A Fundamental Weakness to the U.S. Economy

Permit me to rant a bit...

Something I've encountered through the years is the penchant for people to just enough to get by. It seems to get worse as the years go by - or perhaps I'm getting cynical. But the lack of motivation, the unconcern for quality, and the unwillingness to exert much effort all seem to be the prevailing norms in our society.

Granted, technology plays it's role, making this behavior easier. But the underlying psychology has to be there, or else the technology doesn't matter.

Case in point. I assign research papers in my Econ classes. Every semester, I bust several people for plagiarizing. They are unable/unwilling to do the assignment, even though the goal of the assignment is to enhance their learning.

And it is not like they even do the cheating well! In most cases, it is pure cut-and-paste jobs from the internet or encyclopedia CDs, without even the slightest effort to change any of the wording.

For those who don't cheat, many of the papers are a string of quotes (also probably cut-and-pasted from the web - but at least properly cited), with very little of the student's words or insight.

I know the English instructors (at least many of them) teach the fundamentals of writing research papers: you read a number of sources, get an understanding of the topic, then write about it in your own words. You directly quote mainly in the few circumstances where the original source worded things SO WELL, there is no way to re-say it better. You cite all quotes & facts.

I tell my students that their degree will ONLY get them a job interview. The knowledge they gain in school & life will be what gets them a job and let them keep it. But, alas, they do not seem interested in learning what they can while in school. They seem to only be interested in the degree, expecting that the degree entitles them to good pay & easy work.

This sense of entitlement seems to flow through our society. Kids today have goals of getting rich with minimal effort - they all plan to be singers, play in the NBA, etc. So they do not see the need to study in school. They feel that just because they show up in class, they deserve to be given A's. Just because they came to school they deserve to be given their degree. Just because they graduated they deserve to be given a good-paying job. Just because they show up for work they deserve to get paid. Showing up is all that is required - little concern for effort. Because we are Americans, we deserve hig pay, low taxes, low prices, and handouts from the government.

As this philosophy permeates our society, what happens to our economy? We get less output per employee (so business costs get higher, making it harder for U.S. businesses to compete). We produce lower quality products (harder to sell). We get more people who choose to work less, if at all (so more people look to the government for survival/income - welfare, unemployment insurance, health care, education financial aid, retirement) and do not take personal responsibility.

We are supposed to make arrangements for our retirement. Social Security was meant as a supplement. Many, many Americans (and most of my students) think Social Security is suposed to be their retirement. Then they worry that it will not be there when they retire, but yet they are doing little to nothing to save for retirement themselves.

We are supposed to make arrangements for our childrens' college education. Many people are not setting money aside, expecting that the government will pay for their kids to go to school.

As the quality of U.S. products declines, and the costs get higher, then naturally people throughout the world will buy less U.S. made products. This costs jobs in America. American companies can either surrender to this decline, or try to survive by tapping into workforces that ARE willing to work harder and/or cheaper. If the U.S. company doesn't do this, other companies will. So, U.S. companies have been relocating manufacturing jobs overseas for years - a trend that will continue until/unless things change. At least in this case the U.S. companies get some of the profit.

So...enough pessimism. What do we do?

We need to re-instill the old American work ethic. We need to look up to & respect people of intelligence & drive, and not just the atheletic & beautiful. We need to take pride in quality in every part of our lives. If we have a 40 hour job, we work all 40 hours. We work well. We look out for each other.

Enough dreaming. In the short-term, what do we do?

American companies must re-emphasize quality. (Remember when Ford was "quality is job one"? Now we look to Toyotas instead) They must demand this from their workers. If an American company is going to pay their workers the highest wages in the planet, they must get the highest quality & effort in return.

We as workers must give them this. We must put forth maximum effort & pride in our jobs. Is that too much to ask?

Improved quality of labor & production will get us more products per worker, and better products. This can be done quickly, and will make American products & companies more competitive. This will slow down the flight of jobs out of the U.S.

We all know that we need to buy American to protect American jobs, but that is currently a tough sell when many foreign-made products are cheaper & better. Improved quality will make U.S. products a better value. We each get job security for ourselves if we work better.

It would help if those who can afford the higher prices would buy American to help the U.S. economy finish the climb out of the recession and move forward.

Let's step it up!