Ocean & Daphne – WISE Jobs vs. Mutual Aid: ‘Work’ in communityAnd so we do.Such transitioning can be painful. In my case, it occurred over the course of a prolonged and severebreakdown and it took a change in values before some modicum of healing could begin.
Values are tools for coping. If one set of values isn’t working, then either you die still holding allegiance tothose values, or you evolve.The reverse frequently happens when someone ascends from rags to riches. Their values undergo changeand they forget the lessons learned from their days of financial impoverishment.As survivors of poverty, our storytellers evolved, the inevitable outcome of which is that those of us who wereonce conditioned consumers no longer are.Other consequences include an embrace of voluntary simplicity, a strong distaste for competitiveness, and apropensity to question assumptions that continue to support the status quo. Here’s one example.
Consider the training and education mantra that is familiar to us all:
Stay in school, get your high school diploma, go to university, get a degree, acquire a skill. If you take this advice, your future will be assured.
For decades, children have been told this and adults encouraged to pursue life-long training, all with an eyeto getting and staying employed. However, there are problems with this one-size-fits-all advice, particularlywhen we consider it within the context of market capitalism.First, it assumes that people who are unemployed do not already have training or education. Yet a greatnumber of us do and the larger that number grows, the more it exposes a serious problem.Suppose that everyone followed the advice to get an education, get trained. What then? It used to be that aBachelor’s degree was enough to land a decent job. Then it was a Master’s degree. Now having a PhD isn’tgood enough.Newly-minted PhDs are increasingly required to have at least one post-doc before even being
considered
fora pseudo-permanent position. As things stand now, many of them are being used – and abused – as contractworkers and often getting paid no better than $10 an hour;
this, for a decade and more of post-secondary study
.How’s that for an investment! For the student, that is. There’s no argument that it’s a great investment of thestudent’s and taxpayers’ money for educational institutions.If new PhDs cannot find contract or adjunct work at a university, you may find them flipping burgers, cleaningup other people’s messes, driving taxis, and so on.In other words, there are and always will be a finite number of jobs for the credentialed.
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O
ne is never completely healed from the experience of prolonged poverty or the long, hurtful slide into thatcondition.
March
30,
2007
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