Mocha Jo Posted May 18, 2016 Share Posted May 18, 2016 I would make the argument that "rigged" is the correct term depending on where you stand. Capitalism, by it's nature is for the benefit of those that have capital to start with. It works primarily on their favor. If one doesn't start out rich (and how many of us do?) the system of Capitalism is not designed to gain us wealth, but to keep us working for those who have wealth enough to pay us in the hope (delusion?) that we, too will beat the odds and rise to the 1%. Link to post Share on other sites
WoodwindWhistler Posted May 18, 2016 Share Posted May 18, 2016 I would make the argument that "rigged" is the correct term depending on where you stand. Capitalism, by it's nature is for the benefit of those that have capital to start with. It works primarily on their favor. If one doesn't start out rich (and how many of us do?) the system of Capitalism is not designed to gain us wealth, but to keep us working for those who have wealth enough to pay us in the hope (delusion?) that we, too will beat the odds and rise to the 1%. Yeah. It works exactly how it's supposed to, so it's not "rigged" per se, but socially, and as a false promise/belief for everyone to have a fair shot, or even a good shot, yes, it is "rigged." It aggregates capital in the hands of those who already have it more often than it rewards those who bring new things to the table. In return for offering distribution webs they have control over, capitalists snatch up patents, or copyright, or shares, to things other people created that will make them money. Because they can. Watch any episode of Shark Tank and realize that no matter *how* good an idea is, those who benefit more or less passively are the people who already have money. There's a saying- you have to have money to make money. Even once you have capital, or aggregate it, you'll be given unilateral authority- as a boss- or as an owner/shareholder- over those who do not, which is inherently un-democratic. Akin to a dictatorship, even. It's no wonder we have an oligarchy. You are able to funnel all the profit upwards to CEO salaries. Because you can. You could argue that if everyone were well-educated in financial management from a young age, and did not have the poverty trap of, say, rent which requires payment but gives nothing tangible, useful, and longstanding the way ownership of real estate does, and banks that *charge* for using money (and, paradoxically, not having *enough* of it), capitalism could work better as a social and economic fabric, but those are both in the interests of keeping capital and control of those who are in charge of land and money. Credit unions, workers' co-ops, and housing co-ops seek to break these patterns. Link to post Share on other sites
WoodwindWhistler Posted May 18, 2016 Share Posted May 18, 2016 Interesting reads, there. I just got lost for a couple of hours that I should have been doing other things, LOL. I am 59. The job market is not only rigged against the millenials, but heaven forbid you be aged. I consider myself lucky that I have a job that I can do until dementia takes me over, but I will never be able to retire due to unfortunate life events (like kids and 2 divorces). The system is rigged, and the wool is firmly pulled over the eyes of the majority of people. Why in the world would you call kids "unfortunate life events"???? Only a thoroughly capitalist culture could turn your own flesh and blood into such a phrase. >_> In traditional societies you would be supported by your children . . . after all, you spent your life supporting them, but I don't think that's typically how it's expected to work in a capitalist system. You're supposed to "make your own way." Also, grandparents used to live with their kids and grandchildren, but even though that saves a heck of a lot of money, we've moved away from that because of similar sentiments. Link to post Share on other sites
Sally Posted May 18, 2016 Share Posted May 18, 2016 Credit unions, workers' co-ops, and housing co-ops seek to break these patterns. Credit unions are widely available and offer an alternative to banks, but workers' co-ops and housing co-ops are few and far between. They can't break a longstanding, worldwide situation. Link to post Share on other sites
timewarp Posted May 18, 2016 Share Posted May 18, 2016 The job market is just one part of capitalism. You cannot expect companies to think in anybody else's interest, that's what the governments are supposed to do. I've seen lots of university students doing their internship at my former employer, and from that experience I know very well the risk an employer is taking: it's likely that you pay somebody and have to look after them plus end up doing all the work they were supposed to do. Sorry if this sounds very harsh, but from the experiences I've gathered with those students, I would only employ 1 out of 5 of them. To find that 20% out of those who, according to their cvs and job interviews, seemed to be a good choice, is not an easy decision. In my opinion this is the main reason why chances for anybody freshly graduated from university are pretty slim, while somebody with 1 or 2 years of job experience is better off. The only solution I see for the social problem of unemployment is a basic, unconditional income for everybody, paid by the state. Link to post Share on other sites
sonofzeal Posted May 19, 2016 Share Posted May 19, 2016 The only solution I see for the social problem of unemployment is a basic, unconditional income for everybody, paid by the state. I've been considering various proposals like this lately. There's various arguments and counter-arguments for why it may or may not work economically, but it actually makes a lot of sense with the right perspective. Let's say the government prints an extra $100 for each of its citizens and mails it out with the census. Or, more practically, puts the bills in a central reserve and mails out checks for the same value to prevent fraud. No tax money is spent on this, besides the nominal cost of printing the cheques. What happens? Well, each (documented) man, woman, and child has an extra $100 to their name. On the other hand, inflation would go up - we're putting extra coin into the system, so that devalues the dollar slightly. Now, most people generally treat inflation as a slur, and there's some point to that, but what is inflation if not a subtle sort of tax on wealth? The value of financial holdings trends down over time based on the level of inflation, so this would accelerate that process somewhat though perhaps not as much as you'd think. So each individual's wealth trends downward slowly based on how much they have, but they're also getting new money in at a uniform rate. The end result is a soft pressure towards equalization - the rich get a little poorer (or get richer a little more slowly), while the poor get a bit of a boost, and, notably, there's perfect granularity in between, with each person being affected in precise accord with their holdings, rather than worrying about whether they fall into this tax bracket or that. The further you deviate from the average, the stronger the pressure is, with the median strength of the pressure based on how high the Universal Basic Income is. A low-to-moderate UBI thus smooths out wealth divisions over time, compensates for its own weakness nicely since it too can be scaled to inflation naturally, and boosts the economy since there's less value in hoarding money, and poor people tend to spend their money faster than rich people anyway. The only real problems, then, are the current controls on a government's ability to print its own currency.... and off-shore holdings. Which are their own lengthy discussion, and tend to mess up any sort of sensible economic management (taxes too, of course). Link to post Share on other sites
WoodwindWhistler Posted May 21, 2016 Share Posted May 21, 2016 I've seen lots of university students doing their internship at my former employer, and from that experience I know very well the risk an employer is taking: it's likely that you pay somebody and have to look after them plus end up doing all the work they were supposed to do. Sorry if this sounds very harsh, but from the experiences I've gathered with those students, I would only employ 1 out of 5 of them. Are they not allowed to fire people who don't do a good job . . . ? And you're also not factoring in that plenty of internships are unpaid, which is majorly unfair. If college is not preparing people for the job market (big surprise 9_9 ) then that's something your employers need to be telling universities about. Getting into the career development centers and telling them their experience. I, on the other hand, see STEM field and other highly qualified students struggling to find jobs. Link to post Share on other sites
WoodwindWhistler Posted May 21, 2016 Share Posted May 21, 2016 Credit unions, workers' co-ops, and housing co-ops seek to break these patterns. Credit unions are widely available and offer an alternative to banks, but workers' co-ops and housing co-ops are few and far between. They can't break a longstanding, worldwide situation. Right, they should become more common. That's the nature of all grassroots or social movements- they start out small and then catch on. Rome was not built in a day. An abusive empire cannot be dismantled in a day. Link to post Share on other sites
timewarp Posted May 21, 2016 Share Posted May 21, 2016 I've seen lots of university students doing their internship at my former employer, and from that experience I know very well the risk an employer is taking: it's likely that you pay somebody and have to look after them plus end up doing all the work they were supposed to do. Sorry if this sounds very harsh, but from the experiences I've gathered with those students, I would only employ 1 out of 5 of them. Are they not allowed to fire people who don't do a good job . . . ? And you're also not factoring in that plenty of internships are unpaid, which is majorly unfair. If college is not preparing people for the job market (big surprise 9_9 ) then that's something your employers need to be telling universities about. Getting into the career development centers and telling them their experience. I, on the other hand, see STEM field and other highly qualified students struggling to find jobs. Even if you're allowed to fire someone, you have to go through a lot of trouble, whilst, believe it or not, companies usually also do other things than trying to find good staff (that's what HR departments are for, to minimise the trouble for everybody else). The internships I'm talking about were in fact paid. Oh, employers tell universities about it all the time. And all the universities can think of is teaching theoretical "soft skills", like project management courses (do you believe you can manage a project without having worked on a project?). I am in fact talking about STEM students. These highly qualified students more often than not - do not know how to write a letter - do not know how to take a phone call - do not know how write a report in a neutral (I'm not even asking for formal!) style - fail at simple primary school mathematics - cannot handle units of measurement - are not able to organise their workload and don't know when to ask questions and whom to ask (this one has always been tricky for me; one would imagine this is something a university student had to deal with during their studies, but no, turns out they can't) About one out of five handles all these things perfectly, and the frustrating job for an employer is to develop a strategy how to find that one person and avoid the other four. Link to post Share on other sites
LadyPariah Posted May 21, 2016 Share Posted May 21, 2016 *Totally skipped over most of the replies because I'm a little bit ADHD* I'm sorry to hear about your situation Sindi. I am in the same situation! I can't help but wonder if the recession in America (where I live) could have impacted Finland and other countries, as there is still much that is kept secret about what caused it here. All I know is that our banks, who are a giant monopoly, made risky investments with our money and almost all of it was lost. We had to bail them out after these criminal acts because if they failed, our economy would collapse. Don't even get me started with our corporations that exploit people outside our country for a bigger margin of profits! Anyways, I am a partially disabled person, and it is increasingly difficult to find a job. The employers want people with degrees, but that costs more than an arm and a leg, not to mention I became too sick to finish an associates degree. I even went into a job interview to sort books at a library, and they wanted me to have all this experience and bend over backwards for a minimum wage. Let's just say I refused to kiss ass, and didn't get the job. Even Walmart isn't hiring a lot of people, they are trying to cut back on the amount they have to pay to their workers, so payroll is low, and the existing workers are breaking their backs just to afford food and housing. We don't even have the industry here for people that would like to work in that environment. There are people that would give anything for a job, even if it could kill them. But the corporations don't want to spend the money to adhere to the regulations, unions, and environmental protections, even though they are absolutely needed. So they go to other countries where there are no regulations so they can abuse the land and people. We simply need more money for the people, so they can pioneer new ideas and start new businesses, and figure out what things other countries would want to buy from us, and what skills are needed internationally and locally. It's depressing, I'm not even going to lie. We are all in quite a tough spot, and will be until our leaders take action to fix this and make sure it can never happen again. Some may call us lazy, but it is them who got a lucky break. It's easy to look down on people when you're in the higher spot. Sorry about the rant. Link to post Share on other sites
Archaewok Posted May 25, 2016 Share Posted May 25, 2016 This is from the point of view of an individual, but I think the points stand even in a wider concept. So, it is of course reasonable to expect, that everyone in the society would "do their part", i.e. work. But the fact, that you have to struggle tirelessly and beg on your knees* to even get the "privilege" of doing the simplest job, is very unbalanced and twisted. Of course everyone knows, that a high unemployment is bad. But how often do we think about how absolutely unreasonable it is from the individual's perspective? I mean, many people who have struggled very hard with getting a job, still tend to see it as "just the way things are", as if it was perfectly natural and inevitable, that the society works like this. How do they not lose their societal morals all together? I know I have lost them, and don't tell me to just "get off your ass and make the required effort like a man" or whatever. I might be lazy, but this is not about laziness - the system honestly looks flat out wrong to me. *job hunting I failed the personality test at Walmart at least two times before I finally passed it the third time. Considering that Walmart is one of the lowest rungs on the ladder job-wise, you can bet I was disappointed that it seemed like I couldn't even get a crappy job (I never ended up working there). Link to post Share on other sites
Zerο Posted May 25, 2016 Share Posted May 25, 2016 I've seen lots of university students doing their internship at my former employer, and from that experience I know very well the risk an employer is taking: it's likely that you pay somebody and have to look after them plus end up doing all the work they were supposed to do. Sorry if this sounds very harsh, but from the experiences I've gathered with those students, I would only employ 1 out of 5 of them. Are they not allowed to fire people who don't do a good job . . . ? And you're also not factoring in that plenty of internships are unpaid, which is majorly unfair. If college is not preparing people for the job market (big surprise 9_9 ) then that's something your employers need to be telling universities about. Getting into the career development centers and telling them their experience. I, on the other hand, see STEM field and other highly qualified students struggling to find jobs. Even if you're allowed to fire someone, you have to go through a lot of trouble, whilst, believe it or not, companies usually also do other things than trying to find good staff (that's what HR departments are for, to minimise the trouble for everybody else). The internships I'm talking about were in fact paid. Oh, employers tell universities about it all the time. And all the universities can think of is teaching theoretical "soft skills", like project management courses (do you believe you can manage a project without having worked on a project?). I am in fact talking about STEM students. These highly qualified students more often than not - do not know how to write a letter - do not know how to take a phone call - do not know how write a report in a neutral (I'm not even asking for formal!) style - fail at simple primary school mathematics - cannot handle units of measurement - are not able to organise their workload and don't know when to ask questions and whom to ask (this one has always been tricky for me; one would imagine this is something a university student had to deal with during their studies, but no, turns out they can't) About one out of five handles all these things perfectly, and the frustrating job for an employer is to develop a strategy how to find that one person and avoid the other four. So you came up with these generalizations from where exactly? I'd believe it for electrical engineering/computer science, but science and other engineering majors typically have to write papers and definitely deal with both English and SI units. The elementary math comment is just flat out stupid. Link to post Share on other sites
timewarp Posted May 25, 2016 Share Posted May 25, 2016 I've seen lots of university students doing their internship at my former employer, and from that experience I know very well the risk an employer is taking: it's likely that you pay somebody and have to look after them plus end up doing all the work they were supposed to do. Sorry if this sounds very harsh, but from the experiences I've gathered with those students, I would only employ 1 out of 5 of them. Are they not allowed to fire people who don't do a good job . . . ? And you're also not factoring in that plenty of internships are unpaid, which is majorly unfair. If college is not preparing people for the job market (big surprise 9_9 ) then that's something your employers need to be telling universities about. Getting into the career development centers and telling them their experience. I, on the other hand, see STEM field and other highly qualified students struggling to find jobs. Even if you're allowed to fire someone, you have to go through a lot of trouble, whilst, believe it or not, companies usually also do other things than trying to find good staff (that's what HR departments are for, to minimise the trouble for everybody else). The internships I'm talking about were in fact paid. Oh, employers tell universities about it all the time. And all the universities can think of is teaching theoretical "soft skills", like project management courses (do you believe you can manage a project without having worked on a project?). I am in fact talking about STEM students. These highly qualified students more often than not - do not know how to write a letter - do not know how to take a phone call - do not know how write a report in a neutral (I'm not even asking for formal!) style - fail at simple primary school mathematics - cannot handle units of measurement - are not able to organise their workload and don't know when to ask questions and whom to ask (this one has always been tricky for me; one would imagine this is something a university student had to deal with during their studies, but no, turns out they can't) About one out of five handles all these things perfectly, and the frustrating job for an employer is to develop a strategy how to find that one person and avoid the other four. So you came up with these generalizations from where exactly? I'd believe it for electrical engineering/computer science, but science and other engineering majors typically have to write papers and definitely deal with both English and SI units. The elementary math comment is just flat out stupid. Personal experience. Sad but true. Link to post Share on other sites
WoodwindWhistler Posted May 30, 2016 Share Posted May 30, 2016 I've seen lots of university students doing their internship at my former employer, and from that experience I know very well the risk an employer is taking: it's likely that you pay somebody and have to look after them plus end up doing all the work they were supposed to do. Sorry if this sounds very harsh, but from the experiences I've gathered with those students, I would only employ 1 out of 5 of them. Are they not allowed to fire people who don't do a good job . . . ? And you're also not factoring in that plenty of internships are unpaid, which is majorly unfair. If college is not preparing people for the job market (big surprise 9_9 ) then that's something your employers need to be telling universities about. Getting into the career development centers and telling them their experience. I, on the other hand, see STEM field and other highly qualified students struggling to find jobs. Even if you're allowed to fire someone, you have to go through a lot of trouble, whilst, believe it or not, companies usually also do other things than trying to find good staff (that's what HR departments are for, to minimise the trouble for everybody else). The internships I'm talking about were in fact paid. Oh, employers tell universities about it all the time. And all the universities can think of is teaching theoretical "soft skills", like project management courses (do you believe you can manage a project without having worked on a project?). I am in fact talking about STEM students. These highly qualified students more often than not - do not know how to write a letter - do not know how to take a phone call - do not know how write a report in a neutral (I'm not even asking for formal!) style - fail at simple primary school mathematics - cannot handle units of measurement - are not able to organise their workload and don't know when to ask questions and whom to ask (this one has always been tricky for me; one would imagine this is something a university student had to deal with during their studies, but no, turns out they can't) About one out of five handles all these things perfectly, and the frustrating job for an employer is to develop a strategy how to find that one person and avoid the other four. So you came up with these generalizations from where exactly? I'd believe it for electrical engineering/computer science, but science and other engineering majors typically have to write papers and definitely deal with both English and SI units. The elementary math comment is just flat out stupid. Personal experience. Sad but true. 'how' to write a letter could mean a thousand different things. Could you be more specific? 'how' to take a phone call is typically something that's covered in job training, so they know what to say. Right? Each company is going to give them different instructions on how they want that handled. 'Neutral' style writing- again, could mean lots of different things. Primary school mathematics were outmoded when calculators were invented, weren't they? I would say that's not a problem so much as a generational gap you're being hoity-toity about. Units of measurement were always emphasized in *high school* for me, but I did go to a private school, so. Organizing a workload is stuff they should be learning as they go, right? They've never done the job before, so how are they instantly supposed to know it before you hire them?? When to ask questions is another really vague metric, and whom to ask? Doesn't it take a while to learn everyone's specialties? Are they really supposed to know all of the above *before* they start? Isn't that the purpose of an internship? Link to post Share on other sites
Sally Posted May 30, 2016 Share Posted May 30, 2016 I failed the personality test at Walmart at least two times before I finally passed it the third time. Considering that Walmart is one of the lowest rungs on the ladder job-wise, you can bet I was disappointed that it seemed like I couldn't even get a crappy job (I never ended up working there). WalMart obviously has requirements for what types of personality it wants its workers to have, since they work with customers. That didn't have anything to do with it being a crappy job. Link to post Share on other sites
timewarp Posted May 30, 2016 Share Posted May 30, 2016 Are they really supposed to know all of the above *before* they start? Isn't that the purpose of an internship? Remember, this is a discussion about the job market, which is one of many parts of the capitalist system. Companies prefer to employ somebody with 1-2 years experience, so they can (almost) immediately make profit with them, or at least not lose money. Internships, as I know them from my former employer, are the only risk-free possibility to find good staff. Because you already know who's good. In fact I got my job that way - I did an internship during my university studies, stayed for a part-time job, and could start immediately after finishing university. So I think the answer to your question is: not for an internship, but definitely yes for a normal job. Link to post Share on other sites
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