2016 Presidential Elections in the US

You are not the first one to find out that college education <> professional experience

Absolutely. Unfortunately though, if you want to climb a corporate ladder you really need to at least have a bachelor's. Even certain jobs that a 15 year old with basic computer skills could manage now require a college degree.

Luckily, I have a lot of experience in the corporate world so it's very easy for me to land a good paying job. For the most part though I'm just hoping to be my own boss by the time I get to be around 35. Even if it's a gas station, convenient store, liquor store, or something like that - good enough for me. At least I won't be a slave to a boss and the mortgage like the majority of society.

Master's or Bachelor's are required to get a foot in the door. The rest is attitude and social skills with a pinch of ruthlessness.


Wait until you'll climb up and reach the upper echelons. Hope you'll enjoy the backstabbing... ;)

I've got a friend who - in private - is a fantastic guy who would do anything for his friends and family. In his business life, he's ruthless. He went so far as to plant porn on a colleague's computer, simply to remove them from the running for promotion.

Never been interested in corporate life for that exact reason.

Oh I absolutely love and thrive in the corporate world. It is truly survival of the fittest - like society and the world ought to be. Unfortunately, we reward mediocrity, criticize self-made wealth and punish hard workers through extreme taxation. Nonetheless, I still want to eventually run my own business just so I don't have to work for someone else and make someone above me even wealthier.

As 'evil' as corporations are portrayed - they still provide far more good paying jobs with benefits that most mom-and-pop businesses simply cannot. A Mexican family owned taquiera isn't going to pay a store manager $100k+ a year - but Walgreens and Walmart will - and will give them insurance too. This is why I'm against corporate taxes - the more you tax a company, the less they hire and the less raises they offer to the middle and lower bunch (the top are fine regardless of what happens). If you keep raising and raising the taxes, soon a corporation will simply move out of the state, as plenty have in my state, or even out of the country altogether.

Social Darwinism is a dangerous idea that might bite you in the ass...

Might... but if it does I'll learn from my mistakes - which unfortunately our society is set up here so that people aren't held accountable for their screw ups. In most countries, if you lose your job and don't find another one you will most likely lose your home, not be able to buy food, etc. Not in the US though - oftentimes you'll live better if you go on welfare and every government program available than if you got a $12 an hour job. According to one study, if a woman in Chicago with 1 child and no father around claims every possible government assistance that she is eligible for - food stamps, section 8, tanf, medical - it comes out to the same as if she made $50,000 a year (I believe the exact number was around $52-$53k a year). Personally, I haven't heard of many women, unless they're very experienced of have an MBA, that make over $50k a year.

We have over 100 million people out of work - 1/5 Americas are on food stamps - nearly half of Americans don't pay a federal income tax... if these people went hungry for a few days maybe they'd actually go to work instead of simultaneously relying on taxpayers to feed and shelter them and at the same time criticizing the wealthy which are responsible for the majority of the tax revenue collected.

Guys, we seem to be rapidly losing sight here of the sheer lack of standard in the US, at EVERY level of society, not only education by a long shot!

@Adrian, at the risk of becoming repetitive, if you think education is (wastefully) expensive, try ignorance. When we read of cases where a ballplayer with less than a fifth grade education's making money in the stratosphere, where rules in immigration allow for an illiterate drug dealer to make (vs. actually EARN!!) hundreds of millions by doing illicit things right under the noses of so-called authorities etc.. it is in the long run the American people, and neither our education system nor even our currency, that have been de-valued!!

In former times, when the median salary for a manager, corporation lawyer, school teacher etc. was a mere seventy or so times apart, nowadays, it's likely about four-HUNDRED or more times!! This has again led to a de-valuation of our nation's work ethic and made the practice of sincere, vital, if unglamorous fields, such as education, medicine and law into a sick joke... and the joke's on US, the American taxpayer.

Couldn't agree more...

Education has been turned into a corporate racket where people think that just by getting a bachelor's degree you will have a wonderful existence in the suburbs, with 2 suv's and a golden retriever... Then a few years after graduation, you realized that was all b.s. as you're getting dressed in your mom's basement so you can make it on time to your cell phone store representative job.

Furthermore, people who had a fifth-grade education, say, sixty-odd years ago, actually had the equivalent of a "college" education today, BEFORE open admissions etc. all but ruined the idea of university schooling as something for the elite and deserving!

I'm continually struck by how well a Good Humor ice cream man on an American game/quiz show from around 1958 spoke compared with college grads nowadays, many of whom, even in their writing (forget their speech) can't even put a decent English sentence together without basic orthographic and mechanical errors>

Nowadays they can't even afford it.

Thank you for the compliment Lyzko.

College education I believe means squat. Getting ahead in life is all about who you know and how wise you are. Wisdom can't be learned in a university nor tested through written exams.

Smarter words have never been spoken.
I have used very very little of what I learned in college besides how to charm the pants off a girl and how to roll a perfect doobie.
I enjoyed the sporting events and concerts the most.
Met some awesome people and had a great time at the parties.
None of that helped me get a job or earn a living.
One of the best times of my life however.

Sadly, if it's solely about connections and little else, the entire concept of professional standard and skill becomes a mere laughing stock!

What I always loved about pre-Americanized/globalized countries such as Germany, is/was their sense of unassailably high standard in nearly every walk of professional life, from their cars to their beer to their music etc...

There, while connections DO matter for sure (Vitamin B = Beziehungen aka connections, they call it!), quality can't really be negotiated and technical incompetence can't be bribed one's way out of - except perhaps if one is Russian:-)

Knowing the right people (a.k.a. kissing up) might help you for a while to rise through the corporate ranks, but if you turn out to be just another a ruthless drone (even an intelligent one) who only has his career in mind but lacks social skills to lead a large department or company, you will ultimately fail. A boss is only as good as his team.

It is sad, but nonetheless true.


Not true, I know many people who are totally incompetent but nonetheless keep their jobs because they have family or friends in high places. Also, the ruthless people are the ones who often get ahead the most - even if they lack social skills. Bill Gates was notorious for yelling, swearing, and insulting his subordinates. The ruthless people do great in positions like trading, mergers and acquisitions, law, corporate strategy, finance, etc. while the people with great social skills but not a ruthless bone in their body do thinks like marketing, P.R., h.r, etc.


Hahaha same. I mean really I think that college is more of a place to learn social skills - especially if you live in the dorms since you essentially have to fend for yourself. I couldn't believe the amount of guys who really didn't know how to do laundry at age 18. Although I'll admit, I did pretend to not know either so as to strike up a conversation with some of the cuties in the laundry room. Also, sometimes they just flat out offered to do it for me - even better.

One of the reasons why Trump got to be so wealthy is because he inherited his father's connections. He actually didn't get a whole lot of actual money (that $200 million figure is bogus) - Trump claims a loan for $1million after college - which nonetheless would've still been a fortune in the 60's.

I watched the rally he has in Pittsburgh last night - very entertaining. He does go off on tangents a lot though - he'll start talking about something, then say 'by the way....' and then discuss his 'by the way' side point and disregard (or maybe forget) his original train of thought. I do love it though how he would ask the crowd 'Who's gonna pay for it (meaning the wall)???) Crowd: Mexico!!!! He certainly does have a lot of people endorsing him. I actually like Ben Carson and Senator Sessions a lot.

Lot of 'firsts' in this election...

No offense, but you probably haven't climbed high enough yet to really understand the underlying principle. Without the support of your team, you are nothing. You could be as ruthless as Adolf, and you would still fail because your underlings will simply sabotage you. It only takes two or three screwed up projects which cost your employer important contracts/ customers, and you're toast. You can't blame it on your team, and no friend will help you - not even the owner. But then ... "No falls, no balls" ... as they say in the trade.

No I haven't had the luxury of getting a job just because my family or friend works there, is a politician or business figure, etc. I started working construction with my dad since I was around 12-13 years and had my first formal job stacking tiles in a warehouse when I was 15.


You're right - I personally haven't as I'm not even 30... However, I am in middle management and have people underneath me. I actually was offered a position at Polish company where I'd be in charge of 300 sales people reporting only to the president (no b.s.) but the salary wasn't good enough and commute too long. Although I didn't get my foot in the door because I knew people there, through the interviews it turned out that we actually knew some of the same politicians and lawyers - which certainly helped me get the offer. In nearly every non-publicly traded company I've ever worked for, the people at the top were all family and friends, regardless if they were qualified. Yes, they had to work - but the vast majority of them got the job through connections. Although yes, if someone doesn't do the job well they can get fired - it's much more difficult to fire a person if the one who makes the decision is a family member or friend. Even in huge publicly traded corporations, including the one I work at, all the people at the top are all Israeli Jews that have known each other for decades - don't know if they're family but they're certainly good friends. There are far more qualified and competent individuals within our firm who can run circles around their managers, yet they still report to someone who isn't nearly as knowledgeable and got the job because of a connection. I can't even count how many directors of this, vice president of that, there are who do next to nothing at work - I know because I report to them and quite frankly, I barely do anything. Most of the time I'm at work, I'm on this forum. I'm actually only about 4-5 years younger than my direct boss who got the job because he was buddy buddy with one of the C level guys in college. That's life though - it is what it is... Yes, experience and education is important - but connections will ultimately take you much further.


Except ruthless people will use every tactic to win - even if they have to win using dirty tricks. My boss doesn't like me as a person because I'm an a$$hole who has no qualms about criticizing and shaming people, but I get the job done and my team runs like a top. I have a 'horse's ass' trophy that I give out every week which says 'end of the pack' at the bottom. The person with the lowest sales numbers for the month has to display it on the top of their desk. Things like that make my employees work harder and spend more time on the phone and in the field while competing with one another and do whatever they can to avoid being the 'horse's ass' - although of course every month someone will have it as someone always has to come in last. I also do nice things though for my team - I buy them breakfast and lunch all the time, sponsor outings, give out giftcards, hold random sales contents, etc. People call me rude, mean, cold but any one that works for me and does their job will call me 'demanding, but fair' and 'gives praise when praise is due'

A lot of the skills and strategies I've learned came from Trump's Art of the Deal. The man is truly a great negotiator, terrific businessman, totally fair towards his rewarding, compensates the managers and such very well, and does not tolerate mediocrity at all. We need that kind of thinking as we are simply drowning in debt, are getting ripped off left and right, and have way too many people out of work because quite frankly welfare allows them to live better than if they worked 40 hours a week for $12 an hour.

Until they fail. A boss can't win when valuable employees start to quit because of his behavior.

Everyone fails at something at some point in their life. It's whether you've learned from the mistakes or not that matters more. Some individuals weren't successful till they were seniors - like Colonel Sanders with KFC.

I've had people quit on me - no one cared. If they wouldn't of quit, I would've fired them anyway at the rate they were going.

Like Trump says - you gotta be prepared to walk away from a deal.

As long as it's not the top sales person of the year and it's easy to replace him or her, no problem. If half of your team quits or you have a very high turnover in your department, that's another story. You are the one who will be blamed, and no matter how good you are, you will be the one who they will let go. Sales is a little different, because people who are willing to jump ship are a dime a dozen there. Try to survive a high turnover rate in R&D or strategic planning as the manager in charge...


Can't walk away too often though, because competitors take with each other behind the scenes.

Yes for R&D it would be rather different - although engineers and programmers jump ship all the time - especially in California they hop from Facebook to Google to Yahoo to Microsoft - whoever is going to give them the best pay and working environment.


That's where the bonuses and financial rewards come in. People rarely leave jobs, at least in sales, because the environment isn't good, they don't like their boss, etc. it's about money. I can give my best guy a 5 year old computer, a tiny cubicle, and a busted headset and it wouldn't affect his performance at all since he's about the money. Now if I lowered the commission structure, then yes, that would be an issue and we would lose our best people.

True,
I'm assuming you meant 'talk' instead of take. You're right - that's why we have people in other corporations who report back to us.

Yeah, I ran out of time and couldn't correct.

In order to turn this tragic tide around in the (erstwhile!!) RIGHT direction, we've simply got to quit being so G_d damned permissive in our society in terms of both whom we hire as well as with whom we associate, teach, and (above all), allow to graduate!!!!

The latter will doubtless send a sharp message, like that much needed hard slap in the face, from which we often draw a harsh, yet desparately needed, lesson:-)

From it all, we'll doubtless recover, wilted and wounded, but better people for it!

This is faulty thinking, just stop and think about the implications of what you wrote. No one is "allowed" to graduate, they earn it through merit.

They do????!! On what island have you been living, pray?

Wake up, Rip ol' boy and look around (WITHOUT your rose-colored specs, please)
:-)))

Even an athlete, although they have it much easier as many professors will pass an athlete as they benefit the school and bring in dollars, where another student would have failed a class.

Nonetheless, in order to graduate you have to attain a set number of credits and pay for the education - they might hand you your diploma if you owe a small amount to the school directly, but I know at least with my university and I went to one of the most prestigious schools in the midwest, wouldn't let you graduate unless you had a $0 balance, a certain GPA (at least a C average) and completed a set amount of credit hours.


Permissive on who we hire? Are you kidding - we don't hire enough people because most people don't want to work! According to the BLS, there's tens of millions of people who are able bodied but simply don't want to work because when asked why not - they answered that they simply don't want a job... I don't blame them if them - especially if they perhaps don't have a higher education, no skills, and wouldn't make more than $10-$12 an hour. Might as well sit at home, smoke pot and drink malt liquor, and pop out baby after baby to increase the amount of money you get on food stamps, get a larger apartment through section 8, and continue to get TANF.

There are too many people who simply stand in the a line for a living - whether it's for social services, HUD, TANF, or to vote for a democrat - who will guarantee that the handouts continue.

I am sure that if Trump wins he will make some drastic changes to welfare and make these lazy bums go to work.

Good example Adrian is right here in my home town.
A well establish landscaper just shut down.
He hired season legal workers from Mexico to work every summer.
This year he did not get the paperwork in on time and was denied workers from Mexico.
He paid them $10.50 an hour and was required to pay their medical insurance.
When he found this out he placed an ad in the local newspaper for help wanted.
He ran the help wanted ad for two weeks.
He did not get one single call in response to his help wanted ad.
He since has had to close down his long time business because the government pays better for people to sit home and smoke dope and drink alcohol all day then what he pays.
The Mexicans would work 12 hour days and work 6 days a week for $750.
The government is paying better then that to able bodied welfare fcks being on welfare to do nothing. Sad, very sad.
You can bet Trump would change that in his first week in office and that is why these people are scared to death that they will get cut off from having their nose in the public trough.
These people can't read or write or know who the vice president is or where to find Washington D.C. on the map but they sure the hell know all the loop holes to collect the maximum freebies.
And the younger voters actually believe that Sanders is going to give them free college and free health care and we know that will never happen this next term no matter who gets elected.
At least the young voters know that Hillary is a criminal and belongs in prison.

Yeah that why I honestly have lots of respect for the Mexicans. I actually kind of prefer the hard working illegals because a lot of the legal ones have realized they can take advantage of the system. You can claim that you're unemployed, get welfare, food stamps, medicaid, rent assistance but still work as a landscaper, cook, or some other under the table job and it'll the same as if you were making like $70, $80k a year if not more.


I think I just wrote this to you earlier - we got a new tax that's going to charge people by the amount they drive. everyone's going to have to have a transponder in their car which tells the government where they're going and how much they drove and will tax them. I believe it's like 1 cent a mile or something - not exactly sure of the numbers. This is going to be very costly for people that drive a lot for a living like cabbies, contractors, pharmaceutical reps and other travelling sales people, uber drivers, etc. It's utter lunacy... I wonder if the welfare types will also be taxed... I kind of doubt it... We also had a new tax where everyone who owns a house or business worth over $250k (which gets you hardly anything here) will pay a further 17% on their property taxes. of course those with a house worth under $250k, namely just a few extremely bad areas, will get their property taxes reduces. just to give you an example, one of my good friends is from India and is an architect. He owns a totally average house in the suburbs, small 2 story, maybe around 2,500 square feet. nothing fancy... yet he currently paying $9,900 a year. he has a vacation house in arizona of roughly the same size, slightly smaller, and pays just under $1,000. after the 17% takes effect (it's going to be spaced out over 4 years), he'll end up paying $11,600 a year - for a house worth maybe $270k-$320k or so.... utter lunacy... I really can't wait to move out of here.. If trump wins I'll stay in the US but I'm definitely moving to another state - I can't it anymore here - if a young ambitious man wants to work hard, save his money, reinvest it so that he can retire early and make some sort of small fortune - this is not the city or state to do it in...

oh well it is what it is... i really do feel that Trump would help the economy a lot - first by dismantling some of the terrible trade deals. I love the US, don't get me wrong, but years of bad leadership have really made this country decline. I've heard many various deports stating that Americans actually make less now than they did 20 years ago (relative to inflation of course), some sources even go as far as stating that Americans haven't had an effective wage increase since the 80's/early 90's. I do know this - 25 years ago the minimum wage was like $5 an hour but at least when you bought $100 worth of groceries you had food for 3 people for a whole week. now $100 is just enough to put $20 gas in your car and get enough food for maybe 2-3 days for a family of 3... the costs are just going up and up and up which I don't understand why because commodities are actually pretty cheap now.