Occupy Wall Street

more here:

http://occupywallst.org/

the revolution has began! time to abolish Money and Lobbying in Politics. time to abolish the Federal Reserve. time to abolish the TSA, DHS, Janet Napolitano and John Pistole and the Patriot (Traitor) Act!

Let's also get rid of the Big Banks like Wells Fargo, Bank of America, Citi and also the Unions and give everyone in the United States, regardless of what age, race, sex, religion, sexual orientation, etc a fair working wage and a full time job! The days of the BIG DISPARITY between the HAVES and HAVE NOTS are over!!

Dream on.

j7wild wrote:

Let's also get rid of the Big Banks like Wells Fargo, Bank of America, Citi and also the Unions and give everyone in the United States, regardless of what age, race, sex, religion, sexual orientation, etc a fair working wage and a full time job!

What should be done with the people who had jobs but quit them in order to be part of the protest?

What is a "fair working wage"? Isn't a "fair working wage" whatever the employer agrees to pay for a job and what a free citizen agrees they are willing to be paid?

I'd also like a pet unicorn, a griffin to ride into work every day, a leprechaun as my best friend, and the ability to fart skittles and rainbows.

Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

What is a "fair working wage"? Isn't a "fair working wage" whatever the employer agrees to pay for a job and what a free citizen agrees they are willing to be paid?

Free citizen? What you overlook is that it isn't a relationship of equals, never has been and never will be. Employers always have the upper hand over employees for the simple reason that employers always have a vastly greater choice of potential employees than employees have of potential employers (this applies even in cases where employees have very specialised skills).

What you also fail to acknowledge is that employers are never interested in being "fair" - they're interested in paying as little as they can get away with (unless you're a very high-ranking executive, I guess). A fair wage would be (at least) a living wage, not the minimum wage, but millions of Americans do not get even that, so don't pretend that everything's fair and dandy and equal and above-board because it ain't.

Loomis wrote:

Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

What is a "fair working wage"? Isn't a "fair working wage" whatever the employer agrees to pay for a job and what a free citizen agrees they are willing to be paid?

Free citizen? What you overlook is that it isn't a relationship of equals, never has been and never will be. Employers always have the upper hand over employees for the simple reason that employers always have a vastly greater choice of potential employees than employees have of potential employers (this applies even in cases where employees have very specialised skills).

What you also fail to acknowledge is that employers are never interested in being "fair" - they're interested in paying as little as they can get away with (unless you're a very high-ranking executive, I guess). A fair wage would be (at least) a living wage, not the minimum wage, but millions of Americans do not get even that, so don't pretend that everything's fair and dandy and equal and above-board because it ain't.

And most people aren't earning minimum wage (or even close to it). Minimum wage isn't mean to be lived on. And when jobs are scarce it is an employers market, but I remember when jobs were aplenty and applicants were calling the shots and employers were having to sweeten the pot with all kinds of incentives to get workers. It goes both ways. But ultimately those jobs belong to the employer, and if the market says that the job is only worth $20/hour then it is what it is; nobody is forcing people to accept these jobs. If you don't like working for someone else go create your own company.

Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

Minimum wage isn't mean to be lived on.

Says who? It isn't welfare. It's a wage in return for labour - labour that the employer expects will be taken seriously and performed well. Anyone who works is entitled to a living wage - if not, then minimum wage employees are surely entitled to goof off, which they're not.

Any company that cannot or will not pay its employees a living wage does not deserve to be in business.

Loomis wrote:

Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

Minimum wage isn't mean to be lived on.

Says who? It isn't welfare. It's a wage in return for labour - labour that the employer expects will be taken seriously and performed well. Anyone who works is entitled to a living wage - if not, then minimum wage employees are surely entitled to goof off, which they're not.

Any company that cannot or will not pay its employees a living wage does not deserve to be in business.

Says the market. I've never earned minimum wage in my entire life and that was even back in the day when my first job as a high school kid was bagging groceries. I would never work for minimum wage unless I had absolutely no other choice, and even then minimum wage would just be temporary. It's not meant to be lived on. It's not meant to be earned by people in their 20's, 30's and 40's. If you find yourself in your mid-life and without the skills to earn more than minimum wage then the problem lies within yourself, not the market. I've never even applied for a job where minimum wage was what was being offered. Most employers, the vast majority of them, offer more than minimum wage because offering the bare minimum is not an inducement to get people to apply. The minimum wage is an outdated concept anyway.

And who gets to decide what a "living wage" is? What if my definition of "living" includes needing a new car every 3 years, an HD flatscreen tv, a laptop with wifi, a cellphone 4G cell phone, an Ipad, a 2-story home with a picket fence....who is my employer to deny me the money that I need to live that lifestyle? Who is my employer to deny me the consequences of the choices I've made in my life by paying me more than the job is worth? Who is my employer to not cover all my medical bills and subsidize my transportation needs? Whatever happened to a person just getting paid for the work they did with straight cash instead of having to provide eye care, dental, medical insurance, matching 401k funds, daycare, anger management training, sexual orientation/transgender/racial sensitivity seminars?

My employer exists to provide me compensation for the job that I perform based upon benefits and wages that are mutually agreed upon. That's it and nothing more. Anything else is just gravy.

Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

I would never work for minimum wage unless I had absolutely no other choice.

You and everyone else.

Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

and even then minimum wage would just be temporary. It's not meant to be lived on. It's not meant to be earned by people in their 20's, 30's and 40's. If you find yourself in your mid-life and without the skills to earn more than minimum wage then the problem lies within yourself, not the market.

I'm not saying that the minimum wage should be desirable, merely that it should be, well, slightly more than jack shit. You say that it's not meant to be earned by people in their twenties, thirties and forties - who is it for, then? Teenagers? Look around and you'll find plenty of people of all ages making minimum wage or close to it - and they're often employed by huge and successful corporations (retail, food, etc.) who pay their CEOs and directors millions. These companies can easily pay their shop floor staff way more than they do, but they choose not to (because they view rewarding shareholders and the boardroom as being vastly more important than taking care of the majority of their employees).

The right wing usually portrays the minimum wage as an unacceptable cost to struggling small businesses, but the minimum wage (or very close to it) isn't just paid by mom-and-pop stores and tiny firms that simply can't afford to pay more - it's also paid by some of the most successful business names in the world. So it's not exactly true to suggest that if an employee is earning minimum wage then that's entirely his or her own fault for not acquiring the right skills, because many big business names could easily afford to be more generous with their rank-and-file staff but choose not to be. And without minimum wage legislation in place, you can be sure that they'd pay even less.

You can argue all you want that people shouldn't be earning the minimum wage long-term, and you're right, they shouldn't, just as people shouldn't be on welfare long-term, but whether we like it or not millions of people are on low wages for life. Not everyone can be a doctor or a lawyer or successfully run their own business, and society needs people to do menial jobs as well. All I'm trying to say is that those at the bottom of the ladder on or close to the minimum wage don't deserve to be screwed even more than they are being screwed. It's not unusual for an office janitor to pay more in tax as a proportion of his income than the millionaire exec whose office he cleans, and you can call me a communist if you wish but I think that's just plain wrong.

Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

And who gets to decide what a "living wage" is? What if my definition of "living" includes needing a new car every 3 years, an HD flatscreen tv, a laptop with wifi, a cellphone 4G cell phone, an Ipad, a 2-story home with a picket fence....

That wouldn't be any sensible person's definition of a living wage. A living wage would be a wage that meets the basics of food and shelter. It does not imply HD TVs or swanky cars, let alone home ownership. All I'm suggesting is a basic wage on which one can just about get by, i.e. have some kind of roof over one's head and not completely starve. Alas, the minimum wage does not even provide for that. You might just as well pay the average American minimum wage employee in Monopoly money or Indian rupees for all the good his "wage" will do him.

The problem with the "Occupy Wall Street" crowd is that they're all a bunch of schmoes with no common goal. Some are there to hold up "9/11 Was an Inside Job" signs, some are there to denounce capitalism, some are there to get laid, and others are there because they have nothing else going on in their lives and want to "make a difference".

Maybe the media would bother with them if they could be taken seriously.

Mr. Brown wrote:

The problem with the "Occupy Wall Street" crowd is that they're all a bunch of schmoes with no common goal. Some are there to hold up "9/11 Was an Inside Job" signs, some are there to denounce capitalism, some are there to get laid, and others are there because they have nothing else going on in their lives and want to "make a difference".

The Tea Party it is!

That said, I'd really like to see

"what if my definition of "living" includes needing a new car every 3 years, an HD flatscreen tv, a laptop with wifi, a cellphone 4G cell phone, an Ipad, a 2-story home with a picket fence...."

explained face to face to people who have to work for a living and get nothing but the minimum wage for their pains. How hilariously amusing that would turn out to be...

Mind you, I'm sure that used to be the definition for many people prior to the crisis, make no mistake. But only somebody for whom it still is part of his worldview would dare to utter such bunk.

Loomis wrote:

I'm not saying that the minimum wage should be desirable, merely that it should be, well, slightly more than jack shit.

Then it no longer becomes the "minimum" and simply becomes the average wage or the tolerable way or the "better than jack shit wage". The minimum wage is just that: the minimum that an employer must pay; it doesn't mean they can't pay more, it doesn't mean an applicant can't ask for more or seek more.

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You say that it's not meant to be earned by people in their twenties, thirties and forties - who is it for, then? Teenagers?

Yeah, pretty much. And senior citizens who can't afford to earn too much or else risk their Social Security.

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Look around and you'll find plenty of people of all ages making minimum wage or close to it - and they're often employed by huge and successful corporations (retail, food, etc.) who pay their CEOs and directors millions. These companies can easily pay their shop floor staff way more than they do, but they choose not to (because they view rewarding shareholders and the boardroom as being vastly more important than taking care of the majority of their employees).

I work for a major, major corporation. More than likely a Fortune 100 company (haven't looked at the standings in a while) and I'm nowhere near the top of the food chain, yet I hold no resentment towards those greedy shareholders and boardroom members because A) the job of CEO requires more skill, talent and education than I have or can contribute B) their job is more demanding/harder C) they've earned it and D) I want to earn my own way in life and don't want handouts and "living wages" imposed upon me by the government. Anytime the government makes more demands and enacts more regulations, it usually means a company starts to earn less and in turn has less to offer its employees (the ones they don't lay off or terminate).

And E) I'm a lowly shareholder in the company, so when the company does well my stock does well. Corporations aren't just nameless, faceless, mysterious, evil entities; they're made up of thousands of hardworking, diligent people such as myself.

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And without minimum wage legislation in place, you can be sure that they'd pay even less.

And who would go to work for 4 dollars an hour? I don't know what the minimum wage is right now (somewhere in the seven dollar range I believe), but I can tell you that if my company dropped my pay to $4 dollars an hour they wouldn't be able to fill the jobs because nobody would work for that little. Companies have to be able to offer something to entice good individuals to come work for them, and to suggest that companies would just start slashing salaries if the minimum wage was abolished is not realistic.

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You can argue all you want that people shouldn't be earning the minimum wage long-term, and you're right, they shouldn't, just as people shouldn't be on welfare long-term, but whether we like it or not millions of people are on low wages for life.

You've moved the goal posts. You went from minimum wage to "low wages". One person's idea of low wages may be a king's ransom to other people. Our poorest people in America live like royalty compared to people living in Somalia or India. Compared to Bill Gates my wages are "low". Am I entitled to have my salary artificially inflated in order to have more without having earned it? Why should someone else's hard work and earnings be appropriated and redistributed and given to me at the point of force?

Quote :

Not everyone can be a doctor or a lawyer or successfully run their own business, and society needs people to do menial jobs as well. All I'm trying to say is that those at the bottom of the ladder on or close to the minimum wage don't deserve to be screwed even more than they are being screwed. It's not unusual for an office janitor to pay more in tax as a proportion of his income than the millionaire exec whose office he cleans, and you can call me a communist if you wish but I think that's just plain wrong.

Please show me a credible report that details a janitor on minimum wage PAYING ANY TAX WHATSOEVER. Not only do they not pay any tax, but they usually get a "tax credit" every year which means they get a check from the government that subsidizes their poverty. The top 1% of income earners in the United States are paying somewhere nearly 36% of all taxes, and the top 5% are paying over 50% of all taxes to the government. 50% of Americans pay no income tax at all. How much longer can the filthy rich be expected to float the tax bill and fund the government programs like Senator Reid's "Cowboy Poetry Festival"?

Quote :

That wouldn't be any sensible person's definition of a living wage. A living wage would be a wage that meets the basics of food and shelter. It does not imply HD TVs or swanky cars, let alone home ownership. All I'm suggesting is a basic wage on which one can just about get by, i.e. have some kind of roof over one's head and not completely starve. Alas, the minimum wage does not even provide for that. You might just as well pay the average American minimum wage employee in Monopoly money or Indian rupees for all the good his "wage" will do him.

I don't know where you live, but in America there are innumerable programs that give people subsidized housing, free food, money for transportation, W.I.C (Women, Infants, Children), food stamps, subsidizes on energy, and the list goes on, not to mention all the civic and religious charities and organizations that provide housing, food, clothing and medicine to people on a much more judicial and expeditious level than the American government can. I see no reason to tamper with the American economic system and give people money for jobs irrespective of how much the job is worth just to satisfy an admirable, but misguided, desire for "fairness".

Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

The minimum wage is just that: the minimum that an employer must pay; it doesn't mean they can't pay more, it doesn't mean an applicant can't ask for more or seek more.

People on the minimum wage don't usually have much bargaining power to ask for more. They don't exactly hold many cards. Not that you care, I imagine. I guess this whole topic boils down to the question of whether one believes that people in certain jobs are peasants who deserve no more than the scraps they're given (and in fact don't even deserve those scraps), or whether one believes that all jobs ought to offer people the dignity of being able to support themselves in at least a basic fashion. Note that I say support themselves in a basic fashion - I don't say afford foreign holidays, hi-tech TVs, etc.

You say that you want to earn your own way in life and don't want handouts, and that's exactly what most people on (or close to) the minimum wage want for themselves as well, but if companies refuse to pay their people adequately then the state must take up the slack. Tax credits and the like subsidise corporations' stinginess towards their employees - you the taxpayer are being dunned because successful companies are unwilling to pay workers at the bottom of the pile enough in wages to take care of themselves.

Still, you seem to believe that very few Americans actually earn the minimum wage and that in any case the corporate world is perfectly fair, so there's little point in discussing this further

Do I get this right? Minimum wages don't give people the money they need to live. And America has all those innumerable good stuff for free, housing and food and more? Provided by the taxpayers and charity organisations so people don't starve and have to live on the street. I wonder why many do anyway but what I really wonder is who really profits from the aids? Taxpayers and donors provide the funds for the low-wage sector so the employers don't have to. Effectively you subsidise employers with this, great idea, don't change it! ;)

What a hoot, wonder why anybody would not be tippety top happy with this. Ungrateful bunch of worthless commies, the lot of them.

Loomis wrote:

Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

The minimum wage is just that: the minimum that an employer must pay; it doesn't mean they can't pay more, it doesn't mean an applicant can't ask for more or seek more.

People on the minimum wage don't usually have much bargaining power to ask for more. They don't exactly hold many cards. Not that you care, I imagine. I guess this whole topic boils down to the question of whether one believes that people in certain jobs are peasants who deserve no more than the scraps they're given (and in fact don't even deserve those scraps), or whether one believes that all jobs ought to offer people the dignity of being able to support themselves in at least a basic fashion. Note that I say support themselves in a basic fashion - I don't say afford foreign holidays, hi-tech TVs, etc.

You say that you want to earn your own way in life and don't want handouts, and that's exactly what most people on (or close to) the minimum wage want for themselves as well, but if companies refuse to pay their people adequately then the state must take up the slack. Tax credits and the like subsidise corporations' stinginess towards their employees - you the taxpayer are being dunned because successful companies are unwilling to pay workers at the bottom of the pile enough in wages to take care of themselves.

Still, you seem to believe that very few Americans actually earn the minimum wage and that in any case the corporate world is perfectly fair, so there's little point in discussing this further

The essence of my problem with your arguments is that, at the core of it all, you believe employers should be compelled to give people a wage or salary based upon need, not upon the value of the job. In other words: From each according to his ability, to each according to his need (or needs), which is exactly what you described it as earlier: COMMUNISM.

I work for a company where the labor is almost all unionized, and I walk into an alternate universe everyday....a universe where I and a handful of other management seem to be the only ones actually interested in getting any work done. I'm constantly surrounded by some of the stupidest, laziest, most unmotivated people to be found...all whose jobs are protected by a big union that doesn't give a damn about its workers other than making sure they stay employed so that they can collect union dues. I've got an employee making 30$ an hour to push a broom around and take out the trash. *ANYBODY* could do that job. It's inefficient. I could employ 2 or 3 workers with what this guy is getting paid. It is a waste of money. What's worse, because he's been coddled and protected by the union for so long, he's never had to try and sharpen his skills or educate himself or make himself more marketable.

No one is arguing that poor people shouldn't be helped, but the private sector and employers shouldn't be forced to give people a wage above what the market calls for. It's that simple really, and if people don't like that they should move to China or Cuba and see how that works out for them.

Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

The essence of my problem with your arguments is that, at the core of it all, you believe employers should be compelled to give people a wage or salary based upon need, not upon the value of the job.

Well, yes - a salary based on what people need in order to support themselves. And what's this about the "value" of a job? So who decides the value of a job? Oh, yes, that's right: employers. But, see, employers want value for money, i.e. they want to pay as little as they can get away with. You obviously have zero compassion for the little people, but not everyone is fortunate enough to be in your position in life. All I'm suggesting, I guess, is a little sympathy for those who are less well off.

Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

COMMUNISM.

John Wayne over here.

Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

No one is arguing that poor people shouldn't be helped, but the private sector and employers shouldn't be forced to give people a wage above what the market calls for.

So you prefer it that your taxes should make up the shortfall for employers' unwillingness to properly remunerate their low-paid staff to the point where they can be genuinely self-reliant? Okay.

Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

and if people don't like that they should move to China or Cuba and see how that works out for them.

Which decade are you living in? Seriously.

Loomis wrote:

Well, yes - a salary based on what people need in order to support themselves. And what's this about the "value" of a job? So who decides the value of a job?

The employer and the employee. There is no slavery or indentured servitude in the United States. It is a contract between the person with the work and the person wanting to perform the work. Why do you act as if these big, bad, mean, greedy, evil companies are going out and rounding up people at the point of a gun and forcing them to work?

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Oh, yes, that's right: employers. But, see, employers want value for money, i.e. they want to pay as little as they can get away with.

Clearly you've never run a business or had to make a payroll or budget. Must be nice to sit back and tell companies what they OUGHT to be doing. They OUGHT to be providing daycare for their employees...they OUGHT to be providing full medical coverage....they OUGHT to provide 3 months paid maternity/paternity leave....they OUGHT to pay inflated prices for a job that anyone could perform.

The problem with your zero sum game is that you want to take VALUE out of the equation; you want to eliminate VALUE as a factor in attaining and keeping work. You want to eliminate the employer having the right to determine any VALUE a job may have to his or her company. Basically you want communism.

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You obviously have zero compassion for the little people,

I *AM* the little people. I'm not rich. I'm struggling to get by and pay bills. I don't have a fancy car or a big house or a vacation home or condo...I haven't even taken a proper vacation in years, but I resent you trying to come in between me and my employer.

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but not everyone is fortunate enough to be in your position in life. All I'm suggesting, I guess, is a little sympathy for those who are less well off.

So people who don't aspire to live in a communist society have no sympathy?

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So you prefer it that your taxes should make up the shortfall for employers' unwillingness to properly remunerate their low-paid staff to the point where they can be genuinely self-reliant? Okay.

Are you employed? How old are you? Based upon your talking points I'd say you're somewhere between 18-22, having trouble finding a job, and think you've got the whole world figured out: basically, companies are bad and evil, workers are oppressed and down-trodden and underpaid. That sort of simplistic, idealistic, rose-colored-glasses thinking is usually the sign of a person who is young and has limited life experience.

Wasn't it Winston Churchill who said: ""If you're young and not liberal, you have no heart. If you're old and not conservative, you have no mind."

It's always easier to tell other people what they should be doing with their money until you get a bit of your own and you've earned your own way in life and suddenly the government and a group of degenerate, flea-infested hippies want to "occupy" Wall Street and tell you how to live your life, spend your money, and regulate your business. Oh how quickly the attitudes change!

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Which decade are you living in? Seriously.

What country are you living in? Seriously...take that commie pinko bullshit somewhere else.

Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

Wasn't it Winston Churchill who said: ""If you're young and not liberal, you have no heart. If you're old and not conservative, you have no mind." ... take that commie pinko bullshit somewhere else.

Well, I'm neither a conservative nor a commie - I guess I'm somewhere in between, but, anyway, there's no point in our discussing this further. Neither of us is going to change the other's mind on this topic any more than we did on the death penalty thread.

However, and leaving aside all matters of political affiliation, I do sincerely apologise to you for comments on this thread that, looking back, I see were rather heated and disrespectful. While we often don't see eye-to-eye (for some extraordinary reason you seem to believe that LICENSE REVOKED is a bad film! :D ), I've long been very fond of your posts, both here and on CBn, so apologies once again, and no hard feelings.

Loomis wrote:

Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

Wasn't it Winston Churchill who said: ""If you're young and not liberal, you have no heart. If you're old and not conservative, you have no mind." ... take that commie pinko bullshit somewhere else.

Well, I'm neither a conservative nor a commie - I guess I'm somewhere in between, but, anyway, there's no point in our discussing this further. Neither of us is going to change the other's mind on this topic any more than we did on the death penalty thread.

However, and leaving aside all matters of political affiliation, I do sincerely apologise to you for comments on this thread that, looking back, I see were rather heated and disrespectful. While we often don't see eye-to-eye (for some extraordinary reason you seem to believe that LICENSE REVOKED is a bad film! :D ), I've long been very fond of your posts, both here and on CBn, so apologies once again, and no hard feelings.

Apology accepted. There's no hard feelings. Spirited debates are far more interesting than a thread full of people agreeing with one another.

Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

Are you employed? How old are you? Based upon your talking points I'd say you're somewhere between 18-22, having trouble finding a job, and think you've got the whole world figured out: basically, companies are bad and evil, workers are oppressed and down-trodden and underpaid. That sort of simplistic, idealistic, rose-colored-glasses thinking is usually the sign of a person who is young and has limited life experience.
What country are you living in? Seriously...take that commie pinko bullshit somewhere else.

Gravy, sometimes you go too far.

Still, I have enjoyed this debate.

Santa wrote:

Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

Are you employed? How old are you? Based upon your talking points I'd say you're somewhere between 18-22, having trouble finding a job, and think you've got the whole world figured out: basically, companies are bad and evil, workers are oppressed and down-trodden and underpaid. That sort of simplistic, idealistic, rose-colored-glasses thinking is usually the sign of a person who is young and has limited life experience.
What country are you living in? Seriously...take that commie pinko bullshit somewhere else.

Gravy, sometimes you go too far.

Still, I have enjoyed this debate.

Where have you been? Loomis and I made up both on the forums and in email about a week ago. That argument is old...ancient history...extinct....over...just like Ashton and Demi's marriage.

Here's an interesting story:
Obama Administration Attempted to Apologize to Japan for bombing Hiroshima and Nagasaki:
http://www.investors.com/NewsAndAnalysis/Article/587698/201110111829/Apologies-Not-Accepted.htm

What's next? Apologizing to Britain for wanting independence? Apologizing to Cameroon for having the first man on the moon while they still live in mud huts in the jungle? Where do the apologies end? Good God this man will apologize for anything except his own failures :)

Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

Apologizing to Britain for wanting independence?

Let's face it, it's long overdue.

Erica Ambler wrote:

Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

Apologizing to Britain for wanting independence?

Let's face it, it's long overdue.

Never retreat, never surrender!

And I think Britain should apologize for George Michael if we're going to start playing that game.

The Occupy Wall Street gang received the following endorsement the other day:

http://nation.foxnews.com/occupy-wall-street/2011/10/15/american-nazi-party-declares-its-full-support-occupy-wall-street-protests