It's high time that American workers are allowed to play by the same set of rules as the rest of the world. Please don't tell me that I have to compete whith the slave labor of a ten year old child or a political prisoner while at the same time you tell me how many millions of dollars of value the CEO's and bankers add to our economy.
This time of the year that there’s a lot of talk about football with all of the college bowls being played and the NFL ramping up to the Super Bowl. There’s also been a lot of talk recently about the general decline of our economy and whether or not there is such a thing as a jobless recovery. The politicians and pundits seem more than happy to talk all the way around the real issue. They’ll talk about stimulus plans, banker bailouts, and job training. They’ll even talk about the latest Wall Street scandal or the most recent Ponzi scheme, but the one thing they never want to talk about are the rules we, as Americans, are forced to play by.
There will be a lot of football games played over the next few weekends and interestingly enough in every one of those games both teams will be required to play by the same rules. One team will not be allowed to field twice as many players as the other. There will not be a ‘no touch’ rule for one teams’ quarterback while the other is sacked at will, and one team will not be given twice as many points every time they score a touchdown. How much fun would it be to watch the Rose Bowl if the two teams played by a lopsided set of rules? That’s crazy you say, of course they play by the same set of rules, it’s only fair. Your response may seem reasonable to you but how about we have this debate on national television and in the newspaper, where upon I shout you down and call you a ‘protectionist’. Don’t you know that you are only being ‘anti competitive’ and destroying your own teams’ chances of winning by demanding ‘special treatment’? Of course my team should be allowed to play by a different set of rules.
With my argument for separate rules being applied to opposing football teams I would be rightly banned from ESPN and branded a lunatic. But the fact is the American worker has been subjected to the same defective argument with devastating economic and social consequences. American manufacturers are told they must submit to a host of environmental, worker safety, wage, and quality-control laws while their counterparts compete unshackled by the same restrictions. This is not to say that these rules do not have their place. It is common knowledge that much of the environment in China and the rest of the third world has been made unlivable by corporate and state polluters. It’s reported that half of the drinking water in China is contaminated. I think most of us are aware of the abuses and even slave-labor conditions that are necessary to produce the developing nations’ pool of ‘competitive’ labor, that many of our political and business leaders are so fond of and constantly lecturing us to be more like.
The fact is these politicians, pundits, and so-called business leaders want the American people to play by a different set of rules then the rest of the world. When we suggest that maybe we shouldn’t be expected to compete with slave labor the CEO’s making tens if not hundreds of millions of dollars are happy to explain how greedy we are for asking for a living wage. All of this nonsense about Americans not being competitive enough, or smart enough, or skilled enough, or any one of the hundred or so other condescending monikers that the corporate mouthpieces wish to attach to the American worker are just another way of saying that what they really want is a rigged game and we should all be happy playing by our different set of rules.
Happy New Year
twocanpete