..
..
We have in the US a management and behind the scenes moneyed
class that can afford to do without services by various means
temporarily...that leverage is used to offer progressively
lower compensation to producers...driving wages continuously
south.
These do this... not from evil intent, but to compete with
each other out of greed, to beat the bottom line and expand
the business. About the same as most cancers do in any
living organism.
Those cells living as part of the cancer are themselves
malignant.
One has personal choices in those regards. Maybe thats one of
our greatest opportunities as humans... to be, or not to
be..part of that sort of thing.
SBC bell, DSL service went from 59 dollars to 14 dollars a
month over a 3 year period.. as the dollar lost 30% of its
value...SBC will be driven down to marginal profit levels by
corporate competitors... all involved will do that by
cutting costs, and by gaining efficiency.. and those all tend
to drive down the need for *human labor and skill sets, as
functions are automated etc...this drives down wages...and
renders humanity a disposable commondity.
Sort of like a cancer in a human body renders its host
disposable and wasteable to service the needs of the
cancer...and this goes on..until the cancer sucks all the life
from the body.
Thats the nature of a corporation. Thats its structure and
its charter. to survive. Period. End of charter. No
requirement what so ever to aid humanity. An alien concept to
an inhuman entity of course. the corporation is simply not
human. Not its fault at all. Just a fact.
Mankind as created its own Alien...devouring itself from
within by means of the corporation.
as the wages are driven down ....then all costs must be driven
down in order not to be repressive...but thats not the case...
food, fuel and medicine and real estate are rising at 15% or
for the last 5 years...and wages are stagnant or down.
If you exagerate both trends grossly... you can see where it
ends in various countries around the world, under various
systems of govt. Pure capitalist systems and pure socialist
systems can polarize to the gross detriment of the middle
class.
The upper and lower classes go to extremes. the net result
is that the productive middle class is decimated, that loss of
production decimates govt income, national solvency, and its
military.. . then the nation goes into collapse, looses its
ability to muscle its way around in the world and becomes a
poorer, second rate nation.
Thats the pattern apparently as either reaches its extremes.
Exceptions are govts that do not fund much of a military, and
direct all energy to production, and social welfare...they end
up with a bloated govt at worst... but the lack of waste on a
military allows the nation reasonable prosperity... The
Netherlands are a reasonable example of that today, NZ, and
Australlia and to an increasing extent, China. the socialist
structure sucks enough blood from its corporations to feed the
people. Such a nation does not then enable the super
corporation.
The United States is home to the worlds super corporations.
The USA and Russia are examples of nations decimated by a
rapacious military, attempts to dominate (to secure oil
interests for instance)... The Russians fell first... the US
will fall next. As the Chinese and Indians rise to power. the
super corporations will straddle both worlds.
Since Russia fell first, it is beginning on its recovery phase
as the US declines...we see now Russia aligning with China.
this along with US error and a rapacious military, bloated
govt etc...and a tax rate that has resulted in a baby bust,
and US corporations eating its young, canibalizing themselves
and the US citiznry....will all factor into rough times ahead
for those it feeds on... the producive working class. the
body politic. the body of the nation thus afflicted.
Will this lead to total collapse as some predict? Probably
not. Our agriculture, and energy infrastructure and ability
to build nuclear power plants fast etc..and our geographic
isolation from enemies all mitigate against total collapse.
But a down cycle lasting 50 to 100 years at this point imo is
unavoidable...corporate rapacity will not make it anymore
pleasant.
How will that affect everyone? The lower classes will eat a
little less well and die a little sooner than the upper
classes.. whats left of the middle class will slide by... the
rich will get richer...and progressively less human as they
are coopted by the corporate cancer..these become cancer
cells.. physically healthy... but the disease itself.
For most people the issue will be how to get into or stay in
the middle class. (answer: keep pushing the skills
envelope, or take a mind and spirit destroying civil service
job, or become an entrepreneur and be good at it.).
it will be tough for the US lower classes imho...about half as
bad as the Russians had it. There is a series over the last
month, 3 parts by a Russian journalist on the comparisions at
www.fromthewilderness.com (subscription but the summaries
are free, and in 30 days those go off subscription... accurate
to a very large degree, unnerving...but also imo a bit
exagerated.. and not mentioning as I have here the nature of
corporations as cancerous).
Eventual relief? The next pandemic, routine over world
history. Those take out 25 to 40% of the world population.
The next will leave a wonderland of prosperity...
property values will drop dramatically because of reduced
demand...goods will be cheap because of less demand but
production capacity will still be high because its automated.
How long with that last? Quite a while.
so what is a good plan for a living person?
relax, enjoy, don't worry, stay healthy...dont bleed your guts
for government or any corporation or other interest.
dont get greedy because that ruins you from the inside...let
it roll. You will die sure as hell regardless.
Rich or poor we are all just a micro second away from death on
geological time scales.
If you burn out or turn to stone from being greedy and vicious
in the fight ...you gain nothing, and your immune system will
be weak...(if you are well off and live extra clean your
immune system will also be weak)....
If you relax.. and dont die of old age, and are here for the
next pandemic, and survive...life will be good for you... the
middle and lower classes will tend to survive the next
pandemic to a greater degree than some rich and all very poor
people who are malnurished.
How long will the good times last as far as you are concerned?
A micro second in geogical time.. so enjoy. Because if you do
not enjoy, because you are reacting to some white knuckled
greedy boss, or your own greed, or irritation at an insane
culture...you have lost it all anyway...
Which leaves us what is the purpose of all this? To eat more
than ones neighbor? One can get to 800 lbs that way... a
total victory?
Not hardly.
How about one becomes a super intelligent rapacious corporate
attorney able to devise ways of eviscerating the money and
life from everything in the vicinity? The perfect cancer.
Well fine. Except I've seen such men...the one I met today
looked like an alien with his head clean groomed and jaws like
a grasshopper...somehow that left me revolted to the core.
I know better men...relaxed...in love... kind, decent...
poor...and not so poor... some wise, some not. ..their women
loved them.. some soar on the wind even now...
So what is there then.
well maybe just humble grace..thats not such a bad end game...
or maybe grace and wisdom...an utter pleasure but more than
that beyond words.
It may be that such crosses the threashold of death as well
and does not turn to stone.
The corporate attorney though, at least the one I noticed
today...a strategist with legs like tooth picks, and hunched
over from pouring over documents his entire life.... its not
going to end that way for him.
There is nothing there now, there will be nothing there
later.. except maybe a head like alien... trim looking
though...a grasshopper head, and a 200 dollar haircut ...that
was impressive..
Phil Scott