employment

Child Labor: Republicans’ Wet Dream

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Sarah Huckabee Sanders has become a star in the new Republican crusade to bring back child labor.

I have to concede one point: Today's far-right Republican party does not discriminate against women. In fact, the GOP is giving its female political buffoons a higher profile than its male bozos.

Consider Sarah Huckabee Sanders, governor of Arkansas, who became a star in the new Republican crusade to bring back child labor abuse. Pushed by their corporate backers, GOP governors and lawmakers exclaim that the answer to America's so-called "labor shortage" is not to make jobs more attractive, but to fill them with cheap, compliant children.

Huckabee Sanders rushed to the aid of these corporate powers, eliminating a bothersome Arkansas law that required Tyson, Walmart and other big employers to get a special state permit to put any child under 16 to work. "The meddling hand of big government creeping down from Washington, D.C.," she bellowed, "will be stopped cold... We will get the overregulating, micromanaging, bureaucratic tyrants off your backs."

So, she is using the meddling hand of big state government to creep into the lives of vulnerable children. She is not alone. Ohio's Republican-controlled state government is moving to extend the number of hours bosses can make children work; Iowa wants to let 14-year-olds work in industrial freezers and laundries; and Republicans in Congress have shrunk the number of investigators and lawyers policing child labor abuse, so abusive corporate managers know there is little chance they'll be caught.

Most damning, these corporate politicians value children so little that they've set the maximum fine for violating the workplace safety of minors at $15,138 per child. For multimillion-dollar conglomerates, that devaluation makes it much cheaper to endanger children than protect them.

America should not even be talking about child safety rules in dangerous workplaces -- it's shameful to have any children working there.

One Idea for Actually Stopping Child Abuse

With new outrages erupting every day, I find some comfort in knowing that We the People have at least eliminated certain particularly ugly plutocratic abuses. Child labor, for example -- outlawed in 1938, right?

Well, outlawed, yes; stopped, no. Recent reports reveal that thousands of children, ages 12 to 17, are toiling illegally at dangerous jobs, in manufacturing, construction, food processing, etc. To be clear, there's nothing wrong with teenagers working -- they help their families, gain experience or just earn a few bucks. Indeed, I worked part-time throughout my high school and college years, and while I did gripe some, overall, it was positive.

So, this is not about children working -- it's about corporate child abuse, plain and simple. For example, last year Packers Sanitation Services was caught "employing oppressive child labor" in meatpacking plants to clean saws, head splitters and other butchering machines. In a typical incident, one 13-year-old was badly burned by the caustic cleaning chemicals they used during long night shifts -- which ran from 11 p.m. to at least 5 a.m.!

Once caught, top executives of Packers Sanitation tried to sanitize their reputation by proclaiming they have "zero tolerance for any violation" of child labor laws. Oh? Ask that 13-year-old. These executives would be comical, except they're completely disgusting and morally repugnant. Yet, our worker protection laws are so weak that Packers' multiple violations, involving 102 children in this one case, resulted in a fine of... $1.5 million.

That's not even peanuts for this nationwide giant, which is owned by Blackstone, trillion-dollar Wall Street hucksters run by well-manicured executives who pretend they know nothing about the children they endanger for profit.

How about we make a few of the teenage children and grandchildren of Blackstone profiteers work some midnight shifts cleaning meat-cutting machinery? I'm guessing they would stop the abuse overnight.
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Sarah Huckabee Sanders has become a star in the new Republican crusade to bring back child labor. I have to concede one point: Today’s far-right Republican party does … Read more

How to Be Homeless

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How to Be Homeless
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Anybody can be homeless. You don’t need a driver’s license, social security number, legal address or even a legal name.


By Larry Hankin aka Barnum Justice

It’s getting crowded out here again. That’s not the problem. But I know why it’s getting crowded again. It’s because anybody can be homeless. You don’t need a driver’s license, no social security number, no legal address, you don’t even have to use your right name.

How to be homelessAnybody. C’mon down. The street doesn’t care. The stars and moon and the sun don’t care either. It’s just so cool that they’re there. Like I say, we take anybody: lame, sick, black, white, yellow, blue, green, polka-dot, stripes, big, little, round, square, male, female, hermaphrodite, LGBTQRXYZ, normal, abnormal, subnormal, loony-tunes, batshit-crazy, balls-to-the-wall-fucking-insane: c’mon down. That’s not the problem.

The problem is that this new crop of Newbies coming down now-a-days are completely unprepared. And I see it over and over again: their minds get completely blown away. Unnecessary. Shouldn’t happen.

So, what I’d like to do is give you a couple of little Gemstones and Rocks of Homeless Wisdom to put on the corners of the blankets of your mind, so when you become Homeless, your mind doesn’t get blown away. See what I’m saying?

What you’ll need is a box, backpack, shopping cart, something to put your stuff in, a sleeping bag, most of your arrest-provoking body-parts suitably covered, I’ll talk about that in a minute, two serviceable shoes, a minimum of two rolls of toilet paper, and an attitude of Heroic Buddhism, which I will explain randomly. However: Before we go any further, I’d like to make one thing very clear:

“The Purpose of this diatribe is to diligently pursue one objective: Since the United States is on the brink of having a permanent beggar and homeless class -- and, since it’s been proven over the centuries that it’s impossible to get rid of beggars and the homeless throughout all cultures, ages & civilizations; therefore: If we can’t have less beggars and the homeless: we must have BETTER beggars, and homeless.” 

First of all, back-in-the-day, most cavemen and cavewomen lived directly off their surroundings which went for miles, they sheltered in caves that didn’t face into the wind. You can’t get any more homeless than that.

The worst thing about living on the street is, you’re on your own, completely. Yes, you have friends and there’s the emergency room and a random soup kitchen and a homeless shelter – but, no matter what you do, your stuff keeps disappearing and you can’t get enough sleep or protein.

Let’s talk about People with Homes – which begs-the-question: “Why do People with Homes, or, as I like to call them, 'The Homelessless' – why do 'The Homelessless' not like me, 'The Homeless'?" Simple Question; Simple Answer: Normal people have doorknobs, ergo: People without doorknobs are lying, cheating, lazy, drug-dealing, pariahs. It’s called Simple Logic. Don’t take it personal. It’s not you – it’s them: The Homelessless. What’s The Nightmare of all Homelessless Homo-sapiens? “Being Homeless.” To them, WE, The Homeless, are their own, waking, walking nightmare. We freak them out a priori, on visual sighting alone.

Okay, now, to be Fair-&-Balanced, we gotta look at ourselves from the Homelessless Citizen’s Point-of-View; “walk a mile in a doorknob owner’s eyes.” They don’t see what gifts our genius has contributed to Homo-Sapiens: the gift of Found Object Domicile Development using the detritus of mighty civilizations: corrugated crap, waste, junk, flotsam, jetsam, bubble wrap and the use of drapes, and broken furniture for warmth alone has advanced instant domicile recycling science by leaps and bounds.

Do you see them offering honorifics? Bowing to our ranks? Not really. What they see is us walking or sitting aimlessly around all day or panhandling for spare change; or drinking a café latte. (“Look at that homeless guy sitting drinking that Latte. I gave him a quarter last week and now he’s blowing it on a latte? These frigging people are drug-dealing pariahs.”)

See you next time I see you.




Barnum Justice is the name of a character the author created for a book he is writing about being homeless.
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Anybody can be homeless. You don’t need a driver’s license, social security number, legal address or even a legal name. By Larry Hankin aka Barnum Justice It’s getting … Read more

Quiet Quitting: Confused?

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"Quiet quitting" is defined as workers who don't leave their jobs, but only do what they were hired to do. Imagine that!

For more than a year, America's corporate chieftains have been moaning about the "Great Resignation": the recent phenomenon of workers just up and quitting their jobs. And now comes "quiet quitting": workers who don't leave their jobs, but only do what they were hired to do, quietly rejecting the endless extra (unpaid) tasks and weekend assignments that bosses try to pile on. What's at work in the heads of all these workers?

Simple, barked one taskmaster way back in 1894. "Nobody wants to work." And here's an anti-New Deal baron in 1940, snorting that "trouble is everybody is on relief or a pension -- nobody wants to work." Then in '52 came the same refrain: Everybody is "too damned lazy and nobody wants to work anymore." Year after year, the exact same wail is repeated from on high, including this group gripe expressed in a corporate survey this year: "One in five executive leaders agree (that) 'No one wants to work.'"

Given the historic continuum of executive-suite disdain for working stiffs, it's no surprise that the top dogs are still blaming "sluggish" workers for today's rampant job dissatisfaction. But it's both hilarious and pathetic that high-dollar bosses are so inept at employee relations that they can't keep the rank and file on the job, much less keep them quasi-happy. The corporate response has been to put a silly Band-Aid on this serious problem.

They've created new executive-level positions with titles like "Chief People Officer" and hired consulting firms with such names as "Woohoo" and "Happy Ltd" to come up with treats, trinkets and gimmicks, trying to make the workplace seem like a playscape: Beer tastings! Ping-pong games! Meditation periods! A Lizzo concert! Office slides! Company water bottles! Wine Wednesdays!

Seriously? Memo to CEOs: Try decent pay and benefits, rational scheduling, meaningful goals, real teamwork and personal respect. In a word: Dignity.

In the world of work, what two occupations might seem to have the very least in common? How about long-haul truck drivers... and school librarians? Yes, an odd pairing, but both are prime examples of workers who've had their workplace dignity stripped away. So, solidarity forever!

Start with truckers; the job is literally a grueling haul. You're wrangling massive 18-wheelers some 500 miles a day for 2-3 weeks straight, putting up with traffic jams, storms, bad roads, lunatic drivers, helter-skelter scheduling, truck-stop food, sleeping in the truck -- and battling fatigue, aches, your bladder and loneliness.

Trucking used to be a good union job, with decent pay and conditions -- until the deregulation craze four decades ago brought in Wall Street profiteers and fast-buck hustlers who turned the industry into anti-union exploiters. As a result, the yearly quit rate for drivers is almost 100%! But rather than retaining drivers by upping pay and stopping their torturous treatment, the corporate bosses have rushed to Washington demanding access to an even cheaper pool of low-wage workers: teenagers. Yes -- put an 18-year-old in that 18-wheeler... and keep them profits rolling!

And here's another good job suddenly turned ugly: school librarian. Yes, while student enrollments rise and the need for these nurturers of our society's literacy is greater than ever, their quit rate is soaring -- not because of low pay or long hours, but because of raw right-wing politics. These dedicated, invaluable educators are literally being abused by demagogic GOP politicians and their extremist partisans who've launched an anti-librarian crusade, including book banning and harebrained witch hunting. Come on -- how twisted are you to pick on librarians? Yet, they are under attack by political hacks, condemned by reprobate preachers and physically threatened by frenzied parents... and being fired by wimpy school boards.

Forget the "law" of supply and demand; today's job market is being ruled by greedmeisters and political lunatics.
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“Quiet quitting” is defined as workers who don’t leave their jobs, but only do what they were hired to do. Imagine that! For more than a year, America’s … Read more

Child Care: We Should Look Back for Our Future

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We must make a significant public investment to sustain an egalitarian system of quality child care.

"If you think education is expensive, try ignorance," the old bumper sticker says. Yet for decades, national and state lawmakers have flaunted their ignorance of what makes a good society by stupidly shortchanging our investment in our youngest minds and in child care. At the same time, corporate and governmental policymakers have intentionally rigged our economic and political systems to hold down workers' incomes even while their living expenses rise. The result is that mothers and fathers alike are herded into whatever jobs or jobettes are available -- just to make ends meet. This leaves young children to ... what?

Let's be clear: Caring for children is expensive. Kids are labor-intensive -- assuming, that is, the goal is not merely to keep the little creatures watered, fed and restrained, but actually cared for intellectually, emotionally and socially. Today, only the wealthy can purchase primo attention from private providers and, thanks to ever-attentive lawmakers, the rich even enjoy a special tax-break loophole for their nannies. But workaday families -- especially the majority stranded on the lower rungs of the economic ladder -- are mostly on their own when it comes to child care.

For our society to rank up with other developed countries, there is no shortcut. We must choose to make a significant public investment to sustain an egalitarian system of quality child care ... or maintain our present "We don't care" policy toward our kids.

As inadequate as today's "care" network is, it's only fair to note that the rickety thing actually is heavily subsidized. Not by government, but by the caregivers hired by center owners to tend to the children! Most of these providers are paid less than $11 an hour -- on par with parking lot attendants and less than many dog walkers. The hours are long, the ratio of children-to-caregivers tends to be impossibly high, job stress is severe and staff support is meager. Even as the need for care has soared in recent years and centers' fees have climbed, pay for caregivers (overwhelmingly women and mostly low-income women of color) has stayed flat. Benefits and job security? Get real. Usually, workers' wages are so low that they can't afford to enroll their own children in the centers where they attend to others' young ones. Training and career development? The U.S. model does not consider caregiving a profession or a career.

A mind-warping brainteaser: What country set the gold standard for high-quality, universal child care? Hint: The very one that now fails so pathetically, stupidly and shamefully to meet that crucial need. Yes, it's the mighty USA!

It came at the onset of America's commitment to World War II. With masses of men deployed, masses of women were called to rev up economic production by working as everything from engineers to Rosie Riveters. Their children? Believe it or not, our government responded directly and effectively by passing the Lanham Act in 1943. The new law treated child care as a core component of our nation's infrastructure, key to a unified war effort. This was a national/local government partnership that set up and staffed a publicly subsidized network of more than 3,000 Lanham Act preschool centers all across America, open to all.

These weren't mere child-minding barns, but full-scale teaching and nurturing centers that paid for accredited teachers and staff and trained them in childhood education. The program was widely affordable: For about $.50 a day (equivalent to less than $8 today) a child could get 12 hours of quality care. Twelve hours! The fee included lunch and snacks; the centers operated all day, year-round, reached families in 47 states and aimed at a 1-to-10 teacher-student ratio. Subsequent studies found the program enormously beneficial to the well-being of children, parents, communities and the nation.

So, of course, right-wing extremists killed it. After the war, they loudly insisted that women return to housewifery and that the government get out of child care. Succumbing to their pressure, President Harry S. Truman axed the budget for the Lanham Act centers shortly after Japan surrendered in 1945.
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We must make a significant public investment to sustain an egalitarian system of quality child care. “If you think education is expensive, try ignorance,” the old bumper sticker … Read more

What’s the “Quits Rate?” And Why Is It Skyrocketing?

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Most of the "quits rate" is tied to very real abuses that have become ingrained in our workplaces.

As a writer, I get stuck every so often straining for the right words to tell my story or otherwise make the kind of progress I want on the piece I'm writing. Over the years, though, I've learned when to quit tying myself into mental knots over sentence construction and instead step back and rethink where my story is going.

This process is essentially what millions of American working families are going through this year as record numbers of them are shocking bosses, politicians and economists by stepping back and declaring: "We quit!" Most of the "quits rate" is tied to very real abuses that have become ingrained in our workplaces over the past couple of decades -- poverty paychecks, no health care, unpredictable schedules, no child care, understaffing, forced overtime, unsafe jobs, sexist and racist managers, tolerance of aggressively rude customers and so awful much more.

Meanwhile, corporate bosses across America have been sputtering in outrage at workers this summer, spewing expletives about the fact that while the U.S. economy has been coming back ... workers (i.e., you) haven't!

"Labor shortage," they squeal, lazily accusing the workforce of mass laziness. Apparently, they charge insultingly that millions of workers got used to laying around during the pandemic shutdown, for there is now an abundance of jobs open for everything from restaurant work to nursing to construction work. So, the bosses and their political dogs bark that you people need to get back in the old harness and start pulling again.

Adding a nasty bite to their bark, several GOP governors cut off unemployment benefits to people, hoping to force them to work. Other businesses have proffered signing bonuses, free dinner coupons and other lures, while such notoriously mingy outfits as McDonald's and Walmart have even upped their wage scales in an effort to draw workers.

Yet ... no go. In fact, to the astonishment of the economic elite, the employment flow this year is going the other way! Record numbers of current workers in all sorts of jobs in every section of the country are voluntarily walking away. There's even an official economic measurement of this phenomenon called the "quits rate," and it is surging beyond anything our economy has experienced in modern memory -- in April, 4 million workers quit; in May, another 3.6 million left, in June, 3.9 million said "Adios!" At a time when conventional economic wisdom dictates that, after a devastating 18-month downturn, people would be clinging to any paycheck they can get! The "quits" are so unexpected and so widespread that pundits have started dubbing this year "The Great Resignation."

What's wrong with people, why are such staggering numbers of Americans failing to do their jobs? But wait -- maybe that's the wrong question. Maybe the corporate system's "jobs" are failing the people. Consider this: The most common comment by those who're walking out is, "I hate my job."

Specific grievances abound, but at the core of each is a deep, inherently destructive executive-suite malignancy: disrespect. The corporate system has cheapened employees from valuable human assets worthy of being nurtured and advanced to a bookkeeping expense that must be steadily eliminated. It's not just about paychecks, it's about feeling valued, feeling that the hierarchy gives a damn about the people doing the work.

Yet, corporate America is going out of its way to show that it doesn't care -- and, of course, workers notice. So, unionization is booming, millions who were laid off by the pandemic are refusing to rush back to the same old grind, and now millions who have jobs are quitting. This is much more than an unusual unemployment stat -- it's a sea change in people's attitude about work itself ... and life.

People are rethinking where their story is going and how they can take it in a better direction. Yes, nearly everyone will eventually return to work, but workers themselves have begun redefining the job and rebalancing it with life.
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Most of the “quits rate” is tied to very real abuses that have become ingrained in our workplaces. As a writer, I get stuck every so often straining … Read more

Premature Evacuation: Exit Seat Employment

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Premature Evacuation: Exit Seat Employment
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Sitting at the Exit Seat should be a paid position.


Premature Evacuation: Exit Seat

I'm not talkin' a fly by night deal - I mean a real job with Layovers in Barstow, Moosejaw & Cleveland!  And, a Uniform that would make your Marching Band proud!

That's right; getting paid to sit in the coveted Exit Seat Row!  And yes, guys - 7 Extra Inches!  Sorry Ladies - that's Extra Leg Room & your chance to be a Heroine.  Personally, I never wanted to be a Heroine - and so far it's working out for me!

Actually, I think there should be an Audition for this position Pre-Boarding.  You know, like the old 'Test Your Strength - Hi Striker' Carnival Game; where you hoist a sledge hammer to make a bell sound & at the same time; impress a female.  It's true; more babies are born 9 months after hitting that sucker - than say, after Bowling!  But I digress.


This 'Jobs on Planes' notion came to me last week as the Airline made a big mistake when they chose me to man the Exit Row!

'PULL'?  Are you kidding - half the time I 'PUSH' when a door says 'Pull'! 

Besides, they ask you to assist other passengers.  Now, that's going too far!  I'm way too narcissistic & entitled for that; every 4 Way STOP Sign I've ever gone thru - I got a Ticket!

Premature Evacuation: Exit Seat

Even Larry David had the same predicament on "Curb Your Enthusiasm" & cried out, "I panic, I choke under pressure; I can not be of any help whatsoever in any Unconditional Landing or Conditional Landing"!


Of course, it was funnier when he said it!

Surprisingly; most people do say 'yes' when asked if we are ready, willing & able to sit in 'the hot seat' & perform the required tasks - but we're just glad to get out of that groping TSA Line and after paying $15 for a Hot Dog at the Gate - we're ready to do anything!

So there I sat, 'Battle Ready', never leaving my Post - even when nature called; thinking "I should get paid for this"! 

During the flight, as passengers walked by my row; I could feel their safety confidence level dissipate as they shook their heads & clutched their rosaries to their chest.  

Standing at a petite 5'0; Sitting, much less - I pressed the button above me to get some reassurance from the Stewardess assigned to Coach.

When she finally came; I had finished my lunch, read "War & Peace", sprouted 3 new grey hairs & knitted a Shawl with an inscription - $25 Dollars a Suitcase?  Give me 30 & it's yours!

And, she scolded, "How did you get those Knitting Needles thru Security"?  I said, "I have "Nature Call-Waiting"!


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Sitting at the Exit Seat should be a paid position. I’m not talkin’ a fly by night deal – I mean a real job with Layovers in Barstow, … Read more

Why Build a National Monument to a Union-Busting Robber Baron?

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Union-busting to enrich greedy owners should not be celebrated.

Occasionally, I see something that is so bizarre, so out of place, so wrong that I have to assume I'm hallucinating. For example, I could have sworn I was delusional when I heard about the National Park Service's Pullman National Monument in Chicago.

George Pullman? My mind boggled! Our tax dollars are being spent to build a national park in tribute to a narcissistic, paternalistic, brutalistic 19th-century robber baron? Incredibly, yes. Pullman, a notorious union buster and exploiter of working families, is having his history mythologized by today's Powers That Be, portraying him as a model of the corporate order's historic virtue. At the Feb. 19 official consecration of Pullman's park, Chicago's thoroughly corporatized mayor, Rahm Emanuel, even gushed: "This will be a monument ... to Pullman's role in building the American dream."

"History," as the old adage goes, "is written by the winners," even when they're losers as human beings. Pullman was most certainly a loser as a human being for this "dream," as Rahm refers to it, was a nightmare to Pullman's workers. They toiled in his factories making rail cars, including the luxury "Palace" sleeper for elite train travel. Pullman considered himself a beneficent employer, having built a 600-acre town for the workforce and vaingloriously naming the new home-place for himself. PullmanTown included houses he rented to his workers, churches, schools, a bank, library, and parks -- all owned by his company. Indeed, when officials announced this year that Pullman's town was becoming an honored part of America's park system, officials attested to his generosity by hailing the town as a place he created "to provide his employees a good life."

The workers in the town of Pullman, however, were less charmed, for he ruled the burg as autocratically as he did his factories. No saloons or "agitators" were allowed, nor did he allow any public speeches, town meetings, independent newspapers or even open discussions. In a letter residents wrote to the American Railway Union, they offered an example of Pullman's greed and exploitation of his workers: "Water which Pullman buys from the city at 8 cents a thousand gallons he retails to us at 500 percent advance ... Gas which sells at 75 cents per thousand feet in Hyde Park, just north of us, he sells for $2.25."

The resentful residents created a little ditty that summed up the surreal feel of the place: "We are born in a Pullman house, fed from the Pullman shops, taught in the Pullman schools, catechized in the Pullman Church, and when we die, we shall go to Pullman hell."

In 1894, the workers got Pullman's hell on Earth. Not only did he drastically cut his workers' (he referred to his workers condescendingly as his "children") wages five times, he also refused to lower their rent. He had guaranteed a 6-percent return to the wealthy investors who financed the town, he explained -- and the investors' needs came first. What a dysfunctional father! The suffering imposed by this feudal lord on his workers led to the historic Pullman Strike that quickly spread nationwide, led by union icon Eugene Debs.

This uprising was not a problem for Lord George, though. He and other railroad royals rushed to the White House and got President Grover Cleveland to dispatch the U.S. Army to join police and militia forces to crush the labor rebellion. Thirty workers were killed, Debs was arrested on a trumped-up conspiracy charge and all laborers who'd joined the strike were fired and blacklisted.

Now, 120 years later, we taxpayers are financing a monument to this loser's greed. The only way that Pullman National Monument can have any legitimacy is for the grounds to be strewn with sculptures of the 30 dead workers he killed.
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Union-busting to enrich greedy owners should not be celebrated. Occasionally, I see something that is so bizarre, so out of place, so wrong that I have to assume … Read more

Lost Journal: On Paper, My Job is Reproduction

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Journal entry: February 20, 1996 (age 26) - Reproduction


At the age of 26, I have achieved the title of Reprographic Engineer.

I make copies for a living. Not just any copies, mind you. I don’t copy resumes for any schmo off the street (who, by the way, probably also wants to be a reprographic engineer). Nay, I say. I stand at a copy machine for hours and hours, making piles and piles of copies of piles and piles of documents to be used in litigious litigation. It’s like being a lawyer, but without the high pay, sense of civic duty, or freedom to use a chair.

Every job that comes off the copier is visually checked, page by page, by another employee. If ten sets of copies are made, one, five or, sometimes, all ten sets must be inspected, depending on the importance of the project and the customer’s willingness to pay for the extra quality assurance. Any problems with page order, cut-off words, or legibility must be corrected in all the sets of copies. On a really bad day, the death of an old growth forest may prove to be in vain because of an incorrect contrast setting while copying depositions in the case of Furless Friends of Old Growth Forests v. Heartless Lumberjacks.

My employer, CVK Reprographics, is located in the Capitol Hill neighborhood of Washington, D.C. The business operates out of two townhouses, and a co-owner lives in one of them. The business ran out of room in their main space, so they just plunked a huge copier in his basement. My cousin, Madeline Sullivan, whom I love dearly, got me this job after she worked at CVK for years. The owners trust her and, by extension, me. (One would think this extension of credence to family members would be rare in Washington. But, like Billy Carter, Neil Bush and Roger Clinton, I’m grateful for the consideration.)

I am frequently entrusted with the key to the co-owner’s townhouse, so I can work there when he’s not home. The mind-numbing boredom of making copies all night isn’t helped by being all alone in a creepy old house. At least when I’m at the main office I can joke around with co-workers Andrew Peach and Joey D’Avanzo, both of whom are hilarious. “Joey D” gives me the kind of dating advice that only a confident, young, Italian-American guy can give. Usually, he demonstrates his technique for approaching women – an impressively varied array of facial expressions that he always combines with the same three words: “Get ova here.”

The only benefit to working alone is that I control the music selection. Of the limited selection of CDs on hand, the only ones I really like are Toad the Wet Sprocket’s Dulcinea and Nick Heyward’s North of a Miracle. I can also bring in my own CDs, most of which wouldn’t go over well with my co-workers. (There’s not a lot of Cliff Richard or Helen Reddy fans over there.) But all the music in the world can’t ameliorate the drudgery of this kind of work. Our worst task involves identifying documents for the discovery phase of litigation. I affix a tiny sticker to the bottom right corner of every page, giving it a unique, alphanumeric “Bates number.” I might as well be listening to the original score from Psycho.
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Journal entry: February 20, 1996 (age 26) – Reproduction At the age of 26, I have achieved the title of Reprographic Engineer. I make copies for a living. … Read more

What Job Creation Numbers Don’t Tell Us

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"Job creation" is happening, sure, but what kind of jobs?

Have you noticed "the powers that be" employ an entirely different standard for measuring the health of America's job market than they use for the stock market?

They're currently telling us that, "The job market is improving." What do they mean?

Simply that the economy is generating an increase in the number of jobs available for workers. But when they say, "The stock market is improving," they don't mean that the number of stocks available to investors is on the rise. Instead, they're measuring the price, the value of the stocks. And isn't value what really counts in both cases? Quality over quantity.

Employment rose by 217,000 jobs in the month of May, according to the latest jobs report -- and that brought us up to 8.7 million. That is how many new jobs the American economy has generated since the "Great Recession" officially ended in 2009 -- and it also happens to be the number of jobs that were lost because of that recession. You can break out the champagne, for the American economy is back, baby -- all of the lost jobs have been recovered!

You say you don't feel "recovered"? Well, it's true that the U.S. population has kept growing since the crash, so about 15 million more working-age people have entered the job market, meaning America still has millions more people looking for work than it has jobs. And it's true that long-term unemployment is a growing crisis, especially for middle-aged job seekers who've gone one, two or more years without even getting an interview, much less an offer -- so they've dropped out of the market and are not counted as unemployed. Also, there are millions of young people who are squeezed out of this so-called recovery -- the effective unemployment rate for 18- to 29-year-olds is above 15 percent, more than double the national rate of 6.3 percent.

But take heart, people, for economists are telling us that full employment may be right around the corner. Is that because Congress is finally going to pass a national job creation program to get America working again? Or could it be that corporate chieftains are going to bring home some of the trillions of dollars they've stashed in offshore tax havens to invest in new products and other job-creating initiatives here in the USA?

No, no -- don't be silly. Economists are upbeat because they've decided to redefine "full" employment by -- hocus pocus! -- simply declaring that having 6 percent of our people out of work is acceptable as the new normal. And you thought American ingenuity was dead.

Now, let's move on to the value of those jobs that have economists doing a happy dance. As a worker, you don't merely want to know that 217,000 new jobs are on the market; you want to know what they're worth -- do they pay living wages, do they come with benefits, are they just part-time and temporary, do they include union rights, what are the working conditions, etc.? In other words, are these jobs ... or scams?

So, it's interesting that the recent news of job market "improvement" doesn't mention that of the 10 occupation categories projecting the greatest growth in the next eight years, only one pays a middle-class wage. Four pay barely above poverty level and five pay beneath it, including fast-food workers, retail sales staff, health aids and janitors. The job expected to have the highest number of openings is "personal care aide" -- taking care of aging baby boomers in their houses or in nursing homes. The median salary of an aid is under $20,000. They enjoy no benefits, and about 40 percent of them must rely on food stamps and Medicaid to make ends meet, plus many are in the "shadow economy," vulnerable to being cheated on the already miserly wages.

To measure the job market by quantity -- with no regard for quality -- is to devalue workers themselves. Creating 217,000 new jobs is not a sign of economic health if each worker needs two or three of those jobs to patch together a barebones living -- and millions more are left with no work at all.
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“Job creation” is happening, sure, but what kind of jobs? Have you noticed “the powers that be” employ an entirely different standard for measuring the health of America’s … Read more

Résumé of a Recent College Grad

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Or, Why Didn’t I Listen to my Parents and NOT Major in Liberal Arts?


Résumé

Highlights of Qualifications:
·    A liberal arts degree from a private elite college, setting my parents back 250,000 bucks
·    Four years living in a bubble on a campus paradise brimming with history, intellectual vibrancy, sweeping lawns, and woodland paths where the hipsters go to get stoned
·    Majored in Liberal Arts, ranked #5 on Forbes “The 10 Worst College Majors List”
·    Keen ability to talk to clients about art, music, literature—which they know and care less about than Honey Boo Boo
·    Multi-tasker: can text, Tweet, update FB status, pee, and write a paper at the same time
·    Highly proficient in college drinking games with comprehensive knowledge of mixology for Brass Monkeys and Boilermakers, instrumental for surviving sales incentive meetings.

Education:
Liberal Arts College Too Elite to Divulge, somewhere in middle of nowhere in the Northeast, with less than a 15% admissions rate
B.A., Liberal Arts, June 2013 (What was I thinking? Can I still get into the plumbers’ union?)
G.P.A.: too mediocre to mention (see above, regarding drinking games)
Leadership Activities: embarrassingly none
Varsity Sports: not even Ultimate Frisbee
Community Service: questionable, unless you count buying tequila for underage underclassmen who couldn’t afford fake ID’s
Awards: Achieved campus record for sleeping the most number of hours: 18.5 straight (from 4AM Saturday to 10:30PM—bummed that the dining hall had closed for the night)

Work Experience:
Post College Regression In The Post Recession, May 2013-Present
Position Title: Emerging Adult
·    No choice but to move back home with parents after graduation.
·    Free rent and three meals a day in exchange for making my bed, doing laundry, limiting FB stalking to one hour daily (severe hardship), and e-mailing at least five résumés a day.
Nepotism LLC, Summer 2012
Glorified Slave for Daddy’s Privately-Owned Business
·    Filing, typing, and other tasks way beneath my intellectual capacities.
·    Oh yeah, did some basic social media stuff to promote Daddy’s business. Welcome to the 21st century, Dad!
·    Daddy said I can say anything I want about this “position,” even little white lies if it’ll help me get a real job. Here’s the truth: work is tedious and exhausting. Prefer a job that starts after noon.
·    Skills gained: marketing, business analysis, getting to work on time whenever Daddy gave me a lift, limiting arguments with Dad to one a day.
Camp Privilege / Take a Rich Kid to the Country USA, Summer 2011
Assistant Counselor
·    Could not find a prestigious or even a disreputable internship because it was the Great Recession (not my fault, folks, I was born into this mess)
·    Which is why I followed whining five-year-olds around all day, wiped their noses, tears and butts, did not make fun of their gluten free lunches, and managed not to lose any of them on our trip to the Bronx Zoo in the heat wave of the century.
·    The tips were good, though. I won’t say how much exactly because I didn’t report them to the IRS. Daddy’s advice.
Previous Black Market Employment, Summer 2010
Babysitter and Dog Walker
·    Even once took care of a gecko when the family was on vacation! Skills gained: didn’t contract salmonella.
·    Isn’t it thought-provoking how people pay more to take care of their pets than their children? (Put that on the syllabus for Sociology 200)
·    Ironic that an 18-year-old can make 20 bucks an hour cash, when today’s English majors face the prospect of making $12.50 an hour, minus Social Security, to work in publishing, if it still exists by the time we graduate.
·    This type of fiscal pondering positions me for a job in economics, a field less precise than philosophy, which, did I mention, was my minor? (#4 on the Forbes Worst College Major list).
·    Skills gained: negotiation, start-up ventures, agility walking three purebred dogs at one time without entangling their leashes.

Additional Skills & Training:
·    Fluent in textbook French, which is advantageous when ordering perfectly sautéed organ meats in a Rive Gauche bistro
·    Ability to use “ironic” and “disreputable” in a sentence in a clear, precise, pretentious way
·    One day barista training course, August 2013. Artery-clogging full fat or tasteless skim in your latté? Thank you for the tip, sir, which I will not declare to Uncle Sam.
·    Red Cross Babysitters’ Certificate, Eighth Grade

Other Achievements & Awards:
·    Only girl on my dorm floor who didn’t gain the freshman 15
·    No history of eating disorders
·    Completed marathon: re-read all seven volumes of Harry Potter in one sitting, except for bathroom breaks
·    Raised SAT scores 200 points by retaking them on Adderall
·    Won medals in gymnastics (third grade) and softball (middle school), but they gave a medal to everyone who showed up on Parents Day.
·    No debt…although indebted to my parents for life for their financial sacrifice on my behalf—which they remind me of every friggin chance they get. As in: “Don’t complain about taking out the garbage. Do you know how many college graduates would rather take out the garbage than pay back their student loans?”
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Or, Why Didn’t I Listen to my Parents and NOT Major in Liberal Arts? Résumé Highlights of Qualifications: ·    A liberal arts degree from a private elite college, … Read more

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