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Re: What Makes an Architecture Bizarre? [message #97992 is a reply to message #97877] Fri, 19 July 2013 15:46   Stephen Sprunk Messages: 2166 Registered: March 2013 Karma: 0 Senior Member On 19-Jul-13 10:27, jmfbahciv wrote: > Stephen Sprunk wrote: >> On 18-Jul-13 09:31, jmfbahciv wrote: >>> Take a look at how the money which the US took in from the auto >>> bailout. They spent it three times over and the original money >>> was borrowed; it didn't come from revenues. >> >> All of the bailout money was borrowed. But that doesn't prove, as >> you have claimed, that Congress spent $3 for every $1 it receives. > > I listened to speeches. The money Congress got back from the auto > makers (which was lower than what was given to them) was spent in one > way by Congress and spent in another way by Obama. That's two. The > third is repaying the original debt. Bah. Congress didn't spend the same money three times; even the above only has them spending it once because the "original debt" hasn't been paid off. And you can't spend money twice anyway; they borrowed the second set of money--and I've already refuted your bogus claims about the spending-to-revenue ratio. The repayment of those loans wasn't revenue anyway, and most of the loans made available were never actually taken in the first place. What _did_ happen was the govt paid UAW to take over the pensions and health insurance for retirees, and nobody expected _that_ money to ever come back. >>> Stephen Sprunk wrote: >>>> On 17-Jul-13 08:16, jmfbahciv wrote: >>>> > Consider the losses created with the S&L crisis in the 80s. >>>> > Have those debts been paid off? >>>> >>>> I thought that the FDIC and Federal Reserve, which are _not_ >>>> part of the federal government, were the ones that bailed out >>>> the FSLIC? >>> >>> Not the FDIC. but even so where did those entites get their >>> money? The US taxpayer. >> >> Wrong. They get it via inflation, which steals wealth from >> everyone who holds dollars. That is a disjoint set from "US >> taxpayers". > > The debts incurred were paid by inflation? I'm on my edge of > understanding finacne and economics now. this sounds so wrong. Usually, the FDIC, NCUA and (former) FSLIC act like mutual insurance companies, except that their members are financial institutions. They charge premiums for coverage and, in the event one of them becomes insolved, pay that money back out. However, during the S&L crisis, it turned out that the FSLIC didn't have enough money to cover all the losses, so they had to get bailed out themselves by the Federal Reserve. Congress disbanded the FSLIC; the few S&Ls left were converted to "banks", now covered by the FDIC. The Federal Reserve Banks work totally differently, though. Despite the name, they are not really banks and do not have reserves. When they need to give someone money (e.g. the Treasury, in exchange for a Treasury bill, or the FDIC/FSLIC/NCUA during a bailout), they create new dollars out of thin air; this increases the money supply, which is the very definition of inflation. >> My state's constitution also prohibits the govt from issuing debt, > > Your state can't issue any bonds?!!! How do they get monies for > infrastructure? I can't believe they operate on cash-only basis; > states aren't that rich and don't usually allow extra cash lay > around. Most infrastructure is handled by counties or other local agencies, which can issue bonds. It's just the state that can't. The only state infrastructure I can think of offhand is the highway system, which is indeed paid for with cash (from fuel tax revenues). >>>> > Then the corruption has infected the CBO. It's complete >>>> > nonsense.... or the term "spend" means not investing. >>>> >>>> You call it corruption, but they've produced reports on exactly >>>> how they calculated that effect, which to date no economist in >>>> the world has even refuted, much less disproven. >>> >>> Economists don't seem to know how work is done. Very few seem to >>> go beyond the book learning. >> >> They measured what actual people _do_ with additional income. The >> poor spend it all to improve their standard of living. The rich, >> who don't need to improve their standard of living, spend some on >> conspicuous consumption but speculate with most of it, which means >> _less_ economic activity per dollar of additional income. > > that is a middle-class mindset; they are not the rich. Those high > wage earners who simply spend lots of money on useless things don't > know how to create wealth. WE are talkking about two different > grouops of people. No, I'm talking about the exact group that you are; you just think that "investing" magically creates wealth, whereas what they're really doing with most of their money is speculating, which does not. It is not the rich who start new businesses and create new jobs; that's the middle class. You seem to have the two backward. >> Wealth is the accumulated fruits of labor. > > that's an individual thing. Creating wealth on a a larger scale is > more like prosperity but that word has lots of baggage so I didn't > use it. I used the above terms in the formal macroeconomic sense. >> Labor is the production of goods and services. Obviously, the >> demand for labor depends on the _consumption_ of goods and >> services. >> >> Ergo, it is spending that creates wealth. > > This gets complicated; it's not that simple. Ford created wealth > because his company caused oodles of other companies, businessses and > trade to be created. Those companies, in turn, caused other > businesses and trade to be created. and this was even in the days > when Ford insisted that the company do all its own processing. Ford himself created very little wealth. His _workers_ are who created that wealth, and Ford extracted economic rent from that process, as was his right in return for investing capital in the process. More importantly, Ford wouldn't have made a cent if his _customers_ didn't have money to spend on his products. Just look at the Great Depression: all the factories (capital) and workers (labor) were still there, ready to make things, but the customers didn't have any money to spend, so the economy stopped. >> Capital, which you seem to be calling wealth, is the _subset_ of >> wealth which is devoted to producing more wealth. > > Maybe capital is a better term but I usually associate that with an > entity and not an entire sector and its related sectors. It can refer to the entire economy, too, not just sectors. >> Capital extracts economic rent from labor, transferring wealth from >> the worker to the capitalist. That is fair if the capital makes >> labor more productive (e.g. by investing in machines) by a large >> enough margin to offset the rent, but such is not guaranteed. > > I would not call that a transfer of wealth. I would call it an > exchange of money for work-done. It's a contract, not wealth. Don't confuse yourself by focusing on when money changes hands; money and wealth are not the same thing. Think about this: I have a fishing pole, but you don't. I agree to let you use my pole in return for half of your catch. You catch 10 fish. The total wealth you (labor) created is 10 fish. I (capital) take 5 of the fish (rent). This is fairly easy to understand. Now, let's say the market price is $1 per fish, and instead of you keeping 5 fish, I pay you $5. You (labor) are still the one creating the wealth, and I (capital) am merely extracting some of that wealth from you (rent). Scale it up to a corporation or an entire economy and it gets more complicated, but nothing can change the fundamental truth that labor, not capital, creates wealth. S -- Stephen Sprunk "God does not play dice." --Albert Einstein CCIE #3723 "God is an inveterate gambler, and He throws the K5SSS dice at every possible opportunity." --Stephen Hawking Report message to a moderator

Re: What Makes a Tax System Bizarre? [message #98049 is a reply to message #97881] Fri, 19 July 2013 16:01   Stephen Sprunk Messages: 2166 Registered: March 2013 Karma: 0 Senior Member On 19-Jul-13 10:27, jmfbahciv wrote: > Andrew Swallow wrote: >> The ban on abortion and contraception do feel like the slave >> breeding programs that the southern states introduced when the >> slave trade was banned. Similar rules. > > Of course it is. And all women become chattel. Become? Women were chattel at least as far back as the invention of marriage, probably since shortly after we started walking upright and the species became sexually dimorphic. That started to change in the 1970s, but the neocons are desperately trying to drag us back to the 1950s. I understand why male neocons might desire that, but I don't understand female neocons at all. S -- Stephen Sprunk "God does not play dice." --Albert Einstein CCIE #3723 "God is an inveterate gambler, and He throws the K5SSS dice at every possible opportunity." --Stephen Hawking Report message to a moderator

Re: What Makes a Tax System Bizarre? [message #98051 is a reply to message #97991] Fri, 19 July 2013 18:25   Charlie Gibbs Messages: 5313 Registered: January 2012 Karma: 0 Senior Member In article <87fvva73bc.fsf@cluon.com>, lawrence@cluon.com (Lawrence Statton) writes: > I'm not for a second going to shoot myself in the foot by hiring a > neww grad who is clueless to save myself a dollar in salary but cost > me ten dollars in lost sales. That's all well and good if you don't have to clear it with PHBs who routinely spend $100 worth of their time arguing over a $10 line item in the budget. If you're stuck in an environment like that, you'd better be good at first aid for feet. -- /~\ cgibbs@kltpzyxm.invalid (Charlie Gibbs) \ / I'm really at ac.dekanfrus if you read it the right way. X Top-posted messages will probably be ignored. See RFC1855. / \ HTML will DEFINITELY be ignored. Join the ASCII ribbon campaign! Report message to a moderator

Re: What Makes a Tax System Bizarre? [message #98052 is a reply to message #97911] Fri, 19 July 2013 18:20   Charlie Gibbs Messages: 5313 Registered: January 2012 Karma: 0 Senior Member In article <87bo5y8riu.fsf@cluon.com>, lawrence@cluon.com (Lawrence Statton) writes: > [sparing comp.arch from this continuing hell ... ] > > jmfbahciv <See.above@aol.com> writes: > >> this is unbelievable. Every school which had a PDP-10 had lots >> of kiddies who could code. Everyone wanted to play with the "toy". > > And that's how it was for my generation, but I fear that I'm the last. > > For the next, the "toy" was the Nintendo (or Sega, or XBox, or > whatever it is this week) and you don't have to learn to program > that - just just plug it in and turn it on and get some engaging > entertainment. Passive entertainment, at that. We wrote our own entertainment. > When I was working in the video game "biz", I was asked at a panel > discussion, "What is your favorite game?" And I answered deadpan > "cc". (The C compiler). :-) Gotta remember that one. >> GUI and PC have a lot to answer for. people who buy a system todya >> have no idea and receive no hints about what's underneath. Even >> the Unixes of this world hide basic computing skills. > > That's a red herring -- people buy tools because they want to use > those tools to do their job, or make thier lives easier. Those whose > constitution requires them to know how it works will find out, but the > vast majority of users of <anything> don't really care how to build > it, or how it works, they just want to write their book, or balance > their accounts, or see pictures of kittens, or chat with their > grandchildren, or .... Fair enough. But I wish the tools would do their job efficiently and then get out of the way. A poor craftsman hates his tools. A good craftsman hates poor tools. But I guess J. Random Luser doesn't want to be a craftsman, either... >> I said it once and I'll state it again with stronger lanugage. >> Every kid should have a copy of DEC's _Introduction to >> Programming_. > > I'm torn in two on this issue -- I genuinely believe that learning > to program to some level of compentency will force a person to think > logically about solving a problem, and that can't possibly be a bad > thing. On the other hand, I've met enough people who just CAN'T seem > to break a problem down logically - they can only seem to absorb > information holistically - that it would be like forcing me to learn > oilpainting. I doubt I'd ever get good at it, and I'd hate being > forced to learn it, and hate them for trying. Good point. On the other hand, I have a holistic side as well. When presented with a new system, I want to rapidly scan the documentation to build a gestalt, then go over it slowly to fill in the details. This can cause problems if people want to frog-march you through it in their own way. > The first Real Important Lesson of Adulthood: Everyone is created > unequal. I am unique. There are others like me, but many, many > others totally unlike me. Once people absorb that lesson, you have to pray that they don't consider being different to be an offence (a capital one, in some instances). > My first exposure to that was in differential calculus -- this shit > is so EASY! What kind of brain-damaged MORON are you that this isn't > immediately obvious??! My second exposure was integral calclus. > This shit is so HARD! What kind of brain-damaged MORON am I that > this isn't immediately obvious??! And then I hit linear algebra and differential equations, and was lost forever... :-( -- /~\ cgibbs@kltpzyxm.invalid (Charlie Gibbs) \ / I'm really at ac.dekanfrus if you read it the right way. X Top-posted messages will probably be ignored. See RFC1855. / \ HTML will DEFINITELY be ignored. Join the ASCII ribbon campaign! Report message to a moderator

Re: What Makes a Tax System Bizarre? [message #98053 is a reply to message #97911] Fri, 19 July 2013 14:24   Shmuel (Seymour J.) M Messages: 3286 Registered: July 2012 Karma: 0 Senior Member In <87bo5y8riu.fsf@cluon.com>, on 07/19/2013 at 11:04 AM, Lawrence Statton <lawrence@cluon.com> said: > My first exposure to that was in differential calculus -- this shit > is so EASY! What kind of brain-damaged MORON are you that this isn't > immediately obvious??! My second exposure was integral calclus. > This shit is so HARD! What kind of brain-damaged MORON am I that > this isn't immediately obvious??! It also depends on what you're learning from. As a kid I read "Calculus for the Practical Man" and it didn't seem to make sense. A teacher gave me a copy of Thomas, which actually gave proper definitions instead of dumbed down hand waving, and everything was clear. -- Shmuel (Seymour J.) Metz, SysProg and JOAT <http://patriot.net/~shmuel> Unsolicited bulk E-mail subject to legal action. I reserve the right to publicly post or ridicule any abusive E-mail. Reply to domain Patriot dot net user shmuel+news to contact me. Do not reply to spamtrap@library.lspace.org Report message to a moderator

Re: What Makes a Tax System Bizarre? [message #98054 is a reply to message #97901] Fri, 19 July 2013 18:07   GreyMaus[1] Messages: 1140 Registered: February 2013 Karma: 0 Senior Member On 2013-07-19, jmfbahciv <See.above@aol.com> wrote: > Peter Flass wrote: >> On 7/18/2013 3:32 PM, Andrew Swallow wrote: >>> On 17/07/2013 23:47, Stephen Sprunk wrote: >>>> On 17-Jul-13 16:23, Peter Flass wrote: >>>> > On 7/17/2013 11:24 AM, Stephen Sprunk wrote: >>>> >> There's one serious problem with your theory: 1.5 million women per >>>> >> year choose abortion. That shows they _don't_ want to have a kid, >>>> >> despite the supposedly wonderful life of a welfare queen. So why >>>> >> did they get pregnant in the first place? Because birth control is >>>> >> simply too expensive for someone without health insurance. >>>> > >>>> > Abstinence is free. >>>> >>>> And, in practice, it doesn't actually work. >>>> >>>> Sadly, my state mandated the oxymoronic "abstinence-only sex education", >>>> and within a few years our teen pregnancy rate went from the middle of >>>> the pack to the highest in the country. Gov. Perry declared the program >>>> a "success", which makes me wonder what his goal really was--or if he's >>>> so stupid that he doesn't realize being #1 is a bad thing in this case. >>>> >>>> S >>>> >>> >>> The ban on abortion and contraception do feel like the slave breeding >>> programs that the southern states introduced when the slave trade was >>> banned. Similar rules. >>> >> >> The origin of Planned Parenthood was the Eugenics movement. The idea >> was to stop the undesirables from breeding. >> >> > Then it must have changed into stop breeding undesirables. > > /BAH Ireland is a very traditional, stratified society, yet I can identify people whose grandparents were the `dregs of society', yet the present generation are productive citizens. Free education did that, plus the need for people to improve their lot. Affordable health systems made it desirable to campeign against general problems, rather than profiting by treating the problems when they affect the rich. Socialism grew when the wealthier classes realized that life was better when the poor were treated properly, rather than spending money keeping them subject. A lot of the silly neoconservative ideas got popular when new technologies changed the makeup of the wealthy classes. A lot of these scum are 'new-rich' without any feeling of responsibility to society in general. -- maus . . .... Report message to a moderator

Re: What Makes a Tax System Bizarre? [message #98055 is a reply to message #98053] Fri, 19 July 2013 19:18   Charles Richmond Messages: 2754 Registered: December 2011 Karma: 0 Senior Member "Shmuel (Seymour J.) Metz" <spamtrap@library.lspace.org.invalid> wrote in message news:51e98462$5$fuzhry+tra$mr2ice@news.patriot.net... > In <87bo5y8riu.fsf@cluon.com>, on 07/19/2013 > at 11:04 AM, Lawrence Statton <lawrence@cluon.com> said: > >> My first exposure to that was in differential calculus -- this shit >> is so EASY! What kind of brain-damaged MORON are you that this isn't >> immediately obvious??! My second exposure was integral calclus. >> This shit is so HARD! What kind of brain-damaged MORON am I that >> this isn't immediately obvious??! > > It also depends on what you're learning from. As a kid I read > "Calculus for the Practical Man" and it didn't seem to make sense. A > teacher gave me a copy of Thomas, which actually gave proper > definitions instead of dumbed down hand waving, and everything was > clear. > Yeah, I heartily concur on this! I have found many "dumbed-down" treatments to be much more difficult for the very reason you cited: they don't tell you everything you need to really understand things. To much of the unwashed masses, a "smaller book" means the subject is "less complicated". That's just marketing to reduce the information content and make the book smaller or the print larger. I want the facts plus more examples. -- numerist at aquaporin4 dot com Report message to a moderator

Re: What Makes an Unemployment Myth Bizarre? [message #98056 is a reply to message #97979] Fri, 19 July 2013 19:28   Charles Richmond Messages: 2754 Registered: December 2011 Karma: 0 Senior Member "Shmuel (Seymour J.) Metz" <spamtrap@library.lspace.org.invalid> wrote in message news:51e974cc$2$fuzhry+tra$mr2ice@news.patriot.net... > In <87li535xk0.fsf@cluon.com>, on 07/18/2013 > at 05:10 PM, Lawrence Statton <lawrence@cluon.com> said: > >> These kinds of screwups happen when there is not enough connection >> between the people who need the work and the people who are tasked >> with screening talent. > > One of my favorites was a skills inventory that asked about experience > on the 3168 and also about the 370/168? What's wrong with that? They > are the same machine. > In my experience, Human Resources does *not* have a clue. They ask for 10 years experience on an OS that has only existed for 5 years. They are dumb. They know *not* their own business... unless you consider their business just collecting a paycheck every so often. If you want a job, they are an obstacle to be overcome. IMHO. -- numerist at aquaporin4 dot com Report message to a moderator

Re: What Makes a Tax System Bizarre? [message #98101 is a reply to message #97799] Fri, 19 July 2013 21:04   127 Messages: 41 Registered: July 2013 Karma: 0 Member "Walter Bushell" <proto@panix.com> wrote in message news:proto-846233.06505819072013@70-1-84-166.pools.spcsdns.net... > In article <ks9g7n$u2r$1@dont-email.me>, > Stephen Sprunk <stephen@sprunk.org> wrote: > >> Most don't, actually. For those who do, it's better to have your kids >> close together rather than have large gaps between them. Two years is >> currently accepted as the ideal spacing. > And 6 years is way too long. I'm not convinced. > The baby arrives just when the older kid is entering school > and the older kid gets the "We love you just as much, but > we are going to have to dedicate more time to the baby > speech.". Which goes over like a pregnant pole vaulter. Worked fine in the older larger families where that result was inevitable. Report message to a moderator

Re: What Makes a Tax System Bizarre? [message #98102 is a reply to message #97802] Fri, 19 July 2013 21:07   127 Messages: 41 Registered: July 2013 Karma: 0 Member "Peter Flass" <Peter_Flass@Yahoo.com> wrote in message news:ksb9e3$dqb$2@dont-email.me... > On 7/18/2013 3:32 PM, Andrew Swallow wrote: >> On 17/07/2013 23:47, Stephen Sprunk wrote: >>> On 17-Jul-13 16:23, Peter Flass wrote: >>>> On 7/17/2013 11:24 AM, Stephen Sprunk wrote: >>>> > There's one serious problem with your theory: 1.5 million women per >>>> > year choose abortion. That shows they _don't_ want to have a kid, >>>> > despite the supposedly wonderful life of a welfare queen. So why >>>> > did they get pregnant in the first place? Because birth control is >>>> > simply too expensive for someone without health insurance. >>>> >>>> Abstinence is free. >>> >>> And, in practice, it doesn't actually work. >>> >>> Sadly, my state mandated the oxymoronic "abstinence-only sex education", >>> and within a few years our teen pregnancy rate went from the middle of >>> the pack to the highest in the country. Gov. Perry declared the program >>> a "success", which makes me wonder what his goal really was--or if he's >>> so stupid that he doesn't realize being #1 is a bad thing in this case. >>> >>> S >>> >> >> The ban on abortion and contraception do feel like the slave breeding >> programs that the southern states introduced when the slave trade was >> banned. Similar rules. >> > > The origin of Planned Parenthood was the Eugenics movement. That's not correct. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planned_Parenthood#History The idea > was to stop the undesirables from breeding. No. Report message to a moderator

Re: What Makes an Architecture Bizarre? [message #98103 is a reply to message #97808] Fri, 19 July 2013 21:14   127 Messages: 41 Registered: July 2013 Karma: 0 Member "Peter Flass" <Peter_Flass@Yahoo.com> wrote in message news:ksbasv$ne3$4@dont-email.me... > On 7/18/2013 7:16 PM, 127 wrote: >> >> >> "Patrick Scheible" <kkt@zipcon.net> wrote in message >> news:86ppufdamo.fsf@chai.my.domain... >>> jmfbahciv <See.above@aol.com> writes: >>> >>>> Peter Flass wrote: >>>> > On 7/17/2013 9:16 AM, jmfbahciv wrote: >>>> >> >>>> >> Why is profit such a swear word? >>>> >> >>>> > >>>> > Everyone likes to see a company produce something useful that people >>>> > want to buy, sell a lot of them, and make a fair profit. Most of >>>> > those >>>> > things are not part of current business practices. They're all >>>> > weasels >>>> > these days. They fire people and move stuff overseas, play games to >>>> > avoid paying taxes, try to cheat everyone in sight, and usually >>>> > don't do >>>> > anything useful in the first place. >>>> > >>>> Why do you assume that 100% of business is doing this? >>> >>> Because the businesses that don't do this have been eaten by the ones >>> that do. >> >> That has not happened with all of Google, Facebook, Apple, Microsoft, >> News, >> Intel, Seagate, AMD, Western Digital etc, all which do quite a bit of >> what is useful. > What the hell does Facebook do that's useful? The Buy Sell Swap groups leave Craig's List for dead. They have their own admins and there is normally a lot more than just one in any substantial town or city so you can use the one you like the policies of. It also provides a useful way of communicating with most operations that deal with the general public too. > Or Twitter, That can be quite useful when the brown hits the fan in megastorms, great politic unrest in the armpits of the world etc. > Instagram, ... Some clearly find it useful for moving photos around. Report message to a moderator

Re: What Makes Medical Economics Bizarre? [message #98104 is a reply to message #97852] Fri, 19 July 2013 21:20   127 Messages: 41 Registered: July 2013 Karma: 0 Member "Peter Flass" <Peter_Flass@Yahoo.com> wrote in message news:ksbbmk$tq8$1@dont-email.me... > On 7/18/2013 8:57 PM, 127 wrote: >> >> >> "Stephen Sprunk" <stephen@sprunk.org> wrote in message >> news:ksa0j6$46s$1@dont-email.me... >>> On 18-Jul-13 17:28, 127 wrote: >>>> "Stephen Sprunk" <stephen@sprunk.org> wrote in message >>>> news:ks91u1$5u4$1@dont-email.me... >>>> > Also, there is at least one country that _does_ have a competitive >>>> > individual market for health insurance with compulsory coverage; if >>>> > you don't buy your own, the govt will buy it for you and bill the >>>> > cost to you via deductions from welfare payments or tax refunds. >>>> > It does work in practice, and there is no reason it couldn't work >>>> > here as well. >>>> >>>> But that country has the second highest % of GDP spent on health >>>> care in the entire world, after the US. So while that approach does >>>> certainly work, it is clearly much more expensive than the single >>>> payer alternatives. >>>> >>>> Presumably because of the inevitable extra overheads any multiple >>>> insurance system must have. >> >>> Are you sure about that? >> >> Yes. >> >>> Here's the top 15 from the World Bank's stats >>> on health care costs as a percentage of GDP[1]: >> >>> Country name 2008 2009 2010 2011 >>> Liberia 11.8 18.1 16.4 19.5 >>> Sierra Leone 18.1 22.2 20.8 18.8 >>> United States 16.6 17.7 17.6 17.9 >>> Tuvalu 13.8 13.3 14.5 17.3 >>> Marshall Isls 18.8 18.9 17.1 16.5 >>> Micronesia, FS 12.8 13.3 13.6 13.4 >>> Lesotho 9.5 10.5 11.5 12.8 >>> Netherlands 11.0 12.0 12.1 12.0 >>> France 11.0 11.7 11.7 11.6 >>> Moldova 11.4 12.5 11.7 11.4 >>> Canada 10.3 11.4 11.4 11.2 >>> Denmark 10.2 11.5 11.1 11.2 >>> Germany 10.7 11.7 11.5 11.1 >>> Costa Rica 9.3 10.3 10.3 10.9 >>> Switzerland 10.3 11.0 10.9 10.9 >> >> I prefer the figures from >> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_total_heal th_expenditure_(PPP)_per_capita >> >> because the very low GDP countries aren't really relevant to this >> discussion. >> >>> Which country(ies) are you basing your claims on? >> >> Switzerland. >> >>> IIRC, the one I was thinking of was Germany, >> >> It has rather more than just an compulsory insurance system. >> >>> but it might have been Switzerland, >> >> Yes. >> >>> both of which have a _lower_ percentage of GDP going to health care >>> than the most commonly cited single-payer systems, France and Canada, >> >> Yeah, that claim was about 2000. >> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_systems_by_country#Switz erland >> >>> though the difference isn't consistent enough to draw a conclusion >>> about which is clearly "better", even assuming % of GDP is the only >>> metric that matters--and it's not. >> >> Never said it was. >> >> It Switzerland does not in fact have anything like a truly competitive >> insurance system because the government does not allow the insurance >> companies to vary the insurance premiums based on health risk, just on >> age and does control what can be charged for basic cover too. > I would suggest that the US pays such a high percentage because we've gone > overboard on high-cost high-tech equipment and procedures There isn't any evidence to support that claim when the US health care system is compared with Canada or Germany or Japan. > to the detriment of basic health care, No real evidence of that with the insured or those covered by medicare. > which is also why we don't rate so highly on the effectiveness front. > There are limited restrictions limiting a hospital from buying the latest > scan-o-mat, which than has to be used to recover its cost, regardless of > whether or not it's really the best technology to use in many cases. > > You certainly get a much better ROI in prenatal care, childolld > vaccinations, etc., which don't cost that much, but there are a lot of > forces causing the money to be spent elsewhere. > I believe that at the top end we *do* have the best health care in the > world. That's very arguable indeed. > If you want to get plastic surgery, That's not health care, that’s cosmetic surgery. > the US is the place to go, but it's obvious why we lag in some measures. > We need a "millionaires health-care index" that ignores those inconvenient > poor people and looks at the health care only of the people who count ;-) Report message to a moderator

Re: What Makes a Tax System Bizarre? [message #98105 is a reply to message #97976] Fri, 19 July 2013 21:23   Andrew Swallow Messages: 1705 Registered: January 2012 Karma: 0 Senior Member On 19/07/2013 19:03, Lawrence Statton wrote: > Andrew Swallow <am.swallow@btinternet.com> writes: > First you said .. > >>>> Few valve firms survived the introduction of transistors. > > Then you swithc to >> They were the exception. Have a look at the other manufactures of >> valve TVs and radios. > > So - maybe I misunderstood, I interpreted "valve firms" to be > "manufacturers of valves", not "manufacturers of equiment that used > valves". > In the case of valves - Both. >> >>>> Integrated circuits killed off the discrete components >>>> firms. >>> >>> Yeah, right [sarcasm]. Name *ONE*. The "big ones" I can think of.... >>> >> >> DEC > > I am near dead-certain DEC never manufactured discrete components. > Those that were shipped under their house part-numbers were made under > contract by The Usual Suspects. > >> >> ICL >> > > Another computer manufacturer, not component manufacturer. I know > less about their history, so they may have actually built some of the > components that went into their machines, can't speak to that. > Both used discrete components and designed their instruction sets on the assumption that logic gates were expensive. >> Getting swallowed up is how big companies die. > > No. It's how big companies survive. Quincy Buggywhip and Strap, a > company that produced no product worth buying died because nobody > thought they were worth buying. > > Report message to a moderator

Re: What Makes an Architecture Bizarre? [message #98106 is a reply to message #97877] Fri, 19 July 2013 21:57   Rod Speed Messages: 3507 Registered: January 2012 Karma: 0 Senior Member "jmfbahciv" <See.above@aol.com> wrote in message news:PM0004E1DE91BFE250@ac810898.ipt.aol.com... > Stephen Sprunk wrote: >> On 18-Jul-13 09:31, jmfbahciv wrote: >>> Stephen Sprunk wrote: >>>> On 17-Jul-13 08:16, jmfbahciv wrote: >>>> > Stephen Sprunk wrote: >>>> >> On 16-Jul-13 07:22, jmfbahciv wrote: >>>> >>> the now-delayed medical insurance sosts, >>>> >> >>>> >> You mean Obamacare, which by House Republicans' own admission >>>> >> will actually _save_ the govt money? >>>> > >>>> > You don't get it. If money is "saved", Congress will spend 3x >>>> > the "saved" money. That's how they write their bills. They add >>>> > riders which will "take care" of the savings. When two or more >>>> > of these riders are added to a bill and then it becomes law, >>>> > there is no savings but a triple increase in expenditures. >>>> >>>> The Affordable Care Act as passed and signed into law _reduced_ >>>> the federal deficit. >>> >>> That was the day it was passed. There are extra laws being passed >>> after that which takes care of the pieces which would have caused the >>> ACA to cause a huge deficit. IIR the first one passed was paying the >>> doctors. >> >> Um, what? Under Obamacare, the federal govt doesn't pay doctors, except >> for those under the existing Medicare program who were already getting >> paid. > > There was something about paying doctors which didn't make it into the > original because of the cost; it was added to another bill about 2 months > later and nobody in the news noticed that it made the medical insurance > edict go into the red. > >> >>>> Now you're claiming that they increase spending $3 for every $1 in >>>> savings, which is also patently untrue and easily disproven. >>>> >>>> Congress is a bunch of incompetent buffoons, to be sure, but >>>> they're not quite as bad as you're painting them. >>> >>> Then why is the US on the brink of bankruptcy? >> >> Because Congress is a bunch of incompetent buffoons, as stated above. >> >> Bankruptcy does not require spending 3:1; 1.3:1, which is where the >> federal budget is actually at right now, does that too. >> >>> Take a look at how the money which the US took in from the auto >>> bailout. They spent it three times over and the original money >>> was borrowed; it didn't come from revenues. >> >> All of the bailout money was borrowed. But that doesn't prove, as you >> have claimed, that Congress spent $3 for every $1 it receives. > I listened to speeches. But haven't managed to work out that all politicians lie thru their teeth. > The money Congress got back from the auto makers > (which was lower than what was given to them) Another Limbaugh lie mindlessly respouted. > was spent in one way by Congress Another Limbaugh lie mindlessly respouted. > and spent in another way by Obama. Another Limbaugh lie mindlessly respouted. Obama doesn’t get to spend a damned thing independent of Congress. > That's two. No, that's actually 0. > The third is repaying the original debt. That spending a saving. What they got back from the automakers isnt a saving either. >>>> > Where is funding for Sallie Mae and Freddie Mac coming from? >>>> > They are still in deep shit. >>>> >>>> They've been in deep shit for a long time. >>> >>> And the policies which got them there are still active. Those toxic >>> CDOs have not gone away. >> >> Nor has Glass-Steagal been put back in place. Congress has done pretty >> much _nothing_ to stop the recent implosion from happening again, and >> there are already signs that another housing bubble is starting up. > They dont' intend to solve those problems. Bullshit. They certainly don’t want to have that sort of thing happen again. >>>> > Consider the losses created with the S&L crisis in the 80s. Have >>>> > those debts been paid off? >>>> >>>> I thought that the FDIC and Federal Reserve, which are _not_ part >>>> of the federal government, were the ones that bailed out the >>>> FSLIC? >>> >>> Not the FDIC. but even so where did those entites get their money? >>> The US taxpayer. >> >> Wrong. They get it via inflation, which steals wealth from everyone who >> holds dollars. That is a disjoint set from "US taxpayers". > The debts incurred were paid by inflation? Basically the debt is reduced by inflation. What you have to pay back is significantly lower than it would be if there was no inflation. > I'm on my edge of understanding finacne and economics now. That’s obvious. > this sounds so wrong. Its correct, but rather overstated by him. >>>> My state legislature recently passed a balanced budget--as required >>>> by state constitution. I've heard other states have similar >>>> requirements, but I don't know how many. >>> >>> There is a difference between a yearly balanced budget and borrowing >>> against future income thrice over. Only the interest is shown on >>> the yearly budget. >> >> My state's constitution also prohibits the govt from issuing debt, > Your state can't issue any bonds?!!! How > do they get monies for infrastructure? They setup authoritys that issue the bonds and tax. > I can't believe they operate on cash-only basis; They don’t. > states aren't that rich and don't usually allow extra cash lay around. >> though we've still got some lingering from before that was enacted; >> there is no requirement that it be paid off, just the interest, and the >> buffoons in office never pay a bill they don't have to. > any outstanding bonds will be due at some the future :-). Nope, you just issue more bonds to cover that. >>>> > But your proposals are requiring that profits be "controlled" to >>>> > a low level or none. >>>> >>>> No, I just want mega-corporations to pay (at least) the same taxes >>>> that small businesses are required to pay--similar to how I want >>>> the rich to pay (at least) the same taxes as the middle class. >>>> >>>> I favor progressive taxes for fairly obvious and logical reasons, >>>> so I'd like the former to pay more than the latter, but right now >>>> we haven't even worked our way up to merely regressive. >>> >>> The annual reports I receive show companies paying income tax and >>> other taxes. I have yet to see one which has reported paying >>> US$0.00. Maybe I should be asking about the myth that big >>> corporations pay 0 income tax. >> >> The usual example cited is GE, but there have been dozens of others >> reported widely in the press. Congress even held hearings on the >> matter, but as usual they did nothing to address it. > I don't own GE stock so I can't check their reports. You don’t have to own the stock to see their reports. >>>> > Then the corruption has infected the CBO. It's complete >>>> > nonsense.... or the term "spend" means not investing. >>>> >>>> You call it corruption, but they've produced reports on exactly how >>>> they calculated that effect, which to date no economist in the >>>> world has even refuted, much less disproven. >>> >>> Economists don't seem to know how work is done. Very few seem to go >>> beyond the book learning. >> >> They measured what actual people _do_ with additional income. The poor >> spend it all to improve their standard of living. The rich, who don't >> need to improve their standard of living, spend some on conspicuous >> consumption but speculate with most of it, which means _less_ economic >> activity per dollar of additional income. > that is a middle-class mindset; Nope. > they are not the rich. Those high wage earners who simply spend > lots of money on useless things don't know how to create wealth. Hordes of the middle class are small business owners who in fact create a lot more wealth than the rich ever do. > WE are talkking about two different grouops of people. You keep comprehensively mangling who actually does create wealth. >> Ergo, if the goal is to increase economic activity (and therefore >> wealth), cutting taxes on the poor is better public policy than cutting >> taxes on the rich. >> >>>> > I agree. However, the problems are not because someone doesn't >>>> > pay taxes. The problems are cuased by Congress spending money as >>>> > if there was an infinite supply. Once wealth creation stops, >>>> > the supply will disappear within 50 years. >>>> >>>> As long as you're buying the Reagan-era trickle-down propaganda >>>> that only the rich can create wealth, you're hopeless. >>> >>> Why do you think I'm doing that? I'm not. >> >> You're the one saying that cutting taxes on the rich is the only way (or >> at least the best way) to generate wealth. > When I say rich I mean the really rich. You've been talking about an > upper middle class who have a large disposable income. Tax the shit > out of those people if you want. I'm talking about the people who > create wealth. It isnt just the really rich who do that. It never has been just the really rich that do that. > those exhuberant middle class types don't create wealth Bullshit they don’t when they are small business owners. > although they are working for those who do. Their employers are hardly ever the really rich. NONE of those employed by DEC were employed by the really rich. Lots of wealth was created anyway until DEC lost the plot. >>>> Actual economists agree they create wealth, sure, but they _also_ >>>> agree that the working classes create _more_ wealth given the same >>>> amount of money. That's because _spending_ is what creates real >>>> wealth, while speculation merely creates the _illusion_ of wealth. >>> >>> You are using the term welath in a very different manner than I am. >>> You are talking about expenditures and disposable income. I'm not. >>> If I find a way to describe what I'm talking about, I will post it here. >> Wealth is the accumulated fruits of labor. > that's an individual thing. Creating wealth on a a larger scale is more > like prosperity but that word has lots of baggage so I didn't use it. >> Labor is the production of goods and services. Obviously, the demand >> for labor depends on the _consumption_ of goods and services. >> >> Ergo, it is spending that creates wealth. > > This gets complicated; it's not that simple. Ford created wealth because > his company caused oodles of other companies, businessses and trade to > be created. Those companies, in turn, caused other businesses and trade > to be created. and this was even in the days when Ford insisted that > the company do all its own processing. > I'm using this example becuase I recently read a biography and it's > fresh in my mind. DEC created wealth because people who bought > DEC products made new kinds of businesses which begat other new > kinds of businesses... And DEC was not ever created by any really rich person. Neither was IBM either. Neither was Microsoft, Apple, Google etc either. Tho those did produce really rich people because they were so successful. >> Capital, which you seem to be calling wealth, is the _subset_ >> of wealth which is devoted to producing more wealth. > Maybe capital is a better term but I usually associate that with > an entity and not an entire sector and its related sectors. >> Capital extracts economic rent from labor, transferring wealth from the >> worker to the capitalist. That is fair if the capital makes labor more >> productive (e.g. by investing in machines) by a large enough margin to >> offset the rent, but such is not guaranteed. > I would not call that a transfer of wealth. I would call it an > exchange of money for work-done. It's a contract, not wealth. Yes, he mangled that. Report message to a moderator

Re: What Makes a Tax System Bizarre? [message #98107 is a reply to message #97880] Fri, 19 July 2013 22:00   Rod Speed Messages: 3507 Registered: January 2012 Karma: 0 Senior Member "jmfbahciv" <See.above@aol.com> wrote in message news:PM0004E1DDC06BDA39@ac810898.ipt.aol.com... > Lawrence Statton wrote: >> jmfbahciv <See.above@aol.com> writes: >>> >>> CBS radio news reported a list of skills which are missing. IIRC, >>> IT work was 4th or 5th on the list. Somehow I can't believe that >>> one. >>> >> >> I don't know why you don't believe it. > > BEcause it's so odd. I would have thought that there are plenty > of people with those skills. I'm just simply utterly surprised. > I wasn't trying to challenge your veracity. > > >> I see it, Sprunk sees it. >> Other people I've worked with see it. I'll say it again in short >> words that even you can understand: Qualified candidates are getting >> to be as rare as hen's teeth. >> >> Those who *can* do it, already have jobs and aren't looking, but there >> are more jobs than people who can fill them. >> >> Yes, everytime we post an ad looking for developers, I drown in a sea >> of résumés, but the staggering majority of them are either >> exaggerations, half-truths, or bald-faced-lies. I've stopped even >> BOTHERING to check academic references, because I've found near-zero >> correlation between education and ability. > > that's always been a problem. > >> >> Disturbingly - since I started trying to quantify these data, I've >> found the very slight correlation to be negative. Masters in Computer >> Science from Stanford; can't write ten lines of code in a week. Music >> Major from Weaselpiss State College, but who learned BASIC on his MSX >> system in 1984; HIRE THIS GUY NOW! > > <grin> that means things never change; we always had a disaster when > we hired a CS flavor. They were so sutck in their little black box > that they couldn't develop a way out of a push down list call. > >> >> The way I see it is thusly: There was a time, during the darkest days >> of the "first internet bubble" where anyone who could successfully >> lift and open "HTML For Dummies" got a job as a "Web Developer", and >> these people were often able to jump from job to job earning good >> money doing very little or nothing, but building an impressive list of >> sites they worked at. Fast forward a decade, and now clients realize >> that the ability to rattle off a fistful of buzzwords at an interview >> is no substitute for actual ability. >> >> If this is the sea of "qualified applicants who can't find work", I >> feel no pity for them. The advice I have for them is: Actually >> *learn* your craft, and in the mean-time, learn to ask "would you like >> fries with that?" >> >> There was a recent article on Slashdot [A light-weight news/ >> information site for the geek set] about the poor quality of >> candidates. They link to the following six-year-old blog piece: >> >> >> http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/2007/02/why-cant-programmer s-program.html >> http://tinyurl.com/cant-program >> >> One of the quotes: >> >> Like me, the author is having trouble with the fact that 199 out of >> 200 applicants for every programming job can't write code at all. I >> repeat: they can't write any code whatsoever. >> >> Read the article - it goes on to posit a trivial programming exercise >> that (according to author) the MAJORITY of candidates (that is in >> excess of 50%),who were already prescreened to have at least a degree >> in Computer Science, CANNOT COMPLETE. >> >> FWIW: It took me about 45 seconds to write a solution, that worked >> with zero defects on the first attempt. > > this is unbelievable. Every school which had a PDP-10 had lots > of kiddies who could code. Everyone wanted to play with the "toy". > > GUI and PC have a lot to answer for. people who buy a system todya > have no idea and receive no hints about what's underneath. Even > the Unixes of this world hide basic computing skills. > > I said it once and I'll state it again with stronger lanugage. > Every kid should have a copy of DEC's _Introduction to > Programming_. Nope, because few kids are interested in programming. Report message to a moderator

Re: What Makes an Architecture Bizarre? [message #98108 is a reply to message #97879] Fri, 19 July 2013 22:02   Rod Speed Messages: 3507 Registered: January 2012 Karma: 0 Senior Member "jmfbahciv" <See.above@aol.com> wrote in message news:PM0004E1DEB4DDC0B8@ac810898.ipt.aol.com... > Charles Richmond wrote: >> "Peter Flass" <Peter_Flass@Yahoo.com> wrote in message >> news:ks4oh0$r0m$5@dont-email.me... >>> On 7/16/2013 11:38 AM, Walter Banks wrote: >>>> >>>> >>>> Peter Flass wrote: >>>> >>>> > On 7/15/2013 7:57 AM, Walter Banks wrote: >>>> >> >>>> >> Tax and government polies could easily change wealth distribution >>>> >> significantly with changes in those area's. >>>> >> >>>> >> The latter may very well make Obamacare ineffective and >>>> >> certainly inefficient compared to many other countries but >>>> >> it will make many companies very rich. >>>> >> >>>> > >>>> > I just read an interesting analogy. Most people have two good kidneys >>>> > and really only need one. while some people have kidney problems that >>>> > harm their quality of life and significantly shorten their lifespans. >>>> > Maybe the government needs a policy to redistribute kidneys from the >>>> > healthy people to the sick? >>>> >>>> I am not sure that I understand your point. >>> >>> The government has as much business redistributing body parts as it has >>> redistributing income. It's none of their business. >>> >> >> The government "decides who gets what of value"... that's the reality of >> it. > > Only in socialism. No. No one has a free market in body parts from just dead corpses. Report message to a moderator

Re: What Makes a Tax System Bizarre? [message #98109 is a reply to message #98051] Fri, 19 July 2013 22:07   Lawrence Statton Messages: 326 Registered: May 2013 Karma: 0 Senior Member "Charlie Gibbs" <cgibbs@kltpzyxm.invalid> writes: > In article <87fvva73bc.fsf@cluon.com>, lawrence@cluon.com > (Lawrence Statton) writes: > >> I'm not for a second going to shoot myself in the foot by hiring a >> neww grad who is clueless to save myself a dollar in salary but cost >> me ten dollars in lost sales. > > That's all well and good if you don't have to clear it with PHBs who > routinely spend $100 worth of their time arguing over a $10 line item > in the budget. If you're stuck in an environment like that, you'd > better be good at first aid for feet. > I mentioned up thread: The only person in our organization senior to me is the owner. If he's doing something stupid, I've got enough political capital to say "You're doing something stupid. Cut that shit out." and he listens to me. -- NK1G - Lawrence echo 'lawrenabae@abaluon.abaom' | sed s/aba/c/g Report message to a moderator

Re: What Makes an Architecture Bizarre? [message #98110 is a reply to message #97882] Fri, 19 July 2013 22:06   Rod Speed Messages: 3507 Registered: January 2012 Karma: 0 Senior Member "jmfbahciv" <See.above@aol.com> wrote in message news:PM0004E1DEE6165738@ac810898.ipt.aol.com... > Peter Flass wrote: >> On 7/18/2013 10:32 AM, jmfbahciv wrote: >>> Peter Flass wrote: >>>> On 7/17/2013 9:16 AM, jmfbahciv wrote: >>>> > >>>> > Why is profit such a swear word? >>>> > >>>> >>>> Everyone likes to see a company produce something useful that people >>>> want to buy, sell a lot of them, and make a fair profit. Most of those >>>> things are not part of current business practices. They're all weasels >>>> these days. They fire people and move stuff overseas, play games to >>>> avoid paying taxes, try to cheat everyone in sight, and usually don't >>>> do >>>> anything useful in the first place. >>>> >>> Why do you assume that 100% of business is doing this? >>> >> >> Because enough are that it's unusual to see otherwise. Apple invents >> good products that people want; they're even moving some manufacturing >> back to the US. M$ sells (mostly) cr@p and uses monopoly power to try >> to force people to buy it. All of Wall Street are crooks; everyone has >> their hand out for government money. >> >> > Small business isn't on Wall Street yet. Nor are they bought out unless > they're doing something somebody else wants. > > The computer biz has this model. STartups create a foobar; if it works > well and is useful, the big companies buy out the FOOBAR Corp. Didn’t happen with DEC, Microsoft, or Apple. And it isnt just startups that create a foobar either, most obviously with all of DEC, Xerox, IBM, Microsoft, Apple, etc etc etc. > Then the previous owners of FOOBAR startup > another company with another idea. There are a few examples of that, but not very many at all. > A gal at Howard Miller saw a business opportunity and created a service > which did a piece of work which HM had to have done. She offered a good > price, cheaper than the labor HM was already spending, and outsourced > that particular function to her, a former employee. > Do you think that's bad? > with the stoftware business, the possibilities are almost infinite > these days. You don't even have to deal with distribution. Report message to a moderator

Re: What Makes a Tax System Bizarre? [message #98111 is a reply to message #97888] Fri, 19 July 2013 22:08   Rod Speed Messages: 3507 Registered: January 2012 Karma: 0 Senior Member "jmfbahciv" <See.above@aol.com> wrote in message news:PM0004E1DD71D253BE@ac810898.ipt.aol.com... > Lawrence Statton wrote: >> Walter Banks <walter@bytecraft.com> writes: >> >>> jmfbahciv wrote: >>> >>>> You think health insurance is a right?!!!! >>> >>> I think health care is a right in a civilized society. >>> A healthy population makes a country far more >>> competitive on the world stage. >>> >> >> I don't think I'm willing to call it a "right" myself, but I do >> consider it a moral obligation that we all share to see that no-one >> goes without care. >> > Yes, and it makes good business and political sense. > However, the rabble have been trained to > expect all "right" for free, including not working. Bullshit. > Maybe I should change the word "including" for "expecially". Even sillier. Report message to a moderator

Re: What Makes a Tax System Bizarre? [message #98112 is a reply to message #97911] Fri, 19 July 2013 22:09   sidd Messages: 239 Registered: July 2012 Karma: 0 Senior Member In article <87bo5y8riu.fsf@cluon.com>, Lawrence Statton <lawrence@cluon.com> wrote: > > My first exposure to that was in differential calculus -- this shit is > so EASY! What kind of brain-damaged MORON are you that this isn't > immediately obvious??! My second exposure was integral calclus. This > shit is so HARD! What kind of brain-damaged MORON am I that this > isn't immediately obvious??! I had a similar hard time, but my problem was that most of the time derivatives could be expressed in closed form, but not integrals. I first found out about calculus from a small book called "Gravity" by Gamow. A brief while later an old and wise professor who i was fortunate enuf to kno gave me Hardy's Real Analysis. Out of curiosity from the "Handset to GSM handoff" comment, do u play with Asterix ? Also, you and others have mentioned looking for competence. I happen to know a couple good hard/soft types sorta at a loose end in the midwest and east coast. They will telecommute, but moving em far will take great enticement. As you point out about most such, they are not unhappy at the moment, but rather, these are slitely bored. If someone has a fun project .... sidd Report message to a moderator

Re: What Makes an Architecture Bizarre? [message #98113 is a reply to message #97895] Fri, 19 July 2013 22:11   Rod Speed Messages: 3507 Registered: January 2012 Karma: 0 Senior Member "jmfbahciv" <See.above@aol.com> wrote in message news:PM0004E1DEFC4F4D81@ac810898.ipt.aol.com... > Peter Flass wrote: >> On 7/18/2013 10:32 AM, jmfbahciv wrote: >>> >>> Are you telling me that most people will not have bought their own >>> stocks >>> and bonds, reinvesting dividends, for their retirement? Are you telling >>> met that most people are not doing any saving for their retirement but >>> are depending on the US government and their employer for income after >>> retirement? >> >> Yes and yes. >> >> * Average savings of a 50 year old $43,797 >> * Percentage of Americans over 65 who rely completely on Social >> Security 35% >> * Percentage of Americans who don’t save anything for retirement 36% >> (http://www.statisticbrain.com/retirement-statistics/) >> >> I can't claim to be a retirement genius, because most of my saving was >> done automatically, but I *did* think about it from time to time and >> make some decisions. >> >>> >>> If you are, then I'm beginning to understand why none of you >>> understand what I'm talking about. If you are, then people are really >>> in deep shit and don't know it yet. >> >> Yes, except their expecting the "uncle sam faiery" to bail them out. > Which is why SS and other government freebies SS isnt a government freebie, you pay for what you eventually receive. > are putting the US into bankruptcy. The US is nothing even remotely resembling anything like bankrupt. > people have transferred responsibility > of their lives to the government. Nope, because most do not depend entirely on SS in their time past working. > That's what communism is. That's just plain wrong too. And communism has nothing like FICA or SS either. Report message to a moderator

Re: What Makes a Tax System Bizarre? [message #98115 is a reply to message #98052] Fri, 19 July 2013 22:17   Lawrence Statton Messages: 326 Registered: May 2013 Karma: 0 Senior Member "Charlie Gibbs" <cgibbs@kltpzyxm.invalid> writes: >> For the next, the "toy" was the Nintendo (or Sega, or XBox, or >> whatever it is this week) and you don't have to learn to program >> that - just just plug it in and turn it on and get some engaging >> entertainment. > > Passive entertainment, at that. We wrote our own entertainment. > It's not entirely passive, and some Smart People (Jeri Ellsworth among them) have made cases for the bona-fide intrinsic value of gaming. (Totally aside from the peace-divdend of games driving performance.) >> When I was working in the video game "biz", I was asked at a panel >> discussion, "What is your favorite game?" And I answered deadpan >> "cc". (The C compiler). > > :-) Gotta remember that one. I made the same joke twenty years later, and my cow-orkers didn't get it. If I had said 'gcc', they would have, but none of them were young enough to remember a world where "The" C Compiler was not the Gnu one. > >> [deletia] the vast majority of users of <anything> don't really >> care how to build it, or how it works, they just want to write >> their book, or balance their accounts, or see pictures of kittens, >> or chat with their grandchildren, or .... > > Fair enough. But I wish the tools would do their job efficiently > and then get out of the way. > You'll get no argument from me on that one. Although, some years ago, as I was kneeling in front of the little half-rack of equipment in my office, replacing a dodgy network cable, I commented to my associate "You know what? For the first time in my professional life, I have no complaints about the entire tool chain. Every single thing I interact with every day works the way I think it ought to, can be adjusted to meet my prejudices and biases, and has never failed to perform what it says on the tin. The worst problem we've had in two years is this bad cable that I'm replacing." -- NK1G - Lawrence echo 'lawrenabae@abaluon.abaom' | sed s/aba/c/g Report message to a moderator

Re: What Makes a Tax System Bizarre? [message #98116 is a reply to message #97894] Fri, 19 July 2013 22:18   Rod Speed Messages: 3507 Registered: January 2012 Karma: 0 Senior Member "jmfbahciv" <See.above@aol.com> wrote in message news:PM0004E1DDE189F09C@ac810898.ipt.aol.com... > Patrick Scheible wrote: >> jmfbahciv <See.above@aol.com> writes: > > <snip> > >>> There is "free" and then there is using it. For the >>> pill you have to remember to take it every day at the >>> same time; it's effectiveness (used to be) 95% or so. >>> That's all based on the little fact that there are no >>> irregular menstration prolbems. You have to pay tons of >>> money to get and use the pill. Condoms require >>> cooperation from the male, which is not common, although >>> the AIDS thing may have helped there. >> >> There's Norplant and similar hormone-based birth control that only >> requires a shot quarterly or yearly. > I'll bet the cost is equivalent to taking the pill. You've just lost that bet. There's a reason its used in the 3rd world. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norplant#Use_in_the_developing_ world > Those came after I stopped needing birth control so > I don't anything about their use and effectiveness. >> There's IUDs that cost a fair amount to put in, but last >> for 5-7 years without requiring any new doctor's visits. > Unless they fall out. They mostly don’t and certainly don’t fall out every 6 months anyway. >> Costs money upfront but over the whole time period >> it's inexpensive. If one isn't in a monogamous relationship, one >> should be using condoms as well to prevent disease transmission. > Yea, try to get the male who refuses to put one on. Report message to a moderator

Re: What Makes an Architecture Bizarre? [message #98119 is a reply to message #97887] Fri, 19 July 2013 22:29   Rod Speed Messages: 3507 Registered: January 2012 Karma: 0 Senior Member "jmfbahciv" <See.above@aol.com> wrote in message news:PM0004E1DE14734059@ac810898.ipt.aol.com... > Stephen Sprunk wrote: >> On 16-Jul-13 07:21, jmfbahciv wrote: >>> Stephen Sprunk wrote: >>>> On 15-Jul-13 07:06, Peter Flass wrote: >>>> > On 7/14/2013 4:30 PM, jklam wrote: >>>> >>> In all of the above cases, he'd still be a billionaire >>>> >>> today, which is far more than he ever expected. >>>> >> >>>> >> Yes, he would still be stinking rich even if that capital gain >>>> >> was taxed at 95% and he would still try to do that. >>>> > >>>> > This is a "feel good" argument. That guy was just lucky and a >>>> > lot sess deserving than the lady who cleans the toilets in his >>>> > house, so let's take it from him and give it to her. >>>> >>>> I'd be satisfied if he paid (at least) the same effective tax rate >>>> that she did on her (much smaller) earnings. >>>> >>>> Even Warren Buffet says it's ridiculous that he pays a lower tax >>>> rate than his secretary does. >>> >>> Warren Buffet was comparing earned income to unearned income. >> >> Agreed. >> >>> His secretary has a salary which is in the highest tax bracket. >> >> I'm not sure she's in the highest bracket, but I'll agree for the sake >> of argument. >> >>> Buffet is nuts. >> >> This is where we fundamentally disagree. He is quite possibly the >> savviest investor of our era, which requires an understanding of >> economics and finance that is undoubtedly better than ours. So, when he >> publicly takes a position on something (which is rare) that is against >> his own self-interest (even rarer), that is worth paying attention to. > > I did pay attention; he's nuts. > >> >>>> > The fair way is to let everyone keep the money they earn (or >>>> > "earn") except for the _minimum_ required to run the government. >>>> >>>> Who decides what the "minimum" is? >>>> >>>> Since you (unlike BAH) >>> >>> You are wrong; taxes are necessary; I haven't said otherwise. My >>> objections have to do with stultifying business and trade. >> >> You're the one that says the goal of taxes is to "punish success" and >> "control profits". > No. then I wrote badly. The suggestions in this newsgroup > on how to solve the problems all punish success. Bullshit they do with those that say that the top 1% should be paying the same tax RATE as the next lower group. > This punishment is what I'm arguing against; Proclaiming it is punishment doesn’t make it punishment. > I'm not arguing against having taxes. >>>> > Sure I think a lot of athletes, actors, and dot-com millionaires >>>> > are way overpaid, but why is my opinion worth more than the >>>> > votes of millions of people expressed in the free market? >>>> >>>> If someone is willing to pay them that for their labor or ideas, >>>> then more power to 'em. My problem is solely with said >>>> millionaires (or billionaires) paying a _lower_ tax rate than >>>> middle-class (and often even "working poor") workers. >>> >>> You are again lumpiing unearned income with earned income. >> >> Whether income is "earned" or "unearned" is often a matter of how you do >> the accounting--and the current tax code provides enormous incentive to >> classify as much as possible as "unearned" to get a lower tax rate. >> >> I fundamentally disagree with the notion that unearned income should be >> taxed at a lower rate than earned income. If anything, it should be >> taxed at a _higher_ rate, but for now I'd settle for the same rate. > It is going to be the same rate as of this year. I strongly disagree > with you on this point. My taxes are going to double beause the > rates for unearned income have doubled. Why shouldn’t you be paying the same RATE of tax as you did with the 'earned' income ? Report message to a moderator

Re: What Makes an Architecture Bizarre? [message #98120 is a reply to message #97905] Fri, 19 July 2013 22:35   Rod Speed Messages: 3507 Registered: January 2012 Karma: 0 Senior Member "jmfbahciv" <See.above@aol.com> wrote in message news:PM0004E1DE04FE222E@ac810898.ipt.aol.com... > Rod Speed wrote: >> jmfbahciv <See.above@aol.com> wrote >>> Rod Speed wrote >>>> jmfbahciv <See.above@aol.com> wrote >>>> > Rod Speed wrote >>>> >> jmfbahciv <See.above@aol.com> wrote >>>> >>> Stephen Sprunk wrote >>>> >>>> Peter Flass wrote >>>> >>>>> jklam wrote >> >>>> >>>>>>> In all of the above cases, he'd still be a billionaire >>>> >>>>>>> today, which is far more than he ever expected. >> >>>> >>>>>> Yes, he would still be stinking rich even if that capital >>>> >>>>>> gain was taxed at 95% and he would still try to do that. >> >>>> >>>>> This is a "feel good" argument. That guy was just lucky and >>>> >>>>> a lot sess deserving than the lady who cleans the toilets in >>>> >>>>> his house, so let's take it from him and give it to her. >> >>>> >>>> I'd be satisfied if he paid (at least) the same effective >>>> >>>> tax rate that she did on her (much smaller) earnings. >> >>>> >>>> Even Warren Buffet says it's ridiculous that he >>>> >>>> pays a lower tax rate than his secretary does. >> >>>> >>> Warren Buffet was comparing earned income to unearned income. >> >>>> >> Nope, he is talking about tax rates. >> >>>> >>> His secretary has a salary which is in the highest tax bracket. >> >>>> >> He pays a lower tax rate than she does anyway. >> >>>> > He pays a lower rate because his income is unearned. >> >>>> That is just one of the reasons. The other is because he >>>> has a lot more deductions available to him as well. >> >>> What kind of deductions do you think he has? >> >> The cost of doing business. Costs that she does >> not have because she is just a wage slave. >> >>> He can take interest expense >> >> Yes. >> >>> but not much else. >> >> Bullshit. Her wages for starters. > > She doesn't work for Buffet. she works for the corpooration. > he doesn't deduct her wages from his personal income. her wages > which are very, very, very good for a scretary, are an expense > of the company. I havent' been keeping track of the stock price > of those shares. > > >> >>>> > There is a difference. >> >>>> You seriously 'think' that that is any news to anyone ? >> >>> It is here. People keep producing one of the stupidest >>> quotes of the last 3 deecades and use it to "prove" that >>> the middle class and retireees should have their tax rates >>> doubled or tripled. >> >> You're lying now. No one has EVER said anything about >> doubling or tripping the tax rates on the middle class >> and retirees in here and I read every single post in here. > If unearned income is taxed, those people's taxes will go up. But it wont be DOUBLED OR TRIPLED. > Every suggestion posted would double my income tax each year. Another bare faced lie. The suggestion that the top 1% should pay the same tax RATE as the next lowest group would have no effect what so ever on your income tax each year. >>> If the tax rate went to 40%, >> No one has even proposed that in here. > Are you kidding? Nope. No one has even proposed that IN HERE. >>> that would quadrulple some people's taxess. >> That’s not the tax rate, that’s the tax TAKE. >> Yes, some have proposed eliminating some of the >> deductions and rebates that allow the bottom HALF >> of the US to pay no net federal income tax, > This term you use is so wishy washy and specious. It’s a fact, no matter how much you try to hand wave that away. >> but that would no double or triple the tax RATE >> for those, and would in fact see an INFINITE >> increase in the tax TAKE for them. > when did you switch the word rate for total amount paid each year? I did nothing of the sort. Report message to a moderator

Re: What Makes an Architecture Bizarre? [message #98121 is a reply to message #97898] Fri, 19 July 2013 22:38   Rod Speed Messages: 3507 Registered: January 2012 Karma: 0 Senior Member "jmfbahciv" <See.above@aol.com> wrote in message news:PM0004E1DE9FFF5AA0@ac810898.ipt.aol.com... > Lawrence Statton wrote: >> jmfbahciv <See.above@aol.com> writes: >>> You don't get it. If money is "saved", Congress will spend 3x >>> the "saved" money. >> >> [citation needed]. >> >> I want a real source for that assertion, not "I heard it on late-night >> talk radio" or "it came to me in a dream" or "the party that I dislike >> is in power, so it must be true," but something resembly facts that >> can be verified. You're making extraordinary claims, you have to put >> up extraordinary evidence. >> > I thought I wrote what Mass. did. > > Congress appears to be doing similar things. I heard two differnt > expenditures for the money which came back out of the auto makers. Just because someone claims something doesn’t make it gospel. And that’s not money SAVED anyway. Report message to a moderator

Re: What Makes a Tax System Bizarre? [message #98122 is a reply to message #97896] Fri, 19 July 2013 22:46   127 Messages: 41 Registered: July 2013 Karma: 0 Member "jmfbahciv" <See.above@aol.com> wrote in message news:PM0004E1DDEECC2D02@ac810898.ipt.aol.com... > 127 wrote: >> >> >> "jmfbahciv" <See.above@aol.com> wrote in message >> news:PM0004E1C8F0CF6F60@ac81348a.ipt.aol.com... >>> 127 wrote: >>>> >>>> >>>> "Stephen Sprunk" <stephen@sprunk.org> wrote in message >>>> news:ks7bdm$935$1@dont-email.me... >>>> > On 17-Jul-13 15:02, 127 wrote: >>>> >> "Stephen Sprunk" <stephen@sprunk.org> wrote in message >>>> >> news:ks6ckt$aqf$1@dont-email.me... >>>> > >>> <snip> >>> >>> >>>> >>>>> If neo-cons really want to stop abortions, they need to change >>>> >>>>> the depressing economics of being a single mother--or agree to >>>> >>>>> provide young, low-income women with free birth control, which >>>> >>>>> is far cheaper for the govt than the alternative anyway. >>>> >>>> >>>> >>>> The problem is that many of the single mothers choose to have >>>> >>>> the kids and are essentially volunteering for welfare, so free >>>> >>>> birth control would make no difference with them. >>>> >>> >>>> >>> There's one serious problem with your theory: 1.5 million women per >>>> >>> year choose abortion. That shows they _don't_ want to have a kid, >>>> >>> despite the supposedly wonderful life of a welfare queen. >>>> >> >>>> >> I never said anything about any wonderful life. They just decide that >>>> >> being a single mother on welfare is better than the worst of the >>>> >> unskilled work. >>>> >>>> > ... or they've been brainwashed with moral objections >>>> > to abortion, or they simply can't afford one, >>>> >>>> Doesn’t cost much to get an abortion using RU486 etc. >> >>> And where do people get that? >> >> Off the net. > Not here. Yes, there. > it's still not settled if women are going to have access. Bullshit. They have done for years now. >>> How much does it cost? >> Much less than their cigarettes cost. > You don't know how much a pill costs. We've got this fucking system called the internet that allows people like me to check the price in seconds. I don’t smoke and can check the cost of cigarettes that way too. >>>> or they don't have a realistic idea of how >>>> > difficult it is to be a single mom, etc. >>>> >>>> Sure, but that’s just as true of those that aren't single mothers too. >>>> >>>> > I've known many over the years, and most of them _tried_ to work after >>>> > having a kid but quickly discovered the Welfare Trap. >>>> > >>>> >>> So why did they get pregnant in the first place? >>>> >> >>>> >> Because they like to fuck. >>>> > >>>> > So do most humans, but only the low-income ones tend to have unwanted >>>> > pregnancies. There's a reason for that: >>>> >>>> Yes, few kids that age bother with birth control until they end up >>>> pregnant. >> >>> What birth control methods are available to kids? >> >> All of them. > No, they aren't. Yes they are. > Not in the US anyway. Yes they are. >>> That assumes their parents told them about such things... >> No, kids get most of that information from >> other kids and from the education system. > And it's wrong information. No its not. >>> which usually isn't the case. >> >> That is just plain wrong with many of them. >> >>>> >>> Because birth control is simply too expensive for someone without >>>> >>> health insurance. >>>> >> >>>> >> Condoms don’t cost much. >>>> >>>> > But they're not very effective in practice, over the long run; you >>>> > only >>>> > need to mess up once, and most users mess up frequently. >>>> >>>> They aren't the only cheap contraceptive. >> >>> They're expensive. >> >> No. > Yes. No, they cost peanuts. >>> What other methods are cheap? >> >> All of them. >> >>> I don't know of any. >> >> They are all cheaper than cigarettes let alone the illegal drugs they >> use. > Which shows how much you know about these things. IOW, zip. You're lying now. >>>> >> Even birth control costs a lot less than cigarettes or coffee. >>>> >>>> > Look up the full cost, i.e. including exams every six months >>>> >>>> You don’t need an exam every 6 months. >> >>> Yes, you do. >> >> No. >> >>> To get a prescription rewnewal, you have to see the doctor. >> >> No. > Yes. No. There are plenty of places that sell stuff like that online without one. >>> The only way to get any prescription renewed is to see the doctor. >> You don’t need a prescription. > [stunned emoticon here] How old are you? 16? Older than you, thanks. > <snip> That’s what you always do with what you can't refute. Report message to a moderator

Re: What Makes a Tax System Bizarre? [message #98123 is a reply to message #97897] Fri, 19 July 2013 22:48   Rod Speed Messages: 3507 Registered: January 2012 Karma: 0 Senior Member "jmfbahciv" <See.above@aol.com> wrote in message news:PM0004E1DDCBD46053@ac810898.ipt.aol.com... > Peter Flass wrote: >> On 7/18/2013 5:12 PM, Lawrence Statton wrote: >>> Peter Flass <Peter_Flass@Yahoo.com> writes: >>> >>>> Now there are so many skills involved, and they change so fast, I >>>> can't keep up with them. There's a limit to how much one person can >>>> be proficient in, but if you're a Python expert and the job requires >>>> Ruby on Rails [substitute your own here] you won't be considered. >>> >>> When I was a younger man, an engineer (hardware design) told me "90% >>> of what I know today will be useless in ten years, and 90% of what I >>> will be doing in ten years does not yet exist today." >>> >>> My super-wizard level of skill at Z80 assembly programming, the great >>> tracts of brain real-estate given over to 4000 and 7400 series part >>> numbers, the wiring of a small town TV station thirty years ago -- all >>> of these things that were, at the time, very valuable but are of >>> absolutely zero commercial value in 2013. >>> >>> The tide is going to do its thing, and King Canute can do nothing to >>> stop it. >>> >> >> Probably engineers had problems similar to programmers today. If you >> were an EE working with discrete logic you were competing with kids just >> out of college who had worked with ICs. Of course back in those days >> there was still enough of an employer-employee bond that your employer >> would retrain you (AFAIK). Today they just fire you and hire the kids. > > And then contract out for you to fix the things the kids broke. My > brother experienced that. > > I was told that if you got a mechanical engineering degree, you could > always walk in and find a job. It’s a lie, plenty who have one have found that it’s a lie. Report message to a moderator

Re: What Makes an Architecture Bizarre? [message #98124 is a reply to message #97899] Fri, 19 July 2013 22:50   Rod Speed Messages: 3507 Registered: January 2012 Karma: 0 Senior Member "jmfbahciv" <See.above@aol.com> wrote in message news:PM0004E1DEACFD43A8@ac810898.ipt.aol.com... > Patrick Scheible wrote: >> jmfbahciv <See.above@aol.com> writes: >> >>> Morten Reistad wrote: >>>> In article <51E38421.1070508@SPAM.comp-arch.net>, >>>> Andy (Super) Glew <andy@SPAM.comp-arch.net> wrote: >>>> >On 7/14/2013 12:45 PM, jklam wrote: >>>> >> That doesn't work with the US income tax system because the amount >>>> >> you >>>> >> pay in US income tax is not dependant on where your primary residence > is. >>>> >> >>>> >> What matters is if you are a US citizen for tax purposes or not.] >>>> > >>>> >So have the income and hold the income producing property in an >>>> >offshore >>>> >company that you control. >>>> > >>>> >Leave the money offshore, for offshore expenses. >>>> >>>> Indeed. The idea of incorporating offshore is what secures the >>>> tax base. Even I have an offshore pension fund. I will be taxed >>>> to death if I use it as a non-pensioner, but can take income from >>>> it when I retire. And if I retire in some low-tax jurisdiction >>>> it will be taxed at that low rate. >>> >>> And why should one have to do all of this juggling? Don't governments >>> understand that high tax rates result in the wealth moving out of the >>> country? >> >> Even if the tax rates are low, there's always some pathetic hellhole of >> another country that will tolerate tax rates 2% lower and attract the >> businesses that shop around for the best tax havens. > But your use of the term hellhole says it all. Nope, its just silly rhetoric. Ireland is nothing even remotely like a hellhole. > Why move to a hellhoe if there environs of the original are good? Because you get to pay no taxes. > There are lots of additional costs But those may well be a lot less than the taxes you would have to pay. > and that doesn't include transporting the capitalized assets offshore. That isnt even necessary with most operations. Report message to a moderator

Re: What Makes a Tax System Bizarre? [message #98125 is a reply to message #98105] Fri, 19 July 2013 22:56   Lawrence Statton Messages: 326 Registered: May 2013 Karma: 0 Senior Member Andrew Swallow <am.swallow@btinternet.com> writes: >> [About DEC and ICL] > > Both used discrete components and designed their instruction sets on > the assumption that logic gates were expensive. I hate to sound like Mr. Speed, but you are again mistaken. My left-pond-ism is showing, and I know nothing about ICL's hardware, but I can demostrate the errors of your statement sufficiently without leaving DEC's product-line. While SOME of DEC's architectures hark back to the days of discrete components, near all of the major players made the transition from discrete transistors through integrated circuits into LSI implementations. The KA-10 was discrete components, but the KI, KL and KS were all made with integrated circuits, and I seem to remember those machines having some commercial success. The KS (2020) was built out of the same 2900-series bitslice hardware as some of the contemporaneous 11s and the VAX 11/730. I'm certain you know of Mr. Alderson's former employer who had a LSI implementation of the architecture. (I don't honestly remember if they got it into one package, or had it spread across two or three. Hopefully he'll jump in with the details.) The PDP-8 - the original "straight-8" and the 8-S were both built out of discrete components. Everything from the 8/I on was built out of TTL chips. Of course, we all know about the single-chip implem- entation of THAT platform that got some traction in the embedded systems market, and was used in at least one post-DEC D|i|g|i|t|a|l product. Two of their (if not THE two) biggest sellers were born in the IC era -- the PDP-11 and the VAX. Both of which were first implemented in off-the-shelf TTL, and later condensed into smaller scale packaging as the families matured. The 1975 PDP 11/03 was a two-chip implementation, with the hardware done by Western Digital. Later there were single-chip 11 implementations. The one VAX I owned personally enough to take apart (an 11/730) was built out of medium-scale TTL, PALs and many, many, many pieces of AMD 2900 series bitslice parts. At the end of the era, there were single-chip VAX implementations. Furthermore -- while logic gates are not "expensive" today, they do have a non-zero marginal cost, and there is no designer who is not constrained by gate-count when price-engineering a part. It has always been that way, whether a gate was a transistor, some diodes and some resistors, or a third of a 14-pin TTL pacakge, or a given area of real-estate on a die. -- NK1G - Lawrence echo 'lawrenabae@abaluon.abaom' | sed s/aba/c/g Report message to a moderator

Re: What Makes an Architecture Bizarre? [message #98126 is a reply to message #97902] Fri, 19 July 2013 22:58   Rod Speed Messages: 3507 Registered: January 2012 Karma: 0 Senior Member "jmfbahciv" <See.above@aol.com> wrote in message news:PM0004E1DE43378616@ac810898.ipt.aol.com... > Stephen Sprunk wrote: >> On 15-Jul-13 07:55, jmfbahciv wrote: >>> Stephen Sprunk wrote: >>>> The distribution of wealth in the US was a lot more even before >>>> Reagan shifted the tax burden from the rich to the middle class; >>>> since then, the inequality has gotten out of control, which has >>>> caused all sorts of social and economic problems. >>> >>> Wealth is not a static number. >> >> Duh? I never said it was. >> >>> What you are calling wealth is disposable income. >> >> Wrong. And the distribution of wealth is even more unequal than the >> distribution of income. >> >>> It wasn't Reagans' tax policies which made it go away. >> >> That's when the charts start to go crazy, and it's logical to connect >> that with shifting the tax burden from the rich to the middle class, >> which enabled the rich to accumulate more wealth while the middle class >> was left with almost no gain after taxes and living expenses. > > YOu also have to include the high interest rates, the S&L debacle, > the beginnings of what is now toxic CDOs, China and Indonesia starting > to become important trade exporters...what made things go topsy turvy... > Oh, EEO, of course. A determined dumbing down of elhi training. > all the hangovers from the 70s' production, trade and economic > problems such as the oil cartels, normal interest rates bein at the > usury levels, >> >>> It was unions, >> >> Income and wealth inequality have grown as union power has shrunk, so >> I'm not sure where you get that crazy idea. > > Unions made it too expensive to do business; the business moved. > People making upper middle class wages (at that time) lost their jobs. > So they had to start all over at entry level wages when they did find > a new job. > > >> >>> unreasonable minimum wage editcs, >> >> A minimum wage limits the economic rent that can be charged, which in >> some--but certainly not all--cases reduces the return on capital to >> unsustainable levels. >> >> More problematic for low-end wages is the welfare trap, which means that >> many people aren't willing to take minimum-wage jobs even when they're >> available because it would _reduce_ their income. A lower minimum wage >> just makes that problem worse. > > I understand. i've talked with a woman who quit her job and went on > Welfare because she saw her sister making double with lots of freebies. > This tells me that there is something wrong with the Welfare > administration, > not the job market. > >> >>> and too much government handouts which started manufacturing to >>> move out of the country. >> >> Manufacturing (and now other sectors) are moving out of the US for a >> variety of reasons, but that's not one of them. Heck, it's those very >> manufacturers who are _getting_ govt handouts, often as a reward for >> offshoring jobs! > > > The unions priced themselves out of a job. Their last strikes were > unreasonable demands and you can pick any strike. > >> >>>> > Every single one of those companies you want government control >>>> > over once started out as a small business. >>>> >>>> Who said anything about "government control" over those companies? >>> >>> You are proposing to limit the amount of business the company can do >>> by contolling revenue. >> >> I never proposed anything that even resembles controlling revenue. I >> merely proposed that mega-corporations pay reasonable taxes on their >> income--as small businesses already have to do. > > Somebody did in this thread. > >> >>>> We're just talking about slightly different tax strategies. >>> >>> No, you are talking about destorying trade by using the tax system to >>> punish success. >> >> Punishing success? Now you're just spouting neocon propaganda. > No, if an arbitrary limit is put on how much profit any company can have, No one in here has proposed anything of the sort. > then that is punishing and destroying success. Wrong. > All productive work will move out of that country. It isnt even possible to move all productive work out of any country. Much of it like building buildings and infrastructure has to be done in the country. >>>> > If you punish success, there will not be small business because >>>> > there isn't any point in starting one. >>>> >>>> Any govt needs revenue to provide public services, and there are >>>> only three things that can _be_ taxed to provide that revenue: >>>> production, consumption and wealth. And taxing any one of those >>>> directly results in an indirect tax on the other two. >>>> >>>> That is not the same thing as "punishing success". >>> >>> You want the few who are successful to fund those who are not. >> >> No, I want a system that rewards those who work for their success, >> rather than punishing work and rewarding speculation and idleness. > that's how it should be. That’s how it was with all of Jobs, Gates, Murdoch, Zimmerman, Brin, Buffet, Souros etc etc etc. > Socialsim nor communism nor facism does this. You wouldn’t know what real socialism was if it bit you on your lard arse. >>> That's slavery. >> If you really think so, you're beyond rational debate. > Once again, I was talking about governments > dictating how much profit any business can have. That still isn't slavery. You don’t pay slaves, you flog them if they refuse to work. Report message to a moderator

Re: What Makes an Architecture Bizarre? [message #98159 is a reply to message #97963] Fri, 19 July 2013 23:09   127 Messages: 41 Registered: July 2013 Karma: 0 Member "Patrick Scheible" <kkt@zipcon.net> wrote in message news:86a9liseqh.fsf@chai.my.domain... > jmfbahciv <See.above@aol.com> writes: > >> Patrick Scheible wrote: >>> jmfbahciv <See.above@aol.com> writes: >>> >>>> Morten Reistad wrote: >>>> > In article <51E38421.1070508@SPAM.comp-arch.net>, >>>> > Andy (Super) Glew <andy@SPAM.comp-arch.net> wrote: >>>> >>On 7/14/2013 12:45 PM, jklam wrote: >>>> >>> That doesn't work with the US income tax system because the amount >>>> >>> you >>>> >>> pay in US income tax is not dependant on where your primary >>>> >>> residence >> is. >>>> >>> >>>> >>> What matters is if you are a US citizen for tax purposes or not.] >>>> >> >>>> >>So have the income and hold the income producing property in an >>>> >>offshore >>>> >>company that you control. >>>> >> >>>> >>Leave the money offshore, for offshore expenses. >>>> > >>>> > Indeed. The idea of incorporating offshore is what secures the >>>> > tax base. Even I have an offshore pension fund. I will be taxed >>>> > to death if I use it as a non-pensioner, but can take income from >>>> > it when I retire. And if I retire in some low-tax jurisdiction >>>> > it will be taxed at that low rate. >>>> >>>> And why should one have to do all of this juggling? Don't governments >>>> understand that high tax rates result in the wealth moving out of the >>>> country? >>> >>> Even if the tax rates are low, there's always some pathetic hellhole of >>> another country that will tolerate tax rates 2% lower and attract the >>> businesses that shop around for the best tax havens. >> >> But your use of the term hellhole says it all. Why move to a hellhoe >> if there environs of the original are good? There are lots of additional >> costs and that doesn't include transporting the capitalized assets >> offshore. > > Again, multinationals thrive by moving their costs to where labor is > cheapest and taxes are lowest. That tends to create miserable living > conditions for the population, and maybe the multinational has to build > their own compound with their own security, electricity, and water > purification, but it's still cheaper than operating in a country with > decent living conditions and 1st world tax rates. Their only > involvement in the 1st world can be selling to the consumers there, who > still work for the businesses that haven't moved to the 3rd world yet. Most of them never will move to the 3rd world. It's just not possible for the absolute vast bulk of the service sector that is where most of the jobs are now. Report message to a moderator

Re: What Makes a Tax System Bizarre? [message #98160 is a reply to message #97907] Fri, 19 July 2013 23:24   Anne &amp; Lynn Wheel Messages: 3156 Registered: January 2012 Karma: 0 Senior Member re: http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2013j.html#4 What Makes a Tax System Bizarre? http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2013j.html#16 What Makes a Tax System Bizarre? and some more regarding too-big-to-fail (as a result of GLBA repealing Glass-Steagall) The Verdict Is In: "The Banking Lobby Is Simply Too Strong To Allow It To Happen" http://www.zerohedge.com/contributed/2013-07-19/verdict-%E2% 80%9C-banking-lobby-simply-too-strong-allow-it-happen%E2%80% 9D other recent posts mentioning repeal of Glass-Steagall: http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2013f.html#4 What Makes a thread about the European debt crisis Bizarre? http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2013f.html#8 What Makes an Architecture Bizarre? http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2013f.html#15 What Makes an Architecture Bizarre? http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2013f.html#36 Fed proposes annual assessments for large financial companies http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2013f.html#48 How to Cut Megabanks Down to Size http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2013h.html#30 'Big four' accountants 'use knowledge of Treasury to help rich avoid tax' http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2013h.html#65 OT: "Highway Patrol" back on TV http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2013h.html#66 OT: "Highway Patrol" back on TV http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2013i.html#18 Louis V. Gerstner Jr. lays out his post-IBM life - Washington Post http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2013i.html#20 Louis V. Gerstner Jr. lays out his post-IBM life http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2013i.html#41 Is newer technology always better? It almost is. Exceptions? http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2013i.html#54 How do you feel about the fact that India has more employees than US? http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2013i.html#76 The failure of cyber defence - the mindset is against it http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2013i.html#89 What Makes an Architecture Bizarre? http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2013j.html#6 Barclays, Traders Fined $487.9 Million by U.S. Regulator -- virtualization experience starting Jan1968, online at home since Mar1970 Report message to a moderator

Re: What Makes an Architecture Bizarre? [message #98162 is a reply to message #97883] Sat, 20 July 2013 00:52   Stephen Sprunk Messages: 2166 Registered: March 2013 Karma: 0 Senior Member On 19-Jul-13 10:27, jmfbahciv wrote: > Stephen Sprunk wrote: >> On 18-Jul-13 09:32, jmfbahciv wrote: >>> Robert Wessel wrote: >>>> Tax deferred* 401k and IRA distributions, as well as SS income >>>> (above a certain total income limit) >>> >>> which is very low. >> >> Not necessarily; you can sock away a lot of money in 401k/403b and >> IRA accounts. SS benefits are generally pitiful, though. > > But the amount you can extract each year without paying taxes is > small. You can't even extract the interest/dividends the fund pays. Right; above ~$20k in "earned" income, including 401k/403b and IRA distributions, you're going to be paying income taxes. I don't recall if those distributions are also subject to FICA taxes. The rich, in contrast, get _their_ retirement* savings taxed at the much lower rates for "unearned" income. (* Not that the rich can really retire, since they've never done an honest day's work in the first place.) >> If you think stock/bond ownership is "normal", that says a lot >> about the lack of variety in your social circle. > > I have no social circle. you are it. That explains a lot. >>> If you are, then people are really in deep shit and don't know it >>> yet. >> >> Actually, most of them _do_ know they're in really deep shit; they >> just don't understand how to _get out_ of their situation because >> they also see that the entire deck is stacked against them. > > WEll, it's called don't spend money. But that's like spitting into > the wind and not getting wet. Right, because basic human needs like food, shelter, clothing, health care, etc. are totally optional. Just cut that spending out of your budget and your problems are solved! Why can't the poor see that? S -- Stephen Sprunk "God does not play dice." --Albert Einstein CCIE #3723 "God is an inveterate gambler, and He throws the K5SSS dice at every possible opportunity." --Stephen Hawking Report message to a moderator

Re: What Makes an Architecture Bizarre? [message #98207 is a reply to message #98162] Sat, 20 July 2013 03:12   harry Messages: 143 Registered: May 2013 Karma: 0 Senior Member "Stephen Sprunk" <stephen@sprunk.org> wrote in message news:ksd4nj$tcl$1@dont-email.me... > On 19-Jul-13 10:27, jmfbahciv wrote: >> Stephen Sprunk wrote: >>> On 18-Jul-13 09:32, jmfbahciv wrote: >>>> Robert Wessel wrote: >>>> > Tax deferred* 401k and IRA distributions, as well as SS income >>>> > (above a certain total income limit) >>>> >>>> which is very low. >>> >>> Not necessarily; you can sock away a lot of money in 401k/403b and >>> IRA accounts. SS benefits are generally pitiful, though. >> >> But the amount you can extract each year without paying taxes is >> small. You can't even extract the interest/dividends the fund pays. > > Right; above ~$20k in "earned" income, including 401k/403b and IRA > distributions, you're going to be paying income taxes. I don't recall > if those distributions are also subject to FICA taxes. > > The rich, in contrast, get _their_ retirement* savings taxed at the much > lower rates for "unearned" income. > > (* Not that the rich can really retire, since they've never done an > honest day's work in the first place.) Many of them have, particularly Buffet, Brin, Jobs. >>> If you think stock/bond ownership is "normal", that says a lot >>> about the lack of variety in your social circle. >> >> I have no social circle. you are it. > > That explains a lot. > >>>> If you are, then people are really in deep shit and don't know it >>>> yet. >>> >>> Actually, most of them _do_ know they're in really deep shit; they >>> just don't understand how to _get out_ of their situation because >>> they also see that the entire deck is stacked against them. >> >> WEll, it's called don't spend money. But that's like spitting into >> the wind and not getting wet. > > Right, because basic human needs like food, shelter, clothing, health > care, etc. are totally optional. Just cut that spending out of your > budget and your problems are solved! Why can't the poor see that? > > S > > -- > Stephen Sprunk "God does not play dice." --Albert Einstein > CCIE #3723 "God is an inveterate gambler, and He throws the > K5SSS dice at every possible opportunity." --Stephen Hawking Report message to a moderator

Re: What Makes an Architecture Bizarre? [message #98242 is a reply to message #97883] Sat, 20 July 2013 07:53   Peter Flass Messages: 8375 Registered: December 2011 Karma: 0 Senior Member On 7/19/2013 11:27 AM, jmfbahciv wrote: > > I have no social circle. you are it. You're in big trouble then. Maybe we all are. -- Pete Report message to a moderator

Re: What Makes a Tax System Bizarre? [message #98243 is a reply to message #97860] Sat, 20 July 2013 08:01   Peter Flass Messages: 8375 Registered: December 2011 Karma: 0 Senior Member On 7/19/2013 9:54 AM, Lawrence Statton wrote: > Peter Flass <Peter_Flass@Yahoo.com> writes: >> Probably engineers had problems similar to programmers today. If you >> were an EE working with discrete logic you were competing with kids >> just out of college who had worked with ICs. Of course back in those >> days there was still enough of an employer-employee bond that your >> employer would retrain you (AFAIK). Today they just fire you and hire >> the kids. > > Butter ullshit .... you don't get fired, you adapt to keep up with > changing technology. There is no rule that says just because you left > school you get to stop learning new things. Companies keep old hands on projects that use their current skills and hire new people to do the new stuff. I've seen this happen, even when the old hands expressed an interest in something new, because the new hires already knew how to do this stuff, and no one wanted to bother with a trainee. > > When I first started programming, everything that I learned that was > new I immediately absorbed and rejoiced, and went on a search to find > a place I could use it effectively and get practice with it. Ten > years later - I was "fat, dumb, and happy" and anything new was "the > latest fad" and "the solution to a problem that nobody was having" and > I scoffed and drug my feet. I had a major epiphany one day -- the new > stuff I scoffed at was just as powerful, interesting as the things > that were new when I was young, and they were *not going to go away* > just because I mocked them. I'd agree, except that there's such a churn of "language/tool of the month? that you'll barely have time to learn to use one proficiently before another comes along. -- Pete Report message to a moderator

Re: What Makes an Architecture Bizarre? [message #98244 is a reply to message #97641] Sat, 20 July 2013 08:01   Walter Bushell Messages: 1834 Registered: December 2011 Karma: 0 Senior Member In article <b4r9llFh1jcU1@mid.individual.net>, "127" <127@586.com> wrote: > Housing bubbles don’t normally produce the sort of result we saw in 2008. The financial wizards are getting better with practice. -- Gambling with Other People's Money is the meth of the fiscal industry. me -- in the spirit of Karl and Groucho Marx Report message to a moderator

Re: What Makes an Architecture Bizarre? [message #98245 is a reply to message #97877] Sat, 20 July 2013 08:12   Peter Flass Messages: 8375 Registered: December 2011 Karma: 0 Senior Member On 7/19/2013 11:27 AM, jmfbahciv wrote: > > The debts incurred were paid by inflation? I'm on my edge of understanding > finacne and economics now. this sounds so wrong. You borrow $1000 and agree to pay back $1000 plus (say) 5% interest. If inflation is 7% you're paying back 2% less than you borrowed, in value though obviously not in actual dollars. Everyone loves inflation because it makes borrowing cheaper. Everyone is terrified of deflation, because it does the opposite. -- Pete Report message to a moderator

Re: What Makes an Architecture Bizarre? [message #98246 is a reply to message #97877] Sat, 20 July 2013 08:08   Walter Bushell Messages: 1834 Registered: December 2011 Karma: 0 Senior Member In article <PM0004E1DE91BFE250@ac810898.ipt.aol.com>, jmfbahciv <See.above@aol.com> wrote: > The debts incurred were paid by inflation? I'm on my edge of understanding > finacne and economics now. this sounds so wrong. "The nights you can't sleep the night you stop trying, you'll walk the floor and wear out your shoes; you're on the right path; you're learning the blues." -- Gambling with Other People's Money is the meth of the fiscal industry. me -- in the spirit of Karl and Groucho Marx Report message to a moderator   Next Page

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