The Final Fall of the Once Great American People.
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We gather together for one and each other, demanding justice and fairness, jobs, decent working conditions and to support our troops, veterans and others who se
Eyes Wide Open, Ears Mightily Closed
Years ago Archie Bunker of TV fame used to say "Don't confuse me with the facts, my mind is made up." Of course that was an actor saying his lines, and it was actually funny back then. But what about now? Are we going to ignore the facts that surround us? Are going to keep our eyes wide open but ignore the message? I fear we shall do just this.
I haven't written a hub for some time due to ill health, but this past Saturday I ventured north of the state line to Madison to view the protests there. Frankly, I am against Governor Walker's proposal as much as the way he tried to push it through. In Illinois our governor bargained with our state employee unions and we gave up some of the contract rights we had bargained for. We put off pay raises for two years now, for example. I am pleased to say that my earning power has sunk to the level my father would have earned in a comparable position in 1968.
Since i work with the unemployed, I can see first hand how people either cope with the fact (not opinion, but fact, i.e. truth) that jobs are scarce and those that do exist in our area pay half or less than they did before. Yes, I have seen people used to earning $80,000 a year accept (and be grateful for) jobs at minimum wage or slightly more.
Jobs that only 5 years ago paid $20 per hour are now about 12.50. People who were once proud wage earners are now ending their 99 weeks of unemployment benefits. There are basically two schools of thought on U.I. benefits, I am told. One says we can't afford more than this (and even at times that any benefits are a bad thing), and there are those who say we need to protect families from poverty by extending benefits past the 99 weeks. Personally, I am stunned to hear people say America is broke, that we have no money, especially when we are paying billions, even perhaps trillions on war making, keeping armed forces overseas when the need for this is long over, and wasting money on so many other fronts.
I guess I can smell the roses here: When have we seen any politician,and I mean any and all, vote to reduce their pensions? When have the people we elect ever said no to the perks they receive? When have any of them forgone pay for a year? when have any of them had to live on $51 a week, as do the people I see in our office, those who did not earn enough to get a higher unemployment rate, or those who foolishly thought that by doing any and all part-time work they could while receiving U.I. would help them?
I can't begin to count the number of hard-working people I've encountered who, when they started U.I. were getting the maximum rate of $385, but because they took work when it was available, were requalified at $51 per week. The usual question they ask me: "So by trying to make a living i screwed myself and my family?"
I can only nod my head and hold back the tears. You see, I know some of these people. They are my neighbors, or I've met them at local events. Now, I have to look at them and pretend I have no feelings and tell them point blank, that I can do nothing for them.
It used to be that Americans could look forward to doing better than their parents did, that each generation would work hard and improve their lot in life. But that is now a simple idea from a more naive time in our history. Why? I have some ideas, some insights into just why this is occurring.
We all dream of being better off than we are, and we would all love to either win the lottery or create some product, invent some machine, propose an idea that would instantly change our lives for the better. Most of us, however, are doomed to being who we are for the rest of our lives. Most of us will never win the lottery, or be recognized for our skills. So, we go on dreaming. And it's a good dream, but it remains elusive.
But some people have found wealth and great fortune, and while some of them do give back because they recognize that their fate was nor preordained, many remain greedy and do not care at all for the fate of others. You can see them out there, if you open your ears as well as your eyes.
On Wisconsin!
There are two reasons why I, an Illinois resident, like the Green Bay Packers. One, they are owned by the community, not by some rich person with more money than brains. Decisions are made locally. Two, they tend to win. Well, that last one some of the time.
But in Wisconsin there is a history of labor-management troubles that go back a long way. Wisconsin can be proud of a heritage of striving for worker's rights, but recently the newly elected governor, Walker, decided that he would bust the unions of state employees. And, somehow, this came as a shock to union employees who voted for this guy! Go figure!
OK, I'll be the first to admit that at times unions and/or their leaders have acted badly, often as badly as they management they oppose, but good or bad, we all have benefited from the good things unions have done. Read about how things were 150 years ago, children working and dying in mines, workers injured on the job went home without a job or worker's compensation benefits. No health care at all, no right to a raise, workers putting in 60 hour work weeks, and a whole lot more. It sounds like modern-day nations in the most poverty-stricken lands of all.
Unions shed blood to bring us the rights we have today, and if unions were to go away, the rights we enjoy would also go away. This has been promised by some of the wealthiest people in the world. They have proven that they want cheap labor with no benefits for workers. Is that perhaps why so many of our jobs went overseas? Was it because people over there were grateful for any job at all, even at $1 per day, 16 hour days, with no benefits at all? Hmm, sounds like some of the desperate souls I've encountered in my job at the unemployment office.
So, my question for you is this: Are you working? Do you earn enough money to feed your family? Do you have benefits such as health care, overtime pay, worker's compensation in case of an on-the-job injury?
Or, are you retired? Do you make enough money on your social security benefits? Do you live as well as you did before?
Or, are you unemployed, desperate and out of unemployment benefits?
Most of us fall into one of these three categories. A few do not. And those that do not seem to be calling all the shots these days. Now if you are in the Tea Party, or are a Republican, I have to ask you? Which do you fear most? The Federal Government or the wealthiest amongst us?
Most likely you would say the Feds. You fear "socialism" "communism" and other non-existent threats. Do you know these were the same things anti-Union people used to say back more than 100 years ago? That if we allow unions, we will all become socialists and communists?
Unfortunately, most of our ancestors did not know much about Socialism or Communism, but they did know that they were told that these things were evil, that they were anti-Christian, that they were lurking out there, ready to snap us up and make us all slaves to their political will.
Their eyes were wide open, because they could see the threat, even when it was only in their minds. Yes, there were some socialists and communist out there, mostly idealogues whose message was so bizzare that it was unnecessary for anyone to create lies about it. But there were also millions and millions of hard working Americans, your neightbors, your friends anf family, who were being screwed into the grinder to make more and more money for the industrialists who, at the time, were earning blood money off the backs of workers dying in their factories, their mines, their railroads and oh so many other businesses. In the high times that were robber baronism, a few got rich; the rest stayed poor and died young.
It would be good for all Americans to open their ears and their minds to the very real threat that is right before our eyes, right now, and to act upon that threat. I have heard my Tea party friends go on and on about how this person or that, (mostly Democrats) want to take away their freedom of religion, their guns, their basic civil rights, and so on. But they rather blindly ignore that the people who are manipulating these opinions and ideas are actually doing the very thing we all fear most: The wealthy manipulators are taking away the America we all love, and using us as cannon fodder in the battle against ourselves.
They are creating a civil war between people who should be on the same side in the matter. I may be an Independent who leans toward Democrats, but I do not think of my Republican neighbors as "the enemy". My Conservative friends remain friends because I like them, if not always their politics. On the other hand, they seem to like me, even if they dislike my politics most of the time.
But in these times many of us are whipped up into a frenzy of hatred and anger by a few people who are being bought and paid for by the very same bosses. Yes, the wealthiest few who have the most to gain by this Roman Circus style distraction of the people, this division of Americans into one camp or another.
From washington, to Lincoln and unto modern times, we have known, even if we have at times forgotten, that a Democracy can only be saved from anarchy and despotism by a learned and intelligent populace. People who know that facts and can set aside the propaganda of manipulators can not long be fooled. "You can fool all the people some of the time, and some of the people all the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time. by Abraham Lincoln".
Do not be fooled. I beg of you.
Chef Jeff
Websites of Interest
http://thinkprogress.org/2011/02/01/david-charles-koch-jobs/
http://www.grist.org/article/koch-brothers-tea-party-connections-confirmed-video
http://theweek.com/article/index/206405/the-billionaire-koch-brothers-tea-party-puppetmasters
http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Elections/2010/0919/Who-s-picking-up-the-tab-for-the-tea-party
http://www.woodlands-junior.kent.sch.uk/Homework/victorians/children/working.htm
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Chef, I'm glad you are back, you must be doing better. I am disabled for 30 years with MS, I am not going to get better (only worse).
I believe you are very mistaken this time, we will not go back to the distant past. The U.S. isn't broke? Then why do we borrow, and print money?
When Governor Walker ran for office, he told the people what he was going to do. They voted for him. Doesn't it bother you that Obama organizations are bussing in people to demonstrate? How about the House members that left the state? 'm tired, or I would say more. H
Yep. The only way to win this game is to not play.
If the unions had not chased so many jobs out of the country, we might have more jobs and better pay.
Keep on hubbing!
Unions did not chase jobs out of America, corporate Greed did that. Corporations Want those 'good old days' back and I do not delude myself into thinking otherwise. Good hub.
Dear Old Firm, yes, this is not just an American problem. I went to Spain to visit family and the same thing exists there. People are unemployed, underemployed, unemployable, and so on.
There is an attempt by companies to find cheap sources of labor, but this is a short-sighted view, since their products still have to be sold somewhere. If peope do not work and earn, where will cars and other goods be sold?
But part of it is also our own fault here, because we buy the cheapest stuff, which is usually made in some country with slave-wage labor, and while it's true that we can't afford better at our current level of consumming, but if we changed our habits, stopped buying things we don't need, perhaps the marketplace would force these companies to change their tune. (Of course, that is only true if one believes in the market driven model of economy, which I don't - not completely, at least.
I wish you luck and hope you were not affected by the earthquake in Christchurch.
Cheers!
Fellow wage-slave & fledgling serf,
Chef Jeff
Hello, Harvey, great to hear from you again! Of course I respect ypour point of view, but in America we have stopped working together toward a better future, and we have been abandonned by the companies and the wealthy that used to at least set up funds for the poor. It used to be considered a badge of honor to build libraries, schools, housing for the poorest amongst us, but so few of the wealthiest Americans feel that need these days.
As for Obama organizations, I'm not aware of any organizations funded, sponsored or backed in any way by Barack Obama bussing anyone into Wisconsin. I went there twice ans saw people like me who drove there on their own or were able to rent busses together to get there. I know a few unions in Illinois got busses for transporting people yesterday (2-26-2011) because union people see this as yet another attack on unions. But outside organizations were quite secretive about bringing in Tea Party supporters to counter the unions protests. Suffice to say there are many sides to this issue.
We aren't really broke. We are still the wealthiest nation on Earth. The U. S. government borrows because we are indeed spending faster than we collect, but the recent failure of Congress to raise taxes on those making multi-millions and billions leaves the wealthiest few paying essentially no taxes because they have enough exemptions to basically get off without contributing to the nation's wealth. Also, corporations are allowed to get off the tax roll by numerous exemptions. A little fairness were would go a long way toward correcting the situation, but neither side seems willing to cpompromise for the etterment of the nation.
As for walker's campaigh promises, I have not found where he said anything about disenfranchising service unions or unilaterally doinf away with their bargaining rights (which are now considered to be rights). It would take, according to what I have read on Wisconsin law, a state-wide referendum to change this issue, not just a vote by the state legislature.
Apart from that, Walker ga ve up billions in Federal stimulus money and sold state assets for pennies on the dollar to wealthy campaign & corporate contributors, thus changing the fiscal situation in wisconsin from a surplus situation to a defecit. He has been so irresponsible in his short time in office that it is almost criminal. I have no sympathy for him or his position, which brought him to this crisis: The unions were willing to bargain with Walker, as did ours in Illinois, but he bascially said he wanted this and would not compromise.
I'm sure there are many other issues to be overcome there, but many people who voted for him are now taking back their support. I believe the fire fighters just yesterday said they would oppose him and bring him up for recall after his first year in office, which is when a recall can be put on the ballot.
Cheers, my old friend!
Chef Jeff
Wesman Todd Shaw, you are probably right, but corporations, as long as they have the right to act like they did in the 1880's, will end up more powerful than ever. There needs to be balance, with one side able to stop excesses by the other. What we have are polar opposite extremes that won't budge from their entrenched positions. Thank for the comment!
Cheers!
Chef Jeff
Eovery, I'll agree that at times unions have been their own worst enemy, but unions also brought about a lot of sanity to the workplace. In the pictures above we harken back to when people worked 60 hours a week, gained next to nothing in wages, and children who should have been in school were working in mines, factories and other dangerous occupations. The poor got poorer with no chance for advancement, and the wealthy got more wealthy, sometimes obscenely so.
Just about every benefit we enjoy as workers today come from the unions, for whom many bled and many died, including some of my ancestors and relatives.
As for companies moving jobs overseas, maybe having to pay union wages, or even just minimum wages, caused these companies to think it was better to pay a dollar a day, or in really great conditions, a dollar an hour in some other nation, which are basically slave wages, to make cheap products we will mindlessly buy over here.
There may indeed be blame to share, and I concede that this is so, but to unilaterally blame unions that have been fighting to bring us fair wages and decent working conditions is not the way to go. Don't you agree?
Thanks for the comment!
Cheers!
Chef Jeff
BobbiRant, in general I agree that recent legislation, at least since 1980, and presidential interference in the legislative process, have cause it to be much more easy for U.S. corporations to find cheap labor elsewhere.
Remember when companies moved to Mexico a few decades ago? The reason was, pure and simple, cheap labor. Now these same companies have left Mexico for Southeast Asia and China. Maybe if things continue this way here, companies will return to offer us $1 a day jobs!
Cheers, and thanks for the comment!
Chef Jeff
A ' vote up' article, indeed. This is the result of goof homework.The facts are eye-openers.It the fact told by non-American economists also that- America is unnessessarily spending much on war weapons with the only hope of selling them, and also hoping that it will be world power soon.But what about common American people?
A 'vote up' an 'Awesome' and a request to put this on my FB page.
A 'triple play'--TPC style.
"Unions shed blood to bring us the rights we have today, and if unions were to go away, the rights we enjoy would also go away."
Umm... no. Unions have consistently abrogated the right to work.
Bake any good pies lately, Chef?
Amazing that months later, this hub sounds current. Nothing changes. Why might I have hoped it would? We are again unemployed,even! But this time we cannot get benefits because the Board forced my husband and founder of the company to resign. They wanted the company for themselves. Stinks to be powerless, without enough money to sue, eh?
Well, hugs to you. Miss you being around.
Sad hub. One wonders if the money spent on the current wars was invested elsewhere, the story would be different.
Well written interesting hub. God Bless You, and wishing you good health.
NiComp, I can only quote to you the things my great-grandfather told me as a child that he was working as a child of about 12 and failed to get an education in school. He worked at a large plant in St. Louis that melted scrap metals, mostly iron, and that he worked ten or twelve hours a day, six days a week, and had only Sunday off.
He was paid a pittance, was basically a human mule, lugging a heavy iron mining rail car back and forth, with coal or scrap metal for the furnaces, and ingots of melted metal back to the foundry.
Boys his age died, one he witnessed was being grabbed by a hook on a scrap feeder, being dragged up screaming and shouting for someone to save him, but he was dumped into the molten metal in the kettle. My great-grandfather said that this is what drove him at an early age to become a union man, to demand safe conditions, fair pay and so much more.
My grandfather and my father were also Union men, as has been most of my family, myself included. A few of us have forgotten that our ancestors had blood spilled when company thugs brought their guns and baseball bats to break up union organizing. It was indeed the Unions that brought us so many of the things we take for granted, such as 40 hour work week, overtime pay, days off, somewhat fair pay for a day's work, vacation time, decent working conditions and so much more.
I bristle a bit when someone says that Unions fought against the right to work. They have fought for the rights of workers to expect fairness and decency in their jobs. When people were driven by conditions of poverty to do scab work on a Union worksite, yes, Unions stepped in and picketed or at times took actions directly to stop the work. It was not done because they wanted to see people suffer. It was done because they knew that companies hate unions and will do anything to break them, much as some politicians and corporations do today. In Union solidarity there is power, whereas the individual can be and will be replaced if he utters one word of protest. That, in spite of all the other things Unions have done for better or for worse, is the reason why Unions brought us so much.
In a way we live in times when we live with the benefits of this, but forget that there is no right to work for anyone. If companies had their way they could send any of us packing for any breach of rules, such as taking abreak to eat lunch. I have lived in countries where workers were not allowed lunch breaks, or even bathroom breaks. I personally saw workers beaten when they asked for time off to go to the funeral of one of their children who died of some otherwise cureable disease that a simple health plan could have prevented.
In our own times, yes, jobs went overseas and continue to do so, but it is only because companies will go to the cheapest source of labor, and that often means tremendously hard work done by people who get paid pennies on the dollar for work once done by Union labor.
In places like South Carolina, workers had jobs, not always great jobs, working in textile mills. The comanies did their best and won in preventing any unionization there. People were found murdered along the rural highways if they were suspected of being union sympathizers. So the local people followed the rules, never formed unions, and thought their jobs would be safe because they gave in. I can still remember the huge uproar when those jobs went elsewhere. It wasn't all that long ago. It wasn't because the people working were making too much. It was because the companies found a place where people would do the same job for tremendously less money. was that a good thing? Did it help our nation out at all? I would argue it was simply a selfish move by some companies, many of which now smile as we buy their products once produced by American workers.
Now we see people in our own nation living in poverty, doing work we used to think of as bottom of the barrel, while all of us, government, companies, individuals, support the bad working conditions of overseas workers by buying cheaply made products at large stores. We do the same thing as the corporations do in that we seek the lowest prices, and along with that the lowest quality, and think we are doing right by ourselves.
Unions have had their share of problems and I am greatly disappointed at the selfish attitudes of some of the former& present leaders of unions. At times they shoot themselves in the foot just to make a point. But never fool yourself into believing that corporations, without at times hard nudging by Unions, would ever have allowed the workers' benefits we enjoy today.
Yes, and it was bought with blood, anger, and at times the cost was the life of many a good and decent working man or woman, or even, child.
Storytellersrus, I have not been able to bake too much, but I have been working with my daughter and son to pass on some of the ideas of good and wholesome cooking. Now they are doing very well, creating new dishes and keeping themselves healthy. No greater gift can a father recieve than the secure knowledge that his children appreciate what is truly important; good health, good friends and a life filled with love.
I hope that you are well, as I am better now than I was before. It is not easy to come to terms with things we can not control, but I find a certain measure of peace knowing that if I can not control what ails me, I can live my life to the utmost every moment I draw breath.
Thank you for the kind words!
The Old Firm Level 1 Commenter 15 months ago
Well written Jeff. If you substituted "New Zealand " for "America" the same would be true, with the exception of minor details.
Right now here, an attempt is being made to make those classified as "sick" or "invalids" work for any benefit, as well as the unemployed. This although official unemployment figures are near 7% (actual ones are probably twice that.) So if they work, someone else is displaced from a job, and unemployment continues to rise. So, create more jobs? Nope! firms are outsourcing to China for cheap labour, so jobs are going, not coming, and we have no protective tariffs as the powers that be are signing one sided free trade agreements with mad enthusiasm.
As you imply, governments are dictated to by the international power-brokers. you could say "money", but money is only a means of power, and power a means of absolute control.
Cheers fellow serf,
Peter.