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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: Yes, it's class war. And your point is...?
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Beeswax Altar
Shipmate
# 11644
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by no prophet's flag is set so...:
Forgive me, but dropping money into people's pockets, who may lack the skills and knowledge to know how to handle it, is exactly why dropping coins into the hats of beggars is not the right idea. The right idea is to have programs to help the homeless not to be homeless by dealing with their health, mental health and social issues, providing job skills, and helping them to have stable housing. Of course, in the absence of such programs, we are currently stuck with dropping money directly into the hats of the homeless. Often the small amounts of money are spent on the wrong things: alcohol or drugs. Which is why the liquor board stores report so much activity on welfare cheque days.
I'll say it again: I'd pay more taxes if something legitimately helpful was being done with it on a programmatic basis. As if is, I identify causes I think are worthy and given money, for which I get, of course, an additional tax break. Which means that a donation of $50,000 costs me one-half or one-third of the amount.
And that's why no wealthy Obama supporter will pony up the money. Nothing is stopping a billionaire from sending money to tens of thousands of poor people. Buffett and Gates are both Obama supporters. They wouldn't miss the $14 billion much less $3.5 billion.
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Losing sleep is something you want to avoid, if possible.
-Og: King of Bashan
Posts: 8411 | From: By a large lake | Registered: Jul 2006
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Sioni Sais
Shipmate
# 5713
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Posted
Isn't it such a help to so many consciences that the poor, working or not, are so feckless that so many can feel so little moral duty to help them.
Not. I really miss ken when we have a thread like this.
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"He isn't Doctor Who, he's The Doctor"
(Paul Sinha, BBC)
Posts: 24276 | From: Newport, Wales | Registered: Apr 2004
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cliffdweller
Shipmate
# 13338
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Sioni Sais:
Isn't it such a help to so many consciences that the poor, working or not, are so feckless that so many can feel so little moral duty to help them.
Indeed. If no prophet's rant conflating all working-class poor with a possibly drug or alcohol addicted beggar is about the clearest proof so far of the existence of class warfare.
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"Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid." -Frederick Buechner
Posts: 11242 | From: a small canyon overlooking the city | Registered: Jan 2008
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cliffdweller
Shipmate
# 13338
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by no prophet's flag is set so...:
A multi-site study, unpublished yet as far as I know (I know two of the contracted researchers), was looking at working low-income families*. What they found is that the consumer goods were not really what most of us might recommend: e.g., prepared food meals where the concerns are salt, fat sources and overall nutrition, and electronics. They also found that the income meant less visits to the food bank.
But we're conflating several kinds of desired outcomes here.
Again, the original post was not suggesting that handouts to the working poor was THE best way to deal with inequality, simply that doing so would be better than the current "trickle-down" method of giving huge tax breaks to the so-called "job creators" who are anything but. The fact that the working poor might use their $$ to buy things some of us might disapprove of (as if the rich never do) is beside the point-- the point was simply that lower income families will spend the $$ on consumer goods which drives the economy. Again, a more targeted program might very well provide even greater good than just a flat give-away, the point was simply that even a flat give away is better than the mythical trickle down.
quote:
Originally posted by no prophet's flag is set so...:
Further, they found that the worst nourished children were the latch-key kids whose lower income two or one parent had the adult(s) leave early for work, with the kids getting their own breakfasts (or not), with the same holding true for other meals. They also had issues with homework and classroom conduct. Interventions such as school milk programs and hot lunches were somewhat effective in improving things.
Nothing here strikes me as particularly earth-shattering news...
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"Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid." -Frederick Buechner
Posts: 11242 | From: a small canyon overlooking the city | Registered: Jan 2008
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Adeodatus
Shipmate
# 4992
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by no prophet's flag is set so...:
Forgive me, but dropping money into people's pockets, who may lack the skills and knowledge to know how to handle it, is exactly why dropping coins into the hats of beggars is not the right idea.
Well then, thank goodness all those rich folks work so hard at protecting their money from falling into the hands of idiots.
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"What is broken, repair with gold."
Posts: 9779 | From: Manchester | Registered: Sep 2003
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cliffdweller
Shipmate
# 13338
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Adeodatus:
quote:
Originally posted by no prophet's flag is set so...:
Forgive me, but dropping money into people's pockets, who may lack the skills and knowledge to know how to handle it, is exactly why dropping coins into the hats of beggars is not the right idea.
Well then, thank goodness all those rich folks work so hard at protecting their money from falling into the hands of idiots.
![[Overused]](graemlins/notworthy.gif)
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"Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid." -Frederick Buechner
Posts: 11242 | From: a small canyon overlooking the city | Registered: Jan 2008
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Martin60
Shipmate
# 368
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Posted
When the world's GDP is about $13K per person - thirteen thousand dollars a year for every man, woman and child on the planet - yet half of all persons live on $2 a day or less, who needs Satan?
[ 21. January 2015, 22:05: Message edited by: Martin60 ]
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Love wins
Posts: 17586 | From: Never Dobunni after all. Corieltauvi after all. Just moved to the capital. | Registered: Jun 2001
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orfeo
Ship's Musical Counterpoint
# 13878
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Fr Weber:
quote:
Originally posted by stonespring:
Does it seem to anyone else that the very world "class" (as in socioeconomic class) has become politically incorrect in many situations in the US? Is this the case in other countries? In school for example, we would talk about the class issues in literature or in history but when it came to current events - or especially when it involved discussing our own community and the families in our own school - it was impolite to use the term class and it was instead referred to indirectly with terms like "socioeconomic diversity" and "income Inequality" - which point to class issues, but they don't emphasize that people in a given class - even in a country like America where even the poor believe they can become rich, where people often vote against their class's financial interests, and where both the poor and the rich often call themselves "middle class" when they are asked - even in America people in a given class tend to have common interests that they often find themselves defending whether they intend to or not - if not always at the ballot box. The different classes also have hostilities against other classes and often feel uncomfortable when they are not around people of the same class - although members of the classes often are not aware or do not want to talk publicly about the fact that it is class that causes these feelings.
In the US, we have a shared-world fiction setting where we all agree that there is no such thing as social class. Everyone in the USA is equal.
It follows that therefore class has nothing to do with social inequality. Gender and race explain everything.
It so happens that a couple of days ago I was reading how the USA, "Great American Dream" notwithstanding, actually has greater wealth inequality than other Western countries and a lower opportunity for people born in low-income families to get themselves into higher income brackets.
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Technology has brought us all closer together. Turns out a lot of the people you meet as a result are complete idiots.
Posts: 18173 | From: Under | Registered: Jul 2008
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saysay
Ship's Praying Mantis
# 6645
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Posted
And yet when I tell people that something we're dealing with is a class issue, I frequently get told that class doesn't exist in the US.
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"It's been a long day without you, my friend
I'll tell you all about it when I see you again"
"'Oh sweet baby purple Jesus' - that's a direct quote from a 9 year old - shoutout to purple Jesus."
Posts: 2943 | From: The Wire | Registered: May 2004
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Kelly Alves
Bunny with an axe
# 2522
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Posted
Those people never tried to get a room with a Section 8 voucher.
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I cannot expect people to believe “
Jesus loves me, this I know” of they don’t believe “Kelly loves me, this I know.”
Kelly Alves, somewhere around 2003.
Posts: 35076 | From: Pura Californiana | Registered: Mar 2002
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no prophet's flag is set so...
Proceed to see sea
# 15560
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller:
quote:
Originally posted by Sioni Sais:
Isn't it such a help to so many consciences that the poor, working or not, are so feckless that so many can feel so little moral duty to help them.
Indeed. If no prophet's rant conflating all working-class poor with a possibly drug or alcohol addicted beggar is about the clearest proof so far of the existence of class warfare.
It's not a rant, and I didn't conflate all together. I simply do not believe that social change occurs because you give money to one person or one at a time. I believe that social change occurs because we change things about how the social system is set up. In my community, we started a health clinic with services that normally have to be paid for, including psychological counselling, legal advice, and other things. It's in the neediest neighbourhood. A bicycle co-op where we fix used bicycles and give them away so people have something to transport themselves with. Used computers that we repair, put operating systems on and give them to (mostl) refugees and elderly. Free internet. So yes, I am a goddamned rich asshole who conflates everyone. I can only help with what I know about. You want money to fund something worthy, talk to me. I'll give you my time as well, been doing that since I was a teenager and had nothing.
Now tell me what you do.
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Out of this nettle, danger, we pluck this flower, safety.
\_(ツ)_/
Posts: 11498 | From: Treaty 6 territory in the nonexistant Province of Buffalo, Canada ↄ⃝' | Registered: Mar 2010
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cliffdweller
Shipmate
# 13338
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by no prophet's flag is set so...:
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller:
quote:
Originally posted by Sioni Sais:
Isn't it such a help to so many consciences that the poor, working or not, are so feckless that so many can feel so little moral duty to help them.
Indeed. If no prophet's rant conflating all working-class poor with a possibly drug or alcohol addicted beggar is about the clearest proof so far of the existence of class warfare.
It's not a rant, and I didn't conflate all together. I simply do not believe that social change occurs because you give money to one person or one at a time.
But AGAIN, that's not what the original post was about. No one claimed that giving away money solves all of society's problems. The claim-- as has been explained to you several times now-- was simply that giving money to the working poor would do more to reinvigorate the economy than giving "trickle down" tax cuts to the wealthy. No one ever claimed such a plan would solve all of society's problems. No one ever claimed it was even the best way to spend such a large amount of money. The claim was simple that it would have more benefit due to increased consumer spending than would giving tax cuts to the wealthy.
Your response to that rather simple and limited claim was to equate giving money to the working poor with giving money to a homeless beggar. That IS conflating all poor. If the drug-addicted homeless guy on the corner can't be trusted not to spend your dollar on his next hit, than neither can the working single mother who resorts to picking up fast food for her family instead of cooking a healthy meal after working her 2nd shift.
[ 22. January 2015, 01:18: Message edited by: cliffdweller ]
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"Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid." -Frederick Buechner
Posts: 11242 | From: a small canyon overlooking the city | Registered: Jan 2008
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Beeswax Altar
Shipmate
# 11644
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Fr Weber:
It's class war all right, and the rich are scared shitless that the poor might actually start fighting back.
The rich have already won the class war. They aren't the least bit concerned the poor might fight back. What Edmund Burke called the little platoons have been severely weakened. Without them, resisting tyranny is impossible. Nothing unites the middle and lower class other than we all have less than the upper class. We aren't poor enough to be united by that fact.
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Losing sleep is something you want to avoid, if possible.
-Og: King of Bashan
Posts: 8411 | From: By a large lake | Registered: Jul 2006
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Golden Key
Shipmate
# 1468
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Posted
Giving change to a homeless person can help them eattoday.
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Blessed Gator, pray for us!
--"Oh bat bladders, do you have to bring common sense into this?" (Dragon, "Jane & the Dragon")
--"Oh, Peace Train, save this country!" (Yusuf/Cat Stevens, "Peace Train")
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Karl: Liberal Backslider
Shipmate
# 76
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Sioni Sais:
Isn't it such a help to so many consciences that the poor, working or not, are so feckless that so many can feel so little moral duty to help them.
Not. I really miss ken when we have a thread like this.
This. All of it.
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Might as well ask the bloody cat.
Posts: 17938 | From: Chesterfield | Registered: May 2001
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Mere Nick
Shipmate
# 11827
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Organ Builder:
quote:
Originally posted by Mere Nick:
Of course there is more tax than just federal income tax. However, with what was tossed out at the SOTU, that's all that seems worth discussing, right now.
How odd. I would have thought you would find capital gains taxes equally worth discussion.
That flows through from schedule D to the 1040, the "US Individual Income Tax Return". It's an income tax.
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"Well that's it, boys. I've been redeemed. The preacher's done warshed away all my sins and transgressions. It's the straight and narrow from here on out, and heaven everlasting's my reward."
Delmar O'Donnell
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L'organist
Shipmate
# 17338
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Posted
The OP assumes some correlation between social class and wealth: not something that is a given.
There is evidence of a desire for 'class war' in the UK - this mostly comes from the more assinine pronouncements of people on the left who open their mouths before engaging their brain: latest example of Chris Bryant being pretty typical.
What I worry about more than absolute wealth is that so few of the fabulously wealthy seem to feel any obligation to use their riches to better or enrich the lives of people less fortunate than themselves. Yes, there are people like the Gates, Warren Buffet, etc, but there are also people like the Walton family who give very little.
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Rara temporum felicitate ubi sentire quae velis et quae sentias dicere licet
Posts: 4950 | From: somewhere in England... | Registered: Sep 2012
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Sioni Sais
Shipmate
# 5713
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by L'organist:
The OP assumes some correlation between social class and wealth: not something that is a given.
There is evidence of a desire for 'class war' in the UK - this mostly comes from the more assinine pronouncements of people on the left who open their mouths before engaging their brain: latest example of Chris Bryant being pretty typical.
What I worry about more than absolute wealth is that so few of the fabulously wealthy seem to feel any obligation to use their riches to better or enrich the lives of people less fortunate than themselves. Yes, there are people like the Gates, Warren Buffet, etc, but there are also people like the Walton family who give very little.
This. Why else would there be any appetite for class war?
btw, Chris Bryant is just wrong. What does it say about Labour that so many of their MPs are ex public school and Oxbridge? Is politics truly showbiz for ugly folk?
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"He isn't Doctor Who, he's The Doctor"
(Paul Sinha, BBC)
Posts: 24276 | From: Newport, Wales | Registered: Apr 2004
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kankucho
Shipmate
# 14318
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Posted
Hello again everyone. It's been a while.
Back to the OP, and this...
<< if, as Oxfam alleges, that the people who own half the world's wealth might squeeze into a double decker bus, might it not be an act of justice to drive that bus off a cliff? >>
Justice? Well we could maybe take a vote on that. The real question should be: after we've driven them all of the cliff and redistributed their wealth, would the problem of inequality be solved?
Well, no. Not really. We'll just have temporarily dealt with the effects of some people having built empires out of greed. Unless we actually nip the propensity for acquisitiveness and ego-lust in the bud, the whole process will just start over again as others find ways to clamber above the the newly egalitarian masses.
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"We are a way for the cosmos to know itself" – Dr. Carl Sagan
Kankucho Bird Blues
Posts: 1262 | From: Kuon-ganjo, E17 | Registered: Nov 2008
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anoesis
Shipmate
# 14189
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Beeswax Altar:
quote:
Originally posted by Adeodatus:
Look at it another way. Take one of the top 85 somewhere in the middle of that number. Say their net worth is about $15bn. Well, naively at least, $14bn of that could pay 7000 people a salary of $40000 for 50 years, and the rich person would still have a billion dollars left.
Still, I'm sure they have another very good use for that other $14bn.
Do you think somebody with $15 billion has the entire sum laying around in hard currency and precious metals? Because they don't. No, the wealthy have the money invested in something. Somebody is using that money to do something to make more money. You assume that the government could pay the salary of 7000 people to do something more productive with that money. I agree that's a possibility.
A few questions...
Who are these people?
What will they be doing?
Why is what they will be doing worthwhile?
If it really needs to be done, why isn't it already being done?
For that matter, who gets to decide what those 7000 people do for their $40,000?
Do the 7000 people have any choice about what they do for their $40,000 a year?
What happens in 50 years when you no longer have any ultra wealthy to tax?
To answer just a couple of your questions: What will they be doing? Well, the first thing that springs to mind is that 7000 people each earning $40k a year for 50 years are highly likely to pay income tax, and highly unlikely to have money in Swiss or Bermudan bank accounts. Which I think helps answer the last question of why it might not be a problem tax-wise if the world should run out of 'ultra-wealthy' people.
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The history of humanity give one little hope that strength left to its own devices won't be abused. Indeed, it gives one little ground to think that strength would continue to exist if it were not abused. -- Dafyd --
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Dafyd
Shipmate
# 5549
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by L'organist:
There is evidence of a desire for 'class war' in the UK - this mostly comes from the more assinine pronouncements of people on the left who open their mouths before engaging their brain: latest example of Chris Bryant being pretty typical.
If James Blunt had engaged his brain before opening his mouth he would have been flattered to be mentioned in the same breath as a potential Oscar winner.
Chris Bryant was not saying what James Blunt assumed he was saying.
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we remain, thanks to original sin, much in love with talking about, rather than with, one another. Rowan Williams
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stonespring
Shipmate
# 15530
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Posted
I'm going slightly off topic to get back to the fact that people don't even seem to be talking much about "class" on this thread. At least the tradition definition of class: a division of human society based on how people earned their living.
So in the industrial revolution you had the farmers (who may or may not own land, depending on the country) and the landowning aristocracy, both of whom were declining in numbers and power. The classes that were rising in numbers were the working class (unskilled labor, who worked in factories) (who were becoming the plurality), the bourgeoisie (in its original sense meaning the class of people who owned the factories and banks, and the "new middle class" of shopkeepers, skilled trade workers, white collar workers, etc., who provided services to the bourgeoisie. Doctors, lawyers, and mid-level office managers (who did not own businesses or large amounts of stock themselves) became known as the upper middle class.
Later, when tensions between the working class and the bourgeoisie (and their middle class "allies") - and the fear of revolution - led to the creation of the welfare state and a large bureaucratic government, there was a new group of civil servants and public school teachers who class-wise had some of the interests of the working class some of the more traditional middle class. The prosperity generated by capitalism, especially the mixed-market capitalism that became the norm in the mid-twentieth century, also saw increased incomes even in the working class, allowing for a boom in consumerism and the growth of jobs in service industries (restaurants, hotels, retail, etc.) - which were different than ordinary working class jobs because some workers were highly experienced and skilled, and even in service fields where experience and skill were not as important, worker bargaining power was little to none, and the "class consciousness" of service workers was similar to those of the lower middle class, even if they were often paid worse than the working class.
That brings us to today, where manufacturing jobs have largely left the most developed economies except for highly skilled ones - so the traditional working class is no longer a significant social force (other than its cultural legacy and the political and labor union groupings it gave rise to). There are many different ways of speaking about the current class structure but I would suggest that the largest class is the
-low-skilled service class (subject to stagnant wages, unpredictable schedules, frequent underemployment, high job turnover, etc.)
and that the other groupings are
-the elite with large financial holdings whose income largely comes from interest, capital gains, and dividends
-the professional class of doctors, lawyers, professors, computer engineers, etc., whose livelihood is dependent on their "human capital" (education and experience), the demand for it, and their skill at marketing it
-a very precarious white-collar middle class whose jobs can become redundant very fast and whose skills can quickly become obsolete. Success in this class often relies on effective networking (and the family and friends you have before you put any effort into networking) just as much as proficiency.
-unionized and public sector employees, who deserve a category of their own because they enjoy so many more protections than other employees in the middle income levels and that this has a very strong effect on their political sensibilities - as well as on the way other classes view themselves in contrast with, rather than in solidarity with, these protected workers
-the remaining farmers and fishermen/women - who are declining in numbers although large businesses in their sector of the economy still generate significant income - This group sometimes has a political voice that is much larger than their numbers - and they do not necessarily feel in solidarity with any of the other class groups.
-the underclass of people so marginalized by society that they rarely are given the academic, health, financial, and emotional education and support needed to even hold a place at the bottom edge of the low-skilled service class. This group is far from the largest but its costs to society in terms of social services, healthcare, crime, etc., are very large. Often talk of income inequality focuses on the extremes of the elite and the underclass but many "poor" people work consistently (or consistently seek work) and do not really belong to the underclass because they have enough education and social skills to function in society if they have dignified work and a living wage. In the US there is also a large group of illegal immigrants who have very consistent employment but because of their undocumented status are underpaid and mistreated and live as a kind of underclass, but often with much more stable families than the underclass I am talking about above.
So after all that bluster, I think the only people who really are politically engaged enough to fight in a "class war" (by which I mean a political battle to shape policy less in the interests of one class and more in the interests of their own) - are the unionized and public sector workers and the elite. The elite consistently win but make compromises that benefit the unionized/public sector workers (those whose jobs were not cut when the elite got the chance to do so during the recession) in order to appear to be compromising in favor of other classes, but the other classes largely remain ignored by politicians and also largely remain politically disengaged.
(Note: I fully admit that I am subject to the biases and paternalistic attitudes that come from being the child of parents somewhere in between the professional class and the elite.)
PS I guess you could also count pensioners as a very important political interest group that spans across multiple classes (although retirement-age members of the elite class often do not need the government programs that help other people their age). Although they include many members that struggle economically, they are the other group that manages to eke compromises out of the elite with the appearance (but not the reality) that they are benefiting the politically disengaged classes.
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Jay-Emm
Shipmate
# 11411
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by anoesis:
To answer just a couple of your questions: What will they be doing? Well, the first thing that springs to mind is that 7000 people each earning $40k a year for 50 years are highly likely to pay income tax, and highly unlikely to have money in Swiss or Bermudan bank accounts. Which I think helps answer the last question of why it might not be a problem tax-wise if the world should run out of 'ultra-wealthy' people. [/QB]
To follow on that:
If (for some stupid reason) we're giving the money to those who don't need it, then they'll be paying tax at pretty much the same rate (looking it up and naively overestimating you may lose about a third of it?)*
Assuming we give it to those who are in need (e.g. where a company provides help then we do lose a bit more tax income. For each person we still lose $14,000 from the rich persons tax. We gain at least $6000 straight back from the poor persons tax. However before they were naively a 'cost' to the treasury (though not to society, because they enabled Mr Bloggs to earn more money, so were being an indirect subsidy) which they are now not so that needs to come off (however much that was).
And then...
*Allowing for the change in payroll rates, and likely net deduction changes will make this a fair bit smaller, second order effects will also reduce it a bit (e.g. that they pay VAT when they spend the bit that hasn't gone to Uncle Sam)
Posts: 1643 | Registered: May 2006
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Anglican't
Shipmate
# 15292
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by anoesis:
To answer just a couple of your questions: What will they be doing? Well, the first thing that springs to mind is that 7000 people each earning $40k a year for 50 years are highly likely to pay income tax, and highly unlikely to have money in Swiss or Bermudan bank accounts. Which I think helps answer the last question of why it might not be a problem tax-wise if the world should run out of 'ultra-wealthy' people.
Hang on, wouldn't running out of 'ultra-wealthy' people be a massive problem, if you're reliant on taking their money? It's a bit like killing a goose, eating the meat and then wondering why it hasn't laid an egg. Or do you tell the equivalent of these 7,000 people fifty years down the line that they're not going to get anything?
Posts: 3613 | From: London, England | Registered: Nov 2009
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SvitlanaV2
Shipmate
# 16967
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by stonespring:
I'm going slightly off topic to get back to the fact that people don't even seem to be talking much about "class" on this thread. At least the tradition definition of class: a division of human society based on how people earned their living.
This has been hinted at in some previous posts, but it should be made explicit that what you've said here isn't exactly what class means in the British context. It's far more complicated, I would say.
There's a vague if problematic sense here that class is something you inherit, even if you do a very different job from your parents. It's about attitudes, tastes and behaviour as well as income and employment.
I think this is an important point to make, because the likelihood of 'class war' is presumably reduced if disadvantaged people come from a variety of backgrounds, have a hazy sense of class allegiance, and little sense of unity with others in the same financial predicament as themselves.
Posts: 6668 | From: UK | Registered: Feb 2012
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Jay-Emm
Shipmate
# 11411
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Anglican't:
Hang on, wouldn't running out of 'ultra-wealthy' people be a massive problem, if you're reliant on taking their money? It's a bit like killing a goose, eating the meat and then wondering why it hasn't laid an egg. Or do you tell the equivalent of these 7,000 people fifty years down the line that they're not going to get anything? [/QB]
(of course the problem is that they aren't exactly laying now either).
But that has reminded me that I messed up we are killing geese rather than harvesting (whether sustainable or not) eggs in the metaphor so of course I've given credit to tax that I shouldn't have.
Tax income would hence skyrocket under the nominal plan. Whether that would be enough to get things in place for the next generation (plus the benefits that having a desk.
In any case I suspect it was to provide an idea of the scale of difference and money that is 'locked up' (it may be invested, but in this context the difference is negligible) rather than a specific plan. Which if it was the intent, I got the idea.
Posts: 1643 | Registered: May 2006
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churchgeek
Have candles, will pray
# 5557
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Posted
What stonespring is saying intrigues me. Is that the current definition of class, and if so, used by whom? Historians, sociologists, economists?
ISTM that the gist of what "class" means colloquially, anyway, is indeed socio-economic - not just about how much money you make, but also certain attitudes and loyalties. I'm not expressing this very well, I'm sure.
But I consider myself working-class, even though the jobs I've held were, at one time, considered "professional" jobs, and I'm currently in a PhD program (the loans for which I'll be either paying back or deferring for the rest of my life).
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I reserve the right to change my mind.
My article on the Virgin of Vladimir
Posts: 7773 | From: Detroit | Registered: Feb 2004
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saysay
Ship's Praying Mantis
# 6645
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Posted
I agree with that - it's not just about income levels or professions, there's a culture associated with it.
And ISTM that most working class people aren't more politically engaged because picking between the Democrats and Republicans is like choosing whether you want to get crushed by a jackboot or a birkenstock.
There are far too many people with power and without ethics who are too invested in a system where there's just enough social mobility that everyone can pat themselves on the back for what they've achieved and delude themselves that we're living in a meritocracy. It's actually cronysim.
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Posts: 2943 | From: The Wire | Registered: May 2004
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cliffdweller
Shipmate
# 13338
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Anglican't:
quote:
Originally posted by anoesis:
To answer just a couple of your questions: What will they be doing? Well, the first thing that springs to mind is that 7000 people each earning $40k a year for 50 years are highly likely to pay income tax, and highly unlikely to have money in Swiss or Bermudan bank accounts. Which I think helps answer the last question of why it might not be a problem tax-wise if the world should run out of 'ultra-wealthy' people.
Hang on, wouldn't running out of 'ultra-wealthy' people be a massive problem, if you're reliant on taking their money? It's a bit like killing a goose, eating the meat and then wondering why it hasn't laid an egg. Or do you tell the equivalent of these 7,000 people fifty years down the line that they're not going to get anything?
And again, if anyone was really suggesting loading all the 1% on a bus and running it off a cliff, yes, that might happen. But it's not. We're talking tax increases, not homicide. So, once again, these tax increases won't kill them, they won't put them out of business, they won't even cause them to cease to be significantly wealthy-- just a small tad less so.
So the equivalent metaphor is really, if I take one egg (out of a dozen) from the goose today, will there still be one there tomorrow? And the answer is yes-- tomorrow and the day after that and the day after that.
But as we have the ability to begin feeding all the little skinny geese, the ones too undernourished before, they'll start laying eggs too. And then there'll be even more eggs to go around.
[ 22. January 2015, 23:34: Message edited by: cliffdweller ]
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"Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid." -Frederick Buechner
Posts: 11242 | From: a small canyon overlooking the city | Registered: Jan 2008
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Jonah the Whale
Ship's pet cetacean
# 1244
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by stonespring:
-unionized and public sector employees, who deserve a category of their own because they enjoy so many more protections than other employees in the middle income levels and that this has a very strong effect on their political sensibilities - as well as on the way other classes view themselves in contrast with, rather than in solidarity with, these protected workers
I think the "many more protections" may be overstated, and certainly still diminishing. This is part of the class war which, in the UK, Thatcher won really, though subsequent governments are continuing to press the victory home. Other European countries seem to follow Britain's lead on this at various rates. I don't know the US too well but my impression is that there has never been much of a "problem" with unionised and public sector employees. At least not to the same level as in Europe.
quote:
So after all that bluster, I think the only people who really are politically engaged enough to fight in a "class war" (by which I mean a political battle to shape policy less in the interests of one class and more in the interests of their own) - are the unionized and public sector workers and the elite. The elite consistently win but make compromises that benefit the unionized/public sector workers (those whose jobs were not cut when the elite got the chance to do so during the recession) in order to appear to be compromising in favor of other classes, but the other classes largely remain ignored by politicians and also largely remain politically disengaged.
Probably, but I am not sure what compromises you mean. Have there been any meaningful ones recently?
Posts: 2799 | From: Nether Regions | Registered: Aug 2001
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Soror Magna
Shipmate
# 9881
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Posted
Here's one winner of the class war:
Target Fail
quote:
Target’s "employee trust" package for its Canadian workers, announced last week, amounts to $70 million ($56 million US). It’s designed to provide each worker with 16 weeks of pay.
Depending on who’s doing the calculation, the golden handshake handed to ex-CEO Gregg Steinhafel last May is in roughly in the same ballpark.
Fortune Magazine put the value of his total "walk-away" package, including stock options and other benefits, at $61 million US, including severance of $15.9 million.
Who are the real entrepeneurs in Target? The stockholders, and they've just been royally screwed by a no-talent asshat. This man is filthy stinking rich, but he is clearly neither an entrepreneur nor a job creator. The reason he was able to negotiate a sweet deal for failing so spectacularly is because he and the class of self-styled "entrepeneurs / job creators" have created a culture in which they give each other prezzies at the expense of stockholders and employees.
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"You come with me to room 1013 over at the hospital, I'll show you America. Terminal, crazy and mean." -- Tony Kushner, "Angels in America"
Posts: 5430 | From: Caprica City | Registered: Jul 2005
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Soror Magna
Shipmate
# 9881
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Posted
I forgot to add that Target is also ripping off the Canadian taxpayers as well:
quote:
... Alvarez & Marsal Canada, the court-appointed monitor handling Target Canada’s creditor protection and insolvency, has filed papers that show the retailer has total liabilities of $5.1 billion, including accounts payable of about $546 million. ... The amounts include $12,036,000 to the Canada Revenue Agency, $8,372,000 to the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board, $2,674,000 to the province of British Columbia ...
They could have paid their taxes with some of that severance money, but it was more important to throw money at an idiot.
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"You come with me to room 1013 over at the hospital, I'll show you America. Terminal, crazy and mean." -- Tony Kushner, "Angels in America"
Posts: 5430 | From: Caprica City | Registered: Jul 2005
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Albertus
Shipmate
# 13356
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Anglican't:
quote:
Originally posted by anoesis:
To answer just a couple of your questions: What will they be doing? Well, the first thing that springs to mind is that 7000 people each earning $40k a year for 50 years are highly likely to pay income tax, and highly unlikely to have money in Swiss or Bermudan bank accounts. Which I think helps answer the last question of why it might not be a problem tax-wise if the world should run out of 'ultra-wealthy' people.
Hang on, wouldn't running out of 'ultra-wealthy' people be a massive problem, if you're reliant on taking their money? It's a bit like killing a goose, eating the meat and then wondering why it hasn't laid an egg. Or do you tell the equivalent of these 7,000 people fifty years down the line that they're not going to get anything?
The object is not to keep a stock of ultra-rich people so that you can periodically raid their assets to ameliorate temporarily the position of everybody else. The object is to get as close as you can to a society where nobody is ultra-rich and nobody is ultra-poor, but almost everybody is clsoe enough to the middle to feel, with reason, some sense of connection to everybody else. And as I have said earlier this can be aand has been achieved even within capitalist economies- but not within the model of capitalism that the UK and US follow.
Posts: 6498 | From: Y Sowth | Registered: Jan 2008
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Sioni Sais
Shipmate
# 5713
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Soror Magna:
Who are the real entrepeneurs in Target? The stockholders, and they've just been royally screwed by a no-talent asshat. This man is filthy stinking rich, but he is clearly neither an entrepreneur nor a job creator. The reason he was able to negotiate a sweet deal for failing so spectacularly is because he and the class of self-styled "entrepeneurs / job creators" have created a culture in which they give each other prezzies at the expense of stockholders and employees.
You forgot customers and suppliers. They get screwed too. For all the BS we hear about 'empowerment' only wealth actually empowers anyone, and those who have wealth aren't giving it up without a fight. That fight is called class war.
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"He isn't Doctor Who, he's The Doctor"
(Paul Sinha, BBC)
Posts: 24276 | From: Newport, Wales | Registered: Apr 2004
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Anglican't
Shipmate
# 15292
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Posted
quote:
You forgot customers...They get screwed too. For all the BS we hear about 'empowerment' only wealth actually empowers anyone, and those who have wealth aren't giving it up without a fight. That fight is called class war.
I don't know Target. Never been to one. But if it's a discount retailer don't customers benefit from its existence by being able to buy a range of goods at a low price?
Posts: 3613 | From: London, England | Registered: Nov 2009
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Alan Cresswell
Mad Scientist 先生
# 31
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Posted
The customers don't benefit from a chain of stores that have gone out of business, winding down to pay the CEO who saw the company sink get a massive golden handshake.
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Don't cling to a mistake just because you spent a lot of time making it.
Posts: 32413 | From: East Kilbride (Scotland) or 福島 | Registered: May 2001
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Anglican't
Shipmate
# 15292
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Posted
I've read that Target is closing its Canadian shops, but the whole thing isn't closing, is it?
Posts: 3613 | From: London, England | Registered: Nov 2009
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Sioni Sais
Shipmate
# 5713
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Anglican't:
I've read that Target is closing its Canadian shops, but the whole thing isn't closing, is it?
Nope, and the CEO won't ever have to work again, unlike the erstwhile employees.
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"He isn't Doctor Who, he's The Doctor"
(Paul Sinha, BBC)
Posts: 24276 | From: Newport, Wales | Registered: Apr 2004
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Jane R
Shipmate
# 331
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Posted
Albertus: quote:
The object is not to keep a stock of ultra-rich people so that you can periodically raid their assets to ameliorate temporarily the position of everybody else. The object is to get as close as you can to a society where nobody is ultra-rich and nobody is ultra-poor, but almost everybody is clsoe enough to the middle to feel, with reason, some sense of connection to everybody else. And as I have said earlier this can be aand has been achieved even within capitalist economies- but not within the model of capitalism that the UK and US follow.
This. In a service-based economy it's not the ultra-wealthy who create the biggest number of extra jobs; it's the people on middle-to-low incomes.
If I had an extra £150 a month disposable income, for example, I would spend it on paying someone else to clean my house for me instead of trying to find time to do it myself and pay the hairdresser to dye my hair, which is much less messy than doing it at home. That would improve the quality of life for me, and also for my cleaner and hairdresser, who would have more money to spend on their families... and so on.
Posts: 3958 | From: Jorvik | Registered: May 2001
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stonespring
Shipmate
# 15530
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Posted
The different classes certainly have their own cultures and even in the US we have the idea of class being inherited (although people don't like to talk about it). However, whenever someone from the industrial working class (what's left of it), or from what I call the "low-skill service class" (often the working poor) or the "shrinking and vulnerable white collar middle class" manages to wind up as the owner of a profitable business, or becomes a financially successful doctor or lawyer or other professional who makes money on human capital rather than on other things they own, or becomes a successful politician who makes money in other ways ![[Smile]](smile.gif) , but continues to go on about how their "working class culture" continues to be their ethical motivation, I'm not going to completely disagree with them, but I'm going to be realistic and say that economic incentives are much more influential in terms of a person's economic decisions.
Posts: 1537 | Registered: Mar 2010
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Dave W.
Shipmate
# 8765
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Alan Cresswell:
The customers don't benefit from a chain of stores that have gone out of business, winding down to pay the CEO who saw the company sink get a massive golden handshake.
Well, Target doesn't really "benefit" from this, either - except in the sense that they'll stop losing massive amounts of money on a failed expansion attempt ( $2 billion in losses since 2011.)
It's not as though they're closing stores now in order to pay the CEO they forced out last May, ending his 35-year career at the company. I would think both the current CEO and the previous one would have been much happier to see their company succeed in Canada.
Posts: 2059 | From: the hub of the solar system | Registered: Nov 2004
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Jane R
Shipmate
# 331
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Posted
stonespring: quote:
The different classes certainly have their own cultures...
I wasn't really talking about culture, but about how much money the average person is likely to spend on maintaining their desired lifestyle and how many jobs it will support. For example, if all the people in my village who work full-time could afford to pay someone else to clean their houses for them, that would create quite a lot of extra jobs; not particularly well-paid ones, but locally based and (potentially) flexible enough to be fitted round other responsibilities like caring for children or elderly members of the family. If only the ultra-wealthy can afford a cleaner there won't be any jobs for cleaners in my village, because there aren't any billionaires living here that I'm aware of.
Posts: 3958 | From: Jorvik | Registered: May 2001
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Soror Magna
Shipmate
# 9881
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Posted
Target "expanded" into Canada by purchasing the Zeller's chain and firing all its employees. Some were re-hired by Target at lower wages. So this is the second time they've been chewed up and shitted out by our corporate masters. By definition, the CEO of Target is not an entrepreneur, he is an employee of the corporation, who, unlike all the ordinary employees, is being rewarded handsomely for failing.
That's one of the logical flaws in the slavish worship of the wealthy. People at the top of the scale operate under a different set of rules and incentives than the people at the bottom. You won't hear CEOs saying they have to pay more than minimum wage to get the best employees. Apparently rich people can be motivated to "create jobs" if they can get more money, but if working people are paid more, they will just waste it on smokes and booze. (Which, btw, creates jobs.)
Another cliché of the class war, already seen on this thread, is that poor people are poor because they don't know how to handle their money. I'm not going to waste time explaining how hard it is to live on small amounts of money, or how poor people are forced to make choices that others can't understand. Instead, I'll give you an example of rich people who can't manage their money:
Debt doubts cast shadow for professional couple with five kids
Dad works two days a week, although he claims that adds up to 80 hours per week. They have five kids they obviously can't afford. They live rent-free, but horrors!, will have to find another home in a few months. Although they are self-employed, they've decided they don't need to save for retirement, or get life and disability insurance, because “I have no pension whatsoever, but like my parents, colleagues and mentors, I love my work and plan to keep going well into my 80s, so retiring is not a big concern, just living."
Check out the financial planner's advice:
quote:
“If Eric is willing to work one more day a week in the clinic, they can live within their means and still afford to build the new home using a HELOC with the parents’ home as security,” Mr. MacKenzie says.
So the financial planner's advice to these privileged losers is to work a whopping three days a week and ask Mom and Dad to help them borrow more money to mismanage. The rich really are different. And not in a good way.
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"You come with me to room 1013 over at the hospital, I'll show you America. Terminal, crazy and mean." -- Tony Kushner, "Angels in America"
Posts: 5430 | From: Caprica City | Registered: Jul 2005
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Anglican't
Shipmate
# 15292
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Posted
On the other hand, Jane, Microsoft (whose founders appear in this list of 85) has nearly 130,000 employees and how many jobs have been created thanks to the advances in computer technology that Microsoft pioneered?
Posts: 3613 | From: London, England | Registered: Nov 2009
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Jane R
Shipmate
# 331
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Posted
I don't know. Do you?
Do you also know how many jobs were destroyed by computerization and automation? Because I bet that figure is a lot higher. Heck, just the number of bank clerks who were made redundant by ATMs would probably be higher...
[ 23. January 2015, 13:49: Message edited by: Jane R ]
Posts: 3958 | From: Jorvik | Registered: May 2001
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Anglican't
Shipmate
# 15292
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Posted
Are you saying that's been a bad thing?!
Posts: 3613 | From: London, England | Registered: Nov 2009
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Jane R
Shipmate
# 331
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Posted
Oh, and Microsoft didn't *pioneer* the computer revolution. What Microsoft did (and did very well) was popularize computer use and knock all its rivals out of the market. Xerox and Apple were the first to do a WYSIWYG interface, while Microsoft were still using MS-DOS.
Beta-max was a much better video format than VHS, but because VHS was cheaper they got the biggest market share.
Posts: 3958 | From: Jorvik | Registered: May 2001
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Anglican't
Shipmate
# 15292
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Jane R:
Beta-max was a much better video format than VHS, but because VHS was cheaper they got the biggest market share.
Which is a good thing, isn't it? As it allows more people to buy the product. If Betamax's advantages had been so significant, it would have survived. (Betamax also had a shorter recording time, didn't it?)
Posts: 3613 | From: London, England | Registered: Nov 2009
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Jane R
Shipmate
# 331
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Posted
Anglican't: quote:
Are you saying that's been a bad thing?!
It is if you were a bank clerk and were unable to find another job. Just as closing down the steelworks was a bad thing for the men in The Full Monty, who were left high and dry with no alternative employment opportunities except performing in striptease acts.
No, I don't think automation is a bad thing. In my case it means I can concentrate on the interesting aspects of my job and leave the computer to do (most of) the dull bits. But people who lost their jobs through automation might disagree.
You seem to be arguing that change is always good, which is an odd point of view for a traditional Tory ![[Biased]](wink.gif)
Posts: 3958 | From: Jorvik | Registered: May 2001
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Albertus
Shipmate
# 13356
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Posted
Nah, for a proper traditional Tory view on these boards you need to go to someone like betjemaniac.
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My beard is a testament to my masculinity and virility, and demonstrates that I am a real man. Trouble is, bits of quiche sometimes get caught in it.
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