My thoughts:
If the corporate leaders really loved their country and didn't clearly value money much more they would have gladly made less to keep quality jobs, that had paid benefits, in our country and not shipped them overseas.
If our society really does value, respect and truly hold the helpers of society in high esteem like teachers, preachers, social workers et al, they would pay higher salaries to help ensure drawing more quality people to those professions. Instead its very clear that American society values being entertained much more. This is evidenced by the pay of the actor/actress or our NBA and NFL players. More puzzling is the comparison of lawyers and teachers. Teachers, have a specialized education like lawyers, they also have 7 yrs of education if they earn a master's degree; so why isn't the pay equal or comparable? Why isn't an educator's education valued the same as a lawyers? A teacher's contribution to society is less? An educator's profession is a complex practice, the same as law, which requires research (and educator's don't have para-legals do theirs) and there are good and bad teachers and lawyers--so why the huge pay differentiation? One can say people choose their profession, that's true, but why is one's pay lowered if they want to help society? Again, I try to rationalize this: If one gains a well-earned reputation of seedy, mean, cut-throat people through the years, like a lawyer, they are rewarded; again, they're paid more than any lowly helper-profession
Another area where our value of money is evident is our justice system. Our American justice system is one place that proves if you don't have money, you don't have the same opportunites in this country. So really, how can we make the claim for liberty and justice for ALL? Think: If a poor black kid gets in trouble, like the trouble OJ Simpson, a wealthy black man, was in that poor black kid would have been in prison for life so quickly his head would have spun. The poor, black or white, have no chance in hell to hire "the dream team."
If we are a kind, humanitarian nation who truly wants America/American people to be strong again why don't the wealthy want to help all Americans to ensure their neighbors have the same quality of life? They give to charities for tax breaks. It seems there are many wealthy people who look at the poor and give them the stereotypical "lazy" label.
America has soup kitchens but there are still people who are hungry right here and we continue go outside our country to feed others. There are people who need help rebuilding their weather stricken cities and towns right here and instead we go nation building overseas. This is a simple question: If a father loves and values his family would he feed others and help others before his own family? This makes no sense. The reason we do it is to keep relationships with others for oil or politics instead of trying to develop strength here. We never needed to be isolationists until now. Our country/family is broke.
If we truly valued education in this country we wouldn't condemn those who are educated and articulate, saying things such as "they are elitest", or "just a good speech giver", like many did when President Obama ran for the Presidency. Instead many said they liked the dumbed down ramblings of Sarah Palin. If we valued education, our schools would be a serious place for learning and simply not let in kids who are there to socialize and cause trouble and we would hold them accountable for their work. The schools have become a day care for society as it keeps less-than serious, trouble-making students coming to school where they personally have no intention of learning. I am an educator and I have been asked by my administration to raise students' grades from F's to D's---even when the student never, ever handed in one bit of work! Schools need federal funding and they won't receive any funds it their kids fail because they will have the label of a failing school. That is the biggest reason kids can't read or do math in senior high and why so many colleges require prerequisites...because the student never was held accountable and they never were a serious student.
We have such a tendency in this country to claim we are the greatest country--what once was true is no longer true. To be a great parent we have to take care of our family. Our country's "fathers" are not doing that. Often, people who make this claim never lived in Germany, or Sweden, or anywhere else and we still, with all of our faults, claim exceptionalism.
My prediction is that these revolutionary uprisings that we are seeing now in third-world countries will be seen in our country in 50 years---this divide, this lack of opportunity for those of us without money, this huge and growing pool of poor, this trend that 2% of the people have most of the money in this country, all of these things are crushing what we've called the middle class, in reality there isn't a middle class right now. Some of us have a bit of savings, most don't, most live paycheck to paycheck and on credit if lucky enough to have it--for now.
It seems to me we are on the path of revolution. What are our choices?
If the corporate leaders really loved their country and didn't clearly value money much more they would have gladly made less to keep quality jobs, that had paid benefits, in our country and not shipped them overseas.
If our society really does value, respect and truly hold the helpers of society in high esteem like teachers, preachers, social workers et al, they would pay higher salaries to help ensure drawing more quality people to those professions. Instead its very clear that American society values being entertained much more. This is evidenced by the pay of the actor/actress or our NBA and NFL players. More puzzling is the comparison of lawyers and teachers. Teachers, have a specialized education like lawyers, they also have 7 yrs of education if they earn a master's degree; so why isn't the pay equal or comparable? Why isn't an educator's education valued the same as a lawyers? A teacher's contribution to society is less? An educator's profession is a complex practice, the same as law, which requires research (and educator's don't have para-legals do theirs) and there are good and bad teachers and lawyers--so why the huge pay differentiation? One can say people choose their profession, that's true, but why is one's pay lowered if they want to help society? Again, I try to rationalize this: If one gains a well-earned reputation of seedy, mean, cut-throat people through the years, like a lawyer, they are rewarded; again, they're paid more than any lowly helper-profession
Another area where our value of money is evident is our justice system. Our American justice system is one place that proves if you don't have money, you don't have the same opportunites in this country. So really, how can we make the claim for liberty and justice for ALL? Think: If a poor black kid gets in trouble, like the trouble OJ Simpson, a wealthy black man, was in that poor black kid would have been in prison for life so quickly his head would have spun. The poor, black or white, have no chance in hell to hire "the dream team."
If we are a kind, humanitarian nation who truly wants America/American people to be strong again why don't the wealthy want to help all Americans to ensure their neighbors have the same quality of life? They give to charities for tax breaks. It seems there are many wealthy people who look at the poor and give them the stereotypical "lazy" label.
America has soup kitchens but there are still people who are hungry right here and we continue go outside our country to feed others. There are people who need help rebuilding their weather stricken cities and towns right here and instead we go nation building overseas. This is a simple question: If a father loves and values his family would he feed others and help others before his own family? This makes no sense. The reason we do it is to keep relationships with others for oil or politics instead of trying to develop strength here. We never needed to be isolationists until now. Our country/family is broke.
If we truly valued education in this country we wouldn't condemn those who are educated and articulate, saying things such as "they are elitest", or "just a good speech giver", like many did when President Obama ran for the Presidency. Instead many said they liked the dumbed down ramblings of Sarah Palin. If we valued education, our schools would be a serious place for learning and simply not let in kids who are there to socialize and cause trouble and we would hold them accountable for their work. The schools have become a day care for society as it keeps less-than serious, trouble-making students coming to school where they personally have no intention of learning. I am an educator and I have been asked by my administration to raise students' grades from F's to D's---even when the student never, ever handed in one bit of work! Schools need federal funding and they won't receive any funds it their kids fail because they will have the label of a failing school. That is the biggest reason kids can't read or do math in senior high and why so many colleges require prerequisites...because the student never was held accountable and they never were a serious student.
We have such a tendency in this country to claim we are the greatest country--what once was true is no longer true. To be a great parent we have to take care of our family. Our country's "fathers" are not doing that. Often, people who make this claim never lived in Germany, or Sweden, or anywhere else and we still, with all of our faults, claim exceptionalism.
My prediction is that these revolutionary uprisings that we are seeing now in third-world countries will be seen in our country in 50 years---this divide, this lack of opportunity for those of us without money, this huge and growing pool of poor, this trend that 2% of the people have most of the money in this country, all of these things are crushing what we've called the middle class, in reality there isn't a middle class right now. Some of us have a bit of savings, most don't, most live paycheck to paycheck and on credit if lucky enough to have it--for now.
It seems to me we are on the path of revolution. What are our choices?
.JPG)
AMEN!
ReplyDeleteI agree with you on the teachers being underpaid bit (at least some of them)...I can't wrap my mind around why we Americans value this occupation so little.
ReplyDelete