I am no economist, so I 'd like an explanation.

Why create and allow all this pressure on the working and middle classes in the first place? It seems to me to be very short-term thinking.

As I've written here before, I know white-collar (or as we'd have it these days, polo-shirt and khaki) highly-skilled and so-called professional people who are barely making ends meet, not to mention some other friends with blue collar (otherwise known as polyesther uniformed) jobs! My brother-in-law was making over $125K annually as a security-architect (that has something to do with encryption and hack-proofing of highly secure data). You can imagine how smart he is, but alas...the technical sector shipped off to India, so he had to finally take at job at 1/3rd the pay.

My company of 6,500 just laid off 100 people. I will give them a LOT of credit for laying off administrative or technical managers and directors instead of the operational frontline people (in other words, they chopped from near the top and the middle and not the bottom) but it is also very scary that those 100 people all probably have college degrees and/or a lot of work experience to have risen to where they were (my company tries to promote from within - and that comes from my ten years with them talking.)

I guess my question is this - how can they (the corporations, bankers and retailers) imagine that we can continue buying all their crap if we're hurting so much? How can they expect us to buy shiny trinkets and plastic gadgets galore if we are all struggling to get some groceries or shoes. Have you ever seen milk and cheese priced this high? Bread is over $3. A loaf of bread! I need to buy my son and daughter some good running shoes (my son is a marathoner and my daughter is in drum corps) - but that prospect wipes out most of the gift budget! We're supposed to be getting near our "comfortable" years (mid-forties) and we've both worked damned hard.

My brother owns a few in-line stores in malls in Texas and he says he's seeing the softest sales in seven years. I told him he should give up product retail and sell beer - I think I've heard that that is one item that keeps selling well in good times or hard times!

The talking-head investors and Wall-street types on the financial news shows all look so depressed that the consumer numbers are probably going to be so soft this "holiday season" (otherwise known as the mass-spending-go-into-debt-season). But not to worry, they'll find some false statistic to promote! The economy is great! Everyone is buying cheap Chinese and Taiwanese plastic shit on their credit cards! What's in YOUR wallet? You need to hurry out to charge up some cheap Chinese shit! Buy, buy, buy! It's pretty! It's shiny and new and comes with a has-been Britney Spears ring tone! Mortgage your future or even your soul!

So I just don't get it. The big companies and monopolies (herein out called the Robber Barons) keep transporting our jobs off to foreign places where their new employees suffer dark-ages prison-like conditions and slave's wages. The Robber Barons keep laying off more and more people or they keep offering lower and lower wages to those of us here still "lucky" enough to have jobs and careers (and to show our gratitude and enthusiasm, we try to keep the job by DONATING lots of free charity hours to the Company! Look at me, I am the best Stepford employee ever - I put in 60 hours this week for the same pay!) Gives new meaning to the song-title "The Nutcracker Suite!" I don't even have a pair and I feel like mine are in a vise!

These Robber Barons are ever vigilant to stomp out any whiff of employee or consumer protections, much less organized labor protections! I feel like the idea of unions is such a scant memory somebody had better put up a museum quickly before we forget the concept ever even existed! They're shredding all the history and evidence right now.

And, the big box stores keep putting more and more mom-and-pop and medium-sized businesses out of business.

All stores are starting to look alike.

Their commercials are starting to sound alike!

They are starting to all use the same damned colors in their ads!

All the conglomerates keep glomming and conglomerating into even bigger conbobulated conglomerates. Eventually, there's just going to be one big bad company merged with Wall-street and the government. It'll be 1984 come to pass - only instead of everything being gray and grim, it'll all be eye-candy-popping-colored madness in 30 second bursts of canned laughter and MTV-like shallowness that we watch on huge LED screens while working the line producing the greatest Ronco gadget EVER! that we get paid 17 cents to produce and could not hope to afford. Please sir! May I have some more?

The Robber Barons have our "voices of the people", our supposed voices in government - our supposed Senators and Representatives (herein out called The Congressional Sell-outs) on puppet strings. Watch them dance! Do the Crooked Hokey Pokey. Hey, why should the donations matter? Principles being such an old-fashioned idea for politics! What matters is what committee I'm on and my march to the Chairmanship. Apparently, we all just need to be more realistic in our expectations of how much work they should do for the "regular" folks - they've got hundreds of Bills stacked up to the ceiling designed to get to, to help out the Robber Barons, and lest you forget - the Sell-outs need the Robber Barons' money to get re-elected! And, once they're in office, apparently they will never, ever again have the guts to just leave. And what you and I call dirty, they politely label "compromise", "necessity", and "reaching across the aisle". Ugh. DC is like a black hole that sucks the scruples and balance and common sense right out of a person. The don't even bother with the smoke and mirrors anymore - there is not even the illusion that these Sell-outs will ever stand up to big money!

So, after this whole rant -- what I started out to ask is this: just WHO do the Robber Barons think is going to buy their products and services in three or four more years after this kind of pressure? All of us are only two paychecks away from bankruptcy or the streets! They will have chewed their employees and customers up and spit us all out, but then who is going to provide all that glorious profit for the HOLY shareholders and golden parachutes? It's a simple message of self-preservation I am trying to get across to these Companies. If they don't partipate in protecting the middle class and their employees, they aren't going to have ANY customers!

Guess which one is the happiest and most positive about the future.

I fear for my grandchildren if an education can be a waste of time(and money).

of student loans and the treadmill. I did love learning, but who can remember the joy and the value, when the loans are like having another mortgage?

I have family members who used to envy our security because we had "regular" jobs and they travel around working festivals (Taste of Colorado, state fairs, Mayfest, that sort of thing). Now we envy their freedom.

At least if I worked for myself, I'd only feel that I was working for an idiot half the time (pa dump tum!)

companies rarely engage in that sort of long-term, macro-level thinking.

Here's an anecdotal example:

Seems like every couple years, you hear of some company getting its ass sued off for polluting some lake/stream/neighborhood. Now, in the short term, it was much cheaper for that company to just dump pollutants wherever rather than pay for proper disposal. But in the long run, after having to shell out millions to pay off plaintiffs, it was actually cheaper to have done the right thing in the first place.

You see what I mean? There are, of course, more-specific examples of companies' abandoning long-term profitability for short-term gains. It happens all the time, and it's certainly one of the best ways of refuting the typical free-market-will-govern-itself, deregulate-everything Republican.

Like cancer, its only goals are growth and replication. It is mindless, existing only to consume, digest, and reproduce. It doesn't care if it kills the body it feeds on, because it has no sense of any needs but its own, of any time but the here and now. Asking a corporation to care about the society it exists within is like asking a brain tumor cell to care about the individual it's killing.

There is a logic behind their method, though, simply that they do not need or want us to be able to afford things. They can still be mega-rich if we can only afford the necessities. Actually, if we can only afford necessities and nothing else it makes their jobs easier.

are very bright and motivated. Often, they have dedicatd their lives to improving themselves. Most have taken big personal risks in life and are being rewarded for it. I see nothing wrong with that.

Progressives do not have a very broad view of the world when it comes to their personal lives because they assimilate with decent people.

Like you, the successful people I've been around have been decent and intelligent. But in other circles, it's different.

I've worked for some who barely tried to hide that they were in it for their own financial well-being and they would manipulate anything if it got them a bigger bonus. They didn't care about the well-being of the company, the stock holders, the employees or the customers. Just what numbers could they manipulate to get the maximum bonus.

Quite mind-boggling, close-up. I was so shocked by some of it, that I went back to school and got my MBA so that I could understand some of the financial tools they were using to do the manipulation. Amazing. Tools can be used for good or for ill.

the ones I know are greedy bastards committing economic treason

They will sell to the rest of the globe. Europe, China, Japan, India....

They don't want a middle class. They want the entire globe to be a serf based economy with the corporations as the modern kings. We aren't anything special.

And, the problem is not politics. The problem is human nature. History shows the pattern of a few sticking it to the many for time immemorial. Then, the many being screwed uprise. However, they have the entire globe to ravage this time.

Is the future Rollerball, Robocop, or kind of a melding of the worst of both worlds.

don't care where they sell their goods.


It may be true that fewer people in the USA may be able to buy their products as US workers reduce their standards of living, but that will be more than made up for by new consumers in India, China, etc.

The point is the corporation will look to produce its goods as inexpensively as possible and market them as extensively as possible.

looters aren't worried about where they will shop next month.

Gain control over a business, loot what you can, head for the hills with the cash when the bills come due.

See, the induhviduals (c.f. Scott Adams) are in it for themselves. They know that they only need to plan for the next 5 years, and then they will move on and it will someone else's problem.

You'd think that the overarching brain behind the organisation would have a better plan than that, but they've cleverly put in shareholders/stockholders who want to increase their share price in the short-term - 2-3 years. After that it is someone else's problem.

It's a downward spiral. Sorry.

Money is the root of all evil.

Ultimately, the US will be merely one stop on the Tilt-a-Whirl for the corporations. They will have an office here to portray involvement in this country, while outsourcing the REAL (manufacturing) jobs to third world countries for cents on the dollar and getting insanely rich in the process.
The "global economy" doesn't exist for the average worker...the "global economy" exists for the corporations.
The blind American support for a global economy and free trade perplex me the most because those are the death knells for the middle class. Instead of concentrating on how many high paying jobs have LEFT this country...the media/government has everyone fighting the undocumented workers for the leftover scraps of jobs--while leaving out the important details of WHY those jobs have suddenly become desirable and why those that seek them are now the "enemy"...and leaving out the important intersection of "us" and "them" which is only the fact that we happened to be born on this side of the border--other than that, we are ALL literally in the same boat...they have just been in it longer. Make no mistake though, there will be a day, if not in OUR lifetime, then certainly in our children's lifetime that crossing the border--legally or illegally--to work will be an option that many will have to consider.
The breathless reporting about the Nasdaq, et al...is another thing that I don't understand because most middle class can barely afford their homes, gas, and cars, let alone a blue ribbon portfolio of stocks.
I am not saying these aren't important indicators, but the time that it takes to report on how much money the wealthy and uber-wealthy lost/made today is really not relevant to most. The trickle-down theory does NOT exist, it never has.
However, these things have been portrayed by the media as being "important" in achieving the American dream...when the American dream does not exist anymore. It is a fable.
When I graduated from High School in 1981, college was really only one option. The area that I lived in had manufacturing plants that were good, solid union jobs. The kind where you could raise a family. Those are all gone now and the available jobs have been replaced with Walmart and McDonalds.
I remember in the 90's that it was touted that if you got a degree in computers...man, you were set for life. People flocked to college and trade school--acquiring thousands in loans (enter Sallie Mae, et al). Now, those jobs are either gone or are leaving...replaced again with MORE Walmarts and more McDonalds. More low level low paying service jobs.
The ONLY thing that is existing right now is a redistribution of wealth to the top of the economic spheres. That is not good for anyone making less than a mid 6-figure income. But that is the entire point. It's not supposed to be good for us.
We are dispensable.

past their own noses. Each one of the people who push this nonsense believes that he will be able to grab his money and get out before the whole thing comes crashing down--if the fools even stop to realize that it must all come crashing down and soon.

They are all caught up in the game, believing that nothing is ever enough for them.

Many years ago I read an article in one of the newsweeklies--I no longer remember which one. It described a situation that I have always referred to as the "banana wars."

A tribe of chimpanzees that lived in an area where they had enough food for all, but no significant surplus, was observed over time by a group of researchers. They saw cooperation among the chimps for the most part. When a too weak or too small chimp could not reach a piece of fruit, another chimp would help him/her get it. All did well and lived comfortably.

Then, just to see what would happen, the researchers trucked in a huge surplus of bananas. What happened then should seem eerily familiar. Everyone went nuts. Hoarding and theft replaced cooperation and mutual assistance. The larger, stronger chimps would collect as many bananas as they could amass and then spend all of their time guarding their pile, threatening and driving off any other chimp who tried to get one. The big chimps weren’t eating their bananas; they didn’t have time. In fact, they went hungry while guarding their wealth against constant attempts by other chimps to swipe bananas—or while attempting to enlarge their own hoard while stealing from another chimp’s hoard.

Meanwhile, the chimps without a hoard ignored the perfectly fine ripe fruit in the trees and kept trying to steal bananas from the hoarders’ piles. They too went hungry in the midst of plenty, because they wanted to steal bananas from the hoarders, rather than make even minimal effort to pick a piece of fruit from a tree.

Even family groupings were torn apart by this situation. Mothers would drive their young away from the banana pile if they were both trying to grab one from a hoarder, and if the mother happened to be a hoarder herself, she would even drive her own offspring away.

The banana wealth rotted, the fruit in the trees went uneaten until it was overripe and no longer edible, and the chimp tribe fought and fought and fought.

All along in the modern world technology has made it possible for all to be fed, for all to be provided for. Food shortages are not inevitable—they are created by perverse behavior fueled by greed. Food, shelter, clean water, medical care—there is plenty to go around, though with the growth of the world’s population and the pressure it puts on the ecology, that won’t last. Obviously, when the ecology collapses, there won’t be enough to go around (the fruit will over-ripen in the trees).

Because of our invasion and occupation of Iraq, we are pissing away billions of dollars that could provide health care, green technological research and development, cures for cancer (as opposed to cures for erectile dysfunction), and many other desirable things. The wealthy get wealthier, far beyond any possible need they might have, while the middle class and poor are squeezed and immiserated.

Think about Dick Cheney. The man is old and sick. He probably doesn’t have many more years left. He knows eh could drop dead at any time. He has more wealth than he will ever be able to use. He doesn’t need another cent, and he could easily retire to enjoy a life free of worry—and doing so might well increase his life span. He doesn’t need to do things that make him the most hated man in the country. Why would someone set himself up to be perceived as evil for generations to come?

Of course, he isn’t thinking about that sort of thing. He is just thinking about protecting his bananas from anyone who might try to get one, and about stealing bananas from other people’s hoards—or out of the mouth of the baby chimp who managed to sneak in and grab one when he was defending against a larger competitor.

He isn’t eating his bananas, and he can’t stand to see anyone else eating a banana. He wants all of the bananas in the world, and can’t bear to think that anyone else might get a single banana.

Anyone below them can easily be fooled by greed into playing along for as long as it lasts- but for the top 1%- it will ALWAYS last. Their lifestyle will never change, no matter what. They can always sell us low-grade food & water for pennies if they need a few extra profits just to keep their hands in "the game."

They dont care-and most everyone below them is either too greedy or too stupid to see it-much less stop it. There is your explanation.

The middle class is the hen that lays golden eggs for a capitalist society. The corporate greed-meisters have been grabbing as many golden eggs as they can for so long that they no longer see a connection between the hen and the eggs. Therefore, they only want to get that egg that's under a hen as fast as they can, regardless of any consequences to the hen, because they don't see any connection between the hen and the golden eggs. All they want, care about, or know about are the eggs.

The eggs have been there for so long that they think they are just an automatic part of the universe. Screw the hens! Who needs 'em? They're just in the way of them getting to the eggs.

In their short-sighted greed, they really are that stupid.

If the rest of the economy withers on the vine, that's OK as long as all the money that was sucked out ends up under your control. We are talking about reverting back into a feudal mindset as far as business goes. More enlightened thinkers realize that money must circulate throughout the economy like blood through the body, but some people have a feudal mentality, and it seems those who were born into wealth seem more predisposed to the feudal mindset than those who worked to become wealthy from scratch.

I must say, as an aside, most of the wealthy people you find in the top one percent in America were born into wealth. Only a small minority of them ever became wealthy through their own labor and cunning. The rest inherited their wealth and used it to increase their wealth further.

We gave it away to corporations and states. Mass production and automation makes everything cheaper, but now people aren't needed. You have to pay a corporation or the government, for various products and services, to exist. It's easier to do it that way. It allows us to "follow our dreams". That's all fine and good, but there is a price for that. The subject in your rant is that price.

"All the conglomerates keep glomming and conglomerating into even bigger conbobulated conglomerates."

Thousands of years of history in one sentence. I like it.

Good rant by the way. So the questions then becomes; what to do? Do we keep playing their game until we absolutely no longer can, because to do otherwise would require that we give something up? Do we stop voluntarily? Corporations and governments only have as much power as people give them. Each individuals share is less needed these days, but if we didn't willingly go along with "glomming and conglomerating", then people might actually gain control over their lives again. It wouldn't be easy, and people would have to voluntarily give up a lot of what corporations and government have given them, but there is a price to pay for everything.