General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsThe Game is Rigged! A rigged game is helping this virus
This didn't hit me in the face until I started working about 6 years ago.
I was fortunate enough to go to college for finance on scholarships, get a job in my field, and eventually become self employed. I didn't get my first job until I graduated from college. I'm in my 20s and my mother is in her mid 50s. My mother has always worked paycheck-to-paycheck and still does to this day.
I used to be of that "survival of the fittest" mentality because my section of the finance industry was cutthroat. You either get on board or get left behind. At my old (and first) job, it was completely zero-sum. In order for me to get ahead, I had to bring other people down. Fortunately for me, I am no longer of that mentality. I'm saying this to say that is how the entire economy works, which I'm sure is no surprise to anyone. The people with the most amount of power to change that have no incentive to do so because it works for them. That's what keeps them on top, to have everyone fighting for the scraps that they "trickle down."
That brings me to my mother. My mother informed me last night that one of her coworkers tested positive for COVID. My mom and the rest of the staff at her job were required to get tested about 2 weeks ago. My mother tested negative, thankfully. This coworker had been absent that day so that coworker did not get tested. However, this coworker that about sick about a month ago and was out for about 2 weeks. The coworker eventually came back to work with a doctor's note, as management required him to do. However, the coworker's doctor did not test him for the virus (which I assume management didn't know that) but he got tested, on site, where they worked. They found that he was positive for COVID, but this was after he had been back to work for about 2 weeks. My mother works in the kitchen at a nursing facility. The infected coworker had been around my mother, in the facility's kitchen, around other facility staff and all other the building over the course of 2 weeks.
On one end, I want to place blame on that employee, but at the same time, I completely understood why this person would go back to work. They are given an impossible choice. The company that runs the food services there offers:
1) Shitty pay (between $9 to $14 an hour)
2) Max 35 hour weeks, with no overtime opportunity
3) No paid time off other than 2 weeks vacation time
4) No health benefit at all
This person has no other real options, other than go to work so that they can afford to live. The job doesn't want to pay decently, wants to cap any opportunity to make extra money, and offer no health benefits... and this is a large company. I'm told that they're going to shut everything down for 2 weeks (without pay) and have all employees tested for COVID again. It's possible my mother could have gotten infected, and additionally, may be out of a job because of it.
It's things like this that will keep this virus spreading. A rigged game is helping this virus.
Newest Reality
(12,712 posts)I appreciate your anecdote and the recounting of your experience.
It seems to me that we don't want to go back to normal after this. No way. Even though I have issues with using the word normal too much, (it is vague, nostalgic, statistical, etc.) we may want to get on board with moving forward as the progressives say.
One way or another, there is a growing list of what could be called unsustainable modes of existence and business. Currently, we see that we, the workers, the citizens, the people, are not going to be sustained by what has been considered "normal". No not at all. I would say abnormal is a far better descriptor.
We may need to use different terms regarding what we want our collective future to be and drop the rather conservative idea of "getting back to". That's now one of the casualties of this crises and nostalgia will not help us in a rapidly changing word that faces many new and evolving crisis we must accept, embrace and do our best to meet and contend with in a more reasonable, constructive and creative way.
In other words, some good could eventually come of all this if we are able to frame it properly and use this crisis to create a collective will and vision, (not ideological or utopian) about a balanced and sane way to remain as a species on this planet and to survive in sustainable ways. There is a lot on the line and the motivations to do so are screaming out at us, so it is not a matter of mere belief or opinion, it is plain as day for open eyes.
2naSalit
(86,572 posts)It's showing us, in stark detail, all the ugly things wrong with our society.
Brainfodder
(6,423 posts)PatSeg
(47,418 posts)Change is inevitable and apparently the virus is accelerating it where humans have failed. The virus is a great equalizer. It doesn't care about race, nationality, occupation, or economic status, everyone is fair game.
Under The Radar
(3,401 posts)Our society has embedded stories, fairytales, fables, mythical and biblical rules of behavior into our young heads all with the same theme of work hard, never give up, honesty always pays, fight temptation, and never question authority. All in the name of Democracy, freedom, liberty, equal justice, the Grace if God and free market capitalism. Those rules are for good boys, the Boy Scouts. It is all bullshit. All feel good stuff, until you learn that those rules were not written by the good guys. They dont apply to the top, the ones that dont have to follow the rules.
It wasnt as obvious as it is today, likely because We are here to serve they very few and now with the most brash of them at the top, they dont even care it hide it anymore.
In It to Win It
(8,243 posts)"work hard, never give up, honesty always pays, fight temptation, and never question authority"... all that is to build wealth for someone else. I came to that conclusion after about 6 months at working at my first job.
My old boss was an asshole. I always got the feeling that he felt the employees should shut up and be thankful that they have a job and getting something. He explicitly said that but he treated everyone as if that was the case.
Under The Radar
(3,401 posts)....but boy, did Andy Griffith get it wrong.
We gotta teach our kids today that Christianity doesnt apply to money and that it may be true that honesty always pays, it just doesnt pay very much