Capitalism: Alive And Well

[Johnny Horton]

Goodbye, bloated union roles, fantastical pension plans and other such pie-in-the-sky, socialist fantasy. A new day has dawned in American Business.

Big steel is hurting the best. Unable to compete in the world market because they've been burdened and and ultimately bankrupted by too much "wretched excess," the big steel companies and being bought up, cleaned up and put back in business by people who understand that one minus one does not equal two.

The losers, as usual, are stock holders who'd hoped for undeserved wealth, and the poor saps who put their faith in a mythical board of directors who the foolishly presumed toiled day and night for the welfare of the work force.

And you malcontents can blame big business all you want. Ultimately it is YOU, the consumers, who decided whether a 10th-grade educated steel worker is deserving of a 50-thousand-dollar-a-year retirement.

As Allan Sloan writes in "Newsweek," "If you want cheap flights, cheap steel and cheap phone calls, someone has to pay the price."

American workers must learn the not so difficult lesson to save their money. They seem to drift dreamily along on a vague assumption that someone, somewhere, will not only take care of them, but that they have some sort of right to some protection.

Smarten up, boys and girls. Save. Plan. Even a minimal effort at a young age will provide you with a substantial sum of money later.

You could, of course, invest your hope in Social Security, and then scrape by, month to month on that pittance. It is, as always, your choice.