The Future of the American Worker

"Educating generations of people to graduate from college with a focus on what they'll earn is not noble. An appreciation for what you contribute to society is better."

That rumbling you hear is Ayn Rand turning in her grave. I must counter that I can't think of anything more nobe and beneficial to society than to educate yourself for a career that will provide earnings to sustain an enjoyable life. No dollars = no economy = no society. You can base a society on good feelings as suggested here, but at some point, "people gotta eat". The great "We" of collectivism took a bit of a tumble recently; though, perhaps Sara Horowitz has forgotten about the Soviets. Those folks new all about noble and looking out for their fellow man.

Is that what you really want?

Bama is doing all he can to destroy the economy by eliminating U.S. jobs.

During the presidential campaign for the 92 election, the only candidate speaking the truth was Ross Perot. While George senoir, and Bill Clinton pushed for NAFTA and said it would create jobs on both sides of the border, while reducing the influx of illegal immigration, Ross Perot said that if NAFTA was approved there would be a huge sucking sound as jobs went south. He was right. During the presidential campaign for 2008 Obama said we needed to renegotiate NAFTA, to make it an even playing field and bring jobs back to the US. Now, President Obama says he will not be revisiting NAFTA.So if a manufacturing job went south, it's staying south. There is no one speaking up for manufacturing in this country. Manufacturing has been left out as those in Washington try to turn the US into the leader of the service sector. If you are in manufacturing, you are on your own. One way to keep cost down is to keep labor cost down, through automation, where you need fewer employee's or just plain old low wages. If a shop is a union shop you are at a competitive disadvantage to anyone making the same product in China. Your quality may be superior to the imported product, but, sometimes is just a cost issue. You will never be competitve. If it's a quality and delivery schedule issue, a union shop can still be competitive. Unfortunatly most manufacturing is driven by price. The foot print of the union in the US is bound to shrink as jobs go overseas. The union will still be around for those things that are not imported, construction, teachers unions, etc... But ,for manufacturing, it's a dieing breed.

Labor unions pushed jobs overseas. It is clear and obvious.

When we say "freelancers," aren't we really talking about "contingency workers." Freelancer sounds like everyone is some kind of writer or artist or computer programmer. The reality is far from that. Most people who work from "gig to gig" are employed by temp agencies at lower pay and with few if any benefits. They often work alongside "traditional" employees who haven't yet been laid off but are terrified at the prospect of landing in the same predicament. The contingency workforce needs a champion, and I applaud the Freelancers Union for taking up their cause.

When we say "freelancers," aren???t we really talking about "contingency workers." Freelancer sounds like everyone is some kind of writer or artist or computer programmer. The reality is far from that. Most people who work from "gig to gig" are employed by temp agencies at lower pay and with few if any benefits. They often work alongside ???traditional??? employees who haven't yet been laid off but are terrified at the prospect of landing in the same predicament. The contingency workforce needs a champion, and I applaud the Freelancers Union for taking up their cause.

The three primary players are all suffering. Labor unions got greedy decades ago by demanding way too much for its members which raised the price of cars and did nothing for the quality. Greedy company stockholders were just as much at fault for continuing to pass on costs to the consumer and paid no attention to quality. Along came the imports with much high quality and much lower pricing. The third player, our government's leaders, did nothing to protect these companies and now we all get to pay. Coincidentally, I have owned a product of every major car company at one tiime or another. At present there is a Corvette, a Bonneville, a Toyota Camry, and a Dodge truck in my carport.

well maybe it's time to end organized labor as we know it and get back to organized labor as the workers knew it a hundred years ago. somewhere in the 50's or 60's the term"working class" was dropped from our vocabulary. we all became "middle class" orwell called it pretty well didn't he?

The Middle Class, ha ha, it is the working poor. Welocme to the 21st century, you know belong to the great American working poor.