Wall Street Protests

[Scheavo]

No, financial responsibility means that before you get into a particular situation you're fully aware of what it will cost and when it will need to be paid (student loans, credit cards) you have a means to pay them off. Can't find a job? That's utter bullshit because while I didn't get the engineering job I spent 5 years earning a degree for I spent 8 months moving tables and chairs in a banquet hall with bosses who looked down on me earning and saving enough to pay back my minimums on all my loans. Those types of jobs are available, it's just that most people are holding out for that dream job they went to school for and shun everything else before they get into trouble and realize that maybe they should've been doing something to get money before going completely broke.

Shit jobs are available, but shit jobs don't feed, cloth and house a family very well. On top of that, there are not an unlimited amount of banquet jobs.

Not all situations you get into are chosen, and responsibility gets you only so far. Like I said, catch a virus, get a hospital bill, find yourself fucked, health insurance or not. What are you supposed to do there that is responsible?

Students of history! Is this what happened in Germany in the 20s/30s? I've done German history at high school level, but I don't remember exactly what the pre-conditions were for Hitler's rise. I'm not saying anything that extreme will happen in 21st century USA, but this kind of social environment could be quite easily classified as a pre-condition for historical change.

Wait, what? So every time there's unrest, we have to think it's going to turn into Nazi Germany? What about the American Revolution of 1776? Seems like that went rather well. Seeing as how most liberals aren't proposing anything draconian, or violent, and thus the frustration with Wall street is not something radical (in many ways, it's conservative, and a return to how things were), I don't see how this is at all a current possibility.

Occupy Wall Street = left wing, and most communism, but most likely some form of socialism. Fascism, Hitler = right wing. It's a little harder, given the liberal mentality, for them to be swept up by a Hitler like figure.

[Sigz]

Because, you know, everyone who get's "decent" grades in high school gets 90% of their tuition paid for. Christ, I was in the top 10 of my high school class and if I even had 45% of my tuition paid for my life would be significantly better. What fucking bullshit.

[Perpetual Change]

Another problem is kids who just graduating from college feel like it's so wrong that they can't afford to live away from home.

There's absolutely nothing wrong with just working whatever job you can find while living at home and looking for a better job after you graduate. But kids are just so unwilling to do that these days it seems. And everyone has the same "dude you don't know my parents" excuse.

[Riceball]

I'm certainly not saying anything as extreme as facism will appear out of this, but the emergence of pretty clear class lines, real or perceived, is a pretty significant pre-condition for change.

[orcus116]

@PC, While there are shit home lives I do agree. I'm staying at home now paying half rent (contributing towards utilities and their mortgage) until I can save up enough to get a decent place.

[orcus116]

Not all situations you get into are chosen, and responsibility gets you only so far. Like I said, catch a virus, get a hospital bill, find yourself fucked, health insurance or not. What are you supposed to do there that is responsible?

You keep harping on this but this is an entirely separate argument.

[Super Dude]

Another problem is kids who just graduating from college feel like it's so wrong that they can't afford to live away from home.

There's absolutely nothing wrong with just working whatever job you can find while living at home and looking for a better job after you graduate. But kids are just so unwilling to do that these days it seems. And everyone has the same "dude you don't know my parents" excuse.

You kidding? In my case, it's my parents who can't wait to get rid of me!

[emindead]

This is from 1912.

[Perpetual Change]

So apparently, there's growing concern that the whole "occupy" movement is being hijacked by other groups, like the Ron Paul crowd. That's pretty similar to what happened with the tea-party, only then it was the Republicans hijacking the Ron Paul people.

I gotta say, though, I find it bizarre how hard people are pushing the "End the Fed" thing on the internet. The unemployed out there on the ground don't want to hear about a far-off, highly abstract and unlikely solutions that, if (keyword: if) the ideology is correct, will make the job market better. They want a candidate who is going to be resolute about creating jobs and making sure people who don't have them don't have their safety net taken away. 

[antigoon]

I think, so far, the protesters have done a good job resisting co-opting by establishment groups. Honestly, I don't see any danger in it being hijacked by Ron Paul types. It's too much of a fringe thing. I'm more concerned about the Democrats, who are already trying to align themselves with OWS.

[orcus116]

No they have not. My friend's dad spends a lot of time down there selling buttons and has confirmed that the place is swarming with Truthers and vegans holding up pictures of skinned animals and shit. My friend did have a point that they need inclusion now to get numbers and then in order to become a more solidified force weed out most if not all of everyone who is just trying to leech off their popularity.

[Super Dude]

What's wrong with Democrats trying to become buddy-buddy with OWS?

[antigoon]

What's wrong with Democrats trying to become buddy-buddy with OWS?

It's not a partisan movement. Both parties share blame.

edit: Also, it's a completely phony move.

[Super Dude]

...Or maybe the Democrats could be the vehicle through which those demands are met. Not to say Democrats are faultless, but with OWS support they could go far in the next election cycle.

[orcus116]

With what power?

[Super Dude]

Symbiosis, dude.

[Scheavo]

Not all situations you get into are chosen, and responsibility gets you only so far. Like I said, catch a virus, get a hospital bill, find yourself fucked, health insurance or not. What are you supposed to do there that is responsible?

You keep harping on this but this is an entirely separate argument.

No it's not. Health programs are under threat because we have to cut spending everywhere and on everything, instead of asking the top 1% to start contributing a little bit more, when they've been getting more out of us and paying us less, for a long time now. This unrest is about big business and it's corruption of the government, and health care is a very good example of big business, and it most certainly corrupts government legislation on health care.

I like how all the libertarians are basically implying that there can be full employment, which is fallacious. There are not jobs for everyone out there,

[orcus116]

Did you even look at that article I posted awhile back? Sponging more money from the 1% won't recoup nearly the cost most people assume it will. Like it or not, the middle class and the rest are the real cash cows. Asking for a few dollars more per paycheck from those people will help out a lot more than demanding more taxes on the super rich.

[Perpetual Change]

Did you even look at that article I posted awhile back? Sponging more money from the 1% won't recoup nearly the cost most people assume it will. Like it or not, the middle class and the rest are the real cash cows. Asking for a few dollars more per paycheck from those people will help out a lot more than demanding more taxes on the super rich.

Do the top 1 percent even pay taxes? I was under the impression that they didn't.

[Liberation]

I just read that similar movements are actually appearing in other countries. A few days ago I was barely aware this even exists, and now... I'm starting to think this can grow into something really big. Personally I think they have really good reasons and as long as it remains reasonable (i.e. not extreme or worse, in any way violent), I can say I definitely support their ideas.

Also, I wonder if something similar may appear here in Poland sometime in the future. While we were impacted far less by the crisis than the vast majority of other European countries (not to mention the US), most issues are similar: pretty large differences between the rich and the poor (although here the reasons are different), serious problems with employment among young people (including employers who have mastered abusing different types of job contracts to the extreme in order to pay less) and the government doing basically nothing about this.

And I have to admit, until reading the last few pages and some of the articles linked, I hadn't realised the situation in the US post-crisis is this bad. I knew the crisis had a significant impact, but didn't realise it's gone this far.

[Riceball]

Haha what timing:

OccupySydney ftw!

"Occupy Sydney is the dream of a few men and women who have come together at this time because they are sick and tired of the way they are being shafted and stabbed in the back at almost every level of Government."

lol way to be on message bros. They've got a video up on their blog that asserts the RBA is owned by the British Government, who is owned by the ancestors of some 16th century banker. This is getting ridiculous now...

Apparently there was an Occupy Perth (my capital city) too. We've got unemployment at 4%, eduation and training if you want it, a stable and representative government who announced billions of dollars in spending on community care and social services this financial year, streets are clean and trouble free, no congestion, no air pollution, take-your-fucking-pick of amenity. I guess haters gonna hate, eh.

[Super Dude]

Haha what timing:

OccupySydney ftw!

"Occupy Sydney is the dream of a few men and women who have come together at this time because they are sick and tired of the way they are being shafted and stabbed in the back at almost every level of Government."

lol way to be on message bros. They've got a video up on their blog that asserts the RBA is owned by the British Government, who is owned by the ancestors of some 16th century banker. This is getting ridiculous now...

Apparently there was an Occupy Perth (my capital city) too. We've got unemployment at 4%, eduation and training if you want it, a stable and representative government who announced billions of dollars in spending on community care and social services this financial year, streets are clean and trouble free, no congestion, no air pollution, take-your-fucking-pick of amenity. I guess haters gonna hate, eh.

Alright, see that I can understand people saying it's getting out of hand. Honestly what you described in terms of local political and economic situation sounds really good for the times we're living in. Not to say I know enough about Australia to judge, but that's quite different from the US's situation.

Unless there's a good deal of inequality in Australia too, but hey, I dunno.

[Riceball]

I think (this is going from memory) that our gini coefficient (as much as I think they are overly simplified) is among the lowest/highest in the world - whichever corresponds with low inequality.

The only real "inequity" in Australia is those who work in the mining industry who get paid probably double average wages. But I went up to where they work a couple of weeks ago for a day to check out the ports in Port Hedland - they deserve every cent they are paid for working 80 hour weeks in 50+ degree temperatures. Other than that, there's very little inequality.

I feel like going down there and raging lol. Maybe thats because I'm (still) trying to avoid writing my thesis...

[Scheavo]

Did you even look at that article I posted awhile back? Sponging more money from the 1% won't recoup nearly the cost most people assume it will. Like it or not, the middle class and the rest are the real cash cows. Asking for a few dollars more per paycheck from those people will help out a lot more than demanding more taxes on the super rich.

Taxing the top 1% 3.6% more is equivalent to taking 50% of everything the bottom 49% make. There are 400 people who are as wealthy as 150 million Americans combined. Wealth in our country is insanely concentrated.

I'm not asking to just tax the rich, nor do I think taxing the rich will, alone, make up the budget gap. That's a straw man argument, because I haven't seen anyone ever propose we just tax the rich.

We do need to expand the tax base, but we do that by improving the economy so that the base exists to tax. As it stands, a lot of people are too poor, too in debt, etc, to be able to handle a tax increase. What you propose would be harmful to the economy, the middle class would have less money, which means less demand in the market place, which means fewer jobs, and a vicious cycle. In the end, you'd have more poor people who can't pay taxes.

[orcus116]

Did you even look at that article I posted awhile back? Sponging more money from the 1% won't recoup nearly the cost most people assume it will. Like it or not, the middle class and the rest are the real cash cows. Asking for a few dollars more per paycheck from those people will help out a lot more than demanding more taxes on the super rich.

Do the top 1 percent even pay taxes? I was under the impression that they didn't.

Look, I know you're a smart guy but you have got to be fucking kidding me.

What you propose would be harmful to the economy, the middle class would have less money, which means less demand in the market place, which means fewer jobs, and a vicious cycle. In the end, you'd have more poor people who can't pay taxes.

A few extra dollars a paycheck would definitely cause all that chaos. Yep. Sure would.

[Perpetual Change]

I'm not kidding, orcus. I don't know.

Sorry that my intelligence doesn't live up to your expectations.

[ResultsMayVary]

I'm not kidding, orcus. I don't know.

Sorry that my intelligence doesn't live up to your expectations.

I find that hard believe you didn't know that, PC. I'm not trying to insult anyone here, but I thought that was pretty much common knowledge regarding taxes.

[Perpetual Change]

No. It's not.

Can't wait for someone to enlighten me.

[orcus116]

I'm not kidding, orcus. I don't know.

Sorry that my intelligence doesn't live up to your expectations.

Hey don't try to make me look like the bad guy. The 1% that people are ragging on do end up paying for a significant portion of the total income taxes in this country, at least relative to monetary value. Did you seriously believe that these guys were sitting there evading the law or something?

[Perpetual Change]

Seriously, I didn't know.

EDIT: I was under the impression that the affluent were paying a lot (white-collar upper class or middle upper class people) while the mega-rich Warren Buffet level people basically weren't required to pay that much for a number of reasons. I guess that's wrong.

[orcus116]

No, they supply a lot of money and while their rates aren't as high, someone that makes say, $1 million a year, that pays, I dunno, 25% income tax ends up paying about 5 times the amount as the total salary of a lot of entry level people just on that tax alone. Individually they're paying their share but it's probably more the actual corporation tax breaks that are getting people all in a fuss.

[bertoltus]

Why would taxing the middle class be more effective than simply taxing the rich? The math is quite simple:

I lost the original statistics, let's say, the top 10%, who control 60% of the wealth, pay 70% of the taxes.

Then there's the the bottom 90%, who pay the remaining 30%.

Now, if you increase the taxes for the top 10% by, say, 10%, you, as a country, get 7% more money. If you do the same to the bottom 90%, obviously, you only get 3%.

Enlighten me, where did I go wrong?

[Perpetual Change]

I just wish talks of actually cutting spending (by ending the wars and cutting the bloated defense budget) would come into play before we talked about raising taxes on ANYONE.

[MasterShakezula]

I agree with you, PC.

However, I cannot see that happening soon, unfortunately.  Those military contractors have to make money somehow.   

[Super Dude]

I just wish talks of actually cutting spending (by ending the wars and cutting the bloated defense budget) would come into play before we talked about raising taxes on ANYONE.

I think just the opposite, but hey.