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[Towels]

It is estimated that wealthy US residents avoid paying $150bn in tax each year, through offshore accounts. How many welfare programs would that buy you?

http://www.hsgac.senate.gov/downloa...-in-hidden-offshore-accounts-february-26-2014

 

[benjipwns]

Not in the country I live in. Housing affordability is at record lows in Australia. At any time in the past, an average mortgage would consume less of an average paycheque. A cheap house starts at 400k.

Not fun.

More not fun:

A census carried out in 1954 revealed that 49,148 families were living in huts and sheds, while by the end of 1972, more than 1.5 million people in the major cities [of Australia] were living in flats and houses that were not connected to a complete sewerage reticulation system.

The continued housing bubble for a bit longer is probably worth the cost of having all the rest of our modern wealth.

 

[Kai Dracon]

I hate the luxury argument. It says to me that poor people aren't allowed any entertainment. Video games can be had for cheap (like you said) and can provide a great return on money spent vs time spent (in fact it can be cheap as fuck, cheaper than anything else really) and life fucking sucks when you just work and sleep.

Like what the fuck else are you going to do with your miserable life but sit on a chair in a dusty room twiddling your fingers until your next shift happens?

The luxury argument seems based partly in a culturally inherited notion that anything "pleasurable" in life must be explicitly earned. It compliments a rapaciously capitalistic society very well. In reality we're living in a country full of so much material surplus it's kind of astounding. Stores -throw away- televisions, game systems, software, CDs, books, and toys. Not to mention food and clothing. We have factories pumping out more appliances per day than get sold at stores. It doesn't help that we're swamped by psychologically manipulative marketing which instills us with the drive to earn money to spend it on things we "deserve" for (and only because of) our hard labor.

Basic human needs, like having something to do other than breaking rocks and staring at a wall when not breaking rocks, have been put aside in favor of the structure society has created and pretends is a real thing existing outside human headgames, like oxygen and carbon.

Plus many people are just unaware of changing circumstances. Like how many still see internet access as a pure time-wasting luxury when it has in fact become necessary to function in society and even to get work and hold down jobs.

 

[Dead Man]

More not fun:

The continued housing bubble for a bit longer is probably worth the cost of having all the rest of our modern wealth.

Maybe, but as I said, it is more about the assertion that nothing was better then. Some things were.

And sadly, there are still plenty of indigenous families for whom a hut or shed is still their primary dwelling. Shit is not that much better if you consider the actual average living conditions relative to what is considered essential.

The simple march of time is not really something I consider relevant when looking at which society has benefits structurally or downsides structurally. It's like saying society in the 50's was worse because it had no internet. It is not a structural fault of the society. Racism, lack of access to opportunities for underprivileged people, housing affordability, these are structural issues and the things I am talking about when I say some things are better and some things are worse.

It's about things that could have been changed then or that needed time. Racism could have been addressed, sewerage could have been increased, but a larger pool of money is simply an artefact of time.

If that makes any sense at all? I did not get enough sleep last night so it may well be gibberish

Also, it's not really a housing bubble at this point. Negative gearing and the price boom during the 90's have basically locked out large segments of the population. Property prices are flattening, but not fast enough for wages to catch up for a very long time.

 

[benjipwns]

You said you wanted to go back fifty years, you can't go back with modern wealth implanted into that era, so you do have to give up the internet, cell phones, health care advances, etc.

It's better, on average, to live now than at any other point in history. Communications alone make most of us wealthier than the 1% of 1964. The richest man in the world in 1964 couldn't view cat memes in the middle of the desert let alone have his ulcer's properly treated.

 

[Dead Man]

You said you wanted to go back fifty years, you can't go back with modern wealth implanted into that era, so you do have to give up the internet, cell phones, health care advances, etc.

It's better, on average, to live now than at any other point in history. Communications alone make most of us wealthier than the 1% of 1964. The richest man in the world in 1964 couldn't view cat memes in the middle of the desert let alone have his ulcer's properly treated.

I said I might, and yeah, that stuff would all be gone, but I wasn't looking at that, I was looking at structural things. Otherwise every day is better than the last, woo!! Tell that to people working 3 jobs to feed their kids because real wages have not grown.

Although cat memes are an important thing that I would be loathe to give up.

I would probably trade all the internets for people being guaranteed a living wage though. I just don't care that much about the march of time advances when comparing societies. Take the society 50 years ago, advance it in time 50 years, boom, all the technology and wealth increases and less inequality in wages.

And really, you seem hung up on an obviously (I thought) hyperbolic suggestion that I may go back in time. Get over it. It's not possible, I wouldn't do it, the point was to illustrate that some things were better.

I know you think everything is better now, but it ain't from where I sit. My parent bought their first house for twice the average annual wage. That house is now valued at about 5 times the average annual wage. It is not universally better.

Of course it is better on average, the point is that it is not better in every way as Gates was saying.

 

[shakin_haitian]

$1.8B - social security - medicare

or

Unemployment + SSI + Temporary Assistance for Needy Families + SNAP + School Lunches + EITC + Child tax credit + Medicaid + Childrens Health Insurance Program

Medicare and SS are earned benefits that people pay into their entire lives. That's the only way to get that bullshit 700 billion dollar number, pretending benefits are welfare.

 

[fader]

#livingthehighlife

fuck that brought back memories

 

[benjipwns]

Tell that to people working 3 jobs to feed their kids because real wages have not grown.

Should I tell that to the ones now or the ones vastly poorer in 1964?

I would probably trade all the internets for people being guaranteed a living wage though.

What good is a wage if there's nothing worth buying?

I just don't care that much about the march of time advances when comparing societies. Take the society 50 years ago, advance it in time 50 years, boom, all the technology and wealth increases and less inequality in wages.

But you can't do that. The wealth of society is dependent on the past. We're all standing on the shoulders of giants.

You can't take a punch card operator from 1964, transport him to today and expect him to keep his relative level of wealth or income. The wealth he created in that entire year is created every millisecond these days.

 

[mustafa]

Medicare and SS are earned benefits that people pay into their entire lives. That's the only way to get that bullshit 700 billion dollar number, pretending benefits are welfare.

(a) maybe medicare. Social security probably not

(b) neither medicare nor social security are included in the $700B. If we included both of those it would be $1.8B which is roughly half the budget.

 

[benjipwns]

Social Security and Medicare pay out more than they have accrued. And you don't have a right to either one, the government can change the terms at any time or even eliminate the benefits.

 

[Dryk]

The entire idea is a pipe dream. I've seen the idea posted here more than a few times that people shouldn't have to work, we shouldn't have money, etc. and it's ridiculous and will never happen. It's like the kind of shit a pothead would think about while he's sitting on the couch trying to contemplate paying his bills without having to getting a job.

The amount of people you need to do a job is shrinking, and the number of people that need a job is growing. It's inevitable unless you want to just throw the chaff in an oven to save money/space. People aren't going to like it but eventually they're going to have to support people that are no longer capable of support themselves.

 

[shakin_haitian]

Social Security and Medicare pay out more than they have accrued. And you don't have a right to either one, the government can change the terms at any time or even eliminate the benefits.

For SS, only if you pretend intragovernmental lending from SS is an expense, maybe.

Who's talking about rights?

700 billion requires SS and Medicare. Otherwise you're saying those programs are something like 20% of the budget, which is flat out false.

 

[zero shift]

What good is a wage if there's nothing worth buying.

I have to disagree with this. Money can buy education, wealth, security, entertainment and travel. I agree with your point but let's not get crazy. I'd much rather be financially secure and be able to travel and get a good education without a TV or computer than be poor today.there is more to the world than electronics as beneficial as they can be. Luckily this isn't a scenario most of us have to imagine.

 

[benjipwns]

For SS, only if you pretend intragovernmental lending from SS is an expense, maybe.

No, I don't consider I.O.U.'s in a file cabinet to be actual assets. Future Social Security benefits will be paid by future taxes.

I have to disagree with this. Money can buy education, wealth, security, entertainment and travel. I agree with your point but let's not get crazy. I'd much rather be financially secure and be able to travel and get a good education without a TV or computer than be poor today.there is more to the world than electronics as beneficial as they can be. Luckily this isn't a scenario most of us have to imagine.

But technology and electronics contributes to those things you'd much rather do. You can't travel easier in 1964 than today, air travel has massively democratized for one thing. There is greater access to education today than at any other time in world history. People weren't anymore financially secure in 1964, they just had less to lose.

I give you 300% of the average standard of living in 1964 including any excess for spending money and and you'll run out of things to buy in 1964 before you reach the standard of living today at 75%.

 

[shakin_haitian]

No, I don't consider I.O.U.'s in a file cabinet to be actual assets. Future Social Security benefits will be paid by future taxes.

Well you've demolished a massive chunk of the economy. What do you consider loans, credit cards, mortgages, bonds, and all that to be? Funny money?

 

[benjipwns]

How are those mortgage holdings paying back lately?

 

[shakin_haitian]

How are those mortgage holdings paying back lately?

Pretty well. This isn't 2009.

 

[See You Next Wednesday]

Although Fox News is utter bullshit - it is far better to be "impoverished" in modern day America than nearly anywhere/anytime else. Even raised on public assistance in Reagan's America in an urban area, my family had food on the table and a roof over our heads. Even with Dad working at Burger King and Mom working at Dayton's - we knew we would be sleeping under a bridge.

Being poor in America is better than being poor in Honduras. That settles that!
AMERICA FUCK YEAH!

Fyi those public assistance programs were created from decades of progress, Reagan was the first to slowly start to dismantle them.
Bush, Clinton & Bush continued his perilous plight.

Being poor now is probably harder than being poor in the '80s.

 

[benjipwns]

Fyi those public assistance programs were created from decades of progress, Reagan was the first to slowly start to dismantle them.
Bush, Clinton & Bush continued his perilous plight.

 

[zero shift]

But technology and electronics contributes to those things you'd much rather do. You can't travel easier in 1964 than today, air travel has massively democratized for one thing. There is greater access to education today than at any other time in world history. People weren't anymore financially secure in 1964, they just had less to lose.

I give you 300% of the average standard of living in 1964 including any excess for spending money and and you'll run out of things to buy in 1964 before you reach the standard of living today at 75%.

So what if air travel has democratized, I could still travel back then. When I said education I meant college and degrees. Also less to lose? They had just as much to lose back then compared to now, their house, food, and livelihood,

 

[benjipwns]

Less than 20% of people in 1964 had ever flown, even once. The number of vehicles owned per 1000 people has doubled since the 1960s. Yeah, you could have traveled if you were rich enough but still not as easily as a regular joe can today.

A higher percentage of the population, especially women, have attended college AND acquired degrees today than ever before. Only 10-15% of Americans owned stock in the 1960s.

 

[Aylinato]

Less than 20% of people in 1964 had ever flown, even once. The number of vehicles owned per 1000 people has doubled since the 1960s. Yeah, you could have traveled if you were rich enough but still not as easily as a regular joe can today.

A higher percentage of the population, especially women, have attended college AND acquired degrees today than ever before. Only 10-15% of Americans owned stock in the 1960s.

Come live in Detroit for an entire year in a poor area. Then get back to me about how well off poor people are in the US.

 

[benjipwns]

Come live in Detroit for an entire year in a poor area. Then get back to me about how well off poor people are in the US.

Why would I want to do that again? (Well, Flint.)

If you don't think we're better off today and have more access to more wealth than we were and did in 1964 then I don't know what to tell you.

 

[Aylinato]

Why would I want to do that again? (Well, Flint.)

If you don't think we're better off today and have more access to more wealth than we were and did in 1964 then I don't know what to tell you.

Come to a poor area of Detroit, buy a house, live there for a year, and then tell me that poor people are doing good for themselves and able to get themselves out of poverty with no help.

 

[benjipwns]

Come to a poor area of Detroit, buy a house, live there for a year, and then tell me that poor people are doing good for themselves and able to get themselves out of poverty with no help.

Where did I tell anyone any of that?

I was contesting the notion that things aren't better and everyone isn't vastly wealthier than 1964. Hell, I think even Black Bottom had already been crushed by then so there's not even that to go back to.

 

[Dryk]

Not CPI weighted? Useless

EDIT: I produced that graph, will upload when I get the chance

 

[benjipwns]

It's in constant dollars?

 

[tekumseh]

They're was some idiot on Chris Hayes' show tonight from Americans for Prosperity trying to argue that 133% of the poverty level in some states, like Pennsylvania, adds up to 94,000 odd dollars. Looking it up, she's right, but only if your living in a house with 18 children. Jesus...

 

[zero shift]

Less than 20% of people in 1964 had ever flown, even once.

Of course not, they just started being modernized. Most people traveled via ships, cars, or buses. Are you saying that you could not leave your surrounding area unless you were rich? Ridiculous. How did things like the Great Migration happen then.

The number of vehicles owned per 1000 people has doubled since the 1960s. Yeah, you could have traveled if you were rich enough but still not as easily as a regular joe can today.

Most people lived in cities as well as public transportation being more common. Cars were actually cheaper then as was gas.

A higher percentage of the population, especially women, have attended college AND acquired degrees today than ever before.

What does this have to do with education costs?

Only 10-15% of Americans owned stock in the 1960s.

And?

 

[biggersmaller]

Being poor in America is better than being poor in Honduras. That settles that!
AMERICA FUCK YEAH!

Fyi those public assistance programs were created from decades of progress, Reagan was the first to slowly start to dismantle them.
Bush, Clinton & Bush continued his perilous plight.

Being poor now is probably harder than being poor in the '80s.

It doesn't settle anything, however it's a point that is worth considering to scale back some of the rhetoric.

Another rant:

Liberals demand a constant increase in spending to assist the underprivileged? Sure! However, Democrats demand a constant increase in spending to keep unemployment down. The bloated bureaucratic government agencies and federally funded non-profits whose mission is to serve these populations are ever growing and are hysterically overlapping in their function. Yet, life for those they serve isn't improving given the dollars currently spent. In the State of Minnesota where I live, serving the underprivileged is a booming industry. Just talk to my parents, the way we got out of poverty was my Dad got a job at the county and my mother at a non-profit doing related work. Sure, someone in non-profit only makes $40,000 to $60,000 - -but after benefits and required support infrastructure - each employee costs the taxpayer $60,000 to $100,000.

Mother Jones doesn't include such spending in their stats and Fox News will horribly manipulate the same stats in the opposite direction. Either way, think what those dollars could have done to directly help someone in need. Maybe help them through school. Maybe help them start a business. If giving someone a job is the solution - let's at-least be honest with ourselves and not succumb to such bullshit stats while instead expecting a modicom of efficient.

If I were running for office, my solution would be to significantly increase taxes on the rich to give to the poor, but also eliminate about 50% of non-profit and related government agency spending slowly over 15 years.

 

[Opiate]

Less than 20% of people in 1964 had ever flown, even once. The number of vehicles owned per 1000 people has doubled since the 1960s. Yeah, you could have traveled if you were rich enough but still not as easily as a regular joe can today.

A higher percentage of the population, especially women, have attended college AND acquired degrees today than ever before. Only 10-15% of Americans owned stock in the 1960s.

Definitely true, in absolute terms, we are better off now than we were in the 1950s. You could go a bit farther back, and point out that most poverty stricken people today are better off than wealthy people from the 1900s (electricity, refrigeration, etc.) Also a valid point.

This matters, certainly, but, what seems to actually matter most is relative poverty; relatively speaking, poor people and rich people today have a great divide than has been seen in a very long time in the US.

 

[biggersmaller]

Definitely true, in absolute terms, we are better off now than we were in the 1950s. You could go a bit farther back, and point out that most poverty stricken people today are better off than wealthy people from the 1900s (electricity, refrigeration, etc.) Also a valid point.

None of this matters very much, though. What seems to actually matter is relative poverty; relatively speaking, poor people and rich people today have a great divide than ever.

I would argue that the conditions in-which our poor live matters much more than their relative total wealth compared to those at the very top. If all the super rich suddenly lost their money in foreign investments and greatly narrow the gap, but there was increase in families sleeping under bridges - I would be more concerned of that occurrence than if the opposite were to happen.

 

[Opiate]

I would argue that the conditions in-which our poor live matters much more than their relative total wealth compared to those at the very top. If all the super rich suddenly lost their money in foreign investments and greatly narrow the gap, but there was increase in families sleeping under bridges - I would be more concerned of that occurrence than if the opposite were to happen.

Yes, the absolute levels of poverty seem to matter more at the extreme, i.e., when poor people are dying in the streets of crime or cold or hunger. If those problems are primarily taken care of, however, relative concerns seem to be dominant.

 

[benjipwns]

Relative poverty will always exist, it can't be eliminated. To think that things aren't better off because some peoples lives are only 10% better and other peoples lives are 3000% better is strange.

 

[johnny956]

This is undeniably false.

In 2011, we spent $78B on the SNAP program alone (source: http://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/attachments/04-19-SNAP.pdf). With total spending of $3.6T in 2011 (source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011_United_States_federal_budget), that's 2.2% of the federal budget.

So, if we consider food stamps to be the only welfare program (which is an unbelievable stretch), the number presented by mother jones is barely 1/5 of the size of the actual number.

Mother Jones' own site cites a study in a different article that shows that we spend roughly $1.8B per year on welfare programs (http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2012/02/how-much-do-we-spend-nonworking-poor). Taking out social security and medicare, which I would rather not debate even though they technically are wealth transfers, we are talking about roughly $700B, which would be about 20% of the federal budget.

tl;dr = mother jones says mother jones is wrong by more than a a factor of 10, possibly a factor of 100 depending on how you define a welfare program. Good mythbusting.

Thank you for doing the research I knew number they were quoting was complete crap and something seemed up. Curious how they got that number.

 

[johnny956]

Come to a poor area of Detroit, buy a house, live there for a year, and then tell me that poor people are doing good for themselves and able to get themselves out of poverty with no help.

I would argue poverty was worse in the 50's though. Electricity wasn't even completely built out yet in the 50's (rural areas for example). Food stamps didn't start until the 60's. Section 8 housing while still a mess is much better then the projects they did back then. I'm not saying poverty is easy or enjoyable but if you compared to the past its vastly better to live in poverty now then say in 1950.

 

[The Technomancer]

Relative poverty will always exist, it can't be eliminated. To think that things aren't better off because some peoples lives are only 10% better and other peoples lives are 3000% better is strange.

But by the same token it seems disingenuous to then point to that 10% improvement and say "see, things got better! There's no reason to complain".

 

[benjipwns]

But by the same token it seems disingenuous to then point to that 10% improvement and say "see, things got better! There's no reason to complain".

But I never said that. (Nor did Gates in the quote.) There's always reason to complain about anything.