The "Screw Deal" (Or "Freelancer's Just Another Word For Nothin' Left to Lose").
My dad was a Steelworker. (Yes, with a capital "S." Honest professions deserve that distinction). He got the job straight out of high school, and he spent the next 30 years of his life as a member of the United Steelworkers Union, literally helping to build the economy of not only our small town in Northern Utah, but America itself. Then came the Reagan Years, and those wily Japanese (remember them?), and it was decided that America need no longer be bothered with such trivialities as "building stuff." The NEW model would be instead to send our manufacturing jobs overseas, since the plant(ation) owners had no actual slaves. Paying pennies an hour in Third World sweatshops being the next best thing, the owners of this country could then employ the masses to peel their grapes, pit their olives, and carry their golf clubs. This is known as "trickle down economics", a system where the inconceivably fat and rich would have so much wealth that the mere crumbs of their hedonistic feasts would be enough to sustain the rest of us. It's a system that was and continues to be sold to us by the greatest salesmen ever to roam the face of the planet. Today, in fact, there is a whole cable "news" network devoted to selling the Nero model to the half-witted serfs who subscribe to their ideology...
But I digress. This article is about something much more important - ME! That is to say, us. I am not an "INfluencer" (LinkedIn), nor will I probably ever be. I am not one of those smirking liars who will tell you that YOU can do anything, just follow YOUR dreams, do what YOU love, YOU are in control of YOUR destiny... that's really easy to say from your private jet. I'll bet the view from up there looks pretty optimistic. Here on Earth, however, the future just ain't that damned bright.
I used to have a pretty great job. For nearly 8 years, I worked for a great company who was contracted with Armed Forces Television to control broadcast operations. I was paid a living wage, earned decent benefits, and although it consumed a larger chunk of my time than I would have liked (e.g. all of it), I felt somewhat appreciated, and honored to be providing a service for the men and women of our Armed Forces serving around the world. Then one day, congress (remember what I said about honest professions?) got together to pass a budget. That afternoon, for me, the world spun off it's axis. My department was being combined with another department, and despite said department having been honored for outstanding performance twice in that same year, (well... the company's contract manager received the award) the entire crew was being laid off. We were replaced by federal civilian employees who for the most part had no experience whatsoever in broadcast operations. And oh, by the way, guess who would have the honor of training these replacements!
But hey! I'm an experienced guy, a skilled professional in the field of broadcast operations. No problemo, I'll just find another job. Sure, I've been out of the job market for 7 1/2 years, but how hard could it be? I'll be FINE! (Richard Branson says I can do ANYTHING!!)...
Well, it turns out that while I was busy toiling away in my windowless room in the middle of Nowhere, California, those "Nero's of Industry" must've noticed they were letting some crumbs slip though their fat little fingers. For me, it was a little like opening the bomb-shelter door for the first time after a cataclysmic event. The whole landscape had changed, and everything was askew. Corporations were now people. People were now "Human Assets." And jobs? No, no... there aren't any of those. What are these... "Yobs" you speak of? There are only gigs. Employers now only want Human Assets to fill in on weekends and holidays for the privileged few regular employees who have been grandfathered in to the new system. In other words, to catch whatever crumbs inadvertently fall from the crumbs! There are no sick days, holidays... VACATION?!? You forget your place, sir! Now go and pit me an olive, boy. I grow tired at the sight of you...
Why am I telling you all of this? Because it's not what my father, a Steelworker and an honest man, envisioned for his children and his children's children. I myself am a single dad of a bright-eyed, wonderful, hopeful 5 year old son who will NOT have a great union job waiting for him when he gets out of high school. Hell, even when I was 18 these opportunities were starting to slip into the realm of myths and legends. But mostly because I am angry. Corporate America, you broke our deal, you broke our backs, then you broke our hearts. And I'm sure the Podiatrist is gonna lecture me NO END about all of the lead he has to dig out of my feet by the time I'm done writing this piece. But dammit, every day I see what the "INfluencers" write about, with unfounded optimism and impractical advice that has failed me every time I have tried it. So this is my way of giving them a reality check, if they can even begin to relate to it from that rarified air of success, optimism, and hope. My message to them is simply this: PLEASE stop trying to sell me the whole "I made a billion dollars in my sleep - and so can you!" routine. No I can't. I just really, really, want a job, with enough money and enough security so that I can give my son a good life and a good education. He is the future, after all. I might just be fading into America's past, but my only hope is to give him a chance to be the man I know he can someday be. Our children are smarter than us. I sometimes believe we are witnessing human evolution in our very next generation, and it does give me hope. However, we, both as parents and as a society, cannot afford to drop that ball. And it doesn't matter whether you're an "INfluencer" or a "Freelancer", the future of this country is at stake.
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