The Eve Of Destruction

[poliphilo]

Bosses at the FTSE 100 companies saw their pay rise by 49% last year.

They know it's unpopular, they know it's antisocial, but they just can't help themselves. It's sad, really. They're addicts.

This can't go on, can it- the very rich getting very much richer as everybody else gets poorer? 

I know it sounds melodramatic- and I've been trying to avoid saying it for that reason- but I think we're living in pre-revolutionary times.

Comments

[chiller.livejournal.com]

Yes. So do I. Whether it will be a bloody revolution or a relatively quiet, sea-change type one remains to be seen.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

The thing about revolutions is everyone says "it'll never happen here"- and then it does.

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

The goal of the Occupy Wall Street movement is to try to make the revolution be peaceful, non-violent, and done under the law.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Here's hoping.

My fear is our democratic processes are so corrupt and ineffectual that the only thing that will bring about change is violence.

[davesmusictank.livejournal.com]

It is demonic. Shows capitalism at its worst and the revolution must start soon!

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

I imagine it will start in Greece.

[petercampbell.livejournal.com]

Or China - a repressive regime and a dichotomy between the rich and poor that makes our own look positively insignificant in comparison.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Yes. Seen from a distance China looks monolithic, but I understand there's all sorts of discontent bubbling under.

[cluegirl.livejournal.com]

The corollaries between 1750's France and 1900's Russia are getting harder and harder to ignore.

I find it terrifying, myself.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Yes- the top 1% are getting to be like the nobles of the ancien regime and Tsarist Russia- completely out of touch with the people in the street.

[calizen.livejournal.com]

Will be interesting to see what happens here with the Occupy movement. They've hit a nerve with the big banks, although the prime culprit bank (Bank of America)chairman which sparked the Occupy movement with its insistence on putting $5 a month for debit card told his employees he was incensed that people were attacking HIS bank when the bank had done SO MUCH for the community.

Uh huh.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Poor fellow. What a shame. People are so ungrateful.

[haikujaguar.livejournal.com]

I am more and more impressed, and convinced, by lateral theories that the problem has nothing to do with capitalism and everything to do with the technological revolution; in the sense that other technological revolutions have removed jobs from the market, while replacing them with new ones (factory work, etc)... but that the current one involves technology replacing jobs... while not making any new ones.

This theory strikes me as something that needs far more examination than the usual "blame the social/political system/rich people/privileged people."

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Yes, the disappearance of jobs is part of the problem, but what about the people they're calling the "squeezed middle"- folk who are still in employment and used to be comfortable but are now finding it hard to make ends meet?

[haikujaguar.livejournal.com]

That I cannot say, but it feels related. I am reading quietly and waiting for the picture to coalesce.

[arielstarshadow.livejournal.com]

Well... my brain is telling me that simple numbers... I don't see how this can actually be correct, though I do know it's something we talk about often (a la the "workers replaced by robots/machinery").

But, if there are 7 billion people on the planet now, then there are more people working now than there ever were before technological advances went into overdrive - otherwise, we'd have a worldwide unemployment rate in the double-digits, right? That would seem to disprove the idea that the problem stems from disappearing jobs. I don't know, there's just... something seems to be missing from the theory of disappearing jobs, somehow.

Which is not to say that I don't think "jobs" aren't part of the problem, because I do. (I think that's my biggest issue with what's happening, the way people want to find a single source of the problem, and the truth is there is no one source). I would say, however, it is not the disappearance of jobs (because how can that be, as per the above), but rather:

1. Developed countries, because of their economies, demand higher wages for a whole variety of reasons

2. Corporations, in all their greed (and in the individuals' running them greed) want more profit for their pockets. Thus, they do not want to pay the wages demanded in the developed countries. So, they outsource their jobs (including tech jobs these days) to countries where the workers don't demand as much money for their work.

3. Adding on to the above, corporations are downsizing and cutting back, not to save themselves, but rather to continue to generate more profits for their officers and big shareholders. One only has to look at the disparity between a typical American worker's wage and a typical American CEO's wage (I believe it's 1:456) - we have the highest disparity in the entire world. So yes, jobs are disappearing altogether, as corporations discover they can get more work out of fewer workers and still keep up the same level of production. This is because of the odious "salary" mentality. Instead of paying a worker an hourly wage, they put them on salary, and the expectation is that a salary worker will put in more than 40 hours per week. Those hours add up - and they also devalue the workers. If someone is hired at $50,000 and the typical work-week is 40 hours yet this person is putting in 60 hours... it's easy to see that they have just been devalued, and the company is getting 20 hours of work each and every week for free.

4. Jobs in America have become so specialized that if someone loses a job in one field, it is nigh impossible to find a job in another field without spending more money on education and training - money a lot of people simply don't have.

5. A lot of the jobs that are being created to replace the ones we've lost (either truly lost or which have been outsourced to other countries) do not pay a living wage. Rick Perry likes to tout how many jobs he's created for Texas - what he doesn't mention is that the majority of those jobs were minimum wage jobs, which can't feed and house a single person, let alone a family. So those unemployed, who used to make enough to be able to take care of themselves, now have jobs that don't pay enough to survive, thus forcing them to get a second job, or rely on social services/families/friends.

The whole thing is a huge mess.

[daisytells.livejournal.com]

If this turns out to be like the 60's and 70's (and so far it looks like it) then the only thing that will bring about change is when it turns violent in answer to Gestapo tactics being employed against the demonstrators. The Civil Rights Movement had small results until "Burn, Baby Burn" in Watts, California, made headlines. The movement to end the war likewise gained much momentum along with the sympathy of the "silent majority" in Middle America after the killings at Kent State University in Ohio. The Oakland police and their cohorts may have lit a fuse this past week. Time will tell.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

It's sad, but protest movements rarely get anywhere without a bit of violence. Here in Britain the authorities are poised to evict the peaceful protesters who have camped outside St. Paul's. They (the authorities) think this will calm things down- only it won't.

[trixibelle-net.livejournal.com]

It certainly feels like something is going to happen...but I wonder if people always feel that way and then change comes and you don't notice it, or it takes such a long time that it doesn't feel remarkable until long after the event.
Living 'on the continent' and having a sort of bird's eye view of Britain really makes you feel you are watching, rather than in amongst things. Mind you, the feeling of something imminent is strong here too...it's just I can't understand the press here yet and can't pick up the general feeling.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Who knows? My feeling is the political systems (and politicians) we have in place aren't adequate to deal with situation that is developing- and they're going to get kicked about a bit.

[daisytells.livejournal.com]

I hope so.