In Studs Terkel " Who built the Pyramids? Mike feels upset and angry about working as a steelworker because he thinks it's boring and that's all he do all day is lift steel up and down which it's very painful. Mike doesn't want to do it, but he has to because he has a family he has to provide for. Mike is also angry because he doesn't see the finished work that he has created, and he doesn't have anything to call his own. He want his work to have a meaning to it, he feels as if all hard working people should be recognized as someone who is just as important as a "famous painter".

Mike would change his work hours because he would like to spend more time with his family. He feels as if his children doesn't have a father. It is meant by when mike says he wants his son to be a effete snob is that mike don't want his son to be like him, like making work taking over his life and the things that it is nature for him to do. He also want to make sure of what good he has accomplished is to let people know that he worked hard on it.