Who is For the Working Class?

Quite often in American Politics, politicians try to pander as being for the "working class." It is one of those strange pieces of the human condition where people latch on to this "us vs them" mentality. Most people fall into all different categories and groups and to varying degrees are either persecuted or praised for that group. Take myself for example, I am white, have Jewish heritage but am Christian, bisexual, in a same sex marriage, conservative, middle-class level income, home owner, dog person, tall (over 6 foot tall), thin...ish, wear glasses, speak English, ignore all the gender stuff but am happy with my anatomy as is, so on and so fourth. For all of those traits mentioned, I have at one point or another been grouped by it and either praised or otherwise. Anything from "it must be nice being tall enough to reach stuff" to being called a k*** by someone I worked with at Wal-Mart as a young adult. I have also heard time and time again of people pandering to most traits for people as a group of "us vs them." Of all of these, classism seems to be this one bastion of "us vs them" that is politically correct enough to be accepted. After all, the rich could simply give up their wealth to be like the rest of us, right?

This is where the term working class is poorly defined. A lot of people work, most people need to work to survive. So who are the working class. Most people like to refer to the working class and blue collar workers almost as synonymous. The problem is that there is such a spread that working class people seem to be fighting against each other, working against each other.

I consider myself working class. I live most of my life paycheck to paycheck, but I still have retirement plans in the works. My husband is not much higher than me on income and he's one of those evil "business owners." I work for a public school system at the moment. If we were not married, we would both be economically on about the same level. My husband's business is a franchise, so he has the name of a big corporation even though right now he just owns one store that is considered small, local, and family owned. Politicians would have people believe there is a distinction with a line drawn.

Most big corporations involve family. They mostly get built from the ground up with hard work and determination. Despite what people may say about "big business," there are always faces and people behind them. Any megalithic name you can think of boils down to people. All the "evils" that they commit are decisions made by people or groups of people.

Who are these working class stiffs being taken advantage of by big business, paving the road to be trodden upon? It is not college kids barely scraping by thinking a degree is their only chance at success while at the same time trying to tear down the people who achieved their goals already. It is not the people sitting on top of an empire built upon their ability to act out a story. It is not the career politicians who took pan-handling to a new level of empty promises we are forced to pay for. It is not big businesses who "stand up" for the "little guys" riding in on their self-righteous horses. It also is not those who work day in and day out, because almost everyone does on one level or another whether it's observed or not.

The "Working Class" is a load of bull shit. Business owners WORK to keep their business profiting. Employees WORK to keep not only themselves and their families surviving, but the place of business they work for because it benefits them with a means to survive. People in other countries work to survive just like us, or in some cases against even harsher odds.

Most of us have the same goals. We want to be successful and happy. We want a good environment that can support all the good things we have and come to expect. We want to live in a world where people around us can be happy along with us. No matter what we do, life is not fair. People get lucky, and some unlucky. We cannot do better if we waste all of our time attacking people for being lucky, or born at a better time for what they had accomplished, or for building something that worked out well. We cannot solve problems by taking from those that have and just giving it to those that do not have. We solve problems by working together, or competing, or even just by trying until something works.

These politicians that say they are for the working class is nothing more than a ploy. People are not your enemy just because they are wealthy and they most certainly are not your friends because they are poor. We have college kids barely getting by wasting their time attacking families living paycheck to paycheck to survive or even attacking the companies that are keeping hundreds and even thousands of people employed so they can survive. I am just so sick and tired of all this class crap and political pandering. Politicians should either actually do something that helps or get out of the way and let people fix their own problems. Preferable, get out of the way.

Socialized Healthcare

Healthcare is a rather odd topic. From the capitalist point of view, it makes money mostly on people's misfortune. From a social point of view, there is this idea that everyone has a right to healthcare, after all how can you live a good and happy life if you aren't healthy. It seems like a fair argument on the surface level, who are we to say someone doesn't have the right to be healthy? The problem is that we are neglecting so many factors, especially the human factor. That to me seems to be the problem with socialism as a whole, neglecting the human factor.

So to start with, do we have a right to our health? No. Some people are born with health problems, others may be perfectly healthy from birth to death. Some people choose to live an unhealthy life, others may choose to make their entire life about their health and how healthy they can be. From the very start people are on an unequal footing and as life progresses that changes constantly whether from life choices or unforeseen circumstances. There is no guarantee to anyone that they will have a long and healthy life. Even with modern medicine, we are still limited in how much of an improvement we can offer, if any, to various situations.

So what if it was a right? Or what if we don't care and say everyone should have access to healthcare? Well, the first thing is that healthcare is done professionals. People spend time and money to learn how to care for people's health. Saying a person has a right to healthcare means that people have a right to any healthcare professional's skills. A doctor or nurse would be unable to refuse someone. How could that be bad, someone might wonder. Examples could include if a doctor doesn't support transitioning, abortion, circumcision, or anything that people today want to argue about. Also if we add the government in to the mix, they will most likely fix the prices. Now no matter what skill level the doctors are, they will make the same amount. This may sounds great from a consumer perspective, but this would only degrade the healthcare system as a whole.

Another big problem is that everyone pays into the system, so everyone should theoretically have a say in what services are actually healthcare. This is going to force people to have more rigid views, after all it's part of their money being spent on healthcare. This sounds great to people who believe they have majority opinion. Instead, put yourself in the shoes of a minority opinion. Take abortion for example, imagine if all the people on the opposite side get there way and now the enforcement is not law, but instead healthcare. Imagine the healthcare supporting all that you oppose and not supporting what you want it to. This is what will happen to people who will be forced to pay the socialized healthcare system. People will have more of a right to make those decisions for everyone because they are paying for everyone. You could end up with health coverage that does nothing for you, goes against your beliefs, but you still have to pay for it and to change anything you then need to sway the entire country.

The most damning part of all of this is financially it just is not possible. People get sick unexpectedly, some people are born with more needs than others. Estimating the amount of money needed for this would be hard enough, getting that amount would be impossible. Currently private healthcare companies can work because they are made to make money. Since the goal is to make money, they have money even when the unexpected occur. Some even offer incentives for you to prove yourself healthy and that you are taking care of yourself, costing you less and allowing the chance for the company to make more. It's a win-win while still maintaining a safety net for both parties. Not to mention, they cover smaller areas with fewer people, meaning less overhead for managing it all as well as better fine-tuning. The US is a much larger country than most out there with an incredible number of people. This is a logistical nightmare to try and account for the health of so many people across such a huge area. The money for overhead alone would likely be tremendous. Most of the estimates given are just not achievable.

Socialized healthcare comes from a caring thought, but the warm and fuzzy feelings just cannot change reality. Even if we assume we can get the money and support for it, people will argue about it and try to tear it apart so that it is personalized to them. People are greedy and selfish, and it's not a bad thing. Greed and selfishness are good because we can understand those motivators and work with those goals. It is when those traits are forgotten that we end up with things that sound nice but just will not work. We cannot save everyone and not everyone wants to be saved. As far as I can see, socialized healthcare will not work and even if the figures could add up I would still not support it.