Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[troutbreath]

From what my fisheries research buddies tell me Alex Morton has been ignoring a lot of logic and common sense too. Apparently the vast majority of scientific research into fish farms does not find any CONCLUSIVE evidence of harm to wild stocks. But hey, why let the truth get in the way of a good story??

Ignore what's happened in Chile Norway Britain etc all you want. One day the only salmon you'll be fishing for will be at Marine Harvests pay and play.

[Damien]

So yeah, the thread's about the Occupy thingy.  Not the fish farm thingy.

[joy-of-fishing]

Its called working!

[Sandman]

I remember working for $9.50 an hour and found it VERY difficult to make ends meet, paying rent, eating more than Mac n Cheese, buying gas etc.  That was in the 90s.  I cannot imagine what life is like for people working for minimum wage today, or worse as those poor saps at IHop who have to work for less (since they serve alcohol in IHop these servers will still only make only $8.75).  This minimum wage is set by the politicians that only a few years ago voted themselves huge wage increases of between 20 - 40%.  It is not hard to see why the protestors are occupying.  The disparities are out of whack.  It is not a matter of being lazy and wanting a government hand out.  It is about the fact that someone working hard, for long hours, can still, at the end of the day, not be able to support their family in a "comfortable" living. Can you say they should move out of the city where housing is cheaper?  How will they get to their job in the city with gas prices as high as they are and no rapid rail transit to the valley?  People are frustrated and it is reaching a boiling point.  True, they are currently unorganized and unfocused with no clear goals, but there are enough of them world wide that should the right individual step in, they could electrify this disorganized mob into a Force for change.

[nickredway]

Well put!

[BwiBwi]

Sure but what's these poor saps' education level?  What were they doing in high school / college?

[Sandman]

Sure but what's these poor saps' education level?  What were they doing in high school / college?

Who knows?  Perhaps they had poor home life (alcoholic/drug abusing parents) and could not study at home, or perhaps they had an undiagnosed learning disability and could not keep up with their peers, or perhaps they WERE diagnosed with a learning disability but did not receive adequate learning assistance support due to government cuts in education spending, perhaps they could not afford college, shall I go on?  Do not assume because someone is uneducated that they are lazy.  There are a lot of reasons why someone may not be able to receive a post secondary education and find themselves in service industries.  Many of them may even be working their way through college right now.  They still deserve a respectable wage.  If $9.50/hr was woefully inadequate in 1990, it certainly cannot be adequate in 2011.  All I am saying is I understand why they are protesting.  For Campbell to give himself a 40% wage increase in 2007 and then fight to keep the minimum wage down for fear that it would drive away businesses and bankrupt the province, is hypocritical.  The greed of the 1% is at an all time high.  It is happening all over the world and the 99% will not sit idle for ever.  There has got to be a better way, a more sustainable way.  The current system is not it.

[scuntor]

Good post here Sandman. Not sure why people choose to make assumptions about people's backgrounds. The cracks in our system are growing wider and many people are falling though.
I am still against these occupy protests in Canada. Looks like a lot of doobie smoking and drum beating. Yes we have problems but there are jobs out there if people are willing to do them. We also have a much more stable banking system. The people making minimum wage are too busy working two jobs to crap on the lawn of the art gallery.

Who knows?  Perhaps they had poor home life (alcoholic/drug abusing parents) and could not study at home, or perhaps they had an undiagnosed learning disability and could not keep up with their peers, or perhaps they WERE diagnosed with a learning disability but did not receive adequate learning assistance support due to government cuts in education spending, perhaps they could not afford college, shall I go on?  Do not assume because someone is uneducated that they are lazy.  There are a lot of reasons why someone may not be able to receive a post secondary education and find themselves in service industries.  Many of them may even be working their way through college right now.  They still deserve a respectable wage.  If $9.50/hr was woefully inadequate in 1990, it certainly cannot be adequate in 2011.  All I am saying is I understand why they are protesting.  For Campbell to give himself a 40% wage increase in 2007 and then fight to keep the minimum wage down for fear that it would drive away businesses and bankrupt the province, is hypocritical.  The greed of the 1% is at an all time high.  It is happening all over the world and the 99% will not sit idle for ever.  There has got to be a better way, a more sustainable way.  The current system is not it.

[BwiBwi]

Sure you can make assumptions that those people are disadvantaged but still does that qualify them to have same pay as those that worked hard?

[bcguy]

An artical from the Kitimat times well written by a Mayoral candidate?

http://www.kitimatdaily.ca/show5117a0x300y1z/OCCUPY_KITIMAT

Worth a read 

[Damien]

Sandman, there are dozens of fine towns around this province with entry level jobs available and very inexpensive rents.  Living in and around a major growing metropolis is not for everyone anymore.

People don't HAVE to live and work in the city.  Sure, its a shame that house prices ( I blame immigration for this) and rental rates in Vancouver and the Valley are very high and that has pushed people out of the city, but this has happened in pretty much every major metropolitan city in the world.  As a city grows, and in Vancouver's case be regarded as a great place to live, it brings in people with money and pushes out those from more modest means.  But like we ALL know, this entire province is awesome, leave the city and the valley and push out further. 

I lived in Lillooet for a year making $28,000 right out of University 7 years ago.  Just two hours from Vancouver over the Duffy.  Rent was under $400 and I lived a good life.  I drove to Loops every couple of weeks to load up on Staples and had the Fraser River and many tributaries and small lakes all around me.  I had peach, pear and apple trees in my back yard, local farmers market on the weekend.  Very dry climate, terrific weather all around.  Could have bought a decent house for $90,000-$125,000.  But I CHOSE to move back to Vancouver and have a huge mortgage.

[skaha]

--min wage is announced by government but not set by them..
--There is nothing stopping companies from paying more!
--I owned a retail business and most competitors paid minimum wage I paid more... got the best people... and made more money.

--I don't care that people in the media dubbed Occupy movement have as many differing opinion's as the arm chair biologist do for a Thompson Steelhead recovery plan.
--Most will agree that Thompson steelhead are in trouble and one of the first steps to recovery is letting people know and identify the problem...

--Eventually some themes will emerge with accompanying solutions... we may not all agree on the path but at least they are doing something.

[brownmancheng]

I remember working for $9.50 an hour and found it VERY difficult to make ends meet, paying rent, eating more than Mac n Cheese, buying gas etc.  That was in the 90s.  I cannot imagine what life is like for people working for minimum wage today, or worse as those poor saps at IHop who have to work for less (since they serve alcohol in IHop these servers will still only make only $8.75).  This minimum wage is set by the politicians that only a few years ago voted themselves huge wage increases of between 20 - 40%.  It is not hard to see why the protestors are occupying.  The disparities are out of whack.  It is not a matter of being lazy and wanting a government hand out.  It is about the fact that someone working hard, for long hours, can still, at the end of the day, not be able to support their family in a "comfortable" living. Can you say they should move out of the city where housing is cheaper?  How will they get to their job in the city with gas prices as high as they are and no rapid rail transit to the valley?  People are frustrated and it is reaching a boiling point.  True, they are currently unorganized and unfocused with no clear goals, but there are enough of them world wide that should the right individual step in, they could electrify this disorganized mob into a Force for change.

Good post here sandman. The thing that is being protested is the growing gap between rich and poor. Yes some were able to make it with a low wage but 9 dollars goes a much shorter distance these days. Damien I believe you are taking a bit of a narrow-minded stance here. I am far from a bleeding heart but the fact is it costs more to live and wages aren't rising. And no there really aren't tons of jobs in rural areas that is why there is so many people in the city, because that is where the entry level jobs are. To say people are here because they want to live and work in the city is not a fact. 

[brownmancheng]

Sure you can make assumptions that those people are disadvantaged but still does that qualify them to have same pay as those that worked hard?

Why do you assume that people that are paid less dont work as hard?. In my opinion it is often ( not always)  the reverse people slave away doing undesirable work for low wage and some are exorbitantly compensated for doing very little comparatively.

[Sandman]

Sure you can make assumptions that those people are disadvantaged but still does that qualify them to have same pay as those that worked hard?

On the contrary, I am not making "assumptions," as I prefaced each with "perhaps" indicating that there are a lot of reasons why someone may be "under educated" and working as unskilled labour.  The "assumption" was that if one does not have a diploma or post secondary degree that qualifies them for a more lucrative salary, then they must have been slacking off in high school or college, and thus deserve a salary that keeps them below the poverty line.  Any one of those possible scenarios I mentioned would have been a case of someone probably working twice as hard as I did in high school, but still not able to graduate or go on to college.  Does someone with no skills deserve what I used to make as skilled labour, or what I make now as a professional?  No, it does not, but they still deserve a respectable wage that allows them to live in dignity.