Noumenon72

Reply to Disecting "What the US can learn from the rest of the world" in International JoeUser Forums

You confuse me. The least charitable way to read what you quoted is that I think people have an excuse for committing crimes if they don't feel represented in the government. But that would be an argument against apartheid. And the way I actually meant it is that when one group of people makes the laws for another group, things that are fine for the lawmaking group seem to be much worse crimes when committed by the second group. Such as Congress an

Reply to Disecting "What the US can learn from the rest of the world" in International JoeUser Forums

Andrew, I was thinking that the Jews were in prison for "committing more crimes than others," by Hitler's new and improved definition of "crimes." For example, it was illegal for Jews to rent apartments or own radios. I was thinking in a democracy, similar situations might arise. It might not be illegal to be a West Indian, but if it's illegal to have dirty bathrooms in a convenience store then they have a problem.

Reply to Disecting "What the US can learn from the rest of the world" in International JoeUser Forums

Are you suggesting that there is a coordinated government progrom to round up African Americans and put them into prison? Nope. I said we have "no Hitler pulling the strings," but "democracy's blind spots" mean a program could come down exclusively on the backs of African-Americans anyway. Normally w

Reply to Disecting "What the US can learn from the rest of the world" in International JoeUser Forums

I frankly think it's a credit to America that we made No. 28 on an environmental list that includes countries that fine people for their candy bar wrappers. It's like ranking as the 28th best housekeeper on a list that starts with someone who covers all their furniture with plastic. You're still pretty darn clean and you aren't being all obsessive about it. <TABLE cellpadding=8 width="95%" align=center bgColor=#FFF394 class="mb-Body-Quote-Ta

Reply to Thoughts on Minimum Wage Laws in Business JoeUser Forums

I remember some years ago having a debate on Usenet about minimum wage laws around the time they had last raised it and I said "I predict that in 10 years, you'll see a lot of these jobs being automated or sent overseas. So if you find yourself checking yourself out at the grocery store in a self service line, remember this." Of

Reply to GalCiv 1.6 Betas about to begin... in GalCiv Journals JoeUser Forums

I also would like to add some new custom maps and scenarios but would like to hear if anyone plays those like I do. I will always try the scenarios, I love how they twist your normal approach to the game after you've mastered the sandbox. Maps alone are not as interesting. Many of GalCiv II's

Reply to A Simple Lesson in Bureaucracy in Politics JoeUser Forums

SilentPoet, have you never met an American conservative before? Socialist = communist = Cuba = Eurosclerosis = the DMV = Five Year Plans. Gideon can explain it to you, but I don't really think you have anything to say to each other.

Reply to A Simple Lesson in Bureaucracy in Politics JoeUser Forums

Cream of mushroom soup: 50 cents a can. The retail price for Campbell's Cream of Mushroom soup is about $1 a can. One thing I noticed about cream of mushroom soup, specifically, is that the generic version has flour for the first ingredient, instead of mushrooms. I'm not sure how big a difference that

Reply to A Simple Lesson in Bureaucracy in Politics JoeUser Forums

WOW, noumenon. You consider $1 a day FOOD BUDGET the same as $1 a day food, shelter, transportation, clothing, etc budget? You're so deluded it isn't even funny! OK, I am not the one who directly compared people living on $1 a day to your food budget of $1 a day. That was you. I recognized that it was

Reply to A Simple Lesson in Bureaucracy in Politics JoeUser Forums

I hope you'll forgive me for thinking that "Ironic that in a world where 20% of the population lives on $1 a day US, you would consider $10 a day to be starvation," you were comparing individuals to individuals. Even now that you've explained, I don't think it's very ironic the way you frame it. If you're living on the exact same amount as the poorest people in the world ($10 a day for 10 people = $1), you're close to starvation, albeit by choice.</f

Reply to A Simple Lesson in Bureaucracy in Politics JoeUser Forums

I'm aware that in places where people make $1 a day, you can eat for less than $1 a day. In fact, I read a paper Link that surveyed people in thirteen countries who live on $1 a day and most of them spent only 56-78% of that on food. Check the section "How the Poor Spend their Money" -- even on $1 a day, there's 10% available for weddings/religious festivals, 5-10% for tobacco and

Reply to A Simple Lesson in Bureaucracy in Politics JoeUser Forums

Like I said, I wasn't able to go back and look up exactly what you ate, but I definitely didn't criticize chicken, beans, rice, or vegetarian diets. I slammed mac and cheese and pimped spinach. You might be reacting to the fact that I criticized how you feed your children (very impolite) as much as what I actually said. I think the food stamp payment could be a little lower to let you feel like you're contributing some money to feeding your

Reply to A Simple Lesson in Bureaucracy in Politics JoeUser Forums

During the brief time we received food stamps, we received well in excess of $500 a month. It was so much more than what we needed that we found ourselves having to find ways to spend down the surplus, because there is no incentive for money not spent. I have a couple of reactions to this. One, the le

Reply to What the rich do that others don't in Business JoeUser Forums

On the investment advice: if your goal is to live off your investment returns, financial planners have a rule of thumb based on running simulations in historical market returns. Even if you start at the worst possible time, you should be able to withdraw 4% of your portfolio's value a year and never run out. So you can multiply the income you want by 25 and that's how much you'd have to save to be truly independent. That's not really necessary, tho

Reply to What the rich do that others don't in Business JoeUser Forums

That is a description of a workaholic but has nothing to do with wealthy people other than the reality that workaholics are more likely to be wealthy. In reality, wealthy people build assets and let the income from those assets compound year after year. You seem to be saying that wealthy peopl

Reply to Who should decide how much you make? in Politics JoeUser Forums

I have read that, Frogboy. I've been here a long time.

Reply to Who should decide how much you make? in Politics JoeUser Forums

Sigh. And this is why people like me run the world and people like you complain about it impotently. Exactly it is. People like you who can get a quarter million raise run the world, and people like him who can't get a quarter raise complain, and you blame them for it and call them losers. If you had

Reply to The Socialist and the Capitalist in Politics JoeUser Forums

Dan Greene: That first chart is tracking the percent of GDP the federal government took in in taxes. If you just plotted taxes versus GDP growth it would be harder to read because both numbers are moving up all the time. Even though total federal revenues stay the same, you can see they're getting it from different sources than they used to on this chart . M

Reply to The Socialist and the Capitalist in Politics JoeUser Forums

Wealth isn't distributed. In a capitalistic society, wealth is earned. Person A provides Person B with a product or service in exchange for money. "Distribution" here means statistical distribution, not that people line up at the White House and someone distributes money to them. Like, you can make a

Reply to Europe is dying in Politics JoeUser Forums

Oh, btw, big kudos to you for going to dig in to the French reproduction statistics about "native born" Islamic parents. It's not that it necessarily was worthwhile but it shows that you're mentally still openminded enough to look up facts when you argue. I don't know if having a statistics page is worth it. I have a nice big one but #1 -- I have to look at the statistics all over again to find the right one and reinterpret them when I need them, an

Reply to Europe is dying in Politics JoeUser Forums

We're not talking about people not having children in some theoretical sense. They are NOT having children now. The birthrate in Spain is 1.1. The question of whether people will have children whether they need them or not is already answered -- today. People aren't having them. I came back to argue wit

Reply to Who should decide how much you make? in Politics JoeUser Forums

Now, in the case of an Exxon, market forces are severely restrained because you can't just start up an oil company. And also because most oil companies are nationalized, and the supply of oil is restricted by OPEC... it's a marvel the free market is able to get its hands on any oil at all.

Reply to A peek at JoeUser's future: 2007 in Welcome JoeUser Forums

Speaking of site upgrades, I think the thing you added to tell people why there's no comment box sometimes is just great. I bet you get more new user registrations from that one feature just by giving them that link to register.

Reply to Jennifer Granholm - still doesn't understand economics in Democrat JoeUser Forums

How can you say the SBT doesn't let you deduct labor? Just look at credit provision #24: 3.9% of the compensation paid to employees at a facility in Troy that is engaged in research and development of a two-mode hybrid car engine. "We're business friendly. Here's the business." I ha

Reply to Europe is dying in Politics JoeUser Forums

I do think the key question boils down to: Why do we have children? I don't mind looking at having children as an incentive problem, but I feel like you should factor in that people would have children whether they "needed them" or not. Because we're animals. You can't fix everything about an