14

Goodbye Brains

Posted by $ Abaco 7 years, 11 months ago to Culture
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I want to mention something and get your take. I do a lot of business...meaning - I work a lot, rely on a lot of different people to work with me. This is above and beyond the waiter we all deal with who screws up our order, and the accountant who fills out the forms wrong, etc. Over the past few years I have noticed that almost nobody does their job right anymore. I actually wonder if people are just getting dumbed down, poisoned by something in the water, generally just pissed off, or if there's something else going on. I work with another business our office has done work with for several years. As I'm learning what this office does I'm now forced to ask them, "What do you do for us?" Because, it appears that they don't do anything. They just have a contract with us (that I'm requesting today so I can read it). I mean...I actually find business arrangements like that which have just degraded into nothingness (with nobody able to say why). Hard to explain (as I just have a few minutes and need to jet). But, in the professional world and general public I'm seeing this mass incompetence. What the hell is going on? Anybody else see this?


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  • Posted by awebb 7 years, 11 months ago
    I've definitely seen this.

    Before I came on board with the Atlas team, I made a living doing freelance digital marketing. When I decided to start working with Atlas, I had to do something with those clients. Some had been working with me for years so I couldn't just say "see ya!".

    I took a look around and realized there was no one I felt comfortable referring them to. I thought "okay, no problem, I'll just train someone to do what I do."

    Easier said than done. I basically just needed a solid writer. I can teach any of the other skills. Unfortunately, even the people I found that had strong writing skills were unreliable and inconsistent. The level of incompetence topped with a layer of irresponsibility is something I see more and more often.

    I don't know what the cause is. As jbrenner said, "Who is John Galt?"
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    • Posted by jetmec 7 years, 11 months ago
      Not only do you have this level of incompetence you also get "It's been done this way for years, why should there be change"!
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      • Posted by plusaf 7 years, 11 months ago
        jet, that's 'just' another indication of 'incompetence.'
        There are many.

        Semi-short story (as usual) from me...
        Maybe 20 years ago, my department manager came to me on a Friday Afternoon and said, "Alan, I really appreciate your maturity and ability to solve problems we run into in our department and with our Sales Rep customers and their customers. But I don't see that kind of thinking in many of the others in our group. Can you please tell me how to hire 'more people like you'? What should I look for?"
        I replied that that's a tough question... give me the weekend to think it over, ok? He agreed.
        Monday morning he walked over and asked me if I'd figured out the answer. I replied,
        "Yes... Don't hire anyone under 40 years old."

        I've been trying to figure out "what changed" ever since and have come up with several possibilities but no clearly Root Causes.
        That's probably why, in MY retirement, I focus so much on blog sites where bitchin' is the Way of Life, trying to teach Critical Thinking as a potential Way Out.

        Good luck to us all. Recent developments on college campuses and in political circuses have been very discouraging to me. Probably why I like to sleep alot, though turning 70 may have had some impact, too.
        :)
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        • Posted by blackswan 7 years, 11 months ago
          The thing I've found lacking is an appreciation of what we know that we know, what we know that we don't know, and what we don't know that we don't know. It's the last where we fall down, particularly since that last is the largest part of the knowable. I remember watching the movie "Apocalypto," where the Indians were blithely going about their usual activities, until some of them came to a beach and saw a Spanish galleon at anchor, with a bunch of Spaniards rowing to shore. They'd just encountered what they didn't know that they didn't know. If we're not constantly pushing the envelope of the unknown, shrinking the what we don't know that we don't know, we may end up like the Indians. Given that industrial culture requires us to constantly push that envelope, for us, it's a matter of survival. With globalization, for sure it's a matter of survival.
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    • Posted by Sp_cebux 7 years, 11 months ago
      You've found the result of discussions emanating from the Univ. of Chicago faculty rooms and other institutions supposedly at the fore-front of our nations' education practices.

      Several years ago, our public school system---which indoctrinates 80~90% of our nations kids---stopped teaching writing. The theory being, if one pushes kids to read and read a lot that grammar and writing skills will be picked up through osmosis.

      I.e., good luck getting a writer.

      I have had to buy grammar books (among other subjects) for my own kids.. and am constantly wondering why the heck I even let them go to public schools nowadays. We spend a good deal of time at home going through extra work.

      The public school system is dwindling fast, irregardless of Common Core infiltration. The Department of Education must be closed, quickly. State and Federal levels. Our kids are not taught to think at all now.
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      • Posted by Herb7734 7 years, 11 months ago
        I have had a number of careers, one of which was as a publisher. You are right about writers. We did graphic biographies which entailed research and good writing. In our business finding a good writer was akin to panning for gold. When you got one, you did your best to hold on. We were noted for giving unknowns their first opportunity after submitting samples of their work. About 1 in 50 were passable. Maybe 1 in a thousand could be termed good. Not because of creativity, but because in most cases there were so many errors in spelling, phrasing, grammar, and just plain sentences that made sense, that it would take more time correcting than it was worth. Plus we were always on a deadline. In all the years we were in business, we hired only one writer based on his original submission. We published his submission and then loaded him up with as much work as he could handle. He's still writing to this day, and to this day, I don't know if that first submission was intentional or a lark. But it made a career for him.
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        • Posted by Sp_cebux 7 years, 11 months ago
          The modern school system believes that kids need not learn spelling anymore. That the auto-spell checker is all they need. Ditto for the grammar checker.

          Kids are no longer taught to conjugate verbs. Heck, they don't even know what a preposition is, much less can they tell you what 'past participle' means. They do not graph sentences. Grammar, which used to be a year long endeavor in 7th grade is now nothing but reading, reading, and more reading. No reports are required until at least the 9th grade when its apparent that those 9th graders, like you say, cannot write worth a the price of the sheets of paper provided. Those with signs of some writing skill are permitted to proceed on to 'Advanced Composition' in my kids' district. That's 25-40 kids for a 700-person class size. (~4-6% of the students)

          The current generation of Millennials has hardly had to lift a finger to graduate, either. Grade inflation has become the norm as teachers are ghastly afraid to fail any student regardless of ineptitude. They graduate high school with the expectation that effort is not required; that life will just provide stuff. I.e., that the government will give them whatever subsistence they believe they are entitled. Fervor for work, accomplishment, achievement, setting goals are all concepts as foreign as old-folks talking about days sans smart phones.

          As a nation, we are in grave danger. You think finding a writer is hard... wait until you need to hire a Millennial.
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          • Posted by blackswan 7 years, 11 months ago
            It's the same with mathematics. The dependence on "technology," viz., calculators and computers, is dumbing down the students to the point of uselessness. None of them are learning mathematics; they're just learning how to punch keys on a calculator, with the calculator doing all the work, and they can't tell if what the calculator is showing is accurate,or even correct.
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          • Posted by $ MikeMarotta 7 years, 11 months ago
            Actually, Sp_cebux, different school systems had (and have) different methods and philosophies. We have about 140,000 independent public school systems in the USA, plus about that many "others" - parochial (Catholic), other private schools, charter schools (semi-public), and home schooling.

            Grammar, which used to be a year long endeavor in 7th grade is now nothing but ...

            When I was in school in the 1950s and 1960s, Cleveland Public had a 30-year history of "tracks" for general, business, and college-bound students. For all of us, one semester 7 through 12 was grammar and one semester 7 through 12 was literature. For most of it, the literature was general, but specialized to American in the 11th grade and English in the 12th, including options for "academically talented" as well as "advanced placement" for college credit. Grammar followed similar lines of development from easy to sophisticated.

            I work as a professional writer. At a used book store, I found our 12th grade grammar book, and was happy to pay the discount price. I mean, I have Chicago, and Columbia, and all those, but styles guides are not grammar books: why it must be that way; just so you know...
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          • Posted by Herb7734 7 years, 11 months ago
            I don't care if they don't know a participle from a pancake, so long as they could string together words that would create a readable sentence. Most of what I read lately requires interpretation.
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            • Posted by $ MichaelAarethun 7 years, 11 months ago
              Most requires interpretation because as Mike said there are many interpretations of how to produce a grammatical sentence and many more versions of the meaning of words.

              I learned traditional English the diagrammed sentence led from left to right. I don't give a fig about what followed. I do adjectived and adverbs not modifiers and intensifiers whatever the hell those are.

              It is my job to learn definitions. If you don't use a real dictionary meaning tough. I will interpret what you or anyone else wrote and react to it in pre PC English. It's not my job to memorize thirty million different other versions. If it doesn't come across as intended I can always check to see if there were meanings 2, 3,4, If not....tough.

              I don't do reality tv definitions, I don't do definititons of the so called news casters none of that. I don't do pop illliteracci or glitteratti.

              If you tell me I suck I punch you out. Plain and simple. And that has happened.

              I have a rather large vocabulary and still use a dictionary. It taught me that the redefiniiton goes back fruther than I thought. such as is common with liberal, conservative socialist and capitalist and decimate.

              Consequently I have taken a page from non grammatical of Mr. Lenin and the current crop of leftists. I don't use their definitions at all.

              When I say left wing extremists I am referring to both the national and international version of socialism.

              When I say center I mean the Constitution not the center of the left.

              when i say left I include the Republican party as the right wing OF the left

              It's the only way I've found to make any sense of it.

              If you don't like it ...I do not care.

              If you dangle a participle I conclude you forgot to finish the pancake and wonder was it boxers or briefs? Obviously if you didn't care then ....why should I?

              Is this a conservastive of a liberal failing? BOTH. For none of you use those words with any discernible meaning either. ...Very few. perhaps three...
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              • Posted by $ MichaelAarethun 7 years, 11 months ago
                adjectived and fruther and conservastive. The last left out a letter S. Was it humor, the auto spell or just a hurried stab at an unedited example. Either way. Either is redumbdent. Thus I hoist my petard.
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              • Posted by Herb7734 7 years, 11 months ago
                Writing, like speaking, is communication. If you can express yourself in writing so that I understand your meaning, you are communicating. If you can do it in a well structured elegant sentence, so much the better. But, no matter how elegant the sentence, if it does not clearly communicate a thought, it is worthless. I have read submissions that ramble on for many paragraphs that in the end I didn't know what in hell the point the writer was trying to make. I could sometimes guess, but I'd rather know for sure. And, yes, especially in storytelling, the point (concept, if you will) is deliberately made vague in order to increase suspense, but in that case the reader knows what to expect because of the genre.
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            • Posted by $ MikeMarotta 7 years, 11 months ago
              Herb, it is because "they cannot tell a participle from a pancake" that "they cannot string together words that would create a readable sentence."

              I hate to have to say it, but your anti-intellectual attitude is just the other side of their coin. And this is not unusual for you or to you. You have expressed those sentiments before, and other conservatives do, too.
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              • Posted by Herb7734 7 years, 11 months ago
                Mike M:
                Me? Anti-Intellectual? Nonsense.
                I am, however, anti pretentious intellectual. Perhaps it's my writer's training . I follow the Hemmingway school. When interviewed by an adoring female she said, "Your books are so full of...." Hemmingway interrupted, "Short sentences." Plus, if you can demonstrate to me how knowing what a participle is and does will help a writer put together a coherent thought, I'd love to see it. In summation: Anti intellectual thought and behavior on my part depends entirely on the supposedly intellectual expressing it.
                One further thought, Mike. Perhaps you don't have a sense of humor.
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                • Posted by $ MikeMarotta 7 years, 11 months ago
                  Everyone has a sense of humor. As with roses and noses, some people find the humor of others cloying, perhaps offensive. But the humor is sensed.

                  I made my comment before I saw above that in a previous life you were a publisher. I had time to edit the original slight, but I let it stand so that we could have this conversation.

                  "Non-conceptual" would have been better than "anti-intellectual." Among the great insights provided by Ayn Rand was that an individual is the summation of their ideas. Most people, apparently, do not construct consistent systems of thought from examination and introspection. I could say, colloquially, that you have good instincts. Your heart is in the right place. But you are not a philosopher.

                  The physical law of cause-and-effect cannot be avoided. You complained that the writers who came to you could not tell a story. Worse, they could not communicate a coherent idea in a single sentence. I loved the semesters devoted to grammar, and suffered through the half-year of literature. The only exception was the 10th grade when the literature included more exposition, even technical writing. It was worth reading. It was as much fun as diagramming sentences. The ideas were crisp and certain. The points made were unarguable. You did not have to agree, but you knew what you were disagreeing about. The kids who came to you unable to write suffered from a lack of that in school. That was the point made by Sp_cebux. You dismissed it with a quip.
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                  • Posted by Herb7734 7 years, 11 months ago
                    I'd debate everyone having a sense of humor.
                    Sorry if I don't write up to your standards. However, I have been published, been a publisher and editor. I'm afraid that I don't understand your use of "non-conceptual." Everything must be conceptual or it is just gibberish. Since most people seem to understand what I write, there must be a concept of some sort hidden there somewhere. Perhaps the subject? I'm trying to sew your comments together in order to understand them. Are you implying that I somehow violated cause and effect? I understand your school experience as it was quite a bit like mine.
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                    • Posted by $ MikeMarotta 7 years, 11 months ago
                      While I understand the motivation behind your quip, it remains that knowing what a participle is is important to being able to write well. It is not just knowing the formal definition of a participle, but, more to the point, being able to hear it in your own speech as you write.
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                      • Posted by Herb7734 7 years, 11 months ago
                        One can use a participle without labeling it with the name. Most people write without thinking of what part of speech they are using. "well here's a noun here's verb, now an adverb, a participle, a predicate, etc. "
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                        • Posted by $ MichaelAarethun 7 years, 11 months ago
                          Not in Mrs. Swatts 8th grade grammar class. But these days anything goes and nothing means anything. Today most people cannot write. Back then we didn't have to think about which was which. We had something called schools and received something called an education. Words had meanings and now we circle file meaningless writings such as the Bill of Rights with a "So What?".

                          Remember that when you try to quote your non-existent Constitution and I laugh at you. Or as did happen someone says it's a forgery because they failed to learn proper punctuation. Iis even now using it to legitimize changes in the Constitution.

                          So dangle your participle and when it's chopped off ...don't come complaining to me.

                          You are getting what you deserve.

                          http://www.nybooks.com/articles/2014/...

                          used to backup secular progressives use of ACLU to make constitutional changes in the courts and without amendments and quoted in George Lakoff's hand book for the advancement of Secular Progressivism.

                          All because Professor Allen failed to apply one conceivable angle...that of punctuation and grammar. All because people think the language is unimportant. Cost you the Bill of Rights so far...

                          It took me fifteen minutes to correctly identify the source of her complaint ..It will take Danielle Allen a lifetime and she will still be a dangling participle of a failed education system.

                          I'll give you fifteen minutes to identify the problem and the solution or what the helll take an hour or a day or two.
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                        • Posted by $ MikeMarotta 7 years, 11 months ago
                          It don't matter what you think because everyone thinks what they want and I don't care how many books you published if you can't have an idea to share without putting people down it doesn't matter and you can see that I know don't from doesn't and my ideas are clear, too only you don't see that because your are so stuck on your past life which is what you don't have cause if you did you wouldn't of come here to be online all day long.
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                          • Posted by Herb7734 7 years, 11 months ago
                            Are you trying to be the king of the run-on sentence? I have never put anyone down here in the Gulch, but, I often I need to defend myself. I think for a guy my age, I'm pretty much with it and not stuck in the past. But it is true that my past experiences have helped shape my present. Isn't that pretty much true of everyone? By the way, It might surprise you to find that I have a life, and while I enjoy the Gulch, it is only a small part of it. Since I'm not a gamer or a blogger, the most time I spend is answering or deleting my e-mail. I communicate with people all over the world but rarely spend more than 3 hours a day at the computer unless I'm doing research or writing an article. I must admit to getting 100+ e-mails a day but 1/3 of them are quickly deleted. Since my grandchildren are all adults I no longer am required as a baby-sitter, that is until the sluggards get productively multiplying.
                            And Mike -- I like you, or should I say as you represent yourself since we've never met. You're quite erudite, and a sharp mind. You might be aware, however, that at my age, I have accumulated enough insults and clever put-downs to fill a pocket dictionary, but I never use them here.
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                            • Posted by $ MikeMarotta 7 years, 11 months ago
                              The run-on sentence was meant to be humorous. You implied that you have a sense of humor, but that I do not. I was mimicking a young person. Posts like that are easy to find online all over.

                              It seems that in talking past each other, we have made a mountain out of a mole hill.
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                              • Posted by Herb7734 7 years, 11 months ago
                                I got it. That's my feeble attempt to carry the humor one step further before I changed the subject.
                                Run- ons are one of the plagues of the poor writings that I was referring to. I was startled in a sad way to note supposed sentences without subjects and subjects sans predicates. The easiest time we had was when we decided to do a horror comic book and put previously published stories into graphic form. We were able to use the author's actual copy which had already been edited.
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                              • Posted by $ MichaelAarethun 7 years, 11 months ago
                                It's called Spencerian English technically....Spencer never had to diagram a sentence.
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                                • Posted by $ MikeMarotta 7 years, 11 months ago
                                  That is ambiguous. Do you have a citation. I found many links to Spencerian Script, and eventually got to Edmund Spencer of the 16th century, and The Faerie Queen. You do not mean Herbert Spencer? His writing is clear, but not paradigmatic.
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          • Posted by starbird56 7 years, 11 months ago
            I teach Composition I & II at a community college. I was shocked the first semester at the lack of knowledge of today's students. Granted, I am not teaching the upper crust, but still, I had some level of expectation. Nope; only a few can write an intelligent sentence. I do the best I can, but I can't make up for years of students getting an A just for showing up in class.
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        • Posted by $ MikeMarotta 7 years, 11 months ago
          You would have to find an English teacher who is published in the first place. I had a couple. None in college were. But writing cannot be taught: it must be learned. It is like a sport, a skill for which a coach can be helpful. However, the coach cannot pour motivation and talent into your muscles -- or your mind.

          On the other hand, I trust that your graphics people were good at that. Your problem was that they could not tell stories. They taught themselves how to draw, admittedly, in many cases with the help of good teachers who also were artists. My experience in school is that the art teachers were better artists than the English teachers were writers. English teachers are readers. It would be like finding an art teacher who enjoys the museum but does not draw or paint.

          Graphic novels were never encouraged in school, of course. In my day, teachers hit kids who were caught with comic books. However, I confess that i got through literature classes by relying on Classics Illustrated.
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          • Posted by Herb7734 7 years, 11 months ago
            As to Classics Illustrated: Who didn't?
            In our case, we primarily did biographies which required research as well as writing ability. Writing a comic book or graphic novel is very akin to writing a play, or a screenplay. Each panel must carry forth the narrative, the actual words spoken if any and a description of the panel. The panel descriptions are often altered by the artists whose imagination in terms of visuals is in most cases, superior to the writer's.
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            • Posted by $ MikeMarotta 7 years, 11 months ago
              I had one article of mine turned into a graphic short. I wrote about "Levi Loomis and the Bank of Singapore" a story about wildcat banking in the days of the Michigan frontier, circa 1835. I wrote it for the state history museum magazine, and they rejected it. Rejections happen. Then, a publisher asked me if I had any fiction. "Well, no, but I do have a story." I was impressed with the way the artist did exactly as you said, integrating the action, narrative, and dialog, panel by panel.
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          • Posted by $ MichaelAarethun 7 years, 11 months ago
            Here's one reference if you can find a copy anymore. Mary J. J. Wrinn author of The Hollow Reed and Elements of Journalism published from 1929 to 1935.

            To get the education she provided her high school students back then would take a Masters Degree now IF such a curriculum were available.

            Given your comment that and a result of her work called the Poet's Pack should be of interest.
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            • Posted by $ MikeMarotta 7 years, 11 months ago
              Thanks! I requested both at the UT Library. Both were in storage. One copy of The Hollow Reed is for library use only at the Harry Ransom Center rare book collection. Lost work...
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              • Posted by $ MichaelAarethun 7 years, 11 months ago
                There is some left at Amazon but I bought the last of the inexpensive meaning under $40 volumes.I had been reading a book called Not this August by Kornbluth and Pohl one of the three forecast books for the countries future. CM Kornbluth was a student in that teachers classroom. I have all three including Poets Pack. The Hollow Reed which was also called the Golden Treasure at one time and Elements of Journalism. Should you be interested in reading them.
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                • Posted by $ MikeMarotta 7 years, 11 months ago
                  My library does not have Poets Pack. However, the other two should be up from storage and at the front desk in a couple of days. Thanks!
                  MEM
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                  • Posted by $ MichaelAarethun 7 years, 11 months ago
                    Sounds like donation time.
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                    • Posted by $ MichaelAarethun 7 years, 11 months ago
                      I'm finished with Poet's Pack and the Hollow Reed which details how poems from around the world are designed so to speak. Journalist book will be finished with in two months or so...If you want any or all send private mail address. Spreading a little bread on the waters of the rare volumes department couldn't hurt.
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        • Posted by $ MichaelAarethun 7 years, 11 months ago
          and he is? I want to compare what you said and my goals with that one success.
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          • Posted by Herb7734 7 years, 11 months ago
            His name is Spike Steffenhagen and you'll find his writing all over rock music, graphic novels, etc. He was at the time a huge fan of KISS which led us to a close association with Gene Simmons and the publication of four comic books of their career. The story he submitted in 1990 was a horror story which we published in our first horror comic book. The series was calle GORE comic books, but if you looked closely, you will note that the series was actually called "Tipper GORE's Comics and Stories. Tipper Gore, the wife of Al Gore, founded the PMRC which was an organization devoted to censoring comic books, magazines and graphic novels. By naming horror books after her, we hoped she would sue us which would allow us to bring her censorship efforts to the public. She didn't take the bait. Damn!
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            • Posted by plusaf 7 years, 11 months ago
              Hell, I was never a KISS fan, but I learned a lot about Gene Simmons.... in Astronomy Magazine!
              He rocks, in so many ways!
              For example... https://www.prod.facebook.com/Astrono...
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              • Posted by Herb7734 7 years, 11 months ago
                Gene Simmons is a pain in the ass. However, he is very intelligent, multi talented, and has created his own life rather than merely swimming downstream with the rest of the fishes. Like most successful businessmen, he does it his way, and like most successful businessmen, you can't tell him anything without passing it through his personal filter. It makes him very tough to do business with, hence the P.I.T.A. label I do admire him.
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    • Posted by Maritimus 7 years, 11 months ago
      May I say that I think I see quite a bit of poor writing in this place, also?
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      • Posted by $ MichaelAarethun 7 years, 11 months ago
        You think or you know or perhaps you believe? Never mind the redundant use of also but a point for 'May I.'

        Labor as we might the use of that which I rail against seems to pop out in moments of, usually, late night sessions when the brain is tired and the fingers work as if on auto pilot. Muscle memory has a mind of it's own.

        Think declares a state of hesitation in the value of the observation. Believe is a much stronger and based on personal ability to examine the value of something. Know - although much misused as if it were of no value - is a positive word and a strong one. "You know" is slang and implies the second person with an ability that may or may not be true. Worse is 'You know what I meant or mean with out a question mark."

        Feel completely free to treat me the same. I probably deserve it although it's in the interest of accuracy and not pedantic EXCEPT when it's humor!!!!! All the above relates to Maritimus comment not Abaco and I would hate to cross verbal swords with DHalling or MMarotta. Both of whom have yet to confuse clip with magazine.
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  • Posted by strugatsky 7 years, 11 months ago
    The degradation starts in the kindergarten, when every child is told that he is special, wonderful and perfect. Each is the best that could be. There could be nothing better. So, there is no need to be better; no need to try, no need to exert oneself. Then, when they get a little older, they observe the society's heroes - usually either passive victims (like 9/11) or losers, while the ones that should be heroes, because they took heroic actions, are villified.

    In high school, the kids spend school time on projects to "help" losers, further instilling the notion that it pays being a loser. Then they graduate illiterate and with no useful skills, but the college gives them a couple of years of remedial arithmetic. And after a happy childhood like that (lasting at least until they're 26), what do you expect of them?
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  • Posted by $ blarman 7 years, 11 months ago
    Most people aren't taught to have pride in their work anymore. It's a major problem especially here in the United States. And it doesn't matter how difficult the job is.

    Home construction is particularly blatant evidence of this. Try demanding that the contractor use 6-8 inches of gravel fill under any concrete work (more for high water table) instead of 4" and they will gripe and moan. Asking them to backfill against a foundation (to prevent cracks, etc.) with gravel (instead of the clay dirt in my area) will get you another dirty look. The building companies when they buy the land strip off all the topsoil (and sell it), then when the landscapers come in to lay sod or other plants, they never bother to properly prep the soil so the sun doesn't fry the roots and kill the grass and plants outright. Another easy place to check for shoddy workmanship is on the doors and whether or not they are hung properly so they open without rubbing and don't swing. Or whether or not the plumbing lines are 1-3/4" or 2-1'2" pipe (the bigger pipe clogs less frequently).

    Look at appliances! I bought a used freezer (ten years old) and I've had it more than 15 years since and it still runs great (though the door seal is shot). Yet I've had friends who had to purchase new refrigerators to repair or replace ones only a few years old!

    Furniture is another major offender. Everything is built out of hardboard, making it very cheap, but also very heavy and very destructible. Nothing is built out of hardwood anymore to last - unless you want to spend a fortune.

    Why? I largely blame the forced inflation of the government which forces companies to continue to sell new products every year at higher prices. With a stable monetary value, companies could put out quality products knowing their values would be stable (rather than decreasing) and decreasing the pressure to continue to sell products at higher and higher prices just to stay in business.

    I also blame the mentality many in the US have that says that everyone should tolerate people who don't provide the best products and services. I used to work for Hewlett-Packard back when they still built hard disk drives. At the time, they had the best drives in the world and they were backed by a five-year warranty. And the people there took pride in their work - a lot of pride. They also got paid with quarterly profit-sharing bonuses based on the profitability of that quarter, so everyone had a direct financial incentive to work hard. That whole division of HP unfortunately got shut down (I can tell the whole story as my father was right in the middle of it) and along with the products went those five-year warranties and the pressure on other manufacturers to compete. It was that year that IBM dropped their warranties back to one year (and everyone else followed suit) and that's where we've been since then.

    We need to get back to a business model which encourages the individual producer so as to provide direct incentives for people to do their best. We also need to get rid of the notion perpetuated by the government that any level of inflation is acceptable - let alone a yearly target of 2%.
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    • Posted by $ 7 years, 11 months ago
      Thanks blarman.

      My engineering work has exposed me to a lot of this. Incompetence in the construction field has been very present for decades, I think. In order to get a house built right you need to oversee the entire process yourself or hire a very good, expensive general. A lot of homes built around here in the boom of the 90s were slapped together by labor picked up at the corner by Home Depot. Zero skills. Everything was built wrong. Every builder has gotten sued, and a lot of the homes will either be completely collapsed in another 15 years or strapped together with chicken wire.

      I have designed over 200 projects and have never had one design change order on my work. Not one. That's BOTH lucky AND good.
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    • Posted by blackswan 7 years, 11 months ago
      What's needed are completely new business models that will promote the kind of excellence that you're talking about. The Japanese car industry did it 50 years ago. They couldn't compete with GM, Ford and Chrysler, with their network of mechanics who could fix their cars nationwide, so the Japanese committed to making cars that didn't break down. The rest is history. We're complaining about having lemons. let's figure out how to make lemonade. What systems can you create that will overcome the shortfalls that you're talking about, and enable us to turn out world class products and services? That's the mission. John, Dagny, Francisco and Hank would figure it out. We're their disciples, aren't we? Then we can do it.
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      • Posted by $ blarman 7 years, 11 months ago
        Those weren't actually Japanese business models, just so you know. They were American business models created by Deming (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W._Edwa.... Because there was nothing left of Japan's manufacturing industry due to the bombing, they were able to start over from scratch and build new factories using new equipment, new technologies, and new processes - paid for and engineered by the USA.

        One of the results of WW II was that the US was one of the few manufacturing centers still left in the world - which is why the 50's and 60's were so prosperous for us. But after that initial startup period was over and all our generosity to other nations got them back to providing not only for themselves but manufacturing for the world, their newer plants, technology, and processes quickly put US manufacturing at a distinct disadvantage. The steel mills are the quintessential example. Most of our steel mills were built in the run-up to WW II and used extensive, megalithic footprints and processes. The Japanese (and many others) rebuilt in the 50's using mini-mills, which had a smaller footprint (lower overhead) and could turn out steel of very high quality quickly.

        It's in areas like this that I think there is a case for government to go to businesses to offer them guarantees to rebuild a critical manufacturing industry like steel. There is just simply too much initial capital outlay involved and steel production is too critical to too many industries. Our primary sources for steel now are overseas. Can you imagine how construction would grind to a halt if we got into a major war?
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  • Posted by Herb7734 7 years, 11 months ago
    I don't think you are in retailing, are you? I ask because to most retailers this has been going on for a very long time. It starts early when future adults are still in high school, but first, I must backtrack.When I started in retail, both working for others and then a business of my own, hiring a part-time high school kid was a piece of cake. If they wanted to work, they were told what to do and they did it. Everything from sweeping the floors and dusting to making sales and working the cash register. Fast forward 20 years or so. They can't work a cash register that adds, subtracts, figures the tax and the change to the customer. Sweep the floor? One kid asked if this was some sort of a test. I don't think I need to go on. The high schoolers I hired when I first opened the store went on to college, a couple worked their way through while working for us. The later kids also went on to be the people you are complaining about. What happened? I know at least two failures that weren't the kids. 1. The schools. 2. The parents. I hope this helps you to at least partially understand how formation leads to aggravation.
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    • Posted by johnpe1 7 years, 11 months ago
      from his gulch intros, Abaco is:::
      “I am a man of math and science, a pilot, engineer, father, and sportfisherman. Oh ... and a geek.” plus:::
      he used to fly aerobatics – does engineering by day; finance by night

      he's involved with lotsa incompetence. -- j
      .
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  • Posted by $ 7 years, 11 months ago
    OK...I'm not alone in seeing this. It is no exaggeration when I say that I can work for a week, interface with 30 different people in a work-related way on only one or two of them are competent. I can easily work for three days and encounter nobody who does their job anywhere near well enough to be effective.

    Thinking back I just do not believe that it was always like this. The people who (average American) in the class of being two paychecks to the gutter...Almost every damn one is horribly incompetent. I know a couple young ones, early-mid twenties, who want to claw their way up.

    I was just thinking about this driving in this morning, over a stretch of Interstate 80 that has been under construction for at least a decade now. I will be able to really scale back my work in 4 or 5 years where I don't really have to rely on anybody other than me. Can't quite do it yet.
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  • Posted by LibertyBelle 7 years, 11 months ago
    I don't know. I don't know the statistics on it, how
    much of it is true, or how much just your subjective
    opinion. I have tried to do my jobs properly. (When
    I was18, I was fired from a maid's job because I was no good at it and was too slow, although I tried. I was on it 2 days. I was dreadfully a-
    shamed. I never blamed the man for firing me.
    I think I probably would have done the same).
    But after that experience, I did not want to be
    too slow on a job. The next job I got (carhop), I
    worked to be very fast on it, and this was noted
    very much. I worked very hard, often volunteer-
    ing to do extra time. Once I went 90 days (at
    least) with no days off. I loved that job, until it
    was ruined for me by the manager's repeatedly
    telling me to slow down. I gave a week's notice,
    and when it was done, stayed around another 7
    days, on a day-to-day basis, and then the other
    manager said he had somebody, and then I left.
    I was on that job about a year and a half,and
    about 4 days later got a job in the furniture fac-
    tory.
    I noticed something about that carhop's job.
    The cashiers didn't want to make change as
    they were supposed to. I was given $10 to make
    change with, at the beginning of the shift, which
    $10 I was supposed to turn in at the end of the
    shift, and any other money I had (being tips) I was supposed to keep.

    The cashiers didn't want to accept a lot of
    change when I paid for the order; they wanted
    paper money. The customers wanted to stick me with chicken s%1t out on the Curb; if the
    order was $1.25, for instance, they would want
    to pay me with a five or a ten, and instead of
    letting me get rid of the change,, like normal,
    decent people
    , they would want to pay me the
    quarter overtop of the five, and get an extra
    paper dollar, and leave me with another dollar in
    chicken s%1t, which the cashiers would not
    want to accept from me at the window when I
    paid for the next order. So I would get more and
    more chicken s%1t, and less and less paper.
    The boss told me not to give them a lot of change when they were busy. An old cashier,
    long in the place, said any time they had an
    order, "That's busy." However, they were ex-
    tremely uncooperative about changing into
    paper during slack periods, between orders. And
    then the Boss-man had the utter chutzpah to
    mouth off to me about turning in a lot of change
    at the end of the night when I turned in the $10,
    for him to count. I told him once, (but this was
    some time after I quit, when I was hanging a-
    round the place; he mentioned it) "You de-
    served
    to have to count it, for making me car-
    ry it all night! I wish now I had taken it
    into the kitchen and heated it up on the grill and
    made you count it while it was hot! I wish I
    could have melted it in a cauldron and poured it
    molten down your throat!" He seemed some-
    what taken aback, although somewhat amused,
    but when I told him he was the one who didn't
    make the cashiers turn it into paper during the
    shift, he didn't really seem to have much to say.
    ---However, some years ago, an old co-worker
    buddy of mine told me that that boss had sold
    his share in the place to his brother-in-law (who
    had been the other manager). And since that
    time, the counter has been broken open; the
    carhops go from the Curbhouse into the Inside,
    and go to the cash register, and use it them-
    selves.

    I can't claim that these remarks are super-re-
    levant; but sometimes people seem not to be
    competent on their jobs, when the real cause
    may lie in the incompetence or careless of man-
    agement.
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  • Posted by bassboat 7 years, 11 months ago
    The answer is to shop places or businesses that have a superior product. You cannot discount service and quality for a price. Too often businesses like yours go for the lowest price. Go with quality people and reap the rewards.
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    • Posted by LibertyBelle 7 years, 11 months ago
      I have noticed that at a certain Dollar Store; also
      I consider the service at Walmart fair-to-middling at
      best, and awful at worst. But those places sell a
      lot of Communist crap (which I don't buy, of course;I look over the merchandise very care-
      fully before purchasing it). I consider dealing
      in that stuff supporting slavery. But people who
      don't mind doing that are likely not to treat their
      employees very well, and then it is not surpris-
      ing if employees in that situation are not very
      nice to the customers.
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      • Posted by $ MichaelAarethun 7 years, 11 months ago
        You must not buy very much. And that communist crap is made by the worlds number one capitalist country for the most part. China. The new version of what you are referring to is the USSA formerly the USA.
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        • Posted by LibertyBelle 7 years, 11 months ago
          No, I don't buy very much. I don't have very much
          money.
          I don't see that China is "the worlds [sic]num-
          ber one capitalist country; I've read a lot about
          China. Although the USA is definitely deteriorating.
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          • Posted by $ MichaelAarethun 7 years, 11 months ago
            Walk into any store and add up the number of items tagged Made in USA. Then add up Made In China. Notice the overwhelming difference in quantity?

            Why?

            We can't afford made in the USA anymore.
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  • Posted by Riftsrunner 7 years, 11 months ago
    I have a possible contributing factor to the "dumbing" down of the world. I don't know if there is anyone here who is old enough to remember when they used to add Tetraethyllead to gasoline (ie. Leaded gasoline). This has released enough lead into the global enviroment that there has to be a certain level of neurotoxicity to every person. While I cannot show a causal link to the decrease in intelligence linked to this increase in lead poisoning (there are too many variables caused by different groups that also have caused our educational system to decline), I think it has at least a minor contribution to it.
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    • Posted by $ 7 years, 11 months ago
      I think you are headed in a valid direction on this. Kids are different. The Left's response is to just give them free stuff. The Right's response is to say that they need a spanking or that this is a result of them being given everything. I have been involved, firsthand, in research that clearly showed that kids today, en masse, are loaded with neurotoxins. Were they as loaded 50 years ago? We don't know. I know that they are now.

      This is why when I first coached a youth soccer team several years ago (it was about five years after I first saw the data) and I saw how much trouble the boys were having paying attention to any input we had for them...I'll be honest, I was almost driven to tears. I couldn't believe what I was seeing. At the same time, I was pretty sure I had seen the smoking gun. Very troubling for this Objectivist...
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      • Posted by LibertyBelle 7 years, 11 months ago
        There could be some effect from Ritalin or some
        other "chemical straitjacket". That could do more
        harm even than an unjust spanking. (Of course, I
        am not against corporal punishment, judiciously
        administered, but control by chemicals seems to
        me to be dystopian).
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  • Posted by photobugf4 7 years, 11 months ago
    The whole "twenty something" crawl their way up thing? Some of them I work with are doing exactly this. Others have to be spoon fed exactly how to do everything or it won't be done correctly. I don't know if they don't care to take pride in their work or if their supervisor has played dumb enough that they think they can get away with it too. They know people will give up on training because it's easier to do it themselves and know it is correct instead of training and retraining what should have been learned in school.

    I've heard them called out for sloppy work but it keeps happening again and again. We try to put measures in place but they won't use them. It's more work.

    The title is perfect. Zombies. And, worst of all, the people who care are turning into them because they're burning out from the abuse. Yep. Who is John Galt?
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  • Posted by Mitch 7 years, 11 months ago
    I agree wholeheartedly, everywhere I see it… I see it in every aspects of life and in all professions to one degree or another. This isn’t the simple, “The doctor is useless" type arguments it’s more or less the doctor doesn’t give a hell…

    I remember only a few years ago, the 80’s and 90’s that people had their stuff together; sure, some didn’t but the vast majority did. There were people everywhere wanting a piece of the pie and working hard to get it, now it only seems they come running for cherry pie.
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  • Posted by term2 7 years, 11 months ago
    It's part of the entitlement culture I think. Why work if stuff is just given to you. Give me an education, give me a job, give me credit, give me EBT.
    Secondly I think most jobs aren't intellectually challenging today. Follow the rules, push buttons on the computer, give out the change the cash register tells you to. A lot more of these jobs need to be automated or done by robots
    The first of them to be automated is fast food ordering. The clerks are notoriously bad at just listening while customers are talking. Bring on the robots !!!
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  • Posted by $ Olduglycarl 7 years, 11 months ago
    Yes!, Yes!, Yes!....especially in management, no one seems to care, seems to know, might have ever known.
    I have been studying cycles for a while now, climate, civilizations, sociological, astrological...funny thing, they seem to line up!

    We very well might be going through a time much like what happened in the end days of Noah, the fall of Sumeria, Babylon, or Rome and Greece. Looking back upon climate, upon the cycles of our sun and solar system.

    What's happening now?...we are entering a grand solar minimum which not only brings climate chaos, but a general cooling trend, at the same time, our magnetic shielding is weakening rapidly and our atmosphere is shrinking. These trends are associated and inter related and YES, these events play havoc with your brain!!!...especially upon the "Unaware"...those that do not rely or use their minds to control their brains. (and there are more of these people than you might imagine)-[awareness is key].

    PLUS! something that usually, as far as we know, doesn't happen simultaneously with these events...our magnetic poles are wandering rapidly and seem to be heading toward each other...we have no idea how that fits into the whole picture. But we do know this: With weakened shields, we are even more vulnerable to cosmic radiation and relatively weak solar radiation and at best, it causes a distraction to our concentration and at worst...pushes one over the edge. (what ever psychological edge they might tending).

    Now add all this to the recipe of culture and political chaos and all hell seems to be letting loose. Hence, no one gives a damn, there is no use to anything we do...especially when compared to the incompetent creatures in government, in business and other segments in society that have everything they need, (and don't appreciate nor share that abundance)-[a conscious human trait] .

    Someone called the outcome...cognitive dissonance...I call it apathy and it is, my friend, at least partially, due to the progressive progressively dumbing down of society.
    As I have said often, Stalin's and Wilson's useful idiots have become "Useless idiots" and they all reside in high positions in society, in business and low and behold...governments.
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  • Posted by CircuitGuy 7 years, 11 months ago
    I don't know if this is related, but 15 years ago when politicians asked if the gov't should do more for the needy, I thought that the average person perceived that question as asking if the gov't should take some of their earnings to help the needy. Now it seems like the average person hearing the question perceives it as asking if they themselves should get a handout. Politicians sell this idea that there are these billionaires out there who have enough wealth to pay for a very affluent life for everyone.

    I actually don't see people doing a bad job at work, at least not in my little corner of the economy.

    I see people who are doing well, making decent money, and living good affluent lifestyles saying they would like just a little help from the gov't here and there in funding their lifestyles. This may or may not be related to what you see.
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    • Posted by $ allosaur 7 years, 11 months ago
      I do not know if this is related either but Obama was elected twice.
      Furthermore, a cartoonist (I read he DOES have experience in the business world) named Scott Adams felt moved to create a strip called Dilbert.
      I believe we all know what Dilbert is about.
      Old Dilbert strips happen to be my 2016 desk calendar.
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      • Posted by CircuitGuy 7 years, 11 months ago
        Are you saying the stuff Dilbert poked fun at in the 90s has found its way to the POTUS?
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        • Posted by $ allosaur 7 years, 11 months ago
          No, I'm saying the deadheads Dilbert poked fun at in the business world would likely be the ones who would vote for Obama twice.
          I met some when I was a security guard at a Wachovia data center.
          Two dim Dems in particular really could not stand it when I watched Fox News when I ate a meal in the break room.
          I remember one hovering over my back while I sat and ate while wearing a holstered .38.
          Guess the weapon may be why he finally left without even saying anything.
          Heck, I was eating in there by myself. My wannabe intimidator just came in for a Coke or something.
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    • Posted by $ 7 years, 11 months ago
      Interesting, CircuitGuy. Perhaps a glimmer of hope.
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      • Posted by CircuitGuy 7 years, 11 months ago
        Yes, but so many reasonably affluent people wanting a little bit of a handout is a concern for me.
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        • Posted by strugatsky 7 years, 11 months ago
          Why? The government expropriates part of our earnings in order, supposedly, to provide services (and sometimes products). If someone is affluent and pays a lot in taxes, why shouldn't that person receive back what the government claims it can do better than private individuals, being health care or subsidized housing? Or has the government actually admitted that it takes not because it can supposedly do better, but because that it steals outright and the politicians simply buy votes with the loot? Perhaps it should admit it.
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  • Posted by XenokRoy 7 years, 11 months ago
    I worked in the tech industry since 1991. Since 1998 its been running teams to running departments in the services side of software businesses.

    I have seen two trends
    1) a much larger percentage of job applicants have college degrees. About 1/3 (and usually the best ones) were self taught.
    2) The percentage of those with College degrees that worked in the field prior to completing the degree had declines from about half to none over this time period.
    3) People with the degree before they get any experience often cannot seem to think through a problem and come up with a solution. There are some exceptions.

    This has made it so a major element of what I look for on a resume is did the person have experience in the field prior to getting a degree?

    How does this relate to your question.

    I not only find that many are full of excuses but find the cause if it is getting the education solely from the school and not from work experience.

    Those that learned in school that the result is the code is done, not that the code works and works correctly.

    Meanwhile those with job experience as part of the education process learned that a badly written chunk of code does not mean job done, just because the code is written.

    To put it into school terms. A paper is done regardless of if you get a D or a C+ or A. It should be you did D work, do it again, repeat until its c+ work or do not pass the class. Perhaps B+ work, or even A required on key projects, papers or even a class. This would teach get it done right rather than get it done to pass.

    I believe this to be a major factor on the source of the lazy work I see very often from people.
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    • Posted by blackswan 7 years, 11 months ago
      I have one issue with your requirement of prior experience. I've worked in a number of industries, and in every one, I had no prior experience, but in every one, I was able to contribute a LOT within 2 years or less. In one case my contributions led to a doubling of the company's profits, and in another, what I did helped grow the business 7-fold over 20 years, long after I'd left. I suggest that you look at what the candidate has accomplished, rather than whether or not he's worked in the field. Some people are fast learners, and can come with an ability to see what others can't or have difficulty seeing. That's been my experience.
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      • Posted by $ MichaelAarethun 7 years, 11 months ago
        Prioir military experience is a bird of a different feather. One can have 20 years experience and still not qualify unless one has served in live combat as a front line combatant. One finds that lot is far less trigger happy than a reality TV based civilian. Students...by definition including the newly graduated have no experience and are qualified only to seek qualification level jobs.
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  • Posted by $ jdisbrow 7 years, 11 months ago
    Sometimes I think there is just so much intelligence to go around. Maybe intelligence drops as the numbers increase. Or, as the population grows, and the distribution of IQ remains Gaussian, there are many more folks with scores to the left of 100.
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  • Posted by ObjectiveAnalyst 7 years, 11 months ago
    Hello Abaco,
    Yes. I see it all the time. My company must constantly work to make our tools "fool proof." Forty years of improving tools and trying to do so and try as I might, I have never been able to keep pace with their ability to be foolish. It seems impossible for one with competence to imagine the levels of incompetence possible. The companies that I supply move people with a modicum of ability and intelligence into supervisory positions and struggle to fill the openings with anyone competent.
    Yes, jbrenner is right; who is John Galt?
    Respectfully,
    O.A.
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  • Posted by $ 7 years, 11 months ago
    Anybody ever see the remake of that movie "The Crazies"? Sometimes it reminds me of the early part of that movie and I chuckle...
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  • Posted by mec4cdlic 7 years, 11 months ago
    I hope we are just getting older and more critical.
    It sounds quite similar to the complaint of Pliny the elder, you know.
    There are more goofs - but there are also more people.
    I suspect that one good EMP will sort it all out.
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