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The wealth gap is widening and we shouldn't care!

2

Posts

  • QuidQuid Definitely not a banana Registered User regular
    edited April 2008
    CIPHERHILL wrote: »
    Aldo wrote: »
    Oh, I get it, we're all thinking in economics and material wealth and then you come in talking about spiritual wealth.

    Right, okay.

    No, what I said was that there are people who don't give a shit about being poor, and would gladly stay poor.
    Kay. I don't want to be poor. And there's quite a few million who don't too.

    Quid on
  • CIPHERHILLCIPHERHILL __BANNED USERS regular
    edited April 2008
    Quid wrote: »
    CIPHERHILL wrote: »
    Aldo wrote: »
    Oh, I get it, we're all thinking in economics and material wealth and then you come in talking about spiritual wealth.

    Right, okay.

    No, what I said was that there are people who don't give a shit about being poor, and would gladly stay poor.
    Kay. I don't want to be poor. And there's quite a few million who don't too.

    Ok. Just don't sit around waiting for the government to magically lift you out of poverty.

    CIPHERHILL on
  • DukiDuki Registered User regular
    edited April 2008
    Aldo wrote: »
    Malkor wrote: »
    Well for years socialism has been sysnonymous with Reds. The same people who made us cower under our desks and such. I think a change in the perception will just take time.
    It's weird, I live in a country within pissing distance of the USSR and we had one of the most socialist governments in the world during the Cold War, save from the communists.

    C-can we blame all this on McCarty? :D

    Hating commies has been a long tradition in the United States, McCarthy just capitalised on it.

    Duki on
  • DocDoc Registered User, ClubPA regular
    edited April 2008
    CIPHERHILL wrote: »
    Quid wrote: »
    CIPHERHILL wrote: »
    Aldo wrote: »
    Oh, I get it, we're all thinking in economics and material wealth and then you come in talking about spiritual wealth.

    Right, okay.

    No, what I said was that there are people who don't give a shit about being poor, and would gladly stay poor.
    Kay. I don't want to be poor. And there's quite a few million who don't too.

    Ok. Just don't sit around waiting for the government to magically lift you out of poverty.

    I like how people use "magically" in such a condescending way.

    Doc on
  • MalkorMalkor Registered User regular
    edited April 2008
    Many of the people who do rely on the government to bail them out have to navigate a confusing and oftentimes hostile system.

    Malkor on
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  • AldoAldo Hippo Hooray Registered User regular
    edited April 2008
    I could make a huge write-up about how my government used to help the poor and how we as a society worked together to make that happen, but that would be unneeded, right?

    Lemme spoil something, though: it did not involve magic.

    Aldo on
  • QuidQuid Definitely not a banana Registered User regular
    edited April 2008
    CIPHERHILL wrote: »
    Ok. Just don't sit around waiting for the government to magically lift you out of poverty.
    Did I ever say I was? I'm poor but getting help from the government. Sadly not everyone is eligible for the same help that I am.

    Quid on
  • amateurhouramateurhour One day I'll be professionalhour The woods somewhere in TennesseeRegistered User regular
    edited April 2008
    Malkor wrote: »
    Many of the people who do rely on the government to bail them out have to navigate a confusing and oftentimes hostile system.

    That's because the entire country does nothing but bicker as to where we draw the handout line.

    amateurhour on
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  • QuidQuid Definitely not a banana Registered User regular
    edited April 2008
    Aldo wrote: »
    I could make a huge write-up about how my government used to help the poor and how we as a society worked together to make that happen, but that would be unneeded, right?

    Lemme spoil something, though: it did not involve magic.
    But... But... Santa.

    Quid on
  • CIPHERHILLCIPHERHILL __BANNED USERS regular
    edited April 2008
    Aldo wrote: »
    my government used to help the poor

    CIPHERHILL on
  • DukiDuki Registered User regular
    edited April 2008
    jeepguy wrote: »
    CIPHERHILL wrote: »
    Aldo wrote: »
    CIPHERHILL wrote: »
    CIPHERHILL wrote: »
    You know some people really don't give 2 shits if they are poor, and stuff like this "Wealth gap problem" doesn't really matter to them as long as they have other things they want, which would be ideal Christian values, safety against terrorists, and gun rights, etc.. These are the things they cling to.

    Travelling around this country, I find that so many people are quick to resign themselves to a life of mediocrity for the rest of their life. They don't ever expect or work toward becoming rich, they just sit on the sidelines and ride life out. They just want to work their jobs, raise their kids, and eventually retire with dignity and respect.

    I'm confused, are you saying that's a good thing or a bad thing, because what's wrong with accepting your job, enjoying it, making enough money to be comfortable, even while raising a family, and retiring at an age where you can still enjoy life?

    Did I say it was a bad thing?

    What is your point anyway? If you can send your kids off to a good school, retire at around 65 and live happily ever after you're not poor, you're middle-class.

    School is free. And anyone can retire. Even the poor. Sorry but this is no longer the barometer of middle-class.



    School is free? What country are we talking about here? A K-12 education in the United States is free, but the quality of that education varies greatly based on location, and quality by location is closely tied to the median income of the area in question (ie: the poor get a worse K-12 education than the middle class and wealthy). A K-12 education will also not position you to enter the middle class work force. Higher education is a requirement for a middle class lifestyle in most cases, and it is becoming increasingly expensive to obtain.

    This is how it is in New Zealand too, and we're massive commies. In fact, I'm going to go ahead and say it's like that everywhere in the developed world. Schools in wealthier areas can rely on school donations to get them through. I'm not sure that those exist in the U.S, but school donations are damn near a religion for good schools here. It's how they fund pretty much everyything.

    Not to mention that our secondary school curriculum is even more batshit retarded than anything else I've seen.

    But then our entrance criteria (as well as the fact that it costs far less) for University is pretty damn low. And there's interest free student loans, so the governments paying.

    Duki on
  • QuidQuid Definitely not a banana Registered User regular
    edited April 2008
    CIPHERHILL wrote: »
    Aldo wrote: »
    my government used to help the poor
    They still do genius.

    Quid on
  • CIPHERHILLCIPHERHILL __BANNED USERS regular
    edited April 2008
    Quid wrote: »
    CIPHERHILL wrote: »
    Aldo wrote: »
    my government used to help the poor
    They still do genius.

    Then they shouldn't.

    CIPHERHILL on
  • amateurhouramateurhour One day I'll be professionalhour The woods somewhere in TennesseeRegistered User regular
    edited April 2008
    CIPHERHILL wrote: »
    Quid wrote: »
    CIPHERHILL wrote: »
    Aldo wrote: »
    my government used to help the poor
    They still do genius.

    Then they shouldn't.

    Why, because a minute percentage of the population, according to you, is christian and cool with being poor?

    amateurhour on
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  • QuidQuid Definitely not a banana Registered User regular
    edited April 2008
    Care to give an actual reason? Because you're pretty quick to ignore my post on how a government program is helping me improve my life so that I don't have to be poor if I don't want to.

    Quid on
  • DocDoc Registered User, ClubPA regular
    edited April 2008
    CIPHERHILL wrote: »
    Quid wrote: »
    CIPHERHILL wrote: »
    Aldo wrote: »
    my government used to help the poor
    They still do genius.

    Then they shouldn't.

    Go back to your Ron Paul rally and let us continue the thread untrolled, please.

    Doc on
  • MisanthropicMisanthropic Registered User regular
    edited April 2008
    Doc wrote: »
    One big issue for me is crime rates. High inequity has a strong correlation with increases in crime.

    As I like to say, income inequality is a self-correcting problem. The thing is that it gets a little bloody when it corrects.

    Limed for truth, A++++, would lime again.

    Misanthropic on
  • AldoAldo Hippo Hooray Registered User regular
    edited April 2008
    Quid wrote: »
    CIPHERHILL wrote: »
    Aldo wrote: »
    my government used to help the poor
    They still do genius.

    Eh, a whole lot less now, which is why I used the past tense.

    Yay right wing nouveau riche tearing down social security.

    Aldo on
  • QuidQuid Definitely not a banana Registered User regular
    edited April 2008
    Aldo wrote: »
    Quid wrote: »
    CIPHERHILL wrote: »
    Aldo wrote: »
    my government used to help the poor
    They still do genius.

    Eh, a whole lot less now, which is why I used the past tense.

    Yay right wing nouveau riche tearing down social security.
    I'm not surprised, but I don't think Cipher is looking for less. I'm thinking he's looking for the Randian utopia.

    Quid on
  • Fuzzy Cumulonimbus CloudFuzzy Cumulonimbus Cloud Registered User regular
    edited April 2008
    Quid wrote: »
    Aldo wrote: »
    Quid wrote: »
    CIPHERHILL wrote: »
    Aldo wrote: »
    my government used to help the poor
    They still do genius.

    Eh, a whole lot less now, which is why I used the past tense.

    Yay right wing nouveau riche tearing down social security.
    I'm not surprised, but I don't think Cipher is looking for less. I'm thinking he's looking for the Randian utopia.
    No, says the man in washington, it belongs to fuzzy. :winky:
    I'm a strong advocate of education being the social equalizer and the tool to climb the class ladder.
    ~The more you know, because knowledge is power!~
    It would be great if climbing the class ladder didn't cost me 60k in debt.

    Fuzzy Cumulonimbus Cloud on
  • templewulftemplewulf The Team Chump USARegistered User regular
    edited April 2008
    It would be great if climbing the class ladder didn't cost me 60k in debt.
    How else is the ladder supposed to buy an HDTV for the faculty lounge?

    templewulf on
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  • Fuzzy Cumulonimbus CloudFuzzy Cumulonimbus Cloud Registered User regular
    edited April 2008
    templewulf wrote: »
    It would be great if climbing the class ladder didn't cost me 60k in debt.
    How else is the ladder supposed to buy an HDTV for the faculty lounge?

    :|

    Fuzzy Cumulonimbus Cloud on
  • YarYar Registered User regular
    edited April 2008
    It would be great if climbing the class ladder didn't cost me 60k in debt.
    Your analysis lacks the part about what it benefits you.

    Yar on
  • Salvation122Salvation122 Registered User regular
    edited April 2008
    I'm pretty comfortable with my income status and standard of living, so I honestly don't know how bad it is.

    I didn't see any pretty charts or graphs in the OP, so I'll ask. Just how bad is it?

    It just seems to be that aside from way too much dividing between classes in the middle, it looks like a pretty standard bell curve for capitalism. You've got the super rich and the super poor, and in the middle is everyone else, from about 30K a year to about 90K a year.

    Please correct me, because I just don't get it.

    The thing though is that that middle is backsliding. It used to be not that long ago that someone that made $90K/year was doing pretty damn well. Now, they're treading water in lots of cases.

    If you honestly believe that someone making 90k a year is treading water than either you need to get some fucking perspective or said people are motherfucking idiots, period fullstop.

    Salvation122 on
  • AegisAegis Fear My Dance Overshot Toronto, Landed in OttawaRegistered User regular
    edited April 2008
    It would be great if climbing the class ladder didn't cost me 60k in debt.

    At least, since you get a degree out of it, that debt is temporary and only lasts until your well-paying (usually) job grants you the income needed to get rid of it.

    Aegis on
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  • emnmnmeemnmnme Registered User regular
    edited April 2008
    It's funny when the corporate executives (who already make a bundle) complain about how much CEOs make.

    http://abcnews.go.com/Business/wireStory?id=4656279

    Also, only the little people pay taxes.

    emnmnme on
  • ElJeffeElJeffe Moderator, ClubPA mod
    edited April 2008
    Quid wrote: »
    Aldo wrote: »
    Quid wrote: »
    CIPHERHILL wrote: »
    Aldo wrote: »
    my government used to help the poor
    They still do genius.

    Eh, a whole lot less now, which is why I used the past tense.

    Yay right wing nouveau riche tearing down social security.
    I'm not surprised, but I don't think Cipher is looking for less. I'm thinking he's looking for the Randian utopia.

    More likely he's looking for another IP proxy.

    ElJeffe on
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  • chaosbearchaosbear Registered User regular
    edited April 2008
    Doc wrote: »
    One big issue for me is crime rates. High inequity has a strong correlation with increases in crime.

    As I like to say, income inequality is a self-correcting problem. The thing is that it gets a little bloody when it corrects.

    Limed for truth, A++++, would lime again.

    The blood spilled is usually that of the poor and lower middle class. When crime rates increase, the most affected areas are the poorer sections of society

    chaosbear on
  • FeralFeral MEMETICHARIZARD interior crocodile alligator ⇔ ǝɹʇɐǝɥʇ ǝᴉʌoɯ ʇǝloɹʌǝɥɔ ɐ ǝʌᴉɹp ᴉRegistered User regular
    edited May 2008
    I hate to steal some AngelHedgie's thunder because that response was brilliant, but there are a few more substantive things to say.
    emnmnme wrote: »
    So the American middle class is preparing itself for a slide into lower-middle class and they're mad at the rich for being rich but is it really so bad to be poor in America? Compared to the chronically destitute from third world countries, the American peasantry is well-off. Even if you're just staying above the poverty line, you can still be a good consumer and enjoy Nike shoes, last year's video games, and be well-clothed. There's a chicken in every pot even for unskilled labor so who cares if a CEO is making 43 times what he pays his average employee? Would you rather be poor in India? Heck, no! Trickle down economics may be completely ineffective but why bother worrying about how the celebrities and plutocrats live? It could be worse.

    First off, that argument is a non-starter. It's not actually an argument against the redistribution of wealth, merely an argument that we're distributing it to the wrong people. If the reason we shouldn't be concerned about the wealth gap within the US is because it's so much narrower than the wealth gap worldwide, then let's redistribute wealth worldwide. Let's use CEO tax money to dig clean water wells in Africa, vaccinate poor kids in Cambodia, teach farmers in Belize sustainable agriculture. Of course, then we'll laugh until we cry - we'll laugh when the CEOs start bitching that their operating costs are going up because they can no longer count on the uneducated masses of the third and second-world to sell them cheap manufacturing goods and natural resources for pennies on the dollar; we'll cry when our own cost of living goes up for... more or less the same reason.

    Second, that argument works equally well in reverse. Awww, so your marginal tax rate was 35%, Mr. CEO. Imagine how much you would have been taxed if you were operating in France or Sweden! So you can't afford a five-bedroom vacation home in Martha's Vineyard... quit your whining! Some executives can't afford vacation homes at all!

    Third, it's idiotic to suggest that because some people are worse off than others that we should do nothing. I don't think I really need to expound upon that.

    Fourth, let's say we increase a CEO's tax rate an extra 5%, taking an extra half-million dollars away from him each year. 5% of a CEO's salary is going to have far less of an effect on his quality of life than 5% of a poor person's salary would have on theirs'. To a person who makes $40k a year, $2000 might mean the difference between braces or crooked teeth for their child. It might mean the difference between taking a correspondence course at night and getting an AA or staying in the same dead-end admin assistant job until a late retirement. Or, more realistically, that CEO's $500k, applied to the public good - say, public education or worker's training or health care or transportation - is going to do a lot more good in general than it would have sitting in his bank account. (There is a reasonable argument to be made for the philanthropy of the rich; however keep in mind that a pretty significant amount of philanthropy is done in response to the tax burden, not despite it.)

    Fifth, one of the fundamental American values (supposedly) is upward mobility. Every individual, through working hard and getting educated, should be able to make the most of their life, right? Well, a wide income gap is a sign that that's not happening. It's a sign that the poor are getting poorer and the rich are getting richer. It's a symptom of a real or perceived (or some combination thereof) lack of education, opportunity, and incentive. An income gap that is too wide means that the American system is not working.

    Sixth, unlike libertarians, I don't believe that there's a moral right to keep every dollar you earn. I believe that the specific dollar amount that every person makes in the modern economy is partially a product of the protection, infrastructure, and economic policies of their government and the other major governments of the world. You'd be hard-pressed to convince me that any given CEO did not enjoy a disproportionately large share of the benefit of public works, from the public educated worker bees manning his offices and factories to the public roads that supplied him with raw materials and provided transport for his product to get to the stores or the protection afforded him by public police and military or the economic benefit he received from central banking. I believe that we should let people keep the lion's share of the money they earn because that's the best way to create wealth, stimulate economic growth, and compel people to work hard. Capitalism is a pragmatic good; a means to an end. The public good is the end. I don't believe that just because you convinced somebody to give you $X for whatever product or service you're offering means you're morally entitled to pocket every red cent of that $X that you humanly can.

    Feral on
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  • TalleyrandTalleyrand Registered User regular
    edited May 2008
    Feral kinda beat me to it. I think the bigger issue isn't how it affects the lower classes in America but how it affects other countries. What with globalization and all. The U.S. has a nasty habit of making examples of trading partners that suddenly decide to nationalize their industry.

    I've heard plenty of times that capitalism is a system intended specifically to make the rich richer at the expense of the poor. For me this means I get charged for overdrawing my account while people with large savings accounts are given even more money. Now why shouldn't that piss me off? Is overdraft fees proper punishment for being a poor bastard?

    Talleyrand on
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  • bowenbowen How you doin'? Registered User regular
    edited May 2008
    I think the problem is what people are trying to spend their income on. I can't afford that 89 inch plasma TV that is the size of a small house, no, but I can't get a nice 21 inch TV. I may not be able to get that H3 this year, but I can afford gas and payments and insurance on my mid-sized economy car. I may not be able to afford that 18 bedroom townhouse, but I can afford a decently sized house. 1/4 my income goes towards school bills, too.

    Everyone tries to spend like they make 8 figures and complains when they can't afford anything. It's all about knowing your budget and planning. If I made $90K a year, I'd be able to retire when I'm 40.

    bowen on
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  • Gnome-InterruptusGnome-Interruptus Registered User regular
    edited May 2008
    I would also like to further examine the point made about how profit is privatized while loss is socialized.

    If its impossible to fully privatize loss, for example when the Company does poorly they dont claw back the CEO yearly bonus etc, and they dont claw back the capital gains on share holders. Yet they do claw back employee salaries, benefits, and jobs.

    Then when the company does well, the executives get the fat bonuses, the shareholders recieve huge dividends, but the average joe employee doesnt recieve nearly the proportional profit sharing.

    I'm sure there are many more points to this as well, that I'm hoping someone like Feral or ElJeffe will expound further on.

    Gnome-Interruptus on
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  • GungHoGungHo Registered User regular
    edited May 2008
    jeepguy wrote: »
    School is free? What country are we talking about here? A K-12 education in the United States is free, but the quality of that education varies greatly based on location, and quality by location is closely tied to the median income of the area in question (ie: the poor get a worse K-12 education than the middle class and wealthy). A K-12 education will also not position you to enter the middle class work force. Higher education is a requirement for a middle class lifestyle in most cases, and it is becoming increasingly expensive to obtain.
    K-12 is not free at all. We pay taxes that go directly toward running the schools... sometimes it's taken as income tax, sometimes it's taken as part of property tax, sometimes there's a direct school tax (my area has this). Going to private school just means that people get to pay those taxes and then get to pay more on top of that as a direct bill.

    In fact, the apportionment of those taxes is one of the bigger issues my area is facing, because how they are surrendered differently to different schools and different districts based on population sizes, performance of the schools on standardized tests, attendance, and several other factors. At the end of the day, the poorer districts are getting less money than the richer districts, and the kids end up shorted because of it, which obviously causes issues of lost opportunities further "up the chain."


    Edit: re-reading my post, I'm not really arguing with you jeepguy except for the "free" part. I realize I'm just restating what you said, and for some reason didn't realize I was restating what you said. Sorry!

    GungHo on
  • durandal4532durandal4532 Registered User regular
    edited May 2008
    GungHo wrote: »
    jeepguy wrote: »
    School is free? What country are we talking about here? A K-12 education in the United States is free, but the quality of that education varies greatly based on location, and quality by location is closely tied to the median income of the area in question (ie: the poor get a worse K-12 education than the middle class and wealthy). A K-12 education will also not position you to enter the middle class work force. Higher education is a requirement for a middle class lifestyle in most cases, and it is becoming increasingly expensive to obtain.
    K-12 is not free at all. We pay taxes that go directly toward running the schools... sometimes it's taken as income tax, sometimes it's taken as part of property tax, sometimes there's a direct school tax (my area has this). Going to private school just means that people get to pay those taxes and then get to pay more on top of that as a direct bill.

    In fact, the apportionment of those taxes is one of the bigger issues my area is facing, because how they are surrendered differently to different schools and different districts based on population sizes, performance of the schools on standardized tests, attendance, and several other factors. At the end of the day, the poorer districts are getting less money than the richer districts, and the kids end up shorted because of it, which obviously causes issues of lost opportunities further "up the chain."

    K-12 was the most expensive part of my education.

    I live in Rhode Island. Our school systems are some of the worst in the nation. My mother taught in a few of the Providence high schools, but got tired of other teachers stealing her lunch.

    So my parents sent me and my sister to private school, and my mom taught there in order to get us in at a significantly reduced rate. Then, when there was a scuffle with the administration, we moved to the only public school system that's worth a damn in the state as far as I know, where we paid out the nose for taxes to keep going to a high school that could afford chairs.

    If I were to raise a family in Rhode Island, I would have the choice of going back to my incredibly rich town and paying shit-loads of taxes, or sending my child to private school, which now costs somewhere around $10,000-20,000 a year. That's per year, for fucking K-12.

    I don't know how you solve that, but I do know that I have the choice of getting rich fast, never raising children, or getting the fuck out of RI.

    durandal4532 on
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  • MalkorMalkor Registered User regular
    edited May 2008
    Extra points if you do all three.

    Public education is 'free' in that we all share a small cost, just like roads and sidewalks are 'free'. Quotes.

    Malkor on
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  • GungHoGungHo Registered User regular
    edited May 2008
    I don't know how you solve that, but I do know that I have the choice of getting rich fast, never raising children, or getting the fuck out of RI.
    If I had to live in New England, I'd probably live in Vermont.

    GungHo on
  • GoodOmensGoodOmens Registered User regular
    edited May 2008
    Aldo wrote: »
    I could make a huge write-up about how my government used to help the poor and how we as a society worked together to make that happen, but that would be unneeded, right?

    Lemme spoil something, though: it did not involve magic.

    I'm curious as to where you live, Aldo. And that's not some passive-aggresive veiled attack on your opinion (this is the Internet after all), just curious.

    Educational inequities are very troubling to me. Low parental income is correlated with low quality education, which then tends to lead to low income later in life. Cycle of poverty and all that. Of course, there are very good poor schools and very bad rich schools, but overall children with poor parents and living in poor areas have lower educational achievement.

    Of course, I'm a fucking hypocrite; I teach high school at a private school that charges $14K tuition, and I'm probably tranferring to another that charges nearly $30K/year.

    GoodOmens on
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  • FellhandFellhand Registered User regular
    edited May 2008
    GungHo wrote: »
    I don't know how you solve that, but I do know that I have the choice of getting rich fast, never raising children, or getting the fuck out of RI.
    If I had to live in New England, I'd probably live in Vermont.

    It's cold and wicked expensive to live here. We have a bit of a brain drain problem because most of our youths go to college and then leave the state because they realize there is very little opportunity for a decent job and the cost of living is very high. I was one of the fools that stayed here.

    Fellhand on
  • durandal4532durandal4532 Registered User regular
    edited May 2008
    Fellhand wrote: »
    GungHo wrote: »
    I don't know how you solve that, but I do know that I have the choice of getting rich fast, never raising children, or getting the fuck out of RI.
    If I had to live in New England, I'd probably live in Vermont.

    It's cold and wicked expensive to live here. We have a bit of a brain drain problem because most of our youths go to college and then leave the state because they realize there is very little opportunity for a decent job and the cost of living is very high. I was one of the fools that stayed here.

    This is pretty much the story of all of the New England states, it seems.

    durandal4532 on
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  • Vladimir7Vladimir7 Registered User regular
    edited May 2008
    I find it funny how the government still collects money on MINIMUM wage employees. Uh, if we are making minimum wage how about you go and fuck off Mr. Government and instead just collect an additional 1% from the people that make over 1 mil a year (Note you will get a lot more from them than from me)

    I know if you make a fuckton of money per year you get taxed a lot (50% ish?) But 50% of 20 million dollars is still a fuckton of money.


    Also the whole system is fucked up. Why do people who provide entertainment generally make the most money (Actors, tv hosts, etc who coincidentally work maybe 3 hours a day) but generally contribute the LEAST to society (besides their tax money)
    when you have a farmer down the block growing beans (for human survival)(and who put in 12+ hour days 7 days a week), but can barely make a living?
    It is fucked up.


    My family is middle class, we live comfortably, but not above our means, and I know my father works harder then the majority of people in north america. He puts in 9 hour days at work, then splits wood and a bunch of other house chores for an additional 4 hours just so he can afford the gas to go to his trailer every weekend during the summer... and with the gas prices skyrocketing he may not even be able to do that anymore.

    Vladimir7 on
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