This infamous saying, “work ennobles,” is no less an insult to modern working-class Americans than it was back then to people being herded into the work camps. Many of them worked hard and survived; not so in the modern day.
Catch-22
Christians live by the “Christian work ethic,” the notion that you earn your place in heaven by hard work and by good deeds, most notably practicing charity with your hard-earned money. It’s the firmament of Christian life and the glue that holds western society together.
The wealth power-elites know this. They went to Sunday School, too. They got MBAs at Harvard and Yale, where everybody learns how to squeeze the most out of people by every means possible.
“Convince a Christian that working himself to death for you will earn him a one-way pass through the Pearly Gates and that’s exactly what he will do, no matter how little you pay him.”
This credo is writ large in the MBA playbook earned by every Ivy Leaguer.
Political Man Speaks with Forked Tongue
Every politician in Washington claims to want nothing more than to help the middle class. None of them do anything of the kind.
There is only one way to fund Washington’s lavish socialist agenda, and that’s on the back of the middle class. Everybody knows this but the middle class because they’re working too hard to notice.
The wealthy will never suffer a lessening of income. Tax them more, and they just pass it on to their workers: Fire a hundred full-time employees and hire two hundred part-time employees with no benefits. Problem solved.
In the last 4 years, 8 million full-time jobs have been wiped out and replaced by 8 million part-time jobs (in parallel with a net loss of 4 million jobs total). 80% of all new jobs created are part-time jobs now.
In the last 4 years, the net worth of top wage earners has increased by 70%. Meanwhile, well over half of all Americans have trouble putting food on the table and meeting their most basic needs.
Death by Healthcare
Obamacare incentivizes the wealthy to keep up the good work. You don’t have to provide health care for part-time employees. Not to worry, they’ll still be strong and healthy for the job; they’ll have health care, because the IRS will penalize them if they don’t buy it on their own.
So, the rich keep their workers, the workers keep on being healthy – and here’s the bonus – the workers have to work even harder because they earn less, having to pay for their own health care.
What more could a business owner or manager ask for? The same workers, for less pay, more productive.
Conclusion
Barring a national system of wage and price controls, you can help to foster professional esteem in your trade or business…
Get a professional degree or license and form a union in your trade or industry.
Use your collective influence to get your state legislature to pass laws like Professional Engineers have – requiring employers to provide you with the time, the tools and the qualified help needed to do your job in a timely and professional manner.
Working hard for your rights as a skilled professional or artisan earns you just as many, if not more, points toward Heaven as working hard for some craven, ruthless, penurious fat cat.