conservatives v. socialists..........

[PLC1]

Well one issue here is, I believe Reagan honestly thought this would fix the problem. Perhaps even most non-liberals believed that.

However, we are now in a better position to see that this act didn't fix the problem and made it horribly worse. Further, we have this little terrorism issue, which gives more credit to not giving Amnesty, and more urgency to closing the boarders.

Up to here, I'm with you 100%

Point being, then, at that time, it may have been a neutral issue. But now, at this time, it's clearly Liberal to try the same bad idea again thinking it will help, when clearly it didn't before. This is what Liberals do. They don't fix problems because doing so takes away their political football. If they keep trying a known failed policy, the issue will come back over and over, giving them something to kick around during elections.

This part is correct only if you follow Libsmasher's definition of the term "lib": Someone who doesn't want to fix illegal immigration. Otherwise, it is clearly a bipartisan failure, including the six years from '00 to '06 during which the Republican trifecta did exactly squat to end illegal immigration.

 

[Here We Go]

If it is all the Democrats fault, then how do you explain the fact that nothing was done about illegal immigration for the six years that Republicans controlled the Congress and White House?

If our borders are not secured and something done about illegal immigrants, we may as well change the name of "Mexico" to "South Mexico" and the United States as "North Mexico". Remember the Alamo!

 

[vyo476]

Say there are ten people in a "society".

Yeah, say there are. Did this serve a purpose, because looking down through the rest of the post you seem to rely on a 21-person society.

Conservatives would want a nearly free economic market, and the result could be the following income ratios:

1 person earns 200
2 persons earn 50
3 persons earn 30
5 persons earn 20
10 persons earn 10

1 person earns 200 = 200
2 persons earn 50 = 100
3 persons earn 30 = 90
5 persons earn 20 = 100
10 persons earn 10 = 100

200 + 100 + 90 + 100 + 100 = 590, your conservative society's gross income.

With socialist policies, the result could be:

21 persons earn 9.

21 persons earn 9 = 21 x 9 = 189, the socialist gross income. Wow, that's a lot lower. If you're trying to make a point on how socialist societies are less productive than laissez-faire ones, arbitrarily inventing numbers probably wasn't the best way to go, since we can then do the same in response.

I won't, though; instead, I'll take the gross income of your laissez-faire society (590) and divide it 21 ways.

590 / 21 = 28.09523

So, in an equally-productive socialist society, the universal income would be about 28. When compared with your lassiez-faire society, the universal income would represent an increase for 15 people and a decrease for 6. Everyone doesn't earn less - in fact, the majority earns more.

Everyone earns less, but ahhhhhhhh - there's no "greed".

On the contrary, there's plenty of greed - the top six earners are all painfully aware that they're not receiving as much as they used to. Number one especially has fallen by 172 - quite a decrease in affluence.

I wouldn't advocate full socialistic redistribution of wealth because of the myriad of social problems it would cause. However, this isn't because the math doesn't work.

 

[Andy]

1 person earns 200 = 200
2 persons earn 50 = 100
3 persons earn 30 = 90
5 persons earn 20 = 100
10 persons earn 10 = 100

200 + 100 + 90 + 100 + 100 = 590, your conservative society's gross income.

21 persons earn 9 = 21 x 9 = 189, the socialist gross income. Wow, that's a lot lower. If you're trying to make a point on how socialist societies are less productive than laissez-faire ones, arbitrarily inventing numbers probably wasn't the best way to go, since we can then do the same in response.

I won't, though; instead, I'll take the gross income of your laissez-faire society (590) and divide it 21 ways.

590 / 21 = 28.09523

So, in an equally-productive socialist society, the universal income would be about 28. When compared with your lassiez-faire society, the universal income would represent an increase for 15 people and a decrease for 6. Everyone doesn't earn less - in fact, the majority earns more.

Of course, the issue is the 'equally-productive' part. Socialistic societies are never as productive. China is a perfect example. Prior to the late 70s, the completely communistic economic system was horribly stuck in a stagnate state. While the "Asian Tigers" around them were roaring, China's economy was comatose.

In 1820, China accounted for 33% of the worlds GDP. However, by the industrial revolution, and the domination of Stalinist-Communism in China, led to an ever increasing fall behind even their closest Asian neighbors. By 1978, China was 11th in the worlds GDP, and Japan, was 6 times them economically.

It was begin to get embarrassing that Hong Kong, a tiny island just off their coast, with little resources, a fraction of the people, and very little land to expand, was starting to have a standard of living that PRC could only dream of, and a GPD per capita that was nearly 10 times theirs. Meanwhile, in 1978, under Communism, 30.7% of Chinese lived in poverty, and the economic level considered poverty is almost half the poverty level here.

So, at this time, the government started making social-economic reforms. Among them, private ownership of means of production. Also know as... Capitalism. By 1985 the poverty level was cut in half. Now in 2005, the poverty level is 3.1%. And China's GDP is now 4th in the world, from $147 Billion in 1978, to $2,234 Billion.

Point being... IF a socialized economic system did create the same economic output... THEN it would raise to a good median level.

However... that is a mythical situation that does not exist in the real world. In the real world, a communist/socialist economic system will always fail to produce a fraction of what a Capitalist free market system does.

 

[Libsmasher]

To paraphrase, libs are people who don't want to do anything about illegal immigration, therefore, illegal immigration is the fault of the libs from both parties. The Republican Congress and Whitehouse of '00 to '06 was dominated by libs regardless of which party was in power. It's difficult to argue with such logic as that. How many more definitions of the term "lib" do you have?

Uh, democrats controlled at least one house of congress for every year from 1986 till the present time with a single exception: the 108th congress 2003 - 2005. That means they could (and did) stop any attemp to stop the illegal alien invasion during almost that whole time. By 2003, there were enough republican RINOs to stop any action, and the congress's attention was diverted to the new war in iraq. Also by that time, "new facts" and influences were beginning to have an effect - the corporate interests who now depended on illegal alien labor, the increasing influence of the millions of illegals conversted to citizens from the 1986 amnesty and their high birth rates, the tens of millions now residing in the country, the corporate interests trying to sell those people goods and services. In other words, there is a dynamic time dimension to the history of this, a rapidly accumulating number of effects that tend to preserve the invasion, a kind of "death spiral" effect. But there is no question what the sine qua non has been during the last quarter century - the desire of the democrat party to gain perpetual power by creating millions of new democrat voters, while at the same time promoting things they support such as cultural balkanization and splintering the american national identity.

Illegal immigration has been a problem for decades. When Reagan signed into law the illegal immigration amnesty act of '86, the trickle became a flood. The floodgates may have been open a crack before, after that, they were thrown wide open and have been that way since.

Pure historical distortion. Once again (LISTENING are you??) Reagan agreed to a compromise, which was billed by it's lib authors as a ONCE AND FOR ALL, never to be repeated amnesty, prohibiting employment of illegals. After that, dems in congress ignored both provisions, stopped funding for measures such as an effective wall, refused to fund real ID and other measures to enforce the employment prohibition, and are of course are now back asking for another amnesty, only ten times the number of aliens.

 

[Dr.Who]

..........simplified.

Say there are ten people in a "society". Conservatives would want a nearly free economic market, and the result could be the following income ratios:

1 person earns 200
2 persons earn 50
3 persons earn 30
5 persons earn 20
10 persons earn 10

With socialist policies, the result could be:

21 persons earn 9.

Everyone earns less, but ahhhhhhhh - there's no "greed".

OK so the math wasn't right. But we get the point - wealth is distributed on a bell shaped curve.

What makes some people fall on the top and some fall on the bottom?

I would say that people who are more productive earn more and people who are less productive earn less. This is definitional! If Michael Jordan plays one game of bball and sells two million dollars worth of merchandise then he is two million dollars productive. If Joe Smo works for 2000 hours per year and earns $30,000 then he is $30k productive. if MJ gets hurt and can't play bball then he is not as productive and his income will reflect that. If JS should be paid more then he will apply for better jobs and get them and will be paid more. If he does not apply for better jobs then that is due to his own poor choices and it is a quality of his that makes him less productive.

A huge factor that determines how productive a person is is how hard they work. MJ works really hard training and pushing himself to the limits of what his body can do to play as well as he can. JS can work overtime or at two jobs to be more productive. If his job is to make circuit boards and he can make one per hour then every hour more he works makes him one more circuit board more productive.


Why should MJ push himself so hard? Why should JS work overtime? Obviously the answer is to make more money. If we level off the bell shaped curve so that every one makes the same amount of money no matter how hard they work or how productive they are then why should they bother to take on overtime or to push themselves harder?

Socialism reduces productivity because it takes away the incentive to work harder.

France for a while has had a 35 hour work week. Just recently they have decided that they were being hurt by that policy. The obvious truth that if they work less they are less productive has become apparent.

OK back to the question of why people should work harder for the same pay? Socialism decries that it is fair for people to make the same pay. They might rename this but this is what it is. In practice though they do not have a level pay structure where everyone makes the same amount. Some people do earn more in socialistic countries. In practice they are hypocrites. I think this demonstrates that the arguments in favor of socialism are just tools in a class struggle. Poorer people want more money so they advocate policies that will take money from richer people and redistribute it. They can't take it all or the country would fall apart, but they can take some.

 

[PLC1]

Is the disposable income a person has really dependent on how hard he/she works?

That seems to me to be the premise of many of the posts above, but I could be wrong.

It also seems to me that, while hard work can put bread on the table and a roof over one's head, real wealth comes from power.

Further, power comes from real wealth.

I'm not talking about a few lousy thousand bucks a month. I'm talking about real money, estate sorts of money, exclusive mansions in exclusive parts of the country, where the wealthy rub elbows with the wealthy, and anyone whose worth is not measured in at least eight figures is there only as a servant kind of wealth. Real wealth begets real power, the power to manipulate markets to create more wealth, the power to manipulate political outcomes in order to pass laws favorable to gaining even more wealth. Real wealth can create an image of the person who controls it that is totally fabricated, and then make the country believe that the image is the real person. Real wealth controls this nation, as well as most nations. The rest of us might benefit from the decisions made by the wealthy, but, if we do, it is only as a biproduct of the lust for more wealth and power.

 

[GaiusJuliusCaesarAugustus]

..........simplified.

Say there are ten people in a "society". Conservatives would want a nearly free economic market, and the result could be the following income ratios:

1 person earns 200
2 persons earn 50
3 persons earn 30
5 persons earn 20
10 persons earn 10

With socialist policies, the result could be:

21 persons earn 9.

Everyone earns less, but ahhhhhhhh - there's no "greed".

you've started out mentioning liberals vs conservatives and ended up with conservative vs socialists.

wassup with dat?

 

[Dr.Who]

Is the disposable income a person has really dependent on how hard he/she works?

It is dependent on how productive you are. Hard work is one way to be productive. Having a special talent that is unique and in demand is another way. I am talking about Hollywood. Risking your inheritance to start a factory that employs 200 people is productive. And risking your inheritance to invest in the stock market so that other companies can have capital and hire employees is productive too.

 

[PLC1]

It is dependent on how productive you are. Hard work is one way to be productive. Having a special talent that is unique and in demand is another way. I am talking about Hollywood. Risking your inheritance to start a factory that employs 200 people is productive. And risking your inheritance to invest in the stock market so that other companies can have capital and hire employees is productive too.

Yes, and if your investment goes sour, then your disposable income has gone down due to that productivity.

 

[Andy]

Is the disposable income a person has really dependent on how hard he/she works?

That seems to me to be the premise of many of the posts above, but I could be wrong.

It also seems to me that, while hard work can put bread on the table and a roof over one's head, real wealth comes from power.

Further, power comes from real wealth.

I'm talking about real money, estate sorts of money, exclusive mansions in exclusive parts of the country, where the wealthy rub elbows with the wealthy. Real wealth begets real power, the power to manipulate markets to create more wealth, the power to manipulate political outcomes in order to pass laws favorable to gaining even more wealth. Real wealth can create an image of the person who controls it that is totally fabricated, and then make the country believe that the image is the real person. Real wealth controls this nation, as well as most nations. The rest of us might benefit from the decisions made by the wealthy, but, if we do, it is only as a biproduct of the lust for more wealth and power.

First, I think wealth is subjective, in that I have seen a husband with his wife, and playing football with his kids, earning only $30K/yr in southern Ohio, be far more 'wealthy' and happy, than a multimillionaire that never smiles, and is constantly miserable. Check out Ted Turners life. Or the Kennedy's.

That said, no is going to argue that wealth and power do not go hand in hand. I'm not entirely sure one leads to the other...

Top wealthy Senators:
John Kerry, (D-Mass): $267 Million. (Married his wealthy widow Teresa Heinz)
Herb Kohl, D-Wisconsin: $171 Million. (Earned most of it in the family chain of Kohl department and grocery stores)
Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass): $102 Million. (Inherited wealth from importing liquor during prohibition, deals with mobsters, real-estate, and investing)
Jay Rockefeller, D -West Virginia: $91 Million. (Inherited wealth from Standard Oil and Chase Manhattan and JP Morgan Chase)
Dianne Feinstein, D-California: $79 Million. (Married her husbands $1 Billion, and most of her $26 Mill is in blind trust so who knows who is funding her)
Frank R. Lautenberg (D-NJ): $79 Million. (Earned in Automatic Data Processing INC. and was on the Board of the Port Authority in New York)

So, only 2 of the top 6 richest Senators (all democraps) actually earned their money. Now do the powerful gain their money through politics? No, not as often as inheriting it or marrying it.

Not to say it doesn't happen... For example, in 1995 there was the Al bore oil incident. For those who do not know, then Vice President Al Bore had nearly $500 thousand in stock in 'Occidental Petroleum Company'. In '95 the Elk Hills strategic oil reserve was sold, (by recommendation of a certain VP) to a random oil company... amazingly Occidental Petroleum Company.

And of course, let's not forget the Marc Rich pardon, in which millions given to a former president allowed a known traitor, tax evading, law breaking, enemy supporting multi-millionaire, was able to purchase escape from his crimes... and meanwhile he turns out to be the middle-man for the international oil-for-food scandal.

That all said...
I have to disagree with the theory that "The rest of us might benefit from the decisions made by the wealthy, but, if we do, it is only as a biproduct of the lust for more wealth and power."

This simply isn't true. Most of the average business owners, are not doing what they do simply for greed. Most do what they do, because they love to do it. How many thousands of people have jobs because of Wendy's? Yet Dave Thomas started and grew this international company because of one reason... he loved to cook.

Earning and making wealth, is not so simple as 'work hard'. It is also dependent on what you are working hard at. Working hard at Wendy's may never lead to wealth because flipping burgers is something that anyone can do. You might be the best garbage man in the world, but given the high supply of people able to do such work, you'll never get a six-figure income.

If you want to become wealthy, you have to find a occupation that not everyone can do. Then you have to work hard.. not always as in sweat and 70 hour weeks. But work hard, as in learn as much as you can about that field. Know more than the average guy about it. Be more useful and more versatile.

Finely, and most important. If you want to be wealthy... control your money. Don't blow it on pointless things. There is an amazing number of people in the US with high incomes, and yet are completely broke. They blow their money on stuff they don't need and are shocked when their net-worth is near zero. For more on that, find the book The Millionaire Next Door. A chronicle of average people with a net worth over and million, and how they live. Some of them exist with incomes not much over $50K a year, but because of frugal living, controlled spending, and wise investing, they are very wealthy.

 

[Andy]

Yes, and if your investment goes sour, then your disposable income has gone down due to that productivity.

Well... investing wisely is something that must be learned. Many people choose not to take the time to learn how to invest, and then are shocked when they invest poorly and lose it, or end up no further than where they were.

Everything in life is an investment. Everything. You invest your time. You invest your effort. You invest your money.

You invest your money into a splashy car that loses 10% of it's value as soon as the tires roll off the lot, and lose 60% of it's value in 3 years... that's a bad investment.
You invest your time into video games, and movies, and going to the bars... that's a bad investment.
You invest your effort into Wendy's or some other low end job that anyone can do... bad investment.

You invest your money into education, your time into reading/learning about a career choice, your effort into a high tech job or a position that could lead to a high tech job... these are wise investments.

Someone rightly said that our economy is becoming a knowledge based system. You are paid more for what you know. You know electrical? You know engineering? You know management? You know health care? You'll get paid. You know how to make your Elf girl char in WoW swing a wand around... your not getting paid... no matter how fast you can flip simmering beef on a grill.

 

[Libsmasher]

Well... investing wisely is something that must be learned. Many people choose not to take the time to learn how to invest, and then are shocked when they invest poorly and lose it, or end up no further than where they were.

Everything in life is an investment. Everything. You invest your time. You invest your effort. You invest your money.

You invest your money into a splashy car that loses 10% of it's value as soon as the tires roll off the lot, and lose 60% of it's value in 3 years... that's a bad investment.
You invest your time into video games, and movies, and going to the bars... that's a bad investment.
You invest your effort into Wendy's or some other low end job that anyone can do... bad investment.

You invest your money into education, your time into reading/learning about a career choice, your effort into a high tech job or a position that could lead to a high tech job... these are wise investments.

Someone rightly said that our economy is becoming a knowledge based system. You are paid more for what you know. You know electrical? You know engineering? You know management? You know health care? You'll get paid. You know how to make your Elf girl char in WoW swing a wand around... your not getting paid... no matter how fast you can flip simmering beef on a grill.

Good!

 

[Andy]

Up to here, I'm with you 100%



This part is correct only if you follow Libsmasher's definition of the term "lib": Someone who doesn't want to fix illegal immigration. Otherwise, it is clearly a bipartisan failure, including the six years from '00 to '06 during which the Republican trifecta did exactly squat to end illegal immigration.

I am not suggesting by any stretch that all Repugs are pure on this issue. I will however point out that a political party and political ideology are 2 different things. Neither party has a lock on either political ideology. There are Liberal Repugs, and there are, very few, conservative Democraps.

Liberals tend to believe in a large expansive government that will, in their minds, fix all the issues facing America. Conservatives... what few their are, believe in the Constitution and believe that the people themselves hold the answer to most issues in the free market. Liberals hate everyone in general. Conservatives tend to believe the best in people.

Liberals, whether they are Repugs or Democraps tend to want to give amnesty in order to prolong the issue, there by setting up themselves as the answer to the issue they are creating by giving Amnesty.

So did the Repugs drop the ball? Sure. Of course, in truth, this issue has been dealt with already. According to the Reagan law, the boarder states are supposed to put the fence up. Why are they skirting their duty? We just need to enforce the law already written. Not sure why we do not.

 

[PLC1]

I am not suggesting by any stretch that all Repugs are pure on this issue. I will however point out that a political party and political ideology are 2 different things. Neither party has a lock on either political ideology. There are Liberal Repugs, and there are, very few, conservative Democraps.

Liberals tend to believe in a large expansive government that will, in their minds, fix all the issues facing America. Conservatives... what few their are, believe in the Constitution and believe that the people themselves hold the answer to most issues in the free market. Liberals hate everyone in general. Conservatives tend to believe the best in people.

Liberals, whether they are Repugs or Democraps tend to want to give amnesty in order to prolong the issue, there by setting up themselves as the answer to the issue they are creating by giving Amnesty.

So did the Repugs drop the ball? Sure. Of course, in truth, this issue has been dealt with already. According to the Reagan law, the boarder states are supposed to put the fence up. Why are they skirting their duty? We just need to enforce the law already written. Not sure why we do not.

I know why we don't. It's because the employers who pay for political campaigns like the cheap labor, pure and simple.

Don't you see an inconsistency in the above?

Liberals hate everyone in general. Conservatives tend to believe the best in people.

If the "liberals" hate everyone in general, do they not hate the illegals?

Plus you're mixing up issues, as do most people who see politics as a one dimensional left to right continuum. What, for example, does big government have to do with the illegal immigration problem?

I agree with this part:

Liberals tend to believe in a large expansive government that will, in their minds, fix all the issues facing America. Conservatives... what few their are, believe in the Constitution and believe that the people themselves hold the answer to most issues in the free market.

Conservatives, that is to say, real limited government fiscal responsibility support the tenth amendment types, are an endangered species in Washington, that's for sure. It seems to me, though that both "liberals", meaning people favoring a strong central government, and "conservatives", meaning what you just described, would still want the federal government to fulfill their Constitutional mandate to protect the sovereignty of the nation. This is not a liberal/conservative issue, unless you bend the definition of those terms.