Rich and Poor

Off Topic Politics & World Issues
61

I am amazed at how people view the world.

First people complain that there are not enough jobs in America.

Then they say we need to allow illegal immigration because there are jobs Americans won’t do, or not enough people to do those jobs.

We are supposed to care about creating work for non-Americans, but not supposed to buy what they make because there might be the possibility it was made in a sweatshop, or takes jobs away from Americans.

But if the jobs are kept here, the complaint is that we are creating low paying jobs, not higher paying ones.

No matter what you do, you are wrong. Damned if you do, and damned if you don’t.

Instead of all this closed minded thinking, we should be open to the idea of creating jobs overseas. The jobs that cannot finance an American lifestyle can finance people in developing countries.

Both groups of people can benefit more by working together. As their incomes and economies grow, their unemployment rates will go down, and because of market pressures their income will go up. As their incomes go up, and more people are working in those countries, they will start to have money to spend, and that comes back to us.

At the same time as people move up the economic ladder, they become more powerful, and more demanding of their government and their employers.

Sure we need to stop excessive child labor, slavery, abuse, and truly dangerous conditions. But you don’t do that by taking away jobs, and opportunity.

62

Hey grey,

You are correct that redistribution of wealth not only will not work, but will actually be counterproductive.

I have to disagree with your negative assessment about where the world and America is going. Politics has a way of spreading false information to make things seem worse then they are so the politicians seem needed. Combine that with how news organizations work. They generally do not report good news, only bad, and that truly gives a distorted view of the world.

Actually research has shown that as the American economy gets better, news reports about it plunge, and negative reports become a significantly larger percentage of the reports.

Since 1967 median income in America has gone up about 30% by 2003. (Adjusted for inflation.) In 1997 the number of households worth at least 1 million was 3.5% of the total. While in 2004 it reached 7% of the total number of households. (Not adjusted for inflation.)

63

It is ignorant to that most children growing up in neighborhoods with gang violence, encountering drug pushers in elementary and middle school and going to schools half of which don’t have even close to grade level text books have a high chance of being successful no matter how hard they work. The problem is that there is no simple solution. Go too far towards trying to create equality of opportunity and you are really working to create equality of outcome and a socialist society.

64

Redistribution of wealth is inappropriate and unfair. But better funding for education and other minimum safety nets and programs should be emphasized to try provide more opportunities for self-advancement. And there are currently proposals to cut federal education loans. At the same time there is the desire to cut taxes for the top income bracket who does not need it cut. Ludicrous! And wrong.

65

[quote]hspder wrote:
c) Getting wealthy requires luck, knowing the right people and, quite frequently, being willing to make ethical and moral “sacrifices”, i.e., putting your ambition ahead of ethics and moral values
[/quote]

“I find that the harder I work, the more luck I seem to have.”

  • Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826)
66

[quote]bigflamer wrote:
hspder wrote:
c) Getting wealthy requires luck, knowing the right people and, quite frequently, being willing to make ethical and moral “sacrifices”, i.e., putting your ambition ahead of ethics and moral values

“I find that the harder I work, the more luck I seem to have.”

  • Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826)

[/quote]

Very true. Opportunity is only half of luck. The other half is having the brains and ability to captilize on that opportunity and the discipline and work ethic to follow through.

67

The Mage:

Great post!

You have basically stuck a pin in the liberals fallacy ballon. Wealth is mostly created, not inherited!

I have enjoyed reading this thread. Anyone who wants to get a better understanding of who the millionaires are, and how they live should read: “The Millionaire Next Door.”

Here is a quick review of the book. Well worth reading if you are interested in this topic:

This fact alone says it all: “…at least 80% of current millionaires are first generation millionaires.”

This country will never guarantee you anything more than the {b]opportunity[/b] to make it big!

Those who take advantage of that opportunity and make millions don’t deserve scorn from those who might be just a tad jealous because they either have not achieved that level of success, or look down thier noses at the pursuit of wealth.

Who was it that said, “I never saw a poor person hire anyone.”

So true.

Again, great post Mage!

68

Zeb, this really didn’t seem to be a right versus left thread… which was actually kind of nice.

–

Lorisco,

Nice post. I wish more people felt along those lines.

I don’t think we all get what we deserve, but I think that too many people decide what someone deserves and then is happy if they are left with no way to improve their lot due to those choices and what they “deserve”.

The grace and compassion you talk of seems to be lacking in much of society.

69

[quote]FightinIrish26 wrote:
thabigdon24 wrote:
Fighting : Iam thankful that those chinese sweatshops that employ people @ 1.00/Hr exist ,at least they have jobs. Without the advent of cheap manufacturing less jobs would be available. I think that we just need to get it outof our heads that the " detroit model " of a $40/ hour assembly plant job is what manufacturers will provide to people that cannot do anything else.

Yea, thank God for un-unionized sweatshops…

You missed the point. When they unionize, what is America left with? A colonial empire that we cannot maintain.[/quote]

Africa starting to industrialize.

70

[quote]The Mage wrote:
I am amazed at how people view the world.

First people complain that there are not enough jobs in America.

Then they say we need to allow illegal immigration because there are jobs Americans won’t do, or not enough people to do those jobs.

We are supposed to care about creating work for non-Americans, but not supposed to buy what they make because there might be the possibility it was made in a sweatshop, or takes jobs away from Americans.

But if the jobs are kept here, the complaint is that we are creating low paying jobs, not higher paying ones.

No matter what you do, you are wrong. Damned if you do, and damned if you don’t.

Instead of all this closed minded thinking, we should be open to the idea of creating jobs overseas. The jobs that cannot finance an American lifestyle can finance people in developing countries.

Both groups of people can benefit more by working together. As their incomes and economies grow, their unemployment rates will go down, and because of market pressures their income will go up. As their incomes go up, and more people are working in those countries, they will start to have money to spend, and that comes back to us.

At the same time as people move up the economic ladder, they become more powerful, and more demanding of their government and their employers.

Sure we need to stop excessive child labor, slavery, abuse, and truly dangerous conditions. But you don’t do that by taking away jobs, and opportunity.
[/quote]

Perfect view of international trade. Same reason applies to inter-state trade. Hell even inter-personal trade. Why do I not make my own clothes? Because someone out there can do it better and we both mutually gain by doing this.

71

[quote]The Mage wrote:
I am amazed at how people view the world.

First people complain that there are not enough jobs in America.

Then they say we need to allow illegal immigration because there are jobs Americans won’t do, or not enough people to do those jobs.

We are supposed to care about creating work for non-Americans, but not supposed to buy what they make because there might be the possibility it was made in a sweatshop, or takes jobs away from Americans.

But if the jobs are kept here, the complaint is that we are creating low paying jobs, not higher paying ones.

No matter what you do, you are wrong. Damned if you do, and damned if you don’t.

Instead of all this closed minded thinking, we should be open to the idea of creating jobs overseas. The jobs that cannot finance an American lifestyle can finance people in developing countries.

Both groups of people can benefit more by working together. As their incomes and economies grow, their unemployment rates will go down, and because of market pressures their income will go up. As their incomes go up, and more people are working in those countries, they will start to have money to spend, and that comes back to us.

At the same time as people move up the economic ladder, they become more powerful, and more demanding of their government and their employers.

Sure we need to stop excessive child labor, slavery, abuse, and truly dangerous conditions. But you don’t do that by taking away jobs, and opportunity.
[/quote]

Perfect view of international trade. Same reason applies to inter-state trade. Hell even inter-personal trade. Why do I not make my own clothes? Because someone out there can do it better and we both mutually gain by engaging in trade.

72

[quote]Garrett W. wrote:
The Mage wrote:

Sure we need to stop excessive child labor, slavery, abuse, and truly dangerous conditions. But you don’t do that by taking away jobs, and opportunity.

Perfect view of international trade. Same reason applies to inter-state trade. Hell even inter-personal trade. Why do I not make my own clothes? Because someone out there can do it better and we both mutually gain by engaging in trade.

[/quote]

Oh yea that sure is a rosy picture of the wonders of unbridled capitalism.

Perfect view? My ass. It’s real easy to say all that when it isn’t your six year old working, when your wife isn’t being raped and abused, and when you are not a slave yourself. But hey…Keep them jobs goin!

73

[quote]FightinIrish26 wrote:

Oh yea that sure is a rosy picture of the wonders of unbridled capitalism.

Perfect view? My ass. It’s real easy to say all that when it isn’t your six year old working, when your wife isn’t being raped and abused, and when you are not a slave yourself. But hey…Keep them jobs goin![/quote]

You’ve just gone off the deep end with your logic. So my kid will have to work when he turns 6 , my wife will be raped , and i will be a slave because we llive in a capitalist 3rd world country?

I think what this discussion has boiled down to is that there is NO perfect solution. Either we will have a socialist country with many more poor people or we will have a capitalist country where it is hard to rise up from being poor. Give me the 2nd choice.

74

[quote]jsbrook wrote:
bigflamer wrote:
hspder wrote:
c) Getting wealthy requires luck, knowing the right people and, quite frequently, being willing to make ethical and moral “sacrifices”, i.e., putting your ambition ahead of ethics and moral values

“I find that the harder I work, the more luck I seem to have.”

  • Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826)

Very true. Opportunity is only half of luck. The other half is having the brains and ability to captilize on that opportunity and the discipline and work ethic to follow through.
[/quote]

Very, very true. I’ve heard before that ‘luck’ is being prepared when opportunity comes.

‘Give me a country where it is hard to rise up from being poor.’

Is change ever easy? It takes effort to change things. Look at us, training our bodies, lifting, fighting, whatever it is that we do; it’s never easy to make progress. You have to put out effort before you get the results.

Most people can find a little while a day to do something that’ll build toward a more comfortable position. For me it was playing around with building online games and the programming skills I acquire there led to being able to do that and open additional businesses.

If I hadn’t learned the skills I had, when I had the chances available, then I wouldn’t have been able to use them.

Opportunity is everywhere. A lot of people seem to expect it to come to them and they complain that they’re not rich, that they need to lose 10#, that somebody else should give them all that, instead of developing the capacity to take or build opportunities.

75

[quote]FightinIrish26 wrote:

Oh yea that sure is a rosy picture of the wonders of unbridled capitalism.

Perfect view? My ass. It’s real easy to say all that when it isn’t your six year old working, when your wife isn’t being raped and abused, and when you are not a slave yourself. But hey…Keep them jobs goin![/quote]

Why does it have to be a jump to “unbridled” Capitalism? Did you not read where I actually said everything you said is not something we want? Things we want to stop?

Anyway the fact that you think rape is capitalism just shows how screwed up your vision of the world is. Just because a person is working overseas does not mean they are being abused.

If you have specific knowledge of real sweatshop conditions, and not something where people do not get the proper Starbucks coffee for their breaks, tell me, and I won’t buy that product.

76

an interesting discussion

In relation to the ‘tax the rich to give to the poor’ argument, this little story has been going around the Aust investment websites after the bi-annual journalistic calls for tax reduction.

Suppose that every night, 10 men go out for dinner.
The bill for all 10 comes to $100. They decided to pay their bill the way
we pay our taxes, and it went like this:

  • The first four men (the poorest) paid nothing.

  • The fifth paid $1.

  • The sixth $3.

  • The seventh $7.

  • The eighth $12.

  • The ninth $18.

  • The tenth man (the richest) paid $59.

All 10 were quite happy with the arrangement, until one day, the owner
said: “Since you are all such good customers, I’m going to reduce the
cost of your daily meal by $20.” So now dinner for the 10 only cost $80.

The group still wanted to pay their bill the way we pay our taxes. The
first four men were unaffected. They would still eat for free. But how
should the other six, the paying customers, divvy up the $20 windfall
so that everyone would get his “fair share”?

They realised that $20
divided by six is $3.33. But if they subtracted that from everybody’s share, then the fifth and sixth men would each end up being paid to eat.

The restaurateur suggested reducing each man’s bill by roughly the same percentage, thus:

  • The fifth man paid nothing (like the first four) instead of $1 (100%
    saving).

  • The sixth paid $2 instead of $3 (33% saving).

  • The seventh paid $5 instead of $7 (28% saving).

  • The eighth paid $9 instead of $12 (25% saving).

  • The ninth paid $14 instead of $18 (22% saving).

  • The tenth paid $49 instead of $59 (16% saving).

Each of the six was better off, and the first four continued to eat for

free, as now did the fifth - but outside the restaurant, the men began
to compare their savings.

“I only got a dollar out of the $20,” declared the sixth man. He
pointed to
the tenth man “but he got $10!”

“That’s right,” exclaimed the fifth man. “I only saved a dollar too.
It’s unfair that he got ten times more than me!”

“That’s true!” shouted the seventh man. “Why should he get $10 back
when I got only $2? The wealthy get all the breaks!”

“Wait a minute,” yelled the first four men in unison. “We didn’t get
anything at all. The system exploits the poor!”

The nine men surrounded the tenth and beat him up.

The next night the tenth man didn’t show up for dinner. The nine sat
down and ate without him, but when they came to pay the bill, they discovered
that they didn’t have enough money between all of them to meet even
half of the bill!

That, boys and girls, journalists and college professors, is
how our tax system works. The people who pay the highest taxes get the most
benefit from a tax reduction. Tax them too much, attack them for being
wealthy, and they just may not show up at the table anymore.

77

ShawnW. Great post. (Now expect to be attacked for being logical.)

78

Reminds me of Cuba kicking out all of the US nationals that employed people , there is no telling how much that " brain drain " of losing US people hurt them so it goes both ways ( referring to the earlier post about us getting skilled chinese workers after tianamen square )

79

[quote]The Mage wrote:
ShawnW. Great post. (Now expect to be attacked for being logical.)[/quote]

Bump. Super logical and easy to follow.

I’m gonna use that sometime…

80

[quote]grey wrote:
The Mage wrote:
ShawnW. Great post. (Now expect to be attacked for being logical.)

Bump. Super logical and easy to follow.

I’m gonna use that sometime…

[/quote]

The part he forgot to mention was that the four poor guys were licking the butter knife, while the top dog was eating surf and turf.

Money buys access, protection and power.

It is doubtful he will not show up at the table. Without his wealth he is just another poor guy.