A last stand...

A last stand:

http://www.amoraltalk.com/shows/amoral-laststand.mp3

[I apologize in advance if this post seems like I wasn’t awake when writing it, it was considerably more off the cuff than my normal writing… and if you’ve ever watched me write, you know that’s saying something…]

               

             So, there it is… the last episode of Amoral Talk. If you’re just now reading this [I’m writing to the future here] then a small amount of background information is probably required. For a few years now, I was a co-host of a comedy podcast called Amoral Talk. In the podcast Kane [Gyo] and I would use news stories as a jumping point and pretty much rag on the world. I had a long-term plan for the show, which would have worked if Gyo would have been more consistent. It seemed that everytime we had a decent following [at one point our weekly downloads were in the thousands], Gyo would disappear on me for a few months and people would stop subscribing.

                I don’t think this would have been all that big of a deal if I hadn’t found out that he and a few of his buddies had stolen the next phase of my idea, including one of the working titles I had going for it, and put it out themselves. Then, after they have recorded their first episode, Gyo came over to record this last show and basically said ‘yeah, let’s wrap this up with this episode’. Nice bro, real classy there.

                Now it should be noted that this post isn’t just a rant piece. You see, a friend who listened to the episode asked if I was actually mad. You see, I call Gyo out about the whole ordeal right off of the bat and listening to the show, you get that uncomfortable feeling that I’m actually absurdly pissed off, but that I’m trying to play it off for the show [at least I get the impression that it comes off that way]. This post is an attempt to explain what was, and is, actually going on in my head.

                Am I mad? Yes.

                But it’s a mixed bag in the area of reasons and such. You see, here’s a dirty little secret about the whole event… I wasn’t surprised.

Warning here: The next little bit is going to sound like I’m having a pity party. I want to say right at the outset that I’m not. What I’m saying next is the blunt honest truth, and in my case, the truth is pretty pitiful…

                To further explain, let me use this blog for an example. I have one follower, and to be blunt, I’m surprised that even she’s following me. I think it’s telling when you put a project together and you have to beg people to pay attention to it. It’s even more telling when you can’t even get your own partner to listen or look at it. That is the situation that I’m almost always in. Oh, and just so it’s said, the person who is following me on this blog is not my partner.

                My podcast was popular, when it was popular, to people very removed from myself. I know of one person, just one, that listened to it with any frequency, and that was mainly because I made copies of the show on CD and gave it to her, which is pretty sad since she is an iphone nut and all of our shows were on itunes. But, as I said, this is the situation I usually find myself in.

                Part of the issue is that, as a person I’m pretty forgettable. Take a former buddy of mine, Jason. He and I were friends starting back in tenth grade. By the time we hit our mid-twenties Jason pretty much only called or hung out with me when he needed something. Now it should be said that, as I understand it [and personally think], Jason is a pretty nice guy. His girlfriend [whom he’ll never marry, if you’re wondering] and his other friends just think he’s just the bees-knees. I mean, he’s fairly successful in his career [sound production], people like hanging out with him and he’s over-all well liked.

                Over the last two years of our association I tried getting together with Jason to hang out. We had each other friend-ed on FB and I shrugged off not being able to get a hold of him as him just being busy. Sure, I kept seeing pics of him and people that I was only kinda friends with being posted and pics of parties I wasn’t invited to up on his page, but… oh who the hell am I kidding. You know when it was that he was available to hang out with me? When he needed me for something.

                It’s the same deal with Gyo. He doesn’t need me now, so he’ll disappear, and much the same as Jason, I’ll de-friend him on FB after a little while and I’ll never hear from him again unless he needs something [as a side note, I had de-friended Jason, and he noticed about 8 months later… when he needed something…].

                I could pass this off as them being punks or bad friends, but in reality, I’m pretty sure the problem is with me and me alone. It would be one thing if this happened once or twice. I could just shrug it off, but seeing as this has happened with just about everyone that I’ve known, at this point I have to look in the mirror. At the moment I want to think that it’s just me being forgettable. Another easy to give example: If I were to die this afternoon and my partner decided to tell no one, outside of a few people I hang out with at school, there is no one in my life [online or analog] that would notice my being gone. One day, off in the dim future, someone might ask ‘hey, I wonder what ever happened to that guy… oh, what was his name…’ but that would be about it.   

                The next problem: It seems that people are honestly un-interested in things when I do them. As I said before, there is nothing, absolutely nothing, that I do or am into that any of my friends are interested in, period. I mean, not even out of a sense of duty [speaking of my partner here]. The likelihood that anyone that I know reading this blog, aside from Pandorina, is so remotely small that I’m pretty sure I have more of a chance of walking outside this afternoon, falling on my face and just happening to fall into a pit of money. Yeah… that low. So why do I even try? Well… it’s still fun, even if no one pays any attention…

                So, now that I’ve ranted pretty ineffectually for a while, I suppose I’ll drop it [or at least drop it for now and edit it later if I fell like adding something]. As for my being pissed about the pod-cast and Gyo stealing an idea from me, yeah I was pissed off though I suppose it was more about not being included, but at the end of the day, it’s not like I expected anything different. So, all in all, I suppose I’m pretty much over it… guess I’ll go study.

-Tank

Pols assignment

Pols 241

Question: What are the advantages and disadvantages of outsourcing jobs to both the sending and receiving countries?

            In the article a few points are brought up about what various politico’s have said regarding the outsourcing of jobs. I want to state right at the forefront that, any politician that tries to take one side of the issue or the other is nothing more than a lying bastard. There is no such thing as a professional politician, such as those in Washington DC, that gives a flying flip about if the people they represent are employed or not, rich or poor, minority or majority. The only thing they care about in those regards is ‘what do I need to say or promise to get reelected’.

            With that out of the way, let us actually address the question at hand. A bit of the response will be from the article and a bit from personal and professional experience. First, let’s talk about the obvious advantages to the outsourcing of jobs. One it cuts costs in the bottom line of the company doing the outsourcing, which in turn means an increase in profits for said company. That in turn means more money for the shareholders. It should be noted that this increase will potentially be a short term increase only, for reasons discussed in a moment.

            The second obvious advantage is the creation of jobs in places such as India that wouldn’t be there otherwise. In sociology, being ‘poor’ or ‘rich’ has everything to do with the societal setting the person is in. So, what we consider poor may look amazing in comparison to someone who lives in Ethiopia, but making such a comparison is considered folly, as the poor person in question doesn’t live in Ethiopia. The next consideration is one of cost of living, or to use an index introduced in class, the Big Mac index. If it is a norm for a poor person to be able to only eat a Big Mac as a once a week ‘treat’, then you have to adjust your expectations about middle class wages appropriately.

            So overall, more money and jobs for those in outsourced countries and more money for shareholders and companies that are doing the outsourcing.

            Now for the downside of outsourcing:

            The first thing to remember about economies and with capitalism specifically, not everyone gets to be a winner. Back when you were in grade school and your teacher said that, fi you tried really, really, really hard you could be president, she lied to you, you will never be president. It simply will not happen. Sure, you can dream, but the likelihood that a person with enough wealth and prestige to actually run for that office is actually ever going to read this is so extremely small that it is effectively non-existent.

            Next, we should look at the society in which the jobs are being subtracted from. Analysts are saying that about 70% of the jobs in America are simply unable to be outsourced because of their nature. With this idea, let’s turn the equation around. That insinuates that 30% of the job market could be shipped out. To give this a better perspective, the ‘unemployment rate’ in America since the housing bubble burst as never really gone much higher than 10-12%. Now understand that I put ‘unemployment rate’ in scare-quotes because there were a number of people who are or were considered ‘displaced workers’ that were unable to obtain unemployment benefits. As such, it is my opinion that the rate of unemployment was higher than reported simply because a number of people without jobs were not counted.

            The present economy, although it is ‘on the mend’ as some analysts insist, is still a far cry from what it was or could be. With that statement, what if the unemployment rate was to double? One can only shudder at the proposition.

            There are current studies showing the disparity between the percentage rate in which the ‘rich’ have increased in salary and the percentage rate of the middle class and the poor’s income rate. This is also shown in the cost of product goods in the economy where packages get smaller, yet somehow become more expensive. Although I believe restricted capitalism is a wonderful idea, I find it curious that CEO’s and decision makers or shareholders seem to be showing the symptoms of a terrible disease, the disease of blatant stupidity. By lowering the percentage of jobs available and dismissing people from job-posts, yet increasing costs of basic goods, exactly how do these people think the economy will sustain itself in the long run? Less jobs = less ‘free money’, less ‘free-money’ = market stagnation.

            In the article provided, it states that economists think that more world trade in this sense will mean more money flow, but that money is locked into the upper levels pockets. Thus my equation, ‘free-money’ or ‘money that is actually circulating in the market’, the less that is present within an economy, the more stagnant the market becomes.

            All of this pondering is moot however, much like the idea that I will never become president, it is absurdly unlikely that any of the people that make major decisions at companies, or any of the people that dictate policy, will ever hear what I say, and if by some crazy happenstance that they do read these words or hear my ideas out, they will never actually ‘listen’.    

            So, with this firmly in mind, I must simply shrug and keep trying to get by, hoping that whatever new career that I may get into won’t be just another target by some over-zealous Harvard grad that has never actually worked a day in their life…

-Tank