I keep adding more. Most recent compilation:

http://geocities.com/n8chz/slogans5.htm

I listened to a panel of gaming industry experts last night, and when they were talking about their attempts to create social (collaborative, team) environments, a lot of the contadictions became apparent. For instance, they said that the team mattered more than the individual because there were no original ideas. However they also acknowledged ways to cheat to move up in the system and exploit the people below you (which keeps them from moving up if they are just playing fairly). This affects who is selected to be on teams: this is a place of privilege. Thus “networking” provides certain individuals advantage while also providing them with some patter that denies that privilege to the people they exploited.

While the subject was online gaming, where higher ranking players and players in groups use isolated individuals for their own purposes and keep them down, this could easily apply to corporations. We also talked about the problem with promoting ideas and user-generated content in social situations where higher ranking people are in a better position to exploit the ideas and move ahead, while lower ranking people don’t get any benefit from sharing their ideas: in fact, they remain low rank as long as their ideas are being “farmed”.

I’ve noticed several online resumes where people are announcing the size of their rolodex and their willingness to “work their contacts” to bring other winners wherever they are hired. This surprised me because I always thought the rolodex factor was something strongly implied, but never discussed. Previously I had only seen it in after-hiring analysis articles: for instance, I read a great article about Chelsea Clinton’s first job where she was paid $100k a year basically for her rolodex.

Now people are explicit about and even screaming about their rolodexes. I guess that’s the market economy in action.

I like your ideas about fixing the job application process! I would add that there should be stong discouragement of using outside research (Googling). People of low rank/resources have little means to defend their reputation, and even “trusted” sources like newspapers may not bother with fact-checking. This means adding something to your job application might be a “key word” that could get you in trouble - the sort of thing some people decide to leave off their resume. If there’s going to be a universal application which truthfully lists all working experience, then it should be somehow kept free of all the perception manipulations of the marketing world.

By the way, I decided not to have kids either. I don’t want to provide more fodder for the contingent workforce.

Ps. That’s a great list of slogans!

The bourgeoisie is setting itself up as a gated community, with management ensconcing its offices in literal fortresses and practicing applied information asymmetry (CRM, supply chain, the usual buzzwords) at a level of sophistication worthy of intelligence agencies. They know we (the sans culottes, or people without an established stake in the future) need them more than they need us. They know that, without gainful (as opposed to contingent) economic opportunities, our sociological problems are going to be intractable. Hence a stronger pattern of geographic class segregation. The future looks brutish for most of us. I’m glad I decided not to have kids, and I continue to agitate for zero population growth.

The only way to solve problems like mine, though, is to guarantee a minimum survival kit, including either the right to work or the right to be subsidized when you’re denied work.

Unfortunately, the phrase “right to work” has been dishonestly spun into the public debate as a synonym for non-union shop. Being subsidized when denied work (less politely called welfare or charity) is an affront to dignity. What I think is needed is a return to a large or at least economically significant civil service, with provisions that the existence of job openings is part of the public record, signed applications and not resumes are used as documents of first contact, and interviews (i.e. introvert filters) are a late stage in the selection process, after application processing and competitive examinations. I’m not above advocating holding private sector human resources practices to similar standards. If that makes me a commie, so be it. I also advocate a database of public record for announcements of vacancies, public and private, or at least a proof-of-publication requirement when new employees are added to quarterly withholding tax returns. These reforms would still leave de facto employees who are de jure “independent contractors” as a loophole. Perhaps you can think of a policy strategy for de-gaming that aspect of it. Not that policy is a morally legitimate instrument in a nation whose political spectrum extends from right to center.

For your entertainment:

http://geocities.com/n8chz/slogans.htm

Part of the boomer problem is that it’s hard to get *hired* when the boss is younger. I think this whole situation reveals a massive failure in our society: the boomers in this situation weren’t offered the training and opportunities to keep the respect and position that should have come with their experience.