Labor Secretary: American Workers Stink
No, not your attitude. She really thinks you need to bathe more. I'm completely serious.
High school gym, where listening to lectures on personal hygiene was part of the package. It's one thing for a gym teacher to tell a bunch of sweaty teenagers to hit the showers. But it's something quite different when the U.S. secretary of labor tells Parade magazine-a national weekly read by millions of Americans-the nation's workers need a bath if they want to keep their jobs.[..]
Chao told Parade it's not just the low-cost of foreign labor that is enticing many U.S. employers to ship jobs overseas-overseas workers dress and bathe better.
Beyond the cheaper cost of labor, U.S. employers say that many workers abroad simply have a better attitude toward work. "American employees must be punctual, dress appropriately and have good personal hygiene," says Chao.
Alex Bastani, AFGE Local 12 president,[..] noted that in 2004, Chao's Labor Department changed the rules on who qualifies for overtime pay and millions of workers were robbed of their rights to overtime pay. Just this year, she tried to outsource some 250 Department of Labor jobs but was unsuccessful.
Members of the AFGE Local 12 chapter will be at Department of Labor headquarters passing out the above-pictured bars of soap. And I would be remiss to not remind you who is Chao's (presumably clean-smelling) husband...
She should be used to it, since her husband stinks!
I think Chao stinks! oh and Frist !
Oooh, hety, Frist.
Her husband stinks BAD!
i suggest summers eve for chao but what do i know? iam just going by what my assistants tell me, right?
i suggets summers eve for chao but then again, what do i know? iam only told by my assitants and well they wouldint lie to me right?
time to reboot !! brb
Man... I wish they'd give me a bar of soap. I wouldn't have to buy another one for at least 3 years. Think of the money I'll save!
Perhaps he should get this message to Mr. Vitter, and his skankola looking wife.
They both look like they need to bathe. I know that I did after watching their right wing version of a apology.
Jack Jett
The only thing about me that stinks is my McConnell after I leave a big Chao floating in the toilet.
BTW, First to fist the Frist.
10th? AAAAHRRRRrrrrrrrgggggggggghhhhhhhhhhhh! Maybe I need to reboot too!
Did you know this?
Elaine Chao comes from a very rich family (no surprise there). Her father, who is Chinese, made his money in the shipping business- exporting Chinese goods.
What a classic Bush appointment- making a person Secretary of Labor, when her family has a financial interest in seeing more things made in China.
With all of the Rumsfelds, Brownies and Chertoffs, this may be the most cynical, corrupt appointment of all. Well, what do you expect, at this point?
I think being a Bush Lackey Stinks!!!
Wow, I love it how people don't consider her points and instead go for the old ad hominem attack...regular as clockwork for some people.
Seriously, if we consider her points, I have to agree with her. People may not like hearing this, but the average American worker is not exactly a prime example of good form. Decades of anti-capitalistic mentalities has denegraded many people to be lazy, complain all the time, and feel they are due unjustified rewards just for going to work.
The American work ethic is fading, it is fading fast, and the labour secretary is using tough love on the people who need to hear it. If I were an employer and I had the choice between a Chinese worker in China and an American worker in America who were both "qualified", I would choose the Chinaman any day of the week. They work harder than Americans do.
Of course the first reaction to this comment by some people would be that China is living under tyranny and so they are "slaves", or they would not act that way if they didn't have to. This is a cop out because it doesn't take into account the fact that no Chinese person has to work. It is not law there. They choose to work.
Instead of ignoring what the labour minister said, and falling back on the same old victimization whaaambulance rhetoric, people should be aware of this. Ignoring the truth won't make it go away.
Let's send her a box full of jock straps so she will really understand what the word stink means.
Chao should be passing a box of soap to the GOP instead of American workers because there is certainly a stink around the Republican party full of scandals. And all of the soap in the world won't clean away all that filth in that party.
#14 People may not like hearing this, but the average American worker is not exactly a prime example of good form.
I stopped being a prime example when my company tossed out heath care even when the employees said they would foot the bill for it. That and the no raises except the 1 or 2 % "cost of living" even though the company tripled in size and everyones workload increased proportionally.
Yeah Chinese work harder, that threat of death will do that. I thought we had a better country than that and should expect more.
Private Freedom @ 14:
That may be true, but to send jobs overseas or to import cheap labor to America, for the reasons you cite (as opposed to a little education and guidance) is somewhat less than insightful. our country and our citizens are, or should be, first in line for tha American bounty.
Where ya' from, friend, and do you plan on staying here?
I believe ms Chao's experience with the foriegn labor force is based on meetings not with common laborers, but senior executives of firms attempting to do business.
2ndly... Cross Cultural experiences aside.... I can go down the list about how some cultures that we outsource to customarily eat with thier hands out a common communal bowl, and ensure women are neither seen nor heard unless spoken to. (no women would be in government there by gum). There are also issues with punctuality, and even in China,issues with the quality of the product.
3rdly, The american culture has to be one of the most hygiene oriented cultures in the world. We are bombarded on a daily basis to use this product or that product to smell better, to wash our clothes with brand X, to wipe our butt cheeks with the latest smooth puffy scented wipes, and to wear cosmetics that have been tested or not tested on live animals. To say american labor is unwashed is absurd.
I believe the real issue is american labor consistently questions corporate authority, it is not a "Squeeky clean" clean organisation mallable to the wishes of the corporate elite.
If MS Chao, a former corporate Banker feels unclean from dealing with american workers, I suggest because they question authority, negotiate, and fight as dirty as the corporate elite.
as the sayin goes, never wrassle with a pig who knows its right, It'll have fun, and ya both get dirty..
Chao is well on the way to becoming a beltway journalist...or Democratic consultant.
I
don't
get it
Here's a suggestion for Chao: You are what you eat. If people stink, it's because they can't afford to eat right. Poverty is at an all time high - Americans are working 2 jobs with no time to have real sit-down meals. People are relying on fast food as their staple for square meals, instead of relying on square meals made at home from groceries bought at a grocery store.
So, here's another suggestion: How about laying off the contracts with the fast food industry?? How about promoting better diet habits? How about promoting an agenda that encourages supporting your local farmers instead of local fast food joint?
Don't give people insults about how they "smell". If they smell, it's simply a result of what is wrong with this country.
Otay @ 20:
Oh please. Take more shots at the Democrats. That just makes you a Republican.
Bob Roberts @ 23:
No, it doesn't.
She is a beautiful, clean, articulate, Asian lady.
She is a true American conservative Asian very
much like Michelle Malkin, very clean in mind, body,
and soul with every hair in place for her beautiful.
clean conservative husband Senator McConnell as
she offers her purity as a God fearing daughter
of conservative love.
How do they do it? I don't want to know.
hell these greedy cockslucker corporations dont care how bad you stink if youll work for a dollar an hour!!!!!
Being in the electronics manufacturing business I travel to different factories every week, in and out of the US. It's not about the quality of work Americans do, it's about cheaper labor period.
More and more companies are pulling back manufacturing to the US from China, because the quality is atrocious in China. The Chinese have never met a deadline they can keep. I really love telling a customer that the part they need has a two month lead time.
The American worker is flat out more productive and American made products carry a mark of high quality throughout the world. Why else would Haier (a Chinese company) manufacture appliances in Ohio for sale, not in the US, but China?
Please. This from a Secretary of Labor?
Doesn't surprise me.
Here in the real world, I frequently work with people from many ethnic and cultural backgrounds, including all the main Asian immigrant countries. Everyone - I repeat, everyone - has their pet slack-ass strategies. Not one group stands out from the crowd.
More repuke moronity.
Tough love or just stupidity? Private Freedom, your name says it all...
http://www.winningcampaigns.org/eblast/advantageblog/advantageblog.html
so how did she gather the data???
it's a very broad statement. could it be that she's just another dumbshit??
my personal experience says.... yes.
She should start out personal hygiene by having her hillbilly husband brush his teeth. They look like he just ate a pile of shit.
Okay, just when I think this administration couldn't possibly be more ridiculous!!! Our jobs and our companies are outsourced because we STINK??? Every day is yet another mockery of everything I consider sane and reasonable. I feel like I'm in some strange, bizzarro dream, but I can't wake up!!!
These people are flat out NUTS and "Private Freedom", your post made NO SENSE whatsoever! "no Chinese person has to work. It is not law there. They choose to work"??? They work so they can eat and put a roof over their head, hence they DO have to work, in order to survive, pretty much like we do here.
Way to go Chao, insult the underemployed, uninsured workers of this country, the people YOU work for. I think I'll go take an extra bath and my whole life will be better! Why didn't I think of that?
A US Secretary of Labor who hates American workers.
So typical of Bush's appointees.
Reminds me of that old movie (1940) "The Grapes of Wrath"....
But even so much worse....
Now that it's global slave wages....
I bet she smells like tuna.
She is a beautiful, clean, articulate, Asian lady.
She is a true American conservative Asian very
much like Michelle Malkin, very clean in mind, body,
and soul with every hair in place for her beautiful.
clean conservative husband Senator McConnell as
she offers her purity as a God fearing daughter
of conservative love.
She is so proud of her wonderful gaye husband.
Doesn't have to worry about him making a mess anywhere.
Private Freedom @ 14:
I smell bill oreilly talking points
Only 18 months left for this bitch. And she'll still be on Mitch's terrific health plan. Mitch and the bitch. What a pair.
Good personal hygiene?!?! She's obviously never been to France.
And as for dress appropriately... I actually agree with her. Compared with the rest of the world, Americans really do dress like shit: this is the reason why Europeans can identify you as a Yankee from a mile away.
Has she ever been in a room full of Indian programmers on a hot summer day? If that doesn't bring tears to your eyes, nothing will!
ProgrammerGuy In Oh.
This type of thing is normal for Chao. She's insulted unions from day one on the job!
Chao and her husband's (McConnell) IQ's combined, wouldn't reach triple figures!
Chao, you smell like ass to me.
Private Freedom @ 14:
How long have you been living off that trust fund?
Cantor de Mambo @ 42:
Correction, unwiped ass!
This great unwashed mass that send Ms. Chao for her scented hankie also supply the bulk of our armed forces. They not only sweat, they bleed. Of course she wouldn't know about that any more than she knows about labor. After all, people from her gilded class don't sweat or bleed for the country. They just glisten.
Dirty sweaty teenage boys? Better chain Mark Foley to the school bus!
longnow @ 36:
And sister gave sucky fucky five dollar to Vitter.
Huh?!?! She's married to MITCH?!?! How did I not know that? The same Mitch who recently lead the battle against the Employee Free Choice Act (the bill that would have revolutionized the union movement in this country and helped raise a middle class again without having to spend a dime of public money) under the guise of concern about "democracy"??!?! Jesus. I knew she was anti-labor and all...but this...
Also - for everyone here - especially "people" like Private Freedom@#14 (and the name gives away the idiotic libertarianism there), I don't care if foreign workers WERE doused in bleach every morning... when will people realize that the ONLY reason companies outsource is to increase profit margin. Period. All of this talk that it has something to do with some deficiency on the part of American workers (from "education" deficits to this recent absurdity about cleanliness to the whole work ethic thing) is just bunk. Pure and simple. Don't even give it the time of day.
hey americans do stink. ill give her that. capital hill stinks to high skies. peeeweeee!
Fuck that elitist snobby bitch!
There seems to be a pattern here.
The other day our wise leader says American workers are underinsured because they don't take good care of themselves.
Now Ms Chaos says they're underemployed because they stink.
No, it's not the lack of universal health insurance, or the rapacious insurance companies and run amock globalization and outsourcing that is making life so difficult for the American worker, it is the disgusting, fat, filty American worker him/herself.
They are getting dumber and dumber and dumber and...
What is it with these Washington types?
Is someone poisoning their food or something?
She can go suck a goat's penis. If this isn't the most outragous statement by a public servant, I don't know what is. The final personal putdown. The utter contempt for the unwashed masses. Stick a knife in the American worker and slowly turn it why don't you, you Chinese whore. No healthcare, no vacations, no daycare, no right to organize without bloodshed. Goddamn her to Hell.
(slaps forehead with hand) That's the reason why there is unemployment, BO! So fucking simple and right in front of our face. The reasoning is sublime. She obviously is not needed anymore, problem solved! Fire her and move on.
Chao's an economic royalist. She is addicted to Cato Institute talking points
Her claims fit Republican mythology very well. Republicans always appeal to people by creating divisions. If you have a job, you are encouraged to believe that those who don't are unemployed because of some fault of theirs. If your employer decreased or eliminated your benefits or increased your workload, its because of competion from either illegal immigrants or foreign workers. If the economy goes into the toilet, it's not because Republican polices stifle long-term economic growth, its because other Americans are not working as hard ....
mrs. chao is fortunate that i'm above making the kind of racist joke about her that she so richly deserves to be the butt of
Seriously...are they going to add hygiene as an Olympic Sport. Ask Mitt?
Mrs Chao has probably never smelled an Indian. They bathe in the Ganges. I hear China has some of the sweetest smelling prison labor camps in the world.
US companies go to other places because they can get cheaper wages and not live within rules set up by the government to protect worker's rights. Rights that resulted from years and years of circumvention of the rules by the same companies.
Mrs. Chao....you stink!
Chao can lick my unwashed Dirty Fucking Hippie balls!
Boy, this is the LOWEST remark I've heard these ass-wipes make yet. I'd like to slap her all the way across the room. First they bitch about perfume, and now this. THEY STINK, and YES, IT'S THE EMPLOYER'S ATTITUDE THAT STINKS. May they rot in molten lava...
See how they are? They want to make American workers feel like worthless pieces of crap so they will bend over for their scrooge asses. F*ck'em and feed'em peanuts! REVOLT!!!
Mitch McConnell's "beard" has some weird ideas.
#14: "If I were an employer and I had the choice between a Chinese worker in China and an American worker in America who were both “qualified”, I would choose the [b]Chinaman[/b] any day of the week."
Do you say "negroes" and "eye-talians" too, asshole?
Private Freedom @ 14:
Decades of Reagaonomics, piss-on-the-poor and middle class-trickle-down economics, outsourcing, downsizing, and Milton Friedman acolytes preaching unregulated "free trade", and overpaid, obese, drug addicted, serial-groom, pedophilic, right-wing radio talk show hosts who blame the victims of cutthroat corporate dirtbag tactics have demoralized American workers and our work ethic.
Beaver Cleaver, now you wash behind your ears and get right to work!
Private Freedom @ 14:
You are a liar, how is that for ad hominem.
US workers are amongst the most productive in the world:
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/eco_ove_pro_ppp-economy-overall-produc...
#2 as a matter of fact you lying dweeb.
Typical republiscum snobbery, adding insult to injury to the US worker. Filthy profits for the filthy rich, that's all they care about.
Come down to Memphis and see how you smell, Miz Chao, after 100% humidity stuck in traffic with crackheads assaulting your (un-air-conditioned) vehicle! Bitch.
Yeah no shit, enslaved 3rd world workers are obscenely grateful to have jobs, which is just what you republican war on the poor veterans and your scum stockholding contributors want to turn us into, hence your snotty fucking comment Chao.
Private Freedom @ 14:
Ignoring douches makes them go away though.
This is what one can expect from a dictator...to appoint weird mean people. If you don't like being treated like dirt, read bradblog and quit blaming the American people for this mess. Every election has been fixed big time since 2000. I'm sure before then..it just got worse. Two democrats have bills up. One in the house and one in the senate that will keep elections secret. Republican corporation owned who get right testy when asked to reveal a source code. Our election machines have been proven hackable over and over. Yet Rush Holt in the House and Diane Feinstein in the senate want to maintain the status quo. I wondered why the democrats didn't fight election theft. They were in on it. We've got to face it. Read up.
The American people have once again been given the finger by this mafia masquerading as a government. But they have been doing that consistently since day one.
I am nearly floored at this comment from Ms. Chao. We stink? Well please give us a chance Maam. Written documentation would be a first step to having employees bathe not taking their job overseas.
Personally, I have always worked in places that actually require employees to bathe...... hospitals, nursing homes, etc, requires that employees bathe and be clean. So considering about half the population is employed in hospitals, clinics and insurance companies and pharma, I reckon she means government employees stink.
It must be fun working at the Department of Labor, watching the Secretary arrive each morning with a clothes pin on her contumelious nose.
She’s based out of DC right? Then I can’t blame her for that comment; the stench from the bullshit there must be overwhelming.
jwf @ 64:
Decades of Reagaonomics, piss-on-the-poor and middle class-trickle-down economics, outsourcing, downsizing, and Milton Friedman acolytes preaching unregulated "free trade", and overpaid, obese, drug addicted, serial-groom, pedophilic, right-wing radio talk show hosts who blame the victims of cutthroat corporate dirtbag tactics have demoralized American workers and our work ethic.
I think that about says everything #14 needs to know. It amazes me that #14 skips right past the dehumanization and exploitation of the US labor force. The logic used by the Labor Dept. stinks, and it's not from the sweat of an honest days work.
mojopo@76
I think that about says everything #14 needs to know. It amazes me that #14 skips right past the dehumanization and exploitation of the US labor force. The logic used by the Labor Dept. stinks, and it’s not from the sweat of an honest days work.
Thanks. (I should have spelled it Reaganomics though). For at least 26 years, Americans have been told that if we just let the super-wealthy and mega-corporations run things, everyone would prosper. The only difference between the poor and the middle class now is credit and tons of debt. Elitist economic gasbags like the WSJ's James Glassman, Newseek's Robert Samuelson, The Competitive Enterprise Institute, American Enterprise Institute, just to name a few, have convinced the citizenry that this transfer of wealth occurred organically and not as a result of economic policy designed to benefit the 1% who actually think that Larry Kudlow is not completely full of shit. As an American who loves his country, I'm very concerned about our future, and I don't even have any kids.
Overseas workers probably have to mindful of their hygiene, because they work without air conditioning for slave wages.
Carl from L.A. @ 12:
China owns a big chunk of this country. The government of China receives 1 trillion dollars (U.S. Currency) per year - that comes out to about 80 billion dollars a month, and they have been receiving our money since 9/11. They know every banking transaction - and we buy things that are "made in China." Yeah - I would say her family has a financial interest in seeing more things made in China.
That bitch needs to get a real job and do something productive for once in her miserable life.
Private Freedom @ 14:
Wow. How about the fact that a bulk of jobs shipped to , well, India for example, are customer service or technical service positions things done over the phone. Now as long as you get someone on the phone as a customer, you are pretty much concerned with how these people can help you, not what they smell, or what time they got to work. What they care about is the fact that they cannot get someone on the phone that they understand. I have worked in a call center like this, they employ lots of low skilled labor, people learn valuable customer relation, and through that life values. Why steal these opportunities from our poorer citizens. You can't really explain this motivation away with that argument. It is greed. How come whenever we talk about reforming things in this country, about lowering prices of things, we never mention profit percentage. Is it really worth the suffering of many people to never allow the thought of making a couple of percentage points less a quarter a possibility? GREEDY!!!
PopeTodd @ 66:
Yes, the average US citizen is HIGHLY PRODUCTIVE. But comparing US worker productivity with other nation's peoples does not say anything about US workers themselves. Relative statements can only be that. Relative. I am not disputing the very high productivity of labour that exists in the US. Be that as it may, high productivity has way more to do with the amount of capital goods the average worker uses in order to produce goods. The US is the most capital intensive nation in the world, and so it makes perfect sense that the average American can make a lot of "stuff" in a regular working day. The report you are referring to is looking at the amount of goods produced per hour of labour, or something to that effect. In this respect, yes, the average US citizen produces a hell of a lot per hour. This amount of stuff produced does NOT however, reflect on the average workers' attitudes, work ethic, or "cleanliness", whatever that means.
What I am saying is that if you replace all US workers with Chinese workers IN THE US, meaning a Chinaman takes control of the capital goods that an American used to control, capital with which the US has accumulated over hundreds of years (due to economic freedom) that China has lacked up until now, then what I said stands as it had all along.
If it were not for all the capital goods the average US citizen employs, say if the average American had the same capital to work with as China, then China would blow the US out of the water. The US is still competitive in the world because of, like I said, hundreds of years of capital accumulation that has enabled the average worker to produce a lot. But nothing is permanent, and this could very well reverse if the current attitudes of Americans don't change. Too many Americans are becoming dependent on government, and this has greatly increased the size and scope of government.
This increase in size and scope GOES DIRECTLY AGAINST the average worker's productivity because the average company pays higher taxes, and thus buy less capital goods with which the worker employs to produce goods.
You mentioned that the US is now #2 in the world for worker productivity. You seem to be using this for bragging rights, like you should be proud of that. I'm not. The US used to be #1 by a HUGE margin, but like I said, decades of government size expansion due to (and coupled with) anti-capitalism on the part of not only wage earners but just as well the employers who lobby government for favours and entitlements that hurt other people.
If I earlier sounded like I am blaming the poor worker only and not their employers, I'm sorry. This is simply not true. Everyone, workers and employers, went to the same schools, see the same things in the news, eat the same foods (all for the most part, we are all in the same world), so OF COURSE this anti-capitalistic attitude will exist in both classes of people. This is why lots of companies will not hesitate to curry the government for favours and handouts (subsidies, etc), AND why many workers hate capitalism altogether.
I don't lie.
Private Freedom @ 82:
Maybe not, but you certainly are annoying-and uninformed. And did I mention annoying? And a windbag. You take so long to say nothing. Well nothing that is correct, anyway.
:roll:
miss_kitty @ 83:
If I didn't have your lovely input everyday Miss Kitty, gosh I just don't know what I would do with myself.
I'm annoying, uninformed, and a windbag. Check, check, check...alright, got it.
Hey how do you make those faces? I want to make one too...
:roll:
Private Freedom @ 85:
http://www.winningcampaigns.org/eblast/advantageblog/advantageblog.html
longnow @ 86:
longnow, please read my (#106) post here:
http://www.crooksandliars.com/2007/07/16/open-thread-533/#comments
nyhmr @ 27:
Well, brother, shout this message loud, clear and often. The stereotype about American workers is that they are overpaid and underproductive. Personally, I'd like to see next to nothing made in China for sale in this country. Why line China's pockets? Why not throw all that manufacturing to some place like Mexico? Maybe then we wouldn't have such a big illegal immigrant problem in the U.S. Opps, using logic again. What was I thinking?
Private Freedom?? That is retarded. This woman looks like a pro RNC spammer
except they would never hire her.
And Chao needs to douche.
Private Freedom @ 14:
Your misusing the term ad hominem again.
Chao attacks American workers, and we attack back, it's just quid quo pro.
I realize ad hominem is used by conservatives in a faux attempt to sound intellectual, but it's technically casting aspersions on the character of the opposition to divert attention from the point of what's being said. It's not the dozens.
That's why I come here instead.
To bad all the other things that America used to be number one at and is now in the 30th+ place in doesn't bother Private Freedom as much as moving down one fucking notch in productivity. If the idiot had working brain cells instead of his daily talking points from 'winningcampaigns' he might make a connection between all that we've lost due to rethug/corporate greed and the lost productivity. But unfortunitly it doesn't appear that he has any.
I wonder Why we have so many outsourcing jobs... no wonder she is what Chinese .. .damn ...this country is going down the toilet day by day. I am a foreigner myself but come on ..leave America alone.
ysabddaden @ 91:
No, I didn't misuse the term nor, as you imply, misused it in the past.
Chao did not "attack" American workers. She is making a statement that is more important than mere insult as you seem to think it was. If was merely an insult, then yes, replying in kind would be the proper response. But she was trying to say that Americans just aren't as "good" as they used to be. This is a statement that applies to the current state of the nation, it wasn't a personal attack on anyone nor was it meant to be.
The fact that she is being attacked for what she said, rather than being responded to with something that could contradict her (there isn't), implies an ad hominem attack.
Terrible @ 92:
"To bad all the other things that America used to be number one at and is now in the 30th+ place in doesn’t bother Private Freedom as much as moving down one fucking notch in productivity."
Of course that bothers me as well, but I am not the one who brought productivity up, Pope Todd did. You are putting owrds in my mouth.
"If the idiot had working brain cells instead of his daily talking points from ‘winningcampaigns’ he might make a connection between all that we’ve lost due to rethug/corporate greed and the lost productivity. But unfortunitly it doesn’t appear that he has any."
I don't have talking points, all my words are thought out and considered. If they were just talking points then I would be refuted by you or others, as all talking heads are...but you just insulted me, which implies you have nothing to say that would contradict what I said.
I work with an office full of mostly Europeans. Believe me, Americans are doing just fine in the hygiene department.
Private Freedom @ 94:
Even at that level she's attacking the US workers. How motivated can they be when their pension funds are underfinanced, if they have one at all? Where jobs lack benefits. Where illegals are hired for cheap labor. Where they're laid off and jobs are outsourced. Meanwhile some CEO's get bonuses in the hundreds of million dollars, while our wages are virtually stagnant, with the spending value dwindling due to high energy costs.
ysabddaden @ 97:
"Even at that level she’s attacking the US workers."
OK let me ask you something. If you had an employee who did not perform up to the standards you think is required of that post, and let them know the truth (like a good employer always does), does this qualify as a personal "attack"? No.
"How motivated can they be when their pension funds are underfinanced"
I totally and completely understand your complaint here. It is a very important issue. As such, it is imperative that we find the real reasons why this is happening. Pension funds in the aggregate sense, meaning economy-wide (which I am assuming you mean), can only be underfinanced if the amounts given are not able to buy as mush as it used to. Fixed incomes, like pensions, are subject to inflation brought about by the Fed's expansion of the money supply. The expansion of the money supply is the sole reason pensions just can't buy what they used to buy. Proof? Just consider the time span over the last 50 years. Is there more goods being sold today or less compared to 1950? More. Good. Now if aggregate supply is higher, then average prices should be lower, but they are not. They are HIGHER. But ask yourself, where in the world does all that money come from such that people stand to be able to spend more and more each year which is necessary due to higher prices? The only possible answer is more money being introduced. You have to place the blame where it is due, the government-backed Fed.
"Where jobs lack benefits."
Again, this is the government's fault. It is not because they DIDN'T do enough to solve things. It is because they INTERFERED and caused these problems by taxes, inflation, answering to special interest groups, lobbyists, etc.
"Where illegals are hired for cheap labor."
They wouldn't have an incentive to come here if we took away the welfare state. These people aren't stupid. They know that if they come here they can receive basically free money from the government. Where the welfare state is highest, there are high numbers of illegals. If the welfare state were abolished, and they STILL came here to work, then there is no basis for you complaining, because they are people just like you and me. Hating illegals or blaming them for what is happening is so far off the mark it is almost on again. What if an American citizen were to go to your place of work and offer their services for less money? Would you start hating your fellow Americans too?
"Where they’re laid off and jobs are outsourced."
Nothing wrong with this at all. Nobody complains when jobs get "outsourced" from New York to Los Angeles, but the same process is taking place here as in cross-border "outsourcing". You have to go where the business is good. This is PROGRESS.
"Meanwhile some CEO’s get bonuses in the hundreds of million dollars, while our wages are virtually stagnant, with the spending value dwindling due to high energy costs."
Total CEO compensation as a percentage of total worker wages in the US is a very small fraction. The inequality you complain of is due to the fact that they are better at handling whole companies than you or I. They make that much because that is what it takes to keep them working for the company owners and not for some other company's owners.
U.S. Secretary of Labor Elaine Chou, like many successful people in positions of power, think her proclamations are above scrutiny. To claim "American employees must ... have good personal hygiene,” is to imply it is currently a competative disadvantage for American employees.
First, it's hard to beleive that the personal hygene of American workers is really an issue. One wonders where this issue has comes from.
Second, in response, Chou didn't apologize or back off. Instead she blamed Parade for "omitt[ing] the bulk of an interview which focused on the tremendous achievements and competitive advantages of the American workforce" Ok, but what does that have to do with personal hygene?
Third, on a base level, her shit stinks just like yours.
Chou is a class of '75 graduate of Mount Holyoke College and got her MBA at Harvard Business School. Apparently, neither educational program dealt with instruction on how to recover from gross judgments in error - such as removing one's own foot from one own's mouth.
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