Not wanting money during a global economic crisis. Mad as bicycles that lot.
The Olympics doesn't bring in money, it costs money. The city spends billions on white elephant venues with no future use, then the IOC comes in and scoops up all the profits. Then you pay the debt off for decades, with your 90k capacity stadium filled with 500 people for an athletics meet.
Billions 'invested' in infrastructure is just money taken from much more needworthy causes.
That's not even mentioning the people turfed out of house and home to make room for the facilities, their allotments buried under concrete.
That's the winter olympics, it doesn't involve the construction of a white elephant athletics stadium. You can re-use a ski slope, but outside of the olympics, 90,000 people aren't going to watch athletics.
Meanwhile, while British people moan about people coming to the country and "hardly speaking a word of English", and "putting strain on the NHS", the very same people are making plans to retire to Spain without being able to speak a single word of Spanish, and are planning to live in English retirement ghettos in that country, while putting strain on the Spanish health service.
1) We are not running out of land to build houses on.
Considering how many millions of people are living in cramped, two-up, two-down terraces with a front door opening up onto the street, and a back yard of a dustbin and a small shed, I'd say we ran out of land to build houses on a long, long time ago.
The typical British house would barely qualify as a garage in America, and you're saying we need more people? Do you want us to end up in rat cages like the Japanese?
Figures gained from the ICAR site referencing the official Home Office quarterly report.
Is this the same home office that admitted it didn't know how many immigrants there were in the country?
That's the same Washington DC that was declared the murder capital of the US, with a higher poverty rate than any state other than Mississippi, with an economy entirely reliant on government spending?
Not really a valid comparison, as Canada is the world's second biggest country, and could fit the population of Britian in several times over without even noticing, but Britain is way more accepting of immigration than Canada.
To move to Cananda, they require you speak English or French, preferably both, you generally need a degree, and a job. Or a lot of money. To move to the UK, you don't need anything other than directions to the welfare office. There's not much threat of being deported, it's very easy just to disappear.
Why don't you ask the primary school teachers who are seeing classes filled with kids who barely speak English, as to the benefits of unrestricted immigration. Never mind us accepting them, why don't immigrants to Britain accept us? Why don't they learn the language and secure employment before getting on the plain?
We have millions unemployed, we don't need any immigrants to work as janitors.
You know, the more you use the term nanny state, even for unarguably beneficial things such as road regulation, you devalue the whole term and end up like the boy who cried wolf.
I remember some studies where they removed all the lines and signs in some small towns in Europe and it resulted in many fewer accidents and an overall reduction in average driving speed. I really wish someone would try it in the US. We really need to remind our drivers that they are responsible for the safety of themselves and others.
If the US wanted to copy Europe on anything w.r.t. driving, it would be the standard of testing. Turning on the ignition, driving around the block in an automatic and parking again shouldn't get you a licence.
Then you need to abandon the concept of driving being a right, rather than a priviledge. But this might not be compatible with US suburban sprawl.
Actually you do need a law against each one, as drivers are by and large stupid and think their particular activities are not dangerous, even when they are. If someone is on their phone and this law doesn't exist, they can argue in court that they were still driving safely. This law takes away that get-out.
I suppose you're one of those people who whines about speed cameras as well?
You clearly know nothing about MMO design. You have to trust the client for many things, or the game will be unresponsive or unplayable. Anti-cheating software is absolutely necessary.
Bear in mind that they can say whatever they like, and no-one can find out if it's true or not. Including a Chinese player who paid cents to log on twenty days ago to check his mail is somewhat disengenuous, but I suppose they all do it.
Am I the only one amused at people thinking they're putting in effort and hard work by sitting at a keyboard playing one of the easiest games ever created, and only getting ahead of everyone else because they don't have anything else to do?
The whole point of WoW's success is that everyone can get to the top levels, do all the raids and get all the gear. Five years and twenty million sales later, poopsockers are still telling us how Blizzard got it all wrong.
If the rich were to leave the US, where would they go? Most of the developed world has much higher taxes than the US, which is defined as a tax haven. And as most of the US mega-rich make their money off the backs of the US markets, they wouldn't be able to dodge American taxation anyway.
Anyway, considering the vast, spirally inequality in the US, the mega-rich leaving might not be such a bad thing. It may well leave a much more stable economy where the proceeds of growth are shared more equitably, not hoarded at the top whilst a few crumbs 'trickle down' to the workers. There'd be more social mobility, and less crime.
That beer analogy is a dilemma, but not about the taxes, it's the fact that the rich guy has all the money in the first place. How do pretty much all other first world economies function without handing over all the wealth to a few traders, land-owners and executives who don't actually do anything?
This assumes more liquidity is a good thing. Maybe people would make more sensible investments if they couldn't divest them four seconds later for a profit.
Other companies have to compete for workers. That is part of what makes the economy viable.
You're joking, right? At 10% unemployment, companies can name their terms. Thanks to capitalism, wages have stagnated for decades whilst hours worked increases. You must be living in a by-gone era when the economy outgrew the labour supply. Today, the choice is work ten hours or work no hours. Thank god for the free market, eh?
Free-market capitalism only works for capitalists.
Yeah, working 8 hours a day sounds like hell. Better to follow the Western capitalist model and work 12 hours, four of which are unpaid. I'm sure all the extra wealth you accumulate will make you happier. After all, who needs to spend an extra 700 hours a year with your annoying family when you can be at the desk? The extra money you earn can be spent on a new HDTV.
I always thought Sonic's transition to 3d was much less graceful than say, Mario's. Maybe it was the high speed and the weird feel of the Dreamcast controller that made me feel like I was influencing Sonic's motions, not controlling them.
Or maybe, Nintendo are just much better at making games than Sega.
Slashdot Mirror
Don't US Senators live in Washington?
The Olympics doesn't bring in money, it costs money. The city spends billions on white elephant venues with no future use, then the IOC comes in and scoops up all the profits. Then you pay the debt off for decades, with your 90k capacity stadium filled with 500 people for an athletics meet.
Billions 'invested' in infrastructure is just money taken from much more needworthy causes.
That's not even mentioning the people turfed out of house and home to make room for the facilities, their allotments buried under concrete.
That's the winter olympics, it doesn't involve the construction of a white elephant athletics stadium. You can re-use a ski slope, but outside of the olympics, 90,000 people aren't going to watch athletics.
Citation needed.
Considering how many millions of people are living in cramped, two-up, two-down terraces with a front door opening up onto the street, and a back yard of a dustbin and a small shed, I'd say we ran out of land to build houses on a long, long time ago.
The typical British house would barely qualify as a garage in America, and you're saying we need more people? Do you want us to end up in rat cages like the Japanese?
Is this the same home office that admitted it didn't know how many immigrants there were in the country?
That's the same Washington DC that was declared the murder capital of the US, with a higher poverty rate than any state other than Mississippi, with an economy entirely reliant on government spending?
So immigration is necessary to reduce wages for the domestic population? With millions already on the dole? You must work for the Labour party.
Not really a valid comparison, as Canada is the world's second biggest country, and could fit the population of Britian in several times over without even noticing, but Britain is way more accepting of immigration than Canada.
To move to Cananda, they require you speak English or French, preferably both, you generally need a degree, and a job. Or a lot of money. To move to the UK, you don't need anything other than directions to the welfare office. There's not much threat of being deported, it's very easy just to disappear.
Why don't you ask the primary school teachers who are seeing classes filled with kids who barely speak English, as to the benefits of unrestricted immigration. Never mind us accepting them, why don't immigrants to Britain accept us? Why don't they learn the language and secure employment before getting on the plain?
We have millions unemployed, we don't need any immigrants to work as janitors.
Oh right, you're one of those 'libertarians'. You should have said sooner so I wouldn't have wasted my time.
You know, the more you use the term nanny state, even for unarguably beneficial things such as road regulation, you devalue the whole term and end up like the boy who cried wolf.
In what places does the government provide car insurance? Or helmets? They don't in the UK.
The government also mandates seatbelts and airbags, but I don't think they provide them.
If the US wanted to copy Europe on anything w.r.t. driving, it would be the standard of testing. Turning on the ignition, driving around the block in an automatic and parking again shouldn't get you a licence.
Then you need to abandon the concept of driving being a right, rather than a priviledge. But this might not be compatible with US suburban sprawl.
Actually you do need a law against each one, as drivers are by and large stupid and think their particular activities are not dangerous, even when they are. If someone is on their phone and this law doesn't exist, they can argue in court that they were still driving safely. This law takes away that get-out.
I suppose you're one of those people who whines about speed cameras as well?
So ignoring road signs is a good thing? Only on Slashdot could that be modded up. Seriously, get a fucking grip.
When you're a billionaire, government restrictions don't mean an awful lot to you.
You clearly know nothing about MMO design. You have to trust the client for many things, or the game will be unresponsive or unplayable. Anti-cheating software is absolutely necessary.
Bear in mind that they can say whatever they like, and no-one can find out if it's true or not. Including a Chinese player who paid cents to log on twenty days ago to check his mail is somewhat disengenuous, but I suppose they all do it.
Am I the only one amused at people thinking they're putting in effort and hard work by sitting at a keyboard playing one of the easiest games ever created, and only getting ahead of everyone else because they don't have anything else to do?
The whole point of WoW's success is that everyone can get to the top levels, do all the raids and get all the gear. Five years and twenty million sales later, poopsockers are still telling us how Blizzard got it all wrong.
If the rich were to leave the US, where would they go? Most of the developed world has much higher taxes than the US, which is defined as a tax haven. And as most of the US mega-rich make their money off the backs of the US markets, they wouldn't be able to dodge American taxation anyway.
Anyway, considering the vast, spirally inequality in the US, the mega-rich leaving might not be such a bad thing. It may well leave a much more stable economy where the proceeds of growth are shared more equitably, not hoarded at the top whilst a few crumbs 'trickle down' to the workers. There'd be more social mobility, and less crime.
That beer analogy is a dilemma, but not about the taxes, it's the fact that the rich guy has all the money in the first place. How do pretty much all other first world economies function without handing over all the wealth to a few traders, land-owners and executives who don't actually do anything?
This assumes more liquidity is a good thing. Maybe people would make more sensible investments if they couldn't divest them four seconds later for a profit.
You're joking, right? At 10% unemployment, companies can name their terms. Thanks to capitalism, wages have stagnated for decades whilst hours worked increases. You must be living in a by-gone era when the economy outgrew the labour supply. Today, the choice is work ten hours or work no hours. Thank god for the free market, eh?
Free-market capitalism only works for capitalists.
Yeah, working 8 hours a day sounds like hell. Better to follow the Western capitalist model and work 12 hours, four of which are unpaid. I'm sure all the extra wealth you accumulate will make you happier. After all, who needs to spend an extra 700 hours a year with your annoying family when you can be at the desk? The extra money you earn can be spent on a new HDTV.
Or maybe, Nintendo are just much better at making games than Sega.
What do you define as 'non free'? The USA has all sorts of violations on civil liberties and restrictions on the market.
It was obviously an abbreviation of 'modus operandi'. You'd know that if you weren't mediocre.