I don't have the numbers - but how much of the income do the top 5 and 1 percent make up? At least if you look at total wealth (which depending on your viewpoint may or may not be relevant), I'm pretty sure the numbers are way up there.
Good point. I have no problem with 'the rich' paying a majority of the taxes. I just wanted to show that when there is a tax cut it's generally going to help those paying taxes, i.e. 'the rich'. Tax cuts for the rich also aren't a bad thing (when I spend more money I might buy a new iPod, when Billy G spends more he might start a new company and provide X jobs). The problem is that it all boils down to 2 fundamentally different positions. Either you think the government is better at spending money or the private sector is better at spending money. When it all boils down, that's really what taxes are all about.
Personally, I'm a firm believer that the private sector is generally better at spending money than the gov, and that we should sit down and explicitly spell out where the gov. needs to be and then get them out of every other spot. Democrats usually think the gov. is better at deciding where to spend money.
Cutting taxes has risen the revenue received by the government. There are links elsewhere in this thread showing revenues are the highest they've ever been. Now, I completely agree that we are spending way too much money and need to cut back. My idea is to cut spending and raise lower taxes.
All I'll say is that I don't see how spending money on roads, education, the military, etc, etc qualifies as "income redistribution".
Money is getting spent on all of those things. Federal gov. revenues are way up since the tax cuts. The problem like I mentioned above is the amount of money we are spending in other areas. The only candidate that I remember who even mentioned cutting back on gov. spending was Ron Paul and look where he is now. Sigh...
My original comment was on something that irks me about the democrats party line. "Tax cuts for the rich". Well, who else can they be on? The "rich" pay a huge majority of the taxes. The only way to give someone a tax cut who is paying very little taxes is to just send them free money. The original stimulus package included $600 checks for people who didn't pay any taxes and even illegal aliens. WTF? Luckily that got trimmed back. Obama wants to send out another $1000 to everyone. Inflation is bad now, but lets print even more money and send it out to the public.
In the case of the last eight years we've tried to combine spending increases and the need to fund two wars with massive tax cuts on the rich.
I don't argue that spending is out of control and something that should be slowed down a lot, but I have an issue with the tax cuts on the 'rich'*. The only places that taxes can be cut is on the rich* b/c they are the only ones paying taxes! From here:
In 2005, the top 5 percent of taxpayers paid more than one half (59.7 percent) of all individual income taxes, and the top 1 percent paid 39.4 percent; and Taxpayers who rank in the top 50 percent of taxpayers by income pay virtually all individual income taxes. In 2005, they paid 96.9 percent of all individual income taxes.
So when we cut taxes who else do you want to cut them on? Or are you talking more about income redistribution. The whole take money from those who have it and hand it out to those who don't?
Then let's cut taxes to zero and have INFINITE MONEY.
Damn, I hate this idiotic meme. Tax revenue goes up over time due to inflation. Stop trying to give credit to tax cuts. Try taking that logic with your own finances before you try shoving it on the rest of the country. "Hey honey, I'm going to ask my boss to give me a pay cut so we have more money!"
You're being the idiot. Taxes are a balancing act. Move them too high and you stop consumption which then lowers overall revenue. People like to feel like they are getting value when they buy something. If you tax it so much that value is no longer noticed people quit buying things. If you lower them, then people can (and will) buy more stuff which increases revenue. It's not a hard concept to understand, and there are numbers to prove it.
Your analogy doesn't work. A better one is a company that sells some cool widget for $100. At $100 only 10 people buy it and make the company $1000. The widget is really cool and people want it, but they don't see the value at $100. So the company lowers the price to $10 and now sells 1,000 of the widgets and make the company $10,000. OMG, how did they make more money selling the widget for less??? Maybe they should give it away make infinite amounts of money. I know this is tough logic to follow, but sheesh...
That's bad enough but you forgot "while reducing Federal income by slashing taxes" at the end.
In some areas tax revenues went up when they cut taxes. People spend more when they are paying less taxes on what they buy. As taxes go up people spend less because they feel they are getting less with each $ they spend. It is balancing act, but I find that the dems usually fall way too far on the higher tax side than the GOP does on the less tax side. The problem this time around is we are having to pay for a war.
Well you can't discount the fact that small form factor computers do draw a premium. Look at all of the subnotebooks out there. They are expensive because they are small, not because they win processing contests.
When it comes to the mac vs. PC, I use every feature on the on mac webcam/bluetooth/firewire/etc...(so it would've been required on the dell). Docking port I don't remember, the dell may or may not have had one. A better keyboard? WTF are you smoking? Dell laptop keyboards are the worst things I've ever used. Unless Dell has dramatically upgraded their keyboards in the last year, then buying a new keyboard is something you have to do with a Dell not the mac. I've changed the HD in my MBP and it was no harder than the one in my tower. In fact it reminded me of putting the my old RAM into my friends Dell laptop. When I upgraded the RAM in my MBP it was a simple port on the bottom that I needed to get to to change it. Taking my leftover RAM and getting in my friends dell...well lets just say it wasn't so easy. 1 stick had to go in the bottom of the machine and the other stick had us popping plastic off the top or the machine, removing screws and finally removing the keyboard. That dell is looking like it has more and more 'features' that I didn't account for everyday!
I don't see how my demand was silly at all. Form factor and size is a known cost factor for computers. Comparing a mini at its time of release to a tower of the same price doesn't make any sense.
If you bought the mini right after release then you paid for the form factor. IIRC, it was one of the smallest form factor computers at the time. I'm not sure you could even get something that small anywhere else at the time.
When it comes to the other machines macs are on par with pricing or priced better to equivalent machines right after updates. I know when I bought my MBP it was within $100 of the same dell, and once I applied my developer and student discount it came in significantly cheaper.
Last time I did that I was able to put together a machine comparable to a Mac Mini for about 50% of the price, and a Macbook for about 70% of the price. On average, the "Mac Tax" seems to be about 40% of the list price of a Mac.
I still bought the Mac mini and the Macbook Pro (thought that was tough, I could have gotten everything I actually wanted (hardware-wise) from a Macbook Pro for about the same price as the Macbook). When the choice is Windows vs UNIX-with-actual-applications, the Mac Tax is worth it. But it's still real.
You bumped into the 'wait for refresh' time. The problem with Macs (and especially the mini) right now is that they do not drop in price real time like Dells or HPs do. So right after a refresh a new Mac is generally on par pricewise with other PC guys or even a better price for what you get. Wait 6 months and the curve is no longer in the Macs favor. It's well known right now that the mini is aging and needs a refresh in a bad way.
Oh and BTW, form factor does play a huge part in the cost of a computer. Look how much all those small light laptops cost from all of the manufacturers.
It does not matter whether you can duplicate a Mac for less. What matters is, after you have settled on a spec you want, or found a Dell or HP you want, can you duplicate that for the same price from the Apple product line?
95% of the time you can't. This is what makes Apple a rip-off.
So because Apple doesn't make a spec you want they are a rip off? Interesting...
And to answer your question...yes. The last time I bought a laptop I wanted SR, 17 inch high res screen, etc...and Dell, HP, Apple all came in about the same price +/-$100. Then again, the specs I wanted were high, which is Apples market. When Apple first released their quad core MP, the same Dell was much more expensive. Obviously if you don't need all that power the MP isn't for you, but for those who did need it the MP definitely wasn't a rip off.
Hmm...not to nitpick, but the iPhone (and other phones) are just as much computers as any other computing device. The iPhone has more RAM, more HD space and probably more raw processing power than an old P75 I have laying around. So just because it has a phone attached suddenly means it's not a computer?
I'd also like to know more about these cheap, portable, bed side computers that your hospital is using. Nothing I've ever seen in a hospital was ever described as doing a job cheaply.
Do you have any bedside diagnostic devices? How about instant patient record devices and the like? The iPhone isn't trying to just replace your hospital cell phones, but provide a much larger selection of services in one device. Now, I don't know if the iPhone will be able to effectively do any of those things, but I have to think that bedside computing devices are coming, and even if they aren't the iPhone, I can't imagine them being cheap.
Apple did say the push service wouldn't be up and running for another month or so. Does anyone still use the actual AIM app? I'm waiting for Adium to come to the iPhone once Apple gets it's act together with the push services.
Just let drag and drop things to the phone for fucks sake.
It's been awhile since I've used my ipod across multiple computers, but IIRC if you turn off auto-syncing you could drag anything from multiple computers onto the ipod while keeping everything already on the ipod intact. What you can't do is drag off of the ipod onto the computer. Although, you can spend the $20 and get an app that will allow you pull songs back off the ipod.
This is incorrect. Apple is setting up a push service to allow 'chat' type apps to run in the background. The application may close, but if you receive a push from the server of an incoming message it'll open up and you'll once again be chatting. To the user it'll appear as if the app is running in the background w/o the battery drain.
I have negotiated terms. You have the most power when your original contract is about to end and they want you to stay. Work them over hard enough and you can get a nice free phone and lots of free incentives to sign another contract.
My guess is that his phone is fine. It probably got updated, but can't connect to the activation servers to get re-activated. All the rumor sites are saying to not update until Apple gets their activation servers in order so that you can re-activate post update.
Well if you want a new phone to be subsidized it'll probably hold up just fine in court. The contracts are basically loans. All those free and $50 phones people get cost a lot more than that. The cell company basically lends you the money for the phone, and you pay it back over time with your contract. If someone were to take them to court and win, I would guess the cell companies would just start making the loan explicit. In the end you'd be even more screwed when you lose your phone since you have an actual loan out for it and would still owe the money. Right now you sign a new contract and you're on your way.
I'm fairly certain at least with AT&T you're required to get a data plan and minimum voice plan with the iPhone purchase. Basically this is their solution for the unlockers. Force you into a plan at the store and charge you $200 + activation + 1 month of service if you break the plan.
An app for the iPhone seems similar to the lockin one gets buying a game for the DS or PSP. Sure, Apple is controlling all distribution, but free apps are fine and I haven't seen anything that prevents you from releasing the source code of your app on your own website.
Overall, the iPhone ecosystem is one that other phone makers are going to try and copy because it's easy for the users and appears to just work.
I'm aware complexity by itself does not mean design.
Well that's what you implied in your original post. If I can't show you how evolution made something like the eye, then it must be ID (although, others responded and did show evidence of how the eye evolved, and even how the human eye isn't the most advanced).
I just want the science establishment to lay the groundwork for ID.
Huh? Everything about science points away from an invisible man in the sky somewhere creating things from on high. Look back at history. Each time civilizations didn't understand something they pointed to some deity, until we understood it and realized that there was a natural explanation for things. I would like to think that we have advanced to the point where we can look at the past and know that just because we don't directly understanding something right now, it doesn't mean that some deity created it. The funny part about evolution though is that we do understand it quite well, and have even seen it in action in a lab.
ID needs to remain in philosophy and religion classes, NOT in a science class!
You're exactly right. Obama is now moving towards the center and in the process losing the base that got him there. Change? ROFL, he's no different than any other politician. I'm expecting him to fully implode by the time November rolls around. I'm just wondering when he'll have his Howard Dean moment...
Just because a certain item or behavior appears complex, doesn't mean it required complex actions to create it. Read anything about emergence to see plenty of examples of very complex behaviors emerging out of simple actions. Look at bees or ants for some simple examples.
Complexity does not equal design, and science has shown time and time again that complexities can and do naturally arise out of simplicity.
There is absolutely no reason that the web should be turned into an application deployment platform
And there is no need for more than a few computers in the entire world, or more than 640k of RAM, etc...
Who are you to say that the web isn't the right place for complex applications or a place for application deployments? The history of the web may have been to serve up text documents and markup, but it's pretty clear we have moved way beyond that now as I sit here downloading music, streaming a movie, and writing a web application that will replace a desktop application.
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Never thought of it that way! All good examples :)
Good point. I have no problem with 'the rich' paying a majority of the taxes. I just wanted to show that when there is a tax cut it's generally going to help those paying taxes, i.e. 'the rich'. Tax cuts for the rich also aren't a bad thing (when I spend more money I might buy a new iPod, when Billy G spends more he might start a new company and provide X jobs). The problem is that it all boils down to 2 fundamentally different positions. Either you think the government is better at spending money or the private sector is better at spending money. When it all boils down, that's really what taxes are all about.
Personally, I'm a firm believer that the private sector is generally better at spending money than the gov, and that we should sit down and explicitly spell out where the gov. needs to be and then get them out of every other spot. Democrats usually think the gov. is better at deciding where to spend money.
Cutting taxes has risen the revenue received by the government. There are links elsewhere in this thread showing revenues are the highest they've ever been. Now, I completely agree that we are spending way too much money and need to cut back. My idea is to cut spending and raise lower taxes.
Money is getting spent on all of those things. Federal gov. revenues are way up since the tax cuts. The problem like I mentioned above is the amount of money we are spending in other areas. The only candidate that I remember who even mentioned cutting back on gov. spending was Ron Paul and look where he is now. Sigh...
My original comment was on something that irks me about the democrats party line. "Tax cuts for the rich". Well, who else can they be on? The "rich" pay a huge majority of the taxes. The only way to give someone a tax cut who is paying very little taxes is to just send them free money. The original stimulus package included $600 checks for people who didn't pay any taxes and even illegal aliens. WTF? Luckily that got trimmed back. Obama wants to send out another $1000 to everyone. Inflation is bad now, but lets print even more money and send it out to the public.
I don't argue that spending is out of control and something that should be slowed down a lot, but I have an issue with the tax cuts on the 'rich'*. The only places that taxes can be cut is on the rich* b/c they are the only ones paying taxes! From here:
So when we cut taxes who else do you want to cut them on? Or are you talking more about income redistribution. The whole take money from those who have it and hand it out to those who don't?
* what defines 'rich'?
You're being the idiot. Taxes are a balancing act. Move them too high and you stop consumption which then lowers overall revenue. People like to feel like they are getting value when they buy something. If you tax it so much that value is no longer noticed people quit buying things. If you lower them, then people can (and will) buy more stuff which increases revenue. It's not a hard concept to understand, and there are numbers to prove it.
Your analogy doesn't work. A better one is a company that sells some cool widget for $100. At $100 only 10 people buy it and make the company $1000. The widget is really cool and people want it, but they don't see the value at $100. So the company lowers the price to $10 and now sells 1,000 of the widgets and make the company $10,000. OMG, how did they make more money selling the widget for less??? Maybe they should give it away make infinite amounts of money. I know this is tough logic to follow, but sheesh...
In some areas tax revenues went up when they cut taxes. People spend more when they are paying less taxes on what they buy. As taxes go up people spend less because they feel they are getting less with each $ they spend. It is balancing act, but I find that the dems usually fall way too far on the higher tax side than the GOP does on the less tax side. The problem this time around is we are having to pay for a war.
You just realized Obama was a sham 3 weeks ago? It's been pretty clear all along he's full of it. Change? Hahaha, good one.
Well you can't discount the fact that small form factor computers do draw a premium. Look at all of the subnotebooks out there. They are expensive because they are small, not because they win processing contests.
When it comes to the mac vs. PC, I use every feature on the on mac webcam/bluetooth/firewire/etc...(so it would've been required on the dell). Docking port I don't remember, the dell may or may not have had one. A better keyboard? WTF are you smoking? Dell laptop keyboards are the worst things I've ever used. Unless Dell has dramatically upgraded their keyboards in the last year, then buying a new keyboard is something you have to do with a Dell not the mac. I've changed the HD in my MBP and it was no harder than the one in my tower. In fact it reminded me of putting the my old RAM into my friends Dell laptop. When I upgraded the RAM in my MBP it was a simple port on the bottom that I needed to get to to change it. Taking my leftover RAM and getting in my friends dell...well lets just say it wasn't so easy. 1 stick had to go in the bottom of the machine and the other stick had us popping plastic off the top or the machine, removing screws and finally removing the keyboard. That dell is looking like it has more and more 'features' that I didn't account for everyday!
I don't see how my demand was silly at all. Form factor and size is a known cost factor for computers. Comparing a mini at its time of release to a tower of the same price doesn't make any sense.
If you bought the mini right after release then you paid for the form factor. IIRC, it was one of the smallest form factor computers at the time. I'm not sure you could even get something that small anywhere else at the time.
When it comes to the other machines macs are on par with pricing or priced better to equivalent machines right after updates. I know when I bought my MBP it was within $100 of the same dell, and once I applied my developer and student discount it came in significantly cheaper.
You bumped into the 'wait for refresh' time. The problem with Macs (and especially the mini) right now is that they do not drop in price real time like Dells or HPs do. So right after a refresh a new Mac is generally on par pricewise with other PC guys or even a better price for what you get. Wait 6 months and the curve is no longer in the Macs favor. It's well known right now that the mini is aging and needs a refresh in a bad way.
Oh and BTW, form factor does play a huge part in the cost of a computer. Look how much all those small light laptops cost from all of the manufacturers.
So because Apple doesn't make a spec you want they are a rip off? Interesting...
And to answer your question...yes. The last time I bought a laptop I wanted SR, 17 inch high res screen, etc...and Dell, HP, Apple all came in about the same price +/-$100. Then again, the specs I wanted were high, which is Apples market. When Apple first released their quad core MP, the same Dell was much more expensive. Obviously if you don't need all that power the MP isn't for you, but for those who did need it the MP definitely wasn't a rip off.
Hmm...not to nitpick, but the iPhone (and other phones) are just as much computers as any other computing device. The iPhone has more RAM, more HD space and probably more raw processing power than an old P75 I have laying around. So just because it has a phone attached suddenly means it's not a computer?
I'd also like to know more about these cheap, portable, bed side computers that your hospital is using. Nothing I've ever seen in a hospital was ever described as doing a job cheaply.
Do you have any bedside diagnostic devices? How about instant patient record devices and the like? The iPhone isn't trying to just replace your hospital cell phones, but provide a much larger selection of services in one device. Now, I don't know if the iPhone will be able to effectively do any of those things, but I have to think that bedside computing devices are coming, and even if they aren't the iPhone, I can't imagine them being cheap.
Apple did say the push service wouldn't be up and running for another month or so. Does anyone still use the actual AIM app? I'm waiting for Adium to come to the iPhone once Apple gets it's act together with the push services.
It's been awhile since I've used my ipod across multiple computers, but IIRC if you turn off auto-syncing you could drag anything from multiple computers onto the ipod while keeping everything already on the ipod intact. What you can't do is drag off of the ipod onto the computer. Although, you can spend the $20 and get an app that will allow you pull songs back off the ipod.
This is incorrect. Apple is setting up a push service to allow 'chat' type apps to run in the background. The application may close, but if you receive a push from the server of an incoming message it'll open up and you'll once again be chatting. To the user it'll appear as if the app is running in the background w/o the battery drain.
I have negotiated terms. You have the most power when your original contract is about to end and they want you to stay. Work them over hard enough and you can get a nice free phone and lots of free incentives to sign another contract.
My guess is that his phone is fine. It probably got updated, but can't connect to the activation servers to get re-activated. All the rumor sites are saying to not update until Apple gets their activation servers in order so that you can re-activate post update.
Well if you want a new phone to be subsidized it'll probably hold up just fine in court. The contracts are basically loans. All those free and $50 phones people get cost a lot more than that. The cell company basically lends you the money for the phone, and you pay it back over time with your contract. If someone were to take them to court and win, I would guess the cell companies would just start making the loan explicit. In the end you'd be even more screwed when you lose your phone since you have an actual loan out for it and would still owe the money. Right now you sign a new contract and you're on your way.
I'm fairly certain at least with AT&T you're required to get a data plan and minimum voice plan with the iPhone purchase. Basically this is their solution for the unlockers. Force you into a plan at the store and charge you $200 + activation + 1 month of service if you break the plan.
An app for the iPhone seems similar to the lockin one gets buying a game for the DS or PSP. Sure, Apple is controlling all distribution, but free apps are fine and I haven't seen anything that prevents you from releasing the source code of your app on your own website.
Overall, the iPhone ecosystem is one that other phone makers are going to try and copy because it's easy for the users and appears to just work.
Well that's what you implied in your original post. If I can't show you how evolution made something like the eye, then it must be ID (although, others responded and did show evidence of how the eye evolved, and even how the human eye isn't the most advanced).
Huh? Everything about science points away from an invisible man in the sky somewhere creating things from on high. Look back at history. Each time civilizations didn't understand something they pointed to some deity, until we understood it and realized that there was a natural explanation for things. I would like to think that we have advanced to the point where we can look at the past and know that just because we don't directly understanding something right now, it doesn't mean that some deity created it. The funny part about evolution though is that we do understand it quite well, and have even seen it in action in a lab.
ID needs to remain in philosophy and religion classes, NOT in a science class!
You're exactly right. Obama is now moving towards the center and in the process losing the base that got him there. Change? ROFL, he's no different than any other politician. I'm expecting him to fully implode by the time November rolls around. I'm just wondering when he'll have his Howard Dean moment...
Just because a certain item or behavior appears complex, doesn't mean it required complex actions to create it. Read anything about emergence to see plenty of examples of very complex behaviors emerging out of simple actions. Look at bees or ants for some simple examples.
Complexity does not equal design, and science has shown time and time again that complexities can and do naturally arise out of simplicity.
And there is no need for more than a few computers in the entire world, or more than 640k of RAM, etc...
Who are you to say that the web isn't the right place for complex applications or a place for application deployments? The history of the web may have been to serve up text documents and markup, but it's pretty clear we have moved way beyond that now as I sit here downloading music, streaming a movie, and writing a web application that will replace a desktop application.