Rather useless article from the AP, there. It doesn't cite enough numbers to determine insurance co. income versus what they arbitrarily call "expenses". I.e., if the base pay for a manager in the insurance co's HQ is $1 million, and you ramp that up the closer you approach the C-level suite, those are "expenses" that make apparent profit decline rapidly. And there are many, many more ways to redistribute income so as to make what you report as "profit" shrink without ever revealing your true margins.
All the little workers demand higher and higher wages.
Your words suggest a certain contempt for the American worker/consumer (who are 90% or more of the American people, although some are only discovering their "class" as they are let go as the consequences of Republican economic policies unfold). That in turn indicates a certain myopia, which is suggestive of your economic status/dependency.
Regardless, if you had thought about your last sentence:
I hear it worked great for Detroit.
first, your words might have been different. Since you insist in placing blame upon "all of the little workers" and use Detroit to represent your example, would you care to explain how heavily-unionized Ford keeps ticking along, while GM and Chrysler are lurching towards the abyss?
I am always amused by those who blame America's worker/consumers/soldiers, when it is they who made this country great, and it is they who stood (and stand) between America's wealthy elite - whether they are of the symbiotic or of the parasitical sort - and America's enemies who would take their wealth and slay them out of hand.
You have convinced yourself - and now attempt to convince the world - that leadership and management make no difference.
You complain of "all the little workers" demanding higher wages when it is America's top 5% - exemplified by our CEOs - who drive price increases. It takes a lot of margin to raise your pay and benefits from a multiple of 30 times average worker pay to 400 times; the same goes for higher dividends, and on and on.
If the demands of America's worker/consumer placed a disproportionate burden upon America's economy, then pray tell why has our inequality curve shifted to reflect the wealthy few taking ever more ever faster? http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/08/13/even-more-gilded/
Consider the implications of that chart, and tell me again whose understanding is "broken".
lollll....I gather you think burger flippers should make, oh, $0.50 an hour so that you can have a cheaper burger?
Can probably get an even cheaper burger, if we grind burger flippers up and make 'em into more burgers when they die of starvation.
Why don't you go talk to those burger flippers' landlords, insurance companies, gasoline stations, utility companies, grocery store owners, and so on and so forth and tell them to lower prices so that you can get a cheaper burger by paying burger flippers less?
The cost of living is what dictates minimum wage; perhaps your economics courses did not cover that? It was covered rather well at the two universities I obtained degrees from.
What you are essentially arguing is that you are entitled to live well by picking and choosing what other people are entitled to earn, regardless of whether that is enough for them to live on.
Very...democratic of you, if by democratic I mean dictatorial.
The EPA differs. According to the same link I posted, anything more than one thermometer's worth of mercury requires external intervention. To quote:
Spills of More than the Amount in a Thermometer, but Less Than or Similar to Two Tablespoons (One Pound)
Cleanup Instructions
Have everyone else leave the area; don't let anyone walk through the mercury on their way out.
Open all windows and doors to the outside.
Turn down the temperature.
Shut all doors to other parts of the house, and leave the area. Don't vacuum.
Call your local or state health or environmental agency.
Spill more than two tablespoons (which - being about 150 large thermometers - is a little far-fetched to be an accident in the scenario I posited in a vain attempt at humor) makes you legally required to call the National Response Center.
Does your conclusion that "They're killing themselves, just to enrich our few and their few - no one has to emit that level of pollution to manufacture goods." still apply in this case?
lollll....of course. Did I somehow convey the impression that I approve of the massive emissions of pollution anywhere on this planet?
We all only have one planet - and it is a closed system. If anybody piddles in the pool, we'll all be swimming in it - sooner or later.
The reason the U.S. of A. still emits massive amounts of pollution is the same reason that so much of our industry relocated to China so quickly: Our right - our corporations - see controlling pollutants as an expense that will cut into their profits/bonuses/dividends, so they resist stopping emissions here and, if possible and often preferably, they relocate to a nation whose people are unable protect themselves and their children.
They're killing themselves, just to enrich our few and their few - no one has to emit that level of pollution to manufacture goods. Luckily for the wealthy in all countries, huge piles of cash make you immune to pollution.
Trust me: Americans would happily take a cut in wages to reach parity with Chinese workers...if our housing, food, medical, utility, insurance, and other living expenses also fell to Chinese levels.
But our top economic tier doesn't want that to happen; when you've gone to all the trouble - and three decades of work - to shift America's wealth into your hands, why would you want to see the value of your holdings fall?
lollll...you are a little behind the curve, there. Ever heard the phrase "dual-use" technology?
The Washington Times' article is just revisionism, designed to conceal what the Republicans had already done with free trade by shifting the responsibility forward in time.
You imply that I am unwilling to see other "human beings" become more well off. That is either a misinterpretation or a distortion of my words. Anybody who is willing to work hard should be able to get ahead, wherever they live.
What I am not willing to do is to sacrifice Americans to make the citizens of some other country better off.
Free trade as it is now structured (to include the currency manipulation by some countries) penalizes the American people - and indeed, the people of all of what were once described as "the industrialized countries" - for being successful for so long. The people of our nations do not bear any responsibility for the forms of government that other countries have chosen that have held their peoples back for so long. To ask us to pay for the mistakes - the choices - of others is unwarranted, unrealistic, unfair, and unacceptable.
I would add that those who say or insinuate that Americans do not work hard are either uneducated or willfully ignorant. I would heartily recommend the Discovery Channel series "Dirty Jobs" to such.
Then I would suggest making sure you are part of the 10%
Me, I'm American in the sense that I view the American people to be my people.
I think it is wrong for some to exploit absolutely artificial differences nation to nation in the cost of the essentials of survival - food, housing, medical care, utilities - by transplanting their manufacturing plants and service centers to those cheaper nations so that they can pay lower wages vis-a-vis America's solely to further enrich themselves faster than they could in America.
That costs America jobs and is bringing great harm to my fellow Americans. Further, I would expect the average citizen of all nations to have precisely the same perspective regarding protecting their fellow countrymen.
But it is not the "average" citizen of any country who is being so tremendously enriched by inequitable free trade, now is it?
I have a difficult time accepting that I should seek to be "among the 10%" and take joy in counting my riches while watching my fellow Americans slide into poverty. I may not be religious, but I still don't believe in abusing my fellow human beings just to satiate my greed.
Sigh...I knew the artificial inequities in trade - that is, the artificial difference in the cost of living and thus the wages you can get away with paying, the artificial differences in the cost of regulation, and the way the Chinese manipulate their currency to ensure they maintain a preeminent trade position - would result in the much-ballyhooed "green jobs" going to China.
Am I the only person in America who sees a horribly bleak future for our children because of inequitable free trade and trickle-down economics? The latter only encourages our top economic tier to seek the margins the former provides, eliminating patriotism (and ethics, morality, honor, and even the public displays of religion - but that is another rant entirely) from the equation.
Unless something changes, I don't think America has anywhere to go but down...for 90% of us, anyway.
The possibility of being dragged into a German court just because you viewed something is a game-changer, I'd say.
You'd have to weigh the potential time and money lost responding to German legal proceedings against just how bad you want to see any website that is within reach of the German legal system - unless you know the contents of all Flash animations and other media for the entire website in advance.
Does Google accept !GermanContent as a query modifier?
I don't appear to have any mod points today, else I would have attempted to mod your comment up.
It would appear that Business overthrew our government one day when we were sleeping, and democracy was replaced with corporatism - except under this version of corporatism, Business has displaced almost all other interests.
Half to Barack Obama for demonstrating the leadership to advocate diplomacy as a means of settling and avoiding international conflict.
And half to the American People, for having the guts to choose to try for peace even though we were inundated by the claims of the powerful in both American politics and American media that only those eager for war could protect us from war.
Any flying bee created at Harvard would come complete with a plan for incorporation, 100,0000,000 stock certificates for the initial IPO, and 12 lawyers aboard and thus would never be able to get off of the ground.
The MIT bee would just work.
(Seriously, Harvard?? Far better CMU, MIT, Cal Poly, Stanford...but Harvard? lollll...the skull in "Skull and Bones" is empty for a reason.)
People with "12345" or similar passwords should get their own internet, where they would be allowed to share lolcatz and powerpoint chains, play with their purple internet buddy, and zap those cute webmonkeys on banners without hurting themselves.
an argument that started with the word interestingly:
"Interestingly, it's not the stereotypical offshore or outsourced employee who's most risky to their organizations.
that was not somebody attempting either a subterfuge or the implantation of a subliminal suggestion.
You see, it may very well be true that "offshore" employees in banking have less culpability, thus far...which - entirely coincidentally, I'm sure - corresponds directly to the amount of penetration into banking that offshoring has - thus far.
Interestingly, don't you think that such statistics provide a a nifty argument for offshoring banking?
Slashdot Mirror
Rather useless article from the AP, there. It doesn't cite enough numbers to determine insurance co. income versus what they arbitrarily call "expenses". I.e., if the base pay for a manager in the insurance co's HQ is $1 million, and you ramp that up the closer you approach the C-level suite, those are "expenses" that make apparent profit decline rapidly. And there are many, many more ways to redistribute income so as to make what you report as "profit" shrink without ever revealing your true margins.
All the little workers demand higher and higher wages.
Your words suggest a certain contempt for the American worker/consumer (who are 90% or more of the American people, although some are only discovering their "class" as they are let go as the consequences of Republican economic policies unfold). That in turn indicates a certain myopia, which is suggestive of your economic status/dependency.
Regardless, if you had thought about your last sentence:
I hear it worked great for Detroit.
first, your words might have been different. Since you insist in placing blame upon "all of the little workers" and use Detroit to represent your example, would you care to explain how heavily-unionized Ford keeps ticking along, while GM and Chrysler are lurching towards the abyss?
I am always amused by those who blame America's worker/consumers/soldiers, when it is they who made this country great, and it is they who stood (and stand) between America's wealthy elite - whether they are of the symbiotic or of the parasitical sort - and America's enemies who would take their wealth and slay them out of hand.
You have convinced yourself - and now attempt to convince the world - that leadership and management make no difference.
You complain of "all the little workers" demanding higher wages when it is America's top 5% - exemplified by our CEOs - who drive price increases. It takes a lot of margin to raise your pay and benefits from a multiple of 30 times average worker pay to 400 times; the same goes for higher dividends, and on and on.
If the demands of America's worker/consumer placed a disproportionate burden upon America's economy, then pray tell why has our inequality curve shifted to reflect the wealthy few taking ever more ever faster? http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/08/13/even-more-gilded/
Consider the implications of that chart, and tell me again whose understanding is "broken".
The next time one of those Higgs leaves without paying his tab, I'm calling the timecops.
lollll....I gather you think burger flippers should make, oh, $0.50 an hour so that you can have a cheaper burger?
Can probably get an even cheaper burger, if we grind burger flippers up and make 'em into more burgers when they die of starvation.
Why don't you go talk to those burger flippers' landlords, insurance companies, gasoline stations, utility companies, grocery store owners, and so on and so forth and tell them to lower prices so that you can get a cheaper burger by paying burger flippers less?
The cost of living is what dictates minimum wage; perhaps your economics courses did not cover that? It was covered rather well at the two universities I obtained degrees from.
What you are essentially arguing is that you are entitled to live well by picking and choosing what other people are entitled to earn, regardless of whether that is enough for them to live on.
Very...democratic of you, if by democratic I mean dictatorial.
...that no planet's signature will approximate a noisy amplifier.
The EPA differs. According to the same link I posted, anything more than one thermometer's worth of mercury requires external intervention. To quote:
Spills of More than the Amount in a Thermometer, but Less Than or Similar to Two Tablespoons (One Pound) Cleanup Instructions
Spill more than two tablespoons (which - being about 150 large thermometers - is a little far-fetched to be an accident in the scenario I posited in a vain attempt at humor) makes you legally required to call the National Response Center.
Does your conclusion that "They're killing themselves, just to enrich our few and their few - no one has to emit that level of pollution to manufacture goods." still apply in this case?
lollll....of course. Did I somehow convey the impression that I approve of the massive emissions of pollution anywhere on this planet?
We all only have one planet - and it is a closed system. If anybody piddles in the pool, we'll all be swimming in it - sooner or later.
The reason the U.S. of A. still emits massive amounts of pollution is the same reason that so much of our industry relocated to China so quickly: Our right - our corporations - see controlling pollutants as an expense that will cut into their profits/bonuses/dividends, so they resist stopping emissions here and, if possible and often preferably, they relocate to a nation whose people are unable protect themselves and their children.
http://www.epa.gov/mercury/spills/#thermometer/
You trying to make me feel old? 8^)
I think the rubber hose has been phased out in favor of the oh-so-versatile wet towel.
You fold the wet towel up tight across its width, drop its temperature to the verge of freezing, and Voila!
A cryptanalysis tool that automatically self-destructs while you stall the International Red Cross.
Corporations are people, too: http://www.ratical.org/corporations/SCvSPR1886.html
So I guess they merit "social engineering", eh?
/SarcasmOff
Not yet: http://visibleearth.nasa.gov/view_rec.php?id=1036/
They're killing themselves, just to enrich our few and their few - no one has to emit that level of pollution to manufacture goods. Luckily for the wealthy in all countries, huge piles of cash make you immune to pollution.
I guess.
Trust me: Americans would happily take a cut in wages to reach parity with Chinese workers...if our housing, food, medical, utility, insurance, and other living expenses also fell to Chinese levels.
But our top economic tier doesn't want that to happen; when you've gone to all the trouble - and three decades of work - to shift America's wealth into your hands, why would you want to see the value of your holdings fall?
If they are, I think I have some old thermometers around here somewhere....ooops! Dropped 'em!
lollll...you are a little behind the curve, there. Ever heard the phrase "dual-use" technology?
The Washington Times' article is just revisionism, designed to conceal what the Republicans had already done with free trade by shifting the responsibility forward in time.
See: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/18/AR2007011801029.html/
You imply that I am unwilling to see other "human beings" become more well off. That is either a misinterpretation or a distortion of my words. Anybody who is willing to work hard should be able to get ahead, wherever they live.
What I am not willing to do is to sacrifice Americans to make the citizens of some other country better off.
Free trade as it is now structured (to include the currency manipulation by some countries) penalizes the American people - and indeed, the people of all of what were once described as "the industrialized countries" - for being successful for so long. The people of our nations do not bear any responsibility for the forms of government that other countries have chosen that have held their peoples back for so long. To ask us to pay for the mistakes - the choices - of others is unwarranted, unrealistic, unfair, and unacceptable.
I would add that those who say or insinuate that Americans do not work hard are either uneducated or willfully ignorant. I would heartily recommend the Discovery Channel series "Dirty Jobs" to such.
Then I would suggest making sure you are part of the 10%
Me, I'm American in the sense that I view the American people to be my people.
I think it is wrong for some to exploit absolutely artificial differences nation to nation in the cost of the essentials of survival - food, housing, medical care, utilities - by transplanting their manufacturing plants and service centers to those cheaper nations so that they can pay lower wages vis-a-vis America's solely to further enrich themselves faster than they could in America.
That costs America jobs and is bringing great harm to my fellow Americans. Further, I would expect the average citizen of all nations to have precisely the same perspective regarding protecting their fellow countrymen.
But it is not the "average" citizen of any country who is being so tremendously enriched by inequitable free trade, now is it?
I have a difficult time accepting that I should seek to be "among the 10%" and take joy in counting my riches while watching my fellow Americans slide into poverty. I may not be religious, but I still don't believe in abusing my fellow human beings just to satiate my greed.
...using turbines made in China...
Sigh...I knew the artificial inequities in trade - that is, the artificial difference in the cost of living and thus the wages you can get away with paying, the artificial differences in the cost of regulation, and the way the Chinese manipulate their currency to ensure they maintain a preeminent trade position - would result in the much-ballyhooed "green jobs" going to China.
Am I the only person in America who sees a horribly bleak future for our children because of inequitable free trade and trickle-down economics? The latter only encourages our top economic tier to seek the margins the former provides, eliminating patriotism (and ethics, morality, honor, and even the public displays of religion - but that is another rant entirely) from the equation.
Unless something changes, I don't think America has anywhere to go but down...for 90% of us, anyway.
...as well as who viewed 500 specific videos
The possibility of being dragged into a German court just because you viewed something is a game-changer, I'd say.
You'd have to weigh the potential time and money lost responding to German legal proceedings against just how bad you want to see any website that is within reach of the German legal system - unless you know the contents of all Flash animations and other media for the entire website in advance .
Does Google accept !GermanContent as a query modifier?
I don't appear to have any mod points today, else I would have attempted to mod your comment up.
It would appear that Business overthrew our government one day when we were sleeping, and democracy was replaced with corporatism - except under this version of corporatism, Business has displaced almost all other interests.
Half to Barack Obama for demonstrating the leadership to advocate diplomacy as a means of settling and avoiding international conflict.
And half to the American People, for having the guts to choose to try for peace even though we were inundated by the claims of the powerful in both American politics and American media that only those eager for war could protect us from war.
Egads...never comment on /. on the first cup of coffee. My apologies, Harvard. Was thinking Yale.
Any flying bee created at Harvard would come complete with a plan for incorporation, 100,0000,000 stock certificates for the initial IPO, and 12 lawyers aboard and thus would never be able to get off of the ground.
The MIT bee would just work.
(Seriously, Harvard ?? Far better CMU, MIT, Cal Poly, Stanford...but Harvard ? lollll...the skull in "Skull and Bones" is empty for a reason.)
People with "12345" or similar passwords should get their own internet, where they would be allowed to share lolcatz and powerpoint chains, play with their purple internet buddy, and zap those cute webmonkeys on banners without hurting themselves.
Didn't they use to call that "AOL"?
"Interestingly, it's not the stereotypical offshore or outsourced employee who's most risky to their organizations.
that was not somebody attempting either a subterfuge or the implantation of a subliminal suggestion.
You see, it may very well be true that "offshore" employees in banking have less culpability, thus far...which - entirely coincidentally, I'm sure - corresponds directly to the amount of penetration into banking that offshoring has - thus far.
Interestingly, don't you think that such statistics provide a a nifty argument for offshoring banking?
Who gathered and "analyzed" this "data", again?
That was so long that my ass got numb...I think I shat methane hydrate. Whoopsie! See you next mass extinction!