Sometimes I feel sorry for the cons being duped by their corner of the one percent media and this is one of those moments. On some level, whether they’ll admit it or not (they won’t), they know COVID is real…and they’re concerned. They recognize the danger from the virus and want protection. You know how I know? Ivermectin. Hydroxychloroquine. Ingesting disinfectants. Black lights up their asses. They KEEP trying to find remedies but because conservative media sees conservative contrarianism as the truth, the light, and the way, cons are discouraged in said media from taking the one preventative that actually prevents the worst outcomes.
Sometimes, though, I don’t feel one bit sorry for them. Have you heard about the people being “fired” for their refusal to get vaccinated? Quick question, aren’t they quitting? They’re CHOOSING not to follow company policy. Isn’t that quitting?
“Hey,” the manager tells you, “shift starts at 8.”
“No way man, I’ll see you at 10.”
“Don’t bother…”
Did you get fired? I think you quit. I don’t think you should get any of those beautiful unemployment checks you think makes life so sweet, either.
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So, where the heck ARE all the workers? Yeah, I know. If you’re a con, they’re all at home living the good cushy life on that phat unemployment check. In the real world, though, people still have bills to pay and the unemployment augmentations have mostly ceased. I don’t think the old unemployment rates are enough to get the job done – the reason the augmentations were required in the first place. I hear economists saying people are quitting their jobs in droves. They even have a name for it, ‘The Great Resignation.’ Employees are moving on to greener pastures – but that requires better jobs to move to, right? Here’s one possible contributing factor.
When Covid-19 first reared it’s ugly head, the corrupt Dumbass applied his usual dumbass pseudo-skills to the problem. He tried to bad-mouth the virus into submission. When that didn’t work, he gave up and allowed Covid-19 to gain a solid foothold that started killing Americans at an alarming rate. So far, 700,000 Americans have died as a direct result of his failures. 700,000. I’d say THAT created some job openings. I mean, I know many of those people were no longer in the job market. They had aged out. But think about this. (I’m making numbers up, now. This is just an example of a possibility.) Let’s say mom died when Covid swept through her care facility. She was 85. Her kids are in their early to mid-60’s. There was a time in this once-great nation when the retirement age was somewhere between 62 and 65. Not anymore. Now people work into their 70’s (if they can make it) or right up until the day they die. Those of us who grew up in Better America know we’re getting burned but we have also mostly become resigned to our fate.
Then The Feckless Fuckup’s failures killed mom, who left the kids some money. Not a lot, maybe, but enough to supplement what the kids had already done for themselves. Suddenly, they get to retire now. If mom had four kids and they all retired because of the bump the inheritance provided, that’s four new job openings. If that happened with, say, half of CheetoJesus’s victims, 350,000 people, all with four kids (I know. They didn’t all have four kids.) that would be 1,400,000 jobs nobody is coming back to. Add back the other half of the Covid dead, you’re suddenly looking at nearly 2,000,000 jobs “vacated.” I say again, I made up the numbers to illustrate the idea that the older workers might well have left the work force en masse, leaving those jobs available for younger workers – who are snapping them up as quickly as they can. It’s just going to take time to re-staff and re-train workers to do those jobs.
As a real life example, before Covid, we were hearing reports that truckers were an aging group with jobs in the industry not being replaced fast enough. Maybe Covid just did the final trick for them – one way or another – and they’re done. NOW we’re hearing about supply-chain issues…
It’s frustrating right now, but long-term, I think it’s a good thing. Fewer workers, that is, a limited supply of workers, SHOULD bring wage increases all the way across the board. Joe Six-pack will benefit. Sure, Jeff Bezos might end up with a slightly smaller penis rocket but I have high confidence he’ll be all right…
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I wrote last week that Facebook had cleaned up it’s act, likely in response to the possibility they might get scrutinized for their poor civic attitude. Facebook seemed willing to forego profits in the short term to protect their empire long term. The only question was how long it would last. Not long, it appears. It wasn’t even a full week before I started seeing contrary political posts back on my page. I guess the Congressional bribes, er, campaign contributions were distributed quickly and efficiently and congress hasn’t thought about it since…
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Did you hear that Jon Gruden quit as head Coach of the Las Vegas Raiders over racist, misogynistic, and homophobic emails he sent 10 years ago? I don’t care about Gruden. He’s always been an over-rated hack. His one big accomplishment was “achieved” with a team he didn’t build. He got credit for “winning” Super Bowl XXXVII with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, ironically over the Raiders. THAT team, though was mostly built and trained by Tony Dungy, who was unceremoniously released by Tampa Bay only to move to Indianapolis and repeat the feat with the Colts. Gruden never sniffed the Super Bowl again.
The emails were discovered during an investigation into charges of the Washington Football Team’s racist, misogynistic, and homophobic atmosphere since Dan Snyder bought the team. Gruden’s emails were released publically. The rest of the emails in question have been protected from public scrutiny by the NFL. So, who was Gruden sending the emails to? Who else may have been on the threads? Why are the Washington Football Team’s emails being protected when THEY were the focus of the investigation in the first place?