Good one! I’m waiting to board a flight to Chicago from Singapore after spending a week in Batam, Indonesia at a company that makes commercial aircraft engine components. The department I was observing is staffed by three hardworking individuals working 12 hour shifts seven days a week, and the organization, management, and maintenance of that facility would put a lot of the companies I visit in the US to shame.
The fact of the matter is, naivete on the part of the American Worker is unavoidable, given the fact that very few Americans have any exposure whatsoever to the way of the world outside of their own limited sphere of influence. The good news is, most folks I meet in my considerable travels (i.e. 175k miles flown each year) still have a great deal of admiration for all things American, but my cynical side is whispering their object of affection has become an illusion if not a caricature of its former self.
Those jobs that people whine about having gone overseas are being done a lot more efficiently by hardworking people who take pride in what they produce because of a tradition that abhors shame above all else. That’s a rare commodity to find in these United States these days.
Oh, and if you’d like to know why I despise unions, take a listen to the podcast “Petty Tyrant” which aired on This American Life a couple of weeks ago.
Sigh. I can’t disagree, and will listen to that podcast, but I expect it will be like preaching to the choir...