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.
Basically, the word "fair" has no single relevant meaning. Using that as the standard is never going to result in mutual dialog, let alone mutual agreement.
Bill's example as evidence that one can get ahead even when starting behind is very powerful, when examined in the microcosm. The problem is sort of like the lottery. There are a few winners, enough to make folks say "See? It isn't the money (or race or whatever other factor one wishes to examine). I made it, so if they didn't make it, it is a result of their poor decision-making or they just didn't want it enough!"
This was almost exactly Bill Clinton's stance, as so clearly expressed when he was running for President in 1992, and my biggest beef with his candidacy.
The folks who do make it generally fail to see how much luck played a role in their success, how much native ability plays a role in their success. Bill, your circumstances and success are laudable - but the chances of a person's doing what you did are diminishingly small. A system built to rely on such happenstance is doomed to fail a vast percentage of those students starting in a similar place, because will power is not enough.
*shrugs*
I don't have an answer to the question of "how much is fair?" I know the arguments that the proposed higher taxes will sap the will of people to make more money are specious and that the highest proposed marginal tax rate is substantially below the highest marginal tax rate for more than half of the last 100 years - and less than 50% of that rate for quite a few of those years.
The folks who do make it generally fail to see how much luck played a role in their success, how much native ability plays a role in their success. Bill, your circumstances and success are laudable - but the chances of a person's doing what you did are diminishingly small. A system built to rely on such happenstance is doomed to fail a vast percentage of those students starting in a similar place, because will power is not enough.
And a system that tells people, that indictrinates the belief, that they cannot, are not expected to, make more of themselves than the situation they were born into, is doomed to keep those people there.
And for the record, it may be more & more rare as we go, but I don't believe it's as rare as some people make it out to be. I know of, and I'm sure if you look you ALL know of, quite a few people who have become more than their starting point suggested they would.
Why isn't it fair? The short answer is that I'mnot a socialist, nor do I see Robin Hood as a good model on which to build a society.
Mabe they were able to accrue all that wealth by taking advantage of the opportunities that are availabe to everyone, and by being better at suceeding. THey worked harder, or smarter, maybe even got a little lucky, and ae now making a decent wage. Why should that be penalized even further? Why should those people, and yes I count myself among them, be forced to subsidize so massive a portion of the services used by others who had the exact same opportunity and did less with it? Let everyone have opportunity, and reward those who make the most of it, I say.
I couldn't disagree more...
Opportunity??? It is shriveling on the vine...
When I was college aged, it was possible to put yourself thru college without graduating without mortgage-sized indebtedness... That is no longer the situation... Today you either have to be rich, or a member of a priviledged minority class, or you have to enlist in the armed forces to be able to afford college. I see that happening in my own school district - and it is a relatively affluent one too... Lot's of bright students are either not going to college at all, or having to settle for a 2 year community college degree. I get angry when I think how upside down our national priorities have become...
I am one of those who probably will be paying higher taxes under Obama - and I say 'Good- bring it on!!!'... There is such a thing as knowing when you have enough wealth and wanting to help those less fortunate than yourself... I worry a lot about my children's generation - and the lower standards of living they will be inheriting from us due to our endless greed of the past 30 years...
The dice have been weighted too long in the favor of the affluent, and it is hurting our country as a result... noticeably...
I for one am in favor of the ideas coming from the Obama camp to turn things around.
I am one of those who probably will be paying higher taxes under Obama - and I say 'Good- bring it on!!!'... There is such a thing as knowing when you have enough wealth and wanting to help those less fortunate than yourself... .
I agree with the sentiment expressed in the second part of this statement. My argument comes when SOMEONE ELSE wants to decide for me, and for you, when you have enough, and when it's time for you to help those "less fortunate" than ourselves. And worse, I won't have any say, nor will you, in who those less fortunates are. So the schoolkids we all want to help will be in line for their share of my money and yous, likely behind the heroin addicts who want my cash for a free needle exchange.
And a system that tells people, that indictrinates the belief, that they cannot, are not expected to, make more of themselves than the situation they were born into, is doomed to keep those people there.
And for the record, it may be more & more rare as we go, but I don't believe it's as rare as some people make it out to be. I know of, and I'm sure if you look you ALL know of, quite a few people who have become more than their starting point suggested they would.
If it tells them they can't, then that is as problematic as telling them if they don't that it is their fault.
I hate the expression "make more of themselves."
The problem, from my perspective, is that education is presented as The Great Equalizer, when it mostly fails in that regard.
We do have schools that (unconsciously, usually) teach limits, that hold up models of achievement that say "You, too, could go to Community College!" as the ultimate potential for their students.
Father's income is still the single greatest predictor for degree of educational attainment and has been for at least 7 decades. It is less useful than it was because the single mom/no father known households have to be accounted differently, but the stats are... infuriating.
Guess what? I'm a conservative. I have a couple of degrees from REAL universities in REAL fields. Want the real kicker? There's a 98% chance that my IQ is higher than yours. Now that's gotta hurt.
Guess what? I'm a conservative. I have a couple of degrees from REAL universities in REAL fields. Want the real kicker? There's a 98% chance that my IQ is higher than yours. Now that's gotta hurt.
Guess what? I'm a conservative. I have a couple of degrees from REAL universities in REAL fields. Want the real kicker? There's a 98% chance that my IQ is higher than yours. Now that's gotta hurt.
Talk about a misapplication of statistics!
There may be a 98% chance that your IQ is higher than that of a person chosen at random, but the internet does not provide a random sampling even in the slightest degree.
But... more to the point, as suggested by another poster, albeit obliquely, anti-intellectualism says nothing about the intelligence of the persons with that approach or to whom they have that approach.
Intellectual does not equal intelligent, nor the reverse.
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.
