/dev/chat

Wildcard

12:00 AM

@Tim watch about the first two minutes of this video and tell me what you think: youtu.be/v7gKGq_MYpU?t=3

@Tim I understand what you're saying but you're generalizing.

(over-generalizing)

Tim

I like Federal job guarantee better, although I understand UBI has its own merit

If automation develops to such a degree that many people lose their jobs, then the coorporations that benefit from automation should pay tax to fund UBI

Anyway, that is not my business. I am just recently addicted to your country's politics

Wildcard

@Tim did you watch the first two minutes?

Tim

No

Wildcard

I ask because the first two minutes are not really about UBI.

They are possibly the most incisive summary of the debate about wealth inequality that I've seen.

Tim

Never have I daemonize the rich

My point is that the wealth inequality has already become unreasonable

In a coorporation, there is no cap on the salary of CEO, C...O

Wildcard

12:10 AM

@Tim who should be in charge of defining such a cap?

And who should enforce it?

@Jesse_b by the way, xkcd.com/1925 is enjoyable reading :)

Tim

I have not analyzed these figures. But I know in some countries where there is cap, what happens in US is unimaginable

Nice talking to you. I better not to pretend that I have more leisure time.

Wildcard

@Tim that doesn't answer the question. How about a cap on how much money the government is allowed to collect from its populace? How about a cap on how many people can have kids in a given year? How about a cap on how many strangers you're allowed to make friends with? It's one thing to say "there should be a cap" and it's another thing to look at how such a cap would be implemented, who would enforce it and how, what incentives the cap would create, and what the actual effects would be.

@Tim sure, I have to run now anyway.

:)

Tim

work.chron.com/ceo-compensation-vs-world-15509.html

statista.com/statistics/424159/…

Wealth inequalities are not just within coorporations.

But I don't want to pretend that I know better than you any more

Wildcard

@Tim okay. Just don't paint things with a broad brush, that's all. There are rich people who unjustly accumulated their wealth. And there are rich people who got rich because they drastically improved the quality of life of millions of people. There are poor people who are the victims of chance. And there are also poor people who are simply unwilling to make any effort to change their situation.

Tim

12:33 AM

No poor people really likes to stay where they are. They have lost chances from the beginning when they go to school and when they look for jobs and when they are discriminated. They are stuck where they are, and have lost hope

Some billionaire that are philanthropist and humanitarian are not actually as good faithed as you think.

They are better than those who aren't, but still not doing enough compared to how they acquired their wealth
Bill Gates https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4e8Yu5xJpOY

Michael Bloomberg youtube.com/watch?v=RpFxJviD7rs&t=47s

When the progressives challenge their wealth, they are scared

Wildcard

@Tim you're missing the point. I'm telling you that there is a full spectrum of possibilities, and there are real people at many points on that spectrum. You respond that some people are not so humanitarian as they appear. The point is that some are, and some are more humanitarian than they appear, and you need to recognize the variety that exists.

Tim

If you think about how they acquired their wealth in the first place, you will understand what I am saying

Wildcard

@Tim again, you are painting with a broad brush. You are describing some people, not all. The statement "NO poor person likes to stay where they are" is false.

@Tim I do understand what you are saying. It is too broad a generality. How "they" acquired their wealth also varies widely.

Tim

Consider when you are stuck in a place that you can't change

Wildcard

@Tim Okay, I'm considering it. I imagine you're considering what your response would be to that situation. So my question to you is—do you think that EVERY person would have a response to that situation identical to yours?

There are more things in Heaven and Earth, @Tim, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.

Tim

12:45 AM

I feel that you can't relate to some people that are very different from you

just "some"

Wildcard

@Tim indeed I can. It is precisely my point, that you are making claims about broad groups of people, that do not accurately characterize ALL of the people in the groups you are talking about.

@Tim or was that the general "you"?

Tim

Indeed I have to go now. Nice talking with you

cas

3:12 AM

@Wildcard right, desire for profit is the only possible incentive. I bet that explains why telcos are so efficient and innovative and have such amazingly good customer service.

@Wildcard also, posting a Lobster-man video would completely undermine the credibility of your Libertarian Theology - if it had any to begin with. (US Style) Libertarianism is sound-bite propaganda that works on Americans to get them to support bullshit ideas that harm them directly, and benefit only the rich and powerful (like "tax is theft", "regulations are bad", "the government is evil").

Faheem Mitha

6:43 AM

@cas And also why free software projects don't exist. Since there is typically no financial incentive.

Faheem Mitha

6:57 AM

Chapel Hill Transit (buses) became free many years ago.

Probably not a common move in the US.

The Wikipedia page doesn't cover the history, though.

Wildcard

7:19 AM

@cas I actually have no idea what you're talking about here, but I don't particularly want to argue with a chip on anyone's shoulder. So skip it.

In other (and less contentious) news, I don't know how I got so backlogged on reading new xkcd strips. :)

This one is perfect for this chatroom. I'm trying to even imagine what sequence of events could possibly result in this: xkcd.com/1912

Faheem Mitha

7:32 AM

@Wildcard He's responding to your earlier comment:

8 hours ago, by Wildcard

Governments do not have any incentive to keep the quality high. Once the taxpayers are locked into funding something, there is no actual penalty for doing a bad job at providing it.

That comment, if literally and generally interpreted, is an argument for having no govt managed anything.

Govt managed things can be bad, sure. India is a good case in mind. The govt is a nightmare. But I hope this isn't universally true.

@Wildcard Corrupted boot sector perhaps? Perhaps the thermometer doesn't have UEFI.

@Wildcard The general issue is that having stuff run by govts can be problematic. Having stuff run by private profit driven entities can be as or more problematic.

But I'm sure you're already aware of that.

In India, one is driven to deal with corporations because the govt is so terrible. For example, with internet. I still like the idea of municipal broadband. And similar comments apply to banks.

I used to use MTNL for awhile. It's govt owned, and has the worst customer service imaginable. It's also only alive because it's propped up by the central govt, which spends alarming amounts of money on it. Left to itself, it would have become bankrupt several times over. But, again, I still think municipal broadband is a good idea.

Wildcard

8:20 AM

@FaheemMitha it was a continuation of my previous two comments, which might have been obvious from context but clearly wasn't.

@FaheemMitha that's true, but when you are free to go to a different such entity, it mitigates the problem to some degree. For some industries that is prohibitively impractical, but transportation is not one of them.

@FaheemMitha but why is there a second copy of the monthly energy report word doc on there in the first place? :)

@FaheemMitha there are banks in the US with horrendous customer service as it is. But you can switch to other banks, generally speaking. Some banks have excellent service.

@FaheemMitha yep, that's the sort of concern I have when I hear people proposing, "Let's just have the government run our healthcare, since they're doing such a great job of managing everything else they're in charge of." Not. And there is one sector where they DO manage the healthcare, which is for veterans, and they do an absolutely terrible job of it.

cas

@Wildcard just because YOUR government has been completely taken over by corporate governments doesn't mean that all governments are, or that it incompetence and malice are inherent to government-run services. In parts of the world where the govt hasn't yet been completely hijacked by corporations, govt-run services are efficient, and effective. corruption and lobbying are whittling away at that, but the fight is far from over.

the fight may as well be over in the US because you've all been brain-washed by corporate interests that the government is your enemy. it's not. corporations (and the 0.001% who own them) are the enemy - and by refusing to take back control of your government, refusing to even believe that government CAN be a weapon on your side, you're giving up. You are ceding the power of government to corporate control who now have two huge sticks to beat you down with.

Michael Homer

chat.stackexchange.com/rooms/new

cas

governments, of course, aren't all good. or all bad. they can be a force for good or a force for evil. it depends on whose interests they serve. they can serve the interests of the people. or they can serve the interests of malevolent artificial entities that run on the substrate of the legal system rather than silicon....and not only run on it, they adapt and modify their substrate to suit themselves.

oops. I wrote "corporate governments" above in the first sentence. I meant "corporate interests". although, technically, both phrases are accurate when talking about the US.

Faheem Mitha

9:08 AM

@Wildcard I don't actually disagree with what you are saying, per se. But such arguments can be interpreted broadly as - govts suck - let's hand it over to private entities. Language can be tricky.

@Wildcard Hmm. Still probably better than having private insurance companies grow fat at the expense of the taxpayer. And it's also true (I think) that US health care is among the most expensive in the world. Aren't there mechanisms for holding govts accountable? And not just voting.

Yes, I've heard horror stories about the VA too.

I'm not familiar with how the US system works, but if the govt messes up health care management, isn't there a finer grained way for making them accountable for performance other than (say) a presidential election every 4 years?

@cas I generally agree with what you say, but isn't the AU govt pretty much run by corporations too?

Kusalananda

10:55 AM

@MichaelHomer You're being too subtle 🙂

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