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- Xref: sparky misc.test:9042 alt.politics.clinton:991
- Path: sparky!uunet!stanford.edu!hsdndev!cfa203!borden
- From: borden@cfa.harvard.edu (Dave Borden)
- Newsgroups: misc.test,alt.oplitics.bush,alt.politics.clinton
- Subject: Re: BUSH
- Message-ID: <1992Jul28.144333.8387@m5.harvard.edu>
- Date: 28 Jul 92 14:43:33 GMT
- References: <1682EE4D9.MEDELMA@cms.cc.wayne.edu> <1992Jul24.211142.27598@news.columbia.edu> <JASON.92Jul27161514@ab20.larc.nasa.gov>
- Reply-To: borden@m5.harvard.edu
- Organization: Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory, Cambridge, MA, USA
- Lines: 35
-
- In article <JASON.92Jul27161514@ab20.larc.nasa.gov> jason@ab20.larc.nasa.gov (Jason Austin) writes:
- >
- > Why is it so hard for people to believe that the US is in
- >pretty good shape? People that work hard and develop their skills
- >have jobs, keep their jobs, and can find new jobs when they need to.
- >Everyone I know that is having a hard time don't want to make the
- >effort to find a better job or work at educating themselves.
-
- That's not quite true. Many talented and well-educated people don't have jobs.
- Many more have jobs that pay the rent but don't provide satisfaction. Most
- of all, many of these people are working for a lot, lot less than they used
- to work for, or than people like them used to work for (myself, for instance).
- You should check out the Help-Wanted section in the Boston Globe. There's
- not much! What few positions open up receive literally hundreds of
- applications, because there are so many people here looking for work. As
- for educating oneself to be able to get a better job - you and I and most
- of the people reading this article may have that opportunity, but there are
- many more people who don't. Maybe they can't afford it, maybe they can't
- spare the time away from their two jobs that they have to work to feed their
- children. It's very easy for you to sit there and preach the work ethic, and
- the work ethic does has value, but you should look around you, too. The US
- is not in good shape. The quantity of freelance work that I get (playing
- piano on the side) decreased to half in 1989, and it has stayed there. It's
- possible that I'll personally be able to get more work through effort, but
- that doesn't change the fact that there is less work. There is MUCH less
- work. There are big layoffs all the time; there are fewer jobs. No matter
- how much I educate myself, there are fewer jobs. I might succeed in getting
- a better job, and good for me if I do, but that also means someone else isn't
- getting a job.
-
- All you're doing is pretending the problem doesn't exist, and it's not very
- helpful.
-
- - Dave Borden
- borden@m5.harvard.edu
-