Going for the lowest common denominator

[MadHound]

There is currently a thread going about fired teachers having to do the "perp walk" when they are fired. One of the most disheartening things I read, time and again, on this thread was that the perp walk was a common feature of getting fired in the private sector, that teachers shouldn't be exempted from the walk of shame just because they are teachers.

This sort of attitude is reflective of a corrosive attitude that is pervading our culture, namely the leveling of every worker to the lowest common denominator. We witness this in the attacks on teachers and other public sector employees. These professions are attacked because their employees have a decent pension program that their fellow workers in the private sector don't. The logic goes that since the private sector doesn't have such pensions, or pay scales, or tenure, or what have you, we must strip such benefits from the public sector employees.

We must reduce everybody to the lowest common denominator, a level that is set by the private sector.

This is insane. If we continue to reduce everybody to the lowest common denominator, as set by the private sector, then soon we will all be getting pay and benefits that are reduced to barely subsistence standards. The lowest common denominator in the private sector is the person working a McJob, for minimum wage, with no benefits. Is that where we want all workers to wind up at? Is our jealousy of the compensation received by certain groups of workers so great that we must tear everybody down.

Rather than trying to tear down those workers, those professions who have, through long fights and struggle, actually achieved a decent level of compensation for their workers, don't you think it is time to start lifting up those who haven't achieved such a position? Rather than tearing down your fellow workers out of jealousy and bile, why not lift up the position of yourself and your own workers?

The perp walk is an uncalled shaming of any worker. It is time for it to stop. All workers deserve a living wage, and decent compensation for their labor in relation to their profession. It is time for all workers to join together and fight for the rights of everybody.

Otherwise, we will continue to play into the hands of the wealthy, powerful, corporate elite, who are playing a game of divide and conquer in order to reduce all workers to the lowest common denominator.

[MadHound]

1. kick n/t

[Brickbat]

2. This is an excellent point. Many workers, no matter the industry, have been trained to think "why

should he get that when I don't?" when they see someone with better benefits, salary or working conditions instead of "why don't I have that?" The reverse is true here. When a group complains when they are being treated like crap, the reaction is, "I get treated like crap too, why should you be exempt?" instead of everyone looking at each other and saying, "Hey wait, moneyed interests are treating us like crap, and we won't stand for it anymore!"

[MadHound]

5. It is more of the same divide and conquer strategy that is used to keep

The power and wealthy elite in power. Sadly, so many people fall for it and attack their fellow workers rather than the real source of their misery.

[DirkGently]

3. It's a message to other workers: "We own you. Your lives. Your dignity. Your health."

[hifiguy]

4. BIG K&R

So very, very true....

:kick:

[lib2DaBone]

6. Not since the days of the Great Robber Barons of the 1800's...

Have working people been treated so badly and our Government been so corrupt from top to bottom.
Today's Robber Barons: Bernake, Geithner, Blankfein, Koch Bros......

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The Robber Barons (Paperback) by: Matthew Josephson


This 1934 book provides a history of the late 19th century that is missing from school history books. The author worked for a few years in Wall Street and learned about the "Men Who Rule America". Later he wrote a number of biographies for a magazine. These men were no match for the great capitalists who flourished in the late 19th century (the Gilded Age). He decided to write not just about their lives, manners and morals, but how they got their money. Their great wealth was unaffected by any income tax. These barons of industry were "agents of progress" in transforming an agrarian-mercantile society into a mass production economy. Josephson described their most ruthless actions, their plunders and conspiracies, and their lack of ethics. The system they created led to the Great Depression. Since then academic historians created a revisionist history that claimed those entrepreneurs were saviors of the country and not interested in looting and plundering the economy. This "history" is similar to the "truth factories" in George Orwell's "1984" . Their family dynasties have survived, they established trusts that evaded the tax burdens of other wealthy families. These dynasties seem permanent. The founders were hated by the American people in their lifetime. The farmers of Kansas first applied the name "Robber Barons" to the railroads that oppressed them.

Robber Barons is a classic and a good general history of Astor, Vanderbilt, Drew, Cooke, Gould, Fisk, Carnegie, Morgan, Rockefeller and Harriman.

Most of the men made a great deal of their fortunes through stocks on Wall Street which some of their stories are outlined here. Interesting enough is that over half made their fortunes in Rail Roads through ownership and stock manipulation. This is a good book giving the reader a general overview of some of the biggest fortunes made during the late 1800's. (as well as the Greatest Depression they created in the 1930's)