Poverty

[JOEBIALEK]

With all the debate recently for amending the United States Constitution in favor of recognizing marriage as a union between a man and woman, perhaps a more appropriate amendment should guarantee each citizen of the United States the right to food, clothing, shelter and medical care. Poverty is defined as the condition of being poor or lacking the necessary means of support to live or meet needs. Today we read of enormous corporate tax breaks, outsourcing of jobs overseas and outrageous salaries "earned" by athletes/entertainers. More recently came the revelation of the $200 billion dollars spent by the U.S. on the war in Iraq. In the meantime, the number of those in poverty continues to increase. The Old Testament of the Bible often makes references to the promised land flowing with milk and honey. All one has to do in this country is take a trip to the grocery story or department store and bear witness to the fact that if anywhere was close to exhibiting the characteristics of "the promised land", this country is it. Yet somehow we are still unable to meet the four basic needs every citizen has. Some would argue that this proposal is an extension of Socialism/Communism. Nothing could be further from the truth. Socialism/Communism is a political or economic theory in which community members own all property, resources, and the means of production, and control the distribution of goods. No one is suggesting the replacement of Capitalism; an economic system in which the means of production and distribution are privately owned, and prices are chiefly determined by open competition in a free market. What is being suggested is that in this land of surplus "milk and honey", there is absolutely no reason why the four basic needs of every U.S. citizen cannot be met. Some would argue that food stamps, thrift stores, public housing and medicaid already meet these needs but in the words of President John F. Kennedy, "this country is divided between those who have never had it so good and those who know we can do better". I think we can do better. Resolved, it shall be the right of every United States citizen (in order to further guarantee the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness) to receive food, clothing, shelter and medical care that is adequate to meet their basic needs.

[jjd]

[Fairweather]

Sounds like a great deal! I think I'll just quit my job and live on the government's dime.

 

Additionally, I think every citizen should be guaranteed the right to high speed internet, a DVD player, and home entertainment center...with 5 channel surround sound, of course.

 

Where does it end?

[cj001f]

Sounds like a great deal! I think I'll just quit my job and live on the government's dime.

 

Where does it end?

 

Where does it begin? Heaven forbid everyone get a square meal.

 

I do agree the government is not the best means to accomplish this end.

[Fairweather]

1936 CONSTITUTION OF THE USSR

Adopted December 1936

 

 

 

CHAPTER X

Hammer & Sickle

FUNDAMENTAL RIGHTS AND DUTIES OF CITIZENS

 

ARTICLE 118. Citizens of the U.S.S.R. have the right to work, that is, are guaranteed the right to employment and payment for their work in accordance With its quantity and quality.

The right to work is ensured by the socialist organization of the national economy, the steady growth of the productive forces of Soviet society, the elimination of the possibility of economic crises, and the abolition of unemployment.

 

ARTICLE 119. Citizens of the U.S.S.R. have the right to rest and leisure. The right to rest and leisure is ensured by the reduction of the working day to seven hours for the overwhelming majority of the workers, the institution of annual vacations with full pay for workers and employees and the provision of a wide network of sanatoria, rest homes and clubs for the accommodation of the working people.

 

ARTICLE 120. Citizens of the U.S.S.R. have the right to maintenance in old age and also in case of sickness or loss of capacity to work. This right is ensured by the extensive development of social insurance of workers and employees at state expense, free medical service for the working people and the provision of a wide network of health resorts for the use of the working people.

 

ARTICLE 121. Citizens of the U.S.S.R. have the right to education. This right is ensured by universal, compulsory elementary education; by education, including higher education, being free of charge; by the system of state stipends for the overwhelming majority of students in the universities and colleges; by instruction in schools being conducted in the native Ianguage, and by the organization in the factories, state farms, machine and tractor stations and collective farms of free vocational, technical and agronomic training for the working people.

 

 

Edited July 1, 2004 by Fairweather

[cj001f]

1936 CONSTITUTION OF THE USSR

Truck out the Stalinist Bogeyman

[JayB]

"If the European Union were a state in the USA it would belong to the poorest group of states. France, Italy, Great Britain and Germany have lower GDP per capita than all but four of the states in the United States. In fact, GDP per capita is lower in the vast majority of the EU-countries (EU 15) than in most of the individual American states. This puts Europeans at a level of prosperity on par with states such as Arkansas, Mississippi and West Virginia. Only the miniscule country of Luxembourg has higher per capita GDP than the average state in the USA. The results of the new study represent a grave critique of European economic policy.

 

Stark differences become apparent when comparing official economic statistics. Europe lags behind the USA when comparing GDP per capita and GDP growth rates. The current economic debate among EU leaders lacks an understanding of the gravity of the situation in many European countries. Structural reforms of the European economy as well as far reaching welfare reforms are well overdue. The Lisbon process lacks true impetus, nor is it sufficient to improve the economic prospects of the EU.

 

EU versus USA is written by Dr Fredrik Bergström, President of the Swedish Research Institute of Trade, and Mr Robert Gidehag, until recently Chief Economist of the same institute and now President of the Swedish Taxpayer's Association."

 

Full Text in PDF form here: http://www.timbro.com/euvsusa/pdf/EU_vs_USA_English.pdf

 

Poverty is relative.

[EWolfe]

The selfish nature of The Capitalist.

 

There lies the crux.

[cracked]

The selfish nature of The Capitalist.

 

There lies the crux.

Who decided that selfishness is so evil? It provides an economic system that works better than the alternatives. Here's to selfishness, since a system based on selflessness becomes communism.

[cj001f]

JayB-

European Productivity per hour is close to the US. Just because I spend more hours at work doesn't make me richer

 

Correction: EU Productivity Exceeds the US and GDP per person, excluding Germany, is Equal to the US http://economist.com/displaystory.cfm?story_id=2765877

[cj001f]

Who decided that selfishness is so evil? It provides an economic system that works better than the alternatives. Here's to selfishness, since a system based on selflessness becomes communism.

Go jerk off to Ayn Rand Asshat.

[Fairweather]

The selfish nature of The Capitalist.

 

There lies the crux.

Who decided that selfishness is so evil? It provides an economic system that works better than the alternatives. Here's to selfishness, since a system based on selflessness becomes communism.

 

Well said, Cracked.

[cj001f]

From the Economist:

 

America is widely admired as the beauty queen of the economic world. But the euro area's figures are more shapely than its reputation suggests

 

AS AMERICA'S economy has bounced back, the economies of the euro area still seem to be crawling along. This perception has reinforced pervasive gloom about continental Europe's economic future. A great deal has been written about America's superior performance relative to the euro area. But wait a minute: the widely held belief that the euro area economies have persistently lagged America's is simply not supported by the facts.

 

America's GDP surged by 5% in the year to the first quarter, while the euro area grew by only 1.3%. Europe's GDP growth has consistently fallen behind America's over the past decade: in the ten years to 2003 America's annual growth averaged 3.3%, compared with 2.1% in the euro area. Yet GDP figures exaggerate America's relative performance, because its population is growing much faster. GDP per person (the single best measure of economic performance) grew at an average annual rate of 2.1% in America, against 1.8% in the euro area—a far more modest gap.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Furthermore, all of that underperformance can be explained by a single country, Germany, whose economy has struggled since German reunification in 1990. Strip out Germany, and the euro area's annual growth in GDP per person rises to 2.1%, exactly the same as America's. Germany does represent around one-third of euro-area GDP, but still the fact is that economic statistics for the 11 countries that make up the other two-thirds look surprisingly like America's (see chart 1). (Were Britain part of the euro area, this effect would be even more striking.)

 

The most popular myth is that America's labour-productivity growth has outstripped that in the euro area by a wide margin. America's productivity has indeed quickened in recent years, but the difference between productivity growth in America and the euro area is exaggerated by misleading, incomparable figures. In America the most commonly used measure of productivity is output per hour in the non-farm business sector. This grew by an annual average of 2.6% over the ten years to 2003. For the euro area, the European Central Bank publishes figures for GDP per worker for the whole economy. This shows a growth rate for the period of only 1.5%. But unlike the American numbers, this figure includes the public sector, where productivity growth is always slower, and it does not adjust for the decline in average hours worked.

 

 

 

Europe's voters bash their leaders

Jun 17th 2004

 

 

 

Germany, United States

 

 

 

America's economy

 

 

 

ECB, Federal Reserve

 

 

 

 

 

Using instead GDP per hour worked across the whole economy, American productivity has risen by an annual average of 2.0% since 1994, a bit faster than the euro area's 1.7% growth rate. However, a study* by Kevin Daly, an economist at Goldman Sachs, finds that, after adjusting for differences in their economic cycles, trend productivity growth in the euro area has been slightly faster than that in America over the past ten years. Since 1996 productivity growth in the euro area has been slower than America's. But it seems fairer to take a full ten years.

 

But has not America combined rapid productivity growth with strong jobs growth, whereas continental Europe's productivity growth has been at the expense of jobs? This may have been true once, but no longer is. Over the past decade, total employment has expanded by 1.3% a year in America against 1% in the euro area. Again, excluding Germany, jobs in the rest of the euro area grew at exactly the same pace as in America. And since 1997 more jobs have been created in the euro area as a whole: total employment has risen by 8%, compared with 6% in America.

 

It is true that, during the past decade, productivity growth has accelerated in America, but slowed in the euro area. Alan Greenspan, chairman of America's Federal Reserve, blames Europe's rigid labour and product markets. Structural barriers to laying off workers or to new methods of work may have prevented firms from making the best use of IT equipment.

 

However, there is another, less worrying reason why productivity growth has slowed in continental Europe. Reforms to make labour markets more flexible have deliberately made GDP growth more job-intensive. Firms now have more incentive to hire new workers, thanks to lower labour taxes for low-paid workers and a loosening of rules on hiring part-time and temporary workers, which allow firms to get around strict job-protection laws. The flipside is slower productivity growth for a period, as more unskilled and inexperienced workers enter the workforce. This is exactly what happened in America in the 1980s. In the longer term, more flexible labour markets should help to boost growth.

 

Another popular misconception is that the return on capital is much lower in the euro area than in America, because European business is inefficient and hobbled by high wage costs and red tape. This argument is often given in defence of America's large current-account deficit. America's higher return on capital, it is argued, attracts a net inflow of foreign money, so it has to run a current-account deficit. But according to calculations by Goldman Sachs, the return on capital in the euro area has actually been roughly the same as in America in recent years. The total return on equities over the past decade has also been broadly the same—which is what you would expect given their similar pace of productivity growth.

 

 

 

Nonsense in, nonsense out

So far we have established that, based on official statistics, productivity growth over the past decade has been virtually the same in the euro area as in America, and although GDP per person has grown a bit slower, the gap is modest. However, using official statistics can be like comparing apples with pears, because of differences in the way that GDP is measured in different countries. For example, American statisticians count firms' spending on computer software as investment, so it contributes to GDP. In Europe it is generally counted as a current expense and so is excluded from final output. As a result, the surge in software spending has inflated America's growth relative to Europe's.

 

A second important difference is the price deflator used to convert growth in nominal spending on information technology equipment into real terms. In America, if a computer costs the same as two years ago, but is twice as powerful, then this is counted as a 50% fall in price. Though logical, this is nevertheless a contentious issue among economists. Most euro area countries do not allow fully for improvements in computer “quality”, so again official figures probably understate Europe's growth (in both GDP and productivity) relative to America. This reinforces the argument that the euro area has not been doing that badly.

 

Despite such statistical quibbles, however, it is undeniable that the average person in the euro area is still about 30% poorer (in terms of GDP per person measured at purchasing-power parity) than the average American, and this gap has barely changed over the past 30 years. Thus even if income per person is growing at almost the same pace as in America, Europeans are still stuck with much lower living standards than Americans.

 

Olivier Blanchard, an economist at the Massachussetts Institute of Technology, offers a more optimistic view†. The main reason why the income gap has not narrowed, he argues, is that over time Europeans have used some of the increase in their productivity to expand their leisure rather than their incomes. Americans, by contrast, continue to toil long hours for more income. Who is really better off?

 

In fact, Europe's GDP per person is no longer lower than America's because its economies are much less productive. Average GDP per hour worked in the euro area is now only 5% below that in America; 30 years ago it was about 30% lower. GDP per hour in Germany and France now exceeds that in America. Income per person is higher in America largely because the average person there works more hours. In the euro area, fewer people work and those who do hold a job work shorter average hours. By one estimate the average American worker clocks up 40% more hours during his life time than the average person in Germany, France or Italy.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The narrowing of the productivity gap between America and the euro area over the past 30 years has not been reflected in a catch-up in the euro area's GDP per person because hours worked have fallen sharply. Compare France with America. Between 1970 and 2000 America's GDP per hour worked rose by 38% and average hours worked per person rose by 26%, so GDP per person increased by 64%. French GDP per hour rose by a more impressive 83%, but hours worked per person fell 23%, so GDP per person only increased by 60%. Chart 2 shows for the whole of the euro zone how its improvement in productivity relative to America has also been fully offset by a fall in hours worked.

 

If leisure is a normal good, then it is surely appropriate that demand for it increases in line with income. A broader analysis of living standards based on economic welfare rather than GDP should place some value on longer leisure time. The tricky question is whether the decrease in hours worked is due to employees' preference to take more leisure rather than more income, or due to distortions from maximum working hours, forced early retirement or high taxes.

 

 

 

Lovely leisure

Mr Blanchard's analysis finds that most of the fall in hours worked in Europe has been due to a decline in average hours per worker (thanks to longer holidays or shorter working weeks), rather than a rise in unemployment or a fall in the proportion of the population seeking work. Furthermore, most of the reduction in average hours worked was due to full-time workers putting in shorter hours, not because of an increase in part-time workers who might not have been able to get full-time jobs. Mr Blanchard concludes that the fall in hours worked is mostly voluntary.

 

But that does not settle the matter. Perhaps Europeans choose to work fewer hours because of high taxes. Marginal tax rates have indeed risen by more in Europe than in America over the past 30 years. Taxes reduce the incentive to work an extra hour rather than go home, once a reasonable standard of living has been reached.

 

This is a hotly debated issue. A study** by Edward Prescott, an economist at the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis, claims that virtually all of the fall in hours worked in the euro area can be blamed on higher taxes. But the flaw in this theory, says Mr Blanchard, is that within Europe there is little correlation between the fall in hours worked and the increase in taxes. Ireland has seen a 25% fall in average hours worked since 1970, despite an even smaller increase in tax rates than in America. Other studies have found that taxes have played a more modest role, accounting for about one-third of the fall in hours worked per person.

 

Mr Blanchard concludes that most, but not all, of the fall in hours worked over the past 30 years is due to a preference for more leisure as incomes have increased. Europeans simply enjoy leisure more. Americans seem more obsessed with keeping up with the Jones's in terms of their consumption of material goods. As a result, they may work too hard and consume too little leisure. Their GDP figures look good, but perhaps at a cost to their overall economic welfare.

 

Robert Gordon‡, an economist at Northwestern University, agrees that GDP comparisons overstate America's living standards, but he goes even further. America has to spend more than Europe, he says, on both heating and air conditioning because of its more extreme climate. This boosts GDP, but does not enhance welfare. America's higher crime rate means that more of its GDP is spent on home and business security. The cost of keeping 2m people in prison, a far bigger percentage of its population than in Europe, boosts America's GDP, but not its welfare. The convenience of Europe's public transport also does not show up in GDP figures. Taking account of all these factors and adding in the value of extra leisure time, Mr Gordon reckons that Europe's living standards are now less than 10% behind America's.

 

 

 

Flexing the macro-muscles

 

 

 

 

 

But even if the euro area has not lagged far behind America, does not its pathetic growth over the past couple of years bode ill for the future? Surely America's stronger rebound since the global economic downturn in 2001 is proof of greater flexibility in its economy? In fact, both suggestions are questionable. The main explanation for America's more rapid recovery is that it has enjoyed the biggest monetary and fiscal stimulus in its history. Since 2000 America's structural budget deficit (after adjusting for the impact of the economic cycle) has increased by almost six percentage-points of GDP. Meanwhile, the euro area has had no net stimulus (see chart 3).

 

American interest rates were also cut by much more than those in the euro area. Without this boost, America's growth would have been much slower over the past three years. In other words, America's much faster growth of late may mainly be the result of looser (and unsustainable) fiscal and monetary policies, rather than greater flexibility.

 

While this might have been the right policy to support America's economy, it means that America's recent growth rate says little about its likely performance over the coming years. Indeed, the super-lax policies of the past few years have left behind large economic and financial imbalances that cast doubt on the sustainability of America's growth. From a position of surplus before 2000, the structural budget deficit (including state and local governments) now stands at almost 5% of GDP, three times as big as that in the euro area. America has a current-account deficit of 5% of GDP, while the euro area has a small surplus. American households now save less than 2% of their disposable income; the saving rate in the euro area stands at a comfortable 12%. Total household debt in America amounts to 84% of GDP, compared with only 50% in the euro zone.

 

America's recent rapid growth has been driven partly by a home-mortgage bubble. As interest rates fell and house prices rose, people took out bigger mortgages and spent the cash on a car or a new kitchen. House prices have also been lively in some euro-zone countries, with house prices rising at double-digit rates over the past year in France, Italy, Spain and Ireland. But in general, households have not borrowed to the hilt against those capital gains. Some European policymakers hope that America's bubble will soon burst and that Europe could then sprint ahead. That may be wishful thinking: a sharp slowdown in American consumer spending is also likely to dent Europe's growth rate. It is true, however, that the eurozone's consumer finances are in much better shape.

 

So, America's superior economic performance over the past decade is much exaggerated. Productivity has grown just as fast in the euro area; GDP per person has grown a bit slower, but mainly because Europeans have chosen to take more leisure rather than more income; European employment in recent years has grown even faster than in America; and America has created some serious imbalances which could yet trip the economy up badly.

 

 

 

“Bullish on America”

Indeed, one might say that the economic performance of the euro zone and America has not been hugely different over the past decade, but that American optimism has disguised this. European policymakers are forever fretting aloud about structural rigidities, slow growth, excessive budget deficits and the looming pensions problem. In contrast, American policymakers love to boast about America's economic success while playing down the importance of its economic imbalances.

 

This does not mean that the euro area can be complacent. It still needs to push ahead with structural reforms. Its average jobless rate of 9%, against 5.6% in America, is too high. Contrary to the beliefs of many Americans, there has been labour- and product-market reform in continental Europe over the past decade, which is why employment has perked up. But unemployment remains a problem and, sadly, economic reforms now seem to have stalled in France and Germany.

 

The biggest snag, of course, is that because of its less favourable demographics, Europe has an older economy than America. With lower birth and immigration rates and an ageing population, Europe's labour force will soon start to shrink as a share of the population. That will make it harder for Europe to maintain its current pace of growth in GDP per person—and thus harder for governments to pay pension bills. Without faster growth, Europe will be unable to afford its welfare system.

 

If Europeans do not want to slip down the rankings of GDP per person in future, then they will need to work longer hours during their lifetimes. Alternatively, they may continue to attach more value to leisure and the quality of life, rather than hard cash. That is their choice. A truer picture of their economy might help them make it in an informed way

[willstrickland]

a more appropriate amendment should guarantee each citizen of the United States the right to food, clothing, shelter and medical care.

 

Food stamps, public housing, medicare, social security, welfare. Add private non-profit charities like Salvation Army, community food banks and the like.

 

I'd say everyone has access to the minimum required for survival and then some. This is the land of opportunity. If you want more than the basics, get off your lazy ass and WORK FOR IT. Whether it's hard labor, or ingenuity, cunning, or entreprenurial spirit...make your own way.

 

The only thing I tangentially agree with in your post (and you really didn't even say this) is that CEO salaries at public companies need to be controlled. I don't say this because of a wealth discrepancy issue, I say this because as a shareholder in those companies I think it's complete bullshit to both pay them that much without regard for their performance, and to put that kind of financial burden on smaller companies such as up and coming biotech firms.

 

Somehow the libs have come to the conclusion that because the winners are living very well, the lazy and incompetent should somehow be entitled to live at some formulaic fraction as well as the top. That is absurdity.

 

Everyone should have the bare necessities and the opportunities to work their way into a better situation. I believe they have that now. I think all the public insitutions that provide those bare minimums such as food stamps/welfare could use serious reform to both meet the needs better AND to reduce the cost to the taxpayers. Show me an American dying of starvation or going naked because they can't get clothes.

 

I am the first from either side of my family to go to college. My 18 year old single mother worked two jobs 60 hours a week until she was 30 something and I was in high school to eek out a lower middle class life for us. I personally worked two jobs during college to feed myself and put a roof over my head. I still had to put myself over 30k in debt to get through undergrad and grad school.

 

I have a feeling that all these bleeding heart socialists would have been up the creek in a bad way 100 years ago when you had to work and grow your own food or produce something to trade in order to live.

 

Reminds me of a CLASSIC liberal/conservative parable:

 

The Ant and the Grasshopper [Classic Version]

 

The ant works hard in the withering heat all summer long, building his house and laying up supplies for the winter. The grasshopper thinks he's a fool and laughs and dances and plays the summer away. Come winter, the ant is warm and well fed.

 

The grasshopper has no food or shelter so he dies out in the cold.

 

MORAL OF THE STORY: Be responsible for yourself!

 

The Ant and the Grasshopper [Modern Version]

 

The ant works hard in the withering heat all summer long, building his house and laying up supplies for the winter. The grasshopper thinks he's a fool and laughs and dances and plays the summer away.

 

Come winter, the shivering grasshopper calls a press conference and demands to know why the ant should be allowed to be warm and well fed while others are cold and starving. CBS, NBC, ABC, and CNN show up to provide pictures of the shivering grasshopper next to a video of the ant in his comfortable home with a table filled with food.

 

America is stunned by the sharp contrast. How can this be, that in a country of such wealth, this poor grasshopper is allowed to suffer so?

 

Kermit the Frog appears on Oprah with the grasshopper, and everybody cries when they sing "It's Not Easy Being Green."

 

Jesse Jackson stages a demonstration in front of the ant's house where the news stations film the group singing "We shall overcome." Jesse then has the group kneel down to pray to God for the grasshopper's sake.

 

Tom Daschle & Walter Mondale exclaim in an interview with Peter Jennings that the ant has gotten rich off the back of the grasshopper, and both call for an immediate tax hike on the ant to make him pay his "fair share."

 

Finally, the EEOC drafts the "Economic Equity and Anti-Grasshopper Act," retroactive to the beginning of the summer. The ant is fined for failing to hire a proportionate number of green bugs and, having nothing left to pay his retroactive taxes, his home is confiscated by the government.

 

Hillary gets her old law firm to represent the grasshopper in a defamation suit against the ant, and the case is tried before a panel of federal judges that Bill appointed from a list of single-parent welfare recipients. The ant loses the case.

 

The story ends as we see the grasshopper finishing up the last bits of the ant's food while the government house he is in, which just happens to be the ant's old house, crumbles around him because he doesn't maintain it. The ant has disappeared in the snow.

 

The grasshopper is found dead in a drug-related incident and the house, now abandoned, is taken over by a gang of spiders who terrorize the once peaceful neighborhood.

 

MORAL OF THE STORY: Vote Republican

[Fairweather]

Go jerk off to Ayn Rand Asshat.

 

You seem like an angry worker/peasant tonight, Cj.

 

"Asshat". The word seems a little over used here these days. Please work on originality.

[cj001f]

I have a feeling that all these bleeding heart socialists would have been up the creek in a bad way 100 years ago when you had to work and grow your own food or produce something to trade in order to live.

See Israel as a counterpoint.

[cj001f]

You seem like an angry worker/peasant tonight, Cj.

It's in his Autosig. I'm just tired of the trite Republican/Right Wing criticisms of the European state - which degrade it's biggest benefit (quality of life) while neglecting it's readily apparent Achilles heal (the unsustainability of the Welfare State with a decreasing population, and the absence of astounding productivity growth)

[JayB]

"Despite such statistical quibbles, however, it is undeniable that the average person in the euro area is still about 30% poorer (in terms of GDP per person measured at purchasing-power parity) than the average American, and this gap has barely changed over the past 30 years. Thus even if income per person is growing at almost the same pace as in America, Europeans are still stuck with much lower living standards than Americans."

 

This was the gist of the article I cited Carl, which supports my contention that definitions of poverty are relative and contingent upon the standard that was used to establish the benchmark. In the US, this bar is pretty high, and figures like "The poorest 20 percent in the nation" aren't terribly useful when they are used to define poverty in this country. In some countries like Portugal, I would wager that some of the people classified as poor would qualify as lower middle class.

[JayB]

Kudos to you for reading the Economist though. My favorite magazine for the last dozen years.

 

There may be hope for you yet.

 

 

[cj001f]

This was the gist of the article I cited Carl, which supports my contention that definitions of poverty are relative and contingent upon the standard that was used to establish the benchmark. In the US, this bar is pretty high, and figures like "The poorest 20 percent in the nation" aren't terribly useful when they are used to define poverty in this country. In some countries like Portugal, I would wager that some of the people classified as poor would qualify as lower middle class.

And this was the Gist of my comment, Jay:

"GDP per hour in Germany and France now exceeds that in America. Income per person is higher in America largely because the average person there works more hours. In the euro area, fewer people work and those who do hold a job work shorter average hours. By one estimate the average American worker clocks up 40% more hours during his life time than the average person in Germany, France or Italy."

 

I'd rather have more time off

 

And the Economist is a magazine that has content enough to last for a plane flight!

[JayB]

Me too, but I won't begrudge the guy next to me if he chooses to work himself to death in order to drive a Lexus home to his McMansion.

 

The Euros can collectively do whatever they wish, but they should neither be surprised nor angry when they get their collective macroeconomic asses handed to them by the untold milions of people who are determined, ambitious, and hungry. There's just no way that the 26 year old programmer in Bangalore with an entire extended family to think about is going to cut Jacques and Heinrich some slack so that they can enjoy their six week vacations without the gnawing anxiety that comes along with knowing that somewhere out there, a hard-working person is eating their free lunch.

[cracked]

Who decided that selfishness is so evil? It provides an economic system that works better than the alternatives. Here's to selfishness, since a system based on selflessness becomes communism.

Go jerk off to Ayn Rand Asshat.

Who?

[cj001f]

The Euros can collectively do whatever they wish, but they should neither be surprised nor angry when they get their collective macroeconomic asses handed to them by the untold milions of people who are determined, ambitious, and hungry. There's just no way that the 26 year old programmer in Bangalore with an entire extended family to think about is going to cut Jacques and Heinrich some slack so that they can enjoy their six week vacations without the gnawing anxiety that comes along with knowing that somewhere out there, a hard-working person is eating their free lunch.

I don't begrudge either. Americans need to realize their is no intrinsic advantage to using us over any other 1st world work force. Yes we produce more, but we are also paid commensurate with our production - so on an outsourcing basis, Americans are no different than Dieter, Francois, Geoff, or Giovanni; all equally reproducable by Chang or Sandeep

[cj001f]

Go jerk off to Ayn Rand Asshat.

Who?

Cartman's Mom

[Dru]

joe bialek is a spambot

 

see here: spambot

 

you have all been trolled!