Isn't "the Shrinking Middle-class" Just A Form Of Polarization In Action?

lampofred

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...right.

Everyone is getting the 1000, what would happen to prices?

Rent and food goes up about 1000. You're right back where you started.

This logic doesn't make sense. If the average person spends $10 a day on food, even if prices of everything went up 10x (ridiculous but just trying to get my point across) a homeless person would now be able to eat 10 days a month. The point of the $1000 is not to make everyone no longer need to work, it's to lift up the bottom of society so that there aren't people living at 0 in the richest country in the world. It's impossible for a dividend to ever even out, lower income people will always benefit more than higher income ones.
 

tankasnowgod

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...right.

Everyone is getting the 1000, what would happen to prices?

Rent and food goes up about 1000. You're right back where you started.

Well, the one thing (at least theoretically) about Yang's plan is that the average person would get to spend the money first, instead of the government or banksters. But just like the the Affordable Care act did nothing to make health care affordable, nor did the Patriot Act do anything patriotic, I'm sure it would just be some deceptive trick in practice. I'd say it's would turn people into slaves, but truthfully, the Organic Act of 1871, Downes vs. Bidwell and the Social Security Act pretty much already accomplished that.
 

tankasnowgod

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This logic doesn't make sense. If the average person spends $10 a day on food, even if prices of everything went up 10x (ridiculous but just trying to get my point across) a homeless person would now be able to eat 10 days a month.

What makes you think homeless people aren't already getting some sort of government assistance? The vast majority of them are.
 

kyle

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@lampofred
Homelessness is a social and mental health issue. If getting them out of their situation was as simple as giving them money, then it could be solved overnight.

@tankasnowgod the deception is social control.

Once upon a time a student loan was optional. Now its obligatory.

Imagine that 1000 is a nice benefit suddenly becomes a necessity, as in you cant live by your own means without it...
 

postman

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@lampofred
Homelessness is a social and mental health issue. If getting them out of their situation was as simple as giving them money, then it could be solved overnight.

@tankasnowgod the deception is social control.

Once upon a time a student loan was optional. Now its obligatory.

Imagine that 1000 is a nice benefit suddenly becomes a necessity, as in you cant live by your own means without it...
Most homelessness could be solved overnight but people don't give a ***t about them so it isn't. Only the hopelessly psychotic would be unable to rent an apartment if given money, about a third of homeless people are schizophrenics according to the Department of Health and Human Services, that leaves us with two thirds of homelessness that could be solved overnight.
 

tankasnowgod

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Most homelessness could be solved overnight but people don't give a ***t about them so it isn't. Only the hopelessly psychotic would be unable to rent an apartment if given money, about a third of homeless people are schizophrenics according to the Department of Health and Human Services, that leaves us with two thirds of homelessness that could be solved overnight.

The vast majority of non-schizophrenics DO solve their homelessness problem overnight. You know what is far and away the most common length of time to stay in a homeless shelter? One night. You know what's second most common? Two nights. Those two thirds don't really need any help (or any additional help), they hit a point and suddenly, options they wouldn't consider open up to them, like calling relatives or asking for charity.
 

tankasnowgod

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Once upon a time a student loan was optional. Now its obligatory.

I don't know if you really understood what happened with student loans. That's the problem with speaking in such general terms like this. They certainly aren't obligatory if you have the cash to pay for college, or decide not to go to college in the first place. What DID happen is that laws changed so that they can't be wiped out by bankruptcy. In that case, they became a much more attractive asset to colleges, and basically the same thing that happened to housing market happened to education- it went from price based on cost to price based on loan value. And that's why tuition went up so much in such a short period of time, all while the value of said education declined steeply. If you still think you have to go college to gain knowledge, listen to Haidut's story of how he learned about biochemistry.
 

S-VV

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The net wealth of a nation wont increase if you simply increase the money supply. Yangs idea is economic ignorance

Based and Redpilled.

Inflation destroys those who save, and benefits those who take out huge debt to speculate. It’s very simple maths.
 

S-VV

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Yangs policy is just Quantitative Easing for the general public. Hasn’t worked for the big banks, wont work for anyone else.
 

tankasnowgod

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Nice, care to share the link?

Pretty much the first 18 minutes of this livestream-

Haidut may have been a bit of an outlier, but more likely he's just ahead of his time. A lot of big companies are more interested in recruiting employees out of high school, and teaching them directly-
 
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I know people will jump in and say Yang is "bluepilled" or the argument against him is "redpilled" but the truth is that Yang has some evidence on his side that UBI/basic income can work. Throwing the word redpilled around just when someone goes against something you like/don't think will work doesn't make it redpilled like it's some universal fact alone. For the weight on such terms/uses I can call nearly this whole thread's going direction "bluepilled" since it ignores evidence/facts/reality (supposed redpill) on how UBI and/or the negative income tax can and has worked (most studies/research I've glanced over on the subject are pretty neutral about it).

But sure, when it agrees with my view it is "redpill" -- anything else then becomes the "bluepill." This is all just people fighting for their own "reality" when it's convenient to what they personally want/understand/are willing to accept, which isn't supposed to be the ideal way to be open-minded and growing/changing. I agree that I go on Yang's side with his understanding, but I'm not saying he's 100% right or that any arguments are 100% wrong -- that itself seems polarizing as per the thread's point.

I know that when more and more people become like the "working class" and dissociate from the so-called "elites" group, the reason for the "middle class" vanishing seems apparent -- less people there since more fall beneath it & it seems to end up being more lower and upper like binaries, which is how I see it becoming in a way.
 
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lvysaur

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The middle class is no more desensitised to the plight of the working class than the ruling class is numb to the struggle of the middle class. In fact, considering the socio-economic distance between low and mid versus mid and high, the middle class is likely more aware of where they came from than those above them.

A coping sentiment? People look out for their best interests. Not rocket science.

If you make $100k/year, you're not working class. It doesn't matter if your parents were working class. So why would you care for the working class at the expense of the middle class?
 
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A coping sentiment? People look out for their best interests. Not rocket science.

If you make $100k/year, you're not working class. It doesn't matter if your parents were working class. So why would you care for the working class at the expense of the middle class?

Are you trying to start a conversation without formulating a coherent argument? This isn't the first time. You will recall in the not too distant past that I brought attention to your inane "thought experiment" which attempted to provide proof of injustice based solely on a comparison of IQs and per capita GDPs between two nations. Not rocket science you say? I would agree. Yet you are ignorant of basic economic principles.

You're battling once again that 100k strawman, dragged with you through many tedious threads littered with tired communist tropes.

I wrote that the middle class is likely more aware of where they came from than those above them based on life in the Netherlands. The working class works from 9 to 5, the middle class from 8 to 6. 70-80% of women in both cohorts work part time. If you live in the Randstad (the Amsterdam - Utrecht - Rotterdam/The Hague triangle), both use the same public transport and travel in second class cabins. Both eat the same supermarket food. The middle class earns more but the working class pays less taxes and receives subsidies for rent, health insurance, and child rearing. The middle class have some assets but near equivalent liabilities. Their kids go to the same schools, and only after pre-high school examination the working class kids end up in mavo (vocational education) while middle class kids end up in havo (prep for applied science education). Both graduate and continue the cycle, although it's not so black and white {some working class kids go to havo (second highest level) and many middle class kids go to vwo (prep for academic/theoretical education; highest level)}.

In comparison, members of ruling class families grow up in an alien milieu consisting of villas, hotels, clubs, and fine dining, ensuring limited contact with humans; do not need to study but private school is an option; and do not need to work but could have careers via connections.

Here, middle class life is similar to working class life, whereas ruling class life is entirely dissimilar to middle class life.
 

TheSir

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Middle class is a meme for people in denial about the gap between them and the rich.
 

lvysaur

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You will recall
I actually don't. Flattered that you do, though.

In the states, the gulf between middle and working is far larger due to a worse social safety net. All of this stems from US geography and the pattern of events it set forth (moneyed men could accumulate unheard of resources without "upsetting" the proles, because it was an entire continent up for grabs). This is also why US society is one of the most unequal on the planet, but nobody here is starving (yet), and even poor americans can afford nicer things than in Europe (cheap beef, abundant space, etc).

The US is a place with a fundamentally individualist culture, and this is no different in our government. Tariffs don't do ***t, though I don't expect the brainwashed to understand that--tariffs on China have nothing to do with helping the lower classes, they have to do with nipping Chinese power in the bud before it can pose a threat to US power--which is not a bad thing, but in practice it just means Vietnamese laborers take our jobs instead of Chinese ones.

Until we become isolationist the problem will just continue, that's the real redpill. And due to the immense amount of resources still existing on this continent, as well as the racial diversity that inherently fosters class unconsciousness, we have a long way to go before class consciousness ever becomes a thing.
 

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