Is it moral to have this much of the world's resources?

[Annie]

I needed a job this summer, more for mental health than financial reasons. Oh I could have taught summer school, but that was more mental gymnastics than I was looking for. My nephew is seriously ill, having surgery later this month. I found myself just sitting and thinking of him, nothing I could do.

I applied online to Penny's. They called 2 days later. I'm making all of $8.50 an hour, but love the discount. I like their petite dept for casual clothes. I use their hair salon anyways.

My first 3 days were training, today was my 'first' day on the job. I'm straitening dressing room and helping customers if they need it, (obviously not the sort of place with high demanding customers, like moi. ) I managed to get two customer accolades and two peer accolades, maybe I'll get a raise?

People take jobs for all sorts of reasons. Normally in the summer I find plenty to do. I still am exercising 2 hours a day, pretty hard during the school year to find the time. This job, well earliest I'm starting is 10am. It doesn't take any prep thinking, just go and do and go home.

Financially it might bite, will prolly throw me into paying more taxes than I make, but there is something good about a job that doesn't require thinking, but prevents me from dwelling on things I can't change. Not too mention that Monday when I go to get my hair cut and colored, the bill will be about $65 instead of $145, because of extra Monday discount! LOL!

 

[BaronVonBigmeat]

Why do you think charities can do better than government? I haven't seen that work out so well over time.

Read The Tragedy of American Compassion.

A long list of social ills went up after LBJ's war on poverty was initiated.

They all are special interest groups, though, and the government isn't. Well, except the government's special interest being we the people and our economic well being.

There is also no or less accountability with private charity.

Don't be fooled into thinking that the government doesn't have a selfish interest just because they aren't turning a profit. Government employees, like any other employee, want to get bigger budgets and more power. See: military generals pushing for useless overpriced gadgets that have no application in modern warfare.

I don't think they're all that inefficient. The military, VA, medicare, social security, roads, sanitation, schools, police, etc....it all works pretty well.

Promoting the general welfare of individuals does promote the general welfare of the country.

The military is grotesquely inefficient, VA spends too much money and has terrible facilities, SS gives terrible returns compared to a simple savings account, roads are traffic jammed crumbling messes that kill 40k per year, our schools are continually turning out dumber kids than the previous generation, and the police frequently abuse their powers and prosecute non-crimes like drug use.

Welfare is one of those wonderful ideas that occasionally strike peoplekind and allow us to move forward ever so slowly. LBJ through the genius of his persuasive personality and I'm sure much backdoor promise, made it possible for poverty to decrease in this country as it never had before.

After the war on poverty, we got more poverty.

When you pay more for something, you get more of it. Crazy, I know.

All this whining abut 'socialism', yet other countries do it just fine, and achieve standards of living surpssing our own. And, they manage not to turn into a bunch of system sucking leeches.

Anyone read much about the miraculous economic turnarounds in Ireland or Finland?

Largely thanks to socialism. And ya know what? They don't pay THAT much more in taxes than we already do.

It's true that tax rates in the US aren't as low as people think. It's hard to compare one country with another anyway; seeing as how tax loopholes can make a seemingly high tax rate be much lower in reality.

BTW, Ireland only experienced an economic miracle once it lowered taxes and spending, ie reducing socialism. Kinda like post WWII Germany, and a long long list of other countries.

If socialism worked, then communist countries would have become thriving utopias. Instead, the only ones left are Cuba and North Korea.

 

[Charles_Main]

now he assumes it will continue for 100 years and continue to cost the same each year. Believe me our troops in Germany and Japan did not cost as much after the war was over as they did during the war. Further more this is the word of one economist, and he uses the phrase "broader economic costs" which is code for I am making shit up.

Grow up and stop calling me names and just get your facts right. I bet you do not even know how much the war has cost to date.

You said it would cost us all 30k and did not say over 100 years. Now that I have shown you to be totally wrong you are trying to save face.

just get your facts right and you wont have to try and cover next time. Stop telling lies. Or should I say repeating lies you heard, and learn to think for yourself.

When you just throw around names and insults it just shows us all you are out of your depth and have no idea what you are talking about.

 

[editec]

Nothing there I have a problem with so far.

I have to ask however why you think the "Atlases" are indeed moving offshore.

FREE TRADE. Remember, it's not just crap coming in from China, it is also investment (hell entire factories lock stock and barrell) being shipped offshore, too. Investment there is NOT investment here.

The monied class get to invest in these foreign firms, too.

Couple that with their ability to offshore their corporate identities to shield profits from taxation and we have the formula of starving the beast that Ayn Rand would heartily approve of.

Also, are there no emerging "Atlases" to replace those who have abandoned the social contract to which you refer?

Of course there are always innovators who become wealthy in this society.

So? That has always been the case.

But the case of the industries leaving to find cheaper labor and less restrictions has not always been the case. This teribly short sighted policy (assuming that you love this nation, I mean) is only about fourty years old.

And not all the atlases are migrating either.

Many of them cannot since there is no way tto outsource contracting, real estate, and various service type industries. Now they're just investing their profits (made here) internationally, and who can blame them at this stage of the rape of the nation?

The superwealthy are (I suspect) as ambivalent (and divided) about this policy as the American people are.

One hell of lot of this insanity is the blowback of cold war policies driving foolish economic policies in my opinion..

Remember, in order for us to get some nations to buy our military hardware (and sign on against the commies, too) , we gave them the right to import "low tech" goods.

We BRIBED nations to be our friends (trade partners) by throwing the bones (the garmet industry, the shoe industry, the steel industry and so forth) while retaining (for a while) the meatier higher tech stuff like Jets, hitech and presision machines.

Now even those are no longer our exclusive franchise, of course.


Basically we sold some industries (and probably some Atlases) down the river, right along with those "unskilled" workers we basically decided didn't matter.

SOME people do very well by this seachange in economic policy.

SOME people are paying the bill for it., and worse, being blames (by morons, mostly ) for not being prepared for it.

Do you think the economic/social environment in this country is currently supportive of implementing your proposals?

I'm not sure I made any proposals. I think the people overall are waking up to the fact that we're fucking the working class and by extention, the nation overall, though.

I would guess not so that leads to the question of what has to be changed to make it so?

You mean now that the chickens have flown the coop?

Damned little can be done, now, except to go back to trade policies which take into account the damage they're doing to the industrial base here and designing trade agreements to reflect that fact. (read some tariffs)

You really have to go over this on a industry by industry basis, and one can't simply give a general order that will fix something as complex as all international trade.

Certainly American grew strong industrially behind a wall of protective tariffs, but I doubt that is the answer today, even though it served us all so well the first 200 years of the Republic.

The devil is always in the details, of course but in general I agree with your points.

Yes, the devil is in the details.

Which is exactly why the average American is fed a steady diet of HEADLINE NEWS with a side of jingo-soup and something lacivious and scandalous for dessert.

Our media diet is a bad for us as the junk food corporations regularly serve up.

What I see is essantially this.

About 20% of the American population is doing very well in part because of the changes in trade policy.

Another 20% are at best holding their own for the time being.

60% of us are screwed.

And what else I know is that America needs that 60% not be be screwed because (contrary to the delusion of most neocons) they pay enough of the local taxes that support our society that without those people gainfully employed shit is going get weird fairly soon in the states and local governments which are already hard pressed to pay the bills.

If the American middle class is hosed, so is this Democratic Republic, of that I am certain.

Oh some nation will exist by the same name, but it will not be the nation I signed on for.

 

[Annie]

So far there is silence regarding those overqualified or just trying to build a working resume. I'm in my early 50's, have 3 bachelor degrees and most of my MS degree. I'm for this position, competing with entry level teens. Yeah, by applying and accepting I beat some out, but some were hired.

Any words for them? I showed up today and the 3 days of training 10 minutes early. I followed the 'rules' to the letter.

Today, my first day in 'my position', I did what they asked me to do. Shockingly both the customers and peers responded. My guess, the bar is too low.

 

[editec]

We determine that people who hoard food, fill their houses with stacks of old newspapers, etc are suffering from mental illness. Yet we admire people who accumulate more wealth than they can spend in more than one lifetime.

YES!

Well, some of us admire them.

I admire people who accumulate wealth as a byproduct of their genius. Bill Gates might be in that class, I'm not certain.

But the "whatever it takes" crowd should be put down or put away until we find a cure for their obsessional disease.

I think of the obsessively greedy in about the same way I think of pederasts...as sick people for whom we have yet to find a cure.

 

[jreeves]

YES!

Well, some of us admire them.

I admire people who accumulate wealth as a byproduct of their genius. Bill Gates might be in that class, I'm not certain.

But the "whatever it takes" crowd should be put down or put away until we find a cure for their obsessional disease.

I think of the obsessively greedy in about the same way I think of pederasts...as sick people for whom we have yet to find a cure.

I find people who want to steal money in the name of governmental charity, THIEVES.

In a lot of cases, it's those "whatever it takes" individuals who create jobs for the "I don't have a job" crowd.....

 

[midcan5]

I find people who want to steal money in the name of governmental charity, THIEVES.

In a lot of cases, it's those "whatever it takes" individuals who create jobs for the "I don't have a job" crowd.....

Yikes! That makes no sense. Gov. Charity? create jobs for? What the heck are you getting at?

 

[CSM]

YES!

Well, some of us admire them.

I admire people who accumulate wealth as a byproduct of their genius. Bill Gates might be in that class, I'm not certain.

But the "whatever it takes" crowd should be put down or put away until we find a cure for their obsessional disease.

I think of the obsessively greedy in about the same way I think of pederasts...as sick people for whom we have yet to find a cure.

So it's ok to be wealthy but not TOO wealthy. What is the cut off figure where one is not "obsessively greedy" and deserving of admiration?

It is my opinion that part of the problem with folks today is the idea that everyone has to be average...smart but not too smart, pretty but not too pretty, creative but not too creative. Mediocrity is the goal. I just do not understand why that should be so.

 

[midcan5]

So it's ok to be wealthy but not TOO wealthy. What is the cut off figure where one is not "obsessively greedy" and deserving of admiration?

It is my opinion that part of the problem with folks today is the idea that everyone has to be average...smart but not too smart, pretty but not too pretty, creative but not too creative. Mediocrity is the goal. I just do not understand why that should be so.

There's enough information in this thread to answer your first question. As far as your second question that's a false premise based on a few politically correct absurdities. We still admire and even worship talent, just check out their salaries.

 

[Wow]

He conservatively estimates that the war — by disrupting the oil rich Persian Gulf — has raised oil prices by about $10 a barrel, a hike that is already costing Americans nearly $250 million a day.

Since the federal government has been running budget deficits since before the war began, Stiglitz estimates that the government has borrowed $1 trillion — much of it from overseas lenders — to finance the war. By 2017, he said, the country will have added $2 trillion to the national debt to cover Iraq war expenses. That means additional interest payments for taxpayers.

"American families will be footing the bill ... for a long, long time after President Bush returns to Texas to clear brush full time," said Rep. Lloyd Doggett, D-Texas.

It's estimated that oil is $60 to $80 per barrel "over" priced, thanks to Clinton's "London loophole".

 

[CSM]

There's enough information in this thread to answer your first question. As far as your second question that's a false premise based on a few politically correct absurdities. We still admire and even worship talent, just check out their salaries.

Really? What is the exact figure anywhere in this thread?

Are not those salaries EXACTLY what you and others are complaining about? Is it not the amount of success (in this case in the form of monetary gain) that is at the heart of the latter part of this thread? Why else would the redistribution of wealth be necessary according to some of you?

Besides, it isn't a premise, it is my opinion. you may not like it but so what? I don't like any of yours either.

 

[editec]

So it's ok to be wealthy but not TOO wealthy. What is the cut off figure where one is not "obsessively greedy" and deserving of admiration?

Who suggested that? Certainly not I.

It is my opinion that part of the problem with folks today is the idea that everyone has to be average...smart but not too smart, pretty but not too pretty, creative but not too creative. Mediocrity is the goal. I just do not understand why that should be so.

Yeah? Which folks would those be?

Those mythical cardboard cutouts of liberalism invented by people like Rush?

Yeah, those mythical cardboard cutouts of liberalism are truly stupid, I quite agree.

Happily for most of us, they only exist in the imaginary political landscape painted by wordsmiths like Rush Limbough

 

[Wow]

More proof America is becoming a third world nation due to republican voodoo economics. A hard question: Is it moral (not legal) to make that much money?


"Piketty and Saez’s top bracket comprises 0.01 percent of U.S. taxpayers. There are 14,400 of them, earning an average of $12,775,000, with total earnings of $184 billion. The minimum annual income in this group is more than $5 million, so it seems reasonable to suppose that they could, without much hardship, give away a third of their annual income, an average of $4.3 million each, for a total of around $61 billion. That would still leave each of them with an annual income of at least $3.3 million.

Next comes the rest of the top 0.1 percent (excluding the category just described, as I shall do henceforth). There are 129,600 in this group, with an average income of just over $2 million and a minimum income of $1.1 million. If they were each to give a quarter of their income, that would yield about $65 billion, and leave each of them with at least $846,000 annually."

What Should a Billionaire Give – and What Should You? Peter Singer

"What is a human life worth? You may not want to put a price tag on a it. But if we really had to, most of us would agree that the value of a human life would be in the millions. Consistent with the foundations of our democracy and our frequently professed belief in the inherent dignity of human beings, we would also agree that all humans are created equal, at least to the extent of denying that differences of sex, ethnicity, nationality and place of residence change the value of a human life."

Your post would be more realistic, if you used numbers that reflected the deduction of personal taxes, business taxes, accounting and legal expenses.

 

[editec]

Incomes numbers give us a very distorted idea of how wildly affluent the superweathy are.

The IRS admits that it really doesn't have a clue about the superweathy's real incomes, assets or owneship in many cases.

They pretty much take the numbers given them by the superwealthy's accountants on faith.

 

[Wow]

Incomes numbers give us a very distorted idea of how wildly affluent the superweathy are.

The IRS admits that it really doesn't have a clue about the superweathy's real incomes, assets or owneship in many cases.

They pretty much take the numbers given them by the superwealthy's accountants on faith.

The IRS admits that it really doesn't have a clue about the superweathy's real incomes, assets or owneship in many cases.

This would be true for ALL taxpayers but all taxpayers do not spend hundreds of thousands of dollars each year on accounting and legal expenses not to mention a higher income tax bracket, a possible business tax and being a target for lawsuits.

 

[CSM]

Who suggested that? Certainly not I.



Yeah? Which folks would those be?

Those mythical cardboard cutouts of liberalism invented by people like Rush?

Yeah, those mythical cardboard cutouts of liberalism are truly stupid, I quite agree.

Happily for most of us, they only exist in the imaginary political landscape painted by wordsmiths like Rush Limbough

1) From your post:

"I admire people who accumulate wealth as a byproduct of their genius. Bill Gates might be in that class, I'm not certain.

But the "whatever it takes" crowd should be put down or put away until we find a cure for their obsessional disease.

I think of the obsessively greedy in about the same way I think of pederasts...as sick people for whom we have yet to find a cure."

The above certainly indicates to me that there is a division between wealthy and "obsessively greedy". I was just wondering where you think the dividing line lies.

2) One of the main themes of this thread has been about redistribution of wealth. Some wealth comes from success. If you are too successful, as evidenced in this case by wealth, (see 1) above) then you are derided as "obsessively greedy" (to use your phrase). Tell me please why many college professors and high school teachers grade on a curve. I think it is because of my comments about mediocrity. Heaven forbid some child should feel somehow inferior because some child is smarter than they are!

 

[editec]

The above certainly indicates to me that there is a division between wealthy and "obsessively greedy". I was just wondering where you think the dividing line lies.

I thought I made my position fairly clearly.

"I admire people who accumulate wealth as a byproduct of their genius"

"I think of the obsessively greedy in about the same way I think of pederasts..."

It's a qualitative, not a quantative difference.

Greed is a disease which does not descriminate by class.

 

[midcan5]

Really? What is the exact figure anywhere in this thread?

Are not those salaries EXACTLY what you and others are complaining about? Is it not the amount of success (in this case in the form of monetary gain) that is at the heart of the latter part of this thread? Why else would the redistribution of wealth be necessary according to some of you?

Besides, it isn't a premise, it is my opinion. you may not like it but so what? I don't like any of yours either.

The very first post has exact figures, if you care to read them all consult the URL.

No one is complaining here we are asking a question. The question involves whether or not one person or family is entitled to so large a percentage of the world's resources. And entitled is the key word here as the wealthy no more created these resources than the cook who creates great meals with food raised by others that are grown on the earth. It is the social situation that allows the wealthy their wealth. We could actually say God Created all this and does God want some to suffer while others waste? I'll leave religion even though the thread ended here.

Fairness is the goal not equality of all. I do wonder though at the mindset that defends the rich? How is it Americans who live in a country that aspires to equality, to the pursuit of happiness, can only think of the rich? Is it because they think they are one of them? I assure you ain't. Is it because the wingnut MSM has converted them to a religion of trickle down? Probably a little of both.


"Ideally citizens are to think of themselves as if they were legislators and ask themselves what statutes, supported by what reasons satisfying the criterion of reciprocity, they would think is most reasonable to enact." John Rawls

 

[jreeves]

Yikes! That makes no sense. Gov. Charity? create jobs for? What the heck are you getting at?

You know governmental charity.....welfare, foodstamps, medicaid, medicare.....etc....


Look at the previous post for the explanation for "whatever it takes" comment.