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Temple Student Strike Turns Ugly as School Ends Some Tuition Aid

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Re: Temple Student Strike Turns Ugly as School Ends Some Tuition Aid

#241

Post by the_only_law »

icepat wrote: post #33
shishy wrote: post #9

Bone headed move. They must have miscalculated if they think the students will cave to this pressure. Also, how can they take away tuition reimbursement for the whole semester if the strike hasnt been that long? Garbage administration. I hope the students win and that this isnt the new normal.

> Bone headed move. They must have miscalculated if they think the students will cave to this pressure It´s not about caving, I don´t think. It´s about maximum damage. University administration is one of the most ruthless groups you can come across. They´re well aware that they hold the future ambitions of these students in their hands. Even if they get sued, even if they lose, they´re well aware that they can utterl…

> University administration is one of the most ruthless groups you can come across.

No joke, I managed to twist my way around bureaucrats for years, but university admissions was the one first I could just never beat

Re: Temple Student Strike Turns Ugly as School Ends Some Tuition Aid

#242

Post by BobbyJo »

danaris wrote: post #226
BobbyJo wrote: post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1) Market != Country. There are plenty of free markets within the U.S. 2) There are multiple ways to maximize profits in a free market depending on the market. Not all markets allow you to create monopolies. Monopolies only exist, in practice, were market dynamics are compromised. For instance, power companies are able to be monopolies because power delivery infrastructure is constrained and supply cannot be increase…

Gotta be careful when talking about "Free Markets". Thing is, there are generally two different things that people can mean when they say "free market": 1. A "market economy", as contrasted with a "command economy"—ie, more or less the way the US does things, as opposed to the way the Soviet Union did things. 2. An "ideal free market", as described by Adam Smith, which can, in theory, ensure that many systems find a…

I don't think either is quite right.

I was using free market in a practical sense, as in a market (a pairing of buyers and sellers) that has functional supply and demand dynamics. I wasn't relying on any larger context, like an economy.

I didn't interpret WalterBright's comment as invoking some 'ideal' market either. I don't think talking about 'ideal' anything is even useful outside of an academic context, so I don't assume anyone here, that isn't explicitly talking about theory, is invoking an 'ideal' version of whatever they are talking about.

Re: Temple Student Strike Turns Ugly as School Ends Some Tuition Aid

#243

Post by BobbyJo »

lotsofpulp wrote: post #167
BobbyJo wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or, make said funded loans being paid off contingent, to some degree, on student success? The gov-funded loans were created to solve a problem as well.

The only problem they were created to solve was soaking future taxpayers with debt and a devalued currency, while keeping taxes low in the past and present. The government should either fund higher education directly, or give students cash. This is the same playbook with deferred compensation like defined benefit pensions and retiree healthcare for government employees. Government avoids paying cash now so taxes are…

> The only problem they were created to solve was soaking future taxpayers with debt and a devalued currency, while keeping taxes low in the past and present.

They were created to allow poor kids to fund their education with a vehicle other than government grants.

> The government should either fund higher education directly, or give students cash.

Maybe, maybe not. There is a cost/benefit argument to be made there, but I doubt you have the information necessary to say this with the level of certainty you are presenting.

> This is the same playbook with deferred compensation like defined benefit pensions and retiree healthcare for government employees. Government avoids paying cash now so taxes are lower now, and use liberal accounting assumptions to understate the debt.

There are differences in the risk, and therefore pricing of these two forms of government debt, but yes, the government, like all entities, tries to pay things off as late as possible.

Re: Temple Student Strike Turns Ugly as School Ends Some Tuition Aid

#244

Post by int_19h »

WalterBright wrote: post #236
int_19h wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's too bad that truly free (i.e. competitive) markets don't survive capitalism for long, due to the inevitable concentration of capital that it produces in the long term.

Wealth is created under free markets, not "concentrated".

I didn't say anything about wealth in general. Capital is concentrated.

Re: Temple Student Strike Turns Ugly as School Ends Some Tuition Aid

#245

Post by tehwebguy »

DiggyJohnson wrote: post #216
alephaleph wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It seems pretty reasonable to call a punitive action that is intended to cause bodily harm violence.

It really doesn’t, for me. Violence usually implies direct physical force. I find this to be a core aspect of the word. It’s punitive action, sure, but it isn’t violence because *nobody got hit/shoved/shot/etc. I don’t think any unfair, bad, or evil thing that indirectly affects another persons bodily health is violence. You’d start seeing violence everywhere, it seems. Bit of a stagnant, but is a tax increase violen…

I mean, is a blockade that stops delivery of food & medicine violence if they never fire a shot?

Re: Temple Student Strike Turns Ugly as School Ends Some Tuition Aid

#246

Post by selimthegrim »

thwayunion wrote: post #191
tssva wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The union represents 750 grad students and 150 are striking.

150 are publicly striking. If I were a CS grad student at Temple, I definitely wouldn't strike. But after this hooplah I definitely wouldn't be slinging code at $10/hr either. After all, I'm a good programmer who can write papers and prove theorems and I make $2xK a year. What are they gonna do if I fuck off from running recitations and work on my own stuff or try and sell out my advisor's few half decent ideas to th…

Lie about when your graduate course credits expire? I guess this is why serious programs don’t have a coursework requirement…

Re: Temple Student Strike Turns Ugly as School Ends Some Tuition Aid

#247

Post by [deleted] »

tehwebguy wrote: post #245
DiggyJohnson wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It really doesn’t, for me. Violence usually implies direct physical force. I find this to be a core aspect of the word. It’s punitive action, sure, but it isn’t violence because *nobody got hit/shoved/shot/etc. I don’t think any unfair, bad, or evil thing that indirectly affects another persons bodily health is violence. You’d start seeing violence everywhere, it seems. Bit of a stagnant, but is a tax increase violen…

I mean, is a blockade that stops delivery of food & medicine violence if they never fire a shot?

[deleted]

Re: Temple Student Strike Turns Ugly as School Ends Some Tuition Aid

#248

Post by WalterBright »

komali2 wrote: post #197
WalterBright wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If the profit is basically eliminated, the person can have the high wage, and we can have the nice things. Somehow, however, such Marxist implementations never deliver those nice things.

Co-ops are Marxist? If so, wow, Marxist businesses are remarkably profitable, productive [1], and resilient [2]! [1] https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/worker-cooperative... [2] https://www.uk.coop/sites/default/files/2020-10/co-operative...

You can set up marxist organizations in a free country. They're perfectly legal. They just cannot force people to join, or prevent people from leaving.

Re: Temple Student Strike Turns Ugly as School Ends Some Tuition Aid

#249

Post by exolymph »

tehwebguy wrote: post #245
DiggyJohnson wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It really doesn’t, for me. Violence usually implies direct physical force. I find this to be a core aspect of the word. It’s punitive action, sure, but it isn’t violence because *nobody got hit/shoved/shot/etc. I don’t think any unfair, bad, or evil thing that indirectly affects another persons bodily health is violence. You’d start seeing violence everywhere, it seems. Bit of a stagnant, but is a tax increase violen…

I mean, is a blockade that stops delivery of food & medicine violence if they never fire a shot?

No. I wouldn't call it peaceful, but it isn't violence either. Plenty of things that don't involve the application of physical force are nonetheless bad, and there are plenty of negative descriptors that don't derive their oomph from the implication of physical force. "Despicable" and "heinous" are good ones.

Re: Temple Student Strike Turns Ugly as School Ends Some Tuition Aid

#250

Post by munk-a »

int_19h wrote: post #244
WalterBright wrote: post #236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wealth is created under free markets, not "concentrated".

I didn't say anything about wealth in general. Capital is concentrated.

I think it's generally under appreciated just how unstable free-markets are. Our historical experience with economics has shown that 100% of free-markets have devolved into a less free form and generally that devolution is violent and extremely unpleasant and it can take quite a while for a market to self-correct into a semi-free market with non-abitrary regulations.

Free markets are like pretty much any element north of Plutonium - the half life is extremely short and if they are forced to exist in nature they'll quickly decay to a more stable state... often violently and sometimes with a loud bang.

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