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[Scott]

An economics professor at a local college made a statement that he had never failed a single student before, but had once failed an entire class.

That class had insisted that Obama’s socialism worked and that if enacted, no one would be poor and no one would be rich. It would be a great equalizer.

The professor then said, “OK, we will have an experiment in this class on Obama’s plan.”

The Professor decided that all grades would be averaged together and everyone would receive the same grade. No one would fail, but no one would receive an A either.

After the first test, the grades were averaged and everyone received a B.

The students who studied hard were upset, but the students who studied little were happy.

As a result of the averaged grade, both the students who studied hard as well as the students who studied little decided to study even less for the second exam.

The average score this time was a D and no one was happy.

When the 3rd exam rolled around, the average score was an F.

The scores never increased and students blamed each other for the overall poor performance of the class. No one wanted to study hard for the benefit of another student.

To their great surprise, all students failed the course. The professor told them that socialism would also ultimately fail because when the reward is great, the effort to succeed is great, but when the government takes all of the reward away, no one will try hard or want to succeed.

[Brian S]

That sounds like an infant made it up.

I'm no Socialist..... but come on.

 

[Dawg]

That would be one smart little infant!

True or not, sounds about right to me.

[redcap]

It sounds right to a lot of Americans because of several cultural factors at play. It is a very over simplified explanation of communism more than socialism. Also a democratic socialist situation is very different. Those who own businesses and generate jobs (what some might call capitalists) are free to do as they are best at and make a ton of money. Those who lack the opportunity or inclination can work and are protected from exploitation. Everyone benefits from infrastructure such as health care and safety nets for those unable to work for whatever reason.

There will always be those who exploit this largesse and take more than they should, that is not a problem with any form of socialism but human nature. You can shoot them but even in a fascist or capitalist situation they will exist and be a burden. The trick is to minimize them with education and societal values that make it more attractive to try harder.

Not all socialism is bad, not all capitalism is good. In the USA if you don't have a job and you get seriously ill (or your child does), what them? You live in rented accommodation because your wife took the house, the kids, the car and left you with the payments. You have since remarried and had more children and one of them (or an original from the first marriage) gets very ill. What then?

Hey, even if you are in a great job with great 'benefits' and your child gets ill and you go to the hospital and the insurance company denies the treatment she needs to stay alive, what then? Meanwhile they up your premium and your boss says business is bad, you're going to have to be let go. You have worked hard all your life and the government has spent your SSS contributions to bail out Big Business, yet you can't even get an extra month to pay your taxes because you aren't a big enough capitalist. Now what?

You can go and salute the flag and thank your God you are an Amurricun but none of that will change a thing.

In my democratic socialist country there are laws to stop bosses ripping me off. I had major robotic heart surgery last year including 8 days in intensive care in a coma, plus three more recovering then four days on the ward and all it cost me was $10 a time for parking when my family came to visit. I have private health insurance but I didn't use it as the national health system took care of everything. And I had the best surgical team in the southern hemisphere, perhaps even the world. We get paid $5000 every time the wife has a child and we receive money every month to help us support them to become good citizens and tax payers of the future. Sure some abuse the system but not for long. The govt imprisons hundreds every year for ripping off the system. Not tougher laws every time the media beats up the story, just enforcing the ones we have.

I got my MA(Writing) thanks to government loans I still haven't had to repay as my income is below the threshold for repayment and I still have $60K left I can borrow for more education. Yet because we need college professors my PhD tuition is paid for by the government and they even give you a $22K a year stipend to help you live on while you do your research. But they don't let just anyone in to the course. I am currently developing a new business and get assistance to make sure we can pay the mortgage while it builds and so on. I pay tax but because I have a company I pay very little. The system encourages private enterprise because that is who generates the jobs and the GDP.

Not only that we were the only major industrialized nation not to suffer the GFC to the degree any others did. All because we have a democratic socialist form of government within the framework of a constitutional monarchy. So I'm afraid some outside the USA might see socialism a little differently to that college professor.
Redcap

[arnold]

So how come, when we have poured trillions into solving the problem of the poor, we still have poor. No one is denide medical care in the US. You can walk into anyhospital and they have to treat you. Yes it can harm you credit wise when you can't pay. But there are so many people out there that just believe that everyone else ( the govt) should have top pay for their education or asst them while they develop a new business.
That type of logic is unsustainable and will eventually collapse upon it self.
Hey BS, at least you can be sure your kid or relative didn't make it up. It makes way too much sense!

[redcap]

Arnold, trillions have been expended but not all of that has gone to the problem. Not only that but spending by itself is not the answer, as we have found out in the recent GFC and so forth.

Poverty is not caused by laziness but it does have a side effect of making some lazy due to frustration. They give up because the system is against them. Once they are too deep into the cycle of poverty getting out is harder. The further they sink the harder it gets. Some will end up breeding generation after generation of people with no hope, no incentive and no chance to change. Part of that is the makeup of those people, they are life's losers or would be no matter what the circumstances. Part is the system.

If you are born into a poor family you have less chances than someone born to a wealthier family. School is not free in the USA. In Australia we pay for uniforms for our kids and  field trips and so on, but that's it. The rest is paid via our taxes. If we were poor we could get help with the uniform costs or even free ones from charities. In High School the kids pay for their own exercise books but again, if truly poor these are available from charities. Usually the only really poor are those whose parents are substance abusers and use their income for drug and alcohol purchases. They still breed and these kids often sadly grow up like their parents.

So we still have a percentage of 'losers' but it must be worse in the USA. Sure the hospital must treat you but how well and how much treatment will you get if they know you can't pay? If you are  a minority and fall foul of the law you can end up in prison and it is downhill from there. You now have no hope of getting out of the rut.

Don't get me wrong, I love vacationing in the USA, I have many great American mates and I have found Americans to be generous to a fault and brave as lions under pressure and definitely someone I would be proud to have beside me in a tight spot... but. But I would not like to live in a society that has so little concern for others as official policy as evinced by the government's policies and the user pays mindset that is great if you can afford to pay but degrading and dehumanizing if you can't.

Remember this: those poor people can't afford martial arts classes or internet connections so they don't have a voice here. This forum is a privileged place and we should be grateful to be here, to be so privileged.
Redcap

[arnold]

Yes but the poor can go into public library and use the internet. I blame the government over the last 50 years of settling up a system where individuals become dependent on the government.
The treatment you get in the hospital is the same as everyone else by law. No DR. or hospital would risk less than the law allows for fear of legal retribution.
I agree that the system needs to be changed, but not to the point of throwing the baby out with the bathwater.
Stay safe out there

[TLE]

Redcap- school is not free in the US? As a public school educator, thats news to me. We are mandated to educate all children, including homeless. tHere is not tuition, book fees or other charges if income is low. We have free breakfast, free lunch and free dinner for our students k-12 if they fall below a given income level. We supply uniforms if the students can't aford them. We have before school, after school weekend and all kinds of intervention programs for the students. Now, for what it is worth here is what I have learned:

1. All this encourages fraud and deception to collect more and more of the goodies freely given out. I have seen families at poverty level pick up kids in new Escalades wearing designer clothes I can't afford. And believe me, theses are not isolated incidents. Only in America.
2. If you don't have to sacrifice for something , it is meaningless to you. Entightlement is a form of slavery.
3. Public education is the single, most overrated passage to a better life. Solid moral footing and character  development are the cornerstones to success.

4
4.

[redcap]

I will accept what you say as you are there, I'm not. My next question would be why have you and everyone else in the USA who doesn't abuse the system not done something about it? Perhaps the political system only perpetuates the problem and takes care of the rich who don;t see this as their problem because they get big tax breaks from their paid for representatives and thus these greedy types are funded by Joe Average?

I am sure the Escalade (I presume that is an expensive motor vehicle) Brigade are in the minority but prevalent enough to be noted. So why? Why allow it?

There is a misconception here in Australia of similar misuse of public largesse however the reality is it isn't that misused. While there are always some shocking cases of abuse and greed and laziness, most of the time the system works pretty well. The media will grab something and beat it up if it suits them, such as the muslim multi wife rip off deal. Despite less than 2% of the population being muslim and the vast majority of them monogamous, the Bogans love this one.

This one has a muslim man with beard and pjs visiting each of his four burkah shrouded wives at separate public housing homes, drawing welfare for each wife and children of that union and so on. So the argument goes he is getting four times what a non-muslim would get. Not quite.

If those women were not married to him then they would still get benefits as single parents. The children would still generate benefits at the same rate as children of a single parent or regular nuclear family. Each parent and children would be eligible for public housing if they met the criteria. While it does seem to be taking a liberty (and I believe it does, they should all be in the one house if they are the one family), the criteria has been applied in each case and if eligible, the payments are made. to make an exception and discriminate against muslim multi marriages would be fine by me but it would set a precedent. We would then see other exceptions raised and where would it end? Already indigenous Australians get far more than non-indiginous but there are only 3% of them and they do have problems adjusting to civilized society apparently.

When people living in public housing but making more than the maximum income limit allowed, they are removed and charged for the 'back rent'. As for the flash car, who's to say they didn't have it before they hit hard times and while they should sell it they choose not to?

I read somewhere that only in America would someone drive themselves to the poorhouse. Interesting society you have there.
Redcap

[metz57]

Redcap,

Doesn’t Australia have laws against polygamy? Is it a case of a blind eye being turned when certain groups break the law, in the name of ‘cultural sensitivity’?

Metz

[redcap]

Bigamy is illegal but polygamy is not, providing it is genuinely a part of the cultural/religious kick of whoever is doing it. Exception or exemption rather than blind eye, methinks the official wording might be. Today at a seminar I sat next to a middle eastern man who had his three wives on his other side, all duly covered up of course. I gave him a 'G'Day' and asked if all three were his wives, he replied they were. I asked how many kids did he have all up. He replied he had 3, 4 and 2, from the oldest to the youngest wife and more planned.

Well of course, since we get a $5000 Baby Bonus for each child so he got $25K for the five born here. Nothing for the other 4 born overseas but now the Family Tax Benefit A of $140 per child per fortnight brings in $1260, plus another $200 or so Family Tax Benefit B as he is the only bread winner. Each mother gets a parenting benefit of $411.50 a fortnight and since they are in rented housing they get rental assistance of $208 a fortnight each as they live in separate houses. All up they receive $3110.50 a fortnight, or $1555.25 a week. That works out to $81K a year. Plus he said he 'works' but earns very little after tax as a taxi driver/owner. I would say he rakes in $150K a year from all sources as a cab owner can easily make $70K off his plates.

He was quite open about his circumstances and so it was easy to figure out the rates of benefit paid as this is public knowledge. He had a translator at the seminar even though he spoke fair English, but he was entitled to one according to the NGO running the seminar so somebody paid for that somewhere down the line.

And speaking of lines, the bottom line is he is doing nothing wrong. He didn't ask for this largesse, he is simply availing himself of it as is his right as a citizen or permanent resident. No doubt he is rorting the system somewhere along the line but where they come from that is not wrong.
Redcap

[arnold]

send him to Old Bri, he will take care of him!

[whitewolf]

Red- that is rediculous-they better change the law there brother-i dont care if he has 10 wifes- support them all together -not seperatly and break the state bank- dam brother-what a world-  WW

[redcap]

WW I agree but the simple reality is that if the same women were single parents they would be entitled to the same assistance. I do not know numbers but I would be surprised if even half of the 3-400,000 Muslims in Australia have more than one wife. The fact is every citizen is entitled to X. I do think though they are taking the piss and they know it.

Other minorities do it too. Aborigines get more per head than non-indigenous but many live in remote areas with very few services, if any. The urban ones cry the loudest and when you offer to take away the nasty invading white man's welfare they play the race card pretty quickly.

Then we have the Indian Students Association. We make a lot of money providing education to international students, mostly Indians and Chinese. They are quite political and demand all sorts of extra attention and if one of them gets mugged then it is a racial attack. If one of their own harms one of them then nothing is said. We had this recently with two murders or adults and also a child being accidentally killed but then the child was abandoned, all bu fellow Indians. Not a peep from the ISA.

When I came to Australia in the early 70s the problem was with Mediterranean migrants, then Vietnamese, then Lebanese and currently Muslim and African. All of them have been accused of rorting the welfare system but the system is the same for all and it has been tightened up more and more. No doubt the next wave will find loopholes. At least we don't have the problems on our southern border you guys do.
Redcap

[whitewolf]

Red-thinking about it -makes sense-a minority comes to a foreign country where they can live better-  they automatically try to get as much out of it as they can-human nature i suppose-what is also interesting for example the minority comes to america and vast majority work their ass off- send money  home and gather in groups to gain a foothold in the business world- where as some of our americans sit back enjoy the
free benifits and do not attempt to start a business or venture-i am not saying all but a lot either dont care or are stuck in a situation where they dont want to move out of it.
Hopefully it is getting better in that respect though.
WW (ELB) "speed of light"