Turn the tables on them. Are you looking for a job? You should be interviewing them to see if they deserve to have you for an employee. Are you looking for an apartment? If they want you to prove that you'll be a good tenant, then they just proved that they won't be a good landlord, so keep looking. Nothing will ever change if we don't change it ourselves.
The reason economic systems of exchange are so unfair is that they inherently privilege whomever has the greater power to say 'no.'
That's rarely the job seeker or the apartment seeker. It's almost always the person who has the most money.
@Benfell That's true, but sometimes people are merely intimidated into believing that they have no power. whatsoever, and that's not true.
Having lived on the underbelly of capitalism most of my adult life, I have no experience with what you describe. It's a pretty ugly place.
@Benfell Well, not to get into a measuring contest with you, but I've been places and seen things. So I know about the ugly underbelly.
That being said, I was still able to hop through a string of shitty landlords. When I finally found a good one, I stayed there for 20 years until I could get my house. Admittedly, jobs are little trickier, but right now there seems to be more jobs than workers, so it's a good time for the American worker to get their confidence back.
@ambulocetus Do you know what the original rationalization for slavery was? A "labor shortage." What it really means is they can't get workers cheaply enough and that's why the Federal Reserve responds not to real causes of inflation but by punishing workers.
I haven't been able to find a real job in 22 years, even having, in that time, returned to school and finishing all the way through a Ph.D. Even as they cry about their so-called "labor shortage," they still consign my job applications directly to the bit bucket.
But still they cry. And they lie. Every damn one of them.
@ambulocetus if I had an alternative proposal, I would not face the terrible dilemma I do.
To be pollyannish about it is not merely to diminish, but to deny my situation.