Poor people as a growth demographic, and how to cash in on it -- Continued

The following post was prompted by the New York Times article linked below.

It just continues to mystify me, as well as break my heart, how some of us can so easily acquire material gain via the suffering of others. More to the point, however, is the fact that it is still you and I who allow the environment that fosters this kind of behavior to continue. An environment that is a hothouse for the encouragement of greed and usury. She shame is ours as well as for those more directly involved.



A Choice for Recovering Addicts: Relapse or Homelessness

The myth of the permanently dependent

The following post was prompted by the Washington Post article linked below.

These statistics collected by the Census Bureau show that over 60% of assistance recipients use it for less than a year, and the makeup of that population represents a cross section of demographics.

What would be interesting now would be to have the contrast of seeing a similar study done on corporate welfare; all of the direct subsidies, investment incentives, and tax breaks they pay campaigns for, bully all levels of government for, and withhold jobs to threaten the citizenry for. Perhaps there we might find some truth to the myth of the permanently dependent.



What it really means to rely on food stamps and welfare

The Patriot Act. New Speak for Allowing Others to Manipulate Your Fears

The following post was prompted by the Daily Beast article linked below.

The "Sunset" provisions in the Patriot Act are set to bring its over reaching usurpations of our rights to an end. To which I can only say good riddance. Let us just hope that the congressional proclivities suggested in this article hold true.

I have always held the belief that you don't fight an idea, or another way of living, by becoming less of what is most dear in what is aspired to within your idea, or way of life. What you do, rather, is live those ideals boldly, with as few exceptions as possible; knowing full well that people you care about may suffer, and/or die. That's the whole point of what sacrifice is for something you believe is just as precious as life itself.

Becoming less of what we aspire to as a response to terrorists is simply to keep the initiative in their hands. Showing them that no matter how many of us they might kill, we will just carry on with living the better life that what we aspire to allows us. Not only does this take away any remaining moral ambiguity there might be, it lays bare the horrible truth of their violence and the contrast of that with the poverty and suffering of their own people as they pursue it rather than addressing these needs.

A part of this, of course, is realizing that what we aspire to, in addition to personal liberty, in combination with personal responsibility, balancing the needs of the individual with the needs of the community as a whole, also rejects the injustice of greed, and the tyranny of concentrated power that comes from it.

Too many things have been done in our name to benefit a few. And the primary reason this has come about, and why it remains so, is that Capitalism continues to be our economic operating system. The very system whose very foundation lies upon the "economics of scarcity," as well as the notion that "greed is good."

What is private. What is property. What is commodity, not to mention, what the free flow of information means to the ability of a truly free people to make well informed choices, all become something quite problematic in a system where scarcity, and the control of where, when and how such scarcity is applied, is a virtually certain way of making sure that injustice will always have the upper hand.

You better start thinking seriously about this because the next legislation with a euphemistic title that does things exactly opposite to our ideals will have our nation going down a path to do things at least as terrifying, and destructive, as anything those religious zealots have in mind.



The Patriot Act May Be Dead Forever

How even a $20 minimum wage would barely cut it for a living wage

The following post was prompted by the citylab.com article linked below.

Here again is where having a larger context provides the contrast necessary to give more useful meaning to everyday developments.

The state by state charting of the wage one would need to be able to afford a 2 bedroom apartment is quite telling. If only we could juxtapose this with the cost of feeding 2 or three people as well in these terms.

And the really amazing part, for me at least, is that for Capitalism to truly survive as a commodity/consumerist form of operating system, a good deal more than $20 an hour would be required. After all, how else would the ever increasing lower than middle class be able to afford to buy what this insane making monster puts out?

As I've indicated before, I find it quite unlikely that having the robots somehow take up the purchasing slack will provide an effective solution. And yet this marginal group at the top of the power pyramid still thinks that big profit margins, and continual cost cost cutting can go on for ever. What unbelievable stupidity. And its taking us all towards the same precipice.




Mapping the Hourly Wage Needed to Rent a 2-Bedroom Apartment in Every U.S. State

Helping them help the rest of us

The following post was prompted by the Guardian article linked below.

When you talk about India, and its desire to become a fully developed nation, you are really talking about all of the under developed nations. All of them share this desire to move themselves out of the dark ages in terms of the living conditions their lack of modern infrastructure leaves them in currently. And what could be a more human desire than that.

This is why the already developed nations must take the lead in creating the new pathways to becoming a fully developed nation. Pathways that would obviate the reliance of such carbon heavy fuels as coal.
And what better way to do that than launching the worlds first global public power utility.

This has always been my dream when I was thinking of how to truly integrate a sea based, Tornado Turbine powered, hydrogen fuel stream into the world economy. And it is only the Western World that can lead the way on this.

We must make the resource allocations necessary to make this stream infrastructure a reality. And by that I mean an across the board approach to how the platforms are created, with the right materials used (as in hemp as a new world cash crop), as well as in how we distribute it, and the innovative ways we make it affordable to those with least ability to pay for it.

If we truly believe in making things right with the planet's ecosystem this is the only equitable way to go about it that I can think of.



Why India is captured by carbon

When Is A Felony Not A Felony? When You’re A Bank!

The following post was prompted by the medium.com article linked below.

This article is actually further information on the bust I linked to here ("Banks getting caught in criminal transaction schemes").

The main thrust of this new article is how little what could have been used as punishment actually was. It's disgusting to say the least, but it certainly does serve to remind us of how the "inequality of outcomes" works in practical terms.

When Is A Felony Not A Felony? When You’re A Bank!

What a bunch of crap

The following post was prompted by the fasctcoexist.com article linked below.

Decades later, after a grand parade of tax breaks, incentivizing, and playing the states against each other for the best deal on regulation, as well as taxes, we have this supposedly new idea for an investment fund for cities still "economically challenged."

As the article states, there is a lot of untapped capital sloshing around the world looking for investment opportunities. Why not create a new kind of venture capital fund to channel that money to these "e. c." hot spots; with, of course, more incentivizing to make it worth the while of said overly cashed investors.

The poor dears. What's a well fattened fat cat to do when so much of what might ordinarily be an investment has so many uncertainties. You know, those pesky little details that all revolve around... Dare we even say it? Risk!

So much global instability. So many new potential regulation costs. And lets not even talk about the competition that overseas producers of what ever can throw into the mix. One could almost swoon for the days when interest rates made Certificates of Deposit so attractive; making money just by having it sitting there. Gosh...

One can only wonder how such people cannot even begin to see why cities can wither precisely because no one wants to take responsibility for keeping current infrastructure going, let alone investing in the latest tech to make it on par with the rest of the world. That they have these vast new gluts of cash precisely because they've been able to dodge such responsibilities.

Somebody call Vanna White because these folks desperately need to buy a clue.



Can We Turn Around America's Distressed Cities With Venture Capital And 401K Plans?