Fast Food Employees Replaced By Self-Serve Kiosks, But The TSA Is Hiring Actual Clowns

Survival Saturday is  a round-up of the week’s news and resources for folks who are interested in being prepared.

This Week in the News

This week’s headline sounds more like Saturday Night Live than Survival Saturday, but unfortunately, it’s all too real.  If you happen to be looking for a job, prospects aren’t looking too good out there in the land of fast food. But, hey – the TSA is hiring clowns and people to hand out snacks. Meanwhile, the situation in Venezuela continues to devolve.

How’s That New Minimum Wage Working Out for You?

When employees try to make the rules in businesses, it nearly always backfires.

Case in point? California’s dramatically increased minimum wage. Initially, fast food workers rejoiced at the prospect of earning $15 per hour to flip burgers. However, there are going to be a lot fewer jobs at $15 per hour than there were at the previous minimum wage of $9 per hour.

Now that the minimum wage is incrementally making it’s way to the $15 mark, businesses are scrambling to cut jobs.

Wendy’s has announced that self-service ordering kiosks will be installed at 6000 locations. McDonalds is expected to follow suit shortly. Carls Jr. intends to be close behind. It seems to me like this is a direct example of cause and effect and that our system is (or soon will be) beyond repair.

But hey. Way to go with that whole “forced increase.”

How Long Do You Think Maduro Will Remain in Power in Venezuela?

In Venezuela, the situation has gone from absolutely horrible to even worse, as the starving citizens begin to turn on the government.

The president has decided that an excellent solution to the lack of food is to divert half of the food slated to arrive at stores  to state-run distribution points.

Under the state of emergency imposed by President Nicolas Maduro, the military, along with government-organized civilian committees, ensures that food packets are delivered door-to-door in order to — as officials say — cut out black market operators.

Imagine the rage of a group of thousands who stood in line for hours for the supply truck to arrive at a government-run grocery store, only to watch soldiers get in the truck and take it away. With this kind of public sentiment, one would imagine Maduro cannot be long for this office. The police are currently holding off the protesting citizens with rubber bullets and tear gas in a violent uprising that is sure to get far worse.

Maduro, however, has a lot of people to blame for the dismal downfall of his country. For example, he accused the head of the Organization of American States (OAS) of being a “traitor” and CIA agent. (This accusation triggered the former leader of Uruguay, José “Pepe” Mujica, to say that Maduro is “mad as a goat”.) Maduro has turned down all offers of US assistance, telling his people that the United States is only after the country’s oil reserves. (Hmmm…well…still, people are hungry.)

As we watch our own economic situation devolve here in the United States, we need to pay attention to the goings-on south of the border. You absolutely must remember that as recently as the late 1970s, Venezuela was one of the 20 wealthiest countries in the world. They still have some of the largest oil reserves. If you think it can’t happen to us – that we’re somehow immune to the awful decisions of our politician and the elite financiers – then you need to go reread some history.

Literal Bread and Circuses at the Airports While TSA Lines Make Passengers Miss Flights

Remember how they used to recommend you get to the airport an hour or two before your flight? Well, now, thanks to the TSA and their searches, passengers must be there 3 hours before their flights. Some passengers are spending more time in line to be groped to be cleared by the TSA than the actual time they’ll be spending on a plane.

Needless to say, passengers are enraged. So much so that the airports are trying to assuage their rage with clowns, snacks, and ponies. That’s right, they are putting on little mini-circuses to amuse and distract you while they infringe on your Constitutional rights. There’s honest-to-goodness video of the spectacle.

Was this increase in wait times just a power play to get more funding for the TSA? If so, they won.  Your tax dollars will soon be spent to pay more goons…oops… thugs… I mean agents.

The union representing TSA officers called on Congress to pass emergency legislation funding the hiring of an additional 6,000 full-time screeners.

“Congress has starved TSA of the resources it needs to meet growing demands at our nation’s airports,” American Federation of Government Employees National President J. David Cox Sr. wrote in a letter sent Thursday to House and Senate leaders.

Congress did give the agency some relief earlier this week.

The Department of Homeland Security received congressional approval Wednesday to reallocate $34 million in its budget to increase the number of officers at airports.

Self- Reliance: Create a Collapse Supply List Based on the Things They Are Out of in Venezuela

Sometimes a cautionary tale is more motivating than any amount of positive reinforcement every could be, and the horrifying reports from Venezuela are a perfect example. If you’re paying attention to the things they’ve run out of, you can put together a collapse supply list to see you through the crisis in the event of a breakdown in our own country. The time to prepare is now, well before the situation devolves to one that is similar.

Click here to find out what supplies have disappeared in Venezuela

Anything to add to Survival Saturday?

Do you have any news links you want to share? Now’s the time! I’d love to hear your opinions on today’s stories, too!  Is there anything newsworthy going on in your area that we may not have heard about?

The door is open – please use the comments section to share information that you find important.