2016 POTUS Election Thread

[townsend]

The actually valuable public services are things like a fire department and police department. Roads and bridges to drive on would be as well. A military strong enough for defense of the borders of the country. Beyond that sort of stuff, government is just a huge waste of money.

Park preservation, environmental regulation, anti-trust regulation, support for the impoverished, funding of scientific research, enforcement of worker's rights, regulation of capitalism are all vital roles of gov't. (some of which our current structure is failing at.

 

[BipolarFuk]

 

[townsend]

First of all, NOTHING from the government is free. SOMEBODY is paying for it.

Second, if you are a lower income person and paying relatively little in taxes, and you are getting "valuable public services" that cost way more than the taxes you are paying, that means SOMEONE ELSE is paying for it.

I'm not sure what else you'd call that, you idiots.

First of all if you make more money, you're likely benefitting more from tax dollars, because all of your income is dependent on those government services. If you buy more food your taking better advantage of farm subsidies, if you travel more your taking advantage of oil subsidies and road and bridges. If you get to go to national parks, if you can send your kids to a state funded college. Pretty much everything you've ever purchased was trucked in on government built interstates. Meanwhile poor people on a shoe string budget don't have the money for anything other than their bare essentials.

That's not even discussing the kind of rich people who own lobbyists. If your a Koch brother you spend millions on bribes to bring back billions in subsidies, and all of that is at the expense of the economy, since money flows up hill.

 

[townsend]

By the way, what the fuck are " valuable public services" and who decides what they are and who gets them?
I'd far rather just let people keep more of their own money and they can decide for themselves what to do with it. Imagine that. I wonder if you can.

Education and Healthcare. They're valuable because we have more skilled workers, that won't have to resign to their imminent death if they get cancer. The economic impact of disease and the abominable overpricing of education have been pretty devastating.

 

[L.T. Fan]

Education is something that we've fucked up pretty badly in this country over the last 40 years. We shouldn't be having to import IT people from India and China, we should be able to train Americans for those jobs. We have third world countries doing a better job of training their citizens to get good paying jobs in the US job market than we are doing. That's pretty goddamn sad.

Is it training or cheaper labor?
Sorry. I see this has already been raised.

 

[Clay_Allison]

With IT is there a shortage of trained Americans? Or is it that people in India and China are willing to do it for a cheaper wage? Just curious, I don't deal much in the IT area. I know when it comes to other areas like Tool and Die workers for example there is a horrible shortage of workers because no one goes to trade schools anymore.

The IT companies doing the hiring and sponsoring the visas SAY they can't find Americans to do the jobs. Of course they have been caught lying about that while making existing workers train their cheaper replacements, so it's hard to say. Overall I think there is a shortage of skilled labor in the US thanks to a bogged down, bureaucratic, incompetent education system that has been focused on "academics" rather than job skills.

 

[L.T. Fan]

The IT companies doing the hiring and sponsoring the visas SAY they can't find Americans to do the jobs. Of course they have been caught lying about that while making existing workers train their cheaper replacements, so it's hard to say. Overall I think there is a shortage of skilled labor in the US thanks to a bogged down, bureaucratic, incompetent education system that has been focused on "academics" rather than job skills.

Most of the labor that is shifted in this country is for the most part jobs that are not highly skilled. The labor force in the housing market in the southwest is a prime example. Virtually all the jobs can be done with cheap labor except for plumbing and electrical. Anything that requires licencing can't be utilized. Other areas of labor force inequities are in the same boat. The exceptions are usually in states having heavily entrenched union requirements.

 

[Cowboysrock55]

regulation of capitalism

Yeah no. Unless you're talking about anti-trust regulation and environmental regulation which you already mentioned. Regulation of capitalism is what gets us into most of the trouble we are in. You really are pro big government. It's scary.

 

[Cowboysrock55]

Overall I think there is a shortage of skilled labor in the US thanks to a bogged down, bureaucratic, incompetent education system that has been focused on "academics" rather than job skills.

That's certainly part of it and I think part of it is a coddled society that has made everyone feel like they deserve "academics" and are above certain types of jobs. It's a society of people without jobs who when offered certain kinds of jobs are no longer interested in working.

 

[Clay_Allison]

That's certainly part of it and I think part of it is a coddled society that has made everyone feel like they deserve "academics" and are above certain types of jobs. It's a society of people without jobs who when offered certain kinds of jobs are no longer interested in working.

I don't think people are "above" certain types of jobs, it's that they see no future in jobs that don't provide health care or a living wage. Why would I want to take a job roofing houses? Low pay, no benefits, unsafe as hell. Sounds like a good way to die homeless as soon as I got injured.

All that aside, I pointed to IT because the guys I knew who were Computer Science majors in school aren't hurting for work and we're importing a lot of their coworkers. We don't even teach computer LITERACY in US high schools, especially not in those where the community could really benefit from more people from there making six figure incomes.

Hell, I have to make an appointment weeks ahead of time to get my car worked on because we don't even train enough mechanics in this country.

 

[Clay_Allison]

Yeah no. Unless you're talking about anti-trust regulation and environmental regulation which you already mentioned. Regulation of capitalism is what gets us into most of the trouble we are in. You really are pro big government. It's scary.

I would guess he's talking about banking regulation, prosecuting insider trading, fraud, market manipulation, that sort of thing.

 

[townsend]

Yeah no. Unless you're talking about anti-trust regulation and environmental regulation which you already mentioned. Regulation of capitalism is what gets us into most of the trouble we are in. You really are pro big government. It's scary.

Controlling price gouging and the regulation of banking, investment and securities, illegalization if buying stocks on margin, stepping in and shutting down the markets in incredibly volatile situations, regulation of food and drug quality. There's like a billion more obvious instances where it's in the public's best interest for government to intervene.

Obviously it needs to be a controlled intervention. But I would argue that it's business impregnating gov't that has caused more problems than vise versa.

 

[Cowboysrock55]

I don't think people are "above" certain types of jobs, it's that they see no future in jobs that don't provide health care or a living wage. Why would I want to take a job roofing houses? Low pay, no benefits, unsafe as hell. Sounds like a good way to die homeless as soon as I got injured.

We don't even teach computer LITERACY in US high schools, especially not in those where the community could really benefit from more people from there making six figure incomes.

Speak to the education system in your shitty state. In Iowa we had computer classes.

An no offense but roofing a house absolutely does pay a living wage. It just might not provide a comfortable living wage. Does it provide enough to afford a home with roommates? Absolutely. Does it provide food on the table? Of course. It just might not provide a nice car and luxuries without trying to work a second job. On top of that roofing a house provides things like Workers Compensation for injuries. So if you do happen to fall off the home you receive a pretty fat check, well assuming that you don't test positive for drugs... Again, it comes down to people having the choice of either working to survive or not working and allowing the government to help them survive. I know, but what about the person who has 16 kids, that's not a living wage? A living wage isn't meant to support anyone but the person who is working. If there wasn't such a thing as public assistance it sure makes a hell of a lot more sense to earn 8 bucks an hour then it does to earn 0.

 

[Cowboysrock55]

Obviously it needs to be a controlled intervention. But I would argue that it's business impregnating gov't that has caused more problems than vise versa.

Then you haven't studied many communist economies that are all government with no private business. Government by it's very nature is inefficient.

 

[Clay_Allison]

Speak to the education system in your shitty state. In Iowa we had computer classes.

An no offense but roofing a house absolutely does pay a living wage. It just might not provide a comfortable living wage. Does it provide enough to afford a home with roommates? Absolutely. Does it provide food on the table? Of course. It just might not provide a nice car and luxuries without trying to work a second job. On top of that roofing a house provides things like Workers Compensation for injuries. So if you do happen to fall off the home you receive a pretty fat check, well assuming that you don't test positive for drugs... Again, it comes down to people having the choice of either working to survive or not working and allowing the government to help them survive. I know, but what about the person who has 16 kids, that's not a living wage? A living wage isn't meant to support anyone but the person who is working. If there wasn't such a thing as public assistance it sure makes a hell of a lot more sense to earn 8 bucks an hour then it does to earn 0.

workman's comp. Maybe in the awesome state of Iowa. No way some fly by night roofing subcontractor pays out workman's comp. I think we have different views of these things since you are from a heavily unionized state that has actual labor laws. Here in Texas those kinds of jobs are worked by illegals for cash, not by people who get W2s.

 

[Cowboysrock55]

workman's comp. Maybe in the awesome state of Iowa. No way some fly by night roofing subcontractor pays out workman's comp. I think we have different views of these things since you are from a heavily unionized state that has actual labor laws. Here in Texas those kinds of jobs are worked by illegals for cash, not by people who get W2s.

Well I live in Missouri now but I lived in Iowa until I went to Law School.

So I guess you're on board with Trump that the illegals are the problem? I guess I've never found issue because they aren't too proud to work for those wages and find a way to live off them. Something Americans are unwilling to do.

 

[Clay_Allison]

Well I live in Missouri now but I lived in Iowa until I went to Law School.

So I guess you're on board with Trump that the illegals are the problem? I guess I've never found issue because they aren't too proud to work for those wages and find a way to live off them. Something Americans are unwilling to do.

Illegals being used as cheap labor are a symptom of a problem (the bare fact that we don't enforce labor laws) not the cause of it. The wages aren't really the reason they are used, the cash they make is pretty decent. The problem is it's a lot cheaper to pay under the table than to hire an actual employee the legal way. Sometimes they hire Americans to do that (mostly family who want to make some cash on the side) but when they do they risk getting turned in after someone falls off a ladder. Illegals are less willing and less able to run to the authorities if the guy they are working for fucks them over.

 

[L.T. Fan]

Illegals being used as cheap labor are a symptom of a problem (the bare fact that we don't enforce labor laws) not the cause of it. The wages aren't really the reason they are used, the cash they make is pretty decent. The problem is it's a lot cheaper to pay under the table than to hire an actual employee the legal way. Sometimes they hire Americans to do that (mostly family who want to make some cash on the side) but when they do they risk getting turned in after someone falls off a ladder. Illegals are less willing and less able to run to the authorities if the guy they are working for fucks them over.

I find the illegals are just simply willing to work in order to have an income. Further I find a lot young able bodied people are not willing to work at labor jobs. The latter is the reason jobs are given to illegals. They aren't taken from anyone for the most part they just aren't acceptable for a lot of people.

 

[Clay_Allison]

I find the illegals are just simply willing to work in order to have an income. Further I find a lot young able bodied people are not willing to work at labor jobs. The latter is the reason jobs are given to illegals. They aren't taken from anyone for the most part they just aren't acceptable for a lot of people.

I worked loading trucks for a lumber yard until I ruptured a disc in my back and they told me not to claim workman's comp because if I did no one would ever hire me anywhere else. Since I was stupid and 18 I believed them. I traded a lifetime of back pain for six bucks an hour. I'm not sure why anyone would ever hesitate to sign up for that.

 

[L.T. Fan]

I worked loading trucks for a lumber yard until I ruptured a disc in my back and they told me not to claim workman's comp because if I did no one would ever hire me anywhere else. Since I was stupid and 18 I believed them. I traded a lifetime of back pain for six bucks an hour. I'm not sure why anyone would ever hesitate to sign up for that.

You are just one person with one experience. A lot of young people simply will not attempt to do labor jobs.