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The dilema is that high social need activities tend to be ones that don’t generate any return for the private marketplace.
So the dilemma shall remain... human is the hard problem.
My opinion, any system would work if the human problem could be solved. Collectivism would work just fine if we didn't mind carrying our share of the work and or didn't resent it when others didn't, or didn't derive satisfaction when others are doing more than us for the same reward.
Collectivism would work just fine if we didn’t mind carrying our share of the work and or didn’t resent it when others didn’t, or didn’t derive satisfaction when others are doing more than us for the same reward.
That require qualities we denounced the day Adam ate the apple. :)
Probably why the founders hid behind the concept of God given rights as the basis of individual liberty in the hypocritical logic.
You've got a point galloping Cheeta. It's on top of your head. You've got a pointy head
I like the new Zillow.com satelite shots. I can see my neighbors pot plants. They're not current pics but it's much improved from before
With the Standard & Poor's 500 at a 10-month low is now a good time to buy for investors with a one-year time horizon?
Yes. We're either at or close to a bottom. 33%
No. Stocks will trade sideways or fall further. 67%
61761 Votes to date
Compare this to a Silly Con Valley CEO:
Microsoft Corp. Chief Executive Officer Steve Ballmer received a pay package valued about $1.3 million for fiscal 2007, a year in which profit at the world's largest software maker topped $14 billion, according to documents filed Friday.
For the year ended June 30, Ballmer received $620,000 in salary and a $650,000 bonus. Unlike some technology companies that spend millions on executive security, travel and other perquisites, Microsoft gave Ballmer a modest $6,750 in matches to his 401K retirement plan and approximately $3,000 worth of life insurance and athletic club memberships.
Ballmer, who owns about 4.3 percent of Microsoft's shares, received no equity compensation. He didn't exercise any stock options or vest any stock awards during the year, the company said in the Securities and Exchange Commission filing.
"specifically address mother in law issues" LOL!
Yes, something MUST be done!
Seriously though, the guy is living off grid, generating his own electricity and doing his own thing without it affecting any of the rest of us! I say more power to ya'!
"Find an ancient temple and fill it with slot machines"
This is my waking nightmare. We've had arguments in the past about who is and who ain't a boomer but there just isn't a desirable place left on the globe boomers haven't ALREADY soiled.
I had a client just return from La Paz (Baja Del Sur?) and he said they now have gated communities w/ all the amenities. He said his friends and their neighbors just hung out inside their centrally air conditioned McHaciendas (TM) and drank. Not that the guy is some altar boy but what about hitting the town and drinking w/ the locals? No chance!
Brand,
No, you're right. I've never spent all that much time on the east coast, and most of the people I DO know there are connected to WS is some fashion. I was addressing more in general about regional attitudes toward wealth and money.
Here comes Helicopter from Ben Bernanke:
Bush, Bernanke Support Stimulus Package
Bush and Bernanke Back Package to Stimulate Weakening Economy
WASHINGTON (AP) -- President Bush and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke on Thursday embraced calls for an economic stimulus package to avert recession. Bernanke said such a plan should be quickly implemented and temporary so that it won't complicate longer-term fiscal challenges.
The Fed chief, in testimony to the House Budget Committee, said efforts that involve "putting money into the hands of households and firms would be more effective" than other provisions, such as making Bush's tax cut permament.
median rent prices were essentially flat in 2007, rising just 0.5 percent to $1,465 a month, according to a sampling of 10 metro areas from Investment Instruments Corp.'s Rentometer. The stagnation is attributed to excess housing inventory as people are unable to "flip" investment properties. Residential rents in Atlanta and Houston dropped 12.8 percent last year.
PermaRenter Says:
I want more Silly Con Valley CEOs behind bars …
Me want that too. I don't know if there is a statute of limitations on this, but the eye-witness shenanigans I personally saw back in the '99/Y2K timeframe would be enough to put a couple of IPO CEO's into big trouble. Wish I was a little more ruthless, I could probably monetize that threat somehow... :-)
Permarenter,
Isn't that simply pathetic? The solution from the Fed and other "expert economists" for the current economic malaise is to find some way to get Americans to SPEND more!!! If that's the solution, we are all doomed. We're just fixing the addiction with more crack. Pretty soon, we are all going to OD, crash and burn.
Tent city in suburbs is cost of home crisis By Dana Ford
Fri Dec 21, 8:18 AM ET
ONTARIO, California (Reuters) - Between railroad tracks and beneath the roar of departing planes sits "tent city," a terminus for homeless people. It is not, as might be expected, in a blighted city center, but in the once-booming suburbia of Southern California.
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The noisy, dusty camp sprang up in July with 20 residents and now numbers 200 people, including several children, growing as this region east of Los Angeles has been hit by the U.S. housing crisis.
The unraveling of the region known as the Inland Empire reads like a 21st century version of "The Grapes of Wrath," John Steinbeck's novel about families driven from their lands by the Great Depression.
As more families throw in the towel and head to foreclosure here and across the nation, the social costs of collapse are adding up in the form of higher rates of homelessness, crime and even disease.
While no current residents claim to be victims of foreclosure, all agree that tent city is a symptom of the wider economic downturn. And it's just a matter of time before foreclosed families end up at tent city, local housing experts say.
"They don't hit the streets immediately," said activist Jane Mercer. Most families can find transitional housing in a motel or with friends before turning to charity or the streets. "They only hit tent city when they really bottom out."
Steve, 50, who declined to give his last name, moved to tent city four months ago. He gets social security payments, but cannot work and said rents are too high.
"House prices are going down, but the rentals are sky-high," said Steve. "If it wasn't for here, I wouldn't have a place to go."
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20071221/lf_nm/usa_housing_social_dc
Google $100 drop within 30 days:
16-Jan-08 628.97 639.99 601.93 615.95 10,560,000 615.95
15-Jan-08 645.90 649.05 635.38 637.65 5,568,200 637.65
14-Jan-08 651.14 657.40 645.25 653.82 4,447,500 653.82
11-Jan-08 642.70 649.47 630.11 638.25 4,977,000 638.25
10-Jan-08 645.01 657.20 640.11 646.73 6,334,200 646.73
9-Jan-08 630.04 653.34 622.51 653.20 6,739,700 653.20
8-Jan-08 653.00 659.96 631.00 631.68 5,339,100 631.68
7-Jan-08 653.94 662.28 637.35 649.25 6,403,400 649.25
4-Jan-08 679.69 680.96 655.00 657.00 5,359,800 657.00
3-Jan-08 685.26 686.85 676.52 685.33 3,252,500 685.33
2-Jan-08 692.87 697.37 677.73 685.19 4,306,900 685.19
31-Dec-07 698.57 702.49 690.58 691.48 2,376,200 691.48
28-Dec-07 704.93 707.95 696.54 702.53 2,537,000 702.53
27-Dec-07 707.07 716.00 700.74 700.74 2,942,500 700.74
26-Dec-07 698.99 713.22 698.21 710.84 2,530,000 710.84
Malcolm Says:
They already do that in China. Google was recently investigated because one of the people it turned in from its search engine
Um... I think you are thinking about the _other_ search engine, I forgot what they're called... yeah who? :-)
Bay Area DQ numbers out for December:
http://www.dqnews.com/RRBay0108.shtm
This time, median is finally down, and it's down in EVERY SINGLE COUNTY (except Marin, for which it is flat). Let's hear the bulls' arguments now that Bay Area prices are immune to the downturn.
I like their headline,
"Bay Area home sales drag along bottom, median price back to 2005 level."
median price back to 2005 level
I still remember hearing homeowners boasting $xxx/day appreciation.
SP, I stand corrected, it very well could have been Yahoo and I mixed them up. I'm not certain.
skibum Says:
I like their headline: “Bay Area home sales drag along bottom"
At least another quarter of dragging along the bottom, then a couple of quarters of sliding down the back of the thigh, a quarter dragging along the back of the knee, maybe a quick run down the shin, then circle the ankles for another quarter.
Let me know when it is tickling the sole, I may start looking at a house to buy.
My favorite line is still there: "Indicators of market distress continue to move in different directions". An apt euphemism for stuff hitting the fan.
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Sale prices are always given as an absolute number, without context. The reality is that falling prices can be masked to some extent by a longer number of days on the market.
Getting $500,000 within a week of listing is not at all the same thing as getting $500,000 after having the house on the market for 2 years, yet both are recorded as the same price. Ultimately, you can pretend your house is worth whatever you want by letting days on market go to infinity -- just pulling it off the market. No one will buy it for your dream price, but you don't have to face the reality that it is not worth what you thought either. Assuming you can pay the mortgage.
Realtors know that increasing days on market proves that a house is not worth the asking price. That's why they commonly try to scam users by re-listing a house as if it just came on the market.
Patrick
#housing