Robert F. Kennedy challenges Gross Domestic Product
copyright © 2010 Betsy L. Angert. BeThink.org
On this, another Labor Day the average American finds him or herself underemployed, and over worked. People see the prospects of unemployment in the rearview mirror and through their front windows. Loss of jobs appears just around the bend. Today, might we ponder the fruits of our labor?
In 2010, the twenty-first century, Americans have few dreams. The future seems dire. Most of us already receive less in benefits. Further reductions are on the horizon. The common folk face greater wage cuts, coupled with the threat of layoffs. Indeed, a substantial number of citizens claim unemployment. Those without papers who share this status are not even counted. People who have been out of work for so long do not qualify for any relief. Certainly, these laborers are not calculated into government statistics.
Yet, these innumerable individuals are also at a loss. Quality jobs do not exist anymore. Proud people sweat and toil or did; still, their lives are torn asunder. In September 2010, most Americans are economic slaves to masters of industry and a system that starves the “little people.” This need not be.
True; Presidents and policymakers talk about change. They give the public some sense of hope. We, the everyday people, believe, only to find ourselves once again immersed in the status quo.
Americans, of every political persuasion may find fault with Legislators and those who live larger than most of us can imagine. Yet, were we to be honest with ourselves we might acknowledge, Chief Executives, Congress, and the Commander-In-Chief are not the problem. Nor are these the solution. Change cannot be commanded, commissioned, or controlled by another. Evolution does not rise from sources outside us. We must do the work if we are to reap the authentic rewards.
When we do not work for ourselves, we see all that is this September 6, 2010. Our reality will be our children’s fate and our grandchildren’s future. Robert F. Kennedy understood this veracity forty-two years ago. He spoke to the past as prologue.
"Too much and for too long, we seemed to have surrendered personal excellence and community values in the mere accumulation of material things. Our Gross National Product, now, is over $800 million dollars a year, but that Gross National Product- if we judge the United States of America by that- that Gross National Product counts air pollution and cigarette advertising, and ambulances to clear our highways of carnage. It counts special locks for our doors and the jails for the people who break them. It counts the destruction of the redwood and the loss of our natural wonder in chaotic sprawl. It counts napalm and counts nuclear warheads and armored cars for the police to fight the riots in our cities. It counts Whitman's rifle and Speck's knife, and the television programs , which glorify violence in order to sell toys to our children.
Yet, the gross national product does not allow for the health of our children, the quality of their education, or the joy of their play. It does not include the beauty of our poetry or the strength of our marriages; the intelligence of our public debate or the integrity of our public officials. It measures neither our wit nor our courage; neither our wisdom nor our learning; neither our compassion nor our devotion to country; it measures everything in short, except that which makes life worthwhile. And it can tell us everything about America except why we are proud that we are Americans.”
If we choose to do as we have done, we will achieve as we had in the past. Laborers, let us reflect, and then should we choose, organize as corporate Chieftains and the esteemed elite have. Let us not work against ourselves or just for wages. Let us labor for us.
Resources and reference for reality . . .