I thought we would get an infrastructure boom from Obama during the Great Recession. We went through 2 huge rounds of spending that mostly went to "shovel ready" projects. From my understanding, today's construction budgets are tied up in capital costs like heavy machinery and materials. There isn't much need for labor anymore with automation and specialized equipment.
There is also the issue of planning out infrastructure improvements. With environmental reviews that can take decades and lawsuits that occur after that, it is extremely difficult to pull the same type of "New Deal" programs that happened during the 1930s.
My guess is for all the spending, very few people would end up employed. Is the goal employment at any cost, or providing people without jobs welfare?
Trump has years of experience in real estate development. I am sure he can pass project trough the regulators.
The critical variable is what is the Congress willing to do - if the Republicans embrace the blue collar workers - a lot can be accomplished.
Right now republicans have a chance to shape the country for a generation. And I hope they will see how rewarding the working class could benefit their big corporate donors - because america need a new middle class that can consume everything that corporate america produces.
And infrastructure spending is hard to resist to - it will benefit even Democratic districts.
I don't think you're wrong. But this is the same situation that "millennials" have been facing. They have no cash to move from their family home to chase opportunity. I'm sure many would love to keep their standard of living as-is and have a good job, but most accept smaller and more expensive housing with problems like traffic, crime, pollution in urban areas in return for employment.
The big difference I see is most millennials want to move to a big city and work hard at creating a new and better future.
"Do this or you're fired" will typically get those below you to produce the change you desire. Not sure how you can put that much value on a skill inherit to a hierarchical organization.
If the organization was flat, then I would concede your point that affecting change without any seniority would be difficult and worth extra compensation. A true leader would need to be persuasive, knowledgeable and visionary.
What you describe as "leadership" is people doing their job.
"Do this or you're fired" will typically get those below you to produce the change you desire.
LOL. If this were true it would be so much easier. But talented employees, who can easily get another job across the street, are more likely to laugh at you then do what you want if you talk to them like that.
(We've gotten a bit off topic this deep in the thread. At this point we're really just talking about general management skills which really isn't a big thing for a CEO of any reasonably sized company. That being said....)
Robert: Sorry I can't work late this week. It's my kid's birthday tomorrow.
Back in the real world it's not unemployment that you're gonna worry about. It's how much severance you're going to pay him. Somewhere between 1 and 3 months. Which he'll use to take a nice vacation and then easily go get another job whenever he's ready.
And you'll be down a talented employee that's hard to replace.
Good leaders can effect change without resorting to the "do this or you're fired" line. If your manager kept using that line on you, I suspect you'd go find a place that didn't work that way.
I agree that there are people who will benefit from the use of prescription medications to treat different life issues. I too suffer from hours of staring at work, unable to start or finish. I don't think I have a learning disability or a disease that needs treatment. But I think there are many alternatives to help people who cannot start and finish work tasks.
I can usually find a quiet and productive work environment free from distractions. I can usually adjust my caffeine intake levels. I can usually adjust the amount of personally stress in my life. I can usually adjust the amount of sleep. I can usually break up my work into small enough chunks to get started. I can block certain computer activities which are distracting.
Yes everybody is different. No, we should not throw out the baby with the bathwater. Yes, we should be exploring alternative treatments besides powerful amphetamines which can cause addiction and health issues. I don't believe having a problem justifies all the cost that go along with treatment. Sometimes the solution is worse than the problem.
I don't want to have to do drugs at work to keep my career from those who want to take a pill and work for 12 hours a day.
"Sometimes the solution is worse than the problem."
For someone without the condition, perhaps.
My entire life I've tried to work with managing techniques, such as those you suggest, and a hundred others, none of which made a blind bit of difference. Caffiene does not seem to affect me in the same way as it does most people btw. So I've spent a good part of my career trying to find roles and bosses more suited to my scatty ways - often far from easy - once I realised I was a little unusually wired.
The biggest problem ADD has is that everyone gets distracted, struggles to focus sometimes, so the majority of people exatrapolate that out and presume there's nothing wrong. Then go on to suggest 5 things that help them with their occasional distractions. That's like telling a wheelchair user to just walk. "Well have you tried walking differently?" "Tried a stick?" I spent 50 years trying to just walk and I still can't. My first week on meds however, when I was told I'd probably wouldn't yet notice a difference, was indescribable. Truly I don't have the words. I almost dropped into depression realising I could have been like this my whole life. "Is this what other people have all the time?". I could have achieved so much!
That I achieved some measure of success with the condition, compared to how my mind could have worked surprises and disappoints in equal measure - what might I have achieved?
For many actually with the condition it's highly debilitating. They can't not be distracted. Ever. Often they're being distracted from being distracted from... IT IS NOT "oh look, shiny" on facebook. For some powerful amphetamines will be the best solution of those yet available (in very low doses compared to dietary or recreational uses). You don't get any of the same effects as you would taking amphetamines at a party. It's a neurological imbalance, so a neurological treatment will often be fitting.
Course I probably shouldn't think of it as a learning disability and just adjust the amoutn of tea I drink and look at some ideas for people who cannot start and finish work tasks.
I don't want over diagnosis, or easy diagnosis of very young children, and ideally want some more tools in the box I can choose from.
Why do you assume that I'm not already using all of the techniques you described, in conjunction with the meds? Why do you assume that you know what's going on inside my head better than I do?
I'm not being rhetorical, I honestly would like to know. It's a huge problem that so many people refuse to believe that mental illness exists, not just for me and not just for ADD. You wouldn't say to someone with chronic fatigue syndrome "Yes, nobody likes to get up for work, but you just have to suck it up and deal with it." You wouldn't tell a diabetic that they shouldn't have to take shots just to get through the day. What makes you feel qualified to do that to me?
> Yes, we should be exploring alternative treatments besides powerful amphetamines which can cause addiction and health issues.
Absolutely we should! I would love to find a non-stimulant treatment that works for me. I regularly do research and ask my doctor to see if there are any new treatments available. Until they come up with one that works, I'm going to keep doing what I need to do to get by.
Also, I'd love to see a source on "addiction and health issues," because Ritalin and the other common ADD meds are not addictive, and have no long-term side effects for the large majority of patients, at clinical doses.
> I don't want to have to do drugs at work to keep my career from those who want to take a pill and work for 12 hours a day.
This is a strawman. That has never happened to you; your career is not under threat from drug abusers. My career will absolutely crash out immediately if I stop taking my meds, I've tried it before. What you're doing is no different than medical marijuana prohibition: you'd sooner let patients suffer than run the risk that someone might get high.
I agree with you that long-haul freight is best served by rail. However, I would hardly call the railroads unsubsidized. They received free land, cheap loans and government guaranteed business to develop the rail system.
The eventual beneficiary of cheap transportation is the consumer. I suppose this should considered a regressive tax.
I fail to see how I as a consumer am personally benefitting. I have more expensive healthcare that covers less and it gets more expensive and covers less every year.
I'm sure there are a few very sick people out there who are benefitting. I'm glad that we as a society are able to help them out. But it's clear that I do not have choice in needing healthcare, whereas these providers do have a choice in providing healthcare.
I agree with you that the hybrid approach is not working.
I believe your examples of public services being worse than their private counterparts is a specious argument. Most private schools are paid for by rich people. The cost to attend is higher than public school so it would reason that the quality is better. Same for USPS vs FedEx. The shipping rates for USPS are much cheaper.
Some people are price sensitive. Cheaper is all they can manage to afford and are willing to accept less quality in return. As a healthy person I'd rather take a two percent annual increase in insurance premiums for lower quality of care since I do not have much need for services.
Where's your evidence that most private school is paid for by rich people? Anecdotally, the people that I know that use private schools are middle class. Also, if there weren't public schools there would be more varieties of private schools.
"As a healthy person I'd rather take a two percent annual increase in insurance premiums for lower quality of care since I do not have much need for services." --
And I wouldn't. Why do your views trump others who disagree?
I also have police officers in my family and I have anecdotal evidence from them that there are bad cops and everybody in a department knows who they are and what the issues are with those officers.
The expectations of performance are different between a police officer and a sys admin. It may happen that a sys admin makes a mistake causing systems to go down. Coworkers might be involved in the cleanup and pull an all nighter to recover the systems. Immediately after the incident there will be changes to process and responsibilities to minimize the likelihood of a similar event from happening. Sometimes people are fired. Sometimes people are demoted. Sometimes management is held responsible. Sometimes there is retraining.
Policing does not take any such corrective actions. Individual officers have the protection of powerful unions which hold all officers equal regardless of their performance and efficacy. Sergeants and captains can't correct the actions of the officers under their responsibility without facing repercussions from union representatives. Management becomes damage control and officers regress to the lowest mean because that is what makes their job easiest.
I think there is a lot of blame to go around. I blame our society for allowing this to continue for so long without demanding change from public representatives. I blame our elected officials for not changing laws to reflect our current reality. I blame police unions for protecting bad officers. I blame police department management for not attempting to deal with bad officers and enabling poor policing. Lastly I blame individual officers who should know better but most likely are not incentivized to change their behavior.
Your comment is directly contradicting itself. The value of the Olympics and their fundraisers is because of the athletes. Would Nike pay hundreds of millions to put their logos on TV with no athletes? Take away the athletes and you're left with a bunch of old white men who have connections to marketers at large multinationals. Not very valuable.
I use the command WIN + q which launches the Windows "Search the web and Windows" menu/dialog which I can type a local file name or installed application and quickly open items.
There is also the issue of planning out infrastructure improvements. With environmental reviews that can take decades and lawsuits that occur after that, it is extremely difficult to pull the same type of "New Deal" programs that happened during the 1930s.
My guess is for all the spending, very few people would end up employed. Is the goal employment at any cost, or providing people without jobs welfare?