Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Not when ER visits and such are taken into account. Utah did the math and figured out it's cheaper to house and feed than pay for ER and prison.
Quote:
Originally Posted by rruff
I very much doubt it. If you assume you are imprisoning them for the crime of being homeless, then sure, housing them would be cheaper than that. And do people quit going to the ER when they have a place to live? I didn't know anyone who used medical facilities, although I knew one guy who was begging to save money for dental work.
Who in Utah? And did this "revelation" result in housing and feeding the homeless to save money?
Actually, Jencam is right. And it's been proven many times that by just housing the homeless, you save more money than if you put them in jail. As for the ER, that's a healthcare issue If people, including the homeless, use the ER for what would normally be a $40 office visit, then they're costing the hospital and the taxpayers much more money than they would if their health insurance was just subsidized. Not to mention that the homeless would probably not need to visit the ER as often if they weren't sleeping outside and getting sick more often than other people.
Here's a thought about freeloaders: the religions. Let's take a few examples.
Any religion that doesn't have to pay taxes. That would be all of them, including the Church of Scientology.
And what about the FLDS and the Hasidic Jews?
The FLDS is a polygamous group. The first marriage a man has is to his legal wife. His other wives are not considered married in the eyes of the law, so they are able to go on the welfare rolls as a single mother with multiple children. The last time I checked, the welfare and food stamps the FLDS collected cost the state of Utah $4 per person, as opposed to the $1 per person it usually costs the citizens of other states. The largest polygamous city is also within AZ borders as well. I have no idea what the FLDS is costing them, not to mention the states of Colorado, South Dakota, and Texas, where the FLDS has other compounds.
The Hasidic Jews are in the same boat. They don't believe in birth control and few of the women work. Because of their educational beliefs, many of the men can only find minimum wage jobs. Many of them live in poverty and are able to survive only by being on welfare and food stamps. They are also the top beneficiary of Section 8 vouchers in New York City.
I don't know for sure, but I believe the amount of money the FLDS and the Hasidic Jews are costing the government could be comparable to what the homeless cost. Add in the cults and religions that don't pay taxes and I'd say the people in the US on welfare and food stamps is probably only a drop in the bucket in what they cost the government compared to what the religious organizations cost us in terms of money we could be collecting from them.
Last edited by rodentraiser; 05-03-2017 at 02:16 AM..
This country desperately needs an overhaul in capital gains to justly reward the venture capitalists and penalize the vampire capitalists who buy, devour then get a loss to carry forward.
When I worked in a bookstore, people would come in and look for books on venture capitalism. After doing a subject search and pulling out several titles, the people would look them over but rarely buy them.
When I worked in a bookstore, people would come in and look for books on venture capitalism. After doing a subject search and pulling out several titles, the people would look them over but rarely buy them.
Burger flippers with capitalist fantasies are easily discouraged when they learn more about venture capital. VC funding doesn't go to burger flippers.
Chavez admitted to being a Marxist. Didn't they discuss that in the Chairman's dining room?
Hmmm, envy and cluelessness delicately entwined in the same, short post. Meanwhile, even wikipedia notes the problems with trying to label Chavez a Marxist. Those who make such an effort anyway tend to know far too little about Marx and far too little about Chavez.
The financial institutions new exactly what they were doing. The loans were ****, but they knew they'd pass that **** onto someone else the next day, so they didn't care.
That would so often have been the chop shops of Wall Street where there was a distinct lack of up-front filters to establish standards for minimum loan quality of the sort that the GSE's always had and relied upon. And of course, you can't in fairness condemn the whole of an industry based on the actions of some of its parts. What you are calling ****-loans were disproportionately written by hard-sell, unregulated private brokers (i.e., Countrywide, Ameriquest, and others), not by CRA-covered institutions (i,e., deposit-taking banks and S&L's). Credit where it's due, and blame as well.
Quote:
Originally Posted by rruff
A substantial portion of the population function like money addicts and are particularly susceptible. If grade schoolers were taught reality, that they'd end up a lot wealthier if they avoided loans and credit, finance would quickly drop to a sensible level.
That sounds more like religious zeal than dispassionate analysis. Credit is the basis of every modern economy, and it is a valuable tool at the individual level. Pretending that such facts don't exist will not be a solution to any of our problems.
Regarding productivity and wages the whole "marginal productivity" theory is ridiculous.
Clearly not the case. Marginalism as a whole is a key component of modern economics, but all of that does itself rest on sets of assumptions that are intended to be stated in advance. To the extent that any of the assumptions is violated, appropriate adjustments in the analysis must be made. A priori in a world constrained by assumptions however, initial expectations would be for workers to be hired to the point where marginal product was equal to marginal wage. This is entirely non-ridiculous.
So true, even Warren Buffet has talked about his "luck" and being in the right place at the right time.
Any even moderately successful person not doing so would be guilty of being painfully dishonest and self-serving. In the end, there are few truer words than "You didn't build that." And the wealthy know it better than any other.
Quote:
Originally Posted by cjseliga
The rich are basically just like the poor and will take every and any "handout" they can get, be it favorable tax structures and loopholes that they can exploit since they already have lots of capital and can go from just rich to mega-rich. The rich didn't get there from giving away their money left and right, that's for sure!
The example of Scrooge McDuck will be a poor one. Great numbers among the wealthy are driven by a desire to give something back to the community and society that made their success possible to begin with. The piler-uppers are a distinct though annoying minority.
Quote:
Originally Posted by cjseliga
Rule #1 in becoming rich, try and use as little of your own money as possible, Rule #2, see Rule#1!
Leverage can do a lot to either make or break you. Best to be guardedly cautious on account of the latter.
So live outside the financial sector. Use only cash. Or better yet, barter.
Good luck with that.
Stop the nonsense. It's absurd to claim that the only options are 1. our current deregulated wild west FIRE sector (a product of the Reagan/Clinton years) and 2. barter.
Everything is massively expensive in the Scandinavian countries. Add to that the big taxes on almost everything, and that $20 an hour is not much.
It's slightly less when you take into account PPP, but it still over $15 USeq.
Taxes are high but progressive, and they get a *lot* more in public services.
Bottom line is that in most developed countries, living standards are much more compressed vs the US, by design. Contrary to popular belief, there are no ill effects from doing this, rather there are overall economic benefits.
Prior to the 1970's or so, the US had notions and standards about wages that were much more in line with European notions and standards. People like authors, CEO's, actors, and athletes were paid according to established and traditional industry standards that effectively tied their compensation to standards in effect in more ordinary parts of the economy.
Then the idea arose that these people were actually individualized assets who should be paid at competitive market-based rates. All connection to the worth and wages of the common man was simply lost here in the ensuing years.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
