Keep trying.

WASHINGTON—A team of leading archaeologists announced Monday they had uncovered the remains of an ancient job-creating race that, at the peak of its civilization, may have provided occupations for hundreds of thousands of humans in the American Northeast and Midwest.

According to researchers, these long- forgotten people once flourished between western New York state and Illinois, erecting highly distinctive steel and brick structures wherever they went, including many buildings thought to have held hundreds of paid workers at a time.

Great post Andrew. This in particular:


I believe even Milton Friedman, in who's name this extreme Reaganomics agenda is pushed by the current Republican Congress, would completely disavow it; he would name it for the short-sighted monetary grab by the elite, at the expense of the economy as a whole, that it really is.

GO

edited for clarity

http://www.theonion.com/...rs-found-in-r,26490/

HAZELWOOD, MO—Twenty-six years after Ronald Reagan first set his controversial fiscal policies into motion, the deceased president's massive tax cuts for the ultrarich at last trickled all the way down to deliver their bounty, in the form of a $10 bonus, to Hazelwood, MO car-wash attendant Frank Kellener...

Kellener, who has cared for his schizophrenic sister ever since her federally funded mental institution was closed in 1984, said that he plans to donate the full $10 to the Republican presidential candidate who best embodies Reagan's legacy.

Ok, you wrote who's instead of whose. That's just a pet peeve of mine and doesn't really impair clarity.

The funny thing about this is that criteria "income of the top 1%" really doesn't give a very good picture of the massive disparity in wealth that occurs in the US today. The super-rich (the group whose wealth has grown astronomically in past few decades) is more like the top .01% or even the top .001%.

Here's one possible comparison for income (net worth makes the disparity look even worse): half of all American workers had incomes less than $26,400 in 2010. Meanwhile, the 400 highest earning taxpayers had average incomes of $345,000,000 (2007 data). That's a lot of zeros. One way to compare these two incomes is to see that the guy who made $26,400 would have to work more than 13,000 years in order to bring home as much money as the super-rich dude earned in one year. What was even going on in the world 13,000 years ago? Another way to compare these is to imagine that the super-rich dude is getting an hourly wage, a salary, so to speak (working 40 hours a week, 50 weeks a year - I'm giving him a couple weeks vacation). In that case the super-rich guy only has to work 9 minutes to make the yearly mean salary in the US. Yep that´s right: 9 minutes.

The funny thing about this is that criteria "income of the top 1%" really doesn't give a very good picture of the massive disparity in wealth that occurs in the US today. The super-rich (the group whose wealth has grown astronomically in past few decades) is more like the top .01% or even the top .001%.

Here's one possible comparison for income (net worth makes things look even worse): half of all American workers had incomes less than $26,400 in 2010. Meanwhile, the 400 highest earning taxpayers had average incomes of $345,000,000 (2007 data). That's a lot of zeros. One way to compare these two incomes is to see that the guy who made $26,400 would have to work more than 13,000 years in order to bring home as much money as the super-rich dude earned in one year. I don't even know what was going on in the world 13,000 years ago. Another way to compare these is to imagine that the super-rich dude is getting an hourly wage, a salary, so to speak (working 40 hours a week, 50 weeks a year - I'm giving him a couple weeks vacation). In that case the super-rich guy only has to work 9 minutes to make the yearly mean salary in the US. Yep that's right: 9 minutes.

Again, I see nothing wrong with this. If someone, including some of you here, could figure out how to make 26,000 USD every nine minute, a lot would. Takes a long time and a lot of knowledge/effort to get yourself into that situation.

(And here I was worried someone would catch I said "mean" salary when I should have said "median").

Again, I see nothing wrong with this. If someone, including some of you here, could figure out how to make 26,000 USD every nine minute, a lot would. Takes a long time and a lot of knowledge/effort to get yourself into that situation.

"Right now, this afternoon, just 400 Americans -- 400 -- have more wealth than half of all Americans combined," Moore avowed to tens of thousands of protesters.

"Let me say that again. And please, someone in the mainstream media, just repeat this fact once; we’re not greedy, we’ll be happy to hear it just once.

"Four hundred obscenely wealthy individuals, 400 little Mubaraks -- most of whom benefited in some way from the multi-trillion-dollar taxpayer bailout of 2008 -- now have more cash, stock and property than the assets of 155 million Americans combined."

Again, I see nothing wrong with this. If someone, including some of you here, could figure out how to make 26,000 USD every nine minute, a lot would. Takes a long time and a lot of knowledge/effort to get yourself into that situation.

You don't have to see anything wrong -- you're not here.

As for that "knowledge and effort" phrase -- ha ha good one!

You seem to be telling us that anybody can make lots of money, if they try and keep trying. GZ, I think you have to awfully arrogant say these things.

...
I remember commenting on a climber's on-sigth of a 5.13c to a guy I was climbing with once. He responded with the classic, that guy is just chasing numbers, I'm not interested in being that good, I rather just enjoy my climbing. My partner then got frustrated when he fell on a 5.10. To me, it's the same syndrome, when the rich get rich doing what they do, middle class and poor say they are just chasing money. I reply with, you're not willing to commit yourself to what it takes to earn what they do. Sort of like the guy climbing 5.10 is not willing to commit himself to what it takes to climb 5.13.

Ha ha! GZ, good one!

Wow! Did you go to some special school to learn that stuff?

The Koch Brothers School of Sycophancy?

What part don't you agree with?

learned it via personal observations in the climbing world. Want to know how attainable 5.13 is with a full time job and family commitment, visit Europe for awhile and see what the serious recreational climbers are climbing.

Visit Southern Thailand, Krabi, next Christmas and see what the climbers there are climbing. They spend their Christmas break there because they have full-time careers.

So again, the step is to actually believe you can climb 5.13. The second and almost as hard step is to commit.

I remember commenting on a climber's on-sigth of a 5.13c to a guy I was climbing with once. He responded with the classic, that guy is just chasing numbers, I'm not interested in being that good, I rather just enjoy my climbing. My partner then got frustrated when he fell on a 5.10. To me, it's the same syndrome, when the rich get rich doing what they do, middle class and poor say they are just chasing money. I reply with, you're not willing to commit yourself to what it takes to earn what they do. Sort of like the guy climbing 5.10 is not willing to commit himself to what it takes to climb 5.13.

Ha ha! GZ, good one!

Wow! Did you go to some special school to learn that stuff?

The Koch Brothers School of Sycophancy?

What part don't you agree with?

Learned it via personal observations in the climbing world. Want to know how attainable 5.13 is with a full time job and family commitment, visit Europe for awhile and see what the serious recreational climbers are climbing.

Visit Southern Thailand, Krabi, next Christmas and see what the climbers there are climbing. They spend their Christmas break there because they have full-time careers.

So again, the step is to actually believe you can climb 5.13. The second and almost as hard step is to commit.

Yes, 5.13 is attainable for many, with enough determination.

But to put it in the context of this thread, don't talk about how many CLIMBERS can climb 5.13. Talk about how many PEOPLE-- general population-- can climb 5.13. And then make a claim that everyone could-- still reasonable?

You seem to run with the assumption that everyone can and should get rich. Even assuming that everyone could, which no one but you seems to believe, where would this world be, if everyone was an investment banker?

The worlds needs garbage collectors and janitors, grocery store clerks and secretaries, musicians and geologists, pizza delivery guys and miners, and on and on and on.

And it makes sense that some occupations require more skills and should get paid proportionately more. And some occupations require people who can invest their money, take risks, make good decisions, and when they create more wealth that way it is a pay-off for the risks they did take and the investment of money and time and skills.

But it doesn't make sense that those who are working full-time in many of the jobs that form the foundation of this society cannot make a decent living on that money.

I couldn’t agree more with you. What the world doesn’t need is a janitor complaining about how much a doctor is making.

I personally don’t believe we can ever earn poverty. I’d like to see world hunger end, but poverty will always exist. The people who earn the least within the society you’re looking at are the poverty level.


This is exactly what I have been saying all along.

What doesn’t make sense is that the people who are in those occupations should have to give up the money they earn for making good decision, taking risk, investing wisely, and applying their time and skills.

Raising how much money is earned at the bottom will not increase their quality of life.

For example, if the Untied States raise the minimum wage to 20.00 USD an hour as the minimum federally mandated rate, good at all levels would also rise in cost. Food prices would rise, transportation prices would rise, rents would rise, and everything else. More money in someone pocket isn’t going to make him or her financially independent unless people learn to live within their income level.

Based on your post, I think you were trying to tell me I was wrong, but you seem to support what I have been saying so far.

WASHINGTON—Squeezed by rising living costs, a record number of Americans -- nearly 1 in 2 -- have fallen into poverty or are scraping by on earnings that classify them as low income. The latest census data depict a middle class that's shrinking as unemployment stays high and the government's safety net frays. The new numbers follow years of stagnating wages for the middle class that have hurt millions of workers and families.

I've never heard anybody complain about how much money doctors make. They have to work very hard to get where they are, usually put themselves in significant debt in the process, and, unlike many rich people, are useful to society.


It's called taxes. Everybody pays them.


Of course it would.


I'm sure most people agree with you to an extent. We all agree that a doctor should make more than a janitor. You just take it to an extreme.

http://www.boston.com/..._poor_or_low_income/


Anyone can climb 5.13. frsrsly

Not sure what you mean by I take it to an extreme. High earning doctors are part of the 1% defined by the guys on this site.

I tend to think the people here are taking it to extremes and seeing the issue as black and white, when in reality is much more complicated.