Unemployment benefits for 1.3 Million Expire... Today

[Broomstick]

It's not an insurance scheme; the premiums are not based on actuarial risk. It's a welfare benefit rhetorically attached to a tax that adds to the general revenue, with no requirement that the tax take cover all the costs of the welfare benefit.

Untrue. Again. Which is no surprise in your case.

When the UI fund for a state is depleted the state raises UI taxes on business. Yes, the tax IS required to cover all the costs. Which you would know if you bothered to investigate the matter even via Google

The funding is quite complex when you get into extended benefits and other factors, but you are once again talking out of your ass with your statement that the UI tax isn't required to cover the costs of benefit payouts. Depletion of those funds was an important topic around 2008-2010, a lot of states had issues with it.

Also, an employer who has an unusual number of employees filing valid UI claims can also be charged a higher than normal amount, so employers who contribute an usual number of people to the UI rolls also have to pay more than the average employer.

Keep in mind, too, that this is ONLY for workers in good standing who involuntarily leave their job. You can't collect if you just quit. You can't collect if you were fired for cause (like stealing or something else criminal or in violation of an employer policy that explicitly states firing as a potential consequence).

[Broomstick]

In most countries it's presented as insurance, but this is purely rhetorical. Think about it this way: if all the state did was offer the market rate for insurance that accounted for actuarial risk, why wouldn't people just self-insure like they insure their cars?

Actually, a non-trivial percentage of people don't insure their cars, even though failure to do so is a criminal offense, and that is why part of MY auto insurance policy is for "un-insured drivers insurance" which covers me in case the other guy doesn't have insurance.

And it's not rhetorical, it really is insurance.

Let me explain one more thing about insurance - the greater the pool of people paying into the money pool the lower the risk for everyone involved. Thus, no private insurance in a competitive market is ever going to be able give a better rate than a state government that has a risk pool comprised of the entire population of that state. Likewise, the reason the Federal government gets involved when there are extended benefits, implying a more serious than usual fiscal states, is because no one state in the union can match the actuarial pool comprised of every worker in the US (that's about 100 million people).

It's also why flood insurance in the US is mostly Federal - only the Federal level pool is large enough to spread the risk sufficiently to drop the premiums to levels that are anything like affordable. The wealthy can get a private rider for flood damage... sometimes... but not in all areas. I'm told it's hellishly expensive.

It's also why state-run single-payer universal health insurance costs less than private health insurance - an actuarial pool of 300+ million will always beat out a smaller one, even if (hypothetically) it was the size of California or Texas. But let's not get sidetracked on THAT topic...

[Broomstick]

I don't know how it works in the USA with regards to term assessment, but over here in Germany the longer you work, the longer you get the insurance money.

Let's see if I can do this simply...

Under normal circumstances (typically, unemployment under 7%, more specifically, the U3 from the Bureau of Labor being under 7%) you collect a maximum of 26 weeks from the state where you worked (thus, when I worked in Illionis and lived in Indiana and was laid off I collected Illinois UI). It doesn't matter how long you worked (provided you worked long enough to qualify), you don't get more than 26 weeks.

When there are unusual levels of unemployment (usually defined as over 7%) the Federal government can (and usually does) provide extended UI benefits. How much they extend it varies. Someones only 26 weeks, but it could be less or more. However, you can NEVER collect UI longer than 99 weeks total. Period. (After you work four out of a set of five consecutive quarters you re-qualify for a new cycle).

Now, there is precedent for providing extended benefits for selected states and not for others. For example, if Michigan has high levels of unemployment, say 10%, and Montana only has 3% the Feds can offer extended UI in Michigan but not in Montana. Maybe Michigan gets a full 47 weeks of extended UI and Ohio only gets 13 weeks of extended UI while Montana only gets the base 26 weeks at the state level.

What is unprecedented here is that ALL extended UI benefits have been eliminated even though unemployment continues to be above 7% in many areas. That is what is unprecedented and generating some of the outrage. If you had a state where unemployment is 3% no one is going to argue about ending extended benefits there (well, almost no one...)

Currently, the following states have official unemployment rates of over 7% based on data from the Bureau of Labor:

Arizona, Arkansas, California, Connecticut, Washington DC, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Massachusetts, Michigan, Mississippi, Nevada, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, and Tennessee.

That's 21 states out of 50, and the national capital. Nearly half. Some of those states have unemployment rates of 9% or higher. Cutting extended UI in such places is unprecedented.

[Simon_Jester]

I never made any such claim, and if you were better at reading you would have realized that. But some unemployed/poor people clearly are financially irresponsible. And sometimes being responsible involves doing things that are unpleasant, like switching careers or relocating. As for the rest, who are in a bad situation because of unfortunate circumstance and not irresponsibility, then I am in favor of certain social assistance programs. But those programs should be limited to people who are trying to be productive by doing things like actively searching for work, willing to learn new skills, willing to relocate, and willing to give up their own luxuries before taking mine - that could include selling some assets, including a house, depending on the circumstances.

They ARE already limited in this way. And this is in spite of the fact that they do NOT provide adequate assistance for someone who tries to be "responsible..." and therefore needs tens of thousands of dollars. Which they might, in order to cover the costs associated with selling their house, searching for a job in another state, and moving there to reduce their long term cost of living.

What are they supposed to do, find a loan shark?

So basically, you still have the fundamental, unchanged point that being unemployed (or working poor) is already an economic punishment that makes it harder to limit long term costs. Short-term necessity trumps long-term optimization, when you don't already have hundreds of thousands of dollars in the bank.

I am willing to give them reasonable assistance to have a functional life until they can have their unfortunate situation resolved. In reality, many or most people should have enough savings to get by a few months anyway. If they don't have such savings, they should never have bought a house in the first place, or should have sold it long ago. Naturally, in the event of a housing crisis like in the USA in 2008, social assistance for housing/mortgages is more reasonable than in other times.

For a lot of people who got hit by the housing crisis, "a few months" of savings was not enough; ask Broomstick for an example of this. She was financially responsible, but she STILL lives under greatly reduced circumstances now compared to where she was 7-8 years ago, and she is very much faced with the reality that there are things she could do to improve her position... but which she flat out cannot afford to do NOW because she hasn't got enough cash in hand.

Selling a house is not like pawning a piece of jewelry. It takes a lot of time and a lot of money to do it.

Which is precisely why people shouldn't be buying them unless they have a very high degree of financial security.

This particular piece of economic wisdom was nowhere near as commonplace five years ago, let alone ten or fifteen. That adds up to an awful lot of people who bought houses in good faith, showing no unusual degree of irresponsibility, and are now stuck with them.

People do not need all money they spend, let alone money they chose to spend in the past instead of saving, in the knowledge it might hurt them financially later (eg. taking out the most expensive possible mortgage, paying for cars on credit, holidays, etc.). Peoples' needs include food, water, heat, and the minimal shelter required for a bed and cooking facilities. That is a small proportion of what most people spend. Moreover those costs largely do not increase with income.

What are you, twelve?

You're neglecting huge classes of expenses that people are quite literally forced to undergo unless they want to accept:
-Being unable to work productively in the future (it takes capital to run a business; it ALSO takes capital to 'run the business' of providing labor to a labor-purchasing employer).
-Being unable to raise children (tell me that's a luxury and I have nothing to say but "I spit in your face you rotting pile of filth")
-Being unable to stay alive (medicine)
-Being unable to support loved ones or friends who are already facing inability to do some of the above.

You remind me of this:

http://tapastic.com/episode/15428

[Thanas]

^What Simon said.

[Crossroads Inc.]

Please provide evidence that the majority of those unemployed are in any way ""financially irresponsible""

I never made any such claim, and if you were better at reading you would have realized that. But some unemployed/poor people clearly are financially irresponsible. And sometimes being responsible involves doing things that are unpleasant, like switching careers or relocating. As for the rest, who are in a bad situation because of unfortunate circumstance and not irresponsibility, then I am in favor of certain social assistance programs. But those programs should be limited to people who are trying to be productive by doing things like actively searching for work, willing to learn new skills, willing to relocate, and willing to give up their own luxuries before taking mine - that could include selling some assets, including a house, depending on the circumstances.

Let me begin by stating I agree with the assertion that there are plenty of people out there who are "financially irresponsible" I worked in the banking industry for years, and in that time I talked to a LOT of people who are stupid with money. In that time I have discovered some interesting facts however.
One: The people who tend to be the MOST stupid are the people who HAVE lots of money. I have talked with people who earn 20,000 per month, and are spending 22,000 per month. People who get a paycheck of 6000 and spend a third of that shopping within days of their paycheck. Some of these people have savings, other have nothing, and if they lost their job they would be screwed.
Two: For everyone one person I met like that, I would encounter HUNDREDS of other people making less than 1000 per month and are barely getting by. Swamped by bills, payments and fees.

I have spent years looking at the spending habits of people, and I find often the people who are the MOST finically thrifty, are those who ARE unemployed, or making very little money.

Let me repeat your original assertion:

The conservative view is that financially responsible people should not have to subsidize financially irresponsible people just because those people were irresponsible.

Once again, how do YOU know who is "financially irresponsible" ?
Your assertion read that, if someone is unemployed, it must be BECAUSE they are "financially irresponsible". As though being stupid with money someone gets you unemployed.
Your second assertion for not wishing to pay for the unemployed was:

But those programs should be limited to people who are trying to be productive by doing things like actively searching for work, willing to learn new skills, willing to relocate, and willing to give up their own luxuries before taking mine

Once again, you assertion reeks of pomposity. Who are you to decide who is "Not being productive"
Do you honestly believe that there are a majority of people who get unemployment and set on their asses, twiddling their thumbs?
Do you believe that those getting paychecks that are dramatically reduced from what they used to get are happy with that? That someone with a large house, car, credit card payments, should abandon these things?
You talk as though you were someone who has never actually been face with hard finical choices.
Well, I have.

Six months ago I lost the job I had been at for over five.
At the time I had saving a 401k and was making an ok amount.
In the time it took me to find a new job (four months) I burned through my savings, cashed out my 401k and am now working at a job that pays significantly less.
For those four months I applied on average for about 10 jobs per day, with about 4 interviews per weeks.
I cut back on ALL expenses and fell behind on both my house payments and car insurance until I was able to cash out my 401k.
That kept me going till I got a job in November, but I am still bleeding money.

At any point during this, I cannot think of a single instance where I had been "fiscally irresponsible" I worked my ass off trying to find another job, and wasn't picky. I got the first job I was offered and am now working my ass off to cover bills.
And before you ask, my "house" is a very small two bedroom condo that my partner and I bought at 180k and is currently worth 115k. My car is a 2003 junker that I bought outright and am only paying insurance on. My health insurance payments are currently under my partners program and costing me 400$ a month.
So do let me know where I am being "fiscally irresponsible".

One last thing.
I wanted to point out something you said:

willing to give up their own luxuries before taking mine

This was the statement you used when explaining why you are opposed to having people receive extended unemployment.
that "People should give up theirs, before taking mine"

lets see, what does that sound like? OH YESS!
I've got mine, Fuck everyone else.

Funny that?

[Broomstick]

Let me add my story one more time - I should be able to do so briefly, having had so much practice:

In 2005 I was laid off the job I had had for 13 years. When I walked out the door I had ZERO debt. I owed no money to anyone for any thing. I had two vehicles in good condition that were entirely paid off. I had a sum in savings equal to my then salary.

Even before the lay off we had cut back. Gone were the expensive hobbies, we cut back on eating out, ceased to buy books and movies, cancelled the satellite TV service. We, who had already been living sufficiently under our means to accumulate a year's worth of income, cut our cost of living in half six months before the layoff we saw coming, feeling it would ease the transition rather than having to chop everything abruptly. Which, by the way, meant my "year's salary" in the bank should last two to two and half years.

Not only did I start looking for work immediately, I took any temporary and/or part time job I could get, even if it was for merely a day. That meant that I was getting not only that job wage but the offset UI benefit, while continuing to look for more work. I expanded my garden and went from growing flowers to growing only vegetables to cut down on our grocery bills. As time wore on and I could not get permanent work we started selling stuff - radio control aircraft, jewelry, a gold ingot given as a fallback by the redneck side of the family, some of the older/actually valuable books I owned. I collected aluminum cans and scrap metal from the roadside At one point I was working not one but THREE part time jobs.

Let me also point out that our monthly rent is about 2/3 the average for a place our size. Utilities are included so we don't have those bills to worry about. We never had been living in a McMansion, we didn't own a house. No cigarettes (we don't smoke), no booze, no lottery tickets, not even any new clothes for years on end.

After a number of years, though, the money ran out. And I still didn't have permanent work even though I had been looking the entire time, even though I had over 30 years of working experience, even though I have a college degree.

When I did, finally, find permanent full time work it was at 1/5 my prior income level, basically just enough to disqualify me for foodstamps (which we had been getting because we were destitute at that point). Which hummed along for awhile until my employer suddenly stopped pay her employees. She wound up owing me six weeks of wages, 1/10 of my then diminished yearly income. Fortunately, by then I had some other contacts in my new profession and within a week of looking for a new job I had one. I still had to take the former employer to court, she still owes me all but five hundred of the judgement against her because it takes time to enforce these things. It was a bad hit when we had finally started climbing up a little again, which is why my car has needed a good percentage of the exhaust system replaced for the past five months but we haven't had the funds to get it done. Sure, we had saved up a little bit but six weeks of no pay destroyed what little savings we had, despite living under the poverty line, scraped together at that point. When the battery on the car died a month ago we simply did not have the money to buy a new one so our asset was simply parked. We finally got enough money together and replaced it yesterday.

Point to where we were "fiscally irresponsible". Please, I'd like to know some new source of money for us because we are unquestionably poor these days and could really use it. From where I sit, it sure as hell looks like we did everything right, even by your standards, and we're still balancing on a knife edge.

[Simon_Jester]

Magis, another point here is that when you make policies based on assumptions about who is "fiscally irresponsible," you're doing one of two things wrong.

1) You might be saying 'no one can get these benefits, because we don't want to subsidize fiscal irresponsibility.'

But that is idiotic, as you yourself pointed out: no delusion-free person can look at today's economy and assume that ONLY irresponsible people are out of work, or that responsible people will find work on some kind of set time-schedule. Being a responsible adult is not enough to get you back into the workforce in three months, or for that matter six or twelve.

OR

2) You are engaged in some kind of elaborate bizarre process designed to weed out 'financially irresponsible' people. That's going to require a lot of bureaucracy, a rigorous legal definition of 'irresponsible,' still more bureaucracy to ensure ongoing compliance with 'responsibility' rules by your welfare recipients...

This kind of thing does not make welfare less expensive. It just makes it more punitive for the average recipient, most of whom don't actually need a team of bureaucrats going over their finances with a fine tooth comb every day to "cut the luxuries." They couldn't afford luxuries in the first place, with the possible exception of a very bare minimum of entertainment expenses that frankly the average person needs just to stay sane.

And a lot of the things that disconnected morons like energiewende think are luxuries... aren't, at least not if you want welfare to be a place you can live while finding a job, which was supposed to be the point. You need support to handle medical expenses (in the US). You need support to maintain a car (in almost all places in the US, and many places elsewhere), or to fund heavy use of public transit (everywhere a car isn't needed). You need telephone and Internet access because it's impossible to do a meaningful job search without them. You need someone to look after your (hypothetical) children while all this is going on, because you damn sure can't raise kids effectively while rolling all over town ringing HR departments' phones off the hook.

And yet to hear energiewende talk a little while ago, medicine, cars, bus fare, phone bills, Internet access, and day care are all luxuries.

So who is defining which expenses constitute "luxury" expenses that only "fiscally irresponsible" people would spend money on while unemployed? Better figure out a way to make sure it isn't some idiot like him. Because if it is, then your entire welfare program falls apart and you wind up with a huge blob of absolutely hopeless and destitute people spilling out into society with literally nothing better to do than commit crimes to support themselves.
____________________

Also...

^What Simon said.

[Thanas]

^What Simon said.

Why the ?

[Metahive]

"Fiscal Responsibility", eh? Like all those rich bankers and assorted businessmen who ran the economy into the ground and were generously bailed out for their troubles? Truly money well spent - unlike money given to those freaking unwashed poor. Can't trust them, they might use their money for something frivolous so better keep 'em on the short leash and always check thrice!

BTW, all those tax cuts for the wealthy? That's nothing but welfare, dudes! Wonder why nobody of those "fiscally responsible" libertarian social darwinists ever argues against those...oh, I just answered my own question.

[Havok]

I never made any such claim, and if you were better at reading you would have realized that. But some unemployed/poor people clearly are financially irresponsible.

Just to point this out, most rich people are HORRIBLY financially irresponsible, they just happen to have the luxury of being rich.

[mr friendly guy]

I am willing to give them reasonable assistance to have a functional life until they can have their unfortunate situation resolved. In reality, many or most people should have enough savings to get by a few months anyway. If they don't have such savings, they should never have bought a house in the first place, or should have sold it long ago. Naturally, in the event of a housing crisis like in the USA in 2008, social assistance for housing/mortgages is more reasonable than in other times.

I don't want to dogpile you, but I do have a question and hope you can answer. If you have savings "to get by a few months" and have a house, then the financially beneficial thing would be to put most of it into the mortgage. Its just pure maths. The interest you get from savings is less than the interest you pay on the mortgage. I consider this the more financially prudent strategy and I have done this in my own mortgage (which is now paid off).

However in the event of a job loss, the financially responsible person would be almost as fucked as the financially irresponsible person. Both would be forced to borrow against the mortgage to cover living expenses. The only difference would be the former would most probably attract somewhat less interest due to putting their savings into the mortgage.

If you are for giving some of these financially irresponsible people help, but not so for the financially irresponsible people, how would you tell them apart in this case? (Lets not get into the cost to the government of setting up a new bureaucracy for now).

[Flagg]

Interesting fact that no one seems to be noticing at all:
Cost of Republican Government shutdown? $25 billion
Cost of extending unemployment benefits? $25 billion

[Akhlut]

Speaking of just handing out welfare checks to anyone who asks for them:

http://www.dominionpaper.ca/articles/4100

...Initially, the Mincome program was conceived as a labour market experiment. The government wanted to know what would happen if everybody in town received a guaranteed income, and specifically, they wanted to know whether people would still work.

It turns out they did.

Only two segments of Dauphin's labour force worked less as a result of Mincome—new mothers and teenagers. Mothers with newborns stopped working because they wanted to stay at home longer with their babies. And teenagers worked less because they weren't under as much pressure to support their families.

The end result was that they spent more time at school and more teenagers graduated. Those who continued to work were given more opportunities to choose what type of work they did.

“People didn't have to take the first job that came along,” says Hikel. “They could wait for something better that suited them.”

For some, it meant the opportunity to land a job to help them get by.

When Doreen and Hugh Henderson arrived in Dauphin in 1970 with their two young children they were broke. Doreen suggested moving from Vancouver to her hometown because she thought her husband would have an easier time finding work there. But when they arrived, things weren't any better.

“My husband didn't have a very good job and I couldn't find work,” she told The Dominion by phone from Dauphin.

It wasn't until 1978, after receiving Mincome payments for two years, that her husband finally landed janitorial work at the local school, a job he kept for 28 years.

“I don't know how we would have lived without [Mincome],” said Doreen.“I don't know if we would have stayed in Dauphin.”

Although the Mincome experiment was intended to provide a body of information to study labour market trends, Forget discovered that Mincome had a significant effect on people's well being. Two years ago, the professor started studying the health records of Dauphin residents to assess the impacts of the program.

In the period that Mincome was administered, hospital visits dropped 8.5 per cent. Fewer people went to the hospital with work-related injuries and there were fewer emergency room visits from car accidents and domestic abuse. There were also far fewer mental health visits.

It's not hard to see why, says Forget.

“When you walk around a hospital, it's pretty clear that a lot of the time what we're treating are the consequences of poverty,” she says...

Aw, shit, turns out just giving people money results in better life decisions being made by most people as they stop taking shit jobs just to pay bills, can afford preventative healthcare, and not have to worry about all the daily assaults that poverty inflicts on people.

[xthetenth]

And a lot of the things that disconnected morons like energiewende think are luxuries... aren't, at least not if you want welfare to be a place you can live while finding a job, which was supposed to be the point. You need support to handle medical expenses (in the US). You need support to maintain a car (in almost all places in the US, and many places elsewhere), or to fund heavy use of public transit (everywhere a car isn't needed). You need telephone and Internet access because it's impossible to do a meaningful job search without them. You need someone to look after your (hypothetical) children while all this is going on, because you damn sure can't raise kids effectively while rolling all over town ringing HR departments' phones off the hook.

There are times when it seems that the current policy towards welfare would be dramatically liberalized were it approached strictly as an investment. It feels like sound policy by a government which literally saw human life as a means to doing work for the economy would be more humane than what we have now. It would probably be worthwhile to rephrase the debate as funding welfare programs as a means to preemptively discourage crime, encourage continued participation in the economy and prevent medical costs by allowing preventative care, IE preventing the direct results of poverty.

[Zaune]

I wouldn't advise it. Someone might get it into their head that you could also preemptively reduce crime, healthcare costs and such by turning the unemployed into dogfood.

[xthetenth]

And waste those potentially valuable investments? The only machinery of industry where proper investment is so maligned is humans. Such waste would be unthinkable if it were valuable infrastructure, and the thing is it actually is but people are to caught up in passing judgment to notice that.

[Simon_Jester]

The main problem is that in the current version of capitalism, we more or less model each employee as their own private little company that 'sells' labor. There's no other good way to explain it. This is very natural for economists who want to apply free-market logic to absolutely everything ever, and ideologues who want to do the same.

And it undermines the idea that we should be deliberately investing our collective resources in long-shot 'labor suppliers' who aren't doing well as it is.

The problem with this attitude is that corporations routinely die after a decade or two and no one mourns them; that's what happens to a lot of entities whose life depends on supplying a desired good to the free market. Even reasonably successful corporations have a life expectancy of something like 20 years, and corporations are routinely bought out body and soul by other corporations when they start to fail.

Since neither slavery nor a 20-year life expectancy are something we're prepared to accept for human beings... Maybe we need a different conceptual model for what it means to be a working citizen in a free market economy. Preferably one that emphasizes citizen, not "consumer," "employee," or whatever.

[Purple]

Since neither slavery nor a 20-year life expectancy are something we're prepared to accept for human beings... Maybe we need a different conceptual model for what it means to be a working citizen in a free market economy. Preferably one that emphasizes citizen, not "consumer," "employee," or whatever.

So a model that emphasized human goals rather than economic ones, welfare rather than consumption, the good of each citizen rather than the good of large faceless economic entities? That sounds very familiar. I just can't put my finger on it...

[Gaidin]

The main problem is that in the current version of capitalism, we more or less model each employee as their own private little company that 'sells' labor. There's no other good way to explain it. This is very natural for economists who want to apply free-market logic to absolutely everything ever, and ideologues who want to do the same.

And it undermines the idea that we should be deliberately investing our collective resources in long-shot 'labor suppliers' who aren't doing well as it is.

The problem with this attitude is that corporations routinely die after a decade or two and no one mourns them; that's what happens to a lot of entities whose life depends on supplying a desired good to the free market. Even reasonably successful corporations have a life expectancy of something like 20 years, and corporations are routinely bought out body and soul by other corporations when they start to fail.

Since neither slavery nor a 20-year life expectancy are something we're prepared to accept for human beings... Maybe we need a different conceptual model for what it means to be a working citizen in a free market economy. Preferably one that emphasizes citizen, not "consumer," "employee," or whatever.

Purple kind of isolated that last bit, but it sounded like you were going at it for the company as much as for the person? Am I understanding this correctly? To me this sounds like something, from a person standpoint I'd want to be careful of lest we start requiring corporations to have responsibilities. But then, if we require something have responsibilities, can they demand rights, and you get more and overarching cases like Citizens United again? If I'm taking your post in a totally different direction than you wanted ignore it, because I'm usually not up this early anyway so I'm not usually thinking like this.

[Civil War Man]

And waste those potentially valuable investments? The only machinery of industry where proper investment is so maligned is humans. Such waste would be unthinkable if it were valuable infrastructure, and the thing is it actually is but people are to caught up in passing judgment to notice that.

You'd think that, but particularly in the US that's becoming less true. Just look at, for example, our bridges and power grid. Two absolutely critical aspects of the national infrastructure, and their decay is basically being ignored because zero thought is being given to their long-term viability, and every dollar spent upgrading them is one less dollar that can be funneled into a congressman's pet project in his home district.

A lot of the big corporations seem to be taking a similar attitude. When was the last time you've seen someone fix a broken toaster, instead of just throwing it out and buying a new one? It's been a while, because more and more products have built-in obsolescence. They are specifically designed to be cheap to replace, expensive to repair, and prone to break after a short amount of time. We live in a disposable economy. It costs more in the long run to let the infrastructure decay and die, but the elite don't care because cutting corners puts more money in their pockets now, and they are shielded from the fallout when their unsustainable model inevitably collapses.

[Zaune]

So a model that emphasized human goals rather than economic ones, welfare rather than consumption, the good of each citizen rather than the good of large faceless economic entities? That sounds very familiar. I just can't put my finger on it...

Utilitarianism?

[Simon_Jester]

Purple kind of isolated that last bit, but it sounded like you were going at it for the company as much as for the person? Am I understanding this correctly?

Uh, no. I don't give a damn whether any given corporation lives or dies, because corporations are abstract entities we create and destroy for the sake of having an efficient economy.

I do, however, care what happens to people.

Our rules for corporations boil down to "if you can't compete and/or can't scrape up the cash to dig yourself out of the hole you're in, you either break up entirely or are sold out to a more successful corporation person or organization." This is fine because, corporations are expendable. Corporations have no claim on our mercy, except insofar as real live human beings might suffer- and in those cases our support should go to the humans, not the corporations.

Again, corporations are expendable in pursuit of Value. Or prosperity, efficiency, whatever you want to call it.

But human beings are not expendable in pursuit of these values. Expending human beings for the sake of prosperity totally defeats the purpose of becoming prosperous. Therefore, we cannot treat a human being the way we'd treat a corporation. We cannot say "if you can't compete and/or can't scrape up the cash to dig yourself out of the hole you're in, you either break up entirely or are sold out to a more successful corporation." Because that is what you say to a worthless and expendable thing, not to an intrinsically valuable human being..

[Gaidin]

Sorry about that then. It just sort of struck me oddly as something that would seem to have to be taken that way if you wanted that kind of thing because companies could always die out, and people would lose their jobs. Companies could move and people could lose their jobs, and we've had discussions in this very thread on how hard it is to move. And other forms of how the company may only be interested in the labor as a quantity. I just can't see a reason for them to be interested in more as it stands.

[Simon_Jester]

Hm. I'm not sure I'm understanding what you've said. It might be sleep deprivation, but I'm not processing it very well. Could you explain whether you are agreeing or disagreeing with what I've said, or whether you're raising some separate related or unrelated point?

Sorry. Brain misfiring I guess.