at the unemployment office today there was a job posting ....

[madrchsod]

from the forge shop i worked at in the 70`s. the shop went from 12 hammers in the 70`s to 2 in 2008.
the job was the same one i did in the 70`s where i was paid piece rate that averaged 9-12 dollars per hour. the pay they were offering was the same...

in 30 plus years the wages in the steel forging industry has never gone up.

it`s america grand....

[JuniperLea]

1. I saw a news story on striking EMT's this morning...

The woman they interviewed made $9.45 an hour... I was floored. These people risk their lives rushing around in traffic to help seriously injured and ill people, and they are paid under $10 an hour. How much do you suppose that ride in the ambulance costs the people they pick up? Someone is bankrolling... this is sick.

[Poll_Blind]

2. I was JUST talking to my girlfriend about this and she said the SAME thing.

EMT's are getting fucked over. I mean, shit, an ambulance ride costs at least $1,000...You're right, someone is making out like a bandit on that deal.

PB

[JuniperLea]

5. I can see the greasy fat cat sitting behind his desk now...

No, sitting on a pool deck... smoking a stinky cigar... smacking his underpaid Latina maid on the ass... and laughing. EW! No matter who this person is banking on the hard work of other people, this is how I will think of him... or her. Bastards.

[lpbk2713]

3. And a gallon of gasoline was about 1/10th the price it is today under BushCo.

If anyone ever votes (R) again they should be institutionalized.

[Warpy]

4. That's been the pattern in most jobs

because salaries never did rise to keep pace with the massive inflation of the 70s and haven't risen much since. Only with nearly full employment during the last 2 years of Clinton's last term did wages budge upwards, and they've since been pushed down again in many job classifications.

The few paper raises that people have gotten have been eaten up by increased health care premiums even before they get into the employee's hand to be alloted to inflating fuel, food, and housing costs.

This is why the average family has so much debt to service. Debt is the only thing that has kept the consumer economy going for the past 30 years.

With no way to leverage new debt, families will find themselves below subsistence as they spend everything to service debt with only pennies left over for essentials like food, transportation to work, and clothing.

If you want to know where depressions come from, follow the debt. When people are forced to accumulate too much of it due to being stiffed on wages, they just stop buying. When the consumer market collapses, THAT is a depression.

[dmallind]

6. Which is doubtless the reason they even have two hammers now. NT

[Andy823]

7. I live in rural Washington state

The main source of jobs is agriculture, apples, pears, cherries, and other fruits. When I go out of high school back in 1969 I went to work driving tractor during apple harvest. The pickers were getting 8 to 10 dollars per bin of fruit, about 800 lbs. Six years ago they were getting about the same price, maybe a couple of dollars more if they were lucky. There were always plenty of workers from Mexico to do the work, and they would work for far less money so the growers got richer, and wages stayed the same for pickers. The last few years most of the illegals that work the crops have gone to the city to work in construction. This has caused as shortage that has raised the prices for a bin of apples up to around 14 dollars. As long as the big orchards, many owned by huge corporations now days, could get away with it, they kept the wages the same year after year.

The same goes for many other jobs, he wages have either not gone up, or very little in the last 5 years. Washington state has a minimum wage law, which helps, but it's still only around $7.50 an hour. With the high cost of gas, food, and everything else that a person needs to survive, it's been really hard for many to make a living.