Earlier quoted context omitted.
True. But what does this have to do with poverty levels discussed here?
That you cannot call capitalism any successful economic system. China proved that a protectionist model with colossal government intervention can successfully reduce poverty.
Americans Want to Believe Jobs Are the Solution to Poverty. They’re Not
121–130 of 632 posts
Re: Americans Want to Believe Jobs Are the Solution to Poverty. They’re Not
#122Earlier quoted context omitted.
> concluded it has insignificant impact or improves the economy Just because it improves the economy doesn't mean it's improved the lives of all people in it. With the detachment of wage growth from economic growth in recent decades you can probably expect people to stop caring about what's good for the economy altogether pretty soon, economic growth is just an abstract number disassociated from the reality of most.
> With the detachment of wage growth from economic growth in recent decades And you think immigrants are responsible for this? Or are they simply being used as a sacrificial scapegoat because nobody wants to address the raging inequality in the West?
Entirely? No. Partially? Yes.
Most notably immigration has a huge impact on housing and the ever increasing demand for it. This alone is responsible for much of the fall in living standards.
Re: Americans Want to Believe Jobs Are the Solution to Poverty. They’re Not
#123Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Where people wind up is very much a consequence of their choices. True. But we also have lots of studies showing that the best of the lowest socioeconomic class almost never do better than the laziest of the uppermost socioeconomic class.
We have social mobility, not a social lottery. Moving all the way from the bottom to the top might take a couple generations, which will obviously involve needing to win at a fierce competition. That looks an awful lot like a meritocracy.
Re: Americans Want to Believe Jobs Are the Solution to Poverty. They’re Not
#124Earlier quoted context omitted.
Do they? By how much? Immigrants have usually low wages. Anyways, in Western Europe, the increased demand (which is probably smaller than in the US), those things are easily canceled by the added costs to public healthcare + social benefits.
In belgium the rising healthcare cost is almost entirely due to an aging population. To take care of those elderly you need nurses and care workers, 46000 extra per year for the coming decade. Meanwhile the schools only graduate 5000 per year, due to lack of interest by the native population because of the odd hours in nursing. The only way they’ve found to bridge the gap and take care of the elderly is bringing over…
You could argue that by bringing Filipinos in you lower the wages, and as a result, the native population is less interested in taking such jobs, besides lowering the "status" of the job itself.
I was recently looking for a nanny in Spain and most applicants were Spanish females. Despite that, most parents seem to hire foreign nannies from LA because it's cheaper.
That said, it's really sad if the elderly in Belgium are being taken care of by people they barely can understand. What a nice ending of life!
I remember from my time in the Netherlands that the elderly there get regular visits from a specific person whose job is to socialize with them to solve some of the "loneliness" problems. I wouldn't be surprised if something similar happens in Belgium, which is IMO, a growingly anti-social society.
In Spain (which has the highest life expectancy in Europe by the way) many old people are still taken care of by close family members, or in other cases by people from LA who at least speak the same language. I didn't realize how fortunate they actually are.
Re: Americans Want to Believe Jobs Are the Solution to Poverty. They’re Not
#125Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm sorry to hear about your parents. However I don't know what your point is. On one hand you say your hard work and focus on future got you out of poverty. Then you say your parents are an example of where hard work and grit are NOT all you need. Honestly it sounds like you were born with a certain amount of intelligence, got some money to go to college, and you made the most of it. But where would you be if you ha…
Play his role without the death of his father and incidental lawyer willing to work pro-bono (or, I suspect, on commission): would his hard work have gotten him anywhere besides an early grave? Having been to sea, I can personally say that I seriously doubt he would have gotten much further than his father. Born as grist for the mill.
Re: Americans Want to Believe Jobs Are the Solution to Poverty. They’re Not
#126Earlier quoted context omitted.
i can't tell if you actually think it is simple or not. you and your mother are fortunate for that professional class lawyer who worked pro-bono for no material gain whatsoever.
My point was that none of it was simple. There are many other poor Americans that have had issues pop up like this but are unable to afford or find lawyers to represent them in court. You're absolutely correct that we're lucky that not only did we win the suit but that the lawyer took on the case. Other people aren't as lucky.
Re: Americans Want to Believe Jobs Are the Solution to Poverty. They’re Not
#127Why is this a problem? I just can't see any indication of problem here, this is just supply vs demand: world is globalized now and most of what uneducated people could do can be imported from much cheaper places. If we started to look hard for 'fixes' for this we'd end up just breaking the economy. Force businesses to pay them more and even more of these job will evaporate, because there will be no point any longer.…
Why not invest money in education, training and a social security net that gives poorer individuals the means and space to catapult themselves into wealth?
Re: Americans Want to Believe Jobs Are the Solution to Poverty. They’re Not
#128Earlier quoted context omitted.
The US went from subsistence farming in 1800 to superpower a hundred years later. Nearly the entire population that made up the US arrived penniless, and moved up into the middle class and higher. To say that American capitalism somehow "caused" poverty is contrary to about every statistic.
And those people were able to rise by hurting the natives originally living there... no free lunch theorem strikes again
There's something different about the US - capitalism.
Re: Americans Want to Believe Jobs Are the Solution to Poverty. They’re Not
#129Earlier quoted context omitted.
Ah, the old trope of trotting out Adam Smith. It may surprise you to know Smith was concerned about unfettered self-interest and the ways it would damage society. He wasn’t lauding self-interest and praising it as the perfection capitalism claims it to be. Why not include some more of his gems? Civil government, so far as it is instituted for the security of property, is in reality instituted for the defense of the r…
I don't see anything in the parent's comment indicating that he supports unfettered self-interest. As far as I can tell almost everyone nowadays supports the idea of having markets which are partially free, but subject to some regulation (which was Smith's position). Hardcore Rand and Marx devotees are on the fringe. We are all just debating the degree and character of the regulation. We debate within Smith's world b…
I never suggested the parent indicated this.
Re: Americans Want to Believe Jobs Are the Solution to Poverty. They’re Not
#130Earlier quoted context omitted.
> On one hand you say your hard work and focus on future got you out of poverty. I think that was just to add to the shock factor. The point was that his hard work would not have taken him anywhere, were it not for the money brought by his father's accident lawsuit.
Yes, this. My parents had very little to no ability to save money due to dealing with basic survival plus raising me. Had my father not passed away, they likely would not have saved any sort of money to support a college fund. A fair amount of that money went to support my family because by that time my mother and my step father (also a fisherman) were disabled as a result of their job and practically unable to work.…