That settles that now, doesn’t it.

Swaye said:

I could be rich in India.

@DerekJohnson - true?

greenblood said:

The fact that you need $4.4m to be the top 1% proves that the US still provides the best financial life for everybody. People that bitch and moan about the US being unfair, if told they could leave to anywhere else for free, most would stay here.

Graphs are hard

greenblood said:

The fact that you need $4.4m to be the top 1% proves that the US still provides the best financial life for everybody. People that bitch and moan about the US being unfair, if told they could leave to anywhere else for free, most would stay here.

Creepy's mantra: where you gonna go? You speak Fwench? German? Switzerlandeze? Nope? Forget the Japanese ... they don't want you. Get comfortable at home.

creepycoug said:

HHusky said:

I'm not following what this would "prove", if accurate. But everything I've read in the past couple of years says you're not in the top 1% of the US unless you have a net worth in the low eight figures.

I wonder how meaningful these percentages are and whether we need to break it down further. The top 1/100th (making this up) of the top 1% live significantly better lives than the rest of that top 1%. Said another way, if I am in the same percentile rank as Craig McCaw, we need another measure.

Agreed. Regardless of accuracy, being in the top 1% is certainly very comfortable. But it's being in the top .1% that is fabulously rich.

1to392831weretaken said:

greenblood said:

The fact that you need $4.4m to be the top 1% proves that the US still provides the best financial life for everybody. People that bitch and moan about the US being unfair, if told they could leave to anywhere else for free, most would stay here.

What? No it doesn't. It doesn't do that at all. It just proves that--assuming whatever the hell Knight Frank is is reporting accurately--the U.S. provides the third best financial life for its top percent. The U.S. is decent when it comes to percent below the poverty line, but not even close to the best. It's downright terrible when it comes to income inequality (the denominator in the above graphic having much to do with that), with a GINI coefficient ranked lower than UW men's basketball by both the World Bank and CIA (ranked one spot ahead of the Ivory Coast in 2016, so we got that going for us, which is nice).

It's good to be rich in the USA. Same as it's ever been.

Income inequality is an idiotic measure. Compare our bottom 20% with the bottom 20% in all other countries, and you'll see our 20% have it better. In about 20-25 years when that won't be the case, you idiots will continue to blame the rich, but gladly ignore the millions of low skilled workers storming the southern border.

You can't continue to grow the bottom, and expect the top to support it. That has never worked, and it will eventually drive money out of the US, and causing the government to print even more of it. Then comes hyper-inflation, and you become Venezuela only on a much larger scale.

creepycoug said:

Swaye said:

I could be rich in India.

Would be chintresting to take your million and go to Russia. Some beautiful women over there. Of course, you'd need to take all your weaponry, and then some, and gangster the fuck up. Cuz ain't no way some engine from the US is going to show up flingin' dolla bills in the air and claiming any turf without a fight.

Friend of mine travels there for bidness, and another is now the managing partner of a global law firm with an office in Moscow (he's native Russian but educated here). Apparently the gangster oligarchy class is a very real thing there.

Yup. Moscow is expensive as shit too.

Funny story from a while back now...met up with a South African guy I went to grad school with at a bar in Amsterdam after not seeing him for about 5 years...sharp guy but a bit naive. He was managing a European business in Russia and telling me about living there...started describing his girlfriend and his introduction to her family. Described some crazy expensive gifts her brothers had gotten him...I asked him what the family did. He said with a straight face they imported cars and seriously believed it.

Next twenty minutes was pure comedy as I kept asking questions and I could tell that it started sinking in to him that the girl’s family was Russian mob...not a spot I’d want to be in.

PurpleThrobber said:

Swaye said:

I could be rich in India.

@DerekJohnson - true?

I thought Stalin liked the Korean gals? No?

creepycoug said:

PurpleThrobber said:

Swaye said:

I could be rich in India.

@DerekJohnson - true?

I thought Stalin liked the Korean gals? No?

I do for sure

greenblood said:

creepycoug said:

greenblood said:

1to392831weretaken said:

greenblood said:

The fact that you need $4.4m to be the top 1% proves that the US still provides the best financial life for everybody. People that bitch and moan about the US being unfair, if told they could leave to anywhere else for free, most would stay here.

What? No it doesn't. It doesn't do that at all. It just proves that--assuming whatever the hell Knight Frank is is reporting accurately--the U.S. provides the third best financial life for its top percent. The U.S. is decent when it comes to percent below the poverty line, but not even close to the best. It's downright terrible when it comes to income inequality (the denominator in the above graphic having much to do with that), with a GINI coefficient ranked lower than UW men's basketball by both the World Bank and CIA (ranked one spot ahead of the Ivory Coast in 2016, so we got that going for us, which is nice).

It's good to be rich in the USA. Same as it's ever been.

Income inequality is an idiotic measure. Compare our bottom 20% with the bottom 20% in all other countries, and you'll see our 20% have it better. In about 20-25 years when that won't be the case, you idiots will continue to blame the rich, but gladly ignore the millions of low skilled workers storming the southern border.

You can't continue to grow the bottom, and expect the top to support it. That has never worked, and it will eventually drive money out of the US, and causing the government to print even more of it. Then comes hyper-inflation, and you become Venezuela only on a much larger scale.

I don't do income inequality myself, so we're in general agreement there. What do I care how much 7 or 8 guys have as long as I have a chance to do the same and if I miss still live quite well? What business is it of mine how wealthy Bezos is? As long it's not illegal, it's none-ya-business.

Where we part company is the low-skilled workers "problem". Reform the welfare state so as not to provide any government benefits (other than the most basic human needs) to the newly-arrived. Those people are finding work by and large and if they're willing to do it for less that's the American way. We spend a lot of time arguing against minimum wage laws and $22 / hr. at McDonald's, and not nearly enough time examining what labor protectionist policies would do the the American economy ... short- and long-term.

IDK when this changed, but conservatism used to mean freedom of capital deployment as well. So are we for or against low-skill workers making $22 / hr.? We seem to go back and forth on this depending on whether the worker is an immigrant or a citizen.

On minimum wage, I think the federal government needs to stay out of it. The minimum survival wage in Southern California is much more than Jackson Mississippi. Let the states determine their own minimum wage, based on the economic conditions of their state. We live in a much more economically diverse country, and our pay scale should be reflective of that.

I should clarify on the low skilled workers. We already have a large pool of low skilled workers in this country, and the percentage compared to high skilled workers continues to expand. How does bringing in millions of additional low skilled workers every year help solve this problem? All this does is put greater emphasis on the need of a welfare state. When this happens, the rich move their money (because they can) and the money starts to dry up. I think as a country, we need to do a better job offering more trade schools and work programs for the people already here, and fix this first, then we can look at opening up the gates, once we have a system in place.

I would take it a step further and say all governments need to stay out of it. Let the market work. If you don't have what it takes to get a job in LA that will allow you to afford to live in LA, then you need to leave LA. IDC.

On the legal vs. illegal, I've been consistent on this: we need to regulate the borders because we need to know who is coming and going; but not to have some labor czar take count of who is coming and what skill level they have and in what. The welfare piece is the key. I am no expert on what they get or what they don't get. My wife's family is convinced there are secret federal welfare offices that give "illegals" more benies than our veterans!!!!!! Not sure that seems plausible to me, but I haven't disproven it so I guess it's true. Even if it's not, say they get something. Or say they come and have kids and those kids are now citizens. I would nix all that shit. All of it.

We? let you in, you and your fam. don't pull off the public tit (other than your kids in public school) for 10 years. Make it 15 years. And you need to be gainfully employed for 85% of that time. After that, you're an American and can go on welfare.

If you did something like that, mostly what you'd get are people filling labor gaps in the U.S. and the market would work.

As for skill/no skill, that's Race's wheelhouse and I'll stay out of it. I'll just say that I'm guessing most of the, say, Mexicans who come over with any skill acquired it working and not through special trade school. I see a lot of Mexican framing teams in the Seattle area residential construction bidness just from the eyeball test. Of course landscaping, food service, and agriculture are big employers. If those jobs were readily filled by American workers at prevailing market wages, as opposed to inflated wages set by protectionist labor policies, then the inflow would slow down dramatically assuming, again, you are not providing other incentives to come (like the free stuff).

As far as this notion that we're importing socialism, which you didn't offer but which I read about a lot, I wonder how we feel about Euro-immigrants. I'm serious when I say this: I have not met a single, solitary Euro here on visa (usually student) who isn't a dyed-in-the-wool socialist and can't believe Sanders has not won the Presidency. Remember, guys, the Hispanics didn't invent socialism. That's another thing to lay on the Germans.

creepycoug said:

greenblood said:

creepycoug said:

greenblood said:

1to392831weretaken said:

greenblood said:

The fact that you need $4.4m to be the top 1% proves that the US still provides the best financial life for everybody. People that bitch and moan about the US being unfair, if told they could leave to anywhere else for free, most would stay here.

What? No it doesn't. It doesn't do that at all. It just proves that--assuming whatever the hell Knight Frank is is reporting accurately--the U.S. provides the third best financial life for its top percent. The U.S. is decent when it comes to percent below the poverty line, but not even close to the best. It's downright terrible when it comes to income inequality (the denominator in the above graphic having much to do with that), with a GINI coefficient ranked lower than UW men's basketball by both the World Bank and CIA (ranked one spot ahead of the Ivory Coast in 2016, so we got that going for us, which is nice).

It's good to be rich in the USA. Same as it's ever been.

Income inequality is an idiotic measure. Compare our bottom 20% with the bottom 20% in all other countries, and you'll see our 20% have it better. In about 20-25 years when that won't be the case, you idiots will continue to blame the rich, but gladly ignore the millions of low skilled workers storming the southern border.

You can't continue to grow the bottom, and expect the top to support it. That has never worked, and it will eventually drive money out of the US, and causing the government to print even more of it. Then comes hyper-inflation, and you become Venezuela only on a much larger scale.

I don't do income inequality myself, so we're in general agreement there. What do I care how much 7 or 8 guys have as long as I have a chance to do the same and if I miss still live quite well? What business is it of mine how wealthy Bezos is? As long it's not illegal, it's none-ya-business.

Where we part company is the low-skilled workers "problem". Reform the welfare state so as not to provide any government benefits (other than the most basic human needs) to the newly-arrived. Those people are finding work by and large and if they're willing to do it for less that's the American way. We spend a lot of time arguing against minimum wage laws and $22 / hr. at McDonald's, and not nearly enough time examining what labor protectionist policies would do the the American economy ... short- and long-term.

IDK when this changed, but conservatism used to mean freedom of capital deployment as well. So are we for or against low-skill workers making $22 / hr.? We seem to go back and forth on this depending on whether the worker is an immigrant or a citizen.

On minimum wage, I think the federal government needs to stay out of it. The minimum survival wage in Southern California is much more than Jackson Mississippi. Let the states determine their own minimum wage, based on the economic conditions of their state. We live in a much more economically diverse country, and our pay scale should be reflective of that.

I should clarify on the low skilled workers. We already have a large pool of low skilled workers in this country, and the percentage compared to high skilled workers continues to expand. How does bringing in millions of additional low skilled workers every year help solve this problem? All this does is put greater emphasis on the need of a welfare state. When this happens, the rich move their money (because they can) and the money starts to dry up. I think as a country, we need to do a better job offering more trade schools and work programs for the people already here, and fix this first, then we can look at opening up the gates, once we have a system in place.

I would take it a step further and say all governments need to stay out of it. Let the market work. If you don't have what it takes to get a job in LA that will allow you to afford to live in LA, then you need to leave LA. IDC.

On the legal vs. illegal, I've been consistent on this: we need to regulate the borders because we need to know who is coming and going; but not to have some labor czar take count of who is coming and what skill level they have and in what. The welfare piece is the key. I am no expert on what they get or what they don't get. My wife's family is convinced there are secret federal welfare offices that give "illegals" more benies than our veterans!!!!!! Not sure that seems plausible to me, but I haven't disproven it so I guess it's true. Even if it's not, say they get something. Or say they come and have kids and those kids are now citizens. I would nix all that shit. All of it.

We? let you in, you and your fam. don't pull off the public tit (other than your kids in public school) for 10 years. Make it 15 years. And you need to be gainfully employed for 85% of that time. After that, you're an American and can go on welfare.

If you did something like that, mostly what you'd get are people filling labor gaps in the U.S. and the market would work.

As for skill/no skill, that's Race's wheelhouse and I'll stay out of it. I'll just say that I'm guessing most of the, say, Mexicans who come over with any skill acquired it working and not through special trade school. I see a lot of Mexican framing teams in the Seattle area residential construction bidness just from the eyeball test. Of course landscaping, food service, and agriculture are big employers. If those jobs were readily filled by American workers at prevailing market wages, as opposed to inflated wages set by protectionist labor policies, then the inflow would slow down dramatically assuming, again, you are not providing other incentives to come (like the free stuff).

As far as this notion that we're importing socialism, which you didn't offer but which I read about a lot, I wonder how we feel about Euro-immigrants. I'm serious when I say this: I have not met a single, solitary Euro here on visa (usually student) who isn't a dyed-in-the-wool socialist and can't believe Sanders has not won the Presidency. Remember, guys, the Hispanics didn't invent socialism. That's another thing to lay on the Germans.

You could apply that same concept in the State of Washington and most of the shitheads living in tents and pooping on streets would pick up and go elsewhere.

You don't see homeless in CDA, Idaho - you just don't. Maybe up in the woods or some shit but NEVER in town.

Drive 30 miles west, downtown Spokane has some zombie zone/tent outposts that would give cascade shitholes Seattle and Portland a run for their money.

People behave in ways they are incented to behave. You give them free shit, they'll flock like moths to light. You don't give them free shit, they won't.

This is basic economics, not Tug shit. Doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out the freeloaders go where the free-est load is.

PurpleThrobber said:

creepycoug said:

greenblood said:

creepycoug said:

greenblood said:

1to392831weretaken said:

greenblood said:

The fact that you need $4.4m to be the top 1% proves that the US still provides the best financial life for everybody. People that bitch and moan about the US being unfair, if told they could leave to anywhere else for free, most would stay here.

What? No it doesn't. It doesn't do that at all. It just proves that--assuming whatever the hell Knight Frank is is reporting accurately--the U.S. provides the third best financial life for its top percent. The U.S. is decent when it comes to percent below the poverty line, but not even close to the best. It's downright terrible when it comes to income inequality (the denominator in the above graphic having much to do with that), with a GINI coefficient ranked lower than UW men's basketball by both the World Bank and CIA (ranked one spot ahead of the Ivory Coast in 2016, so we got that going for us, which is nice).

It's good to be rich in the USA. Same as it's ever been.

Income inequality is an idiotic measure. Compare our bottom 20% with the bottom 20% in all other countries, and you'll see our 20% have it better. In about 20-25 years when that won't be the case, you idiots will continue to blame the rich, but gladly ignore the millions of low skilled workers storming the southern border.

You can't continue to grow the bottom, and expect the top to support it. That has never worked, and it will eventually drive money out of the US, and causing the government to print even more of it. Then comes hyper-inflation, and you become Venezuela only on a much larger scale.

I don't do income inequality myself, so we're in general agreement there. What do I care how much 7 or 8 guys have as long as I have a chance to do the same and if I miss still live quite well? What business is it of mine how wealthy Bezos is? As long it's not illegal, it's none-ya-business.

Where we part company is the low-skilled workers "problem". Reform the welfare state so as not to provide any government benefits (other than the most basic human needs) to the newly-arrived. Those people are finding work by and large and if they're willing to do it for less that's the American way. We spend a lot of time arguing against minimum wage laws and $22 / hr. at McDonald's, and not nearly enough time examining what labor protectionist policies would do the the American economy ... short- and long-term.

IDK when this changed, but conservatism used to mean freedom of capital deployment as well. So are we for or against low-skill workers making $22 / hr.? We seem to go back and forth on this depending on whether the worker is an immigrant or a citizen.

On minimum wage, I think the federal government needs to stay out of it. The minimum survival wage in Southern California is much more than Jackson Mississippi. Let the states determine their own minimum wage, based on the economic conditions of their state. We live in a much more economically diverse country, and our pay scale should be reflective of that.

I should clarify on the low skilled workers. We already have a large pool of low skilled workers in this country, and the percentage compared to high skilled workers continues to expand. How does bringing in millions of additional low skilled workers every year help solve this problem? All this does is put greater emphasis on the need of a welfare state. When this happens, the rich move their money (because they can) and the money starts to dry up. I think as a country, we need to do a better job offering more trade schools and work programs for the people already here, and fix this first, then we can look at opening up the gates, once we have a system in place.

I would take it a step further and say all governments need to stay out of it. Let the market work. If you don't have what it takes to get a job in LA that will allow you to afford to live in LA, then you need to leave LA. IDC.

On the legal vs. illegal, I've been consistent on this: we need to regulate the borders because we need to know who is coming and going; but not to have some labor czar take count of who is coming and what skill level they have and in what. The welfare piece is the key. I am no expert on what they get or what they don't get. My wife's family is convinced there are secret federal welfare offices that give "illegals" more benies than our veterans!!!!!! Not sure that seems plausible to me, but I haven't disproven it so I guess it's true. Even if it's not, say they get something. Or say they come and have kids and those kids are now citizens. I would nix all that shit. All of it.

We? let you in, you and your fam. don't pull off the public tit (other than your kids in public school) for 10 years. Make it 15 years. And you need to be gainfully employed for 85% of that time. After that, you're an American and can go on welfare.

If you did something like that, mostly what you'd get are people filling labor gaps in the U.S. and the market would work.

As for skill/no skill, that's Race's wheelhouse and I'll stay out of it. I'll just say that I'm guessing most of the, say, Mexicans who come over with any skill acquired it working and not through special trade school. I see a lot of Mexican framing teams in the Seattle area residential construction bidness just from the eyeball test. Of course landscaping, food service, and agriculture are big employers. If those jobs were readily filled by American workers at prevailing market wages, as opposed to inflated wages set by protectionist labor policies, then the inflow would slow down dramatically assuming, again, you are not providing other incentives to come (like the free stuff).

As far as this notion that we're importing socialism, which you didn't offer but which I read about a lot, I wonder how we feel about Euro-immigrants. I'm serious when I say this: I have not met a single, solitary Euro here on visa (usually student) who isn't a dyed-in-the-wool socialist and can't believe Sanders has not won the Presidency. Remember, guys, the Hispanics didn't invent socialism. That's another thing to lay on the Germans.

You could apply that same concept in the State of Washington and most of the shitheads living in tents and pooping on streets would pick up and go elsewhere.

You don't see homeless in CDA, Idaho - you just don't. Maybe up in the woods or some shit but NEVER in town.

Drive 30 miles west, downtown Spokane has some zombie zone/tent outposts that would give cascade shitholes Seattle and Portland a run for their money.

People behave in ways they are incented to behave. You give them free shit, they'll flock like moths to light. You don't give them free shit, they won't.

This is basic economics, not Tug shit. Doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out the freeloaders go where the free-est load is.

I get it. If you feed the crows, they keep coming back. And I live near Lake City, which is a shithole country.

Yet, you can be as fucked up and lacking in agency as anyone living on the street, but have a family or other safety net that doesn't put you out in a tent. If you don't have that, should you simply become irredeemable?

PurpleThrobber said:

HHusky said:

PurpleThrobber said:

creepycoug said:

greenblood said:

creepycoug said:

greenblood said:

1to392831weretaken said:

greenblood said:

The fact that you need $4.4m to be the top 1% proves that the US still provides the best financial life for everybody. People that bitch and moan about the US being unfair, if told they could leave to anywhere else for free, most would stay here.

What? No it doesn't. It doesn't do that at all. It just proves that--assuming whatever the hell Knight Frank is is reporting accurately--the U.S. provides the third best financial life for its top percent. The U.S. is decent when it comes to percent below the poverty line, but not even close to the best. It's downright terrible when it comes to income inequality (the denominator in the above graphic having much to do with that), with a GINI coefficient ranked lower than UW men's basketball by both the World Bank and CIA (ranked one spot ahead of the Ivory Coast in 2016, so we got that going for us, which is nice).

It's good to be rich in the USA. Same as it's ever been.

Income inequality is an idiotic measure. Compare our bottom 20% with the bottom 20% in all other countries, and you'll see our 20% have it better. In about 20-25 years when that won't be the case, you idiots will continue to blame the rich, but gladly ignore the millions of low skilled workers storming the southern border.

You can't continue to grow the bottom, and expect the top to support it. That has never worked, and it will eventually drive money out of the US, and causing the government to print even more of it. Then comes hyper-inflation, and you become Venezuela only on a much larger scale.

I don't do income inequality myself, so we're in general agreement there. What do I care how much 7 or 8 guys have as long as I have a chance to do the same and if I miss still live quite well? What business is it of mine how wealthy Bezos is? As long it's not illegal, it's none-ya-business.

Where we part company is the low-skilled workers "problem". Reform the welfare state so as not to provide any government benefits (other than the most basic human needs) to the newly-arrived. Those people are finding work by and large and if they're willing to do it for less that's the American way. We spend a lot of time arguing against minimum wage laws and $22 / hr. at McDonald's, and not nearly enough time examining what labor protectionist policies would do the the American economy ... short- and long-term.

IDK when this changed, but conservatism used to mean freedom of capital deployment as well. So are we for or against low-skill workers making $22 / hr.? We seem to go back and forth on this depending on whether the worker is an immigrant or a citizen.

On minimum wage, I think the federal government needs to stay out of it. The minimum survival wage in Southern California is much more than Jackson Mississippi. Let the states determine their own minimum wage, based on the economic conditions of their state. We live in a much more economically diverse country, and our pay scale should be reflective of that.

I should clarify on the low skilled workers. We already have a large pool of low skilled workers in this country, and the percentage compared to high skilled workers continues to expand. How does bringing in millions of additional low skilled workers every year help solve this problem? All this does is put greater emphasis on the need of a welfare state. When this happens, the rich move their money (because they can) and the money starts to dry up. I think as a country, we need to do a better job offering more trade schools and work programs for the people already here, and fix this first, then we can look at opening up the gates, once we have a system in place.

I would take it a step further and say all governments need to stay out of it. Let the market work. If you don't have what it takes to get a job in LA that will allow you to afford to live in LA, then you need to leave LA. IDC.

On the legal vs. illegal, I've been consistent on this: we need to regulate the borders because we need to know who is coming and going; but not to have some labor czar take count of who is coming and what skill level they have and in what. The welfare piece is the key. I am no expert on what they get or what they don't get. My wife's family is convinced there are secret federal welfare offices that give "illegals" more benies than our veterans!!!!!! Not sure that seems plausible to me, but I haven't disproven it so I guess it's true. Even if it's not, say they get something. Or say they come and have kids and those kids are now citizens. I would nix all that shit. All of it.

We? let you in, you and your fam. don't pull off the public tit (other than your kids in public school) for 10 years. Make it 15 years. And you need to be gainfully employed for 85% of that time. After that, you're an American and can go on welfare.

If you did something like that, mostly what you'd get are people filling labor gaps in the U.S. and the market would work.

As for skill/no skill, that's Race's wheelhouse and I'll stay out of it. I'll just say that I'm guessing most of the, say, Mexicans who come over with any skill acquired it working and not through special trade school. I see a lot of Mexican framing teams in the Seattle area residential construction bidness just from the eyeball test. Of course landscaping, food service, and agriculture are big employers. If those jobs were readily filled by American workers at prevailing market wages, as opposed to inflated wages set by protectionist labor policies, then the inflow would slow down dramatically assuming, again, you are not providing other incentives to come (like the free stuff).

As far as this notion that we're importing socialism, which you didn't offer but which I read about a lot, I wonder how we feel about Euro-immigrants. I'm serious when I say this: I have not met a single, solitary Euro here on visa (usually student) who isn't a dyed-in-the-wool socialist and can't believe Sanders has not won the Presidency. Remember, guys, the Hispanics didn't invent socialism. That's another thing to lay on the Germans.

You could apply that same concept in the State of Washington and most of the shitheads living in tents and pooping on streets would pick up and go elsewhere.

You don't see homeless in CDA, Idaho - you just don't. Maybe up in the woods or some shit but NEVER in town.

Drive 30 miles west, downtown Spokane has some zombie zone/tent outposts that would give cascade shitholes Seattle and Portland a run for their money.

People behave in ways they are incented to behave. You give them free shit, they'll flock like moths to light. You don't give them free shit, they won't.

This is basic economics, not Tug shit. Doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out the freeloaders go where the free-est load is.

I get it. If you feed the crows, they keep coming back. And I live near Lake City, which is a shithole country.

Yet, you can be as fucked up and lacking in agency as anyone living on the street, but have a family or other safety net that doesn't put you out in a tent. If you don't have that, should you simply become irredeemable?

The people who don't take advantage of the resources available are, yes, irredeemable. There are so many options available.

If you're still falling through the cracks at that point, you're either choosing that lifestyle (see also 'free shit > working for shit') or you're mentally ill and need to be put in a place where you can't harm others or yourself - Vantage is nice. This endless tent city stuff isn't helping anyone. Definition of insanity at this point.

Again, people behave in the manner in which their own self interest is incentivized.

So are there many resources available in Vantage? This is just a suburban NIMBY argument, isn't it? You know, where Mercer Island and Kirkland complain that homelessness is a Seattle issue simply because the homeless usually gravitate to cities.

My brother-in-law is in health care. He sees staffers living in their cars between shifts because it's their best option. People can work and be on the streets. And that's not to ignore that many of those living on the street are mentally ill, and don't have the agency you attribute to them.

Forget humanitarianism, I selfishly want some solution to this for me. I've never aspired to have US cities look and smell like Mumbai. I don't want the tents either. But the answer isn't to dump people in Vantage.

PurpleThrobber said:

HHusky said:

PurpleThrobber said:

HHusky said:

PurpleThrobber said:

creepycoug said:

greenblood said:

creepycoug said:

greenblood said:

1to392831weretaken said:

greenblood said:

The fact that you need $4.4m to be the top 1% proves that the US still provides the best financial life for everybody. People that bitch and moan about the US being unfair, if told they could leave to anywhere else for free, most would stay here.

What? No it doesn't. It doesn't do that at all. It just proves that--assuming whatever the hell Knight Frank is is reporting accurately--the U.S. provides the third best financial life for its top percent. The U.S. is decent when it comes to percent below the poverty line, but not even close to the best. It's downright terrible when it comes to income inequality (the denominator in the above graphic having much to do with that), with a GINI coefficient ranked lower than UW men's basketball by both the World Bank and CIA (ranked one spot ahead of the Ivory Coast in 2016, so we got that going for us, which is nice).

It's good to be rich in the USA. Same as it's ever been.

Income inequality is an idiotic measure. Compare our bottom 20% with the bottom 20% in all other countries, and you'll see our 20% have it better. In about 20-25 years when that won't be the case, you idiots will continue to blame the rich, but gladly ignore the millions of low skilled workers storming the southern border.

You can't continue to grow the bottom, and expect the top to support it. That has never worked, and it will eventually drive money out of the US, and causing the government to print even more of it. Then comes hyper-inflation, and you become Venezuela only on a much larger scale.

I don't do income inequality myself, so we're in general agreement there. What do I care how much 7 or 8 guys have as long as I have a chance to do the same and if I miss still live quite well? What business is it of mine how wealthy Bezos is? As long it's not illegal, it's none-ya-business.

Where we part company is the low-skilled workers "problem". Reform the welfare state so as not to provide any government benefits (other than the most basic human needs) to the newly-arrived. Those people are finding work by and large and if they're willing to do it for less that's the American way. We spend a lot of time arguing against minimum wage laws and $22 / hr. at McDonald's, and not nearly enough time examining what labor protectionist policies would do the the American economy ... short- and long-term.

IDK when this changed, but conservatism used to mean freedom of capital deployment as well. So are we for or against low-skill workers making $22 / hr.? We seem to go back and forth on this depending on whether the worker is an immigrant or a citizen.

On minimum wage, I think the federal government needs to stay out of it. The minimum survival wage in Southern California is much more than Jackson Mississippi. Let the states determine their own minimum wage, based on the economic conditions of their state. We live in a much more economically diverse country, and our pay scale should be reflective of that.

I should clarify on the low skilled workers. We already have a large pool of low skilled workers in this country, and the percentage compared to high skilled workers continues to expand. How does bringing in millions of additional low skilled workers every year help solve this problem? All this does is put greater emphasis on the need of a welfare state. When this happens, the rich move their money (because they can) and the money starts to dry up. I think as a country, we need to do a better job offering more trade schools and work programs for the people already here, and fix this first, then we can look at opening up the gates, once we have a system in place.

I would take it a step further and say all governments need to stay out of it. Let the market work. If you don't have what it takes to get a job in LA that will allow you to afford to live in LA, then you need to leave LA. IDC.

On the legal vs. illegal, I've been consistent on this: we need to regulate the borders because we need to know who is coming and going; but not to have some labor czar take count of who is coming and what skill level they have and in what. The welfare piece is the key. I am no expert on what they get or what they don't get. My wife's family is convinced there are secret federal welfare offices that give "illegals" more benies than our veterans!!!!!! Not sure that seems plausible to me, but I haven't disproven it so I guess it's true. Even if it's not, say they get something. Or say they come and have kids and those kids are now citizens. I would nix all that shit. All of it.

We? let you in, you and your fam. don't pull off the public tit (other than your kids in public school) for 10 years. Make it 15 years. And you need to be gainfully employed for 85% of that time. After that, you're an American and can go on welfare.

If you did something like that, mostly what you'd get are people filling labor gaps in the U.S. and the market would work.

As for skill/no skill, that's Race's wheelhouse and I'll stay out of it. I'll just say that I'm guessing most of the, say, Mexicans who come over with any skill acquired it working and not through special trade school. I see a lot of Mexican framing teams in the Seattle area residential construction bidness just from the eyeball test. Of course landscaping, food service, and agriculture are big employers. If those jobs were readily filled by American workers at prevailing market wages, as opposed to inflated wages set by protectionist labor policies, then the inflow would slow down dramatically assuming, again, you are not providing other incentives to come (like the free stuff).

As far as this notion that we're importing socialism, which you didn't offer but which I read about a lot, I wonder how we feel about Euro-immigrants. I'm serious when I say this: I have not met a single, solitary Euro here on visa (usually student) who isn't a dyed-in-the-wool socialist and can't believe Sanders has not won the Presidency. Remember, guys, the Hispanics didn't invent socialism. That's another thing to lay on the Germans.

You could apply that same concept in the State of Washington and most of the shitheads living in tents and pooping on streets would pick up and go elsewhere.

You don't see homeless in CDA, Idaho - you just don't. Maybe up in the woods or some shit but NEVER in town.

Drive 30 miles west, downtown Spokane has some zombie zone/tent outposts that would give cascade shitholes Seattle and Portland a run for their money.

People behave in ways they are incented to behave. You give them free shit, they'll flock like moths to light. You don't give them free shit, they won't.

This is basic economics, not Tug shit. Doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out the freeloaders go where the free-est load is.

I get it. If you feed the crows, they keep coming back. And I live near Lake City, which is a shithole country.

Yet, you can be as fucked up and lacking in agency as anyone living on the street, but have a family or other safety net that doesn't put you out in a tent. If you don't have that, should you simply become irredeemable?

The people who don't take advantage of the resources available are, yes, irredeemable. There are so many options available.

If you're still falling through the cracks at that point, you're either choosing that lifestyle (see also 'free shit > working for shit') or you're mentally ill and need to be put in a place where you can't harm others or yourself - Vantage is nice. This endless tent city stuff isn't helping anyone. Definition of insanity at this point.

Again, people behave in the manner in which their own self interest is incentivized.

So are there many resources available in Vantage? This is just a suburban NIMBY argument, isn't it? You know, where Mercer Island and Kirkland complain that homelessness is a Seattle issue simply because the homeless usually gravitate to cities.

My brother-in-law is in health care. He sees staffers living in their cars between shifts because it's their best option. People can work and be on the streets. And that's not to ignore that many of those living on the street are mentally ill, and don't have the agency you attribute to them.

Forget humanitarianism, I selfishly want some solution to this for me. I've never aspired to have US cities look and smell like Mumbai. I don't want the tents either. But the answer isn't to dump people in Vantage.

How do you know? Put them out in Vantage to dry out. Get rehabbed, retrained. Parking them in Ravenna Park sure ain't working out well.

If you're that dumb that you're going to live in a car to be a health care worker in Seattle when there is demand for healthcare workers elsewhere and housing is dirt cheap, that's on you, not society.

The Okies packed up and moved to Cali when they couldn't cut it in OK because of the dust bowl....sixth largest economy because of it....people have faced hard times before and come out on the other side just fine when they had to take care of themselves.

So embrace your inner Great Depression resolve, in other words, as if most places in the US that are empty today aren't empty for a reason.