Yes, Mr. Patton, I am most certainly aware that not much is made here anymore, but I have found a few things made in the USA.
I have found socks at Kohl's, a lovely recliner at Reinholt's and a mail order t-shirt company. It's not easy, but there are alternatives. If I can't find a desired item at a second-hand store or a garage sale, I ask myself do I really need this item or do I just want it?
You see, Mr. Patton, 58,000 Americans of my generation died in a place called Vietnam supposedly to stop communism. Now American consumer dollars end up in Red China. I wonder if, in a few decades, al Qaeda will receive most favored nation status somewhere and become a major trading partner in the name of corporate profits?
My animosity toward Wal-Mart is not limited to their importation of Red Chinese products, but it starts there. When Sam Walton founded the company he used the "Made in USA" slogan as a marketing tool. When trade relations with Red China began and fair trade regulations were tossed out the window, Wal-Mart led the stampede to slave labor. To stay competitive others had to follow. Also factoring into my decision not to be a Wal-Mart shopper is their record on wage and hour laws, gender discrimination and their anti-union activities, which brings us to the subject of unions.
Mr. Patton blames unions for the mass exodus of jobs from our country. He cites the over-paid $60-per-hour auto worker as an example. If that were true he might have a point, but that's another right-wing fabrication. At $60 per hour an auto worker would make $124,800 per year. In 2007, a Big Three auto worker made $67,400 per year. The $60 per hour applies only after legacy cost to retirees are factored in (another reason for health care reform).
When unions represented 30 percent of the private economy, they won a living wage, health care, pensions, paid vacations and overtime pay. Rising union wages and benefits helped lift the living standard of other workers and provided for a vibrant middle class. Union also worked for safer machinery and tools, practical safety procedures and put an end to child labor.
Now with unions representing about 7.5 percent of workers we have seen the dismantling of middle-class America. In its place we have crippled economic activity and obscene disparity of wealth, birthed by laissez-faire capitalism. Executives have given themselves multi-million dollar salaries only to be topped by their multi-million dollar bonuses and retirement packages, at the expense of American jobs.
A worker in Red China works for less than a dollar and hour. Are you suggesting, Mr. Patton, that Americans work for 50 cents per hour?
I don't know who the tea partiers want their country back from, but I want my country back from the greedy, corporate swine that have destroyed it and the lawmakers that incentivized them to do it.
I hope this letter will not be heavily edited as was my last one and a few precious others.
