You and the "boyz" should take a course in capitalism you might learn a lot.
Nonsense! I don't know anything, and I don't need to. I have the gov't to look after me and take care of everything including public transportation. Long live socialism!
Wow, congratulations... You figured out people are naturally greedy.
Except that capitalism rarely works that way. A lot of success in our society has more to do with knowing the right people, or being in the right place at the right time. I know plenty of people who have busted their butts and are still poor. I personally had to take jobs at $5 an hour at times because that's all I could get. Show me a system where the rewards really are directly proportional to the effort and I'll sign up. The problem with capitalism is that the rewards are proportional to the demand for whatever it is you're selling. If nobody wants it, or someone copies it, you're screwed. The demand for things which require more effort to create isn't necessarily higher than for things which require less effort. Britney Spears is a case in point. Nothing she's done is really of any significant value or essential in any way to society, yet she gets millions a year. It could easily be argued that anyone here creates things of more benefit to society than Britney Spears, yet nobody here even earns close to what she does. And as for effort, exactly how much effort could anyone who's only 25 have put into their life? So capitalism neither rewards effort nor education. Maybe on average there's a slight correlation between one's wealth and the effort one puts into life, but that's about it. Many of the homeless and other apparent slackers are people who tried their darnest, then finally gave up in disgust when nothing they did work. I personally have a long string of failed projects which have nothing to do with lack of effort, and everything to do with fickle customers, unfair competition, intellectual property infringement, etc. If I wasn't living with my mom, I'd probably be among the ranks of the homeless. That's how bad things are.
Some measure of socialism is needed simply to make sure those who were plain unlucky, and not lazy or uneducated, get a portion of the benefits of those who were unfairly lucky, such as Britney Spears or any number of other no talent celebrities. This is why we have public housing and public transportation. Nobody expects to live large on the public dole. However, I don't think it's fair either if a person who can only get a minimum wage job can't get to work because no public transportation exists where they live. By the same token, I remain opposed to subsidizing people for having more babies, and also to most plans for socialized medicine. Free medical care doesn't necessarily equate to better health. In fact, the opposite can be argued. If a person knows they'll have large medical bills if they don't take decent care of themselves that's an incentive to stay healthy. If medical care is free, my guess is more will neglect their health while expecting the free clinics to fix everything. Case in point-many poor areas where the residents have medicaid also have the heaviest instances of obesity, diabetes, smoking, alcoholism, and drug abuse.
I'm not sure that's entirely true. I saw something on TV where fossil evidence indicated early man taking care of their elderly who were in pretty bad shape. Now these elderly were no longer of much survival value to the group. In fact, from a strictly selfish perspective the group would have been better off overall just letting them die, but they chose instead to care for them. This was a selfless act at a time when necessities were often scarce, never mind luxuries. I think as a social animal humans need the group, and so often decisions get made which may not be in the best interests of those making them, but instead benefit the group. Or put another way, sometimes a decision favoring the group may seem to not benefit you, but in the end it does. Maybe the tribal elders offered wisdom crucial for survival. A more relevant case in point to illustrate this-you pay $100 a year extra taxes to fund a new public transportation system which you never use because you drive. At first you're unhappy about it. However, the new system allows your company to attract workers who otherwise couldn't afford to get there, your company grows, and next year you get a $2000 raise you otherwise wouldn't have gotten as a result. Everyone wins here even though at first it didn't seem that way.
I actually notice the extra tire drag while cycling over recently paved asphalt roads. It takes a few weeks for the asphalt to cure enough so that the tire drag becomes "normal". I do notice even less tire drag on the few local roads which are made of concrete. As a cyclist the main downside to concrete roads would be road rash. It can get bad enough on asphalt. Concrete would be literally like sliding on sandpaper.
So long as we have a society of mostly morons, things like that will unfortunately be in demand. I guess that's really the heart of the problem. It doesn't take effort or brains to do something which appeals to the masses since they are both fickle and mostly illogical. It's a matter of happening to chance on whatever stupid thing might start another fad, and that really is blind luck.
You've been a lot luckier than you realize compared to many of the people here. Although Merc seems to have the stars lined up against him I'm probably a close second. I don't think udaman has had much luck lately, either, come to think of it.
Let's try another angle here:
I actually rather like the idea. Once we get rid of copyrights the RIAA and MPAA will disappear. Hopefully all the money will go directly to the artists. I don't mind artists profiting directly off their work. What really annoys me are the bunch of parasites (executives, agents, lawyers) who profit off the artists. That's really why CDs cost as much as they do.
When left to the devices of private industry, I think we can all agree that we lose a lot of diversity. Whatever doesn't sell today gets dropped. What does sell gets copied ad infinitum. We need creative people to do whatever it is they do best without the worry of having to have a day job doing something they can't stand just to get by.
After all, I can't just advocate supporting development of only the things which are important to me personally, like LEDs.
Not scared. I just wouldn't gain enough from it to make it worth the risk, probably still rather take a boat if it came down to it. Remember that I don't drive so that means I have no way of getting to a lot of airports. Besides, not much you can do in the way of world travel on my income. The plane trip to China would be about 3 months of my total income for me, more like a year of my disposible income. Remember how I mulled over even spending a lousy $500 to fix my bikes?
Sorry about that. I've been preoccupied lately with other things. I'll get to it.
You're both right and wrong. Sure, most homeless have many social problems which I don't. There are a few who don't and just reached an unfortunate stage where they're unable to earn enough to support themselves for whatever reason. That would really be my problem. I have CTS so full-time work is out. At best, assuming that I get all the work I can physically handle at my normal rates, I can perhaps break $20K a year. It hasn't happened yet, but it's possible (10 hours a week at maybe $40 an hour). Still, $20K a year isn't enough to make it here. Figure a single person needs closer to $75K before taxes just for a modest apartment. The only way to get by with less is if you own a house free and clear like my mom. In that case $15K or 20K might cut it, barely. But you need about $600K to buy the house in the first place. I'm not even one-sixth of the way there. Only two ways for me to make things better at this point-try to get more work up to the constraints of what I can physically handle (roughly 10 hours a week average), or do something where I can bill more per hour (I need richer clients for that). Lately I'm also unfortunately tied up trying to organize/sell all my late father's hobby crap so work has to take a back seat.
How do you feel about distributism? I think it combines the best aspects of socialism and capitalism. Give someone the physical means to earn a living, and then let them take it from there.
First off, relocation is out of the question. I know myself well enough to know I couldn't stand living anywhere but a large city. I went to a college in NJ. After 3 semesters I stopped sleeping there and started commuting because I just couldn't take the boredom of being in a small town any more. I can't change that. Furthermore, I absolutely would hate living in a place where I'm wedded to an automobile. They're expensive, noisy, smelly, finicky, dangerous pieces of machinery. I get car sick on anything but the shortest rides, so to me they don't even register on a list of transportation options. To me it seems totally unnatural to not be able to walk to most places. I remember once on a business trip to Virginia trying to go for a walk from my hotel. I never felt so isolated in my life. The whole place was designed for the convenience of cars, not people. I don't know how people can live in a place like that. The adjustment is just something I can't make. I also like to give myself some chance of maybe eventually hooking up with someone. This means living in a place where the numbers game is in my favor. Small towns are out then. Besides, last I checked relocating would run me something like $50,000 between moving expenses and setting up a new place. That means probably five years or more after counting living expenses to have a chance of breaking even. I'd be better off taking that same $50,000 and just investing it.
I use those words because in many cases I've been there, done that, and for me personally it just wasn't possible. I tried living in a small town for those three semesters. The boredom and ensuing depression because of the sameness was more than I could handle. I was actually suicidal by the time I decided I couldn't do it any more. Ditto for my times of employment. The only thing sustainable for me long-term has been self-employment. I never had a job where I lasted more than about two years. By then I was so bored to tears I had to leave for my own sanity. My only real complaint now isn't about my work situation, it's about my home situation. My dad left us a legacy of useless hobby crap which clutters our lives but is worth too much to just throw away. It'll be some years before it's all gone. Until then, my life, both professional and personal, is pretty much on hold. I haven't even had any friends over for the last six months.
I neither expect nor want handouts, either. Even in my home situation I probably do enough home repairs to cover the extra electric and food I consume, so I don't consider that a handout. Like my mom says, most of the home expenses would be the same with or without me so it makes no difference. We supported my brother for over a year while he was saving to get a house so I'm not the only one on the receiving end. If more families helped each other like this, there wouldn't be a need for state-sponsored welfare.
Yes, I do. Speaking from experience there's a world of difference between working for someone else and working for yourself. As an employee I'm lazy, couldn't care less about developing my skills, and in general do barely what it necessary to keep from getting fired. I arrive late and leave early. As my own boss, I go the extra mile, learn what I need to, have a completely different attitude. I'm not saying the opportunity to be self-sufficient would make all lazy people productive, but I dare say that many would have a completely different attitude once they were in charge. I've pushed myself way harder at times than I ever would working for someone else. Let's face it, when your boss gets most of the money and all you get is a lousy $8 or $10 an hour, what incentive is there to really kill yourself or go the extra mile? Some vague promise of maybe a quarter an hour raise or a promotion where they give you a title? Or maybe a stupid employee of the month plaque? I'm convinced that being lazy sometimes is actually a survival mechanism to conserve energy at times when the return on your effort isn't worthwhile. Unfortunately, even though we purportedly say we reward productivity, we've set up much of our society in a manner where being lazy probably makes more sense. The hourly or salaried employee situation is really the best example I can think of. Paying people by their production has always made much more sense. The amount of wasted time I've seen in large corporations is incredible. The majority of times people could do their jobs in 20 hours instead of 40. I bet if you told people they could leave early once their work was done the trips to the water cooler would end.
Well, not quite universally, but almost. I've pretty much failed to see the whole appeal of the car culture myself. Those idealistic car commercials with people driving on an empty road about as lame as it gets. The reality is closer to perpetual traffic jams, nauseating fumes, road rage, and idiot drivers. And all these exoticars? Exactly where is someone supposed to drive something which goes 200 mph? Why even bother buying such a car at all given the reality of low speed limits, traffic cops, and road congestion? As Mr. Spock might have said, "Illogical, Jim. Totally illogical".
What happens when going over the potholes and driveways, or does it just sit in the garage? 
