ALL’S FAIR IN THE GLOBAL ECONOMY

Unemployment Knows No Country of Origin

The growth of the global economy is supposedly the reason why nearly all the manufacturing jobs have disappeared in the US. Besides eliminating the good paying jobs for “blue collar” workers, it has also eliminated thousands of middle and upper management “white collar” jobs.
Further, over the past 5 years, college graduates have found the job market fairly thin. Less than 30 percent have been hired in their field of study. This year, the demand for graduates is up but it has a long way to go to reach 50 percent. For example, last year the State of Pennsylvania reported that 13,000 people graduated from state colleges and universities with an education degree but only 6000 were hired. (It does make you wonder why so many students are being directed into the education field.)
That is old news; the “new” news is that job market has now become saturated in China, the same country that is sending billions of dollars of manufactured goods to the US. According to the newsmagazine, The Week, 4.1 million Chinese will complete the requirements for a degree yet there are only 1.7 million jobs. As one analyst stated, Asia’s success will soon be eclipsed by a huge army of unemployed.
With the age of automation and mass production that is “cheap” and can produce “abundance,” maybe its time to start thinking about rotating workers, kind of like serving on a submarine.
Sailors on submarines have equal periods of active and non-active cycles. It’s not practical to bring a sub home every night, so a sailor serves for several months and then is assigned to the base for a similar period of time before the next assignment.
With so many qualified workers, companies could start to cycle their workforce, for example 6 months with one group of workers, 6 months with a second group and then rotate the original group back to the job. Gone would be holidays, vacations, sabbaticals and other such benefits. Since you are only working 6 months, you will have plenty of family and recreation time. There would need to be some overlap of workers to help “pass the torch” after each 6-month period, but it should only be a modest cost to the company.
A final idea that differs from the work-split idea is to employ a modification of the 80/20 Rule (where 20 percent accomplishes 80 percent of the results). Perhaps the world only needs to employ 30 percent of the population. The other 70 percent become “wards of the state,” or permanently unemployed, drawing financial support from a fund designed to meet their needs.
I’m sure some sci-fi writer has already figured this out. Why not give it a try?

WE THE PEOPLE?

So You Think You Know Our Government?

Below is a short list of definitions for types of government. The list is "short" as there are over 200 words that describe various forms of government. As you look at the list, it is obvious that American government is not represented in every definition. But, how many definitions do you feel would apply? Several will probably be your answer.
Like so many problems that we are faced with these days, the idea of change is never as simple or easy as would be expected. An overhaul of American government would ask the imposing question: “OK, where do you want to start?”

anarchy
1: absence of government
2: a state of lawlessness or political disorder due to the absence of governmental authority
3: a utopian society of individuals who enjoy complete freedom without government

aristocracy
1: government by the best individuals or by a small privileged class
2: a government in which power is vested in a minority consisting of those believed to be best qualified
3: a governing body or upper class usually made up of a hereditary nobility
4: the aggregate of those believed to be superior

autocracy
1: the authority or rule of an autocrat
2: government in which one person possesses unlimited power

bureaucracy
1: a body of non-elective government officials; an administrative policy-making group
2: government characterized by specialization of functions, adherence to fixed rules and a hierarchy of authority
3: a system of administration marked by officialism, red tape and proliferation

democracy
1: government by the people; especially: rule of the majority
2: a government in which the supreme power is vested in the people and exercised by them directly or indirectly through a system of representation usually involving periodically held free elections
3: the common people especially when constituting the source of political authority
4: the absence of hereditary or arbitrary class distinctions or privileges

monarchy
1: undivided rule or absolute sovereignty by a single person
2: a government having a hereditary chief of state with life tenure and powers varying from nominal to absolute

oligarchy
1: government by the few
2: a government in which a small group exercises control especially for corrupt and selfish purposes

plutocracy
1: government by the wealthy
2: a controlling class of the wealthy

technocracy
1: government by technicians
2: management of society by technical experts

theocracy
1: government of a state by immediate divine guidance or by officials who are regarded as divinely guided

CHINESE: IT’S NOT JUST FOOD

Do You Speak Any Other Language Besides TXT?

As high schools and colleges near the annual rituals for graduation, the nagging question of “What’s wrong with our education system?” appears in many publications. Nearly half of the graduating high school seniors will be seeking some kind of work or trying to adjust to life without high school. Around two-thirds of graduating college seniors will be heading home to live with the “folks” and trying to figure out a way to pay back $40,000 in student loans.
Even though I believe that our educational problems are not isolated to educational institutions, I think there are some things worth looking at with respect to focus. First, USA Today reported recently that over 22 million Chinese school students are learning English. In the US, they estimated that around 2500 students are learning Chinese. Hence, the first problem with American education is the widespread arrogance that the English language will continue to dominate the world markets. Anyone for a little Star Spangled Banner salsa-style?
It will be very difficult for Americans to compete with China in the global marketplace if they can’t speak the language of over 1 billion people. And while Chinese students are studying American culture for the express purposes of marketing their products to US consumers, I doubt if many American students are trying to understand the Chinese culture and how to market to them.
Second, we are leaving behind learning as a scholarly discipline. American education at all levels, including college, is focused on vertical learning or the orderly accumulation of knowledge. When knowledge was “stable” and may last a generation or more, this approach served us well. Now, with the turnover of knowledge occurring in 6-month intervals, vertical learning creates obsolescence within a year of leaving school. Those new graduates who decline to invest in ongoing educational efforts will begin to lose ground and fall behind before the ink is dry on their diploma.
Finally, our approach to education (ie, vertical learning) insists that we be “right.” It’s hard to encourage innovation when you have to be “right” all the time. If Thomas Edison lived now and followed the doctrine of “right”, there would be no dry cell batteries or light bulbs. To paraphrase Edison, his mistakes were one step closer to the solution.
Learning used to be about making mistakes and learning from failed efforts. Now, schools test and colleges manufacture employees. If the best our educational systems can produce is millions of consumers and employees, then I guess we don’t need to learn Chinese. They will gladly give us our daily work assignments in English.

TEAMWORK

Five Pillars of the Community

Schools are under fire for their performance as measured by achievement testing. Recent legislation has attempted to make schools more accountable for achievement and enacted standards for "qualified teachers." Testing and preparing students for testing to measure achievement seems to be a full-time job and is critical for schools in terms of funding. But, what happens when students refuse to learn?
Highly qualified teachers, modern environments, new technology and innovative curricula won't mean much if students don't want to participate. And the problem for teachers is that a small percentage of students who reject learning will consume a large part of classroom time and disrupt the progress of other students. So, refusing to learn isn't just a personal choice because it affects everyone and teachers are graded on how well everyone performs.
Refusing to learn is not solely a school problem: it belongs to the community. For example, there's sufficient evidence that involved parents make a significant difference in their children's focus and discipline at school. But, if those parents are consumed by work because it is necessary to work multiple jobs to pay bills, it's hard to be involved. Lack of parental involvement is a community problem.
The Five Pillars of the Community are: Education, Religion, Commerce, Politics and Social. Each of these pieces of the community are needed to push students forward and create achievement. School boards may be an obvious choice for creating this kind of dialog, but boards are elected by communities and don't always have the suggested representation. An independent board may work, but there would need to be a sense of urgency to convene decision-makers and get them to attend regularly.
Unfortunately, it is easier for community leaders to point fingers and push the blame on schools, teachers and standards. Instead of working together for a solution, community leaders will insist on getting tougher. But schools can't accomplish success alone. They only have students for 180 days -- that's less than one-half of the entire year. On an hourly basis, they only have students for about 1260 hours, not counting early dismissals or late starts due to weather. There's 8760 hours in a year, hence, schools only interact with students for 14% of any given year. So the community and parents need to take responsibility for 86% of time not spent in school. That means commerce needs to plan internships and work experience opportunities. Religion needs to heavily promote activities that build moral values and social responsibilities. Politicians need to provide a reason for students to study by creating meaningful work opportunities. And finally, there needs to be social outlets that allow people of all ages to interact and be role models.
Schools will never have the resources are to overcome a community's indifference to creating a learning environment. Until the community embraces the importance of learning, there won't be much to cheer about when achievement scores are released.

Is The Right Attitude Enough?

ZAP: IT’S AN ATTITUDE!

“The greatest discovery of my generation is that man can alter his life simply by altering his attitude of mind.” – William James

The human body is electrical energy. If your heart defibrillates, electricity is used to “shock” it back into a normal rhythm. Acupuncture uses the theory of “rivers of energy” to heal and renew the body. Our brains are a mass of neurons firing precisely to create speech, fine motor movement and the thousands of impulses necessary to carry on the routines of living.
Hence, attitude is a force, an electrical burst that can move us in both positive and negative directions. For example, biofeedback studies have shown that people can think and create higher, and lower, blood pressure. Humor can help people overcome disease. And leadership gurus are forever saying that success starts with the right attitude!
So how do you go about creating this positive aura that will allow you to reach new goals? How do you avoid falling into a “Pollyannaish” type of trap that, at best, is poppycock?
First, all the positive thoughts you can muster won’t overcome a negative reality. If you live in poverty, positive thoughts may help you get up in the morning but it doesn’t guarantee that you will eat that day. If you live with a physically abusive spouse, all the positive thoughts in the world won’t stop the next round of pummeling. These traps squash positive attitudes and require more concerted help beyond your control.
(Anyone can rise to new heights if offered enough support and guidance. George Bernard Shaw wrote Pygmalion, a story about a person’s transformation from poor to rich. A funny, modern version of the story is the movie Trading Places with Eddie Murphy.)
Regardless of your current situation, you need a plan and a mentor. If your goal is to live a healthy and rewarding life, you need education, opportunities and someone who can walk you through the maze of adapting to your new life. If your plan is to live a physically active life, just putting on your running shoes won’t work. Most likely, you will be sore the next day, quick to make excuses and not continue.
Second, if your plan is about making money, chances are that you will never succeed. You can never make enough money; hence, the reason for greed and corruption in corporate America. Money is never enough. You plan for happiness and if money follows, it’s a bonus.
Attitude is about creating opportunities for small successes. After each success, your confidence grows and reinforces the positive attitude. That leads to the next round of positive attitudes, attempts, success and more confidence. And so the wheel continues to turn: actions reinforced by success that leads to the next round of the plan.
Attitude is essential and we need to do all we can to believe in ourselves and that we will make progress every day. But the main ingredient is planning for action; without action you are simply daydreaming. Find your mentor, construct your plan and begin enjoying your small successes.