds your confidence, and the power will draw you in and make you feel in control (Changing Minds). Power will destroy you as easily as it makes you. So in the end Breaking Bad was a portrayal of real life experiences in regards to economic decline, the down falls of the health care system, why money laundering exists, what greed can lead to and how power can sometimes destroy you. Is Breaking Bad a possible reality? From the points made yes things similar to the story line do happen in real life, there are some exaggerations, as any good story line may have. I don’t think it was the writer’s intent to be factual but rather to make us all fall into the story line, to wait for each next episode. As in any movie or show the trick is to capture your audiences attention and leave us wanting more, but it must be believable as well, and this story line did all of that.

References

Bowyer, C., (2014), Over qualified and underemployed: the job market waiting for graduates. Retrieved from forbes.com/sites/thecollegebubble/2014/08/15/overqualified-and-underemployed-the-job-market-waiting-for-graduates
Gerrontol, J.B., Oxford Journal. (2000). Out of pocket health care costs among older americans. The Journal of Gerontology, Series B, volume 55m (1), pp S51- S62, Retrieved from http://psychsocgerontology.oxfordjournals.org/content/55/1/S51.short
NA, (nd), Changing Minds, para 2, Retrieved from http://changingminds.org/explanations/power/power_corrupts.htm#boo
NA, Legal information institute, (nd), Money laundering, para 1, Retrieved from https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/money_laundering
Taflinger, R.F., Taking advantage the sociological basis of greed, (1996, May 28), Retrieved from http://public.wsu.edu/~taflinge/socgreed.html