Okay… I guess maybe I wasn’t thinking of the entire spectrum of sanitation/plumbing workers… Certainly clean water is a life saver

C’mon man… My list includes 5 jobs that literally save lives… Your figurative life saving can get right outta town

If inflation causes your costs to go up, can you, and all the other plumbers in your area just go ahead and raise your prices to make up for it? Yes… People who are paid by tax money can’t just raise their rates. Even if they go private, Medicaid (in US) tells them what they can charge.

Anyway, I didn’t mean to disparage plumbers. I was using them as an example of an equally important part of society, but that gets to adjust their prices as needed instead of having to wait for a literal act of Congress to adjust prices and pay for inflation.

YOU charge… I don’t get to charge for my services… I just have to take whatever society offers… In fact, with a lot of those jobs I listed, they are legally not allowed to stop working (strike) to get better wages BECAUSE it would fuck society so bad. I’m also in the US, so my apologies if it’s not the same where you are

Sure hope you never need to find out

“Society” doesn’t pay plumbers… Like, you don’t get your plumbing fixed and bill Medicaid you know? Individuals pay for their own plumbing, and plumbers get to set their own prices… The jobs I listed are most often paid by society as a whole, and society as a whole are screwing these professions over… Don’t get me wrong, most workers are getting screwed, it’s just different.

You’re right that all workers are undervalued in our capitalist society

I made a few bad moves in my 20s because I had no basis of understanding when it came to money (parents are bad with money too and never taught me anything useful), have spent my 30s desperately treading water trying to get ahead, but it seems impossible with rent going through the roof, food going crazy, plus now I have medical debt on top of my school debt… my really big mistake was wanting to help people by becoming a social worker.

What pisses me off the most is that if you’re a plumber you get to walk in and demand whatever price you feel like, but if you’re someone who helps society, society gets to cram it up your ass and tell you to smile about it. Same goes for anyone who works for society: teachers, cops, firefighters, EMTs, social workers, librarians, nurses, etc… I don’t get why we don’t all just join together and let society fucking die until they agree to pay us what we’re really worth.

Edit: to clarify, I’m not saying plumbers aren’t helping society. I’m saying when inflation goes up, plumber’s prices go up to match… If you’re being paid by tax money, you don’t get to do that. Nothing against plumbers, it was just an example.

Everyone is getting fucked in our capitalist nightmare, but if you work for Walmart, WALMART investors are fucking you over… If you work for any of those jobs I listed above, SOCIETY is fucking you over (yes, I get that at the end of the day it’s still those Walmart investors fucking us over because the same 1% own everything and stop society from paying us what we’re worth by refusing to pay their fair share of taxes)

Same… Except my parents were teachers, so we were poor, because society is crap and doesn’t pay teachers what they should be getting paid

School and medical debt as well… The more you make, the more they take… Always keeping you at barely scraping by

The global South would want to move south for the same effect.

Oh, yeah I meant in the US… Sorry to be US centric

This is why everyone who isn’t a cis hetero white Christian man absolutely needs to buy a gun and learn how to use it. It’s your job to defend yourself. (Don’t get me wrong, allies are great, and people should be helping each other against the bigots, but end of the day, you’re alone, gotta defend yourself)

Edit: also, I’m really sorry that happened, not trying to blame the victim, just advocating for people taking their power back

“A monopoly is a market structure with a single seller or producer that assumes a dominant position in an industry or a sector. Monopolies are discouraged in free-market economies because they stifle competition, limit consumer substitutes, and thus, limit consumer choice.” ~investopedia

Nothing about needing to jack prices up. I’d say Amazon fits the description perfectly

Crest 3D strips work well, but do not fall asleep with them in… I did that by accident, swallowed one of the strips and woke up in such excruciating pain I had to crawl to the bathroom and puke. Just as heads up

Fix the fucking election system… No more gerrymandering, money out, make voting day a holiday, make mail in easy, zero bullshit restrictions making voting harder, ranked choice, no electoral college, get a handle on primaries too

Lol… Fair point… It was for work though

Grew up in New England. My friend moved to Montana, and was absolutely bullshit that there wasn’t a Dunks on every corner… New England runs in Dunks, the rest of the US not so much. He felt like the “America runs in Dunks” ads we’d seen or whole lives were a lie, and so our whole lives were a lie lol

Good news! Post people donate heavily to Dems and not much to Republicans… Not sure about the dark money though… No idea why he’s got breakfast there… Think he might be losing it

They probably did… Folgers and Jimmy Dean are pretty right-wing, but Post gives mostly to Dems according to open secrets… I don’t know about the others