here is the problem. also that the amount of blue collar, decent paying jobs (factory, construction, assembly line, ect) is seriously lacking.
fry and jays, not all of us can be engineers.
Even good degrees are hurting. Accounting/Finance is one of the most marketable degrees out there, until the banks all cut jobs/put hiring freezes in place. We have people with 15-20 years financial experience applying for jobs lower in rank and salary than where I started with no experience out of grad school.
Baby Boomers fucked up the current generation of college graduates. There is no way to legislate your way out of that hole. The market is flooded with people willing to work for cheap. Supply is up, demand is low. Just wait until they all retire and companies can’t find the help they need. Supply down, demand goes up.
Lets not leave out the fact that some people profit off of their tax “returns”.
Only happened to me once though. My tax prep lady assured me it was correct as I was in disbelief.
^^^ do you have a basement full of children you claim as dependents or something? How do you work at Praxair and get away with paying 0 taxes?
The problem there is the answer isn’t what the occupy movement types want to hear. Want to bring back blue collar manufacturing to the US? Slap some serious tariffs on all the cheap shit we get from India, China and Taiwan. Good luck explaining to the entitlement generation why a 32" flatscreen now costs $1000 because it’s made in America by a union employee making a wage that can support his 2.5 kids and house in the burbs.
There has to be a happy medium here though. We can’t keep importing everything while exporting all our jobs overseas, but at the same time we can’t expect to return to place where blue collar manufacturing is the engine of our economy.
Nope. Family of four income guidelines, Not working at Praxair, stay at home mom, mortgage, etc…
I did not cash in like some getting hundreds of dollars. It was only slightly more than I paid out.
I had considered www.pay.gov, but then realized that it would not be the American way to contribute that “earned” income back to an entity that
clearly had more money that it knew wha to do with.
That is such a simple solution but its such a complex problem. The US exports a lot and if we start limiting our imports by taxes, we need to make sure we don’t shoot ourselves in the foot and have countries that buy our goods be like “Well fuck you. You are getting taxed now too”. Its a careful relationship. I do agree tho if we want to get back into the manufacturing, they need to create some regulations that help lower costs to produce here. we have a lot more environmental and labor laws that are more expensive to follow so we need to give companies a reason to do business here and make it worth their while.
This is more the reality today. And beyond the job issue I find it disgusting that the banks (and others) gambled and were bailed out on our national dime, at the expense of currently hidden & future inflation. They trashed the global economy, or played the majority role in speeding up a collapse. If the government/fed insisted on stimulating the economy they should have put that bailout money in the pockets of those that were trying to pay on their inflated mortgages. As most know I’m NOT a fan of socialism or bailouts period. I believe in consequence even at the expense of deflation. That said IF you are going to try and prevent defaults, give to the people paying the mortgages or trying to do so.
Why am I so against inflation at this point…because it’s inflation that drives our wages up and makes outsourcing so attractive. Want jobs back? You cannot have inflation and a higher cost of living, that drives wages higher! Imports should be penalized but even then the cost of goods will rise and the offset won’t likely be high enough to justify bloated US labor.
All JMHO of course. 
Trade school > college
If not now, then in the next 5-10 years for sure.
There’s plenty of overeducated self righteous pricks like myself. Good electricians? Not so much.
I’m still so 50/50 on the bailouts.
On one hand, I hate that we bailed out banks. You made bad investments? Oh, it’s ok, the american people will keep you afloat.
On the other hand, NOT bailing out banks could have been catastrophic. The lack of available credit to businesses is already a massive problem. It’s causing small businesses to collapse. They depend on their credit lines to continue growing their businesses. I don’t think people realize the implications of massive failure of our country’s credit system.
The flip side to the second argument, though, is that good standing institutions PROBABLY would have bought out the failing ones. As we saw Wells Fargo buy Wachovia and Fiat purchasing Chrysler (just to name a few), MAYBE that would have been the other institutions’ saving graces. It’s hard to tell what WOULD have happened, but it’s easy to just blame our losses on the bailouts, right? The American people have been making piss poor personal finance decisions just the same as the large institutions have. We are all to blame, in my opinion.
Then they’ll start sending them over from China and India as well…
I know guys making $40+/hr with a HS education and lots of mechanical talent/aptitude doing work that I choose not to learn how to do well.
I know plenty of union electricians in the NYC area that are constantly on furlough.
If you want to get ahead, get into finance. We need more analysts to highlight the gains and cost savings to corporations for
leveraging low cost suppliers.
If you’re not first, you’re last.
I would have voted them fail. they profited on risky business practices and the more stable banks would have bought them. If not, the government could have turned into a bank with the trillion dollars we spent in bailouts to provide businesses loans.
The Occupy folks seem unorganized, and desperately need a single realistic vision, that isn’t so extreme left. It currently comes across like a bunch of dirty hippies. Not much different than the tea party folks who come across as a bunch of religious right who quietly put on the white robes and pointy hats at night…
I don’t think many of us in the middle class really want to be associated with either of these groups with extreme positions.
With that said, I think there are some serious problems that warrant some sort of public effort to change. I think a large portion of the middle class is as frustrated as these groups, but doesn’t have the ability to start movements because they are the ones with 40-50 hour per week jobs, families to take care of, etc.
For me - I just want our government to end the demagoguery, close the tax loopholes, stop being paid off by corporate america, and stop cutting taxes for the rich. (By now we’ve learned that it does not spur economic growth).
Top earner’s incomes have skyrocketed while the middle class has stayed stagnant or even lost buying power. During that last presidential election all we heard was the GOP stirring fear about redistribution of wealth, when that is exactly what has been happening, but in the opposite direction. We now have the greatest income inequality in the history of our country.
I blame this on everyone. Nobody wants to work together in our government, it’s constant political games. Basically nothing get’s done, and when it does - it’s because one party owns the hill and policy goes extreme.
Instead of making fun of protesters by posting unrealistic claims about how everyone has the opportunity to go back to school, raise three kids, find sweet jobs, pay off all of their debt and live the dream, we should probably refocus on the true problems facing us as the employed middle class, and figure out how to solve them.
Basically I think both parties suck, and we need to start focusing somewhere in the middle, instead of our government and country being ripped apart by a constant tug-of-war between hippies and the religious right.
Also - A company too big to fail is a company too big to exist. Let’s get back to supporting our small businesses when we can. Buy your food from a farm, eat seasonally, support others who support local businesses. Spend a little more money when it matters.
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I agree with this 100%, and I work with Colleges and Universities day in and day out.
I’ve got a high end tech certificate, 2 years of 10x more clock hours than the average college student, graduate program factory training, tons of awards, highest gpa etc, a ton of experience, want to move up? No degree = fuck off unless I want to continue to wrench. We don’t care what’s on that piece of paper, we just want to see you have one.
I don’t believe it. Someone with a brain on NYSpeed that’s not Fry or JayS? I’m blown away.
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I really like the bold statement! Agreed.