Obama’s Wage Hike For Federal Contractors Won’t Apply to Disabled Workers

[KharmaTrain]

86. This Is Amazing...

...I haven't visited DU much as of late and haven't posted in months as I've seen this place slide into absurdity and irrelevance. I expect this will be one of my last posts as my DU membership expires in a few days and I don't expect to be coming back here much. It's a shame since this place once provided a lot of valuable information and food for thought. Now it's flames, ignorance and intolerance.

That said, I'm related to someone who works in a sheltered workshop and is not unlike "Pat". 60 years ago these people would have been locked away in "hospitals" and left to rot. The workshop is just one facet of the lives in which they live among others with similar disabilities and work together to make their lives worth something.

As you most importantly point out, the workshop is non-profit and many of its "employees" are wards of the state. The work isn't steady as it's affected by the ups and down of the economy and whatever work they do is appreciated. My relative may not earn more than a couple thousand dollars a year, but it's as if she feels that she's contributed something...a part of the very big and generally ugly world that many handicapped and disabled people have to endure.

One last point...all of the people who are at that workshop are living on various forms of state and federal subsidies. Many of these subsidies have either dried up or been reduced in the past decade. If people want to be "outraged"...it should be directed at those who have championed the cutting of funding for the disabled.

Nuff said...not sure why I even posted this...