Hell, how is it different from trying to date a 13 year old on the internet when all you're talking to is an FBI agent? The victim doesn't exist, the act was never committed yet someone gets jailed.
Frankly, I don't think anyone should be jailed for that either. A crime can't get any more "victimless" than that - the victim is a fictional character!
An even closer analogy might be a friend promising you some of the insurance money settlement for burning down his house, when he doesn't actually have an insurance contract. Or a house. And you don't even get as far as starting the fire, you just agree to the plan.
Wire fraud is illegal. Why shouldn't attempted wire fraud be?
Because the alleged money doesn't exist. It's nothing but a thoughtcrime: you want to lock people up for a naughty feeling inside their own heads.
It's not like pointing a gun at someone and then finding that the gun blows up in your face. It's more like pointing a toy gun at a cardboard cutout of a person, but being too blind to realize that it's all fake: there was never any possibility of harming a real person.
If the speakers were in fact stolen people would be breaking the law by buying them, so why is it different if they just believe that they are stolen?
Um.. it's different because they aren't actually breaking the law.
Similarly, if you're driving 25 MPH in a 35 zone but you believe you're going 45, you aren't speeding. And if you break into a house, but it turns out to be your own house, you aren't trespassing.
Arrest the real criminals, not people who mistakenly think they're criminals.
If economies of scale was all that mattered then large scale farms wouldn't need subsidies.
Well, exactly. They don't need subsidies, and if your point is that we should eliminate farm subsidies, then I'm with you.
So what if private insurers didn't employ as many people as government run insurance, private is as you say more efficient.
If you believe that, then why did you say it would create more jobs? Did you accidentally misspell "fewer"?
Look, I'm certainly not saying we should make decisions about our health care system based on the number of jobs it'll produce in the health care industry. I'm just pointing out the contradiction. Either private insurance will be more efficient or it will create jobs -- not both.
What's odd is that you first intimated private insurance would be more efficient
Sorry you got that impression, maybe I wasn't clear. I don't actually believe it would be more efficient -- based on the fact that countries with less reliance on private insurance have more efficient health care systems employing fewer people to handle paperwork, and the fact that Medicare already has lower overhead than private insurance -- but I assumed (correctly, it seems) that you believed it'd be more efficient. Thus the contradiction, because you also said it'd create more jobs.
But in the same report though it said lower income people are more wiling to gamble with their health. And as far as I'm concerned, you gamble you pay.
Well, no, it reports the opinion of someone who "worries that low-income participants will gamble with their health rather than pay a huge deductible". In other words, they're "gambling" because they can't pay.
First, bankrupt [msn.com] means more than just not having enough money [...] I consider it morally bankrupt
Oh. So in other words, you were just talking out your ass when you said this:
"by the tyme the last Baby Boomers retire Social Security probably will be broke"
And this:
"Social Security going broke, without the government putting massive amounts of money in, will happen. The only question is when."
And this:
"By 2018 Social Security will be running an operating deficit [...] I call that bankrupt!"
And now that I've debunked those claims, you're weaseling out by feebly pointing to a metaphorical definition of the word "bankrupt". Cute, but I still remember what we were talking about, and it was money, not morals.
You trust government more than business
False. I simply realize that businesses can't solve every problem: some things are worth doing even if they aren't profitable.
It actually has more to do with the fact that being smaller makes it easier to perform. Younger, smaller athletes have an advantage. The rule seeks to prevent that advantage from unleveling the playing field.
But the rule actually does the opposite. It tilts the playing field in favor of the athletes who are naturally worse performers.
Consider that there aren't a lot of 70 year old setting world records in track events: their bodies just aren't as well-suited to sprinting as a 25 year old body. This rule is akin to saying that track events should only have elderly athletes, or making the younger athletes run with extra weight on their back to "level the playing field".
The point of the Olympics isn't to feature athletes who have overcome their natural disadvantages. That's what the Special Olympics is for. The real Olympics ought to be about letting people put their natural abilities to good use, not limiting them because their biology makes them "too good".
Because big agricultural businesses like ADM and Cargill get billions of dollars in subsidies a small farmer can't compeat and so is forced to move to the city.
Ah yes, that's why small farmers can't compete. It doesn't have anything to do with economies of scale, no sir.
If they a get employment with a private company good for them. And with government out of medical and health care more jobs with private insurers will be created.
Again, the only way we'd end up with "more jobs" is if the system became less efficient as a result. Not that that's unlikely -- private insurers already have higher overhead than Medicare, and countries with single-payer health care typically spend less to cover more people -- but it's odd that you're championing a move toward inefficiency.
Then allow people to open and deposit money into Health Savings Accounts to pay medical costs out of pocket.
People already can do that. You know why they don't? Because HSAs are pointless unless you're either (1) healthy enough that you won't get sick before the account is full, or (2) wealthy enough that it doesn't matter.
Oh really? Two workers paying payroll taxes for every retiree [bloggingstocks.com] isn't bankrupt? By 2018 Social Security will be running an operating deficit [financialsense.com]. "By 2030 Social Security's [usatoday.com] caseload will be 84 million people, up from 50 million today. Medicare will go from 44 million beneficiaries to 79 million. That will leave barely more than two workers paying payroll taxes for every retiree."
I call that bankrupt!
Then you're wrong. Sorry.
See, "bankrupt" means there's no money left to pay their obligations, but that's not going to happen any time soon. So what if there are only two workers paying payroll taxes for every retiree (at least until the boomers finish retiring)? What matters is whether there will still be enough money to pay benefits during that time - and there will be. The boomers' retirement didn't come as a surprise to anyone, although Social Security opponents would like you to think it did.
As for the "operating deficit", that's a simple misunderstanding of the facts. Social Security doesn't depend entirely on ongoing tax revenue. Here's a from the link I gave earlier (emphasis added):
"The trustees project that in 2017, benefit payments will begin to exceed Social Securityâ(TM)s tax revenues. At this point, Social Security will start using some of the interest it earns on its trust fund bonds to pay benefits. Nevertheless, the trustees project that in 2017, the trust fund will have $4.5 trillion in assets and that these assets will increase by another $1 trillion over the following nine years."
The trustees also project that they'll have to start redeeming the bonds in 2026, and the bonds will all be redeemed by 2041. That is when benefits will have to be cut (assuming nothing else has changed by then). But even then, tax revenue will be enough to pay 78% of promised benefits, declining to 75% in 2082.
Life is risk, Nobody owes you an easy ride. If you don't want risk lay down, roll over, and die. Unlike some, I;m willing to take a risk and pay for it if it turns bad. I am not willing to live in a nanny state, but if you want to there's Cuba 90 miles from Florida.
Ha! Considering that these programs have wide support and the majority of Americans are opposed to your "roll over and die" policy, maybe you should move if you want to live in a country that doesn't help the unfortunate.
Where is your proof? I'll give two examples your way doesn't work, China and the Soviet Union. And I'm talking about government not communism.
OK, here are some counterexamples: UK, France, Germany, Sweden, Denmark... oh, and the USA. Government social programs seem to work just fine in real
Robbing Peter to pay Paul is never right, and that's exactly what government does when it taxes your income.
Well, there you go. That's an axiom on which we disagree. Libertarians are opposed to the very notion of taxes; the rest of us are not.
Taxing also hurts the economy, because of taxes people can't spend as much, increasing consumer spending will create jobs.
No, it'll mainly just move jobs around. If you dismantle, say, Medicare, and divert that money into private insurance, then the people who work for Medicare (directly or as private contractors) will have to find work with private insurers instead.
Whether jobs would be gained or lost overall depends on how many employees those private insurers would need to provide the same service as Medicare. If they need more employees, then they create jobs, but that means the system is less efficient overall. Those extra salaries don't appear out of thin air; they come from charging consumers more for the same services.
With lower or no income tax, the economy would be better thus increasing people's pay. With higher pay people would be able to invest more, which would increase employment and again pay.
You're still confusing the average with the individual. Even if we assume that the economy would be "better" with no income tax -- a claim for which there's little evidence, if any -- that doesn't mean everyone would have money left over to invest, because the improvement wouldn't necessarily be distributed evenly.
Have you seen the data? How much is in Social Security? How many Baby Boomers will be retiring? How long they're expected to live? I admit though I don't recall the numbers I have seen them and Social Security going broke, without the government putting massive amounts of money in, will happen. The only question is when.
Nope - some people would you like to think the Baby Boomers retiring will destroy Social Security, but the data simply doesn't bear that out. The Social Security Board of Trustees' 2008 report predicts that even with no changes, Social Security will be able to pay full benefits until 2041 (a decade after the last boomers have retired); after that, even with no changes, it'll still be paying 75% of promised benefits in 2082.
The changes needed to keep it paying full benefits past 2041 are pretty minimal. The simplest is just to raise the cap on the Social Security payroll tax, which would also make that tax less regressive.
Bond holders are guarantied, they're guarantied to be paid before others are. However if going bankrupt is a concern then only buy AAA binds. And not just from one company, but from a number of different companies in different businesses. Or if it's that big a deal, then you can buy gold, silver, or other precious metals and gems.
Those are all fine ways to spread the risk around, but there's still a risk. That's what investment is all about, extracting profit by assuming risk; it's the opposite of insurance, which is about paying someone else to take risk off your hands. In a nation of 300 million individual investors, some of them will inevitably end up losing their investment, which is exactly what Social Security is meant to avoid.
True but more people with more money will help.
... but they still won't be able to help as many people as government-funded social programs, so no, private charity isn't a suitable replacement.
Meanwhile socialists want government to take care of everything, that people shouldn't be held responsible. Instead of turning the US into a socialist state, they can move 90 miles off the coast of Florida to Cuba. Oh darn, even Cuba has private businesses and enterprise [blogspot.com] now.
That's cute, but the only people who actually "want government to take care of e
It sure sounds like you're generalizing from liberal guilt, and not from your own experiences being poor and living in poor neighborhoods.
Huh, that's odd. Maybe it sounds like that to you because you're in denial. For the record, I'm generalizing based on the experiences of my friends and basic logic (e.g. there's no reason to believe that someone working full-time at minimum wage will necessarily have money left over to save, since there's no guarantee that the basic costs of living will be lower than minimum wage).
The majority of families, however, who are strigling because few family members are willing to work (usually the women), and the rest mostly complain about how unfair life is [etc.]
I don't doubt that such people exist; however, I've never met any of them, and I see no evidence that they represent a "majority" of the working poor.
I'm sure you do - that's about the definition of the middle class in America these days. Willing to work (or speculate on silly investments that promise unrealistic income), but unwilling to save, because that would require looking like you were less successful to your friends and neighbors.
Again, I don't doubt that some people are, in fact, able but unwilling to save. However, I see no evidence that it's any more common than being willing but unable to save.
Some people would certainly like for that to be the case: particularly those whose ideology demands low taxes and no social programs, and who need to justify that by convincing themselves that the people who are helped by those programs are irresponsible, stupid, or otherwise inferior. But simply asserting it isn't enough.
Assuming you're an adult who's past the point of the first couple years of near-minimum-wage jobs. there are plenty of opportunities to move to a salaried job with benefits, but you need the capital to take advantage of those opportunities - a couple thousand to pay for training, or relocate, or whatever hurdle makes the opportunity available.
Yes, that's what I've been saying. So what happens when you don't have the capital to take advantage of those opportunities?
What if, say, you became ill or injured while you had one of those no-benefits, near-minimum-wage jobs, incurred five- or six-figure medical bills that you've never been able to pay back, and now no one will even loan you that capital? (Recall that medical expenses are the leading cause of bankruptcy.)
Yup, there are people in that position: people who support the losers in their families who are unwilling to work.
Well, apparently that's the subset you'd like to focus on, but let me rephrase the question.
What happens when you've made all those sacrifices, you aren't supporting any "losers" in your family who are able but unwilling to work, and you still don't have money left over to save?
Or are you just stubbornly pretending that never happens?
Do you realize that their is nothing in the 'trust fund' but air and promises.
Heh. I suppose bonds are technically "promises", but that doesn't mean they aren't worth anything. Do you think everyone who buys bonds is a sucker, or that the government collapses and inflation goes sky-high every time someone cashes in a bond?
Try that line of bullshit with someone else. I've been there and done that. So have other members of my family.
And therefore, anyone who can't do it is a lazy bum. It's so simple!
You have to make sacrifices, but as someone who did I can say that the sacrifice required reduced my actual standard of living by little, outside of status symbols. You don't need a house. You don't need cable. You don't need fashion. You don't need a nice neighborhood (though it's worth avoiding the really violent areas). You don't need a presentable car, just a reliable one.
So, what happens when you've made all those sacrifices and you still don't have money left over to save?
for every person trapped by circumstance there are 10 or 20 trapped by simple lack of responsibility, the belief that working for a living is some sort of scam that they're too smart to fall for, or simply too much stubborn pride to work for someone else
From what I've seen, you have the ratio backwards. I know plenty of people who don't have the resources to weather a disaster; I don't know anyone who's unwilling to work.
There are always better jobs that WallMart available
That's a nice glib remark, but it's not true. Sometimes the only better jobs require skills/experience that you don't have, or they're too far away to commute. Sometimes retail and call centers really are the only available jobs.
Believe what you want, but that doesn't make it true. People have been concerned with Social Security's solvency for decades and it's really only been very recently that the private investment push has really come out.
It's not my belief that makes it true, it's the numbers. The latest prediction from the Social Security Board of Trustees is that, even with no changes, Social Security would be able to pay full benefits until 2041; in 2082 it would still be able to pay 75% of promised benefits. That's not a crisis.
People have been "concerned" for some time, but they've been wrong; whether their wrongness stems from an honest misinterpretation of the figures or a self-interested opposition to the program itself is a matter of opinion, I guess.
No I'm not. Are you saying it is impossible for the government to fail to provide enough money?
Practically speaking, yes. If the government found itself unable to raise enough money through taxation to fund Social Security or other programs, we'd all have much bigger problems to worry about, because it'd mean our economy had crashed to a halt.
But my argument is that it's less about money than actually delivering help to people. The government is moderately good at taking money from it's citizens. It's horrible at effectively putting that money to good use.
Even if private organizations are, say, twice as efficient as government programs, they still have to be able to raise at least half as much money to provide the same level of service. So why not get the best of both worlds: have the government collect the money, and then give it to private organizations who can spend it more efficiently to provide services.
You missed the my last line - the insurance companies don't have to offer it for nothing. The funding for the basic level for individuals who can't afford it themselves can still come from the government.
That's certainly one way to run a national health care system, especially if you include national funding of preventive care (since insurers have little incentive to pay for it on their own). A single-payer system would probably be able to bring overall costs down, though, rather than just shifting the cost around.
It's not against my interest at all. If Libertarians had had their way it would have been the employer of the driver who hit me who would have had to pay not the government, ie taxpayers. Fact is is that employer, the person who hit me was working and driving a company vehicle, got off with a light slap.
In that case, if Libertarians had had their way, you would've been lucky that he was on the clock when he hit you. What if he hadn't, and he didn't have enough assets of his own to compensate you for your injury? Tough luck for you, I guess.
Oh, really? President Roosevelt signed into law Social Security in 1935 during the Great Depression yet the economy was already improving as was employment.
Yes, really. Just because the economy was improving doesn't mean everything was fine; an improvement in the average doesn't translate to an improvement in every single person's life. If private charity and the market had been providing for everyone, there would've been no demand for social programs.
Why would you what? Plan your own retirement?
No, why would I expect Social Security to have the same profit potential as a risky investment? That isn't its purpose (hence the word "security").
Investing for your retirement is a good idea, obviously, and I'm fortunate enough to be able to do it myself. But not everyone can afford to invest, and not everyone who does invest will come out ahead. Social Security ensures that those people will at least end up with something, and I have no problem paying to live in a country where everyone has that assurance.
Heck by the tyme the last Baby Boomers retire Social Security probably will be broke.
That's what some people would like us to think -- the ones who stand to gain from moving all that money into private investments, for example -- but it's more myth than fact. If you want to worry about a program going broke, look at Medicare, not Social Security.
You might, as others have, say that the stock market could crash. Yeap it sure can, and depending on how old you are when it happens you could very well have plenty of tyme to recover.
Sure, you could, and hopefully you will, but maybe you won't. That's the difference between insurance and investment, and it's one reason why investments can't replace Social Security.
If you're old and close to retirement then you should have a good chunk of your investment portfolio in bonds, which as I said above are guarantied. If a business goes bankrupt the first people to get money are those who hold secured financial instruments, which bonds are.
Bonds aren't guaranteed to pay off; that's why they have ratings. If the company goes bankrupt and doesn't have enough assets left to pay the bond holders, what happens? Does the money appear out of thin air? No, the bond holders get screwed.
But you are, no Libertarian I know would let others starve, unless it was their own fault. All I know help those they can who are willing.
No Libertarian you know has sufficient resources. They might like to help everyone, but they can't possibly accomplish it.
That's the problem. They might be perfectly nice people who donate as much as they can to charity, but individual donations aren't enough. When the charity runs out, people will suffer and die, and Libertarian ideology says that's still better than paying taxes (or simply ignores the possibility that such a thing could happen).
Furthermore, many of us non-Libertarians believe that people shouldn't have to starve even if it is their own fault, i.e. that a bad decision shouldn't ruin your life. So, we might conclude that the Libertarians you know aren't too nice after all.
If you're more than a couple years out of college/apprenticeship and you don't have a disaster fund - at least 6 months living expenses, but 12 is better - you are simply irresponsible.
Yes, of course, why hasn't anyone else thought of that? It's so simple! They wouldn't be poor if they'd just save all that spare money they have left over after paying for housing and utilities, buying groceries and fuel, etc.
And hey, if they don't have bread, why don't they just eat cake? How irresponsible they must be, turning away such a delicious treat.
Why, they must be making a fortune at those cushy call centers and air conditioned Wal-Marts. What's the going wage these days, $100 an hour? $200? It's been so long since I kept up with peasant news. Whatever it is, clearly they have no excuse.
No, people stay poor because they make stupid decisions about their lives, over and over. You *cannot* fix this by giving people money.
Preach it, brother! If someone doesn't have the skills to get a higher-paying job, and can't go back to school because he needs to spend his time working, there's nothing money could do to improve his situation. Absolutely nothing.
Get real. Sure, there are people who make bad decisions over and over. But there are also people who make one or two bad decisions -- or have one or two misfortunes -- and then find that they have no more options.
The site hosting it and the band were very upfront about it; there was even a "warning" that the streams were protected and ripping them wouldn't do any good; but there's always someone out there who believes they deserve something for nothing
But they were getting something for nothing! If you decide to give out free video streams to everyone who asks for one, you've already conceded that you don't care about "protecting" your content: giving it away for free is the opposite of protecting it. You then have no leg to stand on if you want to complain that people are decrypting it.
Remember, the original purpose of the VCR was to record TV signals that people were already receiving for free. The studios didn't like that very much, but thankfully the courts had more sense.
In other words, they're relying on security through obscurity. All you'd need to do to crack it is bribe someone who has passed their background check to give you one of the chips for analysis.
If you send a video stream to someone, they'll be able to record it. The VCR proved that once -- do these authors think digital media will be any different? Or should be any different?
Adobe isn't at fault for "not making a better encryption". It's not possible. You have to send someone the key if you want them to watch the video, and once they have the key, they can decrypt it for any other purpose. No amount of programming can evade that basic logic.
Applian isn't at fault for making a program that decrypts the stream, either. They're the VCR manufacturer of this era, making a tool that people can use to time-shift videos. What's wrong with that?
Performance is generally so bad that if you just do what's minimally expected you'll bonus. [...] By the way, that same call center mentioned above offered FULL tuition reinmbursement. There were roughly 600 call reps there and I think 3-4 actually took advantage of it. What does that tell you?
It tells me that the call centers in your neck of the woods are nothing like the ones around here. Believe me, I've worked in call centers and so have many of my friends, and none of them have been anything like what you're describing.
I have endless similar anecdotes, but you're right I don't know what it's like to be poor.
Look, the problem with your anecdotes is that they don't disprove anyone else's anecdotes. You know your experience, but you're incorrectly assuming that it's the same for everyone else -- it's not.
It's great that you had these opportunities, and it's great that the call centers in your area pay for college and offer outstanding bonuses to anyone who's willing to put in the effort. But that's not universal.
The fact is, those opportunities aren't available to everyone, and no matter how much you talk about the opportunities you had, it doesn't do a thing to make them available to anyone else.
No sir, you're the one who is out of touch.
Hilarious! You're the one assuming that your experience is universal, that everyone else shares your luck and opportunities, and that if they don't reach the same outcome it's because they're lazy. I think it's clear which one of us is out of touch.
And in areas where there is something of a de facto guarantee (like Social Security) how's that going to work out? No one in my generation actually believes the money will be there for us and if it is, without drastic changes (which no politician seems to have the courage to deal with)
Well, the alleged problems with Social Security are largely myths, promoted by people who'd like to see all that money directed into private investments instead: it'll stay solvent for decades, and at that point it'll only need small adjustments to stay solvent for decades more. I have no reason to doubt that it'll be there when I reach retirement age, although of course I don't expect to rely on it for my entire income.
By this I don't mean funding either - I truly believe voluntary funding & charitable contributions could get us much further along than forced onces.
Are you saying it's impossible that voluntary funding might fail to provide enough money to run the entire system?
I think it's awfully dangerous to base such a system on the idea that people will just keep funding it out of the kindness of their hearts -- if they're free to stop donating at any time, we can't ignore the possibility that they might do exactly that.
I can call hundreds of insurance companies and shop around for the best price for a 20 year term life insurance contract for $200,000. Why should health insurance be any different?
No insurance company is going to offer a contract with a premium of $0. Meanwhile, we-the-people want health care and retirement/survivor benefits to be available even to people who can't afford to pay a premium. How would privately funded insurance be able to deliver that?
Have you even been in such a situation? I have and am there now.
Indeed I have, and I'm very close to people who still are.
More than 10 years later I am still on disability. Yet I'm still a libertarian.
I don't doubt that. It's funny how people will stick to philosophies and political parties that work against their own interests, isn't it?
Not being forced means just that, not being forced which is what the government is doing when they take the money you work to earn as tax. And just because you don't want government to take your money does not mean you're cold hearted.
No, I'm sure there are plenty of kind-hearted libertarians. But just because they're nice people doesn't mean the policies they favor will actually help as many people as a government safety net. There were charities before any of our social programs existed; voluntary donations weren't enough then, nor are they now.
Or you may want to invest some for your retirement. Starting when 18 years old if you invest $2000 a year for 7 years at 10% per annum, until you're 25 when you retire at 65 you'll have more than $870,000 invested, compounded interest does amazing things if given the chance. Do you think Social Security will pay you that much?
Why would I? Social Security is a form of insurance, not an investment.
Do you think that 10% figure is a guarantee of some sort? If you invest wisely, maybe you'll earn that much, or maybe you'll choose wrong and lose it all. For the people who can't afford to invest in the first place, it's moot anyway. The point of Social Security is to ensure that you get something no matter what happens in the market or how much disposable income you had in the past.
[Libertarians would have us believe that when charity fails, it's better to let those unfortunate people starve]
Now you're lying, lying, lying, lying.
I wish I were, but sadly I'm not. They have no solution for the cases where voluntary charity can't provide for some of the people who can't provide for themselves. That means those people will suffer and die, right? Unless... hrm... you're not a Breatharian, are you?
I'm sorry, I thought we were talking about the USA. I didn't realize the North Koreans had their own Democratic Party, Republican Party, RIAA, and independent music labels.
Not surprisingly, you're making an substantial (and incorrect) assumption here. That only the government can provide a safety net.
If you've got an alternative, one that can make the same guarantees that the government can, then let's hear it.
I don't see how such a thing is possible, considering that charitable contributions are voluntary and unreliable: when you ask people to donate, you can't count on getting any kind of steady income from them, much less the millions or billions it'd take to provide a safety net for the entire country. A charity that may or may not operate in your area, and may or may not have the money to help you, is no safety net at all.
Because the millions of dollars they delivered to help people was tremendously more effective at actually delivering the help than if it had been funneled through the federal government.
You're talking about efficiency here, but efficiency isn't everything. The federal government has the power to raise as much revenue as it needs to fund such programs. A private company or charity does not.
Now, you could argue that the programs should be run by efficient private organizations, but the funding still has to come from somewhere.
I'm sorry, maybe I wasn't clear enough. They don't offer any solutions that work on an individual level - that is, solutions that improve the lives of the people who need it most.
Laissez-faire capitalism is fine for the country as a whole. It can make us all better off on average, but that doesn't mean that any given person will be better off.
Bad things happen to good people. People pick themselves up with the resources they have and get moving again.
Sure, when they have the resources to do that. When they don't, they just spiral downward.
At this point I have enough friends that I could find a job if needed and could help them if needed. None of us are 'rich.'
Hey, good for you! You're lucky to have that. Not everyone does, though.
I'm not sure why I should expect the government to help me if something bad happens to me, even if it was out of my control.
Here's why: because you live in a country where a majority of your fellow citizens think your life shouldn't be ruined just because something bad happens to you, especially if it was out of your control. They think that partly because they realize it could happen to them too, but also because, you know, they care about people.
I've been there. Growing up we qualified for food stamps and the like, but my parents refused to take them. Instead my dad worked his full time job and then had endless side jobs selling anything he could
Again, it's great that your folks were fortunate enough to have those opportunities. Unfortunately, not everyone has them.
The problem with anecdotes like that is that they're only applicable to the people who were involved. Yes, congratulations, you found an opportunity, but that doesn't mean a thing to someone who's in a similar situation but doesn't have a similar opportunity.
(His anecdote, on the other hand, does prove something: it proves that "get off your ass and do it yourself!" doesn't always work, and that we need a better solution to handle those situations.)
At some point you have to get off your ass and do it yourself. I've written software for call centers. Basically entry level places for people who only went to HS. What's funny is that there is a lot of advancement opportunity and the ability to make good money, but that requires people to actually show up.
Well, they'd like you to think there's a lot of advancement opportunity (because they want you to work there), but there really isn't. At best, it's the luck of the draw: some people will get the customers that lead to a bonus, and others won't. You can show up every day, work as many hours as they're willing to give you (which might not be full time), and at the end of it still find yourself earning minimum wage.
As a society how do we fix that? It's definitely not a money issue.
Don't be so sure of that. The way to fix it is to give people the skills and opportunities to climb up the ladder. Money can play a big part in that: for example, think of all the people who could go to college if they didn't already have to spend all their time working to support their families.
(This is the part where someone chimes in with a story about how HIS daddy worked a 12 hour shift at the mill every day and then walked ten miles uphill in the snow to the university, listening to lectures through the open window because he couldn't afford tuition, and anyone who can't pull off the same feat is just a lazy bum.)
I would argue if people don't like being poor they would be more proactive about getting out of it. The first thing they could do is stop popping out kids they can't afford.
Well, I'm with you on that one. But beyond that, there isn't a lot of bumper-sticker advice that will really help. There are plenty of poor people who don't have kids, too.
So someone suggested I try medical assistance in the county I lived in. There they told me I made too much but if I quit my job I'd be able to get medical assistance. I would have also been able to get food stamps. Financially speaking I would have been better if I quit
No, I don't think so. You would've had health care and food stamps, but you would've been worse off overall (since you still have to pay rent, utilities, transportation, etc., not to mention the money you'd like to spend on entertainment and other luxuries).
Either that or you had a really shitty job. Obviously we shouldn't be encouraging people to take jobs that pay less than welfare, right? That will only make their problems worse.
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Hell, how is it different from trying to date a 13 year old on the internet when all you're talking to is an FBI agent? The victim doesn't exist, the act was never committed yet someone gets jailed.
Frankly, I don't think anyone should be jailed for that either. A crime can't get any more "victimless" than that - the victim is a fictional character!
An even closer analogy might be a friend promising you some of the insurance money settlement for burning down his house, when he doesn't actually have an insurance contract. Or a house. And you don't even get as far as starting the fire, you just agree to the plan.
Wire fraud is illegal. Why shouldn't attempted wire fraud be?
Because the alleged money doesn't exist. It's nothing but a thoughtcrime: you want to lock people up for a naughty feeling inside their own heads.
It's not like pointing a gun at someone and then finding that the gun blows up in your face. It's more like pointing a toy gun at a cardboard cutout of a person, but being too blind to realize that it's all fake: there was never any possibility of harming a real person.
If the speakers were in fact stolen people would be breaking the law by buying them, so why is it different if they just believe that they are stolen?
Um.. it's different because they aren't actually breaking the law.
Similarly, if you're driving 25 MPH in a 35 zone but you believe you're going 45, you aren't speeding. And if you break into a house, but it turns out to be your own house, you aren't trespassing.
Arrest the real criminals, not people who mistakenly think they're criminals.
If economies of scale was all that mattered then large scale farms wouldn't need subsidies.
Well, exactly. They don't need subsidies, and if your point is that we should eliminate farm subsidies, then I'm with you.
So what if private insurers didn't employ as many people as government run insurance, private is as you say more efficient.
If you believe that, then why did you say it would create more jobs? Did you accidentally misspell "fewer"?
Look, I'm certainly not saying we should make decisions about our health care system based on the number of jobs it'll produce in the health care industry. I'm just pointing out the contradiction. Either private insurance will be more efficient or it will create jobs -- not both.
What's odd is that you first intimated private insurance would be more efficient
Sorry you got that impression, maybe I wasn't clear. I don't actually believe it would be more efficient -- based on the fact that countries with less reliance on private insurance have more efficient health care systems employing fewer people to handle paperwork, and the fact that Medicare already has lower overhead than private insurance -- but I assumed (correctly, it seems) that you believed it'd be more efficient. Thus the contradiction, because you also said it'd create more jobs.
But in the same report though it said lower income people are more wiling to gamble with their health. And as far as I'm concerned, you gamble you pay.
Well, no, it reports the opinion of someone who "worries that low-income participants will gamble with their health rather than pay a huge deductible". In other words, they're "gambling" because they can't pay.
First, bankrupt [msn.com] means more than just not having enough money [...] I consider it morally bankrupt
Oh. So in other words, you were just talking out your ass when you said this:
"by the tyme the last Baby Boomers retire Social Security probably will be broke"
And this:
"Social Security going broke, without the government putting massive amounts of money in, will happen. The only question is when."
And this:
"By 2018 Social Security will be running an operating deficit [...] I call that bankrupt!"
And now that I've debunked those claims, you're weaseling out by feebly pointing to a metaphorical definition of the word "bankrupt". Cute, but I still remember what we were talking about, and it was money, not morals.
You trust government more than business
False. I simply realize that businesses can't solve every problem: some things are worth doing even if they aren't profitable.
It actually has more to do with the fact that being smaller makes it easier to perform. Younger, smaller athletes have an advantage. The rule seeks to prevent that advantage from unleveling the playing field.
But the rule actually does the opposite. It tilts the playing field in favor of the athletes who are naturally worse performers.
Consider that there aren't a lot of 70 year old setting world records in track events: their bodies just aren't as well-suited to sprinting as a 25 year old body. This rule is akin to saying that track events should only have elderly athletes, or making the younger athletes run with extra weight on their back to "level the playing field".
The point of the Olympics isn't to feature athletes who have overcome their natural disadvantages. That's what the Special Olympics is for. The real Olympics ought to be about letting people put their natural abilities to good use, not limiting them because their biology makes them "too good".
Because big agricultural businesses like ADM and Cargill get billions of dollars in subsidies a small farmer can't compeat and so is forced to move to the city.
Ah yes, that's why small farmers can't compete. It doesn't have anything to do with economies of scale, no sir.
If they a get employment with a private company good for them. And with government out of medical and health care more jobs with private insurers will be created.
Again, the only way we'd end up with "more jobs" is if the system became less efficient as a result. Not that that's unlikely -- private insurers already have higher overhead than Medicare, and countries with single-payer health care typically spend less to cover more people -- but it's odd that you're championing a move toward inefficiency.
Then allow people to open and deposit money into Health Savings Accounts to pay medical costs out of pocket.
People already can do that. You know why they don't? Because HSAs are pointless unless you're either (1) healthy enough that you won't get sick before the account is full, or (2) wealthy enough that it doesn't matter.
Oh really? Two workers paying payroll taxes for every retiree [bloggingstocks.com] isn't bankrupt? By 2018 Social Security will be running an operating deficit [financialsense.com]. "By 2030 Social Security's [usatoday.com] caseload will be 84 million people, up from 50 million today. Medicare will go from 44 million beneficiaries to 79 million. That will leave barely more than two workers paying payroll taxes for every retiree."
I call that bankrupt!
Then you're wrong. Sorry.
See, "bankrupt" means there's no money left to pay their obligations, but that's not going to happen any time soon. So what if there are only two workers paying payroll taxes for every retiree (at least until the boomers finish retiring)? What matters is whether there will still be enough money to pay benefits during that time - and there will be. The boomers' retirement didn't come as a surprise to anyone, although Social Security opponents would like you to think it did.
As for the "operating deficit", that's a simple misunderstanding of the facts. Social Security doesn't depend entirely on ongoing tax revenue. Here's a from the link I gave earlier (emphasis added):
"The trustees project that in 2017, benefit payments will begin to exceed Social Securityâ(TM)s tax revenues. At this point, Social Security will start using some of the interest it earns on its trust fund bonds to pay benefits. Nevertheless, the trustees project that in 2017, the trust fund will have $4.5 trillion in assets and that these assets will increase by another $1 trillion over the following nine years."
The trustees also project that they'll have to start redeeming the bonds in 2026, and the bonds will all be redeemed by 2041. That is when benefits will have to be cut (assuming nothing else has changed by then). But even then, tax revenue will be enough to pay 78% of promised benefits, declining to 75% in 2082.
Life is risk, Nobody owes you an easy ride. If you don't want risk lay down, roll over, and die. Unlike some, I;m willing to take a risk and pay for it if it turns bad. I am not willing to live in a nanny state, but if you want to there's Cuba 90 miles from Florida.
Ha! Considering that these programs have wide support and the majority of Americans are opposed to your "roll over and die" policy, maybe you should move if you want to live in a country that doesn't help the unfortunate.
Where is your proof? I'll give two examples your way doesn't work, China and the Soviet Union. And I'm talking about government not communism.
OK, here are some counterexamples: UK, France, Germany, Sweden, Denmark... oh, and the USA. Government social programs seem to work just fine in real
Robbing Peter to pay Paul is never right, and that's exactly what government does when it taxes your income.
Well, there you go. That's an axiom on which we disagree. Libertarians are opposed to the very notion of taxes; the rest of us are not.
Taxing also hurts the economy, because of taxes people can't spend as much, increasing consumer spending will create jobs.
No, it'll mainly just move jobs around. If you dismantle, say, Medicare, and divert that money into private insurance, then the people who work for Medicare (directly or as private contractors) will have to find work with private insurers instead.
Whether jobs would be gained or lost overall depends on how many employees those private insurers would need to provide the same service as Medicare. If they need more employees, then they create jobs, but that means the system is less efficient overall. Those extra salaries don't appear out of thin air; they come from charging consumers more for the same services.
With lower or no income tax, the economy would be better thus increasing people's pay. With higher pay people would be able to invest more, which would increase employment and again pay.
You're still confusing the average with the individual. Even if we assume that the economy would be "better" with no income tax -- a claim for which there's little evidence, if any -- that doesn't mean everyone would have money left over to invest, because the improvement wouldn't necessarily be distributed evenly.
Have you seen the data? How much is in Social Security? How many Baby Boomers will be retiring? How long they're expected to live? I admit though I don't recall the numbers I have seen them and Social Security going broke, without the government putting massive amounts of money in, will happen. The only question is when.
Nope - some people would you like to think the Baby Boomers retiring will destroy Social Security, but the data simply doesn't bear that out. The Social Security Board of Trustees' 2008 report predicts that even with no changes, Social Security will be able to pay full benefits until 2041 (a decade after the last boomers have retired); after that, even with no changes, it'll still be paying 75% of promised benefits in 2082.
The changes needed to keep it paying full benefits past 2041 are pretty minimal. The simplest is just to raise the cap on the Social Security payroll tax, which would also make that tax less regressive.
Bond holders are guarantied, they're guarantied to be paid before others are. However if going bankrupt is a concern then only buy AAA binds. And not just from one company, but from a number of different companies in different businesses. Or if it's that big a deal, then you can buy gold, silver, or other precious metals and gems.
Those are all fine ways to spread the risk around, but there's still a risk. That's what investment is all about, extracting profit by assuming risk; it's the opposite of insurance, which is about paying someone else to take risk off your hands. In a nation of 300 million individual investors, some of them will inevitably end up losing their investment, which is exactly what Social Security is meant to avoid.
True but more people with more money will help.
... but they still won't be able to help as many people as government-funded social programs, so no, private charity isn't a suitable replacement.
Meanwhile socialists want government to take care of everything, that people shouldn't be held responsible. Instead of turning the US into a socialist state, they can move 90 miles off the coast of Florida to Cuba. Oh darn, even Cuba has private businesses and enterprise [blogspot.com] now.
That's cute, but the only people who actually "want government to take care of e
It sure sounds like you're generalizing from liberal guilt, and not from your own experiences being poor and living in poor neighborhoods.
Huh, that's odd. Maybe it sounds like that to you because you're in denial. For the record, I'm generalizing based on the experiences of my friends and basic logic (e.g. there's no reason to believe that someone working full-time at minimum wage will necessarily have money left over to save, since there's no guarantee that the basic costs of living will be lower than minimum wage).
The majority of families, however, who are strigling because few family members are willing to work (usually the women), and the rest mostly complain about how unfair life is [etc.]
I don't doubt that such people exist; however, I've never met any of them, and I see no evidence that they represent a "majority" of the working poor.
I'm sure you do - that's about the definition of the middle class in America these days. Willing to work (or speculate on silly investments that promise unrealistic income), but unwilling to save, because that would require looking like you were less successful to your friends and neighbors.
Again, I don't doubt that some people are, in fact, able but unwilling to save. However, I see no evidence that it's any more common than being willing but unable to save.
Some people would certainly like for that to be the case: particularly those whose ideology demands low taxes and no social programs, and who need to justify that by convincing themselves that the people who are helped by those programs are irresponsible, stupid, or otherwise inferior. But simply asserting it isn't enough.
Assuming you're an adult who's past the point of the first couple years of near-minimum-wage jobs. there are plenty of opportunities to move to a salaried job with benefits, but you need the capital to take advantage of those opportunities - a couple thousand to pay for training, or relocate, or whatever hurdle makes the opportunity available.
Yes, that's what I've been saying. So what happens when you don't have the capital to take advantage of those opportunities?
What if, say, you became ill or injured while you had one of those no-benefits, near-minimum-wage jobs, incurred five- or six-figure medical bills that you've never been able to pay back, and now no one will even loan you that capital? (Recall that medical expenses are the leading cause of bankruptcy.)
Yup, there are people in that position: people who support the losers in their families who are unwilling to work.
Well, apparently that's the subset you'd like to focus on, but let me rephrase the question.
What happens when you've made all those sacrifices, you aren't supporting any "losers" in your family who are able but unwilling to work, and you still don't have money left over to save?
Or are you just stubbornly pretending that never happens?
Do you realize that their is nothing in the 'trust fund' but air and promises.
Heh. I suppose bonds are technically "promises", but that doesn't mean they aren't worth anything. Do you think everyone who buys bonds is a sucker, or that the government collapses and inflation goes sky-high every time someone cashes in a bond?
Try that line of bullshit with someone else. I've been there and done that. So have other members of my family.
And therefore, anyone who can't do it is a lazy bum. It's so simple!
You have to make sacrifices, but as someone who did I can say that the sacrifice required reduced my actual standard of living by little, outside of status symbols. You don't need a house. You don't need cable. You don't need fashion. You don't need a nice neighborhood (though it's worth avoiding the really violent areas). You don't need a presentable car, just a reliable one.
So, what happens when you've made all those sacrifices and you still don't have money left over to save?
for every person trapped by circumstance there are 10 or 20 trapped by simple lack of responsibility, the belief that working for a living is some sort of scam that they're too smart to fall for, or simply too much stubborn pride to work for someone else
From what I've seen, you have the ratio backwards. I know plenty of people who don't have the resources to weather a disaster; I don't know anyone who's unwilling to work.
There are always better jobs that WallMart available
That's a nice glib remark, but it's not true. Sometimes the only better jobs require skills/experience that you don't have, or they're too far away to commute. Sometimes retail and call centers really are the only available jobs.
Believe what you want, but that doesn't make it true. People have been concerned with Social Security's solvency for decades and it's really only been very recently that the private investment push has really come out.
It's not my belief that makes it true, it's the numbers. The latest prediction from the Social Security Board of Trustees is that, even with no changes, Social Security would be able to pay full benefits until 2041; in 2082 it would still be able to pay 75% of promised benefits. That's not a crisis.
People have been "concerned" for some time, but they've been wrong; whether their wrongness stems from an honest misinterpretation of the figures or a self-interested opposition to the program itself is a matter of opinion, I guess.
No I'm not. Are you saying it is impossible for the government to fail to provide enough money?
Practically speaking, yes. If the government found itself unable to raise enough money through taxation to fund Social Security or other programs, we'd all have much bigger problems to worry about, because it'd mean our economy had crashed to a halt.
But my argument is that it's less about money than actually delivering help to people. The government is moderately good at taking money from it's citizens. It's horrible at effectively putting that money to good use.
Even if private organizations are, say, twice as efficient as government programs, they still have to be able to raise at least half as much money to provide the same level of service. So why not get the best of both worlds: have the government collect the money, and then give it to private organizations who can spend it more efficiently to provide services.
You missed the my last line - the insurance companies don't have to offer it for nothing. The funding for the basic level for individuals who can't afford it themselves can still come from the government.
That's certainly one way to run a national health care system, especially if you include national funding of preventive care (since insurers have little incentive to pay for it on their own). A single-payer system would probably be able to bring overall costs down, though, rather than just shifting the cost around.
It's not against my interest at all. If Libertarians had had their way it would have been the employer of the driver who hit me who would have had to pay not the government, ie taxpayers. Fact is is that employer, the person who hit me was working and driving a company vehicle, got off with a light slap.
In that case, if Libertarians had had their way, you would've been lucky that he was on the clock when he hit you. What if he hadn't, and he didn't have enough assets of his own to compensate you for your injury? Tough luck for you, I guess.
Oh, really? President Roosevelt signed into law Social Security in 1935 during the Great Depression yet the economy was already improving as was employment.
Yes, really. Just because the economy was improving doesn't mean everything was fine; an improvement in the average doesn't translate to an improvement in every single person's life. If private charity and the market had been providing for everyone, there would've been no demand for social programs.
Why would you what? Plan your own retirement?
No, why would I expect Social Security to have the same profit potential as a risky investment? That isn't its purpose (hence the word "security").
Investing for your retirement is a good idea, obviously, and I'm fortunate enough to be able to do it myself. But not everyone can afford to invest, and not everyone who does invest will come out ahead. Social Security ensures that those people will at least end up with something, and I have no problem paying to live in a country where everyone has that assurance.
Heck by the tyme the last Baby Boomers retire Social Security probably will be broke.
That's what some people would like us to think -- the ones who stand to gain from moving all that money into private investments, for example -- but it's more myth than fact. If you want to worry about a program going broke, look at Medicare, not Social Security.
You might, as others have, say that the stock market could crash. Yeap it sure can, and depending on how old you are when it happens you could very well have plenty of tyme to recover.
Sure, you could, and hopefully you will, but maybe you won't. That's the difference between insurance and investment, and it's one reason why investments can't replace Social Security.
If you're old and close to retirement then you should have a good chunk of your investment portfolio in bonds, which as I said above are guarantied. If a business goes bankrupt the first people to get money are those who hold secured financial instruments, which bonds are.
Bonds aren't guaranteed to pay off; that's why they have ratings. If the company goes bankrupt and doesn't have enough assets left to pay the bond holders, what happens? Does the money appear out of thin air? No, the bond holders get screwed.
But you are, no Libertarian I know would let others starve, unless it was their own fault. All I know help those they can who are willing.
No Libertarian you know has sufficient resources. They might like to help everyone, but they can't possibly accomplish it.
That's the problem. They might be perfectly nice people who donate as much as they can to charity, but individual donations aren't enough. When the charity runs out, people will suffer and die, and Libertarian ideology says that's still better than paying taxes (or simply ignores the possibility that such a thing could happen).
Furthermore, many of us non-Libertarians believe that people shouldn't have to starve even if it is their own fault, i.e. that a bad decision shouldn't ruin your life. So, we might conclude that the Libertarians you know aren't too nice after all.
If you're more than a couple years out of college/apprenticeship and you don't have a disaster fund - at least 6 months living expenses, but 12 is better - you are simply irresponsible.
Yes, of course, why hasn't anyone else thought of that? It's so simple! They wouldn't be poor if they'd just save all that spare money they have left over after paying for housing and utilities, buying groceries and fuel, etc.
And hey, if they don't have bread, why don't they just eat cake? How irresponsible they must be, turning away such a delicious treat.
Why, they must be making a fortune at those cushy call centers and air conditioned Wal-Marts. What's the going wage these days, $100 an hour? $200? It's been so long since I kept up with peasant news. Whatever it is, clearly they have no excuse.
No, people stay poor because they make stupid decisions about their lives, over and over. You *cannot* fix this by giving people money.
Preach it, brother! If someone doesn't have the skills to get a higher-paying job, and can't go back to school because he needs to spend his time working, there's nothing money could do to improve his situation. Absolutely nothing.
Get real. Sure, there are people who make bad decisions over and over. But there are also people who make one or two bad decisions -- or have one or two misfortunes -- and then find that they have no more options.
The site hosting it and the band were very upfront about it; there was even a "warning" that the streams were protected and ripping them wouldn't do any good; but there's always someone out there who believes they deserve something for nothing
But they were getting something for nothing! If you decide to give out free video streams to everyone who asks for one, you've already conceded that you don't care about "protecting" your content: giving it away for free is the opposite of protecting it. You then have no leg to stand on if you want to complain that people are decrypting it.
Remember, the original purpose of the VCR was to record TV signals that people were already receiving for free. The studios didn't like that very much, but thankfully the courts had more sense.
In other words, they're relying on security through obscurity. All you'd need to do to crack it is bribe someone who has passed their background check to give you one of the chips for analysis.
If you send a video stream to someone, they'll be able to record it. The VCR proved that once -- do these authors think digital media will be any different? Or should be any different?
Adobe isn't at fault for "not making a better encryption". It's not possible. You have to send someone the key if you want them to watch the video, and once they have the key, they can decrypt it for any other purpose. No amount of programming can evade that basic logic.
Applian isn't at fault for making a program that decrypts the stream, either. They're the VCR manufacturer of this era, making a tool that people can use to time-shift videos. What's wrong with that?
Performance is generally so bad that if you just do what's minimally expected you'll bonus. [...] By the way, that same call center mentioned above offered FULL tuition reinmbursement. There were roughly 600 call reps there and I think 3-4 actually took advantage of it. What does that tell you?
It tells me that the call centers in your neck of the woods are nothing like the ones around here. Believe me, I've worked in call centers and so have many of my friends, and none of them have been anything like what you're describing.
I have endless similar anecdotes, but you're right I don't know what it's like to be poor.
Look, the problem with your anecdotes is that they don't disprove anyone else's anecdotes. You know your experience, but you're incorrectly assuming that it's the same for everyone else -- it's not.
It's great that you had these opportunities, and it's great that the call centers in your area pay for college and offer outstanding bonuses to anyone who's willing to put in the effort. But that's not universal.
The fact is, those opportunities aren't available to everyone, and no matter how much you talk about the opportunities you had, it doesn't do a thing to make them available to anyone else.
No sir, you're the one who is out of touch.
Hilarious! You're the one assuming that your experience is universal, that everyone else shares your luck and opportunities, and that if they don't reach the same outcome it's because they're lazy. I think it's clear which one of us is out of touch.
And in areas where there is something of a de facto guarantee (like Social Security) how's that going to work out? No one in my generation actually believes the money will be there for us and if it is, without drastic changes (which no politician seems to have the courage to deal with)
Well, the alleged problems with Social Security are largely myths, promoted by people who'd like to see all that money directed into private investments instead: it'll stay solvent for decades, and at that point it'll only need small adjustments to stay solvent for decades more. I have no reason to doubt that it'll be there when I reach retirement age, although of course I don't expect to rely on it for my entire income.
By this I don't mean funding either - I truly believe voluntary funding & charitable contributions could get us much further along than forced onces.
Are you saying it's impossible that voluntary funding might fail to provide enough money to run the entire system?
I think it's awfully dangerous to base such a system on the idea that people will just keep funding it out of the kindness of their hearts -- if they're free to stop donating at any time, we can't ignore the possibility that they might do exactly that.
I can call hundreds of insurance companies and shop around for the best price for a 20 year term life insurance contract for $200,000. Why should health insurance be any different?
No insurance company is going to offer a contract with a premium of $0. Meanwhile, we-the-people want health care and retirement/survivor benefits to be available even to people who can't afford to pay a premium. How would privately funded insurance be able to deliver that?
Have you even been in such a situation? I have and am there now.
Indeed I have, and I'm very close to people who still are.
More than 10 years later I am still on disability. Yet I'm still a libertarian.
I don't doubt that. It's funny how people will stick to philosophies and political parties that work against their own interests, isn't it?
Not being forced means just that, not being forced which is what the government is doing when they take the money you work to earn as tax. And just because you don't want government to take your money does not mean you're cold hearted.
No, I'm sure there are plenty of kind-hearted libertarians. But just because they're nice people doesn't mean the policies they favor will actually help as many people as a government safety net. There were charities before any of our social programs existed; voluntary donations weren't enough then, nor are they now.
Or you may want to invest some for your retirement. Starting when 18 years old if you invest $2000 a year for 7 years at 10% per annum, until you're 25 when you retire at 65 you'll have more than $870,000 invested, compounded interest does amazing things if given the chance. Do you think Social Security will pay you that much?
Why would I? Social Security is a form of insurance, not an investment.
Do you think that 10% figure is a guarantee of some sort? If you invest wisely, maybe you'll earn that much, or maybe you'll choose wrong and lose it all. For the people who can't afford to invest in the first place, it's moot anyway. The point of Social Security is to ensure that you get something no matter what happens in the market or how much disposable income you had in the past.
[Libertarians would have us believe that when charity fails, it's better to let those unfortunate people starve]
Now you're lying, lying, lying, lying.
I wish I were, but sadly I'm not. They have no solution for the cases where voluntary charity can't provide for some of the people who can't provide for themselves. That means those people will suffer and die, right? Unless... hrm... you're not a Breatharian, are you?
Try emigrating from North Korea, you moron.
I'm sorry, I thought we were talking about the USA. I didn't realize the North Koreans had their own Democratic Party, Republican Party, RIAA, and independent music labels.
Not surprisingly, you're making an substantial (and incorrect) assumption here. That only the government can provide a safety net.
If you've got an alternative, one that can make the same guarantees that the government can, then let's hear it.
I don't see how such a thing is possible, considering that charitable contributions are voluntary and unreliable: when you ask people to donate, you can't count on getting any kind of steady income from them, much less the millions or billions it'd take to provide a safety net for the entire country. A charity that may or may not operate in your area, and may or may not have the money to help you, is no safety net at all.
Because the millions of dollars they delivered to help people was tremendously more effective at actually delivering the help than if it had been funneled through the federal government.
You're talking about efficiency here, but efficiency isn't everything. The federal government has the power to raise as much revenue as it needs to fund such programs. A private company or charity does not.
Now, you could argue that the programs should be run by efficient private organizations, but the funding still has to come from somewhere.
I'm sorry, maybe I wasn't clear enough. They don't offer any solutions that work on an individual level - that is, solutions that improve the lives of the people who need it most.
Laissez-faire capitalism is fine for the country as a whole. It can make us all better off on average, but that doesn't mean that any given person will be better off.
Bad things happen to good people. People pick themselves up with the resources they have and get moving again.
Sure, when they have the resources to do that. When they don't, they just spiral downward.
At this point I have enough friends that I could find a job if needed and could help them if needed. None of us are 'rich.'
Hey, good for you! You're lucky to have that. Not everyone does, though.
I'm not sure why I should expect the government to help me if something bad happens to me, even if it was out of my control.
Here's why: because you live in a country where a majority of your fellow citizens think your life shouldn't be ruined just because something bad happens to you, especially if it was out of your control. They think that partly because they realize it could happen to them too, but also because, you know, they care about people.
I've been there. Growing up we qualified for food stamps and the like, but my parents refused to take them. Instead my dad worked his full time job and then had endless side jobs selling anything he could
Again, it's great that your folks were fortunate enough to have those opportunities. Unfortunately, not everyone has them.
The problem with anecdotes like that is that they're only applicable to the people who were involved. Yes, congratulations, you found an opportunity, but that doesn't mean a thing to someone who's in a similar situation but doesn't have a similar opportunity.
(His anecdote, on the other hand, does prove something: it proves that "get off your ass and do it yourself!" doesn't always work, and that we need a better solution to handle those situations.)
At some point you have to get off your ass and do it yourself. I've written software for call centers. Basically entry level places for people who only went to HS. What's funny is that there is a lot of advancement opportunity and the ability to make good money, but that requires people to actually show up.
Well, they'd like you to think there's a lot of advancement opportunity (because they want you to work there), but there really isn't. At best, it's the luck of the draw: some people will get the customers that lead to a bonus, and others won't. You can show up every day, work as many hours as they're willing to give you (which might not be full time), and at the end of it still find yourself earning minimum wage.
As a society how do we fix that? It's definitely not a money issue.
Don't be so sure of that. The way to fix it is to give people the skills and opportunities to climb up the ladder. Money can play a big part in that: for example, think of all the people who could go to college if they didn't already have to spend all their time working to support their families.
(This is the part where someone chimes in with a story about how HIS daddy worked a 12 hour shift at the mill every day and then walked ten miles uphill in the snow to the university, listening to lectures through the open window because he couldn't afford tuition, and anyone who can't pull off the same feat is just a lazy bum.)
I would argue if people don't like being poor they would be more proactive about getting out of it. The first thing they could do is stop popping out kids they can't afford.
Well, I'm with you on that one. But beyond that, there isn't a lot of bumper-sticker advice that will really help. There are plenty of poor people who don't have kids, too.
So someone suggested I try medical assistance in the county I lived in. There they told me I made too much but if I quit my job I'd be able to get medical assistance. I would have also been able to get food stamps. Financially speaking I would have been better if I quit
No, I don't think so. You would've had health care and food stamps, but you would've been worse off overall (since you still have to pay rent, utilities, transportation, etc., not to mention the money you'd like to spend on entertainment and other luxuries).
Either that or you had a really shitty job. Obviously we shouldn't be encouraging people to take jobs that pay less than welfare, right? That will only make their problems worse.