Harry Krause wrote in message
...
thunder wrote:
On Thu, 13 Oct 2005 19:37:40 +0000, Eisboch wrote:


That's the "Ka-Thunk" that went off somewhere in my (mostly empty) head
as
I listened to this. It's a social change taking place where the
concept
of earning something by working hard is being replaced with "It's owed
to
me". It's a change whereby if you feel you've been wronged by a
merchant -
you sue him, rather that accepting the fact that you learned a lesson
and
won't do business with him again. It's a change where paying your dues
is
not necessary, you are "entitled" simply because you exist. Its a
change
whereby "I" has become paramount rather than "we". That's what I
meant
by loosing traditional values. It may be inevitable as a evolutionary
step of our society, but I think it will be the primary reason of our
downfall as a nation if not corrected, rather than the actions of
politics
and politicians.

I've been thinking on this. I realize there is no one root cause, but
something occurred to me, and I just want to throw it out for any
responses. We are talking about a fundamental societal change that
seems
to be concurrent with our becoming a mobile country, and it's resultant
loss in "community". Think small town. Merchants couldn't wrong you if
they wished to stay in business. The whole village, in effect, raised
the
children. Hell, even big cities had their neighborhoods, a virtual
small
town in a big city. Now, I've read, the average person lives less than
5
years in one house. Neighbors often change so frequently you never get
to
learn their names. There is an anonymity that allows us to think I,
rather than we. I don't know, maybe interstates weren't such a good
idea. ;-)


Let's not leave out of this argument the fact that millions of
hard-working Americans have been screwed royally by their employers and
left on the side of the side of the road after years of loyal service.
That is not lost on the younger generation, that "the corporation" will
"f*ck" you at every opportunity.

True Harry, but think of why. Those doing the screwing are the large,
publicly held corporations. Small, private companies don't have a
reputation of screwing loyal employees.

The reason the public companies screw the employees is a constant,
never-ending motive to meet quarterly numbers and increase ROI to satisfy
the demands and expectations of the stockholders. Who are these greedy
stockholders? You, me and everyone else that holds stock in a company
directly or through retirement plans. So, who is really to blame?

Eisboch