45,000 Verizon Workers On Strike Over New Contract

Trouble with your landline? If you have Verizon, especially on the east coast, it might not be the best time to have it fixed; The Daily Mail reports that "Forty-five thousand Verizon workers from Massachusetts to Washington, D.C., are on the picket line Sunday as labour contract talks fizzled. More than a fifth of the wireless giant's work force has gone on strike as contract negotiations for the wireline division broke down last night."

Comments

A strike? Oh, No!

[93 Escort Wagon]

What impact will this have on Verizon's legendary customer service?

Re:A strike? Oh, No!

[girlintraining]

What impact will this have on Verizon's legendary customer service?

It'll improve because during the interminably long hold times, more customers will solve the problem on their own, rather than be given the wrong answer.

Re:A strike? Oh, No!

[Anonymous Coward]

Given that it's going from bad to nonexistent, I'd say that may be an improvement.

Re:A strike? Oh, No!

[ccguy]

Problem with these strikes is not that workers stop working - that wouldn't be a problem unless you needed them, which you typically don't.

Problem is that often they break things so you notice their absence faster.

Re:A strike? Oh, No!

[Opportunist]

Problem is that often they break things so you notice their absence faster.

And that's different from the normal operation... how?

Re:A strike? Oh, No!

[Anonymous Coward]

None. Actually only 450 Verizon workers are going on strike. They can't do math.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D2isSJKntbg

Re:A strike? Oh, No!

[PCM2]

True story: One day, my DSL went out. It didn't bother me until it was still out a few hours later. I called my DSL provider. They ran some test and said, "Yes sir, we are seeing some problem on the line. We will fix it and get back to you." An hour or so later they called back:

"Your DSL is fixed now, thanks for your business!"
"No it isn't."
"Yes it is."
"No it isn't. None of the lights on my DSL modem are on."
"Have you tried rebooting it?"
"Yes, I already... oh for fuck's sake. Hold on." (bullshitting while I pretend to reboot it again) "Gosh, still nothing. What can it be?"
"I don't know sir. That's a real shame. Would you like to hear about any of our other Internet options that might serve you better?"
"What?"
"Would you like to hear about any of our other offerings? I see we have a satellite Internet offering in your area."
"What the f...satellite? What does that cost?"
"I'm seeing that as $175/month, sir."
"That's a little more than what I'm paying now, isn't it?"
"Um, yes it is."
"And why would I pay that much if you can't even provide me service on the simple DSL line I have now?"
"Er..."
"You're really telling me you won't send anybody to fix this thing? You're willing to let me cancel my contract rather than repair my service?"
"That's your choice, sir."
"My choice?"
"Yes, and I see that you've been a subscriber for... let's see... 31 months, and there's no early cancellation fee as long as you've been a subscriber for 12 months."
"Oh, fuck you."

I hung up. A little while later I called back, and this time I didn't say anything as simple as "my Internet doesn't work." Instead I made it sound complicated enough that the first-line support person escalated my call to a tech. The tech immediately recognized that I knew what I was talking about. He said, "I have an idea if you're game to try it. Do you have any alligator clips?" I said that I did, and in fact I had some on the ends of an RJ45 cord. He suggested I go out to the phone box in the side yard and hook up my DSL modem there. If I found the right pins and the modem looped up, then it was definitely a problem in my interior wiring somewhere. It sounded plausible to me, so that's what I did.

The modem did loop up, but the problem was even easier to diagnose than I expected. The wires in the box had been cut. Snip, snip. Clean cut, with the other ends still on the posts in the phone box.

That's when I remembered: I had a new neighbor move in upstairs about a week earlier. New neighbor will want to order phone service. New neighbor might want to have a new line installed. New line might mean someone from [the West Coast incumbent phone company that has since been renamed to AT&T] might have to come to the premises to tie some wires in the phone box. Said representative would then see the bright, shiny tag from my DSL provider -- which was a CLEC, not the incumbent phone company. Inquiry with some friends revealed incumbent phone company is unionized, while CLEC is not. Hence: Snip, snip.

Just hearsay, mind you, but why else would anyone cut my DSL line (but not my phone line)?

Re:A strike? Oh, No!

[cowboy76Spain]

Never attribute to malice what can be explained by incompetence?

Re:A strike? Oh, No!

[Anonymous Coward]

No, you've got it the wrong way round. Never attribute to incompetence what can be explained by malice.
-BellSouth DSL.GOD who couldn't get Mindspring DSL service 500 ft from the BellSouth central final support level office site in 2001. Mindspring claimed it was served by Covad. Support calls literally were nothing but derisive laughter - no questions, no nothing, just laughter. This only got fixed by escalating to the guy in charge of all BellSouth-Mindspring contracts.

Re:A strike? Oh, No!

[Anonymous Coward]

(bullshitting while I pretend to reboot it again)

What would it have hurt to reboot it again? Did it occur to you that they may have reset the line when they called? I was all with you on how shitty service is now, but then that. And then I remembered, even when technical service was something done by curious problem solvers, customers would lie. What's the point of having good service if consumers will a) not pay for it (in higher prices) and b) not do what the help desk asks anyway?

Re:A strike? Oh, No!

[Anonymous Coward]

Um, no, this is Verizon (Wired) not Verizon Wireless. Verizon wired has had IMO the worst service among all telcos, and their employees in the field never really "worked" anyway. They just went onsite, stared at a wall for a few minutes and then promptly left; I presume for happy hour at a strip club. Verizon needs to trim some dead weight and get the pompous attitude out of their corporate motto, again, IMO.

Re:A strike? Oh, No!

[ryanov]

It ordinarily takes a really long time to reboot and solves nothing. Then they keep asking you if it's back yet, not realizing that it takes 5 times as long as they think.

Re:A strike? Oh, No!

[PCM2]

What would it have hurt to reboot it again? Did it occur to you that they may have reset the line when they called?

I know. If I had reset it again the wires might have welded themselves back together, but I was too impatient to let it happen. It's a bad character trait, I guess -- that, and assuming that when my DSL modem shows no lights except power, the problem isn't with my modem.

Re:A strike? Oh, No!

[GooberToo]

Never attribute to malice what can be explained by incompetence?

I find incompetent malice to be alive and well in the world.

Re:A strike? Oh, No!

[treeves]

That didn't fix anything. It took a joke that almost all of us got, and turned it into a straight question - a straight question that is no more likely to yield a correct answer that the joke did.

Re:A strike? Oh, No!

[Anonymous Coward]

I had a similar experience with cable service from Ch****r.

I had a drop for a cable modem and basic TV service. The cable ran underground to the back fence and the was exposed so it could be hung along the fence. The installer said someone would come back within a week or two to properly bury it. That burial service never happened so the cable remained exposed at the back corner of the yard before running across the fence tops to the distribution box about 2 backyards away.

Some months later the neighbor next door told me they were having cable TV issues and asked if my service was working. I told them my service was fine and they should call for service. So they called for service. I noticed the service truck a few days later when I got home early from work; "We'll be there between Noon and 4pm" comes to mind right now.

That afternoon I noticed my cable modem would not sync up and my TV service was sorta grainy. I checked all the connections inside the house. No issues found. I looked around outside the house and saw fresh diggings in the lawn. Humm.... I followed the fresh diggings to the neighbor's front fence. That's normal, until I looked in my backyard and noticed some shubbery and plantings were messed up. I went in the backyard to where I knew my cable came up and saw one of those T-splitter boxes: 1-in and 2-out like you can buy at most TV and electronics stores.

Yep. the cable guy took the easy way out by running the new drop from the neighbor's house to my backyard and tapping into my drop. That tap reduced the signal level to my cable modem enough to cause it to fail the sync process and cause the my TV signal to be a little grainy.

Before calling for service I took a few pictures. Then I called for service.

I reminded the service person on the phone that the neighbor next door had cable service out that day because I saw the truck and talked to the neighbor (white lie!). I told them I saw a tap in my drop. They thought I was stealing service but I told them to pull up my account records. Yep. They saw I am paying for basic TV and cable modem service. So they ran some tests and said they couldn't sync up to my modem. They said it could be a few days before someone came out.

I asked the service person why a service tech would tap another drop? They refused to answer. I told them I had pictures of what I found and the next Town Meeting was the coming Monday, a few days away. They said a service tech would be out the next day between Noon and 4pm. I told the service person that I will gladly stay at home to provide access for the cable person and ensure that the repairs correct my issues. They stuttered and said that wasn't necessary. I told them I had pictures for the Town Meeting. They said, "Tomorrow between Noon and 4pm". I said, "Fine."

Funny thing: The service tech they sent out was the same person that repaired the neighbor's cable by tapping my drop. How do I know? He knew where to go to start fixing things after he ran the signal strength tests at the box on the side of the house. When I asked him how did he know where to go he said he was out yesterday at the neighbor's house. So I showed him the pictures I took while he was standing in my shrubbery looking at the tap. He said he needed to go to the truck and get cable and a shovel.

When the guy had finished the repairs, both the neighbor and myself had separate drops that were properly buried. And best of all, my cable signal levels actually improved over previous tests.

It's really strange how people act when confronted with evidence that could be made public in a forum of a regulating body. Our local town government holds a single-source, long-term contract with Ch****r for cable TV and cable modem service within my town, and Ch****r has had a bad record in town that they have been working hard to correct all these years to the point of having to dedicate a contact for all Town issues, and that contact is required to appear at every Town Meeting so they can record/respond to customer complaints.

I will complain!

[DWMorse]

Someone will hear about this, Verizon! I dema [Closing Link: tech.slashdot.com (Disconnected from server.)]

Re:I will complain!

[Anonymous Coward]

Someone will hear about this, Verizon! I dema [Closing Link: tech.slashdot.com (Disconnected from server.)]

tech.slashdot.org*

In other news,

[girlintraining]

In other, totally unrelated news, Verizon reported a 6.3% earnings jump from last year at this time. Of course, since Verizon has less free spending money and has invested in their hopelessly out of date network to remain competitive with the 3rd world... they decided to cut labor and give themselves raises for being so smart!

Re:In other news,

[flaming error]

> remain competitive with the 3rd world

They can't really compete with the 3rd world in quality, so they're trying their best to compete in wages.

Re:In other news,

[mjwalshe]

sweetheart as a veteran of the phone industry the rest of the developed words phone companies does consider the US third world

Re:In other news,

[Anonymous Coward]

As someone who has been in the third world, I can say that the USA's phone network, while not on par with say Japan, is light-years ahead of the actual third world. Your hyperbole is offensive to those in the 3rd world who actually lack what we take for granted here.

Re:In other news,

[Anonymous Coward]

Iraq has some pretty sweet super robust nationwide 4G networks now. America's problem is that America is a generous little asshole.

Re:In other news,

[Nimey]

...and we're generous because of a no-bid contract to some rich campaign donor, right?

Re:In other news,

[flaming error]

As hyperbole goes, measuring infrastructure quality in "light-years" is BTU's worse.

Re:In other news,

[Anonymous Coward]

Not sure about now, but having been in Germany in the 90s I can tell you that some of their rural stuff was vintage by our standards.

Re:In other news,

[PCM2]

Iraq has some pretty sweet super robust nationwide 4G networks now.

But this entire thread is about land-line networks, not wireless. Verizon says its wireless division is likely to be unaffected by the strike.

Re:In other news,

[SomePgmr]

There's a detail you'd expect to have cropped up about 400 posts ago. I mean, it's in the summary.

Re:In other news,

[Anonymous Coward]

What you aren't hearing is that everyone that is non-union has to pay for the union employees to have free medical insurance.

It is about time they started pulling their weight. The union being on strike and continuing to have free benefits just means more layoffs for everyone else.

Thanks guys! :thumbsup:

Re:In other news,

[Rexdude]

heh, even the third world countries have the same opinion!

Can you hear me now?

[Anonymous Coward]

Can you hear me now?

Re:Can you hear me now?

[93 Escort Wagon]

Can you hear me now?

Filthy scab.

Those disgusting proles!

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

How dare they let their petty concerns over whether they get a pittance or a laughable pittance from Verizon's bloated coffers interfere with my right to vapid chatter?

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[TheGratefulNet]

the article is 'surprisingly' short on details about WHY the workers are on strike.

you can bet they have a good reason. and the fact that media does not report news anymore when its the little guy who gets stomped by big business..

I've been on the receiving side of having wages cut, benefits cut and then my job cut. I can look and see the middle class eroding before my own eyes. I can fully believe 'big wireless' is being greedy and forcing workers to settle for less and less over time.

why isn't this reported?

you know why. the real truth is not what media co's want coming out. its actually too unsettling to report this level of truth in the world.

I've been a fan of unions, recently. I see a lot of parallels between the days of woody guthrie and today. big companies are owning your ass and getting you to settle for less and less, all the while getting richer and richer. study history, its a 100% repeat of the early part of the 1900's in the US. listen to the pro-union and pro-labor songs (folk songs) and imagine them being sung today. they fit like a glove.

we need unions back. and we need most of the workers to admit this and force companies to stop stealing OUR hard earned wealth.

capitalism - in its current state - is a failure. look all around you. we need something better. what's it going to take before everyone realizes that? how much worse does it have to get?

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Anonymous Coward]

capitalism - in its current state - is a failure. look all around you.

*looking around*

Yup, looks good. We have money in the bank, and our currency is so strong you could bounce an oil tanker off it. The unemployment rate is at an all-time low. People are starting businesses right and left. Most of them will not make it, but such is life. Crime is low, even for a country that ranks fourth when it comes to gun ownership.

Then again, we have sensible taxes, and we are not being overrun by teabaggers. We don't start wars that drain our coffers every decade or so.

The country would be Norway, which I understand is usually referred to as "communist" at your end of the pond. How are the republicans working out for you guys?

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[dpilot]

According to the Republicans, all of our problems are the Democrat's fault. The current dismal state of the economy has nothing to do with the policies since 2000, and everything to do with Obama.

The "liberal media" echos this sentiment, so it must be true, right?

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

The fact that my original post wasn't trivially identified as sarcasm rather unnerves me...

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Anonymous Coward]

we need unions back. and we need most of the workers to admit this and force companies to stop stealing OUR hard earned wealth.

*shakes head*

a) Unions are still here, they never left.

b) The quality of life in American has never been so good. Poor* people with smart phones? Check. Poor* people with big screen HD TV's? Check. Poor* people owning cars? check. * (Poor as classified by the government's standard and more so by POTUS's claims)

c) Entitlement mentality has never been so high. Just look at your own statements.

d) We don't really have capitalism right now. Things are far to regulated and governed for that. It's a wolf in capitalism's clothing.

e) The US entered a recession and all Keynesian attempts to pull it out of by having the government spend trillions of dollars for make work, dig-a-hole-and-fill-it-back-in jobs have proven to be a failure by the fact that we're STILL facing over 9% unemployment and the US credit rating was downgraded thanks to said "economic policy" of massive debt spending. You can thank your lost job on the fact that our economy is still sluggish and you can thank socialism, not capitalism for that.

f) Unions are a major cause for over-seas outsourcing. We need unions "back" as much as we need a hole in the head. You can look at the state of Wisconsin and see some major examples in: Kohler Co., Harley Davidson, Mercury Marine, Thomas Industries, and more of how these companies are being driving into the ground by private unions.

The same state can be looked up on by how public unions have driven the economics of the state into the ground. Over $3 billion dollar deficit has been turned into a surplus because of the limiting of public unions power. As proof positive of Unions anti-jobs agenda, look at Milwaukee public schools. Refusing to save hundreds of teachers jobs by agreeing to pay a little more in benefits. Teachers who are easily making $50-100K+ a year plus good benefits (ie. not even close to poor) continue to claim their poor and refuse to save the jobs but continue to tough "share the wealth" slogans as only hypocrites can do.

 

No, we don't need unions back. We need government back. Back in the hands of the people. Back in the hands of businessmen, teachers, accountants, creative designers, etc. Not lawyers, lawyers, and lawyers. Not in the hands of multi-millionaires who have no understanding of the real world.

Maybe then we can get tax reform. A simplified tax code so everyone knows exactly how much tax to and no tax deductions that cause the "this company paid no taxes" headlines.

Maybe then we can get tort reform for healthcare to start dropping the cost of healthcare and end this sickening and stupid discussion of who should pay for it that does nothing to solve the real problem.

Maybe then we can get term limits on congress so career politics will be no more. No more motivation for re-election. Decisions can be made on merit, not party policy. A party system that shovels out re-election money to make people vote in their favour, even if it's against the best interest of the country.

And much much more, but there's too many topics and not enough time.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Voyager529]

...And according to the Democrats, all of our problems are the Republicans' fault.

Ultimately, the problem is career politicians. No one in D.C. is willing to forego a re-election in order to make unpopular decisions that are ultimately for the good of the country.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Anonymous Coward]

we need unions back. and we need most of the workers to admit this and force companies to stop stealing OUR hard earned wealth.

I totally agree, we need strong unions for a functioning, for everybody functioning, economy. But, it will not happen in these USA. Our daughter just got laid off, due to illness, unthinkable in other countries. She still holds anti-union views.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[pipelayerification]

As I look around I see tea partiers trying to lower the oppressive tax burden that is stifling business and employment. I see a currency that has been driven into the ground by Liberal Keynsian economic philosophy in action (government stimulus will save the economy, to get money for government stimulus we will take the money from those who make up the economic engine of the country. Then we take 25% of that money for administrative costs of a bloated and corrupt government and send the rest to out favorite causes, political boondoggles, and contributors and call it "shovel ready projects". Presto, we made 25% disappear completely and the rest went to people we really care about like the SEIU. Huh, wierd. The economy is getting worse. Obviously we didn't take enough money out of the economy to give it back to the economy. That must be because of the evil Republicans trying to get us to quit spending the money we confiscated plus the money we borrowed from China. Oh well, blame the rich people. Oh crap, they where the ones who donated to our election campaigns in 2008. That's strange, they get mad when you blame them and start talking about taking their money away. Then they put it in the bank instead of investing in things that create jobs. Must be those evil tea partiers talking them into it. Guess well have to borrow more money from China. Oh wait, that lowers our credit rating. Stupid bond rating agencies fault now. That's weird because they voted for us too. Oh well, back to basics. Must be Bush's fault. Even though the president can't spend a dime without a spending bill that originates in the house which Democrats controlled from 2007 on. That really weird. The economy started tanking right after Dems took control of the nations spending. I give up. This just isn't working like we planned)

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Anonymous Coward]

I bet if you do a survey of the occupations of members of Congress throughout history that Government was always in the hands of the lawyers.

Also, Union representation has been dropping, so while Unions remain, their effectiveness has been limited. And the problem with the stimulus was that it was too small, it's like throwing a bucket of water on a large fire. So the fire didn't go out...does that mean you should stop and not get another bucket?

Don't even get me started on how misinformed you are about the public schools in Wisconsin, or the industry there, which has done its best to take advantage of having Herr Walker in command. He's given away billions in Wisconsin's assets for what? It'll be worse than you think.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Anonymous Coward]

Management wants workers on landlines to pay part of the healthcare costs. The workers say "you're making money hand over fist, we've been postponing or giving up cost-of-living increases, cutting staff to the bone so we're overworked, and now you want to take away one of the remaining *good* job benefits" And they couldn't settle it in contract talks, so the contract has expired.

Frankly, Verizon could simply replace every manager who's every tried to plan the "big picture" with a coin to flip for the same decision making and come out so far ahead they could lower rates *and* protect their union worker's health care.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[atriusofbricia]

How dare they let their petty concerns over whether they get a pittance or a laughable pittance from Verizon's bloated coffers interfere with my right to vapid chatter?

I thought about feeling bad for poor little union people getting screwed over by the big bad company until I got to this line in the article:

"The company said union employees contribute nothing to their health care premiums."

At that point my thoughts switched from "maybe there's a good reason for them striking?" to "Oh, silly me. Union. Fuck them."

Oh darn, they may have to contribute to their health care premiums? Oh noes!!11!!!

Welcome to the real world.

Admittedly the article is light on other details. That being said, I am a little tired of Union employees acting like they're getting totally screwed over when they're benefits are so high to begin with.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[LibRT]

Unions are on their deathbed for a damn good reason: they don't benefit companies, and they don't benefit union members. The only party they benefit are union administrators. What they ultimately are, and what their single purpose is, is (what should be an illegal) restraint of the free trade of labor.

Does someone have a gun to your head forcing you to work at these places you're complaining about? If you don't like it, find another job or start your own company. If you lack the marketable skills to do either of those, suck it up or go work for the government, the only part of the economy which retains a significant union workforce (US: 36.8% vs 7.6% in the private sector, with predictable results).

Also, I don't understand how "'big wireless' is being greedy and forcing workers to settle for less and less over time" - don't union members agree to settlement offers?

Grow a pair and learn to compete!

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[LibRT]

If I had mod points today, you'd get them all - very well put!

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Lehk228]

Labor is not portrayed fairly in the media because a large group of manufacturers got together and agreed to pull ads from newspapers which cover unions positively

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[decora]

"unions never left"

"no, we dont need unions back" ...

uhmmmmm ok ...

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Anonymous Coward]

Citation needed.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Lehk228]

Does someone have a gun to your head forcing you to work at these places you're complaining about? If you don't like it, find another job or start your own company

figuratively yes, people need their jobs far more than employers need an individual worker


I would go along with your idea to ban organized labor as long as we ban organized capital (corporations) as well. Corporations are an abomination against nature, a legal entity which exists on paper but for which nobody is responsible.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[btalbot]

Since when does capitalism include legal tender, heavily regulated media, medicine, food, healthcare, communications, taxes, housing, and [insert industry here]?

The U.S. is not a capitalist nation.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Mr. Slippery]

why isn't this reported?

Because, contrary to popular mythology, the media lean to the right. (It's only gotten worse since 1998.)

Like educated, urban populations in general, journalists tend to be socially liberal -- socially conservative positions are almost always the product of poor education, or of parochial views resulting from a narrow experience of the world. But on economic issues, the media leans right.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Anonymous Coward]

you can bet they have a good reason

Simple. They want more money for doing the same job in an economy where more drones are happy to have regular income. If they don't like their package, they care quit and work elsewhere, or just quit and fuck off.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[jo_ham]

"oppressive tax burden" - I stopped reading right there.

Don't let facts get in the way of your tea bagger talking points.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Anonymous Coward]

This isn't a Keynsian problem. The debt problem is missiles and Geitner's QE2 fiasco, make the rich richer and the poor glad they aren't those poors over there.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Anonymous Coward]

If you don't like it, find another job or start your own company.

Yo, I just started a new communications company to compete with Verizon. I call it Can2Can or C2C. I only have one subscriber, but my rates are low and building my infrastructure requires only recyclable materials. Namely: twine and tin cans.

Care to sign up?

Seriously though. You must be a wealthy shill. Suggesting us lowly serfs compete with you Lords, as you rightfully know, would be a futile endeavor.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Anonymous Coward]

The problem with then vs now is that stuff DOES NOT NEED to be made within the US anymore, and because of that, people with a moderate intelligence are going to other jobs rather than working on the assembly line. Strikers in the 1900's had the benefit that the ports and ships were smaller and more expensive, the roads were crap, very few people had education, and communications took months. Now, we have huge ships, good roads, relatively educated people and instant communication. What do you think is going to happen? You're not only fighting other employees in the US, but automation and people from lower cost countries. By definition the middle class is still here (and shrinking), but the definition of what it takes to be in that class is changing. Change is happening, and the average American worker will be making less for doing the same or more jobs.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Opportunist]

Yes, people are pressured into having a job because there are bills to pay. So, figuratively speaking, a gun is pointing at their head, with the more or less direct threat to suck it up or be spat out.

The employment market favors the employer. For everyone working at a job, 10 are waiting for him to get fired. Do you think it is a good idea to let corporations dictate salaries? If so, we'll end up where we were at the beginning of the industrial revolution. People will work 16 hours and more for an income that barely allows them to survive. But why not go one step further, have employers pay people in their own currency, only valid in the company stores. Again, don't like it? Get lost, I find someone who does!

Healthcare? What for, the moment you get sick I fire you and hire someone healthy. You might come back when you've recovered, maybe we'll have a job for you by then again. Retirement? What do I care how you survive when you're old, care to tell me that? You're not going to produce for me by then, so why should I be responsible for it? Vacation? What do you want vacation for? And what would you wanna do in your vacation, you won't have the money to go anywhere, already forgotten that I pay you with company money that's worth jack shit anywhere but here?

I'd have so many great ideas to borrow from the good ol' days...

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[LibRT]

"people need their jobs far more than employers need an individual worker"

I disagree with this statement, and all you need to look at to prove it isn't correct is the fact that the overwhelming majority of jobs pay more than minimum wage. This means that companies willingly pay more than they are legally obligated to in order to obtain their labor force. They also willingly provide additional vacation time beyond that legally mandated and health and dental benefits and a variety of other perks. They don't have to do any of this, legally. They have to do these things because they need employees more than the employees need them. If that wasn't the case, all companies would pay minimum wage and be turning away scores of applicants. Does this mean companies are altruistic? Certainly not! It simply means that competitive market pressures create more favourable results than any law will (or, for that matter, any union will).

As to your point about banning corporations as a legal entity, I tend to agree with you. The only real point of a "corporation", and the reason they were created, was to absolve owners (ie shareholders) of legal responsibility for the actions of the corporation, thus allowing widespread share ownership among people who do not have an active interest in managing the corporation or otherwise being held accountable, and in the process opening up an ocean of capital to companies.

Note, however, that the legal fiction of "corporations" is not the flip-side of unions: the opposite of a union would be if it was legal for competiting companies to collude with each other to fix the wages they will pay to employees, something which is already (rightfully) illegal.

In all cases, unions act for the benefit of the few to the detriment of the many.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Anonymous Coward]

Here are questions that need to be answered before we pick a trajectory and dismantle everything:

1) Is a strong currency even desirable? China has a very weak currency compared to the dollar, for instance.

2) What does borrowing money mean when it is payed back over enormous time scales, given inflation and fluctuating exchange rates? Hint: China isn't lending us money as a favor, they are doing it to manipulate the exchange rate between their currency and ours.

3) What is government for? What would you like it to do? I see a growing number of people who want to completely dismantle government and put as much money as they can into their pocket. Well, do you like paved roads? Do you like "free" education? These are things that you either pay for in taxes or you pay directly from your wallet.

4) Why is gun ownership such a desirable thing? If you honestly believe you require a weapon on you for personal protection, it means that we are risking societal collapse as two strangers have to worry about the other one attacking them. Not only that, but that no one will come to help them. This is an admission that there is a failure at the local government level (police), that these people exist at all (failure of education and prison system).

5) Why is it important that the US maintain a military large enough to handle two gulf war type wars on two different coasts, at the same time. Are we anticipating world war 3? The terrorists don't even have an air force, let alone a navy.

6) As a species, what is our goal. If the goal is simply to produce more crap next year than last and make sure everyone has twice as many TVs and SUVs, well then, maybe we aren't much brighter than any other primate.

I've always wondered if this is what monarchs worried about, when democracies were being formed. You essentially have peasants, poorly educated, superstitious and generally ignorant, now making decisions about the direction of the state, decisions once made by kings.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Anonymous Coward]

I've been a fan of unions, recently. I see a lot of parallels between the days of woody guthrie and today. big companies are owning your ass and getting you to settle for less and less, all the while getting richer and richer. study history, its a 100% repeat of the early part of the 1900's in the US. listen to the pro-union and pro-labor songs (folk songs) and imagine them being sung today. they fit like a glove.

we need unions back.

What a complete steaming pile. Union's huh? Yeah we need companies like Verizon to follow in the footsteps of freaking too-big-to-fail GM, with their overpaid job banking UAW bullshit.

Here's a clue, why don't these government job wannabes get off their ass and realize that pulling cable and crimping coax doesn't take a rocket scientist, and blue collar jobs have (shock and horror) blue collar benefits.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Anonymous Coward]

Unions is supposed to represent the few members of it, that is their job, and doing otherwise would be as criminal as a lawyer not representing their clients properly, or an elected politician not representing the interests of their district.

Unions are not supposed to be impartial, that's the wrong way to do things.

And you're mistaken about jobs, there is a threshold where things do get to low, but that doesn't mean there is no pressure, just that is swings both ways.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[LibRT]

"For everyone working at a job, 10 are waiting for him to get fired."

Which country do you live in that has a 90.9% unemployment rate?!? And how, exactly, do "corporations dictate salaries"? Are you not voluntarily employed?

I certainly see the appeal of the world view which posits that you have no control over your life and the world is a terrible place and woe is me and everyone is against me and I cannot compete and therefore need to be subsidized, but seriously: give your head a shake - it is impossible for corporations to dictate salaries. If it were possible, why would any salary be > $0? Why would a company offer you a higher salary to join them? The alternate reality (employers pay employees in company currency, blah blah blah) you posit cannot exist, and doesn't exist not because of laws or unions but because of market operations.

As for healthcare and retirement and all the other things you expect an employer to give you and think by some divine right you "deserve", how about providing for yourself, rather than expecting to be provided for and swaddled, cradle to grave?

Every time you pick a product because it is less expensive than a competing product, you are undermining your fundamental argument, because you get to vote on what your priorities are each and every time you buy something. If you want your philosophy to be logically consistent, always buy the most expensive item, such that there's more money available for the proletariat. Never buy a cheaper, better product made in a foreign country, etc. Because the fundamental (rather basic) economic point you are missing is that profit margins are not infinite - they are instead subject to competitive pressures. What this means, practically speaking, is that a company can no more pay their employees infinite wages as they can price their wares infinitely high. And any expense of a company is passed along to the customers, full stop, also because there are not infinite margins (notable exception: government). It makes me think of similarly ill-informed people who call for high corporate tax rates, without realizing that what they are actually calling for is higher prices - those same people tend (like virtually all people) to find the lowest price possible.

Profit margins reach an equilibrium point whereby investors are willing to invest and customers are willing to buy and people are willing to work. They don't just magically appear because your utopia demands them.There's constant pressure on profit margins (a good thing!), and consumers, not corporations or employees, are really driving the bus by sending signals to companies via their purchasing decisions.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[LibRT]

I'm sorry you have such a low opinion of your ability to compete (which is not to say I can determine if it's misplaced or not). But asking others to pay your way because you won't is about as far removed from "fair" as it gets.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[xaxa]

the article is 'surprisingly' short on details about WHY the workers are on strike.

It's a British newspaper (and not a good quality one). I think "Talks in Philadelphia and New York stalled after Verizon demanded more than 100 concessions from workers regarding health care, pensions and work rules, said the Communications Workers of America" sums it up for me, though I'd expect more detail if it was happening here in the UK.

It's odd to have the Daily Mail as the source for some very American news though.

how much worse does it have to get?

I don't know. The anti-union posts on here are really strange to me. (and this one).

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Anonymous Coward]

The U.S. is not a capitalist nation.

Right, we're a former representative democratic republic, and currently a democracy (aka, tyranny of the majority).

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[NoOneInParticular]

Please explain to me why the "job creators" would like to invest in an economy that is in the shitters. If I were to sit on a few million bucks, I would wait it out. Most people are like me.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[cowboy76Spain]

Here are the details: The company was paying the healthcare and now they want to cut it out from salaries.

For example, you get contracted with an offer that says that you will be paid X in cash and another Y in health care insurance (paid directly by the company).

Now the company says that you have to accept receiving X-Y because "you are not contributing to your health care premium" (thats false, you were earning it before even if it didn't go through your paycheck).

Typical example of corporate newspeak.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Kyusaku Natsume]

I understand the sentiment against unions here but the reality is that they are the only chance for workers to negotiate in equal footing with company owners. Corruption inside unions, like corruption in corporations and governments come from a lack of accountability. Make the union leaders to follow the same rules of the elected public officers and make sure that all elections and votes are done by free and secret ballot and you get a union that will take the same care of the company as the shareholders if not better, since the shareholders have a slice of their wealth invested in the company, but for the workers is their means of life.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[sydbarrett74]

You essentially have peasants, poorly educated, superstitious and generally ignorant, now making decisions about the direction of the state, decisions once made by kings.

Don't forget that history is littered with many ignorant, poorly educated, superstitious rulers whose only qualification was being lucky enough to be born into a certain family.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Savantissimo]

There is no difference. Both are owned by their corporate masters. Clinton was the best Republican president ever. Eisenhower was the best Democratic president ever. (And the last real one - don't say he didn't warn you.) If you want your country back, you're going to have to kill some plutocrats.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Savantissimo]

Christ, what an asshole.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[PCM2]

If I were to sit on a few million bucks, I would wait it out. Most people are like me.

Most people who have no money think like you, maybe. People who do have money know better than to "sit on it" until inflation wastes it away to nothing. And how do you want a multimillionaire to "sit on" his money, anyway? Stick it under the mattress? Even if you just put it in a no-interest checking account, the bank still invests your money -- you just don't see any of the proceeds. Why let someone else take their cut when you get nothing? If you have real money, you have pretty much no option but to invest it in something. The trick is diversification -- investing it in enough different things that the threat of losing value in one investment doesn't impact your overall portfolio in a significant way.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[PCM2]

Since when does capitalism include legal tender, heavily regulated media, medicine, food, healthcare, communications, taxes, housing, and [insert industry here]?

I'll bite. Since when does it not? Capitalism is not synonymous with "unregulated markets."

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Savantissimo]

If you object to collective bargaining by workers, then presumably you object to collective bargaining by capital - that is, the management representatives of banks fraudulently lending out 20x the money they ultimately got either from workers or their private, government-backed cartel, the Federal Reserve. Collective, Soviet-style capital, totalitarian fiefs backstopped with multi-trillion-dollar bailouts from the supposed people's government because they threatened to fly the economy straight into the ground?

Quit trolling, asswipe. We don't need any filching, scum-licking apologists for the inhuman parasitic corporate welfare class you whore for here.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[atriusofbricia]

Here are the details: The company was paying the healthcare and now they want to cut it out from salaries.

For example, you get contracted with an offer that says that you will be paid X in cash and another Y in health care insurance (paid directly by the company).

Now the company says that you have to accept receiving X-Y because "you are not contributing to your health care premium" (thats false, you were earning it before even if it didn't go through your paycheck).

Typical example of corporate newspeak.

And to that I would still have to say wahhhhhhh. Because they weren't contributing to their health care premium and to say they were simply because the company was paying for it before and now they aren't doesn't really act as some kind of double pay cut or something. The company was paying for it and now they no longer can afford to or don't want to. I stand by my previous "Welcome to the real world" statement.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[happyhamster]

>>Unions are on their deathbed for a damn good reason

You can't more wrong. It took 30 years of concentrated efforts by "business" and corrupt government to weaken the unions. The fact hat it took so long for a well-financed, organized, vicious assault to semi-succeed clearly demonstrates that workers still understand how useful unions are.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Savantissimo]

You are on the side of inhuman collectives, corporations, artificial legal creatures spawned by government for the express purpose of avoiding responsibility. Your talking points are noise. When the citizenry no longer makes enough to buy the crap for which your patrons shipped manufacturing offshore, (i.e. now) then their sales will plummet even as they cut employment. Your masters have cut their own throats.

Your sort aren't really in favor of open markets or competition - as J.P. Morgan said: "competition is a sin." You put out your Chicago-school free-market propaganda, but you don't really want competition, only Fed and government-backed oligarchy. You have never really read Adam Smith, you couldn't distinguish between comparative and absolute advantage in the real world if your quarterly results depended on it. You don't even know Ricardo's "Iron Law of Wages", let alone the rest of Ricardo, or any of the assumptions that the big-name economists that you like to cite (if only when backed into a corner) made. You're a poseur, your opinions are all third-hand, you know nothing, and are worth even less.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Savantissimo]

The employees have always paid 100% of their healthcare and their pensions, and 100% of the corporations' profits. Everything the shareholders and the management have ever taken has been the fruits of the employees' work.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Anonymous Coward]

I think the problems arise when short term cash flow takes precedence over long term cash flow. So when a company's cash flow drops, costs are cut rather than revenue grown. Revenue growth can take time. Cutting labor has an instant effect on cash flow. Not saying it's good or bad, just an observation.

Another problem is that many companies don't plan for rainy days. Profits are instantly given to shareholders. AT&T carries $65 billion in debt but declared a profit of $3.6 billion or $.60/share last quarter.

Many companies have fat. It's too bad when they reduce their workforce they often cut a lot of meat. I don't blame rich people, they are just people after all. I've just never seen how taxing profits less encourages more pre-tax spending within a company.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[LibRT]

Wow. I'd like to respond but it's not at all clear to me what point it is you're trying to make. I'll try, tho...

If by "banks fraudulently lending out 20x the money they ultimately got either from workers or their private, government-backed cartel, the Federal Reserve" you mean "do I oppose the fractional reserve system, whereby banks can, as an example, lend $100 for each $10 in deposits they take in", my answer would be no, I'm not opposed to that. I'm most certainly opposed to bailouts of any sort: if an investor takes a risk and that risk comes to pass, it's the investor's neck which should be on the line, not the taxpayer! Whenever you come across the term "systemic risk", know you're about to get screwed.

As to the balance of your post, I'm about as far removed from supporting welfare of any sort, corporate included. And, for the record, I do not lick scum...

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[LibRT]

Ya, that's why just 7.6% of workers choose to be in a union (and it is, after all, a choice, except when it's a closed shop and the worker has no choice whatsoever except to pay the union tax).

I've twice worked in a union and both times I wished I could opt out (I couldn't - they were closed shops). The contempt they breed for efficiency and the premium they put on time served at the expense of merit could only be viewed favorably by the lazy and indolent. The second time I worked in a union, I quit and started my own business competing directly with them. There were a million efficiencies to be had, simply by not explicitly rewarding laziness. The union shop went out of business pretty damn quickly afterwards...

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[KingAlanI]

I do listen to some of the older songs in that area and heck, you even have Dropkick Murphys making new ones.
However, even if I like the music, I'm not automatically going to agree with the political opinions embodied within.
It can be good for helping to bring the topic to one's attention and for rallying the base, though.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[LibRT]

I'm glad your vitriol is as impotent as your philosophy! It's also amusing to me to read the assumptions you blindly make of me, simply because I disagree with you about something, and resort to name-calling - the red flag of the weak argument.

But relax: when you get to high school, you may have the opportunity to learn more about economics and markets, and I think you'll be surprised.

In the meantime, I hope you get well, sincerely.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[similar_name]

I disagree about several of your points. However, I'm on board with a simplified tax code and term limits. We gotta start somewhere ;)

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Anonymous Coward]

Essentially all they are doing is quitting until their demands are met. As far as I know, Verizon can hire replacements.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Savantissimo]

"'do I oppose the fractional reserve system, whereby banks can, as an example, lend $100 for each $10 in deposits they take in', my answer would be no, I'm not opposed to that."
Then you are in favor of allowing fraud for privileged cronies of the money cartel. (Fractional reserves could make sense if 10-year deposits were matched by a proportional amount of 10-year loans, but that's not what happens. All deposits, including demand deposits go into a sweep account. Which used to matter before the Fed started giving out free money and the banks started charging interest on deposits while refuing to loan money for any constructive purpose.)

"I'm most certainly opposed to bailouts of any sort"
Then you are opposed to the existence of most of the major banks and financial firms. They would have gone out of business without the bailouts. You are opposed to allowing the Fed to set rates, to giving its favored members unlimited access to loans at near-zero interest. Thus you are opposed to allowing the present shareholders of those firms to keep their entirely bailout-derived wealth , and all the secondary beneficiaries to keep that portion of their holdings that is due to the bailouts. Right? No, you are lying. You will undoubtedly claim that whoever holds wealth is presumptively entitled to it. You think that the Brit aristocrats are entitled to the land they seized via the enclosure acts, that the American farmers hold land according to the deeds in the county offices, (despite what any Indian treaties might say), that the Israeli land titles are good (despite whatever the Ottoman records say), that the banks' titles are good (despite the securitization, fraudulent selling of the same mortgage multiple times, lack of registration of titles, evasion of legal requirements, mass forgery of documents etc. etc.). No, all the wealth coming from that is due to pluck and initiative, just like all the wealth from hedge funds taxed at 15% ( half of the effective tax rate of a secretary), just like all the other wealth due to "investment" of other people's money on a "heads I win, tails you lose" basis.

"I'm about as far removed from supporting welfare of any sort, corporate included." No doubt excepting the entire "defense" budget. And the wonderful profits that the oil companies got from keeping the Iraqi oil off the market. And all the corporate "intellectual property" due to public funding of research, given away free. And the student loans, not dischargable in bankruptcy, yet guaranteed by the government that have so enriched the banks. And the insurance company giveaways too numerous to recount.

No, you're going to be against honoring the obligations of Social Security and Medicare, insurance programs that ordinary people paid for, that have always run yearly surpluses, that the rich did not pay for (at least on SS over present-equivalent earnings over ~100K - a regressive tax), which were looted to pay for corporate welfare to war profiteers. Got it. Contracts are sacred, except for those with poor and middle-class people forced at the barrel of a gun to buy insurance. Only those who take government money to ship the economy to China are really independent businessmen worthy of our respect and exemptions from all taxes (well, also those who offer private prisons at public expense, literally enslaving prisoners whose "crimes" were created by endless lobbying by the prison owners, they deserve not only the prisoners' labor for free to sell as they wish in competition with the taxpaying workers (not yet officially claimed as serfs), but the prison owners also deserve a subsidy, and lots of tax breaks, and immunity from lawsuits. Well no act of Congress will make those prison owners immune to the massive trauma they deserve, and will in time receive. And the same is true of those who, like you, are shills for this violent expropriation.)

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[atriusofbricia]

The employees have always paid 100% of their healthcare and their pensions, and 100% of the corporations' profits. Everything the shareholders and the management have ever taken has been the fruits of the employees' work.

How very socialist of you. I'm sure the company has done absolutely nothing in that regard and does nothing but suck away the valuable and noble labor of those poor poor Union members.

As to your implication that what the company is doing is morally wrong, on what basis do you have such a belief?

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[LibRT]

I'd love to reply in detail, but I can't at the moment. Suffice it to say, you continue to make assumptions about my beliefs and positions without me having ever given you reason for such beliefs.

Briefly:

I'm opposed to the existence of the Fed full stop. It is an impediment to a free currency market, has demonstrably undermined the validity of the US fiat currency, etc.;

Yes, I believe that all the banks and other businesses that should have failed ought to have failed. I'm not in favor of any bailouts, as I said before. The sooner the economy hits rock bottom, the sooner it will start to correct, only so-called "stimuluses" and bailouts have been delaying that day of much needed reckoning. I don't see where I've come out in favor of oil companies or aristocrats, or anything else you're on about in this paragraph. What the Fed is doing, in attempting to keep interest rates down to spur speculation such that the bubble can continue is, in my always humble opinion, criminal;

No, I'm opposed to the "defense" budget (that's in quotation marks because it seems to me the budget has served the purposes of "offense" for the past few decades) almost in its entirety. The US was never intended to have a standing army and its military mis-adventures would be laughable were so many lives not lost (on both sides). In fact, I agree with pretty much everything you say in this paragraph;

Again, your last paragraph puts a lot of words in my mouth which were put there by you, not me. Social Security is not likely to last much longer whether I like it or not. I think you're perhaps missing the fact that people do not pay into Social Security for their own use, like a deposit account, but that rather the current workers pay for the current retirees' benefits, like a massive ponzi scheme. Consider this: when Social Security was set up, there were about 30 workers paying for every 1 retiree's benefits. Currently that ratio is about 3 to 1. It's on the verge of becoming 2 to 1. Where I'll agree with you is that the people who participated in the system in good faith appear to consistently be the ones who lose out. That's the same with public sector unions, which are facing in excess of $1 trillion in unfunded pension obligations: the workers didn't create the situation - the politicians in bed with the union administrators did.

Anyway, gotta run. I don't think we're that far apart philosophically, if you'd bother to read my posts rather than make assumptions about my positions on these issues.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[LibRT]

PS: to your first paragraph: if you give away for free money which you print, but then leave the interest rate at essentially zero, there's very little motivation for banks to lend. They're better of hoarding the free money until interest rates go up, and only then lending. This is what appears to be happening. If you want to get all the money off the sidelines, you need to increase the interest rate, and give the hoarders a reason to put the money into play...

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Anonymous Coward]

You are a fucking faggot.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[sonicmerlin]

Uh... socially conservative positions are the norm throughout the east.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Anonymous Coward]

I have nothing against Norway, I wouldn't mind living there, but you get to coast behind some of the other european countries in terms of military, economics and manufacturing. Especially Germany, France and England doing most of the heavy lifting.

I'm not criticizing, just saying.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Anonymous Coward]

You might be the biggest fucking moron I've have the displeasure of reading today.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Anonymous Coward]

It's not that union member benefits are so high to begin with -- it's that worker benefits are so pathetically low anywhere there isn't a union. Paying a livable wage (i.e. one where your health coverage is enough that you don't lose your shirt if you ever get seriously ill) cuts into bonuses for the CEO!

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Mr. Slippery]

As I look around I see tea partiers trying to lower the oppressive tax burden...

What oppressive tax burden? Taxes are at historical lows and are lower than comparable developed nations.

The rest of your claims are similarly disconnected from reality. Economic experts agree that the problem with the economic stimulus was that it was too tiny, thanks to right-wing opposition. The majority of U.S. debt is owned by U.S. citizens, not by China; and China holds only a little bit more than Japan. No "shovel-ready" projects involved the SEIU, since SEIU is a service industry union, not a construction industry one. Etc., etc.

If you choose to remain ignorant of basic political facts, please choose also to remain silent in the political discourse. Thanks.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[RoFLKOPTr]

You make some interesting points, although I disagree and would like to point out the flaws with each one using the quote-and-respond method that I absolutely despise:

(And to you over-zealous folk with mod points that like to stifle opinions that oppose yours: Please at least read what I have to say after you reflex-mod me Troll.)

1) Is a strong currency even desirable? China has a very weak currency compared to the dollar, for instance.

Currency is traded on an open market, and the value of a currency can only be described in relation to another currency. A strong currency means a strong economy, and vice versa. If you don't think a strong economy is desirable, then that's fine. But if we are to be the successful, powerful nation at the top of the food chain that we have historically been over the last couple centuries, then a strong economy is absolutely necessary.

China has a very weak currency because they have a very weak economy. They're a communist nation and nearly every large project carried out in or by their country is funded by money that does not exist. China carries out large construction projects to artificially increase their GDP by printing more money to acquire materials and pay workers. Most of the real money China has is in the hands of the people who manufacture goods for the United States. That's why China has a huge GDP but a weak currency. Their bubble will soon burst.

3) What is government for? What would you like it to do? I see a growing number of people who want to completely dismantle government and put as much money as they can into their pocket. Well, do you like paved roads? Do you like "free" education? These are things that you either pay for in taxes or you pay directly from your wallet.

Government is for providing public infrastructure to facilitate my ability to lead a successful life of my own. That means transportation, law enforcement, education, defense, and science, among a few other things. Social programs are necessary to an extent, but not the handouts that are so prevalent today. What the Neo-Conservatives and Tea Partiers say they want and what the super Liberals say they want are two completely opposite things and neither will result in a successful economy. A good government is one that involves itself where government is necessary and stays out of things where it isn't.

4) Why is gun ownership such a desirable thing? If you honestly believe you require a weapon on you for personal protection, it means that we are risking societal collapse as two strangers have to worry about the other one attacking them. Not only that, but that no one will come to help them. This is an admission that there is a failure at the local government level (police), that these people exist at all (failure of education and prison system).

Why is it such an undesirable thing? What if I just want to have a gun? Why is that such a problem for you? Why can't you just leave me alone and stop poking your nose into my business?

But that's not the point. There is a failure at the local government level. There is a failure of the education system. There is a failure of the prison system. But that's not the point either. None of those things, no matter how successful, will protect you in the event that a madman enters your house and the only option you have is to kill him yourself... no matter how fast and skilled your police department is, they will never be able to teleport into your house and stop a raving lunatic on a moment's notice. Nor will they stop a mugger. Nor will they stop anybody who wishes harm upon you in any fashion.

But that's not the point either. Gun ownership is important to protect yourself against the government. Guns are feared for a very good reason: They're deadly. They are a tool designed for killing. When guns are in the hands of citizens, the citizens are feared by the government. Call me paranoid, but that is

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Whatsmynickname]

Oh, did I forget to mention, yes I did. Norway is the third largest oil exporter in the world. Sure must help your "communist" society when you get a shitload of cash flowing into your country compared to its size.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Opportunist]

The system I described cannot exist? It did exist! And it's not like a few companies tried to continue the rather beneficial system even after it had been outlawed in most sensible countries.

Companies could easily try to press wages lower and lower as long as they find someone willing to work for this wage. And facing the choice of having no money or at least a little, you'll quickly find someone who opts for the second option. There is a reason why people work 2 or even more jobs today, and it's not because they have to save up for their second Ferrari.

Providing healthcare and retirement for myself is a nice idea. If it was possible in the system you suggest. When you put people into a position where they have bills to pay and mortgages to pay off, where they literally have to get any kind of job to just make ends meet now, they are hardly in the position to haggle for a wage that allows them to prepare for retirement or put some money away for medical bills. Because there will invariably be someone who is already in SO dire straits that he will accept a wage that allows him to survive NOW, at least as long as he is healthy, and he'll hope that he will stay healthy.

Don't believe me? Look around you. How many companies offer any kind of health benefits for minimum wage employees? You think the employees can afford a health insurance for 5 bucks an hour? That's about 800 bucks a month. Gross, no net. I'd be surprised if that's enough to pay your bills, let alone prepare for worse times.

And yes, of course I will pick the product that suits my needs best. That might well be the cheapest one. Why? Because I'm the same kind of selfish bastard everyone is. Duh. Of course I have no personal interest in the well being of the "working class". A country, on the other hand, should. And yes, I'm aware that this essentially means that products will become more expensive for me. That's a given. But I guess I slowly start to understand why we're in the mess we're in today, because it's logical that every individual tries to get the most beneficial situation without any consideration for the rest of the population. It's insane if the government supports this interest, though. It's like playing prisoner's dilemma with jackasses.

High corporate taxes is bullshit, I guess we can agree on that. High corporate taxes, as you correctly identified, only leads to higher cost of production and higher prices without a similar raise in the purchasing power of the demand side. And we need both, cheap products and high wages. Though, the latter kinda contradicts the former, since, well, who would pay the wages if not the companies who make the products?

What I'd tax instead is capital revenue. Yes, exactly what we almost exempted by now should be taxed: Money gained without work. If you're afraid that it could make investing uninteresting, don't worry. Investing IS already about as unattractive as it could possible become. We also don't need more products produced that we can't sell, what we need is more money on the demand side.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[phantomfive]

Corporations are an abomination against nature, a legal entity which exists on paper but for which nobody is responsible.

If you really believe this, start a corporation and commit tax fraud in the name of your corporation. See who ends up in jail/with a big tax bill.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[phantomfive]

you know why. the real truth is not what media co's want coming out. its actually too unsettling to report this level of truth in the world.

Are you serious? You actually believe this? Your braindead conspiratoriality is ridiculous.

capitalism - in its current state - is a failure. look all around you.

I sincerely hope you aren't one of those people who says that every recession. Here is the primary economic problem facing the government, and the US economy. It would be a problem whether we had the hardest capitalism, or if we all lived on our farms in communes. You really don't have to get conspiratorial for this one.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Anonymous Coward]

Oil money. Not hard work. You cannot take credit for that.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[phantomfive]

Uh, the Norwegian national debt is at 60% of GDP, and gross external debt is TWICE GDP. Oil being the major component of your economy, your economy is much more similar to that of Saudi Arabia or Kuwait than it is to the US, so solutions that work in the US will not necessarily work in Norway, and vice versa.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[antifoidulus]

What the US has now is not capitalism, its corporatism. Capitalism implies that the owners if capital, ie the shareholders, actually own the company and have a say in how its run. Thats how things work in real capitalist countries like Japan, Germany, France, Sweden, Canada etc. Thats how things used to work in the US too until Bush Jr. came to power and in a few short years totally dismantled any semblance of shareholder rights. I am so glad that in 2007 when the SEC announced that basically the CEOs no longer had to answer to the shareholders at all, that I sold all my US stocks and bought stocks abroad in more capitalist countries such as France. Since then CEO pay has been outpacing the S&P 500 by about a 2:1 pace. The CEO and boards of companies that have existed for over a 100 years have basically been told they can destroy the company for their own personal gain with 0 repercussions. Trust me, the employees are not the only ones getting fucked over by the corporatist culture and the neo-cons who enable them. Republicanism is the biggest economic drag on the US bar none.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[cowboy76Spain]

And to that I would still have to say wahhhhhhh.

How can someone argue with that? Obviously you are right.

The company can afford that (they got increased profits), so it is just that they do not want. Maybe you like it when you get a deal and later the other side wants to change it in its own favour, only because they are more powerful than you. Perhaps you would not fight back at that, and you would just meekly say "Yes sir, thanks for not abusing me more (by the moment)". I mean, for many people, it looks like what the real world is for them.

That does not change the fact that now you know why this fight is about. Unfortunately, it seems some people want to stay misinformed so they just can "opine" out of his prejudices. Sorry for spoiling that for you.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[MightyYar]

Unions aren't the answer until they find some way to better represent their constituents.

The teaching union in New Jersey could have accepted a pay freeze and saved their lowest-seniority workers, but instead they stuck to their contract and it forced the layoffs of many of the newer teachers. Not all unions do this - the neighboring union in PA is not taking the same stand, probably because they saw the backlash in NJ.

Unions in general are hell-bent on saving the jobs of their absolute worst workers. Save the weakest in the herd and it weakens the whole herd. You want to protect your members from personal vendettas and frivolous firing - but you also need to recognize that every person is not a keeper... you need a way to weed the garden. The unions would gain a lot of respect if the lower ranks weren't riddled with loafing incompetents.

I'm not fervently anti-union, but I have some close friends who were threatened by union goons for daring to make a living without their blessing, and this unfortunately seems very common. I have a lot of trouble respecting an institution that uses bullying and fear. I'm sure there are bad companies that employ similar tactics, and I'd be similarly hard on them. I think the way unions work needs to be reformed. I think historically unions have been very important, and even today they can protect workers against things like seasonal plant shutdowns and such. I just think their relevance has been reduced by their own actions more than the efforts of their enemies. Greed and corruption, stupidity and failed policies are just as common in union leadership as they are in corporate leadership - but at least in corporate leadership they don't pretend to be acting in anyone's best interest except the stockholders.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[intheshelter]

Holy smokes! This post is the jewel of the site. Not being sarcastic, but you hit on the core of the problem. A politician's main goal is not to serve his/her country or fix problems, it is to get re-elected so they don't' have to get a real job. And you can't do that by making the tough decisions that will be good for the country in the long run, but will upset constituents by giving them some short term pain. There is absolutely no hope for this country that I can see. We have become a third rate country, we just don't know it yet.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[intheshelter]

STFU teabagger. It's not too hard to see the stupidity of your post, because it smacks of more right wing nonsense. BOTH parties are to blame for government spending and incompetence and they should BOTH be fired.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Anonymous Coward]

And, this year, we've got two officers on the board that came directly from a wireless background: The CIO and new CEO that came in Aug 1st.

Here's a little sample of what we've been given, speaking of having our personal wealth undermined by VZ:

Early June, they announced a forced and uncompensated relocation. If you reported to your office a few miles away, get ready to pack up your things and report to an office 150 to 300 miles away. No relocation provided. With most owing more on their homes than they are worth, either accept your losses, walk or actually spend that 8-12 hours on the road, one way. A friend of mine in the company will have to pay out close to $1000 additional a month in transportation costs.

Telecommuting was also basically shut down, not on merit, but on whim. Many teleworkers have to report into a facility at least three times a week. No equipment needs are addressed, and office space is on a first come, first serve basis.

The above two were shoved down our throats with a deadline to announce if we stay with the company or leave. We had a severance offer given and rescinded twice, as "upper management was gauging employee reactions". At least 3 other specifics were also in flux making agreement (or not) to continue with the company like signing a blank check.

August, we have the news on the strike. Many non-union workers--myself included--get put on this frivolous 72-hour work week: Monday - Saturday, 12 hours a day. Some of our folks were looking forward to the little extra money, as the company used to pay time and a half on this out of courtesy. Yesterday, I understand we will deal with the extra 32 hours of stress without any compensation, what so ever. Some of the teams--full time telecommuters--were even told they have to be in the office for this.

I think it was in 1862 that slavery was outlawed in this country?

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[intheshelter]

Disclaimer: IANA Teabagger

I would submit the experts are wrong. The problem is the economy is broken by rampant overspending, both at a governmental and private level. Make a balanced budget and stick with it. Government stimulus packages aren't working because they don't work. Spending more money on something that doesnt' work isn't going to improve anything. Fire the pricks in Washington.ALL of them. They don't control the economy and they don't create jobs. They are wasting our time on talking points and not getting anything done.

And there are no such things as "political facts". That very term is an oxymoron.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[del_diablo]

Norway has no goverment debt.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[del_diablo]

That only helped us back in the 70s.
As of the current 10-20 last years we have made a simple policy: We are only allowed to spend the rents gained via banking the oil, not actually use the gigantic fund we have made via the oil.
Besides, look at Sweden or Denmark: Roughly same policies and culture, but no oil, and doing a lot better than USA.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[justsayin]

Last I checked you don't share a border with Mexico. Or any country that might have a much worse economy and lots of workers willing to stay in your country illegally and work for peanuts. Isn't it like really cold there like all the time? Norway is like 1,000 miles long and really narrow. So, maybe, just maybe people do not want to come to your country? I mean if I was going that far I would try for Sweden. What's the diversification like over there? Looks pretty homogeneous, population wise. Got racism? I think we are doing pretty good over here. We are a young country but we'll sort out this government thing in another 100 years or so.

Usually dont reply to anonymous Cowards. Just feeling all patriotic this morning. :)

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[justsayin]

Oh, just told my buddy at work about your comments and he had a comment. Being a little older than I am he is looking back to your history. Who was it that bailed your Norwegian ass out of WWII?

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Anonymous Coward]

Norway has oil (North Sea). Of course you're doing well. Remind me how Greece is doing these days?

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Sectoid_Dev]

Unless you fought in WWII, you have no basis to take credit for any ass saving that occurred then.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Anonymous Coward]

I happen to know why they are striking, because I also happen to know a guy who knows a guy who knows a guy... who happens to be working for Verizon corporate to ensure the strikers get nothing.

Essentially they have a lot of people who work in the wired side of things (not wireless) getting paid upwards of 90,000 a year for 'unskilled' (no college education required) work, such as sales and other jobs, all the while wired income is decreasing. Their unions are balking at the proposed decrease in compensation (higher ups realized they were overpaying people in this division), so STRIKE.

I am all for worker's rights and the ability of people to stick it to the man when they have to. I am not for overpaid workers confusing their struggle with real problems and calling it 'worker's rights'.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[operagost]

Excuse me, do you actually have details on their current salaries and benefits? I have this quaint notion of not assuming that union workers are always under compensated (and mind you, I've chosen to never do business with Verizon again).

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[operagost]

To be honest, I never pay Norway much mind and just let them go about their business... except when some vainglorious Norwegian prick decides to pass judgement on a country he really knows little about.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[operagost]

I'm curious... is the free exercise of religion-- that means allowing people to communicate freely about religion in public, and to publicly display items related to their religious opinions-- socially conservative, or socially liberal?

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[operagost]

I commend you on your patience in dealing with an opponent who substitutes ad homs and straw men for rational arguments.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[phantomfive]

Not sure where you are getting your number, this chart says you are wrong.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[operagost]

I'm sorry I ran out of mod points for you.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Anonymous Coward]

Just wait the bankers will eventually get around to your nation next.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[tompaulco]

Please explain to me why the "job creators" would like to invest in an economy that is in the shitters. If I were to sit on a few million bucks, I would wait it out. Most people are like me.
Smart people realize that the best time to invest is when the price is low. The most successful companies are ones that gear up while gearing up is weak and are ready to grow when the market comes back. Companies that sit back and wait for the market to rebound will be years late to market because they gear up when the economy is already rebounding and labor and goods prices are higher.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[LibRT]

Interesting post - thanks for your reply.

What I don't understand is your failure to see the contradiction in your point about companies having the ability to push wages lower and lower, and yet this demonstrably not happening. That's easy to see:

- 75% of employed teenagers make more than the minimum wage;

- in 1979, 13.4% of hourly-paid workers made minimum wage. By 2009 that fell to 4.9% (tho it rose to 6.0% with the econominc downturn);

- 96.2% of workers aged 25 or older make more than the minimum wage.

So where is this power that companies supposedly have to push wages down at will? (source for all of the above is US Department of Labor, Bureau of Labor Statistics, which you can find here http://www.bls.gov/cps/minwage2010tbls.htm).

I guess on reading your post again that the key point is where you say companies could push down wages if they could find people willing to accept lower wages, which is of course true, but also points out why, in practice, they can't: there aren't people willing to accept lower wages, due to the supply and demand for labor. Would every company pay minimum wage or less if they could? Certainly! But of course they can't: they are constrained by the laws of supply and demand. You can see this play out in real time in China, where rising demand for labor is leading to increased wages, in some areas significantly so. What do companies do? Start looking for cheaper labor in places like Vietnam. And what's the net result? All wages rise.

There's nothing fundamentally wrong with truck systems (ie company stores, whereby workers are paid in currency able to be used only to buy the employer's goods) - it's a voluntary arrangement between consenting adults, after all. The problem with running every single economic system through the lens of the Industrial Revolution is to miss the point that the entire Industrial Revolution was a period of massive but temporary change, which ultimately benefited far, far more people than it harmed. Were some people unable to adapt quickly enough, or at all? Yes. But by much of the logic I've seen applied, the anti-change faction (and the government of the US, as it currently stands) would have the taxpayer massively fund the horse and buggy industry in order to protect its workers from being "disrupted" by the introduction of the automobile. All that does is delay the inevitable pain for the workers, and makes their day of reckoning that much worse.The Industrial Revolution, and the horrible conditions many workers found themselves in, was an example of the market finding its new equilibrium, and should not be taken as evidence of what would perpetually happen to a market left alone. Deep, fundamental transitions like this happen, and it takes time for market forces to adapt. That, however, does not mean that an absence of deep regulation (like the deep regulation found in the current state of the economy) results in perpetual and infinite power on the part of employers, to the detriment of the employees. It just cannot sustainably happen in a free market.

Nobody "puts you in a position" whereby you have a mortgage to pay! Surely you voluntarily accepted the mortgage and its terms!

Your point about minimum wage employers not providing health care may be entirely relevant to that small portion of the population which makes minimum wage, but the vast, vast majority of employers pay more than minimum wage (see above), and also provide health care. Hell, 87% of employees without even a high school diploma make more than minimum wage (same source as above)!

What you seem to be suggesting is that the government should somehow engage in price controls to force prices up such that wages should increase. That's been tried before, in all cases with disastrous results for the people, disproportionately so to the poorest people. Any attempt at price controls (including minimum wage) has negative o

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[LibRT]

Wish I had three-quarters of a mod point, because I agree with almost everything you say, but for your final two paragraphs.

The US wasn't intended to have a standing army, and the battles it is currently engaged in are pretty far removed from "defense", unless you think the folks in the middle east can fire camels, Angry Birds-like, to the US shores. In fact, there's a strong correlation between a US presence in a country and an increase in anti-US sentiment (and terrorism) from that same country (sorry, I don't have time to find the link to the article, but if I recall, Ron Paul included reference to it at one point).

Your point about gun ownership is spot-on: the Second Amendment doesn't have anything whatsoever to do with hunting and everything to do with weapons not being the exclusive domain of the government and keeping the government in check.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Opportunist]

Why is it always that everyone is asking for the extremes? There seems to be no middle way, either the government must not have any influence on markets or it has to take over control of it entirely. That there might be a middle way, and that it has been tried and successfully so, seems to be completely impossible to grasp.

The system has been tried, with overwhelming success, after WW2 in Western Germany and Austria. Called Social Market Economy (Soziale Marktwirtschaft). Basically it was market economy with some heavy regulation concerning some areas of the market, especially crucial infrastructure (gas, power, coal, water), combined with some social services provided by the government (healthcare, social services, a pension system based on transfer rather than pension funds, a social "net" to keep people from falling through the cracks) and market regulations to ensure equal chances for every market participant (e.g. very strong anti-trust laws and heavy favoring of small/medium businesses).

Looking at how Germany was doing as long as it stayed on this path, and how Austria is doing since they didn't move too far from it, I'd have to say that it works pretty well. They both recovered almost instantly from the war results and are now some of the strongest economies in the world. Further, in both countries (Germany 'til they had to take the burden of the reunification with East Germany) the local economy and local revenue is quite strong. Germany suffers from the effects of having to take over the failed East German economy, but Austria is still doing quite fine with the system, has a low unemployment rate, a low crime rate and the various unrests and riots happening throughout Europe so far didn't reach those countries as far as I could tell.

Both countries are also favorites for immigrants from other places from Europe, mostly ex-Yugoslavia and Turkey, and not just for the social security, a lot of people from there open small businesses and to some degree are today some of the driving powers behind their economy, mostly due to the mentioned favoring of small businesses (Small businesses are to some degree tax exempt for a while and company taxes favor small businesses heavily, especially if they create jobs). In both countries you also have a lot of small businesses with about 10-15 employees. Maybe an interesting clue why they are doing so well is that a fair lot of the workforce is employed in small/medium businesses rather than huge corporations. Which makes sense IMO. If you have small businesses in your country, you can push them around if you have to, as the government. Try that with multinational corporations, they'll laugh at you, pack up and go. That's something small businesses can't do as easily.

In such an environment, you can of course create strong pro-labour laws since the companies can do little but grin and bear it.

That also means more money in the pockets of the workers and hence more demand. Both economies, Austria's even more so than Germany's, are still pretty strong with a strong demand side and a high turnover of goods and services. A good indicator for the development of an economy is how the service sector is doing. Services can be produced near limitless (no constraint in raw materials, your limiting factor is how much workforce you can employ and hence put to work), so the deciding factor for the question how a service is selling is demand. Services are also the first thing people cut back on when money gets tight (since you can't stop eating or forgo your home, but you can do without haircuts or a restaurant visit), and the service sector in Austria is still doing quite ok, especially compared to other countries where services had to close due to a plummet in demand.

So I'd guess SOMETHING has to run right in this system. I doubt it's perfect, but I certainly think it's superior to a simple "laissez-faire" capitalist system.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[pipelayerification]

What right wing opposition? The Dems decisively controlled both houses and the White House when the stimulus passed. The Republicans couldn't have stopped it. The only real opposition they faced was in their own party and the public. And if you dont think that stimulus funds benefited the SEIU then perhaps you should read a little at their website (which you so helpfully posted) and see what they themselves thought about the stimulus and its benefits to their members. Read before posting about ignorance of political reality.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[pipelayerification]

Very flawed analogy. Stimulus is like taking water out of one end of a lake and dumping it back in the other end and wondering why the level hasn't come up.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[atriusofbricia]

And to that I would still have to say wahhhhhhh.

How can someone argue with that? Obviously you are right.

The company can afford that (they got increased profits), so it is just that they do not want. Maybe you like it when you get a deal and later the other side wants to change it in its own favour, only because they are more powerful than you. Perhaps you would not fight back at that, and you would just meekly say "Yes sir, thanks for not abusing me more (by the moment)". I mean, for many people, it looks like what the real world is for them.

That does not change the fact that now you know why this fight is about. Unfortunately, it seems some people want to stay misinformed so they just can "opine" out of his prejudices. Sorry for spoiling that for you.

I do note that you haven't responded to my point really. In any case, they aren't changing a deal, they are in the process of contract negotiations not trying to just randomly change it. As to the assertion that the employees are being "abused" because they may have to pay for their health care I just don't see it as abuse. Admittedly that is probably because I'm not an overpaid union worker making unreasonable demands. Yes, Verizon as a whole is making more money but the part of the company where these workers they are making less and less money and like fairly typical union workers their response to this is "we don't care, give us more money anyway".

The business is making less money, they are trying to save it and improve it by reducing costs. Is that somehow irrational and evil on their part? Would you prefer them to simply give in to the demands and then go out of business? The only reason union actions didn't contribute to the death of the automakers was the government bailed them out and then handed the ownership in large part to the unions. Not to say that the automakers didn't make some bonehead decisions, but you cannot ignore the impact of decades of unreasonable demands by the unions. It reminds me of the unreasonable and unrealistic demands of other similar political groups.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[LibRT]

Some very interesting comments (and I thank you for your civility - the name calling I've received from those who disagree with my viewpoint, while amusing, was getting rather boring) - wish I had time to respond more fully, because I don't disagree with a lot you've said.

Canada is a pretty good example of how regulations and taxation and the size of government and government debt can go too far, and also shows the path for the US to pull back from the brink:

Canada has been systematically reducing its various tax rates and cutting government services since the mid-90s. The consequences? GDP grew. Tax revenues increased. Unemployment went from 12% to 6%. The dollar went from being worth $0.67 USD to about $1.06 USD (before lowering to about $1.01 USD in the turmoil of the past few days). Government deficits were eliminated (until recent economic downturn) and the country ran surpluses. Government debt as a percentage of GDP went from 70% at its peak in 1995 (about where the US is today) to about 22% (pre-downturn - it's now around 31%).

I'd say there are some lessons there for the US...

I'm not in favor of no regulation: there is a need to regulate where the market won't find equilibrium in a reasonable time frame (ie in a lifetime, or a generation) or where irreversible harm can be done to humans (think pharmaceutical products and the like). Note however that all regulation comes at an expense, and virtually all regulation is a restraint of trade (by definition, I guess) with often negative consequences. For example, there are a lot of industries which systematically restrain the free trade of labor via regulation, such as lawyers. In order to become a lawyer, one must attend (rather expensive) law school and then article and then write the bar exam and be accepted to the bar. It is not permitted to simply challenge the bar exam and then practice. Or, simply practice, and let your customers decide if you're worth supporting. That's nothing but an attempt to restrict the supply of lawyers in order to inflate the price of legal advice. Same things applies in almost any "professional" organization. Do I think engineers who build bridges should face additonal scrutiny? Well, their design should. Should it matter if they've spent money on the approved education and been accepted into the club? Not so much. Same applies to almost all government regulation, with some notable exceptions. Keep in mind that all this hyper-regulation is a relatively new concept, and that those industries and people regulated still make plenty of mistakes (have a chat with any malpractice lawyer to see how regulation of doctors has not put an end to malpractice).

As for social safety nets, I'm all in favor of them, provided they are privately and voluntarily delivered (ie charitable). I'm happy to (and I do) do my bit for my fellow humans without needing a government to put a gun to my head.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Anonymous Coward]

That's right. In my new capitalist utopia, there will be no food or medicine!

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Opportunist]

There is no doubt about lowering taxes have a brief beneficial effect on the economy. At least as long as the demand side had money to begin with. Dropping taxes in the US now would not accomplish much, though, since there is very little money left in the people who would make up the demand side.

Taking a "socialist" society where people actually earn more than they spend (due to a high minimum wage and "free" social services) and then dumping cheap goods on such a society (due to opening the markets and getting rid of any and all fetters of economy, including the "social" parts that allowed people to have money) will certainly result in a boost of demand, no matter whether everything else points downwards. It just is not sustainable. As soon as the savings dry up, we end up in the mess we're in now. The economy crisis of the US is one of a lack of demand due to a lack of money to spend.

I think we might be able to agree that in any market economy, free, social or otherwise, the driving force behind the economy is the meeting of supply and demand. Only if both exist, economy can exist and thrive because only then goods get sold. Producing alone is not going to get us anywhere.

You also need as many demanders as you could possibly have, there are very few goods where a demand monopoly or oligopoly is desirable, and in all markets I could think of where either exists the supply side is very weak and usually only very few suppliers can exist either. We need a demand polypoly, at least for most goods, to have a strong economy.

And this in turn means that we need many people who have the means to buy what is offered. Again, in our economy, supply is not the problem. We have no problem producing more if we could sell it.

We also have a very lopsided balance between employers and employees. Hence I think dropping and and all regulations would mean that wages will be cut to a bare minimum, to the point where workers cannot earn more than is entirely necessary for survival. This in turn would remove them from the demand side for pretty much anything but the bare essential needs, especially in already low paying (read: no/little experience or education requiring) jobs.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Reservoir Penguin]

Some of these ideas ARE good. Why should these workers dictate how to run someone elses business? I says shoot 200-300 to teach them a lesson, then take hostages. But I understand this good solution may not applicable in your country.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Opportunist]

I agree. If in return we may shoot or hang every manager that drove the company he was responsible for into the ground.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Reservoir Penguin]

It's a geek communist fantasy that a company can be run by the workers without managers, in reality geeks when left to their own devices will just produce HURD or Duke Nukem Forever every 15 years.

Less motivated people like blue collar workers would just steal everything and sell the factories for scraps.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Opportunist]

Well, I don't mind putting people at the helm who know how to run the business.

Sadly, we're sorely lacking any. At least if I look around and see how companies are run.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[LibRT]

I'm afraid I don't understand the logic of your first paragraph: you seem to be saying that putting money in people's pockets via a tax break only serves to stimulate demand if those people already have some arbitrary amount of money. Why would that be? In fact, the less money that people have, the more likely they are to immediately spend a tax rebate, rather than save it (of course, whether they save it or spend it, it still goes into the economy, unless they save it under their mattress). It also tends to be more efficient to give money directly to people, rather than spend money on so-called "stimulus" projects, because those projects come with bureaucracies and other inefficiencies. Obama would have made more efficient use of the "stimulus" money simply by throwing it out of a helicopter.

There's nothing fundamentally "socialist" about people saving more then they spend. In 2007 (ie pre-recession), the top net savers were France, Ireland, Germany, Austria and Switzerland (in order - you can find details here: http://econ365.files.wordpress.com/2008/10/gross-savings-rate.pdf). Nor does that seem to insulate a country from economic problems: on a gross basis, Spain and Belgium have had almost identical rates of savings, and yet face very different economic situations today. In fact, you seem to be arguing that people need to save more but also spend more, in order to stimulate demand! You do realize that you cannot simultaneously save and spend the same dollar?

When it comes to supply and demand, the thing I think you are perhaps overlooking is that these apply to everything, not just products (which is what you seem to be arguing). What I mean by that is that investment, labor, savings rates, interest rates (to some extent - they are heavily manipulated by (what should be illegal) central banks), prices, availability of products, etc. are all a function of supply and demand. And besides, shifting a bunch of money from one group of unfavored people to another group of favored people doesn't accomplish anything economically anyway: that's a zero sum game, and as others have pointed out, other than putting money under your mattress, it is impossible to take money "out" of the economy. When people complain about billionaires "hoarding" money, this is a virtually impossible thing for them to do: they invest it and/or spend it, just maybe not in a way some people (or governments - see Obama and his comments about private jets etc) particularly care for. In my world view, you can do whatever the hell you like with your money.

You cannot "dump" products in an economy and somehow "force" people to buy them (altho in other parts of your post you seem to suggest doing just that). It is a confusing post to me: you think people should save more such that they can spend more but then argue that "As soon as the savings dry up, we end up in the mess we're in now."

The fundamental mistake you're making, in my opinion, is thinking that supply and demand need to somehow be "controlled' or "dictated" by a government. That is the surest way to cause a mismatch between the two: it's been tried many, many times to varying degrees - the governments which have tried it the most have had the poorest of results (I should say their people have had the worst outcomes: see Cuba, USSR, China (pre market reforms) and virtually any desperately poor country. Then take a look at countries which have liberalized their economies. Hell, even Cuba is now permitting some small taste of free market business (ie hair dressers and restaurants) because their attempts to interfere in free markets have had such desperately and heartbreakingly poor results on generations of people). Think a guaranteed "minimum wage" or "social safety nets" are the key to a successful economy, and therefore a prosperous and well-fed people? I'm happy to provide you a one-way ticket to Cuba anytime!

To be clear: it is not

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Opportunist]

To explain the first paragraph: Currently, the poor people in the US are in debt. DEEPLY in debt. Handing them money would not likely lead to more spending. It would rather go to paying off that debt instead, not into consumption. It's probably already too late to fix the economy that way. Yes, in a sense that's what I'm saying: Handing people money to spend is only going to work out if they already had enough money to cover their primary expenses. If they didn't have that much, they will not be able to spend that money on anything but what they are already spending on: Getting rid of their debt and covering their primary needs. We're not talking about them saving it, we're talking about them using it to fix their personal economy crisis.

People saving money is not going to fix this economy problem, though. Money saved is put into the supply side of the economy, what we need today is more money on the demand side. Not more production, we need more consumption, more buying power.

Bureaucracy isn't evil per se. Bureaucracy means that some people have to be employed by the government (what else is bureaucracy? It's not that money spent on bureaucracy is burned, it just goes into different pockets), preferably people who didn't have a job before, then do, and hence have money they can spend. We're also not talking about these people being there forever and infinitely, we're talking about fixing this crisis and then return to a more sensible, less regulated market. Less regulated, but not as unregulated as it was 'til now. I guess we have noticed that this doesn't work out either.

20 years ago, we noticed that communism doesn't work. But I guess it's time to realize that the opposite doesn't work out either. Communism lacked the ability to produce sensibly, it seems capitalism lacks the ability to consume sensibly. A mix seems to be the answer, and looking at central Europe and their models which incorporated a "moderate" way of capitalism, and how they are dealing a fair lot better with the crisis than the US or other "pure" capitalist countries, I have to say these models might have something.

Next, no, saving more than spending is not socialist. Actually, it's very anti-socialist (I'll get to that). The examples you cite (since I know those 4 countries very well, having spent pretty much all my life in one or some of them) have little to do with socialist or anti-socialist, though. They show that there people have money to save. Most of those savings are in the hands of the majority of people in those countries, not a small minority. Which allows these countries to deal with the crisis a lot better than others. Why? Because the people in these countries still have savings and hence still have money to spend! Austria, Germany and Switzerland have been named the "world champions of savings accounts" for the longest time, it was pretty much a given that every citizen has one, and usually a well donated one. Also, you might notice that the four countries you mention have pretty strong economies, despite having more or less heavy social services and things like mandatory healthcare, unemployment and pension insurance and so on, in one word, strongly "socialist" leaning politics (save Switzerland, which is a very special case in most respects).

People need not save more. They need to have more savings to start with. Sadly, it's too late for that now, of course, since we cannot change the past. What made these countries more resilient to the economy downturn is simply that the people there had savings to draw from when the crisis hit and hence the demand did not plummet instantly when the revenue and income dried up. Especially Austria is a very good example how this can work out since there even the poorest have some kind of savings for the rainy day that has come now, and that that they can now rely on, keeping the demand up while everywhere else the economy is crashing.

About taking money "out" of the economy: No, you can't take money out of it (save putting it into a safe and keeping it

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[LibRT]

Thanks for the detailed reply.

It seems to me you have too rigid a defnition of "supply" and "demand", as tho they are somehow mutually exclusive. For example, when you posit that savings go to the "supply side of the economy", I don't understand: savings go to loans (at a considerable leverage, it's better than 10 to 1) or other investment. And what do these loans do? They result in purchases, ie the demand you're looking for! Unless someone borrows money simply to put the money under his or her mattress (which would only make sense with negative real interest rates), borrowing is going to lead to spending, and it's going leverage savings. It is all intertwined, my friend. And even if you hand people money and they in turn pay their debts with it, that's going to lead to demand too, because the lender will now have money to re-lend, and will leverage that money too. The way you explain it doesn't make sense to me: you argue that there is too much supply and not enough demand, but by your same logic, increasing supply means hiring more workers which means more money in the pockets of those workers which they in turn can spend and create your demand!

I agree that paying bureaucrats is not the same as burning money. It's worse. What I mean by that is that you are taking money from a free (and rather efficient) market and giving it to a monopoly (the government) which faces no real competitive pressures to spend that money in an efficient manner. On top of that, the money to pay these people is taken, no less, from those people in the free market whom you wish could purchase more in order to stimulate demand! The case you are inadvertently making for tax cuts is getting stronger :) Of course, you could always borrow that money to pay the bureaucrats - that's exactly what the US government has been doing in earnest since about 1970 (but particularly so since 2008). In fact, government employees now make up about 1 in 7 workers in the US and growing.

We haven't really tried the "opposite of communism" in the past 200 years at least. The extremes you use, ie that communism is on the one hand and the heavily regulated market we've had for the past 50 years is on the other and therefore the answer lies in the middle are false choices: it's more a case, in my opinion, that we've seen that complete command economies fail completely, while partial command economies (like the US and most other western countries) fail more slowly, because those free parts of the economy manage to sustain it. To be clear about one thing: a lot of the popular criticisms of capitalism that seem de rigeur these days seem to have their roots in criminal activity and/or lack of transparency: Madoff, Enron, Worldcom, Tyco, Hollinger, et al are not examples of a market operating freely. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are flat out examples of profound interference in the market by government (why the government should have any interest in whether people buy homes, or encourage them to do so, or set up government-backstopped entities to backstop mortgage, or explicitly encourage the backstopping of loans, under the guise of "helping the poor and historically disadvantaged realize the dream of home ownership", to the people least able to make good on those loans, is all beyond my comprehension). None of the meltdown of 2008 could have occured without the government backstopping mortgages via Fannie and Freddie. That's an example of government intervention directly causing economic harm to a great many people. If you're interested, I can elaborate on exactly the mechanisms which made that possible - essentially, the government actively and explicitly took accountability of mortgage performance out of the hands of the people writing those same mortgages. The prospect you don't seem to be considering is that, if total government intervention is extremely bad, and a lot of government intervention is bad (but not quite as bad), then quite possibly far less intervention may lead to bett

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[LibRT]

PS: thanks for the link - interesting article. The author is correct about bailouts: if investors take the risk of investing in a country (or a bank, or GM, or AIG), and those investments go south, the investor should suffer the consequences, not the taxpayer (which the author subsitutes "workers" for). However the author mistakenly equates corruption with "conservative". I'm not a "conservative" or a "republican" or "right-wing" (I'm a libertarian), but the issues he raises are not a function of economic or political point of view; rather they are a function of criminal activity (a newspaper using wiretapping in order to exert political control) or what should be criminal activity (the government bailing out private companies and investors). The "right" works for a small group of people called "bankers" and the left works for a small group of people called "unions". Neither is correct.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[LibRT]

Well, the social conservative would say, "that's fine, provided only my religion gets that freedom!" The social liberal would say, "it isn't fine, because I hate religion!". The libertarian would say, "who gives a fuck, so long as it doesn't interfere with my ability to exercise whatever religion I choose (or anyone else chooses)."

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Opportunist]

Loans for consumption are pretty much out of the question these days, mostly due to Basel II. Also, the problem is that middle man cutting into the efficiency, you're trading the bureaucracy of government for the revenue of banks, essentially leading to similar problems, just worse because bureaucracy leads to government jobs, bank revenue to bonus checks. The biggest problem is, though, that in this time loans are mostly used to cover other loans. A company taking out a loan today, will they invest that money? Seriously, do you think anyone really invests today, expanding his business so he can produce more? What for? What gets produced is already unsellable, and now they should produce more? Instead that loan will go into an attempt to save the business. I.e. into paying other loans or into an attempt to keep the running costs payable, i.e. into keeping the company solvent. That's pretty much the worst kind of purpose for a loan, since it supports no part of the economy, at best it's a self serving purpose.

Borrowing leading to spending only works until the credit rating goes down the drain. Borrowing leading to spending is what had been done by the majority of the lower income people for the last decade or two. That is exactly the problem now, they can't get any more loans. That's btw also one of the reasons why the whole mess got this big in the first place. Banks lend them money which they "waste" on consumption. Which is great for the economy, don't badmouth squandering, that's pretty much what kept our economy afloat those last two decades. Why did banks lend them all the money? Well, first of all because else they could not reach their own requirements because banks have to lend money to generate an income, whether this lending happens as investment in stocks or as loans to private people is, from the bank's point if view, not so important. It should be a safe investment and a profitable one. Problem is, both systems crashed nearly at the same time, actually due to each other.

I see one of the main initial factors in the crash of the housing market. Houses, real estate in general, has often been the collateral for private loans. Now suddenly those houses aren't worth jack anymore. Why, did they suddenly crumble down or did regulations change? No, they were just overvalued. Whether due to speculation (as it was the case in Japan) or other reasons, the houses were estimated at prices they could not fetch, and most likely when the first people had to sell, it became evident that nobody wants or can pay the price these houses were rated at. And suddenly everyone was sitting on WAY overmortgaged houses. Which led banks to pulling every possible string they could to get their loans back, led to people's consumption grinding to a halt and took the rest of the economy down with them.

Your whole argument looks like you're trapped in the ideal supply-side model, unable to think outside that box. Increasing supply does not necessarily mean hiring more workers. Our technology moved past the point where you need more people to create more goods. Due to technology, you can most likely outmatch production increase to employment increase at least at a factor of 1:10. More production leading to more jobs is a thing of the past, when one shoemaker could make one pair of shoes in one day, so if you want to make two pairs per day you need two shoemakers. Today you have one mechanic who can take care of one shoe making machine, if you want two shoe making machines you don't need two mechanics. You simply have your one mechanic work longer, or you simply reduce the repair cycles of your machines. This is the reality in our working environment today. You can always produce more with the same amount of people as long as you don't push past a certain hard threshold (where, e.g., you'd have to work 3 instead of 2 shifts and hence need a complete batch of new workers).

And, allow me to repeat that, we do not need more supply. We have enough supply. More than enough. There is not enough demand to take care of the

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[LibRT]

I don't think you understand: when you say, "loans for consumption are pretty much out of the question these days", you seem to be saying that only "consumer spending" counts - you are confusing "consumer spending" with "consumption", because the only thing a loan can be used for is consumption, whether that's buying new equipment or paying workers or building a new location: it all ends up being spent in the economy. When a company pays another company for supplies, that is "demand" being exercised; when a company borrows money to pay their suppliers, that is also "demand" being satisfied by supply: they are buying things (be they services or goods or labor or anything else). Anything money gets spent on is "demand" meeting "supply". I don't know why you seem to think it doesn't count unless it is consumer spending. And your argument that the majority of loans are only used to cover other loans, and that borrowers don't "invest" the proceeds is ludicrous on multiple fronts: on the one hand you are arguing that loans are hard to come by ue to Basel II while on the other hand saying banks are giving loans willy-nilly to companies without the means to repay them and for the purposes of paying other loans, like a ponzi scheme, and then you say that the loans will go to "keeping the business solvent", seemingly without realizing that any and all money a company spends ultimately ends up as someone else's consumer purchasing money. When you say, "If I invest, or 'save', money, it will NEVER end up on the demand side", you are 100% entirely incorrect: it cannot do anything but ultimately end up as demand.

I'll tell you exactly why the crisis came about, and how government interference directly caused it: imagine you set up an insurance company to sell insurance against fire destroying houses. You collect premiums and set aside money to cover the eventual fires. You underwrite your customers diligently, because if they are more likely to have a fire, you are more likely to lose money. You are rewarded based upon how well your insurance contracts, in the aggregate, perform: if your customers have few fires, you make some money. If you misjudge the risk, you lose some money. You do your best to price your insurance such that, in the aggregate, you will have enough money to pay losses, plus some profit. Now, imagine what would happen if, suddenly, you no longer had to pay losses. No matter whether a customer of yours has a fire or not, you don't have to pay out, and you make money on the policy. And the more policies you sell (regardless of losses), the more money you make. How would you behave? If you are a rational person, you will start selling policies like crazy without any regard to the risk of a fire to a policy holder. Some customers will come in and tell you their house is already on fire. You couldn't care less, and sell them a policy, and for cheap, too. Other customers come in and tell you their house has burned down to the ground several times before. You don't care about that, either - you sell them a policy.

How does all that relate to the mortgage crisis? It is identical: the government set up Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to backstop mortgages. Banks no longer carried mortgage risk themselves: they instead simply sold mortgages, funnelled them through Fannie and Freddie for insurance against default, and then sold the fully insured loans to investors. Because of the government (and only because of the government), the banks had no concern whether a lender would ever pay back a cent, because their accountability was entirely removed by the government: they now made money solely based on the number and volume of money lent, not on how those loans performed. Did they care if you didn't have a job, no assets and couldn't afford the house? Hell no! It didn't matter! The government took on the risk. And then, the government went all-in: it declared that more "disadvantaged" people and poor people needed to own houses, and insisted

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Opportunist]

Well, I guess I outed me as something a true-blooded US citizen would probably call a socialist. I like paying taxes. I buy civilization with them.

Not my words, I stole them from Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. He was an Associate Justice at the SCOTUS a century ago. And judging from his decisions and other notes about him I can't really see him as a bleedin' heart lefty.

I can see that the "old style" conservatives (the kind the US had in the 80s) had some pretty good ideas and some things worked out pretty well. And back in the 80s, you had every right to oppose unions and their agendas. They didn't serve anyone but themselves. And they did everything they could to protect failed businesses so their members would not get fired. It went way too far, and they had way too much power.

The pendulum swings, though, and today we're at the other end of the spectrum. Business has too much power. And I'm not talking about small businesses (which I, personally, see as the corner stone of a healthy economy, big businesses are actually more a cancer than a boon), I'm talking about businesses that dabble in politics, who influence decisions and laws, to protect their revenue or even their business.

Can you see a parallel? In the 80s, Unions tried to influence decision making to protect their members. Today, it's lobbying groups doing pretty much the same. The interest groups change, from workers to corporations, the net effect is the same: The economy gets screwed over.

I can agree that we need less influence in politics from both sides. Politics should not favor either, workers or corporations, but create an equilibrium. If it has to take any influence, it should be one of moderation. To ensure both sides can negotiate on an equal footing.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Opportunist]

I hope I reply to the right comment now, the new /. system doesn't work too well in Opera, every time I click somewhere it opens the parent posting and the damn list gets longer and longer... ugh.

Anyway.

The reason why I said that demand only "counts" if it is for consumption is that else it does indeed turn into a ponzi scheme. Let's imagine you and I are both producing something. And we both only demand things that can be used to produce more. Let's also assume you have something for sale that I could use to produce something else for 100. I'll buy that for 100, if I can turn it into something that I can sell again for, say, 120. You might buy that, but only if you in turn could create something that can be sold for 140. But for 140, I won't buy it, because I could certainly use it to build something, but I don't think that you'd pay 160 for that, and I'd certainly not pay 180 for whatever you would build with it. In the end, one of us has to go bankrupt. Only if someone eventually buys something to consume it instead of using it to produce more, the cycle is broken. Perpetual production is an illusion, just like perpetual growth. It's just a ponzi scheme, a well disguised one, but essentially that's what it is. In the end, someone has to foot the bill. If he can't, well, someone will go bankrupt.

The reasons you gave for the recession are sound, and the sound awfully like the "too big to fail" crap that's keeping banks from falling now. Well, but how would you suggest to get out of this mess?

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[LibRT]

Well, we can agree on the small business vs big business point: I never understand why politicians are so enamored of big business, because small businesses create 90% of the jobs.

Also, the '80s featured some good policies, but also some terrible ones: everyone reveres Reagan these days, forgetting that he increased taxes 12 times, took military spending off the deep end and nearly doubled the size of government debt. Luckily he was saved by GDP growing even faster than he could grow the debt, due to all the innovation and efficiencies unleashed as regulation was signfiicantly reduced (not too long before that, the government had gone right off the deep end, with price controls, policies which caused inflation to sky rocket (are you old enough to remember 18% being a good mortgage rate???) etc.). Reagan was a partial step in the right direction. Likewise Thatcher.

I'll consolidate posts here and respond to your other one too: in your example, neither one of us would have started producing anything unless we had pretty good reason to believe we had customers for our goods - we wouldn't otherwise risk the capital...and besides, it's not like your example at all: just because a company buys some input from another company does not mean the other company doesn't pay its employees with those proceeds, who the go out and buy things (like, perhaps, the things the first company produces) - just because money is spent on non-consumer goods doesn't mean it doesn't eventually get spent on consumer goods. Every company which produces items for other companies has employees who are at the same time consumers.

The article is right (and so are you) in that both "sides" have been co-opted, just by different interests. Find me a true fiscal conservative who is also a true social liberal (in the classical liberal sense) and I'll be a happy libertarian (of course, Ron Paul is pretty damn close to a libertarian's wet dream, but he somehow doesn't get any press despite breaking records for grass-roots fundraising).

As for the solution: stop bailing things out; stop calling things "too big to fail"; stop fucking borrowing (!) - every man, woman and child is already in the hole to the tune of about $130,000 in federal government debt (!); make unions illegal as a restraint of the free trade of labor; eliminate minimum wage (that will cure your illegal immigration problem too); reform, severely, patent and copyright laws; stop invading other countries (!) and reduce the military to the bare minimum needed for defense; cut spending by at least 2/3rds (most of which is unconstitutional anyway - see the Department of Education, the US Department of Agriculture, etc etc etc); drop taxes by half that amount of spending cuts, and make it a flat tax rate: no deductions, no credits, just a percentage applied to income. Better yet, eliminate income tax entirely and institute a VAT instead (in fact, ultimately all involuntarily taxes should be eliminated); eliminate the criminal enterprise that is the Federal Reserve and allow interest rates to be determined by the market alone. All of that will cause an awful lot of short term pain and an awful lot of long term gain. If you really want to go big, eliminate all barriers to immigration. Of course, you'd have a generation of poorer Americans but a thousand years of richer humans throughout the world...

Unlike you, I don't like paying taxes, because they are taken by force and the only "civilization" you ostensibly buy is provided by a monopoly, which not incidentally holds a monopoly on the use of violence. You can't shop around. You can't say "no". You can't say, "but I don't agree that part of my workday each day should go towards paying for the killing of people in far away places who have yet to even come close to invading us". You can't say, "I don't like your services, so I'm not going to shop here anymore". All you can do is touch your toes, hope is doesn't hurt too much and realize you live in the Land of the Unfree and the Home of the Afraid...

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Opportunist]

Oh, I can answer why politicians are so easily convinced that big business is their buddy. Easy. Kickbacks and a lot of jobs kept by talking to a single person. Instead of having to convince a lot of people to open a shop, they just need to "listen" to one lobbyist and give him what he wants. Presto, a few thousand jobs created and a few millions in his bank account.

Small businesses are better for the national economy, though. First and foremost, government "owns" small businesses. It's the other way around with big business. If government has to raise tax or create other not favorable situations for businesses, small businesses have to grin and bear it. They can't do what big business does in such a situation: Pack and go. Second, they will never be "too big to fail". It's insensible to put all your eggs in one basket, and likewise it's not very wise to rely with too many jobs on a single employer. That leads almost invariably to this employer having way too much power, economically and socially. He holds too many jobs "hostage", and he has a too big impact on economy, so he can actually blackmail the government: Save me, or I take you down with me. For reference, see the various "too big to fail" companies that do exactly that right as we speak.

And yes, I do think Reagan was a pretty decent president for a Republican (back then I was pretty much a conservative, still, I had quite big concerns when I heard that the US elected an actor as prez. It felt a bit like handing the white house to one of the three stooges...), but he turned out to be (at least in his first term, the second was a nightmare IMO, I guess he was slowly getting a few bolts loose, so to speak) a pretty decent one. I also think one of the reasons the GDP soared in that time was his government spending, the spending on military expenses was actually a quite sensible investment back then, the scientific progress that came with it led to a lot of very valuable inventions that in turn benefited the rest of the economy, especially entertainment electronics certainly received a boost during those times, and people had jobs to actually consume those goods. He did raise taxes like there's no tomorrow, but the money he gained that way was spent sensibly, the US were at the bleeding edge in nearly all fields of technology at the start of the 90s. Yes, even surpassing Japan. By quite a margin.

I don't really agree with a lot that Thatcher did, but she was certainly also pretty good for the UK. Hate to say it, actually, since I do not agree with any of her policies, but it was a necessity. UK Unions have become the laughing stock of Europe, everyone on the continent wondered how the governments let those clowns jerk them around and keep the economy down. They really had outlandish demands, and Thatcher proved she's tough enough to actually face them. It was necessary. Hate to say it, but it was. Likewise, today such a Thatcher would be necessary on the other end, to face the outlandish demands from the "too big to fail" businesses with similar toughness and grab them by their neck. Want a bailout? Be prepared to be under the government's thumb 'til you paid it back. That's right, you heard me, until you pay it back. That's the least of what I'd expect. I don't think taking any business over as the government would be a good thing (as has been loudly asked for over here already, that government should take over banks it bails out. As if they ever ran any business well that wasn't just concerned with creating jobs...). But I would expect these companies and banks to hand over revenues and any kind of surplus that is not reinvested, instead of handing it to their managers as bonus payments or for questionable high risk adventures, until that loan (and I would very much like to see it as a loan, at low interest if need be, but this should NOT be a grant!) is paid back. If that means the bank has to pay back this debt for the next 200 years, it will pay this debt back for the next 200 years. Hey, the country has time, it's not going anywhe

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[LibRT]

You're quite right about why politicians favor big business: they're just being efficient, but what they're being efficient about isn't jobs as much as it is fund-raising.

Intersting comments about your concern about an actor running a country. I have a different view: in a democracy, the only qualification to participate in government is to be a citizen - career politician are a huge part of the problem (which is why term limits exist). If you want an example of how a "commoner" can run things well, take a look at Brazil: their last president has, if I recall, a grade four education. He did wonders for the economy (and you'd probably like what he did with handouts to the poor, while really it was his liberalization of the economy that led to Brazil's dramatic gains). In a democracy, there should be no pre-qualification to govern - it's government "of the people, by the people" (or should be). And comparitively speaking, Reagan was pretty good. It's just a very low bar.

If you honestly think a massive military expense increase is a good thing because we got some science out of it which we would have anyway arrived at (altho it might have taken more time), then we're really not seeing eye-to-eye: if your end goal is science, why take the massively inefficient military budget to get there? I don't think science should be a goal of government. Then again, I don't think "job creation" should be either - let business take care of business and stick to policing and the judiciary and defense and not too much else.

I don't like any kind of bailout, and when you propose the government should bail out some companies, what you are suggesting, of course, is that the government should pick and choose which businesses survive and which fail. And thus we're back at the command-style economy which you seem to favor strongly and which I despise, for mostly pragmatic reasons (it doesn't work, and hurts a lot of people). I've said it before: by your line of reasoning, we'd still have a horse and buggy industry funded by government, all to protect the workers from the pain of change. Of course those same few favored workers would have their adaptation delayed and made more painful. What makes you think the government has the abilities (let alone the right) to decide which businesses fail and which don't? The only fair solution is to not play favorites and let the people decide, via their spending decisions - after all, each time you buy something you are telling the market, in your own small way, to invest in that area: when you buy that side of fries, you are telling the farmer to grow another potato.

Honestly, how can you say you don't agree with the things Thatcher or Reagan did, but you fully agree with the results and agree they were necessary? That's a contradiction. You may not like the suffering some (previously subsidized) people endured (I don't either), but that's a function of their prior subsidization!

Are you sure you were a libertarian? A libertarian is decidedly different from a conservative. A libertarian believes, first and foremost, that individuals should be free to act however they choose, provided, always, that freedom does not impede others from freely acting however they choose. That includes the freedom to trade with anyone I choose to trade with, at whatever price we choose, without government interference (ie minimum wages, price controls, bailouts, etc.). There are an awful lot of people passionately opposed to freedom (you, included, by virtue of the fact you argue in favor of bailouts (but only if they meet your criteria), minimum wages, "social safety nets", etc). Likewise, when you argue in favor of patents, but only if they meet your selected criteria, you do realize you are arguing a question of degrees, don't you? It's binary: either you are in favor of freedom or you aren't. When you say that you favor bailouts, sometimes, and favor patents, for some periods, and favor price fixing, occassionally, when i

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Opportunist]

I'm no fan of career politicians either, who I personally consider cloistered in their ivory tower, out of touch with reality. But I would like to have politicians who "know" their job. If they're responsible for healthcare, I would like them to have some kind of background in medicine. If responsible for economy, I'd like them to have a background in BA, who preferably ran his own company (not only posed as the CEO, a company he founded and built to a success). And if they're responsible for defense, a military background can't hurt. I would very much like if parties picked their candidates by their qualification. Since we, as voters, can only choose between what's offered. And if they offer a fool and an idiot, I can want whatever I want and I won't get it. And please don't start the idea of "run yourself", it's like suggesting to open your own ISP if you're not happy with the two that are available to you.

As a president, I'd want someone who has a background in diplomacy, foreign trade, foreign politics and, yes, to some degree he should also have a solid knowledge how to deal with people, so an actor is maybe not the worst choice, but it's not the key qualification. We usually choose our presidents from diplomat stock, but then, our prez has little power aside of representation. He is, in every country, something the rest of the world looks at and judges the country by. You might have an idea how the world saw the US during the reign of GW.

Brazil is an example how a high risk adventure can pay off. It could have resulted in incredibly dramatic failure as well, but it worked out. Yes, handing money to the poor while cutting loose the strings attached to economy can work, if the economy is not on its knees already. Doing the same in the US now would be devastating. Be careful what you wish for. Money handed now to the poor will instantly go into their debt, not increasing consumption, while an even more liberal economy would mean less income due to a lack of sales. Basically, you'd only speed up the downfall.

Not bailing out anything right now would lead to a downfall that cannot be stopped. We dug this hole, now we have to fill it. Leaving it open will only lead to us falling down into it. What happens if the banks crumble, crash and burn? All savings will be lost. All retirement funds will be lost. But hey, the house owners who put themselves over their shoulders in debt will get out!

You're honestly suggesting to punish those that saved up and prepared for retirement, while bailing those out that squandered their money by going over their head into debt, did I get that right? I mean, more power to you, but do you consider that fair?

What's worse is that you will erode the trust people put in the Dollar. And into saving. People will not carry their money to the bank, they will stash it in their mattress. I somehow don't think that you'd probably want that.

What you seem to miss is how people will react. People are not rational, and they will not react rationally. That's, btw, also the underlying problem why Communism didn't work out, its proponents didn't take into account that people are people and act as people. The moment people see trouble on the horizon they will stop spending. And if you eliminate trust in banks, they will not put that money they don't spend into the economy by saving it in the bank. This is about the worst that could possibly happen. Not only do they not spend (which I'd want), they also won't save and allow that money to go into investments (what you seem to want). NEITHER of us will get what he wants.

Again, bailouts are not what I'd want. It's just that I consider the alternative worse. And I certainly do not want them in the form they're handed out right now, pretty much as a gift. When I give someone money, I want something in return. Not getting anything is not acceptable, and I guess that at least we can agree on.

Considering Thatcher and Reagan: I did not LIKE what they did. But it was necessary. It's like getting an infected molar d

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm sorry you have such a low opinion of your ability to compete (which is not to say I can determine if it's misplaced or not). But asking others to pay your way because you won't is about as far removed from "fair" as it gets.

Nu-uh!
You do not own the definite definition of what is "fair".

It's "fair" that someone unfortunate gets more than their average share, if they need a prosthetic leg or something, for example.

The fairest, most enlightened "fair" is "from each according to their ability, to each according to their needs", in my opinion.

Re:Those disgusting proles!

[LibRT]

Karl...is that you?!?

Aren't Landlines Getting Antiquated?

[Anonymous Coward]

I mean doesn't VOIP essentially make them pointless now? Nevermind cell service. They should retask the whole division and fold them into the FiOS service personnel.

Re:Aren't Landlines Getting Antiquated?

[srepetsk]

To a certain extent, but not all that far. A fair amount of POTS calls hit the Internet when they get to the local/regional call center. VOIP (from my understanding) mostly really only matters between the Verizon substation and your home.

Re:Aren't Landlines Getting Antiquated?

[Voyager529]

Yes, except I can't get FiOS where I live, so Verizon can't get me VoIP if they wanted to. Even if they did, I'd be hesitant to sign up for one reason:

Land lines are among the most heavily regulated, heavily redundant services provided. The northeastern US had a three day long blackout in 2003. Awesome time, actually (except the driving; none of the traffic lights worked). Between the time the power went out and the time it came back, I never lost a dial tone. I remember reading somewhere that the PSTN has nine nines of reliability (99.9999999% uptime). Not even the power grid can match that.

So yes, I'm a bit trigger shy at the thought of moving to a fiber optic system that has a 6 hour UPS installed, when the advantages are minimal over the PSTN on my side of the demarc.

Re:Aren't Landlines Getting Antiquated?

[petermgreen]

Whe you say "landlines" do you mean the physical lines or the service?

The physical lines are indeed antiquated but they neeed to be maintained until such time as they can be replaced with something more modern. Remember DSL is delivered over the same lines as POTs.

The service of high quality and reliable phone calls needs to be maintained somehow. VOIP over the open internet works well most of the time but it's sufficiantly unreliable (especially with SIP behind NAT) that i'd be wary of depending on it for a buisness.

Thank you for calling Verizon

[alostpacket]

Thank you for calling Verizon. To go to the main menu, press 1. To exit this menu and go to the main menu, press 2. To return to the main menu, press 3. To hear these options again, press 4.

4

Goodbye.

Re:Thank you for calling Verizon

[metalmaster]

better than this honest example from T-Mobile customer service.....

IVR: "Please tell me what youre calling about in your own words"
ME: "Billing"
IVR: "I didnt understand your request. Im going to disconnect this call, and you can try again later"

I also tried "representative", "account" ,"help" and "support." I eventually got to a person who transferred me to the right department. and then the real fun started.....I asked the rep about a service plan and whether or not it was a flat rate or it included other taxes and fees. She told me i would have to ask an in-store rep for the answer.

Re:Thank you for calling Verizon

[TheRaven64]

Not sure if it's the same in the USA, but in the UK there's a very easy way of getting put through to the one person in the call centre who can actually sort out your problem, which works with all of the mobile carriers:

Hello, I'm calling to cancel my contract.

Re:Thank you for calling Verizon

[Ethanol-fueled]

Hello, I'm calling to cancel my contract.

...And get hit with a $200 early termination fee in the U.S.

Re:Thank you for calling Verizon

[Voyager529]

The GP's point is that saying that to the automated system is about the most guaranteed way to get to speak to an actual person, instead of trying to appease the voice activated command line whose list of commands are terribly documented. Presumably the GP isn't intending to actually cancel the contract, the idea is that companies don't jerk around with customers intending to cancel, and will immediately forward the customer to a live person whose job is to avoid having the customer cancel their service.

Re:Thank you for calling Verizon

[Anonymous Coward]

Sometimes works here. As did the old just enter rubbish in the tone menu until it dumped you to a rep. Unfortunately more and more companies are deciding they really don't need the customers who want to talk to someone. It's gotten to the point that even when you want to cancel a contract or have a repair you can't get anyone. I have one friend who just refused to pay his bill until they cancelled his service and then when they called him over his billing he paid the difference and told them to cancel it. The next month they called because they kept the service going after he told them to cancel it but didn't have a credit card on file to charge the non-existant service to. It's become almost criminal how companies act...at least the mob keeps your shop from burning down when they extort you.

Re:Thank you for calling Verizon

[demonlapin]

She told me i would have to ask an in-store rep for the answer.

The call center monkeys aren't going to have access to all the state and local taxes that may apply. Not that they couldn't, I suppose, but they don't.

Re:Thank you for calling Verizon

[Anonymous Coward]

In the US that only gets you a *large* early termination fee. I think they make more money if you cancel than if you don't.

Re:Thank you for calling Verizon

[metalmaster]

The question was simple flat rate or no. For example, Boost Mobile(Sprint/Nextel) has a $50 plan that's just that.....$50. This differs from the more traditional $50 + tax and fees. Additionally, she wasnt your typical billing or support drone. The person who transfered me to her said she was their "Unlimited4G promotion representative" To me that implies sales knowlege of the service.

Re:Thank you for calling Verizon

[AK Marc]

In the US they make instant money from the cancellation, so they don't fight it as much. Why should they try to keep you when they make $500 for canceling your contract, knowing that you have no other choice or you wouldn't have signed up with them in the first place.

Re:Thank you for calling Verizon

[Renraku]

Some places actually charge you a large early termination fee AND make you return your phone. And charge you if the phone isn't in perfect condition.

Re:Thank you for calling Verizon

[Anonymous Coward]

People don't realize that when they get a 2 year contract so they can get a $500 smartphone that they are in fact getting a 2 year $500 loan at some undisclosed interest rate. You do have a choice if you think about what you are really getting for signing a 2 year contract. In other words, there's no real benefit to it. Buy a phone a go month to month. At the very least you can move around until you find the least despicable of the 3 or 4 choices in our healthy free market.

Re:Thank you for calling Verizon

[Anonymous Coward]

Buy a phone and go month to month

That makes it sound so easy. You should already know this, but in the USA you can't just buy a phone and pick which carrier you want to use it with. Each carrier has its own proprietary technology that nobody else uses. The only way to get a fully compatible phone is to buy it from the carrier. Without exception, if you try to switch carriers and still use the $500 phone you just bought, then you will either have degraded service (no 3G/4G) or no service at all. Not only that, the carriers don't offer you any kind of discount for going month to month. You are paying the same price, or more, as the people with a 2 year contract with subsidized phones. Hopefully in a few years LTE will have taken over and we have a single god damned wireless technology standard and it will be practical to switch carriers like you are saying. But right now it really is a shitfest over here, and the carriers will do their best to ensure that it stays that way for the foreseeable future.

Re:Thank you for calling Verizon

[AK Marc]

You are paying on the loan whether or not you take the loan. They have a government protection racket, and they purposefully damage phones in order to remove functionality that would allow you to take them to other carriers, and the government deliberately limits competition which decreases supply, increasing prices. There is no free market when there's a $10,000,000,000 or so barrier to entry. A free market has zero barriers to entry. The US does not now, nor ever, had a free market, and the worst parts of our economy are the parts that are less free.

When you go month to month, you still are paying on the loan. They make everyone pay. That's why it isn't a choice. You can take the cash or leave it, but you get to pay on the loan anyway. And the cancellation terms have been found to be illegal multiple times, but they aren't changed and are enforced knowing they are illegal, and if you want to fight it, you will win, but it will cost you $5000 to get your $500 back.

Re:Thank you for calling Verizon

[RoFLKOPTr]

Some places actually charge you a large early termination fee AND make you return your phone. And charge you if the phone isn't in perfect condition.

Citation needed. That would be illegal. Even though they lock you into a 2-year contract when buying a phone at a subsidized price, you ARE making a legitimate purchase and the phone does become your property and yours alone (interpretation of "your property and yours alone" may differ).

Re:Thank you for calling Verizon

[Agripa]

Last time I did that to cancel my Earthlink DSL service, they renewed it which prevented re-provisioning.

I added that to my list of reasons for canceling when I called them the next two times.

Re:Thank you for calling Verizon

[Trax3001BBS]

Agent, Agent will most often work www.gethuman.com (talk to a human).

While I'd like to stay on subject.

Charter.net: Usenet? Newsgroups? No we don't have anything like that.
When I asked support what the News Server address was, used google nntp.charter.net

Charter.net again: No you can't use a FTP program to access your web page, you have to use
the programs supplied on Charter.net. in response to why I couldn't get CuteFTP to connect
- it was a password issue.

Re:Thank you for calling Verizon

[secretsquirel]

Don't worry, you can always have your case determined by a fair and impartial arbitrator.

Re:Thank you for calling Verizon

[MBGMorden]

On most of them, if you go ahead and say "Operator" - regardless of where you are in the menu - it'll take you to a human to speak with. I've also heard the some of them to voice recognition for profanity and forward to an operator at that point, but I've always had better luck with just "operator" :).

Re:Thank you for calling Verizon

[tlhIngan]

Some places actually charge you a large early termination fee AND make you return your phone. And charge you if the phone isn't in perfect condition.

Citation needed. That would be illegal. Even though they lock you into a 2-year contract when buying a phone at a subsidized price, you ARE making a legitimate purchase and the phone does become your property and yours alone (interpretation of "your property and yours alone" may differ).

It depends. The ETF is composed of two parts - the first is the phone subsidy, the second is the breaking of contract penalties.

The second part is easy - if you visualize it from the other size. The contract is a source of long-term revenue (18+ months), and the carrier has basically counted on that revenue to continue. By breaking the contract, the penalties are usually such that the future revenues that they would've gotten from you are covered, or at least a portion of them. Basically you're "buying out" the contract - paying upfront what they would've gotten over the period (it's just the same as your employer buying out your notice period so you leave immediately by paying a lump sum). You'll see similar penalties on your mortgage and other contracts, as well.

The first part is somewhat tricky - some contracts state that you get to keep it after a duration (30-90 days is typical), before which it's more of a rental charge to cover loss because it isn't "new" anymore if you choose to break the contract. But after that period, the fee goes toward paying out the subsidy.

It's really composed of two charges - the carriers lump it into one "to make it easier" (e.g., ETF starts at say, $500 and decreashes at $20/month)

Re:Thank you for calling Verizon

[LunaticTippy]

Prepaid plans often are a better deal if you bring your own phone. I bought an older model Android on ebay for $50 and have a $35/month plan with unlimited (!) data.

Re:Thank you for calling Verizon

[RoFLKOPTr]

It depends. The ETF is composed of two parts - the first is the phone subsidy, the second is the breaking of contract penalties.

Maybe you're in a different country? Maybe you're simply talking out of your ass? I don't know.

I can tell you with absolute 100% certainty that the Verizon Wireless Customer Agreement states nothing about returning your phone due to cancellation before the contract period. They do have a cooling-off period where you have the ability to cancel your contract sans ETF as well as get a full refund (minus the cost of the service for the number of days between initialization and cancellation) as long as you return any subsidized equipment. After that 14 days, you will be stuck with an ETF and you are under absolutely no legal or contractual obligation to ever return your equipment to Verizon Wireless for any reason... because, again, you have purchased the equipment from them. It was a direct sale to you. Not a loan. Not a lease. You purchased it at a subsidized price while agreeing to enter into another contract that was completely separate from the sale transaction itself.

The Coming Big, Bloody Class War

[RobotRunAmok]

...will not be between Black and White, or White and Hispanic, or even Rich and Poor. It will be between those who get pensions and employer-provided healthcare and those who don't.

Re:The Coming Big, Bloody Class War

[sam_handelman]

No, it has been between Rich and Poor, although the Poor are getting stomped, as much as the Rich might want us all to believe otherwise. If you look at the last 20 years, the vast majority if the *new wealth* which has been created has been concentrated in the hands of the top 0.1% of the population. That's where all the money has gone, not towards social security, not towards Cadillac health insurance for people with jobs in manufacturing. Where is the money to provide pensions and health-care to the share of the population who doesn't have it? It's sitting in Bill f-ing Gates bank account, that's where it is.

  There's a plate with 12 cookies on it, a rich guy, a teacher and a regular working Joe.

  The rich guy takes 11 of the cookies, leans over to Joe, and says "I'd watch out, I think the teacher is trying to steal your cookie."

Re:The Coming Big, Bloody Class War

[Nimey]

...which is only because the teabaggers (who aren't unionized) are told so, and are too unsophisticated to know when they're being had.

Another propaganda coup by Murdoch.

Re:The Coming Big, Bloody Class War

[Anonymous Coward]

That is pretty much exactly the dividing line between proletariat and bourgoise. The people who are valued members of an organization who are not expendable, versus the people who are merely trainable replaceable parts.

Re:The Coming Big, Bloody Class War

[cowboy76Spain]

The poor are getting stomped because it is SOOO EASY to make them believe that their enemies are other poor with just slightly better benefits...

Re:The Coming Big, Bloody Class War

[Anonymous Coward]

Or maybe because everyone in politics has their hand in the cookie jar and you "me vs them" people keep falling for the same damn trick every election And don't vote for independent candidates

Re:The Coming Big, Bloody Class War

[TarPitt]

They are already fixing this. Pensions are a thing of the past for almost all private sector workers. Originally, public sector workers gained these benefits as a way to keep up with private sector (largely unionized) employees - to keep public sector benefits even.

Now that the private sector has eliminated pensions (and unions for the most part), the same will hold true for the public sector.

Take away a benefit from one group, pit them against another group that still has the benefit, and you lower your labor costs across the board. Getting workers to fight each others greatly benefits the wealthy who need a cheap compliant workforce.

Health benefits have been slowly eroding over the years. This will be next.

Re:The Coming Big, Bloody Class War

[Anonymous Coward]

You know I have heard anywhere from the top 5 percent to your new number the .1%. Where did you get your numbers?

I am not saying you are wrong. But where did you get your information...?

Re:The Coming Big, Bloody Class War

[royallthefourth]

The middle class is better off now than it was 40 years ago. The poor are better off as well.

Over the last 4 decades, consumer prices have steadily increased, while wages for many workers haven't even kept pace with inflation.

Although overall income had grown by 27% since 1979, 33% of the gains went to the top 1%. Meanwhile, the bottom 60% were making less: about 95 cents for each dollar they made in 1979.

http://sociology.ucsc.edu/whorulesamerica/power/wealth.html

Re:The Coming Big, Bloody Class War

[cgenman]

Most successful revolutions and class wars, despite popular sentiment, seem to rise from the middle class. They are the ones who have the luxury of fighting and the resources to fight with. They are also the ones who have an established idea of what life should be like, and who fight against it eroding. Look at the headlining figures of the US revolution, for example.

I suspect the next decade of the US will be defined as a conflict between those who feel oppressed by corporations, and those who feel corporations are the way out. The real truth is probably tangential to both arguments.

Re:The Coming Big, Bloody Class War

[RightSaidFred99]

Wait, so you mean upper-lower and lower-middle class people don't have 50" TVs and phones in their hands that are more powerful than any computer anyone had in 1979? That's amazing to me, I must be on a constant LSD binder and imagining these things, eh?

If you change the metric so arbitrarily then you can prove just about anything you want. The simple fact is that the average person today making the average income is better fed, has better housing, has more of the niceties of life, better health care, etc.. than they did in 1979.

I find it ironic that the supposed non-materialistic left wing measures things by how much "standardized buying power" one has. Fucking ridiculous.

Re:The Coming Big, Bloody Class War

[dkf]

If you change the metric so arbitrarily then you can prove just about anything you want.

There are two possible ways of measuring things. Either you use an absolute metric, in which case everyone is better off than they used to be because they have bigger TVs etc., or you have a relative metric (which measures how a lot of people actually think about their wealth) and in that case most people are much worse off. Relative metrics really are zero-sum games, but they don't measure how comfortable you are; instead, they're really about measuring social status. Us primates being what we are, social status really matters, with lack of it causing all sorts of problems (e.g., health problems, greater tendency to criminality).

Some problems really are difficult, and the Rich really don't want to know.

Re:The Coming Big, Bloody Class War

[royallthefourth]

the supposed non-materialistic left wing

"The left" is an overly broad concept and ends up being pretty much worthless when it's to the point of lumping crystal worshiping hippies into the same group with Marxists. Also,

better health care

lmao

Re:The Coming Big, Bloody Class War

[royallthefourth]

Relative metrics really are zero-sum games, but they don't measure how comfortable you are; instead, they're really about measuring social status.

Not exactly. We're looking at an entire generation of Americans who might get bankrupted if they need minor surgery and will never be able to afford to retire. The fancy TV's, even without being turned on, serve their role well in distracting the working class from how much worse their situation is.

Re:The Coming Big, Bloody Class War

[tompaulco]

.will not be between Black and White, or White and Hispanic, or even Rich and Poor. It will be between those who get pensions and employer-provided healthcare and those who don't.
I know which side I want to be on. I want to be on the side where they don't give me any pension or employer-provided healthcare and instead pay me what they would have spent on that and let me choose my own health plan and retirement benefits.

Re:The Coming Big, Bloody Class War

[sam_handelman]

I exaggerate very slightly; a slight majority of all new wealth is in the hands of the top 1% of the population. The top 0.1% probably only has about half of that, so a quarter of the newly created wealth. Anyway, the details vary slightly from source to source because it depends on whether you are talking net wealth, financial wealth, income, etc. etc. Also it depends on who you lump together, which is a judgement call. It gets "worse" the closer you get to Bill.

  More information than you probably care to know about the topic can be found here:
http://sociology.ucsc.edu/whorulesamerica/power/wealth.html

  Let's look at table 5a. End of 2001, the S&P500 was at 1,148.08. End of 2007, it was at 1,468.36. The S&P 500 isn't a bad proxy for the total value of the entire stock market.

  So, quick guestimate, 2001->2007, richest 1% went from 33.5% OF 1,148 to 38.3% of 1,468, that's 385 to 562 -> a gain of 178. That's more than half of the total 320 point gain.

  So, counting just the stock market (thus not housing bubbles), roughly 55% of the new wealth created between 2001 and 2007 was in the hands of the top 1% of the population.

Re:The Coming Big, Bloody Class War

[Anonymous Coward]

bravo!

Verizon and their union learning from Congress?

[PeterM from Berkeley]

Seems like Congress has set a splendid example for the country!

NEVER compromise, NEVER listen to reason, NEVER allow the rich to lose a dime for the benefit of the middle or lower class?

--PeterM

Re:Verizon and their union learning from Congress?

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe once we get past this entire 'money is a solution' attitude in the states we can make some progress. Not to say that the rich should be sheltered from doing their part but we spend a great deal of money in this country on problems which have no monetary solution. Maybe we need to be a bit more creative in our thinking and see if we can do more with less for once.

Re:Verizon and their union learning from Congress?

[dr2chase]

"We", kimosabe? Lots of problems have monetary solutions, if you are willing to spend enough money. Surely, you have heard of the free market. Do you really expect to attract hardworking, talented people, if you don't compensate them properly? Conversely, if you pay peanuts, why are you so surprised when you get monkeys?

Re:Verizon and their union learning from Congress?

[Savantissimo]

Insightful, not flamebait.

Re:Verizon and their union learning from Congress?

[RightSaidFred99]

Only.. the "rich" pay the majority of the taxes, both as a percentage overall and as a percentage of income.

Re:Verizon and their union learning from Congress?

[Savantissimo]

Not after paying for essentials. Not when counting all taxes - state, sales, excise, social security, and medicare, let alone the kickbacks the rich get from government, not even counting the bailouts they alone got, bailouts for the rich which I estimate were more than the bottom third of Americans were paid in the whole history of America. Hell, the rich and their instruments, the corporations, take over $200B in tax deductions after deducting everything you could think think of: salaries, depreciation, all costs, rents, taxes- after all that, and after all the fraudulent accounting, it's still over $200B per year, just in miscellaneous tax deductions.

And even if the rich did pay most taxes - so what? Compared to the fraction of the disposable national income they command - not through worth, but through theft, fraud and power - they do not even pay their share. Let them move to China, where they sent our manufacturing, if they think they are so poorly treated here. Let their jesters and fools from the Chicago school soothe them as they are wrongfully deprived of their rightful computer bookeeping entries, these mighty who shuffled paper and pulled strings, these bland scions, these New York hustlers, these half-witted MBAs and their mouthpieces ,these parasites who stole the nation, who disinherited and disposessed and destroyed the wealth and dignity of America, the birthright of all those real workers who made and moved and created for a living.

Re:Verizon and their union learning from Congress?

[RightSaidFred99]

Yawn, more fucking lies and rabble rousing. Even after all that stuff the wealthy pay more taxes as a percentage of income, though it's at least closer to equity. And let's not forget the fucking wastes who pay $0 and actually derive money _from_ the government, that's a good sizable chunk.

Yes, even after the mythical "tax deductions". No matter how many times you say "fat cat", it won't change the fact that the rich pay the bills around here, _and_ they pay the salaries of the rest of us.

I find your pathetic rhetoric laughable. Frankly I'm glad the wealthy have disproportionate power. If comes down to a numbers game. The rabble have the numbers and the vote, the rich have the voice and the political power. If the rabble start tipping the balance and taking more and more money from people who work, we're fucked.

I realize that's your wet dream, for the poor people to rise up and use their larger numbers to make radical changes. Too bad it'll never happen - poor people (as a class, not individuals) are fucking stupid and will never rise up or do anything of worth as they're by definition lazy and useless. The only thing the poor class (again, not individuals - many poor individuals are exceptional human beings) is good for is spitting out children they can't take care of.

Re:Verizon and their union learning from Congress?

[tompaulco]

$200 billion is supposed to be a lot of deductions, right? Well, when you divide it by the 31 million companies that exist in the United States, that is less than $7,000 each. I had more tax deductions than that myself and so does anybody with a couple of kids and a house.

Re:Verizon and their union learning from Congress?

[Savantissimo]

I actually did the calculations using the IRS numbers. I also tried to adjust for Social Security taxes (both sides = 12.4% on the first $107K), Medicare (2.9%) and State taxes. The latter varies wildly depending on the state, but a good rough estimate overall is 10% on the first 100K (mostly sales tax, excise tax and misc. fees) and 5% on income after the first $100K (mostly income and property tax). Note that the rich still pay 10% state tax on the first $100K. This drop in effective taxes occurs because consumption and thus sales taxes are lower as a percentage of income in higher income groups, they are more likely to be able to avoid taxes by buying non-food expenditures on the Internet or while traveling, they are more likely to move to low or no-income-tax states. Even without the state tax approximation, or making a flat or progressive approximation, the qualitative results are the same.

By dividing the average AGI for each category by the estimated after-tax income and subtracting the result from 1 we get the effective tax rates:
(add 1 to 5% to percentages above $100K if you don't buy the state tax calculation)
Total average tax rate: 34.89%
No adjusted gross income [1] 100.00%
$1 under $1,000 25.31%
$1,000 under $3,000 25.58%
$3,000 under $5,000 25.52%
$5,000 under $7,000 25.70%
$7,000 under $9,000 25.85%
$9,000 under $11,000 26.01%
$11,000 under $13,000 26.36%
$13,000 under $15,000 26.60%
$15,000 under $17,000 26.84%
$17,000 under $19,000 27.12%
$19,000 under $22,000 27.52%
$22,000 under $25,000 27.87%
$25,000 under $30,000 28.40%
$30,000 under $40,000 29.36%
$40,000 under $50,000 30.31%
$50,000 under $75,000 31.35%
$75,000 under $100,000 32.21%
$100,000 under $200,000 34.83%
$200,000 under $500,000 39.90%
$500,000 under $1,000,000 42.76%
$1,000,000 under $1,500,000 43.29%
$1,500,000 under $2,000,000 43.31%
$2,000,000 under $5,000,000 43.15%
$5,000,000 under $10,000,000 42.36%
$10,000,000 or more 40.04%
[1]These people had negative income but still paid income tax, and presumably other taxes as well - the nominal rate was set at 100%, though it is really infinite.

But if we subtract a nominal $10K from the average gross earnings in each category to represent a minimal after-tax budget for essentials such as food and shelter:
Total tax burden after paying for essentials:
Total 51.35%
No adjusted gross income [1] 100.00%
$1 under $1,000 1935.57%
$1,000 under $3,000 523.62%
$3,000 under $5,000 276.33%
$5,000 under $7,000 192.67%
$7,000 under $9,000 150.84%
$9,000 under $11,000 125.98%
$11,000 under $13,000 109.77%
$13,000 under $15,000 98.06%
$15,000 under $17,000 89.41%
$17,000 under $19,000 82.67%
$19,000 under $22,000 76.34%
$22,000 under $25,000 70.44%
$25,000 under $30,000 64.82%
$30,000 under $40,000 58.10%
$40,000 under $50,000 52.64%
$50,000 under $75,000 47.62%
$75,000 under $100,000 43.78%
$100,000 under $200,000 42.33%
$200,000 under $500,000 43.38%
$500,000 under $1,000,000 44.23%
$1,000,000 under $1,500,000 44.12%
$1,500,000 under $2,000,000 43.89%
$2,000,000 under $5,000,000 43.48%
$5,000,000 under $10,000,000 42.51%
$10,000,000 or more 40.08%

You would have to reduce the budget for essentials to less than $5300 before a family making $40-50K (mean $44.8K AGI) would not be paying a higher tax rate than one making $200-500K (mean $288K).

Re:Verizon and their union learning from Congress?

[LibRT]

Here are some numbers relating to the US federal income tax:

- the top 2% of earners in the US pay 43.6% of all federal income tax (while earning 24.1% of all income)

- the bottom 50% pay 3.3% (while earning 13.4% of all income).

- the top 5% of earners (which equates to an average income of $137,056) pay a whopping 57.1% of all federal income taxes.

Re:Verizon and their union learning from Congress?

[Savantissimo]

For more recent figures (2007) 3.22% of the returns (AGI over $200,000) made 40.39% of the total income and paid 54.65% of the Federal income tax. But this does not count Social Security or Medicare taxes, nor does it count State taxes. These latter are regressive taxes.

Estimating these as above, the $200,000+ club made about 29% of the after-tax income and had a total tax burden in the neighborhood of 43%, compared to an average for the whole population of about 35%. This doesn't seem unduly high, especially if any allowance is made for subsistence, as in my post above. (And nearly 97% of the population made less than $200K, so that group has little effect on the overall figures.) The total tax burden number for the category of "$200K+" is pulled down somewhat by those making over $10M, who paid only 40% on average.

More than half of all federal income tax (55%) comes from those making $50-500K. (Again, this ignores, Social Security contributions, which almost all come from those making less than $100K -SS is a flat 12.4% tax with a cap at $107K; less than 13% of returns are above $100K. These SS receipts were $784.9B in 2007, vs. total income tax receipts of $1116B). Once we add that in, we see that about 56% of the taxes are paid by those making less than $100K, a group that only earns around a 47% share of the income.

Re:Verizon and their union learning from Congress?

[LibRT]

Interesting - thanks for the additional info.

Of course, the "fairest" system would be a single flat income tax or a single consumption tax (where here I'm defining "fairest" as "each person pays an equal share of what they earn/spend"). Then, using your figures above, the 56% of earners making less than $100K would contribute 56% of the revenue. The benefits of such a system would include eliminating the enormous tax-preparation industry that exists simply because the tax code has become so confusing and complicated.

Are you using the stats here http://pubdb3.census.gov/macro/032007/hhinc/new06_000.htm ?

What's interesting is that if you plot this data out, comparing share of income with share of households, some things jump out:

- from about $52K to $100K, share of income almost exactly matches share of households;

- from $100K to $150K, the share of income jumps dramatically compared to the share of households: the percentage of all households in this division is 11.54% however this group earns 20.70% of all income, the second largest discrepancy;

- for the groups in the $150K to $200K and $200K to $250K, the discrepancy drops (to 4.10% households/10.42% income and 1.53%/5.04% respectively);

- at $250K+ the discrepancy rises again dramatically, to 1.93%/13.01% (the biggest point spread of all);

- the halfway point for households is about $50K: 51.36% of households make less than that while 48.64% make more. The share of income is 19.47% ($50K);

- there are almost certainly some extreme outliers at the top end.

Unless you have a system whereby the government entirely dictates who gets what, there will always be natural discrepancies between share of households and share of income, just as two people who sit in adjacent cubicles may make different salaries based on their perceived worth to their employer. And there will always be those who decry any result as "unfair". I guess the better question is: is it possible for a household to make the jump from one income tier to the next?

I arbitrarily picked 2002 data (which you can find here: http://pubdb3.census.gov/macro/032003/hhinc/new06_000.htm) and compared it to the 2007 data. This shows that the number of households in virtually every category below $85K decreased (notable exception: the number of households earning between $70K and $72.5K increased 11.84%) while the number of households above $85K increased, in many cases dramatically (for example: number of households earning $85K to $87.5K increased 5.39%; $87.5K - $90K: +6.94%; $90K - $92.5K: +8.19%; $92.5K - $95K: +11.52%; etc.).

What can one conclude from this? Well, everyone seems to be making more money (note: the data does not seem to correct for inflation, but inflation has been historically low during the sample period). The rich are getting richer, if you define rich as those making more than $85K. The richest households saw the greatest number of new entrants: there was a dramatic increase in the number of households earning $100K - $150K (+27.46%), $150K - $200K (+53.08%), $200K - $250K (+47.62%) and 250K+ (+45.97%). My quick analysis of that leads me to believe people are capable of bettering their place on the income ladder in the US. YMMV.

Re:Verizon and their union learning from Congress?

[Savantissimo]

Thanks, I'll take a look at the census data. I was working from the IRS data at: SOI Tax Stats - Individual Time Series Statistical Tables, but some data for more recent years is also available in more difficult to use form at: SOI Tax Stats - Individual Statistical Tables by Size of Adjusted Gross Income. The IRS data has categories on higher levels of income than the census data, and this allows seeing just how concentrated income really is at the top. For instance, nearly 1/6 of all income in 2007 went tho the 0.28% making over $1M per year.

Here is the 2007 IRS data, with "share" defined as "Share of total income divided by percentage of population". An equal share = 1. Also shown is the percentage of households falling into each category.

Income - % of Population - Share
$5,000 under $7,000 . . 3.38% . 0.1
$7,000 under $9,000 . . 3.47% . 0.13
$9,000 under $11,000 . .3.25% . 0.16
$11,000 under $13,000 . 3.37% . 0.2
$13,000 under $15,000 . 3.33% . 0.23
$15,000 under $17,000 . 3.18% . 0.26
$17,000 under $19,000 . 3.04% . 0.3
$19,000 under $22,000 . 4.42% . 0.34
$22,000 under $25,000 . 4.06% . 0.39
$25,000 under $30,000 . 6.30% . 0.45
$30,000 under $40,000 . 10.31%. 0.57
$40,000 under $50,000 . 7.80% . 0.74
$50,000 under $75,000 . 13.60%. 1.01
$75,000 under $100K . . 8.21% . 1.42
$100K under $200K . . . 9.41% . 2.19
$200K under $500K . .. .2.44% . 4.73
$500K under $1M . .. .. 0.46% . 11.16
$1M under $1.5M . .. .. 0.12% . 19.86
$1.5M under $2M . .. .. 0.05% . 28.33
$2M under $5M . .. .. . 0.076% . 49.17
$5M under $10M . .. . . 0.02% . 112.68
$10M or more . .. .. .. 0.013% . 502.49
(The % of all income earned by each category can be found by multiplying the two numbers together.)

Another interesting statistic is that those making over $1M make nearly as much as everybody earning under $40K combined. (That's 57% of the population making about the same as 0.28% of the population).

While inflation supposedly has been low (I'd say it has been understated at least 1-2% during this period to make GDP growth appear positive and keep government cost-of-living-adjustment expenses down), even using the official numbers that's compounded so that a 2002 dollar is worth over $1.25 today. If the inflation figures are too low by 1.5%, its more like $1.43. Inflation for the rich has likely been higher than for other segments of the population - for instance, boarding schools have quadrupled tuition over a period when the CPI only doubled (since the late '80s).

So using the official figures, $100K today is $79.7K in 2002. That is a big enough difference that eyeballing the figures is not going to work. The problem is that the categories themselves are what needs to be adjusted for inflation, while the available figures are categorized by nominal dollar earnings, so it's hard to compare across years. The Census data also shows the cutoff earnings for each quintile over time, and these can be inflation-adjusted. Here's a graph of that. In inflation adjusted terms, essentially all the real increase in earnings over the past 40 years has gone to the top 20%, virtually all of it to the top 5%. (That's in dollars. In percents things look more even, but that's an illusion.) The bottom 20% have seen shrinking / flat real earnings for several decades. Many people will rise over time in the distribution, but on average the lower you start, the lower you end up, and the more quickly income gains will tend to stop. With

Hell Yes!

[memnock]

I'll say up front, I don't know if the workers are striking because they don't have gold-trimmed toilet seats or their vacation benefits are being cut, but I don't really care. After seeing workers getting shafted in all sorts of industries, I'm quite happy to see at least one group of workers showing the middle finger to the execs.

Unfortunately, my family uses Verizon wireless, but I wasn't going to call customer service any time soon.

Re:Hell Yes!

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't worry. Verizon Wireless isn't union (at least not yet). Verizon is and that's who is striking.

Re:Hell Yes!

[ffejie]

Unfortunately, my family uses Verizon wireless, but I wasn't going to call customer service any time soon.

Verizon Wireless is not affected - they're non union and a different company from Verizon Telecom, jointly owned by Verizon Communications (55%) and Vodaphone (45%). The level of disinformation happening in this Slashdot discussion far exceeds the normal level.

Re:Hell Yes!

[Fireshadow]

Verizon wants 100 concessions from their union employees. Even though Verizon’s top five executives received compensation of $258 million over the past four years (1), Verizon wants to freeze pensions for current employees. Also eliminate traditional pensions for future workers, while making its 401(k) plans somewhat more generous for both (2). Additional, there's demands from Verizon regarding health care premiums for union employees.

References:

• (1) CWA - http://www.cwa-union.org/news/entry/45000_workers_on_strike_at_verizon
• (2) NY Times - http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/07/us/07verizon.html

Re:Hell Yes!

[Anonymous Coward]

That's pretty funny because I single handidly installed numerous T1's and Fibre circuits to every known cell carrier including VZW. You know, up in the North East August is pretty notorious for monster Thunderstorms that wreak Havoc on those giant Lightning rods known as cell towers. Your right VZW will not be affected....: )

Re:Hell Yes!

[cowboy76Spain]

In essence, your post is somewhat like: since there are other workers who had lost their jobs, they have to accept everything the company offers them.

Could you send my the e-mail of your boss/customers? I think he/them might be interested in knowing your POV...

Re:Hell Yes!

[Billly Gates]

YOu know Verizon was paying up to $17/hr for their call center where I lived and offered health insurance for its workers and pensions. The job sucks but it is well worth it if you have a famiy.

I noticed just a few days ago a lot of temp agencies are advertising, BIG TELECOM needs help desk workers, 13/hr, no pensions or benefits, all contract etc.

Now it seems to make sense. Verizon probably paid the temp agencies to quickly find workers to replace the good ones with cheaper ones so they can simply fire all the non union members or have ready replacements to save money.

Re:Hell Yes!

[Kohath]

The level of disinformation happening in this Slashdot discussion far exceeds the normal level.

No, it's about average for Slashdot.

Re:Hell Yes!

[Anonymous Coward]

Not affected? Verizon Wireless cellphones don't get any farther than the cell radio site without riding on the backbone network of the so called "separate company" Verizon Telecom. This is merely a financial shell-game to shift profits to the end point connection portion of this telecom service. I have seen first hand the continuing frantic overbuilds, equipment installs, and circuit adds within Verizon Telecom to support the roll-out of the cell nodes and their increasingly higher bandwidth requirements. I am disgusted to see how the portion of the greater Verizon Communications company now labeled as "wireline" is being publicly cast as nothing but the old copper pots lines in an effort to marginalize this workforce and network. The level of disinformation as to the separation of the Verizon companies with regards to their level of interdependence needed to deliver cell service is what "exceeds the normal level".

Re:Hell Yes!

[cgenman]

But union officials say that the field technicians and call center workers generally earn $60,000 to $77,000 before overtime and that benefits come to well under $50,000 a year.

While that doesn't seem crazy, that's pretty darned good. Still, if an executive is going to demand paycuts from their workers, they should include themselves, especially when making more than 10 million a year.

And thank you for the real links.

Re:Hell Yes!

[gcatullus]

Verizon is asking that the Union members contribute to their health insurance, they contribute 0 now, and they will have to pay $80.00 per week for a full family plan.

Re:Hell Yes!

[jackbird]

So, a $4160/year pay cut, then. No wonder they're pissed.

Re:Hell Yes!

[Anonymous Coward]

Sad thing is CWA didn't even blink when the same happened in the last AT&T contract that affected over 100,000 landline employess. In fact, they claimed it "improved our standard of living" and advised a yes vote in a hastily thrown together one week ratification process.

Sunday?

[Anonymous Coward]

Why would you picket on Sundays? Aren't most people off on Sundays and most businesses closed? You'd think they would be home Sunday watching sports. Monday morning more people would notice, you'd think?

Re:Sunday?

[Anonymous Coward]

Because they all have to work on Monday, they have no time off after all

I slowly remove my bra,

[Anonymous Coward]

to revel a hot set of GOPHERS

Landlines

[BlueMikey]

There's one easy way to solve this: stop using landlines, fire them all.

I guess that would keep Verizon/telcos from gouging customers with ridiculously overpriced, useless, decades-old technology.

Mixed Feelings

[DaMattster]

I have mixed feelings about this one. I think it is fair to expect Verizon's union workers to contribute money towards their healthcare costs. Just about every other employer makes their employees do so.

Re:Mixed Feelings

[SwedishPenguin]

But that would essentially be the same as taking a pay cut, definitely something worth striking over. If the employees have to pay for their health-insurance, then surely they should receive an equivalent pay rise? I don't see why you don't just add a payroll tax and get everyone universal health care coverage though, in the end it's the same except employers can't get out of it and it will be way cheaper without all the insurers skimming huge profits and a single large payer to negotiate prices for drugs and care. (and as a plus, everyone is covered and your coverage can't be cancelled when most needed based on some technicality that they've been holding out on as I understand happens quite frequently)

Re:Mixed Feelings

[Anonymous Coward]

My employer makes me contribute a whopping $25 per paycheck. If they change that rate and don't increase my compensation then I am going to haul ass. I'm just a high school educated guy, working for the man but I demand a middle class wage and benefits. I think everyone else should demand it as well.

Re:Mixed Feelings

[Anonymous Coward]

Welcome to the real world USA.
Healthcare costs money, dosh mulah.

I'm lucky. I pay 11.5% of my income towards the NHS here in the UK. My empoyer pays a similat amount.
For that I get free healthcare at the point of demand. None of this not getting treatment for breast Cancer frm Medicaid because I am a man.
Instead I get perfect treatment for my Leukaemia when ever I need it. No 'Do you have insurance' questions first.
Instead I got perfect treatment when I crashed my Motorcycle after hitting a deer and dislocating my shoulder. No, 'Do you have a credit card' questions first.

When I worked in the US my employer had to pay top dollar to get me insurance because of my Leukaemia even though I was (At that time) in remission and a simple three monthly blood test would show if it was on the way back AND give me time to return to the UK for FREE treatment.
Yeah, I despise the US Healthcare insudtry. They are a bunch of money gragging leeches.

That is IMHO a sign of what is so wrong with the USA today.
Far too many people making a living without contributing to the national wealth.

The new american dream, 'You too can live beyond your means. Just print a few more dollars, no one will ever notice honestly."

Re:Mixed Feelings

[royallthefourth]

I have mixed feelings about this one. I think it is fair to expect Verizon's union workers to contribute money towards their healthcare costs. Just about every other employer makes their employees do so.

"My job sucks, so it's only fair that other people's jobs should suck too instead of taking the effort to organize with my coworkers and demand that our job suck less."

Re:Mixed Feelings

[Anonymous Coward]

The problem you assholes across the ocean have, is that you don't have a huge 3rd world country directly across from your completely unguarded southern border, followed immediately by entire 3rd world continent south of there.

The problem we US Americans have is that if we fuck our own assholes with a plan like yours, we will effectively be giving free health care to every single human being on two continents: North and South America.

I'm sorry, but you globalists can't make us print that much fake money to pay for all those real costs. Nice try. You lose. How about a nice game of chess?

Re:Mixed Feelings

[Billly Gates]

Non-Americans do not have to pay for these outrageous coverage fees and poor service. You can be jealous which is understandable, but it is unsustainable and not fair to yourself and other workers.

Why not help someone do something about it. At the current rate people will be all out in the poor house paying over 50% of their paycheck to greedy HMOs by law.

Re:Mixed Feelings

[TarPitt]

Old fable:

A poor peasant in a desparate country is plowing his field. Suddenly his plow turns up an exotic looking lamp. He brushes the dirt off the lamp and out comes a genuine middle eastern Genii.

The Genii speaks, "I am greatful to you for freeing me. Normally I would grant 3 wishes to whoever frees me but I am far from home, and have only the strength to grant one wish. Whatever you like - wealth, power, fame - is yours for the asking."

The impovershed peasant thinks and thinks. What one thing would bring him the most happiness?

Finally the peasant speaks, "I have my wish now, Genii."

The Genii says, "And what is your wish?"

The peasant replies. "I want my neighbor's cow to die."

American politics is like the peasant in the fable. We have the ability to achieve great things together. Instead we use our energy to ensure someone as desparate as ourselves suffers more.

Re:Mixed Feelings

[nosferatu1001]

Erm, you do realise you have NI numbers that show your entitlement to healthcare in the UK?

It's free to citizens, EU members and those who are here over a certain time limit. Thats it.

Re:Mixed Feelings

[Anonymous Coward]

Keep in mind that many of the people currently on strike are the ones who are climbing up the poles in the middle of the night / dead of winter / triple digit summer temps so that Verizon's customer's can enjoy their phone/internet 24x7. These are the guys managing to keep the network together despite Verizon's cheap-ass management not wanting to invest in upgrading their network. Verizon is a very profitable company from all accounts, and these workers more than any others in the company deserve their compensation.

Despite the fact that I am not 100% pleased with some of the things unions do, at this point they appear downright saintly compared to unadulterated greed displayed by Verizon management.

Re:Mixed Feelings

[phantomfive]

There's nothing to be mixed about. Verizon employees feel it's worth it to strike, let them strike. I don't want a union where I work right now because it wouldn't benefit me, but history has shown when we outlaw the ability for workers to strike, it causes real problems.

Re:Mixed Feelings

[Anonymous Coward]

Right and then you and your "unionized" coworkers will be "unionized" together.. At the unemployment office.

Re:Mixed Feelings

[Anonymous Coward]

Really? My take from the story was that they'd both be enjoying cowburgers if old bessie took one for the team :D

Re:Mixed Feelings

[Anonymous Coward]

"My job sucks, so it's only fair that other people's jobs should suck too instead of taking the effort to organize with my coworkers and demand that our job suck less."

I love the black and white comments like this one lol. So in your line of thinking, since Verizon is being treated differently and their employees do not have to pay towards their own healthcare, instead of letting Verizon fix that we should make it so every single company gets treated poorly also?

Ahh, with every comment like yours the Internet gets a little dumber (what you may call "more dumber").

Re:Mixed Feelings

[Savantissimo]

"in the end it's the same except employers can't get out of it"

There you go.

Re:Mixed Feelings

[RightSaidFred99]

What's your point? You seriously think the "poor illegals" won't get their free health care as well? Or their children? We have a population of poor people larger than most of the countries in the EU. Things won't work the same way here.

Re:Mixed Feelings

[mjwx]

I have mixed feelings about this one. I think it is fair to expect Verizon's union workers to contribute money towards their healthcare costs. Just about every other employer makes their employees do so.

If employee's should be forced to contribute to their company provided health insurance...

What is the difference to paying a tax that provides universal health care?

Answer: The tax will cost less.
Signed,
An Australian.

Re:Mixed Feelings

[zippthorne]

It's fun that you think your employer pays 11% of your pay for NHS...

Take amount you think you're getting in compensation. Your salary, the value of any benefits you're getting, etc. before taxes.

Now take the amount you think the your employer pays on your behalf. The NHS benefit, any payroll type taxes that also don't show up (does the UK have something like FICA?) etc. These numbers might be more difficult to find, as they might not printed directly on your pay-stub.

Add those numbers together. That is what you're worth to your employer.

Actually, it's the lower bound of what you're worth to your employer. If you weren't doing something worth more than that amount to them, they simply wouldn't be able to afford to keep you on. You might be worth more to them. Perhaps quite a bit more, even.

But that is, at least, the level of compensation that you both agreed to. Both of you weighing in factors of what you needed to do, and what you could do against the market of other workers. Do you really think that without the government demanding that a portion of your compensation be spent in a certain way, that you wouldn't be able to get that level of compensation and that you wouldn't be better off if you could spend it yourself in the way that is most beneficial to you?

Re:Mixed Feelings

[zippthorne]

Indeed. Verizon workers should be perfectly free to strike. Also, Verizon should be perfectly free to end their contracts and hire new people *. Let everyone vote with their feet.

*Unless said contracts include a clause which prevents this....

Re:Mixed Feelings

[geoffrobinson]

Depends on whose perspective. Verizon is paying more. Workers will pay more. Looks worse from each end. So it seems like a pay cut, but it depends on your perspective.

Re:Mixed Feelings

[jackbird]

The strawmen you're referring to get free healthcare NOW. They get it in emergency rooms for an order of magnitude more money than it would cost to provide reasonable preventative care. They get heart valves replaced for six figures because they can't afford $500 to get an abcessed tooth pulled. And everyone else foots the bill.

Of course, as the poster mentioned already, it's also not the most difficult thing in the world to have some access controls in place. How would you go about getting a doctor's visit fraudulently billed to Medicare today?

Re:Mixed Feelings

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm glad you stated your nationality. Apparently you don't study politics in the US. American politicians would add X% onto a 'health tax' to get more money to spend on little pet projects in their districts to get re-elected.
BTW, Medicare and Medicaid always reimburse health care providers BELOW THE COST of delivery of the service. For some reason, this never gets mentioned.

Re:Mixed Feelings

[ErikZ]

How do you figure a tax will cost less?

I don't think you understand how inefficient our bureaucracy is.

and do what drop fios for comcast cable? directv?

[Joe_Dragon]

and do what drop fios for comcast cable? directv?

Strikers already lost?

[Anonymous Coward]

If Verizon already had a contingency plan to deal with the loss of workers, doesn't that buy Verizon enough time to hire elsewhere?

Re:Strikers already lost?

[SwedishPenguin]

What kind of insane labour laws would allow firing someone over exercising their right to strike?

Re:Strikers already lost?

[demonlapin]

The rules are a bit complicated, but in some circumstances it's legal to hire permanent replacement workers. There's a summary of some of the relevant law here.

Re:and do what drop fios for comcast cable? direct

[Anonymous Coward]

Neither? Ditch it all-togethor.

so let's make the work 39.9 hours a week with no

[Joe_Dragon]

sick time
time off
health plan

not only that let's go fedex and make then have to buy / rent the tuck and pay all costs even gas and repairs.
make them have to buy there own tools, cable and more.

WTF

[Anonymous Coward]

I know there are lots of things people complain about Slashdot and a part of that is just nostalgia - things were never perfect. BUT why the hell does there seem to be a trend to pick stories up from the Daily Mail, of all places?

Re:WTF

[PimpBot]

Elementary, my dear Watson:

Rob Malda = R.M. = Rupert Murdoch

For years, News Corp has been propping up the Google, Linux, and HURD conspiracy through the awesome power of the Slashdot media empire. Verizon's use of red in their marketing is a signal to all the socialist bourgeois to take up arms!

Buy Windows 7 today, and join the resistance!

Re:WTF

[Anonymous Coward]

I believe the Daily Mail are aggressively targeting social news sites. This story is a fine example - it's about an American company and its American workers and the effects on its American customers, yet somehow we get the report from a UK tabloid!? It's not like it's gone unnoticed in the US.

Re:and do what drop fios for comcast cable? direct

[Anonymous Coward]

Brilliant. Once you have ditched 'it' altogether, we won't have to worry about you posting on this series of tubes anymore, will we?

STRIKE !! STRIKE !! STRIKE !!

[Anonymous Coward]

Batter out !!

Verizon ?? Ah, who gives a shit !! Them east germans are a bunch of pussys anyways !!

Re:so let's make the work 39.9 hours a week with n

[memnock]

Years ago, a UPS driver who was our "regular" guy told me that the drivers had to pay for scratches and damages to the trucks. That's one anecdote and I never verified it. So UPS already has been shafting their drivers.

Verizon:

[Anonymous Coward]

Can you hear them now?

The workers have reason to strike

[gearloos]

The workers have reason to strike! When you thieve, pillage, and plunder Verizon, your suppose to share the spoils.

remove healthcare from all jobs and make it be it'

[Joe_Dragon]

remove healthcare from all jobs and make it be it's own like personal car insurance

Re:so let's make the work 39.9 hours a week with n

[gcatullus]

Depending on the union contract UPS drivers have to pay for damages to their trucks, but the UPS drivers also get things like the ability to retire with a full pension and health insurance after 20 years. Now this just changed and they added that you had to be older than 57 to retire. I just had a conversation with a guy griping that he had to wait another 10 years to retire. He thought that was just not fair, I mean he was 45 and had 18 years. But he said it wasn't all bad, because he had 8 weeks of vacation a year.

Falsehood detected.

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, money spent by the government, it disappears completely. Wait, no it doesn't. Just seeing you make such a blatantly false statement discredits everything else you said.

In reality, the money spent by the government pays back, whether it be in the salaries of workers (who engage in commerce of their own), direct benefits such as highway infrastructure or park creation that actually increases economic activity, or fire and police who prevent harm from coming to numerous others.

But no, you think it just disappears. What, do they just burn it? You may argue that it's not beneficial, or not effective, but don't try to serve such a load of BS on us.

So yeah, you are either deliberately lying, or just so misinformed that nothing else you say is of merit.

This just in,

[DarkIye]

The Daily Mail reports: blah blah blah, don't acknowledge the existence of The Daily Mail.

verizon had customer service?

[Anonymous Coward]

I just cancelled my verizon phone/dsl service last week after a month because they wouldn`t send out a tech to fix the utterly crap line quality and dsl speeds of 384kbps (on a good day). Although I noticed they did have enough sense to stop offering 3Mbps DSL service for this area on their horribly slow, bloated website, apparently now that they know it doesn`t f-ing work.

hahaha

[v(*_*)vvvv]

They can't even treat their workers right, and we expect more from their customer service... *sigh*

If only had a choice.

Send resume to Verizon

[Billly Gates]

Check ...

Me and the 7 million other unemployed Americans will be happy to take these jobs and will be proud to be non unionized. Keep it up union

Re:Send resume to Verizon

[TarPitt]

and hundreds of millions of impoverished workers in the developing world would be happy to take your non-union job.

Sorry, you have already lost.

Re:Send resume to Verizon

[cowboy76Spain]

Don't forget to write in the resume that you are willing to work for as little as anybody else they can find! Ask them to cut your rate if they get cheapest workers!

Re:Send resume to Verizon

[DigiShaman]

This right here. I'm willing to do the same (accept a lower paycheck) if that means staying employed. I assume most Americans would do the same all while grumbling about the whole process. But you know what? The cost of goods would also come down because no one can afford them. Technically, this would be deflation. However, we are in a period of inflation at this moment. At some point, all fiat monetary were bound to have their weaknesses exposed. If you ask me politics only accelerated the inevitable to come.

Re:Send resume to Verizon

[cowboy76Spain]

This right here. I'm willing to do the same (accept a lower paycheck) if that means staying employed.

This does not mean "but if we accept lower wages then more people will be employed" (Verizon has increased profits). It means "I will be hired and someone else will be fired". What then means that someone else will appear offering to work for less than you.

But you know what? The cost of goods would also come down because no one can afford them. Technically, this would be deflation.

Are you sure? Deflation means that any investment needs a better ROI to be profitable.

If I use X $ to buy steel and pay workers to make a car for selling, with inflation I expect that the sooner I begin to do that, the less capital I will need. Also, if I know that today a car like the one I am going to do sells for X + Y, I can expect that when my car hits the market it may be sold by X + Y + Z. And the buyer of the car will know that if he delays buying the car, he will end paying more so he has no incentive in delaying that.

With deflation, I know that if I delay buying and paying the raw materials and labour, it will be cheaper. Also, if I know that today a car like the one I am going to do sells for X + Y, I can expect that when my car hits the market it may be sold by X + Y - Z. If Z is greater than Y, then I am losing money. And the buyer of the car will know that if he delays buying the car, he will end paying less so he will also delay the purchase to the maximum, making Z greater.

So, what is the response to deflation? Do not invest, do not purchase, do not produce. Just keep your money in your wallet as it produces more than if you put it to work.

Also, you seem to assume that prices will be elastic (they will react quickly to falling demand with falling prices). Mind you, some prices are not so elastic so it may take a long time before their price gets down. Asuming that the companies producing them do not decide just to cut supply and close production lines.

At some point, all fiat monetary were bound to have their weaknesses exposed. If you ask me politics only accelerated the inevitable to come.

As opposed to? Gold Standard (another kind of fiat money, with the disavantage that it is not flexible and forces deflation)? Barter?

Re:Send resume to Verizon

[Billly Gates]

We are having deflation right now. THe government is trying to hide it by printing more money which causes inflation. Our interest rates are near zero and still no inflation shows the market is strongly favoring deflation still and many things are going down in price.

I got flamed here for my post willing to work for less, but it beats McDonalds and people need to accept to work more for a lot less money to remain competitive. It is the new standard and Wall Street looks at numbers like salaries carefully. Until there is an economic recovery we all need to be willing to make sacrafices or move back in with our parents as no one wants to think we are worth anything.

Re:Send resume to Verizon

[Anonymous Coward]

And you are the reason why employment laws in the US suck and companies can do with HUMAN resources whatever they want in order to fill the coffers of the rich. Good thinking!

Re:Send resume to Verizon

[Anonymous Coward]

Scab.

Re:Send resume to Verizon

[Anonymous Coward]

Wooo race to the bottom.

Re:Send resume to Verizon

[Anonymous Coward]

Me and 700 million other Indians will be happy to take those jobs and would be proud to work for less than your minimum wage. Keep it up Americans.

Re:Send resume to Verizon

[tompaulco]

and hundreds of millions of impoverished workers in the developing world would be happy to take your non-union job.
If they have the means to shinny up a pole on the east coast within 15 minutes of a call being received, then my hats off to 'em.

Re:Send resume to Verizon

[stanza28]

That's why *they* are powerful. Because *they* have succeeded in making you believe that the enemy is some poor sucker fighting for survival, when in reality the enemy is unchecked greed in the hands of a few very well financed shareholders. This is not about politics, it's about crushing the working person, unionized, or non-unionized. This is game theory at it finest (aka: divide and conquer), working against almost all of us. We are a bunch of mice fighting for scraps at the foot of the table of some gluttonous lions. This mouse is looking forward to the lions keeling over from choking on their greed, and then all the little mice will be nourished by eating their rotting carcasses. Yup, really.

Re:Send resume to Verizon

[Anonymous Coward]

Check ...

Me and the 7 million other unemployed Americans will be happy to take these jobs and will be proud to be non unionized. Keep it up union

Then you can be ussuccessful in yet another minimum wage job with no benefits just like Verizon wants and everyone else offers

By Verizon math...

[Anonymous Coward]

There are only 450 strikers. Nothing to worry about.

Re:By Verizon math...

[Savantissimo]

Unless you are an anonymous parasitic management shill and you are surrounded by those who actually work for a living.

Re:By Verizon math...

[Bill Dimm]

I don't think you got the joke.

Let em strike

[p51d007]

Fire em! With the unemployment rate, I'll betcha there are hundreds that would move, to take those jobs. Amazing...when the economy is good, unions want more. When the economy is bad, unions want more. Hey, I haven't had a raise in a while, but, I don't expect one, because of the economy. I'm just glad I have a job. Now, if/when the economy picks up (with the congress & the current president, I don't expect that happening), I'll ask for a raise, if I think I deserve one, and if I don't get one, I'll ask what I need to do to get one, or, will look elsewhere. Unions aren't getting a lot of sympathy from the general public, who, in large, see them as underworked, overpaid, and worthless. About the only ones who care for lazy unions, are POLITICIANS who know those union dues keep them in office, because most of the rank & file, who couldn't add 1+1 and come up with the correct answer, will vote how their union leadership expects them to vote, or because "I've always voted for democrats". Personally, I'd like to see elections revert to how they use to be...if you didn't own property, you couldn't vote, because you didn't have a personal stake in the country. Too many freeloaders in the country, sucking off of the sweat of others.

Re:Let em strike

[Zironic]

The state of the economy is pretty darn irrelevant. If the company is posting good results obviously they can afford to pay their workers more.

If you're accepting pay cuts because 'the state of the economy' even if your company is doing well, then you're an idiot.

In this economy...

[nurb432]

Lets go on strike and risk what few jobs we do have. Ya, that makes tons of sense to me?!?!?

Smart move CWA.

Re:In this economy...

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't be scared. You are worth something without your boss.

Re:so let's make the work 39.9 hours a week with n

[Anonymous Coward]

UPS is a bad example of a horrible company.
They expect you to work hard and do your job right. In exchange you get paid a ton with great benefits.

Sure they screwup some. But for every box that you got a problem with. Another 100,000 made it somewhere perfectly fine.
That's a pretty good ratio when it comes to companies fucking up these days.

Unlike AT&T here in the story.. They could fuckup dying.

Paying my own way == my job sucks

[Kohath]

I see. "I have to pay for a small part of my healthcare" means "my job sucks".

Let's all organize and demand unlimited freebies until executives cut their pay to $50,000 per year. I'm sure they'll be doing that almost right away. Remember all those times that executives cut their own pay to under $100,000 at all those other companies?

Re:Paying my own way == my job sucks

[royallthefourth]

Let's all organize and demand unlimited freebies until executives cut their pay to $50,000 per year.

Yes, except they wouldn't allow it to cut that far into their take. They'll send in the National Guard before that.

Re:Paying my own way == my job sucks

[sonicmerlin]

The top 5 executives at Verizon earned over $250 million over the last 4 years. That's a far cry from $50,000 you moron.

Re:Paying my own way == my job sucks

[Kohath]

What number is the right number? Exactly what amount should executives make so the unions won't strike?

Re:Paying my own way == my job sucks

[Anonymous Coward]

Try it more like this -

"The employees and the employers agreed a contract that defined remuneration in the form of pay and benefits - where one of the benefits was a non-contributory health-plan. The employers have since decided this was a bad idea, and instead of renegotiating the terms of the contract, where they take one benefit and give another (like the pay these contributions will cost the employees) - they have simply decided to remove one benefit. So the employees have decided to remove the labour until the contract is being adhered to again."

If this was an IT project, or a government contract, everyone on /. would understand implicitly. However since it involves Unions, people seem to be under the impression that these employees are whiners demanding more than they deserve....

They are only asking for what they were promised... if I used the old 'unlimited broadband' as my example would you lot get it faster?

IF the company then can't afford so many employees, they may have to let some of them go. But those let go would presumably be in receipt of redundancy benefits. Which of course is the exact reason Verizon is doing this. They don't want to pay anyone off, they want to screw over everyone so that any who stay cost less, and any who leave do so on their own terms and get no redundancy. It's fucking bullshit, and anyone with a spine and brain working together should be standing shoulder to shoulder with them (even if it metaphorically), whether you support Unions, or you support the rule of law, they are right in both cases.

bias detector

[KingAlanI]

sure, it's the Daily Fail and it's to be expected, but the summary (drawing form the article?) clearly seems to be trying to get customers mad at the workers.

Re:so let's make the work 39.9 hours a week with n

[GameMaster]

http://www.fedexdriverslawsuit.com/

Because we all know: Guns = Crime!

[Anonymous Coward]

And Money = Taxes.

Re:so let's make the work 39.9 hours a week with n

[Anonymous Coward]

Well my wife works for Verizon as Fios support ... and they work their employees to death ... the work them up to 15-20 hours per week MANDATORY overtime (you can get fired for not working it). Many of them have had to do this for well over a year straight.

They treat their employees like crap and lie to them through their teeth.
They have one of the worst work environments that I have ever encountered.

The only reason to work there is that the benefits don't suck (I have had better tho) but this is beginning to change

I know that they were not as profitable as they were last year ... who the hell is... at least they are still well into the black.

Management isn't asked to take cuts but the rank and file are.

On the pension thing It really bothers me personally because we are 1 year from being eligible and now we cant get it, WTF???
( keep in mind that while you accrue a pension you cannot write off IRA contributions on your taxes)

Also they say that subscriber growth has slowed ... well the reason for the slowdown is that expansion has virtually ceased... the only go into markets that they assume that they can get like a 70% + subscription rate.

Plutocrats?

[rossdee]

The Plutocrats are not the ones in charge, if they were, they would never have allowed their planet to be demoted.

I am not sure what planet the Tea Party is from.

Re:Plutocrats?

[Anonymous Coward]

Not sure, but they're probably sponsored by Mars.

So?

[Any Web Loco]

So the poor are getting stomped becuase they're stupid? Still doesn't seem fair...

vzw

[Anonymous Coward]

Called customer service and got the same crappy service I always get.

ETF?

[dnahelicase]

Were these workers outside of their two year contracts? 450 workers x $300 = $135,000. Seems this might be nothing more than nice bonus for a Verizon exec.

interesting news video of striking workers..

[Anonymous Coward]

and one union employee had a beer in his hand while on the picket line....

You know what this means?

[mr_resident]

The strikers will tell everyone they'll show up to the picket lines somewhere between noon - 4PM. They'll show up at 4:30, knock quietly once, leave a "Sorry we missed you" sticker and go home.

The reason is they're living in fairy tale land

[Quila]

Verizon's wireless division is hurting, the need for their services is shrinking. Yet they want to pretend it's still the gravy days. No, they can't just mix it in one big pool with the profitable wireless division, since that's a joint venture with Vodafone. Aside from that, how would the wireless people feel about their profitable division being drained by the unprofitable wired division? Sorry, no raises for you this year, we had to bail out the wired division.

Here are some desired concessions:

Contribute to their own health care premiums: I've always done that.

Freezing and killing pensions. That does suck, but the other side is an expanded 401k.

Five sick days a year instead of unlimited: When was the last time I got sick days at a company?

Deny raises to sub-performing employees: This can be an issue only for the lazy, which is probably why it's an issue.

Strike?

[Anonymous Coward]

Unlike those Comcast employees who get fired for "Poor job performance" if they express an interest in organizing.

Contingent worker transformer explosion

[WanThai]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fZIHE3qYEtE

You KNOW I am with you on this... apk

[Anonymous Coward]

Per our conversations before here -> http://yro.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=2354136&threshold=-1&commentsort=0&mode=thread&pid=36927320

* ESPECIALLY AN "INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY WORKERS UNION"...

APK

P.S.=> Meaning a Union for Programmers/Programmer-Analysts/Software Engineers/Network &-or PC Engineers-Techs-Admins, etc./et al...

... apk

Verizon is only interested in their bottom line

[Anonymous Coward]

Verizon should be ashamed of themselves. They expect union workers to contribute like non union employees, and they would love to move all jobs out of the USA and put more money in their OWN pockets. There is never any thanks or give backs to the customers. They will never mention any promotions that go on in the company to save the customer money, and if you have heard about a promotion for verizon you can be sure it was not from verizon, it would be from word of mouth from another verizon customer, they are all about themselves. The CEO is paid way to much and he wants more for him and his buddies as well, as a matter of fact the CEO gave himself a raise this year where he now makes 36 million, without his stock options OMG how much does one man need in all reality. It is always about, take from the customers, take from the workers and put into there own pockets. Verizon as well as all the other companies do not understand that people wll no longer be able to afford to pay for any kind of services including TV or Phone especially if they keep taking from our pockets. Thei bottom line is profit for there top dogs, and I mean do mean dogs. Where does it STOP Verizon says they only want the union workers to contribute to their health care like their non union employees do but where does it stop, AND WHAT IS NEXT, then they will want the union employees to take a rate of pay cut to match that of their non union employess, and so on and so on, it has to STOP NOW. The big picture is already unfolding before you know it people will have no money to pay for any goods or services because all these companies will be expecting workers to pay more and more out of their own pockets thus creating the collapse of their own companies. There will be no money left to live thus there will not be a need for theses companies goods and services and we will go backwards and there eventually will be a revolution in this country. EX: THERE IS A LOYALITY PLAN THAT VERIZON WILL NEVER TELL YOU ABOUT IF YOU JUST CALL UNLESS YOU SPECEFICALLY ASK ABOUT IT. THERE IS A LOYALITY PLAN WHERE YOU CAN GET 10.00 0FF OF YOUR 29.99 DATA PLAN FOR YOU AND ALL OF YOUR PHONES UNDER YOUR PLAN FOR A YEAR, AND VERIZON WILL NEVER EVER EVER OFFER THIS TO YOU, SO PLEASE TELL EVERYONE YOU KNOW AND CALL AND GET YOUR DISCOUNT TODAY, BECAUSE VERIZON WILL NEVER GO OUT OF THERE WAY TO TELL THIER CUSTOMERS SOMETHING THAT WOULD SAVE YOU MONEY, BECAUSE IT WILL HURT THEIR BOTTOM LINE PROFITS AS WELL AS THEIR LITTLE PIGGY TOP DOGS WALLETS.