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On December 24 2020 01:34 Zambrah wrote:
Placing sole blame on the state of how Americas poor are able to deal with this pandemic on Trump ignores the conditions that have led to so many Americans being incapable of shouldering even minor monetary setbacks.
That is not what I'm saying and representing what I've said that way is a strawman. What I am saying is that Trump's actions with respect to the pandemic (irrespective of all the other factors that have made the pandemic so fucked for everyone) have probably been worth more than net-negative $2000 for your livelihood in the past 9 months, so it's a little odd that a one-time check of $2000 (which is really only net +$1400 from the alternative) is enough to wipe that away.
If someone takes $20 from you, then later gives you back $15, you don't thank him for the $15--you're still out $5 from where you would be if he didn't take $20 from you in the first place. Them being in a position to take $20 was still a net negative for you even if they later gave back $15, when compared to someone who wouldn't have taken $20 from you in the first place. A president who didn't downplay the pandemic, who didn't downplay the importance of testing and basic infection control measures, and who did a better job of coordinating a response to the pandemic at a national level rather than letting states do their own shit would probably, all told, have improved people's lives by more than $2000 relative to where we are now, and irrespective of your political leaning I think basically any status-quo Democrat or Republican that isn't Trump would have accomplished that.
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On December 24 2020 01:38 TheYango wrote:Show nested quote +On December 24 2020 01:34 Zambrah wrote:
Placing sole blame on the state of how Americas poor are able to deal with this pandemic on Trump ignores the conditions that have led to so many Americans being incapable of shouldering even minor monetary setbacks. That is not what I'm saying and representing what I've said that way is a strawman. What I am saying is that Trump's actions with respect to the pandemic (irrespective of all the other factors that have made the pandemic so fucked for everyone) have probably been worth more than net-negative $2000 for your livelihood in the past 9 months, so it's a little odd that a one-time check of $2000 (which is really only net +$1400 from the alternative) is enough to wipe that away. If someone takes $20 from you, then later gives you back $15, you don't thank him for the $15--you're still out $5 from where you would be if he didn't take $20 from you in the first place. Them being in a position to take $20 was still a net negative for you even if they later gave back $15, when compared to someone who wouldn't have taken $20 from you in the first place.
I agree that it’s more of a net negative overall, but it’s just as much a straw man to say I think it’s wiping the damage Trumps done away.
It’s very simple, he’s done a good thing, so I give him credit for good thing assuming the good thing comes to pass.
Acknowledging that he may have helped Americans for once is not saying he’s absolved of all of the fucked up shit he’s done, but I’m not going to pretend like helping get Americans an additional 1400 potential dollars isn’t worthy of some praise.
I think Americans should see these stimulus checks backdated too, one for every month we’ve gone without it, but at the moment this 2000 dollar one is up and looking possible to pass and at the moment this is an additional 1400 dollars Americans need, I’m not going to turn my nose up at that just because it’s not enough on it’s own. I thought the 600 was paltry too but I won’t pretend like I wasn’t glad we were seeing SOMETHING when it was totally possible they’d cut stimulus checks entirely in favor of more corporate welfare.
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Now you're moving the goalposts. "Worthy of some praise" is not the same as "moves above Biden on my shitlist", which is what people were raising eyebrows at. If Trump's pandemic response, with or without the extra $1400, is still net negative relative to a status-quo Democrat, then how does that $1400 move him above one on your shitlist?
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On December 24 2020 01:58 TheYango wrote:
Now you're moving the goalposts. "Worthy of some praise" is not the same as "moves above Biden on my shitlist", which is what people were raising eyebrows at. If Trump's pandemic response, with or without the extra $1400, is still net negative relative to a status-quo Democrat, then how does that $1400 move him above one on your shitlist?
Because Biden is really low on my list?
No goal posts were moved, I think Biden is a shitbag, he’s not even a moderate Democrat he’s worse than that, he’s a Conservative Democrat that shows a very outward contempt for progressivism, I rank him firmly among Republicans given what I understand of his political career.
It’s not that complicated, I look at Storm Thurmond eulogizing war supporting social security cut advocating Joe Biden and see a piece of shit, I look at white nationalist racist incompetent incest fantasizing Donald Trump and see a piece of shit. If one piece of shit does a good thing and the other piece of shit doesn’t then the first piece of shit moved up the rankings.
I haven’t said a thing about a status quo Democrat and how they’d have handled this because we didn’t have a status quo Democrat handle this pandemic and I’m not super interested in speculating how that would have gone. We still have a Republican Congress either way after all.
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On December 24 2020 02:07 Zambrah wrote:Show nested quote +On December 24 2020 01:58 TheYango wrote:
Now you're moving the goalposts. "Worthy of some praise" is not the same as "moves above Biden on my shitlist", which is what people were raising eyebrows at. If Trump's pandemic response, with or without the extra $1400, is still net negative relative to a status-quo Democrat, then how does that $1400 move him above one on your shitlist? Because Biden is really low on my list? No goal posts were moved, I think Biden is a shitbag, he’s not even a moderate Democrat he’s worse than that, he’s a Conservative Democrat that shows a very outward contempt for progressivism, I rank him firmly among Republicans given what I understand of his political career. It’s not that complicated, I look at Storm Thurmond eulogizing war supporting social security cut advocating Joe Biden and see a piece of shit, I look at white nationalist racist incompetent incest fantasizing Donald Trump and see a piece of shit. If one piece of shit does a good thing and the other piece of shit doesn’t then the first piece of shit moved up the rankings. I haven’t said a thing about a status quo Democrat and how they’d have handled this because we didn’t have a status quo Democrat handle this pandemic and I’m not super interested in speculating how that would have gone. We still have a Republican Congress either way after all.
I think the thing that you're missing here is that you're just participating in disingenuous equivocating similar to Danglars and GH.
Trying to say that Trump is better than Biden just because he is pushing for an extra $1,400 in a one-time relief check is hopefully mere hyperbole. Trump is an absolutely horrific human being that has does so many immoral things above and beyond basically any other American politician that, if you genuinely try to compare him to Biden, it makes us question your judgment.
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On December 24 2020 01:30 Salazarz wrote:Show nested quote +On December 23 2020 11:04 Danglars wrote:On December 23 2020 07:55 Liquid`Drone wrote:Danglars, a more precise question: Do you think the wealthy make too much compared to the poor in the US today? I know you said you didn't favor redistribution as a social good and that you don't want more taxes and that you don't want the government to be more involved in running the economy. But I feel like you kinda dodged the implied 'is inequality too high in the US today'- question.  I'm not overly interested in the inequality metric as a thing unto itself. The extreme, extreme poverty alongside wealth, think Brazilian estates next to slums (favelas), would be the time that I'd sign on to the metric. But the poor in the country do not necessarily do worse just because the top billionaires earned an extra 10% this year from next. Vice versa, a lot of poor countries have very little inequality, and misery is commonplace. I want to look at the state of the poor independent on how the rich are doing; how is access to health care, housing, food, jobs, education, and all that. If those metrics are gaining, but inequality also rises, I will celebrate for the improved quality of life for the poor. If the poor lose access to health care, cannot afford housing, have trouble finding food, are mostly unemployed, with terrible schools and colleges, but if inequality goes down across the board, I'm still saddened by the quality of life for the poor. It aint a zero-sum game and I think the debate on that basis distorts the real issues. I've seen you say this a lot so I'd like you to be a little bit more specific: what are the poor countries you have in mind where misery is commonplace, but there is very little inequality? Or alternatively, can you think of any statistically significant examples of places where inequality was increasing and at the same time quality of life was improving? Because using the US as the example, things get kind of funny. Inflation adjusted incomes for lower/middle-class Americans have been stagnant since late 60s-early 70s -- and that's also more or less the time when your income inequality started to grow exponentially. https://b-i.forbesimg.com/louiswoodhill/files/2013/03/Income-Inequality-Chart-032713.jpghttps://motherjones.com/wp-content/uploads/images/change-since-1979-600.gif
Democratic Republic of the Congo, North Korea, India, Bangladesh ...
![[image loading]](https://i.imgur.com/72nXSu6.png)
All with less inequality, but maybe I'm less reticent as you to praise them for such a good job defeating inequality in their countries. Care to lend an admission to the existence of poor countries with rampant miseries, but who have this great measure everybody loves--INEQUALITY--at comparative lows? People here have a habit of dragging me from topic to topic, forgetting their last allegations and acting like they no longer care for them, and I've lost a little patience to indulging the game just to see where they end up.
Incomes are a bad way of looking at things. It misses non-cash subsidies (food stamps, medicare, medicaid, EITC), household size disparities, and what the sum of all those buys. That's consumption. And the poor in America have moved from your 1960s-1970s norm of being unable to afford a TV, microwave, and air-conditioning, to all these things being commonplace among the poor. The US is a perfect example of the basic quality of life for the poor increasing while inequality increases as well.
Your bad focus, indeed many on the left's bad focus, is that if billionaires become way more adept at investing and growing their money at the top, the poor necessarily are worse off. And hell if nobody out there can even bear to type that the math of inequality rewards poor countries for the measure of their uniformity in being poor, and growing health and welfare among the poor made a bad thing if the rich have the ability to outpace their gains!
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United States41995 Posts
On December 24 2020 02:16 Danglars wrote:Show nested quote +On December 24 2020 01:30 Salazarz wrote:On December 23 2020 11:04 Danglars wrote:On December 23 2020 07:55 Liquid`Drone wrote:Danglars, a more precise question: Do you think the wealthy make too much compared to the poor in the US today? I know you said you didn't favor redistribution as a social good and that you don't want more taxes and that you don't want the government to be more involved in running the economy. But I feel like you kinda dodged the implied 'is inequality too high in the US today'- question. I'm not overly interested in the inequality metric as a thing unto itself. The extreme, extreme poverty alongside wealth, think Brazilian estates next to slums (favelas), would be the time that I'd sign on to the metric. But the poor in the country do not necessarily do worse just because the top billionaires earned an extra 10% this year from next. Vice versa, a lot of poor countries have very little inequality, and misery is commonplace. I want to look at the state of the poor independent on how the rich are doing; how is access to health care, housing, food, jobs, education, and all that. If those metrics are gaining, but inequality also rises, I will celebrate for the improved quality of life for the poor. If the poor lose access to health care, cannot afford housing, have trouble finding food, are mostly unemployed, with terrible schools and colleges, but if inequality goes down across the board, I'm still saddened by the quality of life for the poor. It aint a zero-sum game and I think the debate on that basis distorts the real issues. I've seen you say this a lot so I'd like you to be a little bit more specific: what are the poor countries you have in mind where misery is commonplace, but there is very little inequality? Or alternatively, can you think of any statistically significant examples of places where inequality was increasing and at the same time quality of life was improving? Because using the US as the example, things get kind of funny. Inflation adjusted incomes for lower/middle-class Americans have been stagnant since late 60s-early 70s -- and that's also more or less the time when your income inequality started to grow exponentially. https://b-i.forbesimg.com/louiswoodhill/files/2013/03/Income-Inequality-Chart-032713.jpghttps://motherjones.com/wp-content/uploads/images/change-since-1979-600.gif Democratic Republic of the Congo, North Korea, India, Bangladesh ... All with less inequality, but maybe I'm less reticent as you to praise them for such a good job defeating inequality in their countries. Care to lend an admission to the existence of poor countries with rampant miseries, but who have this great measure everybody loves--INEQUALITY--at comparative lows? People here have a habit of dragging me from topic to topic, forgetting their last allegations and acting like they no longer care for them, and I've lost a little patience to indulging the game just to see where they end up. Incomes are a bad way of looking at things. It misses non-cash subsidies (food stamps, medicare, medicaid, EITC), household size disparities, and what the sum of all those buys. That's consumption. And the poor in America have moved from your 1960s-1970s norm of being unable to afford a TV, microwave, and air-conditioning, to all these things being commonplace among the poor. The US is a perfect example of the basic quality of life for the poor increasing while inequality increases as well. Your bad focus, indeed many on the left's bad focus, is that if billionaires become way more adept at investing and growing their money at the top, the poor necessarily are worse off. And hell if nobody out there can even bear to type that the math of inequality rewards poor countries for the measure of their uniformity in being poor, and growing health and welfare among the poor made a bad thing if the rich have the ability to outpace their gains!
Serious question, are you presenting this in bad faith knowing what the issue with what you've done here is or are you sincerely trying to argue that income inequality is lower in places where the income inequality is proportionately greater? You're using absolute dollars to argue percentage differences and I'm genuinely not sure if you know why you shouldn't be doing that.
That chart shows US inequality at roughly 8:1 (48k top decile, 6k bottom decile) and Bangladesh inequality at roughly 15:1 (3k top decile, 200 bottom decile). The chart essentially shows an inverse relationship between inequality and my desire to live somewhere. Scandinavia pretty high up in my desire to live there rankings. UK over the US. US over India. India over Brazil. South Africa going for some kind of record which is what you'd expect from a post-colonial apartheid state.
North Korea isn't even on that chart.
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+ Show Spoiler +Add all of that on top of one old white piece of shit potentially doing something positive and the other old white piece of shit going on to say, "yeah thats not happening anymore, you get no stimulus 'cause government spending" (should that happen would lead to to Trump going from Rank 99 on my Shittiest List up to 98.
I cannot fathom how this was so controversial.
+ Show Spoiler +the other old white piece of shit going on to say, "yeah thats not happening anymore, you get no stimulus 'cause government spending"
If Trump offers more coronavirus stimulus than Biden does than that earns him points in my damn book, this bar to clear for Biden is PATHETIC. Its NOTHING. Pass more stimulus. Don't be a deficit hawk in the middle of a fucking pandemic. Thats all he has to do to keep his ranking as 98/100 on my shit list. Its a low bar, its so low, hes literally better than Trump in my books right now and until he manages to fuck up stimulus checks.
You may disagree, but I place a high value on these stimulus checks, if there are two people I hate and one of them does a good thing and the other actively stops it once he has the chance then I'm going to hold the one who stopped it in slightly more contempt.
That doesnt mean I think Trump is good, it doesn't speak to how Biden may or may not have handled the pandemic, its exclusively saying "I hate these two people, if this one does a slight good and this one ignores a precedent of doing a slight good to actively not do a slight good then I hate the one that actively chose not to do a slight good a sliver more."
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United States41995 Posts
On December 24 2020 02:29 Zambrah wrote:+ Show Spoiler +Add all of that on top of one old white piece of shit potentially doing something positive and the other old white piece of shit going on to say, "yeah thats not happening anymore, you get no stimulus 'cause government spending" (should that happen would lead to to Trump going from Rank 99 on my Shittiest List up to 98. I cannot fathom how this was so controversial. + Show Spoiler +the other old white piece of shit going on to say, "yeah thats not happening anymore, you get no stimulus 'cause government spending" If Trump offers more coronavirus stimulus than Biden does than that earns him points in my damn book, this bar to clear for Biden is PATHETIC. Its NOTHING. Pass more stimulus. Don't be a deficit hawk in the middle of a fucking pandemic. Thats all he has to do to keep his ranking as 98/100 on my shit list. Its a low bar, its so low, hes literally better than Trump in my books right now and until he manages to fuck up stimulus checks. You may disagree, but I place a high value on these stimulus checks, if there are two people I hate and one of them does a good thing and the other actively stops it once he has the chance then I'm going to hold the one who stopped it in slightly more contempt. That doesnt mean I think Trump is good, it doesn't speak to how Biden may or may not have handled the pandemic, its exclusively saying "I hate these two people, if this one does a slight good and this one ignores a precedent to do a slight good then I hate that one a sliver more."
It's because Trump is multiple orders of magnitude worse than Biden. You can hate both of them while still recognizing the difference between the two of them is far greater than $1,400. Let's say Biden killed your dog and Trump killed your son. If someone told you "yeah, but I think Biden is actually worse because Trump gave me $1,400" you'd disagree because the difference in the damage they caused was more than $1,400.
People don't understand how you can understand the awful things Trump has spent the last four years doing and still think that $1,400 is enough to tip the scales here.
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On December 23 2020 16:46 KwarK wrote:Show nested quote +On December 23 2020 16:21 Starlightsun wrote:
Can't believe Trump's pardoning of the Blackwater mercenaries convicted of civilian massacre. I hate how we all can only helplessly watch as he does horrible shit like this. Let's hope this is not in exchange for help from Eric Prince for god knows what purposes. It’s not even the first war criminal he’s pardoned so I’m not sure why you can’t believe it. He also pardoned the guy who was bragging in writing about how he stabbed bound prisoners to death. If there’s anything morally awful that can be done you can bet Trump will do it.
I had forgotten about that. :/ Still shocking to see guys who murdered 14 innocent people in broad daylight being pardoned. I guess since their victims were brown people though it doesn't count.
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On December 24 2020 02:29 Zambrah wrote:
If Trump offers more coronavirus stimulus than Biden does than that earns him points in my damn book, this bar to clear for Biden is PATHETIC. Its NOTHING. Pass more stimulus. Don't be a deficit hawk in the middle of a fucking pandemic. Thats all he has to do to keep his ranking as 98/100 on my shit list. Its a low bar, its so low, hes literally better than Trump in my books right now and until he manages to fuck up stimulus checks.
You may disagree, but I place a high value on these stimulus checks, if there are two people I hate and one of them does a good thing and the other actively stops it once he has the chance then I'm going to hold the one who stopped it in slightly more contempt.
That doesnt mean I think Trump is good, it doesn't speak to how Biden may or may not have handled the pandemic, its exclusively saying "I hate these two people, if this one does a slight good and this one ignores a precedent of doing a slight good to actively not do a slight good then I hate the one that actively chose not to do a slight good a sliver more."
And this is the part that I disagreed with in your original post. The stimulus is one small part of a broader response to the pandemic. The Trump administration has broadly failed to respond appropriately to the pandemic in a multitude of ways, and it is an unreasonable position to consider the stimulus so important that it outweighs literally every other area that the Biden administration can improve upon. The Biden administration can be a net improvement relative to the Trump administration if it improve in all of those other aspects even if they fail to pass the stimulus.
The idea that Biden could address every other failing of the Trump administration in its pandemic response, fail to pass the stimulus and still be worse than the Trump administration in your mind doesn't logically make any sense to me, because the combined value of all those other things is in excess of $1400.
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On December 24 2020 02:33 KwarK wrote:Show nested quote +On December 24 2020 02:29 Zambrah wrote:+ Show Spoiler +Add all of that on top of one old white piece of shit potentially doing something positive and the other old white piece of shit going on to say, "yeah thats not happening anymore, you get no stimulus 'cause government spending" (should that happen would lead to to Trump going from Rank 99 on my Shittiest List up to 98. I cannot fathom how this was so controversial. + Show Spoiler +the other old white piece of shit going on to say, "yeah thats not happening anymore, you get no stimulus 'cause government spending" If Trump offers more coronavirus stimulus than Biden does than that earns him points in my damn book, this bar to clear for Biden is PATHETIC. Its NOTHING. Pass more stimulus. Don't be a deficit hawk in the middle of a fucking pandemic. Thats all he has to do to keep his ranking as 98/100 on my shit list. Its a low bar, its so low, hes literally better than Trump in my books right now and until he manages to fuck up stimulus checks. You may disagree, but I place a high value on these stimulus checks, if there are two people I hate and one of them does a good thing and the other actively stops it once he has the chance then I'm going to hold the one who stopped it in slightly more contempt. That doesnt mean I think Trump is good, it doesn't speak to how Biden may or may not have handled the pandemic, its exclusively saying "I hate these two people, if this one does a slight good and this one ignores a precedent to do a slight good then I hate that one a sliver more." It's because Trump is multiple orders of magnitude worse than Biden. You can hate both of them while still recognizing the difference between the two of them is far greater than $1,400. Let's say Biden killed your dog and Trump killed your son. If someone told you "yeah, but I think Biden is actually worse because Trump gave me $1,400" you'd disagree because the difference in the damage they caused was more than $1,400. People don't understand how you can understand the awful things Trump has spent the last four years doing and still think that $1,400 is enough to tip the scales here.
Biden doesnt have a clean slate, its enough to tip the scales because aside from the open contempt Biden seems to hold for people like me (progressive, young) hes also got a long political career for me to hate things from
His relationship with extremely racist Strom Thurmond, the 1994 Crime Bill, Biden opposition to bussing, his advocacy for cuts to social security (and his general budget austerity mindedness) he actively opposes things like universal healthcare, I think his attitude towards the recent rioting was shitty, hes voted for constitutional amendments allowing states to overturn Roe v. Wade, he had a shit role in the war on drugs, hes voted for the resolution authorizing the invasion of Iraq, his nomination of Cecilia Munoz to his transition team
I'll be honest, the active and open contempt he shows for progressivism and the clips of his VP calling young people stupid and Bidens own remarks where he expresses that he has precisely no empathy for the hardship of millenials is something that makes me dislike him a lot, but theres plenty in Biden's career for me to sour on too.
Trump may have had a more harmful four years, but Bidens got an entire political lifetime of fuckery for me to dislike, and when it comes down to it, a deficit hawking Biden during this pandemic would have to be offset by a LOT of good that frankly I dont think Biden has any interest in doing.
Ill say again though, I hope to shit Im proven wrong, I hope hes great, I hope he delivers all sorts of stimulus checks, and healthcare improvements, and immigration reform, reuniting kids with their parents, reforming the criminal justice system, all of it. If he does good things he'll improve in my ranking, but until I start seeing some material good occurring he's going to be low on my internal shit list. Low enough that I'd start thinking of Trump more fondly for making sure my car doesn't get repossessed any time soon with an additional 1,400 (AND THE CAVEAT THAT BIDEN ACTIVELY DECLINES TO CONTINUE SENDING ANY STIMULUS CHECKS DUE TO DEFICIT HAWKERY)
On December 24 2020 02:59 TheYango wrote:Show nested quote +On December 24 2020 02:29 Zambrah wrote:
If Trump offers more coronavirus stimulus than Biden does than that earns him points in my damn book, this bar to clear for Biden is PATHETIC. Its NOTHING. Pass more stimulus. Don't be a deficit hawk in the middle of a fucking pandemic. Thats all he has to do to keep his ranking as 98/100 on my shit list. Its a low bar, its so low, hes literally better than Trump in my books right now and until he manages to fuck up stimulus checks.
You may disagree, but I place a high value on these stimulus checks, if there are two people I hate and one of them does a good thing and the other actively stops it once he has the chance then I'm going to hold the one who stopped it in slightly more contempt.
That doesnt mean I think Trump is good, it doesn't speak to how Biden may or may not have handled the pandemic, its exclusively saying "I hate these two people, if this one does a slight good and this one ignores a precedent of doing a slight good to actively not do a slight good then I hate the one that actively chose not to do a slight good a sliver more."
And this is the part that I disagreed with in your original post. The stimulus is one small part of a broader response to the pandemic. The Trump administration has broadly failed to respond appropriately to the pandemic in a multitude of ways, and it is an unreasonable position to consider the stimulus so important that it outweighs literally every other area that the Biden administration can improve upon. The Biden administration can be a net improvement relative to the Trump administration if it improve in all of those other aspects even if they fail to pass the stimulus. The idea that Biden could address every other failing of the Trump administration in its pandemic response, fail to pass the stimulus and still be worse than the Trump administration in your mind doesn't logically make any sense to me, because the combined value of all those other things is in excess of $1400.
I don't believe that Biden will address every failing of the Trump administration in it's pandemic response. If he does great! I'll give him all the credit I can for it, but I wouldn't be surprised to see one lockdown, no more stimulus, a bunch of budget austerity for us poor people and a bunch of "small business support" for the wealthy. Bidens a known compromiser and compromising with Republicans leads to bad thing., I truly believe that given the opportunity, Biden would rather actively compromise than force things through a Democrat House, Senate, and Presidency (should Democrats win both Senate seats in the runoff.)
I hold stimulus checks in such high esteem because its key money in the hands of America's poor, people who are at risk of eviction, who are drowning in backrent, credit card bills and other assorted debt accrued during the pandemic. I'm not saying I think managing lockdowns and keeping hospitals flush with PPE and available respirators, and helping small business survive isn't great, but we still need to solve all of the economic strife people are experiencing and at the moment the way thats happening is stimulus checks. It would require some sort of other aid that addresses these problems for me to forgive an active forgoing of stimulus checks, or some SERIOUSLY insane improvements, like almost no daily deaths, almost no spread, massive hiring incentive programs, some SERIOUS stuff to offset the lack of stimulus checks.
I think the problem is we're weighing what a stimulus check means differently, I'm actively borrowing money from my mom to keep paying on my car because I can't find work, and I even only worked up the desperation to do this once I was a few months behind on payments, any food I buy is a day off of expiration (and frequently winds up molding a day or so after purchase) because its cheaper, and even then I have to put it on a credit card. I'm at the point where I'm trying to find somewhere to sell blood plasma twice a week to help afford food. From my vantage point stimulus checks are enormous. Obviously this is a very me-centric point of view, but anyone in my position that is in a state of economic desperation needs these stimulus checks and I have precisely NO sympathy or respect for deficit hawkery at this moment in America. I'll freely admit its a little selfish.
EDIT: to summarize my rambling asininity,
I think we're coming at our views of Biden from very different levels of expectation/charity and we seem to have very different valuations of the important of stimulus checks, which is probably why I seem so far off from the people in this thread, given how easily understood Trump's overall fuckshittery is.
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On December 24 2020 00:00 Erasme wrote:Show nested quote +On December 23 2020 14:12 BerserkSword wrote:On December 23 2020 09:27 Mohdoo wrote:On December 23 2020 05:11 Danglars wrote:On December 23 2020 04:52 Mohdoo wrote:On December 23 2020 04:35 Danglars wrote:On December 23 2020 04:20 Mohdoo wrote:On December 23 2020 04:08 Danglars wrote:On December 23 2020 03:41 Mohdoo wrote:On December 22 2020 23:08 ugohome wrote:
it's not just republicans to blame for the broken corpo-fascist US government of the wealthy.
When one group does something "100" and another group does something "10", it doesn't make sense to pretend they are the same thing. Citizens United and various other examples point to the republican party empowering large corporations and moneyed interests in a clearly greater way. Democratic politicians are just as corrupt and the bill has about the same pork and special interest rules changes from them. You put far too much stock in Democratic relative purity. Remember for next time myself or others criticize the Democrats, and the thread tries to distance itself from those politicians. When push comes to shove, they stan for their political party. "Corrupt" needs defining here. My point is relating to empowering the wealthy and large corporations. You can't pretend Democrats and Republicans want large corporations and banks to be the same amount of powerful or have the same morals regarding limiting their power. Can you point me towards major republican politicians speaking against the ethics of billionaires? Publicly funded campaigns? Have you seen the billions that Silicon Valley has been plowing into Democratic campaigns? And how much they’re spending on lobbyists? The rhetoric is just a ruse; Democrats will carve the same exemptions and policy that they’re lobbying for, while making overtures to the public on closing loopholes and sticking it to big business.You better drop the 100-10 talk, because it basically consists of claiming Democrats farts don’t stink as bad. Spend some time looking at the stimulus/covid bill and ask yourself what share of the bill is really Republican pork and changes. As if the problem in Washington is really the words that come out of politicians mouths; cmon now. You need to understand that when you say things like this, people don't accept it. It isn't as simple as you saying something and suddenly it is true. You are making vague allusions to various things and not really saying anything. Let me ask you this, in a clear way: 1. Do you think Republican politicians generally support higher taxes for billionaires? How does this support compare to Democrats? 2. Do you think support for Citizens United is generally higher among Republican politicians than Democrats? Or lower? And just out of curiosity, 3. Do you think billionaires should pay higher taxes than they currently do? You’re pivoting again, because this isn’t about the vocal support or citizens United (as much about the first amendment as anything else; and Democrats would love to have more of a monopoly on media corporations, while preventing other corps getting their message out). Democrats are the kings at giving the great speeches wanting higher taxes for billionaires. They’re the same ones meeting with lobbyists to carve out the new exemptions and tax loopholes from the new taxes. You’re also relying on the crutch of tax cuts as a proxy for who’s beholden to big business. You think the tax burden on companies are not passed down eventually to the consumers? You think tax raises are the prime mechanism to prove you’re with the common man against billionaires? Ha! The tax code should be simplified and all the complex schemes of separate excise taxes and capital gains taxes and social security taxes and corporate income taxes and estate taxes and alternate minimum taxes should be rolled into a progressive tax rate on individuals. It’s through the machinations of the Democrats talking out of both sides of their mouths (and a certain amount of Republican politicians as well) that these things are necessary. When it becomes too complicated to file but for hordes of accountants; that isn’t a triumph over billionaires—that’s a way to give them the same tax burden with a nominal tax increase while profiting from their dollars. I basically reject your faulty premises Mohdoo. You’re smart enough to know that conservatives don’t view redistribution as a societal good or government as the proper means to run an economy or major economic sector. It might be easier to acknowledge that you’re basing arguments on fallacious roots (what someone on the right would call framing the questions in ways that only allow for one proper answer). I’d twist it back around, and ask you if you will always give Democrats credit for talking tough on taxing the rich, while giving them the SALT and offshoring and all the comforts they’re used to asking and receiving from Democrats in every bill. Hell, it was in Pelosi’s trillion dollar COVID bill itself! I give them no credit; I know how the game is played. They’re bought and paid for politicians just like many Republicans. And you should know by now, it’s not about what the left leaning members of this thread will accept. I’ve already seen billions in property damage across many urban areas, and very few accept more than “mostly peaceful protests” and “Antifa is an idea, not groups.” I’m after the truth, not what people in this ideological collection are prepared to accept at the moment. You can all kill industry and blame the right at each failure up to the moment of poverty, and until your dying breath, refusing to accept responsibility. So let me try to understand what you are saying: You are saying that Democrats don't actually want to make billionaires less powerful? And the evidence of this is that democrats supposedly create loop holes for specific billionaires? So while Democrats advocate for eliminating tax breaks for large corporations and billionaires, they have some sort of system of preferring specific billionaires? You haven't really substantiated that, but I am just trying to make sure I am at least following your thoughts. May I ask what sorts of things you see Republicans as doing to make billionaires less powerful? What is on the Republican agenda aimed at reducing the power of billionaires? The central banking we have now is the system. I can go further and say that government intervention, in general, in what should be a free market, also benefits the rich. This system isn't limited to Democrats, but the Democrats openly embrace it. For example the Fed's policy during the Obama administration was characterized by unprecedented "easy money policy" such as QE. Taxing the rich to address income inequality is addressing the result rather than the cause of the problem. It takes a certain kind of people to look at the current US and say "we need less government intervention for the good of the people". The "market" has become such a weird entity that should somehow self regulate itself by magic. No, the "market" will not fix every problems if we let it run free. What a weird take.
Why? Because it doesn't confirm your priors? The housing market, immigration and occupational licencing are all examples of where deregulation would be beneficial. That doesn't require the market to self regulate by magic (nice straw man). It only requires the market to more efficiently allocate capital than the current situation
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Can't wait to see the housing market in the US without government interference in the next year. You think that mass evictions will make it go up or down ?
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On December 24 2020 03:24 RvB wrote:Show nested quote +On December 24 2020 00:00 Erasme wrote:On December 23 2020 14:12 BerserkSword wrote:On December 23 2020 09:27 Mohdoo wrote:On December 23 2020 05:11 Danglars wrote:On December 23 2020 04:52 Mohdoo wrote:On December 23 2020 04:35 Danglars wrote:On December 23 2020 04:20 Mohdoo wrote:On December 23 2020 04:08 Danglars wrote:On December 23 2020 03:41 Mohdoo wrote:
[quote]
When one group does something "100" and another group does something "10", it doesn't make sense to pretend they are the same thing. Citizens United and various other examples point to the republican party empowering large corporations and moneyed interests in a clearly greater way. Democratic politicians are just as corrupt and the bill has about the same pork and special interest rules changes from them. You put far too much stock in Democratic relative purity. Remember for next time myself or others criticize the Democrats, and the thread tries to distance itself from those politicians. When push comes to shove, they stan for their political party. "Corrupt" needs defining here. My point is relating to empowering the wealthy and large corporations. You can't pretend Democrats and Republicans want large corporations and banks to be the same amount of powerful or have the same morals regarding limiting their power. Can you point me towards major republican politicians speaking against the ethics of billionaires? Publicly funded campaigns? Have you seen the billions that Silicon Valley has been plowing into Democratic campaigns? And how much they’re spending on lobbyists? The rhetoric is just a ruse; Democrats will carve the same exemptions and policy that they’re lobbying for, while making overtures to the public on closing loopholes and sticking it to big business.You better drop the 100-10 talk, because it basically consists of claiming Democrats farts don’t stink as bad. Spend some time looking at the stimulus/covid bill and ask yourself what share of the bill is really Republican pork and changes. As if the problem in Washington is really the words that come out of politicians mouths; cmon now. You need to understand that when you say things like this, people don't accept it. It isn't as simple as you saying something and suddenly it is true. You are making vague allusions to various things and not really saying anything. Let me ask you this, in a clear way: 1. Do you think Republican politicians generally support higher taxes for billionaires? How does this support compare to Democrats? 2. Do you think support for Citizens United is generally higher among Republican politicians than Democrats? Or lower? And just out of curiosity, 3. Do you think billionaires should pay higher taxes than they currently do? You’re pivoting again, because this isn’t about the vocal support or citizens United (as much about the first amendment as anything else; and Democrats would love to have more of a monopoly on media corporations, while preventing other corps getting their message out). Democrats are the kings at giving the great speeches wanting higher taxes for billionaires. They’re the same ones meeting with lobbyists to carve out the new exemptions and tax loopholes from the new taxes. You’re also relying on the crutch of tax cuts as a proxy for who’s beholden to big business. You think the tax burden on companies are not passed down eventually to the consumers? You think tax raises are the prime mechanism to prove you’re with the common man against billionaires? Ha! The tax code should be simplified and all the complex schemes of separate excise taxes and capital gains taxes and social security taxes and corporate income taxes and estate taxes and alternate minimum taxes should be rolled into a progressive tax rate on individuals. It’s through the machinations of the Democrats talking out of both sides of their mouths (and a certain amount of Republican politicians as well) that these things are necessary. When it becomes too complicated to file but for hordes of accountants; that isn’t a triumph over billionaires—that’s a way to give them the same tax burden with a nominal tax increase while profiting from their dollars. I basically reject your faulty premises Mohdoo. You’re smart enough to know that conservatives don’t view redistribution as a societal good or government as the proper means to run an economy or major economic sector. It might be easier to acknowledge that you’re basing arguments on fallacious roots (what someone on the right would call framing the questions in ways that only allow for one proper answer). I’d twist it back around, and ask you if you will always give Democrats credit for talking tough on taxing the rich, while giving them the SALT and offshoring and all the comforts they’re used to asking and receiving from Democrats in every bill. Hell, it was in Pelosi’s trillion dollar COVID bill itself! I give them no credit; I know how the game is played. They’re bought and paid for politicians just like many Republicans. And you should know by now, it’s not about what the left leaning members of this thread will accept. I’ve already seen billions in property damage across many urban areas, and very few accept more than “mostly peaceful protests” and “Antifa is an idea, not groups.” I’m after the truth, not what people in this ideological collection are prepared to accept at the moment. You can all kill industry and blame the right at each failure up to the moment of poverty, and until your dying breath, refusing to accept responsibility. So let me try to understand what you are saying: You are saying that Democrats don't actually want to make billionaires less powerful? And the evidence of this is that democrats supposedly create loop holes for specific billionaires? So while Democrats advocate for eliminating tax breaks for large corporations and billionaires, they have some sort of system of preferring specific billionaires? You haven't really substantiated that, but I am just trying to make sure I am at least following your thoughts. May I ask what sorts of things you see Republicans as doing to make billionaires less powerful? What is on the Republican agenda aimed at reducing the power of billionaires? The central banking we have now is the system. I can go further and say that government intervention, in general, in what should be a free market, also benefits the rich. This system isn't limited to Democrats, but the Democrats openly embrace it. For example the Fed's policy during the Obama administration was characterized by unprecedented "easy money policy" such as QE. Taxing the rich to address income inequality is addressing the result rather than the cause of the problem. It takes a certain kind of people to look at the current US and say "we need less government intervention for the good of the people". The "market" has become such a weird entity that should somehow self regulate itself by magic. No, the "market" will not fix every problems if we let it run free. What a weird take. Why? Because it doesn't confirm your priors? The housing market, immigration and occupational licencing are all examples of where deregulation would be beneficial. That doesn't require the market to self regulate by magic (nice straw man). It only requires the market to more efficiently allocate capital than the current situation
Please explain how professional licensing would do better with less regulation.
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On December 24 2020 03:35 JimmiC wrote:
@zambrah
The strangest thing I find about picking Trump over Biden over 1400 bucks, is was it Biden that was keeping it at 600$
From what I understand Biden had nothing to do with either and it is the Rep Senate trying to keep it low. I get liking trump over Mcconnel because of this but very strange to have this effect your ranking on Biden.
You’re missing the part where Biden willingly denies further stimulus, elsewise as I’ve said he’s still above Trump in the dumpster of the sad pit that is my esteem for politicians. 
I have heard Biden did actually have some say in the negotiations though,
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/21/us/politics/biden-stimulus.html?auth=login-email&login=email
With Republican and Democratic leaders in the House and Senate far apart on how much they were willing to accept in new pandemic spending, Mr. Biden on Dec. 2 threw his support behind the $900 billion plan being pushed by the centrist group. The total was less than half of the $2 trillion that Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senator Chuck Schumer, Democrat of New York, had been insisting on.
The article actually notes Biden gave Democrats confidence to pull back on their demands, lol
This doesn’t even specifically bother me that much since it’s at least setting a precedent of sending more checks.
Christ formatting stuff on mobile is a pain in the arse, especially copy pasting
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On December 24 2020 02:16 Danglars wrote:Show nested quote +On December 24 2020 01:30 Salazarz wrote:On December 23 2020 11:04 Danglars wrote:On December 23 2020 07:55 Liquid`Drone wrote:Danglars, a more precise question: Do you think the wealthy make too much compared to the poor in the US today? I know you said you didn't favor redistribution as a social good and that you don't want more taxes and that you don't want the government to be more involved in running the economy. But I feel like you kinda dodged the implied 'is inequality too high in the US today'- question. I'm not overly interested in the inequality metric as a thing unto itself. The extreme, extreme poverty alongside wealth, think Brazilian estates next to slums (favelas), would be the time that I'd sign on to the metric. But the poor in the country do not necessarily do worse just because the top billionaires earned an extra 10% this year from next. Vice versa, a lot of poor countries have very little inequality, and misery is commonplace. I want to look at the state of the poor independent on how the rich are doing; how is access to health care, housing, food, jobs, education, and all that. If those metrics are gaining, but inequality also rises, I will celebrate for the improved quality of life for the poor. If the poor lose access to health care, cannot afford housing, have trouble finding food, are mostly unemployed, with terrible schools and colleges, but if inequality goes down across the board, I'm still saddened by the quality of life for the poor. It aint a zero-sum game and I think the debate on that basis distorts the real issues. I've seen you say this a lot so I'd like you to be a little bit more specific: what are the poor countries you have in mind where misery is commonplace, but there is very little inequality? Or alternatively, can you think of any statistically significant examples of places where inequality was increasing and at the same time quality of life was improving? Because using the US as the example, things get kind of funny. Inflation adjusted incomes for lower/middle-class Americans have been stagnant since late 60s-early 70s -- and that's also more or less the time when your income inequality started to grow exponentially. https://b-i.forbesimg.com/louiswoodhill/files/2013/03/Income-Inequality-Chart-032713.jpghttps://motherjones.com/wp-content/uploads/images/change-since-1979-600.gif Democratic Republic of the Congo, North Korea, India, Bangladesh ... All with less inequality, but maybe I'm less reticent as you to praise them for such a good job defeating inequality in their countries. Care to lend an admission to the existence of poor countries with rampant miseries, but who have this great measure everybody loves--INEQUALITY--at comparative lows? People here have a habit of dragging me from topic to topic, forgetting their last allegations and acting like they no longer care for them, and I've lost a little patience to indulging the game just to see where they end up. Incomes are a bad way of looking at things. It misses non-cash subsidies (food stamps, medicare, medicaid, EITC), household size disparities, and what the sum of all those buys. That's consumption. And the poor in America have moved from your 1960s-1970s norm of being unable to afford a TV, microwave, and air-conditioning, to all these things being commonplace among the poor. The US is a perfect example of the basic quality of life for the poor increasing while inequality increases as well. Your bad focus, indeed many on the left's bad focus, is that if billionaires become way more adept at investing and growing their money at the top, the poor necessarily are worse off. And hell if nobody out there can even bear to type that the math of inequality rewards poor countries for the measure of their uniformity in being poor, and growing health and welfare among the poor made a bad thing if the rich have the ability to outpace their gains!
Not that Kwark's post needs much adding to on this topic, but do you seriously believe that North Korea is a good example of a country with low income inequality? Like, really? Or India, you know, that place where caste system is an actual thing, that's your example of a country with low inequality?
TVs, microwaves, and air conditioning aren't good indicators of prosperity, either. Price to earning ratio for housing in the US increased somewhere between 400% and 600% since the 70s; median household debt increased around 300% -- despite interest rates being the lowest they've ever been in the last 20 years or so.
The idea that billionaires becoming more adept at growing their money at the top doesn't affect the poor is ridiculous, by the way. There is a finite number of goods and services being produced in the world, and if a small group of people at the top increases their wealth disproportionately to the rest of the populace, this is directly reducing the purchasing power of those at the bottom. That's literally how fiat currencies work. You could try to argue that those at the top with disproportionately growing wealth also contribute to producing more stuff but... supply side economics are retarded, so I hope you're not going to go in there.
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On December 24 2020 04:08 Salazarz wrote:Show nested quote +On December 24 2020 02:16 Danglars wrote:On December 24 2020 01:30 Salazarz wrote:On December 23 2020 11:04 Danglars wrote:On December 23 2020 07:55 Liquid`Drone wrote:Danglars, a more precise question: Do you think the wealthy make too much compared to the poor in the US today? I know you said you didn't favor redistribution as a social good and that you don't want more taxes and that you don't want the government to be more involved in running the economy. But I feel like you kinda dodged the implied 'is inequality too high in the US today'- question. I'm not overly interested in the inequality metric as a thing unto itself. The extreme, extreme poverty alongside wealth, think Brazilian estates next to slums (favelas), would be the time that I'd sign on to the metric. But the poor in the country do not necessarily do worse just because the top billionaires earned an extra 10% this year from next. Vice versa, a lot of poor countries have very little inequality, and misery is commonplace. I want to look at the state of the poor independent on how the rich are doing; how is access to health care, housing, food, jobs, education, and all that. If those metrics are gaining, but inequality also rises, I will celebrate for the improved quality of life for the poor. If the poor lose access to health care, cannot afford housing, have trouble finding food, are mostly unemployed, with terrible schools and colleges, but if inequality goes down across the board, I'm still saddened by the quality of life for the poor. It aint a zero-sum game and I think the debate on that basis distorts the real issues. I've seen you say this a lot so I'd like you to be a little bit more specific: what are the poor countries you have in mind where misery is commonplace, but there is very little inequality? Or alternatively, can you think of any statistically significant examples of places where inequality was increasing and at the same time quality of life was improving? Because using the US as the example, things get kind of funny. Inflation adjusted incomes for lower/middle-class Americans have been stagnant since late 60s-early 70s -- and that's also more or less the time when your income inequality started to grow exponentially. https://b-i.forbesimg.com/louiswoodhill/files/2013/03/Income-Inequality-Chart-032713.jpghttps://motherjones.com/wp-content/uploads/images/change-since-1979-600.gif Democratic Republic of the Congo, North Korea, India, Bangladesh ... All with less inequality, but maybe I'm less reticent as you to praise them for such a good job defeating inequality in their countries. Care to lend an admission to the existence of poor countries with rampant miseries, but who have this great measure everybody loves--INEQUALITY--at comparative lows? People here have a habit of dragging me from topic to topic, forgetting their last allegations and acting like they no longer care for them, and I've lost a little patience to indulging the game just to see where they end up. Incomes are a bad way of looking at things. It misses non-cash subsidies (food stamps, medicare, medicaid, EITC), household size disparities, and what the sum of all those buys. That's consumption. And the poor in America have moved from your 1960s-1970s norm of being unable to afford a TV, microwave, and air-conditioning, to all these things being commonplace among the poor. The US is a perfect example of the basic quality of life for the poor increasing while inequality increases as well. Your bad focus, indeed many on the left's bad focus, is that if billionaires become way more adept at investing and growing their money at the top, the poor necessarily are worse off. And hell if nobody out there can even bear to type that the math of inequality rewards poor countries for the measure of their uniformity in being poor, and growing health and welfare among the poor made a bad thing if the rich have the ability to outpace their gains! Not that Kwark's post needs much adding to on this topic, but do you seriously believe that North Korea is a good example of a country with low income inequality? Like, really? Or India, you know, that place where caste system is an actual thing, that's your example of a country with low inequality? TVs, microwaves, and air conditioning aren't good indicators of prosperity, either. Price to earning ratio for housing in the US increased somewhere between 400% and 600% since the 70s; median household debt increased around 300% -- despite interest rates being the lowest they've ever been in the last 20 years or so. The idea that billionaires becoming more adept at growing their money at the top doesn't affect the poor is ridiculous, by the way. There is a finite number of goods and services being produced in the world, and if a small group of people at the top increases their wealth disproportionately to the rest of the populace, this is directly reducing the purchasing power of those at the bottom. That's literally how fiat currencies work. You could try to argue that those at the top with disproportionately growing wealth also contribute to producing more stuff but... supply side economics are retarded, so I hope you're not going to go in there.
Apologies to the deficiencies of the linked graph, though all citing nations with lower inequality than the US, but not doing as good of a job showing it. I'm pressed for time this holiday season and posted the first I stumbled across.
Pardon me, but did you even read my post. North Korea? Did I cite North Korea? Do you expect me to take you seriously when you bring up countries I didn't cite as evidence against points I didn't make? Go on arguing with your fabricated image of what I wrote and I wish you success.
India is a good example of the failure of the metric. Remember, I'm the one saying it's a poor measure for anyone that wants to discuss the plight of the poor--their material well-being. It won't capture their actual problems and success or failure, because it cannot. So, with thanks for proving my point, India is a good example of the failure of that measure, since you're immediately trying to discount the example and point to other measures that need to be taken instead. I can't predict which examples of poor countries with "better" income inequality than the US that you're just going to 1) discount as a real example 2) cite the other metrics you would rather want to discuss regarding them. Like I said before, and you haven't addressed, the rich getting richer in a country faster than the poor getting richer does not mean the poor aren't improving the quality of their life or are materially worse off. Like I said before, and you haven't addressed, a country with widespread, well-distributed poverty will always trend lower on income inequality measures. I'd rather not celebrate the material worsening of the conditions of the poor, provided the rich became even worse off as compensation.
You understand that luxury goods will always exist for the rich, and the ability of the poor to afford material comforts and food has greatly increased in the last six decades you've cited. I can't justify discarding actual elements of improvement in the lives of the poor, and pointing to price-to-earning-ratio. Again, it fails to capture non-wage government benefits, EITC, non-wage work benefits, and does not give the same disparities when those things are included.
Enough of the fallacy of the fixed pie fallacy. The rich have gotten way better at growing their wealth through investment in recent years. It isn't through robbing the poor. They aren't operating in 12th century England acting like reverse robin-hoods. Their additional great investment, purchase, or loan does not cost an inner city Black family their paycheck or welfare benefits. Far from it, luxury yachts aren't built by billionaires, nor their houses, nor their staffs, accountants, vacations, or the rest.
I'm quite willing to leave you with "This man believes that the economic pie is fixed, and thus any additional money earned at the top must derive from making somebody else less well off" (the more slices the rich get, the less are available for the poor). The fallacious premises directly follow to the fallacious conclusion. It is not my job to rewrite some treatise you've already discarded to argue you out of such a deficient way of viewing the world. One does follow another within the same philosophical presuppositions, and we've arrived at the most basic one (the goods and services produced in the world is a fixed, finite quantity, and all that matters is the distribution graph of this number, and your relative percentage of the whole). You may already guess that I consider the pie to be growing, that both the poor and rich are becoming more well off, and this should be cheered even if incomes change 202% for the rich and 49% for the poor. The real question for the public and their representatives are what are the objective, material needs for the poorest percent of the population for their housing, food, and education. This is not held as some ratio to how much more luxury goods a billionaire may afford, since his increase was not made directly or indirectly from making them poorer. This is a fundamental difference in basic economics not likely to be overcome in a politics thread.
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United States41995 Posts
On December 24 2020 05:03 Danglars wrote:Show nested quote +On December 24 2020 04:08 Salazarz wrote:On December 24 2020 02:16 Danglars wrote:On December 24 2020 01:30 Salazarz wrote:On December 23 2020 11:04 Danglars wrote:On December 23 2020 07:55 Liquid`Drone wrote:Danglars, a more precise question: Do you think the wealthy make too much compared to the poor in the US today? I know you said you didn't favor redistribution as a social good and that you don't want more taxes and that you don't want the government to be more involved in running the economy. But I feel like you kinda dodged the implied 'is inequality too high in the US today'- question. I'm not overly interested in the inequality metric as a thing unto itself. The extreme, extreme poverty alongside wealth, think Brazilian estates next to slums (favelas), would be the time that I'd sign on to the metric. But the poor in the country do not necessarily do worse just because the top billionaires earned an extra 10% this year from next. Vice versa, a lot of poor countries have very little inequality, and misery is commonplace. I want to look at the state of the poor independent on how the rich are doing; how is access to health care, housing, food, jobs, education, and all that. If those metrics are gaining, but inequality also rises, I will celebrate for the improved quality of life for the poor. If the poor lose access to health care, cannot afford housing, have trouble finding food, are mostly unemployed, with terrible schools and colleges, but if inequality goes down across the board, I'm still saddened by the quality of life for the poor. It aint a zero-sum game and I think the debate on that basis distorts the real issues. I've seen you say this a lot so I'd like you to be a little bit more specific: what are the poor countries you have in mind where misery is commonplace, but there is very little inequality? Or alternatively, can you think of any statistically significant examples of places where inequality was increasing and at the same time quality of life was improving? Because using the US as the example, things get kind of funny. Inflation adjusted incomes for lower/middle-class Americans have been stagnant since late 60s-early 70s -- and that's also more or less the time when your income inequality started to grow exponentially. https://b-i.forbesimg.com/louiswoodhill/files/2013/03/Income-Inequality-Chart-032713.jpghttps://motherjones.com/wp-content/uploads/images/change-since-1979-600.gif Democratic Republic of the Congo, North Korea, India, Bangladesh ... All with less inequality, but maybe I'm less reticent as you to praise them for such a good job defeating inequality in their countries. Care to lend an admission to the existence of poor countries with rampant miseries, but who have this great measure everybody loves--INEQUALITY--at comparative lows? People here have a habit of dragging me from topic to topic, forgetting their last allegations and acting like they no longer care for them, and I've lost a little patience to indulging the game just to see where they end up. Incomes are a bad way of looking at things. It misses non-cash subsidies (food stamps, medicare, medicaid, EITC), household size disparities, and what the sum of all those buys. That's consumption. And the poor in America have moved from your 1960s-1970s norm of being unable to afford a TV, microwave, and air-conditioning, to all these things being commonplace among the poor. The US is a perfect example of the basic quality of life for the poor increasing while inequality increases as well. Your bad focus, indeed many on the left's bad focus, is that if billionaires become way more adept at investing and growing their money at the top, the poor necessarily are worse off. And hell if nobody out there can even bear to type that the math of inequality rewards poor countries for the measure of their uniformity in being poor, and growing health and welfare among the poor made a bad thing if the rich have the ability to outpace their gains! Not that Kwark's post needs much adding to on this topic, but do you seriously believe that North Korea is a good example of a country with low income inequality? Like, really? Or India, you know, that place where caste system is an actual thing, that's your example of a country with low inequality? TVs, microwaves, and air conditioning aren't good indicators of prosperity, either. Price to earning ratio for housing in the US increased somewhere between 400% and 600% since the 70s; median household debt increased around 300% -- despite interest rates being the lowest they've ever been in the last 20 years or so. The idea that billionaires becoming more adept at growing their money at the top doesn't affect the poor is ridiculous, by the way. There is a finite number of goods and services being produced in the world, and if a small group of people at the top increases their wealth disproportionately to the rest of the populace, this is directly reducing the purchasing power of those at the bottom. That's literally how fiat currencies work. You could try to argue that those at the top with disproportionately growing wealth also contribute to producing more stuff but... supply side economics are retarded, so I hope you're not going to go in there. Pardon me, but did you even read my post. North Korea? Did I cite North Korea? Do you expect me to take you seriously when you bring up countries I didn't cite as evidence against points I didn't make?
On December 24 2020 02:16 Danglars wrote:
Democratic Republic of the Congo, North Korea, India, Bangladesh ...
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EPT
