We Are Destined To Be A Low Wage Country.

[TheMastersNemesis]

Forget all the empty rhetoric about jobs. The way we are going we will be a low wage country with few living wage jobs. That is the goal of corporate America The writing is on the wall. Profits are all that matter. And you cannot feed the 1% unless the work force is wanting and needy. Why do workers not understand this fact. Even if you are in a higher paying job you will make less in the future or be out of a job altogether.

This situation is the culmination of what Reaganomics and Reagan has wrought. Yes the economy is doing quite well for about 20% of the work force. The MSM will not report on what is happening to the rest of the work force. The real rot in the employment market is like an iceberg. The workers see little of it on the surface, but the rot is there.

Bernie Sanders is right on on labor issues. However the MSM, GOP and business is labeling him too socialist or communist. What the powers that be are saying that if you want a decent job with benefits you are too socialist. That dictum scares people away from voting for their own economic well being. It is now patriotic to work for less and have not job security. Everyithing about work is now so twisted anymore reality is illusive.

[Orsino]

1. Aristos are generally willing to blow it all up rather than evolve.

Unfortunately, we are often willing to let them.

[Hoyt]

2. Who will businesses sell to. I think very few have that goal, but I do think there is

Last edited Thu Jul 9, 2015, 04:07 PM - Edit history (1)

downward pressure on some wages. All the more reason for increasing minimum wage, making sure people have access to jobs with better wages, guaranteed wage, etc.

[jeff47]

13. Why do you think they would be planning that far ahead?

It's pretty common these days for companies to act to get a short-term boost, yet cripples their long-term profit.

For example, major R&D organizations are now gone (Bell Labs and the like). In the long term, they made their parent companies enormous fortunes by inventing new products to sell. But they cost a lot of money in the short run.

So they were spun off/divested/unfunded/closed down to the point where no major company has anything like a real "research" department.

The executives who made those decisions made a lot of money, due to the higher short-term profits. But now there's nothing revolutionary coming from any of them.

[Hoyt]

27. Even the most ignorant manager and stock investor knows you can't kill off all your customers.

If companies were doing that, stocks would tank. It's ludicrous to think companies want to pay everyone 50 cents an hour. I get they want to save money, but except for the simplest, easy to replace, jobs, they are not going to do well ticking everyone off and especially driving all wages to low levels.

Unquestionably, there will always be disagreement between owners and worker over how the pie should be split. I happen to believe it should be skewed more toward workers, but I don't believe most legitimate business people and investor want to drive wages near $0.00.

I do believe, we are in a period where everyone needs to tighten up in certain respects, so we don't end up like Greece or other economies. The rich need to give up a good bit, and even many in the middle class do too to do all the things we talk about on DU -- healthcare, education, welfare, living wage, increases in minimum wage, housing, transportation, etc. Obviously, we need to cut the military. Unfortunately, that affects us also because a lot of good paying jobs are in the production of WMDs. And, we need to ensure the things we do well, continue to do well -- hence my support for at least seeing the final TPP. I get general austerity is not the way to go, but there are some areas where you have to be austere to provide for other things needed in our society.

[jeff47]

30. You can't kill off all your customers today.

But if they all die 10 years from now, well you already got paid.

I do believe, we are in a period where everyone needs to tighten up in certain respects, so we don't end up like Greece or other economies. The rich need to give up a good bit, and even many in the middle class do too

You're welcome to lead the way.

Or you could try to realize that the economy isn't a zero-sum game. Having explained that to you multiple times, I'm sure that won't be happening. I'm guessing your paycheck depends on not understanding it.

[Elwood P Dowd]

33. The 1% water boys will never change. Either they don't want to hear about the problem, or

they are willing participant$ promoting and defending policie$ that led to the problem.

[Hoyt]

36. And the pie-in-the-sky types just think all this mess be corrected overnight, without anyone but

Last edited Thu Jul 9, 2015, 06:41 PM - Edit history (1)

the 1% hurt.

We can change everything in a few years; Bernie Sanders, 500 government people just like him, and Occupy will take over and make everything right. Of course, it could end up the Republicans and tbaggers are in charge.

[closeupready]

35. Don't kid yourself. There's a reason slavery was an institution

which so many wanted to preserve in the pre-Civil War Confederacy - it was hugely profitable. If it was still legal, it would be all over the place. And even though it's still highly illegal, it CONTINUES to thrive globally.

[hifiguy]

47. They want the barest level of subsistence wages and not one penny more.

Just enough to keep the proles alive until about age 40-45, just long enough to birth the next generation of proles. Then they are free to die off. Thirty years ago Henry Kissinger (war criminal and BFF of Hillary Clinton) was already talking about the need to get rid of the "useless eaters."

They can sell the few things that are still made here in China, Brasil, the EU.

They want the benefits of slavery without even those meagre obligations.

In some distant time when the history of this era is written, if there is anyone left to write it, Milton Friedman will be placed ahead of Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot. The only remaining question is whether he will beat out Hitler for the #1 spot of Worst and Most Destructive Human Being of All Time.

[Hoyt]

52. Guess you've never worked for some small business owner. Do you work for a corporation?

[hifiguy]

54. I worked in a business small enough to wonder for an entire year

whether my paycheck would bounce when I tried to cash it. Because it did a few times back in the early 1990s.

I've been unemployed for 2.5 years and at my age have essentially zero hope of ever holding a permanent job again.

Some people and small businesses, perhaps quite a few, will revert to a Jeffersonian kind of small scale localist/regionalist model and succeed.

The Dons of Big Biz, the zilionaire heavy hitting dick-swingers, want one thing - rock bottom wages paid to easily replaceable people. Why else is everything being sent to China, India, and Vietnam. Even China is starting to see outsourcing and Western-owned businesses leaving becauseeven Chinese wages are "bad for business." CHINESE wages. That tell you anything?

Your endless apologias for the 1% make hysterical reading.

[Hoyt]

57. I've worked for the same. Point is, small businesses don't pay very well, if you even get paid.

[hifiguy]

59. Some do, some don't.

I know a handful of businesses in the area of high-end audio that pay VERY well indeed.

It's a luxury goods market, and the owner of the leading speaker company in that field once told me "I HAVE to pay people very well and I WANT to pay people very well. Without them, I'd still be building speakers a pair at a time in my garage." He believes in sharing the wealth with those who make it possible, and has repeatedly refused to move one single bit of his manufacturing to China purely as a matter of principle.

[PowerToThePeople]

67. Great post!

[melm00se]

79. 5 of the top 10,

8 of the top 20 and 19 of the top 50 companies with the largest R&D are US based companies

[jeff47]

80. Development and research are different, despite how commonly they're conflated.

Those companies you refer to are doing development - short-term projects to take existing technology and turn it into a product quickly.

Like Cisco making a new router from existing WiFi radios instead of Bell Labs inventing solid-state transistors.

[Oneironaut]

71. Businesses don't care about other businesses. That's too high level.

At a macro level, yes, it would crash the economy and their business. Businesses don't have such a long term way of thinking, though. Everything on Wall Street is about now. Decreasing wages causes lower operating costs in the very short term. This increases stock prices. Therefore, lowering wages is very desirable.

The problem comes when all businesses do the same thing - the economy as a whole downsizes with those wages. Unable to sustain itself with a much lower amount of cash going around, the economy crashes and burns.

[closeupready]

3. So many ways this post frustrates me.

If you want to give up, I won't stop you. For me and others, I'm going to keep fighting for what's fair and just.

[TheMastersNemesis]

9. My Op Is About Fighting. I Do Not Know How To Reach The People Who Drink The Kool Aide.

Bernie Sanders and the unions et al are pushing for higher wages. The meme out and about is that being pro worker is TOO socialistic. And people run the other way. I do not understand why workers are so lame of demanding their right which is what unions have done.

We are destined to be a low wage country unless workers start agitating for better treatment. Yet I hear so many around me bitching that $15.00 an hour is too much. Or I hear people moaning about pro worker activists being too disruptive.

[closeupready]

11. Oh okay, I see. Do you have cable?

Al-Jazeera did a series of documentaries earlier this year about work in today's US, "Hard-Earned", in which one of the individuals being profiled was trying to organize McDonald's workers. The opposition he faced was daunting, and made for really interesting viewing - kind of like a real-life 'Norma Rae'.

[TheMastersNemesis]

18. I Don't Have Cable, But Al Jazeera Used To Be On MHZ International On Regular TV.

I do not think that Al Jazeera is on now for some reason. MHZ is an international channel that carries CNN news type programs from other countries like China, India, Vietnam, Ireland, Japan et al. You get a very different perspective of issues in other countries. You realize we are not the only country on the planet. And they have news our MSM would never never never cover.

Our MSM is completely corrupt and compromised. Really sad.

[jwirr]

20. I had the priviledge to speak with and hear the stories of many of the old fighters for the Union

when it was a literal physical battle. It seems to me that we have become tamed. We are afraid and will sacrifice much to keep the status quo.

They went out on those battle lines knowing that they were going to face violence. Knowing that they and their families were going to face hardships when they were on strike. Knowing that they were up against the powers that be. That they were the underdog. But they went.

They were also called socialists and many of them actually were, like some of us are. They won a little at a time but they kept going. And when FDR came along (also called a socialist) they won.

That is what we need to remember that we do not beat the PTB by letting them divide and conqueror. Bernie has told us that when he said he could not do it alone. That together we can unite and create our own revolution.

Hopefully it will not require the sacrifice of blood that it did back then. Hopefully it can be a peaceful political revolution which is what Bernie is calling for. Hopefully Bernie can attract voters from all walks of life to unite and defeat the 1% and their corporations. Otherwise you are totally correct. We will be doomed to be just another low income jobs country.

[Eleanors38]

23. Watch "The Inheritance." Labor film. Real bullets...

I showed this to my government classes at Austin Comm. College 40+ yrs. ago.

They couldn't believe it.

Believe.

[jwirr]

34. Where do I find it? And thank you.

[Eleanors38]

70. It should be found on Google. If I remember it is in 2 parts. Sorry, I can't be more specific.

[jwirr]

72. Unfortunately I went to google and it is all about a classic called "The Inheritance". I will keep

looking.

[Eleanors38]

75. Try "labor film the inheritance." Also: www.youtube.com/watch?v=SAwgX8NCeL8.

Actor Robert Ryan narrates, music by Judy Collins, Tom Paxton et al. Real pro job. There is a long version and a short.

[jwirr]

77. That should do it.

[Nite Owl]

81. this doesn't sound like it

but it's all I found from the time frame you gave.
I would like to see it.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0074487/

[Eleanors38]

82. Google: labor film the inheritance. Take your pick. Therenis a longer version

than the youtube version.

[Nite Owl]

83. ok

will try that
ty

[Eleanors38]

24. Part of the problem: The innertubes have made cynicism and political impotence hep-cat.

[whathehell]

58. +100. n/t

[Rex]

4. It is kinda funny to watch people claim 'new, better jobs and more pay' without a lick of proof.

Sad, pathetic...but funny too. I guess someone here will buy into it without thinking about the issue much. Me, I would rather go with facts and the current environment to tell me how things are turning out.

[randome]

15. IT is still booming.

That's where the jobs are and where they will be for the foreseeable future. It's just the way things are.
[hr][font color="blue"][center]A ton of bricks, a ton of feathers, it's still gonna hurt.[/center][/font][hr]

[erronis]

28. I've only been in IT for 50 years and I don't agree with "booming"

Of course we all know about the out-sourcing, the off-shoring - two different things but symptoms of the overall problems.

Companies are merging and combining IT shops. The use of cloud/SaaS is becoming more prevalent (and rightfully so.)

In-house IT is now moving to basically infrastructure support. Networking, cabling, upgrades, firewall configurations, teleco interactions, etc.

The old days when every major company had an in-house group of techies that built their special applications is sliding away. Again, I think this is a natural and good process.

Hard skills like systems programming (understanding the internals of an OS) are no longer in demand. Platform-dependent GUI is being replaced by HTML or cross-platform libraries. Again - a plus. Database programming is something that every sophomore CS student should be able to do.

I think the old world of geeks that understand the arcane nature of computers is giving way to students and workers that know how to use some great tools to get their jobs done without involving the geeks.

It would be interesting to have a discussion about booming IT technologies. Artificial intelligence (2.0), machine-learning, predictive modeling, huge dataset analysis.

I don't think I'd recommend anyone to go into CS with a specialization in a language but rather a desire to learn more about this or other worlds using computers as a tool.

[randome]

31. Definitely being conversant with computers can help in any job, no matter what it is.

Also being mobile. I think we haven't adjusted to the fact that we can no longer stay in one place for 35 years.
[hr][font color="blue"][center]A ton of bricks, a ton of feathers, it's still gonna hurt.[/center][/font][hr]

[PowerToThePeople]

32. Who can afford to relocate?

Companies do not offer relocation anymore.

[randome]

38. You also have to divest yourself of possessions.

Who needs a house? That's a mobile-killer right there because selling it may take forever. And I have a house and two daughters but since my daughters are going away to college soon, I'm going to divest myself of the house and find a cheap apartment somewhere so I can afford to keep them in college.

It's never easy. I didn't mean to drop some easy-to-say buzzwords and imply otherwise.
[hr][font color="blue"][center]There is nothing you can't do if you put your mind to it.
Nothing.[/center][/font][hr]

[PowerToThePeople]

40. I rent

I could not afford to purchase real estate, even if I desired. Still, relocating is unaffordable.

[vinny9698]

73. How can immigrants relocate all the time?

Buy your self a Greyhound ticket. Have a yard sale, call the Salvation Army to pick up the left overs. Go on Craig's List and find a room to rent in your new location. Rent there for a few months until you get that new job, take a job any job, it is always easier to get a job when you have job. Then rent an apartment.
I have relocated 10 times in my lifetime for better job, education, travel. If you have a car it is even easier. Fill up the trunk and off you go. BTW
Illegal's have a harder time, desert trek, no language, dodging cops, and yet they make it. I know I teach ESL and have a lot of them in my classes.

[PowerToThePeople]

78. None of that is even close to doable for me

Maybe right out of high school or college that would have worked. Certainly not currently.

[erronis]

39. Interesting. Mobile means something else to me - able to work with the new mobile platforms

Not necessarily moving lock, stock, and barrel.

There are a few, but way too few, jobs that advertise for telecommuting. I believe this will become the norm rather than the exception over the next 10-20 years.

While the experiences with off-shoring jobs to countries with some language/cultural/time-zone has exposed challenges, it has also opened up the possibility that this can be done within a country.

Technologies such as remote desktop, VPN, collaborative project management, code sharing has made it possible to work from anywhere in the world with a decent connection.

Of course many old-style companies still want to see their minions glued to their desks - probably mainly to show off when friends and investors walk on in.

[yallerdawg]

5. We need progressive taxation.

We need to claw back all the Republican tax breaks.

We need to have living wages and incomes either through employment or through basic income programs. Work should not be our lives, all we do and are from cradle to grave.

We need a Democratic Congress and a Democratic President. We need progressive Supreme Court justices. We need Democratic governors and Democratic state houses.

Then we will change our destiny.

[fadedrose]

6. Low wages are better than no wages

Ask any Republican entrepreneur.


(thanks for spellcheck, Administrators)

[AZ Progressive]

7. We are going to be a low wage country if we don't organize and fight hard

Nothing in this country is freely given, even if promised. Due to the assholes in society, everything seemingly has to be won.


We have to re-fight and re-win the labor battles of long ago because we let them win for all these decades.

[ProfessorPlum]

8. "wanton"?

I do not think that means what you think it means.

I agree that a low wage country is what our corporate masters want. That is quite clear. But they won't get what they want if I have anything to say about it.

[Initech]

10. We could seriously elect democrats for the next 100 years.

We could have an entirely democratic house and Senate, with 3/4 of the states being represented by democratic governors and complete control of SCOTUS. The fact is that we'll probably never undo the damage that Reagan did during his 8 years in office and the damage that George Bush did in his 8 years. Corporations rule us now, the coup was official. They put profit above people.

[PowerToThePeople]

12. My long term goal is leaving the US

Before my son was borm, my long term goal was death. Funny how a child changes your plans. I'll probably go to Canada, then hopefully Scandinavia. Not sure yet if it will work. I would like to get political refugee status from the UN before going. I think this is the future for many anti-fascist Americans. Leave or die.

[jeff47]

16. Make sure you're under 40, or have specialized training/degrees. (nt)

[PowerToThePeople]

17. I will be pushing 60, already low 40s

I am an Engineer, not sure I'll be able to get a job now that you mention it. Dang.

Maybe I can get my son out and just suicide.

[jeff47]

25. There are other options, just probably not Canada or a Scandinavian country. (nt)

[PowerToThePeople]

29. I'll probably just try to free my son from this tyrannical society.

Then burn myself alive on the steps of congress or something. I don't know, I just want my boy to not be as bad off compared to me as I am to my parent's generation. He does not deserve that fate. I wish I had the resources available to offer him that in this hyper-capitalist world. I have time still to plan and act, he is young.

[Skittles]

63. please stop with the references to suicide

if you seriously have such thoughts, seek some help......my dad killed himself - would you like me to tell you how that may make your son feel?

[PowerToThePeople]

64. Please stop with the preaching

My thoughts are my own, not yours. I have free will and the right to them. Nothing you or anyone else can do will change that. If or when I decide to cross that bridge I have every right to do so. Time will tell.

[Skittles]

65. LOL

you need more help than I thought.........will ignore your sorry ass

[PowerToThePeople]

66. Good

One less third wayer that will post downstream of my posts.

[JCMach1]

14. If we don't shift paradigms, we will be a 'no jobs' country as robots

and 3D printing take what manufacturing jobs are left... not to mention almost every other job you can think of...

[Spitfire of ATJ]

19. Not only that but you MUST vote for the corporate candidate or be ARRESTED for insubordination.

[hifiguy]

44. It sure feels like that sometimes.

[matt819]

21. Correct.

Funny (not) story. One of my children is in his late 20s, in a pretty decent paying job. Doesn't matter what. When he asked for a raise, he was given a small one and told that if he pushed it, he'd be fired and they could hire a kid right out of school for half the salary. No irony that this is the usual threat for workers in their 40s and 50s and beyond. And, of course, no consideration for the expertise of the person already in the job.

Race to the bottom.

[StarzGuy]

26. The same is true of public school teachers

...too much education and too much experience means you are unemployable if you decide to quit and find a better teaching job. Why would a district pay for an experienced teacher when they can hire two just out of college teachers for the same cost?

[matt819]

74. That's true

That's been the case probably forever when it comes to us old folks. But when a 28-year old is threatened with being replaced by a 22-year old, that's just plain weird.

[WinkyDink]

22. "No, Mr. Bond; I expect you to DIE!" There ya go.

[Octafish]

37. That's why they hate the New Deal.

Government once supported Unions...good jobs...middle class...educated people....Oh.

[Snow Leopard]

41. Shopping at Walmart for ex.

doesn't help. You can't want low prices and high wages at the same time I don't think.

[Tatiana La Belle]

42. This is what they mean by a "good climate for business."

Globalization and treaties like NAFTA, CAFTA and GATS were all about pressuring wages down worldwide.

[hifiguy]

43. A modern, high-tech version of feudalism

has been the endgame for quite a while now. And it is getting closer to completion every day.

If Bernie or O'Malley can't stop it and reverse it it will still come to an end eventually. A very bloody and messy end for the one percent.

[Elwood P Dowd]

48. This must be what the Reagan-Bush Crime Family meant by the term

"New World Order" -- a giant global takeover and ownership of every fucking thing by the 1%.

[hifiguy]

50. Of course.

Remember when His Chimperial Majesty was blithering about an "ownership society?"

What he meant was clear - when the 1% owns everything, including our asses.

[bigwillq]

45. We already are for a lot of people.

Even for some that make more than minimum wage. I'm glad the minimum wage has gone up, but we need a living wage. Some are making a few dollars more than minimum but haven't had a wage increase in years. Still hard to live on that.

[madville]

46. Globalization and Free Trade

We have to come down a few notches in order for poor, deprived countries to come up a few notches.

[hifiguy]

49. And we will all be mindless drone proles together.

That's the name of the game.

A nation/world of sheep
Ruled by wolves
Owned by pigs.

[roamer65]

51. When your primary worry is day to day survival...

you put up less resistance to the ruling class and it's agenda. That is the goal. Make the 99 percent completely dependent on the few scraps that are thrown to them, and they are less likely to revolt.

[TheMastersNemesis]

53. There Is A Breaking Point. Remember The French Revolution.

The problem is that things do not necessarily get better.

[hifiguy]

55. The Russian Revolution, as well.

But the time comes when people can stand no more of the status quo.

[Hoyt]

61. That Russian revolution worked so well for people. Revolutions ate just as likely

to end up with the wrong side in power, perhaps more likely.

Besides, there is still a significant majority who are relatively happy with how things are. Increase some taxes on the wealthy, and to a lesser degree the upper middle class, provide healthcare, education, increased minimum wage, guaranteed income, etc., and you'd have a lot of relatively happy folks, some who still have reason to complain, and some who'll complain no matter what.

[truebluegreen]

56. A minor quibble: it isn't "destiny"--it is deliberate policy by the elites

including all those who push for so-called free trade and enrich themselves/their friends at the expense of the public, and the public good.

[hifiguy]

60. Thread winner.

It is 100% by design.

[lumberjack_jeff]

62. That is THE strategic objective of TPTB.

US labor (i.e. you) need to be competitive with kids making T-shirts in Pakistan.

[randys1]

76. ONLY way to fix this is A. MASSIVE tariffs B. MASSIVE taxes on rich and corps

make it here etc