# Man, this brings tears to muh eyes. Anti-Austerity protests raging in Europe. **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [September 29, 2010, 2:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-this-brings-tears-to-muh-eyes-anti-austerity-protests-raging-in-europe/555471 "2010-09-29T14:52:32Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 7
**Author:** ![erez](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/e47c2d/32.png) [@erez](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/erez)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2010, 5:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-this-brings-tears-to-muh-eyes-anti-austerity-protests-raging-in-europe/555471/121 "2010-10-02T05:34:20Z")
> [@Damuri\_Ajashi](#): > > Which is why we should tax them while they are generating their wealth here, before they expatriate to the Caymans.. So killing the golden goose is the best long-term policy you can come up with? Just remember that the top 1% of income earners paid 40.4% percent of all federal individual income taxes ([http://www.taxfoundation.org/news/show/250.html](http://www.taxfoundation.org/news/show/250.html)). ---
**Author:** ![Le\_Jacquelope](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e0b2c6/32.png) [@Le\_Jacquelope](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Le_Jacquelope)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2010, 7:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-this-brings-tears-to-muh-eyes-anti-austerity-protests-raging-in-europe/555471/122 "2010-10-02T07:37:24Z")
> [@erez](#): > > > [@Damuri\_Ajashi](#): > > > > Which is why we should tax them while they are generating their wealth here, before they expatriate to the Caymans.. > > So killing the golden goose is the best long-term policy you can come up with? Just remember that the top 1% of income earners paid 40.4% percent of all federal individual income taxes ([http://www.taxfoundation.org/news/show/250.html](http://www.taxfoundation.org/news/show/250.html)). The problem is that society is unsustainable when the top 1% of income earners paid 40.4% percent of all federal individual income taxes and roughly [34.3% of the nation’s wealth](http://www.faculty.fairfield.edu/faculty/hodgson/Courses/so11/stratification/income&wealth.htm). We need a trickle-up system of economics in which the bottom 90% control over 70% of the nation’s wealth. Your own stats (and those you omitted) shows that we’re descending into an era of plutocracy and no country can hope to survive in that state. We’re already doomed if we stay the course. ---
**Author:** ![Baboonanza](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/f475e1/32.png) [@Baboonanza](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baboonanza)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2010, 8:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-this-brings-tears-to-muh-eyes-anti-austerity-protests-raging-in-europe/555471/123 "2010-10-02T08:05:43Z")
> [@carm](#): > > That is in demand because it is standard, and people buy what they know. It became the standard through illegal anti-competitive practises. That’s a dubious contention at best. All of the anti-trust cases were about MS using their existing monopoly in OSs to dominate other areas such as browsers and media players. There has never been an anti-trust case about how MS got that monopoly to begin with. And while it’s certain that there were some dubious practices there the true reason MS became dominant is a combination of luck and being the best of a shitty bunch. What could you have seen replacing Windows? There weren’t exacty many better options. > [@](#): > > I am not the Left’s economic spokesman. Or economic strategist You sound like the most unrealistic sort of socialist to me. > [@](#): > > But yeah - monetary benefits are _of course_ the only possible benefit a company can provide to a society. And that is a dangerous and short-sighted opinion. The western capitalist system has been the engine powering the last 200 years of innovation, prosperity and improvement of the human condition. Wealth is the motivator and driver in this but the side effect is a multitude of important technologies from the motor car to the computer that have been either invented or first exploited on American soil. And the fact that these technologies have been invented by America, a democratic country with high moral values (that occasionally are lived up to) is deeply important. You know the US government has the power to switch off the internet don’t you? You don’t think there is any significance in that? And now you advocate driving this wealth abroad. Where would it go do you think? China? Does that really strike you as a sensible long-term move? ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2010, 8:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-this-brings-tears-to-muh-eyes-anti-austerity-protests-raging-in-europe/555471/124 "2010-10-02T08:41:40Z")
[quote=“Le\_Jacquelope, post:122, topic:555471”] > [@erez](#): > > We need a trickle-up system of economics in which the bottom 90% control over 70% of the nation’s wealth. So as soon as someone founds a successful company, the government should take it away from him and distribute it to the public? ---
**Author:** ![Le\_Jacquelope](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e0b2c6/32.png) [@Le\_Jacquelope](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Le_Jacquelope)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2010, 10:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-this-brings-tears-to-muh-eyes-anti-austerity-protests-raging-in-europe/555471/125 "2010-10-02T10:10:48Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > So as soon as someone founds a successful company, the government should take it away from him and distribute it to the public? You can’t be seriously telling me you interpreted my comments to such a straw man-level extreme… right? CEO pay (roughly equivalent to someone who founds a successful company) to worker pay was [40 to 1](http://www.aflcio.org/corporatewatch/paywatch/pay/) in the 1980s. It’s now 263 to 1. Are you telling me that cutting CEO pay back to 40 to 1 amounts to the Government taking away the entire company and distributing it to the public? Really? Heck, I haven’t even proposed a mandatory cut of CEO pay (mainly because I can’t see an orderly way of making it happen). What I am proposing is a ban on trade with cheap labor nations, nations that do not have a democracy, nations that ignore environmental protections and nations that are rife with unsafe workplaces. If you keep the work from going offshore to some cheap exploitationist economy, you go a VERY long way toward achieving a more even distribution of wealth. Combine this with a loophole-free progressive taxation system and you have pretty much won the game. Of course if businesses get mad and want to leave, LET THEM. We still have top innovators here and foreigners who’ll come here looking to make 40 times the pay of the average worker. They’ll come for the democracy, they’ll come for the breathable air and drinkable water, and most of all they’ll come for the ENORMOUS 300 million person market magnified by a lot of workers with deep pockets. When you take the rich down a few pegs and raise the working class up a few pegs, you have more economic activity. Please tell me what is wrong with that. The way we’re going, though, they’re soon going to ditch Third World America totally and strive to make it in the CHINESE market instead. ---
**Author:** ![erez](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/e47c2d/32.png) [@erez](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/erez)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2010, 10:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-this-brings-tears-to-muh-eyes-anti-austerity-protests-raging-in-europe/555471/126 "2010-10-02T10:14:10Z")
> [@Le\_Jacquelope](#): > > The problem is that society is unsustainable when the top 1% of income earners paid 40.4% percent of all federal individual income taxes and roughly [34.3% of the nation’s wealth](http://www.faculty.fairfield.edu/faculty/hodgson/Courses/so11/stratification/income&wealth.htm). > > We need a trickle-up system of economics in which the bottom 90% control over 70% of the nation’s wealth. > > Your own stats (and those you omitted) shows that we’re descending into an era of plutocracy and no country can hope to survive in that state. > > We’re already doomed if we stay the course. Did you forget already that your own OP was about big economic problems in Western Europe, where the income distribution is much flatter than in the U.S.? It didn’t help them too much compared to the U.S., did it? If you want to argue that one country needs to become more like other countries, it might not be the best idea to start by reminding everyone about big problems in these other countries. ---
**Author:** ![Le\_Jacquelope](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e0b2c6/32.png) [@Le\_Jacquelope](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Le_Jacquelope)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2010, 10:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-this-brings-tears-to-muh-eyes-anti-austerity-protests-raging-in-europe/555471/127 "2010-10-02T10:19:23Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > > [@Le\_Jacquelope](#): > > > > I’m still not seeing the connection between kicking out bad actors who are taking away American jobs and evading taxes through tax havens, and Smoot-Hawley. Call me a country bumpkin and all but there’s like zero parallels that I can see. Help a dumb hick out here will ya? > > I suspect that if you think kicking Bill Gates out of the country and forbidding Microsoft from selling in the US is a good idea, very little can be done to help your understanding. I doubt you are capable of being educated to any meaningful level if you cannot first reach the understanding that _Bill Gates is not God._ He is replaceable. Microsoft is replaceable. If they disappear overnight another operating system company will rush in to fill the void. If Microsoft disappears off the face of the Earth with all its intellectual property tomorrow then Steve Jobs / Apple is right there waiting to take its place. You, sir, should be much more afraid of phenomena like Linux. You talk about the jobs and economic activity that would be lost if I hypothetically kicked Bill Gates out, but you fail to comprehend that even greater damage will be done when Linux’s standing increases in the marketplace. Microsoft could be rendered uncompetitive _globally_ by the innovative power of Open Source programming. Whole nations, as we speak, are switching from Microsoft to Linux. In fact, the entire consumer-grade software industry risks the fate of being wiped out by the growth of Open Source software. That’s what, billions or trillions of dollars in lost wealth, all due to innovation? Again, as I said before, you picked a very, very, _very_ bad example. BTW: Durandal was greater. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Le\_Jacquelope](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e0b2c6/32.png) [@Le\_Jacquelope](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Le_Jacquelope)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2010, 10:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-this-brings-tears-to-muh-eyes-anti-austerity-protests-raging-in-europe/555471/128 "2010-10-02T10:25:48Z")
> [@erez](#): > > > [@Le\_Jacquelope](#): > > > > The problem is that society is unsustainable when the top 1% of income earners paid 40.4% percent of all federal individual income taxes and roughly [34.3% of the nation’s wealth](http://www.faculty.fairfield.edu/faculty/hodgson/Courses/so11/stratification/income&wealth.htm). > > > > We need a trickle-up system of economics in which the bottom 90% control over 70% of the nation’s wealth. > > > > Your own stats (and those you omitted) shows that we’re descending into an era of plutocracy and no country can hope to survive in that state. > > > > We’re already doomed if we stay the course. > > Did you forget already that your own OP was about big economic problems in Western Europe, where the income distribution is much flatter than in the U.S.? It didn’t help them too much compared to the U.S., did it? If you want to argue that one country needs to become more like other countries, it might not be the best idea to start by reminding everyone about big problems in these other countries. Hold up. If Europe’s austerity programs go into full effect they still won’t be as bad as what is ‘normal’ around here. We NEED major, MAJOR left-wing protests here in America. We need to be protesting the private insurance health care system which is far worse than what the Europeans have. We need to protest the constant wars waged by Republicans to kill welfare and welfare-to-work. We need to protest our outrageous gasoline prices (greatly magnified by our lack of public transit, a problem Europe doesn’t have) and the refusal to move toward alternative fuels. We need to protest the lack of paid time off, which is better in Europe than it is here. We need to protest the Social Security age limit - 62 years! Pfah! I’m gonna have to wait until I’m 67 or 70 and that’s going to leave a LOT of seniors competing against other age groups for jobs. I could go on and on about how Europe is better than America and all they’re doing over there is protesting to keep them _from becoming like us!_ We’re so much worse off than Europe it’s unbelievable that we’re even listed as a first world country anymore. Our homeless population probably rivals that of two or three Euro nations combined. ---
**Author:** ![erez](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/e47c2d/32.png) [@erez](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/erez)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2010, 10:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-this-brings-tears-to-muh-eyes-anti-austerity-protests-raging-in-europe/555471/129 "2010-10-02T10:59:58Z")
> [@Le\_Jacquelope](#): > > What I am proposing is a ban on trade with cheap labor nations, nations that do not have a democracy, nations that ignore environmental protections and nations that are rife with unsafe workplaces. If you keep the work from going offshore to some cheap exploitationist economy, you go a VERY long way toward achieving a more even distribution of wealth. Combine this with a loophole-free progressive taxation system and you have pretty much won the game. There is a reason that economists agree that trade barriers reduce standards of living. This is not really controversial, so I won’t go into details, except to note that China is a huge holder of U.S. debt and that you can’t ignore the effects of stopping trade on the Chinese population either. You have no problem with making everybody poorer to achieve your goal of a flatter income distribution in the U.S.? ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2010, 11:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-this-brings-tears-to-muh-eyes-anti-austerity-protests-raging-in-europe/555471/130 "2010-10-02T11:00:19Z")
> [@Le\_Jacquelope](#): > > > [@Alessan](#): > > > > So as soon as someone founds a successful company, the government should take it away from him and distribute it to the public? > > You can’t be seriously telling me you interpreted my comments to such a straw man-level extreme… right? > > CEO pay (roughly equivalent to someone who founds a successful company) to worker pay was [40 to 1](http://www.aflcio.org/corporatewatch/paywatch/pay/) in the 1980s. It’s now 263 to 1. > > Are you telling me that cutting CEO pay back to 40 to 1 amounts to the Government taking away the entire company and distributing it to the public? Really? Heck, I haven’t even proposed a mandatory cut of CEO pay (mainly because I can’t see an orderly way of making it happen). What I am proposing is a ban on trade with cheap labor nations, nations that do not have a democracy, nations that ignore environmental protections and nations that are rife with unsafe workplaces. If you keep the work from going offshore to some cheap exploitationist economy, you go a VERY long way toward achieving a more even distribution of wealth. Combine this with a loophole-free progressive taxation system and you have pretty much won the game. > > Of course if businesses get mad and want to leave, LET THEM. We still have top innovators here and foreigners who’ll come here looking to make 40 times the pay of the average worker. They’ll come for the democracy, they’ll come for the breathable air and drinkable water, and most of all they’ll come for the ENORMOUS 300 million person market magnified by a lot of workers with deep pockets. When you take the rich down a few pegs and raise the working class up a few pegs, you have more economic activity. Please tell me what is wrong with that. > > The way we’re going, though, they’re soon going to ditch Third World America totally and strive to make it in the CHINESE market instead. I’m not talking about the CEOs. I agree with you - CEOs make too much money. I don’t see how legislation will do much to change this though, as it’s more a matter of toxic corporate culture; still, here specifically you have a valid point. No, I’m talking about the entrepreneurs - the people who build companies out of scratch, and the people who risk their own money to invest in them. You’d drive these people away along with the fat-cat CEOs, and without them, you don’t have an economy. A country’s economic strength has a direct correlation to the number of patents it files; how many patents do you think will be filed in your version of America? Prosperity is fueled by dreams of wealth. You’re taking about shutting the valve. ---
**Author:** ![Capt.Ridley\_s\_Shooting\_Party](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/cc9497/32.png) [@Capt.Ridley\_s\_Shooting\_Party](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Capt.Ridley_s_Shooting_Party)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2010, 12:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-this-brings-tears-to-muh-eyes-anti-austerity-protests-raging-in-europe/555471/131 "2010-10-02T12:05:54Z")
> [@athelas](#): > > [QUOTE=Evil Captor] > It just KILLS American conservatives’ arguments that we cannot afford this and that when progressives can point to Europe and say, “THEY can afford it and are doing all right!” [Not](http://crookedtimber.org/2006/10/30/is-social-democracy-a-viable-model-for-the-european-future/) [really](http://www.forbes.com/forbes/2009/0803/international-invest-guide-obama-sweden-public-downsizing.html), but nice try at projection there. > [@](#): > > Western European per capita income is now about 30 percent below that of the United States and I see the gap widening rather than closing. It is common for the United States rate of productivity growth to be twice as high as that of the core European nations (NB: don’t be fooled by statistics of high average labor productivity levels in some countries, such as France. In part they result from limits on the creation of low-wage jobs and they do not predict good future performance.) The relatively free Ireland continues to boom, but France, Germany, Italy and others have performed poorly. Even the Dutch economic miracle appears to have ended. > > Germany may experience a current blip in growth rates, coming close to three percent over the next year. But this will not sidestep the broader and persistent problem of shrinking populations. Most European birthrates are under the 1.5 mark and it is quite possible that many national populations will be cut in half by 2050. Along the way there will be too many retirees per worker and current European tax rates – already among the highest in the world – will have to rise. Since older populations also tend to be less productive, it is hard to see how Western Europe might reassume world economic leadership or even hold its current relative ground. Nor has the EU, for all its benefits, proven itself a good mechanism for making economic policy; farm subsidies are over 45 percent of the EU budget. [/QUOTE] Wait what? Germany’s economy is performing poorly? Since when? The German government’s economic predictions for the last quarter were in fact too pessimistic. German economic growth for this year is now expected to be 3%, the fastest rate of expansion in 20 years. The German unemployment rate is 6.9%, compared to 9.5% in the US. By what definition is this a “poor performance”? ---
**Author:** ![ruadh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/d2c977/32.png) [@ruadh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ruadh)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2010, 12:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-this-brings-tears-to-muh-eyes-anti-austerity-protests-raging-in-europe/555471/132 "2010-10-02T12:39:37Z")
I was going to correct a couple posters’ misconceptions about Ireland but I see **carn** and **An Gadaí** got to them before me. So, I’ll just emphasise this point: Ireland is absolutely the _last_ country anyone would want to point to in support of austerity measures. The fact is this country is going deeper and deeper in the hole [(example)](http://www.progressive-economy.ie/2010/09/q2-gdp-irish-depression.html) and the only reason things aren’t even worse than they are is because of the reappearance of that great Irish tradition of emigration. We are like a freakin’ poster child for why austerity measures don’t work. You simply can’t keep taking money out of an economy and expect it to revive itself. ---
**Author:** ![carm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/c2a13f/32.png) [@carm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carm)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2010, 2:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-this-brings-tears-to-muh-eyes-anti-austerity-protests-raging-in-europe/555471/133 "2010-10-02T14:03:15Z")
> [@Baboonanza](#): > > > [@carm](#): > > > > But yeah - monetary benefits are _of course_ the only possible benefit a company can provide to a society. > > And that is a dangerous and short-sighted opinion. Eh, I think you’ve misunderstood me. I was responding to **Shodan’s** post: > [@](#): > > Providing jobs and paying taxes are what we are talking about. > > So yeah - apart from the benefits they provide, they don’t provide any benefits. Sarcasm, baby, sarcasm. > [@Baboonanza](#): > > The western capitalist system has been the engine powering the last 200 years of innovation, prosperity and improvement of the human condition. Wealth is the motivator and driver in this but the side effect is a multitude of important technologies from the motor car to the computer that have been either invented or first exploited on American soil. > > And the fact that these technologies have been invented by America, a democratic country with high moral values (that occasionally are lived up to) is deeply important. You know the US government has the power to switch off the internet don’t you? You don’t think there is any significance in that? > > **And now you advocate driving this wealth abroad.** Where would it go do you think? China? Does that really strike you as a sensible long-term move? I never said that. I was just saying that Microsoft are not the Godly Providers Of All That Is Good In The World. > [@carm](#): > > Because apart from that, they have a near monopoly on the computer OS market, with a very expensive, inferior product. Obviously exiling Bill Gates is a bit over the top ---
**Author:** ![Rune](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e68b1a/32.png) [@Rune](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rune)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2010, 4:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-this-brings-tears-to-muh-eyes-anti-austerity-protests-raging-in-europe/555471/134 "2010-10-02T16:02:12Z")
> [@ruadh](#): > > I was going to correct a couple posters’ misconceptions about Ireland but I see **carn** and **An Gadaí** got to them before me. So, I’ll just emphasise this point: Ireland is absolutely the _last_ country anyone would want to point to in support of austerity measures. The fact is this country is going deeper and deeper in the hole [(example)](http://www.progressive-economy.ie/2010/09/q2-gdp-irish-depression.html) and the only reason things aren’t even worse than they are is because of the reappearance of that great Irish tradition of emigration. We are like a freakin’ poster child for why austerity measures don’t work. You simply can’t keep taking money out of an economy and expect it to revive itself. And do you expect Ireland world have been able to borrow the money to continue without “austerity” measures? Already the rates banks demand to insure against Irish default are above those of Greece when it went bottom’s up, and the rates keep climbing. And that is with all the cut backs in expenses. Ireland maxed out all its credit cards and there was not a single bank in the world that would have lent it any money if it hadn’t cut down on expenses. At least not without having to pay astronomical rates. It’s not a question of if to have austerity. Ireland has no choice in the matter. Unless they take for granted that the Germans will continue to underwrite cheques for them? ---
**Author:** ![Dangerosa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2010, 5:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-this-brings-tears-to-muh-eyes-anti-austerity-protests-raging-in-europe/555471/135 "2010-10-02T17:47:17Z")
> [@carm](#): > > > [@Shodan](#): > > > > I suspect that if you think kicking Bill Gates out of the country and forbidding Microsoft from selling in the US is a good idea, very little can be done to help your understanding. > > > > Regards, > > Shodan > > Why? Just because of the employment Microsoft provide? > > Because apart from that, they have a near monopoly on the computer OS market, with a very expensive, inferior product. Obviously exiling Bill Gates is a bit over the top; but barring the jobs they provide and the taxes they (presumably) pay, what do Microsoft actually do for America? > > On the other hand, with free Linux-based operating systems, surely the price of PCs would be reduced, leaving people with more cash in pocket, businesses with cheaper IT costs, and a whole lot less frustration when [this](http://technabob.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2006/11/bsod.gif) happens. I like Linux. I dislike Microsoft. My job is to manage the relationship with Microsoft for a big company. The moment the U.S. government makes it difficult for me to do business with Microsoft in the U.S. is the minute my company takes 10,000 U.S. jobs overseas - including mine. We don’t like MS. But we need MS. I’m sure we aren’t the only ones. ---
**Author:** ![Claverhouse](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/13edae/32.png) [@Claverhouse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Claverhouse)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2010, 7:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-this-brings-tears-to-muh-eyes-anti-austerity-protests-raging-in-europe/555471/136 "2010-10-02T19:46:27Z")
[ > [@erez](#): > > Just remember that the top 1% of income earners paid 40.4% percent of all federal individual income taxes ([http://www.taxfoundation.org/news/show/250.html](http://www.taxfoundation.org/news/show/250.html)). I never quite understand this argument. If one had a flat tax of 20% in an island of a 1000 people, where 2 people had 90% of the wealth, wouldn’t one rather accept that those 2 people paid the bulk of the taxes ? Regardless of whether them having 90% was a Good Thing or a Bad Thing. > [@Capt.Ridley\_s\_Shooting\_Party](#): > > Wait what? Germany’s economy is performing poorly? Since when? The German government’s economic predictions for the last quarter were in fact too pessimistic. German economic growth for this year is now expected to be 3%, the fastest rate of expansion in 20 years. The German unemployment rate is 6.9%, compared to 9.5% in the US. By what definition is this a “poor performance”? Faith is impervious to your impious ‘facts’. And even if true, even were, _for example_, it to be provable that socialized healthcare\* had a lower cost and more benefit than the current US model, it would still be wrong because it would be wicked, or unsustainable, or communist, or something. - Off-Topic, but I treasure the day I found this page on **[Socialized Medicine](http://www.aapsonline.org/brochures/smoot.htm)** by a Dan Smoot from 1960 — and unbelievably reprinted in 2000. > [@](#): > > The German citizens paid more for their national compulsory health insurance than they had paid for private insurance before Bismarck came along-and they got less in return. > > Bismarck’s scheme failed miserably to provide better medical care for the people of Germany; but it did become an important feature of the German militaristic state; it helped pave the way for Hitler a generation later. > > There are endless stories about Englishmen who trade their government-issued eyeglasses, wigs, and even false teeth, for beer. > > No compulsory health insurance program has found a means to discourage racketeers or petty complainers who make useless trips to the doctor and monopolize professional time that should be spent on people really needing care. Now I’m off to the pub to offer my false teeth for sale. ---
**Author:** ![Le\_Jacquelope](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e0b2c6/32.png) [@Le\_Jacquelope](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Le_Jacquelope)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2010, 8:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-this-brings-tears-to-muh-eyes-anti-austerity-protests-raging-in-europe/555471/137 "2010-10-02T20:58:55Z")
> [@erez](#): > > There is a reason that economists agree that trade barriers reduce standards of living. This is not really controversial, so I won’t go into details, except to note that China is a huge holder of U.S. debt and that you can’t ignore the effects of stopping trade on the Chinese population either. You have no problem with making everybody poorer to achieve your goal of a flatter income distribution in the U.S.? Trade barriers reduce standards of living? Which economists agree with this? Are these the same economists that also acknowledge that China’s trade barriers are the VERY REASON why they are so prosperous? Why should I care about China’s population? They’re taking care of their own. No one is giving a crap about the effects on AMERICA’S population. American workers are being set adrift while China gets fat off of us. Please explain to me something. We lost millions of manufacturing jobs to China and an equal amount of high paying tech and pharmaceutical jobs to India. How in the world do you or any economist manage to sell this absolute BS propaganda that forcing millions of jobs to come back to America, is going to reduce our standards of living? How do millions of returning jobs cut us back like that? Our standard of living is already declining. It can’t possibly get any worse than this. America has nothing left to lose. China is going to sell off our debt whether we put up trade barriers or not; this much is an absolute certainty. We’re either going to get it on our feet standing up for the working class, or we’re going to get it on our knees before China. _While giving them foreign aid, no less._ ---
**Author:** ![Le\_Jacquelope](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e0b2c6/32.png) [@Le\_Jacquelope](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Le_Jacquelope)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2010, 9:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-this-brings-tears-to-muh-eyes-anti-austerity-protests-raging-in-europe/555471/138 "2010-10-02T21:10:40Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > I’m not talking about the CEOs. I agree with you - CEOs make too much money. I don’t see how legislation will do much to change this though, as it’s more a matter of toxic corporate culture; still, here specifically you have a valid point. > > No, I’m talking about the entrepreneurs - the people who build companies out of scratch, and the people who risk their own money to invest in them. You’d drive these people away along with the fat-cat CEOs, and without them, you don’t have an economy. A country’s economic strength has a direct correlation to the number of patents it files; how many patents do you think will be filed in your version of America? > > Prosperity is fueled by dreams of wealth. You’re taking about shutting the valve. How will we drive away entrepreneurs by barring them from shipping American jobs to China and India and pushing more wealth to the bottom 90%? They’re still going to be billionaires. They’ll still have their mansions and yachts and gold plated Cadillacs. The valve won’t be shut. You’re being sensationalist. The valve was not even shut in the Soviet Union - remember how long they dominated us in the space race and totally owned us with thrust vectoring technology? You want to know what is going to kill innovation in America? Offshoring. Other nations are awash right now in entry level industrial opportunities, which allow their workers to train up to higher level research jobs and entrepreneurial prowess. An increasing number of pharmaceutical research is being done in India, and innovations are starting to come from there, not here. We’re losing our technological edge in solar cell manufacturing to China - in fact we now rely on them to come here to build stuff. This is because of offshoring, not because we clamped down on entrepreneurs. Another HUGE example is the auto industry. Low paid Japanese workers are now innovators over there, wiping out our domestic market with high-MPG cars and hybrids. And another huge hit that will soon come to America’s dreams of wealth? Pennies-on-the-dollar CEOs in India will also be competing with CEOs here, driving down their salary expectations. Failing that they’ll simply mass outcompete us on wages and drive entire American companies out of business like Toyota almost did to GM. You won’t have to worry about “communists” like me driving innovation out of here. If we continue to engage in free trade with these cheap labor nations, they will suck it right out of us. If you’re a computer engineer, pharmaceutical researcher or solar energy engineer, you might as well forget English and learn Hindi and Mandarin. ---
**Author:** ![sleeping](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/839c29/32.png) [@sleeping](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sleeping)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2010, 9:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-this-brings-tears-to-muh-eyes-anti-austerity-protests-raging-in-europe/555471/139 "2010-10-02T21:54:25Z")
> [@Le\_Jacquelope](#): > > And another huge hit that will soon come to America’s dreams of wealth? Pennies-on-the-dollar CEOs in India will also be competing with CEOs here, driving down their salary expectations. Well, I don’t think \*that \*would happen, because any such development will result in the U.S. invading that country, for one reason or another. Otherwise, yes, wages will be depressed. Also: [obligatory](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fEedZJka1HQ#t=0m49s). ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2010, 10:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-this-brings-tears-to-muh-eyes-anti-austerity-protests-raging-in-europe/555471/140 "2010-10-02T22:41:36Z")
> [@Le\_Jacquelope](#): > > > [@Alessan](#): > > > > I’m not talking about the CEOs. I agree with you - CEOs make too much money. I don’t see how legislation will do much to change this though, as it’s more a matter of toxic corporate culture; still, here specifically you have a valid point. > > > > No, I’m talking about the entrepreneurs - the people who build companies out of scratch, and the people who risk their own money to invest in them. You’d drive these people away along with the fat-cat CEOs, and without them, you don’t have an economy. A country’s economic strength has a direct correlation to the number of patents it files; how many patents do you think will be filed in your version of America? > > > > Prosperity is fueled by dreams of wealth. You’re taking about shutting the valve. > > How will we drive away entrepreneurs by barring them from shipping American jobs to China and India and pushing more wealth to the bottom 90%? They’re still going to be billionaires. They’ll still have their mansions and yachts and gold plated Cadillacs. > > The valve won’t be shut. You’re being sensationalist. The valve was not even shut in the Soviet Union - remember how long they dominated us in the space race and totally owned us with thrust vectoring technology? > > You want to know what is going to kill innovation in America? Offshoring. Other nations are awash right now in entry level industrial opportunities, which allow their workers to train up to higher level research jobs and entrepreneurial prowess. > > An increasing number of pharmaceutical research is being done in India, and innovations are starting to come from there, not here. We’re losing our technological edge in solar cell manufacturing to China - in fact we now rely on them to come here to build stuff. This is because of offshoring, not because we clamped down on entrepreneurs. > > Another HUGE example is the auto industry. Low paid Japanese workers are now innovators over there, wiping out our domestic market with high-MPG cars and hybrids. > > And another huge hit that will soon come to America’s dreams of wealth? Pennies-on-the-dollar CEOs in India will also be competing with CEOs here, driving down their salary expectations. Failing that they’ll simply mass outcompete us on wages and drive entire American companies out of business like Toyota almost did to GM. > > You won’t have to worry about “communists” like me driving innovation out of here. If we continue to engage in free trade with these cheap labor nations, they will suck it right out of us. If you’re a computer engineer, pharmaceutical researcher or solar energy engineer, you might as well forget English and learn Hindi and Mandarin. Innovations and improvements in products and processes is done by those who live with them. China and India have thousands of engineers and technicians dealing with manufacturing every day. They will have the inventions of the future. We innovated in the financial field developing money making products that threw the world into a near depression. I am not too pleased with that. Then we do invent tax dodges and tax shelters that keep us from collecting taxes on those innovators. Patriotism is for suckers. The Caiman Islands has 20,000 mail drops with American companies hiding their wealth. That is what we produce. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-this-brings-tears-to-muh-eyes-anti-austerity-protests-raging-in-europe/555471.md?page=6) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-this-brings-tears-to-muh-eyes-anti-austerity-protests-raging-in-europe/555471.md?page=8)