[Lore]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('John_A', '
')
Yup. Fortunately, even for all of that there are still places where innovation is appreciated and rewarded, and America is still one of those places. Unfortunate that those who can are forced to support the socialists agenda of a political organization doing its best to make sure those qualities are forced to pay for the sins of their supporters, but maybe that is just the way the majority want it nowadays. Give them the dole, and they are happy.

[Lore]

More evidence that we've become a nation beholding to a plutocracy.


$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '[')b]Timothy Noah on America's income immobility

(CBS News) Americans have always believed that their children will have it better than they do. But now that's in doubt, according to our Contributor and New Republic editor Timothy Noah, whose latest book is titled "The Great Divergence":

Americans know their country has a lot of economic inequality. But they tell themselves that's OK. It's OK because America offers a wealth of opportunity to those at the bottom. We're unique that way.

The only problem is, it isn't true.

President Obama said so in the recent election: "The rungs on the ladder of opportunity have grown farther and farther apart."

Republican vice presidential nominee Paul Ryan said so, too: "Right now, America's engines of upward mobility aren't working the way they should."

Our self-image as the land of opportunity comes mainly from two writers: One was Horatio Alger, who wrote dime novels about plucky street urchins getting ahead. The other was James Truslaw Adams, an historian who coined the phrase "the American Dream."

Alger and Adams were not up-from-the-bottom types themselves; they were born into prosperous families and received good educations. But they lived in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the time of America's rapid industrialization, and both saw that this young country offered many more opportunities for advancement than class-bound Europe.

Today we've got nothing like that kind of mobility.

The last time U.S. mobility was actually growing was the post-World War II era. Even then, the growth wasn't as rapid as in Alger's and Adams' time. Today, many researchers believe, we have less mobility than we did as recently as the 1970s.

Meanwhile, Europe started beating us at our own game. One recent study ranked U.S. mobility below Germany, France, Spain, even Canada. Another found that American men were more likely to inherit their parents' economic status than they were to inherit their parents' height and weight.

What happened? Economists aren't sure. But it's been noted that countries where incomes are notably unequal -- as they are in the U.S. -- tend to experience notably less mobility.

When those rungs get further apart, the ladder gets harder to climb. So even if you don't care about inequality, you may have to, if you care about opportunity.

timothynoah.com
"The Great Divergence: America's Growing Inequality Crisis and What We Can Do About It" by Timothy Noah (Bloomsbury) | eBook

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-3445_162-57 ... mmobility/

[John_A]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Lore', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('John_A', '
')
Yup. Fortunately, even for all of that there are still places where innovation is appreciated and rewarded, and America is still one of those places. Unfortunate that those who can are forced to support the socialists agenda of a political organization doing its best to make sure those qualities are forced to pay for the sins of their supporters, but maybe that is just the way the majority want it nowadays. Give them the dole, and they are happy.

[Lore]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('John_A', '
')America has been democratic a long time, but only recently has it been trending towards socialism and living on the dole as a life dream of so many.

[Oneaboveall]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'W')hat we have here is the ignoranti being fooled by the plutocrats of power who are adept at shifting blame.

[Buddy_J]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Lore', '
')
Socialism is defined as a system in which the means of production are owned and controlled by the state, often described as central planning. If I'm not mistaken, production in the US economy is controlled and owned within the private sector, so called, free market capitalist system. You only have to see that the rich are getting richer to understand how well that's working.

[Buddy_J]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Oneaboveall', '
')And here is a perfect example:
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'A')merica has been democratic a long time, but only recently has it been trending towards socialism and living on the dole as a life dream of so many.

[Lore]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Buddy_J', '
')Government Motors fits this definition nicely, as does the managed bankruptcy of both them and Chrysler. The US mortgage market, the health care system takeover....seriously...what is left now that the government is in cahoots with their campaign contributors in autos, houses and health care? In those three things a majority of the largest economy in the world has just been accounted for.

[Oneaboveall]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Buddy_J', '
')Aid is not necessarily a necessity, it is a subsidy by the government, a subsidy designed to make sure an ever larger portion of the population knows who puts butter on their bread.

[kublikhan]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Oneaboveall', 'T')his is exactly why I hardly post here anymore. It's either resource depletion used as a justification for handing everything to our beloved corporate gods or complaints about poor people receiving help that completely ignores corporate subsidies and bailouts.

[dsula]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('kublikhan', ' ')If workers were paid a fair wage for their labor and the rules of the game were not rigged for the rich,

[kublikhan]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('dsula', 'I')t's not that simple. The game is surely rigged in favor of the super rich. But claiming the poor only being victims is also wrong. As hard as it sounds, but poor/uneducated/unskilled/unreliable people are in no short supply and can be easily replaced. Highly skilled, motivated, productive people are not as easy to get.

[Buddy_J]

America is in decline for a myriad of reasons, the wealth gap, the functionality of home ownership, paper profit barons, the crating up and shipping out of the manufacturing sector because of wall street driven short term profit goals, and completely inexperienced executive branch leaders among them.

But there are other, more core reasons as well. Expectations of the youth who cannot see a path forward to the type of wealth their rapacious boomer parents have, the modern popularity driven culture driven home by TV and the likes of gangsta rap, get rich quick mentalities and me-first propensities among the youth of the country, hard work being an epithet rather than something to aspire to.

In that context, the likes of Obama being elected is not a surprise, nor are his actions as he races to drag the country to the bottom in as many categories as possible. The WORST RECOVERY EVER being just another consequence of his goals.

[vision-master]

fook off 1%er's.

[topcat]

Kub wrote
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'P')eople do not dream about being on welfare. Do you really think people are out there thinking to themselves "If only I was a little bit poorer, then I could be on welfare!"

[Lore]

Yes, unfortunately we're becoming a country that pays peanuts and then bitches it gets monkeys. We revel in ignorance and admire those who preach it. We aspire to the bottom and then berate those who wallow there.

We've let an elite group of wealthy overloads push the meme that it's your neighbor out to get something for nothing, when in reality it's them who have received much for nothing. Meanwhile, they laugh behind locked boardroom doors at the ruse they've played on their weak minded sycophants. Ultimately cutting their own throats and that of the country.

[Plantagenet]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Lore', ' ')we're becoming a country that pays peanuts ......

[Plantagenet]

Since a rising GDP translates to more wealth, the slow growth since 2009 corresponds to a loss of about $3200 per year for each and every person in America.

The WORST RECOVERY EVER costing Americans big bucks

[ralfy]

I think Lore's phrase refers to paying a small amount, getting a lot more in return, then complaining that a lot isn't good enough. In short, it's a country of entitlement, ignorance, and narcissism, and has been going on for several decades. What took place after 2009 onward is the result of such.

[kublikhan]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Buddy_J', 'E')xpectations of the youth who cannot see a path forward to the type of wealth their rapacious boomer parents have, the modern popularity driven culture driven home by TV and the likes of gangsta rap, get rich quick mentalities and me-first propensities among the youth of the country, hard work being an epithet rather than something to aspire to.