DOLLAR COLLAPSE NOW IMMINENT
indiaBPOking
Clave
news:8465baf3-6625-45e9...@w4g2000prd.googlegroups.com...
> youtube video:
>
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xNOuuhpYBEg&feature=related
Yah, yah -- go get Henny-Penny and tell the King.
Jim
Stray Dog
Dollar collapse....would be wonderful. Millions of jobs would come
back to the USA. Both prices and wages would go up, so there would be
a net positive effect.
Already, exports are up and tourism -- to the USA -- is up. Next boom
will be foreigners with money coming to buy houses (maybe for
themselves).
Dollar collapse...bring it on.
==
On May 12, 2:12 am, indiaBPOking <indiabpok...@yahoo.com> wrote:
> youtube video:
>
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xNOuuhpYBEg&feature=related
The Trucker
I think the word "devaluation" is more appropriate than "collapse".
--
"I know no safe depository of the ultimate powers
of society but the people themselves; and
if we think them not enlightened enough to
exercise their control with a wholesome
discretion, the remedy is not to take it from
them, but to inform their discretion by
education." - Thomas Jefferson
http://GreaterVoice.org/extend
Econotron
news:c91f1a5e-c04b-457d...@v26g2000prm.googlegroups.com...
>
> Dollar collapse....would be wonderful. Millions of jobs would come
> back to the USA. Both prices and wages would go up, so there would be
> a net positive effect.
>
> Already, exports are up and tourism -- to the USA -- is up. Next boom
> will be foreigners with money coming to buy houses (maybe for
> themselves).
>
> Dollar collapse...bring it on.
>
e.
maxw...@my-deja.com
> Dollar collapse....would be wonderful. Millions of jobs would come
> back to the USA. Both prices and wages would go up, so there would be
> a net positive effect.
>
> Already, exports are up and tourism -- to the USA -- is up. Next boom
> will be foreigners with money coming to buy houses (maybe for
> themselves).
>
> Dollar collapse...bring it on.
You seem to forget the effect that a dollar collapse will have
on inflation. Checked the price of gas, copper, alluminum,
food lately? It can get a lot worse all the while your wages
are held flat while your benefits are taken away by republicans.
I prefer the US not be like a 3rd world nation.
h...@nospam.org
But that's the plan, don't you see? It's all intentional. The middle
class was getting too uppity, with that Constitution thing and all.
This whole mess is planned to limit the population, and turn everthing
back to the dark ages where you have the ultra wealthy in their
fortresses, and everyone either licks their boots or starves.
Hal
Raymond
2008 Economy Buy Silver-Real Money-Bullion-Silver Eagle
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fQACDyk7C6o
Stray Dog
> "Stray Dog" <straydog2...@gmail.com> wrote in message
Right now how about you naming any place, any country, any land that
doe not want any jobs? All these 3rd world countries have manipulated
their currencies for maximum export and minimum import.
All the stories I read about localities, cities, towns in the USA show
that the local authorities bend over backwards to offer subsidies,
tax breaks, favors, ..everything you can think of...if a foreign
company or even a US company will build a plant in their area. Can't
remember where I read it but one town in SE USA even offered subsidies
of some $200,000 to a foreign company for every job they put into
their local area and if they would promise to keep the job filled for
at least five years. Basically, the value of that "enticement"
essentially totally pays for most of their employees. And, the story
is that these companies go all over the USA and get all the localities
to bid against each other for the best deal, then take the best deal,
and they have the localities "by the balls" and this is what our
economy has come to.
Its not funny.
Fine, i appreciate your emoticon, otherwise, above.
Here is mine: :-|
Stray Dog
>
> > Dollar collapse....would be wonderful. Millions of jobs would come
> > back to the USA. Both prices and wages would go up, so there would be
> > a net positive effect.
>
> > Already, exports are up and tourism -- to the USA -- is up. Next boom
> > will be foreigners with money coming to buy houses (maybe for
> > themselves).
>
> > Dollar collapse...bring it on.
>
> You seem to forget the effect that a dollar collapse will have
> on inflation. Checked the price of gas, copper, alluminum,
> food lately?
There was a WSJ article a few days ago and in it half of the
economists polled said it was all due to demand from India and China.
That dollar collapse has been also (you are forgetting) led to much
increased exports out of the US, decreased imports (both good for OUR
economy), and inducing a rise in tourism in the USA (where foreigners
spend money here) and a decrease in US people going abroad (because
everything elsewhere is more expensive).
It can get a lot worse all the while your wages
> are held flat while your benefits are taken away by republicans.
Oh, I think the blame should be placed on the shoulders of CEOs much
more than the Republicans (who feel that what is important is to make
rich people happy and forget everyone else).
> I prefer the US not be like a 3rd world nation.
I don't want to give up my car or my air conditioning in the summer or
my heat in the winter, but I'll make a big bet with you that next year
and the year after there are going to be a lot of small foreign-made
cars being sold in the USA for less money than regular cars made in
the USA, and a bunch of peeple are going to be buying them.
I see a lot of other bad trends that are going to be bad for people at
the lower 2/3 of the socio-economic scale in the USA.
Stray Dog
Yeah. Have you been practicing your "groveling" recently? Its going to
be the new occupation in a couple of decades. "I'll grovel for food,
I'll grovel for housing, etc"
> Hal
The Trucker
Stop the presses!!!!!! Econotron has posted something that is factual!
I don't want no stinkin job. I want income. That job shit is what I have
to do to get it. American wages have been kicked in the ass by offshoring
and by illegal immigration. Meanwhile, the price of oil and land in
increasing.
The Trucker
If the tax burden in the USA was shifted to land values then this shit
would cease.
Econotron
news:pan.2008.05.12....@verizon.net...
producers to consumers, it will give boost to the US' waning industrial
strength and all the productive activities in general.
e.
The Trucker
A tax on land is not a consumption tax. But that does not mean that I
think a consumption tax is not superior to a flat income tax.
Stray Dog
What I'd like to do is ask, politely, you guys to explain, in some
detail, why you prefer the kind of taxations that you seem to be
preferring, and I'll stay on the sidelines and maybe "learn" something
about what is "superior" (and I'm not trying to be snotty about this,
I just wanna know).
My off-the-top-of-my-head notion would be to soak the rich, but I
think they are already squirreling away as much as possible to
offshore tax havens, tax dodges, etc. My next notion would be to
_lower_ the taxes on the poor. But, I'll entertain any reasonable,
rational strategy you guys might come up with. Just remember the old
saw: "the best laid plans of mice and men oft go awry."
The Trucker
The first thing to understand is that the initial incidence of the tax is
important. The best example is the ignoramus statement: "Corporations
don't pay tax. Consumers do". With a corporate tax the corporation (the
shareholders if you want) are _FORCED_ by law to pay. They, in turn, must
get the money from customers. The Customers are _NOT_ forced to pay any
particular corporation and there are several competing corporations with
which to do business. Each corporation must _EARN_ the money used to pay
the tax. But if we tax the people directly then the people must suck up to
the corporations to get a job so they can then pay the tax. It matters
what/who is forced to pay.
A tax on the market value of unearned natural resources is not a direct
tax on any _one_. It does not force any particular entity to pay. The
money paid for the use or consumption of a natural resource is a payment
caused by scarcity, and scarcity is the result of population. The money
paid is called _rent_. There is no rent in a one man society because there
is no competition for resources. Government should be funded by rent. At
present if you own a home then you pay real-estate taxes. Some of the
money paid is based on the "value" of the house itself and some is based
on the "value" of the land (the location). All of the tax should be
shifted off of the house and onto the land. The tax rate on the land
should be adjusted to produce the same amount of revenue as the current
tax on both house and land. The land is naturally occurring and there is
no "force" being applied. The person who CHOOSES to occupy that
particular location is simply in competition with others that may want to
occupy that location. That particular location is provided by nature and
no corporation or person supplies it or provides it. There isn't any
direct incidence of tax but to an "owner" of the land. The "owner" of the
land contributes NOTHING to the society or the economy and need not exist
at all.
> My off-the-top-of-my-head notion would be to soak the rich, but I
> think they are already squirreling away as much as possible to
> offshore tax havens, tax dodges, etc.
The naturally occurring land or oil or coal or gold or water, rain and
sun will not be hauled of by the rich. A direct rent (a ground rent) or a
tax on ownership cannot be avoided. Lets see you haul the farm off to
Bimini.
> My next notion would be to
> _lower_ the taxes on the poor.
Most of the land in the United States would become available for use by
the poor. There is much land available and unused. The OIL in the
sovereignty of the United States is a natural resource and subject to
ground rents or taxes on value or other fees. Those fees as they exceed
the cost of government are dispersed as Citizen's Dividends. Think North
Slope, ANWR, offshore oil.
maxw...@my-deja.com
> On May 12, 12:12 pm, maxwel...@my-deja.com wrote:
>
> > On May 12, 9:07 am, Stray Dog <straydog2...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > > Dollar collapse....would be wonderful. Millions of jobs would come
> > > back to the USA. Both prices and wages would go up, so there would be
> > > a net positive effect.
>
> > > Already, exports are up and tourism -- to the USA -- is up. Next boom
> > > will be foreigners with money coming to buy houses (maybe for
> > > themselves).
>
> > > Dollar collapse...bring it on.
>
> > You seem to forget the effect that a dollar collapse will have
> > on inflation. Checked the price of gas, copper, alluminum,
> > food lately?
>
> There was a WSJ article a few days ago and in it half of the
> economists polled said it was all due to demand from India and China.
>
> That dollar collapse has been also (you are forgetting) led to much
> increased exports out of the US, decreased imports (both good for OUR
> economy),
I am not forgetting, I know that an increase in exports is meaningless
if
it is eclipsed by the cost of imports.
> and inducing a rise in tourism in the USA (where foreigners
> spend money here) and a decrease in US people going abroad (because
> everything elsewhere is more expensive).
>
> It can get a lot worse all the while your wages
>
> > are held flat while your benefits are taken away by republicans.
>
> Oh, I think the blame should be placed on the shoulders of CEOs much
> more than the Republicans (who feel that what is important is to make
> rich people happy and forget everyone else).
>
> > I prefer the US not be like a 3rd world nation.
>
> I don't want to give up my car or my air conditioning in the summer or
> my heat in the winter, but I'll make a big bet with you that next year
> and the year after there are going to be a lot of small foreign-made
> cars being sold in the USA for less money than regular cars made in
> the USA, and a bunch of peeple are going to be buying them.
With the dollar as low as it is and with free trade with nations
that don't have any labour standards, I am sure you are right.
>
> I see a lot of other bad trends that are going to be bad for people at
> the lower 2/3 of the socio-economic scale in the USA.
And this being a result, is this what the US should strive for?
A lower currency so people can be reduced to poverty?
Stray Dog
> On Tue, 13 May 2008 12:10:01 -0700, Stray Dog wrote:
> > On May 12, 5:20 pm, The Trucker <mik...@verizon.net> wrote:
> >> On Mon, 12 May 2008 18:43:04 +0000, Econotron wrote:
> >> > "The Trucker" <mik...@verizon.net> wrote in message
> >> >news:pan.2008.05.12....@verizon.net...
> >> >> On Mon, 12 May 2008 10:08:03 -0700, Stray Dog wrote:
>
> >> >>> On May 12, 12:04 pm, "Econotron" <njmfi...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> >> >>>> "Stray Dog" <straydog2...@gmail.com> wrote in message
old material deleted.....
> >> A tax on land is not a consumption tax. But that does not mean that I
> >> think a consumption tax is not superior to a flat income tax.
>
> > What I'd like to do is ask, politely, you guys to explain, in some
> > detail, why you prefer the kind of taxations that you seem to be
> > preferring, and I'll stay on the sidelines and maybe "learn" something
> > about what is "superior" (and I'm not trying to be snotty about this,
> > I just wanna know).
>
> The first thing to understand is that the initial incidence of the tax is
> important.
I'm responding at the bottom but leaving all of your material here for
further thought, later.
Well, if I were to make a general comment, I'd say you were talking
about something in the "middle" of the tax question. Me, I'd like to
start by focusing on this issue: why must wealth and power be allowed
to become "OVERconcentrated" in the hands of "the few" and why must
this process lead to the impoverishment of "the many"? In reality,
this is happening and has happened, mostly, all through the ages. In
"the dream" (someday, maybe never), people everywhere may have
economic rights in addition to political rights and some kind of
formula and process by which hard work will be rewardable but
impoverishment will also be preventable. And, besides your theorizing,
I am aware of many books that have discussed how "the rich" manage to
enrich themselves well beyond -- as far as I'm concerned -- any
"adequacy" or "saturation" in terms of what they need. Right now, the
rich (for example), are in their own "cold war" in private yacht
building. Who will have the longest, biggest yacht next year? Some
rich Arab is now building a private yacht some 500 feet long. Another
one, or the same guy, I don't know which, owns his own privately owned
A380 airbus airplane. Is this kind of thing justifiable?
> > My off-the-top-of-my-head notion would be to soak the rich, but I
> > think they are already squirreling away as much as possible to
> > offshore tax havens, tax dodges, etc.
>
> The naturally occurring land or oil or coal or gold or water, rain and
> sun will not be hauled of by the rich.
Oh, I think you are wrong about this. Oil is the world's biggest
business and in the hands of governments and certain corporations.
Water is being "confiscated" in all third world countries that are
privatizing public wells and selling them to corporate entities who
put a pump and valve at the top (maybe add a filter to take out some
dirt) and start selling it to people who used to get it for free.
Coal? Where can anyone dig the stuff up just by driving up and getting
a shovel out of the trunk? Sunlight? All the oil companies own all of
the solar cell companies (except some in China, which either are or
soon will be owned either by Chinese corporations or if the stock can
be bought by someone else...), and they will/can charge license/
royalty fees if not make you pay for the solar panels which will have
to be replaced after aging years down the road by more.
The energy corporations, back couple decades ago, hired some lawyers
to figure out if they -- because they could preach that they already
had dominion over energy-- could charge a fee for the use of sunlight.
Yes, outrageous, isn't it. Yes, they'd love to do it if they could.
Companies would love to patent anything they can. There are even
efforts to extend expiration dates on patents today. Bunch of crooks!
A direct rent (a ground rent) or a
> tax on ownership cannot be avoided. Lets see you haul the farm off to
> Bimini.
With lawyers, CPAs, payoffs, bribes, tricky-cheaty crap, finding
loopholes in the laws, they can do anything they want. The tax cheat
book had lots of examples. An oil pipeline was built to follow a path
out of one state, then go a mile and then go back into the state it
came out of just to make that pipelined oil certifiable as
"interstate" delivery and to dodge a tax.
Trickery, cheats, loopholes, etc. ... all saves THEM big bucks, the
tax shortfall ends up on the shoulders of the rest of us. It ain't
right.
> > My next notion would be to
> > _lower_ the taxes on the poor.
>
> Most of the land in the United States would become available for use by
> the poor. There is much land available and unused. The OIL in the
> sovereignty of the United States is a natural resource and subject to
> ground rents or taxes on value or other fees. Those fees as they exceed
> the cost of government are dispersed as Citizen's Dividends. Think North
> Slope, ANWR, offshore oil.
Well, there is another book "The Oil Follies of 1970-1980," (by Robert
Sherrill), which pretty well shows that these big oil companies
basically have everyone else shoving bananas up their asses. I read
that book, cover-to-cover, too. Its a losing battle.
Thanks, otherwise, for your time.
Stray Dog
Good question. Besides all the "kitchen table debating" that we're all
doing here--and entertaining all of our personal favorite ideas--my
basic recommendation is that you need to follow the CYA strategy. The
govt is NOT going to help you out. None of the corporations are going
to help you out unless you come to THEM with money, first. And, you'll
be lucky if you can get a cup of coffee from any of the charities, and
you don't want Katrina to come to you so you can get that cup of
coffee. MY favorite recommendation to individuals is to watch out for
yourself, your job, and start working on a fallback plan in case
something happens to your job, your boss, your company, whatever. Save
some money. Don't be poor. Don't save all your money in one place. Get
rid of your debt, ASAP, etc.
> A lower currency so people can be reduced to poverty?
It cuts both ways. If jobs come back to the USA there is a chance that
wages will go up, or if prices go up they will have to pay bigger
wages to get workers. Most of the pundits out there don't talk about
all of the variables and no one can write an equation that explains it
all, not even the PhD economists or politicos or bankers. But, if we
could run the clocks backward a couple of decades, the statistics back
then would show people making, on average, more money with more buying
power. Vast majority of studies I've seen show this. That would be
_my_ magic answer.
In the meantime, CYA. If we keep losing jobs to overseas, then there
will just be more unemployed people chasing fewer available jobs and
that means the employers can get away with offering lower wages. In
the long run, its a disaster for the US. And, by the way, the same
damned thing is happening in Western Europe (exporting jobs to East
Europe) and Japan, which is also exporting jobs to China!!!!
The Trucker
I have no idea what is justifiable wealth. But I will tell you that most
wealth is accumulated through the use of government enforced monopoly
rights and the bulk of it is ownership rights to natural resources. The
sheiks that own the personalized planes are collecting rent on the
naturally occurring oil. Extremely large conglomerates are able to
control large market segments and collect monopoly rents by virtue of
size. But it is all a coercion. One of the saving graces of a highly
progressive income tax is that it taxes away a lot of rent. But it
doesn't really work very well in a global economy.
>> > My off-the-top-of-my-head notion would be to soak the rich, but I
>> > think they are already squirreling away as much as possible to
>> > offshore tax havens, tax dodges, etc.
>>
>> The naturally occurring land or oil or coal or gold or water, rain and
>> sun will not be hauled of by the rich.
>
> Oh, I think you are wrong about this. Oil is the world's biggest
> business and in the hands of governments and certain corporations.
The point I was trying to make is that the oil can't be put in a
briefcase and moved to Bimini. Only some papers showing ownership. And
the government must enforce such contracts or the dude in Bimini gets no
pie. The government could simply refuse to enforce the contracts and
take the proceeds of the sale of the oil. More to the point our
government currently enforces the ownership contracts yet cannot tax the
income from those contracts because the income is realized in Bimini and
the government of Bimini gets the tax proceeds. Whereas the American
government is enforcing the ownership rights then the American government
should get the tax proceeds. An asset tax is much better then an income
tax in a global economy. An asset tax is like the taxes you pay on your
house in that it is paid on the value of the asset as opposed to a tax on
income from the asset. The owner must pay the tax regardless of whether
or how much income is realized from the asset. So it would not matter WHO
owned the asset or what country the owner lived in.
> Water is being "confiscated" in all third world countries that are
> privatizing public wells and selling them to corporate entities who
> put a pump and valve at the top (maybe add a filter to take out some
> dirt) and start selling it to people who used to get it for free.
Here again the water is an asset and it is worth what it is worth and the
government will tax the value of the asset. The government
can distribute the proceeds to the people equally. What will happen is
that the corporation will go tits up and that will be the end of the ruse.
> Coal? Where can anyone dig the stuff up just by driving up and getting
> a shovel out of the trunk? Sunlight? All the oil companies own all of
> the solar cell companies (except some in China, which either are or
> soon will be owned either by Chinese corporations or if the stock can
> be bought by someone else...), and they will/can charge license/
> royalty fees if not make you pay for the solar panels which will have
> to be replaced after aging years down the road by more.
I gotta draw the line here. The coal and the sunlight are natural
resources. The solar cells and panels aren't. The asset tax rate on the
natural resources is much higher than the asset tax rate on the other
stuff.
> The energy corporations, back couple decades ago, hired some lawyers
> to figure out if they -- because they could preach that they already
> had dominion over energy-- could charge a fee for the use of sunlight.
> Yes, outrageous, isn't it. Yes, they'd love to do it if they could.
> Companies would love to patent anything they can. There are even
> efforts to extend expiration dates on patents today. Bunch of crooks!
Yes... It is quite ridiculous.
> A direct rent (a ground rent) or a
>> tax on ownership cannot be avoided. Lets see you haul the farm off to
>> Bimini.
>
> With lawyers, CPAs, payoffs, bribes, tricky-cheaty crap, finding
> loopholes in the laws, they can do anything they want. The tax cheat
> book had lots of examples. An oil pipeline was built to follow a path
> out of one state, then go a mile and then go back into the state it
> came out of just to make that pipelined oil certifiable as
> "interstate" delivery and to dodge a tax.
Now you are being silly. The asset tax system is a lot simpler to
administer. All that stuff you want to complicate the world with is
because transactions are being taxed instead of asset ownership.
Stray Dog
> On Tue, 13 May 2008 19:11:56 -0700, Stray Dog wrote:
> > On May 13, 7:51 pm, The Trucker <mik...@verizon.net> wrote:
> >> On Tue, 13 May 2008 12:10:01 -0700, Stray Dog wrote:
> >> > On May 12, 5:20 pm, The Trucker <mik...@verizon.net> wrote:
> >> >> On Mon, 12 May 2008 18:43:04 +0000, Econotron wrote:
> >> >> > "The Trucker" <mik...@verizon.net> wrote in message
> >> >> >news:pan.2008.05.12....@verizon.net...
> >> >> >> On Mon, 12 May 2008 10:08:03 -0700, Stray Dog wrote:
>
> >> >> >>> On May 12, 12:04 pm, "Econotron" <njmfi...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> >> >> >>>> "Stray Dog" <straydog2...@gmail.com> wrote in message
old material deleted.....
> >> The first thing to understand is that the initial incidence of the tax is
When one person (there are many hundreds of them) has more money than
the GDP of most small countries.
But I will tell you that most
> wealth is accumulated through the use of government enforced monopoly
> rights and the bulk of it is ownership rights to natural resources.
Two books I have make reference to the three biggest busineses: oil,
exchange-rate trading, and moneylaundering (said to be $300-500 bil/
year). Greider's book is one, the other is a recent book I'm reading
now on moneylaundering (which includes a large part of the
international drug trade, too, which is another serious problem)..
And, I cannot agree with you that "most" of those three are due to
govt enforced monopoly rules. Rather, at least two of the three are
under the control of private interests and few people will ever get to
know the details.
The
> sheiks that own the personalized planes are collecting rent on the
> naturally occurring oil.
All the "owners" of all the capital in the world are collecting "rent"
on all of that printed money, printed stock (ink on paper, electronic
bits in RAM memory), and don't forget that "hot money" (a real term),
borrowed shares, CDOs, etc. The whips who know this stuff a lot better
than I do say that the value of the worlds financial markets is 10 to
100 times the world's entire GDP and you'd better think about that for
a minute before you dismiss it.
Extremely large conglomerates are able to
> control large market segments and collect monopoly rents by virtue of
> size. But it is all a coercion.
I think you are basically right about this, but the people who are
"free" (less coerced) are the ones who can afford (i.e. are rich) to
play economic hardball.
One of the saving graces of a highly
> progressive income tax is that it taxes away a lot of rent. But it
> doesn't really work very well in a global economy.
Especially if all manner of tax dodges, CPA trickery, lawyers,
offshore banks, etc., are all running at full force.
> >> > My off-the-top-of-my-head notion would be to soak the rich, but I
> >> > think they are already squirreling away as much as possible to
> >> > offshore tax havens, tax dodges, etc.
>
> >> The naturally occurring land or oil or coal or gold or water, rain and
> >> sun will not be hauled of by the rich.
>
> > Oh, I think you are wrong about this. Oil is the world's biggest
> > business and in the hands of governments and certain corporations.
>
> The point I was trying to make is that the oil can't be put in a
> briefcase and moved to Bimini.
So what?
> Only some papers showing ownership.
In ancient times, kings/emperors just said "I'm going to get that" and
have 100,000 soldiers march over and kill everybody, steal booty,
capture slaves, etc. Today, the same thing is happening (hostile
takeovers, sovereign wealth funds, repatriation, nationalization,
etc).
And
> the government must enforce such contracts or the dude in Bimini gets no
> pie.
I've got a couple more books for you to read about all the underground
economy that is totally under the radar of the govt.
The government could simply refuse to enforce the contracts and
> take the proceeds of the sale of the oil. More to the point our
> government currently enforces the ownership contracts yet cannot tax the
> income from those contracts because the income is realized in Bimini and
> the government of Bimini gets the tax proceeds.
And, that is a drop in the bucket compared to the whole pie.
Whereas the American
> government is enforcing the ownership rights then the American government
> should get the tax proceeds.
Did the US get anything for rescuing Kuwait? Are we going to "make
anything" on the Iraq war?
An asset tax is much better then an income
> tax in a global economy. An asset tax is like the taxes you pay on your
> house in that it is paid on the value of the asset as opposed to a tax on
> income from the asset.
Well, I'd have to think about that. Where I have reservations is that
I hear all kinds of guys with their favorite idea of what is a good
tax and what is a good method of taxing. And, of course, the
Republican mindset is cut the taxes and lets not talk about the
deficit.
The owner must pay the tax regardless of whether
> or how much income is realized from the asset.
Yeah, but the guy is going to say why should I pay taxes on "dead"
assets and I'll agree.
> So it would not matter WHO
> owned the asset or what country the owner lived in.
>
> > Water is being "confiscated" in all third world countries that are
> > privatizing public wells and selling them to corporate entities who
> > put a pump and valve at the top (maybe add a filter to take out some
> > dirt) and start selling it to people who used to get it for free.
>
> Here again the water is an asset and it is worth what it is worth
Back in the hunter-gatherer days that wasn't even an issue.
and the
> government will tax the value of the asset.
All depends on the government.
> The government
> can distribute the proceeds to the people equally.
Nice but capitalists will smell money and hate to see it fly around
instead of "live" in their wallets.
> What will happen is
> that the corporation will go tits up and that will be
> the end of the ruse.
The only time corporations dissolve is if they can't escape with net
profits or use bankruptcy for a breather.
> > Coal? Where can anyone dig the stuff up just by driving up and getting
> > a shovel out of the trunk? Sunlight? All the oil companies own all of
> > the solar cell companies (except some in China, which either are or
> > soon will be owned either by Chinese corporations or if the stock can
> > be bought by someone else...), and they will/can charge license/
> > royalty fees if not make you pay for the solar panels which will have
> > to be replaced after aging years down the road by more.
>
> I gotta draw the line here. The coal and the sunlight are natural
> resources.
And, you don't get the coal unless you buy the land or pay the fee.
Sunlight? If the endpoint of global warming is pretty bad (the most
pessimistic possible outcomes), then you ain't gonna have enough money
to keep it from happening and it might take much more drastic
measures than money can buy.
> The solar cells and panels aren't.
Neither are the mines, miners, and digging machines.
The asset tax rate on the
> natural resources is much higher than the asset tax rate on the other
> stuff.
>
> > The energy corporations, back couple decades ago, hired some lawyers
> > to figure out if they -- because they could preach that they already
> > had dominion over energy-- could charge a fee for the use of sunlight.
> > Yes, outrageous, isn't it. Yes, they'd love to do it if they could.
> > Companies would love to patent anything they can. There are even
> > efforts to extend expiration dates on patents today. Bunch of crooks!
>
> Yes... It is quite ridiculous.
But, that is the gameplan of most greedy-selfish robber-barons.
> > A direct rent (a ground rent) or a
> >> tax on ownership cannot be avoided. Lets see you haul the farm off to
> >> Bimini.
>
> > With lawyers, CPAs, payoffs, bribes, tricky-cheaty crap, finding
> > loopholes in the laws, they can do anything they want. The tax cheat
> > book had lots of examples. An oil pipeline was built to follow a path
> > out of one state, then go a mile and then go back into the state it
> > came out of just to make that pipelined oil certifiable as
> > "interstate" delivery and to dodge a tax.
>
> Now you are being silly.
No, that, among many other examples, was actually described in that
book by Johnston, and he had a lot of references to sources.
> The asset tax system is a lot simpler to
> administer. All that stuff you want to complicate the world with is
> because transactions are being taxed instead of asset ownership.
Well, I think you need to study more how the crooks are being very
imaginative at grabbing anything they can get their sticky fingers on
and keeping it hidden from the authorities.
Mind you, I'm not trying to tell you "I'm right, you're wrong" but
that: i) the whole situation is pretty damned complicated, ii) like
crime in general, most of all this stuff might be beyond the control
of anyone (particularly the victims). I'm sorry.
I didn't see anything new below from you, so I just left it alone.
=======================
> > Trickery, cheats, loopholes, etc. ... all saves THEM big bucks, the
> > tax shortfall ends up on the shoulders of the rest of us. It ain't
> > right.
>
> >> > My next notion would be to
> >> > _lower_ the taxes on the poor.
>
> >> Most of the land in the United States would become available for use by
> >> the poor. There is much land available and unused. The OIL in the
> >> sovereignty of the United States is a natural resource and subject to
> >> ground rents or taxes on value or other fees. Those fees as they exceed
> >> the cost of government are dispersed as Citizen's Dividends. Think North
> >> Slope, ANWR, offshore oil.
>
> > Well, there is another book "The Oil Follies of 1970-1980," (by Robert
> > Sherrill), which pretty well shows that these big oil companies
> > basically have everyone else shoving bananas up their asses. I read
> > that book, cover-to-cover, too. Its a losing battle.
>
> ...
>
> read more »
The Trucker
> On May 14, 12:35 am, The Trucker <mik...@verizon.net> wrote:
>> On Tue, 13 May 2008 19:11:56 -0700, Stray Dog wrote:
<<<< deletia>>>>>
>> I have no idea what is justifiable wealth.
>
> When one person (there are many hundreds of them) has more money than
> the GDP of most small countries.
We may, in fact, be witnessing a hint of what "too much" would be by
looking at the price of oil. The market is being manipulated. There is
no other way that the prices can do what they are doing. Peak oil has
been reached, but that does not explain the short duration of the price
increases. The worlds wealthiest are in the oil futures markets up to
their elbows. And they are not going to turn lose until they get busted
by American conservation and sucking a big gulp out of the strategic
reserve. The nice thing about being the biggest consumer is that you can
kick the speculators' butts and the suppliers too if you set your mind to
it. The suppliers won't really get hurt by this quick action but the
speculators and the money manipulators sure will.
> But I will tell you that most
>> wealth is accumulated through the use of government enforced monopoly
>> rights and the bulk of it is ownership rights to natural resources.
>
> Two books I have make reference to the three biggest busineses: oil,
> exchange-rate trading, and moneylaundering (said to be $300-500 bil/
> year). Greider's book is one, the other is a recent book I'm reading
> now on moneylaundering (which includes a large part of the
> international drug trade, too, which is another serious problem)..
The latter is just sensationalism.
> And, I cannot agree with you that "most" of those three are due to
> govt enforced monopoly rules. Rather, at least two of the three are
> under the control of private interests and few people will ever get to
> know the details.
The oil is not really capital and neither is the money. Both are
controlled by government(s) directly or indirectly and neither have a cost
of manufacture. Money is created with a keyboard and oil just IS.
> The
>> sheiks that own the personalized planes are collecting rent on the
>> naturally occurring oil.
>
> All the "owners" of all the capital in the world are collecting "rent"
> on all of that printed money
And this is what we get when we allow neoclassical economists and
financial weenies to control the vocabulary. It is 1984 newspeak.
MONEY IS NOT CAPITAL AND NEITHER IS OIL OR LAND. And the owners of land,
oil, and Money are not the owners of CAPITAL. But they are most
certainly collecting _RENT_.
>, printed stock (ink on paper, electronic
> bits in RAM memory), and don't forget that "hot money" (a real term),
> borrowed shares, CDOs, etc. The whips who know this stuff a lot better
> than I do say that the value of the worlds financial markets is 10 to
> 100 times the world's entire GDP and you'd better think about that for
> a minute before you dismiss it.
That is not something I will debate or even take exception to. But think
about how all this paper confers wealth and power. It is all based on
government enforcement of monopoly money value. And if the creation of
money was actually in the hands of a representative government
(representative of the common people AND the wealthy) then paper money
would do fine. The deregulation of the financial industries ability to
engage in "investment banking" (money creation) and the creation of money
by the fiscally irresponsible Republicans (no taxes to soak up the
money) is a real problem.
> Extremely large conglomerates are able to
>> control large market segments and collect monopoly rents by virtue of
>> size. But it is all a coercion.
>
> I think you are basically right about this, but the people who are
> "free" (less coerced) are the ones who can afford (i.e. are rich) to
> play economic hardball.
So we are slowly coming to grips with a vague definition of "Too Much
Individual Wealth".
> One of the saving graces of a highly
>> progressive income tax is that it taxes away a lot of rent. But it
>> doesn't really work very well in a global economy.
>
> Especially if all manner of tax dodges, CPA trickery, lawyers,
> offshore banks, etc., are all running at full force.
But you are treading on dangerous ground here. There are "loopholes" in
the tax code that should be there to spur economic development in
particular areas. Real Estate has never been one of the "loopholes" that
should be in the tax code.
>> >> > My off-the-top-of-my-head notion would be to soak the rich, but I
>> >> > think they are already squirreling away as much as possible to
>> >> > offshore tax havens, tax dodges, etc.
>>
>> >> The naturally occurring land or oil or coal or gold or water, rain and
>> >> sun will not be hauled of by the rich.
>>
>> > Oh, I think you are wrong about this. Oil is the world's biggest
>> > business and in the hands of governments and certain corporations.
>>
>> The point I was trying to make is that the oil can't be put in a
>> briefcase and moved to Bimini.
>
> So what?
So it can be taxed right here at the wellhead no matter who claims to own
it. That is also true of all land ownership and mostly true for the
ownership of fixed improvements. Value taxation (asset taxation) can
make ownership passe and it is certainly blind to the nationality of the
owners. It will not matter whether the resource is owned by Americans or
Chinese.
>> Only some papers showing ownership.
>
> In ancient times, kings/emperors just said "I'm going to get that" and
> have 100,000 soldiers march over and kill everybody, steal booty,
> capture slaves, etc. Today, the same thing is happening (hostile
> takeovers, sovereign wealth funds, repatriation, nationalization, etc).
Drama trauma.
> And
>> the government must enforce such contracts or the dude in Bimini gets
>> no pie.
>
> I've got a couple more books for you to read about all the underground
> economy that is totally under the radar of the govt.
Here again. Tell me how you will get out of paying the taxes on yer home
this year. HMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM???????????
> The government could simply refuse to enforce the contracts and
>> take the proceeds of the sale of the oil. More to the point our
>> government currently enforces the ownership contracts yet cannot tax
>> the income from those contracts because the income is realized in
>> Bimini and the government of Bimini gets the tax proceeds.
>
> And, that is a drop in the bucket compared to the whole pie.
You are missing the point: In a global economy the resources must be
taxed directly and indirectly. But it matters that the government
providing the governance be able to collect the taxes that fund such
governance. It is _NOT_ a "drop in the bucket". It is the whole
bucket-full.
> Whereas the American
>> government is enforcing the ownership rights then the American
>> government should get the tax proceeds.
>
> Did the US get anything for rescuing Kuwait?
Yes, actually. Japan and a lot of others sent money in very large
amounts. It was in their interest to preserve the independent oil
suppliers in Kuwait.
> Are we going to "make
> anything" on the Iraq war?
No. That was a total Republican Pig Prancing maneuver from the start.
Imperialism is a loser and has been throughout history. Unilateralism and
rightardedness is a loser.
> An asset tax is much better then an income
>> tax in a global economy. An asset tax is like the taxes you pay on
>> your house in that it is paid on the value of the asset as opposed to a
>> tax on income from the asset.
>
> Well, I'd have to think about that. Where I have reservations is that I
> hear all kinds of guys with their favorite idea of what is a good tax
> and what is a good method of taxing. And, of course, the Republican
> mindset is cut the taxes and lets not talk about the deficit.
There are few if any economists worth spit that would tell you that
natural resource taxes are not the BEST way to tax. And that include MANY
of the otherwise brain damaged neoclassicals.
> The owner must pay the tax regardless of whether
>> or how much income is realized from the asset.
>
> Yeah, but the guy is going to say why should I pay taxes on "dead"
> assets and I'll agree.
And when he sells them they come back to life! It they are "dead" then
why would he want to hold onto them?
ATTEND:
The asset value is the present value of the discounted projected after tax
revenue stream (or utility stream). If the asset is truly dead then it
will not attract a tax because it has no discounted present value. Your
home has a projected utility that would be appreciated by the home market.
It is not a "dead asset" even though it will not be producing an revenue
in the future. What would it rent for?
We always speak of present MARKET value.
>> So it would not matter WHO
>> owned the asset or what country the owner lived in.
>>
>> > Water is being "confiscated" in all third world countries that are
>> > privatizing public wells and selling them to corporate entities who
>> > put a pump and valve at the top (maybe add a filter to take out some
>> > dirt) and start selling it to people who used to get it for free.
>>
>> Here again the water is an asset and it is worth what it is worth
>
> Back in the hunter-gatherer days that wasn't even an issue.
ECONOMIC RENT IS CAUSED BY POPULATION. That is the way it is. Rent can
only be had in a society where scarcity is created.
> and the
>> government will tax the value of the asset.
>
> All depends on the government.
No. It depends on the value that the market (the society) places on the
asset. But it is true that without government there is no ownership and
no market and no privatized rent.
>
>> The government
>> can distribute the proceeds to the people equally.
>
> Nice but capitalists will smell money and hate to see it fly around
> instead of "live" in their wallets.
The "capitalists" (those that invest in actual capital) will be just fine.
>> What will happen is
>> that the corporation will go tits up and that will be the end of the
>> ruse.
>
> The only time corporations dissolve is if they can't escape with net
> profits or use bankruptcy for a breather.
If the corporation lives on rent as opposed to true interest and profit
then the corporation will go tits up regardless of all the fiddling around.
>> > Coal? Where can anyone dig the stuff up just by driving up and
>> > getting a shovel out of the trunk? Sunlight? All the oil companies
>> > own all of the solar cell companies (except some in China, which
>> > either are or soon will be owned either by Chinese corporations or if
>> > the stock can be bought by someone else...), and they will/can charge
>> > license/ royalty fees if not make you pay for the solar panels which
>> > will have to be replaced after aging years down the road by more.
>>
>> I gotta draw the line here. The coal and the sunlight are natural
>> resources.
>
> And, you don't get the coal unless you buy the land or pay the fee.
What happens to the fee? That is the part that matters.
> Sunlight? If the endpoint of global warming is pretty bad (the most
> pessimistic possible outcomes), then you ain't gonna have enough money
> to keep it from happening and it might take much more drastic measures
> than money can buy.
All environmental problems are the result of overpopulation and
horrendous greed and power lust. And it will take
democratic-republican governments to control these problems.
>> The solar cells and panels aren't.
>
> Neither are the mines, miners, and digging machines.
True. Nonetheless the coal itself is a natural resource like oil. What
happens to the fees paid for the coal itself? That is what matters.
> The asset tax rate on the
>> natural resources is much higher than the asset tax rate on the other
>> stuff.
>>
>> > The energy corporations, back couple decades ago, hired some lawyers
>> > to figure out if they -- because they could preach that they already
>> > had dominion over energy-- could charge a fee for the use of
>> > sunlight. Yes, outrageous, isn't it. Yes, they'd love to do it if
>> > they could. Companies would love to patent anything they can. There
>> > are even efforts to extend expiration dates on patents today. Bunch
>> > of crooks!
>>
>> Yes... It is quite ridiculous.
>
> But, that is the gameplan of most greedy-selfish robber-barons.
They cannot escape from paying the extraction fees or the land taxes using
such silly shit as what you have described. That sort of crap only works
with transaction taxes.
>> > A direct rent (a ground rent) or a
>> >> tax on ownership cannot be avoided. Lets see you haul the farm off
>> >> to Bimini.
>>
>> > With lawyers, CPAs, payoffs, bribes, tricky-cheaty crap, finding
>> > loopholes in the laws, they can do anything they want. The tax cheat
>> > book had lots of examples. An oil pipeline was built to follow a path
>> > out of one state, then go a mile and then go back into the state it
>> > came out of just to make that pipelined oil certifiable as
>> > "interstate" delivery and to dodge a tax.
>>
>> Now you are being silly.
>
> No, that, among many other examples, was actually described in that book
> by Johnston, and he had a lot of references to sources.
But we are moving away from the actual discussion about what to do about
all that crap. I am well aware of all the stuff and get very bored reading
about it over and over again. Resource rents/taxes, asset taxes and
extraction fees do away with every bit if that stupidity.
>> The asset tax system is a lot simpler to administer. All that stuff
>> you want to complicate the world with is because transactions are being
>> taxed instead of asset ownership.
>
> Well, I think you need to study more how the crooks are being very
> imaginative at grabbing anything they can get their sticky fingers on
> and keeping it hidden from the authorities.
>
> Mind you, I'm not trying to tell you "I'm right, you're wrong" but that:
> i) the whole situation is pretty damned complicated, ii) like crime in
> general, most of all this stuff might be beyond the control of anyone
> (particularly the victims). I'm sorry.
I take a different approach. I look at what the economists and the people
that know about such things have to say and I apply them with what
little knowledge and intellect I have (and I have read a lot of crap about
how this group and that group get away with all sorts of stuff). And then
I debate right here and elsewhere to see what other people think about
what they have read and seen. I may come to a convulsion :)
Stray Dog
enough to make more people aware of some of these topics and problems,
and ii) that you have thought about them in more detail than most
people. I think we have overlap in many of our thoughts but
disagreement in others and --what the hell--you ask most people in the
world and you'll get their own favorite theory on how the world works
if they care enough to think about it. The oldest and biggest problem
(going back to the beginnings of history) is the rich getting richer
and the poor, poorer. Getting politicians (presidents, senators,
whatever) focused on that problem in a) some way that most people can
agree to, and b) avoids the "best- laid- plans- of- mice- and- men-
oft- go- awry" problem seems to me to be more important than our
endless discussion, here.
Or, maybe I'm asking too much, expecting too much of human society
(and the powers-that-be, who usually look out for themselves and no
one else, anyway)?
== no change to below, included for reference and context, but I did
read it all ==
> ...
>
> read more »
BobR
>
> read more »- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -
Ok, you posed a question earlier now let me pose a question to you and
the rest of the participants.
Lets deal with just the United States and discuss a hypothetical
situation and what the results would be. Take all of the wealth in
all forms from all the people of this country and divided it equally
among all of the population so that each person starts on an equal
position. What would be the result of such a distribution 10 years,
20 years, 40 years later and why?
maxw...@my-deja.com
The Trucker
Without government all the wealth would be in the hands of a few people
all over again. The "all at once" redistribution of the wealth in the
way you describe has never happened before. But it has happened slowly
through the combined use of a highly progressive income tax and government
infrastructure investments. But that observation begs the real question.
And that is how to maintain a government that would use such methods to
prevent the harm caused by extreme disparity in power and wealth. The
removal of government is not the answer. The control of government by the
common people as well as the rich _IS_. I would highly recommend a better
understanding of the purported goals of the United States Government at
its inception. Such goals were not obtainable based on the technology of
that time. That is no longer the case: http://GreaterVoice.org/extend
maxw...@my-deja.com
> test
> Good question. Besides all the "kitchen table debating" that we're all
> doing here--and entertaining all of our personal favorite ideas--my
> basic recommendation is that you need to follow the CYA strategy.
I am a faithful follower of the CYA strategy. It is the only one you
can
truely depend on.
>
> It cuts both ways. If jobs come back to the USA there is a chance that
> wages will go up, or if prices go up they will have to pay bigger
> wages to get workers.
What you describe is text book theory, that is the way it should
work, but that is if everyone competes on a level playing field.
I am concerned that the many will want to deregulate to the
point that the US regulations are like Mexico's. in order to help
the economy. People will justify children working because 3
incomes is better than 2. The downside is an eroded standard
of living.
Europe seems to be doing quite well with a more valuble
currency and higher living standards. I am sure the euro will
fall because as you say they are being hit by the trade and
oil as well. But when their economy goes down I doubt it
will bottom as low as the US has gone.
Like you say there is a "chance" and I believe that wages
will go up but what 1 income bought back 40 years
ago now takes two. What you will see if less being offered
for the same price. Some will think the buying power is the
same or better but they will be paying for lower quality,
cheap junk like that from China.
BobR
> > Ok, you posed a question earlier now let me pose a question to you and
> > the rest of the participants.
>
> > Lets deal with just the United States and discuss a hypothetical
> > situation and what the results would be. Take all of the wealth in
> > all forms from all the people of this country and divided it equally
> > among all of the population so that each person starts on an equal
> > position. What would be the result of such a distribution 10 years,
> > 20 years, 40 years later and why?
>
> Without government all the wealth would be in the hands of a few people
> all over again.
Exactly. Within the 40 years or two generations the distribution of
wealth would be virtually identical to what it is now.
>The "all at once" redistribution of the wealth in the
> way you describe has never happened before.
And I would never propose that it should happen but the concept is
what I was getting at.
>But it has happened slowly
> through the combined use of a highly progressive income tax and government
> infrastructure investments. But that observation begs the real question.
> And that is how to maintain a government that would use such methods to
> prevent the harm caused by extreme disparity in power and wealth. The
> removal of government is not the answer. The control of government by the
> common people as well as the rich _IS_. I would highly recommend a better
> understanding of the purported goals of the United States Government at
> its inception. Such goals were not obtainable based on the technology of
> that time. That is no longer the case:http://GreaterVoice.org/extend
>
The real point of the question is that government can not successfully
equalize the distribution of wealth by law. The pursuit of happiness
mentioned in the Constitution is not a guarantee of achiement or an
equality of results, only the opportunity to try. If we as
individuals fail to take advantage of the opportunities it is not the
governments place to see to it that we protected from the
consequences.
Stray Dog
> On May 15, 8:22 am, Stray Dog <straydog2...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > Well, let me say a couple of things: i) I appreciate that you _care_
> > enough to make more people aware of some of these topics and problems,
> > and ii) that you have thought about them in more detail than most
> > people. I think we have overlap in many of our thoughts but
> > disagreement in others and --what the hell--you ask most people in the
> > world and you'll get their own favorite theory on how the world works
> > if they care enough to think about it. The oldest and biggest problem
> > (going back to the beginnings of history) is the rich getting richer
> > and the poor, poorer. Getting politicians (presidents, senators,
> > whatever) focused on that problem in a) some way that most people can
> > agree to, and b) avoids the "best- laid- plans- of- mice- and- men-
> > oft- go- awry" problem seems to me to be more important than our
> > endless discussion, here.
>
> > Or, maybe I'm asking too much, expecting too much of human society
> > (and the powers-that-be, who usually look out for themselves and no
> > one else, anyway)?
>
> > == no change to below, included for reference and context, but I did
> > read it all ==
Deleted this old material (see farther down)
>
> > ...
>
> > read more »- Hide quoted text -
>
> > - Show quoted text -
>
> Ok, you posed a question earlier now let me pose a question to you and
> the rest of the participants.
>
> Lets deal with just the United States and discuss a hypothetical
> situation and what the results would be. Take all of the wealth in
> all forms from all the people of this country and divided it equally
> among all of the population so that each person starts on an equal
> position.
The factual, historical situation for this is: the hunter-gatherer
days. At most there were tribal chiefs and what wealth there would be
would be infinitesimal compared to the scale we have today.
What would be the result of such a distribution 10 years,
> 20 years, 40 years later and why?
Yeah, this was debated at least in some of the economist media not too
long ago and the prediction was that, yes, we'd end up, automatically,
with a small number of rich/powerful people and everyone else would be
groveling peasants.
Now, I will answer this in terms of _why_ by citing the fact that from
the beginning of recorded history the prevalent phenomenon really was
the "robber-baron" mindset and the imperative was "grab, grab more,
grab anything you can" and forget ethics, morals, justice, fairness.
Now I will _ask_ YOU: Is this what you want? Is this good? Should
ANYone, if he wants to or is capable of it, just go out and "grab,
grab more, ..etc" regardless of ethics, morals, justice, and fairness?
And, while you are thinking about this, please think about the history
of law, the meaning of the Magna Carta (I've read at least three books
recently dealing with this), and whether you want an egalitarian
society.
And, nowhere in what I'm saying is there any requirement that everyone
be absolutely paid the same wages no matter what they do. However, I
think the induction of widespread poverty by advertising, too much
freedom (I really am against, for example, lotteries because they
_induce_ people to spend their money by taking away from food budgets
and this is unhealthy). I really am, on the other hand, against robber-
barons.
Stray Dog
> On May 15, 12:29 pm, maxwel...@my-deja.com wrote:
>
> > test
> > Good question. Besides all the "kitchen table debating" that we're all
> > doing here--and entertaining all of our personal favorite ideas--my
> > basic recommendation is that you need to follow the CYA strategy.
>
> I am a faithful follower of the CYA strategy. It is the only one you
> can
> truely depend on.
Agreed, but with one big caveat: you can _control_ this strategy more
than others (eg. depend on the govt, depend on corporations) but if
you are applying for a job, you CANNOT control the applicant to job
ratio, you can't control how the interviewer decides whether he likes
you enough to offer you the job, and you can't control how much they
offer to pay you (they will just tell you to take it or leave it), and
you can't control when/if they decide to lay you off and hire cheaper
help, or even call you into the office and ask you to take a pay cut
(I've actually known people this has happened to), and then what do
you do?
Or, in other words, in the end, the Robber-barons win. tsk, tsk.
>
>
> > It cuts both ways. If jobs come back to the USA there is a chance that
> > wages will go up, or if prices go up they will have to pay bigger
> > wages to get workers.
>
> What you describe is text book theory, that is the way it should
> work, but that is if everyone competes on a level playing field.
> I am concerned that the many will want to deregulate to the
> point that the US regulations are like Mexico's. in order to help
> the economy. People will justify children working because 3
> incomes is better than 2. The downside is an eroded standard
> of living.
Yeah, I think I follow you. Right now, the corporations are _free_ to
do anything they like and you and I are _free_ to starve if the Big
Boys decide that the bottom line and THEIR wallets are most important
and the rest of society can go to hell.
> Europe seems to be doing quite well with a more valuble
> currency and higher living standards.
Well, there are two sides to that story, too. I've been reading where
they are also exporting jobs to East Europe, and hiring more and more
temps, too. So, if you have one of the secure, union jobs, you're in
"fat city." If not, then you are groveling.
I am sure the euro will
> fall because as you say they are being hit by the trade and
> oil as well.
Oh, I would make the bet that the exchange rate traders will buy
futures, etc., in whatever manner exploits the herd instinct. At some
point in the future, all that money will come back out of the Euro and
dump into USD. I'll bet some money that, even though I'd love to see
the USD go farther down (so jobs come back and exports go up more), it
won't last long. The Europeans will get pissed by the end of this
year. Their trade deficit with China is going up faster than ours now.
That ain't gonna last long.
But when their economy goes down I doubt it
> will bottom as low as the US has gone.
I won't bet on this, but I've looked at enough charts of everything
that everything being measured, sooner or later, goes up, then down,
then up again, and then drifts all over the page space.
> Like you say there is a "chance" and I believe that wages
> will go up but what 1 income bought back 40 years
> ago now takes two. What you will see if less being offered
> for the same price. Some will think the buying power is the
> same or better but they will be paying for lower quality,
> cheap junk like that from China.
Well, there are a lot of things going on, not all good. The cheap
electronics junk is nice but there are a lot of caveats there and I
hate to think that to have all that cheap junk means that the USA has
to give up one percent of its jobs every year. Just think, in ten,
twenty years, that means 10-20% of all jobs, and also mostly the
nicer, higher paying ones, too.
So, how are the people that are laid off going to buy that cheap junk
if they are broke and unemployed?
And, I'm sorry, but re-training is not the answer because we're back
to the applicant-to-job ratio. It does no good to have ten guys
fighting for one job; nine guys are going to go hungry.
Stray Dog
> > > Ok, you posed a question earlier now let me pose a question to you and
> > > the rest of the participants.
>
> > > Lets deal with just the United States and discuss a hypothetical
> > > situation and what the results would be. Take all of the wealth in
> > > all forms from all the people of this country and divided it equally
> > > among all of the population so that each person starts on an equal
> > > position. What would be the result of such a distribution 10 years,
> > > 20 years, 40 years later and why?
>
> > Without government all the wealth would be in the hands of a few people
> > all over again.
>
> Exactly. Within the 40 years or two generations the distribution of
> wealth would be virtually identical to what it is now.
Well, the counter argument is: look at the Marxist states. Not a nice
picture, but Cuba, for example, is actually passable considering that
the US essentially has a blockade of the Cuban economy. What if that
blockade were not there? Ask yourself that. I remember back in the
'50s-'60s, the Soviet Union's economy was expanding at 10-11% per
year, at least for a number of years. Look at China: they only got
private property about one year ago, and look what they, a
totalitarian govt, did in the 10-20 years before. Not much freedom,
but a lot of reforms.
> >The "all at once" redistribution of the wealth in the
> > way you describe has never happened before.
>
> And I would never propose that it should happen but the concept is
> what I was getting at.
The oldest legit method for redistributing the wealth is plain old
taxation. In the last 2-3 decades the burden on the rich has been cut
back quite a bit. On their own, the rich have been doing all kinds of
tax-dodging and that ain't right. Fix the tax system would be my first
simple choice, but they have to get serious about it. Fix this crap
where corporations can pay zero taxes and export the whole company to
Dubai or someplace and beat the tax while making big bucks off of the
rest of us. Etc. etc.
More below....
> >But it has happened slowly
> > through the combined use of a highly progressive income tax and government
> > infrastructure investments. But that observation begs the real question.
> > And that is how to maintain a government that would use such methods to
> > prevent the harm caused by extreme disparity in power and wealth. The
> > removal of government is not the answer. The control of government by the
> > common people as well as the rich _IS_. I would highly recommend a better
> > understanding of the purported goals of the United States Government at
> > its inception. Such goals were not obtainable based on the technology of
> > that time. That is no longer the case:http://GreaterVoice.org/extend
>
> The real point of the question is that government can not successfully
> equalize the distribution of wealth by law.
You got too many lawyers and CPAs working the loopholes. And, laws
will never be perfect.
The pursuit of happiness
> mentioned in the Constitution is not a guarantee of achiement or an
> equality of results, only the opportunity to try.
Brilliant observation.
If we as
> individuals fail to take advantage of the opportunities it is not the
> governments place to see to it that we protected from the
> consequences.
So, it would not bother you if we did not have the FTC, etc., and
Standard Oil, for example, could monopolize gasoline and charge
whatever it felt like?
Ever hear of Columbia/HCA fraudulent govt billing, Archer-Daniels-
Midland and price fixing back in early '90s? Or, how about Enron-
Andersen? You wouldn't mind if we had more of that, right?
BobR
> On May 15, 3:44 pm, BobR <re...@r-a-reed-assoc.com> wrote:
>
> > > > Ok, you posed a question earlier now let me pose a question to you and
> > > > the rest of the participants.
>
> > > > Lets deal with just the United States and discuss a hypothetical
> > > > situation and what the results would be. Take all of the wealth in
> > > > all forms from all the people of this country and divided it equally
> > > > among all of the population so that each person starts on an equal
> > > > position. What would be the result of such a distribution 10 years,
> > > > 20 years, 40 years later and why?
>
> > > Without government all the wealth would be in the hands of a few people
> > > all over again.
>
> > Exactly. Within the 40 years or two generations the distribution of
> > wealth would be virtually identical to what it is now.
>
> Well, the counter argument is: look at the Marxist states. Not a nice
> picture, but Cuba, for example, is actually passable considering that
> the US essentially has a blockade of the Cuban economy. What if that
> blockade were not there? Ask yourself that. I remember back in the
> '50s-'60s, the Soviet Union's economy was expanding at 10-11% per
> year, at least for a number of years. Look at China: they only got
> private property about one year ago, and look what they, a
> totalitarian govt, did in the 10-20 years before. Not much freedom,
> but a lot of reforms.
>
Yes, do look at the Communist and Marxist attempts to "redistribute
the wealth" and how totally they have all failed over the long term.
If you measure success by all but the elite leadership sharing in the
equal misery as being good, you are more than welcome to it.
> > >The "all at once" redistribution of the wealth in the
> > > way you describe has never happened before.
>
> > And I would never propose that it should happen but the concept is
> > what I was getting at.
>
> The oldest legit method for redistributing the wealth is plain old
> taxation. In the last 2-3 decades the burden on the rich has been cut
> back quite a bit. On their own, the rich have been doing all kinds of
> tax-dodging and that ain't right. Fix the tax system would be my first
> simple choice, but they have to get serious about it. Fix this crap
> where corporations can pay zero taxes and export the whole company to
> Dubai or someplace and beat the tax while making big bucks off of the
> rest of us. Etc. etc.
>
We can agree that tax-dodging isn't right but the use of taxes for
redistributing wealth is total bullshit. Taxation should be for the
sole purpose of providing protection and infrastructure for the common
use of all, not for redistribution of wealth.
>
> > >But it has happened slowly
> > > through the combined use of a highly progressive income tax and government
> > > infrastructure investments. But that observation begs the real question.
> > > And that is how to maintain a government that would use such methods to
> > > prevent the harm caused by extreme disparity in power and wealth. The
> > > removal of government is not the answer. The control of government by the
> > > common people as well as the rich _IS_. I would highly recommend a better
> > > understanding of the purported goals of the United States Government at
> > > its inception. Such goals were not obtainable based on the technology of
> > > that time. That is no longer the case:http://GreaterVoice.org/extend
>
> > The real point of the question is that government can not successfully
> > equalize the distribution of wealth by law.
>
> You got too many lawyers and CPAs working the loopholes. And, laws
> will never be perfect.
>
> The pursuit of happiness
>
> > mentioned in the Constitution is not a guarantee of achiement or an
> > equality of results, only the opportunity to try.
>
> Brilliant observation.
Thank you, I know. <BG> Unfortunately it is an observation too often
ignored.
>
> If we as
>
> > individuals fail to take advantage of the opportunities it is not the
> > governments place to see to it that we protected from the
> > consequences.
>
> So, it would not bother you if we did not have the FTC, etc., and
> Standard Oil, for example, could monopolize gasoline and charge
> whatever it felt like?
>
Never said that. There is a substantial difference between your
failure to take advantage of available opportunities and having
someone else take the opportunity that opportunity away from you.
> Ever hear of Columbia/HCA fraudulent govt billing, Archer-Daniels-
> Midland and price fixing back in early '90s? Or, how about Enron-
> Andersen? You wouldn't mind if we had more of that, right?
>
If there is one thing that really pisses me off it is having some
moron try to put words into what I write or say that I did not say or
remotely imply.
BobR
That is not the situation today and there would be no reason to expect
that I would be different.
> Now, I will answer this in terms of _why_ by citing the fact that from
> the beginning of recorded history the prevalent phenomenon really was
> the "robber-baron" mindset and the imperative was "grab, grab more,
> grab anything you can" and forget ethics, morals, justice, fairness.
>
So anyone who gets off their ass and does better than their neighbor
is of the "robber-baron" mindset. Everyone else is what?
> Now I will _ask_ YOU: Is this what you want? Is this good? Should
> ANYone, if he wants to or is capable of it, just go out and "grab,
> grab more, ..etc" regardless of ethics, morals, justice, and fairness?
Hey, this is your picture of yourself and those around you, not mine.
> And, while you are thinking about this, please think about the history
> of law, the meaning of the Magna Carta (I've read at least three books
> recently dealing with this), and whether you want an egalitarian
> society.
>
> And, nowhere in what I'm saying is there any requirement that everyone
> be absolutely paid the same wages no matter what they do. However, I
> think the induction of widespread poverty by advertising, too much
> freedom (I really am against, for example, lotteries because they
> _induce_ people to spend their money by taking away from food budgets
> and this is unhealthy). I really am, on the other hand, against robber-
> barons.- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -
Hey, we are at least in total agreement on one thing...lotteries. On
the other hand, if you are stupid enough to waste your money on a
lottery who am I or anyone else to say you can't. It goes back to the
basic freedom to pursue happiness.
We might also agree on robber-barons if you can name a real life
example of one in our current US population.
BobR
> On May 15, 12:34 pm, maxwel...@my-deja.com wrote:
>
> > On May 15, 12:29 pm, maxwel...@my-deja.com wrote:
>
> > > test
> > > Good question. Besides all the "kitchen table debating" that we're all
> > > doing here--and entertaining all of our personal favorite ideas--my
> > > basic recommendation is that you need to follow the CYA strategy.
>
> > I am a faithful follower of the CYA strategy. It is the only one you
> > can
> > truely depend on.
>
> Agreed, but with one big caveat: you can _control_ this strategy more
> than others (eg. depend on the govt, depend on corporations) but if
> you are applying for a job, you CANNOT control the applicant to job
> ratio, you can't control how the interviewer decides whether he likes
> you enough to offer you the job, and you can't control how much they
> offer to pay you (they will just tell you to take it or leave it), and
> you can't control when/if they decide to lay you off and hire cheaper
> help, or even call you into the office and ask you to take a pay cut
> (I've actually known people this has happened to), and then what do
> you do?
>
> Or, in other words, in the end, the Robber-barons win. tsk, tsk.
>
So now lets change the view for a moment and YOU have a business and
you are the employer. Should YOU be forced to hire without the
ability to determine who and without having a choice of how much to
pay? Is every employer a Robber-Baron and if so what would you do if
there were no employers?
>
>
> > > It cuts both ways. If jobs come back to the USA there is a chance that
> > > wages will go up, or if prices go up they will have to pay bigger
> > > wages to get workers.
>
> > What you describe is text book theory, that is the way it should
> > work, but that is if everyone competes on a level playing field.
> > I am concerned that the many will want to deregulate to the
> > point that the US regulations are like Mexico's. in order to help
> > the economy. People will justify children working because 3
> > incomes is better than 2. The downside is an eroded standard
> > of living.
The standard of living that you desire is your choice but that choice
brings requirements. If your standard requires a 3500sf house instead
of a 1800sf house it might also require two incomes. Could you live
and be comfortable in the smaller house? Probably but the reality is
that you don't want to and thus a requirement for two incomes. Your
choice.
>
> Yeah, I think I follow you. Right now, the corporations are _free_ to
> do anything they like and you and I are _free_ to starve if the Big
> Boys decide that the bottom line and THEIR wallets are most important
> and the rest of society can go to hell.
>
You want to blame it all on the corporations which are nothing more
than people just like you who are trying to do the best they can for
themselves. Don't get me wrong, I can't defend the stupid decisions
made by the CEO's and directors of many of our corporations but in my
60 years I have also seen the demise of many of those same
corporations. They exist in a very competitive world where one
mistake can end their existance.
> > Europe seems to be doing quite well with a more valuble
> > currency and higher living standards.
>
> Well, there are two sides to that story, too. I've been reading where
> they are also exporting jobs to East Europe, and hiring more and more
> temps, too. So, if you have one of the secure, union jobs, you're in
> "fat city." If not, then you are groveling.
>
You are right, Europe seems to be doing well but they have some very
significant problems of their own and in the long run they will be up
and down just like us. The whole world is trying to adjust to a
population of over 6 billion with billions of people moving into the
consumption circle of an ever smaller world.
> I am sure the euro will
>
> > fall because as you say they are being hit by the trade and
> > oil as well.
>
> Oh, I would make the bet that the exchange rate traders will buy
> futures, etc., in whatever manner exploits the herd instinct. At some
> point in the future, all that money will come back out of the Euro and
> dump into USD. I'll bet some money that, even though I'd love to see
> the USD go farther down (so jobs come back and exports go up more), it
> won't last long. The Europeans will get pissed by the end of this
> year. Their trade deficit with China is going up faster than ours now.
> That ain't gonna last long.
>
You are right, like a pendulm it will swing back and forth. In the
long run, that really is a good thing but there will be short term
pain associated with it.
> But when their economy goes down I doubt it
>
> > will bottom as low as the US has gone.
>
> I won't bet on this, but I've looked at enough charts of everything
> that everything being measured, sooner or later, goes up, then down,
> then up again, and then drifts all over the page space.
>
> > Like you say there is a "chance" and I believe that wages
> > will go up but what 1 income bought back 40 years
> > ago now takes two. What you will see if less being offered
> > for the same price. Some will think the buying power is the
> > same or better but they will be paying for lower quality,
> > cheap junk like that from China.
>
> Well, there are a lot of things going on, not all good. The cheap
> electronics junk is nice but there are a lot of caveats there and I
> hate to think that to have all that cheap junk means that the USA has
> to give up one percent of its jobs every year. Just think, in ten,
> twenty years, that means 10-20% of all jobs, and also mostly the
> nicer, higher paying ones, too.
>
> So, how are the people that are laid off going to buy that cheap junk
> if they are broke and unemployed?
Got laid off 5 years ago as a result of the huge movement of IT jobs
offshore and the cutbacks following Y2K. Whined about it for a while
but realized that is was a total waste of time and found a new field.
Took an initial cut in income but it has been short term and I have
recovered. Oh yes, I am not some twenty-something grad from Harvard
but a non-degreed 61 year old fart.
> And, I'm sorry, but re-training is not the answer because we're back
> to the applicant-to-job ratio. It does no good to have ten guys
> fighting for one job; nine guys are going to go hungry.
That is a totally pathetic view. I almost fell into the same mindset
but that is the view of a loser who wants to blame everyone else for
their own failures. Most of us would still be crawling on our hands
and knees if we had taken the same attitude when learning to walk.
Why is it that as adults we suddenly believe that we can no longer
learn something new?
The Trucker
Oh... I might be able to do so, but the vast majority of us would not
want that.
> The pursuit of happiness
> mentioned in the Constitution is not a guarantee of achievement or an
> equality of results, only the opportunity to try.
Quite so.
> If we as
> individuals fail to take advantage of the opportunities it is not the
> governments place to see to it that we protected from the
> consequences.
But it is the purpose of a "republican form of government" to preserve
equal opportunity.
"A government is republican in proportion as every member composing
it has his equal voice in the direction of its concerns: not indeed
in person, which would be impracticable beyond the limits of a city
or small township, but by representatives chosen by himself and
responsible to him at short periods." --Thomas Jefferson to Samuel
Kercheval, 1816.
http://www.greatervoice.org/econ/quotes/American_Republic.php --------
In 1787, republicanism then was positioned between monarchy and
"mere democracy". As it benefited from experience of the years after
1776 and struggled to contain the tension between "inalienable
rights", and majority rule, republicanism became both more moderate
and more intricate. A broadly based lower house of a legislature
continued to be basic to government by consent, but increasingly,
the election of other officials came to be regarded as good
republican practice. Also, mindful of colonial experience, and
following the arguments of Montesquieu, the idea that the
legislative, executive, and judicial powers had to be "separated",
made to "check and balance" each other in order to prevent tyranny,
gained wide acceptance. This often validated devices of government
that would restrain or "refine" the will of the majority in order to
protect rights, or "higher law".
-------------------------------------------------------------
History teaches a lot. Some fail to learn.
BobR
Only at the cost of your freedoms.
> > The pursuit of happiness
> > mentioned in the Constitution is not a guarantee of achievement or an
> > equality of results, only the opportunity to try.
>
> Quite so.
>
> > If we as
> > individuals fail to take advantage of the opportunities it is not the
> > governments place to see to it that we protected from the
> > consequences.
>
> But it is the purpose of a "republican form of government" to preserve
> equal opportunity.
>
The key element of your statement is to preserve equal opportunity and
for that part I concur and believe it is the equilivent of governments
prime directive. When government goes beyond that directive in an
attempt to equalize results it may be causing more harm than good.
> "A government is republican in proportion as every member composing
> it has his equal voice in the direction of its concerns: not indeed
> in person, which would be impracticable beyond the limits of a city
> or small township, but by representatives chosen by himself and
> responsible to him at short periods." --Thomas Jefferson to Samuel
> Kercheval, 1816.
>
> http://www.greatervoice.org/econ/quotes/American_Republic.php--------
>
> In 1787, republicanism then was positioned between monarchy and
> "mere democracy". As it benefited from experience of the years after
> 1776 and struggled to contain the tension between "inalienable
> rights", and majority rule, republicanism became both more moderate
> and more intricate. A broadly based lower house of a legislature
> continued to be basic to government by consent, but increasingly,
> the election of other officials came to be regarded as good
> republican practice. Also, mindful of colonial experience, and
> following the arguments of Montesquieu, the idea that the
> legislative, executive, and judicial powers had to be "separated",
> made to "check and balance" each other in order to prevent tyranny,
> gained wide acceptance. This often validated devices of government
> that would restrain or "refine" the will of the majority in order to
> protect rights, or "higher law".
> -------------------------------------------------------------
>
> History teaches a lot. Some fail to learn.
>
Boy, You said it. The problem now is that so very few want to look at
history and even attempt to learn from it.
> --
> "I know no safe depository of the ultimate powers
> of society but the people themselves; and
> if we think them not enlightened enough to
> exercise their control with a wholesome
> discretion, the remedy is not to take it from
> them, but to inform their discretion by
> education." - Thomas Jeffersonhttp://GreaterVoice.org/extend- Hide quoted text -
maxw...@my-deja.com
Well I could have guessed you don't have formal education because it
is obvious in your arguments.
Stray Dog
> test
Yeah, we can see your "test."
maxw...@my-deja.com
I did this because I encountered a problem that I had never seen
before when I tried repeatedly to respond to your earlier post.
Google groups errored but not on the "test" post. It had
something to do with the content and am still not sure what
caused it. After changing it several times it worked.
Stray Dog
> On Thu, 15 May 2008 07:18:17 -0700, BobR wrote:
> > On May 15, 8:22 am, Stray Dog <straydog2...@gmail.com> wrote:
deleted...
> > Ok, you posed a question earlier now let me pose a question to you and
> > the rest of the participants.
>
> > Lets deal with just the United States and discuss a hypothetical
> > situation and what the results would be. Take all of the wealth in
> > all forms from all the people of this country and divided it equally
> > among all of the population so that each person starts on an equal
> > position. What would be the result of such a distribution 10 years,
> > 20 years, 40 years later and why?
>
> Without government all the wealth would be in the hands of a few people
> all over again.
May I "correct" you by saying that "Without a low-corruption
government...." since it seems like our govt (USA, maybe many others),
there has been what looks to me an ever pro-industry, pro-rich trend
in our govt. The wealth divide has been getting worse the last 1-2
decades and all the data show that.
> The "all at once" redistribution of the wealth in the
> way you describe has never happened before.
Well, in Russia around 1917, private ovwnership went poof, and they
changed currency so if you came to the bank with a lot, they capped
how much new currency they gave you.
Also, if you read some history of the Incas, you will find that they
did have a successufl socialist organization of society and it lasted
some 250 years till the conquistadors came.
But it has happened slowly
> through the combined use of a highly progressive income tax and government
> infrastructure investments.
There was a big wealth divide before the great depression and during
FDR's time, the taxes on the rich were increased. Same deal in
England before the 1800s. The rich had the castles and mansions. Once
the taxes went on, then the rich could not afford to keep their
castles and mansions. I saw the Hearst castle in California back in
late 1960s. It was huge. Hearst had to give it up when taxes went up,
now its a tourist spot.
But that observation begs the real question.
> And that is how to maintain a government that would use such methods to
> prevent the harm caused by extreme disparity in power and wealth.
Very very good question. My first, off the top of my head answer, is
you gotta keep the corruption down.
The
> removal of government is not the answer. The control of government by the
> common people as well as the rich _IS_.
Other answer: convince the rich that money, more money, and even more
money is not a good goal.
I would highly recommend a better
> understanding of the purported goals of the United States Government at
> its inception.
There are a few books out there that indicate the goals of the USA
were not much different than anyone else: power, expansion,
development, etc.
Now, look at what we have: China...a competitor that, in another few
years might be serious trouble for us, and in some ways already is.
Stray Dog
> On May 15, 3:36 pm, Stray Dog <straydog2...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
>
> > On May 15, 3:44 pm, BobR <re...@r-a-reed-assoc.com> wrote:
>
> > > > > Ok, you posed a question earlier now let me pose a question to you and
> > > > > the rest of the participants.
>
deleted b/c no new material
t would be the result of such a distribution 10 years,
> > > > > 20 years, 40 years later and why?
>
> > > > Without government all the wealth would be in the hands of a few people
> > > > all over again.
>
> > > Exactly. Within the 40 years or two generations the distribution of
> > > wealth would be virtually identical to what it is now.
>
> > Well, the counter argument is: look at the Marxist states. Not a nice
> > picture, but Cuba, for example, is actually passable considering that
> > the US essentially has a blockade of the Cuban economy. What if that
> > blockade were not there? Ask yourself that. I remember back in the
> > '50s-'60s, the Soviet Union's economy was expanding at 10-11% per
> > year, at least for a number of years. Look at China: they only got
> > private property about one year ago, and look what they, a
> > totalitarian govt, did in the 10-20 years before. Not much freedom,
> > but a lot of reforms.
>
> Yes, do look at the Communist and Marxist attempts to "redistribute
> the wealth" and how totally they have all failed over the long term.
In recent times, you are mostly right. Failure has to be defined. Some
stories indicate partial success in some areas (Nicaragua, Cuba) but
depend on criteria and I would ask if the USA did not do everything to
inhibit these societies by economic sanctions that they might do
better.
In historical times, the Inca empire (1250-1500 AD) was for 250 years
a successful stable socialist economy and it ended when the
conquistadors came (it was warfare, not peaceful commercial
competition that ended the Inca empire).
There is also a history of a few socialist experiments going back
several thousand years in China but what caused them to end were
natural disasters like floods and earthquakes.
My "take" on all of this is that "robber-baron" processes will, in the
end, lead the domination any civilization regardless of what label you
use to describe it.
> If you measure success by all but the elite leadership sharing in the
> equal misery as being good, you are more than welcome to it.
>
> > > >The "all at once" redistribution of the wealth in the
> > > > way you describe has never happened before.
>
> > > And I would never propose that it should happen but the concept is
> > > what I was getting at.
>
> > The oldest legit method for redistributing the wealth is plain old
> > taxation. In the last 2-3 decades the burden on the rich has been cut
> > back quite a bit. On their own, the rich have been doing all kinds of
> > tax-dodging and that ain't right. Fix the tax system would be my first
> > simple choice, but they have to get serious about it. Fix this crap
> > where corporations can pay zero taxes and export the whole company to
> > Dubai or someplace and beat the tax while making big bucks off of the
> > rest of us. Etc. etc.
>
> We can agree that tax-dodging isn't right but the use of taxes for
> redistributing wealth is total bullshit. Taxation should be for the
> sole purpose of providing protection and infrastructure for the common
> use of all, not for redistribution of wealth.
So, you think we should just let the rich become infinitely rich? and
powerful?
Do you not see that this process is leaving greater proportions of the
world's population more impoverished? Most of the new studies are
showing this. The bottom half of India/China's population is no better
off now than 20 years ago and some are worse off.
>>
>>
deleted b/c no new discussion
> > You got too many lawyers and CPAs working the loopholes. And, laws
> > will never be perfect.
>
> > The pursuit of happiness
>
> > > mentioned in the Constitution is not a guarantee of achiement or an
> > > equality of results, only the opportunity to try.
>
> > Brilliant observation.
>
> Thank you, I know. <BG> Unfortunately it is an observation too often
> ignored.
Fine, but the Consititution was written in simpler times and now with
a whole lot of laws and enforcement agencies out there, and more
complicated ways to live (and steal), the Constitution, by itself,
might not be enough.
>
>
> > If we as
>
> > > individuals fail to take advantage of the opportunities it is not the
> > > governments place to see to it that we protected from the
> > > consequences.
>
> > So, it would not bother you if we did not have the FTC, etc., and
> > Standard Oil, for example, could monopolize gasoline and charge
> > whatever it felt like?
>
> Never said that. There is a substantial difference between your
> failure to take advantage of available opportunities and having
> someone else take the opportunity that opportunity away from you.
See below.
> > Ever hear of Columbia/HCA fraudulent govt billing, Archer-Daniels-
> > Midland and price fixing back in early '90s? Or, how about Enron-
> > Andersen? You wouldn't mind if we had more of that, right?
>
> If there is one thing that really pisses me off it is having some
> moron try to put words into what I write or say that I did not say or
> remotely imply.
All I said was about your "opportunities" statement. If a guy wants to
take YOUR opportunity to be a crook, what are you going to do about
it? Oh, excuse me, but there are a lot of guys out there who consider
themselves _free_ to do anything they want and a lot of other guys who
think _freedom_ somehow includes moral, ethical, legal behavior in
there somewhere.
Stray Dog
Bill Gates made at least half his money by the creation of a monopoly
in which he also destroyed most of his competition.
Back some 10 years ago, Archer-Daniels-Midland was caught by the FTC
in price fixing. Also, Ucars was also caught by the FTC in price
fixing. Various guys in the Enron-Andersen fiascos were playing robber-
baron.
I could list the Ivan Boesky's, Michael Milkins, and many others, and
give you many book titles if you want to read how we've had many
robber-barons, going right back to Standard Oil times with Rockefeller
and the others who did a lot of damage along, simultaneously, with all
of their development of modern society.
Recently, I've done a lot of reading about the kings, kingdoms,
barons, and serfs in medieval England, back 500-1000-1500 years ago,
and even in Mesopotamia 3000 years ago. Same basic deal: how a small
number of guys parasitize a large number of underling serfs/peasants
for monetary gain, power gain, and also get the underlings to bleed
and die in wars.
Stray Dog
Examples include: all the companies that did mass layoffs to offshore
their jobs, all the companies that did employee "replacement" projects
(local guy trains cheap immigrants), all of the companies that did
arbitrary wage reductions (this happened in the 1870s in the USA and
caused mass strikes...its in the history books). And, all the
companies that do bad things to employees not because they are having
difficulties but to increase an already adequate net profit bottom
line (one WSJ article listed many companies that had good profit
reports but the executives were only interested in more and so
initiated draconian further pressures on employees).
No, not every corporation is a robber-baron, but a lot of them are,
and a lot of them do as much bad as they do good and it would have to
be a separate discussion to go into this tangent in detail.
and if so what would you do if
> there were no employers?
We'd be in the hunter-gatherer days.
>
>
deleted some
> > > What you describe is text book theory, that is the way it should
> > > work, but that is if everyone competes on a level playing field.
> > > I am concerned that the many will want to deregulate to the
> > > point that the US regulations are like Mexico's. in order to help
> > > the economy. People will justify children working because 3
> > > incomes is better than 2. The downside is an eroded standard
> > > of living.
>
> The standard of living that you desire is your choice but that choice
> brings requirements. If your standard requires a 3500sf house instead
> of a 1800sf house it might also require two incomes. Could you live
> and be comfortable in the smaller house? Probably but the reality is
> that you don't want to and thus a requirement for two incomes. Your
> choice.
>
Too much of that choice is controlled NOT by you but by the income
associated with your resources and not that many people can control
that. The ones that can are the ones in the Forbes "400 richest
Americans" lists.
>
> > Yeah, I think I follow you. Right now, the corporations are _free_ to
> > do anything they like and you and I are _free_ to starve if the Big
> > Boys decide that the bottom line and THEIR wallets are most important
> > and the rest of society can go to hell.
>
> You want to blame it all on the corporations which are nothing more
> than people just like you who are trying to do the best they can for
> themselves. Don't get me wrong, I can't defend the stupid decisions
> made by the CEO's and directors of many of our corporations but in my
> 60 years I have also seen the demise of many of those same
> corporations. They exist in a very competitive world where one
> mistake can end their existance.
Yeah, but here is my gripe: the executives get a better "safety net"
and have a better deal in general than the underlings and the
underlings have zero control over anything. Corporations are,
basically, dictatorships with a guy basically no different than
_kings_ or emperors in earlier history except that the wars are
economic rather than military.
> > > Europe seems to be doing quite well with a more valuble
> > > currency and higher living standards.
>
> > Well, there are two sides to that story, too. I've been reading where
> > they are also exporting jobs to East Europe, and hiring more and more
> > temps, too. So, if you have one of the secure, union jobs, you're in
> > "fat city." If not, then you are groveling.
>
> You are right, Europe seems to be doing well but they have some very
> significant problems of their own and in the long run they will be up
> and down just like us. The whole world is trying to adjust to a
> population of over 6 billion with billions of people moving into the
> consumption circle of an ever smaller world.
Right.
> > I am sure the euro will
>
> > > fall because as you say they are being hit by the trade and
> > > oil as well.
>
> > Oh, I would make the bet that the exchange rate traders will buy
> > futures, etc., in whatever manner exploits the herd instinct. At some
> > point in the future, all that money will come back out of the Euro and
> > dump into USD. I'll bet some money that, even though I'd love to see
> > the USD go farther down (so jobs come back and exports go up more), it
> > won't last long. The Europeans will get pissed by the end of this
> > year. Their trade deficit with China is going up faster than ours now.
> > That ain't gonna last long.
>
> You are right, like a pendulm it will swing back and forth. In the
> long run, that really is a good thing but there will be short term
> pain associated with it.
OK
>
>
> > But when their economy goes down I doubt it
>
> > > will bottom as low as the US has gone.
>
deleted some b/c no new material
>
> > So, how are the people that are laid off going to buy that cheap junk
> > if they are broke and unemployed?
>
> Got laid off 5 years ago as a result of the huge movement of IT jobs
> offshore and the cutbacks following Y2K. Whined about it for a while
> but realized that is was a total waste of time and found a new field.
> Took an initial cut in income but it has been short term and I have
> recovered.
Good for you, congratulations. But, you might consider telling the
rest of the guys here more about what you're doing and give some
tips.
Oh yes, I am not some twenty-something grad from Harvard
> but a non-degreed 61 year old fart.
I would say you were lucky. Out of dozens of stories like yours, most
of the guys are doing worse than before. Me, I'm 64 and retired and my
resources cover my expenses.
And, some of those 20-somethings from Harvard are having a hard time,
too.
> > And, I'm sorry, but re-training is not the answer because we're back
> > to the applicant-to-job ratio. It does no good to have ten guys
> > fighting for one job; nine guys are going to go hungry.
>
> That is a totally pathetic view. I almost fell into the same mindset
> but that is the view of a loser who wants to blame everyone else for
> their own failures.
You really have no answer, do you, for the fact that when the number
of applicants exceed the number of jobs that there will be real losers
and not because they want to be losers. And, this is why we are seeing
a lot of programmer/IT guys in the USA ending up bagging groceries at
Walmart for $8/hour.
And, that is also an elitist view. You look at the vast majority of
people anywhere in the world who are born in poverty and ignorance and
all of the demographic studies will show that your _chances_ of
getting out of that are near zero, or very low. Most of the kids that
really do have a _chance_ are the ones coming out of typically middle
class backgrounds or above.
Most of us would still be crawling on our hands
> and knees if we had taken the same attitude when learning to walk.
The fact of the matter is that out of a clutch of young birds just out
of the egg, a few will fall out of the nest before they learn to fly,
and a few of those will fall into the mouths of predators waiting on
the ground for them with their mouths open.
> Why is it that as adults we suddenly believe that we can no longer
> learn something new?
It takes more than ability to learn something new to actually learn
something new.
Stray Dog
Google is, kinda, a PoS for newsgroup posts. They don't get all posts
from other ISPs, sometimes don't show even posts you make if you make
them from Google (or after long delays), and I have other gripes. But,
I can hide a little more from spam.
More ideal would be a good ISP where you access with a shell account
(unix) and a unix NG reader/editor, like PINE (I use it a lot),
because you are protected from viruses, malware, spyware, rootkits,
etc. Buuuut, unless you have something like Spam Assasin (which is far
from perfect) the directory harvesters start spaming you within days.
Google gave me error messages if there were more than five crosspost
NGs present. Also, sometimes the post fails to go out (no "your post
was successful" notice). However, it is free, and I guess that is
worth something, too.
Since I have alternative ISPs that I subscribe to, sometimes I use
them to independently check on posts either by myself or others.
Also, you can tell a little bit about how far your post gets out by
what kind of response you get from other people. At least Google posts
get out better now than about two years ago when they were much worse
and I left them, then, because of that.
BobR
>
> - Show quoted text -
It is also obvious from your arguments that you are yet another
formally educated elitist who looks down your brown nose at everyone
else. No, I don’t have a “degree” but don’t confuse the absence of a
degree with a lack of education or worse the lack of ability. I have
had a lot of you elitist “Formal Educated” and degreed morons work for
me over the last 40 years. Most of them have spent far more time out
of work and looking for jobs than I have during that time too. A lot
of them are just like you, they whine and cry about their jobs going
offshore and like you they either think they are too good to retrain
or that they shouldn’t have to.
The Trucker
Sure....
> The
>> removal of government is not the answer. The control of government by the
>> common people as well as the rich _IS_.
>
> Other answer: convince the rich that money, more money, and even more
> money is not a good goal.
That is not an achievable objective. You may as well tell that bull that
you don't like what he is doing to that cow.
> I would highly recommend a better
>> understanding of the purported goals of the United States Government at
>> its inception.
>
> There are a few books out there that indicate the goals of the USA
> were not much different than anyone else: power, expansion,
> development, etc.
I rather like just reading the actual history and making my own
analysis of why people did what they did. Their actions typically give us
a clue as to what they were trying to accomplish. And to be sure, all of
those things (power, etc) were considered in the birth of the USA. I will
even admit that the "founding fathers" were primarily plutocrats at heart
and that they wanted some sort of nobility to form here in the United
States just as it was in Europe. Most of the people that created the
United States Constitution saw themselves and their descendants as BEING
that nobility and deserving of that role due to their knowledge and
intellect.
But there is another side to this coin and that was the need to "sell"
that contract to the people. The "founders" had to play "lets make a
a deal" and there were certain things that they had to "give up" in order
to get the Constitution ratified. And the point I am making here is that
the US Constitution was a "deal" between those that wrote the rules and
those who accepted the rules. Madison himself stated that the "intent" of
the founders was secondary to understanding of those that ratified; that
the Constitution derives its power from the consent of the governed. That
was true then and it is true now.
To understand Constitutionality or to understand what America _IS_ one
must actually read and appreciate the actual history of the ratification.
I hope I make a very small contribution to that understanding at:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Article_The_First
and
http://www.greatervoice.org/extend/Madison.php
<<< deletia >>>
Regardless of what evil lurked in the soul of James Madison, his actions
are indicative of what he was "selling" to the American people. And it
seems impossible to misinterpret Federalist 55 through Federalist 58 on
the subject of "representation" for the people in their government.
There is no silver bullet that can be fired at the heart of despotism, no
wooden stake to be plunged into the heart of such malice, that will
arrest and confine such evil over time. Vigilance is the price of
freedom and liberty and we must constantly guard against the forces of
aristocracy and plutocracy or they will, in fact, have their way. We have
failed in our responsibility to prevent the deterioration of our freedoms
and our liberty. That failure happened very early on with the failure
of the very first constitutional amendment and manifested itself in 1921
when the House of Representatives failed to reapportion the House in
respect of a very steep rise in population and the shift of population
from rural to urban. This, according to many, was a Constitutional breach.
But we failed even more certainly when we allowed the Congress to limit
the representation to only 425 members in 1929.
BobR
> > you are the employer. Should YOU be forced to hire without the
> > ability to determine who and without having a choice of how much to
> > pay? Is every employer a Robber-Baron
>
> Examples include: all the companies that did mass layoffs to offshore
> their jobs, all the companies that did employee "replacement" projects
> (local guy trains cheap immigrants), all of the companies that did
> arbitrary wage reductions (this happened in the 1870s in the USA and
> caused mass strikes...its in the history books). And, all the
> companies that do bad things to employees not because they are having
> difficulties but to increase an already adequate net profit bottom
> line (one WSJ article listed many companies that had good profit
> reports but the executives were only interested in more and so
> initiated draconian further pressures on employees).
>
Hey, I was working at one of those corporations that did mass layoffs
and outsourced a substantial amount of work. I didn't like it one bit
and still don't, but I can also understand the business decisions that
made it almost impossible for the company to do anything else. They
are in competition on a global basis and in order to survive, they
must remain competitive on a global basis. I am not so naive as to
believe that my job, no matter how good I might be at it, can't be
done by someone else far cheaper. It might take two or three Indians
to do it but when they earn less than 10% of what I earned, it still
remains a huge bargain for the corporation.
> No, not every corporation is a robber-baron, but a lot of them are,
> and a lot of them do as much bad as they do good and it would have to
> be a separate discussion to go into this tangent in detail.
>
> and if so what would you do if
>
> > there were no employers?
>
> We'd be in the hunter-gatherer days.
>
>
We really still are, we are just hunting a different game. The
problem is that the vast majority of people would starve to death if
we returned to the "hunter-gatherer" days of the past.
>
> deleted some
>
> > > > What you describe is text book theory, that is the way it should
> > > > work, but that is if everyone competes on a level playing field.
> > > > I am concerned that the many will want to deregulate to the
> > > > point that the US regulations are like Mexico's. in order to help
> > > > the economy. People will justify children working because 3
> > > > incomes is better than 2. The downside is an eroded standard
> > > > of living.
>
> > The standard of living that you desire is your choice but that choice
> > brings requirements. If your standard requires a 3500sf house instead
> > of a 1800sf house it might also require two incomes. Could you live
> > and be comfortable in the smaller house? Probably but the reality is
> > that you don't want to and thus a requirement for two incomes. Your
> > choice.
>
> Too much of that choice is controlled NOT by you but by the income
> associated with your resources and not that many people can control
> that. The ones that can are the ones in the Forbes "400 richest
> Americans" lists.
>
That just simply isn't true, none of it. We all have choices but few
of us really take advantage of those choices. It is far easier for
most to head to the local ice house for a cold beer than to attend
classes at the local Jr. College.
>
>
> > You want to blame it all on the corporations which are nothing more
> > than people just like you who are trying to do the best they can for
> > themselves. Don't get me wrong, I can't defend the stupid decisions
> > made by the CEO's and directors of many of our corporations but in my
> > 60 years I have also seen the demise of many of those same
> > corporations. They exist in a very competitive world where one
> > mistake can end their existance.
>
> Yeah, but here is my gripe: the executives get a better "safety net"
> and have a better deal in general than the underlings and the
> underlings have zero control over anything. Corporations are,
> basically, dictatorships with a guy basically no different than
> _kings_ or emperors in earlier history except that the wars are
> economic rather than military.
>
I agree with you completely on the golden parachute bull shit but that
is really making a super issue out of the tip of the tip of the
iceburg. The problems in all corporate environments isn't just with
the top but from every level top to bottom. The CEO's are simply the
most visible element but many of the decisions that most effect the
rank and file workers are made at various levels throughout the
organization often without the knowledge of the CEO's. The decision
to layoff and outsource where I was working was made by a mid-level
manager.
>
>
> deleted some b/c no new material
>
>
> > Got laid off 5 years ago as a result of the huge movement of IT jobs
> > offshore and the cutbacks following Y2K. Whined about it for a while
> > but realized that is was a total waste of time and found a new field.
> > Took an initial cut in income but it has been short term and I have
> > recovered.
>
> Good for you, congratulations. But, you might consider telling the
> rest of the guys here more about what you're doing and give some
> tips.
>
Took a temporary position as a Project Manager that led to a position
as Senior Billing Analyst. Both were total departures from my Lead
Systems Designer position that I had been working for years. Found
that the IT field had totally collapsed following the Y2K and dot.com
bust. I could complain that I ran into a lot of age discrimination as
well but the reality was that I had ridden my experience for several
years instead of staying on top of current trends.
The worst part of being out of work in your late 50's or early 60's is
that your network of associates is mostly retired or worse, dead. The
second worst part is that you will find yourself interviewing with
people half your age who don't want to hire you because they are
insecure having someone older and more experienced working for them.
My only choice was to fully exploit my network of former clients and
associates with an open attitude and promote my business experience as
well as my IT experience. I got the position because I was willing to
use my experience, to learn and most important, I was willing to take
responsibility.
> Oh yes, I am not some twenty-something grad from Harvard
>
> > but a non-degreed 61 year old fart.
>
> I would say you were lucky. Out of dozens of stories like yours, most
> of the guys are doing worse than before. Me, I'm 64 and retired and my
> resources cover my expenses.
>
Hell, during the time I was out of work I spent three months working
for $11 per hour shoveling sand in the heat and humidity of Houston to
set the floor in a giant oil storage facility. When not doing that, I
was beating the bushes for something else and taking SAP Training.
(Talk about a waste) There was no luck involved, just plain hard
work.
> And, some of those 20-somethings from Harvard are having a hard time,
> too.
>
Too many of them think that the only thing they had to do was get that
degree and everyone would just automatically beat a path to their
door. Its not what you have but what you do with it.
> > > And, I'm sorry, but re-training is not the answer because we're back
> > > to the applicant-to-job ratio. It does no good to have ten guys
> > > fighting for one job; nine guys are going to go hungry.
>
> > That is a totally pathetic view. I almost fell into the same mindset
> > but that is the view of a loser who wants to blame everyone else for
> > their own failures.
>
> You really have no answer, do you, for the fact that when the number
> of applicants exceed the number of jobs that there will be real losers
> and not because they want to be losers. And, this is why we are seeing
> a lot of programmer/IT guys in the USA ending up bagging groceries at
> Walmart for $8/hour.
>
If those programmer/IT guys were really smart enough to be good at
their jobs, they have the same smarts to learn something new. We are
like the blacksmiths of a hundred years ago, the jobs moved on and we
didn't. Instead we believed all the hype that our profession would
continue to grow and that we were all safe.
> And, that is also an elitist view. You look at the vast majority of
> people anywhere in the world who are born in poverty and ignorance and
> all of the demographic studies will show that your _chances_ of
> getting out of that are near zero, or very low. Most of the kids that
> really do have a _chance_ are the ones coming out of typically middle
> class backgrounds or above.
>
I am not talking about those people, they don't have the options that
we have and that is clear. What is also clear is that they are
starting to climb the ecnomic ladder and as they do, they are
threatening those of us who chose to climb up a few rungs on the
ladder and then rest for the remainder of our life.
> Most of us would still be crawling on our hands
>
> > and knees if we had taken the same attitude when learning to walk.
>
> The fact of the matter is that out of a clutch of young birds just out
> of the egg, a few will fall out of the nest before they learn to fly,
> and a few of those will fall into the mouths of predators waiting on
> the ground for them with their mouths open.
>
If not for that, the predators would starve. Its called natural
selection.
> > Why is it that as adults we suddenly believe that we can no longer
> > learn something new?
>
> It takes more than ability to learn something new to actually learn
> something new.-
You are right about that, it takes a willing attitude as well. The
real problem is that most of us really don't want to be forced to
learn something new.
BobR
> > you are the employer. Should YOU be forced to hire without the
> > ability to determine who and without having a choice of how much to
> > pay? Is every employer a Robber-Baron
>
> Examples include: all the companies that did mass layoffs to offshore
> their jobs, all the companies that did employee "replacement" projects
> (local guy trains cheap immigrants), all of the companies that did
> arbitrary wage reductions (this happened in the 1870s in the USA and
> caused mass strikes...its in the history books). And, all the
> companies that do bad things to employees not because they are having
> difficulties but to increase an already adequate net profit bottom
> line (one WSJ article listed many companies that had good profit
> reports but the executives were only interested in more and so
> initiated draconian further pressures on employees).
>
Hey, I was working at one of those corporations that did mass layoffs
and outsourced a substantial amount of work. I didn't like it one bit
and still don't, but I can also understand the business decisions that
made it almost impossible for the company to do anything else. They
are in competition on a global basis and in order to survive, they
must remain competitive on a global basis. I am not so naive as to
believe that my job, no matter how good I might be at it, can't be
done by someone else far cheaper. It might take two or three Indians
to do it but when they earn less than 10% of what I earned, it still
remains a huge bargain for the corporation.
> No, not every corporation is a robber-baron, but a lot of them are,
> and a lot of them do as much bad as they do good and it would have to
> be a separate discussion to go into this tangent in detail.
>
> and if so what would you do if
>
> > there were no employers?
>
> We'd be in the hunter-gatherer days.
>
>
We really still are, we are just hunting a different game. The
problem is that the vast majority of people would starve to death if
we returned to the "hunter-gatherer" days of the past.
>
> deleted some
>
> > > > What you describe is text book theory, that is the way it should
> > > > work, but that is if everyone competes on a level playing field.
> > > > I am concerned that the many will want to deregulate to the
> > > > point that the US regulations are like Mexico's. in order to help
> > > > the economy. People will justify children working because 3
> > > > incomes is better than 2. The downside is an eroded standard
> > > > of living.
>
> > The standard of living that you desire is your choice but that choice
> > brings requirements. If your standard requires a 3500sf house instead
> > of a 1800sf house it might also require two incomes. Could you live
> > and be comfortable in the smaller house? Probably but the reality is
> > that you don't want to and thus a requirement for two incomes. Your
> > choice.
>
> Too much of that choice is controlled NOT by you but by the income
> associated with your resources and not that many people can control
> that. The ones that can are the ones in the Forbes "400 richest
> Americans" lists.
>
That just simply isn't true, none of it. We all have choices but few
of us really take advantage of those choices. It is far easier for
most to head to the local ice house for a cold beer than to attend
classes at the local Jr. College.
>
>
> > You want to blame it all on the corporations which are nothing more
> > than people just like you who are trying to do the best they can for
> > themselves. Don't get me wrong, I can't defend the stupid decisions
> > made by the CEO's and directors of many of our corporations but in my
> > 60 years I have also seen the demise of many of those same
> > corporations. They exist in a very competitive world where one
> > mistake can end their existance.
>
> Yeah, but here is my gripe: the executives get a better "safety net"
> and have a better deal in general than the underlings and the
> underlings have zero control over anything. Corporations are,
> basically, dictatorships with a guy basically no different than
> _kings_ or emperors in earlier history except that the wars are
> economic rather than military.
>
I agree with you completely on the golden parachute bull shit but that
is really making a super issue out of the tip of the tip of the
iceburg. The problems in all corporate environments isn't just with
the top but from every level top to bottom. The CEO's are simply the
most visible element but many of the decisions that most effect the
rank and file workers are made at various levels throughout the
organization often without the knowledge of the CEO's. The decision
to layoff and outsource where I was working was made by a mid-level
manager.
>
>
> deleted some b/c no new material
>
>
> > Got laid off 5 years ago as a result of the huge movement of IT jobs
> > offshore and the cutbacks following Y2K. Whined about it for a while
> > but realized that is was a total waste of time and found a new field.
> > Took an initial cut in income but it has been short term and I have
> > recovered.
>
> Good for you, congratulations. But, you might consider telling the
> rest of the guys here more about what you're doing and give some
> tips.
>
Took a temporary position as a Project Manager that led to a position
as Senior Billing Analyst. Both were total departures from my Lead
Systems Designer position that I had been working for years. Found
that the IT field had totally collapsed following the Y2K and dot.com
bust. I could complain that I ran into a lot of age discrimination as
well but the reality was that I had ridden my experience for several
years instead of staying on top of current trends.
The worst part of being out of work in your late 50's or early 60's is
that your network of associates is mostly retired or worse, dead. The
second worst part is that you will find yourself interviewing with
people half your age who don't want to hire you because they are
insecure having someone older and more experienced working for them.
My only choice was to fully exploit my network of former clients and
associates with an open attitude and promote my business experience as
well as my IT experience. I got the position because I was willing to
use my experience, to learn and most important, I was willing to take
responsibility.
> Oh yes, I am not some twenty-something grad from Harvard
>
> > but a non-degreed 61 year old fart.
>
> I would say you were lucky. Out of dozens of stories like yours, most
> of the guys are doing worse than before. Me, I'm 64 and retired and my
> resources cover my expenses.
>
Hell, during the time I was out of work I spent three months working
for $11 per hour shoveling sand in the heat and humidity of Houston to
set the floor in a giant oil storage facility. When not doing that, I
was beating the bushes for something else and taking SAP Training.
(Talk about a waste) There was no luck involved, just plain hard
work.
> And, some of those 20-somethings from Harvard are having a hard time,
> too.
>
Too many of them think that the only thing they had to do was get that
degree and everyone would just automatically beat a path to their
door. Its not what you have but what you do with it.
> > > And, I'm sorry, but re-training is not the answer because we're back
> > > to the applicant-to-job ratio. It does no good to have ten guys
> > > fighting for one job; nine guys are going to go hungry.
>
> > That is a totally pathetic view. I almost fell into the same mindset
> > but that is the view of a loser who wants to blame everyone else for
> > their own failures.
>
> You really have no answer, do you, for the fact that when the number
> of applicants exceed the number of jobs that there will be real losers
> and not because they want to be losers. And, this is why we are seeing
> a lot of programmer/IT guys in the USA ending up bagging groceries at
> Walmart for $8/hour.
>
If those programmer/IT guys were really smart enough to be good at
their jobs, they have the same smarts to learn something new. We are
like the blacksmiths of a hundred years ago, the jobs moved on and we
didn't. Instead we believed all the hype that our profession would
continue to grow and that we were all safe.
> And, that is also an elitist view. You look at the vast majority of
> people anywhere in the world who are born in poverty and ignorance and
> all of the demographic studies will show that your _chances_ of
> getting out of that are near zero, or very low. Most of the kids that
> really do have a _chance_ are the ones coming out of typically middle
> class backgrounds or above.
>
I am not talking about those people, they don't have the options that
we have and that is clear. What is also clear is that they are
starting to climb the ecnomic ladder and as they do, they are
threatening those of us who chose to climb up a few rungs on the
ladder and then rest for the remainder of our life.
> Most of us would still be crawling on our hands
>
> > and knees if we had taken the same attitude when learning to walk.
>
> The fact of the matter is that out of a clutch of young birds just out
> of the egg, a few will fall out of the nest before they learn to fly,
> and a few of those will fall into the mouths of predators waiting on
> the ground for them with their mouths open.
>
If not for that, the predators would starve. Its called natural
selection.
> > Why is it that as adults we suddenly believe that we can no longer
> > learn something new?
>
> It takes more than ability to learn something new to actually learn
BobR
> In recent times, you are mostly right. Failure has to be defined. Some
> stories indicate partial success in some areas (Nicaragua, Cuba) but
> depend on criteria and I would ask if the USA did not do everything to
> inhibit these societies by economic sanctions that they might do
> better.
>
standard of living for the majority is far below what we consider to
be the poverty levels in this country.
> In historical times, the Inca empire (1250-1500 AD) was for 250 years
> a successful stable socialist economy and it ended when the
> conquistadors came (it was warfare, not peaceful commercial
> competition that ended the Inca empire).
>
Even during the Inca empire there were a few very rich who dominated
the people and the remainder served them.
> There is also a history of a few socialist experiments going back
> several thousand years in China but what caused them to end were
> natural disasters like floods and earthquakes.
>
> My "take" on all of this is that "robber-baron" processes will, in the
> end, lead the domination any civilization regardless of what label you
> use to describe it.
>
>
> > If you measure success by all but the elite leadership sharing in the
> > equal misery as being good, you are more than welcome to it.
>
> > We can agree that tax-dodging isn't right but the use of taxes for
> > redistributing wealth is total bullshit. Taxation should be for the
> > sole purpose of providing protection and infrastructure for the common
> > use of all, not for redistribution of wealth.
>
> So, you think we should just let the rich become infinitely rich? and
> powerful?
>
Infinitely is a very vague and undefined term but when you look at the
history of the "infinitely" rich you will find some interesting
contrasts. Take two of today's richest in the world as examples.
Warren Buffet and Bill Gates are consistantly on the worlds top when
it comes to wealth. Both are clearly rich by any measure but both are
also responsible for forming organizations that employ hundreds of
thousands of people around the world. Both are also major
contributors to various world causes to benefit those who can not help
themselves. Buffet has already setup a trust fund that will funnel
his vast wealth into those causes when he dies. Gates is also
involved in some of the same causes and is using his wealth for good.
They are not alone either.
> Do you not see that this process is leaving greater proportions of the
> world's population more impoverished? Most of the new studies are
> showing this. The bottom half of India/China's population is no better
> off now than 20 years ago and some are worse off.
>
I see a world population that is growing far too fast for anything to
keep a large majority of that population from being impoverished. I
also see that setting up a protectionist government to protect our own
will NOT help end that. If we were not outsourcing jobs to India and
in the process helping build the economy of India, what do you thing
would be the result? Instead of the bottom half being impoverished,
it might instead be the bottom 90%.
>
>
> deleted b/c no new discussion
>
> > > The pursuit of happiness
>
> > > > mentioned in the Constitution is not a guarantee of achiement or an
> > > > equality of results, only the opportunity to try.
>
> > > Brilliant observation.
>
> > Thank you, I know. <BG> Unfortunately it is an observation too often
> > ignored.
>
> Fine, but the Consititution was written in simpler times and now with
> a whole lot of laws and enforcement agencies out there, and more
> complicated ways to live (and steal), the Constitution, by itself,
> might not be enough.
>
Maybe not but right now...it is the best we have and we better protect
it.
>
> All I said was about your "opportunities" statement. If a guy wants to
> take YOUR opportunity to be a crook, what are you going to do about
> it? Oh, excuse me, but there are a lot of guys out there who consider
> themselves _free_ to do anything they want and a lot of other guys who
> think _freedom_ somehow includes moral, ethical, legal behavior in
> there somewhere.- Hide quoted text -
The one thing that I have been a long term believer in is that along
with every right and freedom outlined in our constitution there is an
implied responsibility that goes along with it. We seem all to eager
to claim all of our rights but shuck all of our responsibilities. No,
we don't have the freedom to do anything we want and must take the
responsibility for the moral, ethical, and legal behavior as an
integral part.
BobR
> > Hey, we are at least in total agreement on one thing...lotteries. On
> > the other hand, if you are stupid enough to waste your money on a
> > lottery who am I or anyone else to say you can't. It goes back to the
> > basic freedom to pursue happiness.
>
> > We might also agree on robber-barons if you can name a real life
> > example of one in our current US population.
>
> Bill Gates made at least half his money by the creation of a monopoly
> in which he also destroyed most of his competition.
>
Damn, we think too much alike. Gates was also the first name that
came to mind when I thought about the title robber-baron and God knows
that I dislike that SOB about as much as any human on earth. On the
other hand, I can't totally agree that he was a robber-baron either.
Gates was an opportunist that essentially saw what the public wanted
and gave it to them. He is probably the worst example because his
product was not something that was a life and death product. We
didn't have to buy his operating system or anything else from him, we
chose to.
I go back in the business far enough to have been deeply involved with
the IBM Monopoly of the 60's and 70's. I thought the same of IBM at
the time but looking back the monopoly by IBM was only partly IBM's
doing and much more a stupid follow the leader mentality that said if
you picked anything but IBM, it was your job on the line. Microsoft
became a monopoly on the same mentality.
> Back some 10 years ago, Archer-Daniels-Midland was caught by the FTC
> in price fixing. Also, Ucars was also caught by the FTC in price
> fixing. Various guys in the Enron-Andersen fiascos were playing robber-
> baron.
>
> I could list the Ivan Boesky's, Michael Milkins, and many others, and
> give you many book titles if you want to read how we've had many
> robber-barons, going right back to Standard Oil times with Rockefeller
> and the others who did a lot of damage along, simultaneously, with all
> of their development of modern society.
>
I agree that all did some damage along the way but all also made
contributions along the way that actually were a benefit to our life
today. Even Gates, who I despise, has led to many positives along
with the negatives. Without a company like Microsoft, would the
personal computer revolution have come as far as it has? We will
never know but I doubt it.
> Recently, I've done a lot of reading about the kings, kingdoms,
> barons, and serfs in medieval England, back 500-1000-1500 years ago,
> and even in Mesopotamia 3000 years ago. Same basic deal: how a small
> number of guys parasitize a large number of underling serfs/peasants
> for monetary gain, power gain, and also get the underlings to bleed
> and die in wars.- Hide quoted text -
>
There will always be those who exploit for personal gain. It doesn't
have to be a robber-baron to do so, it happens at all levels.
maxw...@my-deja.com
> > > > > What you describe is text book theory, that is the way it should
> > > > > work, but that is if everyone competes on a level playing field.
> > > > > I am concerned that the many will want to deregulate to the
> > > > > point that the US regulations are like Mexico's. in order to help
> > > > > the economy. People will justify children working because 3
> > > > > incomes is better than 2. The downside is an eroded standard
> > > > > of living.
>
> > > The standard of living that you desire is your choice but that choice
> > > brings requirements. If your standard requires a 3500sf house instead
> > > of a 1800sf house it might also require two incomes. Could you live
> > > and be comfortable in the smaller house? Probably but the reality is
> > > that you don't want to and thus a requirement for two incomes. Your
> > > choice.
My goodness why such a presumptuous statement? I gave no reason
for anyone to think anything of the sort. My guess is this is the way
you think, not about society but about yourself. I am concerned
about other people, the idiots and those that suffer at hands of
the idiots. Myself I don't want to become a victim of other peoples
crimes or a victim of their stupidity. Hence the need for a solid
educational system and an economy that doesn't abandon its
workers.
>
> It is also obvious from your arguments that you are yet another
> formally educated elitist who looks down your brown nose at everyone
> else. No, I don’t have a “degree” but don’t confuse the absence of a
> degree with a lack of education or worse the lack of ability. I have
> had a lot of you elitist “Formal Educated” and degreed morons work for
> me over the last 40 years. Most of them have spent far more time out
> of work and looking for jobs than I have during that time too. A lot
> of them are just like you, they whine and cry about their jobs going
> offshore and like you they either think they are too good to retrain
> or that they shouldn’t have to.
There you go making presumptuous statements again. You don't know
anything about me yet you say mouthful. My job hasn't gone
offshore and I am not crying. You don't know a thing about me
but from what you describe about your own little experience that
life has taught you, you haven't seen shit son. I will clue you on
this; once you really have to go through rough times and tough
experiences then you stop thinking so much about yourself
and you consider the needs of others much more. And from
what you volunteered, that description clearly doesn't fit you.
The Trucker
I do not want to spend my time reviewing past atrocities and whining about
what might have been. I want to re-establish the control of the American
people over their runaway government. That happens at the bottom. Not at
the top. It is _OUR_ House of Representatives and the House is the true
seat of power in our Constitutional government. Monopoly privilege is a
purchase privilege and it can only be purchased where power is isolated
from the majority. The Senate of the United States is, in all likelihood,
the most corrupt legislative body on planet earth. The House of
Representatives can have and should have much more influence on the
membership of that body; not in direct control or appointment but through
the voices of the people as pronounced and amplified by our
representatives in the House. The key to proper government is this
relationship between the true representatives of the people in the House
of Representatives and the common people as defined by the Constitution.
Until the House of Representatives represents the people, as opposed to
the Party and the Lobby, we will make no progress.
http://GreaterVoice.org/extend
Stray Dog
Hey guys, lets get back to substance instead of back-biting.
> No, I don’t have a “degree” but don’t confuse the absence of a
> degree with a lack of education or worse the lack of ability. I have
> had a lot of you elitist “Formal Educated” and degreed morons work for
> me over the last 40 years.
And, there are a lot of non-formal-educated guys who are blind and
clueless, too.
Most of them have spent far more time out
> of work and looking for jobs than I have during that time too. A lot
> of them are just like you, they whine and cry about their jobs going
> offshore and like you they either think they are too good to retrain
> or that they shouldn’t have to.
I think if we take a thousand guys with their bare hands and put them
up against one guy with a mini-gun (gatling variety, 50 rounds per
second), I'll bet that the guy with the mini-gun wins. In today's
world, the many underlings are up against a few CEOs and the CEOs sign
the checks and what do the underlings have? Bricks and stones?
The Trucker
The mentality is perverse. Over the last 100 years the economics
"profession" has been a stalking horse for the rich to a greater extent
than ever before. The installment of "the firm" and the "entrepreneur"
as the horn of plenty from which all good flows has been a mask to hide
the despots that control money and natural resource rights.
If "the firm" serves only the owners of the means of production with no
regard for the benefit of the greater society then what good is "the firm"
to that greater society? Much of the profits realized from shortchanging
the American society through outsourcing of jobs to foreign societies must
be captured and redistributed if the gains from "comparative advantage"
are to be realized by those other than the current owners.
It is a fine thing to say that the current owners deserve to profit from
their self serving intelligent actions. But the current "share" of the
gains from such actions to those who are disenfranchising the most of us
in their lust for more power and wealth is simply too great. And the
proper cure for this malady is, in fact, a greater degree of (Martha! Hide
the Kids) socialism. In this we do not speak of state ownership of the
means of production. Nor do we speak of a "command economy" as opposed
to a market economy. We refer instead to the state providing better
social insurance systems and perhaps more control of the elected
government over the Financial industry. This is a chicken and egg sort of
change in that the current government is corrupt and so the defense will
say that only a crazy man would want to give the corrupt government more
control. The "crazy man" would agree. The fix starts at the action
described at my web site (follow the link in my signature).
We got where we are through the deliberate destruction of our democratic
institutions.
Stray Dog
> On Fri, 16 May 2008 05:24:50 -0700, Stray Dog wrote:
> > On May 15, 12:33 pm, The Trucker <mik...@verizon.net> wrote:
> >> On Thu, 15 May 2008 07:18:17 -0700, BobR wrote:
> >> > On May 15, 8:22 am, Stray Dog <straydog2...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > deleted...
>
> >> > Ok, you posed a question earlier now let me pose a question to you and
> >> > the rest of the participants.
>
>
I could throw in a few other factors but I don't want to present
myself as one of those "elitist" economists.
(a lot of them are full of crap, too).
> > The
> >> removal of government is not the answer. The control of government by the
> >> common people as well as the rich _IS_.
>
> > Other answer: convince the rich that money, more money, and even more
> > money is not a good goal.
>
> That is not an achievable objective.
I beg and petition to differ. I have been also been paying attention
to philanthropic trends and some of these guys actually do have
feelings for the powerless/broke people in the world. Warren Buffet,
for example, has made many public statements in recent years to that
effect. Bill Gates, in his old age, might be feeling a bit guilty over
his earlier robber-baronism since he's trying to spend some money on
good causes. Mary Astor and Leona Helmsley (both recently died) were
compared for their styles of giving to charity before they died in
some magazine and it was a big deal for me. There _are_ some sensitive
rich people out there. Then, we have the Walton family (survivors
worth $100 bil, by the way) and the cheapest, chintziest low
cheapskates of all studied: they gave away less than one percent of
their wealth and out of the top 100-200 that were studied, there were
a lot of rich guys who were giving away 10-20-even 50% of their
booty.
So, you can't say what you said.
You may as well tell that bull that
> you don't like what he is doing to that cow.
That's beyond the scope of this post.
> > I would highly recommend a better
> >> understanding of the purported goals of the United States Government at
> >> its inception.
>
> > There are a few books out there that indicate the goals of the USA
> > were not much different than anyone else: power, expansion,
> > development, etc.
>
> I rather like just reading the actual history and making my own
> analysis of why people did what they did.
Well, two responses to that. i) just ask where the money/power ended
up and how that happened, and ii) lots of history depends on who you
read. I can provide titles.
Their actions typically give us
> a clue as to what they were trying to accomplish. And to be sure, all of
> those things (power, etc) were considered in the birth of the USA. I will
> even admit that the "founding fathers" were primarily plutocrats at heart
> and that they wanted some sort of nobility to form here in the United
> States just as it was in Europe.
Bingo, bingo, bingo. Or were you reading Charles Beard's book "The
Economic Interpretation of the Constitution"? Where, yes, the robber-
barons really were writing our constitution to benefit the robber-
barons, right from the beginings?
And, by the way, this is a very hot debate in certain circles in
history.
Most of the people that created the
> United States Constitution saw themselves and their descendants as BEING
> that nobility and deserving of that role due to their knowledge and
> intellect.
And, that "imperitive" really got cranked up in the early 1900s and I
can provide a reference for that, too.
> But there is another side to this coin and that was the need to "sell"
> that contract to the people. The "founders" had to play "lets make a
> a deal" and there were certain things that they had to "give up" in order
> to get the Constitution ratified. And the point I am making here is that
> the US Constitution was a "deal" between those that wrote the rules and
> those who accepted the rules. Madison himself stated that the "intent" of
> the founders was secondary to understanding of those that ratified; that
> the Constitution derives its power from the consent of the governed. That
> was true then and it is true now.
Yeah, but it all gets wiped out at the electoral college level, AND
the fact that we elect senators and representatives who then, THEY not
us, go on and write the laws, etc. We underlings really don't get to
do anything except chose the lessor of evils every 2-4 years.
> To understand Constitutionality or to understand what America _IS_ one
> must actually read and appreciate the actual history of the ratification.
I think this is important and I thank you for pointing it out.
However, I think a lot of what is in the Constitution is subverted by
the presence of monetary power out there, corruption, high-powered
lawyers, and all kinds of manipulative infrastructures designed to
gain power over underlings.
> I hope I make a very small contribution to that understanding at:
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Article_The_First
>
> and
>
> http://www.greatervoice.org/extend/Madison.php
>
> <<< deletia >>>
>
> Regardless of what evil lurked in the soul of James Madison, his actions
> are indicative of what he was "selling" to the American people. And it
> seems impossible to misinterpret Federalist 55 through Federalist 58 on
> the subject of "representation" for the people in their government.
OK, just look at Gerrymandering and tell me that was done to benefit
the people?
> There is no silver bullet that can be fired at the heart of despotism, no
> wooden stake to be plunged into the heart of such malice, that will
> arrest and confine such evil over time. Vigilance is the price of
> freedom and liberty and we must constantly guard against the forces of
> aristocracy and plutocracy
Or...the Nazi seizure of power in 1933.
or they will, in fact, have their way. We have
> failed in our responsibility to prevent the deterioration of our freedoms
> and our liberty.
John Strachey said once that if you can organize ten men, then you can
control a hundred. Well, sometimes. Or...you can fool enough of the
people enough of the time.
That failure happened very early on with the failure
> of the very first constitutional amendment and manifested itself in 1921
> when the House of Representatives failed to reapportion the House in
> respect of a very steep rise in population and the shift of population
> from rural to urban. This, according to many, was a Constitutional breach.
> But we failed even more certainly when we allowed the Congress to limit
> the representation to only 425 members in 1929.
Here is another problem: In most if not all of Latin America, most of
the constitutions of those governments were patterned after the US
Constitution. What was the problem? Those constitutions were never
enforced.
Look what we have today: The Supreme Court actually making laws. An
unelected body of "powerful" people.
Stray Dog
Well, we are in disagreement. The guy with more money has that much
more options. When we're talking millions to billions, its infinitely
more options.
> We all have choices but few
> of us really take advantage of those choices.
You use the word choice as if behind every choice is a viable job. In
fact, the only thing behind every choice is nothing more than a
strategy for a job-hunting operation. Like the hunter-gatherer days,
if there was no saber-toothed tiger to bring down that day, nobody ate
dinner that night.
It is far easier for
> most to head to the local ice house for a cold beer than to attend
> classes at the local Jr. College.
>
Sure, I agree that there are a lot of lazy, unresourceful people
around.
>
> > Yeah, but here is my gripe: the executives get a better "safety net"
> > and have a better deal in general than the underlings and the
> > underlings have zero control over anything. Corporations are,
> > basically, dictatorships with a guy basically no different than
> > _kings_ or emperors in earlier history except that the wars are
> > economic rather than military.
>
> I agree with you completely on the golden parachute bull shit but that
> is really making a super issue out of the tip of the tip of the
> iceburg. The problems in all corporate environments isn't just with
> the top but from every level top to bottom. The CEO's are simply the
> most visible element but many of the decisions that most effect the
> rank and file workers are made at various levels throughout the
> organization often without the knowledge of the CEO's. The decision
> to layoff and outsource where I was working was made by a mid-level
> manager.
Yeah, but its all part of the same problem:too much of your life is
NOT under YOUR control. AND, its YOU that is inconvenienced by the
unemployment dumped on your head not because you did anything wrong.
>
> > deleted some b/c no new material
>
> > > Got laid off 5 years ago as a result of the huge movement of IT jobs
> > > offshore and the cutbacks following Y2K. Whined about it for a while
> > > but realized that is was a total waste of time and found a new field.
> > > Took an initial cut in income but it has been short term and I have
> > > recovered.
>
> > Good for you, congratulations. But, you might consider telling the
> > rest of the guys here more about what you're doing and give some
> > tips.
>
> Took a temporary position as a Project Manager that led to a position
> as Senior Billing Analyst. Both were total departures from my Lead
> Systems Designer position that I had been working for years. Found
> that the IT field had totally collapsed following the Y2K and dot.com
> bust. I could complain that I ran into a lot of age discrimination as
> well but the reality was that I had ridden my experience for several
> years instead of staying on top of current trends.
>
> The worst part of being out of work in your late 50's or early 60's is
> that your network of associates is mostly retired or worse, dead.
Yes, true, but I'll go beyond that. Worst part is having a hundred
other applications for that one job and ten of those guys are as good
as you, or better, and they are younger, too.
The
> second worst part is that you will find yourself interviewing with
> people half your age who don't want to hire you because they are
> insecure having someone older and more experienced working for them.
So, they do hire the younger guys for a second reason: they can be
paid less than you.
> My only choice was to fully exploit my network of former clients and
> associates with an open attitude and promote my business experience as
> well as my IT experience. I got the position because I was willing to
> use my experience, to learn and most important, I was willing to take
> responsibility.
But it does not work for everyone.
> > Oh yes, I am not some twenty-something grad from Harvard
>
> > > but a non-degreed 61 year old fart.
>
> > I would say you were lucky. Out of dozens of stories like yours, most
> > of the guys are doing worse than before. Me, I'm 64 and retired and my
> > resources cover my expenses.
>
> Hell, during the time I was out of work I spent three months working
> for $11 per hour shoveling sand in the heat and humidity of Houston to
> set the floor in a giant oil storage facility.
Hey, I'm proud of you. Seriously. You did good.
When not doing that, I
> was beating the bushes for something else and taking SAP Training.
> (Talk about a waste) There was no luck involved, just plain hard
> work.
I wish I could talk to the guys who hired you to see what they saw (or
didn't see) in the guys they didn't hire.
And, I've hired guys to work for me, too. Most had degrees, too, and I
myself have two degrees. I was even incorporated for 12 years, made
myself president, hired my wife as vice-president. Sent in my IRS form
1120-A every year with net earnings, too. Did not use a CPA and saved
money. Disolved the corporation this year (IRS form 966) to go farther
into retirement.
> > And, some of those 20-somethings from Harvard are having a hard time,
> > too.
>
> Too many of them think that the only thing they had to do was get that
> degree and everyone would just automatically beat a path to their
> door. Its not what you have but what you do with it.
Not altogether. If you have ten guys around a fishing pond with five
fish in it, then five guys (maybe more) are going to have no dinner
that night).
> > > > And, I'm sorry, but re-training is not the answer because we're back
> > > > to the applicant-to-job ratio. It does no good to have ten guys
> > > > fighting for one job; nine guys are going to go hungry.
>
> > > That is a totally pathetic view. I almost fell into the same mindset
> > > but that is the view of a loser who wants to blame everyone else for
> > > their own failures.
>
> > You really have no answer, do you, for the fact that when the number
> > of applicants exceed the number of jobs that there will be real losers
> > and not because they want to be losers. And, this is why we are seeing
> > a lot of programmer/IT guys in the USA ending up bagging groceries at
> > Walmart for $8/hour.
>
> If those programmer/IT guys were really smart enough to be good at
> their jobs, they have the same smarts to learn something new.
I have to ask WHY is it OK for CEOs to _force_ innocent underlings to
learn something new when, at least up to the time they were laid off,
they were working and getting paid what they were due, and the CEOs
did not have to do anything except put their signature on a memorandum
(which does not require any learning or time or money or anything).
And, the other part of the question is WHY do we just forget the
underlings, among which there will be a failure rate in getting a job
in alternative training, and that will be because there are less jobs
in the new field and more guys chasing those jobs, so the losers will
be greater than before.
So, the CEOs get the guarantees (golden parachutes, bonuses, packages)
and the underlings get the shaft. Where is the justice in that?
We are
> like the blacksmiths of a hundred years ago, the jobs moved on and we
> didn't. Instead we believed all the hype that our profession would
> continue to grow and that we were all safe.
>
> > And, that is also an elitist view. You look at the vast majority of
> > people anywhere in the world who are born in poverty and ignorance and
> > all of the demographic studies will show that your _chances_ of
> > getting out of that are near zero, or very low. Most of the kids that
> > really do have a _chance_ are the ones coming out of typically middle
> > class backgrounds or above.
>
> I am not talking about those people, they don't have the options that
> we have and that is clear.
Well, then, are they just going to be victims and you have no answers
for them?
What is also clear is that they are
> starting to climb the ecnomic ladder and as they do, they are
> threatening those of us who chose to climb up a few rungs on the
> ladder and then rest for the remainder of our life.
And, I'm asking why is it that we have a mindset that says "OK, some
are going to be winners (and everything is OK) and some are going to
be losers (and we're going to not talk about them at all, or care
about what happened to them)?
Its the same moral problem as in wars over all of history: the guys
with the swords kill the guys without, and we don't ask whether this
is good or bad, and even more, don't even talk about whether it might
be good to prevent this from happening in the future.
Swords? How about just plain crooks and criminals that take guns into
banks and shoot the tellers and customers and take the money?
> > Most of us would still be crawling on our hands
>
> > > and knees if we had taken the same attitude when learning to walk.
>
> > The fact of the matter is that out of a clutch of young birds just out
> > of the egg, a few will fall out of the nest before they learn to fly,
> > and a few of those will fall into the mouths of predators waiting on
> > the ground for them with their mouths open.
>
> If not for that, the predators would starve. Its called natural
> selection.
So, then, its OK with you if people get kicked into the sewer,
involuntarily, and its OK if predators live by this method? Or, did
you just mean to say "shit happens and so what?"
> > > Why is it that as adults we suddenly believe that we can no longer
> > > learn something new?
>
> > It takes more than ability to learn something new to actually learn
> > something new.-
>
> You are right about that, it takes a willing attitude as well. The
> real problem is that most of us really don't want to be forced to
> learn something new.
Fine, I see two aspects of this: Yes, people need to be willing to
learn something new, but, No, why should a bunch of people (the
underlings) be forced to learn something new by a few (CEOs) simply
because the net result might be to make a few (CEOs and stockholders)
richer and a bunch of guye (the underlings) poorer?
Stray Dog
> > > Hey, we are at least in total agreement on one thing...lotteries. On
> > > the other hand, if you are stupid enough to waste your money on a
> > > lottery who am I or anyone else to say you can't. It goes back to the
> > > basic freedom to pursue happiness.
>
> > > We might also agree on robber-barons if you can name a real life
> > > example of one in our current US population.
>
> > Bill Gates made at least half his money by the creation of a monopoly
> > in which he also destroyed most of his competition.
>
> Damn, we think too much alike.
Hey, three cheers for us. :-) !!!!
Gates was also the first name that
> came to mind when I thought about the title robber-baron and God knows
> that I dislike that SOB about as much as any human on earth.
Well, we could throw in some venom for Hitler, Stalin, Napoleon,
Ghengis Khan, etc., etc., too.
On the
> other hand, I can't totally agree that he was a robber-baron either.
> Gates was an opportunist that essentially saw what the public wanted
> and gave it to them. He is probably the worst example because his
> product was not something that was a life and death product. We
> didn't have to buy his operating system or anything else from him, we
> chose to.
Fine, I use MS SW most of the time (spent a lot of time with Linux,
some with BSD and OS/2 [=big IBM disaster, but MS was hired to do some
and they deliberately sabotaged IBM, too]). But, MS did all kinds of
really dirty tricks to everyone. I can name many. Most of the old
timers know this.
And, I don't like monopolists and other "anti-competitive" business
practices that are in business history. Give me honest competition and
that's good capitalism. But the dirty tricks are out there and there
are very many books about it.
> I go back in the business far enough to have been deeply involved with
> the IBM Monopoly of the 60's and 70's. I thought the same of IBM at
> the time but looking back the monopoly by IBM was only partly IBM's
> doing and much more a stupid follow the leader mentality that said if
> you picked anything but IBM, it was your job on the line.
I have the notion that when guys get too big for their britches, then
they start confusing themselves with gods. Happened to Alexander the
Great. Human psychology phenonmenon.
Microsoft
> became a monopoly on the same mentality.
>
> > Back some 10 years ago, Archer-Daniels-Midland was caught by the FTC
> > in price fixing. Also, Ucars was also caught by the FTC in price
> > fixing. Various guys in the Enron-Andersen fiascos were playing robber-
> > baron.
>
> > I could list the Ivan Boesky's, Michael Milkins, and many others, and
> > give you many book titles if you want to read how we've had many
> > robber-barons, going right back to Standard Oil times with Rockefeller
> > and the others who did a lot of damage along, simultaneously, with all
> > of their development of modern society.
>
> I agree that all did some damage along the way but all also made
> contributions along the way that actually were a benefit to our life
> today.
I fully agree. If you want a car, then there has to be a car factory
and that means big bucks and big staff and that does not come together
spontaneously or very quickly. They are finding that out in China
right now, too. They got over 100 car factory brands, just like in the
USA back 100 years ago. In the end, there will probably be three over
there, too, plus whatever foreign brands survive.
> Even Gates, who I despise, has led to many positives along
> with the negatives.
Fine, I have a wee little bit less venom for him since he donated a
bunch of money to his foundation and at least he has not built big
obscene yachts like Larry Ellison has.
Without a company like Microsoft, would the
> personal computer revolution have come as far as it has?
Look at Linux. If it were given the same chance. Even better, look at
BSD.
We will
> never know but I doubt it.
I gave my vote just above.
> > Recently, I've done a lot of reading about the kings, kingdoms,
> > barons, and serfs in medieval England, back 500-1000-1500 years ago,
> > and even in Mesopotamia 3000 years ago. Same basic deal: how a small
> > number of guys parasitize a large number of underling serfs/peasants
> > for monetary gain, power gain, and also get the underlings to bleed
> > and die in wars.- Hide quoted text -
>
> There will always be those who exploit for personal gain. It doesn't
> have to be a robber-baron to do so, it happens at all levels.
Well, I don't care if you steal pensils at work or make xeroxes of
dirty jokes, but if you lay off 20,000 guys who bring food home to
another 30,000 human beings and tell them "We can find cheap flesh
someplace so we at the top can get big bonuses and upvalued stock
optione" then I'm gonna have unkind thoughts for you.
Ever read "Barbarians at the Gate" all about Ross Johnson and RJR
Nabisco? Biggest LBO of the last 20 years and did a tremendous amount
of damage for nothing.
The Trucker
I can say whatever I want. And so can you. But I want to be very clear in
my position: I do not want to be a part of a society that is dependent
upon the philanthropic actions of the nobility. The citing of members of
the nobility who, in your opinion, are philanthropists is not sufficient
in convincing me that rule by the nobility is a good idea. Your basic
position is "conservative" and mine is not.
> You may as well tell that bull that
>> you don't like what he is doing to that cow.
>
> That's beyond the scope of this post.
It was an analogy. You cannot alter the ego of the rich.
>> > I would highly recommend a better
>> >> understanding of the purported goals of the United States Government at
>> >> its inception.
>>
>> > There are a few books out there that indicate the goals of the USA
>> > were not much different than anyone else: power, expansion,
>> > development, etc.
>>
>> I rather like just reading the actual history and making my own
>> analysis of why people did what they did.
>
> Well, two responses to that. i) just ask where the money/power ended
> up and how that happened, and ii) lots of history depends on who you
> read. I can provide titles.
The Federalist and Anti-Federalist papers are not "interpretations". The
speeches and correspondence of Madison and Jefferson are not
"interpretations".
>> Their actions typically give us
>> a clue as to what they were trying to accomplish. And to be sure, all of
>> those things (power, etc) were considered in the birth of the USA. I will
>> even admit that the "founding fathers" were primarily plutocrats at heart
>> and that they wanted some sort of nobility to form here in the United
>> States just as it was in Europe.
>
> Bingo, bingo, bingo. Or were you reading Charles Beard's book "The
> Economic Interpretation of the Constitution"? Where, yes, the robber-
> barons really were writing our constitution to benefit the robber-
> barons, right from the beginings?
I try not to read the interpretations of others, thanks. My stuff comes
right out of the pipe.
> And, by the way, this is a very hot debate in certain circles in
> history.
Try as they will, the historians will interpret. They are human.
> Most of the people that created the
>> United States Constitution saw themselves and their descendants as BEING
>> that nobility and deserving of that role due to their knowledge and
>> intellect.
>
> And, that "imperitive" really got cranked up in the early 1900s and I
> can provide a reference for that, too.
>
>> But there is another side to this coin and that was the need to "sell"
>> that contract to the people. The "founders" had to play "lets make a
>> a deal" and there were certain things that they had to "give up" in order
>> to get the Constitution ratified. And the point I am making here is that
>> the US Constitution was a "deal" between those that wrote the rules and
>> those who accepted the rules. Madison himself stated that the "intent" of
>> the founders was secondary to understanding of those that ratified; that
>> the Constitution derives its power from the consent of the governed. That
>> was true then and it is true now.
>
> Yeah, but it all gets wiped out at the electoral college level, AND
> the fact that we elect senators and representatives who then, THEY not
> us, go on and write the laws, etc. We underlings really don't get to
> do anything except chose the lessor of evils every 2-4 years.
Whine, whine, whine....... The discussion needs to center on the history
and an understanding of the motivations. But the discussion must also
encompass proper solutions to the problem. I will say that attempting a
"fix" at the top is like talking to that bull.
>> To understand Constitutionality or to understand what America _IS_ one
>> must actually read and appreciate the actual history of the ratification.
>
> I think this is important and I thank you for pointing it out.
> However, I think a lot of what is in the Constitution is subverted by
> the presence of monetary power out there, corruption, high-powered
> lawyers, and all kinds of manipulative infrastructures designed to
> gain power over underlings.
>
>> I hope I make a very small contribution to that understanding at:
>>
>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Article_The_First
>>
>> and
>>
>> http://www.greatervoice.org/extend/Madison.php
>>
>> <<< deletia >>>
>>
>> Regardless of what evil lurked in the soul of James Madison, his actions
>> are indicative of what he was "selling" to the American people. And it
>> seems impossible to misinterpret Federalist 55 through Federalist 58 on
>> the subject of "representation" for the people in their government.
>
> OK, just look at Gerrymandering and tell me that was done to benefit
> the people?
Same crap. It happened in 1929. This is as close to the actual pipe I can
get:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reapportionment_Act_of_1929 -------------
The Reapportionment Act of 1929 (ch. 28, 46 Stat. 21, 2 U.S.C. 2a,
enacted 1929-06-18) was a combined census and reapportionment bill passed
by the United States Congress which established a permanent method for
apportioning a constant 435 seats in the U.S. House of Representatives
according to each census. The bill neither repealed nor restated the
requirements of the previous apportionment acts - that districts be
contiguous, compact, and equally populated.
It was not clear if these requirements were still in effect until the
Supreme Court of the United States ruled on the matter of Wood v. Broom,
287 U.S. 1 (1932) that the provisions of each apportionment act affected
only the apportionment for which they were written. Thus the size and
population requirements, last stated in the Apportionment Act of 1911,
expired immediately with the enactment of the subsequent Apportionment
Act.
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Prior to this hijacking of representative government there was no
gerrymandering.
>> There is no silver bullet that can be fired at the heart of despotism, no
>> wooden stake to be plunged into the heart of such malice, that will
>> arrest and confine such evil over time. Vigilance is the price of
>> freedom and liberty and we must constantly guard against the forces of
>> aristocracy and plutocracy
>
> Or...the Nazi seizure of power in 1933.
>
> or they will, in fact, have their way. We have
>> failed in our responsibility to prevent the deterioration of our freedoms
>> and our liberty.
>
> John Strachey said once that if you can organize ten men, then you can
> control a hundred. Well, sometimes. Or...you can fool enough of the
> people enough of the time.
The fact that we have "The best Congress money can buy" is not seriously
debated. The current "Campaign Finance Reform" efforts are but a
diversion. CFR has been done over and over. The Supremes recently ruled
that the last CFR was, at least in part, unconstitutional. My own
proposal is the best example if a proper solution I have seen.
Instant Runoff Voting and similar systems of balloting address the need
for improvements in discerning the will of the people in extremely large
electoral arenas. The shrinking of electoral districts to encompass
fewer people and an insistence on compactness would do more to promote
representative government than would even IRV.
> That failure happened very early on with the failure
>> of the very first constitutional amendment and manifested itself in 1921
>> when the House of Representatives failed to reapportion the House in
>> respect of a very steep rise in population and the shift of population
>> from rural to urban. This, according to many, was a Constitutional breach.
>> But we failed even more certainly when we allowed the Congress to limit
>> the representation to only 425 members in 1929.
>
> Here is another problem: In most if not all of Latin America, most of
> the constitutions of those governments were patterned after the US
> Constitution. What was the problem? Those constitutions were never
> enforced.
>
> Look what we have today: The Supreme Court actually making laws. An
> unelected body of "powerful" people.
So what will you _do_ about it? Will you insist that YOUR representative
work to expand the representation? Will you actually consider a candidate
for office that takes a blood oath to vote as the majority of the people
in his/her district WANT on any legislation that is relatively
controversial? Will you refuse to vote for any representative that votes
yes on a bill that has an earmark?
That suit wearing ass is supposed to represent _YOU_.
BobR
> > Damn, we think too much alike.
>
> Hey, three cheers for us. :-) !!!!
>
> Gates was also the first name that
>
> > came to mind when I thought about the title robber-baron and God knows
> > that I dislike that SOB about as much as any human on earth.
>
> Well, we could throw in some venom for Hitler, Stalin, Napoleon,
> Ghengis Khan, etc., etc., too.
>
> On the
>
> > other hand, I can't totally agree that he was a robber-baron either.
> > Gates was an opportunist that essentially saw what the public wanted
> > and gave it to them. He is probably the worst example because his
> > product was not something that was a life and death product. We
> > didn't have to buy his operating system or anything else from him, we
> > chose to.
>
> Fine, I use MS SW most of the time (spent a lot of time with Linux,
> some with BSD and OS/2 [=big IBM disaster, but MS was hired to do some
> and they deliberately sabotaged IBM, too]). But, MS did all kinds of
> really dirty tricks to everyone. I can name many. Most of the old
> timers know this.
>
Dirty tricks or recognition that if you gave them an inch they would
take a mile? IBM gave MS an inch and they took a mile but then they
learn from the masters of the time which was IBM. They out played IBM
at their own game. Which is what usually happend with every monopoly
given enough time. MS is on top for the moment but they are well
aware that the dogs are at their heals.
> And, I don't like monopolists and other "anti-competitive" business
> practices that are in business history. Give me honest competition and
> that's good capitalism. But the dirty tricks are out there and there
> are very many books about it.
>
I agree totally.
> > I go back in the business far enough to have been deeply involved with
> > the IBM Monopoly of the 60's and 70's. I thought the same of IBM at
> > the time but looking back the monopoly by IBM was only partly IBM's
> > doing and much more a stupid follow the leader mentality that said if
> > you picked anything but IBM, it was your job on the line.
>
> I have the notion that when guys get too big for their britches, then
> they start confusing themselves with gods. Happened to Alexander the
> Great. Human psychology phenonmenon.
>
> Microsoft
>
And eventually they will be brought down if by nothing else that the
weight of their own ego.
>
> > became a monopoly on the same mentality.
>
> > > Back some 10 years ago, Archer-Daniels-Midland was caught by the FTC
> > > in price fixing. Also, Ucars was also caught by the FTC in price
> > > fixing. Various guys in the Enron-Andersen fiascos were playing robber-
> > > baron.
>
> > > I could list the Ivan Boesky's, Michael Milkins, and many others, and
> > > give you many book titles if you want to read how we've had many
> > > robber-barons, going right back to Standard Oil times with Rockefeller
> > > and the others who did a lot of damage along, simultaneously, with all
> > > of their development of modern society.
>
> > I agree that all did some damage along the way but all also made
> > contributions along the way that actually were a benefit to our life
> > today.
>
> I fully agree. If you want a car, then there has to be a car factory
> and that means big bucks and big staff and that does not come together
> spontaneously or very quickly. They are finding that out in China
> right now, too. They got over 100 car factory brands, just like in the
> USA back 100 years ago. In the end, there will probably be three over
> there, too, plus whatever foreign brands survive.
>
Ironic how this country actually has more auto manufacturers now than
ever before. They have foreign names but many are built right here in
the states. The old standards are still built here but with foreign
parts.
> of damage for nothing.- Hide quoted text -
>
I would love to agree with you without reservation but I can't
totally. Hell, I get pissed at it all but know that there is more to
it than what we want to believe. I have seen a lot of noble companies
fall by the wayside over the years because they refused to make the
hard decisions necessary to survive. It does little good to try and
save the jobs of a few at the cost of everyone. On the other hand, a
poorly managed company will be a poorly managed company no matter
where the employees are or how much you pay them.
BobR
Seems like you are equally guilty of making presumptuous statements.
You are correct though, I don't know anything about you and judged you
just as you have judged me. Your assumptions are no more valid than
mine and you know nothing about me beyond the one experience that I
related. Want to try again?
BobR
> Well, we are in disagreement. The guy with more money has that much
> more options. When we're talking millions to billions, its infinitely
> more options.
>
you are unwilling to take advantage of the few options you have?
> > We all have choices but few
> > of us really take advantage of those choices.
>
> You use the word choice as if behind every choice is a viable job. In
> fact, the only thing behind every choice is nothing more than a
> strategy for a job-hunting operation. Like the hunter-gatherer days,
> if there was no saber-toothed tiger to bring down that day, nobody ate
> dinner that night.
>
Right, if there was no tiger that day nobody ate tiger meat and you
had to settle for roots. So what do you do the next day, sit in the
cave and continue to eat roots because you assume there won't be a
tiger today?
> It is far easier for
>
> > most to head to the local ice house for a cold beer than to attend
> > classes at the local Jr. College.
>
> Sure, I agree that there are a lot of lazy, unresourceful people
> around.
>
>
> > > Yeah, but here is my gripe: the executives get a better "safety net"
> > > and have a better deal in general than the underlings and the
> > > underlings have zero control over anything. Corporations are,
> > > basically, dictatorships with a guy basically no different than
> > > _kings_ or emperors in earlier history except that the wars are
> > > economic rather than military.
>
> > I agree with you completely on the golden parachute bull shit but that
> > is really making a super issue out of the tip of the tip of the
> > iceburg. The problems in all corporate environments isn't just with
> > the top but from every level top to bottom. The CEO's are simply the
> > most visible element but many of the decisions that most effect the
> > rank and file workers are made at various levels throughout the
> > organization often without the knowledge of the CEO's. The decision
> > to layoff and outsource where I was working was made by a mid-level
> > manager.
>
> Yeah, but its all part of the same problem:too much of your life is
> NOT under YOUR control. AND, its YOU that is inconvenienced by the
> unemployment dumped on your head not because you did anything wrong.
>
Yes, I was inconvenienced by the unemployment, especially since I did
not qualify for any unemployment benefits but when I look back at some
of my own decisions I realized that I set myself up for much of what
happened. I was probably more prepared than most but not nearly as
prepared as I should have been.
> > Took a temporary position as a Project Manager that led to a position
> > as Senior Billing Analyst. Both were total departures from my Lead
> > Systems Designer position that I had been working for years. Found
> > that the IT field had totally collapsed following the Y2K and dot.com
> > bust. I could complain that I ran into a lot of age discrimination as
> > well but the reality was that I had ridden my experience for several
> > years instead of staying on top of current trends.
>
> > The worst part of being out of work in your late 50's or early 60's is
> > that your network of associates is mostly retired or worse, dead.
>
> Yes, true, but I'll go beyond that. Worst part is having a hundred
> other applications for that one job and ten of those guys are as good
> as you, or better, and they are younger, too.
>
How true.
> The
>
> > second worst part is that you will find yourself interviewing with
> > people half your age who don't want to hire you because they are
> > insecure having someone older and more experienced working for them.
>
> So, they do hire the younger guys for a second reason: they can be
> paid less than you.
>
Again true.
> > My only choice was to fully exploit my network of former clients and
> > associates with an open attitude and promote my business experience as
> > well as my IT experience. I got the position because I was willing to
> > use my experience, to learn and most important, I was willing to take
> > responsibility.
>
> But it does not work for everyone.
>
And it didn't work for me for over 18 months.
>
> > Too many of them think that the only thing they had to do was get that
> > degree and everyone would just automatically beat a path to their
> > door. Its not what you have but what you do with it.
>
> Not altogether. If you have ten guys around a fishing pond with five
> fish in it, then five guys (maybe more) are going to have no dinner
> that night).
>
You can take the best bait in the world to the lake but if you don't
bait the damn hook and throw it into the water you aren't going to
catch a damn thing.
> > > You really have no answer, do you, for the fact that when the number
> > > of applicants exceed the number of jobs that there will be real losers
> > > and not because they want to be losers. And, this is why we are seeing
> > > a lot of programmer/IT guys in the USA ending up bagging groceries at
> > > Walmart for $8/hour.
>
> > If those programmer/IT guys were really smart enough to be good at
> > their jobs, they have the same smarts to learn something new.
>
> I have to ask WHY is it OK for CEOs to _force_ innocent underlings to
> learn something new when, at least up to the time they were laid off,
> they were working and getting paid what they were due, and the CEOs
> did not have to do anything except put their signature on a memorandum
> (which does not require any learning or time or money or anything).
>
That CEO is really no different from anyone else. They have a product
(themselves) to market. They must market that product to their
customer and hope the customer will buy. If the product is faulty or
doesn't meet the need of the customer, they are out. Each of us has a
product to sell to our employer. If our product is not valuable
enough to our employer for them to continue to buy it, we must either
improve the product or find another.
> And, the other part of the question is WHY do we just forget the
> underlings, among which there will be a failure rate in getting a job
> in alternative training, and that will be because there are less jobs
> in the new field and more guys chasing those jobs, so the losers will
> be greater than before.
>
You said you had your own company and so did I for over 30 years. Did
you hire people that you didn't need or couldn't afford just to have
more employees? Would you maintain any employee just because they
needed a job even though they could no longer provide a service to
your company?
> So, the CEOs get the guarantees (golden parachutes, bonuses, packages)
> and the underlings get the shaft. Where is the justice in that?
>
I agree, there is no justice in that but as I said before that is
really just the tip of the tip of a very large iceburg.
> > > And, that is also an elitist view. You look at the vast majority of
> > > people anywhere in the world who are born in poverty and ignorance and
> > > all of the demographic studies will show that your _chances_ of
> > > getting out of that are near zero, or very low. Most of the kids that
> > > really do have a _chance_ are the ones coming out of typically middle
> > > class backgrounds or above.
>
> > I am not talking about those people, they don't have the options that
> > we have and that is clear.
>
> Well, then, are they just going to be victims and you have no answers
> for them?
>
> What is also clear is that they are
>
> > starting to climb the ecnomic ladder and as they do, they are
> > threatening those of us who chose to climb up a few rungs on the
> > ladder and then rest for the remainder of our life.
>
> And, I'm asking why is it that we have a mindset that says "OK, some
> are going to be winners (and everything is OK) and some are going to
> be losers (and we're going to not talk about them at all, or care
> about what happened to them)?
>
I care very much and have always been willing to help anyone who is
willing to take the first step.
> Its the same moral problem as in wars over all of history: the guys
> with the swords kill the guys without, and we don't ask whether this
> is good or bad, and even more, don't even talk about whether it might
> be good to prevent this from happening in the future.
>
> Swords? How about just plain crooks and criminals that take guns into
> banks and shoot the tellers and customers and take the money?
>
> > > Most of us would still be crawling on our hands
>
> > > > and knees if we had taken the same attitude when learning to walk.
>
> > > The fact of the matter is that out of a clutch of young birds just out
> > > of the egg, a few will fall out of the nest before they learn to fly,
> > > and a few of those will fall into the mouths of predators waiting on
> > > the ground for them with their mouths open.
>
> > If not for that, the predators would starve. Its called natural
> > selection.
>
> So, then, its OK with you if people get kicked into the sewer,
> involuntarily, and its OK if predators live by this method? Or, did
> you just mean to say "shit happens and so what?"
>
Shit Happens! Its a fact of life. That by no means is acceptance of
the "getting kicked into the sewer involuntarily" actions.
> > > > Why is it that as adults we suddenly believe that we can no longer
> > > > learn something new?
>
> > > It takes more than ability to learn something new to actually learn
> > > something new.-
>
> > You are right about that, it takes a willing attitude as well. The
> > real problem is that most of us really don't want to be forced to
> > learn something new.
>
> Fine, I see two aspects of this: Yes, people need to be willing to
> learn something new, but, No, why should a bunch of people (the
> underlings) be forced to learn something new by a few (CEOs) simply
> because the net result might be to make a few (CEOs and stockholders)
> richer and a bunch of guye (the underlings) poorer?
Again with the CEO's. I am sorry, I hate most of the big Corporate
CEO's too but there really is more to it than that. We are all upset
about the offshoring of "our" jobs to people in China and India but
aren't we trying to do the same to those people that the CEO's are
doing to us? We are in competition with those people and right now
they are willing to do exactly what we do but for less money. If we
can't compete is it fair or right to keep them in poverty by any means
possible just so we can continue with our lifestyle?
The Trucker
> On Fri, 16 May 2008 09:01:18 -0700 (PDT), BobR
> <re...@r-a-reed-assoc.com> wrote:
>
>>>
>>
>>Hey, I was working at one of those corporations that did mass layoffs
>>and outsourced a substantial amount of work. I didn't like it one bit
>>and still don't, but I can also understand the business decisions that
>>made it almost impossible for the company to do anything else. They
>>are in competition on a global basis and in order to survive, they
>>must remain competitive on a global basis. I am not so naive as to
>>believe that my job, no matter how good I might be at it, can't be
>>done by someone else far cheaper. It might take two or three Indians
>>to do it but when they earn less than 10% of what I earned, it still
>>remains a huge bargain for the corporation.
>
>
> How do you feel about government leadership that removes all
> disincentives and actively creates incentives to move these jobs?
BINGO!
Straydog
posts and threads with a lot of replies. tsk, tsk.
See stuff below....
On Fri, 16 May 2008 12:57:14 -0700 (PDT), BobR
<re...@r-a-reed-assoc.com> wrote:
>>
>> > Damn, we think too much alike.
>>
>> Hey, three cheers for us. :-) =A0 !!!!
>>
>> Gates was also the first name that
>>
>> > came to mind when I thought about the title robber-baron and God knows
>> > that I dislike that SOB about as much as any human on earth.
>>
>> Well, we could throw in some venom for Hitler, Stalin, Napoleon,
>> Ghengis Khan, etc., etc., too.
>>
>> =A0On the
>>
>> > other hand, I can't totally agree that he was a robber-baron either.
>> > Gates was an opportunist that essentially saw what the public wanted
>> > and gave it to them. =A0He is probably the worst example because his
>> > product was not something that was a life and death product. =A0We
>> > didn't have to buy his operating system or anything else from him, we
>> > chose to.
>>
>> Fine, I use MS SW most of the time (spent a lot of time with Linux,
>> some with BSD and OS/2 [=3Dbig IBM disaster, but MS was hired to do some
>> and they deliberately sabotaged IBM, too]). But, MS did all kinds of
>> really dirty tricks to everyone. I can name many. Most of the old
>> timers know this.
>>
>
>Dirty tricks or recognition that if you gave them an inch they would
>take a mile?
Both!
> IBM gave MS an inch and they took a mile but then they
>learn from the masters of the time which was IBM. They out played IBM
>at their own game. Which is what usually happend with every monopoly
>given enough time.
Sooner or later, its all a part of "payback," eh? They all do it.
I saw op-ed pieces in WSJ years ago by Scott McNeally, Bill G, and
Larry Ellison and you should have read them. They all said the same
thing: "We are nice guys, the other two guys are badguys." Made me
puke.
> MS is on top for the moment but they are well
>aware that the dogs are at their heals.
And, Google might eat their lunch with ASP, and some others are doing
this, too.
>> And, I don't like monopolists and other "anti-competitive" business
>> practices that are in business history. Give me honest competition and
>> that's good capitalism. But the dirty tricks are out there and there
>> are very many books about it.
>>
>
>I agree totally.
Good.
>> > I go back in the business far enough to have been deeply involved with
>> > the IBM Monopoly of the 60's and 70's. =A0I thought the same of IBM at
>> > the time but looking back the monopoly by IBM was only partly IBM's
>> > doing and much more a stupid follow the leader mentality that said if
>> > you picked anything but IBM, it was your job on the line.
>>
>> I have the notion that when guys get too big for their britches, then
>> they start confusing themselves with gods. Happened to Alexander the
>> Great. Human psychology phenonmenon.
>>
>> =A0Microsoft
>>
>And eventually they will be brought down if by nothing else that the
>weight of their own ego.
And, they have a megaton of that.
Not that I like Steve Jobs that much and Apple has too much religious
following, but iMac sales are going up. Not that OS-X is much safer
(Google on "OS-X hacks" and get 30,000 hits).
>>
>> > became a monopoly on the same mentality.
>>
deleted some
>>
>> > I agree that all did some damage along the way but all also made
>> > contributions along the way that actually were a benefit to our life
>> > today.
>>
>> I fully agree. If you want a car, then there has to be a car factory
>> and that means big bucks and big staff and that does not come together
>> spontaneously or very quickly. They are finding that out in China
>> right now, too. They got over 100 car factory brands, just like in the
>> USA back 100 years ago. In the end, there will probably be three over
>> there, too, plus whatever foreign brands survive.
>>
>
>Ironic how this country actually has more auto manufacturers now than
>ever before.
Well, the books say that around 1900-1910 or so we had many dozens of
car manufacturers. They all soon went out of business as consolidation
took place. gonna happen in China in the next 5-10 years, too.
> They have foreign names but many are built right here in
>the states. The old standards are still built here but with foreign
>parts.
A big mess if you ask me.
>> > Even Gates, who I despise, has led to many positives along
>> > with the negatives.
>>
>> Fine, I have a wee little bit less venom for him since he donated a
>> bunch of money to his foundation and at least he has not built big
>> obscene yachts like Larry Ellison has.
>>
>> =A0Without a company like Microsoft, would the
>>
>> > personal computer revolution have come as far as it has?
>>
>> Look at Linux. If it were given the same chance. Even better, look at
deleted
>> Well, I don't care if you steal pensils at work or make xeroxes of
>> dirty jokes, but if you lay off 20,000 guys who bring food home to
>> another 30,000 human beings and tell them "We can find cheap flesh
>> someplace so we at the top can get big bonuses and upvalued stock
>> optione" then I'm gonna have unkind thoughts for you.
>>
>> Ever read "Barbarians at the Gate" all about Ross Johnson and RJR
>> Nabisco? Biggest LBO of the last 20 years and did a tremendous amount
>> of damage for nothing.- Hide quoted text -
>>
>
>I would love to agree with you without reservation but I can't
>totally. Hell, I get pissed at it all but know that there is more to
>it than what we want to believe.
Yeah, sure. We can bring more caveats into the discussion and then
maybe, yes, the situation gets more complicated.
> I have seen a lot of noble companies
>fall by the wayside over the years because they refused to make the
>hard decisions necessary to survive. It does little good to try and
>save the jobs of a few at the cost of everyone. On the other hand, a
>poorly managed company will be a poorly managed company no matter
>where the employees are or how much you pay them.
Well, I'm going to "go nostalgic" on you. Some decades ago job
security in the USA was a lot better than today. And, same for Japan:
decades ago you worked for one of their big corporations, turned the
crank like you should, and you had a lifetime job. Same deal in
western Europe in the past: good job security. Both other places are
just like the USA, now. Job today, gone tommorrow.
>
Straydog
wrote:
>On Fri, 16 May 2008 11:38:02 -0700, retrogrouch wrote:
>
>> On Fri, 16 May 2008 09:01:18 -0700 (PDT), BobR
>> <re...@r-a-reed-assoc.com> wrote:
>>
>>>>
>>>
>>>Hey, I was working at one of those corporations that did mass layoffs
>>>and outsourced a substantial amount of work. I didn't like it one bit
>>>and still don't, but I can also understand the business decisions that
>>>made it almost impossible for the company to do anything else. They
>>>are in competition on a global basis and in order to survive, they
>>>must remain competitive on a global basis. I am not so naive as to
>>>believe that my job, no matter how good I might be at it, can't be
>>>done by someone else far cheaper. It might take two or three Indians
>>>to do it but when they earn less than 10% of what I earned, it still
>>>remains a huge bargain for the corporation.
>>
>>
>> How do you feel about government leadership that removes all
>> disincentives and actively creates incentives to move these jobs?
>
>BINGO!
ditto for me, too.
Straydog
see stuff below....
On Fri, 16 May 2008 13:50:06 -0700 (PDT), BobR
<re...@r-a-reed-assoc.com> wrote:
>>
>> Well, we are in disagreement. The guy with more money has that much
>> more options. When we're talking millions to billions, its infinitely
>> more options.
>>
>Yes, more money means more options but what difference does it make if
>you are unwilling to take advantage of the few options you have?
That all assumes you have even a few good options. Most of these guys
today are faced with nothing but downward mobility in all of their
remaining options. Its all part of that 100+ applicant to job ratio,
age discrimination, etc., thing.
>> > We all have choices but few
>> > of us really take advantage of those choices.
>>
>> You use the word choice as if behind every choice is a viable job. In
>> fact, the only thing behind every choice is nothing more than a
>> strategy for a job-hunting operation. Like the hunter-gatherer days,
>> if there was no saber-toothed tiger to bring down that day, nobody ate
>> dinner that night.
>>
>
>Right, if there was no tiger that day nobody ate tiger meat and you
>had to settle for roots. So what do you do the next day, sit in the
>cave and continue to eat roots because you assume there won't be a
>tiger today?
If you want to read something important, get a copy of Jared Diamond's
book "Collapse" and read the historical-archeological record of how
few civilizations actually coped with their changes in their
environment. Actual fact: Vikings in Greenland, colony starved because
they refused to eat seafood that the eskimos (actually Inuit) could
easily find. Actually several other examples of fact.
"Assume there won't be a tiger today?" and what to do if, in fact,
there is not a tiger today? Its like my fishing pond example. Five
fishermen better think what they are going to do because each of the
other five fishermen got all the five fish that there were that day.
P.S. all the marine biologists say our fishing stocks in the ocean are
down to the point of near extinction...and nobody is doing crap about
it, either.
>> =A0 It is far easier for
>>
>> > most to head to the local ice house for a cold beer than to attend
>> > classes at the local Jr. College.
>>
>> Sure, I agree that there are a lot of lazy, unresourceful people
>> around.
>>
>>
>> > > Yeah, but here is my gripe: the executives get a better "safety net"
>> > > and have a better deal in general than the underlings and the
>> > > underlings have zero control over anything. Corporations are,
>> > > basically, dictatorships with a guy basically no different than
>> > > _kings_ or emperors in earlier history except that the wars are
>> > > economic rather than military.
>>
>> > I agree with you completely on the golden parachute bull shit but that
>> > is really making a super issue out of the tip of the tip of the
>> > iceburg. =A0The problems in all corporate environments isn't just with
>> > the top but from every level top to bottom. =A0The CEO's are simply the
>> > most visible element but many of the decisions that most effect the
>> > rank and file workers are made at various levels throughout the
>> > organization often without the knowledge of the CEO's. =A0 =A0The decisi=
>on
>> > to layoff and outsource where I was working was made by a mid-level
>> > manager.
>>
>> Yeah, but its all part of the same problem:too much of your life is
>> NOT under YOUR control. =A0AND, its YOU that is inconvenienced by the
>> unemployment dumped on your head not because you did anything wrong.
>>
>
>Yes, I was inconvenienced by the unemployment, especially since I did
>not qualify for any unemployment benefits but when I look back at some
>of my own decisions I realized that I set myself up for much of what
>happened. I was probably more prepared than most but not nearly as
>prepared as I should have been.
Yeah, I could tell some of my own stories. But, I read a few books and
when that bomb came down on my head (a political thing, not
immigration or anything else) I played a particular strategy that they
talked about in the books and got not only a delay, but a little boost
in severance pay, too. It pays to be cool, calm, and composed. ]
Since there were dirty politics in the background, I also filed a
formal greivance some months later and in the end I got an extra
$5,000 severance.
>> > Took a temporary position as a Project Manager that led to a position
>> > as Senior Billing Analyst. =A0Both were total departures from my Lead
>> > Systems Designer position that I had been working for years. =A0Found
>> > that the IT field had totally collapsed following the Y2K and dot.com
>> > bust. =A0I could complain that I ran into a lot of age discrimination as=
>
>> > well but the reality was that I had ridden my experience for several
>> > years instead of staying on top of current trends.
>>
>> > The worst part of being out of work in your late 50's or early 60's is
>> > that your network of associates is mostly retired or worse, dead.
>>
>> Yes, true, but I'll go beyond that. Worst part is having a hundred
>> other applications for that one job and ten of those guys are as good
>> as you, or better, and they are younger, too.
>>
>
>How true.
Amen.
>> =A0The
>>
>> > second worst part is that you will find yourself interviewing with
>> > people half your age who don't want to hire you because they are
>> > insecure having someone older and more experienced working for them.
>>
>> So, they do hire the younger guys for a second reason: they can be
>> paid less than you.
>>
>
>Again true.
Amen.
>> > My only choice was to fully exploit my network of former clients and
>> > associates with an open attitude and promote my business experience as
>> > well as my IT experience. =A0I got the position because I was willing to=
>
>> > use my experience, to learn and most important, I was willing to take
>> > responsibility.
>>
>> But it does not work for everyone.
>>
>
>And it didn't work for me for over 18 months.
You got my sympathy. I know guys that just dissappeared and stopped
answering my emails, etc. I have no idea what they are doing. And, up
till the bomb hit them, they never had problems getting (IT) jobs ever
before in their life. Guess how they feel?
>> > Too many of them think that the only thing they had to do was get that
>> > degree and everyone would just automatically beat a path to their
>> > door. =A0Its not what you have but what you do with it.
>>
>> Not altogether. If you have ten guys around a fishing pond with five
>> fish in it, then five guys (maybe more) are going to have no dinner
>> that night).
>>
>
>You can take the best bait in the world to the lake but if you don't
>bait the damn hook and throw it into the water you aren't going to
>catch a damn thing.
Assuming there is something there to bite?
>>
deleted
>> I have to ask WHY is it OK for CEOs to _force_ innocent underlings to
>> learn something new when, at least up to the time they were laid off,
>> they were working and getting paid what they were due, and the CEOs
>> did not have to do anything except put their signature on a memorandum
>> (which does not require any learning or time or money or anything).
>>
>
>That CEO is really no different from anyone else. They have a product
>(themselves) to market. They must market that product to their
>customer and hope the customer will buy. If the product is faulty or
>doesn't meet the need of the customer, they are out. Each of us has a
>product to sell to our employer. If our product is not valuable
>enough to our employer for them to continue to buy it, we must either
>improve the product or find another.
Yeah, but its like the fishing pond. If the fish can't afford to bite,
then no matter what bait they put on the hook, the customer can't buy
that product.
>> And, the other part of the question is WHY do we just forget the
>> underlings, among which there will be a failure rate in getting a job
>> in alternative training, and that will be because there are less jobs
>> in the new field and more guys chasing those jobs, so the losers will
>> be greater than before.
>>
>You said you had your own company and so did I for over 30 years.
Fine, you lasted longer than I did.
> Did
>you hire people that you didn't need or couldn't afford just to have
>more employees?
I never had that many, never grew much. But, its not that simple;
we're talking about doing economic damage to US guys and shipping the
whole bunch of jobs overseas. Good for overseas guys, but US guys are
now lining up in longer lines for fewer jobs in the USA.
> Would you maintain any employee just because they
>needed a job even though they could no longer provide a service to
>your company?
Gotta think if companies want to sell to guys in the US, then those
guys in the US have to have money--from jobs--to buy stuff.
So far, the trend has been downhill for at least two decades: low end
wages going down, low end jobs dissappearing, too. And, the Mexicans
coming in like Niagara Falls.
>> So, the CEOs get the guarantees (golden parachutes, bonuses, packages)
>> and the underlings get the shaft. Where is the justice in that?
>>
>I agree, there is no justice in that but as I said before that is
>really just the tip of the tip of a very large iceburg.
Fine, we're back to two things: i) stay with CYA strategies, and ii)
bitch about it (like we're doing now).
>
>> > > And, that is also an elitist view. You look at the vast majority of
deleted
>>
>> > I am not talking about those people, they don't have the options that
>> > we have and that is clear.
>>
>> Well, then, are they just going to be victims and you have no answers
>> for them?
>>
>> =A0 What is also clear is that they are
>>
>> > starting to climb the ecnomic ladder and as they do, they are
>> > threatening those of us who chose to climb up a few rungs on the
>> > ladder and then rest for the remainder of our life.
>>
>> And, I'm asking why is it that we have a mindset that says "OK, some
>> are going to be winners (and everything is OK) and some are going to
>> be losers (and we're going to not talk about them at all, or care
>> about what happened to them)?
>>
>
>I care very much and have always been willing to help anyone who is
>willing to take the first step.
So am I. Main theme: CYA. Secondary theme: vote for politico (if there
is one) that might do something to stop the carnage.
>> Its the same moral problem as in wars over all of history: the guys
>> with the swords kill the guys without, and we don't ask whether this
>> is good or bad, and even more, don't even talk about whether it might
>> be good to prevent this from happening in the future.
deleted
>> > If not for that, the predators would starve. =A0Its called natural
>> > selection.
>>
>> So, then, its OK with you if people get kicked into the sewer,
>> involuntarily, and its OK if predators live by this method? =A0Or, did
>> you just mean to say "shit happens and so what?"
>>
>
>Shit Happens! Its a fact of life. That by no means is acceptance of
>the "getting kicked into the sewer involuntarily" actions.
Yeah, I know. But, in addition to CYA, I'm going to say "ouch" when
that shit happens. Love to throw a brick, too.
deleted.
>> > You are right about that, it takes a willing attitude as well. =A0The
>> > real problem is that most of us really don't want to be forced to
>> > learn something new.
>>
>> Fine, I see two aspects of this: Yes, people need to be willing to
>> learn something new, but, No, why should a bunch of people (the
>> underlings) be forced to learn something new by a few (CEOs) simply
>> because the net result might be to make a few (CEOs and stockholders)
>> richer and a bunch of guye (the underlings) poorer?
>
>Again with the CEO's. I am sorry, I hate most of the big Corporate
>CEO's too but there really is more to it than that. We are all upset
>about the offshoring of "our" jobs to people in China and India but
>aren't we trying to do the same to those people that the CEO's are
>doing to us? We are in competition with those people and right now
>they are willing to do exactly what we do but for less money. If we
>can't compete is it fair or right to keep them in poverty by any means
>possible just so we can continue with our lifestyle?
No argument with anything you said above...buuuuuut...what bothers me
is that there are all these people in the bottom half to 2/3 of the
world's population who are getting royallly screwed. No, I don't have
any good answers, either. And, that bothers me, too.
Straydog
No disagreement with above...buuuut...why is it that even if they are
making decent profits, they still go ahead and screw the employees
even more?
>> No, not every corporation is a robber-baron, but a lot of them are,
>> and a lot of them do as much bad as they do good and it would have to
>> be a separate discussion to go into this tangent in detail.
>>
>> and if so what would you do if
>>
>> > there were no employers?
>>
>> We'd be in the hunter-gatherer days.
>>
>>
>We
Except the rich guys in the upper 1-2%. They are in clover, period.
> really still are, we are just hunting a different game.
Yeah, the CEOs are shooting fish in a barrel.
> The
>problem is that the vast majority of people would starve to death if
>we returned to the "hunter-gatherer" days of the past.
They did, anyway, in the hunter-gatherer days of the past.
And, even today, we've got that bottom 1/2 or so to 2/3, all over the
world, that are barely making it from one day to the next.
The only people that are doing OK are those in the upper 1/3, and I'd
even say you have to be in the upper 5% to be able to say you can be
comfortable. Of course, those in the upper 1% to 0.1% are the
super-rich and have all the yachts, mansions, servants (lawyers, CPAs,
PR groups, etc.).
>>
deleted some
>> > The standard of living that you desire is your choice but that choice
>> > brings requirements. If your standard requires a 3500sf house instead
>> > of a 1800sf house it might also require two incomes. Could you live
>> > and be comfortable in the smaller house? Probably but the reality is
>> > that you don't want to and thus a requirement for two incomes. Your
>> > choice.
>>
>> Too much of that choice is controlled NOT by you but by the income
>> associated with your resources and not that many people can control
>> that. The ones that can are the ones in the Forbes "400 richest
>> Americans" lists.
>>
>
>That just simply isn't true, none of it. We all have choices but few
>of us really take advantage of those choices. It is far easier for
>most to head to the local ice house for a cold beer than to attend
>classes at the local Jr. College.
Yeah, but when people come out of those retrainings, I've seen studies
that show at most 1/3 to 1/2 are successful. The rest have the school
bill and still no job. i.e. more debt and no income.
Fine, you can say they didn't work hard enough. The minister at the
church can say if your prayers were not answered, its because you
didn't pray hard enough, either.
>>
>> > You want to blame it all on the corporations which are nothing more
>> > than people just like you who are trying to do the best they can for
>> > themselves. Don't get me wrong, I can't defend the stupid decisions
>> > made by the CEO's and directors of many of our corporations but in my
>> > 60 years I have also seen the demise of many of those same
>> > corporations. They exist in a very competitive world where one
>> > mistake can end their existance.
>>
>> Yeah, but here is my gripe: the executives get a better "safety net"
>> and have a better deal in general than the underlings and the
>> underlings have zero control over anything. Corporations are,
>> basically, dictatorships with a guy basically no different than
>> _kings_ or emperors in earlier history except that the wars are
>> economic rather than military.
>>
>
>I agree with you completely on the golden parachute bull shit but that
>is really making a super issue out of the tip of the tip of the
>iceburg. The problems in all corporate environments isn't just with
>the top but from every level top to bottom. The CEO's are simply the
>most visible element but many of the decisions that most effect the
>rank and file workers are made at various levels throughout the
>organization often without the knowledge of the CEO's. The decision
>to layoff and outsource where I was working was made by a mid-level
>manager.
Fine. What bonuses did he get? What was his severance package compared
to yours? What else was in his package?
>>
>>
>> deleted some b/c no new material
>>
>>
>> > Got laid off 5 years ago as a result of the huge movement of IT jobs
>> > offshore and the cutbacks following Y2K. Whined about it for a while
>> > but realized that is was a total waste of time and found a new field.
>> > Took an initial cut in income but it has been short term and I have
>> > recovered.
>>
>> Good for you, congratulations. But, you might consider telling the
>> rest of the guys here more about what you're doing and give some
>> tips.
>>
>
>Took a temporary position as a Project Manager that led to a position
>as Senior Billing Analyst. Both were total departures from my Lead
>Systems Designer position that I had been working for years. Found
>that the IT field had totally collapsed following the Y2K and dot.com
>bust. I could complain that I ran into a lot of age discrimination as
>well but the reality was that I had ridden my experience for several
>years instead of staying on top of current trends.
Yeah, but how do you keep one job and simultaneously train for
another? All the books talk about "keeping up" but they don't tell you
how to do this and for lots of people who deserve life-work balance,
what are they supposed to do? Kill themselves?
>The worst part of being out of work in your late 50's or early 60's is
>that your network of associates is mostly retired or worse, dead. The
>second worst part is that you will find yourself interviewing with
>people half your age who don't want to hire you because they are
>insecure having someone older and more experienced working for them.
>My only choice was to fully exploit my network of former clients and
>associates with an open attitude and promote my business experience as
>well as my IT experience. I got the position because I was willing to
>use my experience, to learn and most important, I was willing to take
>responsibility.
I think I already answered this somewhere.
That's why I'm editing the subject lines in the reposts, and I
recognize the stuff below, too.
End of this post.
=======================================
Straydog
On Fri, 16 May 2008 12:07:40 -0700, The Trucker <mik...@verizon.net>
wrote:
>On Fri, 16 May 2008 11:10:58 -0700, Stray Dog wrote:
>
>> On May 16, 11:46 am, The Trucker <mik...@verizon.net> wrote:
>>> On Fri, 16 May 2008 05:24:50 -0700, Stray Dog wrote:
>>> > On May 15, 12:33 pm, The Trucker <mik...@verizon.net> wrote:
>>> >> On Thu, 15 May 2008 07:18:17 -0700, BobR wrote:
>>> >> > On May 15, 8:22 am, Stray Dog <straydog2...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
deleted
>>> > Also, if you read some history of the Incas, you will find that they
Why? We have "philanthropic" actions by the govt (eg. welfare of
various sorts, Medicaid) and I would not refrain from using them if I
needed them.
You said one of my ideas was an unacheivable objective (read the above
exchange again) and yet I can cite articles where some rich guys made
large contributions to build hospitals, wings, ...all kinds of things
that benefit society rather than some little spoiled-brat narrow
interest of interest to only a few (some obscure art museum, for
example).
>The citing of members of
>the nobility who, in your opinion, are philanthropists is not sufficient
>in convincing me that rule by the nobility is a good idea.
There have actually been quite serious and deep and detailed
discussions by many philosophers and other "fancy" people over many
years that an enlightened monarchy might be, in the final analysis,
the best form of government. This is really an idea quite separate
from a plutocracy. My reading of history has taught me that there
actually were a few kings and emperors who did not enrich themselves
at the same time they ruled but did rule in a manner that led to both
peace and prosperity and most if not all that was ever written about
these rulers indicated that the people under the rule appreciated what
they had, at least until the next war which in many cases was caused
by external forces not under the control of that king or emperor.
> Your basic
>position is "conservative" and mine is not.
My position is: lets look at all of what has happened in recorded
history and try to learn from it rather than examine these issues with
a prejudiced mindset that requires that we throw out anything not
consistent with the mindset.
>> You may as well tell that bull that
>>> you don't like what he is doing to that cow.
>>
>> That's beyond the scope of this post.
>
>It was an analogy. You cannot alter the ego of the rich.
The ego of the rich can be a very serious problem, but you can also
have snobery from the bottom, too. Where that ego hurts us is when it
drives the rich to continue bilking the poor in a never-ending quest
to satisfy an insatiable appetite for even more money. The ego of the
power-driven, power-seeking control freaks (leading to Hitlers,
Stalins, Ghengis Khans, King Bush II [wrt Iraq], etc.) is maybe an
even more serious pathology since, beyond impoverishing people, it
leads to unjustifiable destruction, pain, and death.
>>> > I would highly recommend a better
>>> >> understanding of the purported goals of the United States Government at
>>> >> its inception.
>>>
>>> > There are a few books out there that indicate the goals of the USA
>>> > were not much different than anyone else: power, expansion,
>>> > development, etc.
>>>
>>> I rather like just reading the actual history and making my own
>>> analysis of why people did what they did.
>>
>> Well, two responses to that. i) just ask where the money/power ended
>> up and how that happened, and ii) lots of history depends on who you
>> read. I can provide titles.
>
>The Federalist and Anti-Federalist papers are not "interpretations".
I am sure that no matter what is written, all readers will interpret
them favorably or not, to some degree. I am sure that those writings,
themselves, depend absolutely on the authors' interpretationis of what
they saw and how they understood what they saw before they put pen to
paper.
> The
>speeches and correspondence of Madison and Jefferson are not
>"interpretations".
Same response as above applies here, too.
>>> Their actions typically give us
>>> a clue as to what they were trying to accomplish. And to be sure, all of
>>> those things (power, etc) were considered in the birth of the USA. I will
>>> even admit that the "founding fathers" were primarily plutocrats at heart
>>> and that they wanted some sort of nobility to form here in the United
>>> States just as it was in Europe.
>>
>> Bingo, bingo, bingo. Or were you reading Charles Beard's book "The
>> Economic Interpretation of the Constitution"? Where, yes, the robber-
>> barons really were writing our constitution to benefit the robber-
>> barons, right from the beginings?
>
>I try not to read the interpretations of others, thanks.
1. Then you have been missing something.
2. Unless there is an unreasonable amount of dogmatic preferential
acceptance of someone's "religion", we all need to interpret our
"inputs" and explain them to ourselves, one way or the other, and put
it all into some kind of mental framework that we can understand,
completely or incompletely.
> My stuff comes
>right out of the pipe.
My stuff comes from everywhere and sometimes those interpretations are
so different from the original material that the original authors are
going one way and all the readers are going in the opposite
directions.
>> And, by the way, this is a very hot debate in certain circles in
>> history.
>
>Try as they will, the historians will interpret. They are human.
And, what is wrong with that?
>> Most of the people that created the
>>> United States Constitution saw themselves and their descendants as BEING
>>> that nobility and deserving of that role due to their knowledge and
>>> intellect.
>>
>> And, that "imperitive" really got cranked up in the early 1900s and I
>> can provide a reference for that, too.
>>
>>> But there is another side to this coin and that was the need to "sell"
>>> that contract to the people. The "founders" had to play "lets make a
>>> a deal" and there were certain things that they had to "give up" in order
>>> to get the Constitution ratified. And the point I am making here is that
>>> the US Constitution was a "deal" between those that wrote the rules and
>>> those who accepted the rules. Madison himself stated that the "intent" of
>>> the founders was secondary to understanding of those that ratified; that
>>> the Constitution derives its power from the consent of the governed. That
>>> was true then and it is true now.
>>
>> Yeah, but it all gets wiped out at the electoral college level, AND
>> the fact that we elect senators and representatives who then, THEY not
>> us, go on and write the laws, etc. We underlings really don't get to
>> do anything except chose the lessor of evils every 2-4 years.
>
>Whine, whine, whine....... The discussion needs to center on the history
>and an understanding of the motivations. But the discussion must also
>encompass proper solutions to the problem. I will say that attempting a
>"fix" at the top is like talking to that bull.
Decisions and actions all come, sooner or later, from power centers,
whether they are revolutionary or established. History shows many
examples of plans that crashed and burned and some examples of clever
if not brilliant rule that preserved order and had desireable
outcomes. However, it is always possible to ask a question and get a
minority dissenting opinion, so...nothing will ever be perfect.
>>> To understand Constitutionality or to understand what America _IS_ one
>>> must actually read and appreciate the actual history of the ratification.
>>
>> I think this is important and I thank you for pointing it out.
>> However, I think a lot of what is in the Constitution is subverted by
>> the presence of monetary power out there, corruption, high-powered
>> lawyers, and all kinds of manipulative infrastructures designed to
>> gain power over underlings.
You did not respond to this.
>>> I hope I make a very small contribution to that understanding at:
>>>
>>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Article_The_First
>>>
>>> and
>>>
>>> http://www.greatervoice.org/extend/Madison.php
>>>
>>> <<< deletia >>>
>>>
>>> Regardless of what evil lurked in the soul of James Madison, his actions
>>> are indicative of what he was "selling" to the American people. And it
>>> seems impossible to misinterpret Federalist 55 through Federalist 58 on
>>> the subject of "representation" for the people in their government.
>>
>> OK, just look at Gerrymandering and tell me that was done to benefit
>> the people?
>
>Same crap. It happened in 1929. This is as close to the actual pipe I can
>get:
See below...
>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reapportionment_Act_of_1929 -------------
> The Reapportionment Act of 1929 (ch. 28, 46 Stat. 21, 2 U.S.C. 2a,
> enacted 1929-06-18) was a combined census and reapportionment bill passed
> by the United States Congress which established a permanent method for
> apportioning a constant 435 seats in the U.S. House of Representatives
> according to each census. The bill neither repealed nor restated the
> requirements of the previous apportionment acts - that districts be
> contiguous, compact, and equally populated.
>
> It was not clear if these requirements were still in effect until the
>Supreme Court of the United States ruled on the matter of Wood v. Broom,
>287 U.S. 1 (1932) that the provisions of each apportionment act affected
>only the apportionment for which they were written. Thus the size and
>population requirements, last stated in the Apportionment Act of 1911,
>expired immediately with the enactment of the subsequent Apportionment
>Act.
>---------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Prior to this hijacking of representative government there was no
> gerrymandering.
The point I was trying to make is that brilliant ideas for rule can be
subverted by various kinds of tricks and thus those brilliant ideas
become worthless.
>>> There is no silver bullet that can be fired at the heart of despotism, no
>>> wooden stake to be plunged into the heart of such malice, that will
>>> arrest and confine such evil over time. Vigilance is the price of
>>> freedom and liberty and we must constantly guard against the forces of
>>> aristocracy and plutocracy
>>
>> Or...the Nazi seizure of power in 1933.
You didn't respond to this, either.
>> or they will, in fact, have their way. We have
>>> failed in our responsibility to prevent the deterioration of our freedoms
>>> and our liberty.
>>
>> John Strachey said once that if you can organize ten men, then you can
>> control a hundred. Well, sometimes. Or...you can fool enough of the
>> people enough of the time.
>
>The fact that we have "The best Congress money can buy" is not seriously
>debated. The current "Campaign Finance Reform" efforts are but a
>diversion. CFR has been done over and over. The Supremes recently ruled
>that the last CFR was, at least in part, unconstitutional. My own
>proposal is the best example if a proper solution I have seen.
See below..
>Instant Runoff Voting and similar systems of balloting address the need
>for improvements in discerning the will of the people in extremely large
>electoral arenas. The shrinking of electoral districts to encompass
>fewer people and an insistence on compactness would do more to promote
>representative government than would even IRV.
My greatest fear is the electronic voting system which can be hacked
and in the last election there was evidence that it was but the whole
thing blew over. It would be simple to have a computer program "throw"
a percentage of cast votes to a different party and then when the
election is over, self-erase the hack so it would be impossible to
detect it. That is all in addition to all the older techniques of
election fraud.
>> That failure happened very early on with the failure
>>> of the very first constitutional amendment and manifested itself in 1921
>>> when the House of Representatives failed to reapportion the House in
>>> respect of a very steep rise in population and the shift of population
>>> from rural to urban. This, according to many, was a Constitutional breach.
>>> But we failed even more certainly when we allowed the Congress to limit
>>> the representation to only 425 members in 1929.
>>
>> Here is another problem: In most if not all of Latin America, most of
>> the constitutions of those governments were patterned after the US
>> Constitution. What was the problem? Those constitutions were never
>> enforced.
>>
>> Look what we have today: The Supreme Court actually making laws. An
>> unelected body of "powerful" people.
>
>So what will you _do_ about it?
Sit here and tell you that your "pipe dreams" are all pretty much for
naught.
> Will you insist that YOUR representative
>work to expand the representation?
Why would my representative listen to me, specifically, when the rep's
constituency will surely have a wide range of conflicting opinions
(read any newspaper for dissent from the people).
> Will you actually consider a candidate
>for office that takes a blood oath to vote as the majority of the people
>in his/her district WANT on any legislation that is relatively
>controversial?
I would really love it if a candidate really did this. But, we don't
vote that often for specific legislation and most of the time we vote
for a rep who then goes on and does what he/she thinks, like it or
not.
> Will you refuse to vote for any representative that votes
>yes on a bill that has an earmark?
All depends on the situation. Maybe the earmark is something that
should be done.
>That suit wearing ass is supposed to represent _YOU_.
Its a nice idea but in practice there will always be a diversity of
opinion and not all issues have clear-cut answers or solutions.
But, thank you for taking the time to explain YOUR viewpoint.
The Trucker
That is _NOT_ the same as a government controlled by the people. And all
the pretentiousness on the planet will not change that fact of reality.
> You said one of my ideas was an unacheivable objective (read the above
> exchange again) and yet I can cite articles where some rich guys made
> large contributions to build hospitals, wings, ...all kinds of things
> that benefit society rather than some little spoiled-brat narrow
> interest of interest to only a few (some obscure art museum, for
> example).
I said that you cannot control the powerful by ass kissing and asking them
top be nice.
>>The citing of members of
>>the nobility who, in your opinion, are philanthropists is not sufficient
>>in convincing me that rule by the nobility is a good idea.
>
> There have actually been quite serious and deep and detailed
> discussions by many philosophers and other "fancy" people over many
> years that an enlightened monarchy might be, in the final analysis,
> the best form of government.
Yet, this is not the same as an ungoverned nobility or an oligarchy. I
THINK the uncontrolled nobility has always deteriorated to feudalism, but
that nay be wrong. I am not going to go read all the history books on the
planet to support this one point. It deems quite probable that feudalism
would result from the ego pretty certainly.
> This is really an idea quite separate
> from a plutocracy. My reading of history has taught me that there
> actually were a few kings and emperors who did not enrich themselves
> at the same time they ruled but did rule in a manner that led to both
> peace and prosperity and most if not all that was ever written about
> these rulers indicated that the people under the rule appreciated what
> they had, at least until the next war which in many cases was caused
> by external forces not under the control of that king or emperor.
Jesus is dead. His policies live on bit the Republicans are doing
something about that as well. Your suggestion seems to be "pot luck" at
best.
>> Your basic
>>position is "conservative" and mine is not.
>
> My position is: lets look at all of what has happened in recorded
> history and try to learn from it rather than examine these issues with
> a prejudiced mindset that requires that we throw out anything not
> consistent with the mindset.
I would be a real dope to disagree with that and I won't but to the extent
that I will not spend the rest of my life or even the next hour
attempting to read your recommended history books.
>>> You may as well tell that bull that
>>>> you don't like what he is doing to that cow.
>>>
>>> That's beyond the scope of this post.
>>
>>It was an analogy. You cannot alter the ego of the rich.
>
> The ego of the rich can be a very serious problem, but you can also
> have snobery from the bottom, too. Where that ego hurts us is when it
> drives the rich to continue bilking the poor in a never-ending quest
> to satisfy an insatiable appetite for even more money. The ego of the
> power-driven, power-seeking control freaks (leading to Hitlers,
> Stalins, Ghengis Khans, King Bush II [wrt Iraq], etc.) is maybe an
> even more serious pathology since, beyond impoverishing people, it
> leads to unjustifiable destruction, pain, and death.
We actually have no disagreement on this. We both KNOW that the ego must
be controlled by a force outside the individual egoists. You, for
whatever reason, chose monarchy and I chose a "republican form of
government". It may be that we are both somewhat correct and that some
hybrid would work best.
>>>> > I would highly recommend a better
>>>> >> understanding of the purported goals of the United States Government at
>>>> >> its inception.
>>>>
>>>> > There are a few books out there that indicate the goals of the USA
>>>> > were not much different than anyone else: power, expansion,
>>>> > development, etc.
>>>>
>>>> I rather like just reading the actual history and making my own
>>>> analysis of why people did what they did.
>>>
>>> Well, two responses to that. i) just ask where the money/power ended
>>> up and how that happened, and ii) lots of history depends on who you
>>> read. I can provide titles.
>>
>>The Federalist and Anti-Federalist papers are not "interpretations".
>
> I am sure that no matter what is written, all readers will interpret
> them favorably or not, to some degree.
The point is that I am doing the "interpretation" as opposed to some
"middle man" inserting and interpretation. The other difference is that I
give the DIRECT sources for the stuff I am "interpreting" and invite
others to do their own interpretation. I do not say "go read all the
books in the library and get back to me when you are done".
> I am sure that those writings,
> themselves, depend absolutely on the authors' interpretationis of what
> they saw and how they understood what they saw before they put pen to
> paper.
Of course. The writings of Madison are his "interpretations" seen in a
way that justifies his point of view. But I am concerned only with
piecing together his "interpretations", if you will, into a solid frame
that shows what he was attempting to _SELL_ to the people of America at
the time. As to his own personal black hearted designs I have no real
comment.
>> The
>>speeches and correspondence of Madison and Jefferson are not
>>"interpretations".
>
> Same response as above applies here, too.
(snore)
>>>> Their actions typically give us
>>>> a clue as to what they were trying to accomplish. And to be sure, all of
>>>> those things (power, etc) were considered in the birth of the USA. I will
>>>> even admit that the "founding fathers" were primarily plutocrats at heart
>>>> and that they wanted some sort of nobility to form here in the United
>>>> States just as it was in Europe.
>>>
>>> Bingo, bingo, bingo. Or were you reading Charles Beard's book "The
>>> Economic Interpretation of the Constitution"? Where, yes, the robber-
>>> barons really were writing our constitution to benefit the robber-
>>> barons, right from the beginings?
>>
>>I try not to read the interpretations of others, thanks.
>
> 1. Then you have been missing something.
So much to do.... So little time.
> 2. Unless there is an unreasonable amount of dogmatic preferential
> acceptance of someone's "religion", we all need to interpret our
> "inputs" and explain them to ourselves, one way or the other, and put
> it all into some kind of mental framework that we can understand,
> completely or incompletely.
Why would I disagree and why even think these "points" would be "issues"?
>> My stuff comes
>>right out of the pipe.
>
> My stuff comes from everywhere and sometimes those interpretations are
> so different from the original material that the original authors are
> going one way and all the readers are going in the opposite
> directions.
Such is the hazard of reading the personally and
politically motivated interpretations of others.
>>> And, by the way, this is a very hot debate in certain circles in
>>> history.
>>
>>Try as they will, the historians will interpret. They are human.
>
> And, what is wrong with that?
It is not a wrong or a right. It just is.
We do not actually disagree here either. When we get to the bottom of all
this verbiage I will try to "sum up" and see what the differences might be.
>>>> To understand Constitutionality or to understand what America _IS_ one
>>>> must actually read and appreciate the actual history of the ratification.
>>>
>>> I think this is important and I thank you for pointing it out.
>>> However, I think a lot of what is in the Constitution is subverted by
>>> the presence of monetary power out there, corruption, high-powered
>>> lawyers, and all kinds of manipulative infrastructures designed to
>>> gain power over underlings.
>
> You did not respond to this.
I do not take issue with it.
The history proves your point. When the "happenings" are reviewed we see
that the original design was flawed, that the correction was attempted and
that it was subverted and failed, and that the power hungry then took
advantage of the "loophole". They started much earlier than 1921, but the
real assault took place at that time.
>>>> There is no silver bullet that can be fired at the heart of despotism, no
>>>> wooden stake to be plunged into the heart of such malice, that will
>>>> arrest and confine such evil over time. Vigilance is the price of
>>>> freedom and liberty and we must constantly guard against the forces of
>>>> aristocracy and plutocracy
>>>
>>> Or...the Nazi seizure of power in 1933.
>
> You didn't respond to this, either.
Why bring up Nazi? The discussion is about controlling the ill effects
of the ego regardless of how it is manifested.
>>> or they will, in fact, have their way. We have
>>>> failed in our responsibility to prevent the deterioration of our freedoms
>>>> and our liberty.
>>>
>>> John Strachey said once that if you can organize ten men, then you can
>>> control a hundred. Well, sometimes. Or...you can fool enough of the
>>> people enough of the time.
>>
>>The fact that we have "The best Congress money can buy" is not seriously
>>debated. The current "Campaign Finance Reform" efforts are but a
>>diversion. CFR has been done over and over. The Supremes recently ruled
>>that the last CFR was, at least in part, unconstitutional. My own
>>proposal is the best example if a proper solution I have seen.
>
> See below..
>
>>Instant Runoff Voting and similar systems of balloting address the need
>>for improvements in discerning the will of the people in extremely large
>>electoral arenas. The shrinking of electoral districts to encompass
>>fewer people and an insistence on compactness would do more to promote
>>representative government than would even IRV.
>
> My greatest fear is the electronic voting system which can be hacked
> and in the last election there was evidence that it was but the whole
> thing blew over. It would be simple to have a computer program "throw"
> a percentage of cast votes to a different party and then when the
> election is over, self-erase the hack so it would be impossible to
> detect it. That is all in addition to all the older techniques of
> election fraud.
I fail to see how this is relevant but for some sort of misunderstanding.
The smaller districts are certainly LESS subject to corruption. As the
pool of voters shrinks the "everyone knows everyone else" reality becomes
much more predominant. The people who "count the votes" are the local
people as opposed to some "ringer from Chicago" so that can't be the
point. My recommended expansion has absolutely nothing to do with how the
votes that select representatives are cast or counted. This is a
"strawman" or just a misunderstanding.
>>> That failure happened very early on with the failure
>>>> of the very first constitutional amendment and manifested itself in 1921
>>>> when the House of Representatives failed to reapportion the House in
>>>> respect of a very steep rise in population and the shift of population
>>>> from rural to urban. This, according to many, was a Constitutional breach.
>>>> But we failed even more certainly when we allowed the Congress to limit
>>>> the representation to only 425 members in 1929.
>>>
>>> Here is another problem: In most if not all of Latin America, most of
>>> the constitutions of those governments were patterned after the US
>>> Constitution. What was the problem? Those constitutions were never
>>> enforced.
>>>
>>> Look what we have today: The Supreme Court actually making laws. An
>>> unelected body of "powerful" people.
>>
>>So what will you _do_ about it?
>
> Sit here and tell you that your "pipe dreams" are all pretty much for
> naught.
That will certainly move the ball forward, won't it. Good grief.
>> Will you insist that YOUR representative
>>work to expand the representation?
>
> Why would my representative listen to me, specifically, when the rep's
> constituency will surely have a wide range of conflicting opinions
> (read any newspaper for dissent from the people).
That is a key point that must be addressed. We are not now debating the
efficacy of the proposal. We are debating the "how to get it done".
>> Will you actually consider a candidate
>>for office that takes a blood oath to vote as the majority of the people
>>in his/her district WANT on any legislation that is relatively
>>controversial?
>
> I would really love it if a candidate really did this. But, we don't
> vote that often for specific legislation and most of the time we vote
> for a rep who then goes on and does what he/she thinks, like it or
> not.
Here again, we are actually talking about implementation as opposed to
propriety of the solution. Surely you will agree that smaller
constituencies are a boon to true representative nature of the
representative; that the representative is more "like" those being
represented as the group size is decreased.
We are actually looking here at how to _ENFORCE_ the oath of office that
would get someone elected in the first place. --- implementation.
>> Will you refuse to vote for any representative that votes
>>yes on a bill that has an earmark?
>
> All depends on the situation. Maybe the earmark is something that
> should be done.
Which implies that you are a C-Span junkie looking at every bill. Why not
just totally outlaw earmarks by insisting that the representative not vote
for such legislation? If the earmark is something worth doing it wouldn't
be an earmark.
>>That suit wearing ass is supposed to represent _YOU_.
>
> Its a nice idea but in practice there will always be a diversity of
> opinion and not all issues have clear-cut answers or solutions.
And the smaller the group the less diverse would be the opinion(s) and the
more accountable the representative will be.
> But, thank you for taking the time to explain YOUR viewpoint.
I appreciate the opportunity to clarify my proposal. Your "alternative"
seems to be authoritarianism in one form or another. That solution was
rejected at the time America was created and I hope it will be rejected
now. I have convinced myself over the last 6 years that expanding the
role of the common people in their government is the correct answer to our
current problems. A "republican form of government" will work so long as
the membership of the House is controlled by "Article the First" as it
came from the House and before it was destroyed in committee by the power
seekers. Tat "algorithm" would have 1600 __**VOTING**__members in the
House at present, or 6000.
BobR
> >Hey, I was working at one of those corporations that did mass layoffs
> >and outsourced a substantial amount of work. I didn't like it one bit
> >and still don't, but I can also understand the business decisions that
> >made it almost impossible for the company to do anything else. They
> >are in competition on a global basis and in order to survive, they
> >must remain competitive on a global basis. I am not so naive as to
> >believe that my job, no matter how good I might be at it, can't be
> >done by someone else far cheaper. It might take two or three Indians
> >to do it but when they earn less than 10% of what I earned, it still
> >remains a huge bargain for the corporation.
>
> No disagreement with above...buuuut...why is it that even if they are
> making decent profits, they still go ahead and screw the employees
> even more?
>
I don't think anyone ever sets out to "screw the employees" period.
Sometimes it seems that way but most of the time it is strictly the
goal of ensuring a steady growth in profits. There are exceptions and
the most frequent that I have personally seen is some manager trying
to work his way up or worse, one who is vying for a major bonus before
taking retirement.
> > The
> >problem is that the vast majority of people would starve to death if
> >we returned to the "hunter-gatherer" days of the past.
>
> They did, anyway, in the hunter-gatherer days of the past.
> And, even today, we've got that bottom 1/2 or so to 2/3, all over the
> world, that are barely making it from one day to the next.
>
> The only people that are doing OK are those in the upper 1/3, and I'd
> even say you have to be in the upper 5% to be able to say you can be
> comfortable. Of course, those in the upper 1% to 0.1% are the
> super-rich and have all the yachts, mansions, servants (lawyers, CPAs,
> PR groups, etc.).
>
You know, the fact is that I really don't care about those super-
rich. The fact is that they spend their money and when they do, they
employ thousands of others. If they are not spending their money,
they are investing it which in turn results in even more jobs.
Somebody is building those yachts, mansions and servants, lawyers,
CPA's and PR groups are making money which in turn contributes to the
economy.
> deleted some
>
> >That just simply isn't true, none of it. We all have choices but few
> >of us really take advantage of those choices. It is far easier for
> >most to head to the local ice house for a cold beer than to attend
> >classes at the local Jr. College.
>
> Yeah, but when people come out of those retrainings, I've seen studies
> that show at most 1/3 to 1/2 are successful. The rest have the school
> bill and still no job. i.e. more debt and no income.
>
So your answer is to do nothing? To not try because you might fail?
If 1/3 to 1/2 are successful then that 1/3 to 1/2 found a way to move
on and better themselves. Where is your study results for those who
didn't try?
> Fine, you can say they didn't work hard enough. The minister at the
> church can say if your prayers were not answered, its because you
> didn't pray hard enough, either.
>
One thing that I always tried to get across to my daughter as she was
growing up was that it far more important to work smart as well as
hard. Oh yes, I have never bought into that crap about prayers not
answered because someone didn't pray hard enough.
>
>
> >I agree with you completely on the golden parachute bull shit but that
> >is really making a super issue out of the tip of the tip of the
> >iceburg. The problems in all corporate environments isn't just with
> >the top but from every level top to bottom. The CEO's are simply the
> >most visible element but many of the decisions that most effect the
> >rank and file workers are made at various levels throughout the
> >organization often without the knowledge of the CEO's. The decision
> >to layoff and outsource where I was working was made by a mid-level
> >manager.
>
> Fine. What bonuses did he get? What was his severance package compared
> to yours? What else was in his package?
>
>
I don't really care what he got, that was his job and he was
performing it. I may not like the results and I don't but I have
learned to live with it and move on. Personally I think he was a
blooming idiot who personally screwed the company for his own
benefit. That though is what happens when you must deal with people.
So far, I haven't found a way to avoid dealing with them.
>
> >> deleted some b/c no new material
>
> >Took a temporary position as a Project Manager that led to a position
> >as Senior Billing Analyst. Both were total departures from my Lead
> >Systems Designer position that I had been working for years. Found
> >that the IT field had totally collapsed following the Y2K and dot.com
> >bust. I could complain that I ran into a lot of age discrimination as
> >well but the reality was that I had ridden my experience for several
> >years instead of staying on top of current trends.
>
> Yeah, but how do you keep one job and simultaneously train for
> another? All the books talk about "keeping up" but they don't tell you
> how to do this and for lots of people who deserve life-work balance,
> what are they supposed to do? Kill themselves?
>
There are more options available today than at any time during my
lifetime but they will still require some commitment beyond the
normal. By the way, while I did spend a substantial amount of my time
and money on training over the years, I wasn't as smart about it as I
could and should have been. If I had been, I would have finished my
degree. Don't know if it would have made any difference but it might
have.
BobR
> > IBM gave MS an inch and they took a mile but then they
> >learn from the masters of the time which was IBM. They out played IBM
> >at their own game. Which is what usually happend with every monopoly
> >given enough time.
>
> Sooner or later, its all a part of "payback," eh? They all do it.
>
> I saw op-ed pieces in WSJ years ago by Scott McNeally, Bill G, and
> Larry Ellison and you should have read them. They all said the same
> thing: "We are nice guys, the other two guys are badguys." Made me
> puke.
>
and most of those ego maniacs are not worth the time of day but do
manage to accomplish things that often need to be accomplished. IBM
was a monopoly that ruled the computer world for several decades but
without them I don't believe we would have seen the same advancement
that we did.
> > MS is on top for the moment but they are well
> >aware that the dogs are at their heals.
>
> And, Google might eat their lunch with ASP, and some others are doing
> this, too.
>
And so the cycle continues. In the last 60 years I have seen a lot of
companies who seemingly were invulnerable and near monopolies fall by
the wayside.
>
> > I have seen a lot of noble companies
> >fall by the wayside over the years because they refused to make the
> >hard decisions necessary to survive. It does little good to try and
> >save the jobs of a few at the cost of everyone. On the other hand, a
> >poorly managed company will be a poorly managed company no matter
> >where the employees are or how much you pay them.
>
> Well, I'm going to "go nostalgic" on you. Some decades ago job
> security in the USA was a lot better than today. And, same for Japan:
> decades ago you worked for one of their big corporations, turned the
> crank like you should, and you had a lifetime job. Same deal in
> western Europe in the past: good job security. Both other places are
> just like the USA, now. Job today, gone tommorrow.
>
We can look back and say how good things were in the past but my
memory is either better than yours or worse, not sure which but I
remember times that weren't so good with high unemployment and a
standard of living that I don't want to return to. Yes, some people
had those lifetime jobs but they were mostly dead end jobs that the
type that I ever wanted. You also failed to mention that todays
companies must generally deal with employees that will jump jobs every
two years without concern for what their actions may have done to the
company.
Mani Deli
<re...@r-a-reed-assoc.com> wrote:
>You know, the fact is that I really don't care about those super-
>rich. The fact is that they spend their money and when they do, they
>employ thousands of others. If they are not spending their money,
>they are investing it which in turn results in even more jobs.
>Somebody is building those yachts, mansions and servants, lawyers,
>CPA's and PR groups are making money which in turn contributes to the
>economy.
American mythology for those getting fucked by the upper one percent!
The small group rich owners of this country need to keep the rest of
you ignorant, that's the American way.
"The owners of this country count on the fact that Americans will
probably remain wilfully ignorant of the big Red White Blue dick
that's being jammed up their assholes every day. Because the owners of
this country know the truth, it's called the American Dream, because
you have to be asleep to believe it."
George Carlin on who really controls America--
watch the whole video
http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&videoID=935607276
Stray Dog
> On Sat, 17 May 2008 21:48:59 -0700 (PDT), BobR
>
> <re...@r-a-reed-assoc.com> wrote:
> >You know, the fact is that I really don't care about those super-
> >rich. The fact is that they spend their money and when they do, they
> >employ thousands of others. If they are not spending their money,
> >they are investing it which in turn results in even more jobs.
> >Somebody is building those yachts, mansions and servants, lawyers,
> >CPA's and PR groups are making money which in turn contributes to the
> >economy.
Nice try to justify the existence of the "elite" super-rich, but the
additional fact is that a great fraction obtain their money by the
exploitation of every trick, every tweak, every cheat that they can
get away with. The fact is that the biggest corporations, with the
most highly paid CEOs (and well off investors) also employ a smaller
relative number of employees than the small businesses, and so I'm
happy for the guys who run small businesses and employ larger
fractions of the population and the owners/executives of most of those
are welcome to make more money but its still a lot less than the
ripoff super-rich.
> American mythology for those getting fucked by the upper one percent!
>
> The small group rich owners of this country need to keep the rest of
> you ignorant, that's the American way.
>
> "The owners of this country count on the fact that Americans will
> probably remain wilfully ignorant of the big Red White Blue dick
> that's being jammed up their assholes every day. Because the owners of
> this country know the truth, it's called the American Dream, because
> you have to be asleep to believe it."
There is a lot of mythology about how "free" we are and yet for 99% of
the people, 99% of their business transactions are based on prices
they will pay at all the stores, with ZERO bargaining power, and they
will pay with money that they make, 99% of the time, with ZERO
bargaining power over how much their wages will be (most employers
will offer a job on a take it or leave it pay scale). That "power
situation" has much more power fall on the side of the rich, as it has
been through most of history, and the underlings have almost zero
control over it. The only situation where the underlings have a little
control is when unions are present and are working within (preferably
low corruption) conditions that allow some power to be shared with the
executives. The idea that you can just not shop at a given store if
you don't like the price is a bogus option since all of those prices,
even at competitors, are cranked out on spreadsheets to maximize
profit for the sellers (minimize bargains for the buyers). Etc.
> George Carlin on who really controls America--
>
> watch the whole videohttp://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&videoID=...
Stray Dog
What is good or bad is something we all have the option of deciding
for our own particular circumstances. In my own life I can
retroactively evaluate the various periods where things were either
better or worse than other periods. In the world situation, there are
quite a few studies out there that show the bottom half of everyone is
getting slightly worse off (economically) every year for the last 2-3
decades. You can say fine, the upper half is doing better, and I'll
leave it to everyone else to decide if its OK to rob Peter to pay
Paul.
Yes, some people
> had those lifetime jobs but they were mostly dead end jobs that the
> type that I ever wanted. You also failed to mention that todays
> companies must generally deal with employees that will jump jobs every
> two years without concern for what their actions may have done to the
> company.
Lets balance that off with companies that hire a bunch of people and
then do a mass layoff of them at any time. For the largest companies,
these layoffs of US guys has been in cycles and waves now for many
decades. Also, look at the ones that continually demand givebacks
every time the union contract comes up for renewal. And, it is a
common fact that benefit cutbacks are a continual feature, too. And, I
blame the exchange rates that all the 3rd world countries set up to
suck jobs out of the USA. Nothing helps a country more than job
creation and nothing hurts worse than job destruction.
Stray Dog
> > >Hey, I was working at one of those corporations that did mass layoffs
> > >and outsourced a substantial amount of work. I didn't like it one bit
> > >and still don't, but I can also understand the business decisions that
> > >made it almost impossible for the company to do anything else. They
> > >are in competition on a global basis and in order to survive, they
> > >must remain competitive on a global basis. I am not so naive as to
> > >believe that my job, no matter how good I might be at it, can't be
> > >done by someone else far cheaper. It might take two or three Indians
> > >to do it but when they earn less than 10% of what I earned, it still
> > >remains a huge bargain for the corporation.
>
> > No disagreement with above...buuuut...why is it that even if they are
> > making decent profits, they still go ahead and screw the employees
> > even more?
>
> I don't think anyone ever sets out to "screw the employees" period.
Oh, on the contrary. You should read the history of strikes in the
USA. You should read labor history. You should notice if you ever read
history going back to the ancient Greek times that there have always
been uprisings, rebellions, revolts over working conditions and
mistreatments. I have read many books now. You should read what life
was like under the kings in England around the time of the Magna
Carta. The underlings were ALWAYS squeezed. I've read many many dozens
of articles in the WSJ over the last 25 years about all manner of
screw-the-underling management processes. I could write a book about
it. But, there are already many good books that discuss this. You're
just not looking.
> Sometimes it seems that way but most of the time it is strictly the
> goal of ensuring a steady growth in profits. There are exceptions and
> the most frequent that I have personally seen is some manager trying
> to work his way up or worse, one who is vying for a major bonus before
> taking retirement.
Maybe you have been primarily satisfied with what you saw or got for
yourself, but the fact is that the farther down you go from, say, the
top 10% in job cushyness, the worse off you will be (unless, also,
there is a strong union present and the company has no particular
leverage over you)
> > > The
> > >problem is that the vast majority of people would starve to death if
> > >we returned to the "hunter-gatherer" days of the past.
>
> > They did, anyway, in the hunter-gatherer days of the past.
> > And, even today, we've got that bottom 1/2 or so to 2/3, all over the
> > world, that are barely making it from one day to the next.
>
> > The only people that are doing OK are those in the upper 1/3, and I'd
> > even say you have to be in the upper 5% to be able to say you can be
> > comfortable. Of course, those in the upper 1% to 0.1% are the
> > super-rich and have all the yachts, mansions, servants (lawyers, CPAs,
> > PR groups, etc.).
>
I answered the stuff below in another post.
===========================
BobR
to the lower half based on the spread between the relative wealth, it
agreeable is pathetic. If however you look at it from a standpoint of
the overall standard of living then things look a bit different. The
overall standard of living for the lowest half is little changed from
the past but for the remainder, they are seeing an overall increase
globally. That same increase on the global basis has a somewhat
negative effect on what was the upper 10% of the population in areas
like the US and Europe. We are seeing our jobs go to those areas like
India, China, and other Asian countries. At the same time, we are
seeing those same people become consumers.
The reality is that we must learn to deal with the change brought
about by a global economy. Maybe we should be concentrating more on
developing those emerging markets instead of futile efforts to protect
our past job base.
> Yes, some people
>
> > had those lifetime jobs but they were mostly dead end jobs that the
> > type that I ever wanted. You also failed to mention that todays
> > companies must generally deal with employees that will jump jobs every
> > two years without concern for what their actions may have done to the
> > company.
>
> Lets balance that off with companies that hire a bunch of people and
> then do a mass layoff of them at any time. For the largest companies,
> these layoffs of US guys has been in cycles and waves now for many
> decades. Also, look at the ones that continually demand givebacks
> every time the union contract comes up for renewal. And, it is a
> common fact that benefit cutbacks are a continual feature, too. And, I
> blame the exchange rates that all the 3rd world countries set up to
> suck jobs out of the USA. Nothing helps a country more than job
> creation and nothing hurts worse than job destruction.- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -
The business world has changed substantially over the last 40-50
years. The up and down cycles are something every business seems to
be facing with increasing frequency. When times are good and business
is there, they hire as many people as possible to service that
business. When the business turns, they must cut back as quickly as
they ramped up. It really sucks for both the company and its
employees. I wish I know what the answer is but I am not certain
there is an answer. You do what you have to do to survive rather you
are an employee, a self-employed individual, or a corporation.
Stray Dog
> On Sat, 17 May 2008 11:06:14 +0000, Straydog wrote:
> > Lots of comments farther down.....
>
> > On Fri, 16 May 2008 12:07:40 -0700, The Trucker <mik...@verizon.net>
> > wrote:
>
> >>On Fri, 16 May 2008 11:10:58 -0700, Stray Dog wrote:
>
> >>> On May 16, 11:46 am, The Trucker <mik...@verizon.net> wrote:
> >>>> On Fri, 16 May 2008 05:24:50 -0700, Stray Dog wrote:
> >>>> > On May 15, 12:33 pm, The Trucker <mik...@verizon.net> wrote:
> >>>> >> On Thu, 15 May 2008 07:18:17 -0700, BobR wrote:
> >>>> >> > On May 15, 8:22 am, Stray Dog <straydog2...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > deleted
>
>
Now I'm going to say something outrageous: A govt controled by the
people is not acheivable. And, I can give many examples of reasons.
> > You said one of my ideas was an unacheivable objective (read the above
> > exchange again) and yet I can cite articles where some rich guys made
> > large contributions to build hospitals, wings, ...all kinds of things
> > that benefit society rather than some little spoiled-brat narrow
> > interest of interest to only a few (some obscure art museum, for
> > example).
>
> I said that you cannot control the powerful by ass kissing and asking them
> top be nice.
If the tax system can be enforceable (and track all the offshore
banking and hiding activities) then you don't have to ass kiss the
rich.
> >>The citing of members of
> >>the nobility who, in your opinion, are philanthropists is not sufficient
> >>in convincing me that rule by the nobility is a good idea.
>
> > There have actually been quite serious and deep and detailed
> > discussions by many philosophers and other "fancy" people over many
> > years that an enlightened monarchy might be, in the final analysis,
> > the best form of government.
>
> Yet, this is not the same as an ungoverned nobility or an oligarchy.
Remember, I'm quoting some famous guys in history AND the key word is
_enlightened_.
I
> THINK the uncontrolled nobility has always deteriorated to feudalism, but
> that nay be wrong.
Well, I'll give you the Inca socialism example, again, as a stable
system where the "govt" controled everything and there was no private
ownership, and that was stable for 250 years and there was plenty of
food and everyone was happy.
I am not going to go read all the history books on the
> planet to support this one point.
You can take my summary as a tentative _rumor_ and if you want, read
someday on your own. MOST kings and emperors were _bad_. I mean really
bad. They made wars on other kings even if they wanted to be peaceful,
so a good king was forced to enter wars. The whole story around the
Magna Carta has a history of hundreds of years on up to democracy
(voting by THE people for candidates that hold offices with term
limits) in Europe (a better example than the USA) being spread around
in the 1800s, because there are 600 years of time for the Magna Carta
ideas to develop.
I think this picture, above, is more important than anything else in
history for human rights. And, you have to read the document and the
translation into english to realize just how bad those medieval kings
could be.
Another very important example is king Hamurabi (king of Babylon)
back 4,000 years ago. It is remarkable how liberal his laws were for
Babylon. Underling people actually had some rights!!! You have to look
this up someday.
It deems quite probable that feudalism
> would result from the ego pretty certainly.
I can't put a number on it, but, yes, kings and anyone with power/
wealth had extraordinary power and most of the time they used that
power to get more power and wealth and both were obtained by taking
them away from anyone who could be made a victim. Hence, wars,
killing, stealing booty, destroying, etc.
> > This is really an idea quite separate
> > from a plutocracy. My reading of history has taught me that there
> > actually were a few kings and emperors who did not enrich themselves
> > at the same time they ruled but did rule in a manner that led to both
> > peace and prosperity and most if not all that was ever written about
> > these rulers indicated that the people under the rule appreciated what
> > they had, at least until the next war which in many cases was caused
> > by external forces not under the control of that king or emperor.
>
> Jesus is dead. His policies live on bit the Republicans are doing
> something about that as well. Your suggestion seems to be "pot luck" at
> best.
I'm just reading history to find out what kind of "systems" existed in
the past, how people behaved, and above all, how power systems and
heirarchies developed. I don't have any magic answers, but I just want
to know how power was shared or not shared between the "establishment"
and the people (people got their power whenever there were rebellions
and revolts and there were a lot of them through history and actually
sometimes they actually did manage to get "the powers to be" to cut
some slack for the underlings. Just like unions and strikes today.
> >> Your basic
> >>position is "conservative" and mine is not.
>
> > My position is: lets look at all of what has happened in recorded
> > history and try to learn from it rather than examine these issues with
> > a prejudiced mindset that requires that we throw out anything not
> > consistent with the mindset.
>
> I would be a real dope to disagree with that and I won't but to the extent
> that I will not spend the rest of my life or even the next hour
> attempting to read your recommended history books.
Well, fine. I'm retired and have not only the interest but the time to
chase this stuff down. Its all very fascinating. All I'm gonna say is
back in the Magna Carta days (King John, who the barons wanted the
king to put his seal on the MC, was a real super-asshole). You just
have to read a couple of books to realize what almost infinite power
led to with a bad king. And, yet, there were good kings, too. Not
many, but everything written (or almost everything) was good or said
that the people liked their king.
> >>> You may as well tell that bull that
> >>>> you don't like what he is doing to that cow.
>
> >>> That's beyond the scope of this post.
>
> >>It was an analogy. You cannot alter the ego of the rich.
>
> > The ego of the rich can be a very serious problem, but you can also
> > have snobery from the bottom, too. Where that ego hurts us is when it
> > drives the rich to continue bilking the poor in a never-ending quest
> > to satisfy an insatiable appetite for even more money. The ego of the
> > power-driven, power-seeking control freaks (leading to Hitlers,
> > Stalins, Ghengis Khans, King Bush II [wrt Iraq], etc.) is maybe an
> > even more serious pathology since, beyond impoverishing people, it
> > leads to unjustifiable destruction, pain, and death.
>
> We actually have no disagreement on this. We both KNOW that the ego must
> be controlled by a force outside the individual egoists. You, for
> whatever reason, chose monarchy and I chose a "republican form of
> government".
Well, I'm not really _for_ monarchy but there has never been pure
democracy. I will say that I'd prefer to vote on things that affect me
rather than vote for some guy and then after the guy gets in office,
he does whatever he wants (eg. King Bush II).
It may be that we are both somewhat correct and that some
> hybrid would work best.
Maybe. There is no perfection out there.
We also need a system of _removing_ people from office if they screw
up, too.
>
>
> >>>> > I would highly recommend a better
> >>>> >> understanding of the purported goals of the United States Government at
> >>>> >> its inception.
>
> >>>> > There are a few books out there that indicate the goals of the USA
> >>>> > were not much different than anyone else: power, expansion,
> >>>> > development, etc.
>
> >>>> I rather like just reading the actual history and making my own
> >>>> analysis of why people did what they did.
>
> >>> Well, two responses to that. i) just ask where the money/power ended
> >>> up and how that happened, and ii) lots of history depends on who you
> >>> read. I can provide titles.
>
> >>The Federalist and Anti-Federalist papers are not "interpretations".
>
> > I am sure that no matter what is written, all readers will interpret
> > them favorably or not, to some degree.
>
> The point is that I am doing the "interpretation" as opposed to some
> "middle man" inserting and interpretation.
thats OK, I do, too.
The other difference is that I
> give the DIRECT sources for the stuff I am "interpreting" and invite
> others to do their own interpretation. I do not say "go read all the
> books in the library and get back to me when you are done".
Well, you have to read a few.
> > I am sure that those writings,
> > themselves, depend absolutely on the authors' interpretationis of what
> > they saw and how they understood what they saw before they put pen to
> > paper.
>
> Of course. The writings of Madison are his "interpretations" seen in a
> way that justifies his point of view. But I am concerned only with
> piecing together his "interpretations", if you will, into a solid frame
> that shows what he was attempting to _SELL_ to the people of America at
> the time. As to his own personal black hearted designs I have no real
> comment.
I appreciate that you appreciate what these guys said. Its important,
too.
> >> The
> >>speeches and correspondence of Madison and Jefferson are not
> >>"interpretations".
>
> > Same response as above applies here, too.
>
> (snore)
>
> >>>> Their actions typically give us
> >>>> a clue as to what they were trying to accomplish. And to be sure, all of
> >>>> those things (power, etc) were considered in the birth of the USA. I will
> >>>> even admit that the "founding fathers" were primarily plutocrats at heart
> >>>> and that they wanted some sort of nobility to form here in the United
> >>>> States just as it was in Europe.
>
> >>> Bingo, bingo, bingo. Or were you reading Charles Beard's book "The
> >>> Economic Interpretation of the Constitution"? Where, yes, the robber-
> >>> barons really were writing our constitution to benefit the robber-
> >>> barons, right from the beginings?
>
> >>I try not to read the interpretations of others, thanks.
>
> > 1. Then you have been missing something.
>
> So much to do.... So little time.
Yeah, I know.
> > 2. Unless there is an unreasonable amount of dogmatic preferential
> > acceptance of
>
> ...
>
> read more »
BobR
> On Sat, 17 May 2008 21:48:59 -0700 (PDT), BobR
>
> <re...@r-a-reed-assoc.com> wrote:
> >You know, the fact is that I really don't care about those super-
> >rich. The fact is that they spend their money and when they do, they
> >employ thousands of others. If they are not spending their money,
> >they are investing it which in turn results in even more jobs.
> >Somebody is building those yachts, mansions and servants, lawyers,
> >CPA's and PR groups are making money which in turn contributes to the
> >economy.
>
> American mythology for those getting fucked by the upper one percent!
>
You sound like someone who suffers from extreme envy.
> The small group rich owners of this country need to keep the rest of
> you ignorant, that's the American way.
>
> "The owners of this country count on the fact that Americans will
> probably remain wilfully ignorant of the big Red White Blue dick
> that's being jammed up their assholes every day. Because the owners of
> this country know the truth, it's called the American Dream, because
> you have to be asleep to believe it."
>
> George Carlin on who really controls America--
>
Wow, I am so impressed by your quote of a crude comedian who racks in
millions for defining the seven most frequently used profanity words.
Now there is an important contribution to our society.
BobR
> On May 18, 10:55 am, Mani Deli <noth...@inter.com> wrote:
>
> > On Sat, 17 May 2008 21:48:59 -0700 (PDT), BobR
>
> > <re...@r-a-reed-assoc.com> wrote:
> > >You know, the fact is that I really don't care about those super-
> > >rich. The fact is that they spend their money and when they do, they
> > >employ thousands of others. If they are not spending their money,
> > >they are investing it which in turn results in even more jobs.
> > >Somebody is building those yachts, mansions and servants, lawyers,
> > >CPA's and PR groups are making money which in turn contributes to the
> > >economy.
>
> Nice try to justify the existence of the "elite" super-rich, but the
> additional fact is that a great fraction obtain their money by the
> exploitation of every trick, every tweak, every cheat that they can
> get away with. The fact is that the biggest corporations, with the
> most highly paid CEOs (and well off investors) also employ a smaller
> relative number of employees than the small businesses, and so I'm
> happy for the guys who run small businesses and employ larger
> fractions of the population and the owners/executives of most of those
> are welcome to make more money but its still a lot less than the
> ripoff super-rich.
>
I am not trying to justify the existence of the "elite" super-rich nor
am I trying to condem them for their success. While I will quickly
agree that there are those who get there on the backs of others, many
that I know have earned their millions by working both hard, smart,
and taking the chances that most of us are afraid to make. I am also
a strong supporter of small business rather than giant corporations.
On the other hand, if not for the large corporations some things would
simply not exist and others would be beyond most peoples ability to
afford.
> > American mythology for those getting fucked by the upper one percent!
>
> > The small group rich owners of this country need to keep the rest of
> > you ignorant, that's the American way.
>
> > "The owners of this country count on the fact that Americans will
> > probably remain wilfully ignorant of the big Red White Blue dick
> > that's being jammed up their assholes every day. Because the owners of
> > this country know the truth, it's called the American Dream, because
> > you have to be asleep to believe it."
>
> There is a lot of mythology about how "free" we are and yet for 99% of
> the people, 99% of their business transactions are based on prices
> they will pay at all the stores, with ZERO bargaining power, and they
> will pay with money that they make, 99% of the time, with ZERO
> bargaining power over how much their wages will be (most employers
> will offer a job on a take it or leave it pay scale). That "power
> situation" has much more power fall on the side of the rich, as it has
> been through most of history, and the underlings have almost zero
> control over it. The only situation where the underlings have a little
> control is when unions are present and are working within (preferably
> low corruption) conditions that allow some power to be shared with the
> executives. The idea that you can just not shop at a given store if
> you don't like the price is a bogus option since all of those prices,
> even at competitors, are cranked out on spreadsheets to maximize
> profit for the sellers (minimize bargains for the buyers). Etc.
>
>
Four years ago the organization that I work for lost a bit over $1
million. Three years ago we lost over $3 million. I started working
for them just over three years ago as a senior billing analyst. It
was made perfectly clear to me that we were on the verge of being shut
down if we could not turn things around. The first thing I did was to
review our cost and pricing structure with a resulting updating to our
prices that in some cases resulted in increases and others were
decreased. Yes, we tried every thing possible to maximize profit.
The result was a $4 million turn around to realize a $1 million profit
last year. Next step was to review the entire billing process and
audit it for lost billing which has pushed the current year to what
will probably result in $2 million profit. As a result, we are now
able to put money back into the organization to replace the IS System
and invest in new equipment. Yes, I use spreadsheets, databases, and
everything else I can think of to maximize our income. If I had not,
I would not have a job today and neither would a couple of hundred
other people.
>
> > George Carlin on who really controls America--
>
> > watch the whole videohttp://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&videoID=...- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -
Gawd, I must say that if I had to live day in and day out with the
same attitude you people seem to want to cling to I would just kill
myself and be done with it. Do you really have it all that damn bad
that you have to be so concerned about those with more than you?
Straydog
<re...@r-a-reed-assoc.com> wrote:
>On May 18, 7:45=A0pm, Stray Dog <straydog2...@gmail.com> wrote:
>> On May 18, 1:19 am, BobR <re...@r-a-reed-assoc.com> wrote:
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> > > > IBM gave MS an inch and they took a mile but then they
>> > > >learn from the masters of the time which was IBM. =A0They out played =
>IBM
>> > > >at their own game. =A0Which is what usually happend with every monopo=
>ly
>> > > >given enough time.
>>
>> > > Sooner or later, its all a part of "payback," eh? They all do it.
>>
>> > > I saw op-ed pieces in WSJ years ago by Scott McNeally, Bill G, and
>> > > Larry Ellison and you should have read them. They all said the same
>> > > thing: "We are nice guys, the other two guys are badguys." Made me
>> > > puke.
>>
>> > Ever play king of the mountain? =A0Yes, I probably read the same article=
>
>> > and most of those ego maniacs are not worth the time of day but do
>> > manage to accomplish things that often need to be accomplished. =A0IBM
>> > was a monopoly that ruled the computer world for several decades but
>> > without them I don't believe we would have seen the same advancement
>> > that we did.
>>
>> > > > =A0MS is on top for the moment but they are well
>> > > >aware that the dogs are at their heals.
>>
>> > > And, Google might eat their lunch with ASP, and some others are doing
>> > > this, too.
>>
>> > And so the cycle continues. =A0In the last 60 years I have seen a lot of=
>
>> > companies who seemingly were invulnerable and near monopolies fall by
>> > the wayside.
>>
>> > > > I have seen a lot of noble companies
>> > > >fall by the wayside over the years because they refused to make the
>> > > >hard decisions necessary to survive. =A0It does little good to try an=
>d
>> > > >save the jobs of a few at the cost of everyone. =A0On the other hand,=
You can't come to this conclusion unless you look at the cost of
living compared to take home pay over the entire spectrum of take home
pays. So, the guys at the top can buy two cars, two computers, two
yachts ..instead of one, but there are guys at the bottom where
inflation combined with sub-inflation take home pay is making THEIR
standard of living go down. There are lots of studies that show this.
I have a published graph that shows minimum wage not changing as much
in the last 30 years as inflation has increased costs. These people
are sinking. That is plain bad. I'm not bothered that much by the rich
guys, but the poor guys really are getting poorer.
And, the job creation rate in the USA has been lower than needed for a
stable ratio of "participation" compared to the total population. What
it means is that decades from now, even more poverty and homelessness
for more people.
> That same increase on the global basis has a somewhat
>negative effect on what was the upper 10% of the population in areas
>like the US and Europe. We are seeing our jobs go to those areas like
>India, China, and other Asian countries. At the same time, we are
>seeing those same people become consumers.
So far, the simplest measure of where we are at is the trade deficit.
The last figures I've seen are that the US is in trade deficit with
virtually all of its trading partners. Now, I know there is more to it
than trade deficit alone, and economists can write essays to come up
with all kinds of abstract analyses but in the end, foreigners can
take their trade surplus and start buying up US assets and if they
want, start planting their nations flags on top of those assets and
that ain't good.
>The reality is that we must learn to deal with the change brought
>about by a global economy.
My understanding about this is that the vast majority of the trade
deficit problem (just one of many) is based mostly on exchange rates.
If labor were not cheap in 3rd world countries, then they would not be
getting the business. Period. And, it is a fact that right after China
got into the WTO, they devalued their currency greatly and they knew
exactly what they were doing. India is a little different. I looked up
the USD/Rupee exhange rates in one of my almanacs and they devalued
their currency constantly over the last 30 years. Same net result.
They got no industry but lots of cheap flesh. Ergo, offshore the IT
jobs from the USA.
And, who really benefits? The big corporations who can exploit the
exchange rates advantage.
> Maybe we should be concentrating more on
>developing those emerging markets instead of futile efforts to protect
>our past job base.
I don't claim to have any magic answers or exclusive and correct
explanations, but I've looked into economic history a little bit and
there is quite a bit of background in western Europe going back some
400-500 years. England and France, among others, played all kinds of
"tricks" with tariffs, laws, procedures, even warfare, to stack the
cards for economic gain at the expense of someone else, and there was
quite a bit of this. Today, a lot of these pundits talk about "free
trade" but its not at all simple. I read Tomas Friedman's book "The
Earth is Flat" and was disgusted with it. I read Greider's book "One
World, Ready or Not" and felt that it was a fair and realistic
analysis of not only the pros but the cons of what is going on today.
For whatever reason, our govt (and the Council on Foreign Relations,
and the Trilateral Commission, and all the big business
infrastructures and trade associations) are totally geared up for,
primarily, increased net profits to corporations, and secondarily for
whatever else will spin out of integrated economies. If anything good
comes out of this it might be with interlocked economies, it might
prevent major wars from happening since a war would tear up an economy
so much that it would be suicide for a country to go to war with a
major trading partner. But, there is a counter argument to that, too.
And, I'm out of mental energy just now, at the end of the day for me.
See you tommorrow or something.
>> =A0Yes, some people
>>
>> > had those lifetime jobs but they were mostly dead end jobs that the
>> > type that I ever wanted. =A0You also failed to mention that todays
>> > companies must generally deal with employees that will jump jobs every
>> > two years without concern for what their actions may have done to the
>> > company.
>>
>> Lets balance that off with companies that hire a bunch of people and
>> then do a mass layoff of them at any time. For the largest companies,
>> these layoffs of US guys has been in cycles and waves now for many
>> decades. Also, look at the ones that continually demand givebacks
>> every time the union contract comes up for renewal. And, it is a
>> common fact that benefit cutbacks are a continual feature, too. And, I
>> blame the exchange rates that all the 3rd world countries set up to
>> suck jobs out of the USA. Nothing helps a country more than job
>> creation and nothing hurts worse than job destruction.- Hide quoted text -=
Stray Dog
shows, and whatever Google does to these posts, whatever you said when
you made a replay definitely did not show up in the material below and
I scrolled up and down several times. The way its supposed to work is
to put a single right-facing "carrot" in front of your lines and all I
see are double or higher carrots.
:-\
===================
On May 15, 10:18 am, BobR <re...@r-a-reed-assoc.com> wrote:
> On May 15, 8:22 am, Stray Dog <straydog2...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > Well, let me say a couple of things: i) I appreciate that you _care_
> > enough to make more people aware of some of these topics and problems,
> > and ii) that you have thought about them in more detail than most
> > people. I think we have overlap in many of our thoughts but
> > disagreement in others and --what the hell--you ask most people in the
> > world and you'll get their own favorite theory on how the world works
> > if they care enough to think about it. The oldest and biggest problem
> > (going back to the beginnings of history) is the rich getting richer
> > and the poor, poorer. Getting politicians (presidents, senators,
> > whatever) focused on that problem in a) some way that most people can
> > agree to, and b) avoids the "best- laid- plans- of- mice- and- men-
> > oft- go- awry" problem seems to me to be more important than our
> > endless discussion, here.
>
> > Or, maybe I'm asking too much, expecting too much of human society
> > (and the powers-that-be, who usually look out for themselves and no
> > one else, anyway)?
>
> > == no change to below, included for reference and context, but I did
> > read it all ==
>
> > On May 14, 4:47 pm, The Trucker <mik...@verizon.net> wrote:
>
> > > On Wed, 14 May 2008 04:28:19 -0700, Stray Dog wrote:
> > > > On May 14, 12:35 am, The Trucker <mik...@verizon.net> wrote:
> > > >> On Tue, 13 May 2008 19:11:56 -0700, Stray Dog wrote:
>
> > > <<<< deletia>>>>>
>
> > > >> I have no idea what is justifiable wealth.
>
> > > > When one person (there are many hundreds of them) has more money than
> > > > the GDP of most small countries.
>
> > > We may, in fact, be witnessing a hint of what "too much" would be by
> > > looking at the price of oil. The market is being manipulated. There is
> > > no other way that the prices can do what they are doing. Peak oil has
> > > been reached, but that does not explain the short duration of the price
> > > increases. The worlds wealthiest are in the oil futures markets up to
> > > their elbows. And they are not going to turn lose until they get busted
> > > by American conservation and sucking a big gulp out of the strategic
> > > reserve. The nice thing about being the biggest consumer is that you can
> > > kick the speculators' butts and the suppliers too if you set your mind to
> > > it. The suppliers won't really get hurt by this quick action but the
> > > speculators and the money manipulators sure will.
>
> > > > But I will tell you that most
> > > >> wealth is accumulated through the use of government enforced monopoly
> > > >> rights and the bulk of it is ownership rights to natural resources.
>
> > > > Two books I have make reference to the three biggest busineses: oil,
> > > > exchange-rate trading, and moneylaundering (said to be $300-500 bil/
> > > > year). Greider's book is one, the other is a recent book I'm reading
> > > > now on moneylaundering (which includes a large part of the
> > > > international drug trade, too, which is another serious problem)..
>
> > > The latter is just sensationalism.
>
> > > > And, I cannot agree with you that "most" of those three are due to
> > > > govt enforced monopoly rules. Rather, at least two of the three are
> > > > under the control of private interests and few people will ever get to
> > > > know the details.
>
> > > The oil is not really capital and neither is the money. Both are
> > > controlled by government(s) directly or indirectly and neither have a cost
> > > of manufacture. Money is created with a keyboard and oil just IS.
>
> > > > The
> > > >> sheiks that own the personalized planes are collecting rent on the
> > > >> naturally occurring oil.
>
> > > > All the "owners" of all the capital in the world are collecting "rent"
> > > > on all of that printed money
>
> > > And this is what we get when we allow neoclassical economists and
> > > financial weenies to control the vocabulary. It is 1984 newspeak.
>
> > > MONEY IS NOT CAPITAL AND NEITHER IS OIL OR LAND. And the owners of land,
> > > oil, and Money are not the owners of CAPITAL. But they are most
> > > certainly collecting _RENT_.
>
> > > >, printed stock (ink on paper, electronic
> > > > bits in RAM memory), and don't forget that "hot money" (a real term),
> > > > borrowed shares, CDOs, etc. The whips who know this stuff a lot better
> > > > than I do say that the value of the worlds financial markets is 10 to
> > > > 100 times the world's entire GDP and you'd better think about that for
> > > > a minute before you dismiss it.
>
> > > That is not something I will debate or even take exception to. But think
> > > about how all this paper confers wealth and power. It is all based on
> > > government enforcement of monopoly money value. And if the creation of
> > > money was actually in the hands of a representative government
> > > (representative of the common people AND the wealthy) then paper money
> > > would do fine. The deregulation of the financial industries ability to
> > > engage in "investment banking" (money creation) and the creation of money
> > > by the fiscally irresponsible Republicans (no taxes to soak up the
> > > money) is a real problem.
>
> > > > Extremely large conglomerates are able to
> > > >> control large market segments and collect monopoly rents by virtue of
> > > >> size. But it is all a coercion.
>
> > > > I think you are basically right about this, but the people who are
> > > > "free" (less coerced) are the ones who can afford (i.e. are rich) to
> > > > play economic hardball.
>
> > > So we are slowly coming to grips with a vague definition of "Too Much
> > > Individual Wealth".
>
> > > > One of the saving graces of a highly
> > > >> progressive income tax is that it taxes away a lot of rent. But it
> > > >> doesn't really work very well in a global economy.
>
> > > > Especially if all manner of tax dodges, CPA trickery, lawyers,
> > > > offshore banks, etc., are all running at full force.
>
> > > But you are treading on dangerous ground here. There are "loopholes" in
> > > the tax code that should be there to spur economic development in
> > > particular areas. Real Estate has never been one of the "loopholes" that
> > > should be in the tax code.
>
> > > >> >> > My off-the-top-of-my-head notion would be to soak the rich, but I
> > > >> >> > think they are already squirreling away as much as possible to
> > > >> >> > offshore tax havens, tax dodges, etc.
>
> > > >> >> The naturally occurring land or oil or coal or gold or water, rain and
> > > >> >> sun will not be hauled of by the rich.
>
> > > >> > Oh, I think you are wrong about this. Oil is the world's biggest
> > > >> > business and in the hands of governments and certain corporations.
>
> > > >> The point I was trying to make is that the oil can't be put in a
> > > >> briefcase and moved to Bimini.
>
> > > > So what?
>
> > > So it can be taxed right here at the wellhead no matter who claims to own
> > > it. That is also true of all land ownership and mostly true for the
> > > ownership of fixed improvements. Value taxation (asset taxation) can
> > > make ownership passe and it is certainly blind to the nationality of the
> > > owners. It will not matter whether the resource is owned by Americans or
> > > Chinese.
>
> > > >> Only some papers showing ownership.
>
> > > > In ancient times, kings/emperors just said "I'm going to get that" and
> > > > have 100,000 soldiers march over and kill everybody, steal booty,
> > > > capture slaves, etc. Today, the same thing is happening (hostile
> > > > takeovers, sovereign wealth funds, repatriation, nationalization, etc).
>
> > > Drama trauma.
>
> > > > And
> > > >> the government must enforce such contracts or the dude in Bimini gets
> > > >> no pie.
>
> > > > I've got a couple more books for you to read about all the underground
> > > > economy that is totally under the radar of the govt.
>
> > > Here again. Tell me how you will get out of paying the taxes on yer home
> > > this year. HMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM???????????
>
> > > > The government could simply refuse to enforce the contracts and
> > > >> take the proceeds of the sale of the oil. More to the point our
> > > >> government currently enforces the ownership contracts yet cannot tax
> > > >> the income from those contracts because the income is realized in
> > > >> Bimini and the government of Bimini gets the tax proceeds.
>
> > > > And, that is a drop in the bucket compared to the whole pie.
>
> > > You are missing the point: In a global economy the resources must be
> > > taxed directly and indirectly. But it matters that the government
> > > providing the governance be able to collect the taxes that fund such
> > > governance. It is _NOT_ a "drop in the bucket". It is the whole
> > > bucket-full.
>
> > > > Whereas the American
> > > >> government is enforcing the ownership rights then the American
> > > >> government should get the tax proceeds.
>
> > > > Did the US get anything for rescuing Kuwait?
>
> > > Yes, actually. Japan and a lot of others sent money in very large
> > > amounts. It was in their interest to preserve the independent oil
> > > suppliers in Kuwait.
>
> > > > Are we going to "make
> > > > anything" on the Iraq war?
>
> > > No. That was a total Republican Pig Prancing maneuver from the start.
> > > Imperialism is a loser and has been throughout history. Unilateralism and
> > > rightardedness is a loser.
>
> > > > An asset tax is much better then an income
> > > >> tax in a global economy. An asset tax is like the taxes you pay on
> > > >> your house in that it is paid on the value of the asset as opposed to a
> > > >> tax on income from the asset.
>
> > > > Well, I'd have to think about that. Where I have reservations is that I
> > > > hear all kinds of guys with their favorite idea of what is a good tax
> > > > and what is a good method of taxing. And, of course, the Republican
> > > > mindset is cut the taxes and lets not talk about the deficit.
>
> > > There are few if any economists worth spit that would tell you that
> > > natural resource taxes are not the BEST way to tax. And that include MANY
> > > of the otherwise brain damaged neoclassicals.
>
> ...
>
> read more »
Stray Dog
> On May 18, 7:38 pm, Stray Dog <straydog2...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
>
> > On May 18, 10:55 am, Mani Deli <noth...@inter.com> wrote:
>
> > > On Sat, 17 May 2008 21:48:59 -0700 (PDT), BobR
>
> > > <re...@r-a-reed-assoc.com> wrote:
> > > >You know, the fact is that I really don't care about those s
deleted
>
>
> > > George Carlin on who really controls America--
>
> > > watch the whole videohttp://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&videoID=...Hide quoted text -
>
> > - Show quoted text -
>
> Gawd, I must say that if I had to live day in and day out with the
> same attitude you people seem to want to cling to I would just kill
> myself and be done with it.
But you don't have the same "attitude" we have, but let me ask why you
keep posting your stuff?
Do you really have it all that damn bad
> that you have to be so concerned about those with more than you?
Lots of people out there don't give a shit about anything but
themselves. A few do give a shit about a few things besides
themselves. I appreciate that I'm not alone.
BobR
> On May 18, 9:44 pm, BobR <re...@r-a-reed-assoc.com> wrote:
>
> > On May 18, 7:38 pm, Stray Dog <straydog2...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > > On May 18, 10:55 am, Mani Deli <noth...@inter.com> wrote:
>
> > > > On Sat, 17 May 2008 21:48:59 -0700 (PDT), BobR
>
> > > > <re...@r-a-reed-assoc.com> wrote:
> > > > >You know, the fact is that I really don't care about those s
>
> deleted
>
>
>
> > > > George Carlin on who really controls America--
>
>
> > > - Show quoted text -
>
> > Gawd, I must say that if I had to live day in and day out with the
> > same attitude you people seem to want to cling to I would just kill
> > myself and be done with it.
>
> But you don't have the same "attitude" we have, but let me ask why you
> keep posting your stuff?
>
> Do you really have it all that damn bad
>
> > that you have to be so concerned about those with more than you?
>
> Lots of people out there don't give a shit about anything but
> themselves. A few do give a shit about a few things besides
> themselves. I appreciate that I'm not alone.
You asked a question above and then answered it for me. I am a
realist who simply sees a half glass of water as just a half glass of
water. Rather the glass is half full or half empty doesn't make any
difference.
BobR
> On Sun, 18 May 2008 18:13:42 -0700 (PDT), BobR
>
> <re...@r-a-reed-assoc.com> wrote:
> >The reality is that we must learn to deal with the change brought
> >about by a global economy.
>
> But that would require disowning the myths, lies and propaganda.
>
>
>
> >Maybe we should be concentrating more on
> >developing those emerging markets instead of futile efforts to protect
>
> - Show quoted text -
No, we can't turn the clock back nor can we isolate ourselves from the
rest of the world. That has not been possible for almost a century
now and will not change in the next century. What would be better is
to turn your had to the front and try to better what will be instead
of changing what was.
BobR
> On Mon, 19 May 2008 07:41:56 -0700 (PDT), BobR
> disowning the myths, lies and propaganda". The first among those is
> your statement above. People will not be inclined to want to fix the
> obvious problems if they can be coaxed into believing either it's not
> really a problem, or it's unstoppable. That is of course nonsense. It
> is a simple matter of choosing priorities and setting policies on
> those priorities. But there are an incredible array of political
> influences heavily invested in making us think this is akin to
> advancing technology or some other silly metaphor that (like isolating
> ourselves from the rest of the world).
>
> This rhetoric has been around for decades. But one only need look at
> what policies and priorities were in place during the best years for
> Americans to understand that it's the change ion policies that has
> made this possible.
>
> We have been sold out to the "cheap labor" crowd and firmly injected
> into the race to the bottom. But there is no need that it remain that
> way.- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -
What best years of the Americans are you talking about? If you want
to try and turn the clock back to the 1800's be my guest but leave me
off that train. The 1900's saw a great depression, two world wars and
several other wars, what was so great about that? The majority of the
economic expansion of the latter half of the 1900's was initially
driven by the post war expansion and was an up and down period of
mostly high unemployment. While those of us in the information
explosion fared fairly well, it was a horrible time for most of the
hard industries of this country like auto and steel manufacturing.
Now we are talking about a recession when we are still experiencing
some of the lowest unemployment in our history. I know some states
are not sharing in the high employment but that too is historical
cycles that you will always have. The newspapers here in DFW just
reported the state figures for Texas and all of the major metro areas
and the state are at record low levels for unemployment with many jobs
(good jobs) going begging. All of that with over 12 million illegals
in the country working too. Those of us in the information sector
have been hit hard this time because instead of the hard blue colar
jobs going overseas, it was our jobs.
If you really want to change then quit buying anything made anywhere
but the USA. Convince your neighbors, friends, and everyone else to
do the same. The problem is that people will buy and consume what
they want at the price they want to pay. If that means buying from
China, India, and other cheap manufacturing countries, they will do
it. Unless you want to force them to pay a lot more for much less
there is little you can do to stop it. Would you pay twice as much
for that HD TV made entire in the US if you could by one of equal
quality from Japan or China at half the price? Most people will not
which is what forces many US corporations to manufacture their
products elsewhere.
BobR
> On Mon, 19 May 2008 15:43:16 -0700 (PDT), BobR> .. .
>
> Take a look at the fifties into the seventies. Higher standards of
> living, more disposable income, job security, pensions, affordable
> colleges, affordable medicine and drugs.
>
Take a look at the fifties into the seventies, hell I lived through
the fifties and the sixties and I can assure you they were no damn
picknik. Unemployment was high and the standard of living was in the
pits and trying to recover from two wars in the prior 20 years with
another one getting underway. The post WWII housing boom was ending
and the economy went through several recessionary periods. I still
remember seeing TV commercials that were trying to convince the public
to not pull back on spending much like the current ones.
> Since then the dereg machine has started taking down all the firewalls
> to prevent those phenomena we learned about in the great depression
> and the results are predictable, the housing and loan crisis, the
> accoutring crisis, the dot com boom, and now the financial services
> melt down.
>
The housing and loan crisis is the third such crisis that I can
remember in my lifetime and there will be more as long as people
insist on speculation and gambling on what they believe will be a boom
in the future. Every last one of those are nothing more than people
gambling with their futures. Put a block on one and people will find
another to replace it.
> With that we totally revamped our tax structure away from corporate
> income taxes on to income taxes, and have become ever less progressive
> in our income taxes. We taken down the jobs -protection in favor of
> cheap labor, we've destroyed unions, and we've made a royal mess of
> things for all but a very few.
>
Tax the corporation or tax the people directly, the results are the
same. The consumer ultimately pays the tax. I can agree to some
extent with the concept of progressive taxes as long as there is some
logic to those taxes besides the robin hood comcept of screw you for
being successful. Unions destroyed themselves when they went from the
fair wage concept to killing the goose that laid the golden egg
without giving anything in return.
> >Now we are talking about a recession when we are still experiencing
> >some of the lowest unemployment in our history.
>
> which of course reflects a reliance on bogus numbers.
>
The numbers are no less or more bogus than they have always been.
Hell, I spent 18 months without a job and was never counted in the
numbers and never collected a penny in unemployment. So what? There
are more than 100 good jobs open where I work right now. A fifteen
minute drive to work in the mornings and I pass almost a dozen
businesses with large help wanted banners on the buildings. Guess
those are all bogus too.
> > I know some states
> >are not sharing in the high employment but that too is historical
> >cycles that you will always have.
>
> LOL. High employment? Employment participation rates have been
> dropping since Bush took office. The rates of those working part time
> who want to work full time have been climbing, the unemp[loyment rate
> stays low by not counting the independent contractors who've stopped
> working, and not counting those who've stopped looking. You want
> something interesting look at what the birth/death model has added to
> the "jobs" figures. See what's really happening:
>
> http://bigpicture.typepad.com/comments/2008/05/nfp-roundup.htmlhttp://bigpicture.typepad.com/comments/2007/12/more-on-birthde.htmlhttp://bigpicture.typepad.com/comments/2005/05/uhoh_below_nfp_.html
>
Oh yes, you will believe any bullshit that supports your contention
while calling anything that doesn't bogus.
> All too many months over 90% of the jobs "created" (before they
> started admitting were losing jobs) were created by a "modeling
> correction".
>
> Throw in a few million illeglas, falling wages, etc., etc.
>
> >The newspapers here in DFW just
> >reported the state figures for Texas and all of the major metro areas
> >and the state are at record low levels for unemployment with many jobs
> >(good jobs) going begging.
>
> Yeah high oil prices do benefit those texans.
>
If you want to believe that all those jobs are in the oil business and
it makes you feel better go ahead but while it is a contributor it is
also not true.
> >All of that with over 12 million illegals
> >in the country working too. Those of us in the information sector
> >have been hit hard this time because instead of the hard blue colar
> >jobs going overseas, it was our jobs.
>
> Yep, and who's letting in the HB-1 As? And who rewrote the taxes to
> make off shorign attractive?
>
Yes, who is? I had dozens of those H1B workers working for me in the
90's while your poster boy for outsourcing was President. Why don't
you look into where the Clintons are making their millions right now
and ask why India considers Hillary to be their Senator?
> >If you really want to change then quit buying anything made anywhere
> >but the USA. Convince your neighbors, friends, and everyone else to
> >do the same. The problem is that people will buy and consume what
> >they want at the price they want to pay. If that means buying from
> >China, India, and other cheap manufacturing countries, they will do
> >it. Unless you want to force them to pay a lot more for much less
> >there is little you can do to stop it. Would you pay twice as much
> >for that HD TV made entire in the US if you could by one of equal
> >quality from Japan or China at half the price? Most people will not
> >which is what forces many US corporations to manufacture their
> >products elsewhere.
>
> We used to have tariffs and policies that aimed at protecting wages
> and protecting jobs.
>
> But you buy the free trade nonsense that a rising tide lifts all
> ships. . . . And anyway it's their end of the boat that's leaking, not
> mine.
Funny how things seem to go in circles. Yes, we used to have tariffs
and policies that aimed at protecting wages and jobs but more often
missed their mark by protecting one group at the cost of others. It
was the public that decided they wanted to pay less and demanded that
tariffs be lowered. It was the public that wanted foreign cars
because either the cars being produced by Detroit were too expensive
or just plain crap. The list goes on and on but the reality is that
if and when the public is ready, they will decide the market and that
is the way it should be.
forbi...@msn.com
> Tax the corporation or tax the people directly, the results are the
> same. The consumer ultimately pays the tax. I can agree to some
> extent with the concept of progressive taxes as long as there is some
> logic to those taxes besides the robin hood comcept of screw you for
> being successful.
Not this old canard.
I have aways supported taxing in a way that maps as closely
as possible to fee for service or externality mitigating.
Neither VAT, income tax, nor sales tax fit this model. This
being said, "Tax the corporation or tax the people directly,
the results are the same." and "The consumer ultimately
pays the tax" are obviously and simply provably false.
I will start with the second claim:
The consumer ultimately pays the tax.
Suppose two produces of a conumable, A and B.
All taxes fall on A and none on B but their
production models are the same.
The market doesn't care who pays taxes and who
doesn't. The market is made where demand and
supply meet. Since A and B supply at market
but A's expenses are greater at market than are
B's expenses, B will produce more and A will
produce less. The difference isn't equal to
the taxes. A has no choice but to accept reduce
profitability in exchange for any profitability
at all. B enjoys greater profitability per item
as well as over all but it isn't equal to the
per item tax paid by A. The consumer doesn't
pay the entire tax other than in the simplistic
sense that the gross revenues include the tax,
the price of goods sold, and profits.
I abhor both VAT and income taxes because they do
the very thing I just discussed. When production
models differ for the same goods the more efficient
model will enjoy greater profitability. Both VAT
and income taxes fall heavier on the more profitable
production model. It's quite perverse.
Having said this, I want to look at the externalities
of particular production and consumption, governance,
and the purpose of taxes.
The purpose of taxes is to fund the activities of
government. As with any industry there are labor
costs. Some of the taxes go to paying the labor
costs associated with the government engaging in
its activities. Some of the government's activities
involve mitigating negative externalities and promoting
positive externalities.
Suppose there are two production models one of which
has large negative externalities. Any taxes used to
mitigate the negative externalities that isn't funded
directly from the producers of those externalities and
in line with the costs of mitigating them is perverse.
If the government collects too much then production is
shifted away from a producer whose negative externalities
have been mitigated. If the government collects too little
then production is shifted towards the producers of
negative externalities whose effects must be mitigated
though other means. In either case production is optimized
at a point disadvantageous to the consumer.
BobR
> On Mon, 19 May 2008 19:09:35 -0700 (PDT), BobR
>
> <re...@r-a-reed-assoc.com> wrote:
> >> Since then the dereg machine has started taking down all the firewalls
> >> to prevent those phenomena we learned about in the great depression
> >> and the results are predictable, the housing and loan crisis, the
> >> accoutring crisis, the dot com boom, and now the financial services
> >> melt down.
>
> >The housing and loan crisis is the third such crisis that I can
> >remember in my lifetime and there will be more as long as people
> >insist on speculation and gambling on what they believe will be a boom
> >in the future. Every last one of those are nothing more than people
> >gambling with their futures. Put a block on one and people will find
> >another to replace it.
>
> swarmy rhetoric about "free markets" and stifling regulations has a
> cost.
I also ignored the fact that the government had no business in
regulating it in the first place.
BobR
> On Mon, 19 May 2008 19:09:35 -0700 (PDT), BobR
>
> <re...@r-a-reed-assoc.com> wrote:
> >> LOL. High employment? Employment participation rates have been
> >> dropping since Bush took office. The rates of those working part time
> >> who want to work full time have been climbing, the unemp[loyment rate
> >> stays low by not counting the independent contractors who've stopped
> >> working, and not counting those who've stopped looking. You want
> >> something interesting look at what the birth/death model has added to
> >> the "jobs" figures. See what's really happening:
>
> >>http://bigpicture.typepad.com/comments/2008/05/nfp-roundup.html
>
> http://bigpicture.typepad.com/comments/2007/12/more-on-birthde.htmlhttp://bigpicture.typepad.com/comments/2005/05/uhoh_below_nfp_.html
>
>
>
> >Oh yes, you will believe any bullshit that supports your contention
> >while calling anything that doesn't bogus.
>
> might actually challenge you into thinking.
>
Typical come back when you have no real facts to back you up then
attack the individual.
> Take the time to maybe actually read one of those links. If you think
> the employment picture is good nationally you're drinking the kool aid
> and ignoring a lot. Labor Market participation rates are down, job
> creation is down, initial unemployment is up, length of unemployment
> is up, but they still manage to game the unemployment figures down?
> LOL.
I have read some of those links but unlike some people, I don't buy
into all the bullshit I read on the internet. You are like just one
of the blind men who could only describe the elephant as a big pile of
shit because he stood behind it when it took a crap.
BobR
> On Mon, 19 May 2008 19:09:35 -0700 (PDT), BobR
> decides, but it was the cheap labor corporate folks who corrupted our
> politics and set it up to give them cheap labor.
>
> They never understand that good wages means more disposable income and
> a better economy for everyone, including themselves. That's why the
> market and the economy consistently perform better under democrats.
> The GOP plays favorites between industry and favors the corporate over
> the worker and always ruins it for both.http://www.eriposte.com/economy/other/demovsrep.htm- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -
ONLY when those higher wages are coupled with a corresponding increase
in productivity is there any net gain. Higher wages without the
productivy simply translates into higher prices which in turn negate
the gain for those receiving the higher wages and do even greater harm
to those who did not benefit from the higher wages. The rest of your
comment is total bullshit.