>Are you really saying that individuals should not expect their gov't to
>work in their behalf while corporations demand that it do so?
Absolutely not! But I AM saying individuals should not demand that the
government support them from cradle to grave without them ever having to
lift a finger in return.
All those big, bad corporations that everyone is moaning and groaning
about do contribute to society in many ways. Sure jobs are going
overseas. Did you ever stop to ask why? Maybe it is because the US
Labor force has priced itself completely out of the market. With union
demands for higher and higher wages and more and more employee benefits,
many US companies can no longer compete in the world market. So they
turn to a lower cost labor force. And that cause the loss of a lot of US
jobs. But many of them brought it on themselves.
In a closed society, when labor costs go up, the company simply
increases the price of its product to offset the increased cost of
production. This causes inflation (increased prices of goods). So the
labor pool demands more pay to bring its buying power up to the former
level. But, that causes a new round of inflation. Eventually, the
currency is worthless.
Bet we do not have a closed society here in the US. So, companies
making the same products overseas import them and sell them at prices
below what US companies can produce them. US companies either go
elsewhere for labor, or go under. This is all basic economics. But
apparently, a lot of people do not understand these principles, or do not
wish to confront them head on.
Sure, every one wants to make more money. The worker wants higher pay.
the stockholder wants more dividends. The problem is that in the last
20 years or so, everyone became very greedy and wanted it all.
How many reading here remember that 20 to 30 years ago most states had
a anti-usury law that forbade any financial institution from charging
interest at any rate above about 10%? The actual rate varied from state
to state, with some as low as 8% and a few as high as 12%. Those laws
have all been invalidated now and everybody wants to see a 10% return or
better on any type of investment. Three to four percent used to be
considered very good. Greed!
Manufacturing jobs used to pay realistic wages. Not any more. Ask an
assembly line worker what he/she gets paid for installing the same bolt a
thousand times a day. So a lot of those jobs went overseas. And now
those workers can't find employment at those highly inflated rates. and
many refuse to work for less. So they are collecting welfare and expect
to continue collecting it until they can find another job like the one
they lost to an overseas worker. These are in addition to the other
welfare recipients we have discussed here before.
BTW, I don't know about others, but I received your letter four times,
with four different message ID's. It didn't appear to be addressed to me
directly. Only through my being a subscriber to the Sanet list. I have
seen some other letters where I got two copies, but never four.
--Dan in Sunny Puerto Rico--