
East End businesses that rely on seasonal immigrants to fill out their summer staffing needs fear that a proposed U.S. Department of Labor rule will require them to pay workers as much as double current wages, threatening many business’s financial viability or the quality of their services.
Earlier this year the department issued a rule that would boost by as much as 100 percent the wages that many seasonal workers in a variety of positions must be paid if they are brought to the U.S. by employers under the popular H-2B Seasonal Visa program. The increases varied depending on the type of work done, based on the results of a wage survey conducted by the labor department, but most required increases of at least 35 to 40 percent.
“It’s a bit crazy—pool companies are paying $9 and change now and the Department of Labor comes in and tells them they’re going to have to pay $18 an hour now and that’s not even counting overtime,” said Lissette Hildesheim, a Hampton Bays attorney who has represented a number of East End employers who have relied on H-2B workers for years. “This is going to really affect landscaping companies, pool companies, hotels—they rely on H-2B workers. Some of them will have to close if this becomes a rule.”
The H-2B Seasonal Visa allows employers to legally bring foreign workers to the U.S. to fill pre-arranged positions they cannot find Americans willing or able to do. The workers can stay in the U.S. for up to 10 months in most cases, after which they must return to their native country for at least two months before they can apply to return. Many East End hotels, pool service and landscaping companies have relied heavily on the H-2B workers for more than a decade to fill labor crews and as chambermaids. Business owners say that it is impossible to find Americans who are willing to do the hard manual labor of moving and planting trees or the menial tasks of maids and cleaning staff and that without the H-2B program many of them would be driven to turn to undocumented immigrants.
“The money is a big issue, but it’s not just how much more it would cost. There are not people here who can do the jobs,” said Fernando Bustamante, a Montauk landscaper who owns Warren’s Nursery in Water Mill. “If we have to pay $15, we will get people apply for jobs who cannot dig holes for trees. They can’t do this kind of work, there’s no way and then we’ll be stuck.”
The H-2B program requires that any jobs to be filled by immigrant workers first be advertised extensively in the U.S. to give Americans an opportunity. With unemployment in the U.S. and Long Island at nearly 10 percent, Ms. Hildesheim surmised that the Labor Department may be looking to make some H-2B jobs more attractive to Americans, at the expense of some small employers who may be stretched financially already.
“If you advertise $18 an hour for unskilled positions then, yeah, you’ll have Americans answer,” she said. “But our employers can’t afford to pay that much and stay in business. They will have to raise prices and they will lose customers.”
But U.S. Representative Tim Bishop said this week that the motivation for the labor department was not unemployment or reducing the number of immigrant laborers coming to the U.S. but a belief that H-2B workers are taken advantage of by employers. The view is a misplaced one, he said, at least locally. “Here on Long Island we have workers that return year after year and they are taken care of very well by their employers,” Congressman Bishop said. “In other parts of the country there may be some issue, but I can say that is decidedly not the case here.”
Mr. Bishop said he is considering sponsoring a bill that could nullify the new wage rules by cutting off the funding to enforce it.
The Department of Labor does not need any Congressional or legislative approval to implement the rule, though Congress could pass legislation countermanding the rule, as the Republican majority in the House of Representatives is currently attempting to do with several Environmental Protection Agency regulations.
The new wage structure was to go into effect on September 31. A group of employers, primarily large farm and sugar harvesting companies and a national hoteliers organization, filed a lawsuit earlier this month challenging the new wage requirement structure. Since then the Department of Labor has announced that it is delaying the implementation of the rule 60 days, until November 30, to hear objections to the new wages.
Employers who rely on H-2B workers have feared for the stability of their critical labor supply in the past. Political wrangling over broader immigration rules threatened to end the H-2B program altogether in recent years, before Mr. Bishop and other federal representatives from seasonal areas mounted a concerted push to secure the program.
Additionally, ...more many of these people will work their H-2B job and pick up something on the side that is not an H-2B job (like staff at a restaurant/bar) to bring in some extra cash. The idea that these people are filling jobs that are unfillable by americans is an absolute joke. It's just easier for these companies to plug in a bunch of 20-something foreign kids then go through piles of resumes and interviews for a wide range of American college aged kids. Plus, local kids either are well off and don't need menial summer employment, or get jobs doing something more lucrative then chamber maid jobs. People from up island who would be interested in a low paying job aren't great candidates because they would have to drive from say Shirley to East Hampton everyday - not going to happen.
Another interesting wrinkle that is left out of this article is the number of H-2B workers who stay in the country illegally after their 10 months are up. I've known a good number of them and many of them get married in order to obtain a green card. How is that any different than the other "illegal" problem we have?
And it is clear that most of you wingnuts comment without ...more first reading the freaking article!
What's better... 50 jobs at $12 / hr or zero at $18 / hr?
You really have no idea of what it takes to run a business. I read your post and wonder why those of us who take the risk ever hire people like you. We are not talking about huge firms here. We are talking about small businesses that can't afford doubling salaries. Unreal. ...more "Rules shifting towards the working people" yeah ok. When there is no profit there is no company. When there is no company there is no job. Welcome to the unemployment line. Hope the rules shift swiftly enough for ya.
But I want to be clear. You moved your goods to market on the roads the rest of us paid for. You hired workers the rest of us paid to educate. You were safe in your factory because of police forces and fire forces that the rest of us paid for. You didn’t have to worry that maurauding bands would come and seize everything at your factory, and hire someone to ...more protect against this, because of the work the rest of us did. Now look, you built a factory and it turned into something terrific, or a great idea — God bless. Keep a big hunk of it.
But part of the underlying social contract is you take a hunk of that and pay forward for the next kid who comes along."
Elizabeth Warren
All we're sayin' is you CAN'T #@&! everyone else to do it.
Just say it progressnow, legal American businesses are evil, and unchecked infiltration of our southern border by people who don't have the respect for this country and it's laws to get in line make your heart flutter.
Now go ahead and repeat the liberal lie about how those guys standing in front of a 7/11 are actually paying ...more taxes, paying for their own health care, and never taking advantage of taxpayer provided benefits.
In the last thirty years, taxes for the upper 10% have dropped like a stone, "middle class" salaries have remained stagnant, roughly 75% of all "trickle down" dollars trickled no further down than the top 10%, and to top it all off, the top 1% INCREASED how much of this country they own in the last four years, and have now exceeded the 40% mark, while most everyone else lost their shirt. In 2009, a ...more full 66% of our country took home 50k, or LESS.
The ensuing result via supply and demand, is that the supply of money is so great for so very few, that the price of everything from a bottle of milk, to a house has skyrocketed for everyone else.
Here's a toast to fiscal anarchy!!
Have you noticed you live in an Oligarchy?
Do you even really know what "Socialism" is?
The problem in this country is the devaluation of an honest day's labor. There is a difference between EARNING, and TAKING.
You want to know what I find "scary"?
Willful blindness.
As to the H2-B workers, they know what they're in for when they sign up, and there's a lot of them who are ...more happy to come to this great country, work their butts off and take the money offered them. Most of these jobs are entry level/manual labor positions that used to be filled by college kids in the Summer, until they got so weak , lazy and inflicted with a sense of entitlement that made them unfit for employment.
What a %^*%$# idiot.
In 2004 the "Job Creators" were given a "Corporate Tax Holiday", and brought money back to the States at 5%, instead of 35%.
What did they do?
They pocketed the money as salary, and bonuses, then proceeded to lay off thousands of people.
Trying to regulate the wrong folks again, aren't they?
The assumption that all small business owners out here are filthy rich is false.
You have property owners, who have either paid such a ridiculous amount of money for the place, they have to charge so much, OR they got it on the cheap years ago, and are TAKING stupid amounts of money from a small business owner, and comfortably lining their own pockets.
Folla' the dolla', and find the problems.
What a patriot."
..and yet philathome has no problem with illegal immigrants undercutting legal workers, do you phil?
You have no clue. Go to work.
Go to work.
Is that what you mean?
What characteristics would make a dish washer or check out person worth $18/hr?
Phil, you have no clue about me, economics, or what it takes to run a business. Your assumptions are so wrong that I check in for a good laugh. You never disappoint. So by your logic all jobs should start above $18/hr. That means a pizza would cost you $30. Your grocery bill would probably double. An ice cream cone would be $10. You conveniently forgot about the impact on payroll taxes.
You are angry because you have to work 2 jobs. Well ...more I work 14-15 hour days here and have to deal with a mountain of stress too. We have chosen these paths, nobody has put a gun to our heads. Deal with it or change it. Just don't expect to turn a $12/hr task into a $20/hr task. Show me the businessman who does that and I'll show you the business that won't last. You don't care though because you only see it through your eyes, the eyes that only see injustice and let you play the part of the victim. Until you learn to place a value on a task and see how it fits with what the market will pay for it I suggest you be quiet. You are talking about things that you clearly have no understanding of.
How about we build a giant K-Mart and put it on Main St Southampton?
What have you done or what do you do to contribute? Have you ever created a job? If not, why not? You seem to have all the answers so I'm sure whatever venture you create will be a major success. Please tell us how because we clearly don't get it.
If you are a department manager, you can expect to be paid $9.50 if you are ...more lucky. Maybe 20k a year to manage a retail department.
If you are an Assistant Store Manager, you can figure starting at more than doubling that amount of 20k to run a department, or more as time goes on.
That's a fair degree of disparity, eh?
Yeah, that's what I thought...
No self respecting geek touches one.
What have YOU done to "solve our problem"?
What is YOUR profession?
(I pray it's not economy professor or we are all doomed)
Yep, bs will not be going to "Occupy Wall St.".
Your claim that we can not afford the wages you ...more speak of somehow equals a lack of care or respect for our employees has zero merit. How do you know how anyone here operates or treats people? You don't.
Again I ask... what have you done and what will you do?
Ignore it again and I'll ask again.
Your ability to view things in such a simplistic nature never ceases to amaze me. There are times keeping it simple, is stupid.
Phil / Z / YesYes, tell me how and I will consider implementing your plan.
What is your plan?
Alvin Lee seemed to have a simple plan.
The employer doesn't get to arbitrarily decide what a certain task is worth. That is determined by the marketplace of the workforce being willing to participate at a given rate ...more just as the value of the product or service is determined by the competitive forces of supply and demand. If the employer must pay more for help then the employer must decide to pass on that expense to the customer or save elsewhere - possibly keeping a smaller share himself, possibly moving the business, possibly closing or maybe even running the business more efficiently.
Those are the challenges of business - why should the business owner expect the government to continue to disturb the balance
of supply and demand by artificially expanding the workforce at the expense of the unemployed?
My favorite approach is when they throw out the false accusation and continue to bring it up as if it became fact. It's a little funny.
Too much coffee today.
To the Socialist nitwits: What is a 'fair" wage for someone who pulls weeds and maintains gardens and roses? How much can a business charge for those services? Do some math and come back with a rational answer. While you're at it factor in unemployment taxes, SS withholdings, business liability insurance, equipment purchase and maintainance, vehicle insurance, vehicle payments , fuel, mortgage on a shop, advertising, MTA tax, income tax and payroll. ...more What wage is "fair" to both employer and employee?
Things that make you go, hmmmmmm...
Oh, I forgot, you don't look at the why.
I do continually try for you to see the big picture outside of your little warped bubble of space time, but you just don't seem to get it.
I don't want the "guvmint" to take care of me, but I would thoroughly enjoy seeing them take the responsibility due them when it comes to regulating, and actually ENFORCING the rules that are on the books. I work hard for a living. I always have. Summers since I was 14, and full time in the work ...more force since I was 20. I have paid my taxes, medicare, and social security for just over 18 years. I have contributed to financing this society, and it's social programs every single year of my working life.
I don't take lightly what has been done to our society, our economy, or our legislative and democratic process by the "elite". I find it abhorrent, distasteful, and a wholly unadulterated abuse of the freedom each and every one of us who busts our ass cherishes.
I have a challenge for you. Take some of your "winter off", and go to Liberty Square. Go to the "Occupy Wall St." protest. Get out of your warped bubble of space-time, and TALK to these college kids, and young adults who are at the core of it.
Providence forbid, you may learn something...
When you learn what a synonym is, the you have the right to tell me what to do when it comes to family.
Irascible fool.
Don't think things like that don't cross my mind, however...
Just false accusations and assumptions.
I employ 5 people PT wages ranging $13 - $17 per hour.
1 college student happy to have a flex sched
2 gents as second jobs in the evening happy to have a flex sched
2 moms working around school sched that I am sensitive to.
Of the 5, 4 like their work and are grateful. 1 of the moms is unhappy that she has to work, but she does a decent job.
I can't afford to pay FT salaries ...more w/ benefits and stay in business. I make about half of what I mad 4 years ago. Last year my personal salary was around $70k and my wife is working FT again.
Nothing would please me more to give these good people more money.
Right now I can't.
Philathome and Z see me as the problem and the bad guy. That's too bad. I think the people who work here are grateful to be employed. They do what they have to as do I. So I'm the bad guy and simple and whatever else you have to say. At the end of the day I have helped 5 people get by and you have don't nothing but complain and scream "injustice!"
You think 70k is a pittance? You make more than 2/3 of this country does right now. Do you know what I could do with 70k a year? With 140k I'd definitely own my own home. What is the most you have ever paid for a personal vehicle? Do you buy brand new? Do you clip coupons? What do you honestly, and creatively do to minimize every one of your personal expenses?
The working class has been abused for so long in this country, ...more that being "grateful" just to have a job is one of the whacked decisions they make nowadays.
I lease my vehicles - both small, good on gas, low payments. I'm sorry if that is offensive to you.
I own a home. A nice modest home that I purchased well before the explosion. I would not be able to afford my house if I were to buy it today. I'm sorry if you are offended by that too.
Again though, ...more I don't see how offering jobs and paying what I can makes me a the bad guy. If I was potting $250,000 / year and playing the same game then I'd be the bad guy. Painting everyone with that some broad brush makes you guys come across as angry, jealous and foolish.
I'm where I am because of an accident, and a medical disability. There was no safety net for me when things went south, I lost everything I spent ten years working for, and I was in school before "the explosion". I was born too late to avoid the consequences of "The Roaring 20's 2.0".
I never criticized what you pay your employees, I ...more did mention Sears Holdings in an above post, and I know very well that the problems that stop you from supplying a better wage are systemic. Look at the flatline middle class wages have been in the past thirty years, compared to the increase in cost of living for those same people. That's (the cost of living) mostly thanks to the upper 10% increasing their compensation well over 600% during the same time period. I will criticize the income disparity in this country, and those responsible for it. You take me the wrong way. The people responsible are not being prosecuted, nor are the laws being changed, or the key ones repealed reinstated. I also said above "Trying to regulate the wrong folks again, aren't they?"
All the checks and balances that kept our economy relatively stable for about forty years after the Depression were slowly, and at times CLANDESTINELY removed over the course of 18 years, and look what happened. '29 all over again, but this time the Treasury was raided to prop up the mess.
My problem is with those who TAKE more from society than they GIVE. If you aren't one of them, you're not the problem, and don't take offense.
It is my opinion that if they were those who did not live so avaristically, we would have no need for the charity they so magnanimously sponsor. Our family business did very well for fifty years, before Reagan was president, and our generation will not do better than the last. THAT is sad. I'm mad as it gets about what's been done, and so is the majority of Gen X.
A huge share of the nation's economic growth over the past 30 years has gone to the top one-hundredth of one percent, who now make an average of $27 million per household. The average income for the bottom 90 percent of us? $31,244. Since when has asking the better off to pay an extra 4% or the same rate they payed under Clinton become such an awful sin? Have you folks heard of the phrase "paying it forward"?
You have republicans proposing cuts to FEMA, education, the EPA, medicare and social security while fighting against any tax rate increase on the rich? They won't even end the billions of dollars in subsidies to big oil while every day more and more Americans slide into poverty. Right now today, in this country, 35% of all African American children live below the poverty level as do 31% of all Latino kids and 12% of all white kids. You want to talk about class warfare?
And do you want to know who pays NO income tax? According to the Atlantic 7,000 Millionaires Paid No Income Taxes in 2011. Who else did not pay income tax? Those making UNDER $39,000.00 These are facts. Period. The effective corporate tax rate is between 13% and 18% and many huge corporations pay nothing. Zero.
As far as the wealthy being the country's job creators - where's the proof? Ten years of Bush tax cuts and the incomes of the wealthy and the largest corporations have steadily increased while their taxes and the number of hires have steadily declined. Again, fact.
There is a class warfare in America and it is being waged against the middle class and poor. I post this to present the opposing view to the overwhelmingly far-right majority of posters on these boards and because facts are facts.
Regarding the topic, I hope this economy turns around soon. As a business owner I can honestly tell you that giving someone a raise is a wonderful ...more feeling. Letting someone go is an absolutely horrible feeling.
But, "We" need to fight for it.
See you at "Occupy Wall St.".
I'll have the sign that says: End "de pecuniae" segregation!
And, yes, that's copyrighted in a body of work. Maybe someday it will be worth a few bucks in some textbooks somewhere.
Phil: I am not complaining about the costs associated with doing business in NY State, the info is provided to you to help when you come up with a wage that's fair to both the employer and employee, still waiting . My people get a $1 raise at the start of each season and a few bonuses along the way. Next year they'll be making $20 ...more per hour. Got a problem with that?
"Inequality is like cholesterol. I mean, you have good inequality, that would an inequality which would lead people to take risks, to actually work harder, to study more in order to make more money. But there is also bad inequality, that's an inequality which actually cements the acquired position, which doesn't let poor people acquire education if they don't have money and so on."
"We all know what inequality in ...more wealth and income means when it comes to political clout. And for weathering economic adversity. And for the kind of lifelong head start or hold back that can be given to offspring. The effects are gigantic and extend everywhere. In more economically equal societies, as British epidemiologists Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett point out in their new book, The Spirit Level: Why Greater Equality Makes Societies Stronger, people do better on every metric, much better, whether it’s drug addiction, teen pregnancies, homicide or life-span."
From United for a Fair Economy:
"Okay, so we’ve got income inequality. But, why is that so bad? Well, let’s take a look at what inequality has led to:
People in more unequal societies live shorter lives. The United States is number 50 out of 222 in the world in terms of life expectancy.
Children in more unequal societies do worse in school. Out of 34 OECD countries, we are 14th in reading skills, 17th in science, and 25th in math.
More people are imprisoned in an unequal society. We have the highest incarceration rates in the world as well as the most people in prisons.
People in more unequal societies are more likely to experience mental illness. In 2003, 17-29% of Americans suffered with mental illness.
More children die in infancy in unequal societies. We are number 176 of all 222 countries.
Obesity is more common is unequal societies. Obesity rates in the United States are the highest of all OECD countries.
Teenage mothers are more common in unequal societies. Teenage pregnancy rates in the United States are the highest of all fully-industrialized nations.
It seems extreme income inequality is a pretty precarious position, and it has already made for some devastating results. It’s time to take a stand before it gets even worse."
Yes, income inequality has always been a part of American life (worst now than at any time, including the great depression) and every single American has the right to work and earn as much as they can. I am not interested in punishing success, however, I am also not interested in punishing the poor. Basic economics, if you do not have people with enough money to buy goods, then those who create the goods will also suffer.
Ever growing income inequality is a real threat to the very fabric of American democracy. The fact that some of us believe this, and others of us don't is at the heart of the struggles currently facing this country and others around the world.
As Mayor Bloomberg said just the other day, “We have a lot of kids graduating college, can’t find jobs,” Mr. Bloomberg said on his weekly radio show. “That’s what happened in Cairo. That’s what happened in Madrid. You don’t want those kinds of riots here.”
All the things you specified are avoided in a better balanced society, by education, and circumstance. These countries do exist. The fiscal anarchy, self entitlement, ego, avarice, and luxury of the few would no longer batter those who they could not run a business without into poverty. We need more small business, and less corporate chains. Most corporate retail workers, could use a union. However, they (the corporotocracy) usually find a way to put a stop to organization. ...more They'd have to cut their salaries at the top, if they didn't.
Earning is one thing, taking is another. All the chain stores, that give minimum wage salaries, and crappy benefits, are hurting people, to line their own pockets.
If you don't believe me about the "evil corporations", look into "dead peasant insurance". That should tell you what these people think of the rest of us.
Isthmus engineering is a prime example.
Fifteen million a year in revenue, and all the employees have equal say regarding compensation.
You are the minority. You need to realize that.
Over 2/3 of this country netted less than 50k per annum in the fiscal year 2009. That 66% split 25% of the nation's income. 12.5% of the population at the "top end" of our society, split just over 45% of the income. That's not earning, that's taking far too much, and it is some of the root of what destabilized our economy. Someday, you may see just how shortsighted you are, but I'm not holding my breath.
The 2010 data is not yet available, but I'm very sure it will tell an interesting tale.
Just the members of the corporate board do.
Millions would have died, that didn't thanks to Salk not taking a dime. In your world, they wouldn't have afforded it.
So If I risked everything to own my business according to you if I am successful you believe I should redistribute my wealth to all my employees.
What did they risk? Did they ...more put their home up for collateral? Did they sign their name on large bank notes promising to repay so I could make payroll and feed your family? No
Nope. You wouldn't have.
Res ipsa loquitur.
TARP passed, the people be d****d.
This illusion of "Big Government", covers up recklessness, special interests, lobbyists, and all the things that defile democracy.
Freedom, taken too far, is anarchy.
Now, "Occupy Wall St." is a "leftist" organization.
What's next? Dubbing Alan Greenspan the next Jesus Christ?
Declaration of the Occupation of New York City
Posted on September 30, 2011 by NYCGA
This document was accepted by the NYC General Assembly on september 29, 2011
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
As we gather together in solidarity to express a feeling of mass injustice, we must not lose sight of what brought us together. We write so that all people who feel wronged by the corporate forces of the world ...more can know that we are your allies.
As one people, united, we acknowledge the reality: that the future of the human race requires the cooperation of its members; that our system must protect our rights, and upon corruption of that system, it is up to the individuals to protect their own rights, and those of their neighbors; that a democratic government derives its just power from the people, but corporations do not seek consent to extract wealth from the people and the Earth; and that no true democracy is attainable when the process is determined by economic power. We come to you at a time when corporations, which place profit over people, self-interest over justice, and oppression over equality, run our governments. We have peaceably assembled here, as is our right, to let these facts be known.
They have taken our houses through an illegal foreclosure process, despite not having the original mortgage.
They have taken bailouts from taxpayers with impunity, and continue to give Executives exorbitant bonuses.
They have perpetuated inequality and discrimination in the workplace based on age, the color of one’s skin, sex, gender identity and sexual orientation.
They have poisoned the food supply through negligence, and undermined the farming system through monopolization.
They have profited off of the torture, confinement, and cruel treatment of countless animals, and actively hide these practices.
They have continuously sought to strip employees of the right to negotiate for better pay and safer working conditions.
They have held students hostage with tens of thousands of dollars of debt on education, which is itself a human right.
They have consistently outsourced labor and used that outsourcing as leverage to cut workers’ healthcare and pay.
They have influenced the courts to achieve the same rights as people, with none of the culpability or responsibility.
They have spent millions of dollars on legal teams that look for ways to get them out of contracts in regards to health insurance.
They have sold our privacy as a commodity.
They have used the military and police force to prevent freedom of the press. They have deliberately declined to recall faulty products endangering lives in pursuit of profit.
They determine economic policy, despite the catastrophic failures their policies have produced and continue to produce.
They have donated large sums of money to politicians, who are responsible for regulating them.
They continue to block alternate forms of energy to keep us dependent on oil.
They continue to block generic forms of medicine that could save people’s lives or provide relief in order to protect investments that have already turned a substantial profit.
They have purposely covered up oil spills, accidents, faulty bookkeeping, and inactive ingredients in pursuit of profit.
They purposefully keep people misinformed and fearful through their control of the media.
They have accepted private contracts to murder prisoners even when presented with serious doubts about their guilt.
They have perpetuated colonialism at home and abroad. They have participated in the torture and murder of innocent civilians overseas.
They continue to create weapons of mass destruction in order to receive government contracts. *
To the people of the world,
We, the New York City General Assembly occupying Wall Street in Liberty Square, urge you to assert your power.
Exercise your right to peaceably assemble; occupy public space; create a process to address the problems we face, and generate solutions accessible to everyone.
To all communities that take action and form groups in the spirit of direct democracy, we offer support, documentation, and all of the resources at our disposal.
Join us and make your voices heard!
*These grievances are not all-inclusive.
Google "We are the 99%", and read the 41 pages and counting of real people, with real lives, which have been ruined by how our society has been run into the ground.
WE ARE THE 99%.
However, the man in question has been observed to be anti-semitic, and his speeches tell the tale. He's no Bhudda...
Photo with 167 notes
I am 62 years old. I have worked honestly and hard my whole life (since I was 14) because that is how you “realize The American Dream.”
I was a home builder and designer.
In 1980, the “Savings & Loan Crisis” forced me out of work and out of business. (the government helped the banks survive…) I slowly rebuilt my life and business.
In 2007, the “Sub-Prime Mortgage Crisis” ...more crushed me again. I lost my business, my home, my wife and my belief in that American Dream. (the government saved the banks again…)
WE ARE THE 99%
Higher education is a bubble, run by the same kind of people who control our banks, our homes, our health. My mother came to this country believing it was the only place where one’s hard work and education could allow you to transcend the bonds of race, gender, socioeconomic class.
I am about to receive my Ph.D. in a technical science from an Ivy League school. I earned scholarships and worked two full-time jobs in college to get here. I have worked ...more on research and taught classes for six years on a stipend that would qualify me for welfare. There are NO jobs waiting for me when I get my doctoral degree. Despite working for the past six years, my university files graduate labor under a tax code that prevents me from applying for unemployment and that saves the university unforetold in tax breaks. Because the school is a private institution, we graduate students are unable to unionize, despite the fact that we provide a significant amount of the teaching and research labor that makes this school $$.
EDUCATION IS NOT A PRIVILEGE but in this country it is held captive as such.
I went to graduate school believing that there might be some financial security afforded by a higher degree, and that with that security I could finally buy my mom her own house and take care of her. Instead, I have wasted six years of my life and am about to enter a job market that will tell me that I am overeducated and overqualified. I will no longer be able to help my mom pay for health insurance, and I will no longer have my own. I pray for our good health because that’s pretty much all we will have left.
i am the 99%
And multiple handwriting styles?
I'd hope the admins are more careful than that...
Hardly.
Our current crises are due to the policies of Alan Greenspan, and his disciples. The same Alan Greenspan who looked over Charles Keating's books, and found nothing wrong.
Dude, I don't know how old you are, and don't take this the wrong way, but you have alot left to learn. As do I.
But, none of us know everything.
I thumbed a great book about tomatoes a while back, part of which focused on Florida, and the equivalent of modern day slavery on the farms which produce them there.
What they try to do with something like this is legislate personal responsibility, to those who take none. What it often does in the long run, is harm those who do.
If the cost of living here were not so exorbitant, we may be able to fall in line with this ...more piece of legislation. However, due to the astronomical cost of everything, a business owner requires a larger income to reside here, which leaves less for their employees paychecks. While it may be feasible eslewhere, it is not in this locale.
As usual, we can blame the usual suspects.
Mea culpa. I forgot that the Press annihilates any post that cites internet competition for the readers' attention, no matter how relevant.
I was censored for naming the website to which you referred wherein people post anecdotal accounts of their own misfortune at the hands of the money-lenders. I questioned whether the anonymous blogger whom you mention actually wrote 33 pages of false stories. That would be hundreds of stories (and photographs) and the majority ...more of those posted. Sounds like a porky to me.
There is only one cause of the current economic catastrophe, that is the creation and manipulation of the real estate bubble by Wall Street investment banks. Instead of arguing about who is entitled to the crumbs their con has left on the table, we should be focusing on preventing another monumental fraud. After all, this is the third time in a decade that they have run the same game on us and emerged unpunished (tech bubble, commodities bubble, real estate.)
Since the US population has been flensed financially by their previous schemes and is out-of-money, they now appear to be trying to sell our infrastructure to foreigners. Governor Rendell of Pennsylvania peddled the Pennsylvania Turnpike to an Abu Dhabi sovereign wealth fund (unsuccessfully, thank god), a deal born in Wall Street.
It included FULL IMMUNITY from present, or future prosecution.
Could you provide a cite? I can't find the proposal. Was it granted? Moreover, there is currently a petition drive ongoing to stop Congress from agreeing the the US AG's request for immunity for Wall Street for uninvestigated crimes, suggesting that any immunity, if granted, was less than total.
A generic Republican now holds a 6 point advantage over Obama in a hypothetical 2012 match-up for the week ending Sunday, Oct. 2
The latest Rasmussen national survey of Likely U.S. Voters finds the generic Republican earning 47% support, while the president picks up only 41% of the vote. Read My Lips No New Taxes! Now enjoy the rest of your afternoon.
Not even Rome.
Obama's biggest mistake, well, one of them, was enlisting the people who MADE the mess to occupy posts in his cabinet.
EPIC FAIL.
"Growth, for the sake of growth, is the ideology of a cancer cell."
~ Edward Abbey
Y'know, his photo reminds me of someone...
That has to be one of the MOST blatantly ignorant statements I have ever heard, ignorant on a level that is staggering in the information age. And, I DO have a top ten.
6th October 2011
Photo with 70 notes
"I am a 28 year old MENSA member with a B.S. in physics. My wife served her term in the Air Force honorably. I have marketable skills and experience as a scientist, a web developer, and a business analyst. I am (fortunately) employed. We do not own HD TVs, expensive automobiles, use cable ...more TV, or indulge in other ‘dumb spending’. We are $80,000 in debt, plus our mortgage which we can barely pay. I cannot afford new shoes and am missing several teeth from lack of affordable dental care.
We are the 99%. Denial of our plight is a salve for your psyche allowing you to believe it could not happen to you. You too, are the 99%. Join us."
You definitely are not a MENSA candidate yourself, that much is abundantly clear.
What's the next Act?
He can work in a restaurant kitchen, he can do a farm job, he can work at a garden center or supermarket loading and unloading (he's a big kid). He'll take minimum wage.
None of this is new; in fact, the act is all getting a bit tiresome. But what particularly amused me is the president’s imperiousness.
In an interview I saw after the speech Michael Reagan said if his father was alive he would be telling obama, Mr President, there you go again.
Matt Taibbi | October 6, 7:51 AM ET
"Robert, you've been duped.
The bubble was not caused by any effort to put people into homes. It was caused by the unregulated derivatives market. Once banks figured out they could sell junk subprime loans as AAA-rated investments, nobody had to force them to sell mortgages to poor people. They were lining up to give those mortgages away because they knew a) they weren't going to hold ...more them for more than 10 minutes, and b) they knew they could sell them to CalPERS and Dutch trade unions as AAA-rated securities for massive profits.
Did millions of people buy more house than they could afford? Absolutely. But a lot of them were encouraged to by everyone in the banking system, right up to Alan Greenspan. They were told to buy adjustable-rate mortgages, and that if their payments went up, they could either sell the house or refinance, no problem.
They should have known better, definitely, but that credit isn't even available minus the massive fraud scheme."