Education is certainly a way out for an individual but it can never be a solution to poverty in general. Why? Because economies need poor people to be able to function properly. Even if we managed to get 100% of the population with university degrees, some degree qualified people would have to work cleaning hotel rooms; collecting rubbish; serving in Mcdonanlds etc etc because these jobs need to be done by someone, probably on minimum wage and they would be… relatively poor. And if you pay these lower end jobs more, all you do is drive inflation up through the economy. If the unskilled labour gets more, then the semi-skilled guy say “hey I should earn more than he does” so his wage goes up, the skilled guy says “I must get more than him”, his wage goes up, the professional says “I must get more than a skilled guy” so his goes up too. Any economy that is even slightly exposed to free market forces has to contain both rich and poor people, (even when socialist government influence is applied). Communism doesn’t work – it just makes everyone equally poor. So there you are, there have to be poor people. All we can do is try to make the quality of life for the poor as good as possible and minimise the gap between rich and poor as much as possible. I dont like this situation, but just telling it how it is..
Light Travelling: Yes, societies demand an underclass of slaves, low-paying workers, or some sort of in between or alternative whilst keeping to the basic idea. However, I had meant how does one elevate oneself beyond that. There will always be new slaves to replace you if you go up the ladder.
Regarding the EU. Actually the EU has put the power back into the regional districts. That is because funding is applied to regions and not countries. This actually led to an increase in importance of regional politics and regional focus/lobby groups. By centralizing the EU has actually de-centralized.
This is because regular citizens want to make cash and spend cash, and kids cost more than being childless.
So what if you are the slave? Then what? Suddenly slavery is not acceptable? Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
Well, geez, TT, you act like that's a new concept for you!? It's like anything else in life .....the one who winds up with the shitty end of the stick ain't happy. Why does that surprise you???? Baron Max
My question is simple: if you become the slave, will you support the slave system? Also, here's another one. Are we all better off with a slave system or without one?
A slave is someone who is owned by somone else i.e. their property. What has the word slave got to do with low paid workers, legally employed, earning the minimum socially acceptable wage? Somone is always going to earn the least (unless evryone earns the same), that does not mean the lowest paid in a society is a slave. I would say thinking like that is an overly materialistic attitude. If you want to talk about illegal workers though, paid less than the leagal minimum, who can be manipulated and controlled because of their illegal status - that is another matter. And that is a drawback of immigration control, that when people do come to another country illegally they are open to abuses and in some cases almost slavery because of their illegal status.
A slave is also completely dependent, and has no way of escaping from that dependence. A slave of the system is locked in that position- he is a slave to the system. If you only gain enough to survive and you are unable to find a way to earn more then enough to survive, then, it follows that you work just to stay alive and, consequently, have no life. You have obviously never been there. The same happens with outsourcing, which enslaves millions of people. Also, in a lot of poor countries people earn less then enough to survive.
This is not a definition of slave. According to this definition all children are slaves, as they are completely dependent. Well in this case most of us are slaves… I know this definition certainly classes me as a slave. We are tied in with jobs, mortgages, loans, families, children. It’s the ‘rat race’ – we are all slaves to the system. (but as a figurative use of the word it is correct) Actually you couldn’t be more wrong. I left school at 16 with no qualifications, thought I knew better. I did a number of crummy dead end jobs for not very much money, by the age of 21 I realised I had made a big mistake, I did a couple of years of night school (whilst still doing the crummy day job) and at 24 quit work and went to university (I got a education grant and borrowed heavily). I graduated with a BSc degree in engineering and now work as a project manager. My quality of life has improved greatly.. So I have seen things from both sides of the fence… Which is exactly my point….. in poor countries people earn less than the minimum needed to survive. SO when they immigrate to the west and earn minimum wage, even though by our standards they are poor. For them their standard of living has improved ten fold. Also if you don’t like the idea of some people being on the bottom of the wage scale… you need to give an economic model where there is no ‘bottom of the wage scale’. As far as I know the only one in existence is communism, and as I said, that has been proved not to work..
Nor can one exist as an isolated entity. Communism was envisaged as a global replacement for capitalism. It's meaningless in any other context.
True, but even on a global scale it is meaningless and cannot work. As soon as one person buys or sells something outside the state system the equality is broken. As soon as one person says to another “I will do this for you if you give me that” the equality is broken; one person has more than another. Once this has happened a few hundred times you still end up with (relative) haves and have nots. You see even the most basic system of bartering within a communist system breaks the status quo, and there will inevitably be black market trading even in a world wide system. It is human nature to trade, to barter, to do deals. The only way to stop this non state commerce, is to have draconian measures and harsh punishments to stop it…. The result is that this becomes slavery. Which is why instead of helping the poor, communism just makes everyone equally poor slaves.
Before WW2 most European states limited their trade to within their nation and their colonies. markets were heavily protected. Needless to say the US demanded opening of the European market in return for help in the form of the marshall plan. capitalism does not equal free market. Communism does not equal closed market.
