The Abyss

[necron99]

Re: The Abyss

This is an interesting discussion going on here. Hopefully I can keep myself civil, but there are just a couple of howlers I really feel I have to address.

I wonder how many unskilled workers decided to pick-up a skill during the good times of 2002 to 2007 by going to a trade school or night school? I mean, after all, we had just come from a recession in 2000-2001. That must have shook them up enough to make sure they could weather another recession? Nope. Instead, the majority remain as "unskilled" as they were 7 years ago, and this time around they are even deeper in debt. Apparently nobody taught them to fish last time either. Or, maybe they just don't give a rats ass.

2002 to 2007 were "good times" [economically]?!?!?! I spent about two years of that period unemployed, probably another year of that under-employed, and I had a lot of company. Incidentally, I'm a Civil Engineer with a Masters' Degree. From my point of view, I'm quite convinced that the disparate growth of the very wealthy (not just those years, but for decades prior) biased the aggregate economic statistics to make it look like we were doing well as a nation when the majority were in fact heading downhill fast.

Talking about the "unskilled" as if this is a monolithic block of the exact same individuals who just stubbornly refuse to get off their couches and learn a useful skill year after year after year, seems absolutely ridiculous to me, bordering on the economic equivalent of bigotry. As if 150,000 new workers don't enter the pool every single year. As if everybody's skills don't become obsolete in 5 or 8 years due to the pace of technology. I mean, IT workers are being paid crap wages these days (the ones who haven't lost their jobs to India yet), whereas even ten years ago they were the top of the heap. And, as others have mentioned, the root of the problem is that nobody is hiring, skilled or unskilled. 5 unemployed to every new job posting. Hope that night course certificate keeps you warm this winter when you burn it because you can't afford heating oil. :eek:

The third thing that really irks me about listening to Libertarians... and believe me, I count several among my relatives and friends, so I have to listen to this guff all the time...

(the second thing that irks me being the attitude above; the first was correctly identified by mcgurme as the assumption that "Hard work always equals success, therefore if you're not successful you must be lazy or stupid, Q.E.D."... c'mon guys, you never heard the term "necessary but not sufficient condition?")

...the third thing that irks me is that Libertarian advice always seems to have a "Hindsight is 20/20" flavor to it.

Wrong. She's had at least a year and a half to figure out Plan B. Plus, prior to getting laid off, she should have been putting away money for such a contingency. While getting unemployment, she should have set her sights beyond Elkhart.

...funny, it wasn't so many years ago that prominent Libertarians with national platforms -- to their credit, not the prominent iTulip Libertarians -- but prominent Libertarians were saying that anyone who saved money was an idiot when they could have been getting ten times the return by investing in Wall Street or buying property. Not such a sound strategy this year, of course. It's like the Libertarian answer to any problem or tragedy is to say "Well obviously you should simply have bought Xerox in May of 1961 (and then sold it in July 1999), then you wouldn't have this problem". It's like Libertarians think that "buy cheap sell dear and time the market exactly right" is some kind of profound philosophical discovery.

Apart from this advice being unhelpful and unsympathetic, if everybody were somehow magically able to make all the right decisions that Libertarians prescribe in hindsight -- that would destroy all the Libertarians' profits by spreading them more evenly among the entire rest of the population. Fallacy of Composition: Libertarian philosophy is a zero sum game. To be successful as a Libertarian leaves unspoken the assumption that large numbers of people must lose out, fail, and starve in order to contribute the money that Libertarians reap as profits due to their alleged individual wisdom and acumen. And yet Libertarians somehow still have the chutzpah to say that liberals (particularly environmentalists) are "anti-human". :rolleyes:

Liberalism simply says that it's not a zero sum game: if we all contribute positively to each other, nobody needs to crash and burn. It doesn't have to be a world-wrecking, punitive social contribution, but it does have to be graduated; the more successful you are, the more you have at risk from a societal collapse, so the more you ought to be invested in making sure the societal collapse doesn't happen. And, as the iTulip gurus and commentators often point out, humans in the long term don't like inequality. So if you allow a blatant disparity of wealth to grow, it will be corrected eventually, whether by the government (for either virtuous or corrupt motives, the end result is the same), or by pitchforks. Destruction is always faster and easier than creation -- it will forever be a lot easier for malcontents to throw a rock (or an RPG) through a limousine window than to build a more bulletproof limousine. Hence it would seem to make a lot more sense to co-operate and contribute socially than to just walk around saying "keep your hands offa my stack".

[bcassill]

Re: The Abyss

necron,

I agree with you on the hard work angle. Hard work in and of itself is for suckers. Your sweat and effort typically goes into someone else's pocket and in return you make as little as they can possibly pay you. That is the equation. Now hard work combined with working smart is the sweet spot. You gotta think, "What's in this for me?" from a skill development or business accomplishment perspective. If there isn't much, then find opportunities to work on things that will add to your bag of tricks to make you more attractive to other employers. This is how you make yourself more valuable for that nice pay bump when you go someplace else. Unfortunately, being good at your craft isn't all it's cracked up to be. Just ask any good programmer who survived the collapse of the tech bubble and tried to find a job after everything is offshored. Or the machinist who is downsized because of changes in technology or increases in productivity makes his position redundant.

While things are hard now, most of these folks will eventually be okay. The ones that tend to remain at the bottom of the heap are the mentally ill or those addicted to drugs and alcohol which makes it hard for them to function in normal society. While we are all grown ups and are essentially responsible for ourselves, the ones I really feel sorry for are those who are unable to help themselves when things head south financially. Specifically, I speaking of the children (who can do nothing for themselves) and disabled family members who may have been depending on ready access to health insurance for their medical care. All of a sudden no job = no insurance = no care. If you are a child, no job for mom and dad = no money = no food, shelter, and medical insurance. But as Phil Gramm said, I guess we are just a nation of whiners. Next time you see that six year old standing on a street corner holding up a sign asking for food (cause I'm sure this will eventually happen here as this crisis drags on), be sure to tell him he just needs to go back to school and learn a marketable skill and quit begging for handouts. Be sure then to give them a big slap on the back and wish them the best of luck.

[flintlock]

Re: The Abyss

If only you knew how hard that is.

I live in a town that's similar to Elkhart*, so I can understand the ties its people have to its history.

At one time, Elkhart was a manufacturing hub that supplied the instruments of deception that changed America.

Ever heard of Sidney Bechet?

How about Paul Desmond?

Johnny Hodges?

Charlie Parker?

All these players as well as the entire Lawrence Welk sax section played horns made in Elkhart, Indiana, home Of the Buescher True Tone Saxophone, and the Buescher Aristocrat Sax, until Selmer bought them out in the mid-1960s.

The loss of the horn business was more than covered by the increase in trailer manufacturing in the 1950s and 1960s until recent decades, when even that declined.

These were companies that mattered to people, and to their families. Their grandparents worked on the production lines for instruments that travelled the world and vehicles that covered every grain of sand in North America.

Some line workers left the larger RV manufacturers and built their own businesses, building a small number of high-amenity vehicles, so these were an entreprenurial people (they don't only exist in California).

I'm sure they were proud of their product, and that kind of pride passes from generation to generation.

You don't make saxes for a living and not show the grandkids those pictures of Bird playing an Aristocrat.

This is a side note — a tangent — but imagine yourself growing up in this. Knowing that your father built horns that travelled the world, speaking a new revolutionary race-defying language of jazz; or RVs that covered the states with families in a way that no family could do before.

To move where?

Arizona? Florida? Las Vegas?

Areas with less than a hundred years of history that were, frankly, a desert, a swamp, and a desert less than a hundred years ago?

(I'm being charitable here.... EIGHTY year ago these areas were a desert, a swamp and a desert).

Elkhart was inhabited, and working hard, and beating its European counterparts.

I bet that if the journalist did his research he'd have asked, anyone in your family work for Buescher? And she would have said "yeah..." and told the story.

But Elkhart is just a headline now. Obama called it "ground zero," and he's been there twice, so that's its claim to fame now. Send the journalist and get them to talk to some people right now.

Let alone the music machines that came off of its lines that were on par with the best in the world, as good as France could manufacture (so good, in fact, that France's Selmer had to buy them out) and better than any town in North America...

The only reason I know this is because, months before I lost my job I decided that I'd learn how to play the sax if I ever did (lose my job). Turns out, these Elkhart horns from the 20s to 50s are of a far higher quality than their counterparts from the last four decades, when Selmer took manufacturing elsewhere, and professionals stopped using Elkhart horns.

I have faith in Elkhart, and hope for its recovery. Those folks come from people that produced the greatest tools of dissent the right-thinking world ever saw right alongside the folks from Nazareth, PA (home of Martin Guitars), and I trust they'll do it again.

*I just want to point out that I've never been to Elkhart, I only know what it's like to live in a town that's repeatedly dragged out as an example of economic depravity. No, it's not Elkhart, but it might as well be; you've heard it before, and you've pitied it before.

EDIT: This whole post is highly sentimental, but what you see here in Elkhart is the broken heart of America. This is no story of take benefits as they come and bleed the gub'mint, it's "holy crap, what I've been doing for the past thirty years is now irrelevant; what my parents did for the previous thirty years is irrelevant; now what do I do?" Manufacturing is no longer existent, but its story is. My kin dug the slate that built New York City: Kingston, NY; My kin built the rails that everything West of Cleveland rode on: Johnstown, PA; My kin built the instruments that fueled the Chicago Jazz scene, until the owners sold out to the Frenchies... It's not likely that any of you will understand, but I hope that those of you that are business owners take note of the geographical identity that you may be luck enough to have. People that take pride in their work will work for far less than those of us that are mercenaries, and far under market.

Yes, sadly, this is being played out all over America. It sucks. I always wanted to live in a smaller city like this. But I knew the future was going to be better near a big city. Luckily I grew up in a small town near Atlanta, so I didn't have to move far away for a job. Actually, I passed up a shot at a better paying, easier job at a corporation when I got out of college because I didn't want to become a white collar drifter. I had too many roots here.

[flintlock]

Re: The Abyss

This is an interesting discussion going on here. Hopefully I can keep myself civil, but there are just a couple of howlers I really feel I have to address.



2002 to 2007 were "good times" [economically]?!?!?! I spent about two years of that period unemployed, probably another year of that under-employed, and I had a lot of company. Incidentally, I'm a Civil Engineer with a Masters' Degree. From my point of view, I'm quite convinced that the disparate growth of the very wealthy (not just those years, but for decades prior) biased the aggregate economic statistics to make it look like we were doing well as a nation when the majority were in fact heading downhill fast.

Talking about the "unskilled" as if this is a monolithic block of the exact same individuals who just stubbornly refuse to get off their couches and learn a useful skill year after year after year, seems absolutely ridiculous to me, bordering on the economic equivalent of bigotry. As if 150,000 new workers don't enter the pool every single year. As if everybody's skills don't become obsolete in 5 or 8 years due to the pace of technology. I mean, IT workers are being paid crap wages these days (the ones who haven't lost their jobs to India yet), whereas even ten years ago they were the top of the heap. And, as others have mentioned, the root of the problem is that nobody is hiring, skilled or unskilled. 5 unemployed to every new job posting. Hope that night course certificate keeps you warm this winter when you burn it because you can't afford heating oil. :eek:

The third thing that really irks me about listening to Libertarians... and believe me, I count several among my relatives and friends, so I have to listen to this guff all the time...

(the second thing that irks me being the attitude above; the first was correctly identified by mcgurme as the assumption that "Hard work always equals success, therefore if you're not successful you must be lazy or stupid, Q.E.D."... c'mon guys, you never heard the term "necessary but not sufficient condition?")

...the third thing that irks me is that Libertarian advice always seems to have a "Hindsight is 20/20" flavor to it.


...funny, it wasn't so many years ago that prominent Libertarians with national platforms -- to their credit, not the prominent iTulip Libertarians -- ...the third thing that irks me is that Libertarian advice always seems to have a "Hindsight is 20/20" flavor to it.
It's like the Libertarian answer to any problem or tragedy is to say "Well obviously you should simply have bought Xerox in May of 1961 (and then sold it in July 1999), then you wouldn't have this problem". It's like Libertarians think that "buy cheap sell dear and time the market exactly right" is some kind of profound philosophical discovery.

Apart from this advice being unhelpful and unsympathetic, if everybody were somehow magically able to make all the right decisions that Libertarians prescribe in hindsight -- that would destroy all the Libertarians' profits by spreading them more evenly among the entire rest of the population. Fallacy of Composition: Libertarian philosophy is a zero sum game. To be successful as a Libertarian leaves unspoken the assumption that large numbers of people must lose out, fail, and starve in order to contribute the money that Libertarians reap as profits due to their alleged individual wisdom and acumen. And yet Libertarians somehow still have the chutzpah to say that liberals (particularly environmentalists) are "anti-human". :rolleyes:

Liberalism simply says that it's not a zero sum game: if we all contribute positively to each other, nobody needs to crash and burn. It doesn't have to be a world-wrecking, punitive social contribution, but it does have to be graduated; the more successful you are, the more you have at risk from a societal collapse, so the more you ought to be invested in making sure the societal collapse doesn't happen. And, as the iTulip gurus and commentators often point out, humans in the long term don't like inequality. So if you allow a blatant disparity of wealth to grow, it will be corrected eventually, whether by the government (for either virtuous or corrupt motives, the end result is the same), or by pitchforks. Destruction is always faster and easier than creation -- it will forever be a lot easier for malcontents to throw a rock (or an RPG) through a limousine window than to build a more bulletproof limousine. Hence it would seem to make a lot more sense to co-operate and contribute socially than to just walk around saying "keep your hands offa my stack".

Great post. But I find a lot of the things you are attributing to Libertarians actually fit the Neocon profile better. (Note I did not say conservative). You know, the people with the picture of George and Laura Bush on the refrigerator, with the fake stamped signature. ( How many of those made the transition to the trash can after the stock market tanked last year?)

I consider myself somewhat of a Libertarian, but not the hardcore type you describe. So maybe its just a question of how one defines Libertarian.

2002 to 2007 were "good times" [economically]?!?!?! I spent about two years of that period unemployed, probably another year of that under-employed, and I had a lot of company.

I hear you on this. My business declined during this period as well for reasons I won't go into here. Some segments were booming during this period no doubt. Namely the FIRE segment. But others were not as you mentioned.

In defense of rjwjr, I think he hires mostly unskilled labor for whatever it is he makes. It's easy to understand how he's going to talk mostly about what he knows best. Now some people consider "unskilled" to be anyone without a Phd, so I understand your frustration at how some lump people into oversimplified blocks.

...the third thing that irks me is that Libertarian advice always seems to have a "Hindsight is 20/20" flavor to it.

I agree again. Funny how you usually won't find unemployed people spouting out all this sage advice about hard work.

...funny, it wasn't so many years ago that prominent Libertarians with national platforms -- to their credit, not the prominent iTulip Libertarians -- but prominent Libertarians were saying that anyone who saved money was an idiot when they could have been getting ten times the return by investing in Wall Street or buying property. Not such a sound strategy this year, of course.

Was this on the Libertarian platform? :confused: I can't recall that. But I do know Republicans who were advising this. Probably many Democrats too. They were called WALL STREET and REAL ESTATE brokers. (As well as that guy at the water cooler and the guy who cut your lawn).

[necron99]

Re: The Abyss

While we are all grown ups and are essentially responsible for ourselves, the ones I really feel sorry for are those who are unable to help themselves when things head south financially. Specifically, I speaking of the children (who can do nothing for themselves) and disabled family members who may have been depending on ready access to health insurance for their medical care. All of a sudden no job = no insurance = no care. If you are a child, no job for mom and dad = no money = no food, shelter, and medical insurance. But as Phil Gramm said, I guess we are just a nation of whiners.

Thanks for the comment, bcassill. Ironically enough, my parents are two of the Libertarians I count among my relatives. After decades of preaching independence, and how only the scum and the uneducated rely on the government for help, they've suddenly lost 30% of their retirement investments in the crash -- and now all of a sudden they are telling me it's the most natural thing in the world that during these "hard times" I should totally for altruistic reasons help them buy a duplex and move in with them and see to their care 16 hours a day (when I'm not working). Not that they'd ever demean themselves by taking advantage of government programs, but if society in general invested in better options for senior care for everyone, maybe I wouldn't have to wreck my own career in order to make sure they, libertarians both, have a decent lifestyle in their retirement. [The outcome of the argument is still up in the air.]

Whether the aid must come from the government or from loved ones, ultimately the philosophy of rugged individualism fails each of us -- due to age if nothing else.

[necron99]

Re: The Abyss

Great post. But I find a lot of the things you are attributing to Libertarians actually fit the Neocon profile better. (Note I did not say conservative). You know, the people with the picture of George and Laura Bush on the refrigerator, with the fake stamped signature.

I consider myself somewhat of a Libertarian, but not the hardcore type you describe. So maybe its just a question of how one defines Libertarian.

Thanks for another thoughtful reply, flintlock. You're completely right that my argument blurs the boundaries between Neocon and Libertarian... but in my defense, the Platonic purity of all these categories has been hopelessly muddled over the last 50 years. I mean, the supposed "most liberal members of the Senate" cooked up a $12 Trillion bailout to rich private banks while the Republicans throw around words like "Socialism" and "Fascism" -- NOT to the government propping up failing crony banks -- but to a medical program practiced with success in virtually the entire rest of the democratic Free World. It just boggles the mind.

If there was some kind of "Reset" switch where we could force everyone back into their own corners, to stick to the dictionary definitions of these epithets and philosophies, we should have hit it long ago. Unfortunately in the real world, there's no such Reset switch. So, yes, I am mainly referring to the faux "Libertarians" who throw a fit about a one-percent tax increase but are totally in favor of spending multiple trillions on drug interdiction and pointless foreign wars... Not a penny for compassion, but sky's-the-limit whenever somebody is being maimed or punished.

A lot of the iTulip Libertarians are much more rigorous and pure in their philosophy, but if they are going to argue to me that any societal spending based on Left ideals leads inevitably down the road to Communist oppression, then I'm going to return the favor. ;)

[zmas28]

Re: The Abyss

Thanks for another thoughtful reply, flintlock. You're completely right that my argument blurs the boundaries between Neocon and Libertarian... but in my defense, the Platonic purity of all these categories has been hopelessly muddled over the last 50 years. I mean, the supposed "most liberal members of the Senate" cooked up a $12 Trillion bailout to rich private banks while the Republicans throw around words like "Socialism" and "Fascism" -- NOT to the government propping up failing crony banks -- but to a medical program practiced with success in virtually the entire rest of the democratic Free World. It just boggles the mind.

If there was some kind of "Reset" switch where we could force everyone back into their own corners, to stick to the dictionary definitions of these epithets and philosophies, we should have hit it long ago. Unfortunately in the real world, there's no such Reset switch. So, yes, I am mainly referring to the faux "Libertarians" who throw a fit about a one-percent tax increase but are totally in favor of spending multiple trillions on drug interdiction and pointless foreign wars... Not a penny for compassion, but sky's-the-limit whenever somebody is being maimed or punished.

A lot of the iTulip Libertarians are much more rigorous and pure in their philosophy, but if they are going to argue to me that any societal spending based on Left ideals leads inevitably down the road to Communist oppression, then I'm going to return the favor. ;)

Appreciated your posts and others on this.
I believe there is a fundamental issue that has been addressed only tangentially here, which is that the state of the economy as it is (FIRE in decline, depression?), is such that it cannot support full employment. I do not think that anyone can seriously say that the solution to unemployment is increased mobility (get up and move to where there are jobs), or increased training. If the argument is that there are more than enough jobs available in the US, if only the unemployed millions could somehow fill, then this is a very difficult case to make.
This is a systemic problem that has to be addressed at that level, and while all the advice to individuals on how to survive is just great, I don't think the "get up and move to where the jobs are" is a solution.

[jk]

Re: The Abyss

as the economy resets, i think there will be new jobs in growing industries, but they will be filled with new entrants into the labor pool - youth and immigrants. i think a lot of middle aged people will never work again except in odd jobs, menial jobs, part-time minimum wage jobs, and so on. they will struggle to make it to social security age, and then will struggle to survive on social security benefits which will not keep up with their cost of living.

[cjppjc]

Re: The Abyss

This truly is a great thread. Assuming there is no perfect answer to these questions. I know of an exercise where a person before making their point says out loud the entire arguement of the other person. This if done sincerely can lead to a greater understanding.

[bcassill]

Re: The Abyss

Thanks for the comment, bcassill. Ironically enough, my parents are two of the Libertarians I count among my relatives. After decades of preaching independence, and how only the scum and the uneducated rely on the government for help, they've suddenly lost 30% of their retirement investments in the crash -- and now all of a sudden they are telling me it's the most natural thing in the world that during these "hard times" I should totally for altruistic reasons help them buy a duplex and move in with them and see to their care 16 hours a day (when I'm not working). Not that they'd ever demean themselves by taking advantage of government programs, but if society in general invested in better options for senior care for everyone, maybe I wouldn't have to wreck my own career in order to make sure they, libertarians both, have a decent lifestyle in their retirement. [The outcome of the argument is still up in the air.]

Whether the aid must come from the government or from loved ones, ultimately the philosophy of rugged individualism fails each of us -- due to age if nothing else.

I hear your point and your conundrum. It's always funny to see how people take the opposite position when they are suddenly down and out. I remember reading a set of rules that was put up in some office in the late 1800's. It basically went through a list of expectations for employees like a six day work week (you got Sunday off for church and were expected to go), being sure to bring in a pail of coal to help keep the office heated, etc. One of the last things on the list was an admonishment to save your money so you wouldn't be a burden on others in your old age. Without knowing more of your particular circumstances, all I can say is that it is both telling and interesting for the sudden change in heart. I can only hope that you can come to some amicable and workable solution that works for you. Issues of how to deal with aging parents are always difficult.

My family too went on about the evils of welfare and government handouts, although my own opinions are not as black and white as theirs. I guess the problem I have with some is the bellicose attitude they have towards helping others (i.e. it's all about personal responsibility BS) while at the same time we have become a nation of handouts and subsidies. Big agribusiness entity or small family farmer, here's your government check. Are you retired? Here's your check. And, oh, here's your free healthcare to boot. Have you been a Congressman? Keep your salary for life. How about the pensions for state and federal employees. Certainly don't see that in the private sector anymore.

See the problem is that up until a few decades ago, we had none of these things. Certainly not in the age when that sign above adorned some businessperson’s office. If you are a true believer in personal responsibility, then we get rid of all these things. After all, as these folks say, it’s a person’s responsibility to look after themselves. You have a job that you get paid for. You should expect nothing more. If you need assistance, you have your friends, family, and local charities to help you out.

What I can tell you is that the government pensions, free health care, Social Security, disability payments, and even our military benefits, are the luxuries of a wealthy society that most of the rest of the world does not enjoy. Either we scrap all of it per the personal responsibility route or we have some sane conversation about the pros and cons of each program relative to what we think as a society we can afford. Cut the ideology. Quit waving the flag or hugging the trees. Quit parroting the Fox News talking heads (and the MSNBC ones for that matter), and let’s have a conversation. That’s all I ask. But, then again, that would actually require listening to what the other side had to say. Never mind, it’s easier to stand on our soap boxes and take cheap shots. Pathetic, isn't it?

Welcome to the New America

[drumminj]

Re: The Abyss

By definition your libertarian attitude is cold hearted. There is no room in the philosophy for actually helping people; only room for people to pull themselves up by their bootstraps and "work harder".

I disagree with this statement. There's a difference between believing the government shouldn't take from a third party (by force) to help these people, and being totally unwilling to help. I can be libertarian, yet help all kinds of people. But I do it by choice, freely, and only give that which I have the right to - that is the fruits of my own labor.

Yours is a straw man. There are many good arguments against libertarianism, but this is not one of them. Just because one doesn't believe that the government should be in the business of taking from those with resources to help those without doesn't mean one is heartless and lacks compassion.

Sadly, I can't scroll back through all the posts in the thread while responding here, but one comment on the first page is right in line with where I stand (edit: it's Flintlock's post) - helping out your community - friends, family, those around you - by choice..by patronizing their stores, helping them get on their feet, sometimes giving a direct handout...many of us 'libertarians' do these things. We do have compassion, and do understand that sometimes people are in a rough spot and need help. We just don't feel it's the gov'ts right to compel an uninvolved, third party to help.

[nitroglycol]

Re: The Abyss

It seems this downturn has hit a class of people who haven't been affected as significantly in others in recent memory, which might help explain why so many were caught unprepared:

Although young Canadian job seekers have borne the brunt of the economic slump, a separate worry involves trends in the prime working age group of 25 to 54 years, a Toronto-Dominion Bank economist says. Prime-age workers "are experiencing rapid deterioration in job demand, beyond what was seen in the past two recessions," TD economic forecasting director Beata Caranci said in a commentary issued Wednesday.

Source.

[walenk]

Re: The Abyss

Then move to upstate New York, although the Dakotas would probably be a better bet.

Can we safely conclude that your helping hand is not in upstate NY or the Dakotas? :rolleyes:

[rjwjr]

Re: The Abyss

A tangential question, but how do you feel about Israel's healthcare plan? The question you are answering mentioned Palestinians, so I just want to know... Your tax dollars are going to Israel, which provides healthcare for every citizen.

Yet American citizens go uncovered.

Hm. Do we agree on that, at least? Cut off the parasite states, such as Israel, Turkey and Egypt, unless they relinquish their healthcare systems?



I don't think you have an idea of how hard it is to live at the lower spectrum of the income brackets. There is no extra money for schooling which may or may not pay off. Or, maybe you're unaware of the inflated cost of education even at trade schools in recent years.

Something isn't clicking here.

Sorry, I don't know enough about Israel, Egypt, and Turkey to comment on your first point, so "no", we can't agree. I've never considered any of the three as "parasite states" as you describe them, however.

Regarding your second point, I have a pretty good idea what it's like at the lower spectrum of the income bracket. I lived in a trailer park for almost 2 years when I was 13. My father lost his job in the early '70's recession. My parents, however, were terrific role models. My mother stretched what we had by buying our clothes and such at garage sales, making due with one car, and other such sacrifices. My father, pissed at having had his life disrupted by decisions outside of his control, worked at a convenience store at night so he could start a business during the day. His dream of being his own boss and having control of the decisions that affected his life came to fruition when his business became successful and we eventually moved far up the socio-economic ladder. My parents didn't make excuses, they made due. Your post about me not understanding and about the high cost of education sounds like excuses to me. From what I see with today's "lower spectrum of the income bracket" is very little sacrifice, very little personal effort toward self-improvement, and a whole lotta expectations of someone else to provide them a hand-out or a break or an equalizer or a shortcut. It's a politically created and reinforced nanny-state mentality. It's not good for the US as a whole, it creates an increasing burden (and a disincentive) on the productive members of society, while serving to kill any ambition or self-reliance in the very group it purports to help.

I'm of the belief that food stamps, etc. exacerbate the problems of high school drop-outs, teen pregnancies, and a parasitic lower spectrum of the income bracket. If life actually were harder, then many more people may take their education and other areas of personal responsibility more seriously. Instead we create programs that allow individuals and families to subsist at a basic level with little personal effort. Surprisingly, many people appear to be just fine there. Sure, they'll complain about the injustice and unfairness of it all, but they'll do very little to make any personal improvements.

[ASH]

Re: The Abyss

Then move to upstate New York, although the Dakotas would probably be a better bet.

Am I being dense, or isn't there a total quantity problem during an economic downturn? An individual might be able to find work by moving, but if the total number of job openings is significantly smaller than the total number of applicants, nationally, shuffling people around isn't going to change the net number of unemployed. The societal problem results from N% unemployment, rather than the situation of any individual. Any individual can solve their personal problem by moving somewhere and striving and finding themselves a job. But solving the individual problem doesn't solve the societal problem. Permanent enrollment on the public dole doesn't solve the societal problem, either. My point is the disconnect between the individual criticism that person X should be able to find employment if they are sufficiently enterprising, and the temptation to generalize and say that all individuals in situations similar to person X should be able to do so. Can't happen simultaneously unless there are more jobs. Better we should be arguing about what to do to create more jobs than how X people ought to compete to fill Y jobs, when Y< < X.