The American Dream – What Happened?

Restored from the Empower Network archive (2011–2017), lightly edited to meet our current advertising standards. Views are the original author’s.

The American Dream – What Happened?

COMMENTARY:

More and more folks are having to partake in the “Government Assistance Programs” every day.

Our government (Bureau of Labor Statistics) is constantly concocting creative new ways of reporting a  growing unemployment rate so that they don’t “appear so damned demoralizing”.  (Don’t get me started on that one!)

The die-hard workers…  good, loyal “employee minded” citizens still believe that “everything’s gonna be alright” drivel that our elected officials and most big businesses are promoting.

Oh indeed, more than ever before, well practiced employers spin their “gilded tongue promises of a pseudo sense of job security” to both the public and their own workforce.

But in the end,  smarter folk recognize that this is actually nothing more than the “Sword of Damocles” tactic… with the actual “sword” nowadays being the Layoff, the RIF, the Downsizing, the Indefinite Furlough, the “Cut”, etc.

In fact the tactic now seems to have become the “weapon of choice”  to spur the “remaining rank & file” into giving “much more of themselves and their families than they can actually afford”… just to maintain production.

Think about it for a moment… What happens when you hear the word “Layoff” trickled about in the form of rumor among your fellow servants, excuse me “workers”?

Of course being psychologically “tuned” to be a good loyal, worker, you do your absolute best to “prove that you’re really needed”…

…And that’s done simply by prostituting your time and talents as much as possible… just so you can “keep your  JOB”!

And what really gets my jaw tight is that EVERY EMPLOYER KNOWS AND USES TO THEIR ADVANTAGE!

Folks,  let’s face it… If YOU are a member of today’s “workforce”, you ARE IN A PSYCHOLOGICAL SWEAT SHOP… and you probably see “no way out”.

Heaven forbid we go back to the thinking of the 70′s…

Maybe they didn’t quite take it “far out enough”, and maybe those folks (actually now you and I) were right!!!…

… because if you scrape off the crusty top layer from the “stuff”  that “the powers that be are presenting to us today”… YOU’LL FIND THAT IT SMELLS A WHOLE LOT WORSE UNDERNEATH…

… because my friends,

EVEN “NEW BULL CRAP IS STILL… JUST CRAP!”

Dave Dubrawsky

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Now here’s something that you WON’T HEAR FROM THE LIPS OF THOSE IN POWER… because it’s just not smart for them to admit that YOU AS EMPLOYEES, ARE KEPT IGNORANT FOR A GOOD REASON…  Read On My Friends…  

 What Happened To The American Dream?

by Peter Weddle

Politicians and pundits alike have been debating just when the “recovery” will finally pick up steam.

They all have different theories, and they’re all wrong.

Recovery suggests that we will, at some point, return to an economy similar to the one we had before the Great Recession.

Well… We won’t. Why? Because of something I call the Economic Singularity.

The term “singularity” was coined by a science fiction writer and academic, Vernor Vinge. He created it to designate that point in time when machines would become smarter than humans.

So, what’s the Economic Singularity? It’s the point in time when the employees in companies outside the U.S. become smarter than American workers.

According to Vinge, we haven’t yet reached the singularity. We have, however, passed the Economic Singularity.

By every measure, workers in China, India, Korea, Germany and elsewhere have more up-to-date skills and more current knowledge than many of us do.

As a result, American companies are no longer competing organizations with cheaper labor.

They’re competing against those with more capable labor.

That reality has opened a new era in the American workplace. As I explain in my just published book, A Multitude of Hope: A Novel About Rediscovering the American Dream, this emerging epoch is often described as an Information Age.

It’s not.

Information is worthless unless it’s put to work effectively. So, what is actually occurring is the dawning of the Informed Age.

The more capable each of us is in using the latest information creatively and productively on-the-job, the more valued we will be by our employers and the more secure our future will be in the global economy.

When you are informed, you excel at your work. And, excellence is the new definition of “qualified” in the American workplace.

Whether you’re looking for a new job or trying to hang onto the one you currently have, it’s no longer enough to be able to do the work; now, you have to excel at it.

This redefinition of workplace qualifications and a host of other changes represent a societal shift that is every bit as profound and permanent as the transition our nation made from an agrarian to an industrial society in the late 19th century.

It is frightening, disruptive and unforgiving.

As with that earlier shift, however, this new era also holds great promise and possibilities. It holds more opportunity than has ever existed in the land which invented it.

For the U.S., therefore, there won’t be a recovery, but there will be lots and lots of discovery.

And, discovery is the energy source of the American Dream.

Thanks for Reading,
Peter

Peter Weddle is a former columnist for The Wall Street Journal and the author and editor of over two dozen books. Check out his blockbuster guide to the secrets of job search and career success called Work Strong: Your Personal Career Fitness System. To read an excerpt from A Multitude of Hope, and to order the book, visit AMultitudeofHope.com.