The OCCUPY Movement

[Hokahey]

Private schools don't do best because of the market, they do generally do better because the student-to-teacher ratio is lower.

I'm sure that's a contributing factor. But a school funded by private dollars, a business if you will, will fail if it does not deliver a desired product.

That's not a problem of federal government overstepping, that's a problem of disparity in the size of states foisting stupid decisions on the rest of the country.

That's exactly what it is.

Those schools are mandated and essentially have no choice in the text books they buy.

Even if the federal government were entirely eliminated, it would probably still be cheaper to buy the same textbooks Texas buys, rather than a different one only New Hampshire wants. That's a really idiotic consequence of the market dictating education policy.

Well, we know that's bullshit because private schools would use the same curriculum as public schools if it wasn't.

[Hokahey]

It's got nothing to do with whether you have children. Taxes are about public goods, not personal goods. You may have never had a fire in your house, or even known anyone who has (I sure haven't), but by your logic, you shouldn't have to pay for fire services because you've never had to use them, and probably never will.

Bad logic. Fire services serve public spaces and your personal property. If you have no children and want to opt out of paying for other people's kids to use those services you should be able to.

If you want 100% natural right, then if I'm bigger than you, I can just kill you and take your stuff.

Nonsense. Wow, really? I want the right to keep my property. Way to twist it.

But to complain about the fact that your taxes pay for something you don't use is ludicrous, even if the amount is, indeed, too high.

What are you talking about?

I do find it kind of amusing, though, that Hoka's Libertarianism is totally fine with such exorbitant taxation at the local level...

You're making some serious jumps in logic in this thread. Because I want more things managed at the local level means I'm fine with exorbitant tax rates? Come on man.

[Hype]

It's got nothing to do with whether you have children. Taxes are about public goods, not personal goods. You may have never had a fire in your house, or even known anyone who has (I sure haven't), but by your logic, you shouldn't have to pay for fire services because you've never had to use them, and probably never will.

Bad logic. Fire services serve public spaces and your personal property. If you have no children and want to opt out of paying for other people's kids to use those services you should be able to.

If you want 100% natural right, then if I'm bigger than you, I can just kill you and take your stuff.

Nonsense. Wow, really? I want the right to keep my property. Way to twist it.

But to complain about the fact that your taxes pay for something you don't use is ludicrous, even if the amount is, indeed, too high.

What are you talking about?

I do find it kind of amusing, though, that Hoka's Libertarianism is totally fine with such exorbitant taxation at the local level...

You're making some serious jumps in logic in this thread. Because I want more things managed at the local level means I'm fine with exorbitant tax rates? Come on man.

They're not jumps in logic, they're direct implications of things you've said. The attempt to distinguish emergency services from education is ridiculous -- it's in the public interest to give people the opportunity to be educated -- it's not a priviledge. Society would crumble without it. Denying this is denying 99% of the Liberal tradition that libertarianism is supposed to be a pure form of... As for the thing you called "Nonsense.", it's standard social contract theory... Hobbes, Locke, Rousseau, etc., all agree that the reason social obligations exist is to some extent to prevent the horridness of a state in which it's every man for himself. Obviously Locke and Hobbes disagreed rather sharply about what a state of nature would be like, and thus on the limits of the sovereign... but I'm not talking nonsense, and I'm not confused about this. Your right to keep your property is DERIVED from your ceding natural right to the state. If you didn't do that, then your right to keep your property only extends to your power to keep it from anyone else... So if I'm bigger than you, and there are no laws, I can just take it. But in exchange for the right to have laws against that, you have to forgo other natural liberties so that others might benefit. That's what being human is.

[chaos]

http://boingboing.net/2011/10/15/your-a ... -fair.html

Your ascent to the 1% doesn't mean the system is fair



From Reddit's Cylinsier, a response to Occupy Wall Street critics who argue that because they somehow managed to bootstrap themselves to wealth and privilege, the system is fair and its critics are just sore losers or lazy, greedy fools.

response to the "Not the 99%" pic that gets posted once every 10 seconds [reddit.com]: http://tinyurl.com/3gseaqm

[guysmiley]

[Juana]

That posting is fine but the problem is that some people will never work their asses off no matter if things were equal or not. Yeah the distribution of wealth is fucked but at the same time it is what it is. There are a lot of people in that 1% that have worked their asses off to get where they are as well. Some were born into it and just lucky but others did work to get up there and if they don't want to share their pie they shouldn't have to.

Its a tricky subject in some contexts.

[Hype]

Yeah... screw a common curriculum.

[Hokahey]

http://boingboing.net/2011/10/15/your-a ... -fair.html

Your ascent to the 1% doesn't mean the system is fair



From Reddit's Cylinsier, a response to Occupy Wall Street critics who argue that because they somehow managed to bootstrap themselves to wealth and privilege, the system is fair and its critics are just sore losers or lazy, greedy fools.

response to the "Not the 99%" pic that gets posted once every 10 seconds [reddit.com]: http://tinyurl.com/3gseaqm

I've seen that, of course.

The problem is he doesn't understand why wall street influences government. It's precisely because the government entagles itself in wall street with regulations and our money, so in turn wall street (special interest, etc.) does what they can to push those things in their direction.

Take the money and power from big brother and no one asks big brother for favors.

This is pretty straight forward stuff.

But no. Instead let's take to the street and demand that people give us some of what they have. Where does it end? What about the bottom 10-15%? Should they take to the streets and demand money from the 16-20% because they have more?

Taken to it's logical conclusion none of us are allowed to save our earnings so long as someone else has it worse off than we do. We all must give everything we have, no matter how hard we've worked for it so that everyone can have the same amount, and it should be taken by force by the government. Count me out.

[Pure Method]

I think they are protesting for change, not handouts. Even you agree the system is broken.

I'd be interested to hear your opinion on this, hoka:

http://blogs.reuters.com/great-debate/2 ... ll-street/

[Hokahey]

I think they are protesting for change, not handouts. Even you agree the system is broken.

I've seen signs that say "where's my bailout."

And what change are they asking for? A general "more regulations?" I don't think they have a clue. I think people are just angry with the state of the economy and so they're pointing their fingers at the people they perceive are in charge, while asking the people really in charge to be more in charge. It's bizzare.

I'd be interested to hear your opinion on this, hoka:

http://blogs.reuters.com/great-debate/2 ... ll-street/[/quote]


I couldn't get past this:

In 2008, the routine gambles of Wall Street almost brought down global capitalism

The collapse of the housing market is what triggered the donimos, and I've already gone on and on about why that happened. There has been plenty of shadiness on the part of the banks, but it was a sympton not a cause.

[Artemis]

[Hokahey]

[chaos]

Another disturbing element is that despite the fact that people work hard to get ahead (or have the option) they are still exploited, especially with regard to their retirement.

http://www.amazon.com/Retirement-Heist- ... 1591843332

It's no secret that hundreds of companies have been slashing pensions and health coverage earned by millions of retirees. Employers blame an aging workforce, stock market losses, and spiraling costs- what they call "a perfect storm" of external forces that has forced them to take drastic measures.

But this so-called retirement crisis is no accident. Ellen E. Schultz, award-winning investigative reporter for the Wall Street Journal, reveals how large companies and the retirement industry-benefits consultants, insurance companies, and banks-have all played a huge and hidden role in the death spiral of American pensions and benefits.
A little over a decade ago, most companies had more than enough set aside to pay the benefits earned by two generations of workers, no matter how long they lived. But by exploiting loopholes, ambiguous regulations, and new accounting rules, companies essentially turned their pension plans into piggy banks, tax shelters, and profit centers.

Drawing on original analysis of company data, government filings, internal corporate documents, and confidential memos, Schultz uncovers decades of widespread deception during which employers have exaggerated their retiree burdens while lobbying for government handouts, secretly cutting pensions, tricking employees, and misleading shareholders. She reveals how companies:
* Siphon billions of dollars from their pension plans to finance downsizings and sell the assets in merger deals
* Overstate the burden of rank-and-file retiree obligations to justify benefits cuts while simultaneously using the savings to inflate executive pay and pensions
* Hide their growing executive pension liabilities, which at some companies now exceed the liabilities for the regular pension plans
* Purchase billions of dollars of life insurance on workers and use the policies as informal executive pension funds. When the insured workers and retirees die, the company collects tax-free death benefits
*Preemptively sue retirees after cutting retiree health benefits and use other legal strategies to erode their legal protections.

Though the focus is on large companies-which drive the legislative agenda-the same games are being played at smaller companies, non-profits, public pensions plans and retirement systems overseas. Nor is this a partisan issue: employees of all political persuasions and income levels-from managers to miners, pro- football players to pilots-have been slammed.

Retirement Heist is a scathing and urgent expose of one of the most critical and least understood crises of our time.

I just checked this out of the library today, so I'll comment on it later.

[creep]

It's no secret that hundreds of companies have been slashing pensions

what jobs in the public sector still have pensions?

[chaos]

It's no secret that hundreds of companies have been slashing pensions

what jobs in the public sector still have pensions?

Although the pensions are small, pensions still exist for federal and state employees. I believe most states still offer employees of public school/universities small pensions. There are also pensions for most policemen and firemen. In the northeast, many public sector jobs still have pensions.

The main focus of the book, however, is on jobs in the private sector. The author starts with GE, Verizon, and IBM.

[creep]

It's no secret that hundreds of companies have been slashing pensions

what jobs in the public sector still have pensions?

Although the pensions are small, pensions still exist for federal and state employees. I believe most states still offer employees of public school/universities small pensions. There are also pensions for most policemen and firemen. In the northeast, many public sector jobs still have pensions.

The main focus of the book, however, is on jobs in the private sector. The author starts with GE, Verizon, and IBM.

i meant to say private sector not public.

[chaos]

It's no secret that hundreds of companies have been slashing pensions

what jobs in the public sector still have pensions?

Although the pensions are small, pensions still exist for federal and state employees. I believe most states still offer employees of public school/universities small pensions. There are also pensions for most policemen and firemen. In the northeast, many public sector jobs still have pensions.

The main focus of the book, however, is on jobs in the private sector. The author starts with GE, Verizon, and IBM.

i meant to say private sector not public.

Well, there are few private sector pensions for current employees. The issue is the cutting of benefits owed to to retirees.

[creep]

It's no secret that hundreds of companies have been slashing pensions

what jobs in the public sector still have pensions?

Although the pensions are small, pensions still exist for federal and state employees. I believe most states still offer employees of public school/universities small pensions. There are also pensions for most policemen and firemen. In the northeast, many public sector jobs still have pensions.

The main focus of the book, however, is on jobs in the private sector. The author starts with GE, Verizon, and IBM.

i meant to say private sector not public.

Well, there are few private sector pensions for current employees. The issue is the cutting of benefits owed to to retirees.

i know...i wasn't really commenting on what you posted about the book since i only read the first sentence and thought to myself "who still gets pensions?". i am the wrong person to comment on any article since i have no attention span left and can usually only get through a few lines.

[chaos]

[Romeo]

It's no secret that hundreds of companies have been slashing pensions

what jobs in the public sector still have pensions?

Although the pensions are small, pensions still exist for federal and state employees. I believe most states still offer employees of public school/universities small pensions. There are also pensions for most policemen and firemen. In the northeast, many public sector jobs still have pensions.

The main focus of the book, however, is on jobs in the private sector. The author starts with GE, Verizon, and IBM.

It was the Police pensions that killed my County's economy.
We had a shit load of Police all retire around the same time after a new union contract. It nearly broke the county financially.
The cops around here earn 6 figures with OT

[Jasper]

http://hotchicksofoccupywallstreet.tumblr.com

[creep]

she goes against your "no tattoos" rule.

she is attractive except for the silly earnings and maybe the eyebrows.

[Essence_Smith]

It looks more like bodypaint, but if they were really tats, I'm sure he wouldn't kick her out of the bed...

[Pandemonium]

She's a knock-out. I'd bang that ass so hard, those hubcaps dangling from her ears would sound like Perkins doing a drum solo on a set of garbage cans.

[MYXYLPLYX]

I'd OCCUPY that!