Occupy Wallstreeter commits heresy...and gets a job

Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you:

No adverts like this in the forums anymore.
Times and dates in your local timezone.
Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance.
Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely.
Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net.

If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

**Melissia**

It's amusing how Frazzled can never attack anything other than men of straw.

Amusing, and also sad, because it shows just how weak his underlying beliefs are.

**daedalus**

I think it's cause he has that knife that gives him +9 to slaying men of straw.

**thenoobbomb**

Frazzled wrote:
http://www.cnn.com/2011/12/07/us/occupy-wall-street-job/index.html?hpt=hp_t2

Ex-Occupier now holds Wall Street job
By Chris Knowles and Raelyn Johnson, CNN
updated 5:38 AM EST, Thu December 8, 2011

Occupy protester gets job on Wall Street
STORY HIGHLIGHTS
• Tracy Postert was fully committed to the Occupy Wall Street protests, she tells CNN
• The biochemist says she had been looking for work, but couldn't prove it to naysayers
• She showed up at Zuccotti Park with her résumé, and soon had a job offer
• She now researches biotech companies for John Thomas Financial -- on Wall Street
New York (CNN) -- The occupiers of Wall Street have been portrayed by some as radicals, young kids without focus, ne'er-do-wells who'd do anything but get a job. But one woman used her time in at Zuccotti Park differently, and as a result she has gone from Occupy Wall Street to occupying an actual office on Wall Street.
In the gathering of the so-called 99%, Tracy Postert had no idea she would be the one who would be working for the 1%.
"There were some days it was a carnival, or lots of music, drumming, costumes, marching, protesting," said Postert, describing the weeks she spent demonstrating at the park in downtown Manhattan.
Frustrated with the economy, Postert says she jumped right into the Occupy Wall Street movement -- all in -- banging drums and washing paint- and dirt-covered sidewalks.
She sounds like the protester stereotype, but she isn't; she has a doctorate in biochemistry.
In the past few years, the biochemist said, she had found herself at times unemployed or underemployed. Until a few weeks ago she decided to change her protest sign to a "Job Wanted" sign and hunkered down in Zuccotti Park with a handful of résumés.
"Passers-by would say, 'Get a job,' and I didn't have a really good response to that," Postert told CNN.
"I wanted to say, 'Well, I'm trying to get a job,' but you know you can't really prove it." Postert said. "So I said, why don't I make a sign (and prove) that I am actively looking for a job?"
Within two days, she said, someone spotted her. They exchanged e-mails, and an offer followed.
That someone was a top executive at a Wall Street financial firm -- in other words, the enemy.
"It might sound like it's a fish-out-of-water story -- (round) peg in a square hole -- but it's really not," said Wayne Kaufman, a market analyst at John Thomas Financial.
"She was standing there. She had her sign, she had her résumé, and I just passed by her and I chatted with her just for a brief few seconds. And she was obviously an intelligent person," Kaufman said.
"The résumé spoke for itself, it was very impressive," he said. "So, I sent her an e-mail the next day and ... she responded almost immediately.
"I asked her if she wanted to come in for an interview; she said yes. I told her what I had in mind for her according to her skill set, and the rest is just history."
For now, Tracy is researching early stage biotech companies for John Thomas Financial. She says she plans to take a test that would allow her to become a broker, and thus a full-fledged member of the 1%. So what are her former Occupy Wall Street compatriots saying?
"I have been accused of being a traitor to both sides. Some people are saying that the whole time I was at Occupy Wall Street I was really a Wall Street insider," says Postert.
She said she plans on keeping her sign. She pledged to protest again when she finds something she feels is worth protesting.

Because of the titel, I will now call you a 'Republican'

**Jihadin**

She had a lot of free publicity though knowing the news agency were recording. So why not put up a sign and have resumes in hand

**Frazzled**

Melissia wrote:It's amusing how Frazzled can never attack anything other than men of straw.

Amusing, and also sad, because it shows just how weak his underlying beliefs are.

Ancient Budha say, always pick fight with man made of paper. You can kick his ass 7 days a week, and if you lose, just set him on fire!

**sourclams**

I think the real distinction here is that this is an individual with an advanced and useful skill that, thanks to some clever marketing on her part, found a relevant job in a short timeframe.

The 'chronic 99%', which, based on media coverage thus far and what I perceive when visiting their official site, tend to be recently graduated liberal arts majors or those [un/under-]employed in similar fields. Another significant segment seem to be/claim to be laborer types. People with some combination of significant debt and employment prospects that do not match what they feel their personal worth is given their experience/education.

I do not think the problem is the current economic system (although I can empathize with the bottom 20% of the American population that has fallen on some truly hard times, and the 30% or so above them who have diminished buying power given economic slowdown and increasing food/fuel prices). The problem is how we have until recently perceived the 'value' of a college degree and institutional 'brand', regardless of major.

Some majors are very technically demanding. Math, sciences, engineering, accounting, basically all of the fields that even today have very, very low unemployment. The OP subject's biochem degree would fall into one such category. Some majors are not; liberal arts, 'business', 'retail', psychology. Coincidentally, these are the fields with the higher unemployment.

Long story short, we've witnessed another bubble burst; an education bubble. At one point, non-rigorous majors were effectively the blue collar labor force within growing bureaucracies, both public and private. Now the world has generally gone to leanness and meanness and pencils have been sharpened and reductions in workforce have been made.

Ditto for unskilled labor.

What this article really shows me is the difference in market value and importance of rigorous, skilled, highly technical positions and nonrigorous, non-technical positions. Liberal arts majors are easier than chem majors--I have a liberal arts major myself and basically washed out of an engineering program. This is also why supply of under-employed liberal arts grads is so much greater, and therefore less valuable, than those with more rigorous technical skills.

**DoctorZombie**

Mr Hyena wrote:I don't care for either group, but I do wish the '99%' would stop saying they speak for me. Thats kind of arrogant.

Good luck to the person who got a job though. Thats all that matters.

Heh, and only 50 percent of those people actually pay taxes.

**Seaward**

DoctorZombie wrote:
Mr Hyena wrote:I don't care for either group, but I do wish the '99%' would stop saying they speak for me. Thats kind of arrogant.

Good luck to the person who got a job though. Thats all that matters.

Heh, and only 50 percent of those people actually pay taxes.

Ah, that old fallacious chestnut.

Everybody pays taxes in the US. Some people don't pay income tax, which seems to be the only tax that anyone ever thinks about. Know what? Those people are still paying a significant percentage of their income to the government in various other taxes; sales tax, payroll tax, etc. The smaller your income gets, the more those taxes hurt your bottom line.

**dogma**

Seaward wrote:
DoctorZombie wrote:
Mr Hyena wrote:I don't care for either group, but I do wish the '99%' would stop saying they speak for me. Thats kind of arrogant.

Good luck to the person who got a job though. Thats all that matters.

Heh, and only 50 percent of those people actually pay taxes.

Ah, that old fallacious chestnut.

Everybody pays taxes in the US. Some people don't pay federal income tax, which seems to be the only tax that anyone ever thinks about. Know what? Those people are still paying a significant percentage of their income to the government in various other taxes; sales tax, payroll tax, etc. The smaller your income gets, the more those taxes hurt your bottom line.

Clarified. Many people that are exempt from federal income tax still pay state income taxes, in addition to the other taxes you outlined.

One thing I've been meaning to look into: how much of the total gross personal income in the US is taxed under FICA?

**sebster**

There's this really stupid idea in the world that you can't play the game and argue for the rules to be changed at the same time.

It's okay to try and get a higher paying job, while recognising that the system could be more fair.

**dogma**

The truly strange part is that corporations are almost never considered hypocritical for seeking changes to, say, corporate tax law. But, if private citizens do the same, well by golly its heresy.

**sourclams**

Seaward wrote:Everybody pays taxes in the US. Some people don't pay income tax, which seems to be the only tax that anyone ever thinks about. Know what? Those people are still paying a significant percentage of their income to the government in various other taxes; sales tax, payroll tax, etc. The smaller your income gets, the more those taxes hurt your bottom line.

The '50% don't pay taxes' is based on amount of money spent on taxes + amount of money received from the government in the forms of various financial aid. When you add up things like food stamps and 'residential assistance' (gov't subsidizes a portion of your rent) people at the lowest end of the economic spectrum end up being net beneficiaries of tax revenue.

**Easy E**

sourclams wrote:
Seaward wrote:Everybody pays taxes in the US. Some people don't pay income tax, which seems to be the only tax that anyone ever thinks about. Know what? Those people are still paying a significant percentage of their income to the government in various other taxes; sales tax, payroll tax, etc. The smaller your income gets, the more those taxes hurt your bottom line.

The '50% don't pay taxes' is based on amount of money spent on taxes + amount of money received from the government in the forms of various financial aid. When you add up things like food stamps and 'residential assistance' (gov't subsidizes a portion of your rent) people at the lowest end of the economic spectrum end up being net beneficiaries of tax revenue.

Site please?

Here's mine:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/06/28/46-percent-of-americans-e_n_886293.html

I guess your definition and the Tax Center's definition are completely different.

**sourclams**

I will admit to a mistake; I said 'net beneficiaries' when what I should have said 'have very little exposure (skin in the game) to taxation'.

wikipedia wrote:In recent years, the number and percentage of Americans who pay no federal income tax has increased. According to a 2007 report by the Statistics of Income division of the Internal Revenue Service,[4] in 2006 the Internal Revenue Service received 134,372,678 individual income tax returns, of which 90,593,081 (67.42%) showed that they paid or owed federal income tax for 2005. That is, 32.58% of those Americans who filed income tax returns did not owe any federal income tax at all for 2005. This percentage increased substantially in 2008, and for 2009 was 47%.

The federal income tax is only one of several taxes Americans pay. Americans who pay zero federal income taxes do pay other taxes, such as payroll taxes, excise taxes, sales taxes, tariffs, gift taxes, unemployment taxes, state income taxes, property taxes, and self-employment taxes (a.k.a. FICA).

Federal payroll taxes are imposed on nearly every American with income from employment (there are exceptions for certain students, certain religious objectors, and certain state/local government employees who participate in a state/local pension). Federal self-employment taxes are imposed on nearly every American with net income from self-employment above $400 (again with exceptions for certain religious objectors). So almost all Americans with some earned income do pay some federal taxes. However, the US also allows refundable tax credits to certain individuals, which can lower their income taxes below zero. When these refundable tax credits equal or exceed other federal taxes, the individual is said to pay "no net federal taxes."

As of 2006, according to New York Times columnist David Leonhardt, approximately 10% of Americans paid no net federal taxes [5]. Mr. Leonhardt did not have figures for 2010, and there were several refundable tax credits which were created or expanded between 2006 and 2010.

According to Congressional Budget Office estimates, [6] the lowest earning 20% of Americans (24.1 million households earning an average of $15,900 in 2005) paid an "effective" federal tax rate of 3.9%, when taking into account income tax, social insurance tax, and excise tax. For comparison, the same study found that the highest earning 1% of Americans (1.1 million households earning an average of $1,558,500 in 2005) paid an "effective" federal tax rate of 21.9%, when including the same three types of taxes.

This is more or less in line with the article in the Huffington Post that you cited, but I think it does a better job of summing up the analysis.

Yes, people in very low income brackets are still subject to taxes on consumption, like sales tax, which would be considered a 'flat tax' and typically hit at the state level. However, at the federal level the lowest percentage of earners also pays the lowest percentage of taxes... mid single digits... which represents far less in both percentage of income and total revenue than what the top earners pay out.

That in itself isn't anything that really gets my dander up; barring exceptions (and there always are) people who make more contribute more. Where tax loopholes are elaborate enough or corruption is rife enough a high earning individual could get away with dodging taxes. In those cases, work to close the loopholes or bring transparency.

But there are problems with simply saying 'rich people should pay more'. The big issue I see is that the rich already pay more in both total revenue and percentage of income, and when 20% of society pays a very small percentage of their income in taxes, it has no skin in the game and therefore no incentive to combat inefficient government spending and bloat. In fact, it actually becomes in their best interest to advocate for the same because they tend to be the net beneficiaries of those programs.

The idea that the top 1% is this homogeneous, never-changing bloc of individuals is also fallacious. Here's an excerpt I pulled from today's 'The Gartman Letter' courtesy of research done by EmmanuelSaez in Bloomberg/Businessweek:

Gartman wrote:That said, let’s look at the “rich” for a second, and let’s
remember that much… indeed most... of the income of
those making more than $1 million is made via
investments; a much, much smaller proportion of their
income is in the form of real wage earnings. Firstly, then,
the number of true multi-millionaires… those making more
than $5 million per year… fell sharply from the high in ’07
when there were nearly 25,0000 who did so to just over
13,000. Those making more than $10 million/year fell
from approximately 17,000 in ’07 to 8,000 in ’09… the
declines reflecting the massive losses those years
suffered by the bear market in equities.

Indeed when looking at those in the now rather “infamous”
1% and comparing it to the rise… and the fall… in share
prices the correlation is shockingly high, with the numbers
rising and falling almost perfectly from the late 50’s
through the bull and bear markets and falling and rising in
perfect tandem these past five years.

As a Professor of Economics at the University of
California, Berkeley… Dr. Emmanuel Saez, said in an
interview recently with Bloomberg/Businessweek,
Most of the fall in [top earner income] is due
to capital gains collapse. Barring economic
cataclysm ahead, top earnings will be
recovering faster than the 99%.

We’ll not mince words here; the top 1% are doing quite
well, for back in ’68 they received 11% of the total national
earned. By ’88 that was up to 15% and by ’08 it was 21%.
It has fallen since, but as Prof. Saez “warns” it will be
rising soon, giving the Left ammunition with which to
attack the wealthy. However… and this is most
important… the top 1% has paid and continues to pay…
income taxes far in excess of what the public perceives
them to have paid and they still pay in far, far more than
their “fair share.”

For example, in ’87, the top 1% received 12.3% of all
income but paid in 24.8% of all income taxes, where the
bottom 50% received 15.6% of all income but paid in 6.1%
of the taxes. This “spread” in favour of the rich paying
huge sums of money in taxes compared to incomes
continued down to the top 5% of income earners, for back
in ’87 this cohort received 25.7% of the national income
but paid in 43.3% of the income taxes.

**Easy E**

Great, so we agree that taxation is not a black and white issue where "Only the Rich" or "Only the Poor People" are to blame.

That is progress!

**sourclams**

As with most blanket statements, trying to blame anything on 'only the Rich' or 'only the Poor' misses most of the argument on either side. The top 1% of earners control a greater percentage of the nation's wealth. They also pay more in taxes. The bottom 20% has a difficult time retaining buying power in a bottom-line inflationary environment when food and fuel prices are on the rise. They also pay very little in [federal] taxes and in some cases pay none/are net beneficiaries.

**sebster**

dogma wrote:The truly strange part is that corporations are almost never considered hypocritical for seeking changes to, say, corporate tax law. But, if private citizens do the same, well by golly its heresy.

It sure is bizarre.

I read a good piece in the New Yorker yesterday about the difference in how mortgage owners and businesses are seen when dealing with their debt. American Airlines can hold $4 billion in cash assets, but decide it doesn't like how it's business is currently sitting, so it declares bankruptcy and negotiates for more favourable contracts, and this is heralded in the business community as very clever. A homeowner who walks away from a mortgage that's greater than the value of his house is irresponsible, and setting a poor example to his children.

It really is one rule for them, and another rule for everyone else.

Automatically Appended Next Post:

sourclams wrote:As with most blanket statements, trying to blame anything on 'only the Rich' or 'only the Poor' misses most of the argument on either side. The top 1% of earners control a greater percentage of the nation's wealth. They also pay more in taxes. The bottom 20% has a difficult time retaining buying power in a bottom-line inflationary environment when food and fuel prices are on the rise. They also pay very little in [federal] taxes and in some cases pay none/are net beneficiaries.

It's completely bizarre that as the gap between rich and poor rises so much that about half of people end up receiving so little pay that they don't pay tax, and people define this as 'people not paying their fair share'.

Instead, think of it as 'people not getting their fair share, and the tax system doing a little bit to make that system a little less fethed up'.

**sourclams**

Well, honestly I can't get upset about that either, really. Yes, the top earners are more wealthy than ever before. But the quality of living for the bottom earners is basically higher than ever before as well, if you look at what they have access to as the measure. The... oh shucks I forget their title... Center for Economic Research, maybe? Some gov't census research institute. Anyhow, they did a study basically evaluating how well off the 'poor' in America are. The majority of 'poor' families have multiple TVs including 'big screen' TVs, cable, dishwashers, smart phones, a car, and all the normal lesser appliances. A minority among the 'poor' have jacuzzis, something like 4% have jacuzzis!

By the standards of the 1950s, today's poor are moderately wealthy. By the standards of the globe, a poor American is still better off than a somewhat middle-class Chinese person, and don't even bring up poor people historically. Do you know where the Chinese draw the line for poverty? $850/year. $2.50/day! That's true, crushing poverty.

Wealth is not some finite quantity. If people create wealth from nothing, and that elevates them above their fellow human, then I still have no issue with the wealth getting 'concentrated' if wealth is still being created and standards of living are generally increasing. If not all citizens have fair access to the systems that create wealth, then that's a problem that needs addressing. However attempting to bridge that gap by putting people on the dole or by government 'redistribution' has not proven successful historically. Look at Fannie Mae/Freddie Mac.

**Mannahnin**

Some redistribution certainly has worked historically. Compare the rates of poverty among the elderly before and after Social Security.

**sebster**

sourclams wrote:Well, honestly I can't get upset about that either, really. Yes, the top earners are more wealthy than ever before. But the quality of living for the bottom earners is basically higher than ever before as well, if you look at what they have access to as the measure. The... oh shucks I forget their title... Center for Economic Research, maybe? Some gov't census research institute. Anyhow, they did a study basically evaluating how well off the 'poor' in America are. The majority of 'poor' families have multiple TVs including 'big screen' TVs, cable, dishwashers, smart phones, a car, and all the normal lesser appliances. A minority among the 'poor' have jacuzzis, something like 4% have jacuzzis!

Which is a largely a function of easy consumer credit, there is afterall a massive difference between getting a bigscreen TV and actually being able to afford it long term. What such a situation would see, long term, is a cycle of boom and bust, as cheap credit is handed out to poor people who have been presented with an aspirational model of success, so they head out and buy cheap consumer goods, and rack it up on credit. When the market turns these people can't make the payments, and the whole thing comes rashing down.

It's something we've seen what, three times now since 1990?

So maybe, instead, we need to ask how many of those people have reliable cars? How many have money left over after utilities, rent and food are bought for the month, so those consumer purchases are coming out of income, and not being put on credit? How many can afford to work less hours, to attend a skills program and improve their lot in life?

By the standards of the 1950s, today's poor are moderately wealthy. By the standards of the globe, a poor American is still better off than a somewhat middle-class Chinese person, and don't even bring up poor people historically. Do you know where the Chinese draw the line for poverty? $850/year. $2.50/day! That's true, crushing poverty.

The existence of crushing poverty elsewhere in the world is a really weird way to justify poverty at home.

Wealth is not some finite quantity. If people create wealth from nothing, and that elevates them above their fellow human, then I still have no issue with the wealth getting 'concentrated' if wealth is still being created and standards of living are generally increasing. If not all citizens have fair access to the systems that create wealth, then that's a problem that needs addressing.

I agree that the ability to build new economic structures, such as a new business, is a vital means of wealth generation. But it simply isn't true that that wealth is invented out of nothing. For me to create wealth out of nothing, I would have to head out into forest, cut down a tree myself, haul it back to my property, and process it until I've made a table that someone else wants to buy, then I present that table in a market and sell it. But no-one does this. No-one could generate anything like what we consider wealth by doing this.

Instead, I buy a piece of forested land, a contract enforced by government. I employ tree cutters, and a hauling service, and woodworkers, and a store front, all arranged through systems that are, indeed, supported by government. It doesn't make sense to accept all that interaction with other members of society, and the mutual benefit we get, all supported by social systems enforced by government law... and then claim that I alone created all that wealth, and that any system that takes part of that money to spend it on other purposes is suddenly an intrusion.

However attempting to bridge that gap by putting people on the dole or by government 'redistribution' has not proven successful historically.

That's serious nonsense. Look at life before 'government redistribution', look at life in 1900. In the US in 1900 up to 30% of infants died before the age of one, mostly the product of malnutrition and preventable disease. About one in four children suffered malnutrition. About 10% of the adult population was illiterate (and that was thanks to US government programs already in place), whereas now it's less than a half of 1%.

Thanks to government programs to ensure everyone had access to education, and that every child was provided with at least one decent meal a day, subsequent generations grew up smarter and healthier, and so were more valuable members of the workforce.

**sourclams**

Mannahnin wrote:Some redistribution certainly has worked historically. Compare the rates of poverty among the elderly before and after Social Security.

This isn't wealth redistribution from the wealthy to the poor, however. It's redistribution from the young to the old. Demographics alone say that this is a ponzi scheme that will eventually fall apart as life expectancy continues to increase, unless the requirements for social security are made more onerous (like raising the retirement age/age recipients start receiving checks).

The government has moved the goalposts on how social security works. Did you know that the original social security pamphlet (issued by Congress) said that employee and employer would pay a maximum of 3 cents per dollar earned each (per year), up to a maximum of $3,000, which was 'the most that would ever be paid'?

That's how it was originally sold; social security was like a retirement account and what one paid in, one would eventually get it out, it became in essence the payer's property, thus to be a recipient later was a right.

In Flemming v. Nestor (1960) the court removed that concept of property right under the justification that it left the program inflexible and unable to adjust to changing conditions.
This is in direct contradiction to the original pamphlet, which said 'the checks will come to you as a right'. This sets up the program to eventually be denied to people who paid into it. Because eventually that has to happen; there will come a point where there are not enough young people working, and too many retirees living longer than the original tolerances allowed for, and inflationary pressures make it impossible to provide a meaningful amount of assistance to everyone. Now, this is still a long ways away, but it is inevitable.

So to your original question, did social security help the quality of life of the elderly? Yes, but it did so on a false promise and eventually those who paid in will not receive checks.

**sourclams**

Sebster, yours is a long post that deals primaril in generalities, so my responses are going to have to be somewhat short and lacking in-depth analysis of necessity. I'm just going to touch on a few in the same manner, as a 'well yes but look at it this way' sort of manner.

sebster wrote:So maybe, instead, we need to ask how many of those people have reliable cars? How many have money left over after utilities, rent and food are bought for the month, so those consumer purchases are coming out of income, and not being put on credit? How many can afford to work less hours, to attend a skills program and improve their lot in life?

What we have just gone through between late 2008 and 2010 was the greatest consumer deleveraging in history. Credit cannot be simultaneously bought down aggressively (both pro-actively and reactively, like when a creditor (bank, credit company) denies credit to someone) but also relied upon exclusively. For a majority of poor families to have at least one smart phone--with a monthly subscription fee in the upper tens of dollars--suggests that either basic needs are being met, or priorities are misaligned.

As to working less hours, attending skills programs, etc., nobody said it'd be easy. My confidence in America and The System is such that those willing to make those difficult commitments early will be better off later on. I do not believe that 'minimum wage' has to be a 'living wage'; skilless labor is not valuable and never will be again (relative to the quality of living that we expect today). I think it is actually important that crappy, part-time jobs intended for high school students and intermediate-term employment don't pay substantial wages as an incentive to leave that role. Technology will continue to replace skilless jobs. Technology will also create more high-skill jobs. It is the responsibility of the individual to improve their skill set to leave the former for the latter.

The existence of crushing poverty elsewhere in the world is a really weird way to justify poverty at home.

My point is that how we are defining poverty at home is lavish luxury compared to recent history and even modern global standards for developing countries (based on %population). If the altruistic argument is that the wealthy own 'too much' relative to the poor and need to 'give it back', then the argument is equally easily made and altruistic that we need to ship that wealth to Haiti, Cuba, mid-Africa.

But it simply isn't true that that wealth is invented out of nothing. For me to create wealth out of nothing, I would have to head out into forest, cut down a tree myself, haul it back to my property, and process it until I've made a table that someone else wants to buy, then I present that table in a market and sell it. But no-one does this. No-one could generate anything like what we consider wealth by doing this.

Instead, I buy a piece of forested land, a contract enforced by government. I employ tree cutters, and a hauling service, and woodworkers, and a store front, all arranged through systems that are, indeed, supported by government. It doesn't make sense to accept all that interaction with other members of society, and the mutual benefit we get, all supported by social systems enforced by government law... and then claim that I alone created all that wealth, and that any system that takes part of that money to spend it on other purposes is suddenly an intrusion.

I see no substantial difference in theory between your scenario 1 and 2. You initiated a process that created profits for yourself. In scenario 1 you did it on a very limited scale. In scenario 2 your scale was much larger. In scenario 2 you involved far more processes, and also probably created far more revenue. And in return the other individuals along the way got a market-bearing cut of the profits. You still 'alone created all that wealth', you just brought more people along on the journey.

That's serious nonsense. Look at life before 'government redistribution', look at life in 1900. In the US in 1900 up to 30% of infants died before the age of one, mostly the product of malnutrition and preventable disease. About one in four children suffered malnutrition. About 10% of the adult population was illiterate (and that was thanks to US government programs already in place), whereas now it's less than a half of 1%.

There were problems in the Gilded Age. Regulation was necessary. Progress in worker's rights, and organized labor was also necessary. However none of the fixes you cite (or rather, effects) were the result of wealth redistribution. Advances in technology, industrial process, things that allowed people to migrate from rural areas to urban with shorter work weeks and more time to focus on skill building rather than ditch digging, and the savings that occurred during several years of wartime economy and resulting consumer spending created wealth and boosted living standards. The greatest redistribution of wealth in the last century was the Great Depression of the '30s; all social gaps narrowed while wealth was destroyed.

**sebster**

sourclams wrote:What we have just gone through between late 2008 and 2010 was the greatest consumer deleveraging in history. Credit cannot be simultaneously bought down aggressively (both pro-actively and reactively, like when a creditor (bank, credit company) denies credit to someone) but also relied upon exclusively. For a majority of poor families to have at least one smart phone--with a monthly subscription fee in the upper tens of dollars--suggests that either basic needs are being met, or priorities are misaligned.

When you look at actual measures of poverty, malnutrition, bankruptcy, food as a percentage of minimum income, there is no doubt the poverty exists in the US.

The existance of consumer goods among the poor doesn't discount that. Instead, it signifies that some things seen as luxury goods aren't any more, because they've become very cheap. But more than that, it points to, as you've noted, some really terrible spending priorities.

Now, that issue of a lot of poor people having really terrible spending priorities does put a hard and fast limit on how much good the system can do, because paying an extra $50 in welfare gives the chance that a person will buy a smartphone instead of buying more nutritious food. But it doesn't mean that the poor aren't in fact very poor.

As to working less hours, attending skills programs, etc., nobody said it'd be easy.

There is a difference between 'not easy' and 'impossible for all but a tiny range of exceptionally talented people'.

My confidence in America and The System is such that those willing to make those difficult commitments early will be better off later on.

How does that reconcile with the fact that social mobility in the US is much worse than in other developed countries? Simply put, it's much more common in the US for a poor person to remain poor, for their children to remain poor and so on, than it is in any other developed country in the world?

I do not believe that 'minimum wage' has to be a 'living wage'; skilless labor is not valuable and never will be again (relative to the quality of living that we expect today). I think it is actually important that crappy, part-time jobs intended for high school students and intermediate-term employment don't pay substantial wages as an incentive to leave that role. Technology will continue to replace skilless jobs. Technology will also create more high-skill jobs. It is the responsibility of the individual to improve their skill set to leave the former for the latter.

And it only sensible for the state to help that people develop those skills, and provide an environment where it is practical for people to spend their time improving their skill base.

Consider the example of a friend of mine, who came from a struggling family, but he was a smart guy and he got into uni to do science. Having lost his Dad when he was in highschool, his mother all but lost her mind entirely when he was at uni, and this placed immsense strain on him and the rest of his family. He made some poor choices, and while he graduated it was with pretty modest grades, and no work came from it. He spent the next year making some more bad choices before realising this really wasn't what he wanted from life. He spoke to a careers councilor, re-enrolled in a one year uni course to become a highschool science teacher, it was a full time course so he existed on a student allowance provided by government. Now he's a well regarded teacher, and father of two who's building his own home.

Something that never would have been possible if there wasn't a government plan to make education afforadable, and provide people with a basic income while they studied.

My point is that how we are defining poverty at home is lavish luxury compared to recent history and even modern global standards for developing countries (based on %population). If the altruistic argument is that the wealthy own 'too much' relative to the poor and need to 'give it back', then the argument is equally easily made and altruistic that we need to ship that wealth to Haiti, Cuba, mid-Africa.

That it would be good to give more to development programs in impoverished countries, and to support development programs at home seem like entirely sensible arguments to me.

I see no substantial difference in theory between your scenario 1 and 2. You initiated a process that created profits for yourself. In scenario 1 you did it on a very limited scale. In scenario 2 your scale was much larger. In scenario 2 you involved far more processes, and also probably created far more revenue. And in return the other individuals along the way got a market-bearing cut of the profits. You still 'alone created all that wealth', you just brought more people along on the journey.

You engaged with all those people in the system through the rules built by society. You accepted all the property laws, employment laws, contract laws written by government, who are representing society's wishes. That was the basis under which you employed each person to cut down trees, haul trees and so on. If that same process decides that people who earn more money pay more taxes, it makes exactly zero sense to suddenly decide that's the point at which government is entering the system to reallocate income.

There were problems in the Gilded Age. Regulation was necessary. Progress in worker's rights, and organized labor was also necessary. However none of the fixes you cite (or rather, effects) were the result of wealth redistribution. Advances in technology, industrial process, things that allowed people to migrate from rural areas to urban with shorter work weeks and more time to focus on skill building rather than ditch digging, and the savings that occurred during several years of wartime economy and resulting consumer spending created wealth and boosted living standards. The greatest redistribution of wealth in the last century was the Great Depression of the '30s; all social gaps narrowed while wealth was destroyed.

It took government programs to give every kid access to education, improving literacy and giving them a chance at a job better than manual labour. It took government programs to improve nutrition. These things were funded with taxation that was levied primarily on the wealthy.

**Mannahnin**

sourclams wrote:
Mannahnin wrote:Some redistribution certainly has worked historically. Compare the rates of poverty among the elderly before and after Social Security.

This isn't wealth redistribution from the wealthy to the poor, however. It's redistribution from the young to the old. Demographics alone say that this is a ponzi scheme that will eventually fall apart as life expectancy continues to increase, unless the requirements for social security are made more onerous (like raising the retirement age/age recipients start receiving checks).

As human healthy life expectancy continues to increase, it's absolutely reasonable and appropriate for the expected retirement/benefits payable age to go up.

Automatically Appended Next Post:

sebster wrote:
I see no substantial difference in theory between your scenario 1 and 2. You initiated a process that created profits for yourself. In scenario 1 you did it on a very limited scale. In scenario 2 your scale was much larger. In scenario 2 you involved far more processes, and also probably created far more revenue. And in return the other individuals along the way got a market-bearing cut of the profits. You still 'alone created all that wealth', you just brought more people along on the journey.

You engaged with all those people in the system through the rules built by society. You accepted all the property laws, employment laws, contract laws written by government, who are representing society's wishes. That was the basis under which you employed each person to cut down trees, haul trees and so on. If that same process decides that people who earn more money pay more taxes, it makes exactly zero sense to suddenly decide that's the point at which government is entering the system to reallocate income.

You forgot to mention the government-paid roads his workers and goods travel on, the socialized police and fire department which help keep them safe, the building codes which help keep his neighbor's place from burning down due to substandard wiring and taking his business with it, etc.

**sourclams**

sebster wrote:When you look at actual measures of poverty, malnutrition, bankruptcy, food as a percentage of minimum income, there is no doubt the poverty exists in the US.

I'll speak most to what I know best, which is food prices. The average American pays 10% of income in food and fuel. The average European pays 20%, the average Haitian pays 85%-90%. From a historical and geographical standpoint, in %income to buy food, America has got the cheapest food in the world, ever.

By that measure, America is still the best place on earth. The issue with malnutrition is largely food availability, not cost of food or food production. In some, primarily urban areas, it is hard to find fresh food. The area I know best in that respect is Chicago. Walmart has long wanted to put in super center stores in the middle of Chicago, but is constantly blocked by union-backed city aldermen. I personally dislike shopping at Walmart and doing business with Walmart procurement teams, but they do have the cheapest stuff, including food. If there is demand for a product and city ordnance blocks the supplier to that demand, how does wealth redistribution fix it? Isn't the bigger issue that food subsidy programs can be used to purchase things like potato chips?

The existance of consumer goods among the poor doesn't discount that. Instead, it signifies that some things seen as luxury goods aren't any more, because they've become very cheap. But more than that, it points to, as you've noted, some really terrible spending priorities.Now, that issue of a lot of poor people having really terrible spending priorities does put a hard and fast limit on how much good the system can do, because paying an extra $50 in welfare gives the chance that a person will buy a smartphone instead of buying more nutritious food. But it doesn't mean that the poor aren't in fact very poor.

I dont think luxury goods have become that cheap. My income is greater than most American families, yet I still don't own a smart phone because I consider a $300 phone with $100/month subscriptions 'too high'. If you are a poor individual, and you are poor based on having misprioritized your spending, and government subsidy programs allow you to continue to survive at a relatively comfortable level in spite of misprioritized spending, how does increasing that subsidy improve general welfare? It certainly improves the comfort for the individual, but are smart phones now a right?

There is a difference between 'not easy' and 'impossible for all but a tiny range of exceptionally talented people'.

I would like to know at what point in history only the exceptionally talented could get ahead in this country. My dad was the son of a prison guard who became a teacher. I'm the son of a teacher who became an economist. My daughter could, potentially, become whatever she wants based on my current and projected earning power.

The issue that does currently exist is that there is a huge overabundance of liberal arts "soft studies" majors, most of which took loans to get their education. Job Openings, which is a reported number just like Unemployment, is back up at 2008 levels having rebounded substantially since 2009-2010. But the openings are in rigorous, technically demanding fields.

If you made a contract (your word is your bond) between yourself and a banker that if they would give you money to get a Gender Studies major, now that you've graduated and nobody is hiring Gender Studies majors, do you really feel that it's okay to break your word because 'hey, suuucks!'?

How does that reconcile with the fact that social mobility in the US is much worse than in other developed countries? Simply put, it's much more common in the US for a poor person to remain poor, for their children to remain poor and so on, than it is in any other developed country in the world?

Frankly I don't believe it, because that's one of those topics that the conclusion varies depending on which study you read. Which developed countries are more socially mobile than the US? EU-27? PIIGS? The countries that have hugely subsidized social welfare at the cost of impossible balance sheets that are now facing crushing... absolutely crushingly brutal long term fiscal austerity cuts that will chop public sector jobs, dole, and social support programs?

Where would you suggest today a poor person go to live if they could pick? I would choose the US or Canada, the economies of which are oh-so-closely entwined.