All Hail Walmart Again!

Re: [spiers] All Hail Walmart Again!

It is easy to make these price comparisons, however, we have to remember:

In the USA, our standard of living is much higher than the Vietnamese. Our
salaries and benefits are better. Our homes are nicer. All this costs $,
and we get it from our salaries. If companies drop prices, what else
happens: they cannot afford to give us the salaries we need or the
benefits.

In my state, teachers salaries in my county have been one of the worst. And
nation wide, my state was at the bottom of the list in a study done on
comparing retirement salaries. Yet on the front page of the NY Times this
past winter, there was an article saying Maryland was the 3rd richest state
in the USA. Well, perhaps it is because the $ is not being returned to the
workers as it should. In my county, it had been so hard to find new
teachers because of the bad salaries, and the fact that the county lost 850
teachers last year (due to this) our county found a new idea: Import
teachers from China and the Phillipines. So they hired 85 teachers from
those places, paid them less, and they do not receive benefits. Wow, think
how much the county is saving now!!
Think about the parents who saved for years, for their children's college
education. Think about how hard those kids studied 4 years to become
teachers, and then lost out on a job because the county is hiring foreigners
to fill jobs that our own should fill.

Think about the long term of what we are doing by all this. There are
people loosing jobs while a few get rich. I worked in Vietnam for a year,
and I know I sure would not want to live like them, nor how the Chinese have
to live either.

What to do? I did something for my county. I spread a newsflyer about our
terrible salaries and benefits to all the campuses last year, where our
county recruits for new teachers. I spent weekends doing this for the year,
including out of state colleges where they recruit. I spread these flyers
all over campus: student unions, bathroom doors of classroom buildings,
classroom lecture halls, libraries, office of the president lobby, and
everywhere. I spread them all over car windows at shopping malls at
Christmas, and the streets surrounding our Capital building.

I informed students of where they should not apply for a job, where they
would be taken advantage of by low salaries, and even lower retirement
package. Did I get results? Yes, this new school year, and for the next 2
years to come, our salaries are increasing 6% each year. Our state office
revamped our retirement in the last legislature session, and now we are
ranked in the middle of the USA, rather than last.

Where the supply comes from is important. Not China or Phillipines, but
from the USA

Linda

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