$75,000 to push fucking paper? I am a PROFESSIONAL making $15 per hour

[gopbuster]

and these MF's are whining because they aren't getting "bonuses on top!"

To push fucking PAPER!

Fuck THEM

[flvegan]

1. Who is getting $75k to "push paper"?

[underpants]

3. A lot of people

it's like the union argument about floating related wages in the industry or area but this is basically supporting the management folks

there were lots of people passing paper on the mortgages who were just moving it along...this has nothing to do with the Masters of the Universe selling each other that baseless paper but that is a whole other story.

[gopbuster]

8. You got it...but I'm angry as ....

about it

[Sebastian Doyle]

83. Masters of the Universe??

So I was right..... Skeletor IS to blame for fucking up the economy!!11!!!!!111!

[havocmom]

98. I know escrow officers who were making that to (collect signatures) push paper

while the title companies were laying off the title workers who actually examined titles and typed the policies at a whole lot less money

[gopbuster]

5. On CNBC today "75,000" min pay to work for a hedge fund

I don't give fuck if the min is $25,000 to get the boss coffee this is class warfare!

These scumbags have NO FUCKING CLUE AND DO NOT RESPECT what it takes to SCRIBE IN A $5000 peice of prefinished wood into their 35 mil home....


they have no fucking clue and the man in the middle needs the get the fuck out of the way

way to many middle men who do NOTHING and are making toooooo much money cuting the real craftsman or PROFESSIONAL out of the equation


SCUMBAGS

FUCK them

This is class warfare

[NashVegas]

89. I Know Exactly Where You're Coming From

Tell them to get it from Wal-Mart next time :)

[Blue Dog Dominion]

27. Tom Daschle got paid 4 million last year to do just that

[cherokeeprogressive]

40. And he thought we'd look the other way if he didn't pay his taxes. n/t

[DFW]

41. Calling Howard Dean!

Maybe he'll get the call to do HHS after all. It wouldn't be the first time he's
pulled the party's fat out of the fire.

[crimsonblue]

2. dude, the guy with the paper cart does not make 75 Gs.

:shrug:

[gopbuster]

9. What's the min? 25 k? I'd like to see these so called pRofessionals

do what I DO

[Political Heretic]

15. Which is what, exactly?

[gopbuster]

High End Architectural Woodworker eom

[Stephanie]

29. Which is not technically a "professional"

Sorry to harsh your mellow. You may be a professional woodworker, an artisan, a craftsman, even an artist. But in your career you are not technically a "professional."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Profession#Examples_of_professions

[Occulus]

36. And at the TOP of that page:

"The factual accuracy of this article or section may be compromised due to out-of-date information."

"The factual accuracy of part of this article is disputed. The dispute is about the vernacular vs. legally-accepted use of the term."

"This article may contain original research or unverified claims. Please improve the article by adding references."

[Stephanie]

43. lol!

you're very funny!

[Fla_Democrat]

51. Wow, the trim carpenters on

Wow, the trim carpenters on our last project was making $27/hr. Must be a regional thing. :hi:

[crimsonblue]

21. try 16 grand.

actual paper pushers are low level interns for the most part. It is disingenuous to use that term to describe corporate america.

[alexandria]

4. Do you have a link?

Do you have to curse?
I am sure you are angry about something ,is foul language needed?:-(

[Lint Head]

6. Warning! I am going to use words that are totally disgusting and obscene.

George Bush! Dick Cheney! Don Rumsfeld! Condileeza Rice! Alberto Gonzalez! Scooter Libby! Karl Rove! Rush Limbaugh! George Gordon Liddy! Joe Lieberman! That's it. I'm worn out. I may got to hell for using that kind of language.
:dem:

[Sydnie]

11. Damn Lint Head ... you could fucking warn a girl

I mean, that is the most obscene post I have read here in some time. I'm glad you stopped when you did or I might have to go midevil on you.




:hi: :)

[gopbuster]

7. I got your link...right here

Get out on the front lines/ trenches and deal with these conservative arrogant peices of crap " pay them cheap and put them in the dirt. I'll just hire Mexican's that way they keep coming back begging for more) AH's

yes....foul; language is needed....it's that serious

[alexandria]

14. What are you talking about?

i am trying to understand what the poster is talking about.
So far no one has explained .
I cannot tell which is worse your gibberish or his cursing..

[gopbuster]

18. What I am saying is these people who lost their jobs on wallstreet were being paid outrageous wages

for pushing paper!

[Stephanie]

28. What does "pushing paper" mean to you?

I'm not familiar with the term.

[Bluenorthwest]

91. ESL?

Bean counter, paper pusher, these are very common terms of derision for the 'busy' work done in most financial offices to rationalze the money they skim from the middle.
People who add nothing but figures, and make nothing but money. Folks who could vanish today and be missed only by their boss, wife and the IRS.
Another way to say it is this. They are the class of people who spent the last few years taking money for financial accumen, yet they could not or would not see the oncoming disaster. People who want a bonus for destroying the economy.

[Sydnie]

12. Alexandria ... welcome to DU

If that post offened you, you better don some blinders because that was tame! You obviously missed the blivet** years around here.

[madville]

10. Please don't ever work for the federal government

You'll go nuts at all the wasted time and money. I have worked for the federal government and now contract with them. I have 4 guys that do more work in a week than 10 of their people do in months. In my travels I have run across federal employees playing poker in storage rooms, watching movies all day, surfing the net all day, sleeping at their desks, taking two-three smoke breaks an hour, etc, etc.

I know plenty of GS-11/12/13 types making 60-85k a year that don't do much more than push meaningless emails back and forth to each other about a project that could have been completed in 1/10 the time they took looking like they were planning something.

[Political Heretic]

13. Oh please..

:eyes:

This kind of anecdotal bullshit is just that. I could say the exact same thing about private sector employees that *I* know who are completely worthless and paid to do nothing..

[NutmegYankee]

23. No kidding.

Didn't expect this outsourcing propaganda to be on DU.

[madville]

24. Outsourcing?

We save the government piles of money and time by efficiently completing tasks on or ahead of schedule.

Don't get me wrong, when things get hectic and stressful I am tempted to go back on the government payroll. I was tipped to a soon to be listed GS-11 position in my field and briefly thought about it, then I reminded myself how boring it was when I was doing the job before. It's much more exciting and rewarding actually having tasks to accomplish.

Like another poster said, many times it is not the employees fault, they simply don't have anything to do or someone telling them what to do. That's what happens when you job is not measured or justified by profit/productivity, it breeds low morale and contempt. I used to work in the very place I now do a good portion of our contract work, everyone that works there is miserable, mainly due to boredom and a sense of having no purpose.

[NutmegYankee]

37. Guess I'm cynical after reading about DOD CONtractiing. n/t

[liberalhistorian]

71. Thank you. That's the kind of

bullshit my hard-working teacher parents had to hear all throughout their forty-year careers and it was, and remains, infuriating.

[gopbuster]

16. sickening...just sickening...we need to push this thing forward

I am a Professional because I do 4- 6 hours in which these other assholes it takes 8- 10

I would be absoutely livid, although patient with equal opportunity.

It;s the authoritarian bosses I would have the problem with

[lib2DaBone]

20. Amen.. is that the truth......

I spend 8 hours a day carrying my "supervisors" on my back. (The dumb-fuck Republicans that they are)

I hate the dumbing down of America...I go 2 steps forward.. they go 2 steps back.

My supervisor makes $80,000 a year. I make $9 an hour.. and he asks ME what to do? Although he has a permanent brown ring around his nose connected to the front office.

Our country (after 30 years of Republican Brainwashing) is truly fucked up.

[earcandle]

22. Authoritarian bosses

We made this song to express our feelings regarding authoritarian bosses!

Worker Bee

Distortion... drama and dialogue are the features of this bit of modern folklore
by The Blame.

Enjoy (maybe)
Disclaimer: Took me some getting used to, but the work has merit.

[cliffordu]

72. There's a lot to be said for

adjusting one's medication before ranting here all night...

:shrug:

[SheilaT]

17. I know from personal experience

that at least part of the problem with federal employees is that they just are given nothing to do. Some of them, anyway.

I was a GS-2, the lowest of the low in an office at the Army Archives many years ago. The next most junior person was a GS-7. I actually made the others quite crazy because I worked efficiently and diligently and kept on asking for more tasks. They just did not have enough to give me. After a while I started playing a little game of shuffling back and forth between two offices (it was semi-legitimate as I occasionally had real reason to go over to the other office on the other side of the building) until I figured that no one could be totally certain where I was supposed to be, and then I'd go home an hour or two early. I suppose that Dr. Hatch, my actual supervisor, knew what I was doing, but since I was doing volumes more work than expected of me, he never called me on it.

This was back in the dark ages before computers and the internet. One woman in my office literally just stared at the walls for about six hours of the day, and worked for two. She must have been bored spitless, and I don't know how she stood it. It was a large room with about twenty or so employees in it, no cubicles, just desks for each of us, so there was no way to read a book or even write a letter or two without it being obvious. Heck, the smokers in the group were better off because they could at least take frequent smoke breaks.


Added on edit:

I had one project which involved ordering documents. I filled out the request for about 150 documents on the first day of that assignment, and a couple of days later Dr. Hatch, my boss, received a very angry phone call from the document center saying that I could only order at most 50 documents per week. So then, casting about for something to keep me busy, I was asked to update the manuals. Now, these manuals were the ones produced by this very office, and they described all the procedures involved in maintaining official Army records, at every Army installation world wide. I promptly learned that the manuals in this office, the originating office, had not been updated in TWELVE years! On the bright side, doing the updating actually occupied about a week of my time. When I was done I went into the office of the most senior guy there (forget his name, but he was a GS 17 I think) and suggested as humbly as I could that not updating the manuals for twelve years was not a good thing, and that maybe this task should actually be assigned to someone to do regularly. I was going to be leaving in a couple of weeks -- my position was more that of an intern than a real employee, so I wasn't going to be around to keep it up.

I had several different people tell me that because I was making everyone else look so bad, that if I'd been a real full-time employee I'd have been promoted out of there so fast I wouldn't have known what was happening to me.

[gopbuster]

19. But I am talkling about people making 75,000 for answering the phone

and pushing paper, making phone calls, etc. This is what Julian ????? (respected hedge fund mgr) on CNBC was saying today

$75,000 MINIMUM working in a hedge fund co.

FUCK THEM

[Stephanie]

26. I know top legal secretaries in NYC who make $75,000

So what? It's related to the cost of living here. How much is your rent?

[earcandle]

34. Hey.... I started out at $17.50 per hour in my own biz

back in 1986, and managed to raise my price up to $50 per hour
by 1995.  I never did raise it again for fear of losing
clients.  Dot.com crash caved my comfy economy, but I am on
the rise. In fact, I now give a 25% discount per day as
incentive, at $37.50 an hour.  I turn raw data into reliable
Financial Statements that can pass an audit, or be easily
corrected after a review.  Not a CPA, but a PA. So if I get 40
hours, which I like working, bearing my own expenses and
overhead, that would be $37.50 x 2080 = $78000!  That works
for me out here in San Francisco where my one bedroom
apartment is $1500 including garage.  That is a good deal,
actually.  

If I found a government job where they let me do internal or
external audits, and coach accountants on processes, and on
ethics, and pay me that much, I would love it and work hard. 
I know the value and meaning of service.  Owning the processes
so that you don't need supervision saves money, so it earns
higher wages.  People who do administrative and management
work are the brains that get the trains running, the hospitals
supplied and equal, and education ready for teachers and
students.  Make people have to complete tasks if you are going
to pay them those kind of fees. And if people are slacking
they should be reprimanded and fired if they do not do their
job.  

But as a business owner, I see no wrong with my being able to
earn a living as a contractor for $78K, if I could find enough
clients to work full time.   But the reality is I am lucky if
I can find 5 or ten days a month.  I carry a lot of
responsibility as a professional.  And people have to trust
me.  

Try it.  You might like it, if you are doing nothing right now
it can give you a good frame of mind and put your body back in
action.  Goals are really important to achieve. 

You can do it too! Americans are the freest people in the
world.  We don't have to settle for low wages if we think for
ourselves and build networks.  This is why the Repugs have not
won.  We are too smart for civil war, and we have a strong
small to mid size business core.  Join the forces, serve
America and serve yourself!  

Ever have ideas about starting a business? Think about how you
can be of service to others and/or provide a great product to
sell.  The hardest part is self motivation to get organization
and funding at the start.  Then, if its real, you coast into
being an independent when it comes to your economy.  As long
as you pay your taxes, you are left alone.  Lots of things
need repair and beautifying.  Especially we need to nurture
ourselves back to balance.   And get a government banking
industry that works for us.  A bunch of nationalized banks,
with 14% interest rates for savings, and 5% interest rates for
borrowing, like when I was a kid. 

Comparison to others is a pitfall and a time-waster, and
potentially life threatening.  Whereas, learning from each
other and allowing yourself to will good for others builds a
character with the intelligence to recognize the power of
ethics.  Professionalism requires it. And then there are
thieves at the top that need downsizing asap.

George Bataille (author of "Erotism: Death and
Sensuality")points out that human beings naturally want
to serve and animal nature wants to be divine in that service.
 Treat us like things, and the animal will rise up and strike
however it sees fit to regain that dignity, or die (or so it
seems to the ego)!

Give us jobs (or let us build businesses) with dignity and we
are happy generous campers.  

I think it is really important right now to treat people with
respect and civility.  

The rage is at tipping point in a lot of places.  
Fathers are dropping their 4 year old daughters, beaten, over
bridges in America.  
Oh my. 

[quakerboy]

38. Whereas Everyone else

knows of plenty of CEO types making 600-850K+ a year who do even less.

Thanks for the anecdote that is in no way representative of my experience of Goverment workers. Most of the ones I know are doing way the crap more than their private party counterparts, because they have caseloads that make everyone else look like slackers.

[Fire_Medic_Dave]

25. What kind of professional are you?

[Hannah Bell]

30. don't ever question the paperpushers' pay - even the smalltime paperpushers

get upset with you

actually making something has no value

as you see by the comments & by the wage structure

[Stephanie]

31. What do you push?

[Hannah Bell]

32. upset another one?

like i said, never question the value of paper-pushing. it's taboo.

question the value of autoworkers, janitors, fast-food servers - but the middle & upper classes push paper for a living, & their pay grade tells them it's important.

[islandmkl]

33. to all asking 'what exactly is a paper pusher?'....

if you really don't know what the context is, why bother to participate?

wall street, and corp america (and world) is full of 'jobs' that do no more than keep the flow going, without influencing actual, real productive output...

one might be fortunate to have procured such a position...but don't start crying when the 'production segment' cannot produce competitively, and profits tank, along with the bennies...

the shell game only works when the 'mark' has no chance to guess where the pea actually is...

[earcandle]

35. Re-inserted..

Hey.... I started out at $17.50 per hour in my own biz Updated at 10:42 PM


back in 1986, and managed to raise my price up to $50 per hour
by 1995. I never did raise it again for fear of losing
clients. Dot.com crash caved my comfy economy, but I am on
the rise. In fact, I now give a 25% discount per day as
incentive, at $37.50 an hour. I turn raw data into reliable
Financial Statements that can pass an audit, or be easily
corrected after a review. Not a CPA, but a PA. So if I get
40 hours, which I like working, bearing my own expenses and
overhead, that would be $37.50 x 2080 = $78000! That works
for me out here in San Francisco where my one bedroom
apartment is $1500 including garage. That is a good deal,
actually.

If I found a government job where they let me do internal or
external audits, and coach accountants on processes, and on
ethics, and pay me that much, I would love it and work hard.
I know the value and meaning of service. Owning the processes
so that you don't need supervision saves money, so it earns
higher wages. People who do administrative and management
work are the brains that get the trains running, the
hospitals supplied and equal, and education ready for
teachers and students. Make people have to complete tasks if
you are going to pay them those kind of fees. And if people
are slacking they should be reprimanded and fired if they do
not do their job.

But as a business owner, I see no wrong with my being able to
earn a living as a contractor for $78K, if I could find enough
clients to work full time. But the reality is I am lucky if
I can find 5 or ten days a month. I carry a lot of
responsibility as a professional. And people have to trust
me.

Try it. You might like it, if you are doing nothing right
now it can give you a good frame of mind and put your body
back in action. Goals are really important to achieve.

You can do it too! Americans are the freest people in the
world. We don't have to settle for low wages if we think for
ourselves and build networks. This is why the Repugs have not
won. We are too smart for civil war, and we have a strong
small to mid size business core. Join the forces, serve
America and serve yourself!

Ever have ideas about starting a business? Think about how
you can be of service to others and/or provide a great
product to sell. The hardest part is self motivation to get
organization and funding at the start. Then, if its real,
you coast into being an independent when it comes to your
economy. As long as you pay your taxes, you are left alone.
Lots of things need repair and beautifying. Especially we
need to nurture ourselves back to balance. And get a
government banking industry that works for us. A bunch of
nationalized banks, with 14% interest rates for savings, and
5% interest rates for borrowing, like when I was a kid.

Comparison to others is a pitfall and a time-waster, and
potentially life threatening. Whereas, learning from each
other and allowing yourself to will good for others builds a
character with the intelligence to recognize the power of
ethics. Professionalism requires it. And then there are
thieves at the top that need downsizing asap.

George Bataille (author of "Erotism: Death and
Sensuality")points out that human beings naturally want
to serve and animal nature wants to be divine in that
service. Treat us like things, and the animal will rise up
and strike however it sees fit to regain that dignity, or die
(or so it seems to the ego)!

Give us jobs (or let us build businesses) with dignity and we
are happy generous campers.

I think it is really important right now to treat people with
respect and civility.

The rage is at tipping point in a lot of places.
Fathers are dropping their 4 year old daughters, beaten, over
bridges in America.
Oh my.

[Morning Dew]

39. what year did they have 14% interest on savings?

I'm in my 50s and I've never seen that. Not that I recall anyway.... 5% maybe...

[Hannah Bell]

42. me neither. methinks the poster misrepresents a number of things, in fact.

certainly if banks were paying 14% to depositors, they weren't charging borrowers 5%. that's a big money-loser.

[earcandle]

45. I think the national goal was to encourage savings

and to discourage debt.  This was before mass credit card use,
which occurred early sixties, yes?  

[earcandle]

46. But I think the point was people who made $75K per year, not interest rates.

[earcandle]

44. It must have been in the sixties

i'll see if I can find some evidence for that but I do remember savings being about to grow at that rate.

[earcandle]

47. here is a link to rates being as high as 19%

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interest_rates#Historical_interest_rates

I was alerted to remember these rates when I took a Financial Accounting class with a textbook that quoted these kinds of rates and I thought wow, this book reminds me of the way it used to be! Now we get 1.75% on savings and pay upwards of 12% to 28% on loans and credit cards. I haven't found loan rates yet, just this deposits rate.

But you can see how we have changed.

[Hannah Bell]

49. The federal funds rate went as high as 19%, under Reagan/Volker.

FF rate = "the interest rate at which private depository institutions (mostly banks) lend balances (federal funds) at the Federal Reserve to other depository institutions, usually overnight."

This means it cost about the same to borrow in the private sphere - for a home loan, for example, & many of my friends who bought homes during the period were paying double-digit interest on their loans.

Savings didn't ever pay "as much as 19%". Banks loan $ at higher rates than they pay depositors. They're not in business to lose money.

Read up on the "Volker recession" here: those high interest rates were accompanied by economic hardship:

http://www.econreview.com/events/volker1982b.htm

[earcandle]

55. THere is a graph on the link above that states the following:

Germany experienced deposit interest rates from 14% in 1969 down to almost 2% in 2003.

Interest rates throughout history have been variously set either by national governments or central banks. For example, the Federal Reserve federal funds rate in the United States has varied between about 0.25% to 19% from 1954 to 2008, while the Bank of England base rate varied between 15% and 1.5% from 1989 to 2009,<1> <2>and Germany experienced rates close to 90% in the 1920s down to about 2% in the 2000s.<3><4> During an attempt to tackle spiralling hyperinflation in 2007, the Central Bank of Zimbabwe increased interest rates for borrowing to 800%.<5>

[Hannah Bell]

60. Look, you started out talking about the US. I was an adult during the period of "high interest rates

in the US, & it was a period of hard recession. High interest rates on savings means even higher interest on borrowing, which means businesses go under because they can't afford to borrow, which means mass layoffs.

Now you move to Germany in 1969. You have no idea why interest rates were high in Germany in 1969, what the spread on borrowing & lending was, how it affected the economic climate or ordinary people's lives, or how long 14% lasted.

In general, high interest rates mean high cost of money (less business activity, sometimes in a deliberate effort to kill inflation by decreasing economic activity), or that domestic money is moving overseas to get better returns, & the central gov is trying to keep it at home.

The short-lived period of high interest rates in Germany (1969-70) appears to have resulted from all of the above.

http://books.google.com/books?id=D78OAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA188&lpg=PA188&dq=germany+interest+rates+1969&source=web&ots=X7QpXq00iy&sig=X4vTG9LEqQ_rcuGNLWiGs0kUPrg&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=2&ct=result

There's never been any long golden age when savings accounts paid 14% & you could borrow money for 5%.

That would means banks were giving away money. NEVER HAPPENED.

[SOS]

59. In 1980.

http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0908373.html

[Hannah Bell]

61. uh, no. "eurodollar deposits" aren't consumer savings accounts.

[SOS]

97. Look two lines below that.

6-month CD 12.94%

[Common Sense Party]

82. Round about 1982 or so.

You could get 13% and 14% CDs. Retirees thought it was wonderful.

Of course, inflation was 13%, so it wasn't that great.

http://mortgage-x.com/general/indexes/codi_history.asp

[janx]

48. Slow down...where is this information coming from? The reason I ask

is that I've wondered about the paper pushers in the financial industry. I am acquainted with a woman who is a middle woman, shall we say, between fairly wealthy people and stock brokers. She works out of her house and makes a ton of money. I thought at first that she was a stock broker ... but no, it turns out that she is the layer between clients and a broker.

Is this what you are talking about? Can you provide some background?

Also, I might add that there are many paper pushers in the insurance industry.

[melm00se]

50. this argument

is the old "working class hero" argument: unless you get dirty, sweaty and smelly you don't truly work for a living.

I heard it when I got my 1st job right out of college. there were folks in my family who were absolutely outraged that I made what I made when the entry levels in their professions were making half what I was.

I am not belittling folks who are in the trades or other forms of manual labor...they are critical to a functioning society. While I don't doubt for a second that I can do what they do for a living but come and walk in the shoes of the folks who are the targets of this thread, you might find that just because you can't see their skills, you would struggle to match the fruits of those skills (whether you agree with those fruits or not)

[earcandle]

56. Right on!

The problems of the left are often instigated by such divisions caused by these kinds of attitudes.

We are all valuable parts of the system. I do not see "infrastructure" stimulus stimulating my side of the fence but instead the trades. I don't have a problem with that at all. It is important for all of us to get jobs.

[NashVegas]

90. The Skill You're Talking About

Is the skill of bringing in money.

That's a great skill to have, but people who make things or provide a service through labor and/or creativity are sick and fucking tired of getting the wrong end of the stick, both from the financial and social aspect.

Go into the movies and turn on your television and look at the people/jobs you see: people with high-paying gigs and glamorous homes and lifestyles are what you see on 90% of written shows.

People with median-income jobs wind up on Wife Swap.

[melm00se]

92. the skill is more than that

they have to be able to sit down, review huge reams of data (some they have collected and collated, others collected and collated by others) and make a decision.

Analysis, especially some of the more arcane accounting practices, is just a refined skill set as the finish carpenter of this thread. It starts with a basic understanding that is then honed, over time, by exposure to more and more complex and demanding situations...that is called experience and that, regardless of the profession, is what employers are ultimately paying for.

Just because they don't swing a hammer, wield a shovel/axe/saw, doesn't mean that they are not working.

I have done both sides of the argument (built houses through college and am currently in sales), both are physically and mentally challenging - albeit in different ways and declaring group A is somehow and someway better than group B due to their skill set and actual job activities is asinine and destructive.

Every job in a society exists for a reason and that society is diminished when that job does not exist.

One can bitch and moan about paper pushers and the fact that all they do is "bring in money" but you would very quickly find that if money is not concentrated in some manner then the effective use of that money for things like: jobs and economic expansion is greatly diminished (if not more costly) and the folks who are able and willing to expend money (regardless of location on the income curve) become fewer and fewer.

I know that sounds like trickle down economic theory (hell it is) but trickle down is a necessary component of an overall economic policy...just like pure Keynesian economics is also flawed...it is a blending and partnership of the best of both theories that is necessary for a healthy sound economy

[Hannah Bell]

99. "Every job in a society exists for a reason" & most paper pushing jobs exist to control

the non-paper pushers or control access to resources for the owning class.


The more you serve the owning class interest, the higher the wages: that's the general rule.

[Vinca]

52. What I don't understand in all of this is why anyone should get a bonus

if the business is failing. If they've done such a lousy job the government has to step in with taxpayer money, they deserve to have no bonus and their salaries cut a few points.

[earcandle]

57. I totally agree! Bonuses for failing must really mean

the target was to get this economy to fail.  And they have
reached their target.

Why make it fail?  So we can have a new world order with a new
private army? 

[Dreamer Tatum]

53. You obviously have no idea what they do, so you insult them.

Try this on:

$15 an hour? To hammer fucking nails?


And I find it laughable that you ridicule people who make more money than you, but you puuf yourself up with "high end"
in your job description. If you're "high end," maybe you should hope there are "high end" people to support your craft.

[ColbertWatcher]

54. Are they bailing out construction workers now!? Cool! n/t

[Hannah Bell]

62. um, it's him supporting your craft. no one cutting wood, growing food, building

bridges = no paper to push.

the paperpushers need the woodcutters & drawers of water, not the reverse.

[Dreamer Tatum]

63. The "paper pushers" buy high end homes

which the OP made clear is his forte.

[Hannah Bell]

64. there wouldn't be any high end or low end homes without people cutting the wood,

making the drywall & fittings, building, plumbing & wiring them.

production workers support the rest of the economy.

the rest of the economy likes to pretend otherwise.

[Dreamer Tatum]

65. Sigh

OK, once more: it's a VERY simple point. The OP is squawking about people who make high salaries, yet he is very careful
to note that he's not just a woodworker, but a HIGH END one.

He needs them like they need him.

It's just that simple.

[Hannah Bell]

66. no, he doesn't "need" them. high end is a matter of skill as well as what

one's paid for the skill.

a skilled woodworker can do useful & valued work in a subsistence economy. not so a paper pusher. the paper pushers' work depends on a lot of lower-paid workers to give it value.

simple as that.

[Dreamer Tatum]

76. Must be nice always be right

even if you have to change it utterly to make it so.

[Hannah Bell]

79. hey, you seem to think you're as "right" as i do, so throw the same snark back on yourself.

it's obvious to anyone without an agenda that if no one does the material labor, there's no surplus production - start with food - to support paper pushers.

the entire administrative, intellectual & technological capital of history was built from the surplus production created by labor.

[earcandle]

93. and that means what?

Are you suggesting we do away with the people who write your checks, process your insurance claims, collect the revenue for your labor and pay the vendors so your company can stay in business?

Are you suggesting that we do not work hand in hand?

Labor applies to both mental and physical work. The mental work required for paper pushing doesn't come naturally and can't be transferred non verbablly, like hammering a nail can. And that work bears some responsibility for making sure the end products serve all of the parties involved, including the laborer.

This is stupid to start a class war over the inner workings of business when we all need each other. All of the pieces are important, not just labor, not just administration, not just sales.

The real culprits we need to take to task are the high level managers and VP's and CFO's and CEO's who are earning outside of the typical rung going up. People who are earning billions of dollars for making fake targets and the auditors who let them pull off this scam, including the Federal Reserve Bank and the SEC. Those are the criminals that need to be tarred and feathered, not us menial working class folks making between $15000 and $90,000. We are the workers.

In my not so humble opinion.

[earcandle]

68. Hey.. I don't own any homes. I am a renter free and clear, except for credit cards... yuk.

[Hannah Bell]

69. you miss the point. it's labor supporting admin, not the reverse.

the people who pick the fruit, mine the coal, build the bridges & houses - make it possible for the rest to push paper.

if those people vanished tomorrow, so would the paper pushing jobs.

[U4ikLefty]

74. No., you miss the point. The OP claims to be "high-end" while complaining

about the high salaries of "paper pushers".

I guess people like structural engineers are "paper pushers" as well, eh?

The "high-end architechural carpenters" (lol!!!) like our OP wouldn't be able to build shit without those structural "paper pushers" to make sure their woodwork didn't fall down & kill someone.

[Hannah Bell]

75. i think the op's point is he's doing high-end skilled labor & making $15/hr

while paper-pushers make $36/hr.

my brother drew the plans for & built his 4000 sq ft house with huge old growth beams salvaged from tear-downs of old warehouses - with a hs diploma.

my uncles & grandparents built their own houses as well. some didn't make it past 8th grade.

no engineers needed.

except, in my brother's case, to approve the plans & take the permit $$$.

some people think degreed professionals invented the building trades, as well as fire, the wheel, the plow & the loom.

ps: my bro now directs the building of huge corporate commercial buildings with the same hs education & some post-hs credits.

[U4ikLefty]

77. Wait!!! OMG, he needed approval of his design by

....an engineer to get permitted?!? Guess you need that particular "paper pusher", eh?

Also, when you say "direct the building of..." what do you mean? Do you mean he carries out the plans designed by...an engineer? Certainly you are not going to imply that he designed the building, c'mon!!!

BTW, this stuff about "degreed professionals invented the..." I don't think the term "degreed professional" was around at the time of invention of the wheel, fire, or the loom...but nice try!!!

[Hannah Bell]

78. he needed approval because that's the law - not because he needed

an engineer to teach him how to build big buildings that wouldn't fall down, or to draw plans. he learned by doing it, sometimes with relatives & sometimes on job sites & sometimes through his own reading.

i think you understand the difference between a legal requirement & a material necessity.

no, he doesn't design the buildings, because the law requires a degreed professional do that.

he just fixes the design bugs in real time.

[U4ikLefty]

80. It is the law because the blood of others has taught society

not to trust somebody's brother with a HS-diploma to design a building. Avoiding unecessary injury/death is more than a "legal requirment".

BTW, if he "fixes the design bugs in real time" without the approval of an engineer, he is in for all kinds of liability. Especially in any kind of medium-large project.

[Hannah Bell]

81. yeah, someone's brother with a high school diploma could never build

anything without killing someone. non-degreed people are stupid & careless.

don't worry yourself, all is by the book, even when redundant. the engineers get their cut.

plenty of folks around here built their own houses, barns & mills for some generations, without the help of a single college boy.

it's a miracle - they all survived to procreate & the buildings still stand.

[earcandle]

94. Hannah, your anger is displaced.

Anger is valid, but again, you can't get a check to cash as a laborer if you don't have a paper pusher processing your hours. And agreed, vise versa.

What is your argument?

[earcandle]

67. we all need each other, actually. can we learn instead of protect for a change?

[BlooInBloo]

58. Um, a professional *WHAT*?

[liberalhistorian]

70. I hear ya, sweetie. My parents were both teachers,

worked damned hard and were damned dedicated for forty years and got squat in both compensation and appreciation. Dipshits without degrees who spouted off on local radio stations got way more than they did. People whose jobs had them sit at a desk all day and screw other people got way more money than they did, while whining about even having to pay the pittance they paid teachers, police, social workers, firefighters, etc., etc. I could go on and on and on but you get the drift, I'm sure. Too many people who do nothing of any value to society whatsoever are getting paid far too much, while those who do the real work of society get squat while having to hear the overpaid hacks whine about not only how little they're paid but having to pay the little people anything at all.

[book_worm]

73. A PROFESSIONAL, well aren't we grand.

[CreekDog]

84. i'd rather raise your wages to 75k than push theirs down to yours

it might be fairer if we all made 25k/year, but it would suck much worse.

[B Calm]

85. BINGO! The race to the bottom mindset baffles me. . . .

[CreekDog]

86. it's stupidity

and they wonder why they aren't in charge.

[Hannah Bell]

87. couldn't do worse for the human race than the present crop of slavemasters

& bright boys.

[Hannah Bell]

88. it's the same thing. & you guys are calling other people stupid.

people don't eat money, they eat what it buys.

if 3 guys produce 6 apples, but one gets $4 while the others get $2 each, one can buy most of the apples.

if they produce the same 6 apples, but each gets $2 for it, they all have the same buying power over the apples.

if they each get $6, it's the same; they have the same buying power; the apples just get more expensive.

it's never about the $ amount; always about the spread.

[earcandle]

96. Socialism and communism are ideal economies

that can only work when the beast of greed in capitalism is
finally tamed.

I am all for enlightened capitalism as a potential bridge to
better economies.

That means goods and services produced that do make a
difference in the quality of human life, or you don't get a
license to operate.  That means higher wages for everyone,
better food, better products, better health because the aim is
to progress, not search and destroy in the name of
competition.  It means learning from each other and honest
competition about best practices, not protectionism, not free
trade.  It means Fair Trade in our financial practices, and
the Fairness Doctrine in our press. 

Hannah, go buy a whiffle bat and beat the fuck out of a pillow
in the name of all you hate and you will feed your inner
animal and see more clearly that all of us are the victims and
the little guys here.  No sense in starting a flame war that
causes the left to be more fragmented and further victimized. 
Unless of course you are a troll working for Da Man trying to
cause a civil class war, the one thing they have NOT been able
to instigate in America yet.  

[NeedleCast]

95. How Dare People Make More Money Than You!

LOL...