A democratic attempt to raise the minimum wage to $7.25 an hour was recently defeated. Do these idiots actually think they would be helping ANYBODY by raising minimum wage? Simple economics shows that if something, say labor, costs more; you buy less of it. So a mandatory increase in minimum wage would simply result in fewer jobs.

Furthermore, the last time minimum wage was raised I was working my way through college and one of my jobs was at seven eleven. I had been there a while and had gotten a few raises based on performance. Then the idiot congress goes and raises minimum wage and suddenly the bonehead I'm training is making the same pay I am! This pissed me off.
The owner said she couldn't afford to give me a raise, what with having to pay the new hires so much.

Minimum wage is a training wage, only about three percent of the population earns it. If you keep a job for any length of time, you will soon be making more than minimum wage. Isn't an unskilled worker, like a high school or college kid, better off with a job at the current minimum wage, than unemployed at the new one?

A democratic attempt to raise the minimum wage to $7.25 an hour was recently defeated. Do these idiots actually think they would be helping ANYBODY by raising minimum wage?

There is no minimum wage on Florida tomato fields. Labor and employers "negotiate" their own terms without meddling of pesky government. It's pure free market, unlike to the sheltered (of the holy free market) existence you have. The fact that mutually "agreed" wage is something like $10-20/day is not important. Its holiness "free market" is all that counts. It's too bad that your free market deity likes hungry and desperate labor force; it's too bad that given free hands the rightwing deity drives wages to the bare minimum (sufficient for physical survival) in a heartbeat. It's too bad that we live in a oppressive hierarchical society ruled but the wealthy (for time being) and their chain dogs. It's too bad that the majority is chronically incapable of organizing to stop exploitation by parazites.

To suggest that untamed plutocracy, backed by all the power of the state, and isolated labor units can negotiate fair wages is so insane that only the most "bright" (and sheltered of free market, I might add) rightwinger can buy into it.

Simple economics shows that if something, say labor, costs more; you buy less of it. So a mandatory increase in minimum wage would simply result in fewer jobs.

It's simple rightwing bullsh*t for braindead. Capitalist economy is a gigantic pump sucking up the labor and sweat of many in the pockets of the few. It's true that without "turning down" the valve, increase of minimum wage will be largely eaten by inflation. Thus, increase of minimum wage should be accompanied with slowing down the wealth deluge going to the top. In other words: increase of minimum wage without true mini redistribution of the wealth pie is just cheap gesture of the spineless libs. Printing more green paper to increase minimum wages WILL NOT CUT IT.

Have you heard about "black plague" in mediaval Europe? 30% of the labor force died out then, which forced nobility to shed some serious dough to the bottom (forced voluntary redistribution of the wealth) to get necessary labor force. That was time of incredible rise in living standards of plebeians.

OK, now let's assume that black plague has never happened and that Jesus appeared in nobilty's dreams 600 years ago and said: "biatches, are you ever going to take my Sermon on the Mount seriously?" Fear stricken nobility out of kindness of its heart threw twice as much "dough" to the bottom... The effect would've been just the same.

Humanity must destroy hierarchy of the wealth (or any other hierarchy) if it wants to advance anywhere. Giving up labor to make rich richer and richer and expecting crumbles in return (no matter their size) ain't smart or just.

Furthermore, the last time minimum wage was raised I was working my way through college and one of my jobs was at seven eleven. I had been there a while and had gotten a few raises based on performance. Then the idiot congress goes and raises minimum wage and suddenly the bonehead I'm training is making the same pay I am! This pissed me off.
The owner said she couldn't afford to give me a raise, what with having to pay the new hires so much.

I leave your obvious thirst for higher perch in a hierarchy of life without comments. However, would you care to think slightly why an increase in minimum wage back then did not lead to the higher sales in junk food sold at 7/11, so that owner could pay you few cents more, so that you could feel more superior to the bonehead you were training, so that your life would be more full of meaning and accomplishment?

Minimum wage is a training wage, only about three percent of the population earns it.

And another 20% gets minimum wage + few dimes :), which is about the same. Remember about them too. Training for what? What is the employment structure in the USA? How many spots for "trained" and how many for "untrained"? What about those who simply cannot be trained for better paying jobs? Let's assume that the obvious nonsense "if everybody works hard he can advance in a hierarchical capitalist society to infinity and beyond" is true. Besides, in a free market, training doesn't have a squat to do with salaries of laborers. Supply and demand does. Ponder about those things in the short breaks between Rush and Hannity shows then rewrite the above sentence to reflect the reality of life not the propaganda staples sitting in your head.

If you keep a job for any length of time, you will soon be making more than minimum wage. Isn't an unskilled worker, like a high school or college kid, better off with a job at the current minimum wage, than unemployed at the new one?

Yeah, $6.50/hr will make a huge difference in one's life :) What skill should have to do with anything? Person A is doing job X. Job X is in demand by society. That means job X should pay bare minimum necessary for decent existence. Whether job X is janitorial or teaching, for example, is absolutely IRRELEVANT. Whether job X could be done by a high school student or a Mexican or a prisoner for much less is IRRELEVANT.

Some people can't get more lucrative skills because they are lacking mental abilities. Some people are DOOMED to be losers in life's rat race because we are living in a piramidal hierarchical society with broad base, narrowing middle and extremely narrow top. Somebody must be at the bottom NO MATTER how everybody tries. That the world we live in. That's why universal living wage is a matter of justice and mere decency. If it will be universal, if it will be enforced, there is no reason whatsoever why employment should drop.

If it will not be universal that certainly will keep business owners on the move in the search of the most desperate and cheap. Profit is a king, after all.

We pay ten bucks an hour to do unskilled labor like mowing the lawn and simply helping with chores with direct full-time supervision. We don't work people very hard, lots of chat breaks and soda and cookies, even free lunch. Yet we can't get any Americans to do it. We've only been able to start getting help around the place since the immigrant community has spread far enough north that it's reached our town. Mexicans think we're saints to pay them that much.

American children all think they're going to grow up to be investment bankers, so they don't need to bother working their way up from the bottom. Even though there isn't a single one of them who can make change for a dollar without a calculator. Their parents support this notion by buying them cell phones, cars, and $300 sneakers, sending them to the prom in limousines, and letting them live with them for free. They all think they're little princes and princesses.

That is the problem with labor in this country.

Humanity must destroy hierarchy of the wealth (or any other hierarchy) if it wants to advance anywhere. Giving up labor to make rich richer and richer and expecting crumbles in return (no matter their size) ain't smart or just..
Humans are naturally hierarchical. Even under communism, the system you seem to thirst for, where people can't compete economically. They competed for political power with bloody purges and massive sufferring. Better to let them compete economically, it's a lot less bloody.


However, would you care to think slightly why an increase in minimum wage back then did not lead to the higher sales in junk food sold at 7/11.
The seven 11 was on the bad side of town. Most of the customers were on food stamps, disability, or were criminals. Wage levels had no effect on them.


Training for what? What is the employment structure in the USA? How many spots for "trained" and how many for "untrained"?
Every job requires training. All spots are preferably held by trained employees. You may start at minimum wage, but before long you should either get a raise or get fired.

Let's assume that the obvious nonsense "if everybody works hard he can advance in a hierarchical capitalist society to infinity and beyond" is true.
Obvious nonsense? Sounds like a lazy man talking. I've held a lot of jobs over the years, in every one of them hard work allowed one to move ahead.

Besides, in a free market, training doesn't have a squat to do with salaries of laborers. Supply and demand does.
The greater the level of skill, the lower the number of people likely to possess it Therefore, one should be able to command a higher salary.


What skill should have to do with anything? Person A is doing job X. Job X is in demand by society. That means job X should pay bare minimum necessary for decent existence.
Job X should pay what it's worth, no more. If you mandate a minimum salary, then job X may not get filled.

Some people can't get more lucrative skills because they are lacking mental abilities. .
And by creating an artificial minimum salary, you may be dooming these low ability individuals to unemployment.

But Job X should pay no less than what it is worth....

Humans are naturally hierarchical.

Naturally??? What does it mean naturally? Is hierarchy insribed into human brains by Allah, Jesus, Zews? Is it genetical? Or, hierarchy is product of human cultures and being transmitted from generation to generation like religions and lots of other things. If we are indeed hierarchical animals what are the parameters humans build hierarchy upon? It was not always wealth. BTW, North American Indians were pretty much non hierarchical that's one of the main reasons why they were exterminated by hierarchical Christian brethren.

Even under communism, the system you seem to thirst for, where people can't compete economically.

I still didn't figure out what communism is to thirst for it. What does it mean compete economically? How workers can compete economically? I don't get it. They can sell themselves at lower prices. However, in the most of the cases, they just take what is offered (or starve under bridge). Isolated workers have no power to compete economically. Sure, once hired they can engage into superior's as$ kissing, backstabbing, office politics, etc. to climb on the higher perch. You can call it economic competition.

If you think USSR was as communist as you can get, I can tell you that official incomes of workers, managers, scientists, etc. could differ LEGALLY as much as 1:10. Lot's of space for a rat race. That's certainly not 1:400 American CEOs enjoy, but it's mighty significant for a commie state. In the undeground economy, one could become soviet millionaire provided the right staff. The only significant difference between USSR and USA was that in USSR money could not buy mega power and power could not buy mega wealth.

They competed for political power with bloody purges and massive sufferring. Better to let them compete economically, it's a lot less bloody.

Who are "they" - people? Soviet people competed for political power because they could not built an economical perch? Common, that's silly. Russian revolution won because and only because the Russian peasants (80% of population at the time) supported it or, at least, were neutral. Why? One of the reasons: tsarist government has decided to build an economic perch in quite egalitarian Russian villages by encouraging creation of the large&medium farms (a la USA), which would had resulted in massive displacements of peasants into city's slums and concentration of the "dough" in the hands of the fewer and fewer people. You see, world is/was not made in the image of the USA. Unfortunately, that's changing.


Every job requires training. All spots are preferably held by trained employees. You may start at minimum wage, but before long you should either get a raise or get fired.

Training could be accomplished in 10 mins. Who said that one should get a raise? Is that a law of nature? Besides, as a said, $5/hr and $7/hr have one thing in common - one can't live decently on that.

Obvious nonsense? Sounds like a lazy man talking. I've held a lot of jobs over the years, in every one of them hard work allowed one to move ahead.

you sound like a man who stuck face in a full trough (sweet success) who doesn't want to look on the society as a whole system. Your personal job rewards means nothing in the great scheme of things. I repeat, current society is a wealth piramide. Had it been populated exclusively by your clones, some of them still would be digging in a garbage can.

The greater the level of skill, the lower the number of people likely to possess it Therefore, one should be able to command a higher salary.
Lots of trades and professions make pretty darn sure that the number of skilled folks in the field is limited. Doctors, dentists and pharmacists are prime examples. In the fields without birth control supply of the highly skilled is so large (relatively to demand) that correlation between absolute rarity of a skill and income is quite weak. This planet is quite crowded :)

Job X should pay what it's worth, no more. If you mandate a minimum salary, then job X may not get filled.

Who decides what job X is worth? Yup, I would have definitely hired 20 folks (no kidding) to do errands had they be willing to work for $.1/hr. What a shame 20 jobs are lost because of the damned minimum wage and not sufficient level of desperation around me. It freaking TWENTY jobs lost. Think about that. I bet you could create 1000 jobs at that rate. If a job cant provide minimum decent living, I couldn't care less if it's not filled. Filling of a job is not a goal in itself.

And by creating an artificial minimum salary, you may be dooming these low ability individuals to unemployment.

Yeah, I would create 40 jobs for low ability folks willing to work for $.05/hr. Damned minimum wage. Having a job is not the goal in itself.

Your dream economy was already created in the past. Just read history of 19th century England and USA with emphasis on the life of working people, and enjoy. Lemme guess, you think that this time it will be different :) Dream on man.

American children all think they're going to grow up to be investment bankers, so they don't need to bother working their way up from the bottom.
I think kids have realistic expectations. They just don't believe as much in the "blue dream" anymore to start rat race at the bottom, buy an apple, wash an apple, sell an apple, and yadda, yadda, yadda. They rely more on luck.


Even though there isn't a single one of them who can make change for a dollar without a calculator.

Rule #1: No matter what you do, no matter what calculator you use to calculate change, most likely, your socio-economic status will be just the same as that of your parents (this is especially true for the very top and the very bottom). That's statistics.

Can't get obsession with math. From what I seen, knowledge of math and arithmetics doesn't help much financially. It's rather income lost. Most trades and professions require bare minimum of math once per year. There are engineering fields where one could be a quite successful professional if he knew (barely) four basic operations of arithmetics. Unless one likes math, wasting time on it is just that - waste, useless in everyday life.


Their parents support this notion by buying them cell phones, cars, and $300 sneakers, sending them to the prom in limousines, and letting them live with them for free. They all think they're little princes and princesses.

Does that include parents in trailer parks, inner cities, depressed and rural areas? You should leave your gated community once in a while.

A a foreign observer, I must say American family ties are quite weak or even non existent by the average world's standards. Kids are not princes and princesses. They are rather just a line on the "to do in life list". Amount of stuff kids get is not a sign of super love, it's rather pay off to buy some free of kids time.

That is the problem with labor in this country.

I think American Aristocracy is the problem :) Once one got to the top 5%, he stays there no matter what. Then one makes top 5% babies, babies go to ivy league schools and get the most desirable jobs (with minimum work and maximum pay). The number of aristocracy members grew, the number of desirable spots didn't grow as much. Thus maintaining the myth from "rag to riches" is more and more difficult, kids of working and middle class slobs don't buy into it as much as their parents did.

Rule #1: No matter what you do, no matter what calculator you use to calculate change, most likely, your socio-economic status will be just the same as that of your parents (this is especially true for the very top and the very bottom). That's statistics.

That's crap. My grandfather came to this country from Cuba with nothing, not even a knowledge of english. Did he have an advantage over the poor downtrodden lower class people you keep talking about? He worked his whole life, raised four kids, and retired a fairly wealthy man in Florida. I worked my way thru college, and now make many times what my father or grandfather ever did. I have a cousin whose parents were wealthier than mine, lived in a great neighboorhood with a huge house. Now she's on welfare and just barely escaped being sent to prison.

People have free will. They are not pieces of driftwood being tossed about on the sea of life. Sure, sometimes people get dealt a really bad hand. Some people are physically or mentally disabled and can't make it on their own. They are a minority. The vast majority of people should be able to stand on their own two feet.

That's crap. My grandfather came to this country from Cuba with nothing, not even a knowledge of english. Did he have an advantage over the poor downtrodden lower class people you keep talking about? He worked his whole life, raised four kids, and retired a fairly wealthy man in Florida.
That's not crap, that's STATISTICS. Again, you don't see the whole picture while keeping your head down in the trough of your/your family success. Logic: "Gee, if everybody been like me, everyone would be living in relative luxury like me" doesn't apply to hierarchical, capitalist societies. You won - congrats. However, there are folks who worked equally hard and lost in a rat race.


I worked my way thru college, and now make many times what my father or grandfather ever did.

I knew folks who worked hard through college, graduate school ... to become virtually unemployable. No large houses and incomes there.

People have free will. They are not pieces of driftwood being tossed about on the sea of life.

Again, people with free will are greatly constrained by societies they live in and yeah they definitely can be tossed as pieces of sh*t on the sea of life. After, all they are not Gods having every parameter of existence under their control. There is lots of stuff that even you cannot control. You can respond to changes in environment (if you'll have time and means). Chinise central bank can definitely wreck your savings/investments:) Can you control/predict that? If you can, lots of folks on Wall Street would be glad to talk to you.

Do you suggest that had everyone had as much free will as you do,there would not be janitors, cachiers, cab/truck drivers, laborers, unemployed..... There would be just highly compensated paperpushers living in burbs. Had everyone been just like you . Claiming that all those folks at the bottom could be future CEOs, doctors and paper pushers working through college cannot be true in this society.

I think that while working hard through college you've missed trigonometry lessons, and concept of piramide is absolutely out of your touch.

Its projection in 2D it looks something like this:

*
* *

* *

* * * *

Rat racers on the bottom physically CANNOT all move up to the top, no matter how hard they will try and how much of free will they will exercise. That is constraint society imposes on them (and you). Some win, much more lose. F*ck losers, they deserved it. After all, had they been fluffy just like you they would have won.

Yes; the minimum wage increase proposal was defeated in the US Congress - yet they did manage to find it in their hearts to give themselves a pay raise. That fat six-figure salary apparently wasn't enough for them to make ends meet.

Of course, this is the same group of 'public servants' who, though whilst enjoying full health care benefits themselves, have repeatedly rejected all proposals to provide health care to their downtrodden constituents. So this is the type of government they are trying to impose on Iraq? No wonder the insurgency is growing by the day.

Dixonmassey is spot-on. The system is fatally flawed, and for every success story, there are countless stories of unconquerable ennui and glass ceilings based on non-meritorious factors.

I think that while working hard through college you've missed trigonometry lessons, and concept of piramide is absolutely out of your touch.

Its projection in 2D it looks something like this:

*
* *

* *

* * * *

Rat racers on the bottom physically CANNOT all move up to the top, no matter how hard they will try and how much of free will they will exercise. That is constraint society imposes on them (and you). Some win, much more lose. F*ck losers, they deserved it. After all, had they been fluffy just like you they would have won.
Of course everyone can not be "at the top", but it's not a zero sum game. In my experience, in every job I've held hard work pays. I've worked at 7/11, a lumber yard, a factory, a grocery store, a restaurant, a hospital, even for the government. In all these jobs those who put forth the effort and applied themselves moved up. Those who didn't didn't.

Had society been populated exclusively by your clones, some of them still would be digging in a garbage can.
Since I believe in free will, you're probably right. Still, it seems to me from watching my kids that a lot of your personality is inborn, so I'd expert a low percentage of homelessness among my clones. Did you ever see that special on twins seperated at birth? There was a set of twins who'd never met. Grew up in different parts of the country. Until they met at a firemen's convention. Their wives even looked alike. Wierd.

Of course everyone can not be "at the top", but it's not a zero sum game. In my experience, in every job I've held hard work pays. I've worked at 7/11, a lumber yard, a factory, a grocery store, a restaurant, a hospital, even for the government. In all these jobs those who put forth the effort and applied themselves moved up. Those who didn't didn't.

Agree, some people are better than the others in selling themselves. Some people are willing to work harder, some people are more gifted, etc., etc., etc. However, that's not the point. Had everyone been identically gifted in the above areas, there would be still people digging in garbage cans. Hierarchical capitalist system simply cannot accomodate everybody on the top or in the middle. Thus, system's promise "work hard and you'll make it" is simply a lie to keep social peace. Thinking globally, working hard, etc. alone is not enough. Sure, one can follow your example and think locally: "I can run hard in a rat race and I can make it". Sure you can. Also you can make a jack pot providing the right choices of numbers. However, you CANNOT extrapolate your local experience on a hierarchical society as a whole and say "gee, if only everybody made right choices as I did, there would be no $5/hr janitors". That would be a lie. Sure, one can say - "everybody cannot make the right choices. Everyone deserves what he gets." However, it's a straw because, as I said, had everyone made the right choices there would be still poors. That making the right choices alone is not the answer.

The "right choice" argument is quite absurd if one would think deeper. In this argument, the hierarchical system apriori is assumed to be just and fair, allowing "unlimited possibilities" (even Bill G, has his limits) for everyone making the right choices. If one "made it" in the system, that is yet another automatic proof of system's fairness. If one didn't make it, obviously it's because he's made the wrong choices along the way. the system can do no wrong. What a killer argument. Sounds like yet another religion where deity can do no wrong.

You see, an hierarchical society cannot exist without some kind of enforcement of hierarchy. People do not accept eagerly and voluntarily that 5% own 95% of the wealth. After all people are greedy and want a greater share of action too. Thus masses needed to be put under control. Masses must be convinced that such 5/95 distribution is fundamentally just, divinely ordained and virtually anyone can join 5% :) Of course, in the primitive societies, rude force is far more important than brainwashing. However, in the USA rude force alone would not fly, plutocracy needed to create a temple/myth of "Unlimited opportunities for everyone. It aced the project. Western Democracy without brainwashing is like a cowboy without a handgun.



Since I believe in free will,

Generally speaking, humans cannot ascertain whether or not they have free will. It's impossible. They can believe they have it. However, Bible, to put it mildly, is very ambiguous in this regard. Calvinists would disagree with your pick.

Agree, some people are better than the others in selling themselves. Some people are willing to work harder, some people are more gifted, etc., etc., etc. However, that's not the point. Had everyone been identically gifted in the above areas, there would be still people digging in garbage cans. Hierarchical capitalist system simply cannot accomodate everybody on the top or in the middle.
What does a homeless guy digging in a garbage can contribute to society? How is the position, "bum", integral to the success of a hierarchical capitalist system?

We may need ditch diggers and janitors, but we don't need bums. And what about a society of high tech super genious's, couldn't they build robots to do the scut work? I myself own a vacuuming robot, the "Roomba".

What does a homeless guy digging in a garbage can contribute to society? How is the position, "bum", integral to the success of a hierarchical capitalist system?

We may need ditch diggers and janitors, but we don't need bums. And what about a society of high tech super genious's, couldn't they build robots to do the scut work? I myself own a vacuuming robot, the "Roomba".


As a point of interest what DO you suggest we do with the bums in society?

One thing that a lot of people don't seem to realize is that almost no one actually makes minimum wage. Only 3% of full-time american workers make the minimum wage. Of those, about half are under 18 and haven't graduated from highschool yet.

Naturally??? What does it mean naturally? Is hierarchy insribed into human brains by Allah, Jesus, Zews? Is it genetical?
Yeah. It is.

Or, hierarchy is product of human cultures and being transmitted from generation to generation like religions and lots of other things. If we are indeed hierarchical animals what are the parameters humans build hierarchy upon? It was not always wealth. BTW, North American Indians were pretty much non hierarchical that's one of the main reasons why they were exterminated by hierarchical Christian brethren.
Even among native Americans, children are not equal to their parents. Elders and chieftains command respect. Hierarchy permeates human society, be it formal or informal. A few are always privileged, be that privilege given or taken.

i am surprised that adult mexicans can survive on $220 a week, wonder what they eat?

Ramen and Easy Mac, maybe?

Yeah. It is.

If so, what kind of hierarchy is genetical? 1% owns 10% of the wealth, or 1% owns 99.9%. Could it be even more natural, if the most deserving ones hold everyone else in slavery?

I did observe that many common (i.e. little $) folks derive lots of their self-worth from the number of population/language/class/economical status .... groups they feel superior too. There is defite longing (among many but not all) to place oneself on the higher perch of life, whether it's real one (with cash value) or imaginary. However, ALL of the "superiority reference points", I'm aware of, are inherited from the previous generations. Which makes me wonder if some other factors than Zews and genes are involved.

It would be really interesting to study mechanisms of creation of hierarchy ladders in the human groups. Once the ladder is created it's relatively easy to maintain. However, the geneses of hierarchy is another matter. Why and how majority accept domination by the minority, if majority doesn't benefit much (or at all) of the ladder existence? It's even more interesting because it appears that minority doesn't do much of the "domination work" itself. It just transforms the lesser ones into their own jailers. Is that genetical too?


Even among native Americans, children are not equal to their parents. Elders and chieftains command respect. Hierarchy permeates human society, be it formal or informal. A few are always privileged, be that privilege given or taken.

There was no hierarchical ladders (meaning the system transforming sweat of the many into the "wealth", and "pumping" that wealth to the top) among North American Indians. I do realize that some people have larger fists and muscles, some are more likable, etc. which is genetic. However, even the most husky fellow (or suck up) is not capable to create the ladder on his own. Thus, the ladder is rather social/cultural than genetic.

How is the position, "bum", integral to the success of a hierarchical capitalist system?


Sure he/she is. Hierarchichal society = top leeches + rat racers + scarecrows (showing why one should run in a rat race in the first place). Rat racers, in their turn, are divided in those who are: having a carrot in front of them, having an abyss behind them.

Hierarchical society revolves around maximizing the cash flow to the top while keeping the relative social peace. One can hold significant chunk of population on the bottom and maintain control (and keep rat racers running).

The class composition of the society reflects the one providing maximum upward cash flow in the given historical/cultural/social circumstances. Needless to say that " historical, etc. circumstances" are diligently shaped to provide maximum cash flow to the top.

For example, mighty police/prison system, 2 millions of inmates (not sure about the number) + 5% of the populace on the very bottom of life (most likely to join 2 millions in prisons) is cheaper (for plutocracy) than lesser police/prison system, 1 millions in prisons and 2% on the bottom. Thus, extra cash could be pumped up. Reagan took bold steps to make poors poorer and rich richer because plutocracy felt that society will absorb the blow without getting out of control (propaganda investments do pay).

Rule of thumb: great wealth is impossible without great poverty. There is no a single country, single historical period, where that rule did not apply. "Tide raises all boats" is good for Rush show, however, in reality, tide sinks many boats too. Besides, real tide raises all boats on the same level, while propaganda "tide" raises large boats much more than smaller ones (those ones it didn't sink).

Rule of thumb: great wealth is impossible without great poverty.
I don't buy it. Your premise is that all wealth is stolen so if one has much, many must have little.

But how does Bill Gate's wealth take anything away from anyone else? If anything, his wealth has resulted in increased wealth for practically everyone due to the efficiency allowed by computers, such as the one's we are conversing on right now.

Wealth can be CREATED. It doesn't have to be stolen. Someone getting rich by creating something great hurts no one and enriches many. Truly a rising tide that lifts all boats.

As a point of interest what DO you suggest we do with the bums in society?
Charity, churches, etc. My point was simply that it's not necesary that some people dig in the garbage for society to function. Dixon is of the opionion that we need them to scare everyone else into working.

If so, what kind of hierarchy is genetical?
The basic behavioral pattern of groups of humans having leaders. The rest is just detail.

i am surprised that adult mexicans can survive on $220 a week, wonder what they eat?
Are you kidding? I easily lived on less than this for years when I was in college. My room mate and I would spend about $100/week on groceries between the two of us, so it worked out to about $50/week per person for food, and we ate pretty well. Three eggs, two slices of toast, and a glass of orange juice for breakfast costs something like 80 cents. Pasta, pasta sauce, and some garlic bread runs you about $1 for a one-person serving. Even a steak diner complete with baked potato, a beer and a miscellaneous vegetable side only costs about $6 when you cook it yourself.

It's actually kind of amazing how much money you save when you buy ingredients for food and prepare meals yourself.

Are you kidding? I easily lived on less than this for years when I was in college. My room mate and I would spend about $100/week on groceries between the two of us, so it worked out to about $50/week per person for food, and we ate pretty well. Three eggs, two slices of toast, and a glass of orange juice for breakfast costs something like 80 cents. Pasta, pasta sauce, and some garlic bread runs you about $1 for a one-person serving. Even a steak diner complete with baked potato, a beer and a miscellaneous vegetable side only costs about $6 when you cook it yourself.

It's actually kind of amazing how much money you save when you buy ingredients for food and prepare meals yourself.

Well what about the family, children, schooling, housing, etc.

After all, you are assuming that each and every member of the family is working right?

Well what about the family, children, schooling, housing, etc.

After all, you are assuming that each and every member of the family is working right?
No, I was just pointing out that you can easily live on less than $220/week. I did it for almost four years. Obviously I was only supporting myself, not any children etc.

Miiniiimummm waaaaaage high-YA! *whip crack*

After reading all the comments made regarding minimum wage I've come to post my opinions as well.

I do think most of the Capitalist society is just plain wrong. The problem comes into play when money becomes the objective and not function. With the environment being destroyed simply to fill workers pockets what we see is although it gives them what they require, in essence it will lead to ruin later. If societies only organize around increasing profit then what we find is eventually they'll ruin themselves.

Capitalist systems haven't had enough time to develop into failures, only because they continue on the same course, making money. When the environment has suffered enough an there are no more resources then everyone will really see what Capitalism has done.

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What's the ideal thing to do then?

I would suggest that unless society begins serving the basic need of FUNCTIONING over MONEY that nothing much will be gained that has already materialized. If you only work because you're paid instead of the idea you are needed there to fullfill a function you become blind. People can take on different functions but money isn't the primary goal, the function itself should be.

Currently I would like a world in which money is never again used, but instead people are given degrees of importance based on their functioning in society. If someone cannot really survive on what you're paying they will not function to their utmost potentional, thus it hurts us all.

It is true some people choose to limit their functioning because of alcohol addiction, drugs, etc... those people need to really be in a place where functions are important not all this other nonsense society thinks.

So in truth, Capitalism has failed, it will eventually destroy the resources in the United States to a point where they have none. I see a time when everyone is arguing over who did what instead of trying to fix the problems. Each sees themselves more important, more regarded then another. Functioning within this system is nearly impossible already.

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So let's look at it this way. Pay everyone what they need to live based on the areas they live in, but not the bare minimum. A little more then the minimum needed so as to provide a comfortable way of life. In Maslow's Heirarchy of Needs we can see that when someone does not have a certain aspect in the pyramid they cannot progress onward. Thus while some are able to skip and get right to education, others are always feeling the need to acquire the bare minimum first then progress.

Anyways it's all about function and logic. It's not logical to pay someone so much that they are able to live beyond another person that's homeless.

sderenzi

I like your points, and I have something to add. Technology is being invented which will allow each human on our earth to become more independent without consuming a whole ton of resources. For example: A machine which can pack dirt into bricks. This has been invented, it will slowly start to spread through the market, now you'll be able to build your own home without tearing down whole forests for lumber. I feel that this is just the tip of the "Iceberg of Technological Independence." Hopefully I'm right, otherwise, we may be in for a nice hard breaking. (which is the stop of a fall, mind you)

There is such a thing as "correlation". There is a correlation between bare skin exposed to sun at noon and skin burn, for example. 99.9% of people don't understand the exact mechanisms behind sun burning skin red, but 100% knows that the above described correlation exists.

Same with mega riches and mega poverty. Show me a multibillionaire, I'll show you slums, inner cities, abject poverty. Any time period, any continent, any country - correlation between mega riches and mega poverty exists. Exact mechanisms differ (in not so essential details).

I do understand that you live in the Imperial Metropoly, so correlations are somewhat hidden (especially, if you are in the upper portion of a piramide). For general education you may read http://www.robinupton.com/people/WizardsOfMoney/. Your standards of Imperial Living is a lot (indirectly) due to the mechanisms of sucking third world dry described on that site.

I don't buy it. Your premise is that all wealth is stolen so if one has much, many must have little.

Darn YES, for one to have MUCH more - many must have much LESS. Isn't that an obvious arithmetics ?

What is "Stolen" in one society/culture/circumstance/ etc. isn't stolen in another. "Stolen" is culturally, etc. relative word.

Analogy: there is a single possible pass through a river. Everybody must use the pass to keep on living. There is a band of "toll collectors" charging arbitrary sums of money for people using the pass and doing nothing else. Is that stealing/racket or a wonderfull example of free enterprise?

Same with society you live in. Hierarchical Society based on money, employment and driven by profit. All work horses must use (or rather being used by) employment, money to survive. There is no other way around (even Amishes must have $ on hands). System's "Toll collectors" (owners of means of production, bankers, "investors") charge work horses arbitrary sums, throwing "bones" to the chain dogs guarding the toll booths and themselves (army, police, prisons, lawyers, politicians), throwing slightly less bones into "education" of populace that such an arrangement is the only possible, maximum just and efficient. Sounds like racket, a.k.a. stealing, for me. But in your cultural coordinates that's just and fair because toll collectors provide an "efficient" passage that only they can do. Only toll collectors can define how much value is in that passage. Horses are too dumb, lazy and shall have no say on that.

You'll say that work horses are free to look for a "kinder" collector or join the collector band. However, until horses will have say on "how much" collectors should fleece them, such a system looks like disguised racket. Silent acceptance of collector's "charges" doesn't constitute justice.

Preemptive remark, it's absolutely impossible for all horses to join the collector band and its support services.

Lastly, humanity must find another way to run economy, toll collectors must go or, at least, become work horses in charge of collector booths.

But how does Bill Gate's wealth take anything away from anyone else? If anything, his wealth has resulted in increased wealth for practically everyone due to the efficiency allowed by computers, such as the one's we are conversing on right now.

So tell me how much an average income of an average Joe have increased in the last 20 years? Doubled, tripled, or stayed, for all practical purposes, the same? I do understand you've done really well, but try to look on the whole society. Productivity (whatever that means) doubled or so, if one believes statistics, corporate profits grew, the wealth of Bill G grew by hell knows which order of magnitude. While an income of an average Schmo was not affected much. It's really peculiar tide :) Where did dough go? Sorry for the obvious question.

Sounds like neo liberal version of capitalism, revived by Reagan & Co, has efficiency coefficient less that that of the most primitive steam engine, if one will decide to use it to improve average worker's income. I'll not touch the subject of quality of life that income brings.

I really don't know how could you tell that Bill Gait's wealth increased wealth for everyone, if it enabled insane, unsustainable globalization of capital and all the related "good" stuff - rust belts, dead plants, lots of dead end jobs, sweatshops, destruction of traditional way of life in 3rd world countries, which cannot even feed themselves anymore, ... endless list.

Efficiency = wealth for the already rich. Efficiency means mostly pink slips and dead end jobs for the rest of mortals (including few representatives of overseer class).

Wealth can be CREATED. It doesn't have to be stolen. Someone getting rich by creating something great hurts no one and enriches many. Truly a rising tide that lifts all boats.

I really want to see how BG would create all those software himself.

You should have said, "BG made himself rich mostly by overseeing overseers who put/control tens of thousands people producing various software. BG exerted heavy premium for his overseeing powers. Tens of thousands of people making software took whatever $ they where given and had no say how much $ they would give BG for his overseeing services".

That's the problem. From a capitalist point of view, labor is just a two legged commodity to be discarded once not needed. That capital and overseeing is salt of the Earth making things possible. Only capitalist can decide how much his services are worth. Some capitalists are more generous than the others in pay department. However, ALL of them indignant when labor try to establish its own price. That's an absolute blasphemy not to be tolerated (even if it doesn't cost much).

Dixon is of the opionion that we need them to scare everyone else into working.

I think that even you will not deny that driving force of capitalism is maximization of profits by any means, even if it means selfdestruction.

From a profit maximization standpoint, labor costs are profit lost (no matter what corporate PR department says) and thus must be minimized. On the other hand, capitalists do realize that without labor they are not capitalists :) Thus, they cannot drop wages below subsistence level of work horses. Labor obviously wants a few finer things in life than a shack and a piece of dry bread. Thus, labor should be properly trained, intimidated or dumbed down to take what is given and never, ever demand anything from a capitalist. Labor doesn't earn, it's capitalist's mercy give whatever he/she desires to labor.

Capitalists both need poors and are afraid of poors. They need poors to keep wages low (supply demand things). Does Wal Mart (the largest employer) benefit from the immense of people at the bottom willing to work for $7/hr or so? Capitalists need poors to "encourage" those who's not at the bottom yet to run as hard as he can without much thinking about the system which makes keeps him running. Capitalists must keep workers few paychecks away from the financial disaster; that will prevent unlikely chances of the dumbed down labor to organize and strike. Most humans naturally tend to choose "a bird in the hand", after all.

Of course, ruling elites are not so dumb as to apply force alone. Divide and conquer still works well. Fairly numerous worker's aristocracy was ingenious invention to keep cost of maintaining order minimal. It provides a carrot for the working majority who thinks: "if I only work slightly harder slightly longer, I'll work my way to a WM manager. I don't need to struggle. If I'll not make it, I'm a loser who deserves no better". Nice training I must say. And there is an education myth. Racial division is still doing its trick. Etc.

And lastly, old good state sponsored terror is as good as always. Have you ever notice that framework of a police state is in its place in the USA? I bet not because proto police state is waging a war against poors in ghettos. War on drugs, 2 millions in prisons is nothing but intimidation of the poors, ... In the time of trouble impetus of the police state will be beeffed up to include suburbs and campuses, no doubt. Vietnam war tought the ruling plutocracy a few things.

What a magnificent social structure plutocracy has created.

Same with mega riches and mega poverty. Show me a multibillionaire, I'll show you slums, inner cities, abject poverty. Any time period, any continent, any country - correlation between mega riches and mega poverty exists. Exact mechanisms differ (in not so essential details).

Show me a multibillionaire, and I'll show you millions of people who have benefited from what they offer, be it employment, products or services. They wanted what the person had to offer. The person was smart/lucky enough to be in a position to offer it. What a crime.

Your standards of Imperial Living is a lot (indirectly) due to the mechanisms of sucking third world dry described on that site.

The third world doesn't have to deal with us, but they want what we offer. "sucking them dry"? That's an intentionally negative skew to support your premise which is generally "buying the myth of fairness", like a child.

Darn YES, for one to have MUCH more - many must have much LESS. Isn't that an obvious arithmetics ?

No, it isn't. It's "I hate capitalism" stupidity. Think about what you've said above. "more" doesn't exist unless it is produced. When MORE is produced, there is MORE to go around. Were in not for the individual or group intelligent or lucky enough to be able to produce goods, there is not MORE or LESS. There is NOTHING.

Analogy: there is a single possible pass through a river. Everybody must use the pass to keep on living. There is a band of "toll collectors" charging arbitrary sums of money for people using the pass and doing nothing else. Is that stealing/racket or a wonderfull example of free enterprise?

Your analogy is simply WRONG. It's more like "before these other guys came along, there was only one river that everyone was trying to go through, and only a few made it because it was so crowded. This guy created a bypass and said, "uh, hey if you help me out with a loaf of bread you can use the bypass I created", and he ended up with so much bread he started offering that bread to the passers through for other items of trade. Oh shit I forgot to support your retarded non-premise.

Your goddamned rhetoric and propaganda is tired and misled. It's just fucking sad.

By your logic, that I spent four years struggling my sorry ass through college should result in YOU getting the same job I can get, even though you don't understand a goddamned thing about what it's about. By the fact that you breath and take up space, you entitled to the fruits of everyone else's labor, as much as you desire.

I think that a "modern society" should ensure that all its members are sheltered, fed and treated if injured. If you want more than that, generate yourself an opportunity or shut the fuck up and appreciate those motherfuckers who are working their asses off to make sure you get fed and sheltered.

Show me a multibillionaire, and I'll show you millions of people who have benefited from what they offer, be it employment, products or services.

As I said in the analogy, "people must cross the river to live(not under bridge)". There is no way around of the goods and services produced by billionaire's owned companies. There is no way around toll booths. One must "benefit", willingly or not, or die under bridge.

Besides, billionaires offer only capital and/or their coordinating/controlling services, or speculation expertise like Trump, etc. I'm quite sure there would be software without BG.

Yes, it's true that many people (overwhelming majority in the Western countries) are gladly using "toll booths" thinking that one day they will be collecting the toll too or, at least, that they'll always have cash to pay off the toll.

I was born in USSR, I remember cursed perestroika. I was in my early teens, but I remember how workers were were transformed into isolated greedy units to rob them later by aspiring (now well established) toll collectors ala Rus. Seduction lane was something like this: you see socialist economy is crumbling, that's because there is no "private ownership and joblessness". People are not scared of starvation/homelessness so they don't work as hard as they are told. Let's privatize and throw 10% of lazy bums out. Aspiring soviet consumers, salivating for joining the Wester temple of consumption, readily agreed. Obviously, nobody of them ever thought of being jobless and starving. That's reserved for those lesser human beings somewhere outside of their families. Darn sure lots of them found out how they were wrong. They later have found out that one could work a lot and be paid a little or not at all.

The moral: working people lost little solidarity they had, they were prepared to throw week and otherwise unfit into a garbage pile in order to pick up the fatter crumbles thrown to them by the masters. Same with people benefitting (greatly) from billionaire economy. They benefit, knowing (or feeling, or suspecting) once in life time at least that their benefitting somewhow is related to somebody's living under bridge or working in a sweatshop.

The final point. It all the matter of the philosophy mankind builds societies upon:
1) maximizing pleasures/consumption/control/power of those fitting well into "toll booth" economies
2) minimizing suffering of ALL people in the world just because they are people not labor/consumption units.

To build society of greed and fear or on solidarity, this is a question.

No, it isn't. It's "I hate capitalism" stupidity. Think about what you've said above. "more" doesn't exist unless it is produced. When MORE is produced, there is MORE to go around. Were in not for the individual or group intelligent or lucky enough to be able to produce goods, there is not MORE or LESS. There is NOTHING.

I can't get it. You argue that 1 apple is NOT much less that 1000 apples as long as someday there will be 10000 apples? And there is no way to get 10000 apples as long as apples are not divided in 1 to 100 ratio? 1:100 ratio of apples is the sole driving force behind economies? Gee, how people lived for 100,000 years prior to industrial revolution? I greatly doubt they can live 100,000 years more on 1:100 ratio. I guess everybody will just commit suicide if CEO will not make 400:1 kill. That's really sad world, if it's true.

First, "tide rise everybody" doesn't work voluntarily under capitalism. Whatever "tides" workers had were fought for. No fighting = to tide for all (as skewed as it was). Whatever seeming improvement bottom had/have is largerly due to the technology offering cheaper, not lasting, frequently dangerous for the health junk. Recent tides were so shallow on the lower side of a piramide, so they are not worth of mentioning. And tides do sink many boats.

Second, there will be a moment when production of 10000 apples will not be physically feasible (damn the limited planet we live on).

You assume that the only way for common Joes to get 10 apples back is to produce 10000 (under indispendible, visionary, you may add your own epithets, leadership of all kinds of MBAs, etc.) and to give 9990 apples back to "visionaries" and their owners? Thankfully, engineers didn't think that way about the heat engines, or you wouldn't go far in a car having 0.1% efficiency coefficient. Oh, sorry, it's 99.9 efficiency, if one is looking from the top :)

Your analogy is simply WRONG. It's more like "before these other guys came along, there was only one river that everyone was trying to go through, and only a few made it because it was so crowded.

Classic apologetics . Of course, toll collectors provided value to the stupid mob, how else? Mob is soooooo stupid. I bet you could argue that even thieve and rapists provide "value" by teaching victim a lesson.

Observation:

I'll use your analogy. when soon to be new toll booth guys came to England in 16 century (or rather feudal aristocracy reinvented itself), the number of people crossing the river of subsistence plummeted compared to that crossing under aristocratic fleecing. How else it could be? Capitalism became possible ONLY and ONLY because lots of people crossed subsistence river under feudalism. Add there development of the production forces (big surprise, capitalism is not the only system where such development is/was possible). In two words, feudals did not fleece mob to starvation, mob proliferated, mechanical loom and manufacture were invented = mob lost its value to feudals, wage slavery became possible. Whatever had peasants under feudals, slum dwellers had it worse. It the STRUGLLE against capitalism made living standards better. Regretably, largerly on the expence of extermination/exploitation of colonies.

Your representing of fleecer as saviors, deserving lion's share of loot, is servile and plainly wrong. Besides, it's not lion's share fleecers take is horrible, it's disempowerement of the people terrible. Toll booth system transforms them into servile mob fighting for crumbles of the pie they've made in the first place and thinking of nothing else.

Your goddamned rhetoric and propaganda is tired and misled. It's just fucking sad.

Propaganda? What exactly did I propogandize, bright communist future? I've made a few observations on the hierarchical, profit driven capitalist system. Unfortunately, reality is much sadder than that, if you cared to pull out your bright head out of the arse.

By your logic, that I spent four years struggling my sorry ass through college should result in YOU getting the same job I can get, even though you don't understand a goddamned thing about what it's about.

What your fuck&ng college has to do with something? It seems that diploma (certificate in boredom tolerance and obidience training) makes you darn proud and self-important, and you think you deserve bigger piece of pie. Sorry, you are a just the same commodity as a janitor and it's not up to you to decide what you are worth. All you can do is to take it or leave it. I have two college diploma, including a Ph.D., so what? I do know what kind of brain dead, futile job education will get you, if the field on your educational level is overcrowded. Yup, me and others stupid were cheaper than a technicians with HS diploma, who did nearly nothing all day long because WE, educated slaves, did all the brain dead work, we were so cheap (relatively speaking).

The times when college diploma was a ticket to a higher paying job with a certain level of control are long time gone. Lemme guess, you are one of a kind guy:)


If you want more than that, generate yourself an opportunity or shut the fuck up and appreciate those motherfuckers who are working their asses off to make sure you get fed and sheltered.

It's you who keeps me fed and sheltered? Thank you very much. Shut the fu*ck up with "opportunity" BS. If all janitors turned into real estate speculators (that's where real "value" is created) you would float in sh*t. One needs fair (meaning enough to live on) pay for a job he does, not pie in a sky, from rag to riches BS. It's not a lottery, it's life with more or less fixed number of opportunities and non-opportunities without which "opportunities" will turn into nothing.

As I said in the analogy, "people must cross the river to live(not under bridge)". There is no way around of the goods and services produced by billionaire's owned companies.

That is simply defeatist. There are a few companies that I'll grant you, are hard to avoid. The majority however, are easily skirted with a little effort. If you choose not to avoid them, you made your choice.

There is no way around toll booths. One must "benefit", willingly or not, or die under bridge.

So it's either use microsoft products or die eh? Lol. Okay.

Besides, billionaires offer only capital and/or their coordinating/controlling services, or speculation expertise like Trump, etc. I'm quite sure there would be software without BG.

That they were able to gather such tremendous resources and allocate them skillfully authenticates at least to some degree, that they are qualified to control them. If you don't like BG's style, why not outcompete him instead of moaning like a little bitch about it?

Yes, it's true that many people (overwhelming majority in the Western countries) are gladly using "toll booths" thinking that one day they will be collecting the toll too or, at least, that they'll always have cash to pay off the toll.

It's the constant reshuffling of resources like that which keeps things going.

I was born in USSR, I remember cursed perestroika. I was in my early teens, but I remember how workers were were transformed into isolated greedy units to rob them later by aspiring (now well established) toll collectors ala Rus. Seduction lane was something like this: you see socialist economy is crumbling, that's because there is no "private ownership and joblessness". People are not scared of starvation/homelessness so they don't work as hard as they are told. Let's privatize and throw 10% of lazy bums out. Aspiring soviet consumers, salivating for joining the Wester temple of consumption, readily agreed. Obviously, nobody of them ever thought of being jobless and starving. That's reserved for those lesser human beings somewhere outside of their families. Darn sure lots of them found out how they were wrong. They later have found out that one could work a lot and be paid a little or not at all.

The moral: working people lost little solidarity they had, they were prepared to throw week and otherwise unfit into a garbage pile in order to pick up the fatter crumbles thrown to them by the masters. Same with people benefitting (greatly) from billionaire economy. They benefit, knowing (or feeling, or suspecting) once in life time at least that their benefitting somewhow is related to somebody's living under bridge or working in a sweatshop.

What a horrifically skewed perspective you cast upon the world. I work and I get paid fairly for my work. So clearly your example isn't universally applicable.

The final point. It all the matter of the philosophy mankind builds societies upon:
1) maximizing pleasures/consumption/control/power of those fitting well into "toll booth" economies
2) minimizing suffering of ALL people in the world just because they are people not labor/consumption units.

All "modern societies" of any maturity have elements of both. The amount of each will be pendulous.

To build society of greed and fear or on solidarity, this is a question.

All economic systems are capitalistic. Only the degree of freedom within the system is in question. To summarize the capitalism as purely "greed based" is to overlook how the entire system really functions.

It's basically an advanced barter system with a "value" unitized to facilitate transactions.

It is people who are fucking greedy. Some people. Not all.

The chief failing of "pure socialism" is that it pretends such a thing isn't true.

In effect, any capitalistic system of which I'm aware has elements of socialism mixed in to appease the social conscience.

What your fuck&ng college has to do with something?
Well yeah, it does actually. It improves my market value and as a bonus, gave me a lot of practice at thinking in a productive way. Oh, and it helped me to understand a lot of things I previously didn't even fathom could possibly exist.

It seems that diploma (certificate in boredom tolerance and obidience training) makes you darn proud and self-important, and you think you deserve bigger piece of pie.
No, the market thinks I deserve a bigger piece of the pie because I've shown aptitude - something you apparently do not comprehend. You are a sour and ignorant individual indeed to assert that a college degree is necessarily a certificate in boredom tolerance and obediance training. What a sad, pathetic view of education. No wonder you're so easily swayed by propaganda promising you some fantastic "fair deal" as if there exists such a thing. *sigh* It's sad really. Your negativity is rampant.

Sorry, you are a just the same commodity as a janitor and it's not up to you to decide what you are worth.
That's right, my worth is settled by a negotiative process whereby I say "I want this" and if someone is willing to provide it, I provide them the requested services. How terrible unfair.

All you can do is to take it or leave it.
If you have nothing to offer a prospective employer, I suppose that would be the case yeah. Have you nothing to offer? If so, why do you think you deserve more?

I have two college diploma, including a Ph.D., so what?
Exactly. Apparently, they are wasted on you.

I do know what kind of brain dead, futile job education will get you, if the field on your educational level is overcrowded.
Well, bad career choice eh? So you deserve more but aren't willing to negotiate or find a means to get it besides attempting to get the government to provide it for you eh? You're a loser because your defeatest attitude overwhelms your capacity to actually do something productive. You are great at bitching and moaning though. If you weren't such a commie dipshit you might have a bright career as a lobbyist.

Yup, me and others stupid were cheaper than a technicians with HS diploma, who did nearly nothing all day long because WE, educated slaves, did all the brain dead work, we were so cheap (relatively speaking).
Sorry it didn't work out for you, but if you're so fucking bright I'd expect you wouldn't be such a whining loser, so the pity factor is negligible.

The times when college diploma was a ticket to a higher paying job with a certain level of control are long time gone.
Look, bright boy... who the fuck gave you a gaurantee of anything and why did you believe them? If you understood a fucking thing about "education" in general, you should understand that "being educated" doesn't count for shit if you're a whining, bitchy cunt who brings everyone down with their shit attitude. Who would want to work with your sorry ass even if they thought you were qualified? It sucks that your career plan didn't work out, and it sucks even worse that you're too stupid to compensate in whatever ethical means necessary rather than bitch and fucking whine about how you got a raw deal. Fuck you, get your shit together, offer someone something and most likely if you do so in good faith, you'll eventually be handsomely rewarded, that is, if you offer something that is marketable. If you don't, you'll be stuck doing shit work and blaming the world for your problems, refusing to comprehend that it's really your shit attitude and lack of flexibility that keep you sucking hind tit.

Get your shit together.

Lemme guess, you are one of a kind guy
Of course I am. Aren't you?

- Bitter dumbasses (like yourself) are a dime a dozen. Get your chip off your shoulder and get resourceful.

Wes,
Thanks for picking up the ball. Well said.

Sure no problem. I don't consider it particularly well said actually, but it'll have to do as it's history now.

I know a guy out here in rural America who makes a living at cutting and delivering firewood. He says he needs help in the business, offers $8 an hour for guys to load, drive and drop the wood to customers, and can't get anybody to take the job.

So much for minimum wage.

I know a guy out here in rural America who makes a living at cutting and delivering firewood. He says he needs help in the business, offers $8 an hour for guys to load, drive and drop the wood to customers, and can't get anybody to take the job.

So much for minimum wage.
Indeed. Minimum wage sets itself.

That is simply defeatist. There are a few companies that I'll grant you, are hard to avoid. The majority however, are easily skirted with a little effort. If you choose not to avoid them, you made your choice.

OH yeah, please, try to avoid using green bills made out of the thin air by federal reserve system (owned by the most parasitical billionaire crowd; actually, they "own" everybody.)

So it's either use microsoft products or die eh? Lol. Okay.
There are no problems in avoiding MS products personally. However, it's simply impossible not to pay for those products indirectly and not be affected by them.

That they were able to gather such tremendous resources and allocate them skillfully authenticates at least to some degree, that they are qualified to control them.

What are those "resources" they've allocated? Labor of the people locked up in the monetarized employment system, which simply cannot be avoided?Slaveowners skillfully allocated slave labor resources too. Actually, even you can "skillfully" allocate resources given a pile of cash. If you don't have IQ80 to allocate them yourself, you can hire others who'll allocate it for you. Who's established heavy premiums on allocation services and how? The anwswer is obvious though - allocators. Why? Because they could. Why " unit labor capitalist" selling his arse to employers cannot do the same? Because he/she can't. Why? Because he's at the bottom of the "piramide" tuned up to service those at the top.


If you don't like BG's style, why not outcompete him instead of moaning like a little bitch about it?

The system is sickening, dehumanizing and selfdestructive. I've wrote only about "materialistic" stuff, "who gets what part of a pie." Me becoming one of the leeches will not change that. This is not to say that I want/could become one.

It's the constant reshuffling of resources like that which keeps things going. [/qoute]

Capital roaming around and seeking the highest returns on investment. Nothing new. Too bad that capital have NO other considerations than return on investments. And that is going to hurt everybody rather sooner than later.

[quote]
What a horrifically skewed perspective you cast upon the world. I work and I get paid fairly for my work. So clearly your example isn't universally applicable.

I didn't try to squeeze my "perspective" into a few sentences. You live in 2/3 - 1/3 society transforming itself into 50-50 society. I vaguelly remember you belong to overseer subclass. Plutocracy is not that dumb not to compensate its overseers. Divide and conquer. Just keep in mind that police terrorizing poor black slobs in ghettos, etc. and your fair compensation are related.

All economic systems are capitalistic. Only the degree of freedom within the system is in question. To summarize the capitalism as purely "greed based" is to overlook how the entire system really functions.

The legacy of "great depression" is being discarded, capitalism becomes purer and purer. Plutocracy invested great deal of $ into non monetary social control techniques, which broadly could be branded as "manipulation of consciousness". It's time to reap monetary benefits.

It's basically an advanced barter system with a "value" unitized to facilitate transactions.

That would be fine. However, it seems you've missed that nowadays 98% or so of "returns" are made in all kinds of financial speculations having nothing to do with "material" world except expecting to buy "real" stuff one day. If that day will come, we're fu*ckd. And sure thing speculation $ can buy as much power as productive $.

It is people who are fucking greedy. Some people. Not all.[/qoute]
You imply that a human is just an atomized fly independent of the society it lives in, surrounding, culture, rules of the game, etc. The system, non greedy unit lives in, can not only encourage but also demand "greed" of its units (in the middle or on the top, at least), no matter their personal level of greed. It's just business, nothing personal. To pretend that everything is about "personal stuff" is to delude oneself.

[qoute] The chief failing of "pure socialism" is that it pretends such a thing isn't true.

I've smelled soviet socialism of the period of decay, it stunk. Bureaucratic rule could be more or less effective (in the sense of reproducing social order) only and only if bureaucracy does not form a closed caste with well established rules of the office games. That's challenging to do without bloodletting, if ever possible.

However, in the period of crisis nothing is more effective than state bureaucracy. The chief advantage of socialism is that has 1) societary conciousness besides monetary one, 2) it doesn't allow mega accumulation of the wealth (=power), which eventually negates many of the capitalist advangages. Thus, that's "socialism" is called to the rescue when sh*t hit the fan.

To be fair, USSR was not originally about "improved consumption of goods and services". That's the shift of degenerated elite's priorities to the consumption race with USA, killed the country.

In effect, any capitalistic system of which I'm aware has elements of socialism mixed in to appease the social conscience.

You forget to mention that "mix ins" were rarely voluntary.

Minium wage sucks there should be help for folks who get stuck on minium wage, like there is for junkies.

In addition, they should raise the minimum wage amount. Say, eight bucks an hour?

Well yeah, it does actually. It improves my market value
Not every college degree improves "market value" (whatever that abstraction means). Many are obvious financial loss. Others have enormous "opportunity costs". If one is seeking a degree/university to "improve market value", he'd better be looking really good and have some serious cash ready. It's getting really crowded out there.
and as a bonus, gave me a lot of practice at thinking in a productive way.
Send that line to Dilbert. Hone your "corporenglish" more, you'll suck your way farther up that way.
No, the market thinks I deserve a bigger piece of the pie because I've shown aptitude - something you apparently do not comprehend.
Market is an abstraction, it doesn't think. So far you've shown aptitude to speak in stereotypes, stuffed in your head. Stereotypes, you've never questioned or analyzed.

You are a sour and ignorant individual indeed to assert that a college degree is necessarily a certificate in boredom tolerance and obedience training.
Let's try to wake up your questioning/imaginative abilities squashed under the piles of delusions of grandeur and "good schooling". Slowly, withdraw you head from the full trough you enjoy and look around at the surrounding world. Look on the jobs most people do. What does distinguish most of those jobs? That's right, drudgery, repetitiveness, having no say. Big surprise, lots of those jobs are done by the college graduates. Now imagine that colleges produce only imaginative, creative, free thinkers, having social consciousness, not used to boredom and jumping as high as boss said. That is not going to be good. What would business say to its agents sitting on the boards of trustees?

First and foremost, colleges are social institutions called by the elites to maintain the existing social order by churning out just the right kind of graduates (and providing ideological support). System happened to be hierarchical, where fair compensation and having a say is reserved for relatively few. The System happened to promise “unlimited possibilities” for everybody who works hard. Thus, “cooling down” of expectations is a must too. Obviously, colleges are doing something “right” to please those who counts.

What a sad, pathetic view of education. No wonder you're so easily swayed by propaganda promising you some fantastic "fair deal" as if there exists such a thing. *sigh* It's sad really. Your negativity is rampant.

Wow, what an “advanced” logic, “those who've grasped the true meaning of education, cannot be swayed by the pesky social, etc. concerns. They cant observe and question. They should be “hot piss” happy to run in the most just and the only possible capitalist rat race, not thinking where it leads.” That's sounds indeed as propaganda solidly nailed to your head. It missed your attention that most of education in the USA should be renamed into “advanced professional training, which most likely will improve one's life time earnings”. “Improved earnings” is the driving force, getting a broad prospective, developing critical thinking, opening one's mind, questioning force fed staples... is in a way. No time for that, and no need too.


That's right, my worth is settled by a negotiative process whereby I say "I want this" and if someone is willing to provide it, I provide them the requested services. How terrible unfair.
Classics apologetics again. Being an overseer, your “worth” is determined by sheer belonging to a power ladder. That's basics of maintaining of hierarchical structures. For the great many of slobs it's “take it leave” kind of negotiating.


If you have nothing to offer a prospective employer, I suppose that would be the case yeah. Have you nothing to offer? If so, why do you think you deserve more?
Speak for the f*ck sake in your own words, if you have them, not by parroting some workshop guru. What are criteria of “Having to offer”? Having a job you wish? If I was chosen, that's cause I have so muchhhhh more to “offer” than the other slobs, right? WRONG. Even if it's soothing to your ego, that's wrong. I could just talk just the right kind BS, HR manager was taught to want to hear (very subjective thing). And yeah, there are discrimination things. To represent employers as unbiased Gods making the right, the most just choice each time is to distort reality beyond recognition.

I have two college diploma, including a Ph.D., so what?
Exactly. Apparently, they are wasted on you.
Why is that? Because I'm not a narcissistic puss bomb stuffed with propaganda, never thought about, stereotypes as you are?

Well, bad career choice eh? So you deserve more but aren't willing to negotiate or find a means to get it besides attempting to get the government to provide it for you eh? You're a loser because your defeatest attitude overwhelms your capacity to actually do something productive. You are great at bitching and moaning though. If you weren't such a commie dipshit you might have a bright career as a lobbyist.

Listen I didn't mention a word on a compensation subject. I didn't mention me, government, who owns me, I didn't bitch, I didn't moan. Got it? Can you put two thoughts together without questioning “legitimacy” of the opposing side. That's the only way you can “argue”. Had I been a loser, a bum, whomever, what does it matter? Could I a freedom to think the way I do? What is the personal income level, which, in your opinion, allows one to have a thought without being called a loser and otherwise question my right to think&feel? Land of the free indeed.

Sorry it didn't work out for you, but if you're so fucking bright I'd expect you wouldn't be such a whining loser, so the pity factor is negligible.

Well, I see the fine product of “education”. Instead of accepting the info and thinking/inquiring about it, or ignoring if no interest. Reject it, blame the messenger, just because the info doesn't fit one's comfy pathetic worldview. Closemindness at its best.

Look, bright boy... who the fuck gave you a gaurantee of anything and why did you believe them?
Unbelievable, man, you are just like a robot zombie perceiving reality according to the records in your head. Matrix is alive? Where in the hell did I mention that I believed some guarantee capitalist society gives. What I was hinting at advertising campaigns colleges (and the rest social institution) pay for. Such a rosy detached from reality picture where once diploma is earned exciting, highly paid jobs are just round the corner .... for everybody. Sadly, lots of slob truly believe it. Colleges can't lie, can they?


If you understood a fucking thing about "education" in general, you should understand that "being educated" doesn't count for shit if you're a whining, bitchy cunt who brings everyone down with their shit attitude.

Broken human CD record is going to teach me a thing or two about education? LOL. So far, it's you who's bitching just because I think not as you do, just because I experienced things you didn't, just because I told about them as they are, without fake, vomit inducing enthusiasm so dear in the corporate world. And that's truly depressing. You are an Alfa male, aren't you:)? And yeah, you may twist it as rosy as you like, you may spin it as you like, but fact remain the fact. Universities deliberately overproduce Ph.D.s to cut labor costs, to get more bang for a research buck; those sweatshop calculation dooms tens of thousands, way brighter than me, folks on being low paid exploited grunts with not very bright future. Few Ks in savings on technicians and human lives? What institutions, priding themselves on being an ethic beacon, would choose? Stupid question. Fortunately, most of Ph.Ds are quite unmarketable in the real world (outside of their narrow fields as lab grunts). Yup, it's not only black and old folks who's being discriminated. I know, it doesn't fit in your bright picture of whips and carrots. So don't overload your brain with pessimistic facts, “don't worry be happy, take your blue pill”.

Preemptive remark, I could not stand Academia for many reasons=no intentions to work there=no bitterness for not working there. Clear?

Who would want to work with your sorry ass even if they thought you were qualified? It sucks that your career plan didn't work out, and it sucks even worse that you're too stupid to compensate in whatever ethical means necessary rather than bitch and fucking whine about how you got a raw deal.
Man, I truly believe you live in the matrix. You see/read what you want to see. You've read mere statement of facts connected with simple casual links without much of the emotional interpretations and you see bitching. I didn't wrote “ME”, btw, I wrote “WE”. Even if I wanted to bitch, I do know what world I live in. Nobody gives a fuck for me, my thoughts, my feelings or my bitching. So why bother?

Fuck you, get your shit together, offer someone something and most likely if you do so in good faith, you'll eventually be handsomely rewarded, that is, if you offer something that is marketable.

Fuck yourself, it's cheaper. Do janitors offer something marketable :)? Leave crap of “handsomely reworded” for the feeble minded. The thread was about the system, not about me. All I wanted to say in this thread is that in a hierarchical system everybody cannot be “handsomely rewarded” no matter the relentless efforts everybody will put in. Thus, the main promise of the system is false, it should be rewritten something like this, “work hard, develop “people's skills” (very negative connotation) and you will have a chance to push another guy away from a trough. If you won't, another guy will push away you. It's not very pleasant to be away from a trough. So run hard, and don't think about the only possible, the most just system making you to run. Don't think about consequences for the surrounding world of you running. Keep in mind, the places next to trough are getting scarcer every year. Hurry up....” That would be an honest message.

If you don't, you'll be stuck doing shit work and blaming the world for your problems, refusing to comprehend that it's really your shit attitude and lack of flexibility that keep you sucking hind tit.

You can't believe how flexible one can become with a job/wife&stuff gone, $100 in checking account left and zero of chances of finding a job in the field. I didn't blame a world. You are imagining things again. World don't give a fuck about me as a pile of rocks doesn't. I don't really give a fuck about the world either. Isn't the way it's supposed to be according to the Book of Life? Why should I blame the pile of rocks? Why should pile of rock blame me? I had a run in a race, I've lost BIG (few people could “beat” me), I should realize my inferiority and crawl under the rock, have no say, no thoughts, no feelings until I run and win? OK, now you can feel better.

LOL.

Nice tyrade.

You should put a bandaid on that exposed nerve.

"Universities deliberately overproduce Ph.D.s to cut labor costs"

LOL. OMFG dude. That's simply RICH. Good stuff there.

As IF Ph.D.s have no fucking choice but to do as the university commands. As if people must enroll in the program.

You're damaged man. Very damaged.

"Universities deliberately overproduce Ph.D.s to cut labor costs"

LOL. OMFG dude. That's simply RICH. Good stuff there.

As IF Ph.D.s have no fucking choice but to do as the university commands. As if people must enroll in the program.

As little as you know, you still think you know it the best. Isn't it a sign of some kind of a mental disorder? Maniacal pomposity? It makes a good managerial material though. You'll suck your way far up. Market truly rewards such talents (no kidding).

Outside of the ladder, try to use all those aptitudes you've shown to google shit prior to letting out the "sacred" flow of stereotypes, insults and general conclusions based on the pompous ignorance. Once "mother ship" filled your tabula rasa, it doesn't mean that you don't need to update the database once in a while.

You're damaged man. Very damaged.
To be named "damaged" by you and likes is the same as to hear a praise.

As is necessary for your damaged mental state, you dehumanize me in an attempt to negate my relevance in your mind. Such is the way.

A non-human like myself can't possibly think for themselves or be relevant in any way. We are just tools in a machine intent on destroying everything you hold to be true and righteous.

Onward commie soldier, destroy enemy.

For example:

As little as you know,

You have established absolutely nothing to this end, yet produce is as a known fact that I know very little. So this is meaningless, yet an apparently important foundation of your attack.

you still think you know it the best.

I've presented statement contrary to your own, yes. Whether those are "best" or not is not for me to decide except in how I relate to it. Apparently you are completely non-pomous in inferring that I should simply defer to your superior, yet completely lacking argument.

Isn't it a sign of some kind of a mental disorder? Maniacal pomposity?

A fallacious accusation based on a random assumption on your part. You've to even establish a basis for the criticism yet seem to take it as gospel.

It makes a good managerial material though. You'll suck your way far up. Market truly rewards such talents (no kidding).

So now you draw a conclusion about me based on pure fallacy. To what end? Merely to destroy my character I suppose. As you wish. You'll find it's impossible, but feel free.

Outside of the ladder, try to use all those aptitudes you've shown to google shit prior to letting out the "sacred" flow of stereotypes, insults and general conclusions based on the pompous ignorance.

Please demonstrate this pompous ignorance. Have you noticed the text you quoted which it would seem you're trying to respond to doesn't have anything to do with what you've said? The point made was quite valid. People choose to undertake a Ph.D. program. Universities don't force them. Thus to say they "deliberately overproduce Ph.D.s to cut labor costs" is a clearly skewed, insufficient respresentation of reality, as it completely ignores the volutary nature of the program. This is not pompous nor ignorant, but does expose those qualities in your rambling, hateful statements.

Once "mother ship" filled your tabula rasa, it doesn't mean that you don't need to update the database once in a while.

More non-sequiter nonsense. It's really quite pathetic that you can't offer something substinative or reasonable to support your point. Please, do try.

To be named "damaged" by you and likes is the same as to hear a praise.

And now, I'm thrust into "my likes" as a member of a collective whom you apparently loath - as to hear a negative criticism from "them" must necessarily indicate you're "right", as they are so fundamentally flawed as to establish an inverse relationship with the real correctness, of which you alone are privy.

*sigh*

Minimum wage needs to be dropped. Having a MW cuts jobs so there ends up being more people looking for a job than are available. Everytime I get into an argument with people about this (mostly family... I seem to be the guy in my family that has to disagree with everything :rolleyes: ) I ask this: Would you rather make $4 an hour or nothing an hour? It's better to have some job than no job. You can use that very low paying job to get experience to find an even better job.

This applies to "price gauging," too. It's classic supply and demand. If there is a hurricane and people need electrical generators, you raise the price since the demand outweighs the supply (for various reasons...).

Unbelievable, man, you are just like a robot zombie perceiving reality according to the records in your head. Matrix is alive? Where in the hell did I mention that I believed some guarantee capitalist society gives.

You said "The times when college diploma was a ticket to a higher paying job with a certain level of control are long time gone."

What I was hinting at advertising campaigns colleges (and the rest social institution) pay for. Such a rosy detached from reality picture where once diploma is earned exciting, highly paid jobs are just round the corner .... for everybody. Sadly, lots of slob truly believe it. Colleges can't lie, can they?

You obviously did, hence the undeniable applicability of the comment you pretend isn't relevant. So, you fell through the cracks or as you would likely put it - gaping holes in the system. You believed and now you're pissed - it's obvious, yet you're trying to tell me it's not true. You're a liar. It's as simple as that. What's funny is that college never promised you a job, they just promised you increased odds at a job. What's worse is that you don't realize that what's keeping you from being employable is your... how did you project it before?... Ah, "Maniacal pomposity". Yes, you are captain asshat and no one wants to have to deal with you, so no one will hire you. Your attitude is cancerous, your understanding of business and well, everythign apparently is so fucking negatively slanted to support your "poor me" and thus "the system is flawed, so lets tear it down" attitude that you are virtually worthless to any organization that isn't intent on catering to your over-sized ego - which is unfortunatley for you - not a profitable business venture.

Dumbass.

Broken human CD record is going to teach me a thing or two about education? LOL.

LOL. "broken human CD record" eh? Please show me how this is true. Oh, apparently you could use some education about education because as it would seem is representative of your entire world-view, you have shown a very disgusted, horrific portrayal of it and is generally indicative of the maturity level of the average 8th grader in my experience.

So far, it's you who's bitching just because I think not as you do, just because I experienced things you didn't, just because I told about them as they are, without fake, vomit inducing enthusiasm so dear in the corporate world.

LOL. I think were you to review our exchange thus far you could recognize that you're at quite the bitchy advantage, but as you wish. I have rejected your claims because IMO, they are obviously lacking in clarity and representative of ideology that supports your emotional pain for "the system having let you down", which like a dirty little bitch, you play to your advantage rather than "relying on yourself" to resolve your own pathetic maturity problems.

I work for a small private company by the way, and for personal clients for whom I provide computer support services. The corporations didn't want to hire me. I don't really like the idea of working for "the big boys", but you assume I'm an ass kissing corporate whore so I must really be and I don't realize it.

And that's truly depressing.

You were depressed way before I said anything.

You are an Alfa male, aren't you:)?

Rhetoric! Yeah!

And yeah, you may twist it as rosy as you like, you may spin it as you like, but fact remain the fact.

Fact EH? Lol. Prove your facts then. Show me the evidence. Explain how it doesn't matter that Ph.D programs are completely voluntary.

those sweatshop calculation dooms tens of thousands, way brighter than me, folks on being low paid exploited grunts with not very bright future.

Prove it.

Few Ks in savings on technicians and human lives?

What are the opportunity costs of the opposite? Further, I'd think that a jolly commie like you wouldn't want money in return for your service right? Shouldn't enough money for the essentials and the satisfaction of serving the research needs of mankind be enough to fulfill you? Who's the greedy asshat? I think it's you, you hypocritical dumbass.

What institutions, priding themselves on being an ethic beacon, would choose? Stupid question.

Indeed, the way the question is written makes no sense. "what institutions would choose"?

Fortunately, most of Ph.Ds are quite unmarketable in the real world (outside of their narrow fields as lab grunts). Yup, it's not only black and old folks who's being discriminated. I know, it doesn't fit in your bright picture of whips and carrots.

Support this crock of shit. Show me the evidence. The Ph.D's I know all have great jobs you moaning panzy. Please, present the actual facts to support your assertions above. Oh, and "whips and carrots"? Man you really, really are just a suckass person eh? Lol. Sad.

Perhaps you're of the impression that anyone with a P.h.D. in "latvian orthodoxy in the mid 19th century" should be able to start as an executive for google? Do you understand why they can't?

So don't overload your brain with pessimistic facts, “don't worry be happy, take your blue pill”.

YOU HAVE YET TO SHOW EVEN ONE OF YOUR ASSERTIONS TO BE FACTUAL. Lol. Have you considered that it could be your pessimissm that is responsible for your interpretation of "facts" as pessimistic, dipshit? LOL. Attitude isn't necessarily sympomatic of circumstance. In fact I've noticed it's usually the other way around - you pessimistic commie bastard.

Preemptive remark, I could not stand Academia for many reasons=no intentions to work there=no bitterness for not working there. Clear?

So far you don't seem to be able to "stand" much at all. I was talking about your bitterness about not working in general, when you sure as hell could find or constrew something to do I'm sure - were you to actually rely on yourself rather than trying to manipulate the world to suit you.

Man, I truly believe you live in the matrix.

Then you're truly dumb.

You see/read what you want to see.

Lol. Ah so since I'm not a cancerously pessimistic asshole like yourself, I'm totally full of shit and can't think for myself. The hypocracy is delicious. Mmm... that's tasty discord.

You've read mere statement of facts connected with simple casual links without much of the emotional interpretations and you see bitching.

No, I read statements of your sorry, skewed, negative opinion that doesn't represent really much of shit besides the meditations of a sour grape with the depth to match.

I didn't wrote “ME”, btw, I wrote “WE”. Even if I wanted to bitch, I do know what world I live in. Nobody gives a fuck for me, my thoughts, my feelings or my bitching. So why bother?

Yet you persist.

Do janitors offer something marketable :)?

They may, yes. People hire janitorial services all the time. You should know, right?

Leave crap of “handsomely reworded” for the feeble minded.

Uhm... I did.

The thread was about the system, not about me.

You pessimistic and unrealistic take on the system points to YOU as the problem.

All I wanted to say in this thread is that in a hierarchical system everybody cannot be “handsomely rewarded” no matter the relentless efforts everybody will put in.

First, not everyone will put in "relentless efforts". Second, it's obvious that not everyone can be hugely rich. Most people however, can be fairly comfortable without even working that hard, depending on how you look at it and where you live. If you're so "socially conscious", you shouldn't mind not being "handsomely rewarded" because you work for social harmony and materialism is unimportant. It seems to me you're pissed because you've been unsuccessful and rather than actually continue working towards something better - you shit on the whole system as broken because it didn't work for you and your sorry attitude. Yet the obvious solution "the system doesn't reward sorry attitudes" never seems to occur to you.

Oh, and you seem to fail to consider that it takes a lot of time and effort to improve your station. At the beginning of your endeavor, you will be "at the bottom" of the heirachy as you put it. You are free to attempt to climb the heirarchy to whatever level you desire. You may not make it. You might. That is what the system offers.

Thus, the main promise of the system is false,

Clearly you're confused and incorrect.

The system makes no promises, you fool. It provides potential. Take advantage of it or continue your whining until you die. Simple. Seems like you tried, failed, gave up and blame the system. I think you're a probably just a huge whiny fool.

it should be rewritten something like this, “work hard, develop “people's skills” (very negative connotation) and you will have a chance to push another guy away from a trough. If you won't, another guy will push away you. It's not very pleasant to be away from a trough. So run hard, and don't think about the only possible, the most just system making you to run. Don't think about consequences for the surrounding world of you running. Keep in mind, the places next to trough are getting scarcer every year. Hurry up....” That would be an honest message.

And you can't see how that is not fact, but your horribly skewed opinion which is only represenative of a sub-section of the reality of the system. I can see already that explanations to the contrary are completely wasted on you, as you're a huge douche. Lol, if you ever get a job worth a shit I'll be impressed - and it would be a testament that contradicts your current stupidity, so you can't even try or your whole world-view goes to shit. My what a predicament you've created for yourself. I'd think someone who could manage to obtain a Ph.D. might be smart enough to avoid such a connudrum. Hmm.. what a tragedy.

You can't believe how flexible one can become with a job/wife&stuff gone, $100 in checking account left and zero of chances of finding a job in the field.

The first step towards being cured is to admit you have a problem. It's pretty obvious no matter how much you refuse to admit it. You have a problem. You have a shitty attitude. Admit it to yourself so you can try to get back on track, well - or you could just wallow in misery about how the sytem is stacked against you. How fucking pathetic. Tzun Tsu shits on your head because you're too much of a pussy to stop him.

I had a run in a race, I've lost BIG (few people could “beat” me), I should realize my inferiority and crawl under the rock, have no say, no thoughts, no feelings until I run and win? OK, now you can feel better.

No you're allowed to bitch all you want, and I'm allowed to call you out on your shallow, pompous, retarded whinings and attempt with little patience to illuminate the issue for you more clearly, which you clearly think isn't possible given your 20/20 vision on all this. I'd prefer however, that you do something productive instead of spouting off about how fucked up the system is when your comprehension of it is clearly skewed by your harsh feelings for having lost whatever previous contest and have yet to win shit, apparently. You may have the potential to be a great dude, but ATM - you pretty much suck ass as far as I can tell. Lucky for you my opinion is irrelevant to you. It leaves you with less to deal with, and in continued avoidance of the reponsibility required to pursue success.

go wes :)

As is necessary for your damaged mental state, you dehumanize [me in an attempt to negate my relevance in your mind. Such is the way.

You dehumanize yourself by being an asshole with mania of grandeur. Common man, order a philipino bride or something, you certainly have to much of the unreleased dirt on your mind/soul. You need a real relief valve, Seems typing tonnes of BS on internet doesn't help you much.

We are just tools in a machine intent on destroying everything you hold to be true and righteous.

Itellectual "giant" stuffed with tonnes of the unthought about stereotypes and dirt, is capable of destroying anything? So far you've not be able to make a single solid argument. BTW, the things one holds the true and righteous are not solely intellectually derived.

You dehumanize yourself by being an asshole with mania of grandeur. Common man, order a philipino bride or something, you certainly have to much of the unreleased dirt on your mind/soul. You need a real relief valve, Seems typing tonnes of BS on internet doesn't help you much.

Can you at least mix your pointless insults with a hint of substance? No?

You have established absolutely nothing to this end, yet produce is as a known fact that I know very little. So this is meaningless, yet an apparently important foundation of your attack.
What do you want me to establish? Shall I publish a testimonial with signatures of those involved to count my experiences as a fact? Sorry, I don't care about the subject of an argument much to do that. Don't give a rat arse. So take it or leave it. You, on the other hand, have no direct experiences nor do you have the desire to learn those of others which is readily available on Internet. All you have is a collection of stereotypical BS stuffed in your head, preconceived hell knows how and when, + unexplainable mania of grandeur.
Merely to destroy my character
You manner of conveying supposedly profound thoughts and opinions you have destroys “perception” of your character. You pass as a little angry , hell knows why, bitch having no guts to find a relief valve in the real world.
Please demonstrate this pompous ignorance. Have you noticed the text you quoted which it would seem you're trying to respond to doesn't have anything to do with what you've said?
Wow, lets use the exactness of text quoting as an argument. Nope, it's you who haven't noticed that I responded correctly to the quoted text by saying in a convoluted way, “Preconceived ideas and sucked out of the arse rationale aside, you don't know what you are talking about.”

Can you at least mix your pointless insults with a hint of substance? No?
there are no insults, just statements on your condition. Since you "care" so much about mine, it would be inconsiderate for me not stretch a helpful hand in return.

The point made was quite valid. People choose to undertake a Ph.D. program. Universities don't force them.
Many don't care about the chances, they want to run period. Isn't that a commendable free rat race spirit? I thought you are “go get it” kind of a guy, on the paper at least? Many don't think about the chances, until it's too late. Many are mislead by professors , promising whatever it takes to lure a soul. And the largest group – foreigners from poor countries (need I explain more?).

But again you didn't catch the point . You've lost zero point of an argument in the sea of the insulting dirt you've wrote. Universities/professors/PIs PLAN to substitute as many “highly paid” grunt jobs as possible spots with Grad students and postdocs. That's economics. The pressure to publish and to get funded is causing even more drudgery than a low wage labor as a Ph.D. Holding technician, etc. Thus, if you one is planning on pursuing a career in science, he/she should be prepared to do lots of brain dead job for many, many years if his luck is an average. That's was the point - a college degree may get you lots of low paid drudgery , which may never be rewarded with a stable , interesting, career and income. Sure, as long as nobody has forced you to pursue that particular path, that makes everything alright.

You 'll say, “Ph.Ds are free to quit to roam the real world in the search of an opportunity.” Laugh. Maybe if one is still a graduate student, having no regrets over losing a few years on the fruitless pursuit, one has a chance to quit and “explore” the real world. But if a Ph.D. Is already earned, that's it, the circle of “opportunities” becomes extremely narrow. Real world doesn't like to see Ph.D.s anywhere but in the labs or in the lab related services. lots of Ph.Ds simply are not qualified to get into the industrial labs(normally, one must do industry related research to have a slim chance) . Gee, a Ph.D. Can't even teach in HS without going back to school for 2 years more.

Fresh Ph.D. In engineering = entry level engineering jobs are off limits, some nasty employers even write in the job adds “this is not a Ph.D. Position”; as though we don't understand, but willing to take it anyway given a fat chance. Earning a Ph.D. In engineering doesn't count as an engineering experience by industry. if your research was on some obscure subject of zero interest for $making = you'll have much more painful catch 22 than BS will eve r have = goodbye engineering, good morning postdocing (in the best case).


I wrote the above not to whine and bitch but to show that quitting is not easy. Spare the spite if you can hold it (unlikely, but maybe). To show that if people stay and keep on muddling through the postdoctoral swamp, that's not because of their irrational exuberance. It's rational realization that they are essentially unemployable outside of the swamp. There is definite anti-Ph.D. bias in the real jungles. Having Ph.D. Is not a sign of aptitude . It's rather a sign of a loser, who quit/kicked out of such a wonderful, highly paid :) career path and have a nerve to apply.

More non-sequiter nonsense. It's really quite pathetic that you can't offer something substinative or reasonable to support your point.
Man, you argue using a set of unregurgitated stereotypes as though your “matrix” was programmed at some point in your life and never has been touched again.

And now, I'm thrust into "my likes" as a member of a collective whom you apparently loath - as to hear a negative criticism from "them" must necessarily indicate you're "right", as they are so fundamentally flawed as to establish an inverse relationship with the real correctness, of which you alone are privy.

Criticism of what? My thoughts? Are you thought policeman/ homogenizer/great inquisitor trapped in the human body? Criticism of my life? Who in the hell are you and what you know about it?

Itellectual "giant" stuffed with tonnes of the unthought about stereotypes and dirt, is capable of destroying anything?

Being a bit brighter than yourself on a particular topic does not constitute a claim like "intellectual giant". Counter my "unthought" if you can. Lol. Oh, and it looks like it didn't take much for the system I was referring to, you know, the giant conspiracy against you that's not just me, who of course conspires against people ALL the time... it didn't take much for them to destroy your spirit, as you allowed them er... us easy access, - apparently.

So far you've not be able to make a single solid argument.

How persuasive.

BTW, the things one holds the true and righteous are not solely intellectually derived.

Ah, the sweet misdirection of an apparently unavoidable non-sequiter. Cool, crisp - refreshing.

dixon, at least you deserve it
*confused*

dixon, at least you deserve it
*confused*
One more of those "who's figured it out" and just can't fucking hold it to share sacred knowledge and mania of grandeur with the world? Kind of early for 21 y.o. It must be acceleration. Wes has developed the decease in the riper age, if profile doesn't lie. Damn hormones in children's food.

First, not everyone will put in "relentless efforts".

Don't weasel out.

Second, it's obvious that not everyone can be hugely rich.
No unlimited opportunities (synonym for the hard cash round here) for everyone as promised? How sad :(

Most people however, can be fairly comfortable without even working that hard, depending on how you look at it and where you live.
You are talking as though the wonderful edifice of the market hierarchical society was not aro