Wealth Inequality in America: Viral Video

[MysticSang'ha]

Originally Posted by Revoltingest

I'm sure you question your own sanity at times.
But ya know, there are people who only work 50 hour weeks & they get a paycheck every 2 weeks.
Yes, it's true!

Announcement: We broke into profit in February - 7 months after opening our doors. I bought myself a salad to celebrate, and it was the best tasting salad I'd had in a long time.

I look forward to the day when I can write myself a paycheck if we continue to hit our numbers.

[Revoltingest]

Originally Posted by MysticSang'ha

Announcement: We broke into profit in February - 7 months after opening our doors. I bought myself a salad to celebrate, and it was the best tasting salad I'd had in a long time.
I look forward to the day when I can write myself a paycheck if we continue to hit our numbers.

If things get rough, you could just stop paying the dancers.
(They're used to that, I hear.)

Don't hit!
Just kidding!

[Alceste]

Originally Posted by Kilgore Trout

I'll dress up like a rich businessman and munificently allow you to admire my god-like superiority and worship my aura of moral perfection.

Then you'll rob us blind with "service charges", steal our house and stash the spoils in the the Caymans to avoid funding the grant programs that support us with your taxes.

I'm onto you!

[Kilgore Trout]

Originally Posted by Alceste

Then you'll rob us blind with "service charges", steal our house and stash the spoils in the the Caymans to avoid funding the grant programs that support us with your taxes.

I'm onto you!

But here, I give you FOXNEWS! It will gradually teach you to rabidly stand up for me, and stand against your own interests, through the clever and consistent use of shameless lying and IQ-draining rhetoric.

[Dirty Penguin]

Originally Posted by MysticSang'ha

Announcement: We broke into profit in February - 7 months after opening our doors. I bought myself a salad to celebrate, and it was the best tasting salad I'd had in a long time.

I look forward to the day when I can write myself a paycheck if we continue to hit our numbers.

If you claim that salad as a business expense you might be able to write it off on your taxes....

[MysticSang'ha]

Originally Posted by Dirty Penguin

If you claim that salad as a business expense you might be able to write it off on your taxes....

Well, I was on my way from a supply run to a company rehearsal...

[Alceste]

Originally Posted by Kilgore Trout

But here, I give you FOXNEWS! It will gradually teach you to rabidly stand up for me, and stand against your own interests, through the clever and consistent use of shameless lying and IQ-draining rhetoric.

Intelligence... dropping... can't fight it.... aaaaargh...

Entitlement mentality! Job creators! Tax is theft! Big government! Abortion is murder! Socialism everywhere! Obama's birth certificate! Bluuuuurgh!

Excuse me, I think I need to go to church now to be told what to do about my newfound political anxieties.

[MysticSang'ha]

Originally Posted by Revoltingest

If things get rough, you could just stop paying the dancers.
(They're used to that, I hear.)

Don't hit!
Just kidding!

LOL. I knew you were kidding.

[Reptillian]

Originally Posted by Revoltingest

Wait...I thought the direction of conversation was predicated on non-constitutional actions (deporting rich folk).

Certainly not. There's some sound philosophical reasoning and historical precedence (these ideas work) behind our constitution.

Originally Posted by Revoltingest

Not really. The permanently poor lack drive & skills to bootstrap themselves into productive membership in a highly technological society.
They would be survived by the non-poor, ie, useful citizens. But of course, there would be a continuous influx of useless people, so the
deportation would be an ongoing program.

I agree that lifting themselves up by their own bootstraps would require an imaginary tensile strength and is impossible by Newtonian standards. Who's to say that the poor are "useless" perhaps we just need to restructure our society a bit. I mean, if convicts can make license plates and pick up roadside trash; then surely the very poor have latent skills which can be utilized. Free (*gasp* socialized) higher education is one way in which our society could improve. In the modern "Information Age" I have a hard time believing that this couldn't be accomplished easily for a very small price. Hell, if we can waste trillions killing brown people in Iraqighanistan, then we can spend a couple billion to give the poor a free education and a chance at upward mobility.

Originally Posted by Revoltingest

Feudal? Hah! No, we must abandon socialism which encourages sloth & reliance on government largess.

Capitalism is very feudal! What are CEO's, supervisors, and bosses but the modern equivalent of land owners, knights, and noblemen? Although I admit that humans, (since they're great apes) naturally seem to prefer a kind of hierarchical social structure with prominent social members and authority figures.

Do the bees and ants complain about the evils of socialism? Do the cells composing your entity complain that communism is crushing them? They're part of something greater than themselves and by cooperating they accomplish more than any individual could ever hope to. I'm not advocating that we become complete socialists or communists, just that we find avenues in which these world views improve our quality of life. Capitalism is to feudalism as communism is to democracy...the problem I think is that most communist societies lack a system of economic checks and balances, and thus result in dictatorships and tyranny.

(I think biology and statistical mechanics could have some interesting things to say about economic theory...I'm a physicist by training, but an interdisciplinary scientist at heart)

Originally Posted by Revoltingest

There is merit in that. But we see many governmental barriers to poor folk entering the business world, eg, regulatory barriers to entry,
incomprehensible regulation, subsidies which punish them for boosting their income. Tis as though bureaucrats & politicians want people
to be either an employee or on the dole. The poor need more opportunity & less punishment by government.

That's another problem with innate human thinking. We lump things into categories, then relate those categories. Our government needs to embrace shades of gray. Perhaps we need to stop thinking so globally and start thinking locally.

[dust1n]

Originally Posted by Revoltingest

You run with a strange crowd. Of all the multi-millionaires I personally know, all got there by smarts, hard work & risk taking.

:shrugg:

I guess we can conclude then that...

But in all seriousness, this will not be reconciled. You're a socialist (since you post in the Socialist DIR).
And I'm a capitalist. We have very different goals for society.

BTW, I don't actually advocate running rich people out of the country.