Entitlements - what's so bad about them?

Yes, you can only think of one. But then you could not find anything an astronomer since Galileo got wrong despite having searched for it. So perhaps we should not just rely on your imagination. So your answer is liberals suck. As always...

This is so true. My friend was telling me about how almost every one in his department was sacked and their role was out sourced to India because wages much lower, there.The corporation (a so called wealth creator) only considers the bottom line insofar keeping the share holders and the board happy by making as much profit anyway it can.It's not a social wealth creator it is a select in group wealth creator from the sweat of another man's brow.

In my country the big corporations also tend to out source a lot to India. One of the biggest reasons is that the labour force in India does not tend too stike too often.Over here strikes last for a month or two. Every year.Edited by Pressie, : No reason given.

I would be interested to see you support your assertion that America has the highest standard of living for it's poorest.What you have missed is that as soon a one person starts employing anyone that employer immediate retards the ability of any one else to employ people. If a car washer sets up shop and employs another person (at a lower wage than himself) he is litterally denying another person the opportunity to bootstrap himself in the same way.By this logic as soon as you employ anybody you reduce their ability to 'go it alone' and reach for the American dream.This leads us to the point where the original car washer employes so many people that he no longer needs to actually do any work. He has distracted any competition by employing those who would be his potential competitors.Economic bullying by any other name. In a fair society people would only benefit from what they themselves could bring to the table: not what other people do for them.Think about Bill Gates: in incredibly rich chap. But does what he does today in terms of effort and time stack up against a fireman or nurse? Of course not.He get paid the amount he does for something he did in the past. As do the children of the mega rich. Think about that for a second: they get a living because of something their ancestors did. As an Englishman that has startling similarities to our Royal families.Are you saying that a capitalist society that generates effective financial royalty after a generation of two at the expense of the working classes is a good this and these scions are entitled to that wealth?

From my Calvinist religious past: Sins of the fathers. That's why some kids will be rich for ever. And others will be poor for ever.

Just going from first principles I would suggest that in general the very religious would be more authoritarian than liberals.Science makes takes no dogmatic authority with it findings. These finding are always open to dispute a revision. The is no authority, only evidence.A theist (such as fundamentalist xainity) gets their evidence from the God via the bible. As right conservatives generally support right wing authoritarianism that fits nicely with the Bible (the social conformity bit) I can see how in general liberals go for science and the more authoritarian go for Jesus.Hope that helps.

We used to have loads of strikes in the 70s and early 80s. With a too left wing government the unions got out of hand.But today we rarely have country wide strikes but IT jobs still get outsourced out of the country taking money out of the economy while still lining the pockets of the board of directors.

Unfortunately, in my country that's the rule today. Everyone strikes for a few months a year. Every year. All scattered over the year. We still have them frequently. Every year. And every union strikes at least once a year. Not much gets done. Same here. I think the worst part is that most of the major companies transferred their head offices and primary listings on stock exchanges out of the country. We have more than double the amount of welfare recipiant families than the number of actual tax payres (this includes individual tax payers as well as companies; all taxpayers). The system is not sustainable.Less tax to be obtained by the Government to pay for their ridiculously high welfare bills.India is a big winner because of it.Edited by Pressie, : No reason given.

Was that really the problem or just another symptom of upper management trying to steal more from the workers?Now that the unions have been effectively busted (Reagan policies), is the middle class better off or worse off?My opinion of the unions back then was that they should be unnecessary, that laws should be used to provide the benefits and conditions that workers were striking for so that those benefits and working conditions were applied to all workers, not just those in the unions.Now we have strikes again, and we also have unions forming again ... because the causes of strikes are still with us -- unfair treatment of workers.The Occupy Movement did not occur out of happiness with the status quo, and it isn't going away any time soon either.And you should be happy about that.

Lots of people who are productive are on government handout programs because they aren't adequately compensated for their productivity. Armed Forces members and Walmart employees are two well-known examples.

Nope, they were moved elsewhere in the corporation expanse of Johnson Worldwide and they got bonuses. Leased, so no loss there. Sold to other companies that used same time of equipment, one of which had been a distant competitor ... so no major loss there either, especially for the whole Johnson Worldwide bottom line (look them up - not small potatoes - they could lose a million and have hardly a hiccup). Interesting that you had to make stuff up to tell yourself this lie. All they lost was access to a good income, and they lost it because of excessive greed and a false sense of entitlement that they could take more. Amusing, now it is big government's fault? Really? Can you tell be what department controls golden parachutes? Would that be the department of delusions? The company employed between 60 and 80 workers. What wasn't his fault and how was he penalized?The workforce doubled and the profits doubled several times while I was there, but there was no change to the work hours and labor of management. The CEO even worked less and took home more.So no, not what you think in any way. This is a common misperception of what happens and who "pays" for failure, but reality is that companies in many cases are rewarded for buying up and trashing companies (Baine for example) ... because of tax laws, the money takers are rarely hurt financially.Edited by RAZD, : ...Edited by RAZD, : ...

Sounds like dead (unchanged) dogma to me ... and an excuse to avoid looking for solutions. Keep assuming it is same-old same-old and you have no impetus to change it. When it is unjust, just as they react to unjust actions of corporations ... people want to be treated fairly and be able to see justice done, and they are unhappy when this doesn't happen. What a surprise eh? Do you think it is level? Do you think that different pay rates for women doing the same job as men is a level playing field? Or different pay rates for people of different races?I would say that any measure of discrimination would indicate a non-level playing field, and this is something we can all see. [qs]What special interest makes that claim? ... Try google for an answer for how many sources. Of course most people don't make minimum wage -- that is not the issue.But when you look at who makes minimum wage (or less) you find that some 40% are single women heads of households ... in jobs they have held for years ... and that even many first level "management" jobs are less than minimum wage, often categorized as "management" so that they are on salary and then told to work overtime with no additional pay. More low income people spending more money means money returned directly to the economy, which then benefits everyone. The economy is the movement of money, not the accumulation of money. People hoarding money do not help the economy, so if you want to boost the economy then you need to have more spenders. Raising the minimum wage creates more spenders. Can you prove that assertion of increased cost? A study of Wallmart showed that increasing their wages to minimum wage (a) meant we no longer had to support them with food stamps and (b) would increase costs less than 1.5% if the total cost of the wage increase were passed on directly to the consumer. So there would be 1.5% increase in cost from minimum wage and over 300% increase in cost due to CEO greed and perceived entitlement? And I can't see them being happy with the money lenders, unless they don't heed that little bit from Jesus ...No I think it is about authoritarianism, as Larni mentioned. Unquestioned obedience to leadership is a common trait of religious fundamentalists and conservatism ... unless of course that leader is one of "them" ... versus those that question everything (science questions everything, progressives question policies, both look for evidence of what works).So I think it is self-sorting, generally, but with a fair bit of overlap. And I find it interesting that fewer people self identify as conservative on surveys the more the anti-science teabillies say the foolish and idiotic stuff they spout. Ted (green eggs and spam) Cruz probably does more for the progressive cause than Obama. What fantasy source did you get this information from?The US spends more than 3 times the military expenditure of the other top 10 spending countries combined. This is clearly excessive.U.S. Military Budget: Components, Challenges, Growth

quote:

---

The U.S. military budget is $756.4 billion for FY 2015. This includes:

​

• $495.6 billion for the base budget of the Department of Defense (DoD).
• $85.4 billion for Overseas Contingency Funds for the wind-down of the War in Afghanistan.
• $175.4 billion for defense-related agencies and functions. This includes the Veterans Administration ($65.3 billion), the State Department ($42.6 billion), Homeland Security ($38.2 billion), FBI and Cybersecurity in the Department of Justice ($17.6 billion), and the National Nuclear Security Administration in the Department of Energy ($11.7 billion).

​

That makes military spending the second largest Federal government expenditure, after Social Security ($896 billion). Military spending is dropping, thanks to sequestration and the end of the War in Iraq in 2011. It's all-time high was $851.3 billion in FY 2010. (Source: Office of Management and Budget, 2015 Budget, Summary Tables, Table S-11)

---

Total US budget is 3.7 trillion so the total US military budget is a good 20% of the total budget.Cutting it in half would save some 380 billion dollars. That is about 10% of the total economy.

I've waited a few days to reply to your post, wanting to take the time to reflect carefully and respond calmly.Let's get the personal out of the way first: I grew up in Indiana and Kentucky, spending the school year in a poor white neighborhood (locally referred to as The Bottoms) in Indianapolis, a neighborhood, like many poor city neighborhoods, saddled with grotesque pollution because the poor have no power to prevent it.I spent summers on working farms in western Kentucky that belonged to close relatives. My parents were Depression kids and never requested or received any kind of public assistance; nor have I. I'll stack up my work ethic and independence against anything you can bring to bear from your generic "hills".Now let's consider your claims about the independence and self-sufficiency of rural folks in general in the U.S.Your claim is that the city people are bloodsuckers who prey on the real, hardworking country folks. But the facts show exactly the opposite: The two coasts (more than half of the American population lives within 50 miles of a coast) and the old industrial upper Midwest generate the lion's share of wealth in the U.S. and carry the greatest tax burden; the rural, conservative "red" states make a profit on their federal taxes, receiving ~30 cents more back on each federal tax dollar than the urban, liberal "blue" states.Many rural "red" states boast of low or no income taxes and/or property taxes. That's because they're vacuuming the funds they need from blue state city slicker pockets.American farmers typically, like you, bemoan federal funds spent to assist urban populations. Meanwhile, they receive subsidies to grow and subsidies not to grow, as well as price supports that prevent Americans from enjoying lower, real world prices on many foodstuffs.In addition, we shiftless city folks subsidize your telephone lines, your regional airports and your highways. Due to our greater efficiency at generating wealth, and thus tax receipts, we subsidize nearly every facet of rural life. Many city dwellers, who rent in higher numbers than rural folks, subsidize home purchases by others in both cities and farms: ever buy a house? Did you enjoy the mortgage interest deduction? If so, you were taking wealth from millions of Americans who did not or could not buy a home.And that's okay with me: we're one people, and it is extraordinarily important for both the present and the future that every child have access to a decent life. I do not, in fact, begrudge a single penny.But I do object to being called a leech in the name of Americans who in fact receive far greater largess.And that goes to the heart of what I most criticize in your posts on these subjects. Your claims and assertions bear the hallmark of the coarsest kind of prejudice--the kind that is readily contradicted by even a cursory examination of facts that are more available than ever. But you can't be bothered. You prefer to cling to ethnic, regional and ideological prejudices so tightly that you refuse to even attempt to give them factual support. You wouldn't dream of conducting a scientific debate in this fashion.So the next time you travel to or from your hills, by air or by highway, or call to say you're almost there, or admire the landscape of green fields and woodlots around you...Hey, you're welcome.

Because the two types of mindsets are utterly incompatible. I was sure that even you could see that. To be blunt, creationist beliefs do not stand even a moment of scientific scrutiny. Breaking away from those kinds of beliefs is the start of questioning the entire mindset of people who hold those beliefs. There is no way to give you an answer that you'll like better than one that assumes liberals are the great evil.

Those with enough wealth to do so can manipulate politicians and markets to their own ends. Big Corparatism is at least as damaging as Big Statism in that regard. A pragmatic approach takes what works and changes what doesn't. Blindly adhering to either the idea that market forces always result in the best outcome or that the state is always best is a fools game. It's about balance. It's about genuinely democratic government taking the steps necessary to curb the worst excesses of market forces, concentrations of power and imbalances whilst recognising that the power of markets and personal entrepreneurship can be harnessed to generate wealth and drive forward innovation. Being British rather than American I don't have any great feelings either way about Gore and Soros is, from my perspective, the guy that made billions when Sterling was forced out of the EU Exchange rate mechanism back in the 90s.