[Cog]

People trap themselves into debt. What entitlements have been cut? I only wish the Republicans had done so.

[Newfie]

It’s not nearly so simple Cog. But I don’t expect you to understand. I grew up poor, generations of poor. Damn hard working poor. No one worked harder than my parents to break from the poverty.

As one from the wrong side of the tracks your voice sounds imperious and ignorant. I don’t know your history, and maybe you have a good reason for your opinions, it is not yet evident.

[Newfie]

Here is a news big that is somewhat relevant to this topic, and many other discussions we have had.

https://nypost.com/2018/02/10/heres-ano ... lling-off/

Who is to blame when the cashier becomes obsolete?

Is society to simply “off” them, deposit in the recycle bin like a Blackberry?

Or is there some obligation to the newly poor?

[Outcast_Searcher]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Newfie', 'H')ere is a news big that is somewhat relevant to this topic, and many other discussions we have had.

https://nypost.com/2018/02/10/heres-ano ... lling-off/

Who is to blame when the cashier becomes obsolete?

Is society to simply “off” them, deposit in the recycle bin like a Blackberry?

Or is there some obligation to the newly poor?

[Newfie]

As I mention time and again we have been struggling with this dilemina for going on 80 years at least. The earliest discussion I know of is by Bertran Russel in about 1935.

Our failure to adapt to this new high level of automation is a large part of our social difficulties and high poverty.

I think Russel’s proposed solution seriously misses the mark. He drastically under rates how much people need to feel a productive part of society, even if it is a thinly veiled illusion. But he did start the conversation.

http://www.zpub.com/notes/idle.html

[asg70]

Doom was supposed to result in a world made by hand, not by robot. Technology will fail as we descend into Mad Max and the Olduvai gorge, remember?



We live in interesting times that the topic has shifted towards a techno-apocalypse instead.

[Plantagenet]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Newfie', 'A')s I mention time and again we have been struggling with this dilemina for going on 80 years at least. The earliest discussion I know of is by Bertran Russel in about 1935.

Our failure to adapt to this new high level of automation is a large part of our social difficulties and high poverty.

I think Russel’s proposed solution seriously misses the mark. He drastically under rates how much people need to feel a productive part of society, even if it is a thinly veiled illusion. But he did start the conversation.

http://www.zpub.com/notes/idle.html

[evilgenius]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('asg70', '&')quot;lost its connection to the science"

Which says what?

[Yoshua]

Another prophet, Peter Schiff: "But they [the Fed] can’t tell the truth that it’s really a bubble, and if we raise rates, we’re gonna prick it."

"Trump is going to get blamed when the economy tanks because the media has already decided that they are on the side of socialism. When all of this happens, prepare for the free market (which we don’t have) to be blamed and prepare for the tax cuts to be blamed.  This will pave the way for Communism."

For a capitalism the worst nightmare is communism...but we all on this site of course know that this will end in an apocalypse.

[asg70]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Yoshua', 'A')nother prophet, Peter Schiff

[Outcast_Searcher]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Plantagenet', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Newfie', 'A')s I mention time and again we have been struggling with this dilemina for going on 80 years at least. The earliest discussion I know of is by Bertran Russel in about 1935.

Our failure to adapt to this new high level of automation is a large part of our social difficulties and high poverty.

I think Russel’s proposed solution seriously misses the mark. He drastically under rates how much people need to feel a productive part of society, even if it is a thinly veiled illusion. But he did start the conversation.

http://www.zpub.com/notes/idle.html

[Outcast_Searcher]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Yoshua', 'A')nother prophet, Peter Schiff: "But they [the Fed] can’t tell the truth that it’s really a bubble, and if we raise rates, we’re gonna prick it."

[KaiserJeep]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Outcast_Searcher', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Newfie', 'H')ere is a news big that is somewhat relevant to this topic, and many other discussions we have had.

https://nypost.com/2018/02/10/heres-ano ... lling-off/

Who is to blame when the cashier becomes obsolete?

Is society to simply “off” them, deposit in the recycle bin like a Blackberry?

Or is there some obligation to the newly poor?

[Newfie]

BMI = Basic Minimum Income

Or

BMI = Body Mass Index

??

[Outcast_Searcher]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('evilgenius', ' ')The problem lies, really, in the disconnection the US economy has developed between the investment world and your average locale within America.

[Outcast_Searcher]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('KaiserJeep', '
')IMHO, the BMI is the stuff of nightmares.

[Outcast_Searcher]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Newfie', 'B')MI = Basic Minimum Income

Or

BMI = Body Mass Index

??

[KaiserJeep]

No homeless folks would get fat or have a child eating kibble, the people rationing is designed to prevent that. Calories are carefully controlled, and hormones are added that prevent reproduction.

Then we need to round the homeless up periodically and put them in camps so that they have a warm place to sleep.

The lucky ones would have sleeping quarters next to the warm ovens. The ovens that are fed with fracked natural gas, paid for by the tax dollars of the 20% still working, for the benefit of the 80% who have no income other than the government dole.

It's all so logical. As conditions worsen, the government must maintain order. The trains must also run on time, and the broadcast of major sporting events must continue. We can vote for the R or the D, depending upon which major party will do the better job maintaining our lifestyle.

It's the way Americans and other citizens of the First World will count themselves among the 10% who survive the Great Die Off. If conditions continue to deteriorate, we can retire those expensive-to-run gas ovens and make kibble from Soylent Green, solving two problems at once.

[Outcast_Searcher]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('KaiserJeep', 'N')o homeless folks would get fat or have a child eating kibble, the people rationing is designed to prevent that. Calories are carefully controlled, and hormones are added that prevent reproduction.

Then we need to round the homeless up periodically and put them in camps so that they have a warm place to sleep.

The lucky ones would have sleeping quarters next to the warm ovens. The ovens that are fed with fracked natural gas, paid for by the tax dollars of the 20% still working, for the benefit of the 80% who have no income other than the government dole.

[KaiserJeep]

I wasn't suggesting that we start with the above nightmare. I do, however think that in the dieback of 90% of the current humans, things will get bad all over, including here in America. I am aware of and somewhat troubled by the fact that the First World nations will get the lion's share of the diminishing FF's, while the Third World and Second World get the lion's share of the suffering and death.

As for your "robot tax", it is nonsense. First of all, there are very few machines that justify the name "robot". Dishwashers, washing machines, weed whackers, and powered lawn mowers for example are appliances or tools - but they rendered domestic human servants obsolete. Once you have a good definition of "robot" my engineering brethren will design non-robotic machines that perform the same tasks without the robot tax. It would also be a non-productive and silly thing to do - if a human form robot can do a task better and cheaper, it should. Nor should it be necessary to re-design the machine into a less efficient form to avoid a robot tax.

As for taxes in general, here is how they are distributed and who pays how much today:

Call the two lower brackets "Low Income" and the two higher brackets "High Income", and the three in the center "Middle Income". 55% of the total taxes are paid by "High Income", 50% by "Middle Income", and the "Low Income" brackets get subsidies that amount to 6% (there is a total 1% rounding error across all seven income brackets).

That is today. The system is already steeply "progressive", if that is the right word. The fabled 1% are all found in the $1M and higher income brackets, of course. Speaking personally, I never made it out of "middle middle" when I was still working, and now I'm to the left of the middle.

Nor do the 1% own all the means of production. They own some, but the four highest income brackets are where virtually all ownership lies, with a large part in the retirement funds of people who basicly worked for a prolonged period for what they have. That includes not only the corporations which you are probably thinking of, but also the Small and Medium businesses that are mainly owned by the Middle Classes.

That lowest Middle Income bracket is "the working poor". They don't own much, they depend upon Social Security alone, they are vulnerable to inflation and the whims of politicians.