The unions are one of several weights around the US economy’s neck.

tw

You make some very interesting points. However, I think you’re only seeing half the problem. Yes the redistribution of wealth doesn’t work. But the absence of regulating that wealth is just as harmful. I agree with you that economic freedom is essential to the overall success of the US. Where I disagree with you is your implication (correct me is I’m misinterpreting your meaning) that economic freedom should only be privilege of the most “productive”. Business should be free to make as much money as it can (provided that they don’t break the law) but individuals and unions should also be free to make as much money as they can (again, provided they don’t break the law). Bear in mind the most progressive economic improvement in US history occurred during the height of union power.

I don’t take you for a troll. I just disagree with you. That is not one and the same. I must say that, unlike most internet posters, you are rare quantity that can disagree without flaming.

Anyway here is the major problem, government people are not some amazing all knowledgeable people that can predict consequences of their action. Quite the opposite actually, most politicians are only good at being politicians and know little or nothing about Economy. What they care about most is to get (re)elected and therefore only care about buzz words and doing things to get a vote. Like all of us, they only have their own self interest in mind. But unlike most of us, they have power. Power is one of the most dangerous of all forces, and it always corrupts. People in power actually believe that they somehow have the answers, and are better then other people.

Our current health care debacle is a wonderful example of this. Government ideas are completely wrong, socializing medicine will not fix the problem, especially considering that the problems exist largely because of Government in the first place. The main issues that we have are due to the over-regulation, trial lawyer, and lack of competition (and no, Government can not be competition since by default Government can not fail since they can run everything in a deficit). BTW some raise in healthcare prices is to be expected naturally, due to longer lives, and better medicine (which is expensive to develop).

I am not saying there shouldn’t be any regulations. Government needs to make sure that all “players” play by the same rules. For instance you can’t have price co-operation between businesses.

However most regulations are just barriers to others into entering industries, this in turn means that you have limited competition, and worst results.

What effects of regulations are, is never known when regulation is passed which is yet another problem with the Government. Obama isn’t nearly as smart as he thinks he is, what he proposes WILL have very bad and unindented consequences but he doesn’t have to worry about that. All he worries about is to make sure that he gets enough votes for him and his party to get re-elected.

Every human en devour is always limited by the basic truths of human existence.
A. We don’t see the future
B. We won’t work as hard for others as we do for ourselves, and for our self interests.
C. our knowledge is limited

Under the above constrains the only system that have a possibility of working is one that doesn’t require any of the above rules to be broken. Capitalism does that because it doesn’t require any special knowledge, people work for themselves, and work hard. Some succeed some fail, but either way that which is most wanted ends up on top. As long as we make sure that failure isn’t rewarded and that we don’t stop failure, we be OK. But as soon as we start trying to play “god” we will fail EVERY time.

However don’t look for the perfect system, that doesn’t exist.

Unless its military contractors. Then spreading the wealth is just fine.

“Oleg’s article is about how wrong it is to want to help out your fellow man.”

WOW. You really must be ill to have gotten THAT from this article!

Helping someone when they are down is not the same thing as KEEPING SOMEONE DOWN on the easy teat of the government. I’m ALL for helping the downtrodden, the children and the disabled. What I’m NOT for is helping to fatten the supposed ‘poor’ who live perpetually on the gov. teat as a ‘living’. BIG-HUGE difference.

Don’t you get it, hon?

Take zinc and vitamin C and get well soon.

You’re not a troll.

Oleg’s article is about how wrong it is to want to help out your fellow man. That any attempts to better the lot of those at the bottom as well meaning as they are serves only to create a warped world in which the achievers of this world are shackled by the fetters of taxation and higher costs.

I say that Oleg might know a great deal about socialism in the Ukraine, but he doesn’t know about US history and the social agitators and critics and their contributions from the left. America will never stand for a command economy, but we don’t stand for Monopolies, Oligarchies and other abuses of Capitalism either. To equate any criticism of Capitalism with hoisting up a red flag in the name of Stalinism is absurd.

I see a country in crisis, a revolving door between private business and government regulation and policy that turns a blind eye to fraud on a massive scale. I see bankers driving companies into the ground and then demanding enormous sums of money for their “expertise”. I see health costs quadrupled in the past four years and steadily increasing with Medicare commitments exacting a greater percentage of our national budget.

The answers to these problems do not lie in sticking our heads in the sand eliminating any government oversight and repeating “the market will work everything out”. If government is letting companies abuse their trust, we need to kick government in the ass and get it to do it’s job. If corporations come begging for a handout because they’ve made a mess too big for them to clean up they shouldn’t be given “gilded food stamps”. When insurers decide they want to not insure sick people and play games to deny coverage to people who pay for their policies.

It is not going to turn our country into some socialist dictatorship to get corporations to stop behaving badly and end the all too cozy relationship between business and government. You don’t want government in your capitalist business, fine, I say get your corporate lobbyists out of my government. Fair enough?

Those Wall Street “paper-pushers” enable the wealth creation. They provide the incentive for large companies to do well. They have allowed 100+million to incest their money, rather than storing it in the mattress.

Are there abuses? You bet? I note that the ones who created the problem, who messed it all up, seemed to be each and every one an Ivy-league graduate. The Lefties control the Ivy-League schools.

The corporations show no thanks to the American people for bailing them out, because “the people” didn’t. Congress did… in direct opposition to those of us who were conservative and crying out to “Let them fail!” They show no appreciation, because it was simply a service they had bought and paid for via Congressional campaign coffer kickbacks. Both Dems and Pubs play this game to ensure their continued power. Only the Conservatives rebelled.

One more thing: in the old days, Wall Street used to support the Pubs. They switched in the last generation to the Dems, not because the Dems got to be more business friendly, but because they allowed out-and-out looting. This is all because the Left-controlled “elite” schools no longer share the foundational American morality system. Right and wrong no longer have a place, because God is just ignorant superstition in their hallowed halls. Our elites lack the “good angels upon their shoulders whispering in their ears”.

“http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Ford” Look it up. I also didn’t mention 8 hour work week, I mentioned 40 hour week.
Trade unions are, and were nothing but parasites to the business. Every industry that they are a part of collapses or at the very least becomes very unhealthy. They also were great at PR, taking other people accomplishments and claim for their own. Look up our education, automotive, steel, shipbuilding, railroad, etc.. Unions are the exactly what is wrong with socialism. To cater to LCD without regard to those that allowed them to be employed. Ultimately it is people like HP, Ford, Sears and others that were important and not those that work for them. Those were an expense that had to be paid, but not creators.
I worked for the union for number of years, I know just how bad it is. Accomplishments is frown upon, hard work is frown upon, because it makes others look “bad”. All in the name of “equality”.

First and foremost I don’t envy the very rich. I want to BE very rich, I may never get there, but I want an opportunity to try. I want nothing from them, I do not want to steal their money at all. Which is all that liberals do, steal money and than give to others who don’t deserve it. Sooner or later money disappears.

Secondly, “or built anything great for mankind” are you kidding? US has done more to bring up people out of poverty, and increase standard of living then anybody else EVER. Those who accomplished this were those who created wealth. Bankers, investors and others of the ilk were the ones who allowed this. Good portion of successful companies were build by someone who needed money to get started, and it is bankers that allowed this. Creation of wealth is single most important activity that humans learned to do. Individual banker maybe a very bad human being, but their profession is essential. Look to what happened to all the societies that kicked out the so called “leeches” i.e. their bankers.

While, let’s say fireman, may save a life or two banker may allow a business to grow that will employ thousands, and allow their families and their children to flourish. Saving life maybe be more glamors but creation of wealth is simply more important to society as a whole.

Capitalism maybe cold, impersonal sometimes cruel, but it works. It is through it that we live now to our 70s instead of our 30s like we did when we were “noble savages”. Socialism never created wealth, it doesn’t know how, it only steals it.

As for my assertion that leftists were responsible for the 40 hour week, look up “eight hour day” on wikipedia. (you’ll find chordry’s claim that Henry Ford invented it is refuted quite soundly)

The fact is, you don’t seem to have an understanding of the history of Trade Unions in America. The drive to safer workplaces and fair wages wasn’t simply agreed upon by citizens. It was a violent struggle between labor organizers and big business.

Oh, and on the Investment Banker thing. I’ve spent more time on a trading floor than I think either of you two will ever see, and I’ve worked long hours there. Like many things though, there are those who work hard, and those who fall into these things. There are analysts who do their own work and plenty who just follow the herd. But I often reflect, that for the millions that some of them were paid, not one saved a life, or advanced our knowledge of the universe, or built anything great for mankind. They just pushed around pieces of paper.

I think we all envy the very rich, but Wall Street has been selling a bunch of snake oil and the gall that these people have, to not even be grateful to the American people for bailing them out. It’s just disgusting.

Socialists may see themselves as modern-day Robin Hoods, taking from the rich to help the poor. But Robin Hood could only steal wealth, not create it. Eventually, there will be no wealth to take, as rich will either have ceased to work, hidden their assets, or moved away. And after the government and the poor have consumed what they took, where will they get more? As Margaret Thatcher said, “The problem with Socialism is that eventually you run out of other people’s money.”

Free shoes sound great to those with no shoes at all. But in Socialism, we must understand that that these come at the expense of tearing down the shoe factory, an unsustainable economic model that will eventually leave everybody shoeless again. The shoeless must be helped. But the secret to lifting up the poor is not finding new means of income redistribution, it’s finding new means of income generation: jobs, small and large businesses, etc. That’s something socialism can’t create.

“Don’t expect to build up the weak by pulling down the strong.” – Calvin Coolidge

“We contend that for a nation to try to tax itself into prosperity is like a man standing in a bucket and trying to lift himself up by the handle” — Winston Churchill

“You cannot legislate the poor into freedom by legislating the wealthy out of freedom. What one person receives without working for, another person must work for without receiving. The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else. When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them, and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for, that my dear friend, is about the end of any nation. You cannot multiply wealth by dividing it.” ~~~~ Dr. Adrian Rogers, 1931-2005