I'd just like to say a big, fat FU to Capitalism.

I have to work tomorrow, and if scheduled, Christmas and New Years too. No overtime pay, no nothin'.

Nothing is sacred but the almighty greenback.

...this lousy t-shirt

It's just getting worse and worse. Hopefully, though, more people will become radicalized. Hang in there.

I get OT for Friday, triple time...and double time for Saturday..double time and a half for Sunday. I guess it's the company you work for more that the "system"....just sayin'

Making it sound so simple ignores the everyday reality of millions of people. It is the system.

:eyes:

..to work your ass off for your entire life with nothing to show for it but credit card debt.

Live it up!

:eyes:

:shrug:

You mean the majority of McJobs that are in the service industries because they've outsourced and union busted the hell out of the good paying jobs?!

Your post reeks of rethuglican privilege.

(but i'm guessing that the hedonistic hypocrite in you will win out)

That's cruel.

I don't see the cruelty, if any.

Don't buy into the consumerism, ignore the marketer's propaganda and consume as little as possible.

Oh yeah...and organize, organize, organize and force change. It won't happen politically. Only when the wealthy live in fear of the workers will change ever occur.

If you work more than 40 hours in a week and aren't on salary you have to be paid overtime under certain conditions. If you are salaried (exempt), you are (morally) entitled to take comp time for the holiday work.

Working on a scheduled holiday can qualify for double time. Some unionized workers get TRIPLE time if they are over 40 hours and working on a holiday.

Here's the federal thing I was looking for:

Synopsis of Law

The Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) establishes minimum wage, overtime pay, recordkeeping, and child labor standards affecting full-time and part-time workers in the private sector and in Federal, State, and local governments. Covered nonexempt workers are entitled to a minimum wage of not less than $5.85 per hour effective July 24, 2007; $6.55 per hour effective July 24, 2008; and $7.25 per hour effective July 24, 2009. Overtime pay at a rate of not less than one and one-half times their regular rates of pay is required after 40 hours of work in a workweek.

Much more at http://www.dol.gov/esa/whd/flsa/

but then- maybe he's on a salary? :shrug:

i doubt that he's in a union.

A lot of people would love to be able to quit their jobs, but it is not as simple as you make it sound. If people quit working they go into financial ruin, and it is not always easy to find another job. No worker should be accused of being a hypocrite just because they have to work in a job they are unhappy with.

quit your job and live on the streets. why would someone who despises capitalism care about financial ruin? :shrug: or getting another job? :shrug:

and i never said that anyone was "hypocrite just because they have to work in a job they are unhappy with."

i was pointing out that if he truly and totally despises capitalism, it's ENTIRELY within his power to eschew it COMPLETELY. however, if he despises it that much, yet still chooses to participate in it for the sake of the creature comforts that he's become accustomed to- then THAT makes him a hypocrite.

Wow, either like my system or go homeless huh? What a kind accepting person you are. For the record American style cutthroat Capitalism is not the only economic system out there, and people have gotten by quite well in other economies without having to resort to homelessness.

Live within the established social order, leave the country, or drop out of society?

:shrug:

No their economies are not perfect, but overall the workers are treated more fairly than they are here and they do not have anywhere near the disparities of wealth. Yes you have to live within the established order, but the OP is suggesting that the established order in the US needs to be changed to treat workers more fairly and I agree. I am not content with the established order of the corporate economy which the neo-cons have helped prop up, and I would hope that no one who considers themselves to be anywhere to the left of center would be happy with the way this economy is structured.

I will say that I felt my standard of living was higher 5 - 10 years ago.

From 1996 to early 2004 I was working for a startup tech company that was burning venture capital. My annual performance reviews were always good, and pay increases were excellent. In 2003 my base salary was about $87,500. However, the company was not selling enough product to make ends meet. It got bought out, restructured, and my position was terminated.

I lived well on vacation pay, severence, and unemployment insurance for several months, and found a new position as soon as I started looking in a serious way. But my income in my present job has been stagnant, no progress at all against inflation. I am thinking of bailing out, but that has downsides too.

I would say that our system generally works, but it can be a roller-coaster ride and is definitely hard on people who are just starting out, or are working in marginal jobs. Getting a decent education is necessary for most people to get a comfortable standard of living, but it isn't a guarantee no matter what career path you take. I have had several periods where my income was low due to conditions largely beyond my control. I was not able to buy my own home until age 36.

he can either choose to participate in it, or not, or move someplace with a different system.

i guess you could say that he's loaded with options. :hi:

What if the majority of us 90% who are getting screwed, decide we want to change the system?

Which side will you be on?

see how far you get.

Pretty obvious which side you're on.

:eyes:

Where have I heard that before? Here I thought we were supposed to be practicing the principles of democracy and working for change if we are not happy with the system rather than just blindly accepting things the way they are. Silly me, maybe I should just accept everything the neo-cons want and be quiet right?

so many people seem to confuse economic systems with political ones...

The economic drives the political. What is mistaken for lack of spine in the Democratic Party is actually complictity.If you want to change the political then you must change the economic.

:toast:

A couple of years ago a man I knew died at age 52 from diabetes, heart disease, obesity, smoking, alcoholism, and general lack of medical care.

He had opted out of the system by working under the table, not paying taxes, and living as a pauper in a subsidized flop house near downtown San Diego.

The man was a Vietnam era veteran, and was qualified for all kinds of benefits including full health care for free. But he made a conscious decision not to be part of the system and dropped out.

I miss him but don't really feel sorry about how his life ended. He knew what he was doing.

...which requires a non-refundable $5 deposit...

then we'd all become hedonistic hypocrites. :shrug:

just the easy comfortable, pre-packaged kind that most have become accustomed to.

there's plenty of free food, shelter, and..."relaxation?" to be found- or made.

It's merely a matter of adopting the best ethical system.

There is no way that Systems Administrators could organize, at least in my area.

But sometimes we do agree quietly agree among ourselves that we are understaffed, and allow things to go to shit in order to make a point that we can't live normal lives and be available 7/24/365.

I went into this holiday weekend with knowledge that I am on call, so it's no big deal when they do call. It just means a little more cash coming in.

I too am in this industry. Check out these guys: http://techsunite.org/

We're working towards changing this. We need all of the help we can get.

I'll check it out.

:hi:

crybaby, I'm sorry, but that's what I see. Is there a system that works that what they pay you with will be worth anything if you don't also work?
I really don't want to be too harsh, but howz'bout getting a grip? If you don't want your dollars, I'll take 'em!

It said nothing about not working at all.

Why bother to have national holidays if the asshole employers of the world are so fucking greedy that they force their employees to work on every so-called holiday? I remember a time when most people, other than cops and and a few others critical to functioning of American infrastructure, were given holidays off with pay. And those that did work got double time. Oh, but that was back during the golden age of the American middle class, when those lazy union workers sat around on their asses and got paid for the entire year. Geezus.

It's one of the things I'm thankful for!

But he had no explanation why the man, who had about 10 years with the company and was highly liked and productive, was only getting paid $46K.

If losing him was a disaster, surely it would have been worth paying him a living wage to keep him happy.

Is that before or after taxes?

My wife and I earn 20K euros per year between the 2 of us after taxes. We live well, pay off the apartment we bought a little bit more every month, have 2 cars, we have a kid, we enjoy vacations in either the USA or on Reuinion Island every year not to mention long weekends in Paris, Budapest and Amsterdam. It is true we pay a lot less for health care and do not have to save for the education of our kids seeing as the universities only cost 200 euros a year on average but damn 46K per year seems like a lot to me. How many hours a week was the IT person doing and for how many weeks a year?

$46K here in Southern California for a family of four would be nearly impossible to live on, unless one wanted to share a two bedroom house with another family of four.

I forgot that I could be talking to someone from CA where real estate prices make those here on the French riviera look affordable. :hi:

Unless I had a hefty cash down-payment in hand.

I bought it 12 years ago when I was married to a woman who earned about the same as I. The house has roughly quadrupled in value.

If I were to sell it and buy another one of equal value, my annual property tax would increase by about $5,000.

"my annual property tax would increase by about $5,000."

holy shit


what state are you living in?

Plus any special assessments that have been approved by the voters.

In San Diego your tax is typically 1.1%.

Up to 3 years ago WE tried to live on a little over 20K a year as a family. It's called living as the working poor and it pretty much brought us to our knees where we almost lost everything. Hubby has a way better job now and we are slowly digging ourselves out of the hole we were almost buried in.

FYI-in the U.S., after taxes, 46K actually means bringing home approx 30K which equals approx $2.5K a month. Rents in the states are usually close to a grand a month unless it's an iffy/dangerous neighborhood. Add on gas, groceries, utilites, car note, insurance and people are lucky to have a couple of hundred bucks leftover to pay for extra unexpected expenses like the dentist, doctor co-pays and prescriptions, car repairs, new tires, etc. Forget about saving money, or nice vacations, and forget about luxuries unless you want to charge your credit cards up to the max. Which far too many in this country do.

800 a month mortgage on our town house in the center of a nice sized country town (40,000 people)

prescriptions and doctor/dentist visits cots us 1 euro each time

we get roughly 30K euros per year take home for the 2 of us combined, we pay roughly 10 k in taxes a year (less middle class tax burden in the USA) but next year perhaps only 8 because of a new law letting us deduct the interest we pay off of our income tax.

Sales tax is 19.5%

gasoline is taxed more than double than in the USA. A gallon here is 6.20 euros

All in all we have nice vacations every year, but on low budget. The plane tickets will eat up 1.5k or 2k each time we go to Reunion Island or the States but once we arrive we stay with family for most of the time so we do not need to pay for hotels. We do road trips for a week or 2 in the USA in the summer every other year, but camp to save money. We still have loot for occaisonal weekends in Nice, Budapest, Amsterdam, Paris and sometimes Lincoln (no not London, we have friends in Lincoln), basically we go where we have friends and squat their couches, they do the same when they visit us.

They seem like really nice vacations to us but some people may not define these as nice vacations.

Until now our extra hundred or two was saved, but now diapers cost us 100 a month so its either cut into savings or my hash smoking fund. I figure on cutting down to 50 euros a month for smoke from a hundred and save 50 or 150 if we can instead of 100 or 200 but hey its my only vice so 50 euros aint a lot ( I never drink and do not spend money in bars or on tobacco which I do not smoke).

Credit cards in the US sense are nearly impossible to find here. Most people have debit/cash station cards which are linked to a checking account. I have a US credit car but only for an emergency (I am French and American) and have 0 debt on it (luckily we have had no emergencies until now).

Do you drive much? That may be what makes such a huge difference, since you probably have a much more efficient public transportation system. Owning a car in the U.S. takes a huge bite out of the budget. We have 2 cars, one paid for, one not. I don't drive that much and I still go through a minimum of $20 in gas a week = $80 a month. My husband spends $40 a week = $160 a month for a total of $240 a month. Add the car note and the insurance for a total of approx $600 a month. BTW-maintenance and repair are not included in that figure. :wow:

Also, it costs our family $20 to go to the doctor and prescriptions are $10 to $15 each. So if you get 2 prescriptions, that's $40 to $50 to see the doctor. And often you have to go back immediately because they get you in and out of the office so quickly-it's like a drive through restaurant-that they often don't solve the problem and you have to keep going back! This past summer I went to the doctor about 16 times for an ear problem, an eye problem and an intestinal problem I was having. Those 16 visits included seeing my regular doctor several times, plus an ear specialist, 2 optometrists, and 2 eye specialists, plus I had 2 ct type scans. And you know what? My eye is still bothering me, my ear is still not 100% and the intestinal thing went away after taking some antibiotics which my doc didn't think I needed after all! :crazy:

I am totally fed up with the medical industry-key word INDUSTRY-and so it's natural medicine for me all the way from now on! Unless I need surgery or need a specialist!



This country is so screwed up that our hard earned money is either taken from us via taxes to fund illegal wars or we are screwed out of it by red tape and other such scams. :grr:

2 cars as well. I do about miles 350 a week in the car during strikes and about 100 when the trains run. My wife does 300 miles a week. Gasoline is twice as expensive but the cars get more then 50 mpg. I am American and French and have lived on both sides of the Atlantic. We ordered a new car made in the new EU state of Romania to have space for our new kid so we have 300 a month on the car to pay. Full insurance on 2 cars for my wife and myself is 100 euros a month.


We do, however, have to pay shitty Veolia corporation for our water because the water is not municipal here like in most of the USA.

US salaries are traditionally expressed as a before-tax figure. $46K was his base salary, used to determine his hourly rate. He was entitled to overtime if he worked over 40 hours in a week, and I am very sure that he did a lot of that. I don't know what his actual earnings were, but I am quite sure his new employer offered him a substantially higher rate. He said that leaving was a no-brainer.

$46K in San Diego would be barely enough to make ends meet, assuming you have a really good deal on a rented home.

more expensive than the whole Oakland, San Fransisco, San Jose area? How much would a reasonable sized three bedroom with a one car garage on a small suburban lot go for there? Here in the Var one would go for 300 000 to 400 000 euros. Our two bedroom apartment with a storage cellar cost us 135 000 and we have 60 square meters of space not counting the bathrooms or the cellar.

Which would require a $33,000 downpayment to avoid a jumbo loan, or $90,000 to get a decent interest rate and no PMI. The annual property tax would be about $4,950. Add about $600 per year for insurance, and the monthly payments would be somewhere around $3,000.

http://www.dqnews.com/ZIPSDUT.shtm

from shady to criminal. If the IT guy was such an asset, they did all they could until realizing diminishing returns.

but the American capitalist system, in my mind, is more fucked up than the French system. Here nearly no one works on holidays. Those that do get overtime pay. Doctors, nurses, cops, firefighters etc. work on holidays but nearly all companies are shut. When the holiday is on a Thursday most people do not work the Friday. We still work, we are very productive in the time we work, we have a 35 hour work week and a minimum of 5 weeks paid holiday. Having lived on both sides of the Atlantic I would have to say that workers have more rights and less pressure in places like Scotland, Finland, Norway, Sweeden, Denmark, Germany, France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Spain and to a certain extent England. These countries are still productive, they just have welfare states in place.

I think France is the ideal, really. Certainly when compared to our system here, it is a paradise. The only reason anyone has to work on Thanksgiving is greed on the part of owners/managers. All so they can sell unnecessary crap. It makes me sick that some people like the OP never get a holiday off and people on this supposedly progressive website say "tough shit, get another job why don't you?" Which may not be an option, or at least not an easy one. What it really will take is for use to get off our collective asses and demand what we deserve: a LIVING wage, plenty of vacation time (don't they get like a month off in France and Germany- in any case we here work too damn much), universal health care, etc.

But even I look to Norway, Finland, and Sweeden as examples. Hell even Scotland (free universities)has some things better than France. I know that French workers get 5 weeks minimum, I think Geramn workers get the same, English workers get 4 weeks and Danish workers get at least 6 weeks vacation.

http://www.iww.org/en/join



Preamble to the IWW Constitution

The working class and the employing class have nothing in common. There can be no peace so long as hunger and want are found among millions of the working people and the few, who make up the employing class, have all the good things of life.

Between these two classes a struggle must go on until the workers of the world organize as a class, take possession of the means of production, abolish the wage system, and live in harmony with the Earth.

We find that the centering of the management of industries into fewer and fewer hands makes the trade unions unable to cope with the ever growing power of the employing class. The trade unions foster a state of affairs which allows one set of workers to be pitted against another set of workers in the same industry, thereby helping defeat one another in wage wars. Moreover, the trade unions aid the employing class to mislead the workers into the belief that the working class have interests in common with their employers.

These conditions can be changed and the interest of the working class upheld only by an organization formed in such a way that all its members in any one industry, or in all industries if necessary, cease work whenever a strike or lockout is on in any department thereof, thus making an injury to one an injury to all.

Instead of the conservative motto, "A fair day's wage for a fair day's work," we must inscribe on our banner the revolutionary watchword, "Abolition of the wage system."

It is the historic mission of the working class to do away with capitalism. The army of production must be organized, not only for everyday struggle with capitalists, but also to carry on production when capitalism shall have been overthrown. By organizing industrially we are forming the structure of the new society within the shell of the old.

are you the first born boy in a Native family.

and how'd that whole thing work out again?

but that's another discussion.

then that system probably shouldn't be emulated.

Capitalists did everything the could to make sure that Communism failed.

Certainly, there are very few that would seek to emulate Stalinism - that hyper-authoritarian form of so-called "Communism." (which many would say looked a whole lot more like State Capitalism than a Marx/Engels definition of it - who, btw (and this is what is always left out), ultimately spoke to the END of state authority in a truly communist society). Letters written by Lenin just a couple years before his death, which were supressed by Stalin, warned of Stalin's rise. As I remember, Trotsky would have been Lenin's choice, and arguably, had it not been for Stalin, the history of the Soviet Union would be quite different (and indeed all of Europe (I remember the speculation of one author who mused that the vast majority of Europe would have adopted socialism had it not been for Stalin)). Of course, some European countries did adopt heavily socialist/welfare state leaning economies and have done very well for their citizenries (who are typically better educated and who enjoy better medical care and retirement than Americans).

But it wasn't just the SU that was damaged under Stalin. Stalinism split the militant core of the US labor movement, and undermined the credibility of anyone who claimed to be a socialist...even those that espoused heavily democratic forms of labor relationships (anarchists and socialist alike), like the IWW or militant faction of the Teamsters (who successfully won the 34 Minneapolis strikes) or the ILWU.

Your statement oversimplifies the discussion to the point of absurdity. But that's not so unusual. The American propaganda machine has invested so heavily in discrediting anything other than "free market" (predatory) capitalism, that I'm not surprised at all.

Stalin and Mao are constantly used to show us how bad anything even remotely resembling socialism is, and people have been misled to believe that Marx was somehow the same as Stalin and Mao. But Marx was not an authoritarian, he was a brilliant thinker and he made many observations that still resonate today. I think the Communist Manifesto should be on everyone's must read list, because it really is an important read still yet today and I think many Americans would be surprised how much they actually agree with it.

Today China is mistakenly considered to be Communist, but has anyone ever looked at China today? It is overrun by big corporate factories that do not allow unions and treat their workers like absolute crap. China is a Capitalist country to the extreme, only their rhetoric is Communist. We can only imagine what Marx would have to say about China if he were alive today, but I think it is a safe bet he would be very upset about what is going on in China and he would denounce anyone who tried to tie him to that type of economy.

Das Kapital

and any system can be subverted

such as the UK up until Thatcher, Finalnd, Sweeden, Norway, France, Scotland (even after Thatcher, Germany, Denmark, the Netherlands and Belgium. Workers united and welfare states were created.

Are you special somehow?

it is a cancer

It oppresses all of humanity with the exception of the richest of the rich.

I don't know of another system I'd trade it for.

if any

Here in France if you have a doctor's note you can have as many as you want. After a certain length of time the health insurance pays you instead of your boss, after I think 1 year off straight you get 80 percent of your wage. I know people that got really sick, got a couple of weeks sick time and still had their 7 weeks paid vacation around afterwards.

if you don't mind being jobless or going without pay.

In California we have state-run short-term disability insurance. It works like unemployment insurance, funded by mandatory payroll deductions. Some other states have similar programs.

Long-term disability insurance is available to be purchased. A good friend of mine bought into a high LTD option when he worked for the University of California for several years. In his early 30s he was diagnosed with obsessive-compulsive disorder, which made his work as an accountant unbearable. His LTD coverage will pay something like 80% of his salary until he reaches retirement age.

I won't go into details, but suffice it to say that he lives well.

But I get double-time.

I have to work tomorrow, and if scheduled, Christmas and New Years too. No overtime pay, no nothin'.

Are you in management working on a fixed salary, chaska, or some kind of exempt professional like a doctor, lawyer, or database administrator?

:shrug:

some people's sense of entitlement runs pretty deep.

It's lonely working on holidays. I've been there plenty of times myself.

For eight years I worked for a bank. One of the provisions of the Glass-Steagall act of 1933 prohibits them from being closed for more than three days in a row, so they are always open the day after Thanksgiving. Only people with several years' seniority had any hope of getting the day off.

guess who worked that friday...?

someone thinks that they deserve overtime for working on a national holiday.:think:

:shrug: and for others- they get BOTH thursday and friday off with pay. and for STILL others- they "get" both thursday and friday off WITHOUT pay...and a lot of THEM would be very happy to be able to work both days just for straight time.

if you do not get paid a days wage to stay home?????

The federal government can mandate that its own offices, and businesses that it regulates like banks, observe the holiday. But private employers are free to do as they please.

The company is closed from Christmas through New Year's Day. That is a management policy driven by the market we serve.

I am permitted to used my accrued Paid Days Off (PDO) to keep my cash flow steady.

I can also opt to go without pay, or to go in and work anyway even though nobody will be there and there isn't anything important to do.

In my first year at the company I didn't have enough PDO to cover the holiday closing, but they allowed me to borrow against it so I started the new year with a negative PDO balance.

Now that I have been there over three years my PDO accrual rate is enough to cover the annual closing plus about 12 days to use for vacation or sick time or whatever.

I like having the last week of the year off. I wish I wasn't forced to use my PDO, but that's the deal I have agreed to. I can leave any time, just as the company can fire me any time.

Employees were only paid six dollars an hour and were required to work holidays with no overtime pay, and not even a discount on the five dollar a bag popcorn. Yet the theaters were always extremely busy on the holidays because people often eat dinner and then go see a movie on Thanksgiving or Christmas. No place else is open so theaters bring in a ton of money, but they don't pay their employees more than the six dollars an hour they normally do.

Also, to get out of a house filled with out-of-town "guests" who they wouldn't associate with if it wasn't for the holiday. Many times when visiting relatives or in-laws invade my house for the holidays, I've had to "excuse" myself to go outside to smoke my pipe (usually I take a walk while puffing). The "guests" appreciate my "consideration" in not smoking around them. Little do they know the real reason is I'm taking a "relative/in-law" break. The smell of a pipe is much better than "3 days of fish and guests."

was forced to work for 15 hours without a break. And usually has to work 12 hour shifts with only maybe a 15 or 30 minute break. And gets yelled a lot and treated like shit.

So yeah, fuck capitalism.

If you work eight hours, you are legally entitled to TWO fifteen minute breaks, which would be added onto your eight hours.

Look under the Fair Labor Standards Act. They probably call her a manager or some such bull so they don't have to pay her overtime, even though she is no doubt eligible for overtime as an employee that is not a manager.

I know nurses, they work on holidays, but they get the best rate possible - it's even higher than overtime.

What state are you in? It must be illegal for them not to give you overtime pay.

That's why they get holiday pay on Thanksgiving even if they work for privately-run hospitals.

on those same days, but I was canned! So now I'm fighting with the same greedy corporation so I can get some unemployment pay.

Corporations Suck. Capitalism will destroy itself. Atone for the Greed, you assholes.

I feel better now.

It is unregulated capitalism. Our big problem right now is the seven deadly sins. No system works when the national attitude is pro-vice. That is why the Dems need to take back the country. We have the vice version of the flu. The Republicans have Ebola.

That sure as hell works for the Man. We are creatures of our environment, don't ya think that changing the system is more feasable than changing all of the people?

Strange as that seems. It's easier to tell all the people "be cooperative and tolerant, hard working and honest, careful and compassionate" than it is to try to legislate and force the behaviors you want. There is no system that can withstand a bad people. People get the government that results from their attitudes, IMO, not the government they deserve. The current system, fairly adhered to by people who behave decently, is as good a system as there has been. The biggest problem is people gaming and fighting the system, running it poorly, failing to maintain it. We will miss the system if it goes.

That's why Bushism is so poisonous. Bush has sown seeds of division in his own house, and we are reaping the whirlwind. Honest, I'm no holy roller. Not in the least. I'm just using that language because the kernel of truth in it is there, despite the fact that that system (the purer part of Judaeo-Christianity) is also debauched by the people right now.

Peace.

I wouldn't want to say which one (Stream of Watertown) and they promised us all a catered T-giving dinner for every shift. So idiots that we were me and many of my fellow employees DIDN'T FUCKING EAT MUCH THAT DAY. Not a fuckin potato chip was provided us.

Oops, too late. :eyes:

:toast:

:hi:

I'm sure other vets will chime in to say the same thing.

My wife and I were both in the Navy at the same time and we never had a "holiday" together (or, as I recall, off). If you had duty on Thanksgiving, you put on your uniform and went to work; no extra pay, no other benefits. There's nothing quite like spending a holiday pacing back and forth on the deck of a ship, making hourly draft readings and staring out across the harbor.

Life is a bitch, then you die.

Ah, it's great being a civilian again!

Leave the poor turkey alone.

Work should be built around the worker, not the other way around.

recommended reading here:

http://www.marxists.org/archive/deleon/index.htm

He's a new name to me.
Off to read some more.

THE PUBLIC GOOD
by
Daniel DeLeon

The Daily People
Dec. 6, 1902

A nent the Pennsylvania Railroad Tunnel Franchise, a great squabble has arisen among the moneybags who control the capitalist press.

Some favor, and some do not favor, the granting of the franchise. And both sets set themselves up as deciding “for the public good".

Opportunity is hereby afforded to kill two flies with one clap.

Who sets up these papers? Was a public vote taken upon them? Indeed not! A set of moneybags met and decided to set up a newspaper business, the same as some other set may have met on the same day and hour and decided to set up a peanut-stand business. In the one case, as in the other, the concern is a private undertaking started for private profit.

“The public”, in such cases, is taken into consideration exactly in the same way that fish are taken into consideration by excursionists on a fishing expedition, or people embarking in the fishing business—to be caught.

Passing impudent is, according, the impudence of capitalist papers when they set up the claim that they represent “the public".

And there lies one fly. The other fly is this:

Ad nauseam we are told that we are a homogeneous people, not divided into classes.

This claim has been so thoroughly triturated, that one should think that those who make it would feel ashamed to repeat it. But shame is no part of the capitalist class makeup.

Accordingly, this claim appears in the pretense that these papers are speaking for “the public good”, and that they represent the public. In reappearing, the claim furnishes the ammunition to blow it up into fragments.

As already shown, these papers do not essentially differ from any other peanut stand. And yet they fill the eyes of the unthinking multitude. Somebody speaks through them. Who speaks? Sir Moneybags. Why does not the multitude? Because it has no wealth to set up such well-equipped newspaper peanut stands.

In other words, the fact that these papers exist and can pretend to speak for “the public” is a proof of the existence of the classes, and is a further proof of class domination. The property-holding class alone is heard; the other class is not heard, cannot be heard, is not counted.

And thus “the public” is, in this and in all other instances, narrowed down to our rulers.

One set, holding stock of the Pennsylvania Railroad Corporation, declares itself in favor of the tunnel under this city. The other set, holding stock of the New York Central Railroad Corporation, to whom a Pennsylvania Railroad tunnel under New York would mean competition for traffic, and resulting shrinking dividends, opposes the tunnel. And both claim to be “the public"; and one of them goes even so far in its vindication of “the public” that, in “the public’s name”, it—a private concern—declares the aldermen who oppose its views, and who have at least gone through the form of a public election, to be “morally and mentally incapable of deciding for the public good"!

The spectacle is worth watching—and understanding.

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Inquiring minds want to know.

A nurse?

That's the only job I know where one works on holidays and doesn't get paid overtime pay. And even then, they have alternating holidays.

....in the land of corporate hegemony....you and your feelings are unimportant....

Really? And in my ignorance I thought it was more like a system of corporate oligarchies interlocked with corporate favorable legislators. Silly me.

I didn't realize we really have a system where all capitalists are small entrepreneurs who exert no control over prices, markets, wages, or favorable government policies.:sarcasm:

Unregulated capitalism is merely organized crime ----

then it isn't freedom.

I might be wrong and am always open for criticism, so please comment.

bankrupts our Treasury ---

TREASON, I say --- !!!

It's good to see more on board.

I work at hotel. I work this whole weekend every day in fact all weekends this next month...except I did ask for christmas off.

I know its hard...don't know what you do but if it matters to you start looking for new job when spring hits and employers are hiring again...

I dont get overtime at all, never have

But of course Im in the military.

A car can be used to get you cross-country in under a week or it can be used to run over children. But it's not the car that's responsible either way, it's the driver.

it's the natural progression to monopoly and tyranny that is implicit in the logic of capitalism. The requirement of continual capital accumulation leaves no out, however lipstick is put on that pig. The implication for the environment of this finite world ain't so hot either.

Capitalism is an inert machine without people. People can use machines for good or ill. Right now, capitalism is being abused. I don't care if you don't like capitalism, just don't lie about it.

"It is not the consciousness of men that determines their being, but, on the contrary, their social being that determines their consciousness."

Karl Marx

No doubt some capitalist are well meaning people, but if they fail to follow the dictate of capitalism, continued accumulation by whatever means necessary, then they cease to be capitalists.
What we see today is more efficient accumulation.

"Yabba dabba doo."

Fred Flintstone

Karl Marx was just a man, not the Nostradamus (who was also just a man) of socio-economics. He didn't then and doesn't now define capitalism for everyone. Even a broken clock is right two times a day.