JPM45
26th June 2015, 14:47
I have apologies to make on behalf my city. In the 1800's Salford (not Manchester) kick-started the Industrial Revolution and also opened the world's first railway; big ideas giving birth to big machines, big factories, big business and a big future for the impoverished cities it was created to support....housing, employment, infrastructure and education reform followed and thus, the malevolent socio-economic dragon was slain. Fast forward to the 1980's and capitalism has taken a deviant and destructive turn...in Western Europe, North America and Japan, cronyism has replaced socialism, profit margins have replaced pragmatism and the death knell for the working and lower-middle class strikes one. Industry and big business looked around and settled it's beady eye on the East, and to the countries whom it's raking claws had not yet touched. In India, China, Taiwan and Bangladesh, there were no statutory rights for workers, there were no emission laws, there wasn't any responsibility of medical care or, even better, there wasn't a minimum wage. Fast forward to now, although employment in UK and US pretends to be high and inflation pretends to be low, it is the part-time jobs that have increased, it is the people who are needing to take two and three jobs that are filling the posts, people have left the labour force in their thousands...and food and gas isn't included in the US inflation rate, so what is touted as less than 2 percent is really 14 percent. China's economy has grown year on year, but is wholly reliant on export, it's market is Western Europe and North America...and guess what? When you took away the jobs from these places, you took away the consumer! Here's my point....high-rise apartments are being built next to Central Park in New York, that are much bigger than the buildings around them, as the rich demand a view to go with the prestige of the location..one apartment went just recently for an obscene 95 million dollars. From 3 o'clock in the afternoon, Central Park is now cast in shadow, owing to the size of the build; ruining not just the happiness and lifestyle of the millions of people who enjoy this park, but endangering the flora and fauna that live there too. It seems to me that, as the sun sails sadly round to shine on no one, it's job has gone too....sold at the highest price, to the sickly strain of humankind, who at the same time, have quenched the light in the bright eye of my indomitable forefathers. Oh look..a juggling squirrel!