Oppertunity Hoarding

Many things shape the way we look at the world. No one thing totally shapes who we are. The way we were raised, religion, and economic status are some things that come into play. When we hear of rich people society tends to think what they did to get there. Who did they cross to become who they are? While a lot of rich families have storied background not all are morally inept. At the same time not all people who are considered poor or not wealthy have great morality. I will look at Zweig, Wright & Rogers, and the film Born Rich support my thoughts.

In chapter 3 of Zweig wrote about dignity of workers. In Detroit the autoworkers would go on strike for better pay/raise. While on strike the local newspapers would point out how much money was being lost by being on strike and how even with a raise would they be able to make up the money lost. It was sated this was because of dignity self-respect.  A hard day’s work deserves the pay to reflect it. Why did these people feel that way? Most were from working class families. The way they were raised as kids set them up for how to look at the world. I work for a job that has a union. It is not uncommon to see 2 or 3 generations all working for the company. It is a form of opportunity hording. The rich do it and the working class do it as well. The parents bring their children on then they bring their children on. I have notice in the last 10 year this has changed. While opportunity hording is still alive and well with the rich not so much with the working class. The company I work for has put policies in place to stop this. When I was hired I sent my resume to my Aunt and was called in for a test then interview.  I don’t recall actually filling out an application. Now employees do not have a way of getting someone hired. The process now goes through a 3rd party and does not come back until time to interview. So if someone can get through all the tape and get called in for an interview a good word can be put in. This makes it so that a father with 30years with a company could not help out his son getting a job at his company. I talk to people who were able to before the changes and there was pride in the fact they had a part in bringing their family into a good company. It makes a discord among employees and management.  Employees look at management as these evil no morally having beings. It add insult to injury when you can see it still working at a higher level. I have seen management positions needing to be reposted multiple times because people know the process and know someone has already been picked. People do not want to go through the process just for the sake of it knowing they have no chance.  

All people want to provide and support their family. All people are not given the same opportunity to do so does that make them unmoral? In the Zweig book it speaks of the underclass- the poor, frequently unemployed, criminals, and welfare users. The thought is people in this group are just lazy they do not want to work or just unmoral people. What type of person would commit crimes or chose not to work and just collect welfare. There is more to it these same people would join the workforce if they could or if it would benefit them. Most not all. Let’s take welfare recipients they are those who it’s a cycle they seen their parents on welfare and when they started having kids it was just assumed they would also. They are in the same economic class with the same opportunity to go up in class or lack thereof. Do these people not have moral or dignity or self-pride. Are they doing what needs to be done to feed themselves and their families? Is the system helping enough to create opportunities to go higher in class? In my personal experience I have seen people with young kids attempt to not use social services. They go out and get jobs not the best paying ones but now can’t provide for their families. The growing price of child care easy $1000+ per month for a small child in addition to food cost and the ever growing price of housing make it near impossible for someone in a low paying job to provide. These people seek out programs to help them while they work and possible move up and make more money. This where the conflict is. You have to be very poor to get assistance so someone working at a low paying job can work but can’t afford childcare and cannot get assistance. I had a friend who was told she could be put on a program to get reduce childcare but the waiting list was years long. When she would have been eligible the child would be in school. She was told if she was already on assistance such as food stamps she would not have to wait for the reduce childcare. So in this case she stopped working so she could get assistance. After getting her childcare she was able to go back and get another job of course the food stamps stopped. The flip side of this is those who do abuse the system and give the bad rep. I have seen a fair share of those who are committing welfare fraud. Those who work in cash business such as hairstylist who have section 8 housing and receive food stamps. The people who can afford nice cars and always have cash on them. Those who justify it by saying rich people work the system all the time.  Is it the same thing? Are these people unmoral because they are cheating an unjust system?