Modern Poverty Includes A.C. and an Xbox

reply to post by DZAG Wright


Actually the gent in the project is screwed if the Chinese show up, not the rich gent. He will not get another check and has no where to go. The majority of those folks wind up in labor camps. Now the rich gent in Montana, I would suspect that he has cash or investment accounts. He can get the hell out of dodge easily. Up to Canada, over seas, he can take his cash and bolt and bolt in style. My guess is that being rich he's smart and saw the brewing trouble and prepared for such an event. If the gent is simply an investor its a slam dunk, he has nothing hard and all of the investment accounts are global in nature. If he has a manufacturing concern, he may lose more, but still has a bunch of dough that he can take and run with.

The employer certainly needs the roads for his workers to get to work and for logistics. Funny thing there. He will find someone who will deal with the crappy roads to get to a job, so the concerns there are minimal. As far as logistics and the impact of poor roads on that, everyone would be in the same situation, hence its a wash. Prices would go up to accomodate for the lack of efficiency for everyone.

In case you folks on the left have not figured it out yet, the rich are preparing for flight and have been for years. There are record numbers of folks becoming expatriots right now as folks are taking their cash off the table and moving. I have a friend who just moved to Panama and is living large. He's tired of living in a place where he is demonized by the media and the left/government for being successful and is quite happy living in a place where they actually like rich folks.

Should it really hit the fan, my friend, the rich will be gone. Thousands of bankers/traders and the like have taken their chips off the table. They've seen the market shoot up and made a ton of dough over the past three years and what are they doing now? Other than playing tennis and golf, they are moving their assets to cash in preparation for the absolute skyrocket in interest rates that this administration has created. Oh its not here yet, but its coming. Historical market returns are basically 5% and that contains risk. Why not pump your cash into a 30 year treasury bond and get 10-12 or perhaps Jimmy Carter 20% interest? How about you just wait until California or Illinois goes belly up and the feds guarantee to back-stop their tax free munis which will ultimately happen. Then the bond looks even better since its tax free.

Rail on the rich all you want - the funny thing is that we've seen a great bull market over the past few years and the folks you're railing at are making a ton of dough. Now when the results of Obama's economic buffoonery comes to pass they will make even more dough. Its ironic that the most leftist and business hostile administration we have had in history is in the process of making the next massive crop of really wealthy individuals. What will the rich need to do to get massively richer without risk? Thats the best part - nothing. Call their broker, lock into a bond portfolio and hit the links.

Originally posted by LoneGunMan
reply to post by dolphinfan

 

We the average and the rich should not pay more taxes.

The 1% that owns 99% of our nations wealth (the ones that are untouchable) should pay a LOT more in taxes.

Now that is fair redistribution of the wealth, you do not get that powerful without being a crook.

this

Originally posted by apacheman
reply to post by neo96

 

There were just as many rich in the USSR as anywhere. Any place as corrupt as it was has tons of rich.

No one needs the rich for squat. If given access to capital, a huge number of folks could be producing vastly more wealth in a year than the current crop of brain-dead rich parasites will ever create in their lifetimes.

They aren't terribly smart, ambititious or anything really...they're just people who had unscrupulous parents who didn't know when to say when on the wealth thing. For every Warren Buffet there's about a thousand Paris Hiltons.

What's with your blind worship of the rich, anyway?

You're right. And, I have a lot of respect for Warren Buffet, but it should be noted he doesn't create wealth either. He is a very smart investor, and he plays a good shell game. He accumulates wealth, but doens't create it. Wealth is created when a society manufactures things of value. The common analogy is taking wood with relatively little value and use, carving it into an axe handle that has more value than the original raw material. That is creating wealth.
This argument that we need the rich is ridiculous. The vast majority do not create anything. Nor do they consume at a level that can support an economy. Moving money around Wall St. and speculating on oil is not creating wealth, it is not providing anyone with jobs. Collecting insurance premiums and working out ways to avoid paying out does not create wealth. These are all just shell games, rigged to benefit the rich.

The true measure of wealth or poverty isn't in whether you happen to have this trinket or that, and it certainly has nothing to do with items like TVs.

True wealth is a form of freedom and where it really manifests itself is in terms of time rather than things. How much time could you go on your savings/liquid assets if you lost your income? It doesn't matter how big your house or how many plasma screens you have if its all highly levereged debt you can't afford and you end up foreclosed a month after losing your job. That's one, very real and immediate way of understanding why true wealth needs to be looked at in terms of time. If you are living paycheck to paycheck you are much more manipulatable than a man who is able to draw on a year's worth of savings. The former man has little leeway to change things around him and is basically at the mercy of his employer. The latter man can walk away more easily, and thus there is less of a hold over him.

Time is the one asset that cannot be replaced. When today is gone, its gone and you can't get it back. When your muscles are slack and your hair is grey you will enjoy that sports-car a lot less than you thought you would at age 20. Mortality and time's arrow of entropy invest our limited time on this planet with much more value than is apparent. TPTB want you to forget this. They want you to chase things instead of learning how to manage your time.

reply to post by silent thunder


Great post. I could not agree more.

Chasing things is the distraction. real wealth is the freedom to say no.

reply to post by silent thunder


Well said. Reminds me of:

"Nothing can be more useful to a man than a determination not to be hurried" -Thoreau

Chasing money is ultimately the big swindle on humanity. People speak in reverent tones about their investments and assets. Modern culture has most completely hypnotized into believing material wealth is the goal of human existence. It is obscene.

reply to post by silent thunder

They want you to chase things instead of learning how to manage your time.

That was one awesome post.

I just have to say.............Thank you for making me feel guilty for buying the most decent swimming pool I have ever owned.......And it is not even that nice.

I figure it is only $300 Federal Reserve Notes.............What the hell though. If the power goes out, I can have a pool party I am currently employed and work in the heat........ and I work my butt off to have this pool...

I am currently buying 1 ounch of silver every week......Just in case it is worth something later on down the road....I consider that to be my savings.....The boss puts in the 401, I personally do not trust the "man" with my money like that anymore.

Thank you for making me think a little tonight.

reply to post by macman


You Obviously never heard of the quote "No man is an Island" it means that none of us is truely independent! If you were really a military man you would know that every soldier depends on each other for his life. So my question to you is why do you think civilian life to be any different?

After all the definition for Civilian is ; A person following the pursuits of civil life, especially one who is not an active member of the military or the police.

Civil life meaning more so then the members of the military. Oh and buy they way if you were or are active military
then I don't support murdering woman and children in nations that have nothing to do with the people of the US.
The costs to the tax payers is far greater then any entitelment programs so it is people like you that are the greatest drain on the tax payers. Oh and I realize you will never respond to this argument because every word of it is right on the money!

reply to post by neo96


I don't hate anyone but the policies of the affluent have to go cause they are totally destructive to the rest of us.
They lack morals, they have no standards, they are accountable to noone and this is why they will step all over
the masses. Of coarse i'm talking about the super rich aristocracy that are the top .1%! these are the people whos business practices have led us to boom and bust cycles to redistribute the monies of those that have worked and not just sat behind a desk or lobbied washington! If we don't stop fighting about the illusion of wealth and worry about what gives us the ability to create this wealth, the resources, we will have nothing but fiat paper to paste to our walls! Energy is what gives us the ability to do work, to create goods but it's getting harder & more expensive to extract! this is why we are done with the boom years! All we have to look forward to is hard times especially considering the redicules waste our economies have. Right now 77% of all jobs in the US are in the service sector & all of Americas labor is either outsourced or mechanized, we ship everything over land water or air, so as the price of energy goes up so will everything else! we need to have centralized distribution and production for all our foods as well as other amenities! If we continue to live like there's no tomorrow we just might not have one or if we do it may be just like one of Mel Gibson's first movies!
We need to wake up before it's too late because the years of luxury are coming to an end and the longer we wait to restructure our infastructure the less sustainability we will have!

For those of you advocating eliminating the rich and spreading the wealth, be very careful what you wish for. Why? Because that is exactly what happened in Germany that allowed Hitler to rise to power. A classless society is communism.

Communism: An advocacy of a classless society in which private ownership has been abolished and the means of production and subsistence belong to the community.

Our country was founded on the principal that anyone can at any time rise above their means and do more for themselves. To advocate spreading the wealth, as so many have on this board have, is an act of treason and contrary to the founding principals of our Republic. The very thought of such a thing is completely contrary to the document so many of you claim you defend and hold dear. You cannot be a defender of the constitution in one breath and object to a classed society in the next. They are not inclusive of one another.

Tell me if some of this doesn't sound familiar? I know of a couple of people who have stated some of these in this thread:

The 25 Points of Hitler's Nazi Party

1. We demand the union of all Germans in a Great Germany on the basis of the principle of self-determination of all peoples.

2. We demand that the German people have rights equal to those of other nations; and that the Peace Treaties of Versailles and St. Germain shall be abrogated.

3. We demand land and territory (colonies) for the maintenance of our people and the settlement of our surplus population.

4. Only those who are our fellow countrymen can become citizens. Only those who have German blood, regardless of creed, can be our countrymen. Hence no Jew can be a countryman.

5. Those who are not citizens must live in Germany as foreigners and must be subject to the law of aliens.

6. The right to choose the government and determine the laws of the State shall belong only to citizens. We therefore demand that no public office, of whatever nature, whether in the central government, the province, or the municipality, shall be held by anyone who is not a citizen.

We wage war against the corrupt parliamentary administration whereby men are appointed to posts by favor of the party without regard to character and fitness.

7. We demand that the State shall above all undertake to ensure that every citizen shall have the possibility of living decently and earning a livelihood. If it should not be possible to feed the whole population, then aliens (non-citizens) must be expelled from the Reich.

8. Any further immigration of non-Germans must be prevented. We demand that all non-Germans who have entered Germany since August 2, 1914, shall be compelled to leave the Reich immediately.

9. All citizens must possess equal rights and duties.

10. The first duty of every citizen must be to work mentally or physically. No individual shall do any work that offends against the interest of the community to the benefit of all.

Therefore we demand:

11. That all unearned income, and all income that does not arise from work, be abolished.

12. Since every war imposes on the people fearful sacrifices in blood and treasure, all personal profit arising from the war must be regarded as treason to the people. We therefore demand the total confiscation of all war profits.

13. We demand the nationalization of all trusts.

14. We demand profit-sharing in large industries.

15. We demand a generous increase in old-age pensions.

16. We demand the creation and maintenance of a sound middle-class, the immediate communalization of large stores which will be rented cheaply to small tradespeople, and the strongest consideration must be given to ensure that small traders shall deliver the supplies needed by the State, the provinces and municipalities.

17. We demand an agrarian reform in accordance with our national requirements, and the enactment of a law to expropriate the owners without compensation of any land needed for the common purpose. The abolition of ground rents, and the prohibition of all speculation in land.

18. We demand that ruthless war be waged against those who work to the injury of the common welfare. Traitors, usurers, profiteers, etc., are to be punished with death, regardless of creed or race.

19. We demand that Roman law, which serves a materialist ordering of the world, be replaced by German common law.

20. In order to make it possible for every capable and industrious German to obtain higher education, and thus the opportunity to reach into positions of leadership, the State must assume the responsibility of organizing thoroughly the entire cultural system of the people. The curricula of all educational establishments shall be adapted to practical life. The conception of the State Idea (science of citizenship) must be taught in the schools from the very beginning. We demand that specially talented children of poor parents, whatever their station or occupation, be educated at the expense of the State.

21. The State has the duty to help raise the standard of national health by providing maternity welfare centers, by prohibiting juvenile labor, by increasing physical fitness through the introduction of compulsory games and gymnastics, and by the greatest possible encouragement of associations concerned with the physical education of the young.

22. We demand the abolition of the regular army and the creation of a national (folk) army.

23. We demand that there be a legal campaign against those who propagate deliberate political lies and disseminate them through the press. In order to make possible the creation of a German press, we demand:

(a) All editors and their assistants on newspapers published in the German language shall be German citizens.
(b) Non-German newspapers shall only be published with the express permission of the State. They must not be published in the German language.
(c) All financial interests in or in any way affecting German newspapers shall be forbidden to non-Germans by law, and we demand that the punishment for transgressing this law be the immediate suppression of the newspaper and the expulsion of the non-Germans from the Reich.

Newspapers transgressing against the common welfare shall be suppressed. We demand legal action against those tendencies in art and literature that have a disruptive influence upon the life of our folk, and that any organizations that offend against the foregoing demands shall be dissolved.

24. We demand freedom for all religious faiths in the state, insofar as they do not endanger its existence or offend the moral and ethical sense of the Germanic race.

The party as such represents the point of view of a positive Christianity without binding itself to any one particular confession. It fights against the Jewish materialist spirit within and without, and is convinced that a lasting recovery of our folk can only come about from within on the pinciple:

COMMON GOOD BEFORE INDIVIDUAL GOOD

25. In order to carry out this program we demand: the creation of a strong central authority in the State, the unconditional authority by the political central parliament of the whole State and all its organizations.

The formation of professional committees and of committees representing the several estates of the realm, to ensure that the laws promulgated by the central authority shall be carried out by the federal states.

The leaders of the party undertake to promote the execution of the foregoing points at all costs, if necessary at the sacrifice of their own lives.

reply to post by haarvik


Hitler and the Nazi's were national socialists, and dedicated enemies of communism. Pick up a book sometime.

reply to post by 0zzymand0s


Call it what you want, but the things you people are angry about is the very same things the German population was angry with as well which allowed Hitler to rise to power. A turd of a different color is still a turd.

reply to post by getreadyalready


Your preaching to the choir man, but thanks for your input...

reply to post by haarvik


I could be really childish here, and point out that Hitler and the National Socialists were authoritarian, and used the pretext of terror attacks to coordinate their rise to power in pre-war Germany. I might also point out that the Nazi's were well connected to the power elite of their day, and that they manipulated the market creating the kind of economic power vacuum which allowed their authoritarian "rule by elite" to thrive and grow, even as the buying power of the average German plummeted, along with the currency the people used to buy food, medicine, energy and shelter.

But history is a complicated beast, and the truth is both sides of our fake "left verses right" paradigm use similar tools to achieve similar goals in our country today. Both are based in authoritarianism and both seem to have an interest in creating a wider gap between "haves and have not's" in the first world, as a way to solidify and galvanize their "base."

The simple truth is that there are a lot of poor people with air conditioning and X-Box's today. Electronics are cheap and have marginal resale value, and this is 2011. As jobs have evaporated over the last 30 years or so, mostly due to so called "free-trade" and market manipulation, the replacement rate for jobs lost has slowed, and finally stopped altogether. What we are left with is a situation where good paying jobs (those that pay above the so called "poverty line") have been replaced by poverty jobs (those that do not). Over the last 8 or 9 years, the jobs lost have not been replaced at all (so called "jobless recoveries.")

Do people participate in the new economy by buying cheap electronics when employed above poverty levels, only to subsequently lose their jobs to globalization, while retaining cheap electronics such as TV sets and X-Boxes? Why yes they do! Hating them for it seems counter-intuitive, because yesterday they were just like you, and tomorrow, you may be just like them. After all -- your "job" depends on their buying power in order to remain in full effect, and that buying power is shrinking at an ever increasing rate.

TL;DR?

Both parties have pursued economic policy that have kept wages flat or falling for the majority of Americans, while promoting increases in the real cost of things like energy, food, shelter and medicine, which -- conveniently enough -- are NO LONGER indexed to the rate of inflation.

Your enemies are those who profit from this growing division, and they do not pay taxes, or contribute to your society by creating jobs, except as a diversion verses the sheer number of jobs destroyed by their authoritarian policies and preferences.

Originally posted by neo96
reply to post by Jezus

 

for crying outloud get off that crap

the government is the end all be all of the american existence blaming the rich is pointless.

the policies and the people that are destroying the middle class and the poor are the same people who cheerlead for them.

hate the rich and you kill the only source of revenue the poor and middle class get.

i have yet to see the poor or middle create wealth.

The only thing that can create wealth is labor, how many rich people do you see working? Sure they try and monopolize god-given resources and bribe others to perform labor FOR them.

In the traditional sense, it is the poor and middle class who start most of the businesses that employ Americans. The rich don't create real businesses anymore, they gamble their money in the world economy.

reply to post by nosacrificenofreedom


I love the "no man is an island" business. It is the same notion paraphrased by every mass murdering socialist/communist and fascist for eons. Mao was all about no man is an island. Great concept on paper until 40 million folks get eliminated.

The logic of philosophy with respect to civil life is that everyone is interdependant and that we all each other to maintain a civil society which of course is rubbish. Now there are things that are a part of the collective that reqiuire mass contribution to build and maintain, but within this thread we are speaking about in many cases folks who do nothing in terms of making a contribution. Why are they needed in society at all? How do they add value to the community?

I am not suggesting in the least that these folks don't add value to society. Of course they do, every human being adds to society.

There is a lot of work that needs to be done around our communities today. Litter picked up, painting, public restrooms cleaned, trains washed and cleaned, parks raked and swept. Why would it be problematic to have those on public assistance show up for work for 40 hours a week in order to get their check? We could certainly figure out ways to accomodate periods of legitimate job searching, education, etc. Have folks show up every day, a day care facilitiy would be on sight, and get assigned a job. If that were happening, I think there would be practically zero complaints about assistance programs.

These programs rob the tax payer by their mismanagement and incompetent construction. They rob those who merely need additional temporary assistance by their lack of flexibility and sensitivity. They fail society because they provide no real methodology to make the need for assistance temporary. Worst of all the rob every one of the potential of the contribution of those on these programs.

reply to post by dolphinfan


I have zero problems with this type of public works exchange for assistance dollars. It's a terrific motivational tool for those on assistance, and it provides needed resume building activities for later on.

However -- lets not kid ourselves here: We are going to need a long term plan for rebuilding jobs in this country, or we will continue to see a rise in the numbers of formerly middle and working class folk needing assistance.

The country will sparkle though. I'll give you that!

Originally posted by dolphinfan
reply to post by nosacrificenofreedom

 

I love the "no man is an island" business. It is the same notion paraphrased by every mass murdering socialist/communist and fascist for eons. Mao was all about no man is an island. Great concept on paper until 40 million folks get eliminated.

The logic of philosophy with respect to civil life is that everyone is interdependant and that we all each other to maintain a civil society which of course is rubbish. Now there are things that are a part of the collective that reqiuire mass contribution to build and maintain, but within this thread we are speaking about in many cases folks who do nothing in terms of making a contribution. Why are they needed in society at all? How do they add value to the community?

I am not suggesting in the least that these folks don't add value to society. Of course they do, every human being adds to society.

There is a lot of work that needs to be done around our communities today. Litter picked up, painting, public restrooms cleaned, trains washed and cleaned, parks raked and swept. Why would it be problematic to have those on public assistance show up for work for 40 hours a week in order to get their check? We could certainly figure out ways to accomodate periods of legitimate job searching, education, etc. Have folks show up every day, a day care facilitiy would be on sight, and get assigned a job. If that were happening, I think there would be practically zero complaints about assistance programs.

These programs rob the tax payer by their mismanagement and incompetent construction. They rob those who merely need additional temporary assistance by their lack of flexibility and sensitivity. They fail society because they provide no real methodology to make the need for assistance temporary. Worst of all the rob every one of the potential of the contribution of those on these programs.

Perhaps you missed 15 pages back when I stated that the days of sitting around collecting assistance forever and free have been over since '96? Persons receiving benefits, indeed have to contribute between 87 and 130 hours per month to society.

reply to post by DZAG Wright


The rich are the folks who make substantial businesses possible. Who raises capital to provide folks with ideas enough money to get an idea off the ground? Private equity and venture capital firms and investment banks. If a firm has a terrific idea and need to get through a tough period where do they typically go for money? Rich people.

There are two levels here. On the one hand you are absolutely right. It is the hard working person with an idea who works his tail off, on his own gets an idea off the ground and makes something happen. There are also thousands of companies that are of a different type, they have ideas that requre substantial infrastructure and staff. It might be servers, networks, data center space, systems programmers, what ever. With out the venture capital industry, these firms would die on the vine. Those firms, in an apples to apples comparrison employee infinately more than the mom and pop. There is no business in the world that has greater leverage than one based on intellectual property and they typically need a kick start of investment to get their firms off the ground. Who kick starts them? Rich folks.

For those of you who think the rich add no value, how do you suppose a gent with a small company which has great potential gets the cash needed to open up more stores and expand? Many products or services require quick time to market to get maximum competetive advantage because sooner or later everything becomes commoditized, so getting out there with the idea quickly is the way to go. Where does that get go to get the cash to open another 100 stores? Without capital he can't and he can only get capital from rich people. Now, of course you like the gent with the small business. Keep in mind that you same folks who love him will hate him once the venture capital firm invests money with him, he opens 100 stores, employees 1000 folks. You will hate him because now he's a rich guy. And when the nonsense in the country gets to be too much, tax rates and regulations become too onerous the gent picks up the firm and calls up an investment banker and tells him he wants to sell his firm. The investment bank finds a suitor, the gent cashes out and there you go, another company lost to taxation and over regulation, another now massively rich gent and of the 1000 jobs, over time once they are absorbed into the firm that purchased them, roughly 800 of them lost.

You folks simply don't get it