# Mr. Romney, just what in the fuck ARE you responsible for? **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [August 4, 2012, 8:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mr-romney-just-what-in-the-fuck-are-you-responsible-for/630452 "2012-08-04T20:09:42Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2012, 5:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mr-romney-just-what-in-the-fuck-are-you-responsible-for/630452/61 "2012-08-05T17:34:00Z")
> [@The\_Tooth](#): > > Since you seem to think you know all of my opinions already, I see no point to responding to most of what you’ve said. But the idea that a company will hire people not because they have a need for employees but because they have a little more money for payroll due to discount paperclips is simply laughable. Cheap paperclips do not create jobs, demand for products or services creates jobs. Even someone as stupid as myself knows this. Please, you put a whole argument in my mouth to strawman me and now you’re crying like a pussy that I showed just how stupid the standard liberal argument is? If you genuinely have a more nuanced view, throw it out there, or be a huge pussy and refrain from actually making an argument. If that’s the case there’s no reason to pay attention another thing you stupidly spew into this thread. Cheap paperclips do create jobs, the fact that you don’t understand this seems to confirm my assessment of your economic expertise. Demand _is created_ when you introduce efficiency. Increased efficiency increases economic growth, this is something economist in the **1860s** understood, but liberals in 2012 still don’t grasp. ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2012, 5:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mr-romney-just-what-in-the-fuck-are-you-responsible-for/630452/62 "2012-08-05T17:35:18Z")
> [@Robot\_Arm](#): > > That’s some mighty fine speechifying there, Martin, but the next time I want to know how a liberal will answer a question, I think I’ll just ask a liberal. Or just open any of the political threads on these forums, you’ll have so much primary source material for how stupid liberals are on economics that any need for citation is simply non-existent. It’s akin to walking through the forest and wondering whether or not trees have leaves, you’ll have your answer instantaneously. ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2012, 5:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mr-romney-just-what-in-the-fuck-are-you-responsible-for/630452/63 "2012-08-05T17:35:23Z")
> [@On another topic](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/630585/4): > > I think I like this trend. Poorly-done spam just trashes up a forum. I’m hoping for the days when the spammers make better posts than the legit posters. Obligatory [xkcd](http://xkcd.com/810/). ---
**Author:** ![The\_Tooth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c67d28/32.png) [@The\_Tooth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Tooth)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2012, 5:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mr-romney-just-what-in-the-fuck-are-you-responsible-for/630452/64 "2012-08-05T17:40:55Z")
I really couldn’t possibly care less if you think I"m a pussy, **Hyde**. ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2012, 5:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mr-romney-just-what-in-the-fuck-are-you-responsible-for/630452/65 "2012-08-05T17:47:05Z")
> [@The\_Tooth](#): > > I really couldn’t possibly care less if you think I"m a pussy, **Hyde**. That’s an unambiguous admission that my characterization of the standard liberal economic argument is exactly what you think, in which case I have already soundly shown how stupid it was, so my work with you is now done. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Tooth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c67d28/32.png) [@The\_Tooth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Tooth)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2012, 5:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mr-romney-just-what-in-the-fuck-are-you-responsible-for/630452/66 "2012-08-05T17:54:07Z")
Well that’s good news, at least. ---
**Author:** ![Robot\_Arm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/robot_arm/32/18280_2.png) [@Robot\_Arm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robot_Arm)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2012, 6:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mr-romney-just-what-in-the-fuck-are-you-responsible-for/630452/67 "2012-08-05T18:05:11Z")
Very well. But, you see, Martin has the will of the warrior. Therefore, the battle is already over. The winner? Martin! Rematch? You lose again! ---
**Author:** ![Happy\_Lendervedder](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/happy_lendervedder/32/8488_2.png) [@Happy\_Lendervedder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Happy_Lendervedder)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2012, 6:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mr-romney-just-what-in-the-fuck-are-you-responsible-for/630452/68 "2012-08-05T18:45:30Z")
Nothing says “winning a debate” better than telling your opponents what they think and then calling them pussies. ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2012, 7:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mr-romney-just-what-in-the-fuck-are-you-responsible-for/630452/69 "2012-08-05T19:07:17Z")
> [@Happy\_Lendervedder](#): > > Nothing says “winning a debate” better than telling your opponents what they think and then calling them pussies. Well, it sure beats the liberal playbook: 1. Refute basic economic fact. 2. Denounce everyone else as trolling and being too mean to debate with. 3. Cry / hug a fish / etc 4. Smugly proclaim victory. Unlike them, I haven’t said one thing in contradiction to economic reality. ---
**Author:** ![Docta\_G](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/2bfe46/32.png) [@Docta\_G](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Docta_G)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2012, 7:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mr-romney-just-what-in-the-fuck-are-you-responsible-for/630452/70 "2012-08-05T19:19:54Z")
It’s a good thing the world doesn’t actually depend on internet message boards to fight ignorance. ---
**Author:** ![AlienVessels](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ba8739/32.png) [@AlienVessels](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AlienVessels)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2012, 7:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mr-romney-just-what-in-the-fuck-are-you-responsible-for/630452/71 "2012-08-05T19:28:36Z")
> [@Martin\_Hyde](#): > > Capitalism rewards people that can more efficiently allocate resources. When you more efficiently allocate resources, some people suffer. Unregulated capitalism generates maximum wealth by delivering the lowest possible value for the highest possible price. Job creation happens at the lowest, most competitive level of capitalist ventures. Large companies generate value by ever increasing economies of scale and by buying up the competitive low level companies. All unregulated capitalism ensures is mega corps employing the cheapest possible labor and buying up the competition to move towards monopoly and plutocracy. The market should serve society, not the reverse. ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2012, 7:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mr-romney-just-what-in-the-fuck-are-you-responsible-for/630452/72 "2012-08-05T19:34:49Z")
> [@AlienVessels](#): > > Unregulated capitalism generates maximum wealth by delivering the lowest possible value for the highest possible price. > > Job creation happens at the lowest, most competitive level of capitalist ventures. Large companies generate value by ever increasing economies of scale and by buying up the competitive low level companies. > > All unregulated capitalism ensures is mega corps employing the cheapest possible labor and buying up the competition to move towards monopoly and plutocracy. > > The market should serve society, not the reverse. You’ve exaggerated on unregulated capitalism, not all industries are susceptible to monopolization and emergence of mega-corporations like that, for one. But it’s mostly irrelevant, no one here is arguing for unregulated capitalism. I’m not, Mitt Romney isn’t, I don’t even know that the Cato Institute is arguing for true unregulated capitalism. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2012, 7:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mr-romney-just-what-in-the-fuck-are-you-responsible-for/630452/73 "2012-08-05T19:38:38Z")
Martin, you seem to think companies hire people because they have more money, which is stupid. A person is hired if the marginal return the employees generates is greater than the cost. It doesn’t matter if the company saved money on office paper. That is a very silly mistake for a person who claims to be the economics genius in the thread. > [@](#): > > Most of the Canadian overtaking is, by the way, because of lower personal debt and higher property values–which are mostly the result of Canada not suffering such a disastrous real estate bubble which devalued their property. Canadians since the 90s have actually been living smart, on both a government and personal level, getting less indebted personally and working to hold down debts at a government level. Canadians are less personally indebted than Americans, but they are not, in actual terms, getting less indebted personally. Canadian personal debt climbs every year. ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2012, 7:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mr-romney-just-what-in-the-fuck-are-you-responsible-for/630452/74 "2012-08-05T19:44:01Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > Martin, you seem to think companies hire people because they have more money, which is stupid. A person is hired if the marginal return the employees generates is greater than the cost. It doesn’t matter if the company saved money on office paper. > > That is a very silly mistake for a person who claims to be the economics genius in the thread. I’m not claiming that. Businesses don’t just hire people because they have more money. If a business has more money it has a long list of options: -Pay down debt -Share buy backs -Issue dividends -Give employees bigger bonuses -Capital investment -Strategic / geographical expansion -etc Several of those won’t directly lead to job creation, several of them will. On the scale of a whole economy, lower prices of a class of products most businesses buy will lead to some job creation in aggregate. > [@](#): > > Canadians are less personally indebted than Americans, but they are not, in actual terms, getting less indebted personally. Canadian personal debt climbs every year. The way I said “getting less indebted personally” didn’t really come out very clear, I didn’t mean they were reducing their personal debt but that they “got into less personal debt than Americans.” I don’t know if that’s still true right now, as after the recession I know Americans have been hyper-aggressively paying down personal debt for various reasons, but historically (most of my life) every article I’ve ever read on personal indebtedness showed Americans were much more profligate spenders than almost any other country in the world, so in general since the 90s part of what Canadians did right that we didn’t was avoided getting as deeply in personal debt as we did. ---
**Author:** ![Paranoid\_Randroid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/paranoid_randroid/32/18_2.png) [@Paranoid\_Randroid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Paranoid_Randroid)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2012, 8:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mr-romney-just-what-in-the-fuck-are-you-responsible-for/630452/75 "2012-08-05T20:51:42Z")
Dude, you’re melting down. Calling another poster a “pussy”, as if you were a teenaged roughneck trying to egg on his friend to do something stupid? Obama’s a “demon” who hates capitalism? Seriously? I’ve always taken you to be somewhat more reasonable than that. Step back, take a few deep breaths, calm down — or at _least_ try harder to sound like an adult when you flame. ---
**Author:** ![BlankSlate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/blankslate/32/80_2.png) [@BlankSlate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BlankSlate)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2012, 9:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mr-romney-just-what-in-the-fuck-are-you-responsible-for/630452/76 "2012-08-05T21:06:12Z")
Obama is a socialist! He bailed out the banks, the very bedrock of capitalism. Hey, wait… ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2012, 9:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mr-romney-just-what-in-the-fuck-are-you-responsible-for/630452/77 "2012-08-05T21:13:00Z")
To answer a previous inquiry, Obama isn’t a socialist, and I’ve never thought he was. He basically seems to be an advocate of “State Capitalism” in which he believes he can have his cake and eat it too. He isn’t opposed to the free market, capital investments, investors earning a return and all that go with normal capitalism. However, the key part of capitalism he appears to be opposed to is the part where lesser competitors are driven out of business. Obama wants to let capitalism exist but to “help pick winners and losers, when appropriate” when appropriate is complicated but it appears to correlate with people who made big campaign contributions to him and companies with strong union presence and etc. Basically winners that are politically in tune with him. But the banks? Well, the banks donated massive amounts of money to Obama in 2008, so at least at one point in time it’s hard to argue Obama wasn’t a “big bank man”, he even hired big bank guys to help him run the country. ---
**Author:** ![Finagle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/b19c9b/32.png) [@Finagle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Finagle)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2012, 9:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mr-romney-just-what-in-the-fuck-are-you-responsible-for/630452/78 "2012-08-05T21:36:19Z")
> [@Martin\_Hyde](#): > > To answer a previous inquiry, Obama isn’t a socialist, and I’ve never thought he was. He basically seems to be an advocate of “State Capitalism” in which he believes he can have his cake and eat it too. He isn’t opposed to the free market, capital investments, investors earning a return and all that go with normal capitalism. However, the key part of capitalism he appears to be opposed to is the part where lesser competitors are driven out of business. I see. And this makes him “an unacceptable demon who should be driven from his position lest he enslave us further with poverty and desperation.”? Like other posters before me, I can’t tell if this is satire or lunacy. ---
**Author:** ![mack](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b19c9b/32.png) [@mack](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mack)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2012, 10:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mr-romney-just-what-in-the-fuck-are-you-responsible-for/630452/79 "2012-08-05T22:12:02Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > His election slogan should be “I’m Mitt Romney and…” …you’re not! ---
**Author:** ![Lochdale](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/edb3f5/32.png) [@Lochdale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lochdale)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2012, 12:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mr-romney-just-what-in-the-fuck-are-you-responsible-for/630452/80 "2012-08-06T00:11:19Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > Explain how he earned being born rich. His additional income he created by himself. He’ll be rich and happy. You’re probably not in the same place. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mr-romney-just-what-in-the-fuck-are-you-responsible-for/630452.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mr-romney-just-what-in-the-fuck-are-you-responsible-for/630452.md?page=5)