Elitism and the value of work

One word I'm sick of hearing from the right is "elitism". It is a label they have hung on liberals, objectifying them as some snobbish class in ivory towers. It is a misnomer. Since the Republican party is powered by the very wealthy, it is also hypocritical. Sure there are wealthy individuals in the Democratic party, but the party is still by-in-large is made up of workers. Although some of our leaders strayed and tried to duplicate the machinations of wealthy power brokers on the right, I would daresay that the rank and file still understand how hard it is to earn a living.

I've been thinking about how to turn that label back on them. The implication is that somehow not all work is important. Yet we know that these greedy captains of industry who are steering the ship of state now only want work from us, and consider their work so important that they deserve to be compensated at levels off of the fairness scale. What if we started talking about the Republicans' disdain for work and how they actively seek to discount the labor of the average worker. First, they valued our work so well that they took the good jobs away and outsourced them, leaving us with a service economy. Second, they chip away at fairness in the work place. How many of you are working in the same job for longer hours, less benefits (if you had them), and earning at a level which does not keep pace with the cost of living and are allowed no avenue to air grievances or address abuses in the workplace? Third, for all the work done by one person over a lifetime, the Republican party power structure would very much like to see the worker work until they die. The concept of retirement for the laborer is a cost to them not a perk. Fourth, the press for laborers to return the maximum amount of their earnings to these companies in the form of rampant consumerism has eroded the workers ability save and move ahead. Pricing practices, pushing of unsecured credit, etc. beg for us to educate the worker in how to avoid being manipulated. And last, but certainly not least, they are currently draining resources away from the very systems which helped the worker move ahead financially and socially in this nation. When a nation does not invest in education and health care for its children--forget the adults--it sets itself up to create a permanent class of people who will never be able to rise above their "station". It is classist to do so. The Republicans are just that "classists".

I'm not an economist or an expert in labor practices so I may not have been as articulate as some on this board. However, I have worked since I was 12 years old. I know that the janitor's work is just as important as any CEOs and that the janitor deserves to not be treated as disposable. I understand that the janitor deserves the same right to breathe air of this earth as the CEO. It is elitist and classist to discount the janitor and his/her right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

Sorry about the length of this. I hope I have conveyed at least the gist of my thoughts. I think it is a huge concept which encompasses many spheres of interest in our society and I can't seem to distill them so that they are all adequately addressed. At any rate, your responses are certainly welcome.

why aren't republicans concerned over the ''buying power'' that workers get at the end of the work week?
not only do they sell off jobs to over seas -- but since 1970{?} they have chipped away at the purchasing power of the pay check.

and just a corner piece here -- why the insistence that savings should go to wall street and not a savings account?{i'm not talking about social security here}
it has bothered me for the longest time that the interest rates for savings is so weak for the longest time.
but banks make a good profit on the money in those savings accounts.

among the wealthy -- i'm sure there is a divide about how wealth is seen.
''liberal wealthy'' probably see ''wealth'' much the same as an average worker.
that's just a side note -- there are all kinds of views and i'm sure there is diversity at the top.
those aren't the folk we need to worry so much about.
i think the corporate oligarchy is as scary to them as us -- but they may not feel the urgency to something about it as we do.
no fault there.

credit card interest and all the fees for services they charge now. They also have been making megabucks from mortgages in the refinancing frenzy Greenspan set off by reducing interest rates. If the economy goes bust, the banks are literally going to own every scrap of currently privately owned property in existence.

is what they lend out for mortgages and basically all loans. They collect the interest on those loans and "repay" our money with a small portion of the interest. This is the reason for different interest rates on longer CDs and on savings accounts and the like. Check accounts and savings accounts are usually the lowest due to the fact that their is not time limit to when you get you money. Then CDs which pay off the long you promise to leave your money with them (ie 6 month CD, 12 month CD etc). Many banks have other types of accounts that pay slightly more, but they get the money to give you the interest they do by charging interest on loans.

and just a corner piece here -- why the insistence that savings should go to wall street and not a savings account?{i'm not talking about social security here}
it has bothered me for the longest time that the interest rates for savings is so weak for the longest time.

You've pretty much summed up the problem facing most Americans today vis a vis lower wages and easier credit.

Greenspan and his ilk are "inflation hawks" who do whatever is necessary to keep prices from rising. Unfortunately, this is also at the expense of workers' wages rising correspondingly.

Greenspan has even said, in public, that he likes to put on the cashflow breaks whenever he detects the slightest inflation in the economy: which usually manifests itself as a rise in wages before a rise in prices.

Greenspan and the current bunch of gangsters who manage the Fed deliberately keep a lid on rising wages, while simultaneously keeping interest rates low, and credit easy.

So, instead of getting more $$$ to pay for life's necessities, the working people of this country are forced to borrow more just to keep up the standard of living they used to be able to afford with their wages.

And therein lies the vicious circle: costs go up, but wages stagnate. However, credit becomes easier to get via credit cards and 2nd mortgages. Workers take on more debt, and borrow more $$ from banks and credit companies. More wealth moves from workers' pockets to the plutocrats, and wealth becomes even more concentrated at the top.

IMHO the Democrats lost their clout when they started going along with the policies of Greenspan and his Monitorist cronies on Wall Street. They're deliberately using the economy to take away wealth from working people, and our Democratic leaders not only sit back and accept it, but even aid and abet the thievery.

After all, Clinton DID reappoint Greenspan, at least once.

When Democrats turned to the same funding sources as Republicans, they had to craft an easy rationale, and it was, "I'm a liberal on social issues but a conservative on economic issues."
In repeating that mantra, they permitted the center on economic issues to keep moving right while some, like Joe Lieberman, galloped right to catch the wave. They made the point for the right-wingers who kept telling working people that the Democrats don't care about you, they care only about social issues, which quickly became the wedge issues. Democrats got boxed in, not because they abandoned social justice issues but because they abandoned the economic issues of living wage, national health care and job creation.

Bill Clinton and the Democratic Leadership Council boys got on the NAFTA bandwagon and rode the working people right out of the party.

There are millions of people at the bottom of the economic pile who usually do not vote. And why should they? They are people on welfare, the working homeless forced to choose between food and rent, the migrant workers. Once the center of national debate, when real Democrats developed a domestic Peace Corps as part of the war on poverty, the poor are now left out of the debate, or worse.

They were abandoned by Clinton and many Wisconsin Democrats with bumper sticker politics of "Work not welfare" and "W-2" that suggested the poor have somehow chosen their lot in life. Over cocktails at fund-raising dinners, Democrats of DLC stripe blame the poor for poverty.
These are the Democrats who seemingly could not figure out that a full-time minimum wage job brings in just over $10,000 a year - with no benefits.

It isn't just about jobs. As our friend from Iowa, U.S. Sen. Tom Harkin, says, "Hell, slaves had jobs and three meals a day." No, it is about quality jobs that permit a person to support a family and dream a little...
They might even recognize what Bill Moyers warned about - "The wealthy have declared class warfare, and they have won." They won without a fight while Terry McAuliffe donned his tuxedo for thousand-dollar-a-plate dinners in Washington with the victorious class warriors. One table for the funders equals a year of work for the person on minimum wage. Does that make sense?

There is an old union song, "Which side are you on?" For too long the DLC Democrats have said, "Well, I'm with you on concealed weapons but not on pocketbook issues."


http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0222-29.htm

Until we have a vehicle through which to advocate or get our voice heard, we are invisible. And the very first step is recognizing why we are invisible and repeating it over and over and over and over.

This whole "elitist" thing is sounding more and more
like re-cycled Marxism: you can only trust the peasants/
workers.

This kind of attitude is on a direct track to Pol Pot's
killing fields. Anyone with eyeglasses or a watch will
be shot.

Michael Lind has an excellent analysis of this kind of
"inverted Marxism", where the capitalist elite are being
"oppressed" by pointy-headed liberals, but they will rise
up in revolt.

We all know the neo-cons are the spawn of ex-Trotskyites.
We really have to "frame" these guys for what they are:
Stalinist thugs with murder on their minds.

arendt

Our society could not function without some of these so-called "unskilled" or "low skilled" jobs.

I'd argue that a janitor's work is more important than the CEO's. If all of the janitors in the country went on strike, we'd know it in a hurry. If all of the CEO's in the country went on strike, I don't think anybody would notice.

Usually the ones who've never had a handfull of blisters and a sore back. Having started working for a living at 15 and dug ditches, mixed cement, crawled under houses, toted a mailbag, washed dishes, and all those other examples of the "nobility of labor", I've often felt the urge to switch jobs with the assholes who sing the praises of "work".

I have worked since I was 16, 11 if you count the lawns I used to mow. But since sixteen I have also dug ditches, carried newspapers, been a parking lot attendent at county fairs, washed dishes, baked bagels, worked a few fast food places, Starbucks, clothing retail as a staff member, stock, and manager, and now sitting in a 5 by 5 cube. And while I hated most of it while I was doing it, I know that it was because of the sense of pride in my accoplishments that I developed from working that I am who I am today. I love that fact that I don't want something unless I feel I've earned it. I never expect anything other than someone to catch me if I fall. I pushes me to work hard at everything that I do.

OK, we gotta do testimonials, I see...

Before graduating college, I worked as an office boy,
a butcher's apprentice, and a waiter.

I had no problem with these jobs because, as a teenager,
the pay wasn't an issue; and, as my parents kept telling
me, I was learning how to work in the real world.

But, if I had to work at those dead-end jobs my entire
life; and if "the man" kept cutting my benefits and chiseling
me at every turn, then I would say that these menial jobs
were a raw deal. And, I would want to get out of them.

If this country were really (small-d) democratic, it would
guarantee healthcare and real pensions for all these menial
jobs. And pay them a living wage. The conservative Edward
Luttwak has observed that raising the minimum wage by
$15,000 a year (add $7.50/hr) is still half the price of
keeping people in jail. That is, it is economically efficient.
It is also socially efficient, in that people have real
(albeit subsidized) jobs that they can take some pride in.

Instead, we lock up 2% of the population (10+% of the minority
population) and make the Prison Guard's Union a major player
in politics. Keeping the lid on our cesspool of a prison/
torture system - that's a menial job you can take pride in.

----

I think that "elitism" is a code word for "we got these
shitty jobs and the man beating on us, and we want you
smart-ass teacher's pets to get the same shitty deal".
Its classic "jocks vs nerds", divide-and-conquer stuff.

Not to mention that its the same kind of "let's kill the
kulaks" class warfare that Stalin pulled on the "rich" Russian
peasants. If the American middle class doesn't wake up,
they are the new kulaks.

arendt

Other than a few instances of actually doing something worthwhile when I was an Employee Assistance counselor and an instructor, I could think of any number of things more interesting and "productive" to do. Like read a good book rather than producing and shuffling endless reports, studies, etc, destined for some warehouse full of such trash.

As for "pride" in my accomplishments as a worker, I preferred a paycheck. They could keep the pride.

Sorry, but I'm confused.

I said that if grunt-work, like waiting tables, was
paid a living wage, then people could what waiters
and such used to do: do their job, and go bowling or
fishing or whatever in their spare time -- and they
could do that fishing proudly because they earned
the money. Its not that they're proud of their work;
they're proud of earning a decent living even with
a bad education.

Your examples of "shuffling endless reports" may be
boring, but they are better paid than waiting tables
I would guess. They might even come with health insurance.
And they certainly require more skills than a high-school
dropout can muster.

So, could you please unmix the metaphor here? Either
talk about grunt jobs and how one gets through life
holding them or talk about boring "gray flannel suit"
jobs and how one keeps from going insane doing them.

My point was only that a job is a lot less demeaning
if the pay is decent. Construction workers put up with
an awful lot for good pay.

Interesting discussion

arendt

It was meant to be direicted to the previous poster. I have no disagreement with you.

My point is, that it is usually the wealthy the admonish us lesser beings to be "happy in your work". Most workers have sense enough to see "work" as a means to an end, namely a paycheck, rather than the backbreeaking labor, and/or, mindless and useless tedium that it is for most.

The idea that a janitor's or dishwasher's or fruitpickers work is any less valuable than Gucci some clad CEO's is utter nonsense. Even in "management" positions, I worked for a paycheck, not "pride" or "fulfill ment" or any of the other rationales that the bosses so ardently tell us we should be grateful for.

BTW I was a construction worker for a few years and put up with a lot for not so good pay. I totally agree with you that the vast difference between the "classes" is demeaning for those unfortunate enough not to be blessed the right color of skin, the right gender, or the right parents or that live in the wrong country.

>> the wealthy admonish us lesser beings to be "happy in your work".

I hate all the motivational BS that is used to dodge
the fact that companies are shafting their workers.

check out www.despair.com for some anti-motivational posters.
Hilarious.

Its fine to be happy in your work, as long as you are
not exploited. If the working conditions are OK and the
pay is decent, why shouldn't you be happy? But things
aren't like that in the USA anymore. All the old Communist
jokes are coming home to roost:

They pretend to pay us, we pretend to work.

In America you don't find the party, the (Grand Old) party finds you.
(Case in point: the rent-a-mobs directed against anyone who
speaks out against * and the GOP.)

----

>> the vast difference between the "classes" is demeaning

As far as wage differentials go, its an establish fact of
statistical research that democracies do not long survive
huge spreads of elite and worker pay. The draining of money
into the elite's bank accounts allows them to buy the government.
Just like what has happened here.

Being "demeaned" is just a side-effect of having your country
stolen out from under you by a bunch of well-funded weasels
and thugs. Sort of like being depressed is a side-effect of
watching your wife and children get murdered.

Sorry to be so negative.

arendt

First of all I was in no way saying that people do not deserve to be paid more, have benefits, and access to retirement plans, in fact I believe something quite to the contrary. My original point was actually that I feel work of all kinds is valuable and that people who do all those jobs including shuffling papers all day are important contributers of society. Their is no job, other than possibly middle management, that produces nothing and therefore their is no job that is unimportant to our way of life.

Second, waiters make more than you think these days. My friend works 5 shifts a week and pulls in about 40k a year, that is one and a half times what I make sitting at my desk.

Lastly I understand your point about work being a means to an ends, but personally it doesn't hold true for me. Yes I look forward to my paycheck every week, but my paycheck does not dictate how hard I work. I work hard to be the best at what I do. It's a sense of pride and a wantonness to stand out. When I worked in retail everyday I wanted to make as many sales as possible. I didn't get commission but I still felt the urgency to do the best job I could. So does that mean that I buy in to the rights propaganda or does it mean that I push myself to be the best that I can because that is the right thing to do.

If the republicans value labor so much, then why is the federal tax code slanted ever more heavily against wages? Wages are taxed for both income tax and social security. Wealth income (i.e. investments) are not taxed for social security at all, and is taxed, for the most part, at a lower rate than wages -- and some republicans want to do away with income taxes on non-wage income entirely!