I was reading today how Macy’s is the next up to announce big layoffs, 7000 nationwide…or about 4% of their workforce.

Locally, Boeing announced layoffs (10000) as did Microsoft. (5000).

I thought about what it meant for those people.  Some will be OK as they have marketable skills and savings to tide them over, bu many will have a hard time and end up on state unemployment, and perhaps eventually federal assistance.

And suddenly it hit me:  The answer to the problems.  How to help the employer save money and people stay working:

Voluntary pay cuts.

Put simply, if Macy’s needs to cut its payroll 4%, they should just apportion wage cuts accordingly.  Heck the upper levels could be cut a bit with no impact.  And wouldn’t the average worker be willing to lose a bit to ensure that everyone stays employed?

Take me and where I work now.  If my team faced such a layoff, I know we would all take a voluntary cut to preserve the team we have.  We work well together and support each other.

I am not a fan of President Carter.  I personally feel he is the worst US president in recent history, bar none.  His single term really had little to show for it, except perhaps for the release of the hostages in Iran.

And as for his life after being defeated by Reagan, he has done very little to gain my even grudging approval.  In all, I have very little to say positive about him.  One of the few positives in my book was his support for Habitat for Humanity, the  program that builds houses for low income people.

Not that HFH has not had its controversies, of course, but even if it is a liberal entitlement dream, it seemed to have some merit.  Like the TV version, Extreme Home Makeover, the program cannot build houses for every deserving family, but it can help some people out.  Every charity seems to face that conundrum.

But now one community is having a little QC problem where the homes are concerned, and it raises questions about the program.  Are the houses they build safe and sound?  Does volunteer labor in this case equate to lowest bidder problems?

It is a shocking tale of modern day slavery in Africa, now imported to the USA via immigration.  Legal immigration by the way.

Poor African families, to pay debts, essentially sell one of their children into slavery.   The case that has spurred this debate is a story by AP writer Rukmini Callimachi about a girl name Shyima who was given as a maid to a wealthy Egyptian family at the age of 10. 

Late at night, the neighbors saw a little girl at the kitchen sink of the house next door.

They watched through their window as the child rinsed plates under the open faucet. She wasn’t much taller than the counter and the soapy water swallowed her slender arms. To put the dishes away, she climbed on a chair.

But she was not the daughter of the couple next door doing chores. She was their maid.

Shyima was 10 when a wealthy Egyptian couple brought her from a poor village in northern Egypt to work in their California home. She awoke before dawn and often worked past midnight to iron their clothes, mop the marble floors and dust the family’s crystal. She earned $45 a month working up to 20 hours a day. She had no breaks during the day and no days off.

The Michael Steele campaign has taken its cue from the Fox ad and replied with an ad of their own.  The ad is positive in nature and uses the same core concept:  Provide a victim that can speak with moral authority.

As it is in response to a blatant mischaracterization by Cardin, I suppose it is slightly less objectionable.  The ad does not address any aspect of the ethics of SCR, it only speaks to showing that Steele is not, as the Fox ad asserts, a heartless person who does not support finding cures.

Decide for yourself if it is effective or not.  (Hat Tip Sister Toldjah)

While you are at it, take a good look at her site, and read her in depth assessment of Missouri’s controversial ammendment 2 with these two posts:

• Proposed Missouri Amendment 2: Pro human cloning?
• Another look at Missouri’s proposed Amendment 2: It’s a fraud

The truth is a powerful weapon and that proposed amendment is not being fairly assessed by the media.