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After the check is gone: The underground economy of rural America

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Re: After the check is gone: The underground economy of rural America

#141

Post by Caveman_Coder »

riot504 wrote: post #125
mrskitch wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can relate to this sentiment, but you've got take into account the whole story: - Failing health, already has nearly died. - No safety net. - Risks life every time this voyage is made. - Doesn't have access to many resources. Here you have someone who doesn't have (what appears to be) working plumbing. Doesn't even have a _kitchen_ (just a hot pad). No assets or finances to speak of. Likely no support network. On t…

I view smoking as a kind of break from life. It has a calming effect. Many people smoked during my deployments to Iraq for the same reason - it calms you and allows a simple break otherwise not found. I don't smoke as the smell gives me a terrible headache but I understand the reasoning - particularly when life is hard.

> "I view smoking as a kind of break from life. It has a calming effect. Many people smoked during my deployments to Iraq for the same reason - it calms you and allows a simple break otherwise not found. .."

I found this to be the same reason why many of my fellow shipmates smoked during my time in the Navy. It was a kind of pre-watch "bonding" session of sorts...We'd smoke our cigs, grab a quick bite from the galley, then relieve the watch...our pre-watch smoke was a kind of "shoot-the-shit" before we had to be serious and formal operators.

Re: After the check is gone: The underground economy of rural America

#142

Post by rbanffy »

noworld wrote: post #127
calt wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Who the fuck are you? Imagine having nothing and then being told you can't have the companionship of a dog or even cheap beer because that means you aren't interested in changing your situation.

I'm the person that would rather have clean clothes and a shower, then get a job, washer, dryer, and bed, and THEN worry about the dog and cheap beer later. This is an article about people that can't suppress an urge right now for long term gains and it holds them in perpetual poverty. That's who the fuck I am.

Try this before judging:

https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2013/11/your-br...

It's not easy for them.

Re: After the check is gone: The underground economy of rural America

#143

Post by r00fus »

549362-30499 wrote: post #111
thaumaturgy wrote: post #99

Logan County, West Virginia, where this article is set, voted 80% in favor of Trump, giving him 10,000 additional votes. [1] The entire state of West Virginia went to Trump. If Democrats want to change the current political landscape in this country, they might start by addressing some of these peoples' problems while they're campaigning on everyone else's problems too. Trump (and conservatives) aren't going to do a…

Clinton did campaign on a jobs and retraining program specifically for these people. But how can you compete with someone saying they'll hand-wave away your problems and return your old way of life?

This is a hard truth: Trump had the populist vote (mostly lies IMHO) and Clinton ceded it to him.

What Democrats needed was to nominate a better populist. I doubt Sanders would have won WV, but I think he might have done better than Clinton in red-areas of states she should have won like Florida or Michigan.

Re: After the check is gone: The underground economy of rural America

#144

Post by alexanderstears »

rbanffy wrote: post #132
alexanderstears wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How appealing is a retaining program when you're dirty, tired, old, and not able to get to a class room? She didn't campaign on a jobs program, or at least not one that would matter like a jobs guarantee.

Should they just lie instead? Sometimes reality is not appealing.

Should they just lie instead?

What's the objective?

I think the retraining is a neoliberal dog whistle for 'these people deserve their current lives'. If the objective is to run a campaign that's consistent with (or an affirmation of) elite coastal values, then harping on retraining is exactly the right thing to do.

If you want to want the most votes, you have to appeal to the most amount of people. Making coastal elites the outgroup is smart because there aren't that many of them and they probably support one of their own anyway.

Re: After the check is gone: The underground economy of rural America

#145

Post by enraged_camel »

csense wrote: post #122
thaumaturgy wrote: post #99

Logan County, West Virginia, where this article is set, voted 80% in favor of Trump, giving him 10,000 additional votes. [1] The entire state of West Virginia went to Trump. If Democrats want to change the current political landscape in this country, they might start by addressing some of these peoples' problems while they're campaigning on everyone else's problems too. Trump (and conservatives) aren't going to do a…

> Trump (and conservatives) aren't going to do a thing for these people, but at least they mentioned them. One of Trump's campaign promises was to cut back environmental and business regulations and get the coal industry rolling again. He actually did pull out of the Paris climate accord. Is this the right approach? Will Trump's actions help these communities? I'm not sure. But it's simply not true that he's doing no…

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the coal sector added only 1,000 jobs from October 2016 through June 2017.

https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2017/06/pruitt-...

(You can click through the links to see the raw data, but the article provides important context.)

The coal sector employs only around 50,000 people, so the added jobs represent a 2% increase. And it is unclear how much of that was a result of, or even encouraged by, Trump's policies. We do know one thing though: most of those jobs are being replaced by, or will soon be replaced by, natural gas mining jobs. Coal as a whole is a dying industry and cannot be "saved" by killing a few regulations.

Re: After the check is gone: The underground economy of rural America

#146

Post by wu-ikkyu »

logfromblammo wrote: post #42
wu-ikkyu wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What about a resource-based basic income? There is already a vast surplus of food and shelter that goes wasted every year, at least in the US.

That's one way to reasonably do it. Otherwise, the benefit goes largely to the rent-seekers instead of the people you're trying to help. I suppose another way would be to issue restricted local currencies and non-transferable coupons or vouchers. That has the added benefit of creating a lot of paper-pushing bureaucracy jobs.

>I suppose another way would be to issue restricted local currencies and non-transferable coupons or vouchers. That has the added benefit of creating a lot of paper-pushing bureaucracy jobs.

Isn't one of the main goals of BI to eliminate the "need" for bullshit jobs, though?

Re: After the check is gone: The underground economy of rural America

#147

Post by seabird »

forkandwait wrote: post #24

So why can't we invest enough time and money in these people to make them engineers and technicians? Then they might be able to start shops that make and distribute the tourist trinkets mentioned by another poster. Why is the only solution that a large company that someone else creates moves in and provides low skill jobs?

It takes years and a huge amount of money to train a skilled worker, all of that on top of the drive needed from the worker in question. Once you're north of 30-40 with no real skills, you're up shit creek.

Re: After the check is gone: The underground economy of rural America

#148

Post by thaumaturgy »

csense wrote: post #122
thaumaturgy wrote: post #99

Logan County, West Virginia, where this article is set, voted 80% in favor of Trump, giving him 10,000 additional votes. [1] The entire state of West Virginia went to Trump. If Democrats want to change the current political landscape in this country, they might start by addressing some of these peoples' problems while they're campaigning on everyone else's problems too. Trump (and conservatives) aren't going to do a…

> Trump (and conservatives) aren't going to do a thing for these people, but at least they mentioned them. One of Trump's campaign promises was to cut back environmental and business regulations and get the coal industry rolling again. He actually did pull out of the Paris climate accord. Is this the right approach? Will Trump's actions help these communities? I'm not sure. But it's simply not true that he's doing no…

He hasn't done (and isn't likely to do) anything that will have a measurable impact on these peoples' lives. Pulling out of the Paris climate accord only hurt the US in the long run and didn't give a single dollar back to anybody in deeply impoverished rural areas in exchange.

For someone to have "done" something, I'd want to see some kind of difference in the before and after pictures.

Re: After the check is gone: The underground economy of rural America

#149

Post by bittercynic »

Diederich wrote: post #124

Once again, I'm probably breaking the rules. Consider this person: https://news.ycombinator.com/threads?id=hestipod > I made an account just to comment on this issue after lurking for a long time but it's surely just another pointless action because it's the same story over and over. Empathy is not common. Three (at this time) comments that seem to be very relevant to this topic and discussion, yet all [dead]. > Most…

hestipod's comments all being dead seems to prove his/her point.

I thought all three were well-written and illuminating.

Re: After the check is gone: The underground economy of rural America

#150

Post by kbaker »

Diederich wrote: post #124

Once again, I'm probably breaking the rules. Consider this person: https://news.ycombinator.com/threads?id=hestipod > I made an account just to comment on this issue after lurking for a long time but it's surely just another pointless action because it's the same story over and over. Empathy is not common. Three (at this time) comments that seem to be very relevant to this topic and discussion, yet all [dead]. > Most…

(Offtopic) If you click on the comment, there is a [vouch] link to bring certain comments back from the dead.

I find that this is a good balance to keep the well-written comments that add to the discussion and deserve a second chance.

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