RE: [Futurework] corporate governance: the end of pensions?

[Cordell, Arthur: ECOM]

Lawry   Favoring those who live in one's geographic neighborhood over those who don't is, at best, capricious     arthur   How about favouring those in your family over those who aren't?  Immediate family?  Extended family?      Greetings, all   I do not view myself as idealistic; I view myself as intensely pragmatic. The species-perspective is the only one that is, IMO, truly pragmatic. All else is short term gains and the infliction of suffering.   My neighbors have been suffering for centuries, as they do now. They include: Vietnamese rice farmers smitten by US napalm bombs; AIDS victims, victims because others could not get HIV testing; American natives, decimated by European colonizers; Cathars, destroyed by the Rome Papacy; UAL older workers; Iraqi children, held captive to the US-driven trade embargo; European gypsies, persecuted by local and national governments; Rwandan Tutsi's, butchered by their fellow countrymen; children in Mali, ravaged by various 'exotic' diseases; American kids who will go deaf because they listen to R&R too loudly; etc.  I have lots of neighbors. It is hard for me to say who is the lost and least deserving of better.   Overall, it is, IMO, the obligation of older generations to leave to younger ones a better world.  An obligation, not a choice.   Favoring those who live in one's geographic neighborhood over those who don't is, at best, capricious.   It would be easy for me to favor my immediate family and neighbors, but it would harm my ability to hand on to future generations a better world.  Better to raise the children to have a pan-species perspective and responsibility.  Maybe they'll have a chance of getting it right.   Cheers, Lawry   From: Cordell, Arthur: ECOM [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, May 12, 2005 4:02 PM To: Lawrence deBivort; Darryl and Natalia; Karen Watters Cole; futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca Subject: RE: [Futurework] corporate governance: the end of pensions?   I admire and envy the idealism of your position.   However when your neighbours lose their jobs, when the housing market plummets and when there is social breakdown then you may want to re-consider if the gain of the other outweighs the chaos which will affect the "my" when there is a global redistribution of income.   arthur -----Original Message----- From: Lawrence deBivort [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, May 12, 2005 3:34 PM To: Cordell, Arthur: ECOM; 'Darryl and Natalia'; 'Karen Watters Cole'; futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca Subject: RE: [Futurework] corporate governance: the end of pensions? Yes, my thought has to do with how we define 'my.'   Some would define it as themselves, others as one's family, other as one's tribe, or nation, or race, or religion....   My 'my' is usually that of the species, Homo sapiens. Globalization seems a lot less threatening when viewed from this perspective.   Cheers, Lawry   From: Cordell, Arthur: ECOM [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, May 12, 2005 3:24 PM To: Lawrence deBivort; Darryl and Natalia; Karen Watters Cole; futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca Subject: RE: [Futurework] corporate governance: the end of pensions?   A loss is a loss, even though my loss is another's gain. -----Original Message----- From: Lawrence deBivort [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, May 12, 2005 2:24 PM To: 'Darryl and Natalia'; Cordell, Arthur: ECOM; 'Karen Watters Cole'; futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca Subject: RE: [Futurework] corporate governance: the end of pensions? A pithy summation, with which I agree re. the effects of globalization.   BUT: perhaps this view is too chauvinistic? Only western workers will lament these impacts, and they are but a fraction of the world's population. For the rest, the equalization is positive.  Should we not be celebrating their gains, even more than Europeans and their American colonists losing their advantages?   Lawry   From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Darryl and Natalia Sent: Thursday, May 12, 2005 12:33 PM To: Cordell, Arthur: ECOM; Lawrence deBivort; Karen Watters Cole; futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca Subject: Re: [Futurework] corporate governance: the end of pensions?   So, if we look at #3 (Unrealistic worker expectations:) then, we see that as the global economy kicks in, we in the western nations (first-world economies) must lower our sights, lower our expectations, lower our standards of living  to become second and third-world nation workers governed by the greed and corruption of capitalist corporations bent on greater profits while the CEO's etc continue to reap the whirl-wind of consumer greed (spurred on by insane advertising) and set up their platinum parachutes for retirement.   Gee, retirement!   I guess UAL has it right. How can the exec's get those wonderful retirements if they have to pay into the worker's retirements? It's just not fair. The exec's give and give and all those workers want to take it all away just because they think they should have the same rights as the exec's when it comes to retirement.   Just a thought: maybe there was so much stress from too few people to do the work that much of this "bad service" began.   But, really, why should any exec's of any company care for anything other than their own hides. That is how we are taught in this society. And things will continue to get worse.   Darryl     ----- Original Message ----- From: Cordell, Arthur: ECOM To: Lawrence deBivort ; Karen Watters Cole ; futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca Sent: Thursday, May 12, 2005 8:29 AM Subject: RE: [Futurework] corporate governance: the end of pensions?   Your point number 3 is the key one for me.   Much needed is some "truth-telling."  Which political party is willing to point out the costs/benefits of "going global."  Which party is willing to talk about trade-offs?   From what I can see on CNN it seems that Lou Dobbs is the only US media person who seems concerned with the preserving the hard won gains of the US economy.   arthur -----Original Message----- From: Lawrence deBivort [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] Sent: Thursday, May 12, 2005 11:07 AM To: Cordell, Arthur: ECOM; 'Karen Watters Cole'; futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca Subject: RE: [Futurework] corporate governance: the end of pensions? I think that there are three issues:   1. Executive immorality: many are taught in Business School that the bottom line is making money (for themselves).   2. Bankruptcy and other commercial law: corporations are treated as individuals, and so benefit from the clean-slate opportunity once reserved for individuals. Combine that with the ability of highly paid executives to retire after just one big gig, and you have a prescription for unmitigated corporate bad-faith.   3. Unrealistic worker expectations: some American workers expect more compensation than their productivity justifies. In a time of international outsourcing, American workers have been unwilling to bite the bullet and figure out ways either to radically improve their productivity or to take gradual and significant cuts in pay.  Like all other Americans, we are willing to take the benefits of globalization (cheap stuff) but unwilling to accept the same low wages received by those who produce the cheap stuff overseas.  And so some American workers have become obsolete, literally.  It is a harsh reality, and I don't see anyone willing to tell them that, including labor union leadership.   Lawry   From: Cordell, Arthur: ECOM [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, May 12, 2005 10:55 AM To: Lawrence deBivort; Karen Watters Cole; futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca Subject: RE: [Futurework] corporate governance: the end of pensions?   It's interesting how promised pensions to workers (flesh and blood humans) can be so easily scrapped so that a corporation (a legal fiction) can be saved.   Priorities??   arthur

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