Category Archives: Current Issues

Anger about Substandard Jobs in America

“The reality that tens of millions of American workers — black and white — are stuck in substandard jobs has finally broken through into mainstream political and economic discourse. The fact was obvious if you just went out and spoke to ordinary Americans, but it wasn’t showing up in the usual economic data….Virtually all of the net jobs created in the past decade are “non-standard” — temp, part-time, contract work, or something other than a traditional job with a normal paycheck.“-Robert Kuttner , co-founder American Prospect

This is from an article on the Huff Post , “Race, Class, Jobs and the 2016 Earthquake.” Some of the powers that be have figured out what is going on with our job situation in the US and it is not good.

Featured image of Colonel Saito from the film “Bridge on the River Kwai” via noslelnad7 on Flickr.

Expectancy

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Have you heard all the talk about how we have a whole new stage of life nowadays after the good old traditional age of retirement of 65. I have read all these estimates that we could have 20 years or more to live after the age of 65. So people are pondering what we should and could do with the extra time. Then I read Life in the Boomer Lane’s post about my generation, the Baby Boomers, where she shares that our original life expectancy, calculated at the year we were born, was around 70. This did stop me in my tracks, because I am getting close to that age. What are you saying? I could die in a couple of years? What happened to my 20 extra years? I even had posted a link to life expectancy charts I had found on Wikipedia in one of my previous posts. Life in the Boomer Lane pointed out that those charts were for people born in the past few years. YIKES! Then she said if your alive now there is a different way of calculating the years you have left.

OK, this got me researching how we get these life expectancy numbers. I found out it is based on statistics, and mathematical formulas, and my head might explode trying to understand it. But I did find the US Social Security Actuarial Tables that predicts, ( with the help of some other mathematical formula), using your age in 2011, how many more years you probably have left. It was very encouraging that it showed I may have those 20 years back again.

You might say, as I do, that no one really knows for sure how long any of us have to live. I just prefer to think I have those 20 years left to go. I think we need to make a conscious effort not to take life shortening statistical predictions to heart because if we buy into them as being absolute it might be a self fulfilling prophesy.

Beatrice Wood ,a famous artist who lived to 105, attributed her longevity to “art books, chocolates, and young men.” That sounds pretty good, especially the chocolates.

Featured Image, Muir Woods paved hiking trail, is courtesy of SCEhardt on Wikipedia.

An AI-Written Novella Almost Won a Literary Prize

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via An AI-Written Novella Almost Won a Literary Prize

I have to stop reading these emails from Smithsonian.com. All right, I know, I just posted something about robots but this is starting to really get to me. For those of you that say a creative person has nothing to worry about with a robot taking your job…..

My question is why would you want a robot to write a novel?

When Robots Take Our Jobs, Should Everyone Still Get a Paycheck?

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“…. tech anxiety got a fresh jolt last month when the White House sent out a Council of Economic Advisers report including a projection that people making less than $20 an hour have an 83 percent chance of eventually losing their jobs to a robot. The odds for those earning up to $40 an hour are more than 30 percent.”

via When Robots Take Our Jobs, Should Everyone Still Get a Paycheck? | Innovation | Smithsonian

Like I didn’t have enough to be depressed about in the world today, I spotted this story in my email. It is not the first time I have read about robots taking over many jobs now done by humans. Science Fiction authors have written about this for a long time. In 1927, there was a film Metropolis, that depicts a class of poor workers , under the city, running the machines that keep society going and then a human like robot is created.

This idea of robots taking over so many jobs is creepy. I really don’t see robots being as good as or better at being human. There are certain jobs where I do not think they can adequately replace humans such as the caring professions. Would you want a robot caregiver, a robot Nurse?

The Smithsonian article also talks about Universal Basic Income ( UBI) where the government would pay everyone a basic amount to live on after the robots take over. Countries are doing studies now to see how this will work.

If you could be guaranteed enough to live on, what would you do with your life? The Universal Base Income would probably be a small amount of money, not like winning the lottery, just enough to meet your basic needs. I can see certain factions in the US not wanting to support the UBI. The same ones that want to abolish Social Security.

Read more about “The Fourth Industrial Revolution” from these articles posted on Drudge this morning:

LA Times

Wall Street Journal

Let’s Rock Age

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I feel a disturbance in the force…things are beginning to shift. Change is coming. In the UK we have AONR ( Age of No Retirement) that is working with older people and companies to “develop prototype programs designed to smash age barriers: to define “retirement” and “seniors” differently and to give older people a voice in new-product development.”

“The reality is that those who live longer are increasingly seeking work, not only to generate income but for a sense of purpose and fulfillment. Many people don’t want to simply retire and garden for 30 years. They’re looking for more.”-Jonathan Collie MD

Then in the US we have a new book by Ashton Applewhite , “This Chair Rocks: A Manifesto Against Ageism.” It is on my list to order from B&N.

I agree with Ashton Applewhite that we can feel alone in facing our ageing and that it would be very positive to have a dialogue about our experiences. At any rate, I am happy to see more light shown on this topic.

And I found this blog: The Radical Age Movement: Confronting Ageism. I enjoyed reading their posts. I like their New Year’s Resolution:

Continue to confront ageism wherever we see it
Create language that honors longetivity
Increase pride in aging
Work toward building an interdependent society
Speak up against age prejudice in our workplace, healthcare, the media, and among our friends and family

This movement is long overdue. I will not be sorry to see the negative stereotypes about ageing finally put in their proper place, (the trash).

Don’t Egg Me On

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“Don’t egg me on,” which means don’t get me started, don’t encourage me to do or say something. I can really get on my soapbox on several issues. Many times it is something I read in the online political and news sites that can set me off. One of my annual beefs is Daylight Savings Time. When my husband announced it was DST starting again this past weekend, I said, “Oh no, it’s not starting already? It seems like Standard Time is over so soon!” Actually, Standard Time is shorter since 2005 in the US when DST was extended by 5 weeks. It used to be from May to October and then our government, in their great wisdom, extended it from March to November. Now my excellent state of California is trying to abolish DST in California. Please make it happen! It turns out DST leads to more heart attacks, strokes and car accidents and doesn’t really save more energy. And our bodies do not really adjust to it. It just adds more stress.

And another thing:

I do a lot of reading about issues facing my generation. A big one is ageism and how it has impacted people’s lives. It is not just that you have to suffer society’s negative stereotypes and attitudes, it affects your ability to hold on to your job and to find employment. There are so many articles written advising people about jobs that may be open to them or suited to their situation, and stage in life. A popular recommendation is about “gigs,” or short term, part-time, temp work that does not offer benefits.

I have seen this recommendation more than once when reading about jobs for older people, drive for Uber. I wonder how many older women would want to drive a taxi. Actually, you use your own car which could be another headache. It seems that there would be more wear and tear on the car and greater chance of accidents,( especially if it is during DST.) So there goes your insurance rates. It would be pretty stressful in an urban area unless you like the challenge of driving crowded freeways and city streets with all the crazy drivers. It would be nice if job suggestions were in touch with reality.

This post is my contribution to Stream of Consciousness Saturday hosted by Linda G Hill. The prompt for today is “egg.”

Taxi image by Pixabay.com used to make this cartoon Angel and Egg image by Pixabay too.

I Wasn’t Invited to the Ball

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I don’t know what happened. I expected to get it in the mail. Where is my invitation to the ball? I get one every year. What has changed? I know I am no longer the ingénue or the belle. Those years are long gone. But I still love to dance and am very skilled in all the steps. I am good at making witty repartee. I would not be a dull partner. Where is my invitation? I noticed that my gentleman neighbor received his invitation and told me he is getting his evening attire out of storage. He doesn’t even know all the dances that I do but it seems he is a more desirable partner. I asked my older woman friend if she got her invitation yet. She told me in a whisper that I should be aware that women of a certain age are invisible to society and must exit the social scene quietly. For heaven sake, don’t make a fuss. Accept the fate assigned to you. Don’t rock the boat. Take up feeding the birds or gardening.

If your over 5o and even starting as early as 35 your prospects of finding a job diminish as you get older. Think this is a fairytale? Watch the PBS video below. Ageism is alive and well. Especially for women. I know it happened to me. From Harvard Business Review, Older Women are Being Forced Out of the Workforce.

This post is my contribution to Stream Of Consciousness Saturday hosted by Linda G Hill. Featured image “Too Early” by James Tissot.

#GiveForGrandma This Holiday | NCOA

You Can Buy (Fake) Followers, Likes, and Viewers

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I read about this in an article by Constant Dullaart in Hyperallergic, Why I’m Amassing an Army of Fake Facebook Followers, where he states he bought fake followers with “Profiles made to look like actual people, made to follow any profile I wanted for $0.002 each, so $5,000 bought me 2.5 million followers.” He says that there are people already doing this to make their product, candidate, and art look much more popular than they really are.

Isn’t it satisfying, a bit scary, ( and humbling I hope), to see more Followers for your blog? I mean real followers, not ones you bought and paid for.

image by Kate Ter Haar

Dullaart goes on to say how some artists were basing the market value of their work on You Tube views and being influenced on the types of work they produced according to the social media responses. He calls this trend in marketing ” the attention economy.” It turns my stomach a little.

A friend of mine just wrote that he received an email offering lots of fake views for a cheap cost. It sounds similar to what Dullaart was saying.

I like to think that I will go on writing whatever I write according to my inner inspiration, feelings, and things I feel strongly about, and not get too overly upset or influenced by Likes and Followers.

The best reason I have for liking real Likes, Comments, and Follows is that people show me they are reading what I am writing, which is encouraging. How do you feel about Social Media responses influencing what you write and are you shocked by the article and my blogger friend reporting the ability to buy followers, likes, and views?