Please, I was arguing points, not the whole thing, that's why I selected what I was arguing. What was so "dishonest" (as if "intellectual dishonesty" really means anything -- it doesn't) about leaving out the fact that all nations have a military. Oh, wait that was YOU being intellecually dishonest. Pot... well, you know the rest.
Guess what that is? A lie. I quoted every service you mentioned except schools & Health care
Since you lied your way into insulting me you had to list now what you left out the first time. Would have saved you the trouble if you had actually said these things before -- intellectual dishonesty, indeed. Okay, that's fine.
So let's see, you cut out the majority of significant services I mentioned, then accuse me of lying. Let's contrast that against the quotes from the original article you commented to, including a listing of services far beyond the trivial list you provided to misrepresent my position.
Citizens of other first world countries pay taxes that are only superficially higher than mine, and receive all the basic services I do here (police, libraries, highways, etc.) In addition, they have national pensions that make social security look pathetic, free health care, free higher education, functional and far reaching public transit, labor protection, etc.
Please check your arrogance and your actual words before attempting to insult someone next time and don't accuse me of leaving out what you did not put in. It might save you some embarrasment. HAND.
Boy, that statement sure looks a bit funny against actual quotes, doesn't it?
You make a snotty point about higher taxes, but fail to mention how much is received for them. Reducing an entire page length discussion of comparative benefits to a brief snipped quote about police and fire services is dishonest.
Hmm, so you call me a liar a few times and claim that I didn't list anything beyond police and fire, but I had an extensive list both discussed through the body of my post, and summarized at the end. You might want to consider reading the post you are replying to before you lie about it's contents.
As to your points. First, you're missing the point that I don't care if government provides this or not. This is not a big government vs little government matter, this is about getting my money's worth. Why is it that the US charges taxes that are not that much lower, yet provides almost none of the services that most other countries do? I am getting ripped off.
Does SS provide a meager retirement, yep, but other countries provide a far better one. You also do realize that most countries let you retire at that level after only 35 years? Do we subsidize colleges, yep, but other countries make it free. You have a point in some areas about the size of the US, but many cities do not have viable public transportation, and there needs to be a better system connecting states, or a revival of Amtrack to equal Europe.
As to free emergency care, no, it is not. They must provide you with emergency care, at absurd rates, then you get to spend the rest of your life paying it off or filing bankruptcy. The problem is that, once again, I pay enough in taxes that I should get more than this, or my taxes need to be cut for real.
Wow, you must not make much, or you pay WAAAAAY too much for health insurance. Or that just tipped the "intellectual dishonesty" scale way past "bullshit."
Ahh, how much you could learn if you only researched before you posted. A married couple with 2 children, $70,000 combined income will save $410. If you know where I can get decent health coverage for a family of 4 for less than that, please let me know.
I could get as big a tax cut by moving to Oregon from California as I could get by moving from a lot of Europe to the US. While paying close to the same as them in taxes, I receive none of the services. That is what this whole issue comes down to. If I am expected to pay
Wow, this has to be one of the most intellectually dishonest cut-and-paste jobs I have seen on a response.
> You get police, highways, etc., but so do the citizens of all first world countries
Yes, same protection, but those nations have higher taxes. Yay for progress.
Hmm, how convenient that you left out every part of my post pointing out the vast number of services they receive for very little increase. The amount of additional taxes you would pay in most countries vs the US is no worse than the difference hit by moving to a state with a different income tax level, in other words, not much at all.
What the US has that they don't: big military What they have the US doesn't: meaningful retirement, free health care, free higher education, and even have a good enough transit system that the unnecessary expense of a car is optional.
> an excellant military, which is only necessary since the US has to go around manipulating other nation's governments
Oh, your country does not have a military? That's impressive. Oh, I see, your country has a military for protection, but the U.S. has it for dominance. Doesn't that sound slightly biased?
Ooh, you got to cut a lot out of that one. I actually said no such thing in the entire paragraph, but to answer your question, no that would not sound biased. What I stated is that the US does have an impressive military, but that a military of that size is in part only necessary because the US also makes a lot of enemies. Most countries get by with very small military budgets because they don't have much to defend themselves from. How many countries have a deep seated hatred of Canada or Denmark?
> I want my taxes reduced.
Which has happened in the last few years. Twice. You didn't see a big reduction? Because (assuming you are not wealthy) you aren't paying much to begin with.
My taxes have been reduced by enough to buy what, one month of health insurance? Be still my heart, at this rate, only 22 cuts to go before I really care.
The lower taxes in general in the US add up to enough money to pay for 3 or 4 months of health insurance. That is not even enough to pay for a single semester of college, or the co-pay on any major medical procedure.
For US taxes to be lower by enough to make up for not having health coverage, higher education, or retirement, tax rates would have to be in the 2%-5% range, with no social security deduction. Doesn't sound like such a good deal to me.
What an absolutely bizarre comparison. Schools are funded by property taxes collected by the local/state goverment and given to schools completely managed by those local/state goverments. The federal government has absolutely no control and no fiscal responsibility for this local issue. Sometimes they make grants to states but this is an inefficient step for the federal government to collect taxes away from states and then give it back.
Actually, it is a lot more warped than that. The money all gets funneled through the fed, so it has a massive amount of influence. Anyway, I believe the poster is referring to the fact that higher education (college/trade school) is also free in the vast majority of first world countries.
Another absurd statement; health care in the USA is the best in the world. Oh wait, he means health care paid for by the taxpayer. There are plenty of private health insurers and hospitals are forbidden to turn away patients who cannot pay.
Oh, it is the best in the world, if you can afford the very best. For the vast majority of the population, and even more so for the 60+ million uninsured, it is hardly as useful. Hospitals must treat emergency cases, but by then you are usually so far gone that everything is both riskier and more expensive. Care to prevent the bad from getting worse or to prevent bad things all together is not avaliable to those without either a generous employer or _very_ deep pockets. Private individuals pay rates around 10x what the insurance companies pay. Also, in the vast majority of first world countries (all of them I think, except for the US), it is free as well, which would explain why most of them also have longer average life expentancies than the US.
That's odd, I get protection from the greatest, by a wide margin, military in the world. Interstate highways, police, fire, national parks, etc. The list goes on and on. Vidal must be a serious hermit to not get ANYTHING for his taxes.
Two parts to this one. You get police, highways, etc., but so do the citizens of all first world countries. Yes, you do get protection from an excellant military, which is only necessary since the US has to go around manipulating other nation's governments and picking fights all the time.
Thanks to superior medical care and a solid national defence...
Of course, living in Canada with access to preventative care he would live even longer. Funny, they don't seem to need national defense much, maybe because they don't work so hard at making enemies.
Umm, what about last week's unemployment numbers down to 6 from 61? Umm, what about the stock market up significantly from the first of the year? Umm, what about corporate earnings meeting and beating expectations (which are up from last year)?
Oh, be still my heart. A completely artifical construct is moving upward, and employment is increasing. It must be our fearless leader...or maybe the Christmas shopping season, which is the only time of year some retailers turn a profit at all.
The main point seems to be that for as little as I receive from the US government, my taxes should be far lower than they are. Citizens of other first world countries pay taxes that are only superficially higher than mine, and receive all the basic services I do here (police, libraries, highways, etc.) In addition, they have national pensions that make social security look pathetic, free health care, free higher education, functional and far reaching public transit, labor protection, etc. The only thing I have in the US that they don't is a huge military, which is in part only so large because the US picks a lot of fights.
Either I want to get my money's worth, or I want my taxes reduced. The current situation of paying for almost nothing is getting a bit old.
Well, they get voted for as directly as the US President.
There are a number of different implementations of democracy/republics, and many don't directly elect most offices. Heck, the most influential people in the President's administration are the unelected cabinet members, and congressional staffers and issue specialists are unelected but have more real power than the congresscritters themselves.
I also seem to recall that some Parlimentary systems have heriditary seats for fairly good reasons, much like the longer termed US Senate, to provide stability and insulation from short lived but intense political movements.
So, is there a democracy anywhere by your definition?
"not reusable in commercial products. This is the highest and best use of code"
If you see commercial exploitation of free work as the "highest and best use," I'd really hate to see what you consider the lowest and worse use...scary.
With the pathetic US voter turnout, it is worse than that. Bush only has the support of 24.48% of voters (who actively voted in the election, not registered), and only 17.94% of the US population. Not exactly what I would call a "mandate" in the current political jargon.
Exactly, that's the point. Those future cash flows are only worth 16.7 million right now assuming a standard 12% return. If the business has two models, one which cashes out for a decent amount right now but burns all your customers and implodes the company in a couple of years, and one that generates a steady cash flow for a long period through happy customers, most choose the former. It usually nets more money in the long run, and without all the headaches of actually running a business for that long.
In the utopian land of economics classes, capitalism is largely self-regulating because they claim that concerns like keeping happy customers and sustaining the business will keep companies from engaging in unethical or illegal behavior. In the real world, many are perfectly willing to let the business die due to unethical or illegal behavior, since they come out of it with a nice lump of cash which will work out much better for them in the long term.
If only it worked that way in the real world. The payoff is so great, and the chance of being nailed by the same media outlet that is probably owned by your parent company is so small, the temptation is overwhelming.
I think the fundamental problem is people who assume the company has to stay in business in addition to making money, that would probably make the rosy assumptions of US business more true. The fact is that most companies see a great opportunity for short term profit, take it, and run. It's kind of like the majority of people that take 20 million now instead of 40 million over the next 20 years or such when they win the lottery. They don't care if they stay in business, they made their money, screw everyone else. In that light, loss of customers and reputation is meaningless as a regulatory mechanism.
Maybe we should turn the low-skill people into high-skill people?
That would be the ideal, and is probably the only sane way out of the current mess. The problem is that most people couldn't dream of affording the time and money for continuing education. What I would like to see is the mishmash of welfare programs rolled into something useful. If you are displaced from your job by something relatively permanent, either like the flight of certain textile jobs out of country, or the elimination of a job category by technology like buggy whip manufacturers, you should get real unemployment.
Instead of giving someone handouts to survive until the next make work job, give them a period of a living wage while studying to be re-skilled for a new career. This costs more in the short term, but preserves our quality of life far better, and returns people to the workforce at the same or better positions. This is an improvement in both moral and practical terms, since they would be paying taxes again, making up the cost, and helping to drive the economy.
But isn't home ownership at all time highs? Isn't housing appreciation a good thing for homeowners?
It's good for the people that bought a long time ago, but the major problem is that new housing is also far more expensive. Normally, what you want is for people to be able to move from a starter home up to their retirement residence, enjoying a steady appreciation along the path. Now, too few affordable homes are being produced in many areas, and most people end up paying far too much of their salary for their home. It is good for those few that can cash in, but bad for all that come after them.
Do you have any justification for your implication that lower taxes leads to lower wages?
I think you are misreading him, I see no such implication. It appears to be alluding to cities competing for corporate call centers and such. These days, cities are so desperate for job creation that they will offer subsidized utilities, a low tax or tax free period for the company, and they often brag about how cheap local labor is. They are not causally linked, just pitched together.
Anecdotal or statistical evidence of wages not going up with increased productivity over a prolonged period of time?
I'd be interested in when increased productivity does increase wages at an appreciable rate. Over a long period of time wages do go up, but rarely enough to match inflation and/or cost of living increases in their area. Since the cult of short term profits over long term stability came into power, companies have been boosing productivity by laying off workers and driving the remaining ones harder. Over the last few years, productivity has been steadily rising, and aside from the IT worker blip, wages have not risen much in the last few decades.
Anecdotally, in companies I've worked for that have increased productivity, management usually receives salary/bonuses for that gain, but the average worker wages don't get more than a cost of living increase.
Peace be with you
And also with you! A signature I wish I saw more often:)
1. Capitalism is not "winner take all". Yes, the rich get richer, and so does everyone else. And not just in absolute dollars: today you can buy a computer for under $1000 that is more powerful than all the computers used in the Apollo project combined. Why? Because Andy Grove and others wanted to make more money.
Yeah, and I used to walk to work, in the snow, uphill both ways. It's so much better now. There is a history of technical advancement in societies regardless of economic system throughout all recorded history. What good is a cheap computer if you can't afford it?
One of the problems of capitalism is that the owners take the massive majority of the profits simply for owning the means of production, not winner takes all, but fairly close.
2. What's your alternative, and how does it avoid the problems of previous experiments such as 100 million people murdered by their own governments?
Simple, avoid the systems that have had such bad outcomes. From previous experiences with countries like the USSR, we can throw out totalitarian dictatorship as a governmental system, and state capitalism as an economic system.
There are an amazing number of good alternatives, most hinging not on the system of government, but on the ownership of property. A lot of current problems are due to the strange set of property rules we live under, and the merging of posession, personal property, and private property into a single concept. This is very much like how the system is becoming severely warped when trademark, trade secret, copyright, and patent are all put under the intellectual property umbrella. It causes many distinct concepts to be treated in substantially the same way, a way that does not fit each item that makes up the whole.
The workers own it, and they decide the terms of its use. The main difference is you don't have someone who owns the means of production making the lions share of the profit, paying the workers the minimum necessary to keep them there. There would not be some single person profiting from the factory, profits would go to all the owners, the workers there. No one could "dictate" terms of use, it is democratic, similar to a co-op for the most part.
It is under communism that the state owns the resources and pretends that they are still owned by the people. This is really just state capitalism, and produces the legal fiction you are talking about above.
Wow, I don't even know where to start there. Why don't you try a basic political science text for starters...
Basic socialist philosophy is simply that the means of production cannot be owned by a single person who then charges "rent" for its use, creating wage labor. Socialism has very little to do with the current use of the term, and not much to do with having rulers at all. When you have a system where the rulers control the means of production as in the USSR, it is state capitalism, not socialism. Under socialism, the workers who use the means of production are its owners.
Six of one, half a dozen of the other. How many die in the US every year because the only care avaliable to them is the ER, and by that time it is usually too late. The numbers are pretty scary there too.
(In the US, the ER cannot turn anyone away even if they can't pay, so many of the poor never get care until it is severe enough to go to the emergency room).
Communism as practiced in the USSR and such is really nothing of the sort, just a combination of a dictatorship and state capitalism. The problem with this theory is that dictatorship does not maximize freedom, and state capitalism precludes any large scale entrepeneurship. The only system that can maximize both freedom and choice is anarchism, the absence of both overbearing government and the chains of the multi-national.
Of course, the piddling effects of a World War or two couldn't have anything to do with it...
Re:The Rich: not to burst bubbles either ...
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Tech Rich Get Richer
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To my experience, that is true only in places that have high taxes, and overrestrictive regulations - otherwise natural forces tend to destribute the wealth.
Where is this? I think you'll find that those countries with less taxes and regulation have an even greater gap between rich and poor, while those with more taxes and regulation have a much smaller gap. Look at wealth distribution rates in Europe vs those in South America.
Try comparing it wages 10, 20, 30, etc years ago in constant dollars...doesn't look so hot after that. Also, while that may not be dirt poor, it is not exactly a life style that will allow for little details like sending children to college or buying health insurance very easily, let alone saving for retirement or starting a business.
Re:Why do you think Bush gave them tax cuts?
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communistic
That word you keep using, I do not believe it means what you think it means.
As to the point of fair, it most certainly is. The rich benefit _far_ more from everything from trade policies to custom loopholes in tax codes to the basic protections of civilization than the middle and lower classes do. Taxes are an attempt to redress the inherent inequalities of our current laws surrounding real and intellectual property, labor rights, and the inexpensive use of public land for corporate profit. The alternative for the rich is actual competition without government favoritism or protections and threats in international negotiations, which they would rather avoid.
Notice how everyone whines about the taxes here, but they all live here after offshoring their entire companies.
That would actually be quite different. This would be like suing a car maker if your 500 HP supercar puts out 499 HP. How many 2 GHz processors are really 1998 MHz?
So, to avoid offending some twit with a one minute rule, one should strive to get there 30 minutes early? In other words, you are proposing that each person give their employer 125 hours of free time each year (assuming 2 weeks of holidays)? That amounts to just over _three 40 hour work weeks_ each year, for no additional pay. You're off your rocker!
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Please, I was arguing points, not the whole thing, that's why I selected what I was arguing. What was so "dishonest" (as if "intellectual dishonesty" really means anything -- it doesn't) about leaving out the fact that all nations have a military. Oh, wait that was YOU being intellecually dishonest. Pot... well, you know the rest.
Guess what that is? A lie. I quoted every service you mentioned except schools & Health care
Since you lied your way into insulting me you had to list now what you left out the first time. Would have saved you the trouble if you had actually said these things before -- intellectual dishonesty, indeed. Okay, that's fine.
So let's see, you cut out the majority of significant services I mentioned, then accuse me of lying. Let's contrast that against the quotes from the original article you commented to, including a listing of services far beyond the trivial list you provided to misrepresent my position.
Citizens of other first world countries pay taxes that are only superficially higher than mine, and receive all the basic services I do here (police, libraries, highways, etc.) In addition, they have national pensions that make social security look pathetic, free health care, free higher education, functional and far reaching public transit, labor protection, etc.
Please check your arrogance and your actual words before attempting to insult someone next time and don't accuse me of leaving out what you did not put in. It might save you some embarrasment. HAND.
Boy, that statement sure looks a bit funny against actual quotes, doesn't it?
You make a snotty point about higher taxes, but fail to mention how much is received for them. Reducing an entire page length discussion of comparative benefits to a brief snipped quote about police and fire services is dishonest.
Hmm, so you call me a liar a few times and claim that I didn't list anything beyond police and fire, but I had an extensive list both discussed through the body of my post, and summarized at the end. You might want to consider reading the post you are replying to before you lie about it's contents.
As to your points. First, you're missing the point that I don't care if government provides this or not. This is not a big government vs little government matter, this is about getting my money's worth. Why is it that the US charges taxes that are not that much lower, yet provides almost none of the services that most other countries do? I am getting ripped off.
Does SS provide a meager retirement, yep, but other countries provide a far better one. You also do realize that most countries let you retire at that level after only 35 years? Do we subsidize colleges, yep, but other countries make it free. You have a point in some areas about the size of the US, but many cities do not have viable public transportation, and there needs to be a better system connecting states, or a revival of Amtrack to equal Europe.
As to free emergency care, no, it is not. They must provide you with emergency care, at absurd rates, then you get to spend the rest of your life paying it off or filing bankruptcy. The problem is that, once again, I pay enough in taxes that I should get more than this, or my taxes need to be cut for real.
Wow, you must not make much, or you pay WAAAAAY too much for health insurance. Or that just tipped the "intellectual dishonesty" scale way past "bullshit."
Ahh, how much you could learn if you only researched before you posted. A married couple with 2 children, $70,000 combined income will save $410. If you know where I can get decent health coverage for a family of 4 for less than that, please let me know.
I could get as big a tax cut by moving to Oregon from California as I could get by moving from a lot of Europe to the US. While paying close to the same as them in taxes, I receive none of the services. That is what this whole issue comes down to. If I am expected to pay
Wow, this has to be one of the most intellectually dishonest cut-and-paste jobs I have seen on a response.
> You get police, highways, etc., but so do the citizens of all first world countries
Yes, same protection, but those nations have higher taxes. Yay for progress.
Hmm, how convenient that you left out every part of my post pointing out the vast number of services they receive for very little increase. The amount of additional taxes you would pay in most countries vs the US is no worse than the difference hit by moving to a state with a different income tax level, in other words, not much at all.
What the US has that they don't: big military
What they have the US doesn't: meaningful retirement, free health care, free higher education, and even have a good enough transit system that the unnecessary expense of a car is optional.
> an excellant military, which is only necessary since the US has to go around manipulating other nation's governments
Oh, your country does not have a military? That's impressive. Oh, I see, your country has a military for protection, but the U.S. has it for dominance. Doesn't that sound slightly biased?
Ooh, you got to cut a lot out of that one. I actually said no such thing in the entire paragraph, but to answer your question, no that would not sound biased. What I stated is that the US does have an impressive military, but that a military of that size is in part only necessary because the US also makes a lot of enemies. Most countries get by with very small military budgets because they don't have much to defend themselves from. How many countries have a deep seated hatred of Canada or Denmark?
> I want my taxes reduced.
Which has happened in the last few years. Twice. You didn't see a big reduction? Because (assuming you are not wealthy) you aren't paying much to begin with.
My taxes have been reduced by enough to buy what, one month of health insurance? Be still my heart, at this rate, only 22 cuts to go before I really care.
The lower taxes in general in the US add up to enough money to pay for 3 or 4 months of health insurance. That is not even enough to pay for a single semester of college, or the co-pay on any major medical procedure.
For US taxes to be lower by enough to make up for not having health coverage, higher education, or retirement, tax rates would have to be in the 2%-5% range, with no social security deduction. Doesn't sound like such a good deal to me.
What an absolutely bizarre comparison. Schools are funded by property taxes collected by the local/state goverment and given to schools completely managed by those local/state goverments. The federal government has absolutely no control and no fiscal responsibility for this local issue. Sometimes they make grants to states but this is an inefficient step for the federal government to collect taxes away from states and then give it back.
Actually, it is a lot more warped than that. The money all gets funneled through the fed, so it has a massive amount of influence. Anyway, I believe the poster is referring to the fact that higher education (college/trade school) is also free in the vast majority of first world countries.
Another absurd statement; health care in the USA is the best in the world. Oh wait, he means health care paid for by the taxpayer. There are plenty of private health insurers and hospitals are forbidden to turn away patients who cannot pay.
Oh, it is the best in the world, if you can afford the very best. For the vast majority of the population, and even more so for the 60+ million uninsured, it is hardly as useful. Hospitals must treat emergency cases, but by then you are usually so far gone that everything is both riskier and more expensive. Care to prevent the bad from getting worse or to prevent bad things all together is not avaliable to those without either a generous employer or _very_ deep pockets. Private individuals pay rates around 10x what the insurance companies pay. Also, in the vast majority of first world countries (all of them I think, except for the US), it is free as well, which would explain why most of them also have longer average life expentancies than the US.
That's odd, I get protection from the greatest, by a wide margin, military in the world. Interstate highways, police, fire, national parks, etc. The list goes on and on. Vidal must be a serious hermit to not get ANYTHING for his taxes.
Two parts to this one. You get police, highways, etc., but so do the citizens of all first world countries. Yes, you do get protection from an excellant military, which is only necessary since the US has to go around manipulating other nation's governments and picking fights all the time.
Thanks to superior medical care and a solid national defence...
Of course, living in Canada with access to preventative care he would live even longer. Funny, they don't seem to need national defense much, maybe because they don't work so hard at making enemies.
Umm, what about last week's unemployment numbers down to 6 from 61? Umm, what about the stock market up significantly from the first of the year? Umm, what about corporate earnings meeting and beating expectations (which are up from last year)?
Oh, be still my heart. A completely artifical construct is moving upward, and employment is increasing. It must be our fearless leader...or maybe the Christmas shopping season, which is the only time of year some retailers turn a profit at all.
The main point seems to be that for as little as I receive from the US government, my taxes should be far lower than they are. Citizens of other first world countries pay taxes that are only superficially higher than mine, and receive all the basic services I do here (police, libraries, highways, etc.) In addition, they have national pensions that make social security look pathetic, free health care, free higher education, functional and far reaching public transit, labor protection, etc. The only thing I have in the US that they don't is a huge military, which is in part only so large because the US picks a lot of fights.
Either I want to get my money's worth, or I want my taxes reduced. The current situation of paying for almost nothing is getting a bit old.
People like Orrin Hatch are why a good argument could be made that serving in public office should be a capital (can be executed for it) offense.
Well, they get voted for as directly as the US President.
There are a number of different implementations of democracy/republics, and many don't directly elect most offices. Heck, the most influential people in the President's administration are the unelected cabinet members, and congressional staffers and issue specialists are unelected but have more real power than the congresscritters themselves.
I also seem to recall that some Parlimentary systems have heriditary seats for fairly good reasons, much like the longer termed US Senate, to provide stability and insulation from short lived but intense political movements.
So, is there a democracy anywhere by your definition?
"not reusable in commercial products. This is the highest and best use of code"
If you see commercial exploitation of free work as the "highest and best use," I'd really hate to see what you consider the lowest and worse use...scary.
I thought executives was read as weasels without moral inhibitions...
With the pathetic US voter turnout, it is worse than that. Bush only has the support of 24.48% of voters (who actively voted in the election, not registered), and only 17.94% of the US population. Not exactly what I would call a "mandate" in the current political jargon.
Words to live by, though I usually check what the CFO is up to as well.
Exactly, that's the point. Those future cash flows are only worth 16.7 million right now assuming a standard 12% return. If the business has two models, one which cashes out for a decent amount right now but burns all your customers and implodes the company in a couple of years, and one that generates a steady cash flow for a long period through happy customers, most choose the former. It usually nets more money in the long run, and without all the headaches of actually running a business for that long.
In the utopian land of economics classes, capitalism is largely self-regulating because they claim that concerns like keeping happy customers and sustaining the business will keep companies from engaging in unethical or illegal behavior. In the real world, many are perfectly willing to let the business die due to unethical or illegal behavior, since they come out of it with a nice lump of cash which will work out much better for them in the long term.
If only it worked that way in the real world. The payoff is so great, and the chance of being nailed by the same media outlet that is probably owned by your parent company is so small, the temptation is overwhelming.
I think the fundamental problem is people who assume the company has to stay in business in addition to making money, that would probably make the rosy assumptions of US business more true. The fact is that most companies see a great opportunity for short term profit, take it, and run. It's kind of like the majority of people that take 20 million now instead of 40 million over the next 20 years or such when they win the lottery. They don't care if they stay in business, they made their money, screw everyone else. In that light, loss of customers and reputation is meaningless as a regulatory mechanism.
Maybe we should turn the low-skill people into high-skill people?
:)
That would be the ideal, and is probably the only sane way out of the current mess. The problem is that most people couldn't dream of affording the time and money for continuing education. What I would like to see is the mishmash of welfare programs rolled into something useful. If you are displaced from your job by something relatively permanent, either like the flight of certain textile jobs out of country, or the elimination of a job category by technology like buggy whip manufacturers, you should get real unemployment.
Instead of giving someone handouts to survive until the next make work job, give them a period of a living wage while studying to be re-skilled for a new career. This costs more in the short term, but preserves our quality of life far better, and returns people to the workforce at the same or better positions. This is an improvement in both moral and practical terms, since they would be paying taxes again, making up the cost, and helping to drive the economy.
But isn't home ownership at all time highs? Isn't housing appreciation a good thing for homeowners?
It's good for the people that bought a long time ago, but the major problem is that new housing is also far more expensive. Normally, what you want is for people to be able to move from a starter home up to their retirement residence, enjoying a steady appreciation along the path. Now, too few affordable homes are being produced in many areas, and most people end up paying far too much of their salary for their home. It is good for those few that can cash in, but bad for all that come after them.
Do you have any justification for your implication that lower taxes leads to lower wages?
I think you are misreading him, I see no such implication. It appears to be alluding to cities competing for corporate call centers and such. These days, cities are so desperate for job creation that they will offer subsidized utilities, a low tax or tax free period for the company, and they often brag about how cheap local labor is. They are not causally linked, just pitched together.
Anecdotal or statistical evidence of wages not going up with increased productivity over a prolonged period of time?
I'd be interested in when increased productivity does increase wages at an appreciable rate. Over a long period of time wages do go up, but rarely enough to match inflation and/or cost of living increases in their area. Since the cult of short term profits over long term stability came into power, companies have been boosing productivity by laying off workers and driving the remaining ones harder. Over the last few years, productivity has been steadily rising, and aside from the IT worker blip, wages have not risen much in the last few decades.
Anecdotally, in companies I've worked for that have increased productivity, management usually receives salary/bonuses for that gain, but the average worker wages don't get more than a cost of living increase.
Peace be with you
And also with you! A signature I wish I saw more often
1. Capitalism is not "winner take all". Yes, the rich get richer, and so does everyone else. And not just in absolute dollars: today you can buy a computer for under $1000 that is more powerful than all the computers used in the Apollo project combined. Why? Because Andy Grove and others wanted to make more money.
Yeah, and I used to walk to work, in the snow, uphill both ways. It's so much better now. There is a history of technical advancement in societies regardless of economic system throughout all recorded history. What good is a cheap computer if you can't afford it?
One of the problems of capitalism is that the owners take the massive majority of the profits simply for owning the means of production, not winner takes all, but fairly close.
2. What's your alternative, and how does it avoid the problems of previous experiments such as 100 million people murdered by their own governments?
Simple, avoid the systems that have had such bad outcomes. From previous experiences with countries like the USSR, we can throw out totalitarian dictatorship as a governmental system, and state capitalism as an economic system.
There are an amazing number of good alternatives, most hinging not on the system of government, but on the ownership of property. A lot of current problems are due to the strange set of property rules we live under, and the merging of posession, personal property, and private property into a single concept. This is very much like how the system is becoming severely warped when trademark, trade secret, copyright, and patent are all put under the intellectual property umbrella. It causes many distinct concepts to be treated in substantially the same way, a way that does not fit each item that makes up the whole.
The workers own it, and they decide the terms of its use. The main difference is you don't have someone who owns the means of production making the lions share of the profit, paying the workers the minimum necessary to keep them there. There would not be some single person profiting from the factory, profits would go to all the owners, the workers there. No one could "dictate" terms of use, it is democratic, similar to a co-op for the most part.
It is under communism that the state owns the resources and pretends that they are still owned by the people. This is really just state capitalism, and produces the legal fiction you are talking about above.
Wow, I don't even know where to start there. Why don't you try a basic political science text for starters...
Basic socialist philosophy is simply that the means of production cannot be owned by a single person who then charges "rent" for its use, creating wage labor. Socialism has very little to do with the current use of the term, and not much to do with having rulers at all. When you have a system where the rulers control the means of production as in the USSR, it is state capitalism, not socialism. Under socialism, the workers who use the means of production are its owners.
Funny, I thought the USSR was state capitalism combined with a dictatorship...whose system failed again?
Six of one, half a dozen of the other. How many die in the US every year because the only care avaliable to them is the ER, and by that time it is usually too late. The numbers are pretty scary there too.
(In the US, the ER cannot turn anyone away even if they can't pay, so many of the poor never get care until it is severe enough to go to the emergency room).
Communism as practiced in the USSR and such is really nothing of the sort, just a combination of a dictatorship and state capitalism. The problem with this theory is that dictatorship does not maximize freedom, and state capitalism precludes any large scale entrepeneurship. The only system that can maximize both freedom and choice is anarchism, the absence of both overbearing government and the chains of the multi-national.
Of course, the piddling effects of a World War or two couldn't have anything to do with it...
To my experience, that is true only in places that have high taxes, and overrestrictive regulations - otherwise natural forces tend to destribute the wealth.
Where is this? I think you'll find that those countries with less taxes and regulation have an even greater gap between rich and poor, while those with more taxes and regulation have a much smaller gap. Look at wealth distribution rates in Europe vs those in South America.
Try comparing it wages 10, 20, 30, etc years ago in constant dollars...doesn't look so hot after that. Also, while that may not be dirt poor, it is not exactly a life style that will allow for little details like sending children to college or buying health insurance very easily, let alone saving for retirement or starting a business.
communistic
That word you keep using, I do not believe it means what you think it means.
As to the point of fair, it most certainly is. The rich benefit _far_ more from everything from trade policies to custom loopholes in tax codes to the basic protections of civilization than the middle and lower classes do. Taxes are an attempt to redress the inherent inequalities of our current laws surrounding real and intellectual property, labor rights, and the inexpensive use of public land for corporate profit. The alternative for the rich is actual competition without government favoritism or protections and threats in international negotiations, which they would rather avoid.
Notice how everyone whines about the taxes here, but they all live here after offshoring their entire companies.
If only this were the rule instead of the exception. Most low profile types don't donate any more than they can get a tax write off for.
That would actually be quite different. This would be like suing a car maker if your 500 HP supercar puts out 499 HP. How many 2 GHz processors are really 1998 MHz?
So, to avoid offending some twit with a one minute rule, one should strive to get there 30 minutes early? In other words, you are proposing that each person give their employer 125 hours of free time each year (assuming 2 weeks of holidays)? That amounts to just over _three 40 hour work weeks_ each year, for no additional pay. You're off your rocker!