Complacency

Does nobody care anymore?  Has the world today really devolved into so many myopic slices of egocentricity, where far too few can be moved to give a shit beyond their own tiny, relative, complacent existences?  That's what I see more and more from where I sit.  People getting comfortable and losing perspective, forgetting the millions and millions of those who aren't.  And just not caring to even give them a moment's consideration. 

 

The other night I had a discussion which at some point degenerated into an argument with two acquaintances who happen to be republicans.   I don't even remember the beginning.  It was the end that upset me so.  We had gotten onto the subject of taxes and I was hearing the familiar refrain of "why should the rich have to pay a higher percentage than the poor," etc.  And then they actually told me that they could see no relationship whatsoever between the corporate fatcats making millions of dollars and the minimum wage workers they employ.  Those minimum wage workers have options.  They aren't forced to work for that company for wages that they can barely live on.  So it is perfectly OK to raise their taxes to a rate equal to that of the wealthy, reducing their income below that required for basic subsistence, and the wealthy should bear no social nor moral responsibility whatsoever in making up the difference.  So we push a few thousand more Americans into literal starvation, so a few more can buy another boat, but hey.  That's capitalism.  They have options.  It was when I realized that these people arguing with me were being glib, flip, even just playing devil's advocate at times and laughing at my passion that I ended the discussion.  This stuff isn't funny.  It's real life.  It means something to me. 

 

The people these two hecklers insist have options are the very foundation of our economy.  None of our big businesses can exist without products and services produced and provided at the lowest cost therefore the highest profit.  Somehow profits keep going up, the cost of living keeps going up.  Wages don't.  Someone has to make up the difference.  As long as companies aren't willing to take care of their own, the taxpayers have to.  Those who are already living at the poverty line can't pay more taxes.  They just can't.  How can people of good conscience ask them to?

 

It goes beyond taxes.  I don't profess to be an expert on fiscal matters.  It all seems pretty common sense, really.  In my opinion, it all boils down to greed.  People are greedy.  Corporations are greedy.  I worked for one of the world's largest communications companies.  I went to quarterly meetings.  I tried to cheer and be excited as we heard about yet another quarter of record sales – sales I made.  But that's tough to do when I'm barely paying my bills, and from one year to the next my income went down 5,000 dollars because they restructured their commission payouts.  My hourly rate went up, a little, not as much as inflation, but my annual income literally went down, significantly, because they decided to pay less for the people who were on their front lines, dealing with their irate customers, selling their products, the very lifeline of their business.  Their annual income?  Record high, of course.  I'm afraid I don't see how that's fair.

 

You have full-time employees of the world's largest retailer being encouraged by their managers to rely on public assistance for their healthcare because they simply aren't paid enough to afford their own company healthplan.  And if they complain, they're fired.  Unionize to better their positions?  Fired.  These folks are a dime a dozen and they're told as much from the get-go.  They are individuals who do not matter to society until they inevitably become a burden to society.  Then society has plenty to say.   

 

It happens everywhere, everyday.  Retail.  Manufacturing.  Telecommunications.  Hospitality.  Wage-laborers, though vitally important, get the shit end of the capitalist stick.  And someone else bitches about having to provide their healthcare, or food stamps, or pay more in taxes.  Greed.  And I'm sick, tired, weary of it. 

 

Why do I have to care so much?  This is more than some after-dinner sporting event to me.  More than a chance to throw around statistics in a pissing contest, a chance to see who's smartest, who can outwit who.  This isn't some debate club for the pushing-30 who didn't make the real debate club – arm-chair politicking.  These things keep me up at night.  They break my heart.  I look at the world around me and don't recognize it.  I wonder how things got this bad.  I wonder why other people can't or won't see it.  I cry.  Oh, man, do I cry.  I wish someone, or something, would just fix it all.  Make everything right.  I wish someone would give me all the answers instead of so many troubling questions