Public healthcare seems to be working quite well for ALMOST EVERY other civilized country in the world .. and you know how manybankruptcies they have every year from unforseen medical emergency ZERO,, Many many americans Fall into financial ruin because of this.....
and there are PLENTY of people working that cant afford insurance by the way ..especially if your like me and have any preexisting conditions... i myself have glaucoma and needed help wit test costs and medicine and the Caseworkers at the office that is meant for helping people not only treated me like **** but basically told me to come back after i was blind and theyd put me on disability for the rest of my life.. witch would cost a great deal more than helping me in the first place..I am not some **** bum i work my *** off to provide a reasonable home in a good schoold district for my dsaughter and thats about the end of the budget there..And as far as ur statement that working people have insurance , there are PLENTY of hard working men and women who dont ... .. Losing your health is often sudden and unexpected so an I'm healthy don't worry about it attitude is stupid


A big problem w the unemplolyment is people arent willing to take a job they feel is below them.. Americans want Premium pay and to be treated like gold and not have to work hard... its tough to find american workers that dont want to get paid tons while being soft and lazy..There are jobs for those WILLING to work.. and kudos to the americans doing it... but no wonder jobs are going elsewhere if the pay to product turn out is unbalanced.. if americans arent willing to realize theyre job can be done just as well and cheaper maybe we will figure out that we neeed to compete for these jobs on a worldwide scale..

I moved here from a very poor county in Northern California. They are getting hit hard by this slump. I have friends losing homes right now, but they are certain to bounce back like always. Even before the recent crash, times were rough there, and I don't know one person not living out of someone else's pocket that doesn't work hard to stay on top. In my hometown, there are college grads working for close to minimum wage. I did when I was there.

My point is, your assumption applies only to a minority. Not all Americans are spoiled and lazy. If I had spent my entire life here in Ventura, I might agree with you. Values seem different here. But I didn't grow up here, and know that it isn't like this everywhere.

So, when the umemployment rate hits 15% will the recession truly be over.
Obummer said it was over already and unemployment continues to rise.

ObaMao and 95% of Congress need to resign and go straight to prison.

Why no kudos to the American workers who have broken new ground in productivity standards. You blame the American worker for being soft and lazy, but if that's true, why does the American worker lead the world in productivity?

To a bean counter, everything will look only like a harvested bean-- they don't take into account the fields where all this happens.

Where I work, just about everyone had to take 10% cut in pay and wear more than one hat. We're told business is off 30-40%, yet half the workforce got cut. Do the math. Yet, our healthcare insurance keeps going up, as do most of the things we buy.

In most other countries, healthcare is paid for by the government, so maybe that explains some of the difference in 'premium' pay Americans need.

And don't forget-- if you paid the American worker the same slave wages and dinked with the foreign exchange rate, American corporate earnings would eventually suffer a LOT more than they have now.

Really, maybe it's the CEO class that needs a reined in. Look at HP and Carly Fiorina-- she often poor-mouthed the American worker even as she was feathering her perk nest and turning a company that was once a lion of American business into a two-bit ink vendor.

-Kerry O.

I knew the soft and lazy comment would get some people riled but its my personal experience trying to find good hard working people to grow with my company.. an i SAid kudos to those that do work theyre ***** off ... Being a generalization means that of course my statement isnt going to apply to everyone ... but if you cant see that it isnt the minority but the majority of americans behaving in this spoiled way.. thats on you i suppose..

ive lived all over the us and the people ive been exposed to led me to beleive this is the way it is maybe i am incorrect but it does seem to be an issue no american wants to face its alot easier to blame obama or bush for EVERYTHING instead of looking at a failing work ethic... As far as the Older americans it seems They have a work ethic that wasnt passed down to the majority of our youth..

Just out of curiosity where did you see that we have the most productive workers in the world??? im sure there is a study that says that .. just as theres probably one in china that says the same about them..

and just to remind you i did say there ARE jobs for those willing to work hard and KUDOS TO the americans that are working their ***** off..I personally Buy AMERICAN MADE equipment trucks and trailers and hire HARD WORKING americans to do my labor instead of paying less for EXTREMELY hard working mexicans that get jobs done well but have very little customer service value ...

What really drives me nuts is the fact when i gfet on the highway dammn near every car is foreign.. and our chrylsler plant is closed and locals are jobless cause no one buys american product in america..Even our beloved Anheiser downtown is now property of a german company now..

Maybe people just don't want to work for you. You have to earn good morale. My hometown is full of small business owners. You can tell which one's low-ball or mistreat their employees by how high the turnover is.

I had SO MANY jobs until I started working at a group home. I spent about 3 years there. I graduated, found a job and moved away. I consider the home administrator's family my own. I'm even going there for Thanksgiving. I'm a civil servant now, and doubt that I will ever bounce back into private sector again. I may never own a Porche, but I will never have to worry about losing my job or being taken advantage of by someone with an "Oppressing Thumb" over me again.

You just think your job will be secure.
Whem ObaMAo grants amnesty to the Illegals, you may be in for a surprise.

You are on the right track, civil service comes with alot more protections than the private industries. Id have loved to have been in a civil service career like my mother was. Longevity, stability, great pay and benefits......

How?

First move would be to remove every single law from the books that protects labor unions. i'd abolish them altogether, but workers do have a right to band together to ask for more. However, it is wrong that the government intervene and do things like require a worker to join a union if it exists.

That would take care of most unemployment issues within a year... or however long it takes all those overseas manufacturers to move those jobs back to america.


tax breaks for the wealthy (and below) to make them more fair and smaller government would be next.

You're a whole 29. You were still in short pants for the '82 recession, so this is your first one.
I'm almost twice your age, ran my own business probably longer than you have yours and a long time ago my ex told me my being a work-a-holic is what killed the marriage. My parents were raised during the Great Depression and told me the stories of what life was like then.


I have a brother in law who is anything BUT lazy or soft who has worked construction his whole life-- it's all he knows and he only has a GED. He laid block in 90 degree weather. Do you think you could do that?



I saw it a couple of places. I'm sure you'll be able to find it if you really want to. Remember: hard work, it's the answer to everything, right? :)



That's laudable. But let me ask you this question: theoretically then, if your employees work harder than you do, should they not be entitled to more of the profits than you? No? So, hard work ISN'T the only ingredient, is it?

What you're doing in this series of posts is kicking good people when they are down and rationalizing it by saying in essence, "Let them eat cake." You're not in the job market now, how can you possibly know how difficult it is, especially for professionals who went to college for 6 years and about a hundred large in dollars?

And what if you fell on hard times in your business through no fault of your own and your best employees start acting like mercenaries? I've grown old listening to businesspeople complain about employee loyalty during good times. And oftentimes, it's the loyal employees who go down with the ship.

Look at what happened to the Simmons Mattress company. When the Bosses and the Moneychangers decided to play Leveraged Buyout and saddle a company of hard workers with crushing debt and eventual bankruptcy, it was the hard workers who came out of it looking like suckers and chumps. The Bosses and Moneychangers made millions just for shuffling some papers. Heck, they didn't even use their own money!

Cuts both ways, doesn't it?





Well, it's not like a few soft American workers went up to Budweiser management and held a Luger to their heads, now is it?

The CEO class needs to man up and take responsibility for their 'spoiled' attitudes once in a while, too. It's pretty tedious to always hear the blame being offloaded on the work-a-day types who are taking the brunt of this downturn.

If you REALLY want to understand what's going on, do some research on the Prisoner's Dilemma. There are a bunch of really, really smart people who have researched it and have some very logical things to say on the subject vis-a-vis societies.


-Kerry O.

study an accounting class for the answer to this one. there are fixed costs in addition to the variable (such as hourly/commission labor) if a product is 40% direct, 20% fixed, and 40% profit (to oversimplify) you still pay the fixed costs even if sales drop to zero. you have to take proportionality in to account


and in fact, labor is the easiest cost to cut as workers can work harder. those that want the job will work harder or be replaced by someone who will.

They say engineers have to work in 5 dimensions-- the three physical ones plus how much and how soon. I know what the margins are, just as I know that even Einstein wouldn't have been productive the first couple of days on my factory floor. And with a tricky biomed product, it's not like changing light bulbs.

What's _your_ experience on the factory floor or the design board? What's your experience with dealing with Fortune 500 companies who have the clout to shove the loss leader items down your throat for the rare privilege of doing the 10% niche items that are profitable?

Do you _really_ think that a few tax breaks are going to get Wal*Mart to give up the China connection? Or that we can win the race to the bottom with good ole fashioned dog-eat-dog capitalism by itself?

-Kerry O.

the fact americans expect to see a $25 an hour paycheck for working an assembly line is what drives walmart to china. we as a society have priced ourselves out of the market here.

I can see both sides to this. I think it's more of a generational thing, too.

My dad worked construction and is in millwright right now, working on teardowns and rebuilds of steam turbines. He's 65 and probably won't be able to afford to retire till 70, because of the stock market last year. He is Union, and supports it, we do too, except for the autoworkers, but that's a whole other issue.

Both unions and non-unions are struggling to get younger men (and women) into millwright work. The younger generation doesn't want to work that hard, and they don't want to start at the bottom of the totem pole. Everyone is figuring there will be building and infrastructure problems because no one wants to do the work, and eventualy, the older guys are going to retire.

As far as what Andrew AV said about that 25.00 an hour check, it's amazing that for how cheap the stuff from China has gotten, people are still struggling to make ends meet.

The pay IS good, but it is hard work.

Like I said I Hire hardworking guys... And after a LOT of turnover have great hardworking guys... And from what it took to find em they are welltaken care of..obviously im not running a huge company but Being that ALL of the equipment advertizing liability and job finding and billing is done by me no i dont think my guys sould be paid more than me ... and im not finding guys to work harder than me i need guys that can work aside me and fukin keep up.. I ended up with older guys that in my opinion have a better work ethic that the MAJORITY of people my age and younger...

and to whoasked if I could lay block in 90 degree weather ..yes I can and have I work my *** of year round outside and it gets nice n hot here...its a little presumptuos to assume I don't work hard or that I underpay or mistreat my employees..I use hardworking american native employees who often advise me of better methods to do some things as some of them being more experienced than me.. As someone pointed out I'm only 29.. That don't make me blind to the fact I couldn't find too many guys my age or younger willing to work hard.. EVERYONE says they want it but don't wanna work hard

Also My origional point wasnt that its the workers fault What i was talking about was everyone blaming everything on bush or obama when some of the blame goes to Work ethic and Demanding Outstanding pay for poor performance..Also Corprate CEo Profiteering the point was Obama hate him or love him isnt the only factor

WOOHOO!!! 10% is the new " normal ".

What a great country.

when you cannot excel, simply lower the bar.

Well, I guess we'll find out when the middle class paycheck is exterminated if there is ANY market left for the stuff the $25,000/hr CEOs are trying to sell, won't we?

History doesn't always repeat itself, but I seem to recall a study that found that when the disparity between the rich and the poor was at its greatest, the times were the worst.

-Kerry O.

Here are your exact words:



Hardly a glowing testimonial. Would you have the guts to say that to an engineer I read about lately who did some consulting jobs for _FREE_ for some companies hoping to get his foot in the door? Yet STILL hasn't secured a job with health insurance? All he got for his trouble so far is taken advantage of.

See, you don't see any of this sort of thing going on. To lots of people, unemployment is something that happens to OTHER people who are deficient in some manner, but who, in better times are gainfully employed people helping to fuel the national economy.

-Kerry O.