Can you flesh that out a little for me?
I live in a 99.98% white town. We have a reasonable high school with a GREAT vocational program. Really smart kids leave town and go to Stanford, Duke, and Harvard. Lots of kids go to UNH.
Lots also stay. Their parents are, or were, line workers making clothing and small electronics.
When you say the bottom half of the white population have to "compete", what exactly do you mean? Compete at what? Compete with whom?
These people will ALWAYS need a place to go to work where a supervisor tells them what to do and how to do it, in exchange for good effort, regular attendance, and reasonable output.
They are not going to start writing code and starting social media companies.
If they don't have work, they will provide a steady supply of depression, self-harm, petty criminality, and drug use.
That's not what I want for the future of America.
Your post is spot on. I doubt you will get an answer from the free traitor crowd.
I’v put off responding to try to develop a clear response.
I am retired but have a great part time job. It involves visiting various companies to look at what they are exporting. I see lots and lots of american manufactured products that are widely wanted in foreign lands. America exports a bewildering array of goods much desired by importing customers
One company is a fairly small manufacturer of very very special products used in the manufacture of tires. Over the years I have become acquainted with the plant manager who always tries to say hi while I’m in his plant. Not too long ago in the recession, he added some space and some new jobs. Six months after erecting a large banner, he still hadn’t filled all the slots.
We live in an area with a small black population as well. The white applicants for the well paying jobs had problems with the drug tests or after hiring somehow failed to come to work on time or at all. Although the jobs were not working on computers, some knowledge and ability with computers or scanners and such was required. This was lacking.
The point is, these jobs went unfilled because those unemployed chose not to compete by acquiring the basic life style and knowledge necessary. To a certain degree, this is the condition all over. American workers at some level choose not to work to develop the necessary educational level required in modern manufacturing or just choose not to develop the life habits necessary to report daily on time in shape.
The great American working man is a myth
Recently, I had my residence re roofed. I contracted with an old, reliable family business I have known for years. To my surprise the crew that showed up were all Mexican. The Mexican leader had subcontracted the labor and gathered up a crew of excellent workers that were all asses and elbows and did the job quickly in a very workman like manner. they did a very good job.
there was the possibility that an American, an East Tennessee good ol boy could have done the same. That was not the case because there was no desire to engage and compete.
There are many here that continuously rant about bringing back American jobs. Aside from the fact there is no such thing as an American job, there is a reason we will likely never bring back the jobs once available for manufacturing paint brushes. The labor costs for operating the Italian designed and manufactured paint brush assembly line is so expensive the paint brushes thus made can not be sold at a profit. The machinery was shipped to China along with an industrial engineer and a foreman that spent some time getting the Forbes 500 company’s China paint brush manufaturing operation up and running.
I witnessed the dismantling and equipment export and was given the inside dope by the engineer in question. I have seen up close many similar situations from refrigeration compressors to state of the art cotton yarn spinning plants
In this instance, no real special knowledge was required to produce paint brushes. However, the problems with high wages, tardiness, alcoholism and just plain old not coming to work resulted in an overall position of non competitiveness.
I’m sure there are other important factors but the human factor is very important. it is apparently easier and better for many Americans to live from hand to mouth rather than assert some initiative and compete on a world scale