My ex-brother in law used to complain about low paid workers being unwilling to climb around on piles of pipes at the pipe-fitting warehouse where he was management. I asked him if they had families. He said yes. I then asked if they had medical insurance through the company since they were being minimum wage. He said no. He is Slovenian and they were Hispanic. The cultural differences around work had to do with the family structure and the sense of responsibility. The Slovenian had what the psychologists call separation and individuation to the higher good of the individual. The Hispanic was individual and knew that he had the individual responsibility to think first of his children and the family's good. He would quit rather than endanger his ability to work. Too little is known about culture and the ways that we are different. It's almost as if the GOP was Slovine and the Democrats were Hispanic. We seemed to just get ignoranter and ignoranter as they say back home with pride in Oklahoma. REH
PS God help you if you missed a holiday in the Slovenian Grandparents home, so it isn't all that simple but for the young and foolish at work it is. From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Ed Weick Sent: Saturday, February 26, 2011 12:59 PM To: RE-DESIGNING WORK, INCOME DISTRIBUTION, EDUCATION Subject: Re: [Futurework] Whither the American dream? Things have changed, Ray, and mostly not for the better. I worked on a logboom crew when I was a young man and I was a member of a strong union at the time, the International Woodworkers of America. One thing I remember was that we could look the bosses who ran the pulp mill that took our logs straight in the eye. Yup, they ran the mill, but we had our union. The IWA is now a thing of the past. I'd hate to be a guy pushing those logs around without a union. To me, a principal purpose of a union is not only to ensure that employees are paid decently, but also to ensure that workers get the kind of protection they require. The demise of unions means the rise of bosses and the loss of principals that ensured the safety and equitability of the work place. Ed ----- Original Message ----- From: Ray Harrell <mailto:[email protected]> To: 'RE-DESIGNING WORK, INCOME DISTRIBUTION,EDUCATION' <mailto:[email protected]> Sent: Saturday, February 26, 2011 11:10 AM Subject: Re: [Futurework] Whither the American dream? I first noticed the greed in Oklahoma at the football games. My father was a coach and he taught me that when the other team was not so good that you shouldn't humiliate them but use the game to play your less accomplished players and give them experience. That the other team was bound to build their program and that you needed to build your future by playing your younger players. That this built both and accomplished one of the purposes for the sport in the first place. But during my high school in the fifties there was a new spirit. A hunger for power and an incipient insecurity that made people want to win as much as 70 to 0. My father said: "What's the point?" Being an Indian in Oklahoma where the dominant population were still jerks It reminded him of the scourge of Wounded Knee, Sand Creek, the Trail of Tears when the elimination of another group was the goal down to the children for as General Sherman said famously: "Nits make lice" as he slaughtered pregnant women and children. They covered it up with the glory of the warrior and applied it to industry as mere managers were called "captains" and ex-military were coveted and retained their titles. At its roots it spoke of a pathological insecurity that could only be rescued through the guarantee of annihilation and genocide. Howard Fineman in the Huffington Post today said that the problem was that the Unions didn't allow the GOP the clean sweep of the governorships. Actually this all reminds me of the Arts where the hicks and trinkets and trash entertainers with little talent and even less hard work are given millions while the virtuosos who expand the aural world and must practice hours a day for no pay are paid peanuts and the NEA and public broadcasting is eliminated. It's the rise of the pathological and the barbaric whether in secular, church or synagogue. The hick and the lazy are here to stay and they are the end of a cycle. the meaning of the American industrial complex has come down to Coca Cola. That's the product of America and American culture. What's the point? The wealthy want everything for their children. All the money. All the complex culture and competence. The good schools. Good health. So many houses they forget how many they have, remember John McCain? The government has returned to the European model of Aristocracy. It's not capitalism or socialism. It's the wish to be Aristocrats and Democracy is the "Road to Serfdom." That's my opinion. REH From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Ed Weick Sent: Saturday, February 26, 2011 10:42 AM To: RE-DESIGNING WORK, INCOME DISTRIBUTION, EDUCATION Cc: [email protected] Subject: [Futurework] Whither the American dream? Interesting series of articles on the demise of American unions, the huge growth of income at the top of the American income pyramid, and the role of politics in all of this. Well worth a read. http://motherjones.com/politics/2011/02/income-inequality-labor-union-declin e Ed _____ _______________________________________________ Futurework mailing list [email protected] https://lists.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
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