From The Trenches

Thanks for the Reassurances. I know you do I great job running this company and doing things the right way, and I really appreciate that.


Guess I’ve just been feeling the weight heavy on my shoulders lately, of providing for 3 kids. I’ve had rent increased and prices going up at the grocery store because of all the inflation, but I’m still able to keep my head above water for now. (fingers crossed that gas prices don’t go crazy). So that’s why I came to talk to you because I want to be prepared for whatever lies ahead.

I am breaking a confidence here. My newest man came to me worried about his future. He used to work for a competitor of mine that went belly up and he had experienced bounced paychecks from his former employer. The young man is in his 30’s and has a family. He knows he is low man on the totem pole…… I reassured him that all would be fine. We are a healthy company and his future is sound and he responded to our conversation with the email above.

Now I don’t share politics or religion in my office. Business is all about business. But this young man is worried about his future and his ability to make ends meet and he earns a very decent salary. He worries about his ability to keep up with unprecedented cost of living increases and is aware that our business has difficulty sourcing materials.

I didn’t whitewash his fears but did all I could as a boss to alleviate his concerns. I need him to be clear minded and productive. But fact is, I am worried too. Folks, our economic health is tanking…. Rapidly.

 

Lots of jobs out there, why worry? And why doesn't he hold conservative values and have a decent amount of savings?

 

How's your reading comprehension FD? Who says the guy's not conservative? After all, he is only in his thirties, and has a family (presumably 5 mouths to feed) and his employer went out of business, so it's not like he'd reasonably have saved a lot yet. His frame of reference and your own are very different, just like yours and mine are.

He wants to work, and is proactively determining whether job security should be distracting him.

 

Why don't we let him eat cake? And what is the point of your question? He is a hard working young man with a family and is worried about what he can see is taking place around him. He is trying to do right and is struggling with forces that he cannot control. He can see his nations leaders worrying over everything except the things that affect his world. While they print valueless money, his cost of living is increasing at a dramatic pace.

I have said a hundred times on this forum. The average guy on the street could give a hoot less about progressive agendas and their feel good impacts. The average guy wants to be able to buy his kid a new baseball glove once the bills are paid. That is what is important in his world. And all anyone can see is that our leaders are entirely blind to Joe Average's daily struggles.

 

If we had decent social safety nets and education programs that don't put people in debt for life he could worry less. I'd bet most people here had a substantial savings or paid off homes in their 30s

 

And that is exactly what you guys fail to recognize. We don't all want to rely on others for our own destiny in life. If my place were to fail, I would work at fast food joints and cut peoples grass before I accepted assistance. I have a deeply rooted need to be a self reliant man and I am not alone in feeling that way.

 

Would you consider such things as affordable health care "accepting assistance"?
Part of the reason my health has failed so miserably is because of health care costs. That is a bona fide fact MD. I know because I've lived it.

Were it not for "assistance" I would most likely be dead by now. As it is I'm in danger of having part of a toe amputated. The big one I'll keep but it's not looking to good for the other one.

Do I accept assistance or do I perform self surgery and hope for the best? If the toe has to go I'll take assistance. I doubt amputations are cheap.

 

So why don't we go off into the bush and live off the land then?

 

No.. And I appreciate your dilemma. My wife's sister had a similar problem three years ago and ultimately lost her entire leg below the knee so i wish you the absolute best. I genuinely do.

And don't misunderstand. This crappy healthcare dilemma we are all in is a horse of a different color. I had spine surgery years back that had me in the hospital for over two weeks. The ultimate bill was almost 200k and I was never so thankful for health insurance as I was then. I see healthcare much like I do when I patched up my old cars years ago when I was living hand to mouth. Had a leak in the radiator so I pour stop leak in. Drive that for a couple of months and now I have to replace a water pump, radiator and get my block flushed because I went with a quick fix. And this is what we have been doing to healthcare. The problem is the cost of healthcare and lawyers, pharmaceuticals, and corporate interests are all at the root of the problem. We had three separate hospitals in our city that were all local that just last year were bought out by a conglomerate out of Texas.

But back to my comment..... I would work around the clock to keep my family fed if that is what I had to do. In fact I left school at fifteen to pursue an income. I had to as I had made my girlfriend pregnant. My daughter is in her forties with a family of her own now and the only way I can lie down to sleep at night is knowing that I provided for her every step of the way. And that's just the way I am made and I will be that way as long as this old body holds up.

 

Partner, if I didn't have a family that relied on me, I could absolutely get lost in the mountains and fend for myself.

 

Can't live or hunt in National Parks. Can't live and hunt on private land. Where would one go?

 

get a ship and head off into international waters. Why can't you live and hunt on private land?
are you going to subsist on meat?

 

Obviously you mean a sailing vessel. Have you ever been at sea during a storm? I have. Private land...maybe the owner might not approve, ya think?

 

unless you own it.

 

Ah, there's the rub. Ever been at sea in a sailing vessel during a storm?

 

How to Find Homesteading Land (wideopenspaces.com)

 

But you have to pay for it and move to Alaska.

 

People put themselves in debt. This guy is working through his difficulties admirably, and you act like he shouldn't.

I've still got a couple of years left on my mortgage, although I did have a decent cushion saved by the time I turned 30, but didn't marry and have a family until after that. We all must trade one thing for something else . . . I know it's a foreign concept to you liberals, but one cannot have it all . . . and one shouldn't.

 

No, you sure are not.

I'll never appreciate the dependent victimhood mentality either.

 

didn't read the article evidently. it mentions free land in many of the lower 48