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True Rate of Unemployment

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Re: True Rate of Unemployment

#61

Post by alyeska2 »

Aurornis wrote: post #51
runako wrote: post #11

Anybody who believes ~30% of the workforce was functionally unemployed in 1999 does not know what those words mean, or was not an adult in 1999. I get what they are trying to convey, but the stronger message is the more straightforward: there are too many jobs that do not pay enough to live on.

> there are too many jobs that do not pay enough to live on. I know this is argued as a reason for high unemployment on the internet, but it does not match my experience in the real world at all. Having a job that pays a little is more income than no job at all. People stuck with low paying jobs often have multiple jobs as a result.

You seem to be confused about the point people are making. The point is that from about 1945 until around 2000 in the USA there really wasn't such a thing as "a job that doesn't pay enough to live on".

People owned houses and cars by working at grocery stores. A single income from any white collar job supported a stay-at-home spouse. Teenagers bought cars by working part time. College kids paid their tuition and living expenses for the full year by working summers.

That today's below-poverty-line job still leaves someone better off than being completely destitute is beside the point.

Re: True Rate of Unemployment

#62

Post by [deleted] »

01100011 wrote: post #52
xbmcuser wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For me the true problem which most countries dont even acknowledge is low wealth and capital gains tax. Salaries are not enough because of land prices and the prices inflation it causes through out the economy. You bring down price of home land rent then price of everything else comes down. And their is a lot more economic activity as trillions of dollars are not parked in real estate for wealth generation.

I have had this sneaking suspicion for years now that most of the money needs to be locked up because if we actually gave it to the masses to spend we'd see massive inflation and/or environmental catastrophe (worse than the current one). I don't mean to defend the wealth gap, and I'm not trying to make a statement on how things should be. I just think there may be an unfortunate reality that we need most of the world…

[deleted]

Re: True Rate of Unemployment

#63

Post by Aurornis »

psalaun wrote: post #41
xbmcuser wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For me the true problem which most countries dont even acknowledge is low wealth and capital gains tax. Salaries are not enough because of land prices and the prices inflation it causes through out the economy. You bring down price of home land rent then price of everything else comes down. And their is a lot more economic activity as trillions of dollars are not parked in real estate for wealth generation.

I agree, but taxing real estate as an investment would break the wealth structure of many voters (and politicians) above the 80th percentile of wealth. For half a century, in France, it's been told that real estate was the safest/best investment for households; everyone was passively peer pressured each year, whatever the macroeconomic situation at the moment, to buy. This is a Ponzi scheme, so even the middle class…

> I agree, but taxing real estate as an investment would break the wealth structure of many voters (and politicians) above the 80th percentile of wealth

Most places do tax real estate. I was surprised to look it up and find that Paris has some of the lowest property tax rates in the world.

Land Value Tax would be a little different, though. It's a proposal to replace most or all taxes with a simple tax on the estimated value of the land. One of the key features of LVT is that if land becomes valuable over time, the tax on that land becomes so high that the owner is forced to sell it. The idea is that the LVT ensures optimal usage of the land by forcing people who own land in valuable areas to use it for a business. So if you buy a house and the area becomes popular 10 years later, your tax bill might get so high that you have to sell it to a developer who will build a high-rise on it, or a grocery store that can afford the high tax rate.

It would never be accepted in practice when everyone's 70 year old parents were being forced to sell their modest forever homes. There's also a major problem where the structures aren't considered at all, so one person with a $2 million home living next to someone with a $200,000 100-year old home would pay the same tax rate if they're on the same size lot, because it only cares about the value of the land.

I don't know why Land Value Tax has become the default solution to everything on the internet, because I think most people would actually hate what it did to society. Having progressive taxes that scale with people's income, spending, and size of their home is good for making the tax burden proportional to wealth and consumption. Replacing it all with a tax that just taxes how much your property is worth ignores everything except the value of your land, which is completely out of your control over several decades of life as the world changes around you.

Re: True Rate of Unemployment

#64

Post by WillPostForFood »

redwood wrote: post #55
runako wrote: post #11

Anybody who believes ~30% of the workforce was functionally unemployed in 1999 does not know what those words mean, or was not an adult in 1999. I get what they are trying to convey, but the stronger message is the more straightforward: there are too many jobs that do not pay enough to live on.

Can you explain what you're saying? Do you mean that in 1999 fewer people worked low paying jobs?

That data is in the article, "true unemployment" was higher in 1999. The last few years are the best years on the graph.

Re: True Rate of Unemployment

#65

Post by hdgvhicv »

bruce511 wrote: post #42
snovv_crash wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

LVT can be deferred to the time of sale.

Unfortunately that doesn't really help. It has the effect of eroding the asset value such that it quickly means the owner can't sell. In other words, if selling removes much of your capital, you then don't gave capital to spend on the next place. Conversely investors become even more motivated not to ever sell. They can defer the LVT forever, and just use the property as collateral for loans (ie getting liquidity wit…

The tennant pays now anyway. Of a landlord could charge more rent they would.

Two identical properties, one under mortgage and one that isn’t, have identical rental prices. The costs to the landlord are irrelevant.

Re: True Rate of Unemployment

#66

Post by Aurornis »

alyeska2 wrote: post #61
Aurornis wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> there are too many jobs that do not pay enough to live on. I know this is argued as a reason for high unemployment on the internet, but it does not match my experience in the real world at all. Having a job that pays a little is more income than no job at all. People stuck with low paying jobs often have multiple jobs as a result.

You seem to be confused about the point people are making. The point is that from about 1945 until around 2000 in the USA there really wasn't such a thing as "a job that doesn't pay enough to live on". People owned houses and cars by working at grocery stores. A single income from any white collar job supported a stay-at-home spouse. Teenagers bought cars by working part time. College kids paid their tuition and livi…

I understand that argument, but what does it have to do with the unemployment rate?

You seem to be confused about the point I'm making, which is that low-paying jobs drive people to take on more employment, not less.

Re: True Rate of Unemployment

#67

Post by bee_rider »

01100011 wrote: post #52
xbmcuser wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For me the true problem which most countries dont even acknowledge is low wealth and capital gains tax. Salaries are not enough because of land prices and the prices inflation it causes through out the economy. You bring down price of home land rent then price of everything else comes down. And their is a lot more economic activity as trillions of dollars are not parked in real estate for wealth generation.

I have had this sneaking suspicion for years now that most of the money needs to be locked up because if we actually gave it to the masses to spend we'd see massive inflation and/or environmental catastrophe (worse than the current one). I don't mean to defend the wealth gap, and I'm not trying to make a statement on how things should be. I just think there may be an unfortunate reality that we need most of the world…

Oh, that’s an interesting thought. Nice way to increase GDP without doing anything actually useful, right?

Re: True Rate of Unemployment

#68

Post by SpicyLemonZest »

ElProlactin wrote: post #57
jandrewrogers wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As someone who lived much of their life in real poverty, you can live a pretty decent life on $50k in most of the US. Yeah, you won’t be posting your vacations on Instagram but who cares. Many people live a decent life within these income constraints. There is an enormous amount of government subsidies if you are this poor. Don’t exaggerate what is required for a decent quality of life in America. It doesn’t benefit…

> ...you can live a pretty decent life on $50k in most of the US. Where? And what's the size of the household? It's one thing to make $50,000/year as a single young person sharing an apartment with 2 other people. It's another to be a family of 4. > Don’t exaggerate what is required for a decent quality of life in America. It doesn’t benefit anyone. "Decent" is subjective, but we can look at hard numbers. After taxes…

It's unavoidably true that 50% of Americans are going to be below the median. I understand why someone might feel frustrated or say they're struggling if they look at their home, car, groceries, etc. and see that 50% of Americans have better ones. But no economic policy can solve this. A meaningful analysis has to be based on some level of functional adequacy, not just comparing median expenses to below-median income.

Re: True Rate of Unemployment

#69

Post by bobthepanda »

01100011 wrote: post #52
xbmcuser wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For me the true problem which most countries dont even acknowledge is low wealth and capital gains tax. Salaries are not enough because of land prices and the prices inflation it causes through out the economy. You bring down price of home land rent then price of everything else comes down. And their is a lot more economic activity as trillions of dollars are not parked in real estate for wealth generation.

I have had this sneaking suspicion for years now that most of the money needs to be locked up because if we actually gave it to the masses to spend we'd see massive inflation and/or environmental catastrophe (worse than the current one). I don't mean to defend the wealth gap, and I'm not trying to make a statement on how things should be. I just think there may be an unfortunate reality that we need most of the world…

this is already happening via asset price inflation.

where i live (Seattle) small businesses are trapped in a death spiral as their rents are going up, the wages they have to pay are up to even attract workers who also need to pay rent, but purchasing power has not caught up.

Re: True Rate of Unemployment

#70

Post by bpodgursky »

ElProlactin wrote: post #57
jandrewrogers wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As someone who lived much of their life in real poverty, you can live a pretty decent life on $50k in most of the US. Yeah, you won’t be posting your vacations on Instagram but who cares. Many people live a decent life within these income constraints. There is an enormous amount of government subsidies if you are this poor. Don’t exaggerate what is required for a decent quality of life in America. It doesn’t benefit…

> ...you can live a pretty decent life on $50k in most of the US. Where? And what's the size of the household? It's one thing to make $50,000/year as a single young person sharing an apartment with 2 other people. It's another to be a family of 4. > Don’t exaggerate what is required for a decent quality of life in America. It doesn’t benefit anyone. "Decent" is subjective, but we can look at hard numbers. After taxes…

> After taxes, $50,000 will be somewhere between $39,000 and $42,000 in much of the US

NO. WRONG. Read what I actually said. This was after transfers, at the OP's income range US income tax is NEGATIVE and puts you at the $49,000 I cited.

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