The kids that can advance faster should be allowed to advance faster.

But, but....won't doing that hurt little Johnny/Suzie's self esteem if they see little Nyguen getting promoted ahead of them based on nothing more than sheer ability?!??

[rolls eyes]

It makes sense, but in the US for years now, we seem to be more interested in catering to the lowest common denominator, than trying to promote true talent.

I think for those on the lower end, we should make vocational education something easier for those kids with that type of proficiency to find their way into...

I'd rather choose "Make it easier for people to make their own widgets or form companies to make widgets."

IP laws, some zoning laws, licensing laws, tax laws, accounting laws, and the like all make both making your own stuff or forming companies difficult; limited availability of low-cost machine tools and education makes it difficult to do stuff yourself. These are the things I would reform, not minimum wage or windfall profits tax.

I was trying to avoid being specific about which "things" needed to "cost less" - because any specific list tends to have more problems than a blanket statement like "things"...

I suppose I could have been a bit more precise: when I said we don't need higher incomes but things to cost less, what I should have said was "things to cost less relative to income, regardless of level of income." That said, my original assertion still stands: raising minimum wage will not reduce costs of items relative to wage in the long run (in the immediate short term it does, granted; but prices for most goods change much faster than wages so catch up quickly.)

Incidentally, removal of barriers to market entry is exactly the method to "rein in" corporate profits: profits are a sign of an inefficient market. Huge profits can only exist when it is too hard for competitors to enter a market - no invisible hand necessary. (Note: "too hard" to enter a market doesn't always mean something like a regulatory barrier; if a company out-innovates others, that is also a type of barrier.)

Price floors have never worked in all of history; I don't know why people think a wage price floor is a good idea. At best, with minimum wage, the long term effect is "nothing".

We don't need people to have higher incomes; we need things to cost less.

Somewhere along the way, society went from improving standard of living by creating new efficiencies to improving standard of living by taking as much profit from others as possible. The former is a sustainable non-zero-sum game, where the latter is zero sum and results in massive wealth concentration.

Raising minimum wage won't reduce the cost of rent, won't reduce the price of a new car, won't reduce the price of a gallon of milk, won't reduce the cost of health care. The only thing that will reduce prices is removing barriers to entry for things that don't need barriers - not adding more barriers.

(I wish, for instance, one of the provisions of the ACA was a new medical school in every state for instance and/or reduced requirements for general medical practice - bumps and bruises kind of stuff. That would reduce costs, not simple spreading costs among more people.)

Give it another 10 years and the gap will be getting near the,"let's form an angry mob and kill the rich guy, we can feed the whole city off of what is in his house.

I don't know many rich people that have a food warehouse in their residence. People tend to forget that most of the wealth of rich people is "paper" wealth - it still has to be converted to real goods and services at some point in time.

In the extreme situation you proposed - how are you going to ensure that farmers are still going to be producing food, and food delivery people are still going to be delivering food, so that taking the stuff in a rich person's house can still "feed the whole city"?

If there is a situation as you describe - all that "paper" wealth of the rich vanishes immediately... so are they really wealthy? The wealth of the rich really does depend heavily on the willingness of the masses to participate...

Those 'other reasons' are pretty simple: Liberal and wealthy societies become complacent due to the ease of their lives, and that makes them neglect the principles and practices that made them powerful and wealthy to begin with.

The default human condition is poverty, misery and violence. Escaping that is rare, and it takes a special society to make wealth, power and security seem normal. Once wealth, power and security are seen as birthrights and not hard-won prizes, the parts of a society that make it special are neglected (because, hey, they're 'mean' and 'hard work'), and rot sets in.

It requires a quite a bit of time in the spring, while preparing the ground and planting, but not much during the rest of the year. But all this work does not have to be your labor. There is an exemption to the 13th Amendment, which outlawed slavery and indentured servitude: You can still coerce unpaid labor from other people, provided they are your direct descendents, and under the age of 18. You can even use extremely cruel and unusual methods to extract this labor, including turning off the TV, and even unplugging the router, until the tomatoes are picked, sliced, and in the mason jars.

LOL, thank you!!

That, I think, is the best post on Slashdot for the year, the rest of us all might as well pack it up till next year, this one wins hands down!!

:)

To each their own, and it's your money, but it seems steep to me. Then again, ordering something on amazon every 2-3 days already seems borderline compulsive behaviour to me too.

I find that more and more, I buy virtually everything on Amazon. I'm starting to even by food/dry goods.

I find the price is usually cheaper than local, no sales tax...and the 2x day shipping is nice.

I also think it is worth it for the free streaming AND the free ebook a month for my kindle. Not many have mentioned that aspect too yet.

I don't order 2-3 times a week (generally), but I probably come close to averaging over 1 purchase a week with them annually I"m thinking.

You should be free to fuck up, but also free to suffer the extreme consequences for it too.

You don't know that they're poor. There are a lot of middle-class projects, where people have good jobs and pay market-rate rents.

Trust me on this one, I am VERY familiar with the projects here in New Orleans.

These I'm speak of, have NO middle class occupants, they'd be scared stiff to live in these places.

That being said, thankfully, post Katrina, we're slowly tearing these down...making some into mixed income areas, but it takes time to flush these bastions of poverty cycle and crime generators out of our city after being here for so long.

I am also in the Bible belt, and the condoms are out there for anyone to pick up. I believe the biggest issue with contraception is people are embarrassed to buy it because they don't want people to know about their sex life. This leads to either theft, no sex, or pregnancy depending on the individual.

But that's not the same as the OP and other posters saying that contraception isnt' available unless ACA or the like is in place.

It's out there always has been, just a matter of people getting it. I think they mean to say, it only matters if someone else is PAYING for it.

Conflating availability with who is footing the bill.

Are you sure you paid into the unemployment fund? Most self employed do not, even though they think they do. If you did, then you should be eligible for unemployment.

I am 100% positive.

I have an "S" corp, I paid myself salary with the taxes and I paid the employer side of all those taxes too. I filled out the parts for unemployment, state and fed taxes.

I was told all the way through my appeals that sure I'd paid it, but the law said I couldn't get it in the state of LA.

People who are poor don't have the same choices you do.

They're not buying 60" televisions.

I guess you aren't driving by the same projects I am, seeing said 60" TVs through the open doors of the apartments, while they're sitting on the porch.

And as for the rest of it...hey, life is tough.