My Dad pumped shit for a living. I don't mean that figuratively, I mean that literally. He worked for the local sewage treatment plant. I didn't really see him that much, he worked second shift. So he was either going to work or at work by the time I got home. I will admit that it created some distance. So even after having lived with him for the better part of the last decade, we still aren't extremely close. However, here is what he did do for me. His good union job paid well enough that he was able to provide a house for me to live in, I had plenty of food to eat without having to rely on public assistance, and I had the clothes that I needed to be comfortable. Heck, He was even able to provide more than that, I had everything I wanted within reason. Sure there are things that I wanted that I didn't have, but that was just me being a child and not understanding that things cost money.
All of this was possible for a man who never went to college and only held one job in his entire life.
What I haven't mentioned is that during this time thanks to changes in the economy he slipped from being Middle Class, to Lower Middle Class, to now that he is retired and living off his pension and Social Security he is Near Poor.
Me on the other hand, I have never been able to escape retail. I started out with more advantages than my father had. I had two parents, instead of being the son of a single mother. I received a better education, actually having graduated from college. Then there is the massive new information technology, which makes finding a job so much easier. I am literally able to do a job search from home. Yet, somehow I am still trapped in the industry that I took a job in to temporarily cover my expenses while attending college.
What changed in this time... The wealthy ripped up the Social Contract. The idea that if you worked hard you would be taken care of. That you had dignity, and that your work was worth something. That when you were no longer able to work, you would be taken care of because you were worth something.
Expecting Corporations to take care of the people who work for them is like expecting your racist Republican uncle to not cause a scene at Thanksgiving. It's just not going to happen. So what can we do about it. The most obvious thing is take the Corporations out of the Social Contract.
Lets stop Means Testing for SNAP(Food Stamps) and other Welfare programs. Why do we even do this in the first place? I personally have lost Food Stamps because I made $3 over the limit. I didn't suddenly become able to afford food because of that massive increase in income. All Means Testing in that case did was make my life harder. Also if you want to bring up fraud, well it actually costs more to investigate Welfare fraud than actually gets paid out in fraudulent payments. We should award Food Stamps to everyone who applies based on household size. If Mitt Romney wants to apply and receive Food Stamps, fine, let him. As long as it means that the lady behind the register at McDonald's doesn't ever have to worry about hers.
Turn Social Security into a real retirement program. Raise the payouts and lower the age at which someone can receive it. The fact is that it should not pay out less than the poverty level. Also, getting people out of the workforce at 55 is a net benefit for society. My Dad who I mentioned before, I love the man, but he is full of wrong information, obsolete beliefs, and knowledge of how things used to work... but not how they are now. It is for the best that he isn't in the workforce and trying to do things in obsolete ways. Heck, I couldn't tell you how often I have older customers looking for VCRs and Typewriters... technology that is firmly dead.
Raise the Minimum Wage to a living wage. $15 is a good start. While you're at it, bake in a provision that employers have to increase employees wages by whatever they are making over the Minimum now. Because that is where the opposition to a Minimum Wage increase that I see now is coming from. It's people who resent years of hard work with minor increases of a period of decades, all that effort and loyalty. Being made meaningless by the Minimum Wage overtaking what they are earning and their wages not being increased as well. They feel like they worked hard to get that $10 more than Minimum that they get now, and it is nothing if a new hire gets exactly the same amount. While we're at it we need to eliminate the Tipped Minimum Wage. Make the Federal Minimum the absolute floor.
Make Post-Secondary Education free, and offer debt forgiveness to those who took out the massive loans necessary to get through College now. I personally owe $20,000 and have no way to ever repay it. For a degree that is useless. I was under the impression that a degree was the gateway to a decent job, Not just a way to become the most qualified Bookseller at Barnes and Nobel.
Put hard caps on executive pay. I don't care if it's done through Taxation or an actual Maximum Wage. As it is now, executive pay is out of control. It is sucking money out of the economy at an unfathomable rate. Money is a (somewhat) Finite Resource. When all of it goes to the guys at the top, there is less to pay those at the bottom.
Finally, Department of Labor regulations have saved my ass. They have kept me from working insanely long hours without any sort of break. We need to improve and expand what the Department of Labor regulates. Things from requiring employers to have 80% of their Employees as Full Time. Requiring employers to give all employees benefits. To a campaign about Wage Theft, and how working off the clock hurts the employee themselves and their fellow associates.
Well, I could keep going for hours, things are just so messed up for those at the bottom. However, at some point you have to say, this is enough for now and move on.