patrick.net

Reality says

The upper middle class who are not rich enough to buy their own lawmakers are the ones who ultimately foot the bills.

Agreed.

Reality says

The government buys a product, just like the Nazi's bought a bunch of IBM punch card computers.

I think you are doing yourself a disservice by using this example, which is kind of like the automobile example I used.

Your government funded computer research. IBM capitalized on it, and another government with unlimited funds bought the technology.

David Losh says

Reality says

The government buys a product, just like the Nazi's bought a bunch of IBM punch card computers.

I think you are doing yourself a disservice by using this example, which is kind of like the automobile example I used.

Your government funded computer research. IBM capitalized on it, and another government with unlimited funds bought the technology.

So you are saying the Nazis in the 1930's bought the fruit of US government funding in the 1940's? How does the time vector work in your world? No wonder you are confused about . . . just about everything!

Reality says

So you are saying the Nazis in the 1930's bought the fruit of US government funding in the 1940's?

You'd have to make that comment a lot more clear. What time line are you using?

Can the private sector cure disease and advance medicine?

"Ain't no money in a cure...they still mad about all the money they lost on polio!"

--Chris Rock

The free market alone can't provide us with everything we might want.

"Reality",

Do you suggest that Las Vegas wouldn't exist if we just got government out of the way?

freak80 says

"Reality",

Do you suggest that Las Vegas wouldn't exist if we just got government out of the way?

If gambling and prostitution were legal everywhere else, Las Vegas as we know it would not exist. Gambling and prostitution would of course exist, but the pay off would not have been as rich if other venues of personal success are more open to the youth. It is no co-incidence that drugs, prostitution and gangs are more common in low-income low-opportunity neighborhoods, esp. when measured vis other sources of income.

If we could just get rid of government schools on those low income neighborhoods, there would be much less drug use and prostitution there.

Reality,

How would you increase opportunity in low income neighborhoods? A tax cut?

freak80 says

Reality,

How would you increase opportunity in low income neighborhoods? A tax cut?

Even more important than that:

1. removing minimum wage laws banning low-opportunity youth from their first jobs. Minimum wage laws banning low paying jobs have a disproportional harm on those with low opportunity cost.

2. removing/raising income cap on welfare or remove welfare altogether, so the poor don't have to seek jobs that pay under the table in order to keep their welfare checks. With nearly 50 million Americans receiving food stamps, this is no longer an issue limited to poor neighborhoods.

freak80 says

Can the private sector cure disease and advance medicine?

"Ain't no money in a cure...they still mad about all the money they lost on polio!"

--Chris Rock

The free market alone can't provide us with everything we might want.

Utter nonsense. The very first effective Polio vaccine was developed by Hilary Koprowski in 1950 while working at Lederle Labs, a private research lab owned by a large private coporation.

It went into medical trial usage quietly, unlike the Salk vaccine announced in 1955 with heavy marketing/promotion money from Ely Lilly. Incidentally, Ely Lilly was also a private company. Selling vaccine to the healthy is apparently even more profitable than selling cure to the sick. The University of Pittsburgh and March of Dimes Foundation that funded Salk's research were also both private non-profit institutions.

Reality says

Even more important than that:

1. removing minimum wage laws banning low-opportunity youth from their first jobs. Minimum wage laws banning low paying jobs have a disproportional harm on
those with low opportunity cost.

2. removing/raising income cap on welfare or remove welfare altogether, so the poor don't have to seek jobs that pay under the table in order to keep their welfare checks. With nearly 50 million Americans receiving food stamps, this is no longer an issue limited to poor neighborhoods.

Proof you are completely delusional.

Just try living on a minimum wage job.

You are completely out of touch with Reality.

freak80 says

Reality says

Even more important than that:

1. removing minimum wage laws banning low-opportunity youth from their first jobs. Minimum wage laws banning low paying jobs have a disproportional harm on

those with low opportunity cost.

2. removing/raising income cap on welfare or remove welfare altogether, so the poor don't have to seek jobs that pay under the table in order to keep their welfare checks. With nearly 50 million Americans receiving food stamps, this is no longer an issue limited to poor neighborhoods.

Proof you are completely delusional.

Just try living on a minimum wage job.

You are completely out of touch with Reality.

Proof that you are utterly illogical and is capable of no dialogue except for personal attacks. If you think the lowest paid and very first job in a person's life has to pay enough to enable the person to live on his/her own, possibly with children to support, then no wonder the result is massive youth unemployment as they can not get job experience started with such a high threshold . . . and many of the young have to get their first jobs either by dealing drugs, prostituting themselves or getting pregnant . . . three of the remaining entry level jobs not banned by minimum wage laws.

The normal sequence of events should be gaining job experience before moving out of parents' homes, not the other way around! The first jobs are not supposed to provide the job holders an independent living all on their own. Otherwise, few would be giving the kids the learning opportunity to begin with.

If they can make $20/hr with prostitution and/or drug dealing, are they going to take a job that pays *less* than minimum wage?

Your assertion that an abundance of shit-work will solve inner city crime and poverty is absurd.

freak80 says

If they can make $20/hr with prostitution and/or drug dealing, are they going to take a job that pays *less* than minimum wage?

Your assertion that an abundance of shit-work will solve inner city crime and poverty is absurd.

Depends on how safety or lack thereof is monetized....

freak80 says

If they can make $20/hr with prostitution and/or drug dealing, are they going to take a job that pays *less* than minimum wage?

IIRC, according to some systematic study that I read, the per hour wage for prostitution/drug-dealing/gang-membership is actually very low, in the low single digits, or even less than $1/hr if jail time is counted too as work for the practitioner. The key problem is that the billable hour percentage is very low compared to client maintenance / self-maintenance (due to professional hazards in the underground industries, both physical and psychological) and other unbillable business maintenance hours.

Your assertion that an abundance of shit-work will solve inner city crime and poverty is absurd.

It's not just a theory, but factually proven true: inner city crime and poverty rates were much lower before the minimum wage laws and welfare came along.

Reality says

It's not just a theory, but factually proven true: inner city crime and poverty rates were much lower before the minimum wage laws and welfare came along.

Your facts are a little selective. Inner city crime rates were lower before all the industry moved to the rural south and was replaced by drug dealing.

Reality says

Your assertion that an abundance of shit-work will solve inner city crime and poverty is absurd.

It's not just a theory, but factually proven true: inner city crime and poverty rates were much lower before the minimum wage laws and welfare came along.

Correlation does not imply causality.

1. We did not have gentrification which brings economic inequality with it leading to crime. Poor people don't look outside legal employment channels when $500 pays the mortgage on a house, but too many turn to gangs and kill each other when a $2500 one bedroom apartment is unaffordable on one salary.

2. Before 1930 we didn't have mortgages to prop up property prices and drive up rents. When FHA loans came on the scene in 1934 they required a 50% loan to value ratio, had a 3-5 year term with interest only, and ended with a balloon payment of the full balance. That's how things worked when we got our first minimum wage law in 1938.

bob2356 says

Reality says

It's not just a theory, but factually proven true: inner city crime and poverty rates were much lower before the minimum wage laws and welfare came along.

Your facts are a little selective. Inner city crime rates were lower before all the industry moved to the rural south and was replaced by drug dealing.

With the exception of Detroit, most innercities were not centers for manufacturing even in their hey days. Cities are centers of commerce.

drew_eckhardt says

Correlation does not imply causality.

1. We did not have gentrification which brings economic inequality with it leading to crime. Poor people don't look outside legal employment channels when $500 pays the mortgage on a house, but too many turn to gangs and kill each other when a $2500 one bedroom apartment is unaffordable on one salary.

Are you saying gentrification causes gang crime? Since when do you see middle class job holders who pay their own rent turn to gang membership en mass as second jobs? Gang crimes thrive in Section 8 housing, where the tenants have the bulk of their rent paid for by the government. Those tenants (and their offpsrings) often can not take legal jobs because the visible income would disqualify them from Section 8 voucher and other welfare payment or reduce the subsidies drastically (effective putting a near-100% tax rate on their incremental income).

drew_eckhardt says

2. Before 1930 we didn't have mortgages to prop up property prices and drive up rents.

You are wrong. Mortgage existed long before the 1930's. The Florida land bubble of the 1920's was the result of mortgage shenanigans very similar to our own time.

bob2356 says

Your facts are a little selective. Inner city crime rates were lower before all the industry moved to the rural south and was replaced by drug dealing.

It is worth mentioning Black unemployment was lower than white unemployment until Davis Bacon and minimum wage laws.

Reality says

With the exception of Detroit, most innercities were not centers for manufacturing even in their hey days. Cities are centers of commerce.

BS. There was plenty of manufacturing in almost every major city until the 1960's. In 1910 in NY 40% of people were working in manufacturing. By 1950 that was down to 28% but there were still 1 million people working in manufacturing in NY. Of ten biggest cities after NY 7 had more than NY's 28% of population working in manufacturing. If you want to educate yourself on the subject read John Gunther's Inside U.S.A. published 1947 if you can find a copy. I'm not loaning you mine.

indigenous says

It is worth mentioning Black unemployment was lower than white unemployment until Davis Bacon and minimum wage laws.

Prove it. Davis Bacon was 1931 for christ sakes. Accurate unemployment numbers by race aren't even available. Minimum wages were 1938. AFDC (welfare) was 1935.

So you are saying that inner city crime rates were lower until the 1930's then rose. Sorry to confuse you with facts but crime rates fell dramatically from 1930 to 1960. Homicides fell 60% in that time. Then rates spiked back up dramatically in the early 1960's. Coinciding quite nicely with white flight from the cities thanks to the brand new interstate system along with manufacturing flight which also took advantage of the new highways to move out of the cities.

Some people think that leaded gas was the problem. The crime rate curve does nicely follow the lead level in the average person's blood. Certainly makes more sense than blaming laws passed 30 years before the crime rate went up.

bob2356 says

Some people think that leaded gas was the problem. The crime rate curve does nicely follow the lead level in the average person's blood.

Alcohol consumption correlates well with teacher salaries.

Ice cream consumption correlates well with the number of drownings.

Correlation is not necessarily causation.

freak80 says

Correlation is not necessarily causation.

I did say some people think. Just like reality thinks davis bacon, minimum wages, and welfare correlate to crime rises 30 years later. I personally believe a 30 year lag is pretty tenuous correlation by anyone's definition.

Reality says

IIRC, according to some systematic study that I read, the per hour wage for prostitution/drug-dealing/gang-membership is actually very low, in the low single digits, or even less than $1/hr if jail time is counted too as work for the practitioner.

If I recall, the drug dealing aspect was discussed to some degree in the book Freakonomics.

bob2356 says

indigenous says

It is worth mentioning Black unemployment was lower than white unemployment until Davis Bacon and minimum wage laws.

Prove it. Davis Bacon was 1931 for christ sakes. Accurate unemployment numbers by race aren't even available. Minimum wages were 1938. AFDC (welfare) was 1935.

Yea I think it is plausible to correlate crime with unemployment.

Davis Bacon was implemented in the early 30s to protect white union jobs. The fair labor standards act was passed in 1938 but it really didn't have an effect until after the war because of war time inflation. Minimum wage law began taking effect in the early 50s.

What this did was protect existing jobs as no one would hire an inexperienced employee at the mandated higher price.

Black unemployment was the same as whites from 1890 until the late 1940s when the government meddling stated having effect.

Which I posit caused the higher crime rate.

bob2356 says

Reality says

With the exception of Detroit, most innercities were not centers for manufacturing even in their hey days. Cities are centers of commerce.

BS. There was plenty of manufacturing in almost every major city until the 1960's. In 1910 in NY 40% of people were working in manufacturing. By 1950 that was down to 28% but there were still 1 million people working in manufacturing in NY. Of ten biggest cities after NY 7 had more than NY's 28% of population working in manufacturing. If you want to educate yourself on the subject read John Gunther's Inside U.S.A. published 1947 if you can find a copy. I'm not loaning you mine.

You are confusing "innercity" with "city" and "metropolitan censors area." Besides, NYC has been doing much better after 1950 than it was in 1910 anyway.

Reality says

You are confusing "innercity" with "city" and "metropolitan censors area." Besides, NYC has been doing much better after 1950 than it was in 1910 anyway.

Really? How do you define inner city vs city and how are you getting your statistics, which I have yet to see any of? What is your definition of much better and where is the data to support it? Almost 2 million whites left NYC from 1948 to 1960 replaced by almost as many very poor immigrants. That's pretty serious white flight. By 1970 the whole city was a shambles. I lived on 110th and Columbus in 76 and 77. There was no inner city. It was all bad, along with big parts of North Jersey.

bob2356 says

Reality says

You are confusing "innercity" with "city" and "metropolitan censors area." Besides, NYC has been doing much better after 1950 than it was in 1910 anyway.

Really? How do you define inner city vs city and how are you getting your statistics, which I have yet to see any of?

I was not the one who invented the term "inner city." If you can't tell the general difference in character between "inner city" vs. "city" and "metropolitan area," you have no business in this discussion. You are essentially asking what the definition of "pornography" is, and some former supreme court justice already gave answer to silly questions like that. Concepts like "inner city" and "pornography" are inductive, not deductive.

What is your definition of much better and where is the data to support it? Almost 2 million whites left NYC from 1948 to 1960 replaced by almost as many very poor immigrants. That's pretty serious white flight. By 1970 the whole city was a shambles. I lived on 110th and Columbus in 76 and 77. There was no inner city. It was all bad, along with big parts of North Jersey.

Are you living and writing in 1970 or in 2013? Where the heck is manufacturing in the post 1990 NYC?

Wealth disparity is generational.

There was a study done in the 1970s to compare Asian immigrates wealth to African American wealth.

What they found is that Asian's think generationally, and have loyalty to vendors of the same community. When a dollar goes into the Asian community it circulates within the community.

In the African American community the dollars generally leave the community, and go to outside community enterprises.

The second part was that wealth was accumulated in the Asian Community for the benefit of the Children's wealth. Living conditions may be hard all over, but in the Asian Community there is much more tendency to double up with parents, children, and grand children all in one house while every one works.

These are deep rooted cultural issues that are slowly working out.

Anyone know where I can score some prostitutes? STD free would be a plus.