Lots of issues someone that is claiming to be a lawyer in their subtitle should understand.
How many law firms store client data on systems they don't control? In so far as I understand it, they frown on that practice.
The first rule of computer security is physical possession.
As to your worry about political agents losing email or destroying it. A better solution would be to put the control of the servers under a different branch of the government. The federal executive is far far too powerful. So I agree that they probably shouldn't have control over their email server. Give control to congress so if they want emails destroyed they have to get approval from a congressional committee. That would create a paper trail and most committees include members from both parties so a republican or democrat administration wouldn't be able to do something without the opposing party knowing about it.
I think it's a very bad idea for the sole responsibility of the email server to be in the hands of a private corporate entity. I have no problem with the government buying the server from a company. But I do have a problem with the government not taking physical possession of it.
As to giving up on laws that can't be enforced, yes... that's the same reason we should end the war on drugs.
Those are stupid laws. Look at how many people we're throwing in jail for minor drug possession. It's stupid.
Any law that you can't enforce shouldn't be a law. Another stupid law would be laws against suicide.
You can't stop people from taking their own lives. Passing a law against it idiotic. It would be like passing a law against people thinking about pink elephants. How exactly are you going to enforce that law?
Have fun with that.
Any law that can't be enforced shouldn't be a law.
Many people seem to have the notion that a society with more laws is more civilized. This is not the case. A society with more laws is a society with more criminals. As you increase the number of things that are illegal you increase the number of people in the society that are technically criminals. This is a good idea when their classification as criminals serves the common good. It is a stupid idea when it does not.
Anyway, I don't understand why you're in favor of policies that increase unemployment, reduce our national competitiveness, deny young workers experience, and generally over complicates the labor market.
But some people love theories more then they love life. Some people love an idea but then anything else. And they'll just close their eyes, fixation on that idea, and ignore the consequences.
If I'm putting words in your mouth, I'm sorry. Its not my intention to impose upon you ideas and thoughts that are not your own. However, you are being evasion on certain points and it requires me to fill in the gaps. If you don't like the way I do that, help me do so accurately.
I truly have no interest in insulting you. My ego is not involved in this discussion and I see no profit in insulting you or anyone else. These are my honest assessments. If they're flawed, understand that I am not intentionally biasing them to be offensive.
I guess I didn't understand the product then. So google will be selling the government actual physical machines with the software running on them and the government will control those specific machines?
If that's the case, I don't see any problem with it.
As to MS, if google was selling discrete machines, I'll assume MS was doing the same thing... just on a hunch.
So one versus the other? I'd probably stick with the MS one if only because I'd better the cloud version of Excel is better then the google equivalent. People that aren't excel junkies probably don't realize it, but that's a very sophisticated piece of software that has not really been surpassed by any of it's competitors. The open office version and libre office versions of it are no where near as good. They LOOK like excel but they don't really have the same functionality.
Maybe google docs does and maybe the cloud version of excel is more primitive. I'm just guessing here. But if you look past all the "M$" hate you have to admit they do make some very compelling and polished software packages within the sometimes myopic spectrum they dominate.
Neither side cares about the science. Both sides are totally convinced in their virtue. Neither side is willing to look at the case dispassionately. Both sides are so invested in what they want the correct answer to be that they will not tolerate anything that contradicts their position.
Is there a case for AGW? Absolutely. It's a totally valid hypothesis. Is it proven? Of course not. There's no causal link. Getting a causal link is very hard but that doesn't mean you don't need one. AGW proponents almost all propose that we should accept a correlative link as proof of a causal link. That's not science. They say we don't have time to wait and we should assume there is a causal link based on the correlative data. That is a political response and again not science.
The anti AGW people are no better in that they'll ally with various political factions just like the pro AGW factions to form political pressure groups. And of course they don't want to hear they might be wrong any more then the AGW group might be.
Everyone has their egos, world views, political interests, and often careers involved in this matter. There are a lot of pro AGW scientists that might lose their jobs if AGW collapses and there are of course a lot of professional "skeptics" that likewise will find their employment terminated should that fall apart.
In this environment how can anyone really be sure what is going on? I'm not stupid and I'm not ignorant... but I can't sort it out. And find it to be unacceptable generally to simply assume one side or the other is right as so many seem to do. Sure, that's easier. Just believe the church is right about is and isn't true. Just trust the king to sort it out. I'm not a f'ing peasant though and I don't like having other people do my thinking for me.
I'm obviously going to get hate messages or... at least negative messages likely from the pro AGW people to the effect of "anyone that doubts the unquestionable virtue of our position is a fool or a heretic"... but that only underscores the sadness of this issue.
We're probably all bored to tears explaining the science of it to each other.
I've read through more material on the issue then I can pretend interest in. I just wish the issue hadn't been politicized.
I don't know when it started... was it when Al Gore made his fatuous little film? Or was it before? Some think the politicization was inevitable given the interests threatened by it but I'm not so sure.
Anyway... for those offended by my contrary nature... I'm not contrary to annoy you... It's just the best opinion I could come to with what information I have. If I'm wrong, I at least arrived at this position in good faith. If we can all say as much then it will at least be an honest conflict.
Why would I want government documents stored on a google or Microsoft server?
It's fine if the government owns and controls the server but if it doesn't we have a problem.
MS office or whatever you're using tend to run entirely on the local system or at least within your network. So its pretty much in the control over the organization that purchased it. But google docs runs on google server farms and my understanding is that MS 360 or whatever they're calling it does roughly the same thing.
That's a problem. If this is a micro cloud that will be completely owned and controlled by the US government, it's fine... but I worry that this is all getting routed through a generic google server farm. And that's a recipe for disaster.
You're assuming the consumption tax is the only tax and that the regulations between point A and point B are the same and that labor costs are the same.
If I'm paying half what you're paying for labor then my product has the same tax yours has applied, I can sell my product for less and still make a profit.
Thus your consumption tax will not equalize prices.
I don't see how your idea offsets the advantage of doing business outside the country and then importing the goods into the market.
If your economy is not competitive, what is to stop me from making the product outside the country, importing it into the country, and then benifits from the price advantage of making it elsewhere?
See? You have to lower taxes so they're internationally competitive or you need to have tariffs. And the tariffs will cause a trade war.
Which means... you need to make the economy competitive. That means keeping the taxes low, the regulation efficient, the regulation reasonable, and generally not going out of your way to screw businesses.
Large corporations are not cohesive entities. Saying Hulu is owned by the studios is like saying Dallas is owned by the United States. Sure, the studios have control but that doesn't mean they always have the same interests.
As to inflation, who's fault is that? The people devaluing the US currency.
Doubtless you're one of the many advocates of massive out of control deficit spending. Well, inflation is what you get.
As to stagnate wages, that has more to do with a failure to reform labor policies. This isn't the 1930s. We need to radically increase automation amongst other things that big labor has been resisting. Its not helpful to the US economy.
If we want to have a 21st century economy we need to start acting like it.
As to what they'd need to come back. I've had that conversation as well, and the lower wage is not the issue. It's the COST of employment itself which isn't entirely the wage. Wages are about half the cost of hiring people. You can radically lower what you spend on employees without lowering their wages.
And in any case, we really don't need that much of an edge to gain total cost parity with China. The difference isn't that extreme.
It's simply too much for a company to ignore. If there were a five percent difference companies wouldn't care so much. But it's closer to 20 percent. If you can lower the cost of doing business in the US by 20 percent things will turn around fast.
And then you need to not jack up prices again. If the VALUE of American labor increases then companies will pay a premium for it. No minimum wage law is going to get companies to pay people more then they're worth. What you'll do is just stop hiring people.
A major consequence of your stupid labor laws is that teenagers are frequently priced out of the market. Their labor isn't worth minimum wage in many cases. And it also contributes to the use of illegal aliens which of course typically are paid below minimum wage.
What do you think you're accomplishing with these stupid laws? Because all you've done is make US companies less competitive, put many americans out of work, denied young people their early job experience, and created an environment where rampant illegal immigration and labor is the status quo.
And you see all of this as an accomplishment?
For your next trick will you blow your own feet off with a shotgun and call it progress?
vat on import only won't cause a trade war if you put all your own domestic suppliers at the same disadvantage. If you arbitrarily inflate the cost of imports that will start a trade war.
And if you don't do that then you have to make your economy competitive.
As to what I meant... I mean your domestic consumers will get a lower price if they buy the imports which will put the domestic manufactures at a disadvantage unless either your domestic prices are competitive or imports are arbitrarily taxed which will cause a trade war.
Ultimately you have two choices.
1. You can make doing business in your country affordable.
2. You can start a trade war by jacking up tariffs.
Hulu is getting harassed by the studios so they're either going to have to jack up their prices, eliminate content, or do something like proving you already pay.
The the third option is actually brilliant. Think about it. How many of you know a friend or family member that will never use Hulu? How many of them have satellite or cable? At least one. So borrow their information to get access. It's not like they need it.
This is genius. My estimation of the wisdom of Hulu just went up a notch. Millions of people without cable can very easy get the authentication information to claim they do. And then the studios are in the position of trying to cut off people that supposedly are already paying. Genius.
The problem with climate models is that they're basically extended MadLibs at this point. We have knowns and lots of blanks that you can fill in with whatever you want. The final story varies wildly and can often be whatever you want.
Charge one variable and then another and you can get whatever output you want. Want run away global warming with sixty meter rises in ocean level? Some "scientists" have predicted that. What a new global ice age with the world covered in continent spanning iceflows? We can do that too.
And everything in between. Want global warming AND increased storm activity? We can do that even though that should be fairly tricky by warming the equator and not warming the poles (thus increasing the temperature differentials and thus the intensity of the storms.).
Climate science needs a lot more study. As it stands, it's not nearly developed enough to make theories. They just don't know enough. Given time, they'll have enough data and have worked out the problems in current analysis.
Look, from a complexity standpoint, consumption taxes are very nice. There's little to no paperwork for the average person. They're very hard to avoid. They're generally pretty fair since they charge everyone the same rate.
So I don't have a problem with VAT taxes. The only thing I don't like about them is that the tax doesn't seperate itself from the base price. Keep it like a national sales tax by showing people the before tax price and then having the VAT be an implicit addition... and I think they're great.
That said, it doesn't solve your problem. Imported goods if they were made in a country with cheaper taxes will probably still be cheaper which will mean manufacturing will have an incentive to not do business in your country.
By and large, you should not give companies an incentive to not employ your workers. It's bad for the economy.
Just add up the total cost of doing business in your country and compare it against other countries. Include everything. The cost of utilities. The cost of regulation. The cost of bribes (in some countries these costs can be very high and you have to pay them to stay in business.). Just add up all the costs. Ultimately, you want to MATCH or beat your competitors.
It is a belief by many in the US that china for example is a tenth the cost of the US. This isn't the case. The labor is much cheaper. BUT many things that are inexpensive in the US are expensive in china. For example, utilities in china are also fairly cheap but they're unreliable. This requires that factories have backup generators with back up fuel supplies. If you add the cost of that to the basic utility charge, utilities in china are much more expensive. Then there is an issue with bribes. They must be paid or you'll get shut down. The good news is that they're very organized bribes so people that are paid tend to give you money for value. In more chaotic countries you'll find that you're bribing ten different officials to accomplish the same goal which may or may not happen. Then you have transport which involves shipping, import, customs, export... delay... international law. A whole other layer of regulation that adds to cost
Long story short, China is about 20 percent cheaper then the US. Twenty percent isn't that much. We can close that difference without skimping on employee pay. Little things like speeding up regulation in the US would close the gap. Not even remove the regulation. Just make it happen faster. So if someone is going to get or not get a permit to build a factory. Give them the permit or deny it within two weeks rather then eight months. Time is money and if you're slow it adds to costs.
In the end, if your country is more expensive then you'll lose companies.
Oh, then your idea doesn't fix the problem. Imports are still often cheaper because they were manufactured outside of the high tax zone. The value of the goods is taxes however that value is set by the retail price and if they charge a lower retail price you'll get a lower revenue.
Ultimately, your problem is how to make your domestic goods competitive with imported goods. A VAT doesn't do that. It just increases the cost of everything by a set percentage. So if your goods were 20 percent more expensive they'll still be 20 percent more expensive.
A tariff would make imported goods 20 percent more expensive thus creating parity with domestic goods. However, that would cause a trade war.
So if your idea is a VAT, it would have no effect.
Look at Greece. They have a VAT... but doesn't matter because their economy is dead. You need to bring business into the country to tax them. People can't buy things if they have no money and you can't tax economic activity if there isn't any.
You're eating the goose that lays the golden eggs. There's no good reason to do that. If you want more gold, figure out how to get the goose to lay more eggs. Be nice to the goose. Don't scare it or piss it off.
In this lay the seeds of economic wisdom. No one ever got rich by pissing people off.
You're talking about import tariffs. That's how trade worked 100 years ago. Much of the trade reforms since then have been to remove tariffs.
Going back to the Tariff system would cause a global trade war.
We used most of our political and economic capital to get rid of them in the first place. What do you think the WTO does? It's all about removing tariffs and removing trade barriers.
It's difficult to properly explain how serious the political and economic backlash would be if you tried to re-institute heavy tariffs at this point. The whole US might be boycotted by the rest of the global economy.
True, we put a man on the moon and developed the internet... and I don't disagree that we could start a thermo-nuclear war that annihilates all who would oppose your "genius" idea. I merely contend that it's not worth the horror... to say nothing of being something only someone with a child's grasp of reality or a literal demon would sign off on.
The simple reality is that it is not in the interest of other countries to cooperate with your idea. So you'll somehow have to trick them all into doing something against their interest or so terrify them that they'll submit out of fear. Short of that, you might as well try flying by flapping your arms... building a house of cards to reach the moon or digging to china with a tooth pick... all the above are more achievable goals.
What you're trying to avoid and you can't avoid is that there are limits to how high you can raise taxes that are set by the global market place. Companies have to set their prices low enough that competitors don't wipe them out by offering a substancially lower price.
Would you suggest that it's a pity that companies are forced to offer competitive prices? Of course not. Well, countries are in roughly the same position as they market themselves as places to do business. Think of the US as a landlord and the taxes and regulation as the rent. Are you going to set up in a place that charges radically higher rent without proportionally higher profits? No. That would be stupid. Which is why many companies walk away.
You don't have a choice. You can't force all the other landlords to raise their rent just so your rent is more competitive. You have to lower your rent or go out of business.
No, they might as well not leave. They're paying your wage. The vast majority of people and nearly all tax revenue in the US comes from taxed income from people that work for companies. Remove the companies and the wages VANISH and then what are you going to tax?
These companies employ millions of people. The federal government collects taxes on all of them. If you think they might as well leave you're saying everyone might as well be unemployed. That's so wildly ignorant I don't even know where to start with it.
As to why companies haven't all left, they are... it takes time.
Your question is akin to asking why a dam doesn't drain in ten seconds.
Further, many of them really don't want to go. They're American companies run by American managers that all things being equal would rather keep as many operations in the US as possible. But not if you keep f'ing them over.
Look, the difference between the US and China is between twenty and thirty percent. It's not that huge a difference. But it too much to ignore on a balance sheet.
Here's all I ask. Rather then coming up with more of your own basement theories... ask a business why they left. Seriously. Find a company that you feel/think/know has left the country for some reason and ask them why they left and what it would take to have them come back.
Don't assume. Ask. Many politicians aren't talking to business at all. They're talking AT business and completely ignoring any of the feedback.
Just make it a two way conversation and you MIGHT have an f'ing clue what you're talking about. Maybe.
It would be more rational to put a tin foil hat on your head and try to find unicorns in your under pants drawer.
I swear... how are so many raving loonies on the internet? Is it just homeless people at libraries writing angry letters or are you guys 15 year olds that know nothing?
I really don't get it. The level of ignorance on this subject from so many people is inexplicable. It's like running into a lot of people that think Tomatoes are poisonous.
Was google harvesting unencrypted wifi traffic? Probably... so what? Who has unencrypted wifi? Even the local coffee shop that gives wifi away for free still encrypts their wifi. They just tell everyone the password.
The moral of the story is encrypt your wifi... also, zip up your fly before you go out in the morning... and bring an umbrella if it's raining.
You know... basic words to the wise... like don't go swimming in sewage. Did google spy on idiots? Probably. But who cares? What exactly are we trying to protect here? The right to be a moron? Encrypt your f'ing wifi.
And given that the FBI just effectively got the power to spy on us all through our ISPs, exactly how much of a fuss do you want to make about Google sniffing unlocked wifi access points?
We need to start encrypting everything now. Phone calls. Email.... possibly proxying everything through other countries. I mean, if you don't care if the government can or is reading your email then carry on. But don't complain when a company comes along and does not even a tenth as much. Just keep it in perspective.
Exactly. And without those exemptions which this stupid article is whining about... the US economy would die.
You'd all be kicked out of your parent's basements because your parents would be broke and the house would be repossessed... or possibly condemned after a short use as a meth lab.
Stop attacking employers unless you want more americans to be unemployed. The people jinning these stories up are fruitcakes.
There is no loss in dignity to offer a competitive rate.
That's merely being reasonable.
If I charged you 10,000 dollars for a sandwich and when you complained about the price... if I said "it would be beneigh my dignity to charge less"... exactly what would you think of my dignity? You'd think I was a moron, laugh at me, and never buy one of my clearly over priced sandwiches.
Do you want what business the US has to leave? Because attacking US businesses is a great way to turn the US into a third world country. No employers. No money. Death.
Anyone that knows anything about economics knows you want to encourage business activity. Not attack it. Attack it and you might as well just slit your f'ing throat and bleed out. Do that and you're f'ed. How much dignity will you have then?
Do you know what I call dignity? Having enough economic security that I don't have to worry about ignorant little pricks mouthing off about subjects they haven't the first inkling.
Okay, so step one... conquer whole earth... large scale nuclear war will probably be required and billions will die in the process. Bring all nations under your iron rule... and then establish a global minimum tax.
Totally sensible... if you're a psychopath... or an idiot.
You can't establish a global tax because there is no global government. Any nation can and will undercut you.
And then you'll say do it diplomatically. But what is to stop one of your allies from selling you out? Look at the sanctions on Iran for example... how many countries that supposidly agree with the US on Iranian nuclear ambitions nonetheless do business with Iran either under the table or with special exemptions?
Your idea doesn't even work in the EU. Look at Ireland. Member of the EU, member of the Euro, and basically zero corporate taxes.
So if you can't even get member states of the EU to do it how are you going to get the hundreds of unaffiliated nations all over the earth to sign on to your suicide pact?
Two choices... you can either admit your idea is ignorant or you can start a thermonuclear war to establish a world government.
Slashdot Mirror
Security. Accountability...
Lots of issues someone that is claiming to be a lawyer in their subtitle should understand.
How many law firms store client data on systems they don't control? In so far as I understand it, they frown on that practice.
The first rule of computer security is physical possession.
As to your worry about political agents losing email or destroying it. A better solution would be to put the control of the servers under a different branch of the government. The federal executive is far far too powerful. So I agree that they probably shouldn't have control over their email server. Give control to congress so if they want emails destroyed they have to get approval from a congressional committee. That would create a paper trail and most committees include members from both parties so a republican or democrat administration wouldn't be able to do something without the opposing party knowing about it.
I think it's a very bad idea for the sole responsibility of the email server to be in the hands of a private corporate entity. I have no problem with the government buying the server from a company. But I do have a problem with the government not taking physical possession of it.
As to giving up on laws that can't be enforced, yes... that's the same reason we should end the war on drugs.
Those are stupid laws. Look at how many people we're throwing in jail for minor drug possession. It's stupid.
Any law that you can't enforce shouldn't be a law. Another stupid law would be laws against suicide.
You can't stop people from taking their own lives. Passing a law against it idiotic. It would be like passing a law against people thinking about pink elephants. How exactly are you going to enforce that law?
Have fun with that.
Any law that can't be enforced shouldn't be a law.
Many people seem to have the notion that a society with more laws is more civilized. This is not the case. A society with more laws is a society with more criminals. As you increase the number of things that are illegal you increase the number of people in the society that are technically criminals. This is a good idea when their classification as criminals serves the common good. It is a stupid idea when it does not.
Anyway, I don't understand why you're in favor of policies that increase unemployment, reduce our national competitiveness, deny young workers experience, and generally over complicates the labor market.
But some people love theories more then they love life. Some people love an idea but then anything else. And they'll just close their eyes, fixation on that idea, and ignore the consequences.
If I'm putting words in your mouth, I'm sorry. Its not my intention to impose upon you ideas and thoughts that are not your own. However, you are being evasion on certain points and it requires me to fill in the gaps. If you don't like the way I do that, help me do so accurately.
I truly have no interest in insulting you. My ego is not involved in this discussion and I see no profit in insulting you or anyone else. These are my honest assessments. If they're flawed, understand that I am not intentionally biasing them to be offensive.
I guess I didn't understand the product then. So google will be selling the government actual physical machines with the software running on them and the government will control those specific machines?
If that's the case, I don't see any problem with it.
As to MS, if google was selling discrete machines, I'll assume MS was doing the same thing... just on a hunch.
So one versus the other? I'd probably stick with the MS one if only because I'd better the cloud version of Excel is better then the google equivalent. People that aren't excel junkies probably don't realize it, but that's a very sophisticated piece of software that has not really been surpassed by any of it's competitors. The open office version and libre office versions of it are no where near as good. They LOOK like excel but they don't really have the same functionality.
Maybe google docs does and maybe the cloud version of excel is more primitive. I'm just guessing here. But if you look past all the "M$" hate you have to admit they do make some very compelling and polished software packages within the sometimes myopic spectrum they dominate.
Neither side cares about the science. Both sides are totally convinced in their virtue. Neither side is willing to look at the case dispassionately. Both sides are so invested in what they want the correct answer to be that they will not tolerate anything that contradicts their position.
Is there a case for AGW? Absolutely. It's a totally valid hypothesis. Is it proven? Of course not. There's no causal link. Getting a causal link is very hard but that doesn't mean you don't need one. AGW proponents almost all propose that we should accept a correlative link as proof of a causal link. That's not science. They say we don't have time to wait and we should assume there is a causal link based on the correlative data. That is a political response and again not science.
The anti AGW people are no better in that they'll ally with various political factions just like the pro AGW factions to form political pressure groups. And of course they don't want to hear they might be wrong any more then the AGW group might be.
Everyone has their egos, world views, political interests, and often careers involved in this matter. There are a lot of pro AGW scientists that might lose their jobs if AGW collapses and there are of course a lot of professional "skeptics" that likewise will find their employment terminated should that fall apart.
In this environment how can anyone really be sure what is going on? I'm not stupid and I'm not ignorant... but I can't sort it out. And find it to be unacceptable generally to simply assume one side or the other is right as so many seem to do. Sure, that's easier. Just believe the church is right about is and isn't true. Just trust the king to sort it out. I'm not a f'ing peasant though and I don't like having other people do my thinking for me.
I'm obviously going to get hate messages or... at least negative messages likely from the pro AGW people to the effect of "anyone that doubts the unquestionable virtue of our position is a fool or a heretic"... but that only underscores the sadness of this issue.
We're probably all bored to tears explaining the science of it to each other.
I've read through more material on the issue then I can pretend interest in. I just wish the issue hadn't been politicized.
I don't know when it started... was it when Al Gore made his fatuous little film? Or was it before? Some think the politicization was inevitable given the interests threatened by it but I'm not so sure.
Anyway... for those offended by my contrary nature... I'm not contrary to annoy you... It's just the best opinion I could come to with what information I have. If I'm wrong, I at least arrived at this position in good faith. If we can all say as much then it will at least be an honest conflict.
Why would I want government documents stored on a google or Microsoft server?
It's fine if the government owns and controls the server but if it doesn't we have a problem.
MS office or whatever you're using tend to run entirely on the local system or at least within your network. So its pretty much in the control over the organization that purchased it. But google docs runs on google server farms and my understanding is that MS 360 or whatever they're calling it does roughly the same thing.
That's a problem. If this is a micro cloud that will be completely owned and controlled by the US government, it's fine... but I worry that this is all getting routed through a generic google server farm. And that's a recipe for disaster.
You're assuming the consumption tax is the only tax and that the regulations between point A and point B are the same and that labor costs are the same.
If I'm paying half what you're paying for labor then my product has the same tax yours has applied, I can sell my product for less and still make a profit.
Thus your consumption tax will not equalize prices.
I don't see how your idea offsets the advantage of doing business outside the country and then importing the goods into the market.
If your economy is not competitive, what is to stop me from making the product outside the country, importing it into the country, and then benifits from the price advantage of making it elsewhere?
See? You have to lower taxes so they're internationally competitive or you need to have tariffs. And the tariffs will cause a trade war.
Which means... you need to make the economy competitive. That means keeping the taxes low, the regulation efficient, the regulation reasonable, and generally not going out of your way to screw businesses.
Given that that is not how HBO, DirectTV, and TimeWarner verify users for online access I have to say you're making an interesting assumption.
Large corporations are not cohesive entities. Saying Hulu is owned by the studios is like saying Dallas is owned by the United States. Sure, the studios have control but that doesn't mean they always have the same interests.
As to inflation, who's fault is that? The people devaluing the US currency.
Doubtless you're one of the many advocates of massive out of control deficit spending. Well, inflation is what you get.
As to stagnate wages, that has more to do with a failure to reform labor policies. This isn't the 1930s. We need to radically increase automation amongst other things that big labor has been resisting. Its not helpful to the US economy.
If we want to have a 21st century economy we need to start acting like it.
As to what they'd need to come back. I've had that conversation as well, and the lower wage is not the issue. It's the COST of employment itself which isn't entirely the wage. Wages are about half the cost of hiring people. You can radically lower what you spend on employees without lowering their wages.
And in any case, we really don't need that much of an edge to gain total cost parity with China. The difference isn't that extreme.
It's simply too much for a company to ignore. If there were a five percent difference companies wouldn't care so much. But it's closer to 20 percent. If you can lower the cost of doing business in the US by 20 percent things will turn around fast.
And then you need to not jack up prices again. If the VALUE of American labor increases then companies will pay a premium for it. No minimum wage law is going to get companies to pay people more then they're worth. What you'll do is just stop hiring people.
A major consequence of your stupid labor laws is that teenagers are frequently priced out of the market. Their labor isn't worth minimum wage in many cases. And it also contributes to the use of illegal aliens which of course typically are paid below minimum wage.
What do you think you're accomplishing with these stupid laws? Because all you've done is make US companies less competitive, put many americans out of work, denied young people their early job experience, and created an environment where rampant illegal immigration and labor is the status quo.
And you see all of this as an accomplishment?
For your next trick will you blow your own feet off with a shotgun and call it progress?
vat on import only won't cause a trade war if you put all your own domestic suppliers at the same disadvantage. If you arbitrarily inflate the cost of imports that will start a trade war.
And if you don't do that then you have to make your economy competitive.
As to what I meant... I mean your domestic consumers will get a lower price if they buy the imports which will put the domestic manufactures at a disadvantage unless either your domestic prices are competitive or imports are arbitrarily taxed which will cause a trade war.
Ultimately you have two choices.
1. You can make doing business in your country affordable.
2. You can start a trade war by jacking up tariffs.
there is always option three... sucking it....
Choose one of the above.
Hulu is getting harassed by the studios so they're either going to have to jack up their prices, eliminate content, or do something like proving you already pay.
The the third option is actually brilliant. Think about it. How many of you know a friend or family member that will never use Hulu? How many of them have satellite or cable? At least one. So borrow their information to get access. It's not like they need it.
This is genius. My estimation of the wisdom of Hulu just went up a notch. Millions of people without cable can very easy get the authentication information to claim they do. And then the studios are in the position of trying to cut off people that supposedly are already paying. Genius.
The question is whether it ACTUALLY does...
The problem with climate models is that they're basically extended MadLibs at this point. We have knowns and lots of blanks that you can fill in with whatever you want. The final story varies wildly and can often be whatever you want.
Charge one variable and then another and you can get whatever output you want. Want run away global warming with sixty meter rises in ocean level? Some "scientists" have predicted that. What a new global ice age with the world covered in continent spanning iceflows? We can do that too.
And everything in between. Want global warming AND increased storm activity? We can do that even though that should be fairly tricky by warming the equator and not warming the poles (thus increasing the temperature differentials and thus the intensity of the storms.).
Climate science needs a lot more study. As it stands, it's not nearly developed enough to make theories. They just don't know enough. Given time, they'll have enough data and have worked out the problems in current analysis.
Look, from a complexity standpoint, consumption taxes are very nice. There's little to no paperwork for the average person. They're very hard to avoid. They're generally pretty fair since they charge everyone the same rate.
So I don't have a problem with VAT taxes. The only thing I don't like about them is that the tax doesn't seperate itself from the base price. Keep it like a national sales tax by showing people the before tax price and then having the VAT be an implicit addition... and I think they're great.
That said, it doesn't solve your problem. Imported goods if they were made in a country with cheaper taxes will probably still be cheaper which will mean manufacturing will have an incentive to not do business in your country.
By and large, you should not give companies an incentive to not employ your workers. It's bad for the economy.
Just add up the total cost of doing business in your country and compare it against other countries. Include everything. The cost of utilities. The cost of regulation. The cost of bribes (in some countries these costs can be very high and you have to pay them to stay in business.). Just add up all the costs. Ultimately, you want to MATCH or beat your competitors.
It is a belief by many in the US that china for example is a tenth the cost of the US. This isn't the case. The labor is much cheaper. BUT many things that are inexpensive in the US are expensive in china. For example, utilities in china are also fairly cheap but they're unreliable. This requires that factories have backup generators with back up fuel supplies. If you add the cost of that to the basic utility charge, utilities in china are much more expensive. Then there is an issue with bribes. They must be paid or you'll get shut down. The good news is that they're very organized bribes so people that are paid tend to give you money for value. In more chaotic countries you'll find that you're bribing ten different officials to accomplish the same goal which may or may not happen. Then you have transport which involves shipping, import, customs, export... delay... international law. A whole other layer of regulation that adds to cost
Long story short, China is about 20 percent cheaper then the US. Twenty percent isn't that much. We can close that difference without skimping on employee pay. Little things like speeding up regulation in the US would close the gap. Not even remove the regulation. Just make it happen faster. So if someone is going to get or not get a permit to build a factory. Give them the permit or deny it within two weeks rather then eight months. Time is money and if you're slow it adds to costs.
In the end, if your country is more expensive then you'll lose companies.
Oh, then your idea doesn't fix the problem. Imports are still often cheaper because they were manufactured outside of the high tax zone. The value of the goods is taxes however that value is set by the retail price and if they charge a lower retail price you'll get a lower revenue.
Ultimately, your problem is how to make your domestic goods competitive with imported goods. A VAT doesn't do that. It just increases the cost of everything by a set percentage. So if your goods were 20 percent more expensive they'll still be 20 percent more expensive.
A tariff would make imported goods 20 percent more expensive thus creating parity with domestic goods. However, that would cause a trade war.
So if your idea is a VAT, it would have no effect.
Look at Greece. They have a VAT... but doesn't matter because their economy is dead. You need to bring business into the country to tax them. People can't buy things if they have no money and you can't tax economic activity if there isn't any.
You're eating the goose that lays the golden eggs. There's no good reason to do that. If you want more gold, figure out how to get the goose to lay more eggs. Be nice to the goose. Don't scare it or piss it off.
In this lay the seeds of economic wisdom. No one ever got rich by pissing people off.
You're talking about import tariffs. That's how trade worked 100 years ago. Much of the trade reforms since then have been to remove tariffs.
Going back to the Tariff system would cause a global trade war.
We used most of our political and economic capital to get rid of them in the first place. What do you think the WTO does? It's all about removing tariffs and removing trade barriers.
It's difficult to properly explain how serious the political and economic backlash would be if you tried to re-institute heavy tariffs at this point. The whole US might be boycotted by the rest of the global economy.
In short, really bad idea.
True, we put a man on the moon and developed the internet... and I don't disagree that we could start a thermo-nuclear war that annihilates all who would oppose your "genius" idea. I merely contend that it's not worth the horror... to say nothing of being something only someone with a child's grasp of reality or a literal demon would sign off on.
The simple reality is that it is not in the interest of other countries to cooperate with your idea. So you'll somehow have to trick them all into doing something against their interest or so terrify them that they'll submit out of fear. Short of that, you might as well try flying by flapping your arms... building a house of cards to reach the moon or digging to china with a tooth pick... all the above are more achievable goals.
What you're trying to avoid and you can't avoid is that there are limits to how high you can raise taxes that are set by the global market place. Companies have to set their prices low enough that competitors don't wipe them out by offering a substancially lower price.
Would you suggest that it's a pity that companies are forced to offer competitive prices? Of course not. Well, countries are in roughly the same position as they market themselves as places to do business. Think of the US as a landlord and the taxes and regulation as the rent. Are you going to set up in a place that charges radically higher rent without proportionally higher profits? No. That would be stupid. Which is why many companies walk away.
You don't have a choice. You can't force all the other landlords to raise their rent just so your rent is more competitive. You have to lower your rent or go out of business.
Choose.
This is an intelligence test.
No, they might as well not leave. They're paying your wage. The vast majority of people and nearly all tax revenue in the US comes from taxed income from people that work for companies. Remove the companies and the wages VANISH and then what are you going to tax?
These companies employ millions of people. The federal government collects taxes on all of them. If you think they might as well leave you're saying everyone might as well be unemployed. That's so wildly ignorant I don't even know where to start with it.
As to why companies haven't all left, they are... it takes time.
Your question is akin to asking why a dam doesn't drain in ten seconds.
Further, many of them really don't want to go. They're American companies run by American managers that all things being equal would rather keep as many operations in the US as possible. But not if you keep f'ing them over.
Look, the difference between the US and China is between twenty and thirty percent. It's not that huge a difference. But it too much to ignore on a balance sheet.
Here's all I ask. Rather then coming up with more of your own basement theories... ask a business why they left. Seriously. Find a company that you feel/think/know has left the country for some reason and ask them why they left and what it would take to have them come back.
Don't assume. Ask. Many politicians aren't talking to business at all. They're talking AT business and completely ignoring any of the feedback.
Just make it a two way conversation and you MIGHT have an f'ing clue what you're talking about. Maybe.
No one is ever going to do that.
It won't happen.
It would be more rational to put a tin foil hat on your head and try to find unicorns in your under pants drawer.
I swear... how are so many raving loonies on the internet? Is it just homeless people at libraries writing angry letters or are you guys 15 year olds that know nothing?
I really don't get it. The level of ignorance on this subject from so many people is inexplicable. It's like running into a lot of people that think Tomatoes are poisonous.
What factory is farting out these fruitcakes?
Was google harvesting unencrypted wifi traffic? Probably... so what? Who has unencrypted wifi? Even the local coffee shop that gives wifi away for free still encrypts their wifi. They just tell everyone the password.
The moral of the story is encrypt your wifi... also, zip up your fly before you go out in the morning... and bring an umbrella if it's raining.
You know... basic words to the wise... like don't go swimming in sewage. Did google spy on idiots? Probably. But who cares? What exactly are we trying to protect here? The right to be a moron? Encrypt your f'ing wifi.
And given that the FBI just effectively got the power to spy on us all through our ISPs, exactly how much of a fuss do you want to make about Google sniffing unlocked wifi access points?
We need to start encrypting everything now. Phone calls. Email.... possibly proxying everything through other countries. I mean, if you don't care if the government can or is reading your email then carry on. But don't complain when a company comes along and does not even a tenth as much. Just keep it in perspective.
Exactly. And without those exemptions which this stupid article is whining about... the US economy would die.
You'd all be kicked out of your parent's basements because your parents would be broke and the house would be repossessed... or possibly condemned after a short use as a meth lab.
Stop attacking employers unless you want more americans to be unemployed. The people jinning these stories up are fruitcakes.
Do you want unemployment to go higher.
You can agree with me and we can have increased job growth or you can disagree and enjoy the suck.
There is no loss in dignity to offer a competitive rate.
That's merely being reasonable.
If I charged you 10,000 dollars for a sandwich and when you complained about the price... if I said "it would be beneigh my dignity to charge less"... exactly what would you think of my dignity? You'd think I was a moron, laugh at me, and never buy one of my clearly over priced sandwiches.
Do you want what business the US has to leave? Because attacking US businesses is a great way to turn the US into a third world country. No employers. No money. Death.
Anyone that knows anything about economics knows you want to encourage business activity. Not attack it. Attack it and you might as well just slit your f'ing throat and bleed out. Do that and you're f'ed. How much dignity will you have then?
Do you know what I call dignity? Having enough economic security that I don't have to worry about ignorant little pricks mouthing off about subjects they haven't the first inkling.
And how would you do that? Planetary government?
Okay, so step one... conquer whole earth... large scale nuclear war will probably be required and billions will die in the process. Bring all nations under your iron rule... and then establish a global minimum tax.
Totally sensible... if you're a psychopath... or an idiot.
You can't establish a global tax because there is no global government. Any nation can and will undercut you.
And then you'll say do it diplomatically. But what is to stop one of your allies from selling you out? Look at the sanctions on Iran for example... how many countries that supposidly agree with the US on Iranian nuclear ambitions nonetheless do business with Iran either under the table or with special exemptions?
Your idea doesn't even work in the EU. Look at Ireland. Member of the EU, member of the Euro, and basically zero corporate taxes.
So if you can't even get member states of the EU to do it how are you going to get the hundreds of unaffiliated nations all over the earth to sign on to your suicide pact?
Two choices... you can either admit your idea is ignorant or you can start a thermonuclear war to establish a world government.
This is an intelligence test.