The Not So "Infinite" Pie

[The_Professor]

I fail to see the problem here with capitalism. If you work hard, you can accomplish almost anything. If you are lazy, then you don't. Which is justifiable, I believe.

Socialism and communism do not reward you for being industrious. People like Bill Gates started with zip and are now wealthy. Nothing wrong wit that, that I can see anyway. In this country, people without advanced degrees have and do become millionaires and are successful in every other sense of the word. Can that happen in pure socialism/communism. Also, doesn't socialism basically protect the lazy?

[kimba1]

it`ll protect the lazy till they become a problem
same as here

[Amianthus]

People like Bill Gates started with zip and are now wealthy.

Bill Gates was not poor.

Unless it's common among the poor to have a mother who's full time job was giving away the father's excess millions.

Bill Gates was born with a silver spoon in his mouth. He was never poor, or even middle class. He was born into a wealthy family.

[Rich]

>>Ok. I was not aware the Scandinavian countries were experiencing such an immigration problem.<<

The problem professor, is that the immagrant are overwhelming Muslim. I've pointed this out several times. The birth rates in Europe are below replacement levels, and it takes workers to keep the welfare state up and running. This crap JS and BO are pushing is just that. It's not that Scandinavia is so wonderful, it's the same thing all over Europe.

[The_Professor]

People like Bill Gates started with zip and are now wealthy.

Bill Gates was not poor.

Unless it's common among the poor to have a mother who's full time job was giving away the father's excess millions.

Bill Gates was born with a silver spoon in his mouth. He was never poor, or even middle class. He was born into a wealthy family.

Sigh, shall I come up with many others then? You're picking at straws here. How about another one of my heroes, Ben Carson? see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Carson.

Are you then saying that there are not many people in this nation that have started with little and become financially successful? Can this happen under pure socialism/communism? Where is the incentive to be productive in that schema?

[Plane]

"...and no tropical diseases that were as fatal to Europeans as malaria, dengue and yellow fever."


 

Yellow fever and Malaria used to be endimic to the Southern US, DDT was really good for that but they can come back and Dengue is coming with them.

[_JS]

People like Bill Gates started with zip and are now wealthy.

Bill Gates was not poor.

Unless it's common among the poor to have a mother who's full time job was giving away the father's excess millions.

Bill Gates was born with a silver spoon in his mouth. He was never poor, or even middle class. He was born into a wealthy family.

Sigh, shall I come up with many others then? You're picking at straws here. How about another one of my heroes, Ben Carson? see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Carson.

Are you then saying that there are not many people in this nation that have started with little and become financially successful? Can this happen under pure socialism/communism? Where is the incentive to be productive in that schema?

You do realize that Maersk, Nokia, and Ikea are all Scandinavian companies, right? Last time I checked they were all rather successful and innovative.

[The_Professor]

Three firms from a dinky country.

But you did not answer my question.

[Plane]

People like Bill Gates started with zip and are now wealthy.

Bill Gates was not poor.

Unless it's common among the poor to have a mother who's full time job was giving away the father's excess millions.

Bill Gates was born with a silver spoon in his mouth. He was never poor, or even middle class. He was born into a wealthy family.

Sigh, shall I come up with many others then? You're picking at straws here. How about another one of my heroes, Ben Carson? see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Carson.

Are you then saying that there are not many people in this nation that have started with little and become financially successful? Can this happen under pure socialism/communism? Where is the incentive to be productive in that schema?

You do realize that Maersk, Nokia, and Ikea are all Scandinavian companies, right? Last time I checked they were all rather successful and innovative.

Are these three good examples of Scandinavian socailst policy?
How?

[Religious Dick]

Canada is not a superpower, despite its huge amount of natural resources, because it lacks the population, but the standard of living is on a par with the US anyway. Canada's government is as democratic as that of the US, if not more so. There are more than two viable parties in most provinces, anyway.
 

Well, let's see - the number of Americans who emigrated to Canada in 2004 was 6,470.

The number of Canadians who emigrated to the United States the same year was 15,569.

Considering Canada has a population only the size of California, that doesn't argue well for Canada's superiority in quality of life...

http://www.migrationinformation.org/datahub/countrydata/data.cfm

We are the envy of whom? What freedoms do I have here that I don't have in Sweden, Denmark, Norway, or Iceland?

The freedom to spend the fruits of my labor on my own benefit, and on things and people who are important to me, rather than on what's important to the government, to the benefit of parasites like you, who are decidedly not important to me...

[Religious Dick]

America?s median hourly wage is barely higher than it was 35 years ago, adjusted for inflation. The income of a man in his 30s is now 12 percent below that of a man his age three decades ago.

By the way, if wages haven't risen in 35 years, why am I always hearing about our need for a massive influx of immigrants? The last I heard, the price of commodities rises with respect to their scarcity. If labor is so scarce we desperately need to import it, why isn't the price of it rising?

Robert Reich is a known idiot. Even if you're going to accept his contention that wages haven't risen since 1973, ask yourself how many Americans owned cell phones, VCR's, computers, iPods, new cars from under $12,000 in today's dollars, and compare the size of the typical home in 1973 with the size of the average home in 2008.

Wages are by far not the only measure of how much the quality of life has improved in the last 35 years. Even if wages haven't improved, they can be spent on life-enhancing goods and services that couldn't have been had at any price in 1973.

[Brassmask]

So Reichs solution to binge buying by the middle and lower classes is to supply them with the equivalent someone else's alcohol?

Here is a better solution.

Live within your means.

While this is excellent advice, it is also a difficult lesson to learn.  It is compounded by the fact that corporations in America BY LAW find that people learning that lesson is antithetical to the end goals of a corporation.

Since it is so antithetical, it is part of a corporation's existence to make sure that no WANTS to learn that lesson so they use advertising to convince Americans that they should be one of several types of afraid.  Afraid that the Jones' are getting ahead.  Afraid that the objects of their sexual desire will not desire them.  Afraid their kids won't be healthy or get into the best school or be stupid...and on and on.

So, when Momma comes in and says that everyone else at work is driving a new car and the old car is losing oil pressure, a lot of times, Daddy is going to do whatever it takes to make sure Momma is happy 'cause she already puts up with a lot and everyone wants the best for the Momma and nobody wants the Boy to be riding in a possible deathtrap.

So, the Daddy is going to try and swing a new car however possible because if he tries to stick to his guns and "live within his means", he's probably going to get a lot of stink eyes from other Mommies and perhaps his own Mommy and then he's got to walk around with that on him constantly along with other god damned thing he's got to think about and worry about.

However, none this changes the fact that those in the top 5% who are so desperately wanting tax cuts to allegedly invest in the American economy are doing nothing of the sort.  The rising tide has not lifted all boats but to the contrary have actually helped some build new boats of paper and have dashed them against the rocks.

The most mind-boggling thought to me in this whole thing is that the top 5% could have averted all this for literally PENNIES on the dollar and still had the same exact lives they lead now replete with $6000 shower curtains by simply raking in money by the same PERCENTAGE rather than by the larger AMOUNTS.

But no, they felt that as the owners or CEO's they somehow were more valuable to the corporation than the guy who turns the nut, pushes the broom or shuffles the papers when in reality, they aren't.

[sirs]

Yep, spend whatever you need to spend, so long as it makes everyone feel better......screw the consequences.  That's for Government to deal with         

[Amianthus]

[snippage]

Gah, what a steaming pile.

[sirs]

That's an understatement