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Everyone has to be rich now??
- Thread starter Cadillac_Mike
- Start date
Late stage capitalism sucks. Greed sucks. IME, much of the issues is caused by that - pure, simple greed. I've had a front row seat to a major, very well-known company almost destroy themselves over greed, and I have had another front row seat to an even bigger company literally destroy itself over greed. It's sad.
Edit: Come to think of it, I've had a front row seat to quite a few companies doing significant harm to themselves, their employees, their customers, etc. over greed.
Stock buybacks, offshoring, "rightsizing," excessive bonuses, stock gants, stock manipulation, insider trading, unfair business practices, lack of ethics, corporations buying up houses, AirBNB/Uber and the trend of ignoring laws, short term profitability (keeping the shareholders happy) over long term strategic thinking, focus on profits over all else, corporate "responsibility" guidelines, price gouging, tax loopholes and "creative accounting, outright fraud ... the list is long.
Too often these issues get blamed on "greedy corporations," but we should never forget that those corporations are actually run by people, and it's greedy people making those decisions.
Edit: Come to think of it, I've had a front row seat to quite a few companies doing significant harm to themselves, their employees, their customers, etc. over greed.
Stock buybacks, offshoring, "rightsizing," excessive bonuses, stock gants, stock manipulation, insider trading, unfair business practices, lack of ethics, corporations buying up houses, AirBNB/Uber and the trend of ignoring laws, short term profitability (keeping the shareholders happy) over long term strategic thinking, focus on profits over all else, corporate "responsibility" guidelines, price gouging, tax loopholes and "creative accounting, outright fraud ... the list is long.
Too often these issues get blamed on "greedy corporations," but we should never forget that those corporations are actually run by people, and it's greedy people making those decisions.
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You do realize these are two FICTIONAL TEEVEE SITCOMS, right?
TeeVee shows are not demographic data.
Hollywood depicted some tough business practices, e.g. The Godfather?, Breaking Bad?, etc. "It's only business, nothing personal", etc.
But I'm not aware that they ever came anywhere close to depicting the full extent of it.
EDIT: ...including the geographical scope.
But I'm not aware that they ever came anywhere close to depicting the full extent of it.
EDIT: ...including the geographical scope.
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Wait, what? I thought MWC was a documentary.
If you’ve seen my post history, you’d know I’m very familiar and sympathetic towards the challenges facing the majority of Americans. I’d even extend the scope further to say that these challenges apply just as much to many workers in corporate America as benefits have been slashed and salary workers are often burdened with working many unpaid, overtime hours throughout the year. Personally, I’ve been in a position once where hourly workers I was supervising were making significantly more than me once you factored in the OT pay they were getting that I wasn’t qualified for.
I think it’s worth noting my personal history with financial struggles. My parents separated when I was very young and the divorce didn’t happen for a number of years. My mother, despite having a Master’s degree in teaching, was largely a stay at home mom throughout the marriage. When my parents split, she didn’t have the needed state credentials to work at the level she was, otherwise, qualified for. My father also neglected to pay both court awarded alimony and child support to my mom. As such, mom went back to work doing jobs well below her income potential. She didn’t have the time to work, pursue additional schooling, and raise me simultaneously. We were on food stamps, and I wouldn’t learn until after my mother’s passing, when going through old holiday cards that friends and neighbors had sent us, just how much support we were getting from others.
Despite my relative ignorance to just how bleak things were at the time, I have vivid memory of being lightly scolded by my mother when donating to Ronald McDonald House because, despite my actions being virtuous and caring towards others, we were not in a position to hand out money. This got reiterated further, in what I’d consider a publicly humiliating way for any child, when in middle school my band teacher asked in front of the jazz band, which included many friends, why I hadn’t returned a signed permission slip to go on a band trip to an out of state competition and my response was, “because my family can’t afford the $100 fee.” Thankfully, boosters were able to support this and I was able to go. These are just a couple examples.
I say all this not to be, “woe is me.” Rather, I say it as some level of validation that I can relate to these challenges and that it’s not good to assume things about others. I can also acknowledge all the ways I was still very privileged compared to others. I grew up in a good suburb and was involved in a great school system. We had good friends who helped us, and, despite all my mom’s challenges, she was still able to keep a roof over our head, food on the table, and even provide a rare indulgence on what was at best a sales associate’s salary at a local retailer. Not everyone is as fortunate, and my advice is not aimed at those in abject poverty. However, as someone who grew up in challenging financial circumstances, I do think I have some fair advice on the matter that individuals could consider.
I will add that while it’s important to understand the overall landscape that Americans are working with when it comes to financial opportunities and challenges, it’s arguably more important, as individuals, to ask, “what am I going to do about it?” Knowing might be half the battle, but taking action and accountability for results is critical. There are a lot of echo chambers folks can fall into that exasperate misery and inability to find success in today’s world, and yet there are folks who are finding success. What’s the source of this difference? My childhood friend will tell you he was genuine “trailer trash” as a child and now he works as a medical physicist making ungodly amounts of money each year.
Back to my previous post… it is way more challenging than it once was, but it is possible. It does take a lot of hard work, good decision making, and a little luck, but it can be done. The best news is that the tools and resources needed to learn how to do this can be found for free online or at a library. I’m sure you’ll say not everyone has access to a library or the internet. Fair enough - my advice isn’t for them. But I’d argue most folks in this thread do, and if they’re struggling there is reason to keep fighting and to utilize what resources are available to educate yourself and work towards a better future.
TL;DR - You’re correct that there a many challenges in today’s world. My question to you is what’s the solution? Do we accept it without action or do we take personal accountability and work towards a better future for ourselves? IME, at least one of those activities gives you a shot at improving your situation.
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JazznFunk
Supporting Member
TL;DR in return: I didn't assume ANYTHING about you or your particular situation or history. I simply stated that your cut-and-dry metrics for fiscal responsibility were too simplistic for the much broader, systemic, often insurmountable factors facing people in today's economic environment(s), and those factors can vary wildly depending on where one lives. While I personally agree with them and practice many of them, I think the way you presented them came off as tone-deaf or cold. I'll concede that I read it with a different tone than I should have, but the words are still there, and their meaning didn't change.
It sounds like you dealt with a lot in your past, and you have my sympathies. However, my post wasn't personal at all beyond the matter/material/words at hand that you presented. It was also informed by MY personal experience, the privilege I know I had (that others didn't), how hard my wife and I have had to work to stay ahead/afloat/as debt free as possible where we are (it ain't easy), and the experience of my friends, scene mates, and professional contacts and what they are dealing with now, especially in the wake of cleaning up and recovering after Hurricane Helene, which only exacerbated inequality and access to the basics where I am, like housing and food. It's easy to tell people to 'pull themselves up by their bootstraps' until their bootstraps, their jobs, and everything they had got washed down a river along with everything they owned. I got lucky there. Many of my friends didn't.
My 'solution' to much of this doesn't fall in the hands of workers at all. I think workers in general, as evidenced by productivity data in the US, shows that American workers are working harder than they ever have.... for wages which are largely flat and fall short in helping them achieve a better quality of life they are obviously putting in the hours to achieve. It falls in the laps of business owners and corporations taking a hard step back and looking at the environment they create for workers. Quality of life matters, and workers seem to get less and less every year for more work. 'Do more with less' has been the mantra since 2008 really. So it is about accountability and action - but not just on the part of workers.
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The Homer Simpson situation is still relevant today. NPP workers are reasonably well paid.
The Al Bundy situation wasn't realistic, even in the 80's. Unless he owned the store.
The Al Bundy situation wasn't realistic, even in the 80's. Unless he owned the store.
Dad didn't have 28 basses, a wall of Mesa/Ampeg, and a pedalboard like a Boeing 747 cockpit.
Every show and movie you see from the 50s-60s-70s (maybe except for 'Bedtime for Bonzo'), Dad could carry a blue collar job, and afford a mortgage, a late model car, wife and three kids, and go on vacation.
There's a reason why that can't happen now, but rules are rules.
Every show and movie you see from the 50s-60s-70s (maybe except for 'Bedtime for Bonzo'), Dad could carry a blue collar job, and afford a mortgage, a late model car, wife and three kids, and go on vacation.
There's a reason why that can't happen now, but rules are rules.
I do think though some tv shows/adult cartoons can base some reality with everyday people. Don't get me wrong many are awful and inaccurate and I also partly blame that for our problems today - people take media too literal I don't wanna even get into that. Friends I never been into and I think that show has hype the idea of city living... meanwhile look at prices at a Manhattan apartment
Don't even get me started on TLC - yeah "the learning channel" my butt
The actual decline in purchasing power is the result of failed government fiscal policy and decades of deficit spending. Call it out for what it is, boomer politicians and their peers have voted decades of tax cuts for themselves, monetized the deficit, and we are now seeing the resultant inflation. Price gouging, if you want to call it that, is fueled by money creation.
The crap hits the interest to service the debt exceeds revenue.
It's just a simple math problem. Deficit spending needs to not exceed GDP growth. Either raises taxes or cut spending, or both. No other solutions exists.
Nobody here here will agree with me, given the political tilt here, but the economic thought and math are sold on this one.
The crap hits the interest to service the debt exceeds revenue.
It's just a simple math problem. Deficit spending needs to not exceed GDP growth. Either raises taxes or cut spending, or both. No other solutions exists.
Nobody here here will agree with me, given the political tilt here, but the economic thought and math are sold on this one.
I retired from Nuke Pwr, and pretty comfortably.
Aside from that…Kurt Vonnegut addressed the current situation way back in 1951 with his first published novel, Player Piano. Not only have the bulk of skilled labor positions been automated away, the exact same thing is happening now with white collar positions. And it’s really just getting started.
Exactly. I've spent nearly 30 years in the software industry and I've somehow managed to survive multiple bloodlettings that sent the bulk of our software development overseas to cut labor costs in the name of quarterly profits.
The current frenzy over AI is the C-suite wet-dream to go the next step and just eliminate software developers entirely (well, except for the tiny handful that will be expected to make crappy AI-generated code actually work).
Blue and white collars are both in the crosshairs. The Law Of Unintended Consequences will eventually come into play after we hit rock bottom. Ain't gonna be pretty.
The crazy part is only 10 percent of Americans make six figures.
We talk about late stage capitalism, but that fatcat Mr. Slate exploited the hell Fred Flintstone.
JazznFunk
Supporting Member
The funny thing about the 50s/60s TV shows (cartoons included) is that they were either wildly idealistic and whitewashed the reality of the 'nuclear family' and the 'average family', or they lampooned it in a way that flew over peoples' heads - like Mr. Slate treating Fred like dirt, which was closer to reality in all likelihood.
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