Say good bye to the middle class!

[Tim4319]

Now with the overtime pay laws combined with outsourcing of jobs, a huge wedge is being driven between the upper class and lower class, pretty much eliminating the middle class. This is sick!

-Snip-

Estimates of how many workers will lose their overtime eligibility range from 107,000 to 6 million. Workers who could become newly eligible range from very few to 1.3 million.

-Snip-

About 1.3 million workers, mostly low- and mid level managers at stores and restaurants, who earn less than $23,660 a year will be newly eligible. However, employers can avoid paying them overtime by raising their salaries, so critics say far fewer will benefit from overtime.



http://www.cnn.com/2004/US/08/22/overtime.pay.ap/index.html

[SoCalDem]

1. It was my understanding too.. that if they are "consulted"

in hiring or firing...or put in a "managerial" situation, they are not eligible..


"Hey Bob, can you lock up for me tonight.. Here are the keys..Thanks, pal".....


or

"Susan, what do you think about that girl who just filled out an application? Do you think she would fit in here"??


Those two people, just became "managerial"...

It won't matter soon, anyway, since unions are almopst toothless, and owners/managers have the power to manipulate the hours so that people won't be ABLE to even work 40 hours.. Benefits usually don't kick in until 35 or so...and lots of bosses deliberately hold people just under the threshhold so they don't have to pay benefits..

The new middle class will involve 2 or 3 so-so jobs, and maybe 5 hours of sleep a night..No family time..

Pretty grim...

[CanIgonow]

2. We are all caught in this "free enterprise" system in which your

labor is going to be free and the guy with the enterprise is going to pocket the profits by the truckload.

[freetobegay]

3. What I don't understand is

They say this will cut down on law suits, they gacve an example of Wallmart. These people are already supose to be protected! So how will this cut down on the lawsuits?

They say the law is to complicated to understand, I think the law is pretty simple, if you work over 40 hours in a work week you get paid overtime. Whats there to not understand?

[SoCalDem]

6. It just means that your boss can work you 60 one week

and 20 the next..and not have to pay you extra.. Bosses can now schedule more "effectively"....emaning that employees are like kleenex.. totally disposable..

[Nimrod]

4. This makes me ill

I hung up the phone on a long-time friend last night when she tried to deny the new overtime laws were *'s doing (don't know how the Democrats are responsible for this, but apparently they are). I'm used to her being a rather mindless parrot of her right-wing fiance but until last night I was able to put up with it.

Seriously, this makes me so steaming mad that I'm starting to see anyone who votes Repuke as sticking their hand in my pocket. I'm aware that's not the least bit rational, but that's the way it is.

[Tim4319]

13. I hope this doesn't ruin your friendship.

I know rumors of this have been floating around since George Bush has taken office. I can even recall signing an on-line petition to fight this. Also, I remember hearing someone speak-out against this on television too.

[onebigbadwulf]

5. Living a comfortable life, able to afford a family...

2 weeks of paid vacation...
happiness...
security...

It's all over-rated.

I prefer a world where the rich are guarded from the poor by metal gates and guards with machine guns.

I prefer a world where the poor kill and steal from each other to feed their starving children.

That's the America I want!

[SoCalDem]

7. Brazil... That's where we are headed..

I heard a piece on the radio that said that the rich are SOOOO more rich ...and the poor are soooooo poor, that some of them have started using helicopters, because of carjacking and kidnapping...and they live in guarded complexes..afraid to even go to the places they claim to love.

We are already there in some communities.. Lots of big houses in gated/guarded communities, but no PEOPLE to be seen...

[iconoclastic cat]

14. Not just the country Brazil, but the movie, too...

Only without the sweet dreams.

[onebigbadwulf]

16. I was thinking more like columbia

but yup you're right!

I tell all libertarians - you want to see what happens with a libertarian government? See columbia.

[CanIgonow]

8. This is what the Third World nations are like.Bush and his pals in

the multinational corporations want to convert the US into another Third World country where people like us will be begging for jobs and so can be controlled by the big wheels.If any country becomes too uncontrollable, they will send their jobs someplace else.If things are bad for us wait until our children start looking for work.

[wildmanj]

9. the middle class

don't always get what they wish for but they almost always get what they deserve----who said it made no difference which party one votes for--not to overlook that dems and repugs are now wings of the same BIRD OF PREY--ever larger corporations

[REP]

10. Middle Class Has Been Gone For a Long, Long Time

Remember the Preppie craze of the '80s, with the world of private schools and county clubs? Guess what? *That* is what's left of the middle class. There used to be a lot of people who lived that way. It was pretty much gone when I was born, 40 years ago.

It's more accurate to say goodbye to upper-lower-class, and hello to poverty for all.

[wolfgirl]

11. It's worse...

Change a person's job title and voila, no raise, no overtime, more work & responsibility...but you still are doing the same hard/low paying tasks.

[Paradise]

12. That is their plan!

Eliminate the middle class! The poor are consumed with survival and, therefore, incapable of interfering with their master plan!

[Deja Q]

15. I wonder how my repubie coworker feels... and a rant on *.

She thinks * isn't responsible for everything that happens. :eyes:

(yet * does nothing, has supported the outsourcing and outright INSULTED American workers in the process...)

* is a traitor to the working class the day he openly insulted them. How dare a leader say this about his own people! He's no better than the fascists and dictators he wants to overthrow because he wants to be the only one on the block!

[AG78]

17. The middle class

isn't normal. It's the exception to human history. Hell, it's the exception to this country.