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We have all heard liberals claim that blue states support the red ones. I also find it strange that a person would brag about thier income by stating what tax bracket they hit. I guess that is very revealing about how you view government, you must enjoy giving away tens of thousands of dollars to wasteful bureaucrats. Don't you want to keep the money you earn?
The high income in liberal cities does not mean what you think it does with respect to how things will play out. Just because people in San Francisco and Boston make big paychecks does not mean they will control the nation, heck those people spend most of that "big paycheck" on taxes and high cost of living. In many cases a guy working in a small factory in Arkansas will live better than some professional people in SF or NYC because of cost of living. Also the cities having more wealth on paper means nothing if our differences come to violence in this nation. Rural red state America is better armed, tougher and more prepared for a conflict. Also it is often true that the winners of a civil war or revolution are the ones who control the countryside. Another fact is that our military is made up of men and women largely from red states and those bases are in red states. Liberal urban money cannot undo these conservative advantages if our differences ever come to violence. The liberal dream of disarming us and taking away our free speech ( enforcement of political correctness by law) will trigger violence, which IMO the left would lose quickly. The best course of action for all Americans is to respect the constitution and avoid a conflict like that.
I make the point about my income - which is in the upper few percent nationally - precisely to counter your narrative that people in the "liberal" cities are socialist parasites. I work a lot of hours and I earn my way, and so do most others around me. I keep plenty of money, but I also don't oppose a social safety net on principle. I would like to see comprehensive healthcare, and I'm not afraid of that sort of "socialism."
I and other liberals are as much American capitalists as anyone. Only difference compared to you is: (1) we're fine with gay people, different ethnicities around us, etc. (2) we're fine with paying for certain public services if we get a say in how they work and share in the benefits.
When you can't win an argument, resorting to " we'll kill you all when the war starts" usually is how it goes. My point is simply that all the economic generators of the 21st century - Technology (Amazon, Google, Apple, Microsoft, on and on), Finance, Biotech, Pharma, Aerospace - they're ALL in critical mass around the coasts, I.e. the "liberal" areas. You are mistaken in thinking that we're all leeches who are looking forward to the advent of Marxism. And inevitably, those who generate the economic growth WILL have an outsized effect on shaping our future - not necessarily just at the polls. Threatening us with violence is not going to change that dynamic.
Census data does not say
"They're the poorest, least educated, most drug addicted, least employed, cohort in America."
Those counties (from your link) have the least median and/or per capita income. There is a difference in making between 25 and 30K/year and being poor. Poor is subjective. One would expect counties with low populations and little to no industry to have a lower median income. For instance in my state, Lake Co. with a population under 8K and less than 3K households, 28% of the population under 18 years old.
I'm not sure what point you are trying to make other than an attempt to degrade a bunch of people based on a median income.
I'm starting to think rural voters really think urban areas need them. If those same urban areas took their money and shopped for food globally (it's already happening, check the tags on the produce at Costco) those rural areas would have no one buying, they've be left to bartering with neighbors. First, let's end all the farm subsidies. And since rural voters hate all that globalism, what are they going to do with all the milk Mexico doesn't buy?
America’s $1.2 Billion Mexico Milk Trade Is Now at Risk
The biggest U.S. dairy importer is talking with New Zealand and buying more from the EU. Guess why.
Face it the both rural people and city people need each other. City people need rural people for food and agricultural trade. In 2016 agriculture exports valued 129.7 Billion dollars. Between 2009 and 2016 agriculture exports valued 1 trillion dollars. That's a lot of cash that provides tax dollars for all of us. If farmers just gave up and didn't want to provide their services that trillion dollars would just go away. Everything you eat, drink, wear, and have in your house was handled by an American farmer. Pig Hair is used for paint brushes, Candles are made with pork bone, fat, Wheat is used for Vodka, Bread, Cake, Cookies, Beer.
America is an agriculture giant, you can say oh well, I saw a tomato from China at Costco or whatever, but that doesn't change the fact that the rest of the country is reliant on American farmers, you are also reliant on American farmers. We export 20.3 Billion dollars worth of agricultural goods to Canada, and 19.2 billion dollars worth of agricultural goods to China, they need us more than we need them, we can grow things that other countries can't grow, and they grow things we can't grow. American Farmers produce so many things. On the other hand American farmers need city people to create automated tractors, tech jobs, marketers, and so much more. We have a global economy and we need each other so we need to work together.
Stats aren't generalizations. Rural areas are the poorest, most drug addicted, least educated parts of America, with the lowest workforce participation. These are the facts.
What are the richest, most productive areas, with the lowest rates of drug addiction and highest education and workforce participation levels? The "liberal" areas. NYC, SF, Boston, DC and the like.
Quote:
Originally Posted by marino760
And so? Is someone forcing you to live in a small town in Kansas? Pat yourself on the back for living in a big city and move on with your life. BTW, stop degrading people because of where they live. It's not very becoming.
How are stats degrading? You can find some of these stats on THIS site, yes. It has nothing to do with NOLA not living in a rural area. S/he's just stating the facts. You may not like reality so I suggest you try to improve your own reality (could be taking a class at your local Community College). Help push those numbers up in rural America! An educated America is a better America.
I stopped reading there. How anyone could say this with a straight face and two Ivy League degrees is mind-boggling. Of course stats are generalizations, they're mathematical models that generalized data points of interest. It means you don't need to read $205,000,000 individual income reports to know the US per capita income.
Per capita income is meaningless unless compared with per capita living costs. BTW on statistics do you earn the per capita income? Do you pay per capita living costs? Just wondering...
if the per capita income is say $16k per annum and the per capita living expenses are say $8k then there's $8k disposable income. However if the per capita income is $100k, and the per capita living expense is $95k then there's only $5k disposable income. Someone who actually earns per capita income and spends per capita living expense has $3k more disposable income living in the $16k per capita area than the $100k per capita area, AND given living expenses are only $8k chances are that the $8k disposable income would go a lot further there than in the $100k area.
Now that's not to say this is the case, but it fits a model where living in a lower per capita income area can lead to greater prosperity than a higher per capita area. Income is not prosperity, it's naive to think it is. You have to examine a lot of factors to determine whether area A or B is more prosperous than just per capita income.
Seems like you might benefit from an introduction to quality of life measurements and save yourself a bit of head-scratching, but true..., "everything is relative."
Determinants of quality of life
The nine quality-of-life factors, and the indicators used
to represent these factors, are:
1. Material wellbeing
gdp per person, at ppp in $. Source: Economist Intelligence
Unit
2. Health
Life expectancy at birth, years. Source: us Census Bureau
3. Political stability and security
Political stability and security ratings. Source: Economist
Intelligence Unit
4. Family life
Divorce rate (per 1,000 population), converted into index
of 1 (lowest divorce rates) to 5 (highest). Sources: un; Euromonitor
5. Community life
Dummy variable taking value 1 if country has either high
rate of church attendance or trade-union membership; zero
otherwise. Sources: ilo; World Values Survey
6. Climate and geography
Latitude, to distinguish between warmer and colder climes.
Source: cia World Factbook
7. Job security
Unemployment rate, %. Sources: Economist Intelligence
Unit; ilo.
8. Political freedom
Average of indices of political and civil liberties. Scale of 1
(completely free) to 7 (unfree). Source: Freedom House
9. Gender equality
Ratio of average male and female earnings, latest available
data. Source: undp Human Development Report
No, the smug, confrontational, arrogant attitude of your ilk is what gave us Trump.
LOL! You're claiming that rural whites would have voted for Hillary, but once they found out that urban voters were "smug and arrogant" they decided to vote for Trump. Yeah, right.
If only urbanites would be "humble" then all the rednecks and conspiracy theorists and white nationalists would have come running to Hillary. Because, obviously people in West Virginia and Alabama are voting based on their impressions of people living in Manhattan. Yeah, sounds plausible...
And, even crazier, they don't like "smug, confrontational, arrogant urbanites" according to you, so decided to vote for Donald Trump, a "smug, confrontational arrogant urbanite" from NYC no less. Makes total sense...
Census data does not say
"They're the poorest, least educated, most drug addicted, least employed, cohort in America."
Yes, Census data shows all these things.
Quote:
Originally Posted by 2mares
Those counties (from your link) have the least median and/or per capita income. There is a difference in making between 25 and 30K/year and being poor. Poor is subjective.
My link wasn't "Census data", it was a Wikipedia link that showed one Census-derived metric.
Poor is NOT subjective, it's a Census derived cutoff.
How are stats degrading? You can find some of these stats on THIS site, yes. It has nothing to do with NOLA not living in a rural area. S/he's just stating the facts. You may not like reality so I suggest you try to improve your own reality (could be taking a class at your local Community College). Help push those numbers up in rural America! An educated America is a better America.
You're assuming they want to or need to. A truck driver makes as much as someone with a bachelor's degree but they won't show up as educated on govt stats because it's only like a 6 month certificate program to get a CDL.
The colleges are all for profit and they love the kool-ade drinkers like you that helped them infiltrate all of the high schools and brainwash the kids into going into debt for 60k.
The biggest thing the schools ever did was get you to drink the Kool-ade and help them pad their endowments by brainwashing kids to go into debt for them.
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