Adrian wrote:
> Chris Tolley
supanet.com> gurgled happily, sounding much like they
> were saying:
> >>> The only possible interpretation of the concept of ``your job, and
>>> those of your children and grand-children'' is that you believe that
>>> jobs are like furniture, passed from generation to generation.
>
>> That's not the only possible interpretation.
>
> True, but it's certainly the most likely one, by a LONG chalk.
>> It is not necessary to postulate a concept of passing jobs between the
>> generations. People from different generations may work alongside each
>> other in the same industry doing entirely different and pretty much
>> unconnected jobs.
>
> And they may equally well work in completely different ones. So?
>
>> A given industry may have a long association with a particular community
>> for perfectly understandable reasons - e.g. coal mining in a certain
>> place because that place is above a coal seam. The coal seam might be
>> well known for having many centuries worth of useful production in it,
>
> Is "useful" the same as "economically viable"?
Usually. It just takes less effort to write.
>> and people in the local area may bring children into the world knowing
>> that there is no reason not to believe that there will be work for them
>> in the local area when they grow up. Until someone many miles away takes
>> a political decision to close the mine down for reasons not connected
>> with its viability.
>
> D'you _really_ believe that the whole demise of the mining industry in
> the UK was _solely_ intended as a snub to "the working class"?
No, and there isn't a shred of evidence in anything written above to
suggest that I do.
> Bollocks.
Yes, that's a reasonable description of your suggestion.
> Even ignoring the undeniable fact that demand for coal as a fuel was
> massively shrinking at the same time as the costs of extraction were
> rising hugely,
What may be true for an industry as a whole, especially one in which a
number of pits are close to exhaustion, need not be true for a given
example pit, especially if it is fairly new.
> I'd suggest that the vast majority of people in those ex- mining
> communities are a damn sight healthier and happier - and, yes, many
> are certainly wealthier - now they're not down t'pit every day, man
> and boy, like their fathers and grandfathers before them.
Suggestions are easy, but they don't prove anything. Statistics, on the
other hand, do tend to support the view that life expectancy for the
unemployed is lower than for the employed.
> Or do you really think that an important use of government funds is to
> keep outdated and useless industries going as a kind of sociological
> museum? Just mining? How about farriers? Canal boatmen? Chimney sweeps
> (Under 10yo, naturally)...?
Each time you start a sentence "do you really think", what follows
doesn't resemble what I think at all. It does however resemble a straw
man.
