Mike,
I'm never insulted by those who disagree with me and explain why they feel I'm wrong. It's why I'm here and how I learn. I agree that my beliefs may not be correct, but until I learn differently, they are what I've come to believe. I've changed political parties several times and have no problem doing so again. Unfortunately, I'm only 42 years old, so that's something I can't change right away, but I'm working on it!!!!
I don't think our way of life is suffering and I'd go so far that even with the increase of what we are paying for fuel, our way of life far exceeds those of our parents and grand parents. We can all become wealthy if we want to and work towards it. Those who just want it, but are not willng to sacrafice and work towards it will never achive it, but I belive that in time, I'll reach a level of wealth that will allow me to retire and live a comfortable life. This is because of my ability to buy and sell what I want, including shares of oil company stocks as well as other comodities.
As for being robbed by corupt management, that's true for every company. It can happen no matter where you work, or who you work for. We saw that in the late 90's when it came out that the big accounting firms were allowing corporations to report anything they wanted for income, which inflated there stock value for instant profits. Same thing happened with the Dot Coms. After a few years, it fell apart and the George Bush had to fix it. Janet Reno should be in jail for her incompetence, but that's another thread.
My point is that those employees knew what was going on, but until it became public and too late to get their money out of their stocks, they let it continue. Of the supposed millions they lost in pensions, it was all based on inflated stock values that should never have been at those levels anyway. The news played it up like they had lost everything, but it was all on paper and they were buying into it like a pyramid scheme. Those of us who were buying stocks like that in the 90's know how crazy it was. We should also be honest enough to admit that we knew none of those companies were worth anything and that it was a gamble that paid off for some, while others got too greedy and lost allot by staying in too long. Bill Clinton came out looking good for awhile because of the massive windfall the government received by the capital gains taxes, but when that went away, he was left with a recession. Again, I blame Janet Reno for not inforcing the laws and allowing the big accouting firms like Arthur Anderson to falsify incomes for their clients.
I remember having to rent the phone in our home while growing up. I remember it not working all the time and I remember having to pay extra for a second and third phone. If they were repaired for free, that was a local condition in your area, because that's what my dad did for a living. Pacific Bell made allot of money being the only business in town, both before and after the breakup of AT&T. Now there are dozens of phone companies to chose from and phone service is probably one of the most reliable things we have available to us.
I agree that government is taxing us too much on phone service and especially cell phone service. It's not something you have to have, and I would just as soon not have mine. But it's business that has made it possible for us to have cell phones due to customer demand. Government just makes it harder and takes it cut of the profits.
The airlines are their own worse enemey. Some are making huge proffits, so we know it's not the industry, but just a few dinasours that have run themselves into the ground. I fly on the cheapest ticket I can find and expect to be uncomfortable. If I wanted comfort, I'd expect to pay more for that. It's available, I just chose to spend as little as possible to get where I want to be.
The same is true with home loans or any other loan. Nobody has to buy a house or take out a 20% loan. They choose to do so because they don't want to save up the 20 percent down payment and get a lower interest rate. Blaming a company for making it available removes all responsibility from the person who actualy takes out the loan and signs the papers. People get into finacial trouble because of the decisions they make, not because they were forced to make spend more then they can afford. Even when they take out those high interest loans, they continue to feed their destruction with credit card debt until they owe more per month then they earn. How many people are losing a house that doesn't have several credit cards that they've maxed out and a room full of high end electronics? I know that we don't have a flat screen TV in our home, and won't until our monsterous, ten year old, big screen stops working.
Nobody wants to go back to the "good ole days" except in very isolated memories of certain things they like. We have it so much better today that there is no comparison. I love to watch old movies, but to see how they lived back then is just amazing. To hear stories from the old timers about a time without AC, phone, electricity, indoor plumbing, effective medicine, highways, airlines and tv is just more sacrifice then I ever want to go through. Making enough money for one or two pairs of clothes, food to eat and a small house is not very appealing either. How many people in the 50's and 60's had what we take for granted today? Cars, appliances, comunications, entertainment and big homes. Things were cheaper, but incomes were also less and allot more peole died from work then old age back then too!!!
We're a long way from getting it right, but with modern, instant comunications, we're also more aware of the problems then before. I think that in time, we'll get better at seeing through the spin and holding those responsible for their actions. The possibility exists to make it better, it's just a slow process with allot of resistance to admitting the old ways didn't work and the new ways might not either, but something will and we need to find it.
Sorry for the soapbox,
Eddie
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