Tag Archives: no unions

Current job opportunities in the wasteland of a “Bain Capitalized America”

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via motherjones:

“By the end of the work day I’m exhausted and dirty…Back at the Labor Ready office, I have to wait nearly 30 minutes to receive my check. The job paid $8 an hour—minimum wage. For five hours of labor, I get $37.34 after taxes. I am not paid, however, for the four hours on call, or the time spent in transit to and from the job site, or waiting to get paid. None of this meets the legal definition of wage theft, but it sure feels like it.”

“Everyone Only Wants Temps,” in which our reporter signs up with this economy’s employer of last resort.

Related: America before Bain Capital: Ampad in Marion, Indiana 

Why Teaparty ideology is killing our country: the next generation

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“There’s now a generation of young workers who are in danger of being permanently sidetracked in the labor markets and disconnected from society. Research shows that the long-term unemployed tend to be depressed, suffer greater health problems and even have shorter life expectancy. The youth unemployment rate is now 24%, compared with the overall rate of 9.1%. If and when these young people return to work, they’ll earn 20% less over the next 15 to 20 years than peers who were employed. That increases the wealth divide that is one of the root causes of growing political populism in our country.” — What U.S. Economic Recovery? Five Destructive Myths – TIME

Meanwhile, the Republicans are fighting for tax cuts for the wealthy, at the same time that the wealthy have so much money that the luxury goods market is currently ‘zooming’.

Here’s TIME’s five destructive myths, with partial info from the article on two that seem to be the ones that the teahadists are constantly insisting will ‘save’ us):

  1. This is a temporary blip, and then it’s full steam ahead
  2. We can buy our way out of all this
  3. The private sector will make it all better: There is a fundamental disconnect between the fortunes of American companies, which are doing quite well, and American workers, most of whom are earning a lower hourly wage now than they did during the recession. The thing is, companies make plenty of money; they just don’t spend it on workers here…
  4. We’ll pack up and move for new jobs
  5. Entrepreneurs are the foundation of the economy: Entrepreneurship is still one of America’s great strengths, right? Wrong. Rates of new-business creation have been contracting since the 1980s. Funny enough, that’s just when the financial sector began to get a lot bigger. The two trends are not disconnected. A study by the Kauffman Foundation found an inverse correlation between the two. The explanation could be tied to the fact that the financial sector has sucked up so much talent that might have otherwise done something useful in Silicon Valley or in other entrepreneurial hubs…

Read it all…