Occupy Wall Street?

[kowalskil]

Occupy Wall Street?

 

The last issue of Montclarion, a student newspaper at Montclair State University, published an article of Grover Furr, about the Occupy Wall Street movement:

 

http://www.themontclarion.org/archives/3740261

 

Yes, rich people always want to be richer and richer. This is unfortunate; no one knows how to stop this, without taking away constructive motivation. What fraction of Bill Gates' fortune is consumed and what fraction is productively invested? My guess is that the first fraction is much less than 10%, and that he is not a rare exception.

 

What does Professor Furr have to offer us? Consider a complex machine which works but not perfectly. Anyone can destroy it; no advanced knowledge is usually needed to accomplish this. But one has to be highly knowledgeable in order to repair it, or to design a better replacement. I am thinking about sophisticated engines, airplanes, TV sets, X ray scanners, computers, airconditioners, oil refineries, etc.

 

The same is true for an economic system. No system is perfect; but some are more efficient than others. Trying to destroy US capitalism  without offering something better is likely to create a lot of misery. I am thinking about what Lenin and Stalin did, as decribed in my two short books. These books are now freely available online; the links are at:

 

http://pages.csam.montclair.edu/~kowalski/links.html

 

Note that even now, one hundred years after the Soviet revolution, standards of living in Russia are much lower than in the US, and in other western countries.

 

Ludwik Kowalski (see Wikipedia)

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[lawcat]

Chinese Restaurant

 

It's all about social expectations. If you go to a Chinese restaurant, they expect to be paid $5.50 a bucket of food. When they need to fix plumbing they will hire a chinese guy for $6 an hour, or buy linoleum tile instead of ceramic. They don't borrow to grow, that's why they are telling us we have to live on a budget, because those are their social expectations.

 

Russia came from a feudal system into communism, economic expectations were set meagerly by feudal lords. Those expectations set bar for the new society. The spirit of private apprenticeship and entrepreneurship was lost, they've invested in education and glorifying education. Now they have ton of educateds who do not produce. All this is changing slowly and especially with unification of European countries it is changing in all Eastern Europe.

 

US does not have this problem historically but US is falling into this problem. Expectations are historically lined up with profit driven systems in England, Holland, Germany etc. A lot of people are getting higher education, too many. Education is glorified instead of pursuit of apprenticeship--a man ought to have a calling rather than being an employee and we are losing that a little bit, mainly because of the government. The government invests in education, makes it more affordable, to support industries.

 

You end up with a lot of employees, meaning small companies do not dominate, economy is not divided into small pieces that share larger pie. Employees do not gain profit but salary, but are paying profit everywhere, when you change tires, when you buy a house, when you go to Walmart, everywhere they pay profit but do not earn profit.

 

And that's how you end up with a bunch of pissed off people wanting to take down Walstreet.

 

As far as taking money from Bill Gates, it would be criminal, would not accomplish much, and it would certainly not change the system or even move the needle in bringing it close to communist Russia.

 

The problem is simple: the government needs to encourage apprenticeship rather than education, but that is a political debate.

[Qfwfq]

The problem is simple: the government needs to encourage apprenticeship rather than education, but that is a political debate.

Er, Law, we're in the third millennium.

 

I agree with some of the things you say, more than I agree with Ludwik, but still we're in the third millennium and in a high-tech economy you need typically more education before you can start an apprenticeship. Or should we all be carpenters and blacksmiths?

 

I think that you are making an unwarranted assumption when you argue as if education leads only to being hired by comapany (and a large one perhaps) while apprenticeship leads only to setting up one's own business. This is false. It is however today's trend, to some extent and probably to an increasing one. It isn't a problem that you solve by favouring apprenticeship vs. education, not at all. The trouble is that, the bigger the companies are in a given trade, the harder it is for a starter to compete with them and don't tell me it's only a matter of economies of scale.

[Michaelangelica]

What happens when kids don't finish their education until their late twenties early thirties?

Then have to pay their University fees/loan

They then get what, 25 years crack at work than at 55 /60 put out to pasture?

 

The system does seem broken; I would like to believe eduction is the solution but I am not sure it is proving to be

We probably NOW have the most educated workforce of all time! Has the education system failed us?

I am reminded of the old adage "To every complex solution there is a simple answer and it is wrong"

 

One glaring problem for me is the way Wall St seems to run without a lot of government checks and balances.

As a liberal Australian I don't get the Yank obsession with a free market.

Free markets are fine, but they have to operate within a framework of rules and regulations, not run roughshod over the world's economies and people.

 

 

• There does seem to be great disparity in salaries CEOs earning 300+ times that of their employees.
• Unemployment is high in the States yet corporations are making more profits today than since the end of WW2.
• Huge multinationals paying no tax but taking tax handouts and benefits.
• Some USA states are spending more on prisons than education.

All things that seem, somehow, "wrong"

[Deepwater6]

Some of the brightest minds of Ivy league schools go to work with their wonderful education. They use that knowledge to work for big brokerage companies creating complicated derivative deals. These deals are so complex that the governemet can't decipher if they are legal or not. Wall st. has become a casino.

 

I highly doubt the CEO of my company works 300 times harder than I do day in and day out. But since he hand picked the BOD what else would you expect.

 

To see the truth about greed in this country watch "Capitalism, A Love Story" by Micheal Moore. If you watch that movie with an objective mind it will make you sick to your stomach.

[lawcat]

Er, Law, we're in the third millennium.

 

I do not disagree with you. Of course I was generalizing to get the point across, reader beware of nuances. My point is there is some imbalance, and balance is needed, and how the balance is best achieved is a matter of political debate. And I am not advocating against education.

 

I don't know if having local computer manufacturers is better than having Dell, I'd like to think it is.

I don't know if having small banks is better than Bank of America, but I'd like to think it is. Eventually, the bigs eat small and system gets out of balance and that's what the government should monitor and fix.

This goes back to having access to technology and information, which is what the government should make available and invest in so that smaller firms can compete.

 

But beyond this, in US businesses can cross state boundaries freely but professionals can not. Each State licenses their own professionals, lawyers, doctors, engineers, hairstylists. These are little barricades to free business that compund.

 

There are a lot of little things government can do bring back balance between big and small.

[Qfwfq]

Eventually, the bigs eat small and system gets out of balance and that's what the government should monitor and fix.

That's more like it, but there's plenty more to it than just that.

[Michaelangelica]

Capitalism, A Love Story

http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/capitalism-love-story/

 

Pretty nasty stuff here; no where near Wall St.

http://www.smh.com.au/photogallery/national/occupy-melbourne-and-sydney-20111015-1lq47.html