I wince as I consider posting this.

Why do I wince?  Because I don't want to sound paranoid.  I am neither a right-wing nor a left-wing extremist. 

But as I look at the employment situation in the United States, I see a real problem.  Not enough jobs.  Not enough jobs that earn enough to live on in these expensive times.  One answer that has been put forth is that we need to be educating people for the jobs of the future.  People need to learn to do... whatever it is that's considered the leading edge of the working world.

There is a problem here.  I will say it delicately.  There are a lot of people out there who are not able to learn the new jobs, no matter how much education they get.

I'll say it indelicately.  A lot of people, whether because they've fried their brains, because they were born that way, or because they have talents that are no longer useful in common life, are... well, some (of the "fried the brains or soaked 'em in alcohol variety) are stupid.  If you do it to yourself, you're stupid.  If you had it done to you (brain damage from birth, accident, genetic mutations, autism, and so on) you're not stupid.  You're unfortunate.  But you're probably having a really hard time finding a job, even so.  And if you can't even figure out how to make your computer work for you, a career in IT is not in your future.

We need living-wage jobs for everybody.  Not that everybody needs to be (or can be) wealthy--I'm not saying that.  But we all need jobs, and we need to be able to meet the necessities of life (housing, food, clothing, medical care, and yes, recreation) from these jobs.

This means a couple of things.  Either SOMEONE needs to provide living wage jobs (and by this, I mean either the government or private industry, or a combination of both) enough for every person who wants to work or SOMEONE (again, this can be the government, private industry, or a combination of them) needs to provide the necessities of life to those who need it. 

Oh, dear.  Now that does sound like an issue, doesn't it.

How many owners of private industry are willing to provide lots of living-wage jobs to whole bunches of Americans?  Really?  These are the companies (and the CEOs and the CFOs) that are outsourcing jobs to countries where the cost of living is lower, and thus the amount they pay for the work is lower. 

How many owners of private industry are willing to provide housing, medical care, food, and all that) to people in the United States who need it, and who don't even work for them?  Ha!  Laughable! 

Okay, now the government side.  First, is anybody willing to guess how much it would cost the government to house, feed, and otherwise provide for every person in this country who doesn't have a job?

Let's pause here to cross our eyes. 

Talk about deficit spending.  Whoa. 

Now, let's see how many politicians would even suggest such a thing.  Keep in mind that a politician's first goal trumps all others:  they want to stay in office.

I don't see the government seriously taking up this issue.  The government can't even figure out how to do one part of this mighty mess--medical coverage.

Deficits.  Trillions of dollars.  Taxes.  Separation between the very rich and the very poor.  Hold onto your hats, folks.  The divide is getting wider, and statistically, you're more likely to fall down to the depths of the very poor than to scrabble up to the heights of the very wealthy.

Yikes.  Do I sound paranoid?  Yeah, a little.  But more seriously, if you lose your job and can't get another one that pays nearly as much, or if you lose your job and can't get another one at any amount of pay, you're in trouble.  Ask anybody who's lost their home to foreclosure.  It doesn't take much to find someone like this.

So.  In a simplified fashion, that's the problem. 

Answers, anybody?

Let's start here.  Why do the wealthy get big tax breaks?  In the past, one could excuse it by saying, "Well, these big corporations provide jobs for the less fortunate, so to encourage them to hire more people, we should give them a hefty tax break."  This doesn't hold water anymore.  The world has changed.  Big corporations now provide jobs to people in third-world countries.  They are providing bonuses to their own management.  They are providing increased values for their stockholders. 

I cannot see any reason why a person, or a corporation, that is wealthy doesn't pay the same percentage of tax, or a higher percentage of tax, than I do, or than my coworkers do.

To me, a good place to start is here:  Every company that outsources work, even a small percentage of work, to a country outside the United States loses every tax break, and picks up several "outsourcing" taxes that negate the amount they save by outsourcing. 

Let the stockholders whine.  Let the CFOs scream.  Why do stockholders and managers, who are after all just people with enough money to spare, decide how much they will pay in taxes? 

Okay, I'm all tired out.  I need another cup of tea.  I'll have to continue my thoughts in my next post.

-Spottedcat