08-09-2004 22:35									#271
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quote: Originally posted by Japher And than you assume that ppl can't do anything for themselves, but somehow are not at all lazy or unwilling to take any job that comes along. That assumption is also false. Even we acknowledge the rock and point out that it is not falling you still act like chicken little.

No. I'm not assuming anything. I open my eyes and see in the real world there has never been a job for every worker. Therefore, punishing people for stealing is immoral because some people have no other choice. That's not chicken little crap. I'm telling you about the real world, but you have your hands over your ears singing. La La La!

	08-09-2004 22:37									#272
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So I'm living in a fake world? A fake world filled with soup kitchens, day laborers, and government checks. Give me a break Kid, I see more than you care to give me credit for. There is never a reason to steal, though there may me plenty of excuses.

	08-09-2004 22:38									#273
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quote: Originally posted by Solomwi Yes, insanity to require people to legally fend for themselves.

If you're requiring someone to do the impossible, then yes that is insane.

	08-09-2004 22:40									#274
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quote: Originally posted by Japher So I'm living in a fake world? A fake world filled with soup kitchens, day laborers, and government checks. Give me a break Kid, I see more than you care to give me credit for. There is never a reason to steal, though there may me plenty of excuses.

No you don't see it. You can't just rely on what you see. You have to depend on others to tell you about the real world. You obviously never had serious trouble making ends meet or finding a job. Good. That doesn't mean that everyone has the same experience. If you only rely on your own experience then yes, you are living in your own little world.

	08-09-2004 22:44									#275
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quote: Originally posted by Solomwi If this mother were that concerned about her baby, she would have (drumroll please) gotten a job when notified that she would no longer be collecting welfare.

Really, and if its a single mother, who takes care of the baby?

Her relatives are either working or looking for work because there's no welfare. And they're poor with few job qualifications so they can only get part time work.which means they're all scraping by.

So what happens to the baby?

	08-09-2004 22:46									#276
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quote: No you don't see it.

Come and visit me, and see where I live buddy.

quote: You can't just rely on what you see.

But you can?

quote: You have to depend on others to tell you about the real world.

I live it, and others confirm it...

quote: You obviously never had serious trouble making ends meet or finding a job.

I struggle with making ends meet every day, and I have worked jobs that I loathed so that I can get where I am today. And I have had trouble getting those first few jobs... I have lived on water and bones, and that made me want to get up even more.

quote: That doesn't mean that everyone has the same experience.

I am not saying that everyone has the exact same experience, but everyone faces or will face the same problems I have.

quote: If you only rely on your own experience then yes, you are living in your own little world.

And you yours.

	08-09-2004 22:50									#277
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Japher, you seem to not realize that I'm not trying to tell you that your experiences are false, but you are telling me that mine are, and millions of people with similar experiences. I've already said that I believe that you had that experience. So don't tell me that I don't.

	08-09-2004 22:53									#278
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ok, Kid...

You say that ppl need help sometimes.

I agree.

However, the help they are being given is not the help they need. If we continue with the way the help is given many will become dependent on it. Granted many will get to their feet, but that is the hard way out, and not everyone (and I would argue that not even a majority) cares to take the hardway out.

	08-09-2004 22:53									#279
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quote: Originally posted by Solomwi Fact is they supported themselves, as I did, by beating the bushes and finding things people needed done, then offering to do them for a reasonable price. It's not a difficult concept.

Let me guess, you came from a poor, poor family. Your parents are both alcoholic high school drop-out and so are you. You were beaten as a kid and as a result, have anti-social tendencies. But naturally, someone wanted to hire you. You started working 26 hours a day when you were 16 and saved your pennies by living in a cardboard box. By working hard, you were promoted because the hardest worker always gets promoted. Then the sun came out and through your hard work you had become a millionaire.

Happens all the time.

	08-09-2004 22:56									#280
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quote: Originally posted by Japher I struggle with making ends meet every day, and I have worked jobs that I loathed so that I can get where I am today. And I have had trouble getting those first few jobs... I have lived on water and bones, and that made me want to get up even more.

And the majority of welfare recipients have done the same. Most of them go on welfare for brief periods of time and then they find work.

There are people who abuse the system, but why destroy a system that helps millions of honest people because of a few crooks.

	08-09-2004 23:00									#281
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quote: Originally posted by Tingkai Let me guess, you came from a poor, poor family. Your parents are both alcoholic high school drop-out and so are you. You were beaten as a kid and as a result, have anti-social tendencies. But naturally, someone wanted to hire you. You started working 26 hours a day when you were 16 and saved your pennies by living in a cardboard box. By working hard, you were promoted because the hardest worker always gets promoted. Then the sun came out and through your hard work you had become a millionaire. Happens all the time.

Yes, that's exactly what I said. Why, verbatim, almost. Good to see your reading comprehension is up to par.

	08-09-2004 23:05									#282
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Talk about missing the point.

	08-09-2004 23:07									#283
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You had one?

	08-09-2004 23:10									#284
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Own goal

	08-09-2004 23:19									#285
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The Tingkaiverse must be a fascinating place.

	09-09-2004 00:09									#286
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I suggest that having privately owned and operated roads would nothing short of an economic catastrophe.

Now, the details on how such a scheme are sketchy, partly because it's such a deranged idea, like how to build a car out of cheese or something, so I'll have to use guesswork.

Toll-roads. If we put aside suburban roads for a minute, just consider the impact of having every main road in a state paid for by tolls. The sheer number of toll-booths will slow down traffic, as well as making every journey need the same level of financial planning as a shopping trip. Imagine a small company that does business all over the country. They're going to have to pay through the nose for all the paperwork, working out toll expenditure and/or paying the road companies for a season ticket.

And for anyone looking for a job, the cost of job-hunting will be further increased.

The opportunities for profiteering are enormous. What's to stop the owner of the only road to a small mountain community charging extortionate fees for the inhabitants? Sure, some entrepreneur might come along and build a rival road, but that will take years, and there's no guarantee that it'll happen. By the time it's finished, the owner of the original road will have a suitcase full of money and won't care either way.

As for suburban roads, the mind boggles even more. Will people have to pay to use the pavement? That'll make job-hunting (and all sorts of other economic activity) more expensive and frustrating. Now, if suburban roads were simply given to the community as a present, that might work. At least better than handing over the economic lifeblood of the community to some rich person.

A toll-booth is just another word for a checkpoint, really. Having privately-owned roads amounts to little more than a series of checkpoints across the country - like a totalitarian state. Even if toll-booths are replaced by more advanced technology, it's still intrusive. Freedom of movement is an often neglected aspect of modern democratic states. It should be protected.

	09-09-2004 00:17									#287
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quote: It doesn't matter how much money there is. Even a fully funded pension system that magically required no input from current workers will still fail if there aren't enough young workers to support the economy as a whole. If one person is supporting two retirees, that is still the case whether the pension system is private or public. Either you have a demographics problem or you don't. Either there are enough people who are so productive that the economy can support a large non-working population or there aren't.

Spot on.

I hate to agree with Che but he is right. The root of the problem is not social security, but the demographics crunch. We would not be speaking about the demise of Social Security if we had a better ratio of workers to retired people.

And he is right about the older people, that their efficiency drops off as they get older. Raising the retirement age is a band-aid solution to the much greater demographic problem.

Same with immigration. Immigration relies upon an available workforce, and with the worldwide trends, such a workforce will not always be available.

	09-09-2004 00:56									#288
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quote: Originally posted by Japher ok, Kid... You say that ppl need help sometimes. I agree. However, the help they are being given is not the help they need. If we continue with the way the help is given many will become dependent on it. Granted many will get to their feet, but that is the hard way out, and not everyone (and I would argue that not even a majority) cares to take the hardway out.

Yes, people can become dependent on welfare. That's because of problems with the system, not because there are plenty of jobs.

	09-09-2004 02:43									#289
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quote: Originally posted by Ben Kenobi And he is right about the older people, that their efficiency drops off as they get older. Raising the retirement age is a band-aid solution to the much greater demographic problem.

Is it? From my own experience I'd argue vehemently that, even if the average 70 year-old is less efficient than the average 50 year-old, they're still markedly more efficient than the average teenager.

	09-09-2004 02:55									#290
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Well, teenagers are useless.

	09-09-2004 04:30									#291
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Just to say here that something doesn't add up about unemployment in America. We have millions of illegal aliens in United States almost almost whom seem to find jobs and we have one or 2 million a year more pouring across our borders in seek of employment. They would not be coming here in such high numbers if there was no work.

And still we have Americans who complain that there are no jobs and they cannot find work. This does not make sense.

I was listening to an expert talking talking about actual employment in America. Apparently the "jobs" surveys is conducted among 30,000 corporations of some size. The surveys are not conducted among new businesses or small business in general where much of the new employment seems to be occurring. Even though we have somewhat anemic job growth among the 30,000 corporations, we simultaneously have an historically very low unemployment rate. In other words, according to the unemployment rate, we are at full employment even while the job growth numbers among the 30,000 corporations is slow. This seems to demonstrate that there is a significant growth in jobs outside of the 30,000 corporations which are part of the jobs survey.

	09-09-2004 04:55									#292
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What's hilarious is that Libertarians, to a man, do not understand how the economy works. At least socialism has a track record of being sustainable (if not optimal in many respects).

If you want to live in a low-crime society where crushing poverty does not cause a sizeable chunk of the population to lose any stake in the system, you need a welfare state. Libertarians seem to believe that stern moral lectures or throwing people out on their own will magically lead to them becoming socially responsible citizens.

If you want to see what it will be like, look at some of the East African countries with their rampant criminality.

Free markets work extremely well at providing certain goods that people need, but they also fail miserably at providing other equally important goods. That's why we have a welfare state, not because people are nice or because it's morally good, but because it is the only way of providing things that people need and the market won't provide at all (like an army) or won't provide at the needed levels (like health care).

	09-09-2004 05:18									#293
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quote: Commie

With these wackos around, I'd rather be a Commie .

Hell, these extreme Libertarians are pushing Communism as well. If their dream state gets actualized, there would be a Communist revolution within a generation . Like I said earlier, I believe when Marx saw capitalism, he saw the Libertarian version of it and that is why he was so wrong (at least in IMO, che... no need to go off on Marxian theory ).

quote: We have millions of illegal aliens in United States almost almost whom seem to find jobs and we have one or 2 million a year more pouring across our borders in seek of employment. They would not be coming here in such high numbers if there was no work.

Yeah, they also get paid $2/hr which is impossible for a citizen to make (employers can do it with illegals because they know that they won't complain about min wage).

	09-09-2004 05:26									#294
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quote: Originally posted by Ned I was listening to an expert talking talking about actual employment in America.

It's 400,000, actually. The Household suvey is of 16,000, and is considered much less reliable, even if it is more likely to catch people who are (actually, as opposed to merely saying they are out of embarressment) self-employed.

	09-09-2004 05:28									#295
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quote: Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui Yeah, they also get paid $2/hr which is impossible for a citizen to make (employers can do it with illegals because they know that they won't complain about min wage).

They also live ten or twenty people to an apartment, which is illegal and if you do it you can get your children taken away.

	09-09-2004 05:29									#296
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That's also true... it's how they can live on their $2/hr.

	09-09-2004 05:37									#297
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It is also true that illegals sometimes work "well" paying jobs, $10 an hour of more for construction work. This is also a case, however, of bosses refusing to hire Americans, who they feel are inferior workers.

	09-09-2004 07:21									#298
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quote: Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui quote: Commie With these wackos around, I'd rather be a Commie . Hell, these extreme Libertarians are pushing Communism as well. If their dream state gets actualized, there would be a Communist revolution within a generation . Like I said earlier, I believe when Marx saw capitalism, he saw the Libertarian version of it and that is why he was so wrong (at least in IMO, che... no need to go off on Marxian theory ).

So far social-democracy has generally been able to slow down the process that Marx had foreseen, but in truth the climax of social programs has already been reached and has begun to erode. I think it's reasonable to assert that SDs are a mere bump in history and that in essence Marx was probably right - look at how effective the right is in selling the virtues of the "market". I think that Marx hadn't predicted that the working class would turn into a petit-bourgeois class (which arose from the mediatic revolution along with the agony of old-school industrial economies).

But libertarians are so idiotic that I don't listen to them anymore, and most intelligent people don't.

	09-09-2004 07:39									#299
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quote: I think it's reasonable to assert that SDs are a mere bump in history and that in essence Marx was probably right

Um.. no it isn't. Like you said, Marx never saw the rise of the middle class, which destroys the entire theory.

You speak of the right selling the virtues of the market, but Bush has expanded spending more than Clinton did. The welfare state is here to say.

	09-09-2004 07:49									#300
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quote: Originally posted by chegitz guevara They also live ten or twenty people to an apartment, which is illegal and if you do it you can get your children taken away.

The Vietnamese used to do this in southern California all the time. They'd have a four bedroom house with 20-30 people in it.