Website owner:  James Miller

Survival, need for a livelihood, competition for jobs

   Facts of life:  Competition in a world of limited resources.  
     Scarcity of good, well-paying jobs and competition for them. 

   The central, most important concern of humanity around the 
     world is that of finding and holding onto jobs.  In all 
     countries (whatever the political and economic system of the 
     country) there is that scramble for jobs.  In all countries 
     there are relatively few good jobs and there is competition 
     for them. 

   The underlying, important "fact of life" for people around the 
     world is the need for food and shelter.  That generally means 
     finding and holding onto a job. 

   To get the good jobs you must climb above those around you in 
     some way; you must distinguish yourself; you must rise above 
     the masses.  Thus, competition with your fellow human; you 
     must shine over him, look better than him, do better than 
     him.  Some people raise themselves above their fellow men by 
     fair methods (such as hard work).  Others use methods not so 
     fair or so honest. 

   To hold onto a job you must please your employer and this often 
     means you must bend your moral principles in one way or 
     another, do things you know are wrong, because that is what 
     he requires.  

   It seems that wherever you live in this world there are more 
     people than jobs; that a job is a hard thing to find and a 
     thing you don't want to lose once obtained.  It is sustenance 
     not only for you but also for your family.  It is not just 
     your needs that are dependent on that job  but also the needs 
     of those that you love, those that depend on you. Their needs 
     as well as yours are dependent on that job. 

   At its fundamental level human society is ruled by laws of 
     survival and competition that are, in essence, much the same 
     as those that rule the natural world of wild animals --- the 
     laws of the jungle.  He who does not have a job is on the 
     outside in a cold, cruel world. 



   Feb 1990