|
|
Post by plantsnobin on Mar 13, 2008 11:44:31 GMT -5
Landarc, I agree with you, and your post reminded me of something. A couple of years ago I was helping out a mail order nursery near me, I was inside the greenhouse, and a retaining wall was being built right outside, so I could hear what the guys were saying. The young man doing the work had just started out with his own landscaping company, and was probably only 22 or 23 years old. He had a couple of guys working for him that were about the same age. You could tell a difference in them-owner had pride in his work, the others were just there. When they finished, I heard the owner say something along the lines of 'That turned out really nice, don't you love it when you work hard and have something you can be proud of?' That kid had what it takes to make it, but I bet most of the guys he hired were gone by the end of the summer, when it got really hot and nasty out. Maybe he had a father who taught him that hard work pays. Sadly, too many don't.
|
|
|
|
Post by MawkHawk on Mar 13, 2008 13:05:11 GMT -5
"Where has the work ethic gone ?"
I'd answer this, but I'm just too lazy....
|
|
|
|
Post by Jim on Mar 13, 2008 14:15:16 GMT -5
Well I'm 26 soon to 27 earned an engineering degree, got a job, got married ( holy shit a lot of work) and worked my up my company to a manager. I think I'm one of few not lazy people of my generation, I know too many people my age who do nothing but play video games and let their parents support them. I blame it heavily on poor parenting. I saw and continue to see how hard my parents work and how much they sacrificed for my education. They are my heroes.
|
|
|
|
Post by grungy on Mar 13, 2008 14:47:30 GMT -5
<sadly getting up on the soap box>
IMHO it's a combination of poor parenting and government interference. The day the governments basically told the parents that they can't use "child labor" was the start of the down slide. How many here had (the dreaded words) "unpaid chores". How many here were expected to earn their marks in school, instead of the teachers feeling that they had to protect the child's psyche? And how many here had parents that informed them that they were the parents, they set the rules, and no they didn't want to be their kid's friend?
Act out in school - no more detentions or heaven forbid the dreaded trip to the principal's office - no a suspension to be sent home where there is no adult supervision, because mom and pop are out trying to keep up with "Joneses", giving the kids time to do whatever they want to do, whether it is playing video games, or raising heck. To top it off there have been cases where the courts have ordered the parents to continue supporting their kids well past the age of majority.
And one wonders why the kids are turning out the way they do?
Sorry about the rant, but I think that it's time concerned parents and adults start taking back the right to raise their kids from the so called "experts" who never have raised kids of their own. They may have reproduced themselves, but the nannies and teachers (who get paid whether not they really care about the kids), have done most of the raising. Play school, pre-school, kindergarden, daycare ect. ect. ect.
<shaking her head, wondering where the "civilized" world is going to, stepping down and allowing someone else to step up>
grungy/val
|
|
|
|
Post by PapaVic on Mar 13, 2008 15:36:14 GMT -5
Things I learned in old school:
Wear two pair of jeans and four pair of underwear when you know you gotta paddling comin' from the history teacher who also is the football coach.
Don't let your parents find out you got a paddling at school ... or you would get another whoopin' at home.
If there was a particularly odious chore at home, make sure you never quite caught on to the nuances of correctly performing the chore to the detailed satisfaction of your drill sergeant, anal retentive dad ... so he'd have to "instruct" you once more, thereby completing most of the task.
Find a better place to hide the naughty magazines than under your mattress.
Get the goods on your siblings early, so you could blackmail them into not telling on you.
Keep a stock of rootbeer Fizzies handy so when there was a pop quiz you could fake frothing at the mouth in class. Then when sent to the nurse's station, hold the thermometer over the radiator until it registered 103.5 ... be careful though not to let it get above 105, or they call the ambulance service!!!
Okay ... there's much more. But maybe someone else has a few. Maybe it doesn't indicate how INDUSTRIOUS we were as a generation, but at least it gives some sense of how CREATIVE we were!
pv
|
|
|
|
Post by hoosierheightsfarm on Mar 13, 2008 17:34:45 GMT -5
I think the Europeans who came here and killed off the natives should be the 'illegals'. Now, now, just kidding. I saw a funny along the lines of this the other day, it went something like: Native Americans didn't have a strict stance on immigration; look where it got them. |
|
sammyqc
grub
Urban, small raised beds, Zone 5 (Canada)
Posts: 94
|
Post by sammyqc on Mar 13, 2008 22:05:06 GMT -5
I hope I didn't sound insulting with my post. I didn't mean that anyone should be responsible for someone who signs himself into debt, except for that person.
I just wanted to point out, that if it's that difficult to find a good employee, then you have to go the extra mile to keep them. And economics here are probably very different. I meant it when I said that here, in Canada, that would not seem like a huge wage. But our cost of living is probably higher as well as our taxes, so it doesn't really make a difference in the end. A friend of mine, single mom with three kids (not through choice, but mental illness on her ex-husband's part), was working a 'decent' job. Making about 12/hour, and she could barely make ends meet. It's not easy, and the system doesn't make it easy for someone to get ahead, once you're stuck.
|
|
|
|
Post by sandbar on Mar 13, 2008 22:35:30 GMT -5
Well I'm 26 soon to 27 earned an engineering degree, got a job, got married ( holy ---- a lot of work) and worked my up my company to a manager. I think I'm one of few not lazy people of my generation, I know too many people my age who do nothing but play video games and let their parents support them. I blame it heavily on poor parenting. I saw and continue to see how hard my parents work and how much they sacrificed for my education. They are my heroes. BINGO!! We've got a winner!! Touche', my friend. BTW, guys like you are REALLY hard to find. Glad to hear you had great role models in your parents and were smart enough to figure out they had pointed you in the right direction ... AND ... you sucked it up and kept going in the right direction. Kudos to you, Bud. |
|
|
|
Post by sandbar on Mar 13, 2008 22:35:58 GMT -5
"Where has the work ethic gone ?" I'd answer this, but I'm just too lazy.... THAT was funny! Thanks ... needed that today. |
|
|
|
Post by cff on Mar 13, 2008 23:29:10 GMT -5
No I didn't take your post as an insult at all, we all have opinions and I welcome yours. We're competitive with other business just like our own and $11:00 isn't all that bad in our area, the company paid benefits are generally better than what our competitors offer their associates. Most of the younger people we hire today don't seem to understand the difference between being poor - vs - being broke. Poor equates to not having an opportunity to earn a living - broke = simply spending more than you make and more often than not a good opportunity will be used to become broke. I'm hopeful they'll learn and I wish it didn't have to be the hard way; but when a guy picks up a $5.00 an hour raise for changing jobs and then tells me this job just doesn't pay enough I know where he's at in the learning curve. Throwing money at associates who can't manage there personal finances doesn't seem to teach the class. I know and agree with you that there are special cases and uncontrolled events that cause debt and burden our lives but feeling the need for two new cars just doesn't seem like a life changing event to me. I drive a used car to work, it's got a lot of miles on it and looks pretty bad but I purchased it with the EZ credit plan ................. 100% down and no payments. I've had more than a few associates make fun of my ride to work and I tell them I only need to be on time; I don't have to make monthly payments to look good ......  - I hope I didn't sound insulting with my post. I didn't mean that anyone should be responsible for someone who signs himself into debt, except for that person. I just wanted to point out, that if it's that difficult to find a good employee, then you have to go the extra mile to keep them. And economics here are probably very different. I meant it when I said that here, in Canada, that would not seem like a huge wage. But our cost of living is probably higher as well as our taxes, so it doesn't really make a difference in the end. A friend of mine, single mom with three kids (not through choice, but mental illness on her ex-husband's part), was working a 'decent' job. Making about 12/hour, and she could barely make ends meet. It's not easy, and the system doesn't make it easy for someone to get ahead, once you're stuck. |
|
|
|
Post by grunt on Mar 14, 2008 3:21:10 GMT -5
Up onna box. rant about to start:
Work ethic went the same place as being able to seal a deal with a handshake, and know it was going to be okay. Remember when newspapers used to be sitting there, with change on top of them, and you made your own change. Or you didn't have to lock your door, or worry about getting swarmed when you walked through a park? You could leave tools on the bench in your back yard, and know they'd be there when you needed them. You could tell your neighbor to come get what ever he needed, and bring it back when he was done - - - and it would happen? Sports heroes were just that, not overpaid whiners who figured the laws didn't apply to them? If you were a kid, what you would face at home would make anything the school could do pale in comparison. Your neighbors helped keep you in line and safe almost as much as your parents. People looked out for each other, and were only to glad to help out if you needed it. If you had car trouble, someone would stop and give you a hand, and not expect anything for it - - - and you didn't have to worry about the person stopping. We have lost substantially more than the work ethic.
Rant finished. Offa box.
|
|
|
|
Post by MawkHawk on Mar 14, 2008 6:54:22 GMT -5
I have a nephew (28) who is a borderline genius type. His parents were going to pay for his college, full ride. He flunked out of 3 universities because he wasn't going to classes. He worked at Costco for a few years and got fired. He was a substitute janitor for a while and got fired. He was unemployed for a few years and would spend his days in his room on his computer. Sometimes he'd work part time for minimum wage. Now he's living in TN with his girlfriend who works and pays the bills while he sits on his lazy ass. Oh yeah, he was working for a dry waller there and got fired.
My stepdaughter who is 29 was a B-C student in high school. We sent her to Central MI University and after graduation she moved to LA then to Chicago. She is a manager at a medical industry event planning company. She travels around the world (Brazil, Greece, Paris, London, Prague so far) and makes much more than I made at her age. After she was in LA for a few months she sent me a thoughtful letter which said, in part, "I never realized how hard you worked".
OK, I'm welling up a little now....
|
|
|
|
Post by kctomato on Mar 14, 2008 10:20:14 GMT -5
Kill the television set (Nintendos and computers too)
|
|
|
|
Post by Jim on Mar 14, 2008 10:41:57 GMT -5
Hey hey hey. I played nintendo and owned a computer, I just wasn't allowed to use them if my homework wasn't done, chores weren't done, was in discipline, or just wasn't with the program...lol
|
|
|
|
Post by plantsnobin on Mar 14, 2008 12:52:33 GMT -5
I have to admit that sitting here on this computer isn't doing much for my work ethic
|
|
-
