President Obama signs $8.7 billion food stamp cut into law

originally posted by: macman
Really?? Another Socialist take on business.
My wage comes from my employer’s ability to sell said widget/service.
My companies’ monies come from our ability to sell a product/service to a customer.

Socialist take on business? How so? The socialist take on business is that corporations exist to serve the community where they exist. Their first priority isn't to the employees or the owners but rather to the community.

Saying that your customers are the ones who make your business function isn't socialist. Then again we just got off the label topic. Progressive, Socialist, you're just labeling things as terms you dislike out of ignorance.

Are you really comparing a person taking welfare to a person working a job??
What exactly is that welfare person doing for that check??? Oh I forgot. We are paying them not to rob and steal.

Welfare is more about the support of a child (something I think we need to cut back on btw) especially so seeing as how you cannot even get welfare unless you have children and in some cases not even then. SNAP while being a welfare program is not welfare itself. It is an extremely small food stipend so that people don't starve it comes out to just a bit over $100 for a single person and the amount continues to decline each year while food prices go up. Disability is an insurance program that pays out to people who become unable to work if they've paid into the system.

What is the person with 6 kids who refuses to work doing for a check? Not much. And it's a loophole in the system that needs fixed.

What are others doing for their (considerably smaller) checks? Exactly what they were supposed to do.

So again, it is good to take from me, to give to you so you can go to school to maybe get a job paying the listed salary?
I guess I couldn’t have any better plans with MY earned money than to have the Govt remove it from me, take a large portion just for being the Govt and then giving you the left overs.

If you want to live in a society that has skilled labor you must also be willing to accept a system that makes obtaining the necessary education possible. It's the cost of doing business.

Besides that I would hardly call what you pay a large amount. If you're as well off as you imply your effective tax rate is somewhere around 10% just like the Mitt Romneys of the nation.

Sooo, they weren’t needed when the country was founded because there were plenty of jobs…Honestly, where and how do you come up with this crap.
So, if the safety net wasn’t something that was needed, how was it written into the founding documents if they didn’t know what they didn’t know.

Have you paid any attention to the economy for the past 60 years? The better the economy does the less people that end up on some form of assistance as a result. Consequently these times also mirror the times when we've had policies in place that minimize the wealth gap. The purchasing power of minimum wage in 1955 was higher than the purchasing power of a $50,000/year job today. And that was for ENTRY level work. More recently we can compare from 1980 onwards where the purchasing power of wages for virtually everyone other than the top 5% have declined from between 33% to 50%. The top 2-5% have remained about equal and the purchasing power of the top 1% has gone up by more than 1000%.

When wages decline so sharply people are going to end up on assistance.

Oh, so because taxes are okay with you, as they benefit you directly and who would turn away Santa Clause, they are not Tyranny.
What was the revolt about again???Hmmm, seems taxation was a big part…Maybe.

The war was about representation in government. It wasn't an argument against excessive taxation (taxes were even higher after the war). It had to do with being represented by the government those taxes were being paid to.

So, since Tyranny, as you stated is basically the Govt being able to do something, and not the people…I can tax the Govt then?

You really need to rethink your basis on these things and come back with something better.

No. You've agreed to give congress the exclusive power to tax.

When was this minimum wage thing instituted again?? I mean, if the Founders had that as their thought, it would have been placed into the laws.

Minimum wage was instituted in 1903 because wages had declined to the point where people were virtually slaves to the owners of capital. Seeing as how the country was still in a recovery from a war where the idea of slavery was rejected this couldn't stand.

Are you for slavery? The minimum wage for any job is enough food to survive and shelter so you don't die. Minimum wage laws prevent a race to the bottom.

The Constitution/BOR is in fact the rules/laws as to what the Federal Govt is allowed to do.
If you don't like them, then please work to have the outlined process, stated within the Document(s), and change them.

Correct, however it is still a document written by humans, formed of immense compromise, and thought a total failure by it's designers when it was ratified (a small lesson for you there about extremism vs compromise). That aside I'm not the one arguing for a change to it. You are. You're the one who believes it's not supposed to provide for the general welfare and wants it to be military only. A bit more history for you, we tried that before with the Articles of Confederation. It was a failure.

a reply to: jrod

And yet again.....I blame the Govt as a whole.

And yet again, just gloss over my statements about that.

And yet again, keep saying I blame the poor entirely after I have stated that I don't.

originally posted by: ZeroReady
So this happened 6 months ago. Back when congress was in session. Republicans in congress wanted to cut 20 bn$, Obama didn't want to cut food stamps at all, so they compromised at 8bn. What's the big deal? That congress actually accomplished something, 6 months ago?

True? I wouldn't be surprised if it's.

It boils down to jobs. They're the machine which enables everything to function smoothly. Without them, it grinds to a halt.

As it's, I think so much money is spent on imported goods, and that money leaves our soil completely. Spending on locally made products increases the economy nearby.

Sometimes the quality of a imported product is just better and I can't argue against that. Still, if we fail to properly educate and employ our own population then they can easily lead us to ruin by pulling us down with them. We have to establish minimums, rather than bowing completely to international forces - which can destroy us.

It also seems because regulations at home and lack of oversight on what happens elsewhere, production locally is reduced and has deteriorated. The same thing is happening with their efforts to combat greenhouse gas emissions. They overregulate what happens on american soil but underregulate what happens elsewhere. In other words, we relocate the emissions to other countries where it's not regulated. PUt another way: We overregulate domestic business while underregulate international business.

I do think there're people who NEED food stamps because of disabilities or injuries, but it gets blurry when their problem is addiction or obesity or - in general - bad choices. That's why republicans don't like the welfare state: It sometimes throws money at people who don't deserve it. Some people likely live in a state of learned helplessness - it's an actual psychological problem. Worse, because they depend on the society for their survival, they're more likely to be less critical of its actions. Many of these people have become mentally or physically compromised, and this complicates recovery.

People who're working and support themselves are more likely to be and stay healthy and are also better able to move to other countries. If a government desires power over its people, it wants to restrict empowerment. It might become an unknowing participant in harming its own people. Perhaps this happens by way of "helping" its population too much. The proverb comes to mind about teaching a man to fish rather than throwing a fish at him. But it might also over control its populace, making them feel inferior. Repeated uses of the control can lead to psychological dependencies. I don't think it has to be intentional. It might be accidental and/or mutual.

Links:
en.wikipedia.org - Learned helplessness...
www.psychologicalscience.o rg - Why Do People Defend Unjust, Inept, and Corrupt Systems?...

originally posted by: Aazadan

So if they're paying cash what's the problem? Someone getting help doesn't suddenly mean every aspect of their life is subject to the approval of you or even the majority of people.

You are really going to ask this question?? Okay then.
If they have the cash to purchase beer and other crap, why do they need my tax dollars to purchase other items??
Instead of dropping $100 for beer, chips and other non-essentials, why is that money not being applied to their baby’s needs?

originally posted by: Aazadan
So a person has to live according to your standards if you give them 1/10 of one cent per month? That's what you're giving each person right now. Actually you're giving them even less than that. Does that miniscule amount of assistance suddenly mean they are beholden to all of your thoughts and beliefs? What about when they get help from someone with totally contradictory viewpoints to your own. What is the person supposed to do? At best the person can only satisfy one of you.

I pay around 30% in taxes. Regardless the small amount that is used for one program, theft is theft.
You amount basically to the guys in Office Space. But it is just a fraction of a fraction.
It is still taking from me, to give to others.

originally posted by: Aazadan
People who get disability worked for that too. Disability is essentially an insurance payout, if you've paid X into the system and become unable to work, you get help. Are you against insurance providers now as well?

Insurance where you voluntarily pay into it is not theft.
The Govt taking from me by force, under threat of jail time is theft.
With the Govt it is a pyramid scheme, much like SS.
The Govt is corrupt, yet you want them running more and more and taking more and more.
Mind boggling.

originally posted by: Aazadan
You're free to spend all of your after tax income however you want. The same as everyone else.

Just not free to keep ALL of what I EARNED.
Well thank you. And Oliver Twist thanks you as well.

originally posted by: Aazadan
Wait let me get this straight. You think the phrase "general welfare" means adherence to the Constitution and limited authority? And I'm the one who makes things up?

Where did I state that?
Provide for the General Welfare as in security of the Country.
Instead of trying to make something out of my statement, why not take it for what is typed out.

originally posted by: Aazadan
So you're perfectly willing to give them jobs then? Start hiring. You can start with me. I have multiple college degrees and a strong computer background between programming, web design/development, graphic design, and even a good deal of hardware knowledge. I work cheap, but you'll have to give me a bonus to relocate as I simply don't have the funds to do it.

The company I work for, you know, the evil corporation run by an evil rich person, is hiring.
We hired 250 last year, and are on track for 500 this year.
My business is getting ready to take on a couple part time people, and maybe full time next year.

But….I could do more if I were not taxed as heavily as I am.
Between Federal, State, SS, WC, Medicare, Medicade and FET, it makes no sense for me to hire more, or full time.

originally posted by: Aazadan
Or are you all talk but when it comes time for action it's someone elses job?

See above.

originally posted by: Aazadan
Again basic psychology. This time it's the nature vs nuture argument. When you put people in an environment that encourages criminal behavior (in this case by making it the only viable option) people become criminals even though in other circumstances they could be productive upstanding citizens.

So, more excuses. You sound like a bad 90s arm chair therapist trying to explain why little Timmy is a bad boy.

originally posted by: Aazadan
So those without jobs should just accept their fates and quietly starve to death?

They have that freedom to do so.
Or, look for help from others, you know where someone actually helps/gives of their own free will.
Or..move somewhere where the jobs are.
Or…..there are hundreds of answers here. None requiring someone to take money that was stolen from someone else.

originally posted by: Aazadan
The government doesn't have to step in and provide if private business is upholding their part of the deal. In fact, if private business is making every day life for people lucrative the government can't step in because there's nothing of substance that they can offer.

Business has…They pay a wage for work performed. Very very simple.

originally posted by: Aazadan
Mine says I'm not even allowed to kill a fly. So does Christianity for that matter. The clause for self defense (which Christianity taught as turning the other cheek btw) generally applies to the idea that by killing you are saving life. This assumes that if you don't kill a person, that person is going to go on to kill two more people. Even then it is generally frowned upon because you're taking the future choice of to kill or not to kill away from that individual.

No, Christianity does not.
Turn the other cheek as in reference to someone mistreating you. NOT for when some will do you physical harm.
And that is a shame that your religion pushes you to not defend yourself.
Sounds much like the idea that poor people can only turn to crime, if the Govt doesn’t give them free stuff.

Both are choices made.

originally posted by: Aazadan
Suddenly it's a progressive idea to want to live in a society where violent rebellion is almost unheard of?

So, we have moved from me stating I want the poor executed to now violent rebellion.
Are you just going down a checklist of retorts?? Or are you actually thinking of these on your own?

originally posted by: Aazadan
What do you want the country to be? A wild west utopia where gunfights in the streets are common and you don't dare leave the city limits at night because of bandits? Why is your ideal version of the US any more valid than mine?

Oh how the ignorant love to state Hollywood driven statements.
Please, after you research more on Christianity, go and research the “Wild West” and let me know how many gunfights and such actually took place.

originally posted by: Aazadan
Welfare tax? The constitution gives congress the authority to tax and spend. The income tax comes from these powers but is also specifically mentioned in the 16th amendment. It was added because of the immense expense of WW1, however when the war was over it wasn't repealed. Funny thing back then, they actually increased taxes in times of heightened spending in order to avoid deficits and debt.

Ahhhh, so the process was walked, to change the Constitution, for the taxation of income and you hold it on high.
But, you can’t/wont that same process to change other aspects.
How very interesting.

Cont

originally posted by: Aazadan
I've been homeless before, I've also been in the situation where I had to stretch $5 to cover a months worth of meals and it wasn't all that long ago, just a few years. I've also been in the situation where that pesky need to eat required me to attend free church dinners (I'm still in that situation), all they require is the constant acceptance, thanks, and worship of a god I don't believe in. Good times.

But…..you should have been robbing people and stealing stuff…because that is the only way the poor can survive. If applying your logic.

originally posted by: Aazadan
Also I can say this from personal experience, I have stolen food before to avoid starvation. I've done some pretty bad things in the name of being able to eat. I'm a pretty average person certainly nothing special. If I'll do it, so will many others. There have been thousands of studies and hundreds of real world examples that have proven this notion as well.

So, there it is. That criminal element you offer up as what, some badge to wear proudly??
You personally took from someone, to provide for yourself. You called that stealing.

The Govt takes from me, to do roughly the same, but you don’t call that stealing.

It truly is always different with Progressives.

originally posted by: Aazadan
In other words you don't want to discuss. You simply want to label and dictate.

Dictate you say??? Dictate what exactly.

Seems to be that the only one, or group that wants to dictate is you and those that want to allow the Govt to continue to take from some to give to others.

originally posted by: Aazadan
Socialist take on business? How so? The socialist take on business is that corporations exist to serve the community where they exist. Their first priority isn't to the employees or the owners but rather to the community.

Go back and re-read my statement.

originally posted by: Aazadan
Saying that your customers are the ones who make your business function isn't socialist. Then again we just got off the label topic. Progressive, Socialist, you're just labeling things as terms you dislike out of ignorance.

I stated that.
You stated my pay comes from the customer. It does not. It comes from my employer.
Ignorance….right..sure sure.

originally posted by: Aazadan
Welfare is more about the support of a child (something I think we need to cut back on btw) especially so seeing as how you cannot even get welfare unless you have children and in some cases not even then. SNAP while being a welfare program is not welfare itself. It is an extremely small food stipend so that people don't starve it comes out to just a bit over $100 for a single person and the amount continues to decline each year while food prices go up. Disability is an insurance program that pays out to people who become unable to work if they've paid into the system.

All funded by taking from someone else.
I bet that if we just stated that the Military budget was “For the children” that would be okay then.

originally posted by: Aazadan
What is the person with 6 kids who refuses to work doing for a check? Not much. And it's a loophole in the system that needs fixed.

Great.

originally posted by: Aazadan
What are others doing for their (considerably smaller) checks? Exactly what they were supposed to do.

Obviously not, as their job ability has not moved them upward financially.

originally posted by: Aazadan
If you want to live in a society that has skilled labor you must also be willing to accept a system that makes obtaining the necessary education possible. It's the cost of doing business.

And that system exists. People can go get the training they desire. I should not be fronting the cost of THEIR education or training.

originally posted by: Aazadan
Besides that I would hardly call what you pay a large amount. If you're as well off as you imply your effective tax rate is somewhere around 10% just like the Mitt Romneys of the nation.

30% in taxes is pretty large.

originally posted by: Aazadan
Have you paid any attention to the economy for the past 60 years? The better the economy does the less people that end up on some form of assistance as a result. Consequently these times also mirror the times when we've had policies in place that minimize the wealth gap. The purchasing power of minimum wage in 1955 was higher than the purchasing power of a $50,000/year job today. And that was for ENTRY level work. More recently we can compare from 1980 onwards where the purchasing power of wages for virtually everyone other than the top 5% have declined from between 33% to 50%. The top 2-5% have remained about equal and the purchasing power of the top 1% has gone up by more than 1000%.

All thanks to inflation and corrupt Govt.
And the unskilled labor force getting their lives offset by others.

originally posted by: Aazadan
The war was about representation in government. It wasn't an argument against excessive taxation (taxes were even higher after the war). It had to do with being represented by the government those taxes were being paid to.

en.wikipedia.org...
en.wikipedia.org...
en.wikipedia.org...
Imposed on the Colonies. They were taxed largely and without a voice.
SO..yes, yes it was about taxation. Because if they had a voice, the taxations would not have been as high and on goods that they consumed.

originally posted by: Aazadan
No. You've agreed to give congress the exclusive power to tax.

I did???? What meeting or memo was that? Was I sick that day?

originally posted by: Aazadan

Minimum wage was instituted in 1903 because wages had declined to the point where people were virtually slaves to the owners of capital. Seeing as how the country was still in a recovery from a war where the idea of slavery was rejected this couldn't stand.

Ohhhh, so it took another law to institute something that you state was there by default.

originally posted by: Aazadan
Are you for slavery? The minimum wage for any job is enough food to survive and shelter so you don't die. Minimum wage laws prevent a race to the bottom.

Do you need a definition of what slavery is??

originally posted by: Aazadan
Correct, however it is still a document written by humans, formed of immense compromise, and thought a total failure by it's designers when it was ratified (a small lesson for you there about extremism vs compromise). That aside I'm not the one arguing for a change to it. You are. You're the one who believes it's not supposed to provide for the general welfare and wants it to be military only. A bit more history for you, we tried that before with the Articles of Confederation. It was a failure.

So, the AoC state welfare is to take from some via taxes, and give to others in free handouts?

originally posted by: jonnywhite
As it's, I think so much money is spent on imported goods, and that money leaves our soil completely. Spending on locally made products increases the economy nearby.

Sometimes the quality of a imported product is just better and I can't argue against that. Still, if we fail to properly educate and employ our own population then they can easily lead us to ruin by pulling us down with them. We have to establish minimums, rather than bowing completely to international forces - which can destroy us.

The majority of the money we lose isn't in the trade deficit itself but rather in the virtual trade deficit where our corporations are reincorporating in other countries and sending the money away so that it avoids taxes. They only ship the bare minimum back into the country to cover expenses. Or sometimes they get a tax holiday year where they move large amounts back untaxed as happened a couple years ago.

That's how most of the wealth gets shipped out of the country.

Macman: As much as I'm enjoying explaining things to you, I'm going to stop responding to every single point after this reply. Needing three posts of replies is absurd, so I'm going to start cutting it down to one.

originally posted by: macman
You are really going to ask this question?? Okay then.
If they have the cash to purchase beer and other crap, why do they need my tax dollars to purchase other items??
Instead of dropping $100 for beer, chips and other non-essentials, why is that money not being applied to their baby’s needs?

So tell me if I have the argument correct: Person A has $100 for the month and gets $100 in assistance. They use that $100 in assistance money to buy essentials and then use that other $100 to buy non essentials like some beer or a piece of cake or anything else. Your belief is that they shouldn't have gotten the $100 for essentials and should have had to spend that $100 they already had? That sums it up correct?

I've addressed this point in the Maslow Hierarchy. People need things beyond food and shelter, those are the base necessities for life but look at what happens to someone who is in solitary confinement and literally has ONLY food and shelter. Their mental state degrades and they become permanently insane. People having a small budget for extras is not a bad thing, it's even a necessary thing. For me it's basic internet access and buying two coffee's from Starbucks every week, for some it's alcohol, and for others it's cable tv. People need a way to decompress, that's all there is to it.

I pay around 30% in taxes. Regardless the small amount that is used for one program, theft is theft.
You amount basically to the guys in Office Space. But it is just a fraction of a fraction.
It is still taking from me, to give to others.

The question was how much does someone have to get for you to dictate how they spend it? In the case of someone who gets the typical $700/month you're probably contributing about .1 cents. Why does that low of a contribution entitle you to force someone to live according to your standards?

Insurance where you voluntarily pay into it is not theft.

What do you call car insurance? I don't see you arguing against that with anywhere near the same zeal as welfare programs even though it's the same system as disability.

Just not free to keep ALL of what I EARNED.
Well thank you. And Oliver Twist thanks you as well.

In what nation at any point in history has that ever been the case? Even the most libertarian nation on earth, Somalia which has the smallest government possible has an income tax rate of 18.9% and sales tax of 10%.

Where did I state that?
Provide for the General Welfare as in security of the Country.
Instead of trying to make something out of my statement, why not take it for what is typed out.

Precisely in your definition of what general welfare means. You seem to have a habit of forgetting what you write.

The company I work for, you know, the evil corporation run by an evil rich person, is hiring.
We hired 250 last year, and are on track for 500 this year.
My business is getting ready to take on a couple part time people, and maybe full time next year.

Great, tell me where and I'll apply. I expect to make enough however that I'm able to afford some modest food and shelter.

But….I could do more if I were not taxed as heavily as I am.
Between Federal, State, SS, WC, Medicare, Medicade and FET, it makes no sense for me to hire more, or full time.

What do taxes have to do with hiring rates? It's all a percentage. If the additional person makes you $1 more it's worth hiring them. If they don't then it's not. Taxes only increase the end cost of your product since all taxes are ultimately paid by the consumer.

So, more excuses. You sound like a bad 90s arm chair therapist trying to explain why little Timmy is a bad boy.

Knowing something happens and knowing why something happens are two very different things. I'm not a psychology expert but these are basics. People are very predictable and these behavior patterns have been modeled time and time again. If you know what makes people tick you also know how to avoid undesirable behavior, or how to make them act in a desireable fashion (what I mostly focus on).

They have that freedom to do so.
Or, look for help from others, you know where someone actually helps/gives of their own free will.
Or..move somewhere where the jobs are.
Or…..there are hundreds of answers here. None requiring someone to take money that was stolen from someone else.

Help from others is essentially charity. Something you may not realize is that charity is woefully underfunded. It's also extremely biased because people give to groups that help people like them. An under represented group among the successful class is also under represented by charity. Different demographics get different amounts of help. That's great for the popular demographics but not so great for the unpopular ones that need the most help.

As far as moving where the jobs are, it requires money. People in these situations have no savings and often no long distance transportation. You say it's easy to move, but have you ever tried moving somewhere where your address is your car? Lacking simple infrastructure like running water for showers so that you can look presentable at a job is a real hurdle. You take having money for granted. Seriously try getting by for even a day using no money whatsoever. That means no electricity, no fuel, no water, no phone, no food. Now try living in those conditions for an extended period of time, then look and see how employable you are. That is what people have to overcome when moving to where the jobs are.

Business has…They pay a wage for work performed. Very very simple.

And those wages have been declining for the better part of 35 years now. It's not just inflation, that's part of it but CPI doesn't actually measure these things. The wages themselves have been increasing at a rate less than inflation (or even decreasing) while the goods themselves are getting more expensive faster than the rate of inflation.

originally posted by: macmanNo, Christianity does not.
Turn the other cheek as in reference to someone mistreating you. NOT for when some will do you physical harm.
And that is a shame that your religion pushes you to not defend yourself.
Sounds much like the idea that poor people can only turn to crime, if the Govt doesn’t give them free stuff.

Both are choices made.

Stealing is mistreating. Turn the other cheek is the idea that you respond to mistreatment (including force) without violence or legal defense. Essentially that you forgive the act and don't respond to it with a negative action of your own.

The closest the two concepts get is in a survival analogy. Most people will fight back if they believe their life is in danger in much the same way the person who is starving will steal food so that they don't die. The difference is that in one the person is making a choice the other is being driven by instinct.

So, we have moved from me stating I want the poor executed to now violent rebellion.
Are you just going down a checklist of retorts?? Or are you actually thinking of these on your own?

I classify people on a mass scale resorting to violence and theft as a survival mechanism a violent rebellion. This is what happens when people can't afford food.

Please, after you research more on Christianity, go and research the “Wild West” and let me know how many gunfights and such actually took place.

Hollywood plays the gun fights up a bit, but the west was still a considerably more violent place than back east.

Ahhhh, so the process was walked, to change the Constitution, for the taxation of income and you hold it on high.
But, you can’t/wont that same process to change other aspects.
How very interesting.

Where am I advocating a change to the constitution? I see parts of welfare as falling under the provision of law enforcement by being a cost effective method of crime prevention. You're the one whose saying the government shouldn't live up to those obligations which is a clear departure from what is written.

But…..you should have been robbing people and stealing stuff…because that is the only way the poor can survive. If applying your logic.

I have stolen stuff out of hunger. I consider it a low point in my life. However I also know that if I can be motivated to do that so can many others. I don't see it as a bad thing to want to live in a society where people aren't forced to turn to crime in order to meet basic life necessities.

The Govt takes from me, to do roughly the same, but you don’t call that stealing.

Because taxes aren't theft. They're rent for living in the city/state/country that provides you opportunities to earn that income in the first place.

I stated that.
You stated my pay comes from the customer. It does not. It comes from my employer.
Ignorance….right..sure sure.

And your employer gets that money from where? The customer. Your customer gets that money from where? Their employer. That customers employer gets their money from where? Another customer. This process can be walked backwards all the way to the government which ultimately puts money into circulation by being a customer.

Your employer (aside from banks who can literally create currency from nothing) does not create wealth, it only collects and redistributes it.

All funded by taking from someone else.
I bet that if we just stated that the Military budget was “For the children” that would be okay then.

That wouldn't make it ok with me. I place little value on for the children arguments and would rather disincentivizie people in general from having kids, especially if they can't support them. As for them all being funded by someone else, one saves billions of dollars per year, another is an insurance program. The last one (first in the list) is the only one in need of actual reform. Personally the approach I would take with all programs is that they're temporary (6 years max, reapplication decided on a case by case basis, but largely rejected... unless you can demonstrate that your skills aren't marketable), provide much more income than they currently do (index it to say the current value of 25k/year), and offer an additional stipend if you have 1-2 children. No additional income for children past two.

The last thing I would require is that you must be in a job (re)training program or college that you're scheduled to complete before aid runs out so that by the end of the aid you have marketable job skills. The job program or degree sought must be approved when beginning the program so that there's some oversight on not getting a worthless skill.

Obviously not, as their job ability has not moved them upward financially.

Upward mobility is at the lowest point in the US that it has ever been. Upward mobility and the wealth gap are effectively inverse scales of one another.

And that system exists. People can go get the training they desire. I should not be fronting the cost of THEIR education or training.

No, that system does not exist. Have you seen our college graduation rates? The school I'm at has a graduation rate of 21%. My previous school had a graduation rate of *11%*. That's almost as low as congressional approval rates. Financing is also a very real issue. College educations are becoming prohibitively expensive. We're a nation that runs on credit debt and in a decade we went from a tiny amount of student loan debt to having student loan debt utterly dwarf credit card debt. Students are never going to be able to repay this money. A bachelors degree at this point costs as much as a house, if not more. We need a massive overhaul to our system of financing college, largely involving getting government out of the loan business, but that's another topic for another day.

30% in taxes is pretty large.

You may be in the 30% bracket but I seriously doubt you paid an effective rate of 30%. Even if you did, is that a bad thing? Taxes are the price you pay for living in a country that lets you be successful.

All thanks to inflation and corrupt Govt.
And the unskilled labor force getting their lives offset by others.

No, it's not all thanks to inflation. Inflation is only a part of it. CPI which measures our "real" inflation rate dramatically undersells the problem. What ends up happening is that from year to year the price of goods goes up by 5%, inflation goes up by 2%, and wages go up by 1%. This leads to a 2% shortfall every year. Compound that for 40 or even just 10 years and you get our current problem.

Imposed on the Colonies. They were taxed largely and without a voice.
SO..yes, yes it was about taxation. Because if they had a voice, the taxations would not have been as high and on goods that they consumed.

So you agree with me, it was a representation issue.

I did???? What meeting or memo was that? Was I sick that day?

You agreed when you decided to live and work in the United States and abide by our laws.

originally posted by: macman
Ohhhh, so it took another law to institute something that you state was there by default.

This falls under the general welfare clause. It goes against the general welfare to promote a system where the commoners are serfs ruled by a few owners of capital that get to be lords. That goes against the very nature of our system. A minimum wage that ensures people have economic freedom is vitally important to a nation focused on the idea of liberty. Originally there was no need to have a minimum wage, it wasn't until widespread industrialization took off and labor became mechanized that such a thing became an issue. The constitution and the writers of it couldn't see the future and they realized that, that's why everything is broadly and vaguely defined so that it could offer guidence for specific laws or lack of.

Do you need a definition of what slavery is??

No, but perhaps you do. It's the condition where one human owns another. In modern times it has evolved to mean forcing a person to work for no wage. Providing basic food and shelter but no money or paying in points to be redeemed at a company store are modern day takes on slavery. Putting someone in a dead end job with no upward mobility is a slightly more loose definition but is generally seen to be the same thing as the person in question has no opportunity to improve their position in life.

So, the AoC state welfare is to take from some via taxes, and give to others in free handouts?

No, they created a very weak central government which more or less only provided for a common military. All other matters were left to the states. This sounds like the system you're pushing for, we tried it once and it ended in absolute failure.

a reply to: Aazadan

originally posted by: Aazadan
So tell me if I have the argument correct: Person A has $100 for the month and gets $100 in assistance. They use that $100 in assistance money to buy essentials and then use that other $100 to buy non essentials like some beer or a piece of cake or anything else. Your belief is that they shouldn't have gotten the $100 for essentials and should have had to spend that $100 they already had? That sums it up correct?

Yep. If they have $100 to spend on other crap, then they don’t need nor are they entitled to it.

originally posted by: Aazadan
I've addressed this point in the Maslow Hierarchy. People need things beyond food and shelter, those are the base necessities for life but look at what happens to someone who is in solitary confinement and literally has ONLY food and shelter. Their mental state degrades and they become permanently insane. People having a small budget for extras is not a bad thing, it's even a necessary thing. For me it's basic internet access and buying two coffee's from Starbucks every week, for some it's alcohol, and for others it's cable tv. People need a way to decompress, that's all there is to it.

So, now the tax payer is to fund not only the essentials, but now the tax payer will fund everything else.
You really have got to be kidding me.
This truly is mind boggling that you and those suckling on the Govt teat are okay with doing so. And pretty disgusting that you think I and others should be funding this.
So, what shouldn’t the Govt pay for then, for you and others that need not only essentials, but those items to decompress.

originally posted by: Aazadan
The question was how much does someone have to get for you to dictate how they spend it? In the case of someone who gets the typical $700/month you're probably contributing about .1 cents. Why does that low of a contribution entitle you to force someone to live according to your standards?

Because it is theft from me to others.
Regardless how large or small, it is theft.
Your entitlement mentality is about as narcissistic as it gets.

originally posted by: Aazadan
What do you call car insurance? I don't see you arguing against that with anywhere near the same zeal as welfare programs even though it's the same system as disability.

Oh good hell.
Car insurance is not required of every person, only those that operate vehicles.
And car insurance is there to protect others, from your actions while operating a vehicle.

originally posted by: Aazadan
In what nation at any point in history has that ever been the case? Even the most libertarian nation on earth, Somalia which has the smallest government possible has an income tax rate of 18.9% and sales tax of 10%.

Somalia as your example of a Libertarian based Govt??
Now that is funny.

originally posted by: Aazadan
Precisely in your definition of what general welfare means. You seem to have a habit of forgetting what you write.

This is very simple, as the Fed Govt was created to be small in nature.
Provide for defense of the country, as that is the General Welfare.
You really need to revisit this idea of what General Welfare means.

originally posted by: Aazadan
Great, tell me where and I'll apply. I expect to make enough however that I'm able to afford some modest food and shelter.

Now why in the hell would I tell you where I work??
I do love the “I expect” statement. That speaks volumes as to what your mentality truly is.
YOU EXPECT many many things. That is called entitlement. That is your problem…and the problem of many others in your situation.

originally posted by: Aazadan
What do taxes have to do with hiring rates? It's all a percentage. If the additional person makes you $1 more it's worth hiring them. If they don't then it's not. Taxes only increase the end cost of your product since all taxes are ultimately paid by the consumer.

Are you kidding me?
$1 more in profit, with the adding of a person is not worth it. It is nice when the uneducated chime in with uneducated statements.
If I hire someone for $9 an hour, I pay out roughly $20+ per hour as a company.
Why would it be worth it to bring on someone for 40 hours a week, making it close to $3200 a month I pay out, with the added costs associated with someone working?
It would take an increase of $6400 in gross profit per month to justify hiring a new person. Not $1.
But, I bet your business prowess is highly sought after and you are successful in that world.

originally posted by: Aazadan
Knowing something happens and knowing why something happens are two very different things. I'm not a psychology expert but these are basics. People are very predictable and these behavior patterns have been modeled time and time again. If you know what makes people tick you also know how to avoid undesirable behavior, or how to make them act in a desireable fashion (what I mostly focus on).

Yes, that is great.
So, knowing that people over time, when given stuff, instead of having them work and earn it, has shown exactly what we have today. 1/3 of the US population getting Govt handouts…..and “expecting” it.
What a wonderful way to condition people to be dependent upon the Govt

originally posted by: Aazadan
Help from others is essentially charity. Something you may not realize is that charity is woefully underfunded. It's also extremely biased because people give to groups that help people like them. An under represented group among the successful class is also under represented by charity. Different demographics get different amounts of help. That's great for the popular demographics but not so great for the unpopular ones that need the most help.

Underfunded maybe because most have been conditioned to the idea that they don’t need to donate because the Govt will take care of others.
See….predictability.
And it still isn’t the job of the Fed Govt to take from some to give to others.

originally posted by: Aazadan
As far as moving where the jobs are, it requires money. People in these situations have no savings and often no long distance transportation. You say it's easy to move, but have you ever tried moving somewhere where your address is your car? Lacking simple infrastructure like running water for showers so that you can look presentable at a job is a real hurdle. You take having money for granted. Seriously try getting by for even a day using no money whatsoever. That means no electricity, no fuel, no water, no phone, no food. Now try living in those conditions for an extended period of time, then look and see how employable you are. That is what people have to overcome when moving to where the jobs are.

Those horizontal things attached to the bottom of those vertical things attached to your rear can be used for many things. Including getting up and going to where the jobs are.
Or. You and others can keep pissing and moaning that there are no jobs in your area, crying woes me and not having the jobs that countless others are able to get. YOUR choice.

Cont...

a reply to: Aazadan

originally posted by: Aazadan

And those wages have been declining for the better part of 35 years now. It's not just inflation, that's part of it but CPI doesn't actually measure these things. The wages themselves have been increasing at a rate less than inflation (or even decreasing) while the goods themselves are getting more expensive faster than the rate of inflation.

It is not the job of the company to provide a living wage. The company is there for one reason. To provide a profit for the owner(s).
The actions in doing so is by providing a market driven need for a widget and/or service.

originally posted by: Aazadan
Stealing is mistreating. Turn the other cheek is the idea that you respond to mistreatment (including force) without violence or legal defense. Essentially that you forgive the act and don't respond to it with a negative action of your own.

You are talking about revenge. Not defending yourself.

originally posted by: Aazadan
The closest the two concepts get is in a survival analogy. Most people will fight back if they believe their life is in danger in much the same way the person who is starving will steal food so that they don't die. The difference is that in one the person is making a choice the other is being driven by instinct.

Stealing is now equal to defending your life from an attacker??
Man, you really stretch everything in an attempt to have it fit your narrative.
Must be hard to live life being this immoral, with all the excuses you have to come up with to justify your actions and the actions you side with.

originally posted by: Aazadan
I classify people on a mass scale resorting to violence and theft as a survival mechanism a violent rebellion. This is what happens when people can't afford food.

Thought you were above classifying others??

originally posted by: Aazadan
Hollywood plays the gun fights up a bit, but the west was still a considerably more violent place than back east.

Much like how the East is so much more peaceful then the Southwest??
How many people were shot yesterday in Chicago and NY? Compared to say AZ, ID or UT?
You really have no clue.

originally posted by: Aazadan
Where am I advocating a change to the constitution? I see parts of welfare as falling under the provision of law enforcement by being a cost effective method of crime prevention. You're the one whose saying the government shouldn't live up to those obligations which is a clear departure from what is written.

By introducing new meanings as to what is meant.
If the founders had intended to have a Govt based welfare system, why did it take 100+ years to install?

originally posted by: Aazadan
I have stolen stuff out of hunger. I consider it a low point in my life. However I also know that if I can be motivated to do that so can many others. I don't see it as a bad thing to want to live in a society where people aren't forced to turn to crime in order to meet basic life necessities.

More entitlement based theory.
People are now “forced” into crime? I guess they had a gun to their head and were forced to do so?
I guess someone physically grabbed you, and forced you in stealing from someone else, who used their earning to purchase what you stole, only so you could feed yourself. Hmmm, wonder if that person you stole from, went hungry and couldn’t eat then.
Ahhhh, screw them right?? I mean, they had food and you didn’t.. That is all that matters. That you get what you don’t have, because you need it.

originally posted by: Aazadan
Because taxes aren't theft. They're rent for living in the city/state/country that provides you opportunities to earn that income in the first place.

WOW…you really are pretty talented at justifying stealing.
So, with your logic applied, if I stole 30% of your monthly income, but used it for say….”the children” then it would be okay.
And no, neither the City, State or Country provided me with the opportunity to earn an income. I and my employer have provided that.
I understand that you are beholden to the Govt, as it supplies your income….but that doesn’t mean everyone else is.

originally posted by: Aazadan
And your employer gets that money from where? The customer. Your customer gets that money from where? Their employer. That customers employer gets their money from where? Another customer. This process can be walked backwards all the way to the government which ultimately puts money into circulation by being a customer.

At least you get some basics of business.

originally posted by: Aazadan
Your employer (aside from banks who can literally create currency from nothing) does not create wealth, it only collects and redistributes it.

Nooo again. My employer and my business are paid for a service/product.
It pays the employees a wage for work performed.
Creating wealth and creating currency are 2 drastically different things.
But, I wouldn’t expect someone that follows the Keynesian Economic model to state that.

originally posted by: Aazadan

That wouldn't make it ok with me. I place little value on for the children arguments and would rather disincentivizie people in general from having kids, especially if they can't support them. As for them all being funded by someone else, one saves billions of dollars per year, another is an insurance program. The last one (first in the list) is the only one in need of actual reform. Personally the approach I would take with all programs is that they're temporary (6 years max, reapplication decided on a case by case basis, but largely rejected... unless you can demonstrate that your skills aren't marketable), provide much more income than they currently do (index it to say the current value of 25k/year), and offer an additional stipend if you have 1-2 children. No additional income for children past two.

But SNAP is “for the children” and you are okay with that.
I mean, the Govt takes from me, and then it takes a percentage of that, then gives it to a person, who in turn uses an EBT card which is profited from by a company contracted with the Govt.
All for the children.

originally posted by: Aazadan
The last thing I would require is that you must be in a job (re)training program or college that you're scheduled to complete before aid runs out so that by the end of the aid you have marketable job skills. The job program or degree sought must be approved when beginning the program so that there's some oversight on not getting a worthless skill.

Why does the tax payer have to front this persons’ job training?

originally posted by: Aazadan
Upward mobility is at the lowest point in the US that it has ever been. Upward mobility and the wealth gap are effectively inverse scales of one another.

You honestly sound like an 0bama talking point.
Why is it that I, and thousands of others have been able to progress through their career again? Since there is little to no “upward mobility”?

Cont..

a reply to: Aazadan

originally posted by: Aazadan
No, that system does not exist. Have you seen our college graduation rates? The school I'm at has a graduation rate of 21%. My previous school had a graduation rate of *11%*. That's almost as low as congressional approval rates. Financing is also a very real issue. College educations are becoming prohibitively expensive. We're a nation that runs on credit debt and in a decade we went from a tiny amount of student loan debt to having student loan debt utterly dwarf credit card debt. Students are never going to be able to repay this money. A bachelors degree at this point costs as much as a house, if not more. We need a massive overhaul to our system of financing college, largely involving getting government out of the loan business, but that's another topic for another day.

How is it my responsibility via taxes for someone to graduate college?
And why do I need to provide financially for those that made the free choice to go to college, rack up debt and sign on for Govt backed education loans?

originally posted by: Aazadan

You may be in the 30% bracket but I seriously doubt you paid an effective rate of 30%. Even if you did, is that a bad thing? Taxes are the price you pay for living in a country that lets you be successful.

Is it a bad thing?? Are you #ing kidding me?
Yeah, it is a bad thing as that was money that I worked for and earned. Not you or anyone else.
30% is quite accurate.

originally posted by: Aazadan
No, it's not all thanks to inflation. Inflation is only a part of it. CPI which measures our "real" inflation rate dramatically undersells the problem. What ends up happening is that from year to year the price of goods goes up by 5%, inflation goes up by 2%, and wages go up by 1%. This leads to a 2% shortfall every year. Compound that for 40 or even just 10 years and you get our current problem.

Did you just state that inflation wasn’t the issue, only to turn around and use CPI as your grounds??

originally posted by: Aazadan
So you agree with me, it was a representation issue.

They were focused on the high taxes. Representation was not the major issue, as they knew they were removed physical from Britain.

originally posted by: Aazadan

You agreed when you decided to live and work in the United States and abide by our laws.

Ohhh, so since I work, I be default have agreed to be taxed so that others may live.

How very Progressive of you.

originally posted by: Aazadan

This falls under the general welfare clause. It goes against the general welfare to promote a system where the commoners are serfs ruled by a few owners of capital that get to be lords. That goes against the very nature of our system. A minimum wage that ensures people have economic freedom is vitally important to a nation focused on the idea of liberty. Originally there was no need to have a minimum wage, it wasn't until widespread industrialization took off and labor became mechanized that such a thing became an issue. The constitution and the writers of it couldn't see the future and they realized that, that's why everything is broadly and vaguely defined so that it could offer guidence for specific laws or lack of.

You really have no understanding of the Free Market that was sought after by the founders.
And this idea that “Need” drives a new interpretation of what something means is….Progressive.
But…..you have yet to explain in any way, why it took 100+ years for the Federal Govt to exact control over something like Govt based Welfare, since it was built into the creation….and that it took new laws for this to be enacted…and newly established Govt departments and agencies….and new policies.

[

originally posted by: Aazadan
No, but perhaps you do. It's the condition where one human owns another. In modern times it has evolved to mean forcing a person to work for no wage. Providing basic food and shelter but no money or paying in points to be redeemed at a company store are modern day takes on slavery. Putting someone in a dead end job with no upward mobility is a slightly more loose definition but is generally seen to be the same thing as the person in question has no opportunity to improve their position in life.

Ahh the dramatic stylings of the Progressive take on working vs actual slavery.
Seeing that regardless how hard you press, the person in a dead end job is not owned by the company they work for, which provides them a wage for work performed really shows just how much the Socialist and Progressive base leads you around in life.

originally posted by: Aazadan

No, they created a very weak central government which more or less only provided for a common military. All other matters were left to the states. This sounds like the system you're pushing for, we tried it once and it ended in absolute failure.

The Fed Govt was created as such, so it was not powerful..

You really need to go get educated on what the founders stated on Federalism vs Statism.

a reply to: macman

Yep. If they have $100 to spend on other crap, then they don’t need nor are they entitled to it.

Again we get into needs, while the absolute basics are food and shelter people need more than that if they're going to be productive law abiding citizens. I'm not saying (and neither is anyone else) to give the poor a ton of luxuries. Rather the argument is that a small amount of reprieve does a world of good to a persons mental state.

So, what shouldn’t the Govt pay for then

As many total luxuries as the people who work are able to afford.

Car insurance is not required of every person, only those that operate vehicles.
And car insurance is there to protect others, from your actions while operating a vehicle.

Car insurance is required in virtually every area of the country if you want to be productive. Most places have no public transportation systems, and transportation to a job is a requirement of working that job.

Car insurance protects others, but so does food stamps as they dramatically reduce the crime rate. By a factor many times what they cost even.

Provide for defense of the country, as that is the General Welfare.

Then why does the constitution seperately mention general welfare (which is the general well being of the people) and national defense?

Now why in the hell would I tell you where I work??

So when actually asked by someone saying I want a job your response is too bad? The exact opposite of what you claimed.

As for what I expect, yes I do expect a wage that allows me to live without public assistance to afford food, shelter, and other basics. On top of that I have an education, I expect that to make my skills more desirable than minimum wage. With your education and experience do you also not expect to make above minimum wage?

$1 more in profit, with the adding of a person is not worth it. It is nice when the uneducated chime in with uneducated statements.
Why would it be worth it to bring on someone for 40 hours a week, making it close to $3200 a month I pay out, with the added costs associated with someone working?
It would take an increase of $6400 in gross profit per month to justify hiring a new person. Not $1.

So if an employee is paid $3200 and it costs you $6400 total to have that person employed then it's not worth it if they bring you $6401? Hence $1 in profit?

So, knowing that people over time, when given stuff, instead of having them work and earn it, has shown exactly what we have today. 1/3 of the US population getting Govt handouts…..and “expecting” it.

That is why we keep decreasing payouts per capita making welfare programs of any type less lucrative yet more people than ever are needing to use them?

Those horizontal things attached to the bottom of those vertical things attached to your rear can be used for many things. Including getting up and going to where the jobs are.
Or. You and others can keep pissing and moaning that there are no jobs in your area, crying woes me and not having the jobs that countless others are able to get. YOUR choice.

So now your solution is to walk across the country? In my case it's a 1200 mile walk to get to where I want to work (Austin TX), not the greatest thing ever and not the worst thing ever (putting aside the back injury that prevents me from making the walk). But what exactly am I supposed to do on the trip when it comes to pesky survival needs like food, water, and shelter? Those cost money, something poor people are unable to attain. Moving to where the jobs are is only a solution for the middle class and above. That's why you get things like suburbs while also having inner city hell holes.

It is not the job of the company to provide a living wage. The company is there for one reason. To provide a profit for the owner(s).

So you're a proponent of slavery? If it's not the job of the company to provide a living wage, then logically it's also not the job of the company to provide any wage at all. Furthermore maximum profit is obtained at a labor cost of 0, so in order to most benefit the owner employees should be paid less.

Guess what? If no one pays their employees, no one (aside from the few at the top who collectively consume relatively little) has the funds to pay for anyones services they offer.

Stealing is now equal to defending your life from an attacker??
Man, you really stretch everything in an attempt to have it fit your narrative.

Stealing food to prevent starving to death is defending your life.

Thought you were above classifying others??

It's the act of mass rebellion and the reason.

Much like how the East is so much more peaceful then the Southwest??
How many people were shot yesterday in Chicago and NY? Compared to say AZ, ID or UT?
You really have no clue.

First of all I was referring to the Hollywood version as it sounds like that's what you want. But to answer your question in 2012:
New York - 19,570,261 people, 455,750 violent crimes. 1 per 42.94 people
Utah - 2,855,287 people, 91,300 violent crimes. 1 per 31.27 people
Idaho - 1,595,728 people, 34,969 violent crimes. 1 per 45.63 people
Arizona - 6,553,255 people, 260,038 violent crimes. 1 per 25.20 people
Arizona+Idaho+Utah (closer in total population) - 11,004,270 people, 386,307 violent crimes. 1 per 28.49 people
www.disastercenter.com...

I'm the one with no clue?

If the founders had intended to have a Govt based welfare system, why did it take 100+ years to install?

Because there was no need when the founders were around. It was also generally understood to be the states responsibility not the feds. The founders in general were for welfare programs but they wanted them to be limited. Franklin for example found value in programs that were temporary and gave people just enough to be able to survive and find work. He wasn't for long term assistance or for it to provide for a very comfortable life but he found the idea itself worthwhile. Another would be Jefferson who believed in the idea of the poor living in group homes and being assigned work at the governments behest. Also worth noting is that he believed in the concept of reasonable wages and that people should refuse to work (and instead be covered by the government) if offered a substandard wage.

Ahhhh, screw them right?? I mean, they had food and you didn’t.. That is all that matters. That you get what you don’t have, because you need it.

When you haven't eaten for over a week then yes, that becomes precisely the mentality. Give it a try sometime if you care about understanding. Start slow, give yourself a 6 pack of ramen for two weeks. Then take it a step up and stretch the coins you find on the ground when walking around as you try to go about your day to last for a months worth of food. Once the hunger sets in it gets real easy to justify sneaking a box of corn flakes out of a grocery store.

At least you get some basics of business.

So you agree. It all comes from the customer.

a reply to: macman

My employer and my business are paid for a service/product.
It pays the employees a wage for work performed.

...which is collecting and redistributing wealth.

But SNAP is “for the children” and you are okay with that.
I mean, the Govt takes from me, and then it takes a percentage of that, then gives it to a person, who in turn uses an EBT card which is profited from by a company contracted with the Govt.

No. SNAP is for anyone. WIC is specifically for the children and happens to give far larger per capita benefits.

Why does the tax payer have to front this persons’ job training?

Because education is expensive and it's unreasonable to expect people fresh out of high school to take on that risk. It is very easy to be ruined for life by a poor education choice. Let me give an example of a friend of mine. He went to Ohio University for a year, that cost him $20,000 in tuition which he paid for with loans. He found that he couldn't both work and attend school at the same time so he had to take an additional $12,000 loan to support himself. As far as students go my friend is a poor student, he's not the brightest and he's far too prone to getting distracted. At a party school like OU it's very easy to just get drunk every night and blow off the work. At the end of the year my friend was $32,000 in debt and had flunked out of school. He returned to the town I lived in at the time and couldn't get a job. His student loan payment came due as he was no longer a student but he had no job to make the payment. A month later it defaulted which carries a $10,000+25% fine. All of a sudden he owed $53,000. That didn't magically give him the funds to make the payment so the interest rate continued to compound which jumped to 15% due to a default. After a year he owed 60,950. He got a job which paid minimum wage ($7.45/hr) and lived extremely frugally using ALL of his spare money to pay down the debt. At the end of the year he was able to pay off $6,000. Of course the interest continued to climb. He paid off 10% but that didn't even cover the interest, after all was said and done he owed $64,000. After that he said screw it and is waiting for the wage garnishment. He knows that he will never be able to pay off the debt. This was 3 years ago. His debt is now around $98,000.

So about that story. There's a good deal of financial irresponsibility involved as well as someone who didn't take college seriously. Is the appropriate punishment for that, that he be financially ruined for life? Does a failed year of school mean he should just commit suicide now because his life is essentially over? What if he wants to get serious in the future? He has no chance as things stand.

Now lets try an example without personalizing it. Skilled labor benefits society, having systems in place that allow people to obtain that education increases quality of life and earnings potential. As the average wage of the every day citizen goes up taxes can be lowered while simultaneously improving available services. By making it possible for people to obtain job training without having the funds upfront the amount of money that needs to be taxed in the long run goes down.

Why is it that I, and thousands of others have been able to progress through their career again? Since there is little to no “upward mobility”?

Because there are always outliers. Personal experience counts for very little when talking about statistics.

Did you just state that inflation wasn’t the issue, only to turn around and use CPI as your grounds??

No, I used the price of goods. Inflation is subtracted from the increase in the price of goods. Inflation for the consumer is a good thing as it effectively subtracts from the increase in the cost of goods. 5-2-1=2.

Ohhh, so since I work, I be default have agreed to be taxed so that others may live.

Did you ever expressly agree to the constitution when it outlawed treason? How about your state laws on murder, rape, and theft? You're bound to those in just the same way.

You really have no understanding of the Free Market that was sought after by the founders.
And this idea that “Need” drives a new interpretation of what something means is

Yet they weren't for 100% free markets because they correctly identified that Laissez-faire free markets are self destructive and bad for the consumer. Again this goes back to general welfare which speaks of a need for regulatory bodies in the name of consumer protection.

I skipped all the taxes are stealing stuff because it's all the same statements from you. So here's a question what is your optimal tax rate? We have to have a military, we need a few other random programs too like NASA and public education. How much should you or I have to pay? Have you ever put any thought in trying to figure out the Laffer Curve for various income levels? If you have, what are those values and how did you get them? If you haven't, how can you justify a tax rate without facts to back you up?

Well... I tried to make it a single post but I failed.

a reply to: macman

An educated person is less likely to become a criminal, and much less likely to be a violent one. It is the best interest of a thriving nation to give everyone the opportunity to become educated without being enslaved by debt.

a reply to: Aazadan

originally posted by: Aazadan
Again we get into needs, while the absolute basics are food and shelter people need more than that if they're going to be productive law abiding citizens. I'm not saying (and neither is anyone else) to give the poor a ton of luxuries. Rather the argument is that a small amount of reprieve does a world of good to a persons mental state.

So, the tax payer needs to fund not just necessities, but other items as well.
Where do you come up with this crap? Honestly. At what point to you not stop, think and say “Why does my neighbor need to fund my life financially”?
Or where do you think welfare ends? And where does this crap fit into your distorted understanding of the “General Welfare”?

originally posted by: Aazadan
As many total luxuries as the people who work are able to afford.

Oh, so subjective decisions made at the Fed Govt level. Yeah, that is exactly what the Founders had envisioned.
And who gets to decide what is luxury and what is not?

originally posted by: Aazadan
Car insurance is required in virtually every area of the country if you want to be productive. Most places have no public transportation systems, and transportation to a job is a requirement of working that job.

Do live under a rock?? Most cities have public transportation, which is offset by the tax payer. Every state has a governing authority on it.
And at what point in life did you decide to make these moronic 1:1 correlations like car insurance?
Car insurance is required if you operate a vehicle on public roads.
It is there to protect the other person, should you damage someone else’s property.

originally posted by: Aazadan
Car insurance protects others, but so does food stamps as they dramatically reduce the crime rate. By a factor many times what they cost even.

Now that is the dumbest statement of the day.
The fear of getting shot usually protects the average person from a criminal. Not food stamps. If that was the case, with 1/3 of the US population of the Govt dole, crime rates would be a fraction of what they are.
Reality does not offer you any hope as to being right.

originally posted by: Aazadan
Then why does the constitution seperately mention general welfare (which is the general well being of the people) and national defense?

Because National Defense can be used, and has been used for Warfare in general. General Welfare is called out for the physical security of the citizen.
If it were about “welfare” it would have been “General welfare”, not “the General Welfare”.
I suppose you think the right to bear arms is this?

originally posted by: Aazadan
So when actually asked by someone saying I want a job your response is too bad? The exact opposite of what you claimed.

Yeah, let me get right on telling you where I work.
There are a couple of people here on ATS that I have informed of open positions where I work. Maybe they will chime in. Maybe they won’t.
But, do hold your breath over me telling you, just because you say it isn’t so.

originally posted by: Aazadan
As for what I expect, yes I do expect a wage that allows me to live without public assistance to afford food, shelter, and other basics. On top of that I have an education, I expect that to make my skills more desirable than minimum wage. With your education and experience do you also not expect to make above minimum wage?

So, a Progressive with an entitlement mentality who is not successful in life, that has resorted to stealing and refuses to move to where the jobs are, has expectations of everyone else…all at the funding of the tax payer.
Good luck with that.
How about this. Let’s revisit this next year around the same time. You continue to “expect” these things…all of these things you are “entitled” to and we can compare it to what is going on with me. Someone who doesn’t “expect” things and who isn’t “entitled”.

originally posted by: Aazadan
So if an employee is paid $3200 and it costs you $6400 total to have that person employed then it's not worth it if they bring you $6401? Hence $1 in profit?

Nope. Since you display nothing to show that you have actually run a business, I will clue you in on some of the reason why.
Bringing someone else on, unless their work can provide at the very least on increase in gross profit per month of half of what it takes to have them on payroll, is not a working business model.
If it costs me $6400 a month to employ them, this doesn’t cover really any benefits, doesn’t factor in vacation time, the amount spent in training someone that may leave, background investigations, interviews that consume time, the idea that this person may cost the business money due to mistake and/or theft, and of course the cost associated with having them in the space (Called real-estate).
My monthly gross would have to increase at the very very least to $9600.
I am not in the business of employing people just to provide jobs to the public. I am in the business of making a product so I can reap the profits from this.

originally posted by: Aazadan
That is why we keep decreasing payouts per capita making welfare programs of any type less lucrative yet more people than ever are needing to use them?

Welfare as a whole needs to be reduced to a very small amount.

originally posted by: Aazadan
So now your solution is to walk across the country? In my case it's a 1200 mile walk to get to where I want to work (Austin TX), not the greatest thing ever and not the worst thing ever (putting aside the back injury that prevents me from making the walk). But what exactly am I supposed to do on the trip when it comes to pesky survival needs like food, water, and shelter? Those cost money, something poor people are unable to attain. Moving to where the jobs are is only a solution for the middle class and above. That's why you get things like suburbs while also having inner city hell holes.

If walking was what made the difference between having a career or having a job….yeah. But, how about this. Using the entitlement mentality, I guess you want someone to provide a moving service, apartment finding, job procurement, a Union Greeting and someone to pat your bottom when you have finished with such a hard trial in your life.

Honestly…you got more excuses as to why you and others can’t. No wonder you are successful in the career/business part of adult life.

originally posted by: Aazadan
So you're a proponent of slavery? If it's not the job of the company to provide a living wage, then logically it's also not the job of the company to provide any wage at all. Furthermore maximum profit is obtained at a labor cost of 0, so in order to most benefit the owner employees should be paid less.[/quote]
So, what company in America not only owns people, but doesn’t allow them to leave for a different job??
And also, what company forces people to work for them??

a reply to: Aazadan

originally posted by: Aazadan
Guess what? If no one pays their employees, no one (aside from the few at the top who collectively consume relatively little) has the funds to pay for anyones services they offer.

Again….I love this angle you have taken in your work life. May I ask (All hypothetical because I already know the answer), using this logic.. how is that career going for you?

originally posted by: Aazadan
Stealing food to prevent starving to death is defending your life.

Much Alinsky…. So, the person you stole from had done you wrong, and was threatening your life?

originally posted by: Aazadan

First of all I was referring to the Hollywood version as it sounds like that's what you want. But to answer your question in 2012:
New York - 19,570,261 people, 455,750 violent crimes. 1 per 42.94 people
Utah - 2,855,287 people, 91,300 violent crimes. 1 per 31.27 people
Idaho - 1,595,728 people, 34,969 violent crimes. 1 per 45.63 people
Arizona - 6,553,255 people, 260,038 violent crimes. 1 per 25.20 people
Arizona+Idaho+Utah (closer in total population) - 11,004,270 people, 386,307 violent crimes. 1 per 28.49 people
www.disastercenter.com...

I'm the one with no clue?

www.fbi.gov...

NY - 19,570,261 residents and 79,610 Violent Crimes reported.. .4%
UT - 2,855,287 residents and 5,876 Violent Crimes reported.. .2%
ID - 1,595,728 residents and 3,318 Violent Crimes reported.. .2%
AZ - 6,553,255 residents and 28,108 Violent Crimes reported.. .4%
Seems your website and the math you provided is WAY off.

originally posted by: Aazadan
Because there was no need when the founders were around. It was also generally understood to be the states responsibility not the feds. The founders in general were for welfare programs but they wanted them to be limited. Franklin for example found value in programs that were temporary and gave people just enough to be able to survive and find work. He wasn't for long term assistance or for it to provide for a very comfortable life but he found the idea itself worthwhile. Another would be Jefferson who believed in the idea of the poor living in group homes and being assigned work at the governments behest. Also worth noting is that he believed in the concept of reasonable wages and that people should refuse to work (and instead be covered by the government) if offered a substandard wage.

Are you serious???
So, if there was no need, then how would they know to put in in as a generality?
And Franklin also stated “I am for doing good to the poor, but...I think the best way of doing good to the poor, is not making them easy in poverty, but leading or driving them out of it. I observed...that the more public provisions were made for the poor, the less they provided for themselves, and of course became poorer. And, on the contrary, the less was done for them, the more they did for themselves, and became richer.”
So, guess Franklin saw the future and called it out.
Bravo Franklin and Bravo Aazadan.

originally posted by: Aazadan

When you haven't eaten for over a week then yes, that becomes precisely the mentality. Give it a try sometime if you care about understanding. Start slow, give yourself a 6 pack of ramen for two weeks. Then take it a step up and stretch the coins you find on the ground when walking around as you try to go about your day to last for a months worth of food. Once the hunger sets in it gets real easy to justify sneaking a box of corn flakes out of a grocery store.

Yep, that is the response I was expecting.
Screw the person that has what you want. Screw the fact that they worked for what you stole. Screw their budget that was impacted due to your theft.
So, let’s rehash this.
I work, pay taxes, don’t receive welfare handouts, employee a couple of people, pay business taxes.
You receive Govt Welfare……..Oh, and steal stuff when you are hungry.

I think that about sums it up.

originally posted by: Aazadan

So you agree. It all comes from the customer.

Money from providing a product/service. Sure.

originally posted by: Aazadan
...which is collecting and redistributing wealth.

No. Please go and actually get the definition of the terms you tout.
It is called compensation for work performed.

originally posted by: Aazadan
No. SNAP is for anyone. WIC is specifically for the children and happens to give far larger per capita benefits.

Well, I stand corrected on my Govt provided Welfare terms and programs.

a reply to: Aazadan

originally posted by: Aazadan

Because education is expensive and it's unreasonable to expect people fresh out of high school to take on that risk. It is very easy to be ruined for life by a poor education choice. Let me give an example of a friend of mine. He went to Ohio University for a year, that cost him $20,000 in tuition which he paid for with loans. He found that he couldn't both work and attend school at the same time so he had to take an additional $12,000 loan to support himself. As far as students go my friend is a poor student, he's not the brightest and he's far too prone to getting distracted. At a party school like OU it's very easy to just get drunk every night and blow off the work. At the end of the year my friend was $32,000 in debt and had flunked out of school. He returned to the town I lived in at the time and couldn't get a job. His student loan payment came due as he was no longer a student but he had no job to make the payment. A month later it defaulted which carries a $10,000+25% fine. All of a sudden he owed $53,000. That didn't magically give him the funds to make the payment so the interest rate continued to compound which jumped to 15% due to a default. After a year he owed 60,950. He got a job which paid minimum wage ($7.45/hr) and lived extremely frugally using ALL of his spare money to pay down the debt. At the end of the year he was able to pay off $6,000. Of course the interest continued to climb. He paid off 10% but that didn't even cover the interest, after all was said and done he owed $64,000. After that he said screw it and is waiting for the wage garnishment. He knows that he will never be able to pay off the debt. This was 3 years ago. His debt is now around $98,000.

So, because it is hard and expensive, and let’s face it you are “entitled” to it, the tax payer should pay for this.
Makes sense for any Progressive who thinks the tax payer is infinite, with bottomless pockets.

originally posted by: Aazadan
So about that story. There's a good deal of financial irresponsibility involved as well as someone who didn't take college seriously. Is the appropriate punishment for that, that he be financially ruined for life? Does a failed year of school mean he should just commit suicide now because his life is essentially over? What if he wants to get serious in the future? He has no chance as things stand.

Suicide is his choice.
College was his choice.
Student loans were his choice.
What he did/didn’t do in regards to his school work was his choice.
NOT mine.

You want to control people. That is your problem.

originally posted by: Aazadan
Now lets try an example without personalizing it. Skilled labor benefits society, having systems in place that allow people to obtain that education increases quality of life and earnings potential. As the average wage of the every day citizen goes up taxes can be lowered while simultaneously improving available services. By making it possible for people to obtain job training without having the funds upfront the amount of money that needs to be taxed in the long run goes down.

All at the funding of the tax payer, instead of having the person be responsible for their life and actions.

originally posted by: Aazadan
Because there are always outliers. Personal experience counts for very little when talking about statistics.

Your right. Seeing that the statistics are showing that they entitlement minded people are not really being successful in life, I gotta say again. Good luck with that mindset.

originally posted by: Aazadan
No, I used the price of goods. Inflation is subtracted from the increase in the price of goods. Inflation for the consumer is a good thing as it effectively subtracts from the increase in the cost of goods. 5-2-1=2.

Okay then.

originally posted by: Aazadan
Did you ever expressly agree to the constitution when it outlawed treason? How about your state laws on murder, rape, and theft? You're bound to those in just the same way.

So now you are trying to tie in murder rape and theft???
Thought those were just things that decent people didn’t do.

originally posted by: Aazadan
Yet they weren't for 100% free markets because they correctly identified that Laissez-faire free markets are self destructive and bad for the consumer. Again this goes back to general welfare which speaks of a need for regulatory bodies in the name of consumer protection.

So, they created such Govt based agencies just after the birth of the nation??
And yet again, your 1:1 correlation of them in deed stating that a total 100% Free market may not the be the best thing, does not then equate to them wanting or writing in laws regulating industries.

originally posted by: Aazadan
I skipped all the taxes are stealing stuff because it's all the same statements from you. So here's a question what is your optimal tax rate? We have to have a military,

No, no we don’t There is this thing about a standing army that was addressed by the founders. And a Militia and so on.

originally posted by: Aazadan
we need a few other random programs too like NASA and public education.

Where did you get this education that defined need? NASA is a want. Federal Governing of education is a Progressive want. National parks are a want.
Didn’t you outline “need” just a little bit ago??

originally posted by: Aazadan
How much should you or I have to pay? Have you ever put any thought in trying to figure out the Laffer Curve for various income levels? If you have, what are those values and how did you get them? If you haven't, how can you justify a tax rate without facts to back you up?

Well... I tried to make it a single post but I failed.

So, a Progressive tax rate is not theft nor I assume you are going to say it is punitive in nature.
Because, if someone makes more (then others) then they therefore can pay more, because they won’t miss it, or it want hurt them as much. I mean… it’s only fair that someone making a million dollars, that doesn’t use welfare, SNAP, WIC, Food stamps, Govt subsidized housing, Govt based cell phone and so on HAS to and can pay more than the person only making $25K a year that uses Food stamps and WIC, and SNAP, and Housing and all the other items.

a reply to: jrod

Can we look at the educated persons involved with crime??

Your view is that providing something to someone will make them less likely to be a criminal, all at the tax payers expense.

The adult grownup view is to not be a criminal and be responsible for your life, actions and finances.

a reply to: macman

So, the tax payer needs to fund not just necessities, but other items as well.

If you ever expect that person to become a productive contributing member of society, then yes. The more you have the easier it is to focus on enrichment acitivies such as education and job training that lets you have more. I'm not saying go out and buy everyone on some form of assistance a yacht and a lamorguini, but a handful of comforts go a long way. If you make things too comfortable then people have no incentive to improve, but if you make them too uncomfortable people simply don't have the opportunity to improve.

Oh, so subjective decisions made at the Fed Govt level. Yeah, that is exactly what the Founders had envisioned.
And who gets to decide what is luxury and what is not?

Items that are luxuries are things beyond food, water, shelter, utilities, and required transportation. Incidently we just covered 100% of my income/spending if you classify internet as a utility (as it should be).

Do live under a rock?? Most cities have public transportation, which is offset by the tax payer. Every state has a governing authority on it.

No, they don't. The US is last among developed countries in public transportation. If you live in one of the bigger cities you're likely to have some bus system and in some cases even a rail system but for many others that's not the case. My previous town I recently moved from is your typical small town, it was even rated one of the nicest small towns in the country to visit. There were a handful of taxi's (too expensive for the poor to use) and no bus system. My current small town is the same way, no bus system.

I just double checked the Ohio Department of Transportation actually, my county has 0 fixed bus routes, only some limited service for the elderly. My previous county is labeled as having 8 routes but that's being generous. There were 4 bus stops in town: Krogers, Walmart, the courthouse, and the college. If you're generous with how you label those you can get to 8. Trying to use it for employment was totally useless.

Ohios public transportation funds in cities that do have it btw, are at the lowest levels they've been since 1980.

The fear of getting shot usually protects the average person from a criminal. Not food stamps.

The best protection is to never be in that situation in the first place. It's not an easy metric to gauge either as you can only compare before and after results. The best protection against crime isn't a gun, it's not creating the conditions that cause people to commit the crime in the first place.

I suppose you think the right to bear arms is this?

Actually no. I think the right to bear arms is the right to have access to any weapon you want. I find fault in the law in the fact that the government has access to weapons that aren't available to the citizenry. I see no problem with private citizens owning body armor, "assault rifles", grenades, explosives, or anything else. The greatest flaw in the second amendment is that the government can afford to buy items like carriers, fighter jets, and tanks which cost millions or billions of dollars each. The private citizen cannot compete with that. When the law was written it was at a time where there was little if any quality difference between military and private equipment.

How about this. Let’s revisit this next year around the same time. You continue to “expect” these things…all of these things you are “entitled” to and we can compare it to what is going on with me. Someone who doesn’t “expect” things and who isn’t “entitled”.

Next year around this time I expect I'll be employed earning minimum wage, same as now. One year closer to finishing school. And with another year worth of software written. Ten years from now I expect I'll be employed earning minimum wage, done with school, and own a failed business. Statistically that's the most likely outcome.

If it costs me $6400 a month to employ them, this doesn’t cover really any benefits, doesn’t factor in vacation time, the amount spent in training someone that may leave, background investigations, interviews that consume time, the idea that this person may cost the business money due to mistake and/or theft, and of course the cost associated with having them in the space (Called real-estate).

Those are all called costs. The costs of an employee go beyond their wage. You have taxes, equipment, management, training, mistakes, hiring expenses, and anything else you can think of. All of that combined is the cost of hiring that person. If that cost is less than the amount of revenue they generate for you +1 minus taxes then they're worth hiring from a purely financial perspective.

Welfare as a whole needs to be reduced to a very small amount.

The more corporations pay, the less people need to be on assistance.

If walking was what made the difference between having a career or having a job….yeah. But, how about this. Using the entitlement mentality, I guess you want someone to provide a moving service, apartment finding, job procurement, a Union Greeting and someone to pat your bottom when you have finished with such a hard trial in your life.

Somewhat. My expectation towards moving expenses is more along the lines of a sign on bonus that's taken out of my pay for the next couple of months to be able to afford relocation. As I already covered though, relocation by walking simply isn't financially viable. It costs money to move.

So, what company in America not only owns people, but doesn’t allow them to leave for a different job??
And also, what company forces people to work for them??

Every minimum wage employer in the country that doesn't offer any real job skills or training. Each job is interchangable, and they're all pretty much the same. It's very similar to slavery. I think the term people generally use here is wage slave

originally posted by: macman
Again….I love this angle you have taken in your work life. May I ask (All hypothetical because I already know the answer), using this logic.. how is that career going for you?

Lets see: I've completed 12 out of 14 years of school (and I've done it in only 8), I hold multiple certificates, and even have a couple of awards. The list of relevant software I know is as long as this post. Experience is where I lack, I've had a couple of consulting jobs but that's all. It's a tough industry to get into, it makes the employment market in the rest of the country look good.

My solution to the lack of a job market is to create my own product, however while that may make me feel better the current trends show a startup business failure rate of 90% so I have no expectations on my future business being something I can do long term.

Much Alinsky…. So, the person you stole from had done you wrong, and was threatening your life?

Not at all, they were innocent grocery stores. As I've said, when you're hungry right, wrong, and innocent cease to have meaning it's more about survival instinct and if things happen... they happen. You've never been in the situation so you wouldn't know.