BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: GUEST,Albert
Date: 10 Apr 09 - 08:33 AM

I see in today's paper the Labour party are running scared. Harriet Harman, who is also leader of the Commons and the Party's chairman, said: "The BNP are a bigger threat than they have been before."

Labour is waging a campaign at local level to prevent the BNP from winning its first seats in the European Parliament.

In areas where there is heavy BNP activity, Labour is using the slogan, "fairness not fear", instead of its national banner "winning the fight for Britain's future".

She added "The party is focused on the BNP in this election in a way it hasn't been previously," she said.

You can't blame the British public for voting for the only party which appears to care for those who built this great country into what it is today only to see it flooded with every Tom, Dick and Harry walking into it and milking it for all it is worth.

She has a right to feel scared.

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 09 Jun 08 - 05:56 PM

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 09 Jun 08 - 04:56 AM

""My point about distribution ignored.

It's the specifics of how capital and labout are irreconcileable that you continue to ignore e.g. the conflict between keeping down costs versus the need to raise wages to consume more to keep profits rising.""

Not ignored, Auto!! Already answered.

In every equation there is an optimum balance point. Cost versus pay is an equation. Ergo:- solve the equation and you have the best available outcome for both sides.

""Surely compromise is unacceptable to Capitalism, any attempt to put the brakes on causes the Capitalist to withdraw and move on to easier pickings.""

In my lifetime, Ake, labour has never tried compromise as a way to achieve a better result.

A flat out demand for insupportable increases, coupled with demands for job demarcation, and pay differentials which meant everybody moved up a step but nobody was satisfied. That was the history of pay negotiations in the sixties and seventies, and if the boss refused to bankrupt the company by agreeing, then the labour force bankrupted it for him by strike action.

You see I DO have a long memory, too long for the comfort of some here, who might prefer to forget the days when a factory could be shut down for weeks because the wrong employee changed a light bulb.

There have, however, been many examples of (usually, but not always, small) companies where boss and workers HAVE negotiated compromise solutions which have led to those workers receiving more than the current union rate, and they have traditionally been vilified for it by the workforce at large, and been called traitors to their kind.

Much more sensible, IMHO, to have emulated them.


You can talk to me about Capitalist intransigence, but you need to recognise that intransigence has been, and still is, a two way street, and the meeting point IS in the middle of the road.

Don T

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: akenaton
Date: 09 Jun 08 - 03:32 AM

Don ...I don't need to repeat your words, I know there will never be a Utopia and that remark was unworthy of you.
I am talking about long term survival not Utopia.

Please explain how Capitalism can be made sustainable, when all the evidence suggests that it causes untold damage.
Surely compromise is unacceptable to Capitalism, any attempt to put the brakes on causes the Capitalist to withdraw and move on to easier pickings.

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: autolycus
Date: 09 Jun 08 - 01:43 AM

My point about distribution ignored.

It's the specifics of how capital and labout are irreconcileable that you continue to ignore e.g. the conflict between keeping down costs versus the need to raise wages to consume more to keep profits rising.

Et Cetera.


   Ivor

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 08 Jun 08 - 07:04 PM

""You can carry on saying capital and labour mus work together (in many ways they already do) after we've pointed out on what ways those two forces are in apparently irreconcileable opposition, one of many, many points you and teribus have simply ignored, or maybe don't have an answer for??""

Thanks for your permission. I have every intention of carrying on saying it.

Neither Teribus, nor myself have ignored the "apparently irreconcileable opposition". We have repeatedly stated that it will require compromise.

I will say again, there is a point where labour is getting the maximum pay for its work that Capital can cough up without going bankrupt. That point can never be found unless labour and Capital TOGETHER go looking for it.

""Saying that we have nothing to replace Capitalism with is simply wrong.""

If you go back through this thread you will find that the only alternatives suggested were as follows:-

1. Anarchy.

2. Dismantle everything, do away with all organisation, and go back to hunter/gatherer days. Or to put it another way, Anarchy.

You would think, would you not, that if there were a better system, that someone among all the haters of Capitalism on this thread, would be able to tell us what it is.


The only suggestion I am seeing is that we reverse the course of human evolution and revert to the primitive beginnings of humanity, and if that IS genuinely the only way for the human race to survive, then the whole damn thing has been a waste of time, and it isn't worth saving.

Fortunately, I will NEVER subscribe to that notion, because I truly believe that we are capable of better things, once we stop reacting out of hate, and envy to any who show greater talent, or ability, or intelligence.

In YOUR world of equals, WHO WILL DO THE DIRTY JOBS, when there is no incentive offered? WHO WILL TAKE CARE OF OTHERS, when it is easier to take one's own share and sit back?

Like it or not SOMEONE will have to organise, and manage, and that someone will seen as a boss, hated and envied. So there WILL have to be some incentive to take on the job, and here we go again.

Say after me, UTOPIA is fictional! UTOPIA doesn't work!

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: autolycus
Date: 08 Jun 08 - 05:49 PM

In my last post,

governments have got to step when

Should have read, "governments have got to step in when...."

You both so 'forget the past'

Should have read, "You both say 'forget the past'".


Ivor

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: akenaton
Date: 08 Jun 08 - 04:28 PM

Don, there is nobody saying that Capitalism can be destroyed overnight, but we should be making a start on dismantling it.

All the environmental damage which is now becoming evident, air and sea pollution, destruction of rain forest, starvation in Africa, brought about by organised overpopulation, can all be laid at Capitalism's door.
We need to start telling people the truth about our economic system.

There are also the social problems. Many people now see making money ...being successful....as the main goal in life. A society of haves and have nots cannot survive for long when the divide becomes so obscenely wide, in fact society seems to be in the process of disintegration right now, with gangs of feral youth terrorising whole areas of our cities.

Saying that we have nothing to replace Capitalism with is simply wrong.
The problem for the Capitalists is that any workable alternative will mean the beginning of the end....and not before time.

What makes Capitalism so utterly virulent, is that it is based not on need as Teribus says, but on demand and in most cases that demand is artificially created by Capitalism itself.
To satisfy that demand,we squander scarse resources, poison the water and air around us, create a moronic, vicious, uncaring society, while the real things of value in human life start to fade from memory.

Any alternative to the current system will of course mean huge changes to the way we live, and we should be under no illusions that we can continue doing as we do now and that a bit of tinkering can solve the problems. Change cannot take place until the Capitalists loosen their grip on our throats, but unlike the Communists, our leeches will adhere until until we rip them off with our bare hands.

If we are to survive as a species, it is not just the ideology of Capitalism which must be abandoned but the whole structure which has been constructed to support and service it.   The great cities, the technology, the financial institutions and ultimately all the funtions of "organised" government. It will be a long painful journey, but we have absolutely no alternative....Ake

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: autolycus
Date: 08 Jun 08 - 04:00 PM

There are so many straw men in these arguments.

Don I made my sarcastic-free point because you don't explain and haven't explained how come capitalism does distribution - food, cement, ink, cars, vcomputers, paper , cosmetics - yet when it comes to food, all of a sudden governments have got to step when capiralism fails to deliver to the starving.

One straw man - nobody said or suggested that politics and economics were interchangeable; that's just misreading lox's post.


You can carry on saying capital and labour mus work together (in many ways they already do) after we've pointed out on what ways those two forces are in apparently irreconcileable opposition, one of many, many points you and teribus have simply ignored, or maybe don't have an answer for??

You both so 'forget the past'. I wish the right did when it keeps banging on about how everything went wrong with the 60s, or with things like the NHS.

"Those who forget their history will be condemned to repeat it."

It is impossible to deal with the humungous problems we have without grasping how we got here.m That's how the Imperialist Powers dealt with 'foreign parts' - never mind you history, we're going to divide it up with a 1-foot ruler.

I don't really think in the end these arguments are really at the lkevel of facts, theories, history ot knowledge. Alas.

It is no wonder that the punchline of the immortal Python Parrot sketch was, (talking of England/UK), "You've got to argue till your blue in the mouth if you want to get anything done in this country."


   Ivor


   Ivor

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 08 Jun 08 - 11:19 AM

UN doesn't work, as Russia and others veto anything that seeks to cramp their spheres of influence.

G

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 08 Jun 08 - 10:24 AM

"We need to find a sensible controlled way of redressing this imbalance before the status quo collapses and the environment goes to pot."

I was under the impression that I was saying much the same as this Lox, but the destruction of the Capitalist System, without having first some clue as to what will replace it, is neither sensible, nor controlled.

This has to be done with reason and compromise, or it is certain that what results will be much, much worse.

One good move towards a solution would be to give the UN much greater powers to set parameters, and the level of force needed to ensure that nobody overstepped those limits.
And all members of the UN should have equal say, with no vetos permitted. Majority rules...LIVE WITH IT! That should be the bottom line.

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: GUEST,lox
Date: 08 Jun 08 - 08:50 AM

The south African government doesn't have much control over Sierra Leone or Mozambique etc etc

... but that is a churlish response and doesn't tackle your point properly, merely giving me the feeling that I have scored some puerile point ...

The intelligent (and infuriating to have to spell out) response is that these countries are dependant on the corporations that exploit them in the same way that an abused child is dependant on their parents.

The leaders of exploited nations cannot just expel the companies exploiting them because they have no leverage. The corporations enjoy the advantages that corruption offers and support the corrupt regimes who hold on to power with fat inducements.

Like Shell in Nigeria, who have their own police force - the shell police (that is literal not metaphorical). If you were an Ogoni tribe member iin the 90's and complaining about leaky pipelines rendering your farmland infertile, you risked thiis bunch chopping you and the rest of your village up with machetes

Hand in hand, corporations and corrupt regimes destroy the land they exploit.

To add to this, the corporations enjoy the protection of their parent states eg in the case of de beers diamonds, the netherlands and the EU none of whom complain about the revenue.

And of course western arms manufacturers enjoy the profits of sales to these corrupt regimes to assist them to squash any dissent that may occur thus taking more of their money and helping them kill the people from whom the money has been taken.

The west must take responsibility for abuses that are current in Africa and the least we can do as individuals is be honest about it.

If we don't face up to it we will have no leg to stand on when china's commercial imperialism begins to wreak real havoc and we begin to moralize about them.

This is already beginning to happen.

Who has Mugab been getting his guns from?

For the record, what you are talking about isn't capitalism, you are talking about social democracy and on that point I am pretty much with you, though it is a broad concept.

The role of Government in my view is to ensure the enfranchisement of the common man.

Different people have different ideas about how to achieve that goal.

On one extreme you have people who believe that the government should butt out and let market forces do the job, and at the other end you have people who believe that the state should have a directorial role in the development of industry and commerce.

These days, these two extremes serve as useful concepts and landmarks in the development of our understanding of economics.

Neither is a serious political alternative on it's own, but neither can be ignored and it is nonsense to see this dicussion as being about what model we should discard and what has worked and what hasn't etc.

We are constantly evolving and growing (hopefully) and need to deal with the challenges we face.

But we can't deal with challenges we haven't faced up to.

The economy of the west depends on the subservient role played by the developing world.

We need to find a sensible controlled way of redressing this imbalance before the status quo collapses and the environment goes to pot.

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 08 Jun 08 - 07:05 AM

Given a little less selective reading, you might have noticed that I have never said Capitalism is perfect.

I have in fact repeatedly said that it is IMO the best among the bad choices, and there is nobody on this thread who has even hinted at knowing a better alternative, unless anarchy is your bag.

I have also suggested several times that the way forward is to change, not to destroy, and I stand by that.

In spite of the pie-in-the-sky brigade's insistence that the world can run without capital, it cannot. And all the forms of government so far tried, have proved, whether by success or failure, that the only thing that has half a chance is labour and capital working together.

That's the bottom line, and until we eradicate this ridiculous hatred of the people who generate employment, by those who benefit from the earnings produced, we will never change the system to make it better.

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 08 Jun 08 - 06:53 AM

Just one question Lox.

Who, would you say, is in the perfect position to ensure that conditions improve in your diamond mine, and elsewhere in that country?

YEP!! GOT IT IN ONE.   The South African government, that's who.

BUT THEY DON'T.

My point, I believe. Governments MUST act.

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: GUEST,lox
Date: 08 Jun 08 - 06:34 AM

This is only one example of African exploitation.

This has nothing to do with the past.

It is NOW!

So when you've finished trying to "justify your beliefs and prejudices" have a little think about the lad in the following picture.

diamond mines

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: GUEST,lox
Date: 08 Jun 08 - 06:22 AM

I meant Don's though I believe I dealt with the point in Gioks post too.

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: GUEST,lox
Date: 08 Jun 08 - 06:21 AM

That last post is full of gross errors.

1. Capitalism is a political ideology that advocates allowing market forces to direct change and government intervention should be reduced.

This is a point of view that you clearly don't share or you wouldn't argue that governments should initiate change.

... interesting lack of understanding of market forces ...


2.Governments also make laws to inhibit the behaviour of their subjects.

This includes businesses and private individuals in equal measure.


3. Unethical business practice affects peoples lives in Africa right now - this minute - as we are chatting.


African instability IS - not WAS but IS the result of poverty.

Yet Africa is a continent rich with resources.

Most of Africas most valuable resources are owned by western companies and are therefore improving the lives of westerners.

A perfect example is Diamonds.

Ever seen what conditions in a Diamond mine are like?

Or how old many of the employees are?

Market forces won't help those kids.

Only a compassionate western foreign policy can, in which responsibility is accepted.

It is this knowledge that monsters like Mugabe are able to exploit to keep their grip on power.

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 08 Jun 08 - 05:48 AM

You cannot deal with, or solve today's problems by rehashing yesterday's mistakes.
It doesn't matter a fuck who gave what to whom, it matters that people are suffering and solutions need to be found.
It's like people squabbling over one piece of bread, as to who should have the moral gratification of giving it to the starving child.
The child doesn't care!!

G

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 08 Jun 08 - 05:47 AM

Aye Giok.

Deal with the problems of NOW. The past is over, and none of us in the "civilised" world have reason to be proud of it.

Politics and Economics are interlinked, NOT interchangeable!!

I repeat, governments must initiate change, and others must ensure the money supply needed to carry them out.

Governments do not, of themselves, have money. They acquire it by taxation, the vast majority of which comes, not from individuals, but from corporations.

But you must have capital to have that money available, or you get the USSR in the second half of the twentieth century.

Five year plan after ten year plan after five year plan, none of which work because there is not the cash available. The Commissars live high on the hog, while the populatio at large barely subsists.

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: GUEST,lox
Date: 08 Jun 08 - 05:41 AM

Justifying beliefs or prejudices is not my area.

If it is a concern of yours that's not my problem.

Your question shows you to be a little behind me in your thoughts.

I said: "or evn just 50 years depending on how broad a view you wish to take".

I should have added "... or narrow..."

My point being that you don't have to go back very far at all to see that Africa is still under the thumb of the west.

And as a little aside, Commerce did not award Mugabe his knighthood.

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 08 Jun 08 - 05:06 AM

Just how far back in history are some people prepared to go, to justify their beliefs, and/or prejudices?


G

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: akenaton
Date: 08 Jun 08 - 04:53 AM

Aye ...Thats about it...Ake

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: GUEST,lox
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 05:32 PM

I think therein lies the heart of this disagreement.

A discussion that is cross purposes.

You clearly define capitalism as a commercial doctrine not a political one.

You also state that the problems of starving humanity are to be solved by political means.

So in your understanding these are two seperate and distinct contexts.

Yet to a "politician" who advocates a "capitalist ideology" they are not.

Equally, to someone like me who doesn't advocate a "capitalist ideology" they are not.

I see ecomomics and politics as indivisible.


And before we start blaming Africa for it's own misfortune and palming off responsibility for African poverty on it's leaders, we need to be honest and face up to western political and commercial abuse of Africa over the last 500 years or evn just 50 years depending on how broad a view you wish to take.

Either way, we can't take any honest pride in our business or political relations with Africa.

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 06:39 AM

""I hesitate to draw again the parallel with your own complaints about life, but it is capitalism and its yoke upon "New Labour" (and your own demands for some types of conspicuous consumption) that cause your grief.""

Conspicuous consumption on a pay scale of £7 per hour? I don't think so. And before you make a complete fool of yourself, that pay is not as a result of Capitalism. I work for a CHARITY, which pays what it can afford, and at my age it is not easy to GET a job, never mind have a CHOICE of jobs.

""And millions starve now, with the current undestroyed system.

Shurely shome mishtake.""

No Ivor, I haven't been at the whisky, and sarcasm is indeed a pretty low form of wit.

When your car doesn't develop full power, do you put it in the crusher?

NO!! You tune it.

A system needs changing? Change it!

Capitalism is a commercial, not a political, construct.

The solution to the problems of starving humanity will, in fact must, be a political one. Only governments can alter national situations to produce the economic climate for poorer countries to trade for what they need,

When African leaders stop using aid money to buy guns, or feather their own nests, that change can be made.

I firmly believe that every person on this planet has some skill that can be exchanged for goods/services, and it is Capitalism which ultimately supplies the only market in which one can trade to get the best return, as opposed to being thrown a crust while the commissars eat caviar.

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: GUEST,lox
Date: 06 Jun 08 - 07:22 PM

More smoke and mirrors.

Ergo ... Richard you are clearly a racist QED (?!?!?!)

You fascist!

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 06 Jun 08 - 04:48 PM

If the sort of prejudice Richard displays in this thread was directed towards a racial minority, he would be in breach of the law of the land.
By what right do you attack people on the grounds of their political orientation, before they have even started to do the job they have been elected to?
I am all in favour of condemning those who do wrong, but to condemn someone for their politics is prejudice in the extreme.

G

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: sapper82
Date: 06 Jun 08 - 04:37 PM

From: Richard Bridge - PM
Date: 05 Jun 08 - 05:51 PM

"a few ruthless, well armed thugs will take everthing they can reach, and the rest WILL starve." - Sounds like Capitalism to me.

Richard, Richard, Richard! You have just proved that you obviously know sod all about the system you claim to support!
That is EXACTLY what happened MANY MANY times in the former Socialist paradise of the USSR under Lennin and Stalin. The well armed Socialist thugs came, took the food and the peasants starved.

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: autolycus
Date: 06 Jun 08 - 10:56 AM

All scaremongering aside, there is currently sufficient food on this planet to feed everybody, and all that is needed is redistribution.

But THAT requires exactly the kind of organisation you would destroy.



And millions starve now, with the current undestroyed system.

Shurely shome mishtake.


   Ivor

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: GUEST,lox
Date: 05 Jun 08 - 06:09 PM

This has all gone very weird ...

I preferred the "3 men go into a bar" routine.

The 10 man format just isn't funny.

You can make any story about numbers fit your meaning and you can create illusions through all sorts of mathematical sleight of hand.

Here's an example that has no more bearing on reality than the one above but is hopefully a little more entertaining ...

three men want to spend the night in a hotel.

Their room costs 25 pounds

they each have a ten pound note

they club together to pay for the room.

The landlord owes them 5 pounds in change

But rather than try and split 5 pound three ways, he decides to take advantage of the situation.

And he gives them 3 pounds back instead

1 pound each

so they have now spent 27 pounds

and he keeps the remaining 2 pounds

Bringing the grand total up to 29 pounds

where has the missing pound gone?


This is merely an illusion but it serves to illustrate why there is no real argumentative merit in convoluted hypothetical analogies which can easily be invented to support any point of view thus serving as distractions from any genuine debate.

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 05 Jun 08 - 05:51 PM

"a few ruthless, well armed thugs will take everthing they can reach, and the rest WILL starve." - Sounds like Capitalism to me.


"there is currently sufficient food on this planet to feed everybody, and all that is needed is redistribution" - Er, Don, Economics 101, capitalism provides it to those who can afford it, not to those who need it, and today we are seeing the consequence. I hesitate to draw again the parallel with your own complaints about life, but it is capitalism and its yoke upon "New Labour" (and your own demands for some types of conspicuous consumption) that cause your grief.

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 05 Jun 08 - 02:33 PM

Ake, I have a great deal of respect for your opinions, but on this occasion you are way off beam.

The results of doing away with ""Capitalism and other methods of "organising" humanity"", will emphatically NOT cure the ills of humanity.

Only such methods of organisation stand between us and a world where a few ruthless, well armed thugs will take everthing they can reach, and the rest WILL starve.

Look at the situation in the Redneck states of the USA, where survivalists are already geared up to hijack anything they fancy.

They even have their own well drilled, and well equipped private armies.


All scaremongering aside, there is currently sufficient food on this planet to feed everybody, and all that is needed is redistribution.

But THAT requires exactly the kind of organisation you would destroy.

How does that make sense?

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: akenaton
Date: 05 Jun 08 - 05:44 AM

Don...Until population is reduced, production and consumption of energy brought to a sustainable level, Capitalism and other methods of "organising" humanity abolished, we will have no alternative other than to "all starve together"

There is no debate, the future is staring us in the face, the results of intensive farming have been a disaster and the brakes have had to be applied. The same will be true of the human livestock.

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 05 Jun 08 - 05:28 AM

Perhaps that's why Teribus has a Ph.D. and a chair of Economics.

Because he knows more about it than we do....DOH!

I like the way that was explained T. It has the ring of truth about it, and seems to reflect what we see in real life.

Nobody moans when the rich man pays 59% of the cost for all.

Everybody moans about him getting anything when there are benefits to be divided, in spite of the fact that he gets the smallest share, having paid the largest.

Everybody cries their eyes out if he is no longer around to foot the bill.

Amazing!

Then some bright spark suggests that he only has that money because he stole it from the others, who would, in fact, have nothing at all, if he did not generate the means of acquisition.


Until another system is invented, which works better, the destruction of Capitalism will simply mean everyone starves together.

THANK YOU, NO!

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 05 Jun 08 - 02:53 AM

That is supposed to indicate something? Who did the tenth man get his money from? The other nine of course. Doh!

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: Teribus
Date: 04 Jun 08 - 08:04 PM

Suppose that every day, ten men go out for beer and the bill for all ten comes to £100.

If they paid their bill the way we pay our taxes, it would go something like this:

The first four men (the poorest) would pay nothing.

The fifth would pay £1.

The sixth would pay £3.

The seventh would pay £7.

The eighth would pay £12.

The ninth would pay £18.

The tenth man (the richest) would pay £59.

So, that's what they decided to do.

*********
The ten men drank in the bar every day and seemed quite happy with the arrangement, until one day, the owner threw them a curve. 'Since you are all such good customers,' he said, 'I'm going to reduce the cost of your daily beer by £20.' Drinks for the ten now cost just £80.

The group still wanted to pay their bill the way we pay our taxes so the first four men were unaffected.

They would still drink for free.

But what about the other six men - the paying customers?

How could they divide the £20 windfall so that everyone would get his 'fair share?'

They realized that £20 divided by six is £3.33.

But if they subtracted that from everyone's share, then the fifth man and the sixth man would each end up being paid to drink his beer.

So, the bar owner suggested that it would be fair to reduce each man's bill by roughly the same amount, and he proceeded to work out the amounts each should pay.

And so:

The fifth man, like the first four, now paid nothing (100% savings).

The sixth now paid £2 instead of £3 (33%savings).

The seventh now pay £5 instead of £7(28%savings).

The eighth now paid £9 instead of £12 (25% savings).

The ninth now paid £14 instead of £18 (22% savings).

The tenth now paid £49 instead of £59 (16% savings).

***************
Each of the six was better off than before. And the first four continued to drink for free. But once outside the restaurant, the men began to compare their savings.

'I only got a pound out of the £20,' declared the sixth man.

He pointed to the tenth man, 'but he got £10!'

'Yes, that's right,' exclaimed the fifth man. 'I only saved a pound, too.

It's unfair that he got ten times more than I did'

'That's true!!' shouted the seventh man. 'Why should he get £10 back when I got only two?

The wealthy get all the breaks'

'Wait a minute,' yelled the first four men in unison.

'We didn't get anything at all. The system exploits the poor'

The nine men surrounded the tenth and beat him up.

*********************

The next night the tenth man didn't show up for drinks, so the nine sat down and had beers without him.

But when it came time to pay the bill, they discovered something important.

They didn't have enough money between all of them for even half of the bill.

And that, ladies and gentlemen, journalists and college professors, is how our tax system works. The people who pay the highest taxes get the most benefit from a tax reduction. Tax them too much, attack them for being wealthy, and they just may not show up anymore. In fact, they might start drinking overseas where the atmosphere is somewhat friendlier.

David R. Kamerschen, Ph.D.

Professor of Economics

Now ain't that the truth!!!

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 04 Jun 08 - 07:52 PM

Try starting from the fact that we haven't got a socialist regime - and ask yourself if you want more of the same or less of the same.

What has caused the situation you bewail is capitalism.

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 04 Jun 08 - 06:23 PM

As far as I recall I was complaining about the complete balls-up of the current "Socialist" regime, who, in point of fact profess to be on YOUR side of the fence.

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 04 Jun 08 - 06:09 PM

Oh Don - if the system is so great, what were you saying about it on Sunday?

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: GUEST,lox
Date: 04 Jun 08 - 01:11 PM

Sounds like its time to get on your bike ;-)

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 04 Jun 08 - 12:11 PM

That's boll***s, Ake

Some people HAVE to travel to EAT!!

I know, I'm one of them. And please don't tell me get a job nearer home. When you are 67 years old, you get a job where you CAN.

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 26 May 08 - 05:23 AM

"Cameron looks like a successful man to me. great haircut. "

Great haircut indeed! No need to rub my nose in it, wld! LOL!

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: akenaton
Date: 25 May 08 - 05:15 PM

That pillar of left wing politics, The Sunday Times, carries the following piece by SIMON JENKINS
In this article, Simon makes it clear that the days of "wine and roses" are over and that we must accept that cuts in energy use and consumption of scarce resources, signals the end of Capitalism as we know it.
"Travel must become a luxury."
"Living space and carbon fuels rationed."
"House prices soared not because of "need", need is not an economic concept, only demand"

Mr Jenkins is a bit of a favourite of mine, one of the few who tells the truth about where this mad economic system is taking us...Ake

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: autolycus
Date: 25 May 08 - 03:30 PM

Quote from prog via thera[pist James Hillman

"You can never get enough of what you don't need."


   Ivor

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: autolycus
Date: 25 May 08 - 03:13 PM

Meanwhile prog Channel 4 about future of planet - seems to be related to corporate activity.

Ivor

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: autolycus
Date: 25 May 08 - 02:46 PM

Don

You and Teribus have not answered most of my questions, and I've already commented that one of your answers was barely the beginning of one.

I am quite aware of holding out on some of your and Teribus's questions, and the above is the reason why.

So you and I are in the same boat.

I have found the same thing elsewhere, i.e. good points going unresponded to.

So I'm giving a reason for not answering some for the moment.




    Ivor

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: GUEST,lox
Date: 25 May 08 - 02:35 PM

Ivor.

I'm not sure whther to thank you for that information or not.

Thanks because it is better to be informed, no thanks because I would rather it wasn't true.

I am a single parent who has fought to make something of himself despite having to overconme the most horrendous obstacles on the way.

I have pretty much excaped the poverty trap now, with the result that my child is safe.

There is no way I could have done it if it hadn't been for the superb support that was provided by Lewisham council.

If I lived in teribus's ideal world, my daughter would have been in care long ago as I would have ended up homeless.

Charlie Chaplins "modern times" may have been funny, but I think we can be fairly confident he wasn't advocating that lifestyle. Perhaps even drawing attention to a social scandal that as a more evolved species we refuse to allow to happen again.

You'd like to think you've evolved wouldn't you teribus?

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: GUEST,lox
Date: 25 May 08 - 02:17 PM

As I said teribus, try and see ouside your immediate field of vision.


The world is bigger than your back yard.

When people "CAN'T" get work, they do actually starve.

When people do not have access to resources they die.

In some cases they join up with bands of murderous thugs and get what they need by force.

Or perhaps you're saying we should make our country more like the third world.

Is that what you're saying teribus?

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 25 May 08 - 02:07 PM

So when we DO answer your questions, and you don't like the answer, you change the subject.

Not much point in us responding then, IS THERE?

Don T

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: autolycus
Date: 25 May 08 - 01:22 PM

And this is what you do as an early act as new Mayor of London

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/7419227.stm


   Ivor

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 25 May 08 - 12:50 PM

"But remember.... the benefits system is an integral part of Capitalism, without it you know very well Capitalism could not funtion."


Bloody clever these Capitalists, getting Socialists to set up a benefit system for them?


"What do you do whereby whatever you do, there'll be losers?"

SIMPLE! If you are Gordon Brown, you make sure that the losers are the poorest people with the least clout, and the winners are th larger nimber which you hope will vote for you as a result of their tax cut.

Poor Prime Minister? He certainly IS!!

Don T.