link to original reddit post by /u/HighlandValley
I work for a federal contracting company (I'm never actually assigned to any contracts, I'm back office and work from home) and I'm biting my nails waiting to see what OSHA's guidelines actually are following Biden's plan to mandate vaccines for us. I'm legitimately wondering if I'm going to lose my job for refusing an injection (not that it should matter as anyone should be able to refuse, but I'm a healthy 20-something and statistically my odds of dying in a car crash in my life are 100x higher than my odds of dying from COVID [<0.01% COVID IFR for my demographic, 1 in 107 lifetime odds of Americans dying a car accident according to National Safety Council]). The idea of the executive branch unilaterally injecting itself into the medical decisions of so many Americans honestly makes it feel like the walls are closing in around me. My life was just starting to get back to normal this summer and my only fear were private company vaccine mandates, but the company I work for now and the company I worked for just before this both said, "we will never require you to disclose your vaccination status."
It feels like a once in a lifetime thing, but sadly it's not. The first example that comes to mind is the raising of the legal drinking age to 21 across the country. This wasn't done via federal law, but instead by withholding federal highway funding from states who did not pass their own laws setting their drinking age to 21. Literally the federal government extorting the states to get an outcome it can't legally mandate directly. I can't imagine the frustration of a 19 year old working a factory job who regularly goes out for beers with colleagues, who would then have to abstain (or break the law) for 2 years until they reach a special date on the calendar that says it's all okay.
CARS - domestic auto manufacturers fucked up and had unstable balance sheets? We'll bail them out, which is bad enough, but in an effort to both stimulate that sector of the economy and try to make America's cars more fuel efficient, we'll give free money to people to buy a new, more efficient vehicle. Okay, that's really just a stimulus, which we've seen before but this time it's tied to a particular green goal. But wait... as a condition of the "cash for clunkers" trade, the car that is traded in needs to be permanently disabled. Ironically, some studies have shown that the most environmentally friendly thing to do regarding cars is just to keep them running as long as possible - i.e. the "Reduce" part of "Reduce - Reuse - Recycle." So the super green federal initiative encouraged more consumption, made it impossible to reuse the cars in the used car market, and made sure that many parts from the engine would be impossible to recycle via junkyards. So imagine you're poor with an older car that barely runs, and the federal government is going to just hand you $4500 towards the purchase of a new car. Unless you have horrible credit, you would be stupid not to take that deal from a financial perspective. Some call it an "incentive," I call it exploitation. Your money is stolen via taxes, and their generous offer is to give some of it back if you perform an action they like.
I don't know how this can be fought, but I feel like the two main pursuits should be to live off-grid as much as possible, and try to be completely financially independent. Two of the only ways to live a life that cannot be interrupted by the feds.