Today, I identify very, very strongly with the anti-banker sentiment out there lately.
I will probably hate them for the absolute rest of my fucking life.
Why? Because in their infinite greed, they fucked up the economy so hard as to render my engineering degree from MI-fucking-T effectively worthless.
I don’t think I feel unjustly entitled- I think it’s perfectly fair that after EIGHT years of studying engineering at some of the best possible schools, I should expect to be able to find employment in engineering.
Or employment in ANYTHING, for that matter. I’ve been applying to random postings on Craigslist, jobs that only require a GED and some mechanical knowledge…
Meanwhile, the bankers who have utterly failed in their jobs get bonuses of $1,000,000.
Fuck you guys.
Seriously. Allow me to point out that this figure is a BONUS- in addition to their annual pay. I just want 20 grand- a measly TWO PERCENT of their ADDITIONAL pay for the next YEAR in exchange for working long hours on difficult tasks.
Maybe that’s greedy of me- technically the poverty line for a single person is about $10,000 per year, but since I don’t live in the MidWest I think it’s fair to adjust somewhat for cost of living.
I was incredibly lucky to receive a fantastic financial aid package in college- I only have about $7,000 in student loans to pay off, starting in March.
It’s absolutely ABSURD that I should be worried about paying off a 4 digit loan immediately after graduation- again, from one of the TOP SCHOOLS in the WORLD. I can only imagine what it must be like for people who have much higher loan amounts to pay off.
I spent most of today trying not to cry.
To quote one of my favorite TV characters, Liz Lemon: “Everything’s the worst.”
I am so with you on that. The banksters are absolutely responsible for this mess. The whole problem is that not enough money is flowing through the economy, either through consumer spending or investment. The reason that happened is that the banksters made a bunch of irresponsible gambles and now they have to hoard the $800 billion we forked over to cover their losses. Fuck ‘em. We should have let the banks fail and used the FDIC to make small depositors whole. We need to get money flowing to businesses and workers again. Fuck those guys, and fuck the politicians that won’t even consider raising taxes on those who can damn well afford to make a small sacrifice to get our economy rolling again.