Azelma wrote:
Certainly I don't. Which is why those art history majors need to quit bitching and accept their lot in life.
What, to be unemployed and on state aid? If anyone is "not accepting" of that it is you.
And I think you would feel quite different if the shoe were on the other foot. You are not particularly intelligent or skilled; you are overly proud of what you have - if you were told to accept your "lot in life" I don't see you taking it with any more equanimity than you take any else of life's ups and downs.
Azelma wrote:
I just think those people shouldn't complain about not having white collar, highly paid jobs, when they didn't bother to go after them by getting a law degree, or learning how to code, or by trying their hand at being entrepreneurial, or going to business school, or becoming an engineer, or any of the other thousands of things they could have done to avoid being a waiter.
They aren't. UNemployed.
Azelma wrote:
I think a global economy changed that actually. If someone will do the same job for less and not demand every benefit they can possibly get, can you fault the corporations (whose main goal is to increase profits for shareholders) for hiring them?
Yes.
There's no such thing as free trade and there never will be. Foreign workers are cheaper only because their governments are willing to allow their people to suffer a level of neglect and abuse that civilized people would never tolerate.
Go read about life in Wuhan.
Azelma wrote:
Regardless of your thoughts on the matter, the times change...we became a service based economy. We can't go back. You either adapt or you don't. If you don't adapt, or won't adapt, then I can't say I feel sorry for you.
You are ignorant. Historical pendulums swing back and forth all the time. We are not the first declining nation to have reduced employment and industry. Sheltered people have been giving this same attitude of indifference for thousands of years in almost the same words thinking they've found something new when it's really just repeating old mistakes.
Go read a few of Cato the Younger's speeches, or re-read "A Modest Proposal".
"Adapt" really just means, "I got mine, so my brain has turned off. Until I don't got mine anymore."
How did Reagan put it? "A recession is when your neighbor loses his job. A depression is when you lose yours." It sums up the attitude here nicely.
Azelma wrote:
Wrong. For-Profit organizations exist solely serve to increase their value for shareholders. That's it. I personally feel that with that, however, shareholders and executives should have a social conscience.
If you think that corporations' only responsibility is to make profit for themselves and not be a part of making a better world, why don't you become a Communist? What is the point in advocating a system that even you claim isn't aimed at making a better world?
What, to you, defines a "social conscience"? Blood money?
How is that different than alms under feudalism?
Azelma wrote:
Who has more culpability, the person who asks or the person who gives? The government didn't have to authorize the bailout...they could have let them fail, which they should have done. I fail to see how it is the corporations fault for doing anything they could to survive. Did you expect all the executives and shareholders to simply say "oh, well, we're fucked.....ce'st la vie!"? No. It was the government's responsibility to be the parent and let them fail. The government didn't though...so here we stand.
...because corporations are pulling the strings.
"The government" is a tool. It has no preformed intentions. Corporations do, they have the intentions, they have the power.
Azelma wrote:
No...it's called "what happens in growing organizations." Adding employees doesn't = added value 100% of the time...and in fact it can take away value. Ask any businessman ever. Hey test it out if you want. Start your own business (taking all the risk of course), and just start hiring people because it's "the right thing to do" and let me know how that works out for you.
From the Great Wall of China to the Internet, more is pretty invariably better.
If what you said is true that would contravene the principle of the free market which is that price directly equates to value.
Azelma wrote:
You are mixing corporations and people (Understandable given the problem that is corporate personhood). That said, the government is terrible at enforcing change or competitiveness in corporations.
Corporations are comprised of individual people.
The government has done a pretty damn good job. Clean Air Act? Civil Rights Act? Health and safety laws? Are you really going to say that would come to pass through private initiative?
General Motors? They fought efforts to get them to adapt tooth and nail. Now they're dead. Same with RCA, AOL, etc.
Azelma wrote:
Think of how the government allows Clear Channel Communications to exist. Again, you are blaming the problems of corporate America on everyone but the government. Really, the government is equally culpable. They made the rules of the game and have the nerve to blame corporations for exploiting them.
Bullshit. Lobbyists write the rules.
Azelma wrote:
Here's a WoW example for you. Blizzard rages when people use exploits to defeat boss encounters or get achievements (even going so far as to ban people). Is it the player's fault that Blizzard's mistakes led to exploitable flaws in the system that they didn't anticipate? Nope. It's Blizzard's fault for not finding and eliminating those flaws in the first place. Sure, it's pretty cheap for a player to exploit...but it wouldn't be an issue if the exploit didn't exist - can't blame human nature.
Kungen is stupid and wrong and so are you. If it's not working as intended then it's exploiting and actionable. You might as well argue you're entitled to walk off with anything that isn't nailed down.
Finally, Azelma, I'm going to point out, you're a nominally skilled individual who gets paid a fairly generous salary in a difficult economic environment. You realize, statistically, the chances of you being a bum by the age of 40 are pretty good. I truly wonder what you will think and say when that comes to pass.