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vercingatorix wrote:Oh and Melissa, if you don't want job security to depend on merit, there's a whole lot of government workers that you should talk to before CEOs.
Uhm. What.
I never said I DIDN'T want job security to depend on merit....
As for government workers, I never disagreed that the government's policies could use reform...
The people in the past who convinced themselves to do unspeakable things were no less human than you or I. They made their decisions; the only thing that prevents history from repeating itself is making different ones.
-- Adam Serwer
My blog
If you think a jobs pay depends on merit and board of directors believe that CEO's skill merit their high price tag. Why complain about CEO's salaries?
Does every salary that increases at faster than market average deserve to be ousted for unfairness?
vercingatorix wrote:If you think a jobs pay depends on merit and board of directors believe that CEO's skill merit their high price tag. Why complain about CEO's salaries?
Because quite a few boards of directors are staffed with a large number of idiots, stooges, idiot stooges, and stooge idiots whom are manipulated into giving away millions of dollars to CEOs that just drove their company into the ground. And because the free market is proving too incompetent to solve this problem, the government has to instead (a scary thought indeed).
You know that old saying-- with great power comes great responsibility? CEOs have great power. But for many big companise this comes without the responsibility.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2011/10/21 17:43:52
The people in the past who convinced themselves to do unspeakable things were no less human than you or I. They made their decisions; the only thing that prevents history from repeating itself is making different ones.
-- Adam Serwer
My blog
Melissia wrote:And because the free market is proving too incompetent to solve this problem, the government has to instead (a scary thought indeed).
Who is Melissia that she gets to decide that the free market* has failed and so we must turn to government** instead? I don't recall voting for you, or agreeing to give up my freedoms and rights.
* We'd have a free market, if only the government wouldn't interfere so much.
** The government doesn't do anything well. How could getting them involved lead to improvement?
Regards,
"Stop worrying about it and just get naked." - Mrs. Phanatik
"To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield." -Alfred, Lord Tennyson
Frazzled - "When the Great Wienie comes, you will have a favored place among his Chosen. "
MachineSpirit - "Quick Reply has been temporarily disabled due to a recent warning you received."
Phanatik wrote:The government doesn't do anything well. How could getting them involved lead to improvement?
Because sometimes, as bad as government is, capitalists do it even worse.
The people in the past who convinced themselves to do unspeakable things were no less human than you or I. They made their decisions; the only thing that prevents history from repeating itself is making different ones.
-- Adam Serwer
My blog
I love the idea of the free market as much as the next guy (who loves the free market) but this is what happens when you deregulate. It happened.
I don't understand your link, other than it proves my point.
Instead of letting the banks fail (because they were forced by the government to make bad loans), the government used taxpayer money to interfere again and save the banks that gave them political donations.
Whats deregulation got to do with it?
Regards,
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Melissia wrote:
Phanatik wrote:The government doesn't do anything well. How could getting them involved lead to improvement?
Because sometimes, as bad as government is, capitalists do it even worse.
True. Sometimes too true.
The difference is, if capitalists get it wrong, you can boycott them, email them, protest them, sue them, or generally make yourself a nuisance until they stop or go broke.
If the government does it wrong, you're screwed. End of file.
Best,
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2011/10/21 18:23:41
"Stop worrying about it and just get naked." - Mrs. Phanatik
"To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield." -Alfred, Lord Tennyson
Frazzled - "When the Great Wienie comes, you will have a favored place among his Chosen. "
MachineSpirit - "Quick Reply has been temporarily disabled due to a recent warning you received."
You can always vote them out of office or get them to change through voting, or through the courts.
The people in the past who convinced themselves to do unspeakable things were no less human than you or I. They made their decisions; the only thing that prevents history from repeating itself is making different ones.
-- Adam Serwer
My blog
Melissia wrote:You can always vote them out of office or get them to change through voting, or through the courts.
Voting, if you can overcome the incumbent advantage - you are looking at 2-6 years to make a change, which could be too late. Also, you'd need a majority in both houses plus the WH to sign the Bill.
Courts (which have judges appointed by ... the government) - who can say how many years you are looking at, considering appeals, etc. Also, who has more bank than the government? How many lawyers, and for how long, can you afford?
Best,
"Stop worrying about it and just get naked." - Mrs. Phanatik
"To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield." -Alfred, Lord Tennyson
Frazzled - "When the Great Wienie comes, you will have a favored place among his Chosen. "
MachineSpirit - "Quick Reply has been temporarily disabled due to a recent warning you received."
The difference is, if capitalists get it wrong, you can boycott them, email them, protest them, sue them, or generally make yourself a nuisance until they stop or go broke.
So, why is this unique to Capitalists and not representative governments again? In theory, (I know theory isn't reality) a representative government should be more responsive than a Capitalist since the representative government is by its nature "representative" where Capitalists are not.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2011/10/21 18:39:16
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The difference is, if capitalists get it wrong, you can boycott them, email them, protest them, sue them, or generally make yourself a nuisance until they stop or go broke.
So, why is this unique to Capitalists and not representative governments again? In theory, (I know theory isn't reality) a representative government should be more responsive than a Capitalist since the representative government is by its nature "representative" where Capitalists are not.
See my previous.
Best,
"Stop worrying about it and just get naked." - Mrs. Phanatik
"To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield." -Alfred, Lord Tennyson
Frazzled - "When the Great Wienie comes, you will have a favored place among his Chosen. "
MachineSpirit - "Quick Reply has been temporarily disabled due to a recent warning you received."
In Economics 101, students learn that the share of national income received by labor stays roughly constant with the share received by capital. This is the first of “Kaldor’s stylized facts,” articulated half a century ago by the Cambridge economist Nicholas Kaldor.
Recent experience betrays this lesson. Over the past two decades -- and especially since about 2000 -- the share of national income that flows into wages and other kinds of worker compensation has been plummeting in various countries.
Labor share normally bounces around over the business cycle, but given how long the decline has lasted, it can’t be dismissed as cyclical. And this partly explains the kind of anger and frustration that is fueling the Occupy Wall Street movement worldwide.
The numbers involved are substantial: In 1990, about 63 percent of business income in the U.S. took the form of wages and other types of labor compensation, according to data compiled by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. By 2005, that figure had dropped to 61 percent. And by the middle of this year, it had fallen to 58 percent. (Similar declines have occurred in other data sets, but are milder when the analysis includes the government, rather than only the private sector.)
The difference from 1990 to today -- about 5 percentage points or so of private-sector income -- amounts to more than $500 billion a year. In other words, if labor’s share hadn’t fallen, labor income would be $500 billion higher this year.
Worldwide Decline
Similar decreases have been occurring in other countries. In Germany and France, the labor share fell about 4 percent from 1995 to today, and it dropped about 6 percent in Australia and Japan during the same period. As Francisco Rodriguez and Arjun Jayadev wrote in a November 2010 paper for the United Nations, the labor share across the globe has “been subject to a consistent decline over the last two decades, contrary to the (earlier) received wisdom of a constant labor share across most regions in the world.”
Why the drop? Part of the reason is that the advanced economies have been shifting toward certain types of services and advanced manufacturing that have lower shares of labor income. But that explains only a small part of the decline. Even within such sectors, the share has been falling substantially. What’s causing that?
The two primary drivers are globalization and technological change. From 1980 to 2005, as the world became more integrated, the effective labor supply available on a global basis expanded by 100 percent to 300 percent (depending on how the estimates are done). That increased competition has pushed labor compensation down in the industrialized economies.
The effects of technological change are more subtle. As automation reduces the demand for workers, the labor share initially falls, but in time, as people adjust their skills to suit the new technology, the effect is often reversed.
In a 2007 paper for the International Monetary Fund, Florence Jaumotte and Irina Tytell tried to parse the various causes of the declining labor share. In the U.S., the U.K., Australia and Canada, the economists concluded, labor globalization and technological change played roughly equal roles, and crucial ones at that. In European countries and Japan, technological change was more significant than labor globalization. Other factors --including unions and privatization trends -- have been found to be influential, but labor globalization and technological change loom as the dominant forces.
Further Decline Ahead
Over the next decade, the global pool of labor is likely to expand rapidly for many reasons -- as more workers in China obtain advanced educations and migrate to the coastal cities, for example.
(Interestingly, the labor share has also been declining significantly in China. Part of that appears to be a statistical error, and the remainder reflects an ongoing shift from agriculture to manufacturing. The early stage of that process often involves a decline in labor share, which is then followed by an increase as the development process continues.)
The labor share in the U.S. will probably bounce up and down as the economy slowly recovers. Unless we are somehow going to cut ourselves off from the world, though, we face the prospect of a continued downward trend in the labor share. The trite response to this reality is to call for more education and better training for workers, and more investments in research and development as well as infrastructure. It’s true that all such actions would help. But they take time, and even then they would probably only take some of the edge off the decline, not fundamentally reverse it.
No wonder the frustrated Wall Street protesters lack any specific proposals for change: We are effectively missing $500 billion a year in wages, and no one has a credible set of ideas that would bring it back.
(Peter Orszag is vice chairman of global banking at Citigroup Inc. and a former director of the Office of Management and Budget in the Obama administration. The opinions expressed are his own.)/quote]
The people in the past who convinced themselves to do unspeakable things were no less human than you or I. They made their decisions; the only thing that prevents history from repeating itself is making different ones.
-- Adam Serwer
My blog
1. Workers own capital in the form of their pension funds. Why haven't these increased?
2. Labour compensation includes executive pay. Even if the division of GDP had swung from capital to labour, "face workers" would still be worse off due to the massive increase in executive compensation.
3. The population of Europe more than doubled between 1900 and 2000, which presumably doubled the labour force. Shouldn't this have adversely affected the labour/capital division? In reality, things got a lot better for the ordinary man in the street.
The reason why people are angry is simple. They think they are being ripped off by government, big business and the banks.
So Melissa, you ignored the entirety of my response except for one line, which after I (and another) tried to dispute you stopped responding.
you support capitalism at heart and want free trade
one of the tea parties three main goals is to be MORE free trade orientated
you don't like the tea party
you support occupy wall street and wish you were out there. yet it has no stated goal except stop corporate greed. with no clear way of doing it or really way of defining "greed" . Many of the ways are very much anti-free trade.
you think government should stop corporations from making poor financial choices by paying lots of money to CEO's (anti-free trade)
you think pay should be based on experience, occupation, resume, and skill. unless of course the title is CEO (pro-free trade until the end)
you think corporations make too much money (anti-free trade)
you also think we should "frak them" which you later explained means ignore corporations and banks (except for regulating politcaly donations)
you think we're currently ignoring corporations and banks right now, and this has caused lots of job loss (doesn't really work with above statement)
you simultaneously do not want to "crush" or help or ignore corporations (you think we should "fix" corporations with regulation while leaving them alone and god forbid giving them tax breaks
you think anyone who "makes money with money" is not being productive. (this would be every single business, but you must be refering to investors, who finance business that produce things)
you think corporations do not create jobs( you're kind of right here in that its about 30%, but their already employing half the population.)
you want to give tax cuts to the poor and middle class (http://visualizingeconomics.com/2010/02/05/who-is-not-paying-taxes/) what are we doing right now then?
Most of the things you have said on here are not free trade. So this might be why people have complained about your consistancy. you seem to present consistant views, but you're not calling them by the correct definitions.
you do not want free trade. You want a highly regulated economy, that is far from an open, free trade market. you want the government to equalize results, not opportunities. this is not free trade.
edited for stupid mistakes
This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2011/10/24 02:28:46
Because the tea party's views are abhorrent to me. They might talk a good deal about free trade but they haven't actually done anything about that and even decried Obama's free trade attempts. Because Obama did them, of course.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Another analysis:
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2011/10/24 15:40:11
The people in the past who convinced themselves to do unspeakable things were no less human than you or I. They made their decisions; the only thing that prevents history from repeating itself is making different ones.
-- Adam Serwer
My blog
"As the protest has grown, some of the occupiers have spontaneously taken charge on projects large and small. But many of the people in Zuccotti Park aren't taking direction well, leading to a tense Thursday of political disagreements, the occasional shouting match, and at least one fistfight."
Anarchists not following directions? I never would have counted these guys for having problems with authority figures. What gives?
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2011/10/24 15:55:45
again Melissa ignoring my entire post except for one line!
the tea party is generally in favor of free trade. why do you find this abhorrent when you said on this very thread that you wanted it.
I haven't seen complaints from the tea party about Obama's free trade, its his other stuff that bothers them. I may not be terribly hip after a year in canada but I don't understand what is abhorrent about enforcing laws and reducing national deficit.
well the laws that the tea party is talking about, enforcing immigration laws. I don't know why you consider those to be bad.
Also, the Tea party is for free trade, not laissez-faire economics which means they are in favor of laws requiring full disclosure, the main problem with wall street.
it seems to me like killkrazy, you're just going for a clever phrase more than substance.
Occupy grandma's house Oct 25th 2011, 19:09 by A.S. | NEW YORK
THE trouble with being a rebel without a cause is that people tend to project their causes on you. That seems to be the case with Occupy Wall Street (and its many local offshoots). The movement has gotten a great deal of attention, despite the absence of a clear objective, gripe or solution. Perhaps that’s what’s so fun about the movement; OWS allows everyone to make it about their favourite villain. For some, that's capitalism; for others, just the parts of capitalism they don’t like. Others get their kicks targeting the protestors. The popular interpretation of OWS is that its an outgrowth of class war: the 99% taking on the 1% who have all the wealth. It's rarely productive for one group of citizens to fight another over resources, because the game is so rarely zero-sum. But if I may be so presumptuous (pretty much everyone else is, so why not me?), I’d suggest that rather than singling out Wall Street fat cats for taking too much of the pie, the protestors look closer to home. Maybe they should look to their parents and grandparents.
A large part of the frustration downtown is probably driven by the fact that young people feel they've gotten a bad deal. The unemployment rate for those under 25 is 17.1%. There's evidence the recession will impact their wages for decades. But to some degree the trouble goes beyond current economic conditions. Some future economic problems are structural and much of the blame can be placed on older workers. Older generations aren't necessarily themselves to blame; shifting demographics and the current phase of globalisation mean there’s a chance many young people today will not enjoy the rise in prosperity their parents and grandparents did. The bill for pensions and retiree health care are set to take an increasing share of GDP, which means that fewer resources will go towards the young and their children. Spending fewer resources on capital that benefits current and future workers can have negative consequences for long-term growth.
Liabilities for state and local pensions are probably much larger than people realise, and the shortfall will likely come out of the pockets of the young and future workers. Or, as we’ve seen in places like Vallejo, California, savings will be achieved at the cost of fewer of the services used by the entire population. Buttonwood recently pointed out that any pension, even funded ones, is really a claim on future workers’ output. These claims are rising rapidly.
Another reason OWS may want to shift their focus is that the elderly (or at least the their most effective lobbby, the AARP) has declared war on them. Retirees recently marched on Washington demanding that Social Security and Medicare cuts not be included in any debt proposal. Yet, who is proposing that existing benefits be cut? Social Security benefits were actually just increased 3.6%, as part of the annual cost of living adjustment. If you read the fine print in most proposals I’ve seen, substantial benefit cuts affect people set to retire at least ten years from now and would have little impact on current or soon-to-be retirees. Is that what they’re protesting? AARP has historically fought any future benefit cuts (though recently they have changed tone and taken a controversial decision to be more open to the idea—as yet they have not endorsed any plan that involves benefit cuts), which implies that they’re counting on more revenue from future tax payers. They won’t even endorse raising the retirement age on future retirees. Recent history suggests that each new cohort lives longer than the last, so this means that each generation gets a longer retirement, while its children get stuck with a progressively bigger bill. Resistance among seniors to even engage in a serious discussion about entitlements makes reform poltically difficult. This is delays decisions, which makes the solution more expensive still for future taxpayers and retirees.
It seems ironic to me that retirees are marching on Washington as their grandchildren protest, concerned about their economic future. America and Europe are long overdue for entitlement reform precisely because the elderly are great at mobilising and wielding their political power. I suggest the OWS youth use this opportunity do the same.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2011/10/26 15:16:53
The people in the past who convinced themselves to do unspeakable things were no less human than you or I. They made their decisions; the only thing that prevents history from repeating itself is making different ones.
-- Adam Serwer
My blog
Mmm... the masss arrests are beginning. Now we need to see tear gas and horses. Its so..Chicago 1968!
-"Wait a minute.....who is that Frazz is talking to in the gallery? Hmmm something is going on here.....Oh.... it seems there is some dispute over video taping of some sort......Frazz is really upset now..........wait a minute......whats he go there.......is it? Can it be?....Frazz has just unleashed his hidden weiner dog from his mini bag, while quoting shakespeares "Let slip the dogs the war!!" GG
-"Don't mind Frazzled. He's just Dakka's crazy old dude locked in the attic. He's harmless. Mostly."
-TBone the Magnificent 1999-2014, Long Live the King!
Whether or not your protest is legitimate aside, when the cops show up, tell you you're breaking the law, and you throw bottles at them I don't know what other possible outcome you could expect.
Agreed. When you assault a police officer in a situation like that... you're not exactly giving yourself a good image.
The people in the past who convinced themselves to do unspeakable things were no less human than you or I. They made their decisions; the only thing that prevents history from repeating itself is making different ones.
-- Adam Serwer
My blog
Easy E wrote:OOh, OOh tear gas reports in Oakland.
Yes! We have horses here but only about 15 OC people so its not worth it.
-"Wait a minute.....who is that Frazz is talking to in the gallery? Hmmm something is going on here.....Oh.... it seems there is some dispute over video taping of some sort......Frazz is really upset now..........wait a minute......whats he go there.......is it? Can it be?....Frazz has just unleashed his hidden weiner dog from his mini bag, while quoting shakespeares "Let slip the dogs the war!!" GG
-"Don't mind Frazzled. He's just Dakka's crazy old dude locked in the attic. He's harmless. Mostly."
-TBone the Magnificent 1999-2014, Long Live the King!
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Rikers cons flood Zuccotti for free eats
By REBECCA ROSENBERG, JAMIE SCHRAM and BOB FREDERICKS
Last Updated: 6:17 AM, October 26, 2011
Posted: 3:50 AM, October 26, 2011
More Print Newly sprung ex-cons and vagrants rousted from other parks are crashing the Occupy Wall Street protest, where gourmet meals are free and boozy, drugfueled parties are on tap, the movement’s leaders griped yesterday.
“They’re telling people who leave prison to go to Zuccotti Park,” lamented Daniel Zetah, a leader of the OWS community-relations group.
Volunteer Lauren Digioia, 26, said, “We have drug dealing going on here, gang activity, public intoxication. There are a lot of instigators. There are a lot of vultures.
“Everyone knows we give out free food and sleeping bags, and it’s a perfect opportunity for squatters.”
Digioia said she recently met a man who just before getting sprung from Rikers, was told by a fellow inmate to hit Zuccotti for the free accommodations.
The frustrated organizers said they’re brainstorming how to launch a protest within the protest to target the drunken, stoned layabouts.
The derelicts, organizers say, are terrorizing people who are there to support the movement.
“There’s a lot of drugs, alcohol, assault [and] theft [by] the homeless groups coming in. We’ve had meetings all day to brainstorm what to do,’’ said Zetah, 34.
The hardened thugs are having a field day preying on overly trusting protesters, many of whom hail from small towns, leaders said.
On Monday, a 24-year-old Brooklyn woman originally from Brownville, Maine — population 1,260 — told cops that three men threatened her because she’d fingered one of their pals for brutally punching her and two others, another woman and a man in the face Oct. 11.
“You got our friend arrested. We’re going to kill you. Watch your back,” one of them told her.
Garfield Leslie, 19, of Brooklyn, was later charged with assault and Hasan Castillo, 23, of East Orange, NJ, with intimidating a witness.
And when the undesirables aren’t intimidating protesters, organizers said, they’re adding to the filth.
NYPD spokesman Paul Browne said he was unsure whether ex-cons really are relocating to the encampment.
But he added that “we’ve made arrests of suspects who assaulted people in Zuccotti Park in one instance, sexually abused a woman in another, and removed an individual who had stolen another’s boots.”
Meanwhile, in other developments yesterday:
* The NYPD inspector who pepper-sprayerd a protestor has been quietly transferred to an administrative post on Staten Island, The Post has learned. Anthony Bologna had been docked 10 vacation days after he was caught on video spraying teacher’s aide Kaylee Dedrick, 24, in the eyes.
His new assignment, as the borough’s special-projects inspector, will “get him out of the line of fire,’’ a source said.
* Four demonstrators headed uptown yesterday to harass Rep. Charles Rangel, who’d twice visited Zuccotti Park to support OWS but drew their wrath by voting for free-trade agreements with South Korea and Panama.
* A splinter group of OWS protesters and supporters found a new target — the city Department of Education. More than 100 demonstrators, including teachers, last night disrupted a schools meeting — shouting down Chancellor Dennis Walcott — at Seward Park HS on the Lower East Side.
The protesters complained about too much test prep, lack of resources and recent layoffs.
They’re drowning out the parents, who were the primary focus for tonight,” Walcott lamented to reporters.
* Another Community Board 1 meeting was held to address ongoing concerns over Zuccotti, which is in its area. The board voted 33-3 to limit drumming there to two hours a day.
A motion to clear out all the protesters from part of the park was tabled.
Additional reporting by Jessica Simeone, Antonio Antonucci, Yoav Gonan, Erin Calabrese & Doug Auer
-"Wait a minute.....who is that Frazz is talking to in the gallery? Hmmm something is going on here.....Oh.... it seems there is some dispute over video taping of some sort......Frazz is really upset now..........wait a minute......whats he go there.......is it? Can it be?....Frazz has just unleashed his hidden weiner dog from his mini bag, while quoting shakespeares "Let slip the dogs the war!!" GG
-"Don't mind Frazzled. He's just Dakka's crazy old dude locked in the attic. He's harmless. Mostly."
-TBone the Magnificent 1999-2014, Long Live the King!
