My parents were born in 1923 and 1924, and I came along when they were in their forties. My dad was in the Navy during WWII. They were married in 1947. Both lived through the Depression and the war, in rural Iowa, where even without a depression and a war, it could be difficult to earn a living.
As a result, I grew up hearing about how tough things were in the 1930s and 1940s. Most of the boys in my mom’s high school graduating class didn’t make it back from the war. People put cardboard in their shoes because they couldn’t afford new ones. Electric clothes irons were nearly impossible to come by, but somehow my maternal granddad managed to get his hands on two, one of which my mother used for the rest of her life. That sort of stuff, you get the picture.
I am today grateful that I have a vivid idea of just how bad things were not all that long ago in this country. There are many things I wish were different today, but it could be so much worse.
I think young people would be better off – and better human beings – if they really, truly understood history.
Not that there is ever a valid reason to steal, but as the corporate hypocrisy and greed grows, I can easily see the allure to giving companies the middle finger. You pay Amazon X$ for two day prime, but most of your stuff comes in about 3-4 days, pay to watch prime movies and now you are forced to watch ad’s to increase their profit, they get to spy on you and sell your personal information and profit off that too, all of this with zero recourse due to binding arbitration, and double speak where you don’t actually own the music and movies you paid real money for… I can see why the average joe, DGAF about stealing from Amazon, especially when coupled with ignorance about how vendors/sellers have to eat it.
Not at all justified, but just like United Health care…I am not at all shocked that it happens.
Why? It’s the merchant, not the card company, that pays both the charge and the fee to “investigate” the chargeback. The CC co. gets paid twice. They sure are friendly in the rare cases when I have a legit chargeback.
It won’t change anything because the narrative being told in our society is that if you are not profiting off of someone else, you are a word ending with -ist, or supportive of any number of -ism’s to make it seem like you are not a true American, because you won’t step on the throat of your fellow Americans for personal gain.
There is no shortage of greedy pieces of crap who will stand in line to feed the corporate greed machine other people’s lives for money. Just look at the platinum level knee pads and neck braces politicians wear, and now the CEO’s are wearing for the politicians.
Bezos even brought some cleavage eye candy with him to an event recently, because he knows the predilection of some politicians, despite Epstein being six feet under.
It’s all rigged and going to take a lot more pitchforks to change course.
Sure are. Credentials are required for most “good jobs” whether they are needed or relevant or not.
Human resources departments control hiring at most big and some small companies. Human resources departments do not know the business or what is required to keep them running.
Human resource departments have been perfecting their skills at dehumanizing employment for all of the post boomer generations.
It ain’t greed which creates all of the problems, lots are created by ignorance, stupidity and laziness.
Aye - Hubbard’s Corollary to Heinlein’s Hanlon’s Razor:
I was in public service (not elected office, to be clear) for my first career. I truly did not realize how very transactional too many people are–who even think it’s right to be and are always seeing little dollar sign estimates for every person or entity in their “beautiful minds”–until in my second career I started selling on Amazon, specifically.
If you’re not looking to maximize the dollar value for yourself of every other person at all times–if you are not somehow earning at all times and in all activities–then you are worthless (or stupid) yourself.
Prior to Amazon, I thought that was just a twisted but rare mindset of either some of my relatives or some of my clients. It’s been a fascinating education at how widespread and internalized it is.
Perhaps that very mindset that many retailers espouse is exactly what drives customers to deceive, especially when they feel like it’s so easy that maybe the businesses letting them get away with it even deserve it for being so stupid, and it isn’t really about their own personal character.
Meanwhile, some retailers feel entitled to any available dime (legitimate or otherwise) while complaining about the rampant thievery of customers, and some customers feel entitled to thieving without remorse while complaining about the evil greed of business owners.
But maybe that’s just the flu talking… 
Darn right, it is the best way to keep nepotism alive and well by hiding it under the name “HR” department. Ivy league colleges with their “legacy” admissions and acceptance of sub par SAT scores, to pad their sports teams to tell young Americans that merit means nothing. Passed down family knee pads are better than merit in America.
Let us not forget that greed is the reason the marketplace developed and pitched the lie that the “customer is always right”. Talk about fake empowerment… SMH.
If the customer is always right, then let me fix my Iphone, or John Deere tractor and make me opt in to sell my info or do arbitration.
But there’s an anti-corrolary: “Never blame on artificial intelligence what can be explained by natural stupidity.”