View Single Post
Old 03-09-2011, 12:39 PM   #136 (permalink)
mixedmedia
has all her shots.
 
mixedmedia's Avatar
 
Location: Florida
Quote:
Originally Posted by flstf View Post
This is easier said than done especially if you are in your mid fifties and the company you worked at for over 20 years is sold and you are downsized. There are not enough jobs with good benefits in the private and public sectors to go around even for the younger workers. The company I worked for also eliminated their pension and dental plans as well as doubling employee healthcare contributions for those who are left. Your comment seems almost like "Let them eat cake".[COLOR="DarkSlateGray"]
my comment was meant to be facetious. You deserve a pension and so do I.

I was parroting conservative platitudes that have been used for decades to give working class people the false assurance that they have control over their livelihoods. 'In the capitalist system, you can be whoever you want to be!' Which any working person who has been out there more than 15-20 years knows is a crock of shit. The companies that we work for have been chiseling away at what is rightfully ours for decades so that now we are in the position of resenting the few who still have the benefits and job security that our parents had. I mean, my father went to work for Southern Bell right out of college, stayed there for more than 50 years and retired with a pension. It's the way things used to be. Therefore, I cannot find it - not in my heart and not in my mind - to resent the few people who still have these benefits when it is my opinion that more people should have them, not less. Particularly when they are the people who are teaching our kids or protecting our streets or keeping our neighborhoods from burning down.

It's sick, what is happening to this country.

Let them eat cake? It's not me who is saying it. It's your employer.
__________________
Most people go through life dreading they'll have a traumatic experience. Freaks were born with their trauma. They've already passed their test in life. They're aristocrats. - Diane Arbus
PESSIMISM, n. A philosophy forced upon the convictions of the observer by the disheartening prevalence of the optimist with his scarecrow hope and his unsightly smile. - Ambrose Bierce
mixedmedia is offline  
 

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36