Chapter 29. Think Bigger Than Pocket Change
“Yes, sir!”
The eyes of Bulgom Gong Hyeongtae and Red Dog Kim Museong brightened at once. It was the look of children on their first day at kindergarten, staring at the storybook the teacher was reading aloud.
...
That was oddly hard to deal with.
They were pure in the strangest places.
Still, on second thought, that was a relief.
Even if they were being taught, it was a hundred times better than being indifferent and showing no desire to learn at all.
“Gong Hyeongtae.”
“Yes, Chairman.”
“How much money did I give you?”
“Uh...”
Bulgom Gong Hyeongtae hurriedly wet his finger with spit and counted the bills.
“It’s 460,000 won, Chairman. Four 100,000-won checks and six 10,000-won bills.”
“We’ll start by changing the unit of money.”
“Huh? Changing the unit...?”
“From now on, round to the nearest 10,000 won. Now then, how much is 460,000 won?”
“Round? I know what ‘round’ is, but what’s the ‘roun’...”
Gong Hyeongtae looked baffled, apparently not knowing the term for rounding.
For a moment, I had to wrestle with myself.
Should I get angry, or should I teach him patiently? I stood at the fork in the road, deciding which way to go.
Thwack.
“Huu... Quit talking nonsense like that.”
“Urk. What was that for, hyung?”
Kim Museong let out a sigh and smacked Gong Hyeongtae on the back of the head, and Gong Hyeongtae’s face twisted into a pout.
“If you don’t know something from now on, just ask me. If I’m not around, keep your mouth shut and ask later. Don’t go spouting nonsense in front of the Chairman. Got it?”
“Yes...”
From here on out, I’d have to keep my own temper in check too. In my past life, I had watched Gong Hyeongtae after he was already in his forties, but right now, I was still looking at a Gong Hyeongtae who wasn’t even thirty yet.
And this version of him was far dumber than I had expected.
“Hyeongtae.”
“Yes, Chairman.”
“I mean round up. One through four goes to zero, and five through nine goes up to ten. Understand?”
“Yes, Chairman.”
“Then if it’s 460,000 won, how much is it?”
“Hmm...”
Gong Hyeongtae folded his fingers and counted with a serious expression, then spoke carefully, like a gambler going all in at a casino.
“...500,000 won.”
“...Right.”
“Um, Chairman. Do we really need to count numbers like this?”
“It’s a matter of concept.”
“Concept?”
Kim Museong, who had been pretending not to care while listening to our conversation, also pricked up his ears. Just from that instinctive way he zeroed in on the real point of the discussion, it was obvious that Kim Museong had a better feel for things than Gong Hyeongtae.
“Let’s expand the concept a little.”
I took another 100,000-won check out of my wallet and handed it to Gong Hyeongtae.
“How much is it now?”
“560,000 won, Chairman.”
“Now round it and tell me.”
“600,000 won.”
Confidence crept into Gong Hyeongtae’s voice.
“Now change that into tens.”
“Tens...”
As the number moved from ones to tens, Gong Hyeongtae’s voice shrank again, and Kim Museong once more cracked him on the back of the head.
Thwack.
“Hundreds, you punk. Hundreds. You really said you graduated middle school? Didn’t you say you dropped out in the first year of high school? Be honest. Did you even finish middle school? Or did you take night classes in elementary school?”
“I... I graduated.”
“You’re sure?!”
“I repeated two years.”
“...High school?”
“Middle school...”
“Then you entered high school at nineteen and dropped out right away? Didn’t you tell me you dropped out of high school at twenty because I said I don’t take high-school punks or minors?”
“The truth is...”
“The truth, what. Just say it.”
“When I was nineteen, I got serious and studied for three years so I could try getting into college, but then I ended up repeating a year again, and...”
“So...?”
“The friends I used to run errands for were already in their first year of college, and I was still a first-year in high school at twenty, so I got frustrated and started drifting. Then I met you, hyung, and when you said you didn’t take high-school punks or minors, I dropped out right away and started living with the crew.”
“...You’re really proud of that in front of the Chairman, aren’t you, you bastard.”
“...”
At Gong Hyeongtae’s honest answer, Kim Museong and I were left speechless.
“Ah, I get it now.”
Maybe Kim Museong’s beating had actually worked. Gong Hyeongtae clapped his hands and answered brightly.
“Since it’s 560,000 won, rounded off, that makes 1,000,000 won, Chairman!”
“Good. Remember what you just learned. From now on, when I ask about an amount, answer like that. Got it?”
“Yes, Chairman.”
All’s well that ends well. In any case, I had gotten the answer I wanted.
“Take it.”
I pulled one last 1,000,000-won check from my wallet and handed it to Gong Hyeongtae.
“Now how much do you have?”
“1,500,000... no, 2,000,000 won, Chairman.”
Gong Hyeongtae had been about to answer the way he always did, but he hurriedly clapped a hand over his mouth and gave the right answer instead.
“Good, Kim Representative.”
“Yes, Chairman.”
“How much cash do you have right now? Including checks.”
“Roughly 7,000,000 won, Chairman.”
Kim Museong, having taken Gong Hyeongtae’s disgrace as a lesson, answered without hesitation with the response I wanted.
“Kim Representative.”
“Yes, Chairman.”
“From now on, round to the nearest 10,000 won.”
“Yes, Chairman.”
“Good. Listen carefully, both of you.”
“Yes, Chairman.”
The eyes of Kim Museong and Gong Hyeongtae grew bright with attention.
“People from the middle class and above count cash in units of 100 won. Kids, or people who are a little short on money, might count to the nearest 10 won. But a few decades ago, people counted money in won, or even in jeon, which was smaller than a won.”
“Yes.”
“...Yes.”
Just that much was enough for Kim Museong to begin to catch my meaning, and his reply carried confidence. Gong Hyeongtae, meanwhile, kept sneaking glances at him.
“You hear about it on the news sometimes, don’t you? The sons and grandsons of famous chaebol families gambling overseas and blowing hundreds of millions of won, or spending tens of millions on booze. What’s strange is that the punishment for gambling is usually very light. And there’s no punishment at all for how much they spent on drinks. Why do you think that is?”
“Because... well, they’re rich bastards with good backing, Chairman?”
Unlike Kim Museong, who paused to think a little, Gong Hyeongtae answered immediately.
“Hyeongtae.”
“Yes, Chairman.”
“You get off work, play some go-stop with your friends at 100 won per point, and lose 100,000 won. So you get angry and drink 50,000 won’s worth of alcohol at a bar. Would that be a crime?”
“?”
At my question, Gong Hyeongtae stared blankly, then raised his voice in disbelief.
“No, Chairman. Why would that be a crime? If that were true, who’d be left not getting dragged in during Chuseok or Lunar New Year?”
“That’s the world the chaebol, or the rich bastards, live in. That’s how they value money.”
“Ah...”
“For them, 100 million won is probably about what 100,000 won is to you. And for them, 50,000 won is probably like 50,000 won to you.”
“...Understood, Chairman.”
“The current bank interest rate is probably around fifteen to twenty percent. If you’ve got only 10,000,000,000 won in cash, that means you can make at least 200,000,000 won a year just in interest. So would it really be a problem if someone with 2,000,000,000 won in annual passive income drank 10,000,000-won liquor a couple of times a month?”
“No, Chairman.”
“Nobody spends money while thinking about anything below one percent of what they already have. You understand what I mean, right?”
“...Yes, Chairman.”
Gong Hyeongtae’s voice shrank as if he were the one who’d done something wrong.
“Then let’s review. How much did I give the girl at the teahouse a little while ago?”
“100,000 won, Chairman.”
“How much was the coffee?”
“15,000 won.”
“To me, what’s the value of 100,000 won?”
“...Money you can live without, Chairman.”
“Right. But the girl at the teahouse would be different.”
I took a sip of the coffee I’d brought back from the teahouse.
“She’ll think she made 85,000 won in profit. At the same time, she’ll probably feel like she earned more than ten times the margin she would’ve made from selling two cups of coffee. And if that keeps happening, she’ll start treating us with more kindness than we need, while regular customers are likely to get shortchanged.”
“...I suppose so.”
“That’s why. In a proper company, even if there’s an employee who’s exceptionally good at the job, you don’t hand out huge rewards recklessly. If that employee spends decades serving the company and eventually becomes an executive, you can pay them multiples of the salary they used to make. But right away, you never reward them that much.”
“Now I really understand, Chairman. As you said, if an employee handles a big amount of money all at once, they’ll keep looking for only that kind of work, and before long they start neglecting their basic duties.”
“From now on, get into the habit of looking at money in bigger units. Don’t fuss over small sums. We’re not salaried office workers, and if you keep your eyes on pocket change, you’ll miss what’s above it. And when the time comes to make an important decision, you’ll hesitate over a trivial amount and end up taking a big loss.”
“Understood, Chairman.”
“I’ll keep that in mind, Chairman.”
Gong Hyeongtae and Kim Museong bowed their heads. It was time to wrap up the lesson. And it was also time to reward Gong Hyeongtae.
“Kim Representative.”
“Yes, Chairman.”
“Officially, what is Hyeongtae’s position?”
“Hmm...”
Kim Museong scratched his head awkwardly before answering.
“To be honest, there wasn’t anything like that. Nobody even came here to borrow money, and when we did collections now and then, if the guys looked experienced enough, we’d call them managers, and everyone below that was just deputy. Among the crew living together, we usually just called him Bulgom.”
“So Hyeongtae was number two in the Red Dog Faction?”
“Yes, Chairman.”
“Then promote him to executive director this time. Hyeongtae earned it.”
Gong Hyeongtae’s eyes widened like a rabbit’s at the sudden windfall, and Kim Museong, who had been glaring at him for a moment, slowly nodded.
“I’ll do that, Chairman.”
“Thank you!”
At my order and Kim Museong’s approval, color returned to Gong Hyeongtae’s face.
“And officially, let’s set the salary at executive-director level.”
“Understood, Chairman. What amount should we use?”
“What were you thinking?”
“Well... would 50,000,000 be enough?”
At the mention of fifty million, the corners of Gong Hyeongtae’s mouth twitched up and down. It was obvious he was holding back his excitement because the amount was much larger than he’d expected.
“We’re absorbing Yeonhui Credit Union and building Happy Credit Union into a real force in the loan-shark market, and the salary for an executive is only 50,000,000? Isn’t that a little stingy, Kim Representative?”
“Then surely you mean...”
Kim Museong’s voice trembled slightly, and Gong Hyeongtae’s body quivered with anticipation.
“The baseline is 100,000,000. Round according to performance. Set the rest of the crew’s pay and positions in a similar way.”
“Understood. I’ll make the arrangements.”
“...”
Gong Hyeongtae’s expression stiffened.
If this had been the old Gong Hyeongtae, he would have been unable to hide his delight at the 100,000,000-won figure. But now he understood the meaning beneath my words. If he simply did the work assigned to him without causing trouble, he’d get 100,000,000. If he screwed up, it would be 50,000,000. And if he did exceptionally well, there would be an additional performance bonus worth close to another 50,000,000.
“Who’s next after Bulgom in the chain of command?”
“Deputy Manager Choi Hwangyeol, Chairman.”
“Reorganize everything by today. Keep the existing hierarchy in place where it matters, but from now on, promotions are strictly based on ability and results. Also, make sure the company ranks take priority over the gang hierarchy.”
“Yes, Chairman.”
“Good. And take care of this by today too. We need to start moving in earnest tomorrow.”
I handed Kim Museong a white envelope containing important documents.
“May I open it now?”
At his question, I nodded, and Kim Museong carefully pulled out the papers and spread them open.
“Huh?! Th-this is... ?!”
After checking the contents, Kim Museong began trembling so hard that the hand holding the papers looked as if it had been struck by lightning.
“C-can we really handle this exactly as written?”