So... if I have a business unit that's losing money and I tell it to either turn a profit or they'll be laid off, am I responsible when the employees cheat and break the law to save their jobs because there's no other way?
If there is no other way to turn a profit besides breaking the law, and you tell people to turn a profit or be laid off, then yes you are most certainly responsible. Who's in charge and what does it mean to be in charge?
The employees had a choice. Stop trying to put blame somehwere else. Typical in today's society to always blame someone else. Oh its not the poor workers faults. What a load of crap.
Sure, they had a choice. Break the law or get fired. Just like you had a choice before posting such sophistry.
The difference is that in this case we're talking about fraud on a grand scale. Those employees should not only be fired, but prosecuted too
Yeah, but that doesn't happen to large financial institutions. "Fraud on a grand scale" describes half the housing market from 2000 to 2006. But did anyone go to jail?
This story is from the same CNNMoney that declared that Math is Racist
The story declared no such thing, but don't let that stop you. It describes how statistics and computer algorithms and models are used to perpetuate inequality and racist dynamics. It says math is being used to perpetuate racism, not that math is racist.
I agree with you on one thing: there shouldn't be *any* State or federal funding for any university. The same should be true of any funding, none should be coming at the expense of people, whose money is stolen via the violence of the State to provide anybody with any benefit.
It's not your money. It belongs to the Federal Reserve; says so right on the bill. You're just borrowing it. So enough about how the government is stealing your money. You are already paying a bank just for the privilege of having money at all.
Those skillsets are high school level skilled trades these days. Because of the insistence that IT was only something you could get into with a full college degree by people like those on Slashdot we never trained those workers in the skillsets.
IT is the equivalent of welding these days. Until the US vocational schools start cranking out IT and programmer techs companies are going to fill the positions with Indians.
Didn't ITT Tech just go under? And how is designing, building, upgrading, maintaining and troubleshooting complex systems anything like welding?
Elected politicians do.
The fact that these elected politicians sell legislation to the highest bidder has nothing to do with Capitalism and everything to do with Statism.
If you want to reduce the influence of money on the State, then the correct course of action is to reduce the influence of the State. I bet however, that you are one of those "don't throw your vote away" douches that is going to vote for Donald Clinton.
Can you hear my eyes rolling from wherever you are? Because you should be able to.
I'm constantly amazed at the ability of Libertarians to ignore the power of concentrated wealth. If you reduce the influence of the State, who steps into the vacuum? Nobody? You think that's reasonable to expect? Or maybe the most wealthy and powerful private interests? What do you do about them? How do you reduce their influence when they start running roughshod over people and their rights and interests? Do you sue them? With what money? And who enforces contracts and the outcome of lawsuits? The government? The same government that should be so weak it isn't worth taking over?
This is what drives me nuts about this simplistic Libertarian bullshit. The government has to be the biggest kid on the block! Reasonable people can disagree about the size and scope of government. But the government has to be supreme in order to enforce laws. At the end of the day it has to have coercive power. The idea behind a government by and for the people is that this big bully will work for the benefit of society and protect the weak against the strong. You keep money out of it by enacting laws against it and enforcing them; not by reducing government to the point of impotence.
It doesn't matter how much it costs. So long as the savings are passed on to new graduates, and the service levels don't degrade, please make education cheaper. If you have to go to foreign suppliers because domestic suppliers are too expensive, go foreign. Domestic suppliers will quickly realize they are uncompetitive and either change their pricing or change their product to deliver a competitive value proposition.
Seriously, since when does being an American mean we are uncompetitive and in favor of protectionism?
The thing is, unless there is some egregious waste, there isn't a way to significantly reduce cost without affecting quality. As Mwvdlee said below, the reason outsourcing companies can charge less is that their employees are living in a third-world country. In order for American companies to compete, the US would have to become a third-world country.
You wonder when Americans became less competitive. I wonder when they forgot that you get what you pay for.
When we were looking at what phones to provide at work we asked people what they wanted and two things of note were that no one mentioned battery life as a key factor and most people wanted the iPhone 6s which has distinctly mediocre battery life.
When I got my last new phone, I went with an iPhone 6+ precisely because of the longer battery life. The phone is too big, but the battery will last two days between charges. So there's that.
Judging from the early comments it is clear why the FBI director is calling for a "grown up" conversation. Are all of the comment going to be F bomb anti government posts? How about a debate and constructive conversation?
There's not really anything to discuss. Encryption exists and can be made practically unbreakable. Back doors or weakened encryption will be exploited by criminals or other malicious actors making the encryption useless. Anyone with the know-how can make an encryption algorithm that doesn't contain the back doors, shutting out law enforcement. So it's pointless to install back doors or weaken the encryption if the goal is to catch criminals.
It's tough to compare the environment now to what law enforcement has "always" done in history, though. There never used to be a way for them to read every single letter and cable being sent and received everywhere, so in that sense, the power they're looking for is unprecedented, even if they promise only to use it in a way that's analogous to old school manual police work. And even the claim that they've "always" had access to the data they're asking for doesn't entirely hold up. They've never had, say, access to timestamped GPS data about everywhere a person has gone every day or years of archives of mail. In the idealized old days, they could start tapping your phone or reading your mail at a certain point in time and get data for that time window, but not everything you'd done for years before that. There are types and quantities of data about us that exist now because of smart phones and ubiquitous use of the Internet that simply didn't exist in the "good old days" he's pining for.
So I think the fundamental claim he's making is at least a little bit flawed, and that's before we even get into discussions about whether it's technologically feasible or whether law enforcement can be trusted with the expanded powers.
Well said. And I think his claim is more than just a little bit flawed. As you have laid out, technology has actually enabled law enforcement to have much more power and information than they have ever had before. It has actually made their job easier. Yet here is the FBI director complaining that he can't be effective without a panopticon.
You misunderstand. I wasn't suggesting that wealth lead to enlightenment. I was saying that intellectuals who have wealth are able to keep the moronic masses at bay, or at least at a sufficient distance that they have no impact. Meanwhile, intellectuals without means are more likely to be drowned out by the rabble.
But, I absolutely agree with you. I should spend a lot more time with rich people! Could you perhaps make an introduction for me?
Ah, now I see what you're saying. Sorry, I can't offer any introductions. I generally can't stand those swells.
The ability to amass wealth has no correlation with intellectual enlightenment or critical thinking.
Is that something you're basing on evidence or logic, or just something you tell yourself until you believe it?
Certainly, my job requires critical thinking, and permits me to amass wealth.
It's based on my personal experience. I said critical thinking and wealth are not correlated, not that they can't exist in the same place. I would expect you would understand that, what with your critical thinking skills and all.
Well, don't want to sound like a dick or nothin', but, ah... it says on your chart that you're fucked up. Ah, you talk like a fag, and your shit's all retarded. - Idiocracy(2006)
The moron uprising is shifting into high gear.
Intelligent people, or even less intelligent people capable of critical thinking, are being drowned out by drooling morons. The only salvation appears to be wealth and even the wealthy are under siege by the moron hoard. I'm really not sure how much longer they will be able to stave off the tide.
You should spend more time with rich people. You may find they are just as benighted as the common folk, perhaps more so. The ability to amass wealth has no correlation with intellectual enlightenment or critical thinking.
And all the laws that were designed to prevent banking meltdowns didn't stop the last meltdown, and now we have more laws that won't stop the next one. Instead of creating new laws, how about tossing people in jail for actual criminal behavior. I am sure we could toss a few Bankers in jail for committing fraud for their schemes to rip people off.
Part of the reason for that is that some of the banking laws, like Glass-Steagal which prohibited commercial banks from also being investment banks, were repealed. Sometimes the laws actually work. I'm with you on prosecuting fraud, which did not happen and should have.
IF you want to address the economic impact of taxes, try lowering them to almost zero, and see what a market free to operate without the drag of "progressive" taxes does. Yes, we had roads, schools and so on before we had onerous taxes. And no grandma won't starve.
And where did the money come from to build those roads and schools? Non-onerous taxes? Taxes that aren't called taxes? Public infrastructure requires money to build, and Walmart and Coca Cola aren't going to do it. And actually, before Social Security, Grandma just might have starved.
Slashdot Mirror
So... if I have a business unit that's losing money and I tell it to either turn a profit or they'll be laid off, am I responsible when the employees cheat and break the law to save their jobs because there's no other way?
If there is no other way to turn a profit besides breaking the law, and you tell people to turn a profit or be laid off, then yes you are most certainly responsible. Who's in charge and what does it mean to be in charge?
The employees had a choice. Stop trying to put blame somehwere else. Typical in today's society to always blame someone else. Oh its not the poor workers faults. What a load of crap.
Sure, they had a choice. Break the law or get fired. Just like you had a choice before posting such sophistry.
The difference is that in this case we're talking about fraud on a grand scale. Those employees should not only be fired, but prosecuted too
Yeah, but that doesn't happen to large financial institutions. "Fraud on a grand scale" describes half the housing market from 2000 to 2006. But did anyone go to jail?
That wasn't capitalism it was fraud. For capitalism to work you have to actually produce something of value, and that doesn't happen with fraud.
LOL, tell that to Wall Street!
This story is from the same CNNMoney that declared that Math is Racist
The story declared no such thing, but don't let that stop you. It describes how statistics and computer algorithms and models are used to perpetuate inequality and racist dynamics. It says math is being used to perpetuate racism, not that math is racist.
I would consider the fat welfare ladies I see sitting on their stoops all day to be lower class, because they sure as hell aren't working.
The 1980's called. They want their cliche back.
I agree with you on one thing: there shouldn't be *any* State or federal funding for any university. The same should be true of any funding, none should be coming at the expense of people, whose money is stolen via the violence of the State to provide anybody with any benefit.
It's not your money. It belongs to the Federal Reserve; says so right on the bill. You're just borrowing it. So enough about how the government is stealing your money. You are already paying a bank just for the privilege of having money at all.
You'd say there are rational arguments for nation states? Arbitrary lines drawn over the globe by tribal apes? Rational? Yeah, right.
So, your position is that it is irrational for tribal apes to demarcate the boundaries of their tribe? Who's really being irrational here?
Because they take my tax dollars under threat of imprisonment or death. A corporation does not.
You stupid motherfucker.
Oh, really? They don't?
http://www.forbes.com/sites/emilywillingham/2016/08/21/why-did-mylan-hike-epipen-prices-400-because-they-could
Those skillsets are high school level skilled trades these days. Because of the insistence that IT was only something you could get into with a full college degree by people like those on Slashdot we never trained those workers in the skillsets.
IT is the equivalent of welding these days. Until the US vocational schools start cranking out IT and programmer techs companies are going to fill the positions with Indians.
Didn't ITT Tech just go under? And how is designing, building, upgrading, maintaining and troubleshooting complex systems anything like welding?
And who controls the government in the US?
Elected politicians do. The fact that these elected politicians sell legislation to the highest bidder has nothing to do with Capitalism and everything to do with Statism. If you want to reduce the influence of money on the State, then the correct course of action is to reduce the influence of the State. I bet however, that you are one of those "don't throw your vote away" douches that is going to vote for Donald Clinton.
Can you hear my eyes rolling from wherever you are? Because you should be able to.
I'm constantly amazed at the ability of Libertarians to ignore the power of concentrated wealth. If you reduce the influence of the State, who steps into the vacuum? Nobody? You think that's reasonable to expect? Or maybe the most wealthy and powerful private interests? What do you do about them? How do you reduce their influence when they start running roughshod over people and their rights and interests? Do you sue them? With what money? And who enforces contracts and the outcome of lawsuits? The government? The same government that should be so weak it isn't worth taking over?
This is what drives me nuts about this simplistic Libertarian bullshit. The government has to be the biggest kid on the block! Reasonable people can disagree about the size and scope of government. But the government has to be supreme in order to enforce laws. At the end of the day it has to have coercive power. The idea behind a government by and for the people is that this big bully will work for the benefit of society and protect the weak against the strong. You keep money out of it by enacting laws against it and enforcing them; not by reducing government to the point of impotence.
It doesn't matter how much it costs. So long as the savings are passed on to new graduates, and the service levels don't degrade, please make education cheaper. If you have to go to foreign suppliers because domestic suppliers are too expensive, go foreign. Domestic suppliers will quickly realize they are uncompetitive and either change their pricing or change their product to deliver a competitive value proposition. Seriously, since when does being an American mean we are uncompetitive and in favor of protectionism?
The thing is, unless there is some egregious waste, there isn't a way to significantly reduce cost without affecting quality. As Mwvdlee said below, the reason outsourcing companies can charge less is that their employees are living in a third-world country. In order for American companies to compete, the US would have to become a third-world country.
You wonder when Americans became less competitive. I wonder when they forgot that you get what you pay for.
When we were looking at what phones to provide at work we asked people what they wanted and two things of note were that no one mentioned battery life as a key factor and most people wanted the iPhone 6s which has distinctly mediocre battery life.
When I got my last new phone, I went with an iPhone 6+ precisely because of the longer battery life. The phone is too big, but the battery will last two days between charges. So there's that.
I use wired. They came with the phone. They work. They don't lose charge. I use BT in the car.
This is one of my gripes. It's one more thing for me to have to keep charged. Wired headphones work just fine.
citizens obeying the law and still getting gunned down by officers of the law with neither warrant nor true probable cause.
[citation needed]
Seriously? You need a citation for that?
Judging from the early comments it is clear why the FBI director is calling for a "grown up" conversation. Are all of the comment going to be F bomb anti government posts? How about a debate and constructive conversation?
There's not really anything to discuss. Encryption exists and can be made practically unbreakable. Back doors or weakened encryption will be exploited by criminals or other malicious actors making the encryption useless. Anyone with the know-how can make an encryption algorithm that doesn't contain the back doors, shutting out law enforcement. So it's pointless to install back doors or weaken the encryption if the goal is to catch criminals.
And replace him with what?
A new boss who is the same as the old boss, of course!
It's tough to compare the environment now to what law enforcement has "always" done in history, though. There never used to be a way for them to read every single letter and cable being sent and received everywhere, so in that sense, the power they're looking for is unprecedented, even if they promise only to use it in a way that's analogous to old school manual police work. And even the claim that they've "always" had access to the data they're asking for doesn't entirely hold up. They've never had, say, access to timestamped GPS data about everywhere a person has gone every day or years of archives of mail. In the idealized old days, they could start tapping your phone or reading your mail at a certain point in time and get data for that time window, but not everything you'd done for years before that. There are types and quantities of data about us that exist now because of smart phones and ubiquitous use of the Internet that simply didn't exist in the "good old days" he's pining for. So I think the fundamental claim he's making is at least a little bit flawed, and that's before we even get into discussions about whether it's technologically feasible or whether law enforcement can be trusted with the expanded powers.
Well said. And I think his claim is more than just a little bit flawed. As you have laid out, technology has actually enabled law enforcement to have much more power and information than they have ever had before. It has actually made their job easier. Yet here is the FBI director complaining that he can't be effective without a panopticon.
You misunderstand. I wasn't suggesting that wealth lead to enlightenment. I was saying that intellectuals who have wealth are able to keep the moronic masses at bay, or at least at a sufficient distance that they have no impact. Meanwhile, intellectuals without means are more likely to be drowned out by the rabble.
But, I absolutely agree with you. I should spend a lot more time with rich people! Could you perhaps make an introduction for me?
Ah, now I see what you're saying. Sorry, I can't offer any introductions. I generally can't stand those swells.
The ability to amass wealth has no correlation with intellectual enlightenment or critical thinking.
Is that something you're basing on evidence or logic, or just something you tell yourself until you believe it?
Certainly, my job requires critical thinking, and permits me to amass wealth.
It's based on my personal experience. I said critical thinking and wealth are not correlated, not that they can't exist in the same place. I would expect you would understand that, what with your critical thinking skills and all.
I would bet, victims of those crimes ...
Most of these crimes don't have victims.
I might ask, then why are they crimes.
Well, don't want to sound like a dick or nothin', but, ah... it says on your chart that you're fucked up. Ah, you talk like a fag, and your shit's all retarded. - Idiocracy(2006)
The moron uprising is shifting into high gear.
Intelligent people, or even less intelligent people capable of critical thinking, are being drowned out by drooling morons. The only salvation appears to be wealth and even the wealthy are under siege by the moron hoard. I'm really not sure how much longer they will be able to stave off the tide.
You should spend more time with rich people. You may find they are just as benighted as the common folk, perhaps more so. The ability to amass wealth has no correlation with intellectual enlightenment or critical thinking.
Fear and nativism?
And all the laws that were designed to prevent banking meltdowns didn't stop the last meltdown, and now we have more laws that won't stop the next one. Instead of creating new laws, how about tossing people in jail for actual criminal behavior. I am sure we could toss a few Bankers in jail for committing fraud for their schemes to rip people off.
Part of the reason for that is that some of the banking laws, like Glass-Steagal which prohibited commercial banks from also being investment banks, were repealed. Sometimes the laws actually work. I'm with you on prosecuting fraud, which did not happen and should have.
IF you want to address the economic impact of taxes, try lowering them to almost zero, and see what a market free to operate without the drag of "progressive" taxes does. Yes, we had roads, schools and so on before we had onerous taxes. And no grandma won't starve.
And where did the money come from to build those roads and schools? Non-onerous taxes? Taxes that aren't called taxes? Public infrastructure requires money to build, and Walmart and Coca Cola aren't going to do it. And actually, before Social Security, Grandma just might have starved.