'What's good for G.M. is good for America' no longer applies

[shugah]

this is a very good article - it touches on so many of the current ills that it's difficult to select a few sample paragraphs to post. great summary of how proud we once were to have a strong middle class, and how "The middle class is not simply "vanishing" (as some well-paid scribes of the establishment media so blithely put it) -- the middle class is being vanquished!"

somewhat lengthy, but a very good read!

Vanquishing the American Dream
By Jim Hightower, Hightower Lowdown. Posted January 24, 2006
As General Motors shuts down well-paid middle-class jobs, the old slogan 'What's good for G.M. is good for America' no longer applies.

The job has been good to Paulk and Roy, too. Under the contracts negotiated by the United Auto Workers, Paulk, his wife, and their two teenagers have been able to enjoy a slice of middle-class comfort. Likewise, Roy, a third-generation GM worker, has done well enough to afford a modest but pleasant house on a lake near Flint, Mich., where his job is.

The Paulks and Roys represent a common story that can be told by millions of Americans of their generation. It's the story of our country's "social contract" -- an implicit agreement between working stiffs like them and corporations like GM. This is a remarkable success story, embodying our nation's egalitarian ideals and our commitment to the common good. In practice, America's historic social contract has established within our huge, diverse and fragile society something essential: a stable middle class. While the Constitution and Bill of Rights are the legal glue of our nation, this contract is the social glue -- it binds us as one people, giving tangible evidence that "we're all in this together." Those who produced this democratic advance were not the founders back in 1776, but our parents and grandparents -- and doing so did not come easily for them.

In the 1920s and '30s, working families in industry after industry openly rebelled against the rampant corporate greed, workplace abuses and political corruption of the day. As they organized, marched, and held sit-ins and strikes, they were bludgeoned, shot and often killed by corporate bosses, Pinkerton goons, police and even the National Guard. It was a hellacious period of bloody labor war, deep social unrest and spreading political upheaval. Finally, fearing for the very survival of capitalism, corporate chieftains began to signal to union leaders that they were ready to negotiate for labor peace and a new social order.

The ensuing bargain was straightforward: Corporations would get labor, loyalty and productivity in exchange for assuring job and retirement security. From the New Deal until the mid-1980s, unions, corporations and government hammered out a series of explicit agreements, rules and laws that gave legal structure to this implicit contract. The result was a new balance of power that made ordinary people like autoworkers the first decently paid, decently treated working class in the world.

~snip~

What has the majority of America's working families worried, angry and in a mood to revolt is that the Powers That Be have unilaterally decided to walk away from the social contract, and in so doing, to kiss off our country's middle class. The evidence of their abandonment is everywhere:

http://www.alternet.org/columnists/story/31127/

[shugah]

1. kick

because it really is a good article

[raccoon]

2. This article's well worth the read. Thanks for posting. nt

[shugah]

3. i thought so too

it sums so many things up so well.

[Batgirl]

4. great article, thanks for linking

Some tasty bullet points:
"• Cut-backs, take-backs and downsizings have become routine corporate practice, even in a time of soaring corporate profits.

• Wages have been deliberately depressed (now not even keeping up with inflation), while workers have dramatically increased the productivity, profitability and competitiveness of their corporations.

• While CEOs slash wages, cut health care and eliminate pensions for workers, they wallow in extravagant pay packages for themselves, get Cadillac health coverage for life and grab rich pensions they haven't earned.

• The courts and regulatory agencies have been stacked with former corporate minions who are consistently ruling against worker rights and protections.

• Wall Street's powerhouse investors are now demanding that every corporation and the overall American economy be organized on the low-wage, no-benefit, antiunion model of Wal-Mart.

• The media establishment (itself corporate) has obligingly adopted the corporate spin that the day of unionism is long gone, that workers must learn to accept insecurity and a lowered lifestyle, that the social contract is simply too much of a burden on corporations and governments in this age of global competitiveness, and that, for success, tomorrow's workers "must take on the responsibility" to identify and acquire -- "on their own" -- "the emerging skill sets" that will be "valued in the marketplace" (believe it or not, this glob of gobbledygook actually came out of the mouth of an IBM executive, quoted approvingly in the New York Times)."

The article clearly outlines how working people who vote for Repub/corporate-looter policies are voting for their own demise. They're voting for the U.S. to become an authoritarian, hive society. A real beehive is fascinating to observe. At times you will see certain bees being excorted to the exit and kicked out of the hive -- certain death being the outcome of eviction. My dad who was a hobbyist beekeeper explained these were drones who no longer served a purpose in the hive. Makes sense from an efficiency standpoint, why waste community resources (food/shelter) on bees who are no longer able to be productive? A point of view shared by the corporate aristrocracy now in charge of eliminating the middle class here in the U.S. Today's working class Repub voter is tomorrow's drone, thrown out of the hive to crawl around hopelessly and wait for death.

[shugah]

5. good point about drones

and, an aside - drone/worker bees are pretty much what our public education system is now encouraged to provide for society. it could work out okay when an assembly line job could provide a real living, but isn't the skill set that is now needed not only for the individual but for the whole US 'hive.'

critical thinking, creativity, innovation etc are not qualities valued in school - and those are the very skills that would paint a possibly brighter future for the drones of tomorrow.

edit: clarity in brevity

[raccoon]

6. critical thinking, creativity, innovation etc are not qualities valued

by multinational corporations either..they just want everybody to consume, consume, consume.

[shugah]

7. yes

i wonder when they will figure out that the "consumer culture" is now largely underpaid or without jobs? who do they expect to buy their products/services?

[raccoon]

9. I've been wondering about that one myself, for some time. nt

[sendero]

8. All you Texas haters..

.... BOW DOWN to Texan Jim Hightower. And go read this article, it is great!