the poorer you are, the less options you have. The rich have all the options. If I'm poor, I can't afford electric buses. I feel helpless, and I'm going to take it out on the people that fucked it up for me.

This doesn't address the issue that Oil Companies/Banks etc manipulate the markets so make those profits. Again, when you are producing record profits due to tax and policies that drive wages down while other people are laid off or unemployed, people will be pissed.

companies rather have workers working for minimum wage and 60 hours + a week. More profits, but less employees.

Doctors make life and death decisions daily, arguably work in an occupation that requires a higher skill set than a CEO, have a much more extensive education than anyone working in business is required, are in extremely high demand all over the world, also work long hours and are always on call; given that, one would think that a doctor should be entitled to equal or greater pay than a CEO.

Yes, a CEO has a demanding job that requires a significant set of skills, but in comparison to other highly skilled occupations they are still earning far to much.

I did exactly the same thing you did and now I own a home in richmond with my brother after 3 years of hardwork.

for those of you who are wondering, I do a mindless labour job

80% of Canadians live in urban areas, so MOST have access to public transit. Driving is not a necessity, its a easy scapegoat for the uninformed and lazy.

Even for those who live where driving is a necessity, the type of vehicle they drive is a choice. Over the past decade in the US the percentage of 4cyclinder engine cars has risen from the high 20s to the mid 40s percent. People are choosing to pay the gas companies less.

In fact some of the gas companies have complained that their profit margin is down to a point they don't have the extra cash to fund more gas exploration. Why is this important? cause unless we keep looking we're going to hit peak oil sooner and prices will go up as supply dwindles. Not that I expect you to understand this, nor have looked it up before criticizing.

So back to why do we pick on Exxon with a profit margin of 7.6% when most of US manufacturing has a profit margin of 6% while companies like Apple make a profit margin of 40%?

FFS Buying a bus pass is cheaper than owning a car.

If you're poor you fucked up, take it out on yourself, leave me out of it.

Again, what is record profit? For the largest company in the world yes making 7.6% translates to a big fucking number, yet its still only 7.6% slightly ahead of the 6% most of US manufacturing makes while Apple makes 40% profit (and I bet you own an Apple product).

Why is Exxon profit up so much? hmmmmmm lets take a look at the price of commodities like oil, metals, food, ... all are up record levels from 3 years ago. Why are these prices up? Cause we, main street, demand that our investments return certain levels, while our economy only advances 2-3%. So wall street speculates to meet main streets demands, which drives up commodity prices and companies producing commodities make record profits while we pay more for stuff and have less cash.

Do you see how to break the cycle? main street needs more realistic expectations, and maybe wall street won't speculate.

I respectfully disagree. I have an uncle who is an emergency room surgeon and two that are CEOs (one heads an American multinational that I am sure most of you will recognize). This is what I think. Life and death decisions while important, is a different kind of decision than the important decisions CEOs need to make. Their not comparable. Theoretically going by that logic, if we as a society determine that the highest pay goes to those that save lives, how much should paramedics make then? Firefighters? scientists designing cancer drugs? arguably, doctors would be at the top of this hierarchy as they have specialized knowledge and ability, but where do you draw the line? You also have to remember these are paid by taxpayers as opposed to private capital. Usually, CEO salaries are inflated by stock value (like how Steve Jobs made $1 in salary). These stock options can be sold on the markets to other people who are willing to give them their money. Besides, doctors, especially specialist and surgeons can make quite a bit in the US (comparable to many CEOs who only make a couple thousand).

Studying to be a doctor has almost no risk, whereas in business its ALL about risk. Doctors can safely assume they would get a job, even banks guarantee loans if your a med student. You pretty much know how much you would make from the start, so if a doctor isn't happy with his pay, he shouldn't have got into the profession. Going into business does not guarantee you success (just like a degree doesn't automatically give you a job), nor does climbing the corporate ladder guarantee you the CEO position. There is only one such position in every company, just think of all the competition and politics involved. Not all doctors are cut out for this, just because your book smart does not make you a successful businessman. Doctors are more like technicians if you think about it, they do the same thing over and over (much like a pilot) whereas a CEO needs to be more dynamic (strategic plans look 10+ years down the road, how do you look into the future?). If you've ever met a CEO in your life, I think you'll realize in a 5minute talk why they are where they are at.


Private companies are owned by shareholders. Do they not have the right to choose who they want to be their CEOs? and how much they want to reward them? CEOs are answerable to shareholders, if they suck, you can damn well bet they will be REPLACED. Imagine if this was your company, why does an outsider get to determine how much you want to pay your top management? If people want more jobs, we need more entrepreneurs to CREATE them. We need more people to step up in society who have balls instead of the whiners who think that they deserve a job.

^ there are many people that "fucked" up, without being their fault.

I don't own an Apple product, wtf does that have to do with anything?
I have a financial background, big numbers are all relative. I understand that. Cisco has saved 40Billion dollars due to tax loopholes and increase their profits from years in the past (record), yet doesnt have a net increase in # of employees. Commodities doesnt seem to have a huge play there.

Wall street is speculating due to their own greed. Many Traders and investment bankers would sell their grandmothers to make a buck. These are quotes from VPs and Directors.

In my humble opinion, to break the cycle we need to have a more demand driven economy.

Since 1950, the lowest unemployment rate was in 1953, when it was at 2.5%, and personal tax rates back then was 91% for anyone making more than $200,000.

$200,000.00 in 1953 is $1,641,790.26 in 2011. Thus, anyone making $1.6 million would be taxed marginally at 91%. Tax rates were high back then, and it didnt stop people from making more money.

.

I do think that research scientists should earn much more than they do; the salaries they earn do not reflect the fact that they are some of the most intelligent members of our society, make greater contributions towards progress and assume massive risk to pursue their educations even in funded programs. Discussing the appaling lack of value society places on academic contributions is an entirely different topic, however.

I've both met and spent a fairly significant amount of time with multiple CEOs actually, my mom is a senior vp and a large financial institution and I have interacted with them in my own professional life. The mind set of a CEO is certainly different, and it's not something that just anyone can have adopt, but I don't think it's all that special ultimately. I also don't feel that CEOs are taking a massive risk pursuing an MBA, I've known a few people in my life with business degrees and all of them held six figure positions within the first few years of entering their careers.

Shareholders have the right to choose who their CEO should be and the pay rate they will be given, certainly, but the pay rates are artificially high. I don't want to go into explaining my reasoning for that on my phone, but I will later.

Ultimately, there will always be people at the bottom of the pay scale working entry level jobs for one reason or another. Some of those people are not driven or intelligent enough to push beyond that level, others for entirely different reasons. Although I don't personally hold much respect for the majority of those people, I do feel they deserve to earn a wage where they can comfortabley support a life style with conservative management of their finances.

These are just my opinions of course, I appreciate and enjoy discussing these issues with anyone who can respectfully disagree with someone who holds opposing views.
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the post ww2 decade were one of the biggest booms in the world. ever. of course unemployment would be low. but oh but guess where a good chunk of people worked back then? labor building the newly expanding post war country and labor in manufacturing.

Thats all fine and dandy but do you really think everyone out there has the option to do that? What if at age 25 you were 100k in school debt?

Part of the problem are the lobbyists. Like when how Obama promised to bankrupt all the coal fired power plants. Yet GE plants havn't been touched by this, also if you sold your plant to GE they will allow it to continue running. Anyone remember how enron made record profits? Imagine what would happen when GE starts shutting down plants and charging crazy prices... I mean enron would be a blip (one state) on the radar compared to this monopoly GE has going for it.

And didn't have a career that allows you to easily start your own business?

During the recession I went from working 60 hours a week at a great wage, to taking a pay cut and working 20 hours a week. Fortunately, I was paid as a sub-contractor working in construction, so I reached out to contractors and home owners taking on small jobs that wouldn't be profitable for a typical sub-contractor who has overhead and the extra effort earned me a great income. That flexibility is one of the benefits of working in construction.

If I were newly graduated with a finance degree and massive student loan debt, I wouldn't have had that option during the recession. I would have been over qualified for construction, retail, food service and no matter how many jobs I applied for the likelihood of finding something would have been low. So, if that person, who may well still be unemployed or not working in their field, stands in the streets trying to enact change for weeks without compensation is a whiner or has a poor work ethic then maybe you can suggest an alternative.

So apparently this is happening in Vancouver next Saturday?

I might head down to take some pictures.

^I'll be there

Our economy is dependent on services, sure, but not baristas. 'Services' is container that includes much more. Software can be a product or a service, for example.

The market will set the wage. If no one can survive working there, the coffeeshop will have to increase the pay. Econ is a wonderful course to learn about how our system works and the tradeoffs you have to make. The theory is not common knowledge cuz ppl in the media really distort the facts.

:heckno:

I would recommend that you stop at 20K and work coop or something to pay it off before moving forward. If you can't find anything, then maybe that's a signal to reconsider your major. God will not come down from the sky and save you from bad choices. Maybe this person with 100K in debt has had too comfortable a life!

If you worked as contractor, then you took a narrow field of work, it is a risky business.
If you decided to take out loans for a finance degree, then you took not only a risk for a field but also for a loan.
You balanced both long term gain and a fulfilling profession against the risk of a narrow field or a loan.
Suck it up.

If you wanted something safe, then you don't take something rewarding.
You work your way up to become a manager of Mcdonalads.

It's not just who isn't a hard worker and whiner.
It's who made bad decisions in life and ends up paying for it either.


I have made some pretty bad decisions, but you don't blame management that you can't learn to work the system to your advantage.


I keep hearing about cases where people take risks then raging at the system when they got burned. They had lots of lower risk options on the table but explain it away as "beneath them".


If you are hard working enough and can talk somebody into holding onto your job, you'd be the best damn janitor ever.

Don't blame it on the system.


The only thing I blame on the system is that the big banks got bailed out.
And there isn't enough transparency with large government contract.

Contracting isn't a narrow field, it's a hugely diverse field, the skills anyone in construction learns are transferable to almost any specific field in the industry. There is also almost always a significant number of construction jobs available.

A finance or business degree is the same, it's not something someone pursues for intellectual fulfilment, it's about the long term financial security; that's why I used that hypothetical example. Someone pursues a degree in history or art is taking a risk in exchange for the potential of a fulfilling profession, I have no sympathy for someone with a degree in literature being unemployed.

The majority of people don't choose jobs low level jobs, like work as a janitor or manager at mcdonalds, because they want to earn more than twenty dollars an hour at some point in their lives. It would be tough to find a manager at the store front level of mcdonalds not living pay cheque to pay cheque, even with a financially conservative life style.

The reality is that people with practical degrees have been out of work for years, because of the unnecessary risks taken by big business in an attempt to maximise profits. It's the systems fault for the lack of regulation put in place to prevent that, the lack of regulation directly correlating with the power of lobbyists in America. American politicians had the world economy holding their breath for a week over an insignificant sum of money for fuck sakes, that's the level of disconnect the people at the top have.

Then lets roll this back to when I was 17-18 just out of highschool looking at going to university. I had a single mother who was just managing to pay the bills, I couldnt ask her to pay for my schooling. And I KNEW I didnt want 100k in loans to goto school. So I found a job and started working. Now I have a future thats in my hands, not dependent on big corporate bosses, and I probably make more money than I would have if I had gone to school.

Is there a federal reserve in vancouver? That is the root problem not wall street.

*sigh

Good examples but you must know that there is no one CORRECT path to life. Even if someone else followed the exact same paths and decisions you had is not a guarantee to yielding the same results.

No knock on you and I congratulate how well you're doing, but I laugh a little when I hear people with success stories say.... "If only you did this... this... this..."


Does one ever consider that they did? Or perhaps that they followed another model of paths to success (perhaps from their parents, friends, etc) and did not yield the result desired?

+ 1

There are many hard working individuals that succeed, and there are many hard working individuals that don't.

Ok, in between work I have been doing reading and research on this so I can know for myself what is going on.

Here is what I have come to.

I think the system is fucked. I think we all know it to be so. I am assuming to be a cross section of middle class folk-give or take-I see a few pictures of some pretty pricey cars sitting in front of some pretty pricey housing around here.

What most of US do, is accept it, and work within it. We know the system is fucked, but that does not stop the vast majority from going to work on Monday. We know that up the chain, someone is in charge that makes money off of what we do. Hell, I quit my job and starting working for myself, and guess what? My clients make money off of what I do.

I think there is a growing segment of the population that has watched their parents work within it, and their grandparents and really all for nothing. Cogs in a machine.

I do not think that the peaceniks in New York are the only ones that know the system is fucked. And by fucked, I mean unsustainable. In our system, you have an ever growing need to find new markets, and new opportunity. If you cannot find new markets, then you sell existing customers new product. Eventually, something gives. And its giving. I do not think the economy is going to return to normal-not without some external force to create change. Do I think this is the only time in history that people have asked these questions? NO.

I think things probably looked pretty bleak in 1929. I think they looked pretty bleak in the 30s, and definitely in the early 40s. But the war was an external force that caused change. There was war production, and an entire generation of men gone and all the other factors of that level of war, plus countries obliterated that left the US as the only competitor in a new world stage.

People fear change. And honey, change is happening right now.

In my tin foil hat epiphany that I had today, I think I may have finally decided in my mind whats happening. In the quest for providing an ever greater world in which to live, debt has been the answer, and its starting to crush countries. The US is really not going to easily cut 1.5 trillion from their budget to even balance their books. If they cut defense, they die. If they cut social programs-they die. If they raise revenue-haha, they die.

(cut defense, and the rest of the world takes them out, cut social, and the people rise up and if they raise revenue by 1 trillion, the people rise as the economy dies)

So, its a matter of time. And here is the tin-foil part. The guys in power, they know it too. Is it possible-possible, that the New World Order conspiracy may have a basis in fact actually planning for the end of the world economy? The first thing you would have is a large, confused, angry population that has now contributed their lives to a dead system, and someone stands up and says, well, this is what we had in mind. It actually does not seem so far fetched. That is exactly how the US came to be in the first place. Some people started talking about a brave new day without England, and then started planning for it, and then actively worked to bring it about.

I think the part that everyone kind of rolls their eyes about is the desire to bring it about, as opposed to the necessity.

I just re-read this, and it comes off as rambling. Most of my reading has been really left wing shit, so maybe I will go back to my middle of the road yay capitalism self in the morning.

i agree with you. i have been very fortunate to have a good head on my shoulders and a little bit of luck and a good handshake to get to where i am now and where im heading. i didnt follow any footsteps, i just sorta found my way thru the mess, with good ears and picking up little bits of advice anywhere i could.

but on the same token, there are tens of thousands of people pouring into business and finance and god forbid arts programs every year. surely they must have heard stories of people 2-4 years ahead of them coming out with no jobs available. would it not make sense to listen to those stories of no jobs, and try doing something else?


in any case, i think ive dragged this topic away from where it was. as i said a page or 2 back, i absolutely agree there needs to be a change with the way the government and banks and investors are run. im just making a point about these kids using the protests as an excuse to complain about sucking at life and how its not their fault. and obviously theres a good chunk of people coming from below middle class with legit reasons, im not talking about them.

See, this is the stuff that just fuels the fire:

quote:

Cain earlier this month addressed protesters in a Wall Street Journal interview, saying: 'Don't blame Wall Street, don't blame the big banks, if you don't have a job and you're not rich, blame yourself.'

Read more: Occupy Wall Street: It's not just politics... Sex, drugs and love brigade hijack Wall Street protest | Mail Online

I think...think...its ok to talk a little bit about the role that big banks have in affecting peoples lives. Given the 700bn golden handshake they got when they fucked up-even the most ardent republican needs to address the fact that this is a huge, unprecedented slap in the face to capitalism-unless that republican has blinders on.