Now, I wonder if the aged auto plant work force, decimated and demographically warped by seniority-based layoffs, might be part of the problem?Federal government moves to bail-out the auto industry are correct for moral, if not economic reasons, but Bourrie raises a helluva a good point. And in any case a bail-out can at best only make the ride to the bottom a little bit easier for these people.
7 comments:
BCL, first support for Ignatieff, and now some disdain for old blue collar workers. Lurching to the right?
What exactly are you implying here (based on a photograph)? That old workers can't hack it anymore and should be laid off?
(But old white collar workers, hell, they're fit to be Prime Minister, aren't they? Ignatieff is probably even older than those folks in the picture).
If your argument is that the productivity of Canadian Autoworkers is negatively affected by their age, at least post some stats to support that argument. Don't appeal to people's biases with a picture.
I'd be interested to see what your conclusions are once you actually examine some data. Something you do regularly in regards to climate change deniers. Why couldn't you do that for some folks who are about to lose their jobs?
BCL - age discrimination here?
Think about it - part of the problem is that auto workers retire far too young. A neighbour retired in his early 50's because he met the required formula of age plus years of service.
Now, if he lived to say 80 - that's nearly 30 years of pension and no production for the company.
...What exactly are you implying here (based on a photograph)? That old workers can't hack it anymore and should be laid off?..."
Try it from the other end. As a geezer-in-training myself, I can testify that it is very difficult to get another job after decades in the workforce. I was rightsized a few years ago, and nothing I've been interviewed for since then has offered a wage of more than 50% of what I used to make, and no benefits.
It's a slightly mixed blessing that my house is paid off. That saves me a cool $8-10,000 a year in either rent or mortgage payments. But OTOH, I can't just pick up and move, either.
Retraining is possible for some people, (I retrained), but this doesn't help a bit when you are called for an interview and the interviewer sees you are old enough to be his mom. Or grandmother.
Noni
Dilemmas, dilemmas. I don't want to come off hard-hearted by being insensitive to people losing their jobs. And yet, I'm the tail-end/first cohort of the post-boomer generation who've been told since his early 20's that there is no such thing as job security. By the boomers themselves. And it's true. Every enterprise I've worked at was always under the threat of lay-offs and downsizing, in good times as well as bad. It was through pure luck that I was never laid-off myself.
I think this is something that generation should have started thinking about more critically a long time ago.
I think this is something that generation should have started thinking about more critically a long time ago.
I did, God knows. I've been thinking and writing and agitating about this for at least 15 years, since I first saw the "rightsizing" bloodsucking hordes taking over the management of the North American workforce. I was hissing at Total Quality Management within days of first seeing it in our workplace.
Sadly, the guys making the laws have a different constituency which does not include you or me or those older folks in the photograph.
Noni
Unless those people in the picture get out and vote...and are still the majority of it.
Is there retraining required for older voters?
Christ, first a bunch of posts dignifying that asshat Bush for dodging some shoes and now this.
I took a severance package seven years ago and at 47 years of age travel the globe for work. Fun? Yes and no. I have no health care and no retirement, not because I'm stupid but because I'm not part of the elite. My RRSP has dropped 30% in three months and will disappear altogether soon (so much for the severance).
The middle class will soon be dust. Get wise, get crooked. It's the future dawgs.
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