Earlier quoted context omitted.
Time and time again it’s the same bullshit argument. I’ve grown tired of it. The price of goods and services has decoupled from the cost for a while now, and prices are rising at a staggering rate without salary increases.
>The price of goods and services has decoupled from the cost for a while now, and prices are rising at a staggering rate without salary increases. Almost as if there's multiple supply chain disruptions (from pandemic to ukraine) causing goods to be more scarce, causing consumers to bid up the prices for the goods that remain.
French workers protest plan to increase retirement age
811–820 of 835 posts
Re: French workers protest plan to increase retirement age
#812Earlier quoted context omitted.
Time and time again it’s the same bullshit argument. I’ve grown tired of it. The price of goods and services has decoupled from the cost for a while now, and prices are rising at a staggering rate without salary increases.
Has demand risen faster than supply?
Re: French workers protest plan to increase retirement age
#813Earlier quoted context omitted.
> "Giving old people money for free " uh, didn't the old people finance their own social security? Didn't they give up money their whole lives to finance their homes? Don't they contribute to society in other less-measurable ways? That said, there could be some ways to retire, but be able to work in such a way that retirement is not adversely affected. Some of my friends who retired had to carefully not work or socia…
> In the original Act benefits were to be paid only to the primary worker when he/she retired at age 65. Benefits were to be based on payroll tax contributions that the worker made during his/her working life. Taxes would first be collected in 1937 and monthly benefits would begin in 1942. (Under amendments passed in 1939, payments were advanced to 1940.) That's from https://www.ssa.gov/history/briefhistory3.html - s…
Also, it might be the relative value of money.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_dollar#Value
The $30,000 paid for a 1960 house would be worth $223,000 50 years later in 2010.
Re: French workers protest plan to increase retirement age
#814Earlier quoted context omitted.
90. Retired early at 60.
If he started working at 15, doesn't that put him at 45 years in the workforce and 30 years retired? He has to make it to 105 to meet your original claim.
Re: French workers protest plan to increase retirement age
#815Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Source? https://libcom.org/article/phenomenon-bullshit-jobs-david-gr... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bullshit_Jobs > Who's going to take care of sick people? Who's going to maintain our infrastructure? Who's going to police people? Who's going to defend our country from war? Who's going to make sure your cellphone still works? Who's going to make sure your house still has electricity? Who's going to make sure the…
You're probably 15 years old or thereabouts, so I'll keep this simple: With UBI, you will have to drive your trash to the nearest landfill yourself. And the car will barely work for lack of mechanics. And the road will barely function for lack of construction workers. And the landfill will just be a disordered rubbish tip, and not a proper facility. Because no one--and I mean no one--is working in garbage, grease, or…
Not everyone is a cynical monster who would only ever do anything that benefitted themselves personally.
Re: French workers protest plan to increase retirement age
#816Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Bullshit jobs are not specific to state capitalist Yes, but unlike in socialist governments, companies with a lot of bullshit jobs will die due to being inefficient. Thats the point of capitalism. Nobody has to work to support other able bodied humans rent seeking off their labor and capital. But in the US this is not true, as we don't have true capitalism in the US, we have a socialist mix and the govt can sometim…
> But in the US this is not true, as we don't have true capitalism in the US, we have a socialist mix and the govt can sometimes prop up inefficient companies. This is the "no true capitalist" fallacy. The reality of capitalism is that big companies get to impose whatever they want on any smaller entity they want. They may either do so directly (e.g. when operating in a weak country, like Chiquita's Banana Republics)…
How is it different from the "no true socialist/communist" fallacy that is more common?
> Before claiming such hilarious idealism, maybe take a look at the capitalist US South and the way it was built by 150 years or more of slave labor.
A free market requires free participants. Therefore, the US South was not purely capitalist. Also, slavery was not the only component in building the South. Other continents and countries have/had slavery for longer periods and are poorer.
The US South was an exploitative mix of socialism + capitalism that was defeated by the more capitalist and freer North.
> The reality of capitalism is that big companies get to impose whatever they want on any smaller entity they want.
Which exploitative project by a company has the lifespan and reach of CCP or Soviet Russia's decades long exploitation and rent seeking?
The difference is Oracle can't force you to buy their database for your small company but you have to pay gawking wages even if you are a poor person.
> weak country ... or by co-opting government (either in cahoots with an authoritarian government like the USSR or China, or a democratic government like the USA or Europe).
Thank you, thats my point. They can't survive long unless they are supported by an authoritarian govt or by a weak govt.
It is obvious now that we are arguing in circles with you supporting my point. So I guess we can end the conversation here.
Re: French workers protest plan to increase retirement age
#817Earlier quoted context omitted.
> But in the US this is not true, as we don't have true capitalism in the US, we have a socialist mix and the govt can sometimes prop up inefficient companies. This is the "no true capitalist" fallacy. The reality of capitalism is that big companies get to impose whatever they want on any smaller entity they want. They may either do so directly (e.g. when operating in a weak country, like Chiquita's Banana Republics)…
> This is the "no true capitalist" fallacy. How is it different from the "no true socialist/communist" fallacy that is more common? > Before claiming such hilarious idealism, maybe take a look at the capitalist US South and the way it was built by 150 years or more of slave labor. A free market requires free participants. Therefore, the US South was not purely capitalist. Also, slavery was not the only component in b…
However, that is not how those terms are normally defined or used. Capitalism means "an economic system where most enterprises are wholy owned by those who invest the initial capital". This differs from earlier economic models like feudalism, where enterprises were typically wholy owned by a lord through hereditary rule.
Socialism is normally defined as "an economic system where most enterprises are wholy owned by the workers who work in them".
Socialism can very well be a free market system, just like workers co-ops compete today with other worker's co-ops and more traditional capitalist corporations. Conversely, an economic system doesn't stop being capitalist just because there are tariffs or subsidies or other interventions by the state.
In particular, you can have a purely capitalist system with slave labor, since workers' rights are entirely irrelevant to whether a system is capitalist or not. In fact, freeing slaves has usually posed a problem to those with capital, and so the states that forced them to free their slave typically had to reimburse the owners for their loss of property as if they had nationalized a piece of land.
Later edit:
> Thank you, thats my point. They can't survive long unless they are supported by an authoritarian govt or by a weak govt.
My point about the weak government was that a powerful corporation faced with a weak government will just hire its own mercenaries and do what it wants, ignoring any law (usually forcing people to work) - like Chiquita and other banana companies did in South America.
Re: French workers protest plan to increase retirement age
#818Earlier quoted context omitted.
> left-leaning ideas of the younger generations about ecology and equality "extreme-left" Whatever the labelling you want to use, but we know for a fact that extreme ecology is going to destroy our country. We saw what happened with French nuclear, we are seeing it in the EU car industry, we are seeing it in French housing. We already know that radical ecology is going to bring social unrest. That the first to suffer…
> Macron is just trying to level the playing field and make France attractive. ... to whom? > After this reform, we will still be one of the most generous country in the world even for pension and social net even among Europe and even more worldwide. Not sure why I'm thinking about a frog being slowly boiled alive.
It is true that this reform (like all others before it, they revolve every 5-10 years in France) is only modifying the system at the margin, so it really is a slow boil.
Re: French workers protest plan to increase retirement age
#819The french pension reform attempts have been going on for decades . I remember in the mid-90s a huge, weeks- (months-?) long public transit strike which, funnily enough, kick-started Parisian's interest in roller-blading (and led to the awesome weekly Friday-night roller-blading tour [1]. If it's your thing, I highly recommend it! But be prepared to have to go over some cobblestone sections) France's system has the w…
the system IS sustained. the main white collar one even generates profits. increase the salaries that will increase money being sent to retirement funds and it won’t be a problem anymore. france income per capita has been the same for the past 20 years. they are stealing our wages to make us slaves and they blame us for not working enough. christine lagarde pushed for blocking wage rise in the EU, european commission…
regardless of whether this is correct or not (difficult to predict the future, even the COR only has "scenarios" to talk about, but nobody knows really what will happen), the current system is unjust in many ways (some "special regimes" are super favorable, with little justification other than legacy, and some workers should have more favorable regimes because of their work conditions, yet they do not and the reform does nothing for these people).
>it is nothing else than a betrayal at the highest level of the state
Agreed. Still, this is less worse (I can't really say "better") than the first attempt at reform during Macron's first mandate: that first attempt included a contribution rate falling from 28% to 2.8% above 120Keuro/year (if I recall correctly), which was effectively a tax cut for the wealthy.. If anything above this threshold, the contribution rate should increase (i.e. be progressive instead of regressive). The main issue is that the whole thing is un-reformable because so many consistuencies have vested interest in the status quo.
Re: French workers protest plan to increase retirement age
#820Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Every single pension system has the working population pay for the retirees. Where do you think the money comes from? Disagree. Counter-examples: 401k in the US Second pillar in Switzerland. The money comes from the people saving and investing their own money for their old age. Shocker, I know.
Those are not pensions. The 401k system is explicitly an alternative to the older pension systems. Words mean things.