Anti Wage-Slavery Pro-Freedom Quotations Of The Week 1395-1397

For starters, I wrote a blog post about quitting my job and it got some attention. I heard from so many people with the same story. From junior designers getting their feet wet for the first time, all the way up to senior execs and newly established millionaires who seemed to have it all.

Everyone said the same thing — that they feel like they’re losing their souls by staying, and yet they can’t find the courage to leave.
Linda Eliasen
Medium
On Quitting: Part II
December 10, 2015

 Several recent studies have furthered our awareness of the pathologies caused by the breakdown of connection and community. According to a recent report published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, white, uneducated, middle- and working-class adults between the ages of 45 and 54 are now dying at higher rates than ever before, deaths involving suicide, drug and alcohol abuse, and liver disease. The stresses of economic stagnation, along with the increased availability of prescription painkillers seem to be two factors behind his increase. The authors also suggest that hopelessness and the helplessness of social isolation—the breakdown of a sense of meaning and purpose—were common threads in the people at increased risk. As Johann Hari documents in his book, Chasing the Scream, it is emotional trauma and social disconnectedness—rather than the compellingly addictive power or “hook” of certain substances themselves—that offer the best explanations of the causes of addiction today.

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Researchers and theorists have pointed to many factors that could be causing this depressing trend. The decline of social and community organizations, along with volunteerism, the increasingly long work days and commutes, the growth of two-career and single parent families, the privatizing effects of television, the decline in direct personal conversations caused by social media and the Internet,
How Can We Stop America's Deadly Epidemic of Loneliness?
By Michael Bader, DMH / AlterNet
December 22, 2015
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President Barack Obama’s 16-day Christmas getaway in Hawaii will bring the cost of his family’s personal travel during his time in office to more than $70 million, according to a new study.

This year alone the estimated bill for the first family’s holidays was $11.6 million, including golf trips to Florida and California, and Michelle Obama going skiing in Aspen. It costs just over $200,000 an hour to fly Air Force One, meaning $3.6 million for the round trip from Washington to Hawaii. It is the Obamas’ seventh family holiday in Hawaii during his presidency.
‘The Obamas are treating Air Force One like an Uber ride’: First family’s travel tab tops $70 million
National Post
Nick Allen, The Telegraph | December 21, 2015
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