One of my least favorite expressions...you do the math. No thanks, we would be here til the end of time. However, I have an honorary PhD. in THE 99% occupying the nation. Allow me to explain.
I know how happy this makes most of you.
I was born a lower middle class child. That was a pretty good deal in the 1950s. Toys were simple, TV was black and white, choices of everything were limited. You received something, you used it until you outgrew it or it broke. If you broke it you didn't get another one. As I reached age 9, my dad's employer got a huge government contract and we moved up to the middle class.
Life there wasn't much different. It was bigger but all in all we still lived like we had in our smaller home. We did get another car for a total of two. WOW, we were living high on the hog. Actually, the government. General Dynamics would not have existed without government contracts. It was a comfortable but not lavish lifestyle. The only problems occurred when the contracts would run out and people got pink slips. Employed one day, unemployed the next. My dad was lucky in that he was never laid off. He did, however, suffer, and I mean suffer, the worry and anxiety of not knowing if he would have a job tomorrow.
I graduated from high school and got my first job. I took home $65.00 dollars a week. That didn't last long. Then I got another, better job. I took home $107.00 a week. Oh yes, I was living large. OK, I was eking out a living with a roommate and a car that was a decade old with no air conditioning. I had rats in my house. BIG rats. They were afraid of nothing. They ate whatever they wanted. Come home from work and find a plant gone. Not missing, eaten.
Then I had a small cancer problem. The kind that requires surgery. I had no insurance. Depression is lying in a hospital bed for eight days, (this was when they didn't send you home with a band aid and "good luck"), wondering how on earth you will survive. How would I pay my medical bills? My job was gone. I was poor. I was broke. I was unemployed and needed six weeks recovery time so my insides didn't spill everywhere.
Life sucked.
I got a REAL job. The corporate kind. Fortune 500 company kind with a BENEFITS PACKAGE. I could now get sick and die and it would be paid for. I didn't make much money but the benefits were great. The vacation time was great. The pressure was tremendous and the requirements to stay employed were tough. Be very good at your job or be doomed to be entry level forever.
I climbed the ladder a couple of rungs. I made a little better money. I heard all the reasons why a one percent raise was good in this economy, (1987 the economy tanked too). I heard how lucky we, the employed, were. I heard that I had SO much potential and SO much opportunity that I needed to consider that and not worry so much about the pay. I would be rewarded in the end.
I really liked having some money though. I was not all that excited about my insurance except for the dental package. I was hoping to NOT learn how well the hospitalization worked. I had a 401K before I knew what one was. It was a matching 401K. Unfortunately, I couldn't afford to put more than "none" in my 401K. My take home pay lasted until I got paid again. Paycheck to paycheck. I wasn't too in debt after a while. I was not going forward financially either.
I got recognition awards. I got plaques and trophies. Sometimes I got recognition money, you pay tax on that. Twice. Once when you receive it and again at the end of the year as it is considered income. Thanks. I got great reviews and raises. Small raises. Five percent was my largest raise ever. Wow, try not to faint. Taxes ate that right up.
That's life. That's corporate life. I was not rolling in dough but I wasn't suffering anymore. That was nice. After a decade I started looking at all the things I had done to improve the business. Things that had rolled out across the nation. Projects that saved the company lots of money in the long run when successfully implemented. I didn't feel compensated. Neither did anyone else.
One day I met a nice man. He was much higher up in the same corporation. I retired. We got married. One day shortly before we married he received a check in the mail from our corporation. It was his bonus. Bonus? Say what? I didn't know there was an executive bonus program. That was never mentioned in meetings. No one posted the bonus plans for executives. They posted everything thing we worker bees did, had or would get. We were open books. I looked at the check.
It was more money than my annual take home pay.
I flipped out. Even though I was no longer an employee I wanted to riot. How on earth could anyone justify that action? I know how hard people work in an entry level position. They get all the crap and have to navigate it well. The executives work hard. I am not taking away what they have to accomplish and the pressure they feel. However, they cannot execute anything alone. That takes workers. Workers that make the executives eligible for bonuses.
"How do you sleep at night?" I asked. "How can you let people have penny ante raises and spend this money without being struck by lightning?" Well, of course, these decisions were way above him. He finally reached the pay grade level in the corporation that included the bonus plan. He had worked very hard for many years. Yeah, me too. He made more money in a bonus? That wasn't right. Period. Not right at all. If there is money for executives there is money for the people who make them look good.
Apparently, I was not understanding. Bonus money and raise money were not out of the same accounting pot so to speak. Nice Man went on to explain that in order to retain good executives it was common to have a bonus plan. It was a perk, a way to say, "you make this company better".
So is a pay raise. What a bunch of upper echelon drivel.
"People can't pay RENT and you guys get bonuses? That seems fair to you?".
We had a long discussion about how business worked. Executive compensation made the world go round and the company healthier. Headquarters felt it necessary to retain their best people. The latest CEO was guaranteed millions of dollars to STAY or GO.
What? Paid to GO? Yes, just how it's done. In this particular company's case the new CEO changed so many business processes and cut so much man power he was given his contracted 60 million to get out. He tanked the company stock. People lost their jobs, many people. Executives took pay cuts and lost those bonuses. The former CEO got rich.
I started paying close attention to business news. This was happening everywhere. CEOs had parachutes WHEN and IF they screwed the pooch so to speak. How nice for them. How horrible for companies. These CEOs were the same people who would speak about personal responsibility, accountability and being loyal workers.
Banks and lenders started making everything so easy. Buy a car. Get credit cards. Buy the American Dream. A house and another car. Have children. Put them in daycare because you will need two incomes to support the American dream.
Oops, there was the Enron problem. And bank mergers. And corporate mergers. That creates two people for every position. Dot Coms took over wall street. Companies that produced nothing became worth billions.
Bernie Madoff got his day in court. He was/is the poster child of greed. Lending houses tanked. Fannie May, Feddie Mac, the housing industry, POOF, bye bye economy.
Who does the government save? The people who tanked the economy as they were too big to fail.
Corporations must satisfy wall street. Overhead is cut. That translates to people. The lucky keep the jobs and do the work of three or four people. The rest of the employees get nothing. The Company P&L looks better, wall street is happy, investors invest. The rich get richer, the rest get screwed.
The People didn't do that. Greed, lies, questionable money management at the top levels in business and government did that. Lack of industry regulation did that. Wars did that, they cost money you know. People lost jobs, homes, lives. Greed and lies fed on the misery.
The People were supposed to say "oh well, that's life, them's the breaks, homeless can't be too bad. The government might help us."
Not without an address they don't.
This is America. We were born of revolution. However, this time around we don't have an enemy. We only have each other. Us and them. The government and media have done an excellent job of making us Red or Blue. We have no centrists. We have no one with any sense of One Nation.
Greed wins.
Now, I suggest we all open up a history book or two and read a little about other nations, societies, governments and empires that have crumbled. You will see many similarities. Read about The Roman Empire. Read about France, their revolution. Read about America. Learn about what we were made of.
We are now like dogs cowed by a cruel owner. Yes, master, I will obey. I will also lick your hand and wag my tail. Someday, however, I will bite you out of a natural sense of survival.
That's what the Occupy movement is all about. It's the growl before the snap. Wake up. Don't do as I say, don't do as I do. Educate yourself and decide where you want America to be in ten years. You want to be armed in your homes waiting for the hungry and the angry to get to you? Or do you want to demand better from the decision makers in business and government? You want to live through the Better Depression? (Great was already taken). You want to stand in soup lines? You want to depend on the kindness of strangers with handouts?
This should NOT be US and THEM. It should be US. When one falls we all fall. When we let one die, we all die. When one needs help, we all need help. When one succeeds, we should all succeed. Not socialism. Not Communism. Humanism.
We are the government, of the People, by the People, for the People. Not business, not the Supreme Court, not Congress, not The President. WE THE PEOPLE want change from the greed, lies and party politics.
Time to wake up 1%. Some of you should be in prison for your business practices. You achieved your wealth from this nation. The rights granted you here. The opportunities afforded you here. You got nowhere all on your on. Not one among us has.
You're Welcome,
Lillybell Blues
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