The Time has Come, the Walrus Said...

...to talk of many things; of ships and shoes and ceiling wax, of cabbages and kings.'

Let's talk specifically about 'jobs'. This blog is going to cover current events in both the U.S. and the UK. First the U.S..

The U.S. is involved in a huge debate over its national debt. It stands at $14.2 trillion, and counting. (Some say it is really larger, and much larger, than that.) Firstly, to say: the U.S. will never be able to pay that debt off. The nation is, technically, bankrupt. A bit of Kabuki theatre is going on over there, and in the rest of the world, on this matter. But just to look at one aspect of the matter here, having to do with jobs.

Both sides of the political aisle want to be seen as on the side of creating jobs. But a fundamental difference in attitude towards accomplishing that feat is mirrored in the political differences between the right and the left in looking at how to tackle The Debt. The hard right says to tackle it exclusively by cutting spending; the hard left, by raising taxes, especially (or exclusively) on the wealthy; with most people at various positions in between. The 'right' (roughly speaking) feels that the 'left' has had it too good for too long, in getting the federal government to spend too much on 'the little guy', and especially the welfare-mentality category, and also especially through the power of the unions; the latter phenomenon causing many business owners to locate overseas, for their labor-costs advantages. So the 'right' wants to break the power of the unions, which they feel have not been realistic in the economic terms of recent decades, and especially since the Recession of 2008. The 'left' (roughly speaking) feels that the 'right' cares only for themselves, and are sitting smugly pretty, with their bank bonuses and such, while the little guy is forced to take on the bulk of the spending cuts now required to get the federal debt into some semblance of control. Both sides of the political equation, then, feel hard done by events.

But they also see the arcane 'science' of 'economics' itself differently. The right says: Cut taxes on the job-creators, and more jobs will be created, and there will also be more revenue coming in to pay down the debt, because economic activity will thereby have been stimulated; while left-wing economists seem to have more faith in the economic stimulation of more money pumped into the economy, either by 'quantitative easing' - creating money out of nothing (and thereby creating more debt, in interest on that funny money) - or by the federal government paying out monies in unemployment benefits, which then gets circulated directly into the 'main' economy, whereas letting the rich keep more of their money only goes to high-end economic activity. I may not have this difference in perception entirely correct, but it's roughly what I have read; and lets me get to what I really want to say.

Which is to highlight the dangers in both sides only listening to their sides of the arguments. Case in point: Today I received, amongst many other e-newsletters, one from a left-wing source in the U.S. on a strike going on there right now, and one from a right-wing source addressing the same strike, only with a different take on it. The company is called Verizon. The left (the Daily Kos) emphasizes how much money the handful of its highest honchos have made in the last few years and the profit the company made last year, and how the workers feel that they have a right to share in that success, and not be frozen out of the middle class in America; and the right (the Right to Work Foundation) emphasizes how the unions arrogantly take dues from their members and spend it as they wish, without regards to the rights of their members, OR the right of workers not to join the unions involved in the first place.

I signed the petition of the 'left', in drawing attention to how workers in America are facing a huge cut-back in their standard of living, at the same time as the management is being handsomely reimbursed for their services; and I also responded, with some appreciation of the argument, but also some caveat, in the Comments thread to the right-wing's article; which was entitled 'Union Strike Militancy and Violence on Display during Verizon Strike'. The tone of the other responses was decidedly anti-union. My comment, to another poster's anti-union rant:

"Workers have a right to collective bargaining, just as they have a right to sign individual contracts. Violence harms their cause. There are constructive ways to deal with these matters, and destructive ways. I don't want to see unions walking all over businesses, anymore than I want to see businesses walking all over their workers, and creating the 20:80 society of corporate-management infame. A strong middle class benefits us all, in the long run.

"Talk of sending'em to "a burger flipping joint" is no more helpful than a union worker putting his child in front of a vehicle to slow it down from crossing a picket line.

"Hopefully, cooler heads will prevail, on both sides of the issue. The bottom line is, as always: a right to be heard."

This same sort of thing was going on in Australia years ago, when I lived there; a union-busting mentality swinging into great action, as the corporate world had sensed its day had come; and it was when I was researching into the roots of these standoffs that I came across information about this '20:80 society' business, whereby Business Management 'experts' were pointing out to their managerial and business-oriented readership that we were reaching a point on the planet where there were going to be too many people capable of being gainfully employed - especially with the development of technology, throwing people out of jobs - and what was going to result was a 20:80 society, where 20% of the populace would be more than 'useless eaters', and 80% were going to be 'superfluous to needs'; and so the point was to pay the 20% handsomely for their loyalty to the system. And as for the 80%; well, there was always the possibility of a police state, to keep the peace, and therefore the scenario of a dystopian future on the planet.

And enter now comment on the current scene in the UK, where that 80% has been having a go - and a very violent one - at a society that sees them as 'superfluous to needs', and what will inevitably result from that attitude. And now as well for what I am getting at.

The point is, the old paradigm has to go. Indeed, technology is 'throwing people out of work'; and that scenario will continue. Creating pressure for a new way of looking at the social structure on the planet. Also because of the mindless creation of such a large number of people who are 'superfluous to needs'. And I say 'mindless creation of', because it has been social policies, in both the UK and the U.S., and other western countries, that have exacerbated the problem. The problem to their societies, and to the carrying capacity of the planet.

The bottom line: The states have been remiss in creating a welfare class, on into welfare generations, by in effect paying young females to have babies that they haven't had the financial wherewithal to raise properly. It has been immoral to have children in poverty circumstances; it has also been immoral to take money from taxpayers - many of whom have not had enough of an income to have their own children, and so, responsibly, have not done so - to give to females without a sufficient income to take care of their child or children, to have such children on the taxpayers' coin.

When I have tried to figure out how this ever became a governmental policy, I have come across the argument that 'it is not the child's fault that he or she is born in poverty, so you can't blame them'. I certainly don't blame them. I blame their mothers, AND the society that led them to HAVE babies on the taxpayers' coin.

Let's get clear. No one is entitled to steal from any other person. A society can choose to spend its tax monies AS it chooses. But it should be aware of the ramifications of those choices. And especially when we are talking about people's lives.

And their properties. Which we have just seen go up in smoke in the UK, in fires lit by children born into poverty situations where their mothers, or parents, have not had sufficient income to raise them properly, but were seduced into having them anyway because of the society's short-sighted policies about 'child care'.

The society should have looked down the road to this sort of very possible outcome, of disaffected youth, with no decent job prospects - or jobs at all - and therefore no future. Except another generation living off of the taxpayers' coin.

How demeaning. And how short-sighted.

A road, paving, and good intentions come to mind.

An answer? The state could make contraceptive information available to those females who are not in a position to take care of a child properly; and could even choose to make contraceptive materials themselves available, at low or no cost. But not one cent for tribute; to say, as incentive to have a baby, or babies, dependent then on 'society'. To say, on individuals who have their own needs that they are often struggling to fulfil.

Having said all this, the answer - the more complete answer, besides just dismantling the welfare state, for its pernicious outcomes - is, as I said, a change in paradigm, where we do away with the current system, of interest-bearing money and the necessity for a 'job' in order to have 'income' - and go up a notch in consciousness, and thus create a better, healthier society on the planet, based on understanding, and fully accepting, our basic natures, as 'spiritual beings having a human experience'. But we need to have 'learned our lessons' along the way, in order to inherit such a kingdom.

And one of the most important lessons to have learned - in order for this evolutionary stage to come about - is the lesson of taking personal responsibility.

Of awareness of the outcomes of our actions. And taking responsibility for them.

Not expecting somebody else, or some thing else, to do 'it' for us.

Like giving us money to have babies. And then complaining, because that money given to us is not enough.

What a sorry state of affairs has been created, in this matter of the creation of a welfare class. Which has now become an affair - and a very great affair - of state.

Once we learn this lesson, and this sort of lesson - that we are responsible for our own actions - we can move on.

A great future awaits us, when we do.

But we have to earn it.