I don't see how you could possibly support the idea that a country that was supposed to be based on principles of freedom can just take things from other countries by brute force. It's a massive contradiction.If one country has the power to take something from another, and it would be benificial to them, then they can. I am not saying I am all for the Iraq war, I am against it, I am just saying that taking over one country is a way to earn what it has. Just not the best way to earn it.
Power, maybe. Wealth, no.I already stated that I dislike the way the American Army is headed. I agree it is hurting the US economy, but one way to determine a country's wealth is how large their army is.
Paying people enough to live on for not working certainly seems like a disinsentive to work to me! Those who are motivated to try and work their way out will work. Of course, like I said, some people just pick up a job that pays cash so they don't have to claim it.Marril said:You try it. Seriously. "Some" people do not mean that everyone under the system will be unmotivated.
Depends which ones you consider "basic" I suppose. Am I against all social programs? Probably not. Public education is a reasonably good idea as it increases human capital which thus creates more capable workers which is generally good for society. Although it is flawed in execution. The biggest problem facing public schools is grade inflation. Many students get grades that they don't earn. The only explanations for this are that either the teachers aren't given incentives to care or that they are given disincentives which cause them not to care.Are you against basic social programs or not?
"Love it or leave it" you say?It's called leaving the country. It's possible, therefore to sound Moss-like, it should be the balance... don't like government, leave the country. It's actually a beautiful comparison to how Moss' arguments work with real life anyway.
I'm relatively serious, as long as people are going to take a "vote with your feet" option, I may as well too.
Okay, so change it. Vote with *gasp* your vote. It's not like the government is just some self-appointed oligarchy imposing its laws upon you without considering your opinion in any way.There is a difference between changing the country where you reside and quitting a job.
If that person is can create wealth, a company will pay him proportianally to the amount of weath he creats. I am not in touch with many CEO's of large companies, so I really couldn't "show" you.
If those employees are willing to work for less, then the company can arrange for that to happen. If they are not willing to work for less than minimum wage, then they can strike or sue(if the company enforces lower than minimum wages).
If one country has the power to take something from another, and it would be benificial to them, then they can.
Some people are simply better with money than others. Should those that are good with money be forced to pay the people that aren't???
Paying people enough to live on for not working certainly seems like a disinsentive to work to me!
Depends which ones you consider "basic" I suppose.
There is a difference between changing the country where you reside and quitting a job.
Actually, you have not. You’ve given me some wonderful illustrations of what you say utility isn’t, but not what utility is. You gave the equivalent of a "a square is a parallelogram but a parallelogram is not necessarily a square" analogy; but you haven't not told us what utility is if not happiness. Do me a favor and finish this sentence: “Utility is not happiness; the definition of utility is…”I answered this for you already.
That is all an opinion. You cannot make that conclusion for everyone. While many people in a company may find it to be worth the tradeoff, it will not be worth the cost to every employee.and really, the gained benefits are worth the small (and I emphasize small) amount of wages you pay out to the union.
I am the one lying?! Tell me, Marril, at what percentage is the portion of your wages taken out “significant?” It is completely relative! How can I possibly be lying? “Significant” to one person isn’t the same as “significant” to another. Frankly, I would never work for a union if I were forced to pay dues, the amount is always too significant for me, no matter how small. Significant is a term relative to the one paying it; significant to you may not be the same as significant to me. So before you again resort to the only method of debate you have any talent in, mudslinging, realize the own gaping holes in your logic. Significant is a relative term, how can you say factually what is significant to someone and what is not? Where is the cutoff? It doesn’t exist.It is not a "significant" portion of your wages. I am downright sick of your blatant lies in this regard. Your arguments would be helped greatly if you did not litter them with basic factual errors like you're doing with unions.
Again, completely misrepresenting my argument. The way unions have it set up, an employee will earn more for being employed longer regardless of whether or not they are a better and more loyal employee than someone who has been with the company less. Without unions, you are paid according to what value you add to the company, which generally increases with seniority, but is given the flexibility to reward those who add significant value without seniority and to not blindly throw rewards at those who do not add value as significantly as those with comparable seniority. You seem to argue that taking this flexibility away is a good thing, I fail to see why. Why would it be better to pay someone more who produces less? What does that do for morale?You speak as if more experience doesn't mean you're going to know more about the job...
The quote you provided had no source for the figure. Did Mr. Chabbert perform the study himself? If not, I would like a source for the 99% figure. The “lack?” The only thinking lacking is your ability to debate without using ad hominems and personal attacks to cover up your inability to prove me wrong. It really is incredibly immature that you simply have no possible way of communicating with someone you disagree with in a civil manner. Grow up, Marril."Lack"?
You do not have to formally threaten a strike in order for the company bargaining to know that that option is on the table. A union’s most powerful weapon to get more than their fair share is the strike. An employer does not need to be formally threatened with one to know that they are capable of doing it.So I guess the whole collective bargaining process is secondary to striking!
Are you implying that people are completely ignorant of the fact that they can lose their jobs? What happened to personal responsibility?If a company can fire someone arbitrarily prior to retirement and thus annul their pensions, that person has lost the entirety of their expected future wealth, which, had they known it ahead of time, would have severely impacted upon their previous consumption and savings choices.
You talk about me lying? An employer has every reason to pay their employees fair wages! For one, people getting paid more are more productive on average. They are less likely to defect to other companies. Are you implying that nobody who isn't a part of a union is paid fairly?The myth of the greedy, corrupt union is probably one of the most enduring urban legends. the fact remains that unions bring certainty and regularity to the lives of workers whose employer would have no reason to pay them fair wages or provide job security otherwise.
Again, if you read the article (which I’m sure you didn’t as you expect me to read and debate every single one of your articles but have only really criticized one of mine, the GM one, and upon my highlighting the points of how the union is destroying GM simply conceded the point with your lack of response), you’d see that increased funding does not lead to better schools. Obviously, the inverse is true to a point; all schools need funding to operate. I am a supporter of well-funded schools in that they provide a massive positive externality to society. Consequentially, I also support efficient schools that provide maximum educational value for the funding they receive. That is why I am a staunch proponent of vouchers. The Canadian schools may actually already have a voucher-type system; most countries do have some form of them, which is why I can’t believe America is still in the stone age of educational funding.Fact is, funding for them has been reduced over the past few years.
Trust me, I have. You are consistently vague, ambiguous, undefined, and nonspecific in these posts. Either say something of substance or just be mature and concede the point: you have no idea how to create incentives in government to spend money wisely.Read. My. Damn. Posts.
Example: You go to a restaurant and want to buy the most expensive dinner on the menu. You reach in your pocket and realize you don’t have the money! Are you being inefficient with how you’re spending your funds? No, you just don’t have the money to waste on expensive items. Just because you cannot fund something does not mean you are being inefficient with how you spend your money. Being inefficient means you are spending your money, but you’re spending it in ineffective ways. What are the government’s most basic functions, as defined by our founding fathers?A government weakened with the inability to perform even its most basic functions, as you're suggesting by killing off their main source of revenue, is even more inefficient.
I repeat: Everyone works with the intentions of maximizing their utility. Including you, including everyone who has ever lived. You have not, and will not, give me your definition of utility. Probably because you don’t know what it means (here is a hint: happiness).I know someone who doesn't. Your "everyone" claim is instantly refuted due to the very meaning of the word.
What portion of society works to become less happy? That’s right, its none of it. Everyone from capitalists, communists, pastors, CEOs, union workers, athletes, to even disgruntled female pseudointellectual youths, work to maximize their utility. It is universal.My point with that? You do not speak for all of society.
Nothing can be “nearly infinite.” If it is anything other than infinite then it is infinitely less than infinite. Furthermore, it is impossible to achieve infinite positive or negative utility. You are so uneducated it astounds me.They could be given nearly infinite negative utility for a very long time.
When did the income percentile of the middle class have a better standard of living than the period of time we’re in right now? One hundred years ago? Fifty years ago? When was it Marril?Except that, if you were to read my source stating that they aren't, you'll realize that indeed they aren't.
But the majority of top income earners still work every day. Hasn’t anyone told them they’ve reached their carrot?! My God, somebody tell these people!The reward of capitalism, which to you is "maximized utility," is flat-up nonexistent to the vast majority of people.
Actually it is nonexistent to 100% of people because “maximized utility” is not the reward of capitalism. People work to maximize their utility, but nobody every does because we have unlimited wants. No matter how happy we are, there is always something else we could do to make ourselves happier. What capitalism does offer is a mechanism for society to achieve more utility than any other system.The reward of capitalism, which to you is "maximized utility," is flat-up nonexistent to the vast majority of people.
I argue for government in the state that it actually existed in before it became convoluted, large, corrupt, and massively wasteful (it is inherently wasteful if collecting taxes, however with income taxes is far, far more wasteful). Our government operated just fine for a very long time and did it’s fundamental duties: defended us from foreign invaders, corrected market failures, protected our property and lives from domestic attackers. I do not see how cutting back funds to useless programs like a “bridge to nowhere” or a $1,000,000.00 earmark to build a virtual reality spray paint training program (just a few that were passed this year) will somehow affect government’s ability to protect our lives and property. You don’t come up with a reason why either (because you have none). The fact remains clear: government has basic functions which it provided without social programs and Ponzi schemes like it is funding today. Cutting these back in no way diminishes the ability for government to effectively protect it’s people and correct it’s markets.You oppose possible efficiency, citing ineffectiveness and inefficiency, and so argue for forms of government that would be even less effective and more inefficient, in favour of private enterprise having even more and more power.
You play Pokemon, right? Have you ever traded a card before? How many parties must disagree to make a trade fall through? One. If anyone involved with the trade does not wish to perform it, the trade does not happen. You cannot go into someone’s binder, see a Charizard ex and force them to trade your Dunsparce for it. Both parties must agree to the trade. They cannot force you to trade something you do not wish to trade under the discussed terms, and you cannot force them to trade likewise.Likewise, you cannot go back into work after having been fired and force them to still pay you. Only one party must agree to the terms in this situation.
The tobacco industry continues to exist today despite giving out incorrect information previously because people now know the dangers of smoking but continue to do it anyway. It maximizes their utility. Smoking makes them happy. People die in car accidents speeding; they know the dangers but do it anyway. People drink themselves do death. People can do things that seem quite irrational, but they do them because it makes them the most happy. While many things people do are not a decision I would make, I will fight to preserve their autonomy and allow them to make that decision. Personal responsibility and all that.The tobacco industry. Game, set, and match on this point. Next one, please.
While that is a relatively small portion of our debt load when compared to the social programs, go ahead and get us out of Iraq too!Not really. You're still financing a Roman takeover of another country, after all, with the American government.
I think that sounds like Marril conceding a point!If you say so, Mister Historian.
I honestly don’t see myself winning this debate. Why? Because whenever I prove you wrong, you simply change subjects or don’t address it. I am expected to respond to every single one of your questions and prove wrong every single one of your sources, while my own questions, my own points, and my own sources go unread, untouched, unspoken of. It is incredibly unfair. You even said you’d concede the point with the whole GM-union thing, and you didn’t do that. Own up to your losses.You might even have a shot at winning the debate if you do so.
You criticize me for using the “every” qualifier and yet you use it yourself. How would a nontax-funded government be unable to function with regard to every public service? Our government survived without an income tax (aside from the Civil War levy) until 1913. The government provided its people with the security and protection of their lives and property from foreign and domestic intruders. It corrected market failures. How are you to assume that we can no longer do this without an income tax?2) Crippling to a society which is used to it, certainly, but then again every public service being crippled by inability to function by removal of taxes would also cripple you.
If you (or the company, but I’ll address them both as “you”) earned that money, I have no right to influence how you choose to spend your money. It is your property. Perhaps others could manage it better, however it is your right to choose where your money is spent and I will defend that right whenever possible. The premise of government is to defend your life, property, and liberty to do what you want with the first two as long as it doesn’t including acting with force on the life or property of another. This is generally speaking, but government is based primarily off of this notion.I have a question for you. If I mismanaged money, would it be bad for me to get my hands on it? If a company mismanages money, is it bad for them to get their hands on it?
Marril are you simply just in denial? I swear to God I don’t want to have to say this again, but it really is getting ridiculous. Are you simply choosing not to read what I am saying? Again,Problem: Corporations will not help social problems most of the time. Private enterprise cares solely about itself.
Is there something you don’t understand? Are you going to even try to offer a counterpoint, or just simply disregard what I’m saying? I guess you’re too busy trying to claim you won to actually debate.Moss Factor said:Capitalism is a system which defends property rights. This gives incentive for people to, following rational self-interest, increase their property, knowing it will be defended. To do this, people can create systems of production, protected from liability called businesses. These businesses are profit-minded. As a result, they only produce things people want (if people didn’t want it, why would they sell it?). They also maximize their resources only buying what they need. Therefore because they’re only producing what society wants and using their resources efficiently, we have a mechanism for taking all of society’s limited resources and turning them into only the things that people want. This system creates a great number of goods and services that increases our standard of living. This also creates numerous and diverse entities for us to apply our labor to. It allows for specialization and division of labor which leads to more and more efficiency.
All of this compounds. Businesses produce more and better technologies which help us push our production frontiers out further and further. More surplus is created. Wealth is created. It is not a zero-sum game.
How much are they making in terms of the buying power of their economy. Remember, in most 3rd-world countries, these people have never earned a wage in their lives. They have been micro-scale farmers or fishers that essentially produce enough to get by. They are not forced to work in these factories. They do so because it gives them better living conditions than the ones the face otherwise.Their standard of living is not improved by pennies a day for long hours with no benefits.
They offered similar goods at lower prices. This allows every member of the community to effectively have more money to spend; they spend less on the things they normally buy, giving them more money to spend elsewhere. The greater good is served because everyone buying the Wal-Mart products effectively now has “more money” (the money that they do have goes further).Their owners and employees were out of a job, simply because a large corporation decided that it would provide its service. This made many lives worse, and yet "all" of society benefits?
What are major connections? Getting money from them? Campaign money, personal money? What about the business just letting you fly their jet around or the business gives you some of their stuff? What if you don’t receive anything monetarily from them, but you happen to own their stock and did own it before you were elected? What if you have a brother that works in private enterprise (most brothers do), are you thrown out of office? What if your husband or wife works for a business? How do you define “major connections” and where is the line drawn? Everyone is in some way connected to private enterprise. At what point does the connection become “major,” and how does this line not blur terribly?If you're a politician and caught with major connections to private enterprise, at the very least you'll instantly be thrown out of office.
Marril once again is quick to tell us what we can and cannot do with our own lives and property.No[, you wouldn’t be allowed to spend your own money on elections.]
This process is not new. I may be pro a specific issue. Let’s say it is ending the Iraq War. In the US currently, I can form a PAC and generate funding for this cause. I will then promote politicians who support ending the Iraq War. Now, I’m not giving the money to any politicians and I’m they will have no say in how the money is spent. I simply have a cause, and promote those that have the same views as me. Is this “corrupt?” Why shouldn’t I be allowed to support and fight for those who feel the same way as myself?"Independantly"? Sounds like a new form of corruption.
Remind me again how to make plastics without polluting. Does one only pollute if cutting costs? Is there always a practical way of producing something without polluting to where polluting is only done as a way of cutting costs?The latter is what private enterprise does as a way of cutting costs.
What socialist countries have solved the poverty problem? The pollution problem? Socialist countries have not been able to solve these problems. Capitalist countries do improve standards of living over time. Take a look at the US expansion in just the past 80 years.Just because your government cannot implement it correctly does not mean that such programs cannot work in general.
I don't know about Canada, but nowhere in the US Constitution does it state that you have any rights to a job. You have no right to be employed. The government does not secure this in any way. What are they designed to secure? Your life, property, and liberty so as long as you don't infringe on the lives and property of others. This is why it is so fundamentally backwards that a government would take your property when it is supposed to be protecting it.Being entitled to a job means that you are entitled to money which is paid to benefit all of society.
Exactly my point. Canada produces less, and has less debt. Production is correlated with ability to pay down debt, so a presentation of of it's numbers requires the context of the country's size.Thus, while our percentage of debt compared to GNP is higher than yours, our production is lower such that our debt as a flat number is itself lower.
It does automatically reduce waste and creates a greater surplus in the economy. Automatically.Lowering taxes does not automatically improve governance.
I have.But I haven't seen the large private institutions behave any better.
We survived without income, capital gains, dividends, and most other taxes for the majority of the United States' history and still provided funding for all o f the things you have listed. There are ways for these programs to fund themselves. Furthermore, there are other forms of funding the government has available to it that do not include theft from its own citizens. Issuing bonds, tarrifs, and penalties for breaking laws. The government was sustainable and provided all of these functions before income taxes. It could still do that today. The majority of the income taxes it does recieve is wasted.taxes are essencial for society
no taxes, several things dont get paid for
no police, firemen, court systems, teachers, schools, politicians (YAY), or any other job that is paid for by the government
taxes are needed, plain and simple
Do you know what is the source of the majority of that debt? Medicaid, Medicare, Social Security and War. Get rid of these unnecessary expeditures and you have significantly reduced our current and future debt.Yeah. Except for the 8.5 trillion dollar debt, of course. But like most people, let's just look the other way when it comes to that one.
No problem, you can definitely use it.To shorten: monopolies can come about in other, capitalist-approved ways. Thanks for the info.
There are market failures! I have been saying this all along (finally you guys listen). Government can help to correct these market failures. Businesses are only the "best" when they are efficiently using our limited resources. Competition is what causes this to occur. Competition breeds efficiency. If ever there is not competition occurring, there is inefficiency and thus a market failure has occurred. This is where government can improve markets by fixing these market failures and break up the monopoly. Again, I have been saying this all along. It is about time you've listened.But monoplies can be produced with the free market system of capitalism, which is supposed to foster only the best of businesses! So now what it seems like you're saying is, capitalism works well, unless it fails.
"Human rights" again is a very subjective term. What is tolerant human rights today is not what was tolerant years ago and visa versa. One-hundred fifty years ago it was commonplace for children to work long hours, especially in agriculture (not just because the corporations said so). These days this is not the case. Similarly, having many minorities work certain upper-class jobs was seen as taboo. Times have thankfully changed. It is not government that enacts these changes, but society. If people do not approve of the standards of a business they can choose not to patron them. You can already see this as an effective means of preventing this situation; many companies who have committed our currently-defined human rights violations have gone out of business as a result of consumer boycott. This is an effective means of regulation that changes instantaneously with the times and accurately values the extent of the violation.Anyway, an efficient business will take advantage of all those things, and preventing them from doing so would be regulation of business. So, under capitalism, maintaining human rights is bad because it prevents businessmen from turning their ideas into money.
If Wal-Mart has been proven to use "sweatshop labor" and continues to operate, it must mean that society doesn't see it as being as big a human rights violation as you do.I pointed out three well-known businesses that use sweatshop labor and seem to be doing just fine. Here's one exapmle: Wal-mart.
This is not true; capitalism does not have a rule that there can be no government intervention. Government is often necessary in capitalism to correct market failures and to enforce rules.I'm aware of that, but if they obstruct certain business practices, putting them into law wouldn't be permissible under capitalism.
I understand what you're saying. However, if you pollute an area to the point where it is irreversibly destroyed, you cannot "redestroy it." For example, if you pollute a pond by a factory producing some medicine, and you pollute it enough to where it is irreversibly destroyed, each additional amount of pollution has no additional cost of destroying that pond (under my proposed system, the company would keep paying any fines). Therefore, despite that cost being perpetual, the benefit received from the production is perpetual as well.Let me rephrase my thoughts: the act of irreversible pollution, due to the fact that there is no way to undo it, remains a problem forever. You could probably refer to this as a "continuous cost to society."
To maximize my utility, of course! Why else would I?moss, why do you start these?
Nobody said you necessarily get paid proportionally to how hard you work. You get paid proportionally to how much you earn. I could work hard every single day for a year at digging a hole and produce less than one person with a backhoe in a day or so. Should I get paid more because I worked harder? Luckily for us, however, there is a high correlation between those that work harder and those than earn more.The idea that hard works correlates to fair earnings is not true, because the playing field is not even.
What social measures do is to put weights on the shoulders of those people who are faster. Is that leveling the playing field? No, that is limiting the abilities of some. Why should government be able to take property from those who have earned it, even if they may have had some luck to do so. Would it make sense for a casino to take a portion of the winnings from patrons who got lucky to subsidize those who did not?So what social measures do is strive to level that playing field, and, in direct answer to your question, it is fair because, almost inatley, those who are better off have become that way by indirect exploitation of resources such as labor and the enviornment.
You forget to discount what technology can buy. The money may only be able to be spent on similarly on the same handful of goods (which high oil prices hurt), but we have increased technology that increases our standards of living in many ways that wage buying power does not reflect. Furthermore, wages do not reflect benefits, a component of compensation that has become more and more important in recent times. People now expect many perks from their businesses, retirement plans, health coverage, some companies even have cars, gyms, meals, any many other perks for their employees. This additional compensation is not included in their wages.We can say that the market, for example, set a fair labr price - but this isn't true. If it did, real wages would have progressed at least with inflation over the past 50 years. Instead, real wages and spending power have progressed hardly at all.
Then why don't baseball players make less per year? Hell, I'll play baseball for $10,000 a year, no benefits! Just let me play!there will always be someone to step in and fill any given job at a low price because that low price is still better than they were doing before.
Yes.Sure, its more than they were making before, and they'll work for that, but is it really what their labor is worth?
My God he's reading my mind!Maybe, maybe not - if you define worth by the system which is already in place, the answer is yes.
A market system serves those with both! People with money pay it to labor to produce. Labor then has money and pays it for goods that other people were paid to produce. A market system benefits labor by giving them money in exchange for their labor.social program strive to create a more level playing field where the market serves not only those with the money (power) but those with the resources (labor).
Why should taxes be based on the ability to pay? Should Bill Gates be forced to pay for a bridge in Alaska he'll never drive over because he is more able to pay for it? Should Warren Buffett be forced to pay for a swimming pool in California he'll never swim in because he is more able to pay for it? Look at who should pay the taxes before even considering whether or not those taxes should be paid at all. Does it make sense for someone to pay for services they receive no benefit from? We are already paying a great cost in the liberties we give up for the protection of government. It is a crime to take more via force. Government is supposed to protect our property, not take it to spend how it sees fit.Furthermore, progressive taxes work because, and I know conservatives will disagree with this, 35% to an upper-middle class family is less of a financial burden than 15% to a lower class family.
Buddy, I'm living in the lowest class. A few months ago I was applying for a margin account. Filling out the form I found myself in the lowest asset, income, and basically every other bracket possible. I understand the realities and I also understand the best solutions for solving these problems. Free up the marketplace from its tax burdens and you will see incredible growth in living standards.It is hard to understand that unless you've lived in that lower class and had to worry about where your next meal is going to come from. Its hard for the wealthy to understand just how important that 15% is when you can barely afford the pay the electric bill.
As a side note, I don't think that social programs discourage wealth.
Does a 50% tax on lottery winnings discourage people from playing the lottery?
I don't know, nor have I ever heard stories about, people as a whole just beng lazy because they feel like their investments are not going to pay.
I daresay that even if the debt were to completely freeze right now, it would still be a large obstacle in the future. Unless we just sort of inflate it out of the way.Do you know what is the source of the majority of that debt? Medicaid, Medicare, Social Security and War. Get rid of these unnecessary expeditures and you have significantly reduced our current and future debt.
But why? Why would their be market failures if everything is supposed to naturally move to a state of well-functioning businesses? Could it be because the contradictory role of businesses is to eliminate the competition they need to not suck?There are market failures!
That would definitely be government interfering with business. If you admit that a capitalist system needs the government to help it out of a rut every once in a while, then I've pretty much proven my point that business isn't necessarily going to work perfectly well without the government butting in and imposing some restrictions and whatnot.If ever there is not competition occurring, there is inefficiency and thus a market failure has occurred. This is where government can improve markets by fixing these market failures and break up the monopoly.
*Coughaffirmativeactioncough*?Similarly, having many minorities work certain upper-class jobs was seen as taboo. Times have thankfully changed. It is not government that enacts these changes, but society.
Okay, but you're ignoring the part I wrote about widely acccepted values being prevented from becoming law because it would regulate business. And that has to be done because society is not entirely single-minded. Ever. In spite of the fact that most people accept values, some people don't and will continue to act accordingly unless the law seeks to stop them. Similarly, people will do things they know are immoral and against their own values for various reasons, and they'll need punishment. That's why we need these laws."Human rights" again is a very subjective term. What is tolerant human rights today is not what was tolerant years ago and visa versa. One-hundred fifty years ago it was commonplace for children to work long hours, especially in agriculture (not just because the corporations said so). These days this is not the case.
So all thta laissez-faire stuff is meaningless?This is not true; capitalism does not have a rule that there can be no government intervention.
Or they just don't know. Or they don't care. Or they don't care enough to give up a good deal. This is why it's a problem that money is all that counts within the system of capitalism; people are forced to make a choice between maintaining human rights (at some far-flung place they've never been near, so they're less likely to comply) or saving a couple of bucks. Such a choice should never exist. Human rights should not be for sale.If Wal-Mart has been proven to use "sweatshop labor" and continues to operate, it must mean that society doesn't see it as being as big a human rights violation as you do.
No, if you totally pollute a pond, you have to move on to another one. Or let's try some better examples: logging, and greenhouse gas emissions. And don't tell me you can undo logging in a timely manner; saplings are no substitute for full-grown trees, especially en masse.I understand what you're saying. However, if you pollute an area to the point where it is irreversibly destroyed, you cannot "redestroy it." For example, if you pollute a pond by a factory producing some medicine, and you pollute it enough to where it is irreversibly destroyed, each additional amount of pollution has no additional cost of destroying that pond (under my proposed system, the company would keep paying any fines). Therefore, despite that cost being perpetual, the benefit received from the production is perpetual as well.
These things were provided for before income and other forced taxes on our citizens. Most of our income taxes go to fund massive social programs and every few years, wars. Essentially the majority of our tax money is simply redistributed to someone else. They don't provide any service, the funds are simply given to someone else.Thing is, moza, that taxes mean the government gets money for things you likely use. I mean, you'd probably like schools, roads, parks, all those fun things.
Wealth is not zero-sum. You do not have to "screw" someone over to attain wealth. One does not have to take wealth from another to create wealth for themselves.As it is, the upper class' interests are to screw the middle class, and the middle class' interests are to prevent themselves from being screwed (by making unions, etc) despite the upper-class teachings that such prevention is a bad thing.
*high-fives*Paying taxes for something I use and/or benefit from (roads, the army, parks, etc) is different from paying for things that I cannot use and/or benefit from (welfare, social security, etc). There is a difference between using government money for something that benefits most of society and paying out to citizens directly. The latter is unconstitutional anyway.
Stealing from someone for the sole reason of their having good fortunes is fair as well, then? Is theft ever fair? Is robbing someone ever correct? Does it matter if their ability to cushion the loss is greater? The answer to all is "no." Theft against anyone is immoral.Right, so someone who works hellishly hard hours their entire life can get nowhere, but being born with a rich daddy and never having to put any serious work in is perfectly fair?
Michigan is not a "right to work" state. Marril would be better off if she spent more time researching than attacking.Unless I'm gravely mistaken, this is a "right to work" state. Just a bit of a sampling of what people raised under that doctrine believe, that helping the poor to not be poor is a bad idea.
It does not help society in gerenal, it only helps those that recieve the funds. Because of how taxes work, the money given out to others is not equal to the surplus lost from collecting taxes. This is called deadweight loss. Society in general loses. Furthermore, the rich give out plenty of money, but on their terms. It isn't the rich being selfish for resisting, but the rich resisting because they're being robbed. You also seem to think it is only "the rich" who pay for these wealth redistribution programs. I'm paying a significant portion of my income in taxes. I'm a college kid, living in the ghetto, and I still have to pay out a very demanding portion of my meager wages to funds these programs. I am not some super rich fat cat who has my wealth accumulated from inheritance, I am a college student working in debt from student loans and still having to pay for these ridiculous social programs.The whole "if my money's going towards it, I should be getting the benefits" thing is nothing more than pure selfishness. You're not losing any vast amounts of your money from it, and it helps society in general.
There is a difference between making the playing field fair and penalizing the rich to give the poor a better shot.I spoke about creating a fair playing field so the poor have opportunities to better themselves.
"Poverty" is how you define it. Do you refer to their being people in the lowest % of income earners? If so, there will always be "poverty." Capitalism does create economic inequality. There will never be a time when everyone is equal. The benefit of it, however, is that it creates a society so productive that the standards of living of all people increases dramatically in the long-run. There will still be a "lower class," however that "lower class" will be far better off than otherwise.Either poverty is a problem which makes the world a worse place to live
Or poverty is a required element of a functioning system.
Or, that it is both and we shouldn't try to do anything about it (i.e. economic darwinism).
There is great economic mobility. As I have shown and sourced in an earlier post, there is almost no correlation between the income of the grandfather and the income of the grandson. There is no long-term consolidation of income.OK, so let me ask you this: how do you stop the long-term consolidation of income?
But the US isn't some schmo. US Treasury Bonds are the safest in the world. The highest quality. The US government has never defaulted on a loan. The same cannot be said for all governments. We have the highest GDP in the world. A country's GDP is highly correlated with its ability to pay its debts. That is why US T-bonds are the highest rated in the world.First of all, that's a pretty bold statement. And second, it's because the debt isn't being dealt with. If some schmo takes out a bunch of loans and totally ignores paying them back, it's going to look like he's doing well too.
Slam-dunk! Schell is on fire! (NBA Jam references ftw).Do I believe that all that matters is my income? Of course not. There are plenty of other things that also matter. Do I believe someone less fortunate is ENTITLED to part of my income? Not in a million years. I'm not opposed to helping the poor. I don't believe the government is helping them and I don't believe they deserve what is mine. If I want to give them what is mine I will do so. I will donate to worthy causes and/or I will volunteer my time if I wish. But I do not endorse having my money taken from me because someone feels they're entitled to part of my pay check.
What is fundamentally wrong with someone having more than someone else? What is fundamentally wrong with an income gap? And why do you feel it a good thing to close this gap by redistributing income?In the defense of what I'm arguing, my standpoint is that the gap between "rich" and "poor" should not be as great as it is.
I have shown that there is great room for economic mobility in America. You are trying to perpetuate the myth that poverty is inescapable. Very few people are in poverty for a long period of time. Your inability to accept this is stunning.Not if you were never rich enough to afford the opportunities to get ahead (post-secondary education, etc), and are forced to work relatively close to minimum wage throughout your life.
Yes, because the majority of immigrants to the US are upper class and thus aren't exploited. Wrong. They know that there is great economic mobility in America and our brand of capitalism affords great opportunity for attaining wealth. People around the world know America as "the Land of Opportunity." This is for good reason; we provide great amounts of economic mobility and have very high standards of living.They know that the US has laws that allow the American upper class to exploit them by offering them meagre handouts.
Wow, what backward thinking. So according to Marril we need to reduce our debt while increasing our social programs! Marril, what do you think is causing all of our debt in the first place? Social security was our largest expenditure for the 2007 budget, with Medicare, Unemployment and welfare, and Medicaid not far behind. These four categories comprise 58% of our total budget. We could cut our tax inflow in half and still come out ahead if we cut these programs. It is astonishing. Furthermore, the way Social Security is set up, unlike the way the government forces all businesses to report their debts, the government does not include future promised Social Security payments into their numbers, merely what was actually paid out. If you count what the government has promised, this number becomes astronomical. If anything is a risk to the US government ever in the future having solvency problems, it is these social programs.Until your economy collapses from doing nothing but spiralling down deeper and deeper into debt. America's economy is not limitless, and at this rate it is only a matter of time before it collapses.
With all that time and effort, one would think they’d get it right. Unfortunately that is not the case.Welfare is run by people with the time and effort to do it.
It is an example showing how capitalism works to improve living conditions. We’re not saying to those in poverty that “you shouldn’t be upset, at least you’re not them!” The point of the comparison is to show that because of free markets and capitalism, even our “poor” live much better than the “poor” elsewhere. It is an example showing how the invisible hand works to improve all of society’s living conditions over time.It does nothing for the people out on the streets to tell them that there are starving children in Africa.
They are incentives to not earn anything additionally. Why would you want to earn more money if, after earning it, you had less than before earning it? How can you not see this as a clear reason why welfare programs make severe distortions of incentives?Barely enough money for a cheap apartment and food enough not to starve, and then taxing any other earned money by 100% are not "incintives[sic] to stay poor".
He also didn’t say anything about government programs which do not redistribute wealth. As I stated, the largest nonwar government expenditures were for Social Security, Medicare, Unemployment and welfare, and Medicaid. These are all redistributions of wealth.Misleading. Not all tax money is "given" to people who didn't earn it. Welfare is what "gives" this money to the poor. Other social programs aimed at helping the poor, you have said nothing about, and I doubt that you have anything to say on the subject given your long tirades of "it's my money, mine mine mine!" So I take it welfare is the main point of concern with you.
Stealing: The crime of taking someone else's property without consent. I guess it isn’t a “crime” because the government allows it, but then I suppose anything the government says it can do is never a crime. Regardless, they are taking our property without our consent; how is that not stealing?Stealing is wrong, but taxes aren't stealing.
Well lucky for us, while there are problems with our system, America is still the best country on Earth. So I’m happy to stay; despite the shortcomings, we’re still by far and away #1. I’d be paying a massive opportunity cost going anywhere else.Don't like it? Do as Moss keeps saying, and vote with your feet. What? You won't and/or can't? Funny, that's what a lot of people he says should be voting with their feet say...
It's called leaving the country. It's possible, therefore to sound Moss-like, it should be the balance... don't like government, leave the country. It's actually a beautiful comparison to how Moss' arguments work with real life anyway.
Capitalism is about defending property rights and maintaining free and efficient markets. When left alone, markets tend to reward merit, although not always. Some people work very hard, but work at the wrong things or simply don’t produce much. Like I said, you can work all day digging a hole with a shovel; should someone with a backhoe who can do it in five minutes be paid less than you because they didn't work as hard? Income is based most causationally on productivity.Isn't capitalism supposed to be about rewarding merit?
Oh baby a great point by Schell! Anyone ever wonder why everything in the US is sweetened by High Fructose Corn Syrup instead of just Sugar? It is because the government subsidizes sugar growers to keep the price artificially high. As a result, it becomes actually cheaper for US companies to covert corn into a sweetener instead of just using sugar due to its inflated prices. As a result, we have to have our food sweetened with something that actually does not taste as good as the real thing because of the government!I'm also against my money being used by the government to buy up surplus agricultural products to keep their prices high.
I’m not here to speak for Chris, but I am against non-voluntary redistributions of money. Social programs are fine. Many nonprofit organizations offer them. Many religious organizations offer them. The idea of the social program is not something I am against, but when it is funded by money taken from people against their will, it is something I oppose.Are you against basic social programs or not?
False dilemma logical fallacy. Marril sets it up the question so you can only pay someone minimum wage or $30/hour. There is no room for an in-between? People get paid based on how productive they are. If someone can produce more for a company than $30/hr, they would receive that compensation. If they did not produce that much per hour for the company, they wouldn’t. Education does not guarantee higher earnings, but there is a very high correlation.Show me someone willing to pay $30 an hour to someone who barely managed to pass high school (if that) and has few to no actual job skills.
That is perhaps the smartest thing I’ve heard Marril say! Surprising you should feel that way, considering most of the push for giving illegal immigrants more rights is coming from the left. It is a disgrace that we simply allow so many illegal into our country and do so little to get them out. Many are proposing just granting them all citizenship. It is a slap in the face to everyone who became a citizen legally and creates incentives for people to further enter the country illegally. I’m totally with Marril on this one!Seriously, learn the issue. The word "illegal" in "illegal immigrant" is not for decoration. America should not be allowing these people to get jobs.
Not true. Our bonds are still very strong. No bond, country, business or otherwise, is rated higher than US Treasury Bonds. If it were even reasonable that the country would be insolvent within even 20-30 years, you would see that price reflecting clearly in the bonds of those years. They would be returning far higher yields. Currently, US T-Bonds are the lowest-yielding bonds of every maturity.America's collapse, however, is assuredly within the next decade or two at best if it continues along the path it is currently.
Welfare checks do not include in-kind transfers. In-kind transfers are donations of specific goods: food/food stamps, shelter, supplies, etc; anything non-monetary that assists people to live. “According to a study by the Census Bureau, if in-kind transfers were included in income at their market value, the number of families in poverty would be about 10 percent lower.” The numbers included were a poverty rate of 11.3%, meaning a 10% reduction would mean that including in-kind transfers reduces the real number of people in poverty by 88.5%; quite significant. (Quoted source: Mankiw: Principles of Microeconomics. Data source: US Bureau of the Census, 2000 numbers).You pretty much literally cannot afford anything else if you're on welfare, other than rent and groceries... at least around here, but around here is a pretty generous welfare situation.
Leaving the country is always an option, he just does not want to. Same with changing jobs, that is, too, always an option. It may not always be your best option, which if it isn’t, you should continue the status quo.Not for some people. For some people, quitting their job due to working conditions is simply not an option, just as leaving the country is not an option for you. That is what I was trying to impress upon you.
You make the implication that if something is not public, then people cannot receive it. We make a contract with government to allow them to rule us in exchange for protection of our lives and property. We very much deserve protection; if the government will not protect our lives and property, why do we allow it to rule us?Also, poor people don't deserve good health. Let's privatize the police since they probably don't deserve protection either.
They’re a market failure because they create a situation where the company would sell us something at a specific price and someone would buy that item at that specific price, but the transaction does not occur because of the economics of the monopoly. Here is a representation of how the production function of a monopoly works. If you see, there is a triangle (nonhighlighted) created by the Qm, MC, and demand curves. This triangle is where deadweight loss occurs. The Qc line is where a normal, competitive company would produce at. The monopoly produces at Qm. As a result, deadweight loss occurs in the triangle described previously. This is a market failure because every point within the deadweight loss triangle is a price and quantity that a seller could profitably produce at (if there were competition) and a buyer could profitably buy at. However, because of the lack of competition, there is no transaction; a market failure occurs when people who want to sell and want to buy cannot due to economic conditions (in our case, a lack of competition).But why? Why would their be market failures if everything is supposed to naturally move to a state of well-functioning businesses? Could it be because the contradictory role of businesses is to eliminate the competition they need to not suck?
Government doesn’t correct businesses per se, it merely corrects markets. As long as markets are operating correctly, which you would be able to graphically determine if they are or not, government should not interfere if it is the goal of government to provide the most good to society.That would definitely be government interfering with business. If you admit that a capitalist system needs the government to help it out of a rut every once in a while, then I've pretty much proven my point that business isn't necessarily going to work perfectly well without the government butting in and imposing some restrictions and whatnot.
Are you implying that companies would not hire minorities without affirmative action? Are you implying that companies didn’t hire minorities before affirmative action?*Coughaffirmativeactioncough*?
Buyers and sellers can effectively regulate markets without failures. If people do not like a company’s business practices, they will go out of business. Arthur Anderson was the accounting firm that cooked the books for Enron, World Com and a host of others. AA went out of business like the rest of them, but not because it necessarily broke any laws (the partners may have been convinced, but the business was already gone well before). They went out of business because not a single company wanted those guys auditing their financial statements. They didn’t want to be associated with them. It lost effectively all of its business and discontinued operations shortly thereafter.Okay, but you're ignoring the part I wrote about widely acccepted values being prevented from becoming law because it would regulate business. And that has to be done because society is not entirely single-minded. Ever. In spite of the fact that most people accept values, some people don't and will continue to act accordingly unless the law seeks to stop them.
It is a good rule of thumb, but not written in stone. Generally the best mentality is a laissez-faire one, but free markets can be improved by correcting market failures.So all thta laissez-faire stuff is meaningless?
The “don’t know” argument is a poor one. You can get away with any kind of atrocity if nobody knows about it. The don’t care one is perfectly valid! If they don’t care about a human rights violation, then maybe it isn’t a violation after all.Or they just don't know. Or they don't care. Or they don't care enough to give up a good deal.
Again, if people are willing to enact human rights violations to save $0.10 on a box of Mac and Cheese, then perhaps the violation isn’t really a violation. Markets will determine what is and is not a violation by boycotting what really counts.people are forced to make a choice between maintaining human rights (at some far-flung place they've never been near, so they're less likely to comply) or saving a couple of bucks. Such a choice should never exist. Human rights should not be for sale.
Why?No, if you totally pollute a pond, you have to move on to another one.
Logging had to be one of the worst examples you could have used. Trees literally grow on trees. What is wrong with planting two trees for every one you cut? Furthermore, people typically get a very small benefit out of just one tree. But I can use my Oak desk every day to provide me with plenty of utility. The desk, in its produced form, is helping me every day to stay organized, to study, and to hold up my computer so I’m not typing on the ground; while a tree, although helpful in the form of producing oxygen, shade, and the ascetics of them, is not nearly as utility-providing as a tree would be. And that is just one thing produced by the tree. Obviously although a final product wood item is more useful that the tree it came from does not mean we should just cut down every tree. I have one in my front yard. I could cut it down and sell it, but the money provided from the sale would not be worth the benefit I receive from my tree. People can choose for themselves what is worth it and what isn’t.Or let's try some better examples: logging, and greenhouse gas emissions. And don't tell me you can undo logging in a timely manner; saplings are no substitute for full-grown trees, especially en masse.
Although it was just a joke, it is not too far from the truth, sadly enough. It speaks a lot about how wasteful government is with the taxes it has to waste surplus on to get in the first place.Guess who got the job?
it is fair because, almost inatley, those who are better off have become that way by indirect exploitation of resources such as labor and the enviornment.
It is fair to force someone to give to others when what they are giving is not legitimately earned or achieved.
I dunno, seems to me like welfare (etc.) helps society in spite of the fact that only some people receive the funds, in the same way that a business helps society ins pite of the fact that only some people buy the products. But the business doesn't cost everyone something, you object? It does if it pollutes.It does not help society in gerenal, it only helps those that recieve the funds.
Not my quote, but I said pretty much the same thing and you didn't respond, so I'll assume you're using this to cover both.Right, so someone who works hellishly hard hours their entire life can get nowhere, but being born with a rich daddy and never having to put any serious work in is perfectly fair?
Stealing from someone for the sole reason of their having good fortunes is fair as well, then? Is theft ever fair? Is robbing someone ever correct? Does it matter if their ability to cushion the loss is greater? The answer to all is "no." Theft against anyone is immoral.
No, I make the implication that if something can't be afforded by some people, they can't have it. Which I think is a very fair assumption. That applies to medical care, as in the example I was referring to. Also the police, a more abstract example.You make the implication that if something is not public, then people cannot receive it.
Why isn't there a transaction? If the product is essential enough, people will cough up extra cash in spite of the fact that ithey're being overcharged. Electricity? Gas? Phone service?They’re a market failure because they create a situation where the company would sell us something at a specific price and someone would buy that item at that specific price, but the transaction does not occur because of the economics of the monopoly. Here is a representation of how the production function of a monopoly works. If you see, there is a triangle (nonhighlighted) created by the Qm, MC, and demand curves. This triangle is where deadweight loss occurs. The Qc line is where a normal, competitive company would produce at. The monopoly produces at Qm. As a result, deadweight loss occurs in the triangle described previously. This is a market failure because every point within the deadweight loss triangle is a price and quantity that a seller could profitably produce at (if there were competition) and a buyer could profitably buy at. However, because of the lack of competition, there is no transaction; a market failure occurs when people who want to sell and want to buy cannot due to economic conditions (in our case, a lack of competition).
Actually, that was meant mostly in jest. You mentioned hiring of minorities and that society and not law imposes moral values. I couldn't help but point out the inconsistency.Are you implying that companies would not hire minorities without affirmative action? Are you implying that companies didn’t hire minorities before affirmative action?
Hold on, now. This doesn't seem right. You yourself pointed out a number of ways a monopoly, a "market failure," can arise in a capitalist system. And capitalist systems are supposed to be regulated only by the buyers and sellers. So can or can't they prevent market failures iwthout the government's help? I guess the answer is pretty obvious, considering monopolies have existed.Buyers and sellers can effectively regulate markets without failures.
But a capitalist system sometimes needs the government to regulate it, you say. So capitalism doesn't produce an efficient market? Sounds like another contradiction.The point is, efficient markets regulate themselves.
No, that's just idealism. Most people aren't perfect moral authorities. If they were, we wouldn't need laws to enforce these things. It's easy to be tempted to screw over a bunch of Chinese kids you'll never see for the benefit of your own pocket.If people are upset about a business practice that they view as a human rights violation, they will not patron that business.
I agree. And also by banning pollution and asserting various workers'/human rights. That would help. Though there could still be problems.Generally the best mentality is a laissez-faire one, but free markets can be improved by correcting market failures.
Um,Logging had to be one of the worst examples you could have used. Trees literally grow on trees. What is wrong with planting two trees for every one you cut?
To spell it out for you, a young tree is nowhere near as good as a mature tree. Simple as that.And don't tell me you can undo logging in a timely manner; saplings are no substitute for full-grown trees, especially en masse.
A desk made of something else, like stone (crappy example, but whatever), could do all that. And trees are also parts of ecosystems and also hold soil in place with their roots (yes, they're also held in place by the soil; weird, I know). Chopping down a bunch of trees will not only wreck the ecosystem in the area, but also possibly change the very sort of land that the trees used to be growing in. Like, to a big, loose, not-very-useful desert-like area.The desk, in its produced form, is helping me every day to stay organized, to study, and to hold up my computer so I’m not typing on the ground; while a tree, although helpful in the form of producing oxygen, shade, and the ascetics of them, is not nearly as utility-providing as a tree would be.
Do me a favor and finish this sentence: “Utility is not happiness; the definition of utility is…”
It is OK to be wrong once in awhile Marril. Just own up and admit it so we can move on.
That is all an opinion. You cannot make that conclusion for everyone. While many people in a company may find it to be worth the tradeoff, it will not be worth the cost to every employee.
Tell me, Marril, at what percentage is the portion of your wages taken out “significant?”
Frankly, I would never work for a union if I were forced to pay dues, the amount is always too significant for me, no matter how small.
The way unions have it set up, an employee will earn more for being employed longer regardless of whether or not they are a better and more loyal employee than someone who has been with the company less.
Without unions, you are paid according to what value you add to the company
The only thinking lacking is your ability to debate without using ad hominems and personal attacks to cover up your inability to prove me wrong.
It really is incredibly immature that you simply have no possible way of communicating with someone you disagree with in a civil manner. Grow up, Marril.
A union’s most powerful weapon to get more than their fair share is the strike. An employer does not need to be formally threatened with one to know that they are capable of doing it.
Because they have no counterpoint; I am correct.
Are you implying that people are completely ignorant of the fact that they can lose their jobs? What happened to personal responsibility?
You talk about me lying? An employer has every reason to pay their employees fair wages! For one, people getting paid more are more productive on average. They are less likely to defect to other companies. Are you implying that nobody who isn't a part of a union is paid fairly?
simply conceded the point with your lack of response
Trust me, I have. You are consistently vague, ambiguous, undefined, and nonspecific in these posts. Either say something of substance or just be mature and concede the point: you have no idea how to create incentives in government to spend money wisely.
Example: You go to a restaurant and want to buy the most expensive dinner on the menu. You reach in your pocket and realize you don’t have the money! Are you being inefficient with how you’re spending your funds? No, you just don’t have the money to waste on expensive items. Just because you cannot fund something does not mean you are being inefficient with how you spend your money.
I repeat: Everyone works with the intentions of maximizing their utility.
to even disgruntled female pseudointellectual youths
work to maximize their utility
Nothing can be “nearly infinite.” If it is anything other than infinite then it is infinitely less than infinite. Furthermore, it is impossible to achieve infinite positive or negative utility. You are so uneducated it astounds me.
When did the income percentile of the middle class have a better standard of living than the period of time we’re in right now? One hundred years ago? Fifty years ago? When was it Marril?
But the majority of top income earners still work every day. Hasn’t anyone told them they’ve reached their carrot?! My God, somebody tell these people!
People work to maximize their utility, but nobody every does because we have unlimited wants.
Our government operated just fine for a very long time and did it’s fundamental duties: defended us from foreign invaders, corrected market failures, protected our property and lives from domestic attackers.
Cutting these back in no way diminishes the ability for government to effectively protect it’s people and correct it’s markets.
What is so difficult to understand, Marril?
People can do things that seem quite irrational, but they do them because it makes them the most happy.
I think that sounds like Marril conceding a point!
I honestly don’t see myself winning this debate. Why? Because whenever I prove you wrong, you simply change subjects or don’t address it.
Own up to your losses.
Our government survived without an income tax (aside from the Civil War levy) until 1913.
Government, on the other hand, steals our money with force. Then they go on to mismanage our money. This is the distinction.
These businesses are profit-minded. As a result, they only produce things people want (if people didn’t want it, why would they sell it?).
They also maximize their resources only buying what they need.
Therefore because they’re only producing what society wants and using their resources efficiently, we have a mechanism for taking all of society’s limited resources and turning them into only the things that people want.
This system creates a great number of goods and services that increases our standard of living.
Businesses produce more and better technologies which help us push our production frontiers out further and further.
Are you going to even try to offer a counterpoint, or just simply disregard what I’m saying?
Question: if working for a factory makes you worse off than you would be otherwise, why would you work for it?
This allows every member of the community to effectively have more money to spend; they spend less on the things they normally buy, giving them more money to spend elsewhere. The greater good is served because everyone buying the Wal-Mart products effectively now has “more money” (the money that they do have goes further).
What if you don’t receive anything monetarily from them, but you happen to own their stock and did own it before you were elected?
How do you define “major connections” and where is the line drawn?
Marril once again is quick to tell us what we can and cannot do with our own lives and property.
Is there always a practical way of producing something without polluting to where polluting is only done as a way of cutting costs?
Capitalist countries do improve standards of living over time. Take a look at the US expansion in just the past 80 years.
I don't know about Canada, but nowhere in the US Constitution does it state that you have any rights to a job.
We already pay a significant price for the protection we receive. That cost is our liberty and the protection is over our property.
Exactly my point. Canada produces less, and has less debt. Production is correlated with ability to pay down debt, so a presentation of of it's numbers requires the context of the country's size.
If Wal-Mart has been proven to use "sweatshop labor" and continues to operate, it must mean that society doesn't see it as being as big a human rights violation as you do.
To maximize my utility, of course! Why else would I?
Most of our income taxes go to fund massive social programs and every few years, wars.
You do not have to "screw" someone over to attain wealth. One does not have to take wealth from another to create wealth for themselves.
Furthermore, why is inequality a bad thing? Just because someone achieves some wealth, that you deserve a share of their wealth? That you have a claim to someone else's property? Does that even make sense?
Theft against anyone is immoral.
Michigan is not a "right to work" state. Marril would be better off if she spent more time researching than attacking.
You also seem to think it is only "the rich" who pay for these wealth redistribution programs.
I am not some super rich fat cat who has my wealth accumulated from inheritance, I am a college student working in debt from student loans and still having to pay for these ridiculous social programs.
There is a difference between making the playing field fair and penalizing the rich to give the poor a better shot.
I can again draw from the sports analogy. Both teams are not always equally-able to win the game.
Would basketball be a better game if player like Micheal Jordan were forced to wear weights on their ankles?
What is fundamentally wrong with someone having more than someone else? What is fundamentally wrong with an income gap? And why do you feel it a good thing to close this gap by redistributing income?
You are trying to perpetuate the myth that poverty is inescapable.
Why would America have such high levels of immigration, specifically from those who are very poor, if those poor people have no opportunity for increasing their living standards?
Nobody immigrates to the US for the welfare.
So according to Marril we need to reduce our debt while increasing our social programs! Marril, what do you think is causing all of our debt in the first place?
How is increasing government spending on these ridiculous social programs going to help that?
The point of the comparison is to show that because of free markets and capitalism, even our “poor” live much better than the “poor” elsewhere. It is an example showing how the invisible hand works to improve all of society’s living conditions over time.
They are incentives to not earn anything additionally.
I guess it isn’t a “crime” because the government allows it, but then I suppose anything the government says it can do is never a crime.
Well lucky for us, while there are problems with our system, America is still the best country on Earth.
False dilemma logical fallacy. Marril sets it up the question so you can only pay someone minimum wage or $30/hour.
Why would you want to even employ them?
That is perhaps the smartest thing I’ve heard Marril say! Surprising you should feel that way, considering most of the push for giving illegal immigrants more rights is coming from the left.
If it were even reasonable that the country would be insolvent within even 20-30 years, you would see that price reflecting clearly in the bonds of those years.
Leaving the country is always an option, he just does not want to.
(BTW, I don't think that people should hire illegal immigrants. I just said that a company can offer lower wage prices.)
And as I've pointed out, it's fallacious to look simply at direct family ties. Friends in high places are as good or even better. Is there a "economic standing of friends of friends" study?There is great economic mobility. As I have shown and sourced in an earlier post, there is almost no correlation between the income of the grandfather and the income of the grandson. There is no long-term consolidation of income.
There is a fundamental difference between these two. If I want to take advantage of any of these social programs, I can’t, because they won’t let me (I don’t qualify for any). However, businesses don’t pick and choose who can buy their products. Anyone who is willing to pay what they’re charging can buy their products. The government won’t let me “buy into” all of theirs.I dunno, seems to me like welfare (etc.) helps society in spite of the fact that only some people receive the funds, in the same way that a business helps society ins pite of the fact that only some people buy the products.
Some people get lucky. I don’t think I need to go over this again. What is your proposed solution to some getting lucky and others unlucky? Try your best and eliminate luck? Is it even possible to do this? What conclusions are you trying to make here?Kind of a pointless argument since I myself used the example of it constantly being pointed out that it's not fair that some people have their money taken away and some have it handed to them.
We do have laws that force people to be treated in ERs regardless of insurance. A long-term solution to health insurance needs is HSAs or Health Savings Accounts.No, I make the implication that if something can't be afforded by some people, they can't have it. Which I think is a very fair assumption. That applies to medical care, as in the example I was referring to.
There isn’t a transaction because there is no competition, that causes a market failure. Allow me to explain:Why isn't there a transaction? If the product is essential enough, people will cough up extra cash in spite of the fact that ithey're being overcharged. Electricity? Gas? Phone service?
I’m sorry, I phrased that poorly. Read as “Buyers and sellers can effectively regulate markets that do not have market failures.” If a market doesn’t have a failure, it will be regulated by the buyers and sellers. The existence of a market failure means that the market is not operating properly. It means that deadweight loss is occurring or that all costs and benefits are not being factored in properly. If the markets are working properly, everything is correctly valued.Hold on, now. This doesn't seem right. You yourself pointed out a number of ways a monopoly, a "market failure," can arise in a capitalist system. And capitalist systems are supposed to be regulated only by the buyers and sellers. So can or can't they prevent market failures iwthout the government's help? I guess the answer is pretty obvious, considering monopolies have existed.
A contradiction of what? If a market is efficient, it has no failures. These markets regulate themselves. If a market has a failure, it instantaneously ceases to be an efficient market. Therefore, it needs correction by the government to become an efficient market. Once it becomes one, it no longer needs regulation.But a capitalist system sometimes needs the government to regulate it, you say. So capitalism doesn't produce an efficient market? Sounds like another contradiction.
However, somehow government officials are exempt from this criticism?No, that's just idealism. Most people aren't perfect moral authorities.
I don’t think there are many illusions as to how some goods are produced. Usually it is widely publicized when a company uses potentially questionable business practices to produce its goods. You have to then assert if people know about these things and still buy them, then it must mean that they do not view it has a human rights violation after-all.And no corporation is going to write on its labels, "Produced in China through sweatshop labor!"
Give me a break, it’s not a sapling for long. Are you telling me that we cannot perform any logging whatsoever because newly planted trees are not a good as a mature one for a relatively short period of time? You could have used nearly any other example: a river, a large lake, something, anything that doesn’t literally grow back. Trees are the perfect example of a renewable natural resource.To spell it out for you, a young tree is nowhere near as good as a mature tree. Simple as that.
Utility is not a term limited to economics. It is used in ethics (see Utilitarianism) and other fields of study to define happiness. Economics deals with consumption of goods and services, and therefore utility in that context refers to the happiness derived from the consumption of goods and services. Ethics deals with the analysis and employments of things being right and wrong; in this instance utility means happiness gained as a result of an action."... a theory in economics that links the consumption of commodities to happiness."
I emphasize "theory in economics." Simply because it is used as a theory does not make it fact that happiness is gained from material consumption.
Individuals determine whether the cost of something is worth the benefit of it, not you Marril.It instantly becomes worth the cost to every employee in the union when the union's collective bargaining process secures tangible and beneficial results.
Can you please provide a source for the 1.2% figure? Earlier you said “the figure "1.2%" is in my head, but I forget who I know had this figure,” so I’m worried as to its validity. Please no blogs, thanks!If you'd call 1.2% a "significant percentage" then be my guest, but that means you're making "only" $98.80 for every $100 earned.
Never have, and I’ve consistently made more per hour than most of my peers, have received regular pay increases, I have full benefits and a 401k, and have never been fired. Just me personally, I’m sure you’ve worked for plenty of unions, though.Then do not work for a union
Good to know! Do you have any more figures to pull right out of you-know-where for us?I'd say you'd have to be at least moderately loyal to put in 15 years' work with a single company.
There is plenty of incentive to pay an employee proportional to what they produce. If you do not pay them fairly, you run the risk of competition offering them a better deal and you’ve now lost an employee that would have been profitable to employ even at higher wages. You also have lower productivity and decreased morale from paying someone significantly less than what they produce. It is in a company’s best interests to pay its employees proportionally to what value they add to the company.Not if any kind of employer can help it. Why pay your employees more than they're willing to work for, and all that? There's no incentive to, and as you keep trying to drill into me, people will only respond to incentive.
“An ad hominem argument, also known as argumentum ad hominem (Latin, literally "argument against the person") involves replying to an argument or assertion by attacking the person presenting the argument or assertion rather than the argument itself. It is a logical fallacy.” (see Wikipedia). I don’t think I need to say much on this, because it is quite obvious you use personal attacks quite regularly. Who are you trying to convince that you don’t? The members of this board, or yourself? Is anyone willing to come to Marril’s defense on this one?I defined an ad hominem earlier in this debate, and indeed I have not brought up irrelevant information about my opponent as a means of weakening his arguments. I have brought up relevant information, such as your somehow trying to get me to believe in a 75% union due.
No, that is not what I’m trying to tell you. You had a line that said “99% of labour contracts are renewed or renegotiated without even the threat of a strike action or other kind of dispute.” I simply said that it is unnecessary for a union to even have to threaten to strike, because the employers already know that the strike is an option if the renegotiations go sour. As an example, if you’re robbing someone at gunpoint you don’t have to tell them that if they don’t give up their wallet you’re going to shoot them; that is what robbers with guns do, they shoot people. As a result, a statistic saying “99% of armed robberies are resolved without even the threat of personal injury” would be similarly ineffective.Aha, so take away the option of a strike, and collective bargaining itself dies off, is that what you're trying to tell me?
That efficient free markets with limited government intrusion are the surest and best paths to promoting prosperity and higher standards of living for all members of society in the long run.Restate, in no uncertain terms, what it is you think to be so irrefutable, and why it can never be refuted for all time, as long as man walks the earth and the stars shine in the sky.
Again, there are always consequences to actions. If a company starts firing people as they reach retirement age to annul a pension, think of what that will do to every other member of said company. Will they stay for long? I know I wouldn’t. Will they get many others willing to put in a lifetime’s worth of work? How long will this strategy work before the business simply loses every single once loyal employee? Do you see this strategy enacted in businesses without unions on an even remotely regular basis?Are you implying that it's a wise decision to start firing employees once they near retirement age just for the purposes of annulling their pensions?
People do it all the time! I’ve actually received two raises doing exactly that.I highly doubt any employee can walk up to his employer and with any credulity say, "I am earning less than I should be, and here is why.
There are many ways to gauge this. The best is by comparison. If workers in another company in the same industry are making more than workers at your company, you can use this as an argument to be paid more. You don’t need to be a financial wizard to determine how much the value you add to a company is worth, just to be able to compare salaries.They'd be quite powerless to even initiate this conversation, as well, as it could easily lead to their termination and replacement by a person who will not argue. How does an employee gauge their contributions to the company? Does a sheet metal worker factor it as the price of the metal he produces per day? Does a McDonald's employee gauge it based on how many orders they take per day? How can they, as they simply do not have the information to be making this assessment.
Again, if this were the case, then why do nonunion companies pay more than the minimum wage?No, the only statement was that without the presence of a union or other balancing factor, the employer has no reason to pay the employee more than the bare minimum he can get away with paying out.
You have given no reason for anyone to believe these “arguments” you’ve given are plausible in the least! “Mismanagement can't occur if you change the rules such that it can't occur,” great! I can really see how that would be something that works. Now, the most important question, how? How are you going to change these rules? "Restructure such that they have incentive." Again, how? You’ve given some things that can make politicians have more accountability than they have now (adding transparency, which steps are actually being taken to have that occur now), however you’ve given no reasons for how government restructuring will have incentives to spend money wisely or effectively and what this restructuring will be.As for the latter point, I refer you to the arguments I have made about incentives for the government to spend money wisely, the points which you simply have not read or cared about, as they did not fit within your own very limited world views.
Did Mr. Palast do that study himself? If not, where did those numbers come from? Furthermore, they’re down 0.6% over what period of time? The quarter? The year? The decade? The century? Where is the context?Straight from Greg Palast, "Today America is regressing. Middle-class income has stopped growing. The net worth of those who earn less than $150,000 per year (which includes everybody from the working poor to the highest end of the most well-off of the middle class) is down by 0.6 percent."
Isn’t it a premise of “the carrot” that one is satisfied once one reaches it? If someone reaches “the carrot” and they aren’t satisfied, then isn’t “the carrot” really some other level? As far as I see it, “the carrot” means many different things. If it means “being able to afford to never work a single day more in their lives,” then someone will stop working once they reach this level. Obviously, if you don’t define your “carrot” as this, you will continue working until you reach that goal. Maybe to some people “the carrot” is simply giving their family a better standard than the generation before it. Maybe to some “the carrot” is getting your kids through college. Maybe to some “the carrot” is to be able to afford to do what you love. “The carrot,” as far as I see it, means different things to different people. What do you define “the carrot” as? The top 20% of income earners? The top 1%? Someone better tell my professors and my priest that they need to stop doing what they love and start earning more if they’re going to be satisfied with their lives!A good number of them work because they aren't satisfied with the carrot.
Anyone can achieve the maximum amount of happiness from their limited resources. People, of course, have unlimited wants. Just because you maximize the happiness possible from the limited resources you have, does not mean you cannot become more happy. As we all know, people have unlimited wants; we can always do something to gain more utility (to become more happy). However, we can always maximize our utility by becoming as happy as possible with the resources we have available.You You argue that "anyone" can maximize their utility, but ignore than not everyone can, nor do some people ever have a hope of it.
I would still want more utility, not necessarily more wealth. Again utility is happiness, and money cannot always buy you happiness. No matter how happy you are, you can always become more happy.Basically, even if you had, say, fifty billion dollars in wealth in stocks and whatnot, another few hundred million in material wealth including land, and not a single worry for the rest of your days, you'd still want more.
What’s the word I’m searching for here…I assure you though, that at least one person on earth does not have "unlimited" wants.
Exactly! People can handle leading themselves full well.Basically, you want a government that does not lead the people. Again, you simply want a government that does not lead the people.
Governments will protect our lives and our property, while maintaining markets. Markets will provide for the rest. They do so more efficiently and effectively than any other mechanism.You want private enterprise to take over every other aspect?
Plutocracy is a form of government, anarcho-capitalism is not. Again, you do not fully understand what you’re talking about. Furthermore, you’re misdefining me as an anarcho-capitalist despite my correcting you. Please do not do this again.Your precious anarcho-capitalism would degenerate into plutocracy.
How so? That is what the US government was when it was initially set up. Society managed to do quite well here in America.Furthermore, private enterprise cannot replace what the government does. Reducing the government to nothing more than a military and correction for "market failures" effectively kills society.
The primary difference is that working for a company is an agreement between you can the company. You don’t have to work there, they don’t have to employ you; you do so because both parties want to. However, if I am to live in the property I, not the government, owns, I must pay them. I must pay them for services many of which I do not receive. I must do this just to keep the things I already own or even more of my property will be taken from me. This is not a trade. I am not receiving anything that I voluntarily exchange for. The exchange I already made for the government’s services was with my exchange for my liberty for the protection the government offers.You do not have to agree to being fired from your job. Thus, the company can force you to do something against your will, in this case they can force you to cease working. Your entire argument, that the government can force people against their will and companies can't, is nothing more than a load of crap.
I am of the opinion that if your actions do not result in inducing force against someone else’s lives and property, that you should be allowed to do it. In other words, as long as you are responsible for the consequences of your actions, you should be allowed to do it. If you’re driving your car that fast through the city, you have a very high likelihood of hurting or killing someone, or at least causing some damage to their property. As a result this behavior is restricted.Provide for me an argument why, then, marijuana shouldn't be legally sold. Or cocaine, or heroin, or basically any illegal drug. Personal responsibility and all that, thus they are increasing their utility by buying it!
You cannot drive a hundred kilometers an hour in the middle of a city. The law is telling us what to do with our own lives and property!
No, our government, despite having far more income, has far more debt. Looks like when government gets a taste for spending, no amount is good enough. Who spends more lavishly: the man with $10 or the man with $1000?Are you trying to tell me conditions are the same in 1913 and 2006?
It wasn’t always that way. Unfortunately, our government got off the gold standard and introduced fiat money. The money does not have value, however, because the government says it does. The money has value because the market says it does. It doesn’t matter much what the government says, if merchants stop accepting US dollars for payments, the dollar isn’t worth anything. The government has no rule that you must accept US currency for payments.They printed it, they distribute it, but they still control it. Money is nothing more than some kind of paper and cheap metal coins; money has no intrinsic value. It has value because the government says it does, and because people accept it. Their control, their money. They're simply allowing you to use it.
Wow, you really talk a lot about “the basis of capitalism.” Tell me, since you keep on adding more and more premises and fundamental ideals of capitalism in your posts, do you mind giving us all a list of what capitalism stands for?You left out that businesses also convince people to want things they don't need, solely for their own profit. It can do this in a number of ways, from imposing an image onto their product (e.g. diamonds), making their product habit-forming (e.g. alcohol), simple inundation (e.g. the ads that seem to run every commercial break on TV), or any number of tactics. People want it because the businesses tell them they want it. This is a basis of capitalism.
Advertisement is generally a good thing. It provides a consumer with information about what goods and services they can consumer with their limited resources, ie, what types of products are available in the marketplace. It would be a bad thing if someone would be more happy if they could consume good A over good B, but didn’t because they didn’t know about good A.Society doesn't "want" things until they're convinced they want them, more often than not. Remove advertisement from businesses and you'd remove a good deal of income.
As long as people know the risks of what they’re doing, and their actions don’t enact force upon other’s lives or property, there is no reason government should intervene with paternalistic policies as to how other’s should live their lives.Or hurts you in the long run, e.g. tobacco or fast food. In the case of the latter, people simply want cheap food they don't have to do work to make, regardless of the health. They're paying a secondary cost, with their health, for the sake of convenience. They're doing this because they think it will aid their utility to do so. However, health and utility cannot be excluded from one another, and such "standard of living" costs are paid in capitalism. Those that can exploit this make money off of those being exploited.
As long as the exchange is voluntary, people can take responsibility for their own actions. Caveat Emptor.There are no checks to prevent taking advantage of others, because taking advantage of others helps one's own utility greatly as long as it is done skilfully. Capitalism is merely the art of exploiting others by giving them wants they wouldn't otherwise have, or preying upon human nature without regard to their detriment for one's own benefit.
Why would you do something that doesn’t provide you with a benefit? I don’t understand: if I’m not going to be benefited by doing something, I simply don’t do it. Shouldn’t someone tell these people that they should stop going to work because they receive no benefit from doing so?I didn't say it made them worse off; I merely said it does not benefit them. Desperation motivates these people to work, regardless of conditions or pay. They receive no benefit.
I did not say that the income of those who lost their jobs is greater because they lost their jobs. What I said was everyone in society effectively has more money than they otherwise would have, because they can buy the goods they would normally buy at grocery stores for a cheaper price.How do you have more money when you're out of a job?
When a Wal-Mart enters a new market and drives a smaller grocery store out of business, you say there is a loss of jobs. What you’re forgetting is that there are jobs created by all of the people who are now working at Wal-Mart. In fact, Wal-Mart is the largest employer of any company in America, by far. You, again, are looking in the micro. You see only that someone came in and now these guys are out of jobs. You’re forgetting the big picture: there is now a large employer that can give far more robust career opportunities to people in the community (how many mom and pop groceries have a human resources department?). Also, everyone in the community can now buy their goods at a lower price. Basically, you seem to be of the opinion that companies should be free from competition. That companies shouldn’t have to worry about someone else selling the same thing for a better price and putting them out of business. Do you really think competition is bad?More jobs were lost than created, thus unemployment was raised, thus there was less money to be spent because fewer people were earning it.
"Would have quite a lot of stock" in what company? In any company? In a company who’s policies would be affected by your voting? What about a foreign company, could you own stock in any foreign companies? What if you agree not to buy or sell your shares while you’re in office?The way politics seems to work nowadays, a politician would have quite a lot of stock indeed in the company. This is a form of corruption and should be prevented.
The line is drawn when decisions would be affected in any way by a certain business. It's one thing to correct a market failure, it's another to have one or a few companies' interests in mind when making decisions.
Not all companies do that. Many do have regard for location and practice proper procedure. Still, they are polluting. Is pollution then alright if you have regard for location and procedure?Simply dumping off refuse with little regard for location, or practicing improper procedure simply as a way of saving money, is certainly a way of cutting costs.
I never said it did solve these problems, however it is quite naïve to say that we aren’t far better off in terms of living conditions than we were even just eighty years ago. When in history have there been such compelling increases in living standards as there has been today?America has not solved the poverty problem, as poverty still exists in America. America has not solved the pollution problem, as Americans generate vast amounts of pollution, far more than other countries.
I pay my liberty in exchange for protection over my life and property.So, if I read you right... you're paying your liberty and property protection for the "protection [you] receive"?
As long as the members have the same earnings potential, they have the same ability to pay back their debts.If I earn, say, $5 over a portion of time, and I owe someone $10, that's the same ratio as someone who earns $5,000,000 over a potion of time, and owes $10,000,000, but who is in a worse state of debt if you actually stop to think about it?
How exactly are you guys defining sweatshop labor? Is it based on hours worked? Is it based on price paid? Is that price paid based in US purchasing power, or purchasing power in the native country? “Sweatshop” labor can mean a lot of different things, just as what some people view as a human rights violation is different than what others would. Marril has already had a debate about what is and is not morally corrupt in this post; as you can see when it comes to personal value standards, things vary widely from person to person and culture to culture.Though this is a point Zak answered well, I should point out that sweatshop labour is illegal in America as a human rights violation, and as such overseas sweatshop labour should be seen as the same.
Utility in the context of an economics problem is happiness derived from consumption. However, this thread is not an economics problem. I am not making a trade. I am, however, performing an action with consequences. Therefore, in this situation my utility is in terms of happiness derived as a consequence of my actions.What commodities are you consuming in this thread? What gains are you having? You're simply arguing for no point other than to fluff your own ego... that doesn't seem like consumption to me! Perhaps you shouldn't be using the word "utility."
Why not just cut both!Cut war before social programs, I'd say, but then again, "war is good for business."
So if you don’t get what you want, you’re “screwed?” Are there other ways to get screwed? Also, in order to be “screwed” does someone else always have to benefit? “Screwed” sounds to be like a sour grapes euphemism for someone who doesn’t get things to go their way.If someone's hours are increased with no overtime pay, he is being screwed. If someone's union is broken and a forced collective agreement passed, the workforce has just been screwed. If someone's benefits are cut back, he has just been screwed. None of those involve taking wealth from another, but they create wealth for someone else all the same, and the person being screwed is probably worse off for it.
Because they, on average, produce more wealth.Why should someone with one skillset earn more than someone else with a comparable skillset, assuming they work just as hard as each other and produce comparable wealth?
Than they “deserve?” The marketplace is the ultimate determiner for what someone “deserves.” The market price for someone’s labor is the sum total of every single person’s opinions about what someone should make. It is the sum opinion of every employer and every employee about what someone of that productivity for that company should make.Why should skilled employees be paid less than the deserve?
You have dodged this question over and over again: if employers have no reason to pay someone more than the minimum, why doesn’t everyone who works for a nonunion employer make the minimum wage?If it was, why would employers wish to keep employees at the minimum possible wages and benefits? Because these things cost money. Money does not come from nowhere, and paying benefits to your employees costs money. Why not save money for yourself, then? This is another tenant of capitalism.
In that story Robin Hood is a hero of the people. The Sheriff of Nottingham levied massive taxes and appropriated land. He took the property of the people of Hottinghamshire, and Robin Hood fought against this. He did not steal from the Sheriff, because what the Sheriff appropriated was not rightfully his property. Robin Hood fought to only reclaim the property that was rightfully the people’s and to stop the Sheriff from claiming more. Kinda sounds like me! (Except I look good in tights!)I remember a debate which must be about a year or two old by now, that even Robin Hood would be condemned even though he is regarded as a hero for children.
While I don’t see how working more means that you get less (Would the inverse be true then? Would I get more if I worked less? Somehow that doesn’t add up…) , there comes a point where working harder must be replaced with working smarter. Again, I brought up the shovel vs. backhoe example in my previous thread. The person digging a hole with a shovel will work all day to dig what the person with the backhoe does in a few minutes. You cannot simply work your tail off and expect compensation. This does not mean, however, that hard work isn’t a direct causation of higher earnings. Working hard does earn you more than not working hard, but this alone isn’t enough. One needs to improve their skills and education as well as other facets. These, combined with hard work (and it takes hard work to become educated and more skilled as well), have a very positive impact on one’s productivity. More productivity allows you to produce more for a company, which is a direct component of what you are compensated. Hard work has a high correlation to higher compensation, but it does not always have a causational relationship with higher compensation. However, if one could choose to either work hard or not, on average, the one that works hard would overwhelmingly earn more than the one that does not. Make no mistakes about that.I don't know about you, but as one of the points I posted that you didn't even respond to, which then I guess means you agree with, pointed out, "The more you work, the less you get. It used to be that as the economic pie got bigger, everyone’s slice got bigger too. No more."
The market determines what you should be compensated, and just because you feel that you are not paid enough does not mean that theft took place. The only time a “theft” takes place in labor compensation is where markets are not allowed to function freely and efficiently. A union is an example of this situation.I'd call not paying someone for more work as "theft" of what they truly earned. Thus capitalism promotes its own version of thievery.
Thievery is, after all, apparently always wrong, no matter is form or circumstance, and as such capitalists are thieves who convince themselves that they are not.
Why do I honestly think there are poor people in this world? I think it is because nobody tells them how to not be poor. In school, what do they teach you? Mathematics, reading, sciences, social studies; lots of great things to know about this world. However, who teaches children about finances, savings, accounting, etc? All that is taught at the dinner table. Rich parents teach their kids what they learned to become rich. Poor parents teach their children generally nothing about finances, because they don’t know much. I feel that if we really made a push in our schools to teach personal finance, we’d have people really knowing what to do with their money. They’d learn the power of compound interest and see the benefits of savings. It would open up many new doors.In your world, all poor people are poor because they choose to be, I assume.
Who are you to assert that you should be able to exert an act of force on someone’s property? Do they have the right to perform an act of force on yours? It is theft, plain and simple. You keep on trying to justify stealing someone’s property. All the rationalization in the world can’t deny the fact that you are condoning theft.And then there is penalizing people for greed and material gluttony.
The analogy isn’t exact; in those situations only one team or player can win. In life, winning is more ambiguous, and clearly isn’t limited to just one person. You can think of it as a marathon (and exclude the few people who are actually trying to win it to avoid the false analogy that there can be only one winner). For most people, you’re just trying to finish. Some people are lighter than others. Some people are better conditioned. Some people are even in wheel-chairs. In the end though, one person having an advantage doesn’t decrease your ability to finish the race. The only person who can determine whether or not you finish is you. Just because there is a Kenyan guy in the race who runs 50kms every day since he was 12 does not mean you can’t finish the race.From the sports analogy, it is a case of a high school team versus the pros. From the Pokémon analogy, it is the case of a Worlds winner versus a random scrub. The upper class has options, tools, and opportunities ("better players" or "better cards") than the lower class, which lacks these things.
Again, this is a myth. There is significant economic mobility. A very small percentage of Americans are below the poverty line for more than ten years. This also does not include in-kind transfers in determining who is and is not below the poverty line. There are many opportunities to receive assistance from nonprofit organizations. There are many opportunities to further educate oneself and develop skills necessary to reach higher levels of earning power. I don’t see how you could simply be inescapably impoverished.Maybe you'd be fine with shrugging off those without the chance to increase their utility
I've met people who could never hope to escape it. For some people, poverty is indeed inescapable.
A very significant number of immigrants do not work wage-based jobs, however. Many own and operate their own businesses; restaurants, convenience stores, gas stations, newsstands, mall islands, are frequently owned and operated by immigrant entrepreneurs. They come here because they know that America has great opportunity for business success.Because they know they can undercut American workers. Their living standards increase, at the cost of taking away the opportunity for an American's living standards to do the same.
What is the cause of Canada’s debt, which is at a higher percentage of GDP than America? Do Canada’s social programs not cause debt. I find it very hard to believe that any government can fund social programs in the long term without incurring massive debt.Simply because America's social programs create debt does not mean that all social programs create debt.
Defense spending was 16.7% of the total US federal budget for 2007. The four major social programs (Social security, unemployment and welfare, Medicaid and Medicare) constituted 58% of the total budget. There are ways, yes, to reduce spending. However, none of them are as compelling and effective as cutting out social programs.War can be reduced, the military can be cut back. There are many ways to reduce spending without cutting back social programs.
I have never used it as an excuse and I have never claimed to want to keep anyone poor. What I have stated is that you can use comparison of living standards to see that capitalism is working in America. Our poor live better than the poor nearly anywhere else in the world. Things are only getting better. Capitalism is fueling the growth in GDP which directly correlates with increases in living standards for all members of the economy. It isn’t saying that the problem is solved, it is saying that things are getting better. That living standards are increasing. That you can see where we’ve come from, and where people still are, and use that to gauge the progress that has been made.It also serves as an excuse to keep them poor, as they're better off than other poor people in the world. This is a completely appalling thing to do, to simply write them off like that.
Obviously just because you’re on welfare does not mean you are permanently trapped in poverty. However, what it does do is limit your opportunities for other forms of income due to the disincentives it creates from high marginal tax rates. You have to find an income stream that pays you enough over what you’re making now to make up for the high marginal tax rates. This means that there are situations where you will have to pass up some other forms of income because the tax rates will be so high. It can mean people staying in poverty longer than they otherwise would have.If you can find a job that pays more than welfare, I'd say the taxes on welfare are enough to mean that you'd take that job. Rather, the taxes are to prevent people from doing things like collecting cans (or whatever) for more money than they otherwise get. If you let them keep extra money, they have no incentive to get off welfare.
Government taxes noncash transactions. It even taxes transactions involving other country’s currency. Regardless, the whole premise that “it is government’s tender so it can take it back if it wants” is ridiculous! That is like saying a farmer can just come into your house and take a slice of bread, because they were the ones that grew your wheat. Just because the government printed money does not make all money the government’s property. The property is yours; you earned it with your labor or through trading your property for it. The government has no claim over it. Taking your money through forced taxation is theft.This does not mean taxes are stealing, as the government is the one that is in charge of the actual legal tender.
And I’m sure that’s your opinion and that is why you haven’t immigrated anywhere else!That is merely your opinion, and yet you state it like a fact. I shall do the same as you: "You are wrong; Canada is the best country on earth."
How can you simply have “no skills?” Even paraplegics and people with mental handicaps are employed. I don’t see how you can simply have no skills unless you’re in a coma or something.This is the exact issue! Why hire some people for any price when they have no skills? They'd be a drain no matter what job they take, and so they shouldn't be working! Anyone could do their job better!
Oh its relatively easy to prove if someone is an illegal immigrant. You simply ask them for a piece of ID like their social security card and it is pretty easy to spot. Simply put, they’re called illegal immigrants for a reason. Do not let employers hire them and the problem is solved. If you can’t get work as an illegal immigrant, you eventually have to leave the country.Force employers to pay equal wages to everyone, such that even if they are paying illegal immigrants but it cannot be proven somehow, there is no incentive to do so anyways.
They wouldn’t, and that’s the point. The bonds having the high rating that they do means that basically nobody in the world thinks America is going bankrupt any time soon. And if they do, they’re not willing to put their money where their mouth is. US Treasury bonds are the safest investments of any maturity level. They are safer than any corporation and any other government. They are this way because investors around the world view them to be in consensus. If the US went bankrupt, they would not be able to pay for these bonds. Thus, the high rating of the bonds is evidence that nobody can find a reason why the US Treasury will go bankrupt anytime soon, and that even if there is reason, it is still less likely to go bankrupt than any other bond issuing entity.Explain in clearer terms how the country itself can (to use an imprecise simplifcation) go bankrupt, and yet its bonds would ensure its economic survival even after its money becomes worthless.
It isn’t entirely analogous, but to a point it is possible to change countries if you are dissatisfied enough with your current country. Obviously the market for labor has greater liquidity than the market for citizenship.Ah, so in other words, at any given point, he could simply walk up into Canada and get a job here with full citizenship, at no cost to himself outside of the physical moving, just fine and dandy?
As I stated above, welfare does not mean that people earning it are unable to have economic mobility, merely that there are disincentives that limit their mobility from what they would have otherwise if not earning welfare. It even works with unemployment. If I am earning unemployment and getting $x per month, and I can get a job that pays $x-200 per month, it is not in my best interests to take that job as I have to give up $200/month to do so. This is what I mean by high marginal tax rate. Now that person earning the unemployment will not be prevented from getting another job, they just have to wait for one that pays them enough to make it worth losing their unemployment check for. The same is with welfare. In both situations, it is not impossible to escape the trap of high marginal tax rates, but it makes escaping it more difficult.Oh, and another contradiction I am ashamed at only now noticing. Moss has provided sources which he uses to assert now and then that there is great economic mobility in the US. Moss also claims that welfare programs discourage people from improving their economic standing. These welfare programs definitely exist in the US. Therefore, the poor should largely remain poor.
I saved this one for last. As I recall in our last debate, I posed a set of questions to you and practically begged you to answer them over the course of a few posts. You claimed this was an ultimatum and that debates don’t involve ultimatums as a way of hiding the fact that you simply could not answer the questions. That’s fair, I shouldn’t have presented it in the way I did, however I was frustrated that you simply refused to answer a question so fundamental to the debate we were having. So this time I’ll make it a little more professional, by setting up a trade (this is a post that deals with markets, so I find this fitting).Careful, Moss, or I'll rack up all the points you've simply swept under the rug and point out to you that you've "conceded" far more than I.
The main point is utility is a measure of happiness regardless of what field you’re studying. It need not necessarily be as the result of consumption. It simply is a measure of happiness.
Individuals determine whether the cost of something is worth the benefit of it, not you Marril.
Can you please provide a source for the 1.2% figure? Earlier you said “the figure "1.2%" is in my head, but I forget who I know had this figure,” so I’m worried as to its validity. Please no blogs, thanks!
Never have, and I’ve consistently made more per hour than most of my peers, have received regular pay increases, I have full benefits and a 401k, and have never been fired. Just me personally, I’m sure you’ve worked for plenty of unions, though.
Good to know! Do you have any more figures to pull right out of you-know-where for us?
There is plenty of incentive to pay an employee proportional to what they produce.
“An ad hominem argument, also known as argumentum ad hominem (Latin, literally "argument against the person") involves replying to an argument or assertion by attacking the person presenting the argument or assertion rather than the argument itself. It is a logical fallacy.” (see Wikipedia).
The “75%” figure hasn’t even been proven incorrect!
As an example, if you’re robbing someone at gunpoint you don’t have to tell them that if they don’t give up their wallet you’re going to shoot them; that is what robbers with guns do, they shoot people. As a result, a statistic saying “99% of armed robberies are resolved without even the threat of personal injury” would be similarly ineffective.
That efficient free markets with limited government intrusion are the surest and best paths to promoting prosperity and higher standards of living for all members of society in the long run.
If a company starts firing people as they reach retirement age to annul a pension, think of what that will do to every other member of said company.
People do it all the time! I’ve actually received two raises doing exactly that.
You don’t need to be a financial wizard to determine how much the value you add to a company is worth
Again, if this were the case, then why do nonunion companies pay more than the minimum wage?
You have given no reason that I am willing to quote for anyone to believe these “arguments” you’ve given are plausible in the least! “Mismanagement can't occur if you change the rules such that it can't occur,” great! I can really see how that would be something that works.
Did Mr. Palast do that study himself? If not, where did those numbers come from? Furthermore, they’re down 0.6% over what period of time? The quarter? The year? The decade? The century? Where is the context?
Isn’t it a premise of “the carrot” that one is satisfied once one reaches it?
Someone better tell my professors and my priest that they need to stop doing what they love and start earning more if they’re going to be satisfied with their lives!
Anyone can achieve the maximum amount of happiness from their limited resources.
No matter how happy you are, you can always become more happy.
Exactly! People can handle leading themselves full well.
Governments will protect our lives and our property, while maintaining markets. Markets will provide for the rest. They do so more efficiently and effectively than any other mechanism.
Plutocracy is a form of government, anarcho-capitalism is not.
Furthermore, you’re misdefining me as an anarcho-capitalist despite my correcting you. Please do not do this again.
How so? That is what the US government was when it was initially set up. Society managed to do quite well here in America.
This is a fundamental difference in your analogy, and is the reason why it is false.
I started to touch on it last post, and that is when it got locked so I don’t want to change the subject enough to where this one gets locked as well.
However, I don’t feel that I have to be. This isn’t a post about the legalization of drugs.
Who spends more lavishly: the man with $10 or the man with $1000?
We our not paying the government taxes solely because we use their money.
Tell me, since you keep on adding more and more premises and fundamental ideals of capitalism in your posts, do you mind giving us all a list of what capitalism stands for?
There is more to life, however, than just living. Everyone works to maximize their utility, not just to live.
Free markets find wants people have and provide them with the goods to satisfy these wants.
Thus, advertising reduced the average prices by more than 20%. This is simply one example of how advertising fosters competition.
As long as people know the risks of what they’re doing
As long as the exchange is voluntary, people can take responsibility for their own actions. Caveat Emptor.
Why would you do something that doesn’t provide you with a benefit?
Shouldn’t someone tell these people that they should stop going to work because they receive no benefit from doing so?
I did not say that the income of those who lost their jobs is greater because they lost their jobs. What I said was everyone in society effectively has more money than they otherwise would have, because they can buy the goods they would normally buy at grocery stores for a cheaper price.
What you’re forgetting is that there are jobs created by all of the people who are now working at Wal-Mart.
how many mom and pop groceries have a human resources department?).
Do you really think competition is bad?
Is it even possible to fully eliminate a politician from benefiting economically from companies?
Is pollution then alright if you have regard for location and procedure?
I never said it did solve these problems, however it is quite naïve to say that we aren’t far better off in terms of living conditions than we were even just eighty years ago. When in history have there been such compelling increases in living standards as there has been today?
I pay my liberty in exchange for protection over my life and property.
All of these countries are having their debt load balloon
Marril has already had a debate about what is and is not morally corrupt in this post; as you can see when it comes to personal value standards, things vary widely from person to person and culture to culture.
I am, however, performing an action with consequences. Therefore, in this situation my utility is in terms of happiness derived as a consequence of my actions.
Why not just cut both!
“Screwed” sounds to be like a sour grapes euphemism for someone who doesn’t get things to go their way.
Because they, on average, produce more wealth.
The market price for someone’s labor is the sum total of every single person’s opinions about what someone should make. It is the sum opinion of every employer and every employee about what someone of that productivity for that company should make.
You have dodged this question over and over again: if employers have no reason to pay someone more than the minimum, why doesn’t everyone who works for a nonunion employer make the minimum wage?
He did not steal from the Sheriff, because what the Sheriff appropriated was not rightfully his property.
(Except I look good in tights!)
there comes a point where working harder must be replaced with working smarter
However, if one could choose to either work hard or not, on average, the one that works hard would overwhelmingly earn more than the one that does not. Make no mistakes about that.
just because you feel that you are not paid enough does not mean that theft took place.
The only time a “theft” takes place in labor compensation is where markets are not allowed to function freely and efficiently. A union is an example of this situation.
Poor parents teach their children generally nothing about finances, because they don’t know much.
I feel that if we really made a push in our schools to teach personal finance
I excelled in sciences and went into a pre-med curriculum to become a doctor. I was well on my way when I got introduced to the business world by a good friend of mine. I added a finance minor to get my feet wet, and the next semester I was so enamored with it that I made it my major.
You keep on trying to justify stealing someone’s property. All the rationalization in the world can’t deny the fact that you are condoning theft.
The analogy isn’t exact; in those situations only one team or player can win.
Again, this is a myth.
They come here because they know that America has great opportunity for business success.
What is the cause of Canada’s debt, which is at a higher percentage of GDP than America? Do Canada’s social programs not cause debt. I find it very hard to believe that any government can fund social programs in the long term without incurring massive debt.
What I have stated is that you can use comparison of living standards to see that capitalism is working in America.
You have to find an income stream that pays you enough over what you’re making now to make up for the high marginal tax rates.
Just because the government printed money does not make all money the government’s property.
And I’m sure that’s your opinion and that is why you haven’t immigrated anywhere else!
How can you simply have “no skills?” Even paraplegics and people with mental handicaps are employed. I don’t see how you can simply have no skills unless you’re in a coma or something.
Do not let employers hire them and the problem is solved.
The bonds having the high rating that they do means that basically nobody in the world thinks America is going bankrupt any time soon.
You claimed this was an ultimatum
That’s fair, I shouldn’t have presented it in the way I did, however I was frustrated that you simply refused to answer a question so fundamental to the debate we were having.
Deal, or no deal?
You can't buy a product you can't afford. It's sort of the opposite of how welfaresque programs work... they benefit the poorer end of society, while corps are more for the richer end. Sometimes that "richer end" extends all the way to and even into the "poorer end," though. There are varying cases.There is a fundamental difference between these two. If I want to take advantage of any of these social programs, I can’t, because they won’t let me (I don’t qualify for any). However, businesses don’t pick and choose who can buy their products. Anyone who is willing to pay what they’re charging can buy their products. The government won’t let me “buy into” all of theirs.
Then I guess my argument is that it's too easy to live a fine life just by being born into it, by being lucky.Some people get lucky. I don’t think I need to go over this again. What is your proposed solution to some getting lucky and others unlucky? Try your best and eliminate luck? Is it even possible to do this? What conclusions are you trying to make here?
So capitalism works until the market fails, an action the system is both powerless to prevent and powerless to remedy. Sounds like the ideas need a bit of work, then, no?I’m sorry, I phrased that poorly. Read as “Buyers and sellers can effectively regulate markets that do not have market failures.”
Government officials aren't arbitrarily handed authority over the society they create laws over. They're elected by the people, meaning that in general, their moral views that could be made law would align with those of most voters. so when the laws are made, most people should agree with them.However, somehow government officials are exempt from this criticism?
Actually, I believe you should do that. You're arguing with a fairly vague notion, so you could just pull a point you've never mentioned before and say, "Yeah, that's part of what I've been defending the whole time." In other words, state your position, please. Specifically.Wow, you really talk a lot about “the basis of capitalism.” Tell me, since you keep on adding more and more premises and fundamental ideals of capitalism in your posts, do you mind giving us all a list of what capitalism stands for?
I didn't know that those companies used sweatshop labor. I knew some did, I didn't know which specifically. Did you? Ask some people you know, while I try to dig up some numbers. And do remember that this is information the corps would be wise to try and keep from the public. Rich, rich corps.I don’t think there are many illusions as to how some goods are produced. Usually it is widely publicized when a company uses potentially questionable business practices to produce its goods. You have to then assert if people know about these things and still buy them, then it must mean that they do not view it has a human rights violation after-all.
Fine, I see what you mean, although logging has probably outstripped possible regrowth for a long time now. And, more to the point, you're still just picking on the example and not the issue. To help you once again, the representative example: greenhouse gas emissions.Give me a break, it’s not a sapling for long. Are you telling me that we cannot perform any logging whatsoever because newly planted trees are not a good as a mature one for a relatively short period of time? You could have used nearly any other example: a river, a large lake, something, anything that doesn’t literally grow back. Trees are the perfect example of a renewable natural resource.
I thought it was fairly clear "sweatshop labor" was just used as a shorter version of "low wages, long hours, poor conditions, child labor." Sweatshops imply most of those classically, and in modern usage the word has pretty much taken on that very meaning.How exactly are you guys defining sweatshop labor? Is it based on hours worked? Is it based on price paid? Is that price paid based in US purchasing power, or purchasing power in the native country? “Sweatshop” labor can mean a lot of different things, just as what some people view as a human rights violation is different than what others would.
Not true. There is something called the time value of money. Basically, money is worth more now than it is later. If you have money now, you have greater liquidity. You can invest it. You can spend it! Money is much better in your pocket than anywhere else. If I am to loan it or give it to someone, I need compensation. This compensation is what interest is. So actually, it is not always worth it to pay union dues if they prevent me from having >$50 in benefits cut back for a variety of reasons. For example, I'm a healthy young man. If the union is taking $50 in dues to save me $51 in health benefits, frankly I'd rather have the $50 cash. Why? I'm not likely to receive these benefits any time soon, but I can spend the cash right away. Furthermore, the same can be said for most non-cash increases in benefits; if I am not necessarily taking advantage of them, I am better off having the cash that I can spend on things to improve my situation.Let's say you pay a dollar to the union for, oh, fifty paychecks. That's fifty dollars spent. Now, if the company wants to cut back benefits worth more than fifty dollars, and the union prevents it, then yes, it is by the simple numbers worth it.
So my asking a friend is not ok, but your asking a friend is? How about you site a real source so we can squash this issue?I actually managed to find out where I got that figure after I initially posted it. It's the union due for someone I know (it was simply a matter of asking her what it is).
If you really think you haven't been abusive, Marril, then you are simply in denial.I may have performed a circumstantial ad hominem, but I refrain from downright abusive ad hominem,
I actually disagree with you on that one...Neither have flying saucers, but you don't see anyone rushing to their defense either.
Here we go!"That efficient free markets with limited government intrusion are the surest and best paths to promoting prosperity and higher standards of living for all members of society in the long run."
Why?
People are much smarter than you give them credit for, and much more paranoid. People in a company generally know those who have been with it for many years better than ones that have not. When they see the obvious correlation of employees getting fired when they are close to their pensions, it will be quite obvious what the company is up to.If that's the stated reason, certainly it would affect them negatively... but as long as you fire them for other, "unrelated" reasons, you're more or less in the clear.
Am I an outlier? I find it very hard to believe, but if you can provide a source that says the majority of people who request a raise are turned down, I'll concede the point.Outlier, norm, etc.
How much did you add to the company you last worked at on average per day? Without even looking at your paycheck or your salary, gauge it for me, to an uncertainty of, say, fifty cents.I added approximately $8.75 in value per hour to my company. In competitor businesses to mine, as well as all people hired into my company were making wages similar to mine. The company was making slightly more in value than it was paying me, and due to the high demand for the particular position I was in among various companies, I estimated that the company was not making much more than it was paying me. I can be confident of this because if they were underpaying me, competitors would be paying more as they would have incentives to pay more productive employees better to "gobble up" all the most productive employees. Due to the fact that competitors were offering similar wages, I know that, without looking at any financial statements, I'm getting fair wages.
Again, you don't have to be a financial wizard to compare yourself to the competition.This comes into play when you consider that some people aren't "financial wizards" and are willing to be paid less than they add to the company (sometimes because the company misleads them on that figure). Unions protect that.
That would work just fine, if there wasn't competition. Not only can you compare your wages to what competitors are paying, but you can actually get those wages by jumping ship over to another business in the industry. This competition between businesses for good labor drives the margins they make off labor to as small as possible. If an employee of a specific productivity is getting paid less than their worth, you can hire them in at higher wages and still make a profit on them. This competition leads to fair wages.I'll implement numbers into this. Say someone adds, oh, ten dollars to the company per hour through their work. They don't know this exact figure, but the company pays them, say, five dollars an hour. A union would be the people saying, "Hey, wait a minute, this guy's getting underpaid."
As I have explained over and over again, one's infinite wants are for more utility. One can derive happiness from things other than monetary gain.Whatever happened to these "infinite wants"?
How can you simply not have "any hope of ever" increasing your resources. I could literally walk the street for five minutes and find enough change or pop bottles to increase my resources even a little. If you're going to criticize me for speaking in absolutes, make sure the pot isn't calling the kettle black.So now it's a game of managing peoples' resources. Or rather, some people cannot increase their resources, nor do they have any hope of ever doing so, thus their maximum utility is far less than others'.
Inequality isn't necessarily a good or a bad thing. It isn't something we need to promote or deter."Inequality is good," you say, but tell that to the people without the resources to achieve this greater utility of yours.
How can you reach a level where nothing you could do would make you happier?Biologically impossible, Moss.
The employer is hired by the owners of the company to make the owners of the company money. Thus it is in the employer's best interest, if they want to keep their job long that is, to pay people fair wages, and not allow a union cut into profits enough to, in some situations, make the company insolvent. So why do employers want to block union formations? Because it is in their best interest! (Of course.)The problem is that they handle themselves so well, they start to handle others as well. Why should an employer not trust that people can lead themselves, and allow a union to form? Why combat this?
The market will keep itself afloat just fine, however, it can be made better (or more accurately, more efficient) by correcting failures. A market will still work if you can only buy your products from one seller, however it will be inefficient and have deadweight loss. A market will still work if externalities are not fully internalized into the costs of production, it just won't supply the socially optimal amount of that good.You want a market that can't even keep itself afloat without the government to correct its failures. You want a system that doesn't take responsibility for its own mistakes.
However, have no illusions that market failures are "mistakes." The markets, if working correctly, adjust automatically to changing conditions. The government is simply necessary to make sure the markets are working correctly, if they are, mistakes in mispricings are corrected quickly and automatically. No pricing system is as dynamic and efficient as a marketplace.
I think you misunderstand the difference between favoring free markets and favoring business. Businesses today will do a wide array of things to skew markets in their favor, lobby for government restrictions on competition and for handouts, and other rules bendings and even breakings to get ahead. Favoring free markets is not necessarily favoring what the businesses want. Businesses don't necessarily want free markets, they just want profit. They'd be more than happy to have the rules bent in their favor. That is why we need a government to make sure that markets are working efficiently. The problems arise when government is used to make rules to inhibit the free market and favor some business over others. This is where plutocracies occur; when the government makes rules restricting economic growth and competition and allows wealth and social mobility to slow down due to government restriction on competition and growth.One is an effect of the other. In other words, a system which starts in anarcho-capitalism may over time descend into plutocracy simply by its own workings.
My arguments have consistently been for the existence of a government. Fundamentally, anarcho-capitalism does not believe in the existence of a state. I understand that you don't fully know much about the terms you use (misdefining utility and capitalist beliefs), therefore I'll correct you again. I think a state is necessary, anarcho-capitalists do not. Therefore, I am not an anarcho-capitalist.I'll class you as your arguments dictate.
I never said this. You stated that a limited government "effectively kills society." I stated that society in America has existed under the terms I described and was not "killed." This is even in spite of the social standards of the day that directed less-than-favorable government policy. Another reason government power should be limited: look at the atrocities it has waged.If you want things to be as they were back then,
The difference is, you own your life and property and still must pay for it. The government forces you to pay for something you already own. You do not own your job. Your job is a mutual agreement between you and the employer; the employer cannot force you to work and you cannot force them to hire you. This is the fundamental difference: the government forces you to pay for things that you, not government, own, while businesses can disallow you to work for them because neither you nor your employer owns your job. It is simply an agreement with terms, and those terms mandate that either party can end the relationship at any time. If you choose to "end your relationship" with government, they put you in jail. I can't take my property and secede from the state or union. It is not an agreement.I read your two paragraphs, read this, then went and reread the previous two paragraphs, unable to find such a difference as to prove what I said wrong. The reason for this is that such a difference was nonexistent.
The question is not pointless. It serves as an excellent example illustrating that the more money you give to government, the more they'll spend. They won't just buy what they need. Government spending is correlated with government income. Just look at the debt since we've started collecting income taxes; one would assume we would have less debt due to their being more of an inflow of funds, however just the opposite has occurred. The more money government gets, the more money government spends.Given only their current sums of money, it is impossible to say. The entire question is pointless. Don't ask pointless questions.
It is not a fact and I did not agree. Please do not misquote me. The money I have is my property. The government, and no one else, owns it. The government was the producer of the money, however I, not the state, have ownership of it much like I, not the wheat farmer that grew it, has ownership over my bread.I merely used the fact that it was their money (a fact to which you agreed!) as a case for pointing out that the government's taxation is not theft.
Please do not misrepresent what I have said. This is twice in a row now that you have done this. I am politely asking you not to do it again. I did not say that welfare offers "no incentive to get out of it." I said that welfare programs create disincentives due to their high marginal tax rates and can serve as a trap to keep people poor longer than they otherwise would have been.On the one hand, you say that welfare offers no incentive to get out of it.
Welfare checks exclude in-kind transfers, which cover the majority of things necessary to live. There are many programs currently offered by a variety of nonprofit organizations that satisfy what people really need "to live" off of, but do so through in-kind transfers and not blind check payments.Welfare, at least in our overly-generous system up here (a point I have to keep hammering in to you; our welfare system trumps yours in generosity), provides nothing more than "just living" (a fact sourced earlier in this thread, including exact numbers). Which is it to be, Moss? If you are "just living," how can you not want to maximize your utility by finding a way to do more than "just live"?
Who are you to say that people buy things that are artificial wants? Just because you see their wants as not necessary or artificial does not mean that they don't provide them with more utility than anything else. That is what is great about free markets; you don't have some command economy saying what people really want and need vs. what they don't really want and need. You have individuals deciding for themselves what they want. Something that you buy (Pokemon cards maybe?) may be seen as very silly to someone else. "Why would you pay so much for some pieces of cardboard?" However, it makes you happy when you play the game and thus what seems as a waste to someone else is seen as a provider of utility to yourself. Free markets are extremely efficient at supplying a vast number of people with a wide array of differing wants with goods to satisfy these wants.My point being that free markets also find wants people don't have, and then supply them with those wants, and in turn supply them with the goods to satisfy these artificial wants.
I like debating (at least when it involves thought-out, sourced arguments and not so much the consistent personal attacks you spice your posts with). It provides me with tremendous utility. I'm convinced that if you actually listened to half my points with an open mind, you would eventually see things correctly. Besides, my friends don't even try to debate me because I consistently dominate them, and you're the only person who keeps coming back for more everytime I knock you down.I dunno, why are you arguing here? What benefit do you gain from this?
Ding ding ding! Even "slightly less unlivable" is a benefit, last time I checked! Again, you're the one who chastised me for speaking in absolutes. "No benefit" means that you gain nothing.Cases vary... it's anything from imagined benefits to simply making unlivable conditions only slightly less unlivable.
I specifically used "everyone" in that context because it was correct. Sure, the people who lost their jobs have less in future revenues however, Wal-Mart still gives them effectively more money of what they currently have. I just got laid off, but I still have to buy groceries. I can spend $35 on them at my old employer, or I can go to Wal-Mart and buy the same things for $30. I have more money currently because of Wal-Mart. Everyone does the moment Wal-Mart opens its doors.There's that word "everyone" again, and Moss is still using it incorrectly! "Everyone" includes the people who have less money than the otherwise would have because they aren't getting paid. Thus, they do not have more money than they otherwise would have.
What types of jobs? Shelf stocking high schoolers or human resources, managerial, etc, jobs that a company like Wal-Mart can afford but smaller grocers cannot? There is a difference between adding one of the former types and one of the later types of jobs. Furthermore, I never claimed that Wal-Mart added more jobs than it eliminated (which it may), I merely pointed out that it did create a lot of new jobs, which you were overlooking.Find me a study saying that Wal-Mart offers as many or more jobs than the companies it drives out of business combined.
In business, what is wrong with that? The consumer gets the better product at the better price."Competition" in this case is not as simple as one company offering goods and services at a better price than another. It is, again, to use the sports analogy, a case of a minor league player up against a pro.
In a word, how?In a word, yes.
Then what is the solution? Do you agree that pollution is a necessary evil? If so, how do we combat it?No, but it is less harmful to nature. It still harms it, of course, which means it is not a perfect solution nor should it be construed as an acceptable solution
No, you didn't. You gave me a quote of someone reading off data. There was no source for this data. I even asked for it: "Did Mr. Palast do that study himself? If not, where did those numbers come from?" Then I asked for clarification as to the context of the numbers. He said, "The net worth of those who earn less than $150,000 per year (which includes everybody from the working poor to the highest end of the most well-off of the middle class) is down by 0.6 percent," but provided no context for the period of time they've been down 0.6%. A drop over a small period of time is less significant than a drop over a longer period of time. You simply wrote of my questions and said it was from the article I "refused to read." Unlike my articles, which, besides the GM piece that I assume you agree with, you've never quoted a single thing I've linked to, leading me to believe you've never read one, I make an effort to read every single one that actually loads. I attempted to access them once at work and had problems, so it is not a result of my machine.In any case, I've given sources that say standards are regressing
Regardless, a blog rattling off some numbers is not a source. A study, a newspaper, some sort of actual research done, a government site, anything more official than someone simply writing in their journal would be a source. Some numbers without context is not.
We do pay our immunity from arbitrary exercises of authority. We pay our ability to take from others. In the state of nature, where property and life is not protected by anyone but the owners of it, anyone who is stronger than someone else can take the property of anyone weaker. My liberty is my freedom. Without laws or rules, I have the freedom to take someone's life or property if I can. I can do whatever I want, I have full liberties.You pay with your immunity from arbitrary exercises of authority for protection of life and property... and then complain at arbitrary exercises of authority? I detect hypocrisy! This is a pretty debate-shattering case, as well, Moss. For shame.
Obviously people saw this as a problem. As a result, they agreed to form a social contract. In this, they gave up their liberty over all things in exchange for protection over their lives and property. Not immunity from authority, wherever you got that one from. Another case of Marril simply putting words into my mouth.
Canada's debt is neither small nor proportionally smaller than America's.Look at the growth in America's debt compared to the growth in Canada's debt. America definitely seems to be worse with its money.
There is a difference between someone making $20/hr in one part of America and someone making $20/hr in a different part. This is because of the costs of living; rent is higher in cities, goods and services are higher in places with high demand for them. Just as the costs of living differ in parts of America, they differ in other parts of the world as well. Thus you cannot use absolutes and say "well I expect Americans to work no less than $5.15 an hour, but this person overseas can work for $1/hr." The differences are because they have much different purchasing power. Just as during depressionary times you could buy things for far cheaper than you can now, in economies which aren't developed, the same is possible. Thus the comparison in wages between Americans and other countries is not apples-to-apples.I would also know, however, what a double standard is. Deeming certain things to be wrong within American borders should mean that Americans take it as wrong regardless of where it is in the world. Thus an American should not be willing to do to a non-American as he is wont or able to do to an American.
For starters, I said nowhere that only cutting social programs will have a beneficial effect; contrary, I think "why not just cut both" is quite insightful to my opinion that we need to cut spending across the board.Provide me the numbers to show that you cannot cut any expenditure but social programs and have a significantly beneficial effect, and I'll consider it.
However, the fact remains that cutting the social programs I listed (Social Security, Welfare and Unemployment, Medicare and Medicaid) will have a greater reduction in spending than any other possible combination of cuts which don't involve those categories. Those four programs comprise 58% of the US 2007 federal government budget. As a result, the most we could pare back from the budget without touching those programs is 42% of the spending. The social programs are the biggest ticket items on our budget.
So every time you have something taken from you without your willing you are screwed? I guess about every single American citizen (besides the masochists) is screwed pretty badly come tax time. Are you against all forms of "screwing" then? And you accuse me of having double standards?No, "screwed" in every instance I provided has been a case where someone has had something taken from them without their willing (i.e. non-coerced) consent.
I apologize, I misread the question. If two employees are equal in all aspects; seniority, skill set, wealth production, effort, hours, etc., then they should be compensated similarly.I was (since you so blatantly missed it) saying that if employee A is equal to employee B, then A should be paid equally to B. Who is this "they" of yours that produces "more wealth," and who is it that "they" are producing more wealth than?
There isn't one absolute thing where you can say, "there, that is the only thing we look at to determine what someone is paid." Productivity is directly proportional to wages, but it is not the only factor. Some people look at loyalty and seniority. Two people may produce the same per hour, but one person is willing to work Saturdays every couple months, and employers may value having someone with that kind of flexibility. The sum opinion is based on a number of factors, but certainly productivity is extremely high, if not #1.Funny, don't you also say that it's proportional to what wealth they produce for the company? Therefore, if the sum opinion is grossly different, should that mean that the price is right at that, even if, say, someone produces $10 but the sum opinion says $50? You're not making sense, Moss.
The beauty of a marketplace is, because there are many people who are willing to hire you, you are not subject to one person undervaluing your labor. Furthermore, the supply of people willing to work a job that overvalues them will be extremely high, which will drive the wages paid for an overvalued job down to more accurate wages.
Competition will drive that minimum price up to fair wages. It’s all supply and demand. The supply of labor willing to work the lower paying jobs dries up as there are better opportunities. Decreased supply causes a shift in the supply of labor to the left, which drives wages up.... I didn't say "minimum wage," Mr. Moss, I said "minimum possible." As in the minimum possible wage to not have your employees leaving on you.
No, it is not. The government did not earn it through labor or trade. The government does not own my cash. I do. It steals my property when it taxes me.Similarly, taxes are not theft as the money taken is rightfully the government's.
You've seen me in tights?!I've seen the unfortunate pictures. You don't.
Why is this? People "sitting at a desk all day" can and do create significant value.You don't work very "hard" when you're simply sitting at a desk all day, compared to the construction worker building an entire building with his crew.
A union uses the technique of tying to earn higher wages. Businesses are actually banned from using that technique, however labor is able to do it. How does a union determine what is sufficient and insufficient compensation? Why is a union's method better than the marketplace's?A union prevents the theoretical theft by insufficient compensation. I don't see what's so hard to understand. Just because you don't understand the basic workings of a union doesn't mean you can't understand their beneficial function.
There is no American standard curriculum. States mandate some specifics, and the rest is left to the individual schools to sort out. So painting "American high schools" as inadequate due to this alone is not accurate. We did have a class in economics and some limited personal finance, but it was never stressed and essentially was easy As.It was a mandatory course at my high school. It taught not only finance, but general business education, ranging from how to do something as simple as write a resumé to the generalities of actually engaging in business. American high schools must truly be inadequate!
However, I think a small scale "here's how you balance a checkbook and write a resume" isn't enough. I think we need to make a push in schools for more business education. Unfortunately with the union controls over education, I doubt we'll see any major curriculum changes, despite how unprepared many poor students are for managing their own funds in the "real world."
Well I have the Biology and Chemistry minors completed, so they will be on my records as having done so. Furthermore, the study habits I developed for the Premed "weed out" classes like Organic Chemistry, Biochemistry, and Human Physiology I aced were invaluable. Also, I really feel like I have a grasp of how the body works on a cellular level, which gives me great insight on a lot of things. Lastly, it taught me that I don't want to be a doctor. I think the money I spent in my first two years of college was invaluable. I wouldn't take it back.Sounds like you wasted the money spent on whatever courses were requisite for your med courses.
Taxes are theft. Ford cannot take back the car it sold me just because it made the car. Nintendo cannot come and claim my Pokemon cards simply because they printed them. They do not own the cards. I own them, they merely printed them for me. If Nintendo took my Pokemon cards back without my consent, they would be prosecuted for theft. For some reason, you seem to think that the government has the right to play by different rules.If you're referring to taxes (the debate subject at hand), I've already established that it's not theft. Your entire point here vanishes.
It is a premise of being an analogy that it is just an example to illustrate a point. You can't prove the analogy "wrong" and thus assert that the point the analogy was illustrating is therefore wrong as well. An analogy is not a reason why a point is right or wrong, thus disproving the analogy does not disprove the point. An analogy is merely a way of presenting your point by comparison, and the specific parts of the analogy I was describing are similar. The analogy is not perfect, but it doesn't have to be, it's simply an illustration of the larger point.Yet you still use the analogy of shackling the feet of the pro marathon runner. For the love of your god, Moss, stop being a hypocrite.
The point being that the existence of people in a capitalist society with more opportunities to succeed does not diminish the ability of others to succeed nonetheless.
You're trying to tell me that Canada does not have "massive debt?" And what exactly are you trying to prove? That Canada taxes the hell out of its people to pay down massive government spending? If either country is to eliminate their debt loads, both need to sharply cut back spending.Canada's working its debt lower, and you're saying out social programs are unsupportable? Perhaps it's only America's own economic nightmare that's the cause of it. You've got proof in the form of two basically irrefutable sources of the fact that social programs do not cause "massive debt."
The living conditions of our poor are not only getting better, but are much better already than the poor in most other countries. This is clear evidence that capitalism is working to counter poverty, and in the long-term eventually will. Inequality will still exist, however people struggling with their physiological needs will not.It isn't "working" if the poor still exist.
You're forgetting about the in-kind transfers such as food stamps that government programs employ. These add significantly to what someone must make in order to avoid the high marginal tax rates.Let's take a look at welfare, at least around here. The rates are about $510 a month, which comes to on average $127.50 a week (four weeks to a month). Minimum wage around here is $8/hour, so if you find full-time work (a 40-hour week), that's 8*40, or $320 a week. That seems like a lot of work, but you only need 16 hours a week to earn as much as welfare. Basically, work more than three hours a day and you're earning more than welfare gives you. This is not something anywhere near impossible.
No, they do not. The market gives it value. The government has the same claim over my property as anyone else whose goods I own but did not create: none. Again, you're miscontextualizing and clearly misrepresenting my statements. I only used the term "their money" because it was the term you described it as, and I was using it in a passage to describe how despite the fact that government prints it, they do not own the money in circulation. It is not surprising that you didn't quote my passage directly, as this would expose your lies.They're the ones giving it value.
Furthermore, you agreed that money is the government's to control in the first place, by calling it "their" money.
The government gives no value to money. The government does not own the money in my possession. The government has no claim over my property simply because it exists in its borders. Taxes imposed by the government are theft.
I'm actually studying the causes of unemployment right now. Nowhere does it state "lack of skills." Why? No matter how feeble your skills are, there is almost always something you can do. You may be dumb, but I'm sure you could do some sort of manual labor. You may be weak, but it doesn't take much to do orders at the local burger joint. If there is anything causing people with limited skills to have difficulty entering the workplace, it is restrictions on the market for labor, such as minimum wages. Eliminate them and you'll increase employment.No useful skills is the implication. And indeed there can be people who cannot find stable employment because they can't find anyone willing to hire them. Again, not rocket science.
Paying someone less than minimum wage is just as easy as paying them under the table. Hell, if you're already breaking the law by not hiring someone legally, it’s not like you're worried about reporting that to the IRS, right? See how quickly the debate breaks down when you employ the "well what if they don't follow the rules!" strategy?An employer would be a lot harder pressed to correctly falsify his records stating that he paid less than minimum wage to someone than that Carlos out there with a sandwich board doesn't have a social security card when the people who care about such things aren't knocking at the door.
If America is indeed going broke, it is going broke after every single other borrower of debt on Earth. The US government has the best credit on the planet. If Mr. Walker thinks we are going to go broke soon, it appears that the world financial markets (and crowds are very smart) thinks otherwise.Except their comptroller general. Go ahead, call up Mr. David Walker, head auditor of the US government, and tell him he's wrong. I'm sure he'll appreciate hearing it from you.
Interest rates are rising globally. It is the first rule of bonds that when rates go up, bond prices go down. "Your bonds" can be extended to "everyone's bonds." US Treasury Bonds still have the smallest default risk premium of any bond.Your bonds aren't doing so hot, either. Just thought I'd point it out.
So no deal, then? I figured that you were all bark and no bite. It seems when put to the test of actually answering hard-hitting questions or addressing gaping holes in your logic, you'd simply rather take flight rather than fight for what you believe.Do whatever you feel is necessary, however, do not expect me to follow your format. The idea was a musing of mine, but if you feel the need to run with it, go ahead.
I'm curious though, are you backing down because of a specific topic, or because the compelling points I make will force you to say, "you're right, I'm wrong" and you'd rather not debate than say that?
Honestly though Marril, I really thought you were going to take to my challenge. I really thought you believed in what you were saying to the point where you'd actually have the respect to fully answer any question I asked. I guess I thought wrong.
The deal is still on the table, if you've got the stones to back up what you believe.
Basically, money is worth more now than it is later. ... You can invest it.
So my asking a friend is not ok, but your asking a friend is? How about you site a real source so we can squash this issue?
Wealth is created. It is not a zero-sum game.
People are much smarter than you give them credit for, and much more paranoid. People in a company generally know those who have been with it for many years better than ones that have not. When they see the obvious correlation of employees getting fired when they are close to their pensions, it will be quite obvious what the company is up to.
Am I an outlier? I find it very hard to believe, but if you can provide a source that says the majority of people who request a raise are turned down, I'll concede the point.
I added approximately $8.75 in value per hour to my company
Due to the fact that competitors were offering similar wages, I know that, without looking at any financial statements, I'm getting fair wages.
Again, you don't have to be a financial wizard to compare yourself to the competition.
Not only can you compare your wages to what competitors are paying, but you can actually get those wages by jumping ship over to another business in the industry.
As I have explained over and over again, one's infinite wants are for more utility. One can derive happiness from things other than monetary gain.
How can you simply not have "any hope of ever" increasing your resources.
Inequality isn't necessarily a good or a bad thing. It isn't something we need to promote or deter.
How can you reach a level where nothing you could do would make you happier?
Thus it is in the employer's best interest, if they want to keep their job long that is, to pay people fair wages, and not allow a union cut into profits enough to, in some situations, make the company insolvent. So why do employers want to block union formations? Because it is in their best interest!
The market will keep itself afloat just fine, however, it can be made better (or more accurately, more efficient) by correcting failures.
Businesses today will do a wide array of things to skew markets in their favor,
Businesses don't necessarily want free markets, they just want profit. They'd be more than happy to have the rules bent in their favor. That is why we need a government to make sure that markets are working efficiently.
My arguments have consistently been for the existence of a government.
(misdefining utility
I think a state is necessary, anarcho-capitalists do not. Therefore, I am not an anarcho-capitalist.
I stated that society in America has existed under the terms I described and was not "killed."
Another reason government power should be limited: look at the atrocities it has waged.
The difference is, you own your life and property and still must pay for it. The government forces you to pay for something you already own. You do not own your job. Your job is a mutual agreement between you and the employer; the employer cannot force you to work and you cannot force them to hire you. This is the fundamental difference: the government forces you to pay for things that you, not government, own, while businesses can disallow you to work for them because neither you nor your employer owns your job. It is simply an agreement with terms, and those terms mandate that either party can end the relationship at any time. If you choose to "end your relationship" with government, they put you in jail. I can't take my property and secede from the state or union. It is not an agreement.
The question is not pointless. It serves as an excellent example illustrating that the more money you give to government, the more they'll spend.
It is not a fact and I did not agree. Please do not misquote me.
I said that welfare programs create disincentives due to their high marginal tax rates and can serve as a trap to keep people poor longer than they otherwise would have been.
Who are you to say that people buy things that are artificial wants?
Something that you buy (Pokemon cards maybe?) may be seen as very silly to someone else.
I like debating (at least when it involves thought-out, sourced arguments and not so much the consistent personal attacks you spice your posts with).
Even "slightly less unlivable" is a benefit, last time I checked!
I specifically used "everyone" in that context because it was correct. Sure, the people who lost their jobs have less in future revenues however, Wal-Mart still gives them effectively more money of what they currently have.
Furthermore, I never claimed that Wal-Mart added more jobs than it eliminated (which it may), I merely pointed out that it did create a lot of new jobs, which you were overlooking.
In business, what is wrong with that? The consumer gets the better product at the better price.
In a word, how?
No, you didn't. You gave me a quote of someone reading off data. There was no source for this data.
A study, a newspaper, some sort of actual research done, a government site, anything more official than someone simply writing in their journal would be a source. Some numbers without context is not.
Another case of Marril simply putting words into my mouth.
Canada's debt is neither small nor proportionally smaller than America's.
The differences are because they have much different purchasing power.
Those four programs comprise 58% of the US 2007 federal government budget. As a result, the most we could pare back from the budget without touching those programs is 42% of the spending. The social programs are the biggest ticket items on our budget.
So every time you have something taken from you without your willing you are screwed?
I apologize, I misread the question. If two employees are equal in all aspects; seniority, skill set, wealth production, effort, hours, etc., then they should be compensated similarly.
Productivity is directly proportional to wages, but it is not the only factor. Some people look at loyalty and seniority.
The beauty of a marketplace is, because there are many people who are willing to hire you,
Competition will drive that minimum price up to fair wages. It’s all supply and demand. The supply of labor willing to work the lower paying jobs dries up as there are better opportunities. Decreased supply causes a shift in the supply of labor to the left, which drives wages up.
You've seen me in tights?!
Why is this? People "sitting at a desk all day" can and do create significant value.
A union uses the technique of tying to earn higher wages. Businesses are actually banned from using that technique, however labor is able to do it. How does a union determine what is sufficient and insufficient compensation? Why is a union's method better than the marketplace's?
However, I think a small scale "here's how you balance a checkbook and write a resume" isn't enough.
Ford cannot take back the car it sold me just because it made the car.
For some reason, you seem to think that the government has the right to play by different rules.
You can't prove the analogy "wrong"
The point being that the existence of people in a capitalist society with more opportunities to succeed does not diminish the ability of others to succeed nonetheless.
You're trying to tell me that Canada does not have "massive debt?" And what exactly are you trying to prove? That Canada taxes the hell out of its people to pay down massive government spending? If either country is to eliminate their debt loads, both need to sharply cut back spending.
The living conditions of our poor are not only getting better, but are much better already than the poor in most other countries.
You're forgetting about the in-kind transfers such as food stamps that government programs employ. These add significantly to what someone must make in order to avoid the high marginal tax rates.
The government gives no value to money.
If there is anything causing people with limited skills to have difficulty entering the workplace, it is restrictions on the market for labor, such as minimum wages. Eliminate them and you'll increase employment.
See how quickly the debate breaks down when you employ the "well what if they don't follow the rules!" strategy?
If Mr. Walker thinks we are going to go broke soon, it appears that the world financial markets (and crowds are very smart) thinks otherwise.
Interest rates are rising globally. It is the first rule of bonds that when rates go up, bond prices go down. "Your bonds" can be extended to "everyone's bonds." US Treasury Bonds still have the smallest default risk premium of any bond.
So no deal, then? I figured that you were all bark and no bite.
It seems when put to the test of actually answering hard-hitting questions or addressing gaping holes in your logic, you'd simply rather take flight rather than fight for what you believe.
I'm curious though, are you backing down because of a specific topic, or because the compelling points I make will force you to say, "you're right, I'm wrong" and you'd rather not debate than say that?
Honestly though Marril, I really thought you were going to take to my challenge. I really thought you believed in what you were saying to the point where you'd actually have the respect to fully answer any question I asked. I guess I thought wrong.
The deal is still on the table, if you've got the stones to back up what you believe.