I was at the self-checkout line at Home Depot in Salem this evening.
36' of 1/4" quarter rounds in pine, a couple lag bolts, and some latex gloves. This woman comes up to me and asks, "Excuse me, do you have a full-time job?".
I was a little stunned, thought she was asking if I worked at HD for a moment. Then I sort of parsed the question, figured she was going to try to sell me something about doing mass mailings from the comfort of my home. I replied, "Yes, no thanks." or something like that.
Her retort was, "Well, I hope they don't automate your job out of existence", and she walked away. I went to staring blankly at the checkout machine. Of course, she was long gone before I thought, "What the hell is she doing at Home Depot at 8:45pm if she's even remotely concerned about keeping jobs in Salem?" I feel you abdicate any moral high ground about supporting local business when you walk into one of these Big Box stores. I do it, yes, but I do it with my eyes open. (Target is no better than Wal-Mart by the way).
This also made me think about all those Made in China tools I've recently bought from HD. (OK, sorta a shameless show off of my
new tools.) All those clothes from T.J.Maxx (OK, and now Marshall's (I'm getting so... bourgeois)).
China is a communist country, they've trampled on the rights of there own citizens and subjugated the citizens of other countries. However, I believe in far trade. We should not be providing shelter to our business community if they aren't competent enough to compete globally. I also believe that China is not going to become a democracy while it's citizens are mostly poor, rural farmers. Sending my money to China and enabling the creation of a middle class (that word again!) there is the only road to freedom.
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I'm glad I didn't tell that woman the primary purpose of my job at work is to create automated processes to reduce the labor costs of our product.
