Posted by Dinah on November 26, 2005, at 12:56:27
In reply to Re: just one more... » Dinah, posted by alexandra_k on November 26, 2005, at 3:12:31
Sorry. Don't agree.
Not sure where the figures about the stocks and bonds came from. Nearly everyone who has a 401K has their money invested in mutual funds, most of which consist of stocks and bonds. The retirement of just about everyone who has a retirement plan rests on hte health of "big business".
By a controlled economy I mean a controlled economy. Not an economy influenced by incentives, or with compliance laws.
Economic well-being has traditionally been judged by percentage gross profit, percentage net profit, or return on investment (having to do with the profit returned per dollar of stock value, or something like that). Clearly a company that makes $100,000 a year on $5,000,000 of sales is healthier than a company that makes $100,000 a year on $500,000,000 of sales, so it makes sense.
Exactly how much a government does for people in low income brackets or who earn no income is up for debate. Of course, who makes no income is also up for debate. The underground economy is booming, thank you very much.
I see two keys in making this situation better. One is education. Two should be education as well. And so should three, four, five, six, and seven. I come from an area with such poor education, that many of our residents make minimum wage, unless they manage to get into a profession with tips. And we can't attract better jobs because our education system is so bad.
But I'd also like to see major improvements made in the medical care system. The insurance portability was a big step forward. But it didn't go far enough. Being able to keep your health insurance at a reasonable rate is vital. Getting help paying for premiums if necessary is cost effective for the government as well as anyone else. And I'd personally like to see Medicaid replaced by an insurance pool, with subsidized premiums. Our government hasn't shown a great record in the medical insurance industry, and I'd rather see the poor have access to the same insurance plans as the middle class, with the premiums subsidized. You'd still probably have a small segment of the market, nursing homes, group homes, etc. that would have to be directly funded by the government.
How familiar are you with the tax laws, welfare laws, disability laws, earned income credit, etc. that exist in the United States? It certainly is not a perfect system, but I don't get the sense that it is exactly as you are portraying it. And I say that as someone who knows a fair number of people in my area who are part of the system.
I rail at the injustices as much as anyone (on both sides, I might add - since I do know people who abuse the system). But if I had the energy and the will to really want to make a difference, I'd learn all I could about how things really work now, and study psychology and economics to gain the perspective needed to gain a reasonable understanding of the likely effects of proposed changes. I would be a voracious consumer of all sorts of information from all sorts of sources. I'd probably be especially careful to read sources that came from a different perspective than the ones I would normally choose, to make sure that I cleansed myself of any biases that might cloud my judgement or influence my decision processes.
But I really don't have the energy to do any of that. :(
I heard a story that NASA hired a whole bunch of scientists who said it was impossible to get to the moon, and made sure they had solutions to all of the problems these scientists brought up.
I'm afraid my best role is that of those scientists.
poster:Dinah
thread:578654
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/poli/20051121/msgs/582369.html