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• Monday, December 1, 2008 07:39 PM

  Andrew - you've got to save us

  You make a great point about the downward spiral of smart saving consumers. They should be smart, because the government is saving the country club crowd, not them. Never blame the businesses or their pattern of destruction. Andrew, you've got to get on talk shows and speak out out this. Journalists are not asking tough questions.

  But what no one seems to be talking about in the bailouts and any stimulus is homegrown jobs. The auto manufacturers beg for money holding the economy hostage to their stupidity and what will they do with it? Layoff workers here and build factories and hire cheap engineers overseas. With our "stimulus" or "bailout" money.

  Meanwhile, the car companies claim they have to restructure pension agreements, but don't talk about existing restructuring executive retirement agreements. Those are contracts just as the pensions are contracts with the line workers. But we don't talk about demanding restucturing of drug benefits, annual payouts, and benefits of existing retired executives and board members, just the line labor. Funny. An executive of Verizon came out and said they have to pay on pensions and deal with labor unions and its not sucking them under, so why do we take the explanation from the car companies that it is all labor unions fault, basically, without question.

  Obama mentions spending on health records - the computer and tech companies salivate - but their workers have been offshored so much and others are on contract with H1B visas. Meanwhile, tech workers that are over 40 or going back to school fresh with their "re-education" for smart jobs cannot get jobs. They advertise for workers only as a curtesy to some govt rule, then they hire exclusively from other countries or build in other countries saying we lack the talent here.

  But using your logic, why should our students major in technology when companies layoff and send jobs elsewhere? If the students are smart like smart consumers, the trend is to avoid technology jobs, there is no future in it. We have laws against abuse, but no company is ever prosecuted. Ever. Ever.

  Here is an interesting article on how stimulus plans & conditions of employment are not being linked.

  http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/08_49/b4111000652752.htm?chan=magazine+channel_top+stories

  —CindyLu Read CindyLu's other letters
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