>I dont know about you, >but in the last year i havent been to a >"no service" area..
Depends on where you live. If you're in Canada and use a GSM handset, you can expect to spend more time outside of service zones than in.
I'm actually rather surprised when I can make a clear call with my GSM phone.
That being said, I'd not switch to TDMA/AMPS/CDMA for all the signal in the world. I like being able to switch between providers (even if there are only the two biggies).
>If we assume for a moment that half of these are defective, this means it would only cost an additional $15, on average, to make perfect LCDs with no bad pixels.
Well, at one point (a long while ago, but I digress) the success rate with LCDs was 10%.
That's at the current max 10 dead pixel rates (depends on who makes it). I would think you can chop those numbers by 10 or more if you want perfection. That makes a $150 LCD $1500 to make perfect, not to mention disposal costs.
Most consumer products cost about 20% - 50% of the original price to manufacture (or so it seems from my poking about), which would mean the $1500 LCD becomes a $3000 - $7500 LCD when it's on the shelves of your local Best Buy. And that's for a 15" LCD.
Who the hell will pay that much for one? I sure wouldn't.
>I would like to see the section of the criminal code where PI's have additional rights over others. A handbook isn't a legal document.
No problem. I'll have to pull it off my shelves (where did I put it?). I'll quote out of it where I read it, however, it's been a while since reading it. I expect I've probably made a mistake (although I clearly remember the impersonation part). Most likely there's certain organizations you aren't allowed to impersonate and/or you have to make up the organization. It could also be that anyone is allowed to do this, but nobody but a PI cares.
I'm relatively sure it's the latter now, as these are the only two personation charges I could find nationally for Canada (don't blame me if you find more, IANAL):
Section 403, Criminal Code (Section 404 is pretty interesting too!:-) Section 5, Security of Information Act (I'm pretty sure that only applies if you're investigating the government itself, but I could be wrong)
(I only read the book because it was a short read, cost $2 at the college bookstore [the course was cancelled, and the publisher didn't want the books back, and what can I say? I'm a sucker for a good deal], and was mildly interesting)
BTW: The handbook might not be a legal document, but they were serious enough to make 50% of the book a quotation of various legal Canadian documents that are of interest to private invetigators. Most discussions on what a PI could/couldn't do in Canada included legal cites (the relevant law being in the back of the book).
>What's more, missing a promised release date can bleed buzz, precious in an industry where many young buyers have to take the time to squirrel away $50 for a typical purchase.
Sounds to me like it wouldn't be a problem if the price weren't something they'd have to "take the time to squirrel away".
>You can put whatever name you want in the phone book no charge.
Maybe if you talk to someone clueful.
I tried to convince bell to write "MODEM" after my name, as my new fax/data line would show up BEFORE my voice line in the phone book, and I didn't need confused people getting an earful of modem tones. They either didn't have a clue how to do that, or just didn't want to, or it wasn't possible, dunno which (like they'd tell me). Either way, it just wasn't going to happen.
In the end I asked if they had special treatment for fax lines (I know Bell Canada has a lot of really stupid rules about them). At that point they said if I'd like they'd just unlist the number for life for free. And they did.:-)
But, really, if they could put in *any* name, why not "shepd, MODEM"?
>For example, legal, medical, or security reasons may make it impossible or impractical to seek consent
Ok, I'm pretty sure satellite TV doesn't come under any of those...
>When information is being collected for the detection and prevention of *fraud* or for law enforcement, seeking the consent of the individual might defeat the purpose of collecting the information.
Which would mean that you have to look at how seeking consent over not seeking consent would somehow make a difference in fraud. I just can't think of a way it makes a difference. Satellite TV receivers aren't a controlled substance, they aren't weapons, and they aren't counterfeiting materials.
About the only fraud you can do with one is pirate TV, but whether they have your address on file or not doesn't make it any easier to detect fraud (I should know -- 2 years ago I was pirating satellite TV left right and center -- ahh, for the good old days again).
It's like giving someone traceable bank notes in an attempt to see if they're burning them in their fire... it just doesn't work that way.
>Canadian private investigators? Not that I'd miss those buggers.
Not likely. I once read a Canadian PI handbook, and they have special rights other regular joe's don't have. Like, for example, the right to impersonate others to gather information.
They could, for example, show up at your door as a gas repairman, and if you let them in, they're allowed to gather any information they can get their grubby little hands on to.
(or so it seemed to me when reading it... maybe I'll pull it off the shelves again)
>No, you can get pretty much whatever you want listed in the phone book.
Not in Canada. Here you have to pay a surcharge to be unlisted from the phone book.
I suppose it doesn't mean it's impossible, but at least now the service will be completely free.
Speaking of that, the idiots at Bell will probably finally be forced to list my fax number properly (well, they did that out of courtesy and confusion a while ago anyways, but that's another story).
They've been active in ensuring anybody gets in trouble no matter what.
The company that owns them (Quebecor) is particularly horrid as well, banning Religious & Ethnic Satellite Television (FTA) advertising from their newspapers.
I agree with all that, even though I personally don't like Lord of the Rings (but I can see why others might), but sometimes this is the result of "originality". AFAIK, there's only been one episode made. I have it in DiVX, just to show people how bad TV really can get.
Not all original ideas are good. Some totally suck, worse than ST:TNG "Shades of Grey".
>For instance on healthcare, the law states that hospitals MUST provide emergency medical coverage with no regard to payment. That 70+ million americans are NOT covered by public health and also do not have private insurance, that's a huge fiscal disaster.
Sounds like a raw deal. Hospitals did know this when they got into the game, no? Are they run as private entities there? If so, them's the breaks. The system is simply correcting itself for the forced losses imposed on it by government by raising prices wherever possible. The two obvious solutions would be to either make it a public service, or to bust the government out of hospitals. As I never did cry when I watched John Q., I'd probably go for #2.
Otherwise, sounds like a complicated problem which I'm not qualified to solve. However, I might suggest a two-tier system, similar to what the prior Ontario government was pushing towards.
>However, there is a greater economic interest in keeping people in their specialized fields. If you disagree with that on principle, there's no argument that will convince you otherwise and I'm done trying.
I'll not disagree on it in principle; I'm open to a good argument on why there's a greater economic interest in having people with unemployable skills stick with them, rather than move to another skillset which offers increased employment opportunities (even if the skillset is "unskilled labour").
It has always seemed to me that outdated/outmoded/unwanted (generally because of the prior) skills are best weeded out. We don't have phrenologists, alchemists, or many typewriter repairmen (hey, gotta throw that in!) because of it, and, IMHO, that's not a bad thing at all.
I'm a strong believer that the capitalist system of laissez faire economics will, after a period of instability (in whatever is the problem), always find it's own solution to problems. For example, while there was a downturn in employment for your field, new jobs appeared when market conditions levelled, and I bet that in the next year or two, there'll be a lot more available, and you'll probably be wanting (rightly) a raise.
However, if the job is truly unnecessary, there'll never be work available in it, and the job skill will cease to exist, and nobody but historians will care.
>I also have a background in social services and healthcare finance, so I've known the eligibility side of this for the better part of twenty years. This is a HUGE problem in America. That I experienced the effects myself only serves to bolster my interest in the problem, regardless of how much I "needed" public assistance at any point in my life.
Ok, tell you what. Since you seem to be best qualified to answer this, tell me what's so broken. Tell me why it made more sense to you (as a qualified-to-asnwer individual) to be on welfare than be working a job you might not enjoy, but definately paid more.
A few other things: If welfare were higher, would you have been in such a rush to become useful to the economy again? Or would you have been more willing to sit back and see what comes your way? Or is there something else you might have done?
I'm thinking it would have made you a little more sedentary at looking for a job. To improve, IMHO, a country needs every able bodied person at the wheels getting stuff done. It certainly seems, from my experience in Canada, weaning people from welfare is difficult.
Considering the absolutely amazing amount of progress India has had in the past 100 years, their system seems to be working absolute wonders. Perhaps it's this work ethic, combined with a willingness to get things done for less pay, that's influencing companies to hire immigrants, especially educated ones from developing countries? I have had it commented to me, serveral times, that hiring someone from outside the country will get you a worker more willing to put in all their effort than not. Can you comment on why this is?
>That you are so hostile to someone saying "hey, this policy is ass-backwards" is a mystery.
I'm hostile because I am paying a lot of taxes for services that, quite frankly, are totally unnecessary. You did seem a bit hostile on that point also, I think you might agree.
Then I get a bit more hostile when people start bashing my ideals without good reason*. You know, sort of like saying "Everybody from your political party is [insert expletive]".
* - My ideals not agreeing with a few radical groups not being a particularly good reason. I think you might find a few of the more moderate libertarian-style parties to be much closer than you might think to popular political parties.
For comparison, here's the Libertarianeqsue party I plan to run for locally (once elections come up in... argh... 4 years), and here's the party elected to Premier (like Governor) twice (but lost this time) in the past decade.
>If all you can see in this is McDonald's, perhaps you should be working there yourself.
Actually, I own my own store (the one you probably noticed in my user info). And you make more than me (I get $400 CDN monthly "pay", so little I actually don't have to pay any taxes directly on that at all). However, I'm taking the "make less now, more later" road. Funny how you expect sympathy from someone making less than you.
>The unemployment laws have a notion of "reasonable employment," since there is no economic benefit to the economy as a whole to take people with highly specialized skills and send them off to flipping burgers--there are PLENTY of people whose skillsets are limited to that who are willing to take those jobs.
Just because you have a "skill" doesn't mean it's useful. The fact is, if there are no jobs you can get using your present skills, it's because all the needed positions are filled. ie: Your skills aren't important right now.
The fact is, if there's openings in other jobs, it's because that skill is needed. If you aren't willing to participate in needed skills, you can expect to remain unemployed, perhaps permanently.
>The average timeframe to find new employment is six months.
If you are going to refuse to do labour you don't enjoy, yes. I've discussed this at length with people graduating from my class at college, and while I opened up my own store, they spent between 4-8 months looking for the job "just right" for them. Then I ask them the hard question: "Did you get any offers?". The answer? "Nothing I wanted." Did you apply for all jobs? "All the ones I wanted."
I have ZERO sympathy for people who bitch about being unemployed as long as they don't apply for jobs they don't like that much. It's like the graduate who wouldn't take the RPG job because "It wasn't my style." They spent another 4 months leeching welfare to get a different job, that they liked, but paid FAR less. And they weren't even able to hold their dream job (they're now unemployed again). I bet they wish they'd taken the RPG position now...
>The insurance is there precisely so people are not forced to do what people like you would apparently love to seem them do: lose their house, starve their kids, beat their wife and commit suicide.
I said nothing of the sort. Don't put words into my mouth unless you want some shoved in yours. I'd call you a wefare-sucking-elitist-leech, but then I'd be doing the same.
I believe people should make themselves useful to society in whatever way society thinks they'd be useful. Guess what. YOU COULD BE USEFUL RIGHT NOW IF YOU'D CHANGE YOUR PRIORITIES. Stop it with the ego, make with the eggo, my friend.
>It is that those who have paid the country's bills are given nothing in return when time comes that they need it--even though for most of their lives they'll never use those services they are disproportionately paying for.
Fix it and vote libertarian next time. I did. Don't grouse to me about problems I deal with every day. Every time I move in this business I'm taxed more than you could believe (My business pays probably 3x more in tax than I make), so rather than try to sqeeze more out of the government and needlessly up the taxes, I'm trying to fix the problem.
Fixing the problem entails abolishing support programs for the able bodied and able minded. It does not entail "give me back every penny I paid". No program, especially a government program, will be able to work like that. Administration fees alone have been known to outstrip the actual benefits reaped by government from taxes.
Kill the service, get rid of the problem.
>I'm working in my field again after moving 3000 miles across the country at a cost of $30k, which was less than half of my reserves.
In that case I'm right, you certainly could have found employment, but chose to do differently because you wanted to stay in your field. It's your choice, and it may have bee
>America gave me $6,100 in unemployment and said "get lost."
That's it?
Seems to me there's something fishy here. Everytime I'm in the US I see plenty of "Help Wanted" signs at McDonald's, who pay minimum wage of $5.15 an hour. That means the recipient, working an average 35 hours a week, can take home $9,373 a year.
Why aren't you working there? Are there no McDonald's in your area?
Perhaps it's just an east coast phenomenon that McDonald's can't find workers, and you are on the west coast?
All I know is that all the way from New York to Florida, minimum wage jobs are starved for workers, and they get paid more than welfare (according to your stats).
In short, I wonder, why didn't you get a job?
>Meanwhile, a minimum wage earner who has paid almost NOTHING into that budget would be 100% covered.
Seems you have the answer staring you in the face! The US thinks you need to get a job, ANY JOB. Unemployment rates in the US tell me you could have one right now, if you tried. Did you?
>And how many dozens of times higher is the cost of living in the U.S. than in India?
According to the CIA world factbook:
India GDP per capita - $2,600 US GDP per capita - $36,300
The answer, therefore, is 1. Sorry the number isn't nearly as high as you expected, and shows that someone on US welfare lives more comfortably than a phone jockey in India.
>It had dozens of quarter sized dimples, and ran really fast. I'm not sure, but it might have benefited from some kind of golf ball wind resistance effect.
Homer: [suspicious] Hey, what are all these holes? Salesman: [quickly] These are speed holes. They make the car go faster. Homer: Oh, yeah. Speed holes!
[bullets riddle the car and smash the windshield]
Salesman: You want my advice? I think you should buy this car.
Slashdot Mirror
>I dont know about you,
>but in the last year i havent been to a
>"no service" area..
Depends on where you live. If you're in Canada and use a GSM handset, you can expect to spend more time outside of service zones than in.
I'm actually rather surprised when I can make a clear call with my GSM phone.
That being said, I'd not switch to TDMA/AMPS/CDMA for all the signal in the world. I like being able to switch between providers (even if there are only the two biggies).
Well, first off, $15 just doesn't jive.
I'm willing to say maybe $150... anyways...
>If we assume for a moment that half of these are defective, this means it would only cost an additional $15, on average, to make perfect LCDs with no bad pixels.
Well, at one point (a long while ago, but I digress) the success rate with LCDs was 10%.
It's now 18%.
That's at the current max 10 dead pixel rates (depends on who makes it). I would think you can chop those numbers by 10 or more if you want perfection. That makes a $150 LCD $1500 to make perfect, not to mention disposal costs.
Most consumer products cost about 20% - 50% of the original price to manufacture (or so it seems from my poking about), which would mean the $1500 LCD becomes a $3000 - $7500 LCD when it's on the shelves of your local Best Buy. And that's for a 15" LCD.
Who the hell will pay that much for one? I sure wouldn't.
>I would like to see the section of the criminal code where PI's have additional rights over others. A handbook isn't a legal document.
:-)
No problem. I'll have to pull it off my shelves (where did I put it?). I'll quote out of it where I read it, however, it's been a while since reading it. I expect I've probably made a mistake (although I clearly remember the impersonation part). Most likely there's certain organizations you aren't allowed to impersonate and/or you have to make up the organization. It could also be that anyone is allowed to do this, but nobody but a PI cares.
I'm relatively sure it's the latter now, as these are the only two personation charges I could find nationally for Canada (don't blame me if you find more, IANAL):
Section 403, Criminal Code (Section 404 is pretty interesting too!
Section 5, Security of Information Act (I'm pretty sure that only applies if you're investigating the government itself, but I could be wrong)
(I only read the book because it was a short read, cost $2 at the college bookstore [the course was cancelled, and the publisher didn't want the books back, and what can I say? I'm a sucker for a good deal], and was mildly interesting)
BTW: The handbook might not be a legal document, but they were serious enough to make 50% of the book a quotation of various legal Canadian documents that are of interest to private invetigators. Most discussions on what a PI could/couldn't do in Canada included legal cites (the relevant law being in the back of the book).
>What's more, missing a promised release date can bleed buzz, precious in an industry where many young buyers have to take the time to squirrel away $50 for a typical purchase.
Sounds to me like it wouldn't be a problem if the price weren't something they'd have to "take the time to squirrel away".
>You can put whatever name you want in the phone book no charge.
:-)
Maybe if you talk to someone clueful.
I tried to convince bell to write "MODEM" after my name, as my new fax/data line would show up BEFORE my voice line in the phone book, and I didn't need confused people getting an earful of modem tones. They either didn't have a clue how to do that, or just didn't want to, or it wasn't possible, dunno which (like they'd tell me). Either way, it just wasn't going to happen.
In the end I asked if they had special treatment for fax lines (I know Bell Canada has a lot of really stupid rules about them). At that point they said if I'd like they'd just unlist the number for life for free. And they did.
But, really, if they could put in *any* name, why not "shepd, MODEM"?
>For example, legal, medical, or security reasons may make it impossible or impractical to seek consent
Ok, I'm pretty sure satellite TV doesn't come under any of those...
>When information is being collected for the detection and prevention of *fraud* or for law enforcement, seeking the consent of the individual might defeat the purpose of collecting the information.
Which would mean that you have to look at how seeking consent over not seeking consent would somehow make a difference in fraud. I just can't think of a way it makes a difference. Satellite TV receivers aren't a controlled substance, they aren't weapons, and they aren't counterfeiting materials.
About the only fraud you can do with one is pirate TV, but whether they have your address on file or not doesn't make it any easier to detect fraud (I should know -- 2 years ago I was pirating satellite TV left right and center -- ahh, for the good old days again).
It's like giving someone traceable bank notes in an attempt to see if they're burning them in their fire... it just doesn't work that way.
>Canadian private investigators? Not that I'd miss those buggers.
Not likely. I once read a Canadian PI handbook, and they have special rights other regular joe's don't have. Like, for example, the right to impersonate others to gather information.
They could, for example, show up at your door as a gas repairman, and if you let them in, they're allowed to gather any information they can get their grubby little hands on to.
(or so it seemed to me when reading it... maybe I'll pull it off the shelves again)
>No, you can get pretty much whatever you want listed in the phone book.
Not in Canada. Here you have to pay a surcharge to be unlisted from the phone book.
I suppose it doesn't mean it's impossible, but at least now the service will be completely free.
Speaking of that, the idiots at Bell will probably finally be forced to list my fax number properly (well, they did that out of courtesy and confusion a while ago anyways, but that's another story).
Does this mean I can finally buy a Bell Expressvu system without providing them my drivers license?
;-)
Interesting...
No surprise there.
They've been active in ensuring anybody gets in trouble no matter what.
The company that owns them (Quebecor) is particularly horrid as well, banning Religious & Ethnic Satellite Television (FTA) advertising from their newspapers.
Might want to stay the hell away from them...
I agree with all that, even though I personally don't like Lord of the Rings (but I can see why others might), but sometimes this is the result of "originality". AFAIK, there's only been one episode made. I have it in DiVX, just to show people how bad TV really can get.
Not all original ideas are good. Some totally suck, worse than ST:TNG "Shades of Grey".
Or use star commander and hook up a real 1541 to your computer. :-)
(NOTE: Give the drive a rest every 5 or 10 disks in turbo mode or you'll burn out the 1541)
>However there is still some heat generated.
This comes from the incandescent starter heaters inside the tubes, and from radiant heat from the ballast.
>Since the client is (at least the demo) windows only, you are required to buy windows anyway.
Yes, but just one copy instead of two (unless you plan to play UT at the CoLo...)
Well, it's a *minimum* of 250 DVDs at once... :-)
That's a looooot of work to get going, IMHO.
CIA World Factbook. :-)
HTH!
Would you be talking about J-cells?
>For instance on healthcare, the law states that hospitals MUST provide emergency medical coverage with no regard to payment. That 70+ million americans are NOT covered by public health and also do not have private insurance, that's a huge fiscal disaster.
Sounds like a raw deal. Hospitals did know this when they got into the game, no? Are they run as private entities there? If so, them's the breaks. The system is simply correcting itself for the forced losses imposed on it by government by raising prices wherever possible. The two obvious solutions would be to either make it a public service, or to bust the government out of hospitals. As I never did cry when I watched John Q., I'd probably go for #2.
Otherwise, sounds like a complicated problem which I'm not qualified to solve. However, I might suggest a two-tier system, similar to what the prior Ontario government was pushing towards.
>However, there is a greater economic interest in keeping people in their specialized fields. If you disagree with that on principle, there's no argument that will convince you otherwise and I'm done trying.
I'll not disagree on it in principle; I'm open to a good argument on why there's a greater economic interest in having people with unemployable skills stick with them, rather than move to another skillset which offers increased employment opportunities (even if the skillset is "unskilled labour").
It has always seemed to me that outdated/outmoded/unwanted (generally because of the prior) skills are best weeded out. We don't have phrenologists, alchemists, or many typewriter repairmen (hey, gotta throw that in!) because of it, and, IMHO, that's not a bad thing at all.
I'm a strong believer that the capitalist system of laissez faire economics will, after a period of instability (in whatever is the problem), always find it's own solution to problems. For example, while there was a downturn in employment for your field, new jobs appeared when market conditions levelled, and I bet that in the next year or two, there'll be a lot more available, and you'll probably be wanting (rightly) a raise.
However, if the job is truly unnecessary, there'll never be work available in it, and the job skill will cease to exist, and nobody but historians will care.
That's how I see it, anyways.
>I also have a background in social services and healthcare finance, so I've known the eligibility side of this for the better part of twenty years. This is a HUGE problem in America. That I experienced the effects myself only serves to bolster my interest in the problem, regardless of how much I "needed" public assistance at any point in my life.
Ok, tell you what. Since you seem to be best qualified to answer this, tell me what's so broken. Tell me why it made more sense to you (as a qualified-to-asnwer individual) to be on welfare than be working a job you might not enjoy, but definately paid more.
A few other things: If welfare were higher, would you have been in such a rush to become useful to the economy again? Or would you have been more willing to sit back and see what comes your way? Or is there something else you might have done?
I'm thinking it would have made you a little more sedentary at looking for a job. To improve, IMHO, a country needs every able bodied person at the wheels getting stuff done. It certainly seems, from my experience in Canada, weaning people from welfare is difficult.
Considering the absolutely amazing amount of progress India has had in the past 100 years, their system seems to be working absolute wonders. Perhaps it's this work ethic, combined with a willingness to get things done for less pay, that's influencing companies to hire immigrants, especially educated ones from developing countries? I have had it commented to me, serveral times, that hiring someone from outside the country will get you a worker more willing to put in all their effort than not. Can you comment on why this is?
>That you are so hostile to someone saying "hey, this policy is ass-backwards" is a mystery.
I'm hostile because I am paying a lot of taxes for services that, quite frankly, are totally unnecessary. You did seem a bit hostile on that point also, I think you might agree.
Then I get a bit more hostile when people start bashing my ideals without good reason*. You know, sort of like saying "Everybody from your political party is [insert expletive]".
* - My ideals not agreeing with a few radical groups not being a particularly good reason. I think you might find a few of the more moderate libertarian-style parties to be much closer than you might think to popular political parties.
For comparison, here's the Libertarianeqsue party I plan to run for locally (once elections come up in... argh... 4 years), and here's the party elected to Premier (like Governor) twice (but lost this time) in the past decade.
>If all you can see in this is McDonald's, perhaps you should be working there yourself.
Actually, I own my own store (the one you probably noticed in my user info). And you make more than me (I get $400 CDN monthly "pay", so little I actually don't have to pay any taxes directly on that at all). However, I'm taking the "make less now, more later" road. Funny how you expect sympathy from someone making less than you.
>The unemployment laws have a notion of "reasonable employment," since there is no economic benefit to the economy as a whole to take people with highly specialized skills and send them off to flipping burgers--there are PLENTY of people whose skillsets are limited to that who are willing to take those jobs.
Just because you have a "skill" doesn't mean it's useful. The fact is, if there are no jobs you can get using your present skills, it's because all the needed positions are filled. ie: Your skills aren't important right now.
The fact is, if there's openings in other jobs, it's because that skill is needed. If you aren't willing to participate in needed skills, you can expect to remain unemployed, perhaps permanently.
>The average timeframe to find new employment is six months.
If you are going to refuse to do labour you don't enjoy, yes. I've discussed this at length with people graduating from my class at college, and while I opened up my own store, they spent between 4-8 months looking for the job "just right" for them. Then I ask them the hard question: "Did you get any offers?". The answer? "Nothing I wanted." Did you apply for all jobs? "All the ones I wanted."
I have ZERO sympathy for people who bitch about being unemployed as long as they don't apply for jobs they don't like that much. It's like the graduate who wouldn't take the RPG job because "It wasn't my style." They spent another 4 months leeching welfare to get a different job, that they liked, but paid FAR less. And they weren't even able to hold their dream job (they're now unemployed again). I bet they wish they'd taken the RPG position now...
>The insurance is there precisely so people are not forced to do what people like you would apparently love to seem them do: lose their house, starve their kids, beat their wife and commit suicide.
I said nothing of the sort. Don't put words into my mouth unless you want some shoved in yours. I'd call you a wefare-sucking-elitist-leech, but then I'd be doing the same.
I believe people should make themselves useful to society in whatever way society thinks they'd be useful. Guess what. YOU COULD BE USEFUL RIGHT NOW IF YOU'D CHANGE YOUR PRIORITIES. Stop it with the ego, make with the eggo, my friend.
>It is that those who have paid the country's bills are given nothing in return when time comes that they need it--even though for most of their lives they'll never use those services they are disproportionately paying for.
Fix it and vote libertarian next time. I did. Don't grouse to me about problems I deal with every day. Every time I move in this business I'm taxed more than you could believe (My business pays probably 3x more in tax than I make), so rather than try to sqeeze more out of the government and needlessly up the taxes, I'm trying to fix the problem.
Fixing the problem entails abolishing support programs for the able bodied and able minded. It does not entail "give me back every penny I paid". No program, especially a government program, will be able to work like that. Administration fees alone have been known to outstrip the actual benefits reaped by government from taxes.
Kill the service, get rid of the problem.
>I'm working in my field again after moving 3000 miles across the country at a cost of $30k, which was less than half of my reserves.
In that case I'm right, you certainly could have found employment, but chose to do differently because you wanted to stay in your field. It's your choice, and it may have bee
>America gave me $6,100 in unemployment and said "get lost."
That's it?
Seems to me there's something fishy here. Everytime I'm in the US I see plenty of "Help Wanted" signs at McDonald's, who pay minimum wage of $5.15 an hour. That means the recipient, working an average 35 hours a week, can take home $9,373 a year.
Why aren't you working there? Are there no McDonald's in your area?
Perhaps it's just an east coast phenomenon that McDonald's can't find workers, and you are on the west coast?
All I know is that all the way from New York to Florida, minimum wage jobs are starved for workers, and they get paid more than welfare (according to your stats).
In short, I wonder, why didn't you get a job?
>Meanwhile, a minimum wage earner who has paid almost NOTHING into that budget would be 100% covered.
Seems you have the answer staring you in the face! The US thinks you need to get a job, ANY JOB. Unemployment rates in the US tell me you could have one right now, if you tried. Did you?
>And how many dozens of times higher is the cost of living in the U.S. than in India?
According to the CIA world factbook:
India GDP per capita - $2,600
US GDP per capita - $36,300
The answer, therefore, is 1. Sorry the number isn't nearly as high as you expected, and shows that someone on US welfare lives more comfortably than a phone jockey in India.
HTH, and maybe better luck next time?
>How do you feel about the American programmers that are angry they lost their jobs to outsourcing? Do you think they have a right to be angry?
As long as welfare in the US remains dozens of times higher than the average wage in India, I don't think they'll shed any tears. Neither should you.
>It had dozens of quarter sized dimples, and ran really fast. I'm not sure, but it might have benefited from some kind of golf ball wind resistance effect.
Homer: [suspicious] Hey, what are all these holes?
Salesman: [quickly] These are speed holes. They make the car go faster.
Homer: Oh, yeah. Speed holes!
[bullets riddle the car and smash the windshield]
Salesman: You want my advice? I think you should buy this car.
Gotta love snpp!
>I'd love to see the look on their faces after their windows get blown out ;)
"Woah!"