Occupy.... the Simthsonian?

I know some of you have read Shop Class for Soulcraft.........because that's where I heard of the book......here.

For those who haven't read it -- it's one guy's view of how we're ruining ourselves as a nation because we're closing down shop class/trades in high school and telling the kids that they need to go to college and get a college education instead. We're creating a generation of folks who don't know a trade and yet have a college degree.

It gets better.............

Anyone see the TV show Friends? One of the running jokes on the show was that one of the characters went to work in an office............and no one knew what he did! We have an entire culture nowadays that accepts this (seen the TV show the Office?) as normal. Office workers need reviews for promotions, etc........how do you grade people when they don't create/do/make/produce anything? Instead, people now get check marks next to their name if they attend training or can demonstrate how they have adhered to/promoted corporate values and mission statements.

Here is problem #1 -- not everyone needs a college education/degree. Someone's gotta fix the plumbing and make sure the lights stay on -- and plumbers/electricians get paid pretty well. And not everyone is really cut out for an office position, yet this is what we all market to each other as the present-day American ideal.

We do need more technical folks with degrees. Why don't we see more engineers being created? Because we've told our children that just showing up is good enough.......just because you tried means you get a trophy. So graduating with a degree in underwater basketweaving is good enough.....you went to college! Now the kid with the degree in underwater basketweaving thinks that he's "arrived" and should make $100k or more because he has "a degree". And he feels he should make that on day 1 out of college.

Which leads to problem 2 -- aversion to hard work and the sense of entitlement. A lot of folks seem to be really upset at the C-level execs that are pulling down large salaries and comp bonuses, but here's a secret. I bet all but a privileged few worked very very hard to get to the point where they could haul down that kind of cabbage. I bet they sacrificed time with family and friends and put career first to get to that c-level position. Do what matters most to you -- don't fault the guy that put in more hours and effort and sacrifices to get to the top. Chances are you wouldn't want his job anyway........

And about the college thing............ I dunno, but I thought getting through college with a little family help, some grants, some work study, some working over summer, and some loans is how it is done. It's how I did it. Graduated in the late 80's from a private school. Cost in 1980's dollars was about 75k. It wasn't MIT, although the shocker for the time was that tuition there was ~$20k or so......I remember thinking how anyone would/could afford that!

I had about $30k of that in loans when I graduated (and had an on campus job and spent the summers rigging boats for around 70 hours a week)....and I had top of the heap pay for an engineer in the 80's......$29k. I looked up some stats on teh interwebz, so they must be right (har!) -- Private school tuition today (room/board) is averaging $27k a year and average engineer starting salary is around $65k. About what I'd expect things to be 25 years later.

Our commencement speech was given by Bob Horton, CEO of BP. He said doing what you want in life, whether it is work, hobbies, even family relationships, all require hard work. I don't think we instill this particular value in our youth anymore.

I could go on, just might in a later post, just had to add my $0.02 to the mix.

It's easy to say that it's people not willing to put in the hard, dirty work. Sometimes (like with my roommate), that's true. A lot of the time, it's not.

I've got married friends living up somewhere in Washington. He's sick of working as a manager at Auto-Zone. He's studied and ready to apprentice (or something like that; he meets the requirements) to be an electrical lineman. There are too many people going for that job right now and the district can't afford to hire as many lineman as it actually needs. Even if it could hire as many as it needs, the majority wouldn't have positions. She's a trained Pharmacy Tech. I'm pretty sure she's not doing that right now.

Maybe it's just the people I choose to keep as friends, but I meet a lot more who are willing and want to work hard than feel entitled to a free ride.

Salanis wrote: Maybe it's just the people I choose to keep as friends, but I meet a lot more who are willing and want to work hard than feel entitled to a free ride.

I think a lot of people are making sweeping generalizations of the protestors. I can see how that is done when you only see dreadlocked, tiedyed shirt wearing scrubs talking to the media. I think there is a lot broader spectrum of people there, they just don't get the facetime on camera. Everybody I know that is out of work falls in the working hard (if allowed)category. The whole they are rich because he/she worked hard and they are poor because he/she feels entitled to a free ride is an ignorant and false assumption.

orphancars wrote: I looked up some stats on teh interwebz, so they must be right (har!) -- Private school tuition today (room/board) is averaging $27k a year and average engineer starting salary is around $65k. About what I'd expect things to be 25 years later.

OT, but 65K!!! I make that now, six/seven years out of college with two BS degrees and five years of co-op, raises every year but one. I would not expect to start there.

I read Shop Class for Soulcraft and understand the part about people being sold a bill of goods in regards to a college degree.

I don't see the jump from there to 'sense of entitlement'. That sounds more like a talking point that people with a certain political point of view keep throwing at the Protest Wall Street people. I know recent graduates with degrees in Accounting and Engineering, NOT underwater basketweaving who are having trouble finding work. I know one guy with an engineering degree who is thinking of going to law school because he can't find work as an engineer. I also know a few experienced mechanics who are out of work. I have another friend who used to be an experienced computer programmer for a Fortune 500 company, until that company offered him a choice of moving to India for a big cut in pay or moving to the unemployment line. And all of this is in Rick Perry's Texas.

I hear some states are even worse.

Snowdoggie wrote: I read Shop Class for Soulcraft and understand the part about people being sold a bill of goods in regards to a college degree. I don't see the jump from there to 'sense of entitlement'. That sounds more like a talking point that people with a certain political point of view keep throwing at the Protest Wall Street people. I know recent graduates with degrees in Accounting and Engineering, NOT underwater basketweaving who are having trouble finding work. I know one guy with an engineering degree who is thinking of going to law school because he can't find work as an engineer. I also know a few experienced mechanics who are out of work. I have another friend who used to be an experienced computer programmer for a Fortune 500 company, until that company offered him a choice of moving to India for a big cut in pay or moving to the unemployment line. And all of this is in Rick Perry's Texas. I hear some states are even worse.

I agree, it is tough out there, and jobs are hard to get.

Clearly this is because rich people took all of our money!

They tuk R Jobs!

Step 1: Jobs are hard to get and keep and stuff is expensive

Step 2: ????

Step 3: Poop on cop cars whilst camping in public parks.

Clearly this is because our capitalist nation is biased towards the people/corporations/organizations that have much more influence in policies than the common man.

Politicians feed us BS to get our votes, but get straigt to helping out the organizations that paid them the most during fundraising. So unless we can pool all our money and buy a lobbyist, the middle class will continually lose.

tuna55 wrote:

Snowdoggie wrote: I read Shop Class for Soulcraft and understand the part about people being sold a bill of goods in regards to a college degree. I don't see the jump from there to 'sense of entitlement'. That sounds more like a talking point that people with a certain political point of view keep throwing at the Protest Wall Street people. I know recent graduates with degrees in Accounting and Engineering, NOT underwater basketweaving who are having trouble finding work. I know one guy with an engineering degree who is thinking of going to law school because he can't find work as an engineer. I also know a few experienced mechanics who are out of work. I have another friend who used to be an experienced computer programmer for a Fortune 500 company, until that company offered him a choice of moving to India for a big cut in pay or moving to the unemployment line. And all of this is in Rick Perry's Texas. I hear some states are even worse.

I agree, it is tough out there, and jobs are hard to get. Clearly this is because rich people took all of our money! They tuk R Jobs! Step 1: Jobs are hard to get and keep and stuff is expensive Step 2: ???? Step 3: Poop on cop cars whilst camping in public parks.

None of the unemployed people I know are camping out at those rallies. They are too busy looking for work and working temp jobs and part time work they are overqualified for to make ends meet.

I didn't see anybody pooping on cop cars here in Downtown Dallas either. Most of the cops here look rather bored by the whole mess. A bunch of people dressed funny holding signs. Most of them are under 30 and most of them couldn't agree on one coherent political view other than hating Wall Street.

I think the real problem is not that we don't have hard working industrious people in this country, but that hard working industrious people can make four times as much money engineering credit default swaps as they can engineering cars and space shuttles so they study finance instead of engineering.

tuna55 wrote:

orphancars wrote: I looked up some stats on teh interwebz, so they must be right (har!) -- Private school tuition today (room/board) is averaging $27k a year and average engineer starting salary is around $65k. About what I'd expect things to be 25 years later.

OT, but 65K!!! I make that now, six/seven years out of college with two BS degrees and five years of co-op, raises every year but one. I would not expect to start there.

The average starting salary of mechanicals I have seen is $58K. I will say it also depends on where you live. I have a friend making several thousand more then me right out of college but his cost of living is several thousand more (he is in Cali).

Snowdoggie wrote: I think the real problem is not that we don't have hard working industrious people in this country, but that hard working industrious people can make four times as much money engineering credit default swaps as they can engineering cars and space shuttles so they study finance instead of engineering.

I thought business majors were just DB frat guys. At least they are at my school.

93EXCivic wrote:

Snowdoggie wrote: I think the real problem is not that we don't have hard working industrious people in this country, but that hard working industrious people can make four times as much money engineering credit default swaps as they can engineering cars and space shuttles so they study finance instead of engineering.

I thought business majors were just DB frat guys. At least they are at my school.

Exactly. Two guys go to business school. One graduates with a 4.0 in accounting. The other graduates with a 2.1 in general business. Ten years from now, the accountant is working his ass off for $50-100K. The general business student will be a stockbroker making 5 times that amount. Now if the general business student graduates from Harvard or Yale, he can be a hedge fund manager making 100 times that.

The douchebag stockbroker only requires one other thing - a complete lack of ethics. The hedge fund manager requires the complete lack of ethics and a connection to other filthy rich people.

Datsun1500 wrote: It is tough to blame the rich AND say there are no jobs at the same time. Ask a poor guy for a job and see how well that goes. Wealthy people create jobs, poor people do not.

No. Individual people, rich or poor, do not create jobs. Demand for a good or service that requires people to do work creates jobs.

Jobs are created when the demand for a good/service rises above what the current force is capable of producing. Jobs are removed when the amount that can be produced is greater than demand. That can be accomplished by lowering demand, or increasing the amount of work that can be done by one person.

There is currently not as much demand for work as there is supply of people who want to do that work.

ditchdigger wrote:

MG_Bryan wrote: When you can no longer afford college, you should stop berkeleying going.

This statement is just another way of saying that only the wealthy/priveleged should be educated. The costs of a degree at even a community college are far in excess of what a student could earn in the few hours they have left between studying, sleeping and class. There is no way, unless a student is lucky enough to have a wealthy family that any person could afford a higher education.

I disagree. There are grants, scholarships, loans and yes, working full time and going to college part time. There are options, there are opportunities. I worked 50 hours a week while taking 13-15 credit hours a semester before I realized that A.) I don't want to be a band director, 2.) there won't be a job for me in that field in 5 years and iii.) I don't want to burn the candle at both ends going to college when I have no idea what I want to do with it.

MAny of my friends worked full time hours while taking classes to get through school. We all came from poor to lower working class backgrounds and we were doing it all on our own.

This bullE36 M3 theory that only rich kids can afford to go to college is just that, bullE36 M3. If you are not a lazy, self-centered, KID that believes the world owes them something, you can do it on your own.

I paid for college and graduate school with zero help from my parents. I recouped my costs within a few years of graduation, so it was worth it. Sure it would have been great to have my parents pay for it all. But life doesn't always work like that.

If you are funding the whole thing, you might want to plan a little. For example, an art history undergraduate degree is a luxury. It probably won't ever pay for itself. Is that fair? I don't know. Maybe you feel like that is the only degree you really want. I understand that. Maybe a new 911 Turbo is the only car I really want. I can't afford one, so I realigned my desires with my means. You have to do that sometimes.

Datsun1500 wrote: I disagree. Business are started by people. A successful businessman will end up creating jobs. Without the wealthy people or corporations that these people are protesting against, there would be less jobs.

So that gives them free reign to do as they want and write thier own rules?

If they don't know what they are protesting, how will they know when they get their demands??

Cone_Junky wrote:

Datsun1500 wrote: I disagree. Business are started by people. A successful businessman will end up creating jobs. Without the wealthy people or corporations that these people are protesting against, there would be less jobs.

So that gives them free reign to do as they want and write thier own rules?

Please show me exactly where and how this is happening? If corporations are really writing thier own rules why do we have so many overly burdensome regulations on business that is destroying these very corporations?

Destroying these very corporations? Which corporations are destroyed?

If you look at upper management, board, and CEO salaries they seem to be doing just fine.

Selling bad loans to other organizations is illegal. But apparently if you bundle them with one or two good loans it's perfectly OK...right? Seems to have worked out great for everyone.

I guess if we leave them completely unrestricted they will flourish and the middle class will have jobs growing on trees?

Do you really believe that regulations were designed to hurt (excuse me, destroy) business? Or do you think they were put in as safeties and checks and balances?

Who do you think writes the bills that go through Capital Hill? Do you really believe that the Senator/Congressman personally writes them? Nope, they are written by the highest paying lobbyist and then handed to them to put their name on and pass it.

oldsaw wrote: Seems more appropriate to protest on K Street if these people really want to make a statement against the system. Invoking a shutdown of a Smithsonian museum only serves to make look ever more uninformed and immature.

I know I am about 5 pages late to the party but I can't upvote this comment enough.

In those 5 pages was an article where a Conservative journalist admitted intentionally starting the "riot" like behavior at the Smithsonian.

Datsun1500 wrote:

Salanis wrote: No. Individual people, rich or poor, do not create jobs. Demand for a good or service that requires people to do work creates jobs.

I disagree. Business are started by people. A successful businessman will end up creating jobs. Without the wealthy people or corporations that these people are protesting against, there would be less jobs.

Yes funding a successful entrepreneur will (usually) generate jobs. Funding a big, established corporation will generate profit. I think a lot of what (sane) people are angry about is that big organizations have been getting special treatment because enough people have been sold on the idea that giving them money will create jobs. They got money, and they didn't create the jobs they said they would, because it doesn't help them. They're in business to make profit, not create jobs. Jobs are a side effect of expanding a business.

If your goal is to create more jobs, you're better off giving that funding to a middle class entrepreneur who wants to start or expand a small local business. Unfortunately those big banks who got big bailouts have decided it benefits them more to sit on that money than to take the risk of loaning it out.

Cone_Junky wrote: Destroying these very corporations? Which corporations are destroyed? If you look at upper management, board, and CEO salaries they seem to be doing just fine. Selling bad loans to other organizations is illegal. But apparently if you bundle them with one or two good loans it's perfectly OK...right? Seems to have worked out great for everyone. I guess if we leave them completely unrestricted they will flourish and the middle class will have jobs growing on trees? Do you really believe that regulations were designed to hurt (excuse me, destroy) business? Or do you think they were put in as safeties and checks and balances? Who do you think writes the bills that go through Capital Hill? Do you really believe that the Senator/Congressman personally writes them? Nope, they are written by the highest paying lobbyist and then handed to them to put their name on and pass it.

So the answer is no you can't show me exactly where and how all you can do is conjecture.

Destroying, not destroyed. Regulations cost businesses billions a year. I own a corp and if the EPA rules on CO2 based on their politically motivated junk science go through and stay I will have to close shop and lay off people. I'm just one example. You do realize that corporations can be as small as one person right? These same rules hurt large multinationals too. Thats why they pack up and leave to places more welcoming to business.

I don't care why they were put in I only care that the outcome hurts corporations and in turn the people who work for them.

Looks like the problem is with Congress and not the corporations. You do know you can always vote them out right?

So please show me where these corporate lobbyists are writing bills that cost them billions a year?

Which, of course, explains protesting the National Air and Space Museum.

Cone_Junky wrote: In those 5 pages was an article where a Conservative journalist admitted intentionally starting the "riot" like behavior at the Smithsonian.

Those poor idiots just couldn't help them selves could they? They just had to riot. Personal responsibility and self control were just too hard for them.