Well screw the middle class.

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I sort of agree, those would be good too. They are both necessary... and is what distinguishes us from many 2nd world nations and BRICT nations, and they inspire confidence in the middle class so that they personally insure less against the risks of tomorrow, and spend more today to help our consumer spending driven economy forward, but it does hurt our savings rate tremendously.

Romney could not get rid of the safety net. Just like Bush with his pitch to the elderly via the medicare prescription drug program, the vote of the elderly is vital for the success of the GOP in election years. Regardless of who is in office this next election, our entitlements are not sustainable, and Obama or Romney will have to began cutting them for future generations, or raise taxes severely both on the wealthy and everyone in general to sustain them.

I thought supply and demand always set wages to match productivity. Therefore if you're poor it's because you're unproductive.

Or they could put tax money to better use and cut other areas. I mean I wonder what most tax money goes to?

Our military spending is problematic, and not because we spend so much... I would even argue we need to spend more because of the current reality that we keep the peace in much of the world. Our military spending is problematic because we don't demand all of those who benefit from the world we have made and maintained to also invest in the international security that keeps the peace. Romney frames it correctly, we should demand that other nations in alliance with us spend at least 2% of their GDP on defense spending as a condition for American support.

Look up the Grace commission and it shows what happens with our income tax. 1/3rd is lost to waste and inefficiency, another 1/3rd escapes collection due to the underground economy, and the remaining 1/3rd goes EXCLUSIVELY to servicing the interest on national debt and by federal government contributions to transfer payments. Zero goes to any of those government services certain people love so much.

Think about that the next time these jokers talk about taxes not being high enough,

Uhh what peace? you mean all the various wars and other terrible things going on around the world?

1. bad things are happening, indeed, but much worse could happen.

2. there has never been peace on earth in modern times. And if you think it is bad now, contemplate The Hundred Years war and the Thirty Years War. Our wars, dreadful as they may be are generally concluded in under ten years.

ruveyn

Who does the Middle East turn to when Iran or Iraq is causing problems? Who does Taiwan, South Korea, Japan, Australia, India, and all who share the South China Sea turn to when China or North Korea is misbehaving? Who do the Europeans turn to when a genocide on their own continent is taking up to much newscoverage and they simply wish the massacres away? Who will stand up to Russia when they began to bully one of their many former territories? Everyone knows their role, especially the major powers, because the US will be there in a second if they misbehave.

Our fleets in the Pacific keep the peace in Asia, and Obama has done a swell job of forging relationships with many of the nations there to keep a hold on China. Iraq and Afghanistan withstanding, every Middle Eastern country looks to the US whenever it needs reassurance that there will be someone to back them up if one of their many dictators decides to invade any of the many countries in that part of the world. The Europeans are utterly useless and take no leadership on anything, and so is the UN. Considering the history of humanity, the question isn't why there is war today or other terrible things going on around the world... but why there isn't more of it. I don't know how professors have colored your view of the world, but war is the norm, and that France isn't warring with Spain, Japan isn't warring with the Philippines or South Korea, or America with Canada is relatively new in the history of man. Democracies tend to go to war less with other democracies, and you have America, its military, and its' spread and enforcement of the ideal to thank for that.

When did I claim there was? Also how does worse wars in the past make it 'good' now? I just said what peace? there isn't really much of that so how is the U.S keeping the peace if there isn't any.

It does, but you're oversimplifying. The demand for people who can perform a heart transplant is higher than for people who can grab their junk, because the ability to perform a heart transplant is in lower supply than people who can grab their junk.

There are no good times. There are only bad times and worse times.

ruveyn

I may not be as well versed in all the details of textbook neoclassical economics as you (I'm in the process of learning) but I'm not an idiot.

Your statement is true when we are talking about skilled professions that are in demand. This is because through demand, skilled professionals have the bargaining power to be their own agent. Before the industrial revolution the economy was dominated by skilled craftsmen who had the bargaining power to be their own agent. Mass production changed all this, shifting the bargaining power to those who own capital, placing more and more people into jobs that could theoretically be done by a robot. Does neoclassical economics somehow derive that an owner or CEO may be a hundredfold times more productive than an average wage earner? I've heard some make this claim and I would assume it holds up even in the case of the infamous absentee landlords during the Irish Potato famine.

As I've recently had a couple of discussions that went haywire, in part I'm sure to my tendency to assume that everyone knows what I do and think like me, I'm trying to take precautions.



I'm not entirely sure if the following is from neoclassical economics or another school (sorry haven't slept for 36 hours so I do apologize if this is somewhat incoherent at times) but it goes something like:

A capital owner (in this case an factory owner, a land owner etc) is productive through delaying his own gratification (gained from spending money now) in order to receive more at a later time (through allocation of capital to a productive activity) due to this part of the resulting production can be attributed to the owner.

I can elaborate later, but right now I need some sleep as I can't really think straight.