Homeless in America

[Anna B 1,414]

Yes I do have first hand knowledge of these people working of job sites, tools have been stolen from my brother in laws site that they wouldn't know how to use anyhow , as for jobs being taken over by new techonology, sounds like you just realised it,, where've you been for the past few years

 

Of course I haven't just realised it. It's been going on since the Luddites started wrecking looms, but it is gathering pace and I honestly think we are going to witness mass unemployment on an unprecedented scale in our lifetime.

And I can't see a way back, if the only way to get the money needed to live is to work, (and there is no work) then the result will be starvation.

 

We tolerate starvation in Africa (a quarter of the world's children go hungry - not because of a shortage of food but because they can't afford to buy it.) I wonder how we will feel when it's us that's doing the starving.

[Rupert_Baehr 10]

... I think the idea that 'there's loads of work' sounds a bit unlikely in a recession. The impression I got was that these people would do any work rather than live in poverty, but the work isn't there and if it was it didn't pay enough to live on.

 

There may not be work for everybody - but there certainly is work - and well-paid work, too though some of it is unpleasant and it isn't always 'on your doorstep'.

 

I have a friend aged 55 who lived in Michigan. He recently lost his job and couldn't find a job which paid much above minimum wage, so he's gone to Minot SD. (Why not Minot? - Freezin's the reason.) The climate (particularly at this time of the year) is harsh. There is a considerable amount of oil exploration going on there and there are jobs going. Hard work in a challenging climate - but well-paid work.

 

Nagel said (some weeks ago on another thread) that oil companies are crying out for skilled people - they can't get them. It appears that either people lack the skills, or lack the motivation. "I don't want to work there because it's uncomfortable/it takes me away from home/ it's too much like hard work/it's dangerous and I might get hurt - (insert your own reason.)"

 

Then there are the companies which complain that they can't get people with the skills they want in the local markets, so they have to import them from elsewhere. If the people in the developed world won't obtain the skills and qualifications necessary for the hi-tech jobs, then others will and will come in and take those jobs too.

 

As jobs disappear because of outsourcing to countries with lower pay there is no way western countries with much higher standards of living can compete. Do we really want a race to the bottom?

 

The unskilled and low-skilled jobs go first. We've known that was going to happen for at least the last 50 years. Developed countries can't compete with countries which have lower pay in unskilled work, but they certainly can compete in high-skilled areas and indeed, have a head start. Why do we not have a pool of highly-skilled well-trained people ready to take the hi-tech jobs? Are there no schools in the UK? It appears that 40% or more of the people who leave school are unemployable.

 

Harleyman says education and qualifications is the answer but tell that to the thousands of graduates in Britain who can't get a job, neither is any profession a safe bet, teaching jobs may go as children are educated by computer, policing replaced with surveilance cameras, shopping is done online, even surgeons can be replaced with robots. Who knows what will be left in the future?

 

What degrees do those thousands of unemployed graduates have? Forty years ago if you had a 2-2 in almost any subject. you would have little difficulty in getting a job. Then again, 40 years ago the 'top 5%' (plus a few others) went to university.

 

Nowadays, you don't even need 'A' levels to get on some courses. Standards have fallen . A few years ago Mandelson said: "Too many people are failing to complete degree courses. We should make the courses easier."

 

I doubt many potential employers would agree with him.

 

Standards haven't fallen everywhere, but they have done in enough places to make employers aware that merely having a 'degree' is not an indication that an individual is potentially suitable as an employee.

 

Can computers assess a student, can they consider the student's reasoning and provide advice and guidance? - AI is nowhere near that good

 

Do the surveillance cameras analyse the data they capture?

 

Do you really think robots can (or would be allowed to) operate on people unsupervised?

 

Shopping is done online, computers order stock for shops (though they don't always get it right ). Automation and mechanisation have reduced costs - which mean that more people are able to buy hi-tech products nowadays. Forty years ago, few people in te UK had colour TVs - they were very expensive. Thirty years ago few people had computers. Both items are now ubiquitous. Indeed, if you haven't got a colour TV in the UK nowadays, you're classed as being 'deprived'.

 

Mass unemployment seems to be the future overtaking the west. We need to start thinking about ways of sharing the wealth before we become the new third world.

 

Or perhaps we need to start thinking about what qualifications and skills we need to do the jobs before the third world beat us to them.

Edited February 15, 2012 by Rupert_Baehr

[Anna B 1,414]

It's interesting that the same people who insist that British 'scroungers' 'don't want to work' because they get generous benefits, use the same argument about unemployed Americans who 'don't want to work,' but get next to no benefits at all.

 

A flawed argument surely?

[alternageek 10]

It's interesting that the same people who insist that British 'scroungers' 'don't want to work' because they get generous benefits, use the same argument about unemployed Americans who 'don't want to work,' but get next to no benefits at all.

 

A flawed argument surely?

 

Because its easy to blame the poor and unemployed. Theyre leeches, dont you know?

 

Job searching is soul crushing, its worse here imo than it was in the States. It takes a lot to sit in front of some stranger trying to sell yourself and prove that your good enough. When your self esteem has been destroyed and the press and the government constantly reminds you that youre not good enough, it does a number on you.

 

In the US, 9 times of out ten the work I did there was one interview and then a phone call the next day to say if you did or didnt get the job. Here its a series of interviews, jumping through hoops and if youre lucky a phone call back (more than likely, not) Though when you do land work, as long as you do your job well and last a year, your job is your job..

 

Though depending on WHERE you live in the US, is depending on your workers rights. Florida, for example, is a right to work state - which means they can fire you at the drop of a pin and unemployment can be denied. No severance, no 'signing on', nadda. In a poor market and no access to assistance, its a big reason why people are losing their homes and savings...

[*_ash_* 88]

It's interesting that the same people who insist that British 'scroungers' 'don't want to work' because they get generous benefits, use the same argument about unemployed Americans who 'don't want to work,' but get next to no benefits at all.

 

A flawed argument surely?

 

There's no argument to be flawed. Your sentence doesn't make sense.

[Rupert_Baehr 10]

 

Though depending on WHERE you live in the US, is depending on your workers rights. Florida, for example, is a right to work state - which means they can fire you at the drop of a pin and unemployment can be denied. No severance, no 'signing on', nadda. In a poor market and no access to assistance, its a big reason why people are losing their homes and savings...

 

 

I'M not sure how you arrived at that interpretation of 'Right to Work'.

 

Here's what the Florida 'Right to Work' law says:

 

"Fla. Const. Article 1, § 6

§ 6. Right to Work

 

The right of persons to work shall not be denied or abridged on account of membership or non-membership in any labor union or labor organization. The right of employees, by and through a labor organization, to bargain collectively shall not be denied or abridged. Public employees shall not have the right to strike. (Constitution Amended by General Election, 1944; Revised by General Election November 5, 1968 )"

[911wasalie 10]

It seems to me some young-uns think that getting a degree is the final step when in fact it's just a good start. The USA is a third world country and it's like that because the children get molly - cuddled and quite often think the world owes them a living " because I'm an American " Drivers have to slow down to a crawl while 16 year olds get out of a school bus because the poor dears can't walk across the road on their own.

 

If these degrees are so wonderful why don't they give the recipients the tools to start their own business.

 

I've lived in the USA for 18 years and life is good if you have money but probably the worst country in the world if you haven't.

[chem1st 10]

Quite sad to watch.

 

Here is a link to some pictures of 'obamaville' a tent city in NJ. The state officials sent in a demolition crew and destroyed their community sleep shed (which had heating facilities), that the community had installed to provide a safe place for people to sleep through the winter, and to avoid the fires that occur when people try to heat their tents in the freezing cold and avoid death by hypothermia.

 

http://www.businessinsider.com/lakewood-new-jersey-homeless-tent-city-2011-9?op=1

 

And they seek to demolish housing in many places!

 

http://news.firedoglake.com/2011/10/13/the-new-america-home-demolition-rises-as-solution-to-housing-crisis/

 

I’d rather see a community garden than a blighted property. And if the banks are paying for the demolitions, at least it’s better than refusing to pay for the upkeep of a vacant home. But this is an action rooted in total failure. As Matt Yglesias shows, housing starts are down massively, far more than they were elevated during the bubble years. Construction companies and developers aren’t building new homes, but this is not because we’ve had some huge decay in the population. It’s because people cannot afford new homes, because their wages have fallen and they’ve lost their jobs. The answer to this is not to artificially prop up the housing market by reducing supply through demolition, it’s to improve the economy, pay people more and get demand to a level that stabilizes the market.

 

For you see, it is better for a minority at the top to force houseprices up by demolishing homes and to inflict poverty upon the poor than it is to allow fellow citizens access to the land of their nation state.

For then you can extract all the surplus value of these peoples labour whilst they live the most basic of lifestyles.

 

Over here we are a bit more sophisticated about it.

 

So to attract people into the army, we prioritise them for housing and land access by paying them allowances and giving them favourable mortgages, bumping them up the 'social housing' list. They are rewarded by their masters for protecting the interests of their masters. And the masters aren't giving much up, they are artificially increasing the price of their own assets.

 

The message to the poor is; Got to get a job, go and get a job. Work for your local landowner. He is having difficulty hiring, your not entitled to use that idle plot of land as an allotment, heavin forbid you actually construct your own slum housing upon it!

 

What we need is tax breaks for these land owners, so that they can create jobs.

Edited February 15, 2012 by chem1st

[buck 11]

For all the other yanks out there, you can watch the BBC program on Youtube

 

The chick narrarating the program has the strangest accent. A weird mixture of British and American.

 

The only problem I have with shows like these is that they need to show everything. They really leave out the parts that would make these stories make sense.

 

The mom in the motel who was crying she couldn't afford to get her child's hair cut? Take him down to the local beauty college. My sister in law always took her son and my son down there and the students buzzed their little heads into Bart Simpson type haircuts for free every summer. The students were thrilled to have someone to practice on and the haircuts were so short, virtually nothing could go wrong.

I remember Panorama from my days in Britain many years ago. It apparently hasn't changed much. Full of half truths and downright lies. Funny thing about British shows or jornalism is that they tell you everything that is wrong about America, while totally ignoring the same things happening in Britain.

[Sierra 22]

I remember Panorama from my days in Britain many years ago. It apparently hasn't changed much. Full of half truths and downright lies. Funny thing about British shows or jornalism is that they tell you everything that is wrong about America, while totally ignoring the same things happening in Britain.

 

You know buck, it's not so much that they lied, it's just that they didn't tell the truth. They left out pieces of information that would have fleshed out the story and made more sense. The man with the hernia who needed surgery? They made it seem like he had to pay for his operation, up front. Which wasn't the case at all, as I explained upthread.

 

Of course, it wouldn't have been so shocking then.

[alternageek 10]

I'M not sure how you arrived at that interpretation of 'Right to Work'.

 

Here's what the Florida 'Right to Work' law says:

 

"Fla. Const. Article 1, § 6

§ 6. Right to Work

 

The right of persons to work shall not be denied or abridged on account of membership or non-membership in any labor union or labor organization. The right of employees, by and through a labor organization, to bargain collectively shall not be denied or abridged. Public employees shall not have the right to strike. (Constitution Amended by General Election, 1944; Revised by General Election November 5, 1968 )"

 

I'm going on what my mother has told me as a resident of Florida and recently was fired from her job for no reason.

 

I was also wrongfully fired from a job in NYS and was denied Unemployment. Luckily I was able to take the company to a hearing and won my case. Though NYS is not a right to work state

 

Unemployment CAN be denied if you have been fired from work. Unlike here there is no dole in the US.

Edited February 15, 2012 by alternageek

[Sierra 22]

I'm going on what my mother has told me as a resident of Florida and recently was fired from her job for no reason.

 

I was also wrongfully fired from a job in NYS and was denied Unemployment. Luckily I was able to take the company to a hearing and won my case. Though NYS is not a right to work state

 

Unemployment CAN be denied if you have been fired from work. Unlike here there is no dole in the US.

 

Many years ago, my husband was denied unemployment after being fired. Why I don't know, except that his boss was just being a jerk. Not only was he denied, they were trying to make him repay what he did get. At the time, it was only about $200, but we were both 20 years old and panic stricken because we didn't have it.

 

A sympathetic clerk at the unemployment office said never mind. He told my husband the demand for repayment would get 'lost'. And it did. Nelson Muntz ha HA!

 

Those were the days!