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This quote won't absorb all your red ink (how appropro), but I'll point out one thing you seem to not get: The reason a blue collar worker shouldn't expect a white collar salary is supply and demand. There are millions and millions and millions of people who can clean a house or quickly learn how to put up some drywall. There are not that many people who can figure out how to write an application or run a business. Just because someone works "hard" doesn't mean they're entitled to the same wage.
If something is important to you, you'll find a way. If it isn't, you'll find an excuse.
I met a real hard left liberal yesterday.
Great guy.
He and his wife not only talked the talk but walked the walk.
They decided that here we too many unwanted kids in the world so they adopted five children.....and took in three others when their parents died.
The only problem.....their liberal, big government attitudes.
They had a 5,000 sq ft home....built in pool, movie theater, sauna and, I kid you not, 14 large flat screen Tvs.
The kitchen had a $35,000 oven and a $17,0000 refrigerator.
Both of them chain smoked and they both had several drinks in the hour and a half that I was there, at 2 pm.
He then went on a tirade about how unfair the system is. Describing person after person after person who he knew that died due to the lack of health insurance.
He took in the 17 year old son of a close friend of his and was complaining that the kid couldn't afford health coverage. ( i don't know a single person that died because they couldn't get coverage)
Again, I hope they continue to have a great income. I hope that they can buy a $3 million dollar oven some day and have 58 big screen TVs.
The problem is the fact that they have done well for themselves, yet still want big government to socialize medicine.
thats because they are right! Basic medicine should be available for all in any first world country. Aren't you hugely embarrassed that we are the ONLY first world country that doesn't allow for it? Why are you also the group of people (being the right wing) that wouldn't want EVERYONE to pay for this in an individual mandate? You don't want abortion, but won't pay for contraception, you don't want people to be required to pay for medical insurance but you don't want to let them have it given to them. You don't want the government to be able to extremely cut the costs of health care and pharmaceuticals as they do with the military by having a single payer system.....You people just don't have a lick of common sense in you! Instead of carrying the water of these large insurance companies you choose to blame the poor sick person. Crazy in a jar!
So the real "value" of a person is limited to the money he is able to command from the economy. People should only be paid what someone else determines he is worth. We should all have to improve our own value to an employer and if not recognized go to another employer.
That is as good a description of "Living Hell" as I can imagine. It is the ultimate commoditization of human beings this side of slavery.
Yup. Only you and other select few work hard. You're special.
I am in New York City this week for work. Every day I walk past a work site where union construction crews are carrying buckets and bags full of god knows what up ladders to the third story of the building they are building. These bags and buckets look heavy. They are at work when I walk to the office in the morning and still there after I have had dinner.
I couldn't do it. These guys work hard. Harder then I do. I sit in a temperature controlled environment in front of a computer. I don't go home tired. I don't go home dirty.
These men do. And I thank them for their efforts.
If you don't go home tired, you probably don't do anything special, either. I go home tired almost every day. I'm mentally drained.
And that, right there, is the difference. I could be physically strong enough to do their job. They would (in the vast majority of cases) never be able to be mentally capable enough to do mine.
So the real "value" of a person is limited to the money he is able to command from the economy. People should only be paid what someone else determines he is worth. We should all have to improve our own value to an employer and if not recognized go to another employer.
That is as good a description of "Living Hell" as I can imagine. It is the ultimate commoditization of human beings this side of slavery.
It's not the only option; you can also start your own business, and let the "market" determine how much your skills are worth.
It's always puzzling to me how some people equate freedom with slavery. I suppose some people will remain permanent slaves to their own ineptitude.
Yup. Only you and other select few work hard. You're special.
I am in New York City this week for work. Every day I walk past a work site where union construction crews are carrying buckets and bags full of god knows what up ladders to the third story of the building they are building. These bags and buckets look heavy. They are at work when I walk to the office in the morning and still there after I have had dinner.
I couldn't do it. These guys work hard. Harder then I do. I sit in a temperature controlled environment in front of a computer. I don't go home tired. I don't go home dirty.
These men do. And I thank them for their efforts.
I've done construction. Please. Just please. People who equate physical labor with 'working hard' are totally missing the boat. Most people who are in physical labor jobs are there because they didn't have the mental discipline to do something else.
And it's the sitting on the butt staring at monitors people I am also including in the 'people who think they work hard but don't really' category.
Do you honestly feel that the compensation of one person has adverse aggregate effect on rank and file employees? This is just ludicrous. What I pay myself has ZERO effect on what I pay my employees!
Unbelievable. You clearly haven't walked in the shoes of a CEO. That's why you toss around 3,000 charts to make your point....because you've actually never been there.
Who thinks that compensation for one single person has adverse aggregate effects? It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure it out! The charts show how it has happened in the system for the last 30 years as you can easily see from them. You do know how to read those charts don't you? Or do you need one of your rank and file employees in accounting to do it for you? What you pay yourself directly removes those funds from the corporate wallet that pays ALL of the other employees. Even a manicurist could figure that one out! How did you ever become a CEO without that basic understanding? My husband is a Pres of 35 different companies under one umbrella company, he runs them all....when they were facing this horrible recession it was he, the owner of the company and a couple of the top earners that took l/2 pay and no pay until the worse of the crisis was over and to continue to be able to keep their rank and file in salary. Clearly THEY could figure out the equation. CLEARLY you haven't a clue how finances work!
If you don't go home tired, you probably don't do anything special, either. I go home tired almost every day. I'm mentally drained.
And that, right there, is the difference. I could be physically strong enough to do their job. They would (in the vast majority of cases) never be able to be mentally capable enough to do mine.
Mentally drained won't make you physically broken at 50 either. I don't know many office workers that could be physically strong as these guys anyway, but that isn't the point. Many of them could easily do your job as well had their lives taken that patch. Exactly what is the point you are trying to make. That somehow you are more superior or useful to civilization than they are?
No, the word is "valuable." I could do his job, but he couldn't do mine. Value lies in the eyes of the beholder. The people profitting from the high rise worker building that building would find him infinitely more valuable than you.
Since when is working a call center a high paying job? That's the bottom rung of the white collar world; you might as well compare it to a blue collar worker whose only skill is shoveling manure. A skilled laborer working on that high rise is a top level blue collar job. Just as valuable a worker as ANY white collar worker of the same level. The guy shoveling the manure is ALSO a low level blue collar job. Its all relevent.
No kidding. If you re-read your post, it seemed as though you were lumping the working middle class into the "poor people" catagory.
No one is entitled to any level of compensation. In my book no one is entitled to a "living wage" or vacation or a pension; you are supposed to earn it. Everyone earning any sort of dollar is supposed to earn it. Of course there are the thieves be it the bank robber, the purse snatcher or the Bernie Madoffs of the world. But once you have established yourself as a wage earner, you ARE ENTITLED to compensation that is a living wage, vacations, health and dental, and pensions if they are part of the pay packet that you agreed to.
Family + FAFSA + A job. Nothing that's out of the reach of the typical family with a median income. Which is what most everyone else does even when they choose a different career path. Not everyone is college bound, and good for those that are as it would then degrade the whole college experience should it be that everyone DID actually go to college. Some people choose other life experiences, choose to remain in the lower, to middle/middle income levels and that also is a good thing. Everyone is happy. The problem starts when those in the upper middle to lower and middle/middle rich classes start assuming superiority to those that chose different life paths. And the upper rich classes.....well everyone in the country does their bidding, they think we are all useles, lazy peasants that work for them....and we do.
Yes, unlike that high rise worker, who must work extremely hazardous jobs to make up for the fact that he has no other value in the labor market. I learned how to do complex things with my brain, so I wouldn't need to put myself in harm's way to make a living. I seriously doubt you....and your unfinished brain of an 18-24 year old decided too much yourself anyway. I'm sure you were lucky enough to be inspired and or co-erced into college by your parents and/or peer group and it had nohing to do with putting yourself in harms way. Tha age group LOVES being in harms way. But it doesn't make you any more valuable as a human being is my point. Just simply on a different path.
I never said they didn't work hard. Working hard is completely irrelevant. This is about being valuable. again, assuming your value is more than the high rise worker or the mechanic Valuable has to do with skills, knowledge, efficiency, education, and decision-making ability exacty my point all those skills are required of most any job in the country other than the most basic minimum wage jobs. These people are deserving of decent compensation as well... what you produce, not just how hard you work. I was taught the concept of delayed gratification; i worked hard when i was young so i wouldn't be forced to work hard when i'm old. No you didn't. That is a learned life skill.....those brain functions don't exist until you are at least 25..... and the brain is finished growing. but nice try. We as parents and grandparents do try to instill the information into the younger ons though.
I am mainly lucky by genetics. I also had very good middle class parents.
There are people who grew up wealthier than me, and people who work much harder than me, and who have more natural talent than me, who failed to develop and yield much value to their employers.
that is why there is a class of uneducated poverty stricken people that will never change, although most are born into such generational poverty that they have zero chance of escaping. Those need a least some basic services because we are human beings capable of feeling others pain.
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You're special.
