The New York Times has an article on the perils of part time work this morning. In short, employers expect people to be on call all of the time with very unpredictable hours. If you ask for more consistent hours, you might find your hours cut even further. Just go read it. It’s a nightmare.
Couple that with Obamacare. You HAVE to have an insurance policy or pay a penalty. But if you don’t have a consistent income from week to week, you don’t have the money to pay for the policy. And if you don’t make enough money, you don’t get a subsidy, as I found out earlier this year. So, to recap, the precariat worker is doubly screwed, triply screwed if they live in a state that doesn’t expand Medicaid.
So, to all of you lefties out there who just can’t understand why the working class is not enamored with the expensive, low coverage plans that they can’t afford anyway, wake up before it’s too late. This is a disaster in the making.
Stop blaming the victims for being insufficiently grateful.
Filed under: General |
The Confluence 
Ugh, Digby’s hating on Clinton, already, and pushing Warren, who hasn’t got a snowball’s chance in hell of winning the election.
And to think, I once thought she was smart; a coward but smart.
Do you think winning is everything? Therefore we must bow to the inevitable? Please clarify. Kos told his flock to support Hilary or GTFO. Are you saying something similar?
Know what? I think this time around, Kos should stfu. Seriously, it was Kos that forced us out of our tribe and then lead the social psychology storm troopers to quell dissent on the left. Did Kos support Florida and Michigan voters in 2008? Um, no. Was Kos a Hispanic leader defending the rights of primary voters who were locked out of Texas caucus sites? Um, no. Did he defend the little old ladies who were silenced in Kansas? How about the primary votes in nj that were handed over to Obama without do much as a “by your leave” by jon Corzine at the convention? Crickets from Kos. Silence from him on the fact that the only successful female candidate in the history of American politics was denied a legitimate role call vote at the convention.
His behavior was so egregious in 2008 but no one challenged him. Well, WE did but then his flying monkeys accused us of r@cism.
So, I’m sure that Kos now flatters himself as a man of principle by refraining from entering Arizona. But he sold those principles to the highest bidder in 2008 giving us a president who I am convinced will go down in history as the Nero of our country. In the process, he helped to invalidate the primary system. So, fuck Kos with a 2in diameter test tube brush.
He’s done enough damage. The best thing for democrats to do is to get the hell out of the way and let people have choices. Their determination to decide what is the best for us backfired stupendously in 2008.
Just stop tinkering with the election process. Most Democratic voters know who is going to work for them. They don’t need to be corralled like sheep.
That’s not my place.
See below.
Actually, see above.
Nestin’ is hard work:(
I think once the reality of Obama (Romney)-care hits home to union workers even the most dire of threats from headquarters won’t stop the members from voting republican .
One approach to the issue raised here -> http://righttobelazy.com/blog/2014/07/%E2%80%9Cthe-proletariat-is-dead-long-live-the-precariat%E2%80%9D-2/
I agree that a return to the guild system would be very useful for certain professions, especially for research and development workers. They have their degrees but these become less useful indicators of the overall professional as time goes on. Some BS level people gain enough experience to operate independently on projects while some PhDs never really develop past graduate school. So there should be some certification strategy that combined educational level with acquired skills and experience and that should be licensed or otherwise formalized with an appropriate pay schedule enforced by a guild or professional association.
Just because you can hire a PhD from China doesn’t mean that person wants to do mind numbingly boring routine work for a pittance and risk their immigration status when the shareholders feel like the dividend check is too small. It’s dehumanizing. Guilds can take us partially back to the stage where corporations have to consider the human being represented by the certification process. They are distinct entities that have intrinsic value.
The corresponding key would be for national legislators to forcefully compel corporations to hire from such guilds.
Unfortunately, I don’t expect my own association, the American chemical society to come to the defense of its members. It has been a collaborator from what I can tell. It is past time for researchers to step up and take this on.
Btw, I have long been an advocate of a guild system for R&D. I don’t think a union strategy is useful for research because of the nature of the work, its complexity and the internal drive to solve problems means that researchers must be free to pursue an idea unencumbered by rigid work rules.
But unions can be indispensable for other industries, such as education and manufacturing and they should be strengthened so that even the big box stores benefit from a workforce that can buy their goods.