On poverty

Saying "you're wrong" is not a valid argument. I appreciate the discussion and know that you believe Democrats are better for society if Republicans stay out of their way. Towing a party line requires ignoring results.

CA leads the US in poverty. That is an irrefutable fact.
CA does not have Republicans in the way.
The claim this thread is based on is false.

If you want to discuss our roads, CA still brought in high taxes before the second gas tax and added registration fees. How did the roads deteriorate to this point when they were collecting taxes all along?

You pay the mobile home park every month to maintain the grounds. If they take the money, but don't deliver what you paid for, are you now moaning, and griping for discussing it?

 

Well, we already have a ton of safety net programs. I have no idea how many though. I'd need to consult a social worker to see what programs are available now.

Maybe someone should find all the social programs on the book and figure out what we have now, what we need to have in the future, and, perhaps, what existing programs need to be changed.

And we'd need more public awareness of what programs are available for adults and children. A good online reference.

I guess that's the job of the government. It probably will be decided by the Georgia state runoff election, and who ends up controlling the Senate.

 

Your's is the viewpoint of the cynic as it is derived from neoliberalism, which is neither new, nor liberal, but insane. To understand why it is insane, you'll have to put your viewpoint on pause, just for a few minutes, and jump out of your own skin, a feat, of course, which I suspect is not likely if well nigh impossible. To better understand the argument against neoliberalism, which, in no way, advocates the opposite extreme, either, ( socialism/communism) you'll have discard your simplistic mindset, which, again, I suspect, is not likely.

Nevertheless, my rebuttal:

Great harm has been inflicted on America by neoliberalism which has been the mainstay of economic thinking by the right and on the moderate left, Reagan/Clinton/Bush/ et al (promulgated by Milton Friedman, et al., which accelerated with Reagan, )

Here is a 3 minute clip, for your edification.



More:

 

Really? Ever heard of Madoff, Epstein, Enron, etc, etc. ,and white collar crime? What about Trump's evading $400 million in taxes?

You'd think that poor folks are the only ones committing crimes. The ones doing the MOST DAMAGE are the rich ones.

 

I've lived in many states, and CA is the best, the most beautiful, and I've never had a problem with crime.
You can't judge much from looking at stats, you have to live there to really know what a state is like.

The reason cost of living here is the same reason a Lincoln cost more than a volkswagen.

Sure, I could take $400k and buy a large spread in Nebraska, but then, I'd have to live in Nebraska.

I've lived in California, Mississippi, Louisiana, Floridia, Texas, Illinois, and NYcity.

California is, by far, the best. the best beaches, the best weather (low humidity), sunsets, and no ****ing mosquitoes hurricanes or tornadoes.
If I have an itch to ski it's a two hour drive in the wintertime. California has it all.

 

Why bother with facts when an anecdote can be used to represent 40 million people? Perhaps that little gem can provide comfort for victims of crime or those living in poverty. "Hey, your suffering hasn't bothered me!"

I do admire your transparency.

 

The problem with minimum wage is it really depends on where you are and what one considers living. I lived a much better life at right below the line to receive free insurance and food stamps than I did for years after I started making to much to receive anything. That being said, minimum wage is still to low in most of the places I have lived. But, $20/hr would also be to low in some places, would it not?

I believe it should be adjusted locally, at the county level and as minimum increases, the government should also pull back some of give away programs. Take some of that money and use it to help small business owners overcome the increases to labor cost and lower tax burdens where we can.

 

that is why States can raise the min wage more then that

the federal min wage is the lowest wage any State can set

 

Well, interesting that you brought up the fact that 40,000,000 people CHOOSE to live in CA and NOT other states.

All big cities have urban problems, so what else is new?

Nothing you state refutes my comment, thus, which owing to choice factors, could logically represent a majority of the forty million who live here:

I've lived in many states, and CA is the best, the most beautiful, and I've never had a problem with crime. You can't judge much from looking at stats, you have to live there to really know what a state is like.

The reason cost of living here is the same reason a Lincoln cost more than a volkswagen.

Sure, I could take $400k and buy a large spread in Nebraska, but then, I'd have to live in Nebraska.

I've lived in California, Mississippi, Louisiana, Floridia, Texas, Illinois, and NYcity.

California is, by far, the best. the best beaches, the best weather (low humidity), sunsets, and no ****ing mosquitoes hurricanes or tornadoes. If I have an itch to ski it's a two hour drive in the wintertime. California has it all.

 

California has had a number conservative governors as democratic governors (Reagan, Deukmejian, Wilson, Schwarzenegger) . When Reagan was here, he cut funding for mental hospitals, and many who lived there were evicted, resulting in a significant rise in the homeless population. So, whatever problems CA has is bi-partisan. Before Covid, CA had multibillion dollar surplus. CA is the 5th largest economy in the world.

My park is immaculate, and the lowest priced in the county, owing to rent control (I rent the space).

Why? Because liberals enacted policies that allowed people like me could afford to live here, otherwise, I'd have to move to Nebraska or some such place I wouldn't enjoy living in.

Look, if you don't like CA, then don't come here or move if you do live here. But, you're just one of those, what Spiro Agnew referred to as , 'nattering nabobs of negativity'.

Quitcherbitchin' as it were. You gripes about the left remind me of this clip by someone anonymous, but it is so true:

A Day in the Life of Sue Republican
Sue gets up at 6 a.m. and fills her coffeepot with water to prepare her morning coffee. The water is clean and good because some tree-hugging liberal fought for minimum water-quality standards.
With her first swallow of coffee, she takes her daily medication. Her medications are safe to take because some stupid commie liberal fought to insure their safety and that they work as advertised. All but $10 of her medications are paid for by her employer's medical plan because some liberal union workers fought their employers for paid medical insurance - now Sue gets it too.
She prepares her morning breakfast, bacon and eggs. Sue's bacon is safe to eat because some girly-man liberal fought for laws to regulate the meat packing industry.
In the shower, Sue reaches for her shampoo. Her bottle is properly labeled with each ingredient and its amount in the total contents because some crybaby liberal fought for her right to know what she was putting on her body and how much it contained.
Sue dresses, walks outside and takes a deep breath. The air she breathes is clean because some environmentalist wacko liberal fought for laws to stop industries from polluting our air.
She walks to the subway station for her government-subsidized ride to work. It saves her considerable money in parking and transportation fees because some fancy-pants liberal fought for affordable public transportation, which gives everyone the opportunity to be a contributor.
Sue begins her work day. She has a good job with excellent pay, medical benefits, retirement, paid holidays and vacation because some lazy liberal union members fought and died for these working standards. Sue's employer pays these standards because Sue's employer doesn't want his employees to call the union.
If Sue is hurt on the job or becomes unemployed, she'll get a worker compensation or unemployment check because some stupid liberal didn't think she should lose her home because of her temporary misfortune.
It's noon and Sue needs to make a bank deposit so she can pay some bills. Sue's deposit is federally insured by the FDIC because some godless liberal wanted to protect Sue's money from unscrupulous bankers who ruined the banking system before the Great Depression.
Sue has to pay her Fannie Mae-underwritten mortgage and her below-market federal student loan because some elitist liberal decided that Sue and the government would be better off if she was educated and earned more money over her lifetime.
Sue is home from work. She plans to visit her father this evening at his farm home in the country. She gets in her car for the drive. Her car is among the safest in the world because some America-hating liberal fought for car safety standards.
She arrives at her childhood home. Her generation was the third to live in the house financed by Farmers' Home Administration because bankers didn't want to make rural loans. The house didn't have electricity until some big-government liberal stuck his nose where it didn't belong and demanded rural electrification.
She is happy to see her father, who is now retired. Her father lives on Social Security and a union pension because some wine-drinking, cheese-eating liberal made sure he could take care of himself so Sue wouldn't have to.
Sue gets back in her car for the ride home, and turns on a radio talk show. The radio host keeps saying that liberals are bad and conservatives are good. He doesn't mention that Republicans have fought against every protection and benefit Sue enjoys throughout her day. Sue agrees: "We don't need those big-government liberals ruining our lives! After all, I'm self-made and believe everyone should take care of themselves, just like I have."


Damn those liberals, messing with our 'freedom'.

 

Your claim was easily refuted.

CA leads the country in poverty.
CA has no Republicans getting in the way.
The claim this thread is based on is false.

To follow a religion or a political party, blind belief combined with ignoring results are requirements.

Now we can agree on how beautiful our weather is and how much we like to ski, but neither party can take credit for that.

 

But, see, people want to live her because of it, and owing to supply and demand, prices go up.

It's capitalism, not liberalism, keeping those prices high.

 

The federal rate should be a baseline, and it's just too little. It should be enough to live on in the least expensive city in america, and other states can adjust accordingly.

$20 an hour would be to little to live in Manhattan, but i doubt anyone expects minimum wages to live in Manhattan.

Funnything, in 1970, I shared an apartment in Manhattan for $200 per month on a $3.25 per hour job. Not possible today, on the adjusted for inflation version of that.

Standard of living has gone down since I was young, and it has gone down pretty much everywhere.

 

Until 1980 the disparity between CEO pay and average worker pay was very reasonable, since 1980 and the advent of DOWNSIZING it has exploded and continues to do so as the salary gap has grown ever wider along with the reduction in fringe benefits for rank and file employees. Unions have been largely kneecapped and diminished.

 

CA leads the US in poverty.
CA has no reps in the dems way.
The claim you made is false.

Holding government accountable is not bitching and whining.

 

On the contrary, the BEST approach is to learn from the mistakes of others. It's always preferable to falling down and stumbling yourself.

 

You left out the parallel 'higher cost of living'.

 

This, to the power of ten.

Those who refuse to discuss it are the cause of all of it. They very clearly want to see the decline perpetuated - since no reasonably functional adult can possibly claim they didn't know. It's despicable.

 

Everyone is supposed to be equal under the law.
We both know that is not true and we’ve got work to do to get there.

Equal opportunity simply means we all should be playing the game under the same rules. We both know that ain’t happening either. We’ve got to get serious about enforcing the rules.

A good example of that is enforcing the Fair Housing Act passed roughly four decades ago. The notion of actually enforcing the law created the ridiculous meme about the “government building projects in your neighborhood”. I’m sure you recall the hair on fire posts on this forum. One could translate that into people were actually opposed to allowing people to live wherever they could afford to live. Oh! The horror.
We’ve got a lot of work to do.

I’m not sure who supports equal outcomes or if that notion is simply a divisive political meme.

 

Many poor folks do better on welfare than on a chump job. They don't need to pay a nursery, provide for transportation to get to and from work. No new clothes for the job etc...

 

Yeah, I loved it.
The people complaining must have lived in the ghettos.
They probably moved to Ca. so they wouldn't be cold while they were homeless.

 

And crime in the black community, nope can't discuss that.

 

Why do you claim the economy turns solely on who is President at the time? That's utter folly. Or that Presidents alone control government spending and resulting deficits? More folly. For instance the FY 2009 Bush/Rep deficits was a paltry $161B, then the Democrats took back the Congress for FY2008 and FY2009 do you assign those budgets and resulting Deficits to Bush? Especially 2009? OR how about the late 1990 budgets passed by Gingrich and Kaisch do you assign those Clinton? In both why?

 

You can't put a dent into poverty until you have jobs and you can't have jobs until you have lower crime. You can have investment in poor areas but not high crime areas, people aren't going to invest there. And education is quite affordable in poor areas in fact for the taxpayers it's quite expensive but it does no good if the people there don't take advantage of it nor matter how much money we spend. Democrats have been doing this for decades but they refuse to address the systemic problems within those communities and it's not racism. A young single girl not getting her education, having several babies how is that the road to success? A young male not getting his education engaging in drugs and crimes, creating babies and not being father to them, how is that the road to success? It's the Democrats who think they can just pass bills that spend money with abandons and say hey look at us are we great. The first three years of the Trump administration we saw some of the best ever recorded economic situations for minorities, Biden and the Dems want to turn away from that and back to the we're the government and we're here to help mentality.

 

The corporation's are who drove the outsourcing to get at cheaper labor. Labor is basically like a commodity so all things being equal you buy the cheapest commodity. If government tells corporations not to outsource labor that is interference in the business. The extreme right wing economic Yahoo!'s want American workers to work for the same wages as Chinese workers or maybe less. If that happens American workers will not be able to afford the products that they produce so that segment of the market would be closed off from the corporations.