And in that same period, 1,830,680 people emigrated into Canada. Now in 2001, we had 31 million to your 281 million, so we had nearly 50% more immigration per capita. Not that it's a race and anybody's counting or anything.
Ah, but according to here, over 50% of those immigrants are from the United States (23%) Australia (6.44%) or Europe (20.5%). And most of them come with money.
Most people that come to the United States have very little to begin with. That makes a difference.
Are you truly as naive as you sound? Have you never heard of export and import tarrifs? Do you think every country does not favor internal companies to external companies?
Of course I have heard of export and import tarrifs, but what is more, I actually know what they are and they are as I decribed: restrictions on who I can trade with, and they are there because politically powerful groups want my money and won't let me give it freely to whom I please. It's easy to throw around words like "tarrif", remembering what they mean in the real world is the heard part.
Besides, how are you to pay for those cheap goods when you don't have a job?
Yeah, that's it. Try to scare me. I prefer to take the high-road. People have a right to trade freely with whom they please. I'm not going to extort money from them.
And that's what a tarrif is. What happens if I trade with someone and don't pay the tarrif? Why should I pay it? Am I getting some service for this tax? Of course not. It's extortion. I'm not going to support extortion. There are much better ways of dealing with problems.
The United states government (you know, the guys *I* elected to represent *me*) should take *my* needs into mind when vast amounts of out-sourceing starts to occur.
Well my needs should be taken into account, too and I need inexpensive goods and services.
Besides, what right do you have to keep me from freely trading with people of other nationalities? I'm only allowed to buy from you? What are you, the mob? I have to do business with you "or else", right?
And just because you might get the government to do the dirty work for you doesn't make such your attitude any less wrong.
Tough. Yes, you heard me. Tough. I want my job. My company is based in my country, and I say they have an obligation to support their own country first.
One must mix capitalism with a healthy dose of patriotism. It's in the best interest of the United States that jobs stay within the nation.
You want tough? Ok.
Give back that computer. It was made outside the US.
How about that car? Parts made in Japan were they?
Maybe you'd like to give back that TV.
How about those shoes and that shirt?
You want cheap, affordable goods for yourself, but when it comes to people wanting less expesive software, you say "tough".
You can't have it both ways without looking like a hypocrite.
I've always read that a big reason for our double digit health care increases is because there are so many uninsured people out there.
Actually, I think it's just the opposite. Most people have insurance or use something like Medicare and for them, the care appears nearly free. I know my deductables are very low. They're so low in fact, that I really have no incentive to shop around for anything.
The real problem is that supply is inelastic. The amount of care available doesn't change much, so increases in spending just raise prices so that supply and demand are put back in balance.
Very simplified example:
Assume there are 10 visits available at the doctor's office. 20 people want to see that doctor. What to do? Raise prices until 10 people can afford the doctor. The other 10 stay home.
To "solve" the problem, those 10 people get money from the government or insurance to help them pay for care. Now 20 people can pay for 10 available visits.
What to do? Raise prices again until only 10 people can afford the doctor.
Repeat until the medical industry has all the money.
The reason we spend so much on health care in the US is because it's so heavily subsidized and subsidies almost always raise prices, no matter what the industry.
I can knock your entire math right off the level with this one figure:
Mortgage -
$127,006 financed at 6.5% after 3% down for 30 years fixed. Property taxes (currently $3900/yr) and property insurance (currently $1019/yr) included. FHA-required mortgage insurance ($53/month) included.
Monthly: $1276 Annual: $15,312
You know what sort of house I bought after getting my $40,000/ year intro IT job?
Mortgage -
$69,000 at 8.5% 30 years. Property taxes are $860 (homestead exemption). With insurance, I pay 672.96 all together each month.
One year: $8075.52
Now sure, it's a 2 bedroom plus den with 1 bathroom and garage, but yes, it's big enough to raise a family and it's in a nice small town to boot. The most I've spent on a single repair was $150 for an OEM electric motor for the heat pump.
Where did you get your information from? Really, I've spent a lot of time trying to confirm what you said, but there doesn't seem to be much support for it. Maybe you can supply a reference.
The only thing I was able to find was a table here.
Reproduced:
Country's median income (US=100)
Belgium = 106 Denmark = 105 Canada = 95 France = 95 Germany = 80 UK = 76 Spain = 73 Average EU + Canada = 90
This would seem to contradict what you've said. Can you point me to your source of information?
Plagiarism is taking credit for someone elses work. Don't do that. Simply quote and give credit where credit is due.
I think what might be happening is that students are being told to turn in a research paper, when in reality, the instructor means a survey paper of other's research.
I remember how intimidated I was by the idea of having to do a research paper. I put myself under an incredible amount of pressure believing that when I wrote a paper, it had to contain real, original, never before seen theories and results.
Ridiculous, maybe, but there were several times when I just gave up and wrote nothing and received a failing grade for the assignment. My A+ became a C-.
If someone had just said "survey paper" instead of "research paper", I could have saved myself a lot of headache.
yes, and when they stop co-operating, they fall apart (usually through revolution). Seeing as how the classes aren't getting along, I seriously wonder what that means in regards to the longevity of our current society.
Actually, the classes do seem to mostly be getting along, and I don't think you help people by exaggerating the situation.
Workplace morale is the employer's responsibility, though, especially in a high-turnover workplace like this. If so many people are so willing to cheat him, he needs to ask himself why. "Because they can" is not the answer.
Are you sure? I've worked with people that used just that sort of logic. They think they're just being practical. They actually think it's a sign of weakness and naivete to consider such things as morality and ethics. If you bring it up, they just pat you on the head like you're a kid.
I'm not sure that putting in a system which is almost guaranteed to lower morale further is the best solution.
Maybe, but the fault lies with those that are dishonest, not with the owner.
The best solution is more public discussion about morality, ethics, and their purpose in a civil society.
Now for some armchair psychology... Perhaps he chose this particular solution because it allowed him to continue believing that "they" are the problem, not him. Fixing it is simply a matter of keeping them "under control."
"A proper moral code" is a two-way street. If you expect someone to treat you fairly, you had better see to it that he feels treated fairly by you. Otherwise, it's too easy for him to justify moral transgressions by telling himself, "I'm only taking what I deserved in the first place." My guess is that most of the people who cheated this employer used similar justifications.
I'm not saying that two wrongs make a right. But I am saying that actions have consequences. If his employees feel, rightly or wrongly, that they are getting screwed, they are more likely to screw him back. It doesn't make it right, but there it is.
Ah, there's the rub: how do we determine what is fair?
As far as I can tell, "unfair" has been reduced to meaning "I don't like it."
I think people, especially the young, are dishonest to workplaces because employers have given them absolutely no reason to be honest, they just screw the employees around every chance they get.
The history of all hitherto existing successful societies is the history of class cooperation.
While not as high-tech why not just stick with a punch card or swipe card. Sure you can get a few people who will punch in for someone every once and a while or something what's the big deal. This just sounds like a gigantic waste of money to me.
The math is simple enought even for the dumbest of business people. He only needs to ask whether or not the money spent on this device is less than or greater than the money stolen from him.
I think the fact that he's willing to spend so much money on such a device suggests that the incidence of theft is much greater than you think.
I also want to say that it's disturbing that you take lightly dishonesty. Things like morality and ethics aren't just stupid games philosophers play. What people believe is right and wrong has a real, though indirect impact on society. It ultimately come back to you, although for most people it's difficult to see.
This very story is about some of those more obvious impacts. The owner can't trust his employees to do the right thing, so energy and resources must be wasted on this device -- energy and resources that could have gone elsewhere and put to more productive use. He's unhappy and the employees are unhappy.
Ultimately, a proper moral code tries to guide people to make good decisions that lead us generally away from such economically wasteful and socially unhappy situations a this. I don't think it's too far off to suggest that dishonesty and theft are not part of such a moral code.
It's pretty ironic for republicans to portray democrats as fiscally irresponsible: republicans have been far, far worse over the last few decades, starting with Reagan. Republicans love towaste huge amounts of money unproductively, foremost on the military and propping up unproductive industries.
What happened is this:
The Republicans got tired of losing elections because they would not play the give-away game.
They almost went back to their old ways when they won the senate for 2 years (out of 40) under Reagan. Once they started talking about reforming social security, the Democrats used it as a bludgeon and won back the senate. The lesson wasn't lost on the Republicans: buy votes with taxpayer money.
Yes, but what people want isn't always what's best for them.
What is "best" is subjective. How do you know your version of "best" is superior to their version of "best"? You just assume it. You can't know. What people value varies from person to person.
Giving "the people" what they want is very much like giving a 6 year old what he wants all the time... and you end up with a malnourished, spoiled little shit and $10,000 in dental bills.
So what the people want is something like a "big brother" to watch out for them, right?
Look at private business for perfect examples, short-sighted C?O's focusing on nothing more than stock price destroying the long-term viability of a business in order to make a fast buck.
Do we really want to live in a society run by the Darl McBrides of the world?
A private business doesn't have public stock.
Also, historically, business has been much more successful at giving people what they want than say a planned economy where the government knew what was "best" for the people.
Your kind of thinking is has been the justification for many dictatorships -- they all claimed they knew what was "best" for the people instead of letting the people decide for themselves.
What jobs are lost because taxpayers have less to spend in the private economy?
What government spending can do is redirect jobs from one part of the economy to another part. Of course, it's hard to know what jobs exactly are lost in other parts of the economy because of this.
What ends up being really important is this: are those jobs being used to produce things that people want? If the money stays in the taxpayers pocket, they are very likely to make their wishes known in the market place and they are very likely to get what they want.
If it is taxed away for a space program, it's less obvious that they'll be getting what they want. I have to admit, though, I love looking at hubble pictures all day. I think the government has given me my monies worth, at least.
The other important thing to ask is whether or not the jobs being moved from one sector of the economy to another are going to improve efficiency. If people are creating as part of their job technology that makes the production of goods and services more efficient, then it might be a win overall because people get more for their money. A lot of military spending has this effect. How much technology was developed that later made production more efficent? Certainly the investment in computer technology has paid off in all sorts of ways.
There are also situations where spending tax money acts a simple transfer of goods and services and this can actually be a real burden on the economy if the recipients don't help improve production or don't recipricate.
Imagine a hamburger-flipper that is taxed at a 15% rate (payroll taxes for example). Now if that money is simply given to another group of people (retirees for example), when this group shows up at the hamburger joint with that tax money, they are in effect collecting free hamburgers and the taxpayer is unknowling giving them away because all the money he sees looks the same.
Now after getting back this money, it will of course be taxed again and some of it will go right back to that group to collect more hamburgers and the cycle will repeat, with 15% of the hamburgers being made for free for some group.
So the question becomes, how much are people willing to put up with this burden before it starts impacting their own production? No hamburger stand ever stayed in business by giving all it's hamburgers away for free.
If you are an American taxpayer, and you don't want to pay to kill people whose country you can't find on a map, I suggest you vote for Howard Dean, or the intelligent, non-violent candidate of your choice.
And just how is this non-violent candidate going to collect all that money from American taxpayers for government programs, like social security or education or medicare?
I suppose if people don't pay up, he'll just ask them again, nicely and non-violently.
The more I see stories like this, the more I think it's time to (re)ask the question "what counts as a scientific claim?" When is it legitimate to claim an assertion as knowledge or fact or scientific? How much weight should such claims be given?
Consider the fate of Bjorn Lomborg, the author of the Skeptical Environmentalist. This man was beaten up by the environmental community and even his government. He was called unscientific. It was even suggested that because he is a statistician, he wasn't a "real" scientist - as if being a statistician meant spending all day taking the mean of 100 random numbers.
Yet, when it comes to issues concerning legitimate belief and knowledge, statistics has much more to say than physics, chemistry, or environmental science. Only in philosophy is there more discussion about what counts as legitimate belief or knowledge.
So again I ask, what counts as science? Do scientists even know? Are we at the point when we simply defer all judgement to people that call themselves scientists? Is science simply whatever such people say?
If companies are restricted from hiring foreign workers, what's to stop a new company from forming in that country to take advantage of the labor and compete against US companies?
That's the conventional Republican wisdom in the USA, but the basic physics tells you that the basis of Kyoto is rock-solid absent solid evidence to contradict this chain of reasoning:
Carbon dioxide, methane, sulfur hexaflouride and such are transparent to most solar radiation, but absorbent across various bands of thermal wavelengths.
Due to this absorbency, increasing the concentration of these gases in the atmosphere will tend to trap heat which currently radiates to space.
To restore the balance between solar flux and radiative cooling, the temperature of the Earth will have to increase on the average.
If we desire to ameliorate these changes, we have to reduce the rate at which greenhouse gases are put into the atmosphere.
Seems logical, but the problem is that the atmosphere has so much CO2 in it that it is already mostly opaque to outgoing longwave radiation. Adding more CO2 doesn't make it much more opaque. Imagine trying to compare the opacity of a 1 mm sheet of foil to a 2 mm sheet of foil. Sure, 2 mm of foil blocks more light, but 1 mm will block nearly all the light shown on it.
The only thing that makes the theory kinda work is the spreading of the absorption spectrum of CO2. The idea is that the extreme ends of the curve still let enough LW radiation out that increasing CO2 will reduce this escape. The effect, though, is estimated to be very small. The effect is further reduced because the spectra of other greenhouse gases overlap with these etremes.
To enhance this small effect, the theory asserts a dramatic increase of water vapor. Most of the increase in warming, according to the theory, actually comes from water vapor acting as a greenhouse gas and not CO2.
So what happens to all that vapor? Does it just stay in the atmosphere or does it precipitate out? What about the effect of clouds? If there are more clouds, does less solar radiation come in?
The theory also assumes the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere will increase exponentially. Can we really predict how much CO2 will be put into the atmosphere 40 years from now? What happens as oil becomes more and more expensive? Will things like nuclear power be much more in use?
Now I won't say the theory is complete bunk, but it is still much more speculative than is suggested in the press.
And what about Kyoto? Well, even it's supporters agree that it will delay warming by a modest 6 years or so.
The problem with local governments is that they have grown very large. So while it used to make sense when you came from a small town of a few hundred, when your town has millions of people in it... letting local government determine what to censor is a bad idea. It makes more sense to let families determine the "right" answer. Let the parents determine what to censor.
It really depends on how great a chance there is that someone's behavior will affect you. When it comes to jet airliners, for example, there can be great risk to people far away from where the decision is made to allow someone to board. Such matters require a single standard over a larger-than-city area.
The same thing applies to your comment about parents. My kids aren't going to stay locked in the house all day. Other people affect them and they affect other people. I don't think they'll get much farther than the city they live in, however, which is why I think the decisions should be city-wide.
The other question is: in what ways can parents limit the actions of other people with respect to their children? I think I should have a say. Like I said before, children won't (shouldn't) be locked in a house all day. I can't be there for every purchase they make.
Anyway, there really wouldn't be much argument, however, if cities were allowed to decide for themselves. We don't have Berlin walls around our cities to keep people in. If a city is too conservative, go to a city with different standards.
The nice thing about this approach is that it allows for experimentation. Cities can learn from eachother what works and what doesn't.
Why should there be just one standard of risk tolerance for the whole country?
Violent video games do have an effect on the young. The question is, how willing are you to accept this risk in exchange for greater freedom?
The tolerance for risk varies from person to person, so the answer to that question will vary from person to person.
At some point, a compromise must be reached amoung people about just how much risk they should all accept. It is possible though, that some people accepting risk in one part of the country add no extra risk to those in another part of the country. What game kids play in Seattle has little affect on the people of Tampa.
The best approach to this problem, IMO, is to allow cities/communities to set their own standards. There is no single "right" answer for the whole country. This seems like it ought to be a "cities-rights" issue.
Slashdot Mirror
There is free as in free to do things without interference, and free as in getting something for nothing.
They're not the same thing.
And in that same period, 1,830,680 people emigrated into Canada. Now in 2001, we had 31 million to your 281 million, so we had nearly 50% more immigration per capita. Not that it's a race and anybody's counting or anything.
Ah, but according to here, over 50% of those immigrants are from the United States (23%) Australia (6.44%) or Europe (20.5%). And most of them come with money.
Most people that come to the United States have very little to begin with. That makes a difference.
Are you truly as naive as you sound? Have you never heard of export and import tarrifs? Do you think every country does not favor internal companies to external companies?
Of course I have heard of export and import tarrifs, but what is more, I actually know what they are and they are as I decribed: restrictions on who I can trade with, and they are there because politically powerful groups want my money and won't let me give it freely to whom I please. It's easy to throw around words like "tarrif", remembering what they mean in the real world is the heard part.
Besides, how are you to pay for those cheap goods when you don't have a job?
Yeah, that's it. Try to scare me. I prefer to take the high-road. People have a right to trade freely with whom they please. I'm not going to extort money from them.
And that's what a tarrif is. What happens if I trade with someone and don't pay the tarrif? Why should I pay it? Am I getting some service for this tax? Of course not. It's extortion. I'm not going to support extortion. There are much better ways of dealing with problems.
The United states government (you know, the guys *I* elected to represent *me*) should take *my* needs into mind when vast amounts of out-sourceing starts to occur.
Well my needs should be taken into account, too and I need inexpensive goods and services.
Besides, what right do you have to keep me from freely trading with people of other nationalities? I'm only allowed to buy from you? What are you, the mob? I have to do business with you "or else", right?
And just because you might get the government to do the dirty work for you doesn't make such your attitude any less wrong.
Tough. Yes, you heard me. Tough. I want my job. My company is based in my country, and I say they have an obligation to support their own country first.
One must mix capitalism with a healthy dose of patriotism. It's in the best interest of the United States that jobs stay within the nation.
You want tough? Ok.
Give back that computer. It was made outside the US.
How about that car? Parts made in Japan were they?
Maybe you'd like to give back that TV.
How about those shoes and that shirt?
You want cheap, affordable goods for yourself, but when it comes to people wanting less expesive software, you say "tough".
You can't have it both ways without looking like a hypocrite.
I've always read that a big reason for our double digit health care increases is because there are so many uninsured people out there.
Actually, I think it's just the opposite. Most people have insurance or use something like Medicare and for them, the care appears nearly free. I know my deductables are very low. They're so low in fact, that I really have no incentive to shop around for anything.
The real problem is that supply is inelastic. The amount of care available doesn't change much, so increases in spending just raise prices so that supply and demand are put back in balance.
Very simplified example:
Assume there are 10 visits available at the doctor's office. 20 people want to see that doctor. What to do? Raise prices until 10 people can afford the doctor. The other 10 stay home.
To "solve" the problem, those 10 people get money from the government or insurance to help them pay for care. Now 20 people can pay for 10 available visits.
What to do? Raise prices again until only 10 people can afford the doctor.
Repeat until the medical industry has all the money.
The reason we spend so much on health care in the US is because it's so heavily subsidized and subsidies almost always raise prices, no matter what the industry.
I can knock your entire math right off the level with this one figure:
Mortgage -
$127,006 financed at 6.5% after 3% down for 30 years fixed. Property taxes (currently $3900/yr) and property insurance (currently $1019/yr) included. FHA-required mortgage insurance ($53/month) included.
Monthly: $1276
Annual: $15,312
You know what sort of house I bought after getting my $40,000/ year intro IT job?
Mortgage -
$69,000 at 8.5% 30 years. Property taxes are $860 (homestead exemption). With insurance, I pay 672.96 all together each month.
One year: $8075.52
Now sure, it's a 2 bedroom plus den with 1 bathroom and garage, but yes, it's big enough to raise a family and it's in a nice small town to boot. The most I've spent on a single repair was $150 for an OEM electric motor for the heat pump.
Where did you get your information from? Really, I've spent a lot of time trying to confirm what you said, but there doesn't seem to be much support for it. Maybe you can supply a reference.
The only thing I was able to find was a table here.
Reproduced:
Country's median income (US=100)
Belgium = 106
Denmark = 105
Canada = 95
France = 95
Germany = 80
UK = 76
Spain = 73
Average EU + Canada = 90
This would seem to contradict what you've said. Can you point me to your source of information?
Just listened to these.
While their "Volcaloid" tech is nice, their "Lyricoid" tech needs work.
Hmmm, Republicans use unethical means to determine Democrats also unethical.
File this under: double plus obvious, tell us something new.
Plagiarism is taking credit for someone elses work. Don't do that. Simply quote and give credit where credit is due.
I think what might be happening is that students are being told to turn in a research paper, when in reality, the instructor means a survey paper of other's research.
I remember how intimidated I was by the idea of having to do a research paper. I put myself under an incredible amount of pressure believing that when I wrote a paper, it had to contain real, original, never before seen theories and results.
Ridiculous, maybe, but there were several times when I just gave up and wrote nothing and received a failing grade for the assignment. My A+ became a C-.
If someone had just said "survey paper" instead of "research paper", I could have saved myself a lot of headache.
The article implies that the camera is monochrome and that filters are used to capture each color.
So, adding the images together, 1 megapixel green + 1 mp red + 1 mp blue = 3 megapixels.
yes, and when they stop co-operating, they fall apart (usually through revolution). Seeing as how the classes aren't getting along, I seriously wonder what that means in regards to the longevity of our current society.
Actually, the classes do seem to mostly be getting along, and I don't think you help people by exaggerating the situation.
Workplace morale is the employer's responsibility, though, especially in a high-turnover workplace like this. If so many people are so willing to cheat him, he needs to ask himself why. "Because they can" is not the answer.
Are you sure? I've worked with people that used just that sort of logic. They think they're just being practical. They actually think it's a sign of weakness and naivete to consider such things as morality and ethics. If you bring it up, they just pat you on the head like you're a kid.
I'm not sure that putting in a system which is almost guaranteed to lower morale further is the best solution.
Maybe, but the fault lies with those that are dishonest, not with the owner.
The best solution is more public discussion about morality, ethics, and their purpose in a civil society.
Now for some armchair psychology... Perhaps he chose this particular solution because it allowed him to continue believing that "they" are the problem, not him. Fixing it is simply a matter of keeping them "under control."
"A proper moral code" is a two-way street. If you expect someone to treat you fairly, you had better see to it that he feels treated fairly by you. Otherwise, it's too easy for him to justify moral transgressions by telling himself, "I'm only taking what I deserved in the first place." My guess is that most of the people who cheated this employer used similar justifications.
I'm not saying that two wrongs make a right. But I am saying that actions have consequences. If his employees feel, rightly or wrongly, that they are getting screwed, they are more likely to screw him back. It doesn't make it right, but there it is.
Ah, there's the rub: how do we determine what is fair?
As far as I can tell, "unfair" has been reduced to meaning "I don't like it."
I think people, especially the young, are dishonest to workplaces because employers have given them absolutely no reason to be honest, they just screw the employees around every chance they get.
The history of all hitherto existing successful societies is the
history of class cooperation.
While not as high-tech why not just stick with a punch card or swipe card. Sure you can get a few people who will punch in for someone every once and a while or something what's the big deal. This just sounds like a gigantic waste of money to me.
The math is simple enought even for the dumbest of business people. He only needs to ask whether or not the money spent on this device is less than or greater than the money stolen from him.
I think the fact that he's willing to spend so much money on such a device suggests that the incidence of theft is much greater than you think.
I also want to say that it's disturbing that you take lightly dishonesty. Things like morality and ethics aren't just stupid games philosophers play. What people believe is right and wrong has a real, though indirect impact on society. It ultimately come back to you, although for most people it's difficult to see.
This very story is about some of those more obvious impacts. The owner can't trust his employees to do the right thing, so energy and resources must be wasted on this device -- energy and resources that could have gone elsewhere and put to more productive use. He's unhappy and the employees are unhappy.
Ultimately, a proper moral code tries to guide people to make good decisions that lead us generally away from such economically wasteful and socially unhappy situations a this. I don't think it's too far off to suggest that dishonesty and theft are not part of such a moral code.
It's pretty ironic for republicans to portray democrats as fiscally irresponsible: republicans have been far, far worse over the last few decades, starting with Reagan. Republicans love towaste huge amounts of money unproductively, foremost on the military and propping up unproductive industries.
What happened is this:
The Republicans got tired of losing elections because they would not play the give-away game.
They almost went back to their old ways when they won the senate for 2 years (out of 40) under Reagan. Once they started talking about reforming social security, the Democrats used it as a bludgeon and won back the senate. The lesson wasn't lost on the Republicans: buy votes with taxpayer money.
Yes, but what people want isn't always what's best for them.
What is "best" is subjective. How do you know your version of "best" is superior to their version of "best"? You just assume it. You can't know. What people value varies from person to person.
Giving "the people" what they want is very much like giving a 6 year old what he wants all the time... and you end up with a malnourished, spoiled little shit and $10,000 in dental bills.
So what the people want is something like a "big brother" to watch out for them, right?
Look at private business for perfect examples, short-sighted C?O's focusing on nothing more than stock price destroying the long-term viability of a business in order to make a fast buck.
Do we really want to live in a society run by the Darl McBrides of the world?
A private business doesn't have public stock.
Also, historically, business has been much more successful at giving people what they want than say a planned economy where the government knew what was "best" for the people.
Your kind of thinking is has been the justification for many dictatorships -- they all claimed they knew what was "best" for the people instead of letting the people decide for themselves.
What jobs are lost because taxpayers have less to spend in the private economy?
What government spending can do is redirect jobs from one part of the economy to another part. Of course, it's hard to know what jobs exactly are lost in other parts of the economy because of this.
What ends up being really important is this: are those jobs being used to produce things that people want? If the money stays in the taxpayers pocket, they are very likely to make their wishes known in the market place and they are very likely to get what they want.
If it is taxed away for a space program, it's less obvious that they'll be getting what they want. I have to admit, though, I love looking at hubble pictures all day. I think the government has given me my monies worth, at least.
The other important thing to ask is whether or not the jobs being moved from one sector of the economy to another are going to improve efficiency. If people are creating as part of their job technology that makes the production of goods and services more efficient, then it might be a win overall because people get more for their money. A lot of military spending has this effect. How much technology was developed that later made production more efficent? Certainly the investment in computer technology has paid off in all sorts of ways.
There are also situations where spending tax money acts a simple transfer of goods and services and this can actually be a real burden on the economy if the recipients don't help improve production or don't recipricate.
Imagine a hamburger-flipper that is taxed at a 15% rate (payroll taxes for example). Now if that money is simply given to another group of people (retirees for example), when this group shows up at the hamburger joint with that tax money, they are in effect collecting free hamburgers and the taxpayer is unknowling giving them away because all the money he sees looks the same.
Now after getting back this money, it will of course be taxed again and some of it will go right back to that group to collect more hamburgers and the cycle will repeat, with 15% of the hamburgers being made for free for some group.
So the question becomes, how much are people willing to put up with this burden before it starts impacting their own production? No hamburger stand ever stayed in business by giving all it's hamburgers away for free.
If you are an American taxpayer, and you don't want to pay to kill people whose country you can't find on a map, I suggest you vote for Howard Dean, or the intelligent, non-violent candidate of your choice.
And just how is this non-violent candidate going to collect all that money from American taxpayers for government programs, like social security or education or medicare?
I suppose if people don't pay up, he'll just ask them again, nicely and non-violently.
The more I see stories like this, the more I think it's time to (re)ask the question "what counts as a scientific claim?" When is it legitimate to claim an assertion as knowledge or fact or scientific? How much weight should such claims be given?
Consider the fate of Bjorn Lomborg, the author of the Skeptical Environmentalist. This man was beaten up by the environmental community and even his government. He was called unscientific. It was even suggested that because he is a statistician, he wasn't a "real" scientist - as if being a statistician meant spending all day taking the mean of 100 random numbers.
Yet, when it comes to issues concerning legitimate belief and knowledge, statistics has much more to say than physics, chemistry, or environmental science. Only in philosophy is there more discussion about what counts as legitimate belief or knowledge.
So again I ask, what counts as science? Do scientists even know? Are we at the point when we simply defer all judgement to people that call themselves scientists? Is science simply whatever such people say?
I hope not.
If companies are restricted from hiring foreign workers, what's to stop a new company from forming in that country to take advantage of the labor and compete against US companies?
Seems logical, but the problem is that the atmosphere has so much CO2 in it that it is already mostly opaque to outgoing longwave radiation. Adding more CO2 doesn't make it much more opaque. Imagine trying to compare the opacity of a 1 mm sheet of foil to a 2 mm sheet of foil. Sure, 2 mm of foil blocks more light, but 1 mm will block nearly all the light shown on it.
The only thing that makes the theory kinda work is the spreading of the absorption spectrum of CO2. The idea is that the extreme ends of the curve still let enough LW radiation out that increasing CO2 will reduce this escape. The effect, though, is estimated to be very small. The effect is further reduced because the spectra of other greenhouse gases overlap with these etremes.
To enhance this small effect, the theory asserts a dramatic increase of water vapor. Most of the increase in warming, according to the theory, actually comes from water vapor acting as a greenhouse gas and not CO2.
So what happens to all that vapor? Does it just stay in the atmosphere or does it precipitate out? What about the effect of clouds? If there are more clouds, does less solar radiation come in?
The theory also assumes the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere will increase exponentially. Can we really predict how much CO2 will be put into the atmosphere 40 years from now? What happens as oil becomes more and more expensive? Will things like nuclear power be much more in use?
Now I won't say the theory is complete bunk, but it is still much more speculative than is suggested in the press.
And what about Kyoto? Well, even it's supporters agree that it will delay warming by a modest 6 years or so.
The problem with local governments is that they have grown very large. So while it used to make sense when you came from a small town of a few hundred, when your town has millions of people in it... letting local government determine what to censor is a bad idea. It makes more sense to let families determine the "right" answer. Let the parents determine what to censor.
It really depends on how great a chance there is that someone's behavior will affect you. When it comes to jet airliners, for example, there can be great risk to people far away from where the decision is made to allow someone to board. Such matters require a single standard over a larger-than-city area.
The same thing applies to your comment about parents. My kids aren't going to stay locked in the house all day. Other people affect them and they affect other people. I don't think they'll get much farther than the city they live in, however, which is why I think the decisions should be city-wide.
The other question is: in what ways can parents limit the actions of other people with respect to their children? I think I should have a say. Like I said before, children won't (shouldn't) be locked in a house all day. I can't be there for every purchase they make.
Anyway, there really wouldn't be much argument, however, if cities were allowed to decide for themselves. We don't have Berlin walls around our cities to keep people in. If a city is too conservative, go to a city with different standards.
The nice thing about this approach is that it allows for experimentation. Cities can learn from eachother what works and what doesn't.
Why should there be just one standard of risk tolerance for the whole country?
Violent video games do have an effect on the young. The question is, how willing are you to accept this risk in exchange for greater freedom?
The tolerance for risk varies from person to person, so the answer to that question will vary from person to person.
At some point, a compromise must be reached amoung people about just how much risk they should all accept. It is possible though, that some people accepting risk in one part of the country add no extra risk to those in another part of the country. What game kids play in Seattle has little affect on the people of Tampa.
The best approach to this problem, IMO, is to allow cities/communities to set their own standards. There is no single "right" answer for the whole country. This seems like it ought to be a "cities-rights" issue.