by metatron 44 Replies latest jw friends
Thanks for the feedback JT and one.
I think I see your point One. The cost to house those at Bethel must be very high. So even if you're paying your people .50 cents an hour, the cost to feed, house, etc, must be higher then outsourcing the product you need.
It kind of makes me wonder if my sister and borther-in-law who are now leaving Bethel because she is pregnant decided to leave because they saw the writing on the wall.
I agree that most of this downsizing is from lack of demand.
However, if they do outsource a lot of the printing, it should
be interpreted as a major evidence of the internal decay
of the organization. I firmly believe that they can't run
efficiently the way they used to do because skilled, committed
brothers won't volunteer to work for the Society. The days
of new boy cannon fodder are over - brothers with deep experience
in technical areas don't want to live in one room, work in a
factory, and have every thought and movement subject to
examination in a cult-like collective. Why did they send
Bethelites to college? Why did they try to train their own
legal workers? or plumbers? THE SKILLED LABOR AIN'T THERE!
I think this also relates pretty well to the general
dumbing down of the organization - they reject
deep thinking and education to survive against facts and
reality.
That's why Patterson is needed - the sweatshop days are gone
and you have to treat people better - or they'll quit.
metatron
mybatty,
It was a known secret that when you wanted out of pioneering, co, do, bethel etc you make your wife pregant, or she does the trick somehow, if her husband was not willing and she wanted out (abortion is out the question).
Another trick was/is to become seriously sick.
If they have not seen the 'handwritting' probably they feel the heat coming from all corners. Time to run...
Been there done that
<in best Nelson voice> Ha ha!
Note to the Bethel workers ... get out now if you're still young and have at least a decent shot at a 'good' job!!! Don't wait until you are 40 years old, no school, no work experience (and don't buy the snake oil that businesses care about your 20 years 'volunteering'. They don't.) Get out now, get some edu-mication and get crakin' - or it'll be another 30 years of cleaning floors/windows until you are too old to move. The big 'A' won't save you - your parents/grandparents/great-grandparents thought that too. And now look at them - dead or dying. Sorry to be harsh, but that's reality. Not the fantasy world ....
Until I read this post, I'd forgotten about a conversation I had with some Bethelites a few years ago when I was still attending. The Society had a "farm" in Florida (maybe still does), an orchard really, where they grew oranges, etc. Also one in New Jersey, I think, where they grew tomatoes. All for the Bethel family. At that time they were beginning to realize that after growing, picking, processing, trucking and storing this food, it was actually costing them more than what they could get the same stuff for by buying in bulk.
As fewer young people go to Bethel, and with all the problems they are facing since growth began to slack off in the mid-90s, downsizing and outsourcing are just more ways to slow the decline. My wife and I were talking the other day, trying to think of anyone that we knew that had gone to Bethel in the last decade. We could not think of ONE PERSON!!!! We'd HEARD about someone who'd gone, but that was it.
S4
One says:
Another trick was/is to become seriously sick.
##########
this is so funny- it was one of my wife's favorite tricks
she would go to the hall and then get sick and one of th sisters would have to take her home and man did those sisters love leaving those meetings
smile
Roybatty
It shows once again, that capitalism works better than slavery. Remember the precivil war north south economic conditions? It costed more to work the slaves and care for them, than to set them free to live in ghettos, and just hire what is needed.
Watchtower
'When you loose control,
You'll reap the harvest you have sowed'
-Pink floyd
Seeker, that pisses me off. I know my parents have broken their backs working in that orchard, and are in no physical shape to do so. When I first heard about it, I asked my father when he became a migrant worker, but he insisted he wanted to do it. Yeah, like I wanted to guard Turnersville. Anyway, good business sense means you invest in anything that has a positive return. If its outside your core competency, it generally won't. But when you can't do better farming citrus in Florida with no paid workforce, while the commercial farms often must house workers anyway, they suck at bussines management as much as at prophecy.
It struck me as strange when I first heard that they were outsourcing some of thier food. But, after reading these posts it makes sense. I guess that if god was behind you wouldn't all of your endeavers be profitable.
Don't forget that although they sign a vow of poverty, the worldly courts may not look too kindly on a Borganization that sucks the life out of its people and yet doesn't care for them when they are old or injured.
Could labor lawsuits be in the works??? These can cost companies MILLIONS.
Lisa
