They survive quite well in the wild without any government assistance at all. Some even manage to be entertaining to the rest of us while doing so.
Posted on 08/14/2004 8:07:59 AM PDT by ppaul
The author is some guy named Craig. Surely the photograph you posted is some skank women (looks like a druggie to me). Is the photo really a guy?
Dude, I am talking about the author of the French sloth book, not the guy who wrote the NYT article. I was making a point of how fugly the French author is.
They survive quite well in the wild without any government assistance at all. Some even manage to be entertaining to the rest of us while doing so.
Unfortunately, I see hints of this kind of work attitude creeping into American work ethics.
Employers are faced with so many laws so that everything will be "fair" that many times, incentive to work harder and better and have a good work ethic is a waste of time.
I see co-workers doing things that would've gotten them fired post haste 20-30 years ago.
Who gets merit raises anymore? No, we have to be fair so we get a piddly little cost of living raise so no one's self-esteem is hurt.
This evolves into raising the minimum wage to unreasonable levels - causing cutbacks in hiring and inability to give raises to those who really deserve them.
She apparently is not familiar with the Steel Workers. They have earning wages while minimising work to a fine art.
Anything beneficial to the company is hated as bad as Bush.
Work is a game......what can I not do today.
Having ruined their own industry, steel workers have branched out to any company with employees dumb enough to certify them.
HEY!
While your point is well made, some states, such as Arkansas, make it a particularly attractive option. Here you have a third of the people living off the state, a third of the people working for the state and the remaining third make up the rest of the work force...including those jobs done by illegals, of which there are many. Arkansas has the most rapidly growing population of illegals in the country. The benefits with many jobs are sadly lacking or nonexistent. State law here doesn't even require breaks, other than lunch.
I was happy to get my state job, after 5 years of a job where I worked my butt off in horrible working conditions. After the first year, the company yanked everybody's insurance benefits except for upper management. I made enough to keep the bills paid, but not enough to ever get ahead, and I d**n sure couldn't afford to get sick or, heaven forbid, die. At least now, I don't have that worry so much.
That said, there is plenty to criticize about the state, and I'm sure the same can be said of any other state government as well. If an efficient and cost effective way can be found to do something, you can bet it was by accident and you can count on them to correct it post haste. If something starts to make sense, they will change it until it doesn't, and their answer to everything in the state of Arkansas is to raise taxes some more. The corrupt RATs here never met a tax they didn't love. We already have some of the highest and silliest taxes I've ever seen anywhere, and yet there is seldom, if ever, an opportunity that slips by that they don't get the issue of more taxes on the ballot, and if they can find a way around presenting it to the voters at all by calling it something else, they will. The state is always complaining about being poor, but they never seem to think it might be because we are taxed to death.
One of the supervisors in my office always tells me that I have to learn to quit trying to use common sense because there isn't any and that although our mission statement implies compassion, he says that there is only room for compassion when the state's @$$ is covered...thanks to the lawyers.
Any other Arkansans, state workers or otherwise, have anything to add?
Foreign money and ill-gotten gains, although sometimes they're the same thing.
I actually applaud this womans message. She is merely pointing out the futility of working hard in such a controlled economy. In an entrepeneurial or ownership society, it is worth it to work hard. In a socialist economy, there is absolutely no reason to excel and there is very little economic freedom, hence no opportunity to benefit yourself.
She is just pointing out the rational frustration of somebody who is working for the benefit of somebody else(the state).
ping
You forgot our tax-loving REPUBLICAN governor.
Then they can demand to immigrate to the USA after they let their own country reach third world status -- and we'll have to take them in if we're going to be consistent.
Won't happen, once the Moose Limbs become the majority in twenty years they will simply enslave the Kaffirs and make them work 80 hours a week. And of course we all know that arabs have a propensity for the very latest 7th century technology. That will keep the Frogs very competitive exporting grape juice, humus and baba ganush.
Heck, even the 20th century Soviets worked harder than the 21st Century French. Granted, the Soviets' motivation was to NOT end up dead or in Siberia, but at least they actually worked to support their government. The French apparently have no such desire. I love France, as a life-long student of architecture, art, culture and history, and I have met some wonderful French people. It pains me to see them rotting themselves into oblivion. I wish that they could cut off that cultural gangrene. But lacking that, I wish they would just keep the stench to themselves.
The sloths may find solice in their latinous voluptuousness, and gallant laziness, but while they eat and make love with their faces, industrious Muslim chickens will be building culturally exclusive roosts.
Atos
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