On 2022-12-31 15:48, Steve Litt via PLUG-discuss wrote:
[email protected] said on Sat, 31 Dec 2022 10:54:21 -0700
Here are my thoughts. Nothing is free.. had an econ prof that used
to
say there are no free lunches... it might be free to you but someone
paid for it.
True. But schooling for the citizenry is an investment. Educated
people
pay more taxes and use less welfare, WIC and food stamps. An educated
citizenry means we can quickly ramp up production if a war or boycott
cuts our supply of foreign goods. A lot of our social and political
strife is due to the fact that a large swath of our citizenry is
constantly running uphill financially, and they're getting tired.
I'm a high school dropout that dropped back in.
Life is not easy. Don't have money for school? Go to work for a
college or university that gives free tuition for their employees or
maybe you can be like me and join the military and get the GI Bill.
We've been cheaping out K-12 for the last 3 or 4 decades. A huge
portion of our young people are completely unprepared for either
college or a modern job. We now have uneducated parents raising
uneducated kids. What could *possibly* go wrong?
I'm glad our forefathers were willing to endure and did not quietly
quit. There are stories they were out in the freezing cold fighting
for our freedom while only having rags on their feet because some or
maybe many did no have shoes. Some lost their lives and some lost
their fortunes.
And when they did that, I doubt they were fighting for future
generations to work in our current sweatshops that aren't a lot
better
than the sweatshops of 1910.
[snip]
I think as a society we have gotten soft.
You know who's gotten soft? The trust fund babies. The Fortune 500
CEOs
with their multimillion/year compensation. Those living on
investments.
Believe me, the guys who nailed the roof onto my house in the burning
Florida sun are not soft. Nor are the homeless people who work 40 and
still can't find housing, or those who get laid off through no fault
of
their own and are instantly homeless because the middle class is
constantly on the ragged edge of financial ruin.
For me, in my youth, I was grateful for the minimum wage jobs I was
able to work at.
Back then, a minimum wage job kept a roof over your head, and in many
cases your company gave you health insurance. And back then it was
easy
to get a job exceeding the minimum wage. In a big city, you could
find
factory row, knock on every door, and come home with a job that
night.
A job whose only educational requirement was to be able to speak,
read
and write, if that.
My opinion is a job at McDonalds is not a career job and if you
think
it is your selling yourself short. These are starter jobs and if
one
does not like minimum wage then go build some skills.
How? Today's construction trade pay is pulled down by the steady
inflow
of immigrants, legal and illegal. Today's sales jobs are minimum
wage,
so unless you're in the top 10 percent of sales people, that's where
you stay. You could be a server in a high class restaurant if you can
get the job, but you better stay young and good looking, especially
if
you're female.
If things become too east people will not rise to their potential.
Tell that to the trust fund babies.
Again as a country we have become soft.
But a lot harder than in the 60's and early 70's, when a guy with an
IQ
of 85 could get a factory job and feed his family. In the 60's, one
of
my buddies lived in a rich suburb, and his father paid for him and
his
brother to go to college. His father was a garbage collector.
I'll say it again: Our nation needs to invest in its citizens'
education if we don't want to become a third world country.
SteveT
Steve Litt
Autumn 2022 featured book: Thriving in Tough Times
http://www.troubleshooters.com/bookstore/thrive.htm
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