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Showing posts from October, 2012

October Moment

Eating my linner on West Cliff in Santa Cruz just now I was blessed to watch a porpoise leisurely playing among the slow, low rolling waves. It reminded me of the times I've watched from a lawn chair a slightly younger Gabriel entertaining himself quietly and contentedly at a corner of the pool, engaged with pool toys and hydrodynamics, a moment of solitary peace between the raucous splashy times he'd have with other kids.

The Profit of Human Decency

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The fundamental problem with the American economy is that corporations as a rule do not consider a decent standard of living for their employees to be a worthwhile expense. They do not as a matter of policy take any role in improving the communities in which they operate when they could make a really big difference. They do not recognize that their focus on the bottom line in the long run works against their interests. They do not see the intrinsic value and humanity of bolstering the morale of their employees with decent pay, good benefits, and incentivizing profit shares. They do not see the obscenity and recklessness of CEO salaries that are hundreds, even thousands! , of times higher than the average pay rate of their workers. They do not see thriving lives of the individuals they employ as a damn fine accomplishment, an end in itself. They reject the notion that the fundamental American value, the pursuit of happiness, and not the one-dimensional obsession of the p