Thursday Open Thread
What's on your mind? I'm rushing out the door to commute to teach a summer school class. Will check in a couple of hours. This is an open thread.
Submitted by Mike Pridmore on Thu, 2007-06-07 08:10
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Comments :
I hear
the Immigration bill is not going that well in the senate... Just passed the Dorgan amendment
to sunset the temporary worker program after 5 years.
I am not a fan of Lou Dobbs but listening to that guy on immigration (he calls it amnesty) made me sour on this bill lately. Perhaps it is not a good idea to provide a path to citizenship to all those illegals. The effects on this country, from incredible costs (to support the newly legalized millions), to job loss, etc are too incredible to be discounted lightly by the backers of this idiocy that does not even provide adequate enforcement. Who is going to pay the trillions of dollars that this crap is gonna cost? We will.
I think I am now leaning more towards the enforcement only - fence, more agents, going after companies who hire them, deportation, etc.
Hope this bill fails. Good job Lou Dobbs, you've convinced me and changed my mind.
"To discuss evil in a manner implying neutrality, is to sanction it." AR
The bill creates a nightmare
of unenforceable beaucracy.
The excuse that this bad bill is better than no bill is pathetic.
The bill is hostile to working Americans, and that includes immigrants.
Mexico is the 12th richest country in the world.
The wage distrubtion in Mexico keeps most of the populace in extreme poverty, while favoring a very elite, very rich ruling class.
Why not exert pressure on Mexico to take a look at the way the wealth in their own country is distributed, and instead of asking the US to solve their economic problems.
Why? Cause the rich elite in this country want to keep wages low by having an endless supply of cheap labor. It is not fair to the citizens of this country, not is it fair to immigrants from Mexico.
It is the economy, stupid.
The Hi Tech folk out here in the Bay Area are up in arms
over the new immigration plan. This link to todays SF Chronicle
titled:
VISA PLAN ANGERS SILICON VALLEY; Immigration bill would limit employers' choice of workers, is a misnomer. If you read the articles they've been putting out lately, what they're pissed at is that under the old plan, an H1B worker was an indentured servant. They could only be sponsored by and work for one company. If anything went wrong, the company could call immigration & say they'd cancelled the workers "contract" and the person would be deported. Under the new plan, a qualified worker can work for whomever he can get a job from & has the right to switch jobs.
What's really screwed is that highly profitable companies have been using the H1B visa program to hire low payed programmers rather than hire a more highly paid American. It isn't as if there aren't enough Americans to do the jobs, there are tons of programmers looking for better work in Silicon Valley right now. These companies just wanted paid slaves.
I'm all for trying to make your product more competative in a marketplace, but when you're screwing the very people (US workers) you claim to champion, it just seems to me there's a very bad moral disposition to these corporations. I'm not one who thinks corporations only responsibility is to their shareholders. I think they have a responsibility to the communities they exist in as well. But I understand communities don't have stockholder voting rights.
Where's the middle ground here?
But, but, but
It's free markets, free people. Profits create equality, only not for you. Free markets are encouraged by a minority of ultra rich financial investers, and enable the creation of a larger and larger majoriy of poor. As the price of everything goes up, wages go down.
Surely there is a better way.
When will people stand up for themselves. Can they go on strike to protest, or will they just import from the vast labor pool of the world and say sorry, you lose!
I hope people start to see this issue more clearly. There needs to be some standard of ethics and fairness around the world, for corporations and for workers in this new global economy.
It is the economy, stupid.
Who says this?
I don't think I have ever heard that before. It is, of course, total nonsense. Profits create wealthy people. It is the free markets that create the equality.
This is also pure nonsense. I promote free markets and I am by no means a member of the group of "ultra rich financial investers".
Republican Maverick at Large
-4:Strongly Disagree; 0:Meh; +4:Strongly Agree
Profits create equality
maybe was the wrong turn of the phrase.
The mantra of the WSJ and the invester class is that free markets are the best thing since greased lightening.
Let's outsource American companies overseas, because it will raise up China's standard of living, while benefiting Americans with cheap goods. Therefore globalization supports "equality" with free markets.
Chinese people generally are now more equal financially to the US than they were before free markets took US companies overseas. That is what I meant.
It is the economy, stupid.
Fair enough.
Do you disagree with this part?
Is this not true?
Republican Maverick at Large
-4:Strongly Disagree; 0:Meh; +4:Strongly Agree
Yes.
It's true. But at what price. Look at the pollution in Hong Kong, one factor among many others.
And what is wrong with being a rice paddy farmer. It is their culture and their heritage. Why do we dishonor their ways and the rewards of their labor. Besides organic is now seen, after all is said and done as having value.
I am not saying progress is bad, I am saying it needs to show respect for culture, the earth (as in don't poison that which brings you wealth).
Cheap trinkets are not all they are cracked up to be.
I just think things need to slow down to a reasonable pace. Whether that happens or not remains to be seen.
But I am pleased to see people talking about globalization and its consequences, because some of the consequences have been unpleasant and harmful...... in the name of profit for profits sake only. Isn't that a sin...... as in greed and gluttony.
It is the economy, stupid.
You just can't help yourself, can you?
It is not about profits for profit's sake only. That is a fallacy which reveals your bias (bigotry?).
And this is our fault how? Who's running that country anyway? Are you suggesting that we are bullying the Chicoms?
Republican Maverick at Large
-4:Strongly Disagree; 0:Meh; +4:Strongly Agree
The illegals already HAVE a path to citizenship.
Go home, and come in legally using the existing process. They just don't LIKE that path, obviously.
I am totally against giving anyone here illegally a fast track to citizenship. Let them go to the back of the line and follow the legal process to actually BE an immigrant. If you are here illegally, your are NOT an immigrant ... you are a criminal and should be deported.
If the existing legal process is insufficient, then fix THAT.
Enforce the borders and enforce the laws. Why are the Democrats (and some Republicans) supporting this lawless behavior?
Republican Maverick at Large
-4:Strongly Disagree; 0:Meh; +4:Strongly Agree
What would you do
with the 12 million people who are already here illegally and have been here for several years? Cite for me an example of a nation that has successfully moved 12 million people.
Should we distinguish between those illegals who have spent their time here working, paying taxes and not getting into trouble and those who are deadbeats and/or criminals?
qui tacet consentire
here is a counter example
We probably have a few million criminals out there, and not in jail yet. Cite me for example a nation that caught all their criminals and put them in jail? So just because you can't get them or even most of them, does that mean we should just give up trying and legalize what they did?
Yeah, ok man. Great solutions.
"To discuss evil in a manner implying neutrality, is to sanction it." AR
What you ask is impossible
It would be far more difficult to round up all the Bush Administration cronies and send them to jail than to deport all the illegals.
I'm afraid some of the Bush cronies are going to end up getting off with no punishment.
qui tacet consentire
More LOL
Gee, and down below you claimed to prefer living in a reality-based universe? You seem to slip in and out of reality a lot. You should probably get that checked out! :)
Republican Maverick at Large
-4:Strongly Disagree; 0:Meh; +4:Strongly Agree
They are here
and I don't think we can put them on busses and ask them to leave.
A new trail of tears.
It is the economy, stupid.
Me?
I would deport them, one at a time. I recognize that this might take a long time. I also recognize that this is never going to happen, but it SHOULD happen.
While I certainly don't condone the reasons that they chose to move the people in question, one example would be Germany. My only point is that this is a valid example to answer your question, so spare me the Nazi references.
No, we should not. By definition they are all criminals. The only distinction is the severity of their offenses.
Again, this is all moot. We both know that they are never going to be deported, and that they are going to receive amnesty, and that we are going to use them to pay the social security taxes needed to fund the baby boomer retirements ... assuming, of course, that they don't represent a net drain on the entire Social Security system which is a very real possibility.
Republican Maverick at Large
-4:Strongly Disagree; 0:Meh; +4:Strongly Agree
I would deport them, one at
By my calculations, if we somehow manage to deport 1,000 illegals every single day, including Christmas, it would take 32.87 years to deport 12 million people.
I prefer to work within a reality-based universe.
Face it. These 12 million people are not going anywhere. They are here to stay. And many of them are the kind of hard-working, taxpaying people we would want to be Americans anyway.
So let's concentrate on getting control of the border so the number doesn't become 20 million and concentrate on getting rid of the deadbeats and criminals who are here illegally -- the people who are dragging society down.
qui tacet consentire
LOL
You are so sure of what I am going to say that you can't even adjust your talking points to match what I actually said. Hilarious.
Well, I guess we better get started then, eh? Or streamline the process. Why only 1,000 per day? Why not 10,000 per day and be done in a few years, since this is all hypothetical anyway?
You complain that I am not being "reality-based", yet you then proceed to say exactly the same thing:
I think I did, and in the very comment that you quoted.
So, when "I" say that they aren't going anywhere I am living in la la land, but when "YOU" say that they aren't going anywhere you are living in the "reality-based universe"! Just hilarious.
Do you even read your own posts for consistency?
I fully agree with this. But none of this is inconsistent with what SHOULD happen.
Republican Maverick at Large
-4:Strongly Disagree; 0:Meh; +4:Strongly Agree
What should happen
is fantasy if it CANNOT happen. That is what people here on Planet Reality know.
We should all live in peace and harmony and brotherhood and love one another, but since that isn't going to happen either we have to come up with other solutions, don't we?
Since 12 million people aren't going to be put on Greyhounds bound for the border -- whether it is 1,000 a day or 100,000 a day -- how about coming up with a realistic solution instead of blaming liberals and burying your head in the sand.
qui tacet consentire
Yea, that's what I said!
Almost, anyway. Technically it CAN happen as I pointed out, I just admit up front that it WON'T happen, which has the same effect for our purposes here.
I agree, that's why I said it. Welcome aboard!
Hmm, let's think about that. 1) They are already here. 2) We are not going to send them back. Solution: 3) They get to stay.
Note that (3) isn't so much a solution as a foregone conclusion. If they get to stay, what's left to solve?
Republican Maverick at Large
-4:Strongly Disagree; 0:Meh; +4:Strongly Agree
It is very disappointing
This bill on immigration is such a sham....... the American people hate it.
Big business loves it.
Why does Congress support it? Because the Congress both democrats and republicans are supported by corporate donations.
I think this bill is a piece of trash and should be thrown in the garbage. It does not serve the people well.
True story: A friend worked for Visa Credit Card Co, was well paid. He was told that he would be leaving and that he would be training is replacement an foreigner with a visa, who would be working of course for less. He would receive a years severance pay ONLY if he completed the training of his foreign replacement.
He ended up working for the same company a year in a different location (long commute) for lower pay, and much stricter rules on proper 'behavior' for employees.
That is what the free marketers call 'free market competition'. It is bs.
It is the economy, stupid.
actually yes that is freedom
it's freedom to hire and fire whoever the hell you want. It's much freer than you telling the companies, via the government, what they can and can't do with their employees.
"To discuss evil in a manner implying neutrality, is to sanction it." AR
It is freedom
only in the Orwellian sense.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed, by their Creator, with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of a year's severance package, but only if they tyrain their foreign replacements.
qui tacet consentire
it is freedom
in the non-socialist sense. :)
"To discuss evil in a manner implying neutrality, is to sanction it." AR
Tell me that
when you are 53 years old and your company dumps you in order to save a few thousand a year by hiring a 25-year-old from Bangalore.
And I will tell you to buck up and go find a job making fries at Wendy's.
qui tacet consentire
don't give me sob stories
that in no sense invalidate the fact that no one should have an absolute right to keep their job. That has nothing to do with freedom.
"To discuss evil in a manner implying neutrality, is to sanction it." AR
And you guys on the right
are the ones who supposedly hate Darwin.
qui tacet consentire
check how well
what you are advocating is working out in France.
"To discuss evil in a manner implying neutrality, is to sanction it." AR
Oh, I see
it's either one extreme or France.
We don't live in France, though I have been there. It is very nice. They have nice museums and topless beaches.
qui tacet consentire
I don't mind
exporting the topless beaches, but not their economic problems.
"To discuss evil in a manner implying neutrality, is to sanction it." AR
exactly
we have our own economic problems to deal with!
Unregulated immoral capitalism that imports cheap labor, undercuts American wages, and outsources American companies overseas.....:-)
It is the economy, stupid.
Two sides of the same coin.
You say "imports cheap labor". I say "raises the standard of living for poor people around the world."
The argument ofr why they are all coming here is to better their circumstances in life, right? Are you saying that is inaccurate or a bad thing?
Republican Maverick at Large
-4:Strongly Disagree; 0:Meh; +4:Strongly Agree
If you are so interested
in raising the standard of living of the rest of the world, then why is it you don't advocate open borders?
Wouldn't it be much more efficient if they all came here?
What about all the poor Mexicans who can't make it here? Should we send buses to Mexico City to bring them up here?
qui tacet consentire
Nicely done sir.
It is the economy, stupid.
Thank you :)
qui tacet consentire
You keep arguing with me like I am
advocating for this, which I have said I am not. I am merely describing what is happening as I see it, whether I like it that way or not.
I don't necessarily feel the need to raise the standard of living for eveyone else, but I am not against their trying to do so on their own. Although I am surprised to hear the liberal leaning folks on this site being so protectionist at the expense of Third World countries and their peoples.
Open borders is not the same thing as free trade. I can be against open borders (for my security) and also for global free trade (for the good of everyone on the planet). These are not mutually exclusive positions.
No, it is crowded enough here as it is. Let's instead send the jobs to them. As I said, Mexico can access the American job market just as India has done without the need to send everyone up here.
Why do you want to deny the poor of the world a chance to improve their lot in life? That may not be you intent, but that sure is the way that it sounds.
Republican Maverick at Large
-4:Strongly Disagree; 0:Meh; +4:Strongly Agree
How did I know
you were going to say that? :)
I think
you make a mistake when you take it to this extreme position...... of absolute rights.
There is a middle ground that provides for a sense of job security, and safety nets that prevent violent political unrest and upticks in crime, that comes from a jobless population that feels hopeless against an invasion of insourced labor and outsourced jobs.
It is the economy, stupid.
I am as much at risk as the next guy due
to outsourcing. I think it sucks, but I don't demonize the corporations for doing what they are supposed to do: driving costs out to lower the cost of their goods (which by the way lowers the COST of living and thus raises the STANDARD of living across the boards).
There is a solution to all of this outsourcing, BTW. Agree to work for what the guy in India is agreeing to work for and I am sure that the company will be more than happy to let you keep your job.
Americans are just not willing to do that.
Republican Maverick at Large
-4:Strongly Disagree; 0:Meh; +4:Strongly Agree
Hmmm
Will your mortgage company agree to accept less each month to reflect your new economic reality?
Will the grocery store now recognize that you are now subsisting on Third World wages and give you half off a box of Corn Flakes?
qui tacet consentire
No, and no.
That's why it sucks ... for us. But do you deny the guy in India the right to make a living too?
Through globalization the wage structures and the standards of living are going to equalize. Up until now there have been large disparities, something that liberals frequently point out.
This process will have the effect of "lowering" the standard of living for the "haves" and significantly raising the standard of living for the "have nots". This is the very effect that we are seeing with outsourcing and the illegal immigrants.
Until things equalize world-wide the "haves" are going to be feeling constantly squeezed as you are articulating above.
EDIT:
I am NOT advocating for anything here. I am merely observing the reality around me and describing what I see for your consideration.
Republican Maverick at Large
-4:Strongly Disagree; 0:Meh; +4:Strongly Agree
Basically, I don't care
as much about the guy in India as I care about the guy down the street whose kid is in my child's class at school.
Call me a wacky and crazy liberal, I guess.
Sounds like something Karl Marx could appreciate. Or maybe his brother, Groucho.
qui tacet consentire
I don't like it.
But I, like everyone else, is going to have to live through it.
Is taking from the rich and giving to the poor not a liberal ideal? In the US this takes the form of progressive tax rates. Globally it takes the form of outsourcing and illegal immigrants.
Republican Maverick at Large
-4:Strongly Disagree; 0:Meh; +4:Strongly Agree
It isn't taking from the rich
It's taking from the American middle class and giving to the Third World to further enrich the American upper class.
qui tacet consentire
Nice try.
Relative to the Third World, the American middle class ARE the rich. Hell, relative to the Third World the American poor ARE the rich.
Every society has its winners and its losers and those in between. The Third World is no different. The only thing that is being equalized is the differences between the corresponding social strata within these countries.
Republican Maverick at Large
-4:Strongly Disagree; 0:Meh; +4:Strongly Agree
Sorry, I still don't care
as much about some guy in Bangladesh as I do about the guy down the street.
You see, the guy down the street belongs to my tribe -- the Americans. The guy in Jakarta or Bangkok or Dacca belongs to a different tribe.
My tribe = good. Other tribes = not as good.
qui tacet consentire
And neither do I.
Hey, I would be happy to see the guy down the street get ahead too. But I am not going to support policies which, in the long run, let me do so at the expense of the poorer countries in the world.
Do you believe in Equal Opportunity? Do you retrict that notion to just the US? Why, because of some tribe concept you have in your head?
Republican Maverick at Large
-4:Strongly Disagree; 0:Meh; +4:Strongly Agree
But the American middle class
doesn't live in the third world. They live, pay mortgages taxes and stuff here at US rates.
And if you're going to bring up income inequality (you said it not me) why is it that the CEO's who as little as 20 years ago were making 50 times the average workers rate are now clearing over 440 times their average workers rate?
It's because the workers don't sit down with the board at the compensation hearings. It's an incestuous little circle jerk on the chiefs part.
This is true.
And why are those expenses so high? Because Americans demand so much in terms of pay. The cost of labor is ultimately just turned right back around by the corporations and passed on to their consumers. It is a vicious circle.
Prices go up, people need and demand more to maintain their standard of living, costs to corporations rise, which in turn drives prices up. This is the basic cause of inflation.
The cycle can run backwards too, though. Corporations outsource jobs to cheap labor, costs decrease, competition forces the savings to be passed back to the consumers, cost of living drops, so consumers can get by on less.
The world is just at a point in time where we are observing the latter case due to the cheap labor in other countries coupled with the globalization of the economy.
Why are CEOs making 440 time their average workers? Because they can demand, AND receive, that much for their services. CEOs are a commodity too. They sell their expertise just as much as the brick layer or the painter does. They both demand as much as the market will bear. Demand too much, and you get undercut by cheap labor.
Republican Maverick at Large
-4:Strongly Disagree; 0:Meh; +4:Strongly Agree
You speak like you don't live here in the US.
What, are you FRENCH or something?
What the hell is that supposed to mean?
I speak like a capitalist, which in case you haven't noticed is a particularly American perspective.
Republican Maverick at Large
-4:Strongly Disagree; 0:Meh; +4:Strongly Agree
You have a way with words!
I love the way you are taking this complex issue and boiling it down into easy to understand language!
It is the economy, stupid.
Look
Here is where I am coming from on this:
If you start the XYZ Co. tomorrow and go out and hire a bunch of guys in India to make and sell your product, I have no problem with that.
If you own the XYZ Co. which has been in business for 50 years and decide one day that the 20 percent annual profit margin you are used to has suddenly dipped to an intolerable 15 percent so you decide to replace 100 workers who have been with you loyally for 30 of those years and will never get similar paying jobs because they are 55 years old because you can hire 100 guys in India for half as much and you don't have to give them the health insurance that you agreed to give your American workers (apparently while a gun was put to your head), then I have a MAJOR problem with that.
There is more to the employer-employee relationship than a simple wage vs. work calculation. There is loyalty and trust, for instance.
But loyalty isn't reflected in the quarterly earnings reports, so CEOs have to do something, anything, to temporarily boost the bottom line to get the institutional investors off their backs. So they outsource and they lay people off and they close plants to boost the short-term gain at the expense of long-term investment. And then they bail out with their golden parachutes before it hits the fan.
It is sort of like Circuit City, which laid off its older, more experienced sales people to hire younger, cheaper people. They discovered -- surprise, surprise -- that they didn't sell as many TVs and appliances.
qui tacet consentire
I understand completely.
I am completely empathetic to these issues. I work for (what was) a large US telecom company. We have been hit by these types of things over the past 5-10 years constantly. Especially after the tech bubble burst. So I really DO know where you are coming from. I have seen some really good people get caught up in this.
But I still think that the free market system is the best way to run the economy over all. The success of the US is sufficient proof to me of this fact.
I also still believe in equal opportunity to make one's self better and to raise your standard of living through your own efforts. I don't really restrict this idea to the US only, though, I think that this will be true in a global economy as well. So, if our collective goal is to raise the standard of living, overall, for eveyone on the entire planet then globalization and free markets are the way to do that. The process has begun. The effects in the short term are as I have described, at least IMHO.
EDIT:
On the issue of loyalty between employer and employee, I wish that we were still in a world where this concept had any discernable meaning. I have 23+ years with a company that used to have the concept of loyalty to its employees. This is a notion from the past. Labor is now a commodity just like any other resource.
We are free to demand whatever we want for our services, but if someone else is willing to provide the same service for less money I can't really blame the company for wanting to lower their costs. Sucks to be me. I either agree to lower my demand or I find another type of work.
Republican Maverick at Large
-4:Strongly Disagree; 0:Meh; +4:Strongly Agree
Free markets
have that nice word, free, in there, but really the deck has been stacked against us with our own govt's help.
Free markets need some type of brakes, or oversight, or ethical standards, because chasing profit just for profits sake will not work.
Capitalism is definitely a good system, but unregulated free market captialism with no moral grounding is dangerous.
It is the economy, stupid.
market missliberties
I would agree with all but the "moral grounding" part. it is enough that we regulate business according to the interests of our country as a whole.
Morality is an individual thing, and had the founding fathers been able to envision a country with a large secular population, it is my opinion that they would have erected a "wall of separation" between government and morality. To them, freedom of "practice of religion," which incudes most specifically the practice of the morality of that religion, is exactly what Jefferson wanted to wall off.
Should we as individuals reward moral corporations? yes, we should, if we as individuals think it is the right thing to do, and we should do it according to our own morality.
I have a problem with those who think they have THE morality, and that they should have the right to impose it on everyone using the power of the government. Do we really think that there should be laws against sodomy?
"The" morality
is that something different than being a good citizen. A citizen is required to be reasonably productive, obey the laws and not harm others.
Why shoud global corporations be able to get out of being good citizens in our world.
The universal moral code...... man seeks it always. Einstein did. Eleanor Roosevelt did. Philosophers do.
I don't see that as some sort of evil, seeking unifying principles of ethics and justice as a general guide.
The universal moral code for many corporations today ( and there are fewer and fewer as the seek to merge and consolidate their power) is unadulterated gluttony in the quest for a good quarterly profits report. Every empire falls. It is a lesson of history.
I am a hopeful sort, and I see changes in the wind and a new awareness rising and part of it is blowback from the consequences of using unrestrained greed and backroom extortion in the quest for power. The quest is disguised the the code word 'free markets'.
It is the economy, stupid.
THE morality--missliberties
is that something different than being a good citizen.
Yes. We don't require anyone to be a good citizen. We should recognize and reward them when they are, if that suits you. The reason , no doubtt, that fro a few years there, you ionly bought you winter clothes from Aron Feuerstein's Malden Mills.
Why shoud global corporations be able to get out of being good citizens in our world.
The mission of a corporation is to make a profit, and it is expected to make an attempt to do so within the law. I think all this romantic thought would be cured by a little stock ownership. The easiest way for a corporation to be "immoral" is to intentionally refuse to make a profit for its owners w=hen it could, say, by ignoring the wishes of its owners to "be a good citizen."
A citizen is required to be reasonably productive, obey the laws and not harm others.<?i>
Does that mean that because I am out of work, I am not, thereby, a good citizen? Talk about the good old WASP Puritan work ethic.
No, we don't require anyone to be a good citizen. We may wish they were, we may hoipe they are, we may even exp[ect them to be. But our jails are not filled with those who have somehow failed to be a good citizen. There is no laws which require adjudication for "failure to be a good citizen."
We believe that citizens and corporations should do what ever they freely do without breaking the law.
As for harming others, impossible to avoid. When you get a job, other applicants are harmed. Should the good citizen avoid excluding others from a job by taking it himself? Is taking a job for which others apply not just an example of "unrestrained greed." What of the hungry children of the other applicants? What of me, who has an income of exactly $24 over two years? Where are you good citizens?
I find your loine of reasoning to be extremely frightening.
A toast
to your immoral citizens.
and another one to your unlovely world.
It is the economy, stupid.
Hmmm
It is getting a bit hard to figure out who is responding to whom the way the reply boxes are lining up, but...
Like everything else, the free market is prone to excess, which is why we have antitrust laws and wage discrimination laws and pollution regulations and safety requirements and Social Security and overtime regulations etc. etc.
Or would you rather the market just took care of everything?
qui tacet consentire
Use the parent button to see which
post a given comment is attached to...
I favor a minimum of regulation on the market, but I certainly favor anti-trust laws. I believe that true competition is a critical ingredient to making a capitalist syste, work. Monopolies, obviously, work against the benefits incurred through competition.
I also have no problem with these things: wage discrimination laws and pollution regulations and safety requirements.
Social security is another matter altogether, but since it is here now I don't think that there is any way to put it back in the bottle.
Overtime regulations? I guess that those are OK too, especially for certain industries where alertness is a key requirement.
Minimum wage laws? They are evil and should be abolished. Let the market set the price. Artificial barriers always lead to inefficiencies within the system, and thus they are always a source of higher than needed costs and prices.
Republican Maverick at Large
-4:Strongly Disagree; 0:Meh; +4:Strongly Agree
So would you say institutional investors
and their insistance on constant growth in their quarterly earnings reports are the problem.
Are these institutional investors the share holders, or the stock holders?
It is the economy, stupid.
What's the difference between these two?
I think that these are the same people.
Republican Maverick at Large
-4:Strongly Disagree; 0:Meh; +4:Strongly Agree
Institutional investors
like fund managers who invest huge blocks of money, often from pension funds generated by workers -- which is more than a bit ironic.
qui tacet consentire
Thanks!
I appreciate your perspective on all this, which I think is brilliant in its simplicity.
If I could I would hire you to be THE go to guy, lobbyist to speak for the interests of the American people!
It is the economy, stupid.
old company--quaoar
Oddly, you are tryng to create a situation where it is profitable toi own a company and close it down every few years so that one can escape the legacy costs (like a loyal workforce that has gone up the pay scale and has advanced benefits, say), thus throwing everyone out of work. This strategy would allow the company to carry its assets to a new company which could hire people from the next India.
We don't keep older (that is, longer) employees in unskilled jobs like Circuit City bedcause oit makes no sense to do so. the reasons for that are many and varied, but include the modern demand that the focus be on quarterly profits rather than long term growth and financial stability, and because loyal employees are no longer as valuabel as they used to be.
Marx's Utopian Dream
is disguised as raising the standard of living around the world, at the expense of the middle class, disguised as free markets, free people.
It's a tyranny imposed upon us and assault on reason.
It is the economy, stupid.
Why are you being beligerent.
Like I am saying that I WANT things to be like this?
For us as the "haves" it sucks. I agree. But I am not going to deny the "have nots" their opportunity to have a better life. Are you?
Republican Maverick at Large
-4:Strongly Disagree; 0:Meh; +4:Strongly Agree
PUt me down as agreeing with
Q wholeheartedly and enthusiastically when he says,
I am not saying that you want things to be like this, but let's not pretend that it is something that it isn't.
Just like MS said yesterday, why does the US think that it has to take care of all the worlds problems, when we can't.
If people in third world countries want a better life, then let them find their own solutions at their own pace without disrupting their culture. There are many ways to lift people up around the world without bringing everyone that needs a job into the United States.
It is the economy, stupid.
I think that you have it a little backwards.
The US is not forcing our jobs or our culture on the Third World countries, the Third World countries are coming to our corporations (because they have the jobs) and offering to work for less.
Again, it is not us trying to lift THEM up, it is THEM trying to lift THEMSELVES up.
Some, like India, do it via outsourcing. Others, like Mexico, do it via illegal immigration.
The underlying desire on the part of the foreign worker is the same, to have a better life. The motivation of the corporation in both cases is the same, to lower their costs.
The equalization of standards of living that I am referring to is NOT a consciously thought out and intended program or policy. It is merely a natural outcome of the free market for labor coupled with the globalization of that market. It is automatic and not guided by any explicit desire to "help the poor", that is just the effect.
Republican Maverick at Large
-4:Strongly Disagree; 0:Meh; +4:Strongly Agree
In that case
Why don't we just sell them guns so they can overthrow their inefficient governments?
qui tacet consentire
Why are you acting lke this? n/t