America and the dollar

Spectre

Spectre

Joined
Nov 3, 1998
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I just finished my final exam, a take-home, in my Colonial America class. One of the two main texts we had for the semester portrayed America as having been built almost literally on the bodies of the exploited lower classes. I disagree.

This country was created in pursuit of wealth, was occupied by those in pursuit of wealth, has become great in pursuit in wealth, and has remained a bastion of freedom because of laws allowing accumulation of wealth.

Not that I'm a capitalist, or anything. ;)

John
 
I agree with you, John, but I'd believe most of the texts at todays universities have such an ignorant slant. That way the professors are comfortable with what they are reading. Who is the publisher I wonder?
 
cliff355 said:
Well, it is news to me that the original white invaders were pursuing anything. I always thought they were trying to get away from the Pope.
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Most of those that we call colonials, I believe, were running from the Anglican Church.
 
I guess it depends on what you mean by exploitation.

In the 1700's we took the Indians land and moved into agriculture. The immigrants moving here were moving away from exploitation to a better life more or less. The indians were moving the other way.

In the 1800's we had slavery. The vast quantity of agricultural goods produced were not able to be produced as cheaply without slaves. I only know a few people who could say blacks weren't exploited.

In the 1900's government policy (cutting taxes for the rich) caused an accumulation of wealth at the top while the vast majority of workers were in poverty. Eventally it got to the point that they couldn't afford anything and the economy crashed.

After WW2 the GI bill offered an education to classes that couldn't afford it and allowed lots of folks to up their income, and their family's income. Also unions increased wages.

Now with globalization peoples wages are falling. However lucky for the US we can buy cheap goods from the Chinese and other third world countries. Are we exploiting these people? The Chinese gov't could really better these folks a lot more than they are, but they are putting a lot of the profit into buying our gov't bonds to finance our debt rather than helping their own folks, although people ARE doing better there.

It's really hard to say who is being exploited now. Who should reap the most benefit for production? The people producing the raw materials and goods or the people financing them?

My only concern is that we are seeing a return to the royal families and accumulation of wealth at the top like we saw in medieval europe and the early part of the 20th century. A democracy can only be strong when it has a healthy well educated middle class. Otherwise they can be swayed politically by emotion rather than reason. When legislators are looking at cutting education and health care in order to give tax breaks to investors and inheritors I feel like we may be going in the wrong direction.:thumbdn:
 
Hell, in my very limited education on the matter (think grade school and highschool classes) this country was accidentally "discovered" (basing this on European exploration, not Viking or American NDN migration) while in search of wealth. Ol' Christopher was trying to find a more economic route to India and other parts of Asia for the spice trade, was he not? Then the Spanish and everyone else got the notion that the indiginous peoples had vast wealth in gold and gems. It seems to me that groups of European migrants that get the most amount of attention are in the minority for why they came here. True, this part of the world is rich in resources and highly valuable elements, but it was also about as far away as you could get from England. North and South America's bounty of natural wealth practically invite capitalism, IMHO. It was a rough go at first, but good God man, how many other places on earth can you yield profits 100's of times over with the amount of work you put into it. Think of the soft fertile soil out in the plains as far as the eye can see. Now think about the stoney crags of places like Ireland and what farmers had to do to make things work there.
There will always be haves and have-nots. Not everyone who stepped off the boat had the same amount of stuff as everyone else. So from the very first day you had inequality. That's human nature, or even nature in general. Socialism tried that "let's give everybody the same" thing. What you got were a lot of hungry people that cheated the system and a level of upper crust government that didn't take their "fair" share.
The wealthest will always owe their fortune to those under them to some degree. In my mind, it doesn't matter how wealthy you are. There should be no cap on that. What matters is what you DO with that wealth beyond padding your pockets, and giving back to society does not mean you have to give hand outs. Even the origins of very old money were earned some how.

Jake
 
This is something I really don't know much about and I'm somewhat torn between a union and a non-union working class of people.
I do think if it hadn't been for the unions that the rich would've remained rich and the poor remained poor.
Then there was the lack of child labor laws where kids as young as six years old were working for a pittance of a living.
At one time in the US of A I don't think conditions were much different than they are in Nepal right now.:(
 
Yvsa said:
This is something I really don't know much about and I'm somewhat torn between a union and a non-union working class of people.
I do think if it hadn't been for the unions that the rich would've remained rich and the poor remained poor.
Then there was the lack of child labor laws where kids as young as six years old were working for a pittance of a living.
At one time in the US of A I don't think conditions were much different than they are in Nepal right now.:(
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I agree with you, Yvsa. I'm torn on unions myself. I can see where they benefit the working man and keep the big wigs from cutting the workers out of the profit picture. However, coming from a hardworking privatly owned construction family, I have had my absolute fill of teamsters that have a bullying streak. We do residential jobs for the most part. we always have. However, in leaner times we would take any old concrete job we could get. From pouring a garage floor to a 4x4 concrete pad sidewalk. It was during one said 4x4 sidewalk pour that my dad had his worst run in with some union guys. A shop owner had a section of walk that had frozen, cracked and raised over the years. he had asked the city to repair this several times as people were tripping coming into his store. After being ignored for over a year, he takes it upon himself to call a private contractor to remove and pour this section of walkway. He was going to eat the cost of it. It was a little job. Just a 4x4 piece of walk and little pad that would ramp up to his door. It couldn't have been more than a couple of yards of concrete.
He hires my father to do the work. This was 15 years or more ago. It was winter and my dad needed the work. He takes the job. He's just gotten the old concrete broken up and the new forms set when a couple of guys from the city construction union roll up and ask him for his "card". My dad, being a bit of smart @$$, takes out one of his business cards and hands it to them. They throw it on the ground and ask to see his union card. Long story short, he was thrown off that job site, fined for breaking up city walk ways, and had to pay for the concrete to be repoured by someone from the city. It took those guys 4 days to get out there and pour 2 yards of concrete and it looked like hell when they were done.
The shop owner felt bad about my father getting the book thrown at him and hired him to repour his driveway and garage to help him repay the stupid fines and put some money in his pocket.
The things some teamsters will do to make sure we "scabs" aren't cutting in on their financial bounty...all two yards of it:rolleyes:
So, I have a mixed bag of emotions when it comes to Unions.

Jake
 
IMHO Unions have served our country well at their inception. That said I believe they have served their purpose. Today's labor unions are a travesty and unionized workers are prooving to be half of the main problem with profitablility at BIG companys. (The other half of the problem is overpaid mgmt.) Look at the unions that represent wealthy athletes today. The baseball players union was all prepared to strike and cancel out the world series while our soldiers were fighting in Afghanistan. And they are millionaires. Unscrupulous!

To say, however, that America has rizen to its place of power through exploitation of the lower classes is a slap in the face to all that have come here and made it what it is today. They werent the rich. They were the salt of the earth. "Give us your huddled masses." Look at Dave Thomas. There are hundreds of examples. During GW's (George Washington's) first administration everyone in the world expected us to fail. It was Alexander Hamilton's brilliant economic system that enabled us to succeed. Not exploitation, or slavery, or anything else.

In reality we weren't even considered a superpower until after WWII. I guess some people don't mind sullying the memory of the greatest generation and their accomplishments by saying it was exploitation that made this nation great?
 
aproy1101 said:
IMHO Unions have served our country well at their inception. That said I believe they have served their purpose. Today's labor unions are a travesty and unionized workers are prooving to be half of the main problem with profitablility at BIG companys.
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Oh yea. We don't want to do anything to hinder profitablity of big companies do we;)

Seriously though. While some union workers are paid way in excess of the prevailing wage for similar work, many unions made tremendous concessions during the 1980's so their companies could stay profitable, only to be left out of the share of profits when the company returned to the black.

With corporate profits at or near an all time high, it is only fair that the employees who do the work share in the profits rather than only the rich CEO's and stockholder.

Also is it fair for corporations to not provide health care for their employees to maximize their profits when these costs have to be picked up by either the taxpayers- when they qualify for medicaid -or by the people who do have insurance when the doctors who treat them for free raise the cost to those who do have insurance to offset the loss?
 
What is fair about redistributing wealth as you see fit, Hollow?

Corporations pass production costs onto consumers. Mandating health care raises the price of goods and services.

Ask yourself what the average union wage would be if all workers on earth belonged to a union.

It's a problem. I don't know what to do. Socialism does not work- ask France now. Capitalism is the best we've found.


munk
 
If you do choose to hurt the profitability of big companys you will only hurt the bottom line of the little guy. The HIGH paid managers will cut jobs before their own salaries. I agree that the managers have never made the concessions that the workers have. However big unions have ruined entire industries (airline), and have made the American manufacturer and factory worker uncompetitive.

Additionally, today people who don't need unions are unionized. Athletes, pilots, and other people with 6, 7, and 8 figure salaries. Those aren't common men. They are privilidged and the union is there to secure their status. That is not why they were needed.
 
aproy1101 said:
If you do choose to hurt the profitability of big companys you will only hurt the bottom line of the little guy. The HIGH paid managers will cut jobs before their own salaries. I agree that the managers have never made the concessions that the workers have. However big unions have ruined entire industries (airline), and have made the American manufacturer and factory worker uncompetitive.

Additionally, today people who don't need unions are unionized. Athletes, pilots, and other people with 6, 7, and 8 figure salaries. Those aren't common men.

They are privilidged and the union is there to secure their status. That is not why they were needed.
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Andy that makes a lot of sense and I largely agree.:thumbup:

I've said for the last 35 to 40 years that we needed something between a union and the non-union in order to get a fair shake from the big corporations for the working man.
I worked in a union shop once and was forced to join the union because I was just one step below staff management.
Being in the position I was in I found the union to be a PITA from a mangement standpoint and not really all that helpful when negotiating benefits and raises from the company.

I really don't know what the answer may be and methinks there are a lot of folks a lot smarter than I that doesn't know either.
I do know that Oklahoma now has the "right to work" law and that it sucks big time.
Like I said in another thread today, "Most times the truth lays somewhere in the middle." Methinks that may be the case here as well.:confused:
 
munk said:
What is fair about redistributing wealth as you see fit, Hollow?
munk
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Munk,

I don't believe it is fair.

I believe the facts will support my contention that any redistribution of wealth that has gone on in the past 25 years has been a redistribution FROM the lower and middle income folks TO the wealthy people. That for sure is unfair.:thumbdn:

When we cut taxes disproportionately for the upper eschelon, and change the laws to help the super wealthy, while at the same time let the minimum wage stagnate we ARE redistributing wealth, but we are doing it in the opposite direction than you are insinuating.;)

It was mentioned in this thread about people pulling themselves up by their bootstraps, and working their way up, and how this is a positive thing. However when we redistribute the wealth so that the lower and middle income people get less proportionately then we actually make it harder for a person who is out every day working to move up economically and we stifle the very "up by the bootstraps" ethic we purport to admire.

nat_inc_share-2.jpg
 
Hollow, the upper 'income' brackets already pay the lion's share of taxes. That is income redistribution, but you want more?
IT is only by lowering the top brackets we avoided a economic depression after 9-11.
England has not done well with 'taxing the rich'.

It really doesn't matter. When you tax the 'rich', you simply raise the price for goods and services at the bottom.

THis approach does not work, but it is repeated endlessly. I wonder why that is?

I do not understand why this is hard to understand.
Every time in this country that taxes are CUT, GNP, wages, and employement go up. Now, have we stopped the 'greedy' from getting rich? No, but we have made it better for every one.

Corporations, and 'rich' people do not sit on bars of gold. They buy things. They make more toasters. They commision more factorys and more buildings to be built. This in turn requires them to SPEND money.

YOu would do better to address offshore profits.
munk
 
munk said:
Hollow, the upper 'income' brackets already pay the lion's share of taxes. That is income redistribution, but you want more?
IT is only by lowering the top brackets we avoided a economic depression after 9-11.
England has not done well with 'taxing the rich'.

It really doesn't matter. When you tax the 'rich', you simply raise the price for goods and services at the bottom.

THis approach does not work, but it is repeated endlessly. I wonder why that is?

I do not understand why this is hard to understand.
Every time in this country that taxes are CUT, GNP, wages, and employement go up. Now, have we stopped the 'greedy' from getting rich? No, but we have made it better for every one.

Corporations, and 'rich' people do not sit on bars of gold. They buy things. They make more toasters. They commision more factorys and more buildings to be built. This in turn requires them to SPEND money.

YOu would do better to address offshore profits.
munk
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We'll sing that together when we're selling apples in the streets together here in anothe 20 years;)
 
I don't know what to do. There's a hell of an argument for letting it all go and seeing what happens. We couldn't do much worse. Lower capital gains taxes to nothing. Stop corporation tax. Get a flat personal tax.

IT really doesn't matter how much they make. We can't stop it. There is no idea I've heard in 40 years about how to make it 'fair'.

I suspect someday we will have health care. Canadians will not longer cross our borders to get much needed services when that happens. No sense waiting in line here when you can wait in line from home.

Walmart citizens.

I've always said the Working Man will never win his own revolution.



munk
 
It may be dangerous for me to step into the middle of this conversation, but I know munk and hollow are pals so I don't mind putting myself on the firing line.
What I see is that you're both saying that we should have a more equitable system. Something a little more fair, no? The problem, as I see it, is that neither of your approaches will accomplish that goal. You aren't proposing different economic systems, just different types of the same (liberal capitalism). You're both trying to fix a system that will never benefit anybody but the powerful. Is it not apparent that we are all cattle for their profit? Everything we do re-distributes money upward. Even if the rich do build factories and provide jobs, the goal is personal gain. Profit, and not ours. We go to work all day in exchange for little tokens that we immediately give back to wealthier parties in exchange for our very means of existence. The only way to win is not to play. Rather than waste our time and effort arguing about how we want to be robbed, why not do things simply because they must be done for society to function?

Of course somebody will point out that this isn't possible. Not now, anyway. A tribal society with caste divisions would have little difficulty functioning on a gift economy. I do not advocate a solution for our present situation because I see little point in trying to put band-aids on a dying civilization devoid of culture or values other than consumerism. I only hope we survive ourselves and move on to something better.

-Tycho-
 
Even if the rich do build factories and provide jobs, the goal is personal gain. Profit, and not ours.
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Respectfully, the thing that has made America great, financially, is the ability of each to pursue his own economic self-interest. Russian communism worked *a little bit*, but only when laws restricting working for personal gain were relaxed, and there was an economic incentive to work.
 
Spectre said:
Respectfully, the thing that has made America great, financially, is the ability of each to pursue his own economic self-interest.
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Indeed, the US has financial might. I will not dispute that many have become wealthy by this system and in turn the nation has shared the benefits of that wealth. However, economic status is a poor indication of greatness. Sure, we're fantastically rich by world standards, but it's come at the cost of culture, heritage, unspoiled wilderness, clean air and water, and ideals higher than self-interest. If you don't care about material wealth, what good is an economy? It serves no purpose in a society that's more interested in philosophy and spirituality than getting their hands on the newest iPod.

-Tycho-
 
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