Rich folks have forgotten that when inequity gets really bad…

Rich folks have forgotten that when inequity gets really bad, and more and more of society are arbitrarily disadvantaged, financially and otherwise, it is only a matter of time before the poor people rise up and cut off the rich people’s heads

So, there seems to be a worker shortage afflicting our societies here in North America. There are help wanted signs out all over the place and some folks are saying that people just don’t want to work anymore. What I think’s happening here is that the working poor – that’s most of the jobs that can’t be filled – have discovered that if they’re gonna be poor anyway, what’s the point in working. You have to remember that if you’re on social assistance, you’re poor, but you’ve usually got some type of government benefits and things really aren’t a whole lot worse than if you’re out there slogging away for minimum wage or something slightly above.

Truth of the matter is that I could write, ad nauseum, about pretty much the same thing every week – and maybe should until some of you people actually understand what’s going on here….there is massive inequity in our societies….there are a bunch of people in our societies who are doing extremely well…there are a bunch more people who are just doing well – and then there’s the whole rest of the population who are really and truly struggling to eke out a living in the capitalist system – and are not doing very well at it.

Most of us, and likely most of the people who might read this, live in a type of economic bubble. I live a comfortable life, as do most of the people who surround me in life….so if I’m not careful, I can easily forget about the legions of people who are not in my social strata – as the sociologists tend to say. And most of us need reminding on a fairly regular basis that we live pretty privileged lives in our world, but most people do not. Please remember that capitalism is sort of like a giant pyramid scheme…and for centuries and centuries wealth has been flowing toward the top. It’s the natural way of things…water always flows down and money always flows up. That’s why the whole idea of “trickle down economics” was a wildly stupid and insane way to try to run our economy. In fact, it should be fairly obvious that it was a plot deliberately hatched by those wealthy criminals who somehow control our societies. And we just lined up and voted for it like the obedient sheeple we are.

And, of course, the biggest mystery about all of this is that it is the middle classes that have supported the system that has bankrupted them to the benefit of the really rich. We have voted in successive governments, both right and left, that have ridiculously skewed our tax systems to the point where the really rich are getting pretty much a free ride, the poor pay very little, and the so-called middle class is holding up the whole system. It’s totally unsustainable. Rich folks have forgotten that when inequity gets really bad, and more and more of society are arbitrarily disadvantaged, financially and otherwise, it is only a matter of time before the poor people rise up and cut off the rich people’s heads. That’s also the way of the world. The only reason it hasn’t happened yet is because the rich people have let us take cruises and buy golf memberships and eat lobster just enough to convince enough of us that our lives are not entirely hopeless….oh, forgot lotteries. George Orwell would be quite pleased to know we’ve given our poor and middle class folks lotteries, along with that faint hope for success.

I sort of feel an obligation to write about this every week…..until more people get it. The reason I feel this obligation is because I seem to have been born with a larger-than-usual social conscience. I’m not worried about myself when I write these diatribes – indeed, my wife and I were just talking yesterday about how bad we feel about the world we are leaving to our children and grandchildren and future generations beyond – or even Keith Richards for that matter.

We need to somehow fix things, people. The old adage that the world is shrinking is so totally true these days. We are constantly in each other’s faces and in each other’s business, meaning it’s more important than ever that we start working together to create a better, safer and more secure planet for all to live on. And that’s only going to happen if or when we decide to make a real effort to share the resources of our world with everyone on it. And learn to respect all life.