What do people think to the statement "the majority of long term unemplyment is due to individual failings"

Answer 1

It's superficially correct, but fundamentally short-sighted, possibly to the point that it might appear to reflect an agenda.

--Who gets to define "the majority" here? The employers? The employed? The unemployed and underemployed? The Census Bureau, which at any moment might be *all* about whatever agenda *funds them*?

--Define "long-term unemployment" here. Does being underemployed, being forced to accept part-time or volunteer work count, since it isn't the desired outcome, or is a job a job? Do you count the people who have given up hope, in despair of ever finding meaningful work? And how long term *is* long term? Six months? Six years?

--"Is due to" is a terrible way to put things. As far as such statements go it's one of the most passive-voice, non-commital, bureaucratic ways to say nothing *ever*. Are you talking about causation here, in the sense of "It's because of?" or more of a correlation, in the sense of, "It just so happens that you're unemployed because you're a loser, these things *go together* usually, nothing personal?"

Pardon my snarkiness here, but really, if you intend to say something, *say something*, you know? Passive voice sucks.

--"Individual failings". Ah, the meat of the issue here. The agenda. Blame the victim? Really, I suppose you also believe that the people of New Orleans were somehow to blame for having a hurricane wipe out their homes too, just because the city was built on land *below* sea level (like Galveston, in Texas, or Amsterdam, in Holland). Never mind that needed defenses like dikes and levees were there but *not maintained* or repaired properly.

And I suppose you blame San Diego for the wildfires too.

Stop it already. -_- We've heard this one before and it's lame.

Working people don't, by and large, *outsource* themselves to China and India....CEOs do that for them. Working people don't willfully *choose* to work at minimum wage with no perks in a system *rigged* to keep them on welfare in spite of working full time--they get stuck doing that when Wal-Mart is the only employer who is *hiring*.

Do you see where I'm going with this? People don't always or even usually have control over their lives when it comes to this damned pathetic workplace. They don't have *any* really, we saw to that in the 1980s courtesy of Reagan's union-busting tactics. The CEOs, high-level managers and other One Percenters (and their wannabes) hold all the cards and have all the say...

And did I mention they own all the Media too, so that they can endlessly hire *hacks* like O'Reilly to blather on and on about how this is the way things "should be" or "must be" or how "God meant it to be like this"?

My point? I'm not saying that people aren't or shouldn't ever be responsible for themselves. We can and have to be. But ones own personal responsibility only goes so far. We can only own, or be responsible for, things we can control. And....the workplace with it's CEO/One Percenter culture, is majorly and *massively* out of control.

To suggest anything else is like telling a little kid that his mommy's drinking too much beer is "all his fault" somehow. It may make for an amusing stand-up comedy routine once or twice, but really. Can a kid control what *any* adult does, never mind his own parents? Extreme tantrums and other acts of psychosis aside, this isn't the case, ever, and our society doesn't allow it. And no, I'm not talking about a kid getting a toy or his favorite cereal....I'm talking about a little kid stopping his parent from being an *addict*. It doesn't happen.

So yeah....suggesting that people, working people, are to blame for their own failings *and* the failure of nerves of their bosses as well is just insane. It's propaganda. It's abusive really. We don't get any say in the matter on outsourcings, on pay cuts, on benefit cuts and outright *denial of them*, on union-bashing, on lobbyists *buying out* elections and politicians alike. To suggest that we buy into the idea that we're responsible for the Demented Excesses of Our Mad Billionaires not only takes them off the hook too easily, but it also *infantilizes* the rest of us by making us *inappropriately* "accountable for" and guilty about the behavior of Wannabe Paternalist Madmen we *explicitly* can't control. In short it takes what should be a *functional* relationship between consenting adults and turns it into a *dysfunctional* relationship between a *Surrogate* Abusive Parent and a *Surrogate* Suffering Family of Burdened *Surrogate* Children.

I tell you what....I'll be responsible for Donald Trump's nuttiness if *you* take on that guilt trip for *Charles Manson*, ok? That's what it boils down to....you're asking us to take on guilt and responsibility *way beyond* what's called for or even possible, never mind reasonable or fair.

And when you do that, some would suggest that the "extreme tantrums and other acts of psychosis" aren't too far off, on a societal level. History tends to bear this out. America itself was *born* from such an outburst, remember? Something about "taxation without representation" ring a bell?

Yeah, it's called taking from people without ever giving *a damned thing* back. It's called giving someone ALL of your burdens and NONE of your benefits. Expecting people to "work wonders and sh!t cucumbers" one minute, but then saying they have "no vote" or no say in their lives at all the next.

It's treating a human being like a beast of burden, like a pack mule, and then *beating* that "pack mule" to death when it doesn't perform as expected.

Get it? -_- I do.

And people are catching up with me, even if they don't want to, courtesy of your exploitative, "take all and never give back" agenda here.

Thanks for your time....such as it is.

Answer 2

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Answer 3

Absolute poppycock!

The leadership in most countries is at best a club for the industrialists to gain most profits. There is no proof whatsoever that unemployment is correlated with personal failings.
Some who have begun from the most humble of beginnings became successful have risen to great heights from their own inner strength. Likewise the converse is true if the odds against them were so insurmountable, that no matter what help was given, that person simply had no motive to better themselves. I can speak from personal experience in that starting off from a disabled body at 17 years there were times it seemed impossible to get a job. Forty years later I managed to help raise two sons and gain a 2nd class honours degree.

Answer 4

True. If it's long term, something is going on with the person. Not the employer.

Answer 5

correct bit who is responable for those individual failings, another question