[Rob Instigator]

Not a theory. My own thoughts based on 45 years of living and reading and seeing/witnessing the LIES that businessmen and the business world use to justify destroying everything for an extra dollar.




When anything gains in perceived "value" something else loses it's perceived "value." Think of the creation of mini-cassette tapes. That business BOOMED, due to convenience, ease of use, and cheapness, compared to the 8-track cassette, which dropped in sales and perceived "value" almosty instantly.


a businessman/capitalist will argue that they CREATED wealth and value by creating a new product, but they KNOW that what they have actually done, is destroyed the "value" of a separate product by creating something better.


If "wealth" was infinitely expandable, inflation would not exist. You could literally print money endlessly and all the money would be worth the exact same, always. However, since there is only a finite amount of wealth to go around, a dollar is worth HALF now what it was worth in 1980, and printing more money just devalues the money that already exists.


Millionaires and billionaires try to pretend this is not true, so as to justify their largesse and their hoarding of wealth. If they truly thought wealth could be created they would not have any proble with poorer people getting their share.

[!@#$%!]

Originally Posted by Rob Instigator

Not a theory. My own thoughts based on 45 years of living and reading and seeing/witnessing the LIES that businessmen and the business world use to justify destroying everything for an extra dollar.

oh.

Originally Posted by Rob Instigator

When anything gains in perceived "value" something else loses it's perceived "value." Think of the creation of mini-cassette tapes. That business BOOMED, due to convenience, ease of use, and cheapness, compared to the 8-track cassette, which dropped in sales and perceived "value" almosty instantly.

yeah and mini cassettes lost value too eventually.

also see: furbys (or what were they called?), dutch tulips, leeches as medicine

what is the problem?

value like you said earlier post is ephemeral. but it exists. i meant to bring this back but forgot.

i mean....value exists, but it fluctuates in time, yes, because consumer demand fluctuates as in time well as our needs and desires change

that’s the whole principle behind financial markets: to trade the risk and reward of rising and dropping economic values

Originally Posted by Rob Instigator

a also see: furbys (or what were they called?), dutch tulips, leeches as medicine
/capitalist will argue that they CREATED wealth and value by creating a new product, but they KNOW that what they have actually done, is destroyed the "value" of a separate product by creating something better.

that is schumpeter’s “creative destruction” yes! he wrote about it in the 40s.

schumpeter thought this was a dead end. other people differ.

the replacement to me is an increase in wealth! flash recorders replaced the minitape because they had better value! i love flash memory. so portable. you can’t put a minitape inside a smartphone. some day in the future i won’t because business enterprises will come up with an even better product. who knows what that will be?

and the thigns that we can build with it...

Originally Posted by Rob Instigator

If "wealth" was infinitely expandable, inflation would not exist. You could literally print money endlessly and all the money would be worth the exact same, always. However, since there is only a finite amount of wealth to go around, a dollar is worth HALF now what it was worth in 1980, and printing more money just devalues the money that already exists.

but but but... money is not wealth itself... money is a... language. a means of exchange. and a currency also has value in itself but... yes it can be destroyed.

this is why rampant inflation can be a fucking disaster. this is precisely what we’ll get with bernienomics: a flood of increasingly worthless dollars. modern monetary theory my ass!

Originally Posted by Rob Instigator

Millionaires and billionaires try to pretend this is not true, so as to justify their largesse and their hoarding of wealth. If they truly thought wealth could be created they would not have any proble with poorer people getting their share.

poorer people get their share! some save it and invest it, some spend it.

some invest it in themselves as education. some invest it in a hoard of their own. some blow it all in vegas. some pass it along to their families.

do you not save and invest your share of wealth?

[Skuj]

Sorry for this brief interruption, but:

a) Mueller report likely done in a week.

b) When will Trump start tweeting about Smollett?

OK, carry on. Thanks.

[h8kurdt]

Originally Posted by !@#$%!

some invest it in themselves as education. some invest it in a hoard of their own. some blow it all in vegas. some pass it along to their families.

do you not save and invest your share of wealth?

Absolutely insane. People living hand to mouth every week do not have the option to save, or invest, of what have you. You're making out that people on barely minimum wage should be grateful that they get even that much, and that it's their own fault they haven't built up a nice nest egg for themselves. The quickly disappearing middle class may had the option to do all that but not so much now.

Do you think that it's right that the Walmart family can continue to shaft workers out of a living wage just so they can add to their billions of dollars? Or is it the workers fault for being poor and that they can easily stop.

[!@#$%!]

Originally Posted by h8kurdt

Absolutely insane. People living hand to mouth every week do not have the option to save, or invest, of what have you. You're making out that people on barely minimum wage should be grateful that they get even that much, and that it's their own fault they haven't built up a nice nest egg for themselves. The quickly disappearing middle class may had the option to do all that but not so much now.

are you living hand to mouth? do you not have retirement savings? i thought you just spent a month in ‘merica. im confused...

who are you talking about?

Originally Posted by h8kurdt

Do you think that it's right that the Walmart family can continue to shaft workers out of a living wage just so they can add to their billions of dollars? Or is it the workers fault for being poor and that they can easily stop.

walmart does not belong to “the walmart family”. it’s not a privately owned business. it belongs to me and many others who have shares in it one way or another.

walmart moves billions of dollars though the economy but because of a competitive retail environment their profit margins are very thin. if you think walmart is guaranteed megaprofits you’re not informed correctly.

i actually know a bunch of people who work there actually. some like it some don’t. the ones who didn’t left, the one who do, stay.

i actually shop there too.

[!@#$%!]

ps

“POORER”

i did not mean “the down and out and distressed and the homeless”

i was responding to demonyo’s “poorer people” vs millionaires and billionaires. because middle and working class people are “poorer” than billionaires but own stocks.

[h8kurdt]

[quote=!@#$%!]

are you living hand to mouth? do you not have retirement savings? i thought you just spent a month in ‘merica. im confused...

who are you talking about?

Wasn't talking about me specifically. IIdo ok, nothing special but ok. And nope I don't have any retirement savings. However, I will say that I worked in a warehouse job for years minimum wage. I lived in a crappy bedsit, owned a crappy £150 rover, one week of my monthly wage was spent with not a penny to my name. Pretty much every penny I had went on bills with a little bit left over to actually enjoy life. This is the reality for millions of people over in your end and here too. Moe Tucker actually wrote a great song about this. The recession ruined me and my ability to hold a steady wage as a decorator. Thankfully I managed to get.iut of the warehouse job. However, that isn't the case for most people in those jobs and bounce from one dead end job to another with no option to save and/or invest in shares.

walmart does not belong to “the walmart family”. it’s not a privately owned business. it belongs to me and many others who have shares in it one way or another.

walmart moves billions of dollars though the economy but because of a competitive retail environment their profit margins are very thin. if you think walmart is guaranteed megaprofits you’re not informed correctly.

i actually know a bunch of people who work there actually. some like it some don’t. the ones who didn’t left, the one who do, stay.

i actually shop there too.

Thin but on a massive scales means they were able to report a fourth-quarter profit of $3.69 billion. But you knew that already. I'd consider 3.69 billion for one quarter a massive profit no matter how you look at it.

And apologies, not Walmart, Walton family are majority owner.

And the ones who leave generally drift from one shitty job to another.

[demonrail666]

Originally Posted by !@#$%![/quote

and maybe subsidies are the disaster itself, that keeps a dying enterprise in artificial life support?

That argument's fine if you have a viable alternative up and ready to replace it, but without one I think the social benefits of subsidising a dying enterprise are what ultimately stand between communities that are just about barely holding on and the actual disaster of those abandoned mining towns in the north of England or the rust belt in the US.

[!@#$%!]

Originally Posted by h8kurdt

Wasn't talking about me specifically. IIdo ok, nothing special but ok. And nope I don't have any retirement savings. However, I will say that I worked in a warehouse job for years minimum wage. I lived in a crappy bedsit, owned a crappy £150 rover, one week of my monthly wage was spent with not a penny to my name. Pretty much every penny I had went on bills with a little bit left over to actually enjoy life. This is the reality for millions of people over in your end and here too. Moe Tucker actually wrote a great song about this. The recession ruined me and my ability to hold a steady wage as a decorator. Thankfully I managed to get.iut of the warehouse job. However, that isn't the case for most people in those jobs and bounce from one dead end job to another with no option to save and/or invest in shares.

everyone suffers from a recession. my business crashed during the recession. i had to downsize HARD. eventually we recovered but later we shut it down for good. so? failure is a good teacher. knowledge is not a waste.

and that's what i meant by some people invest on themselves. you acquire new skills and move up from minimum wage jobs as your career progresses. isn't it how it works? are you supposed to do the same thing now that when you were 20? gotta take some courses. move up in the world. treat the job like an entrepreneur.

as for retirement, i guess here some people will depend solely on social security (a growing albatross), but working class people with pensions and other types of retirement accounts are all invested in the market. teachers, cops, firefighters, municipal employees, they're all... walmart owners!

and walmart actually offers a 401(k) with matching contributions to employees, btw.

Originally Posted by h8kurdt

Thin but on a massive scales means they were able to report a fourth-quarter profit of $3.69 billion. But you knew that already. I'd consider 3.69 billion for one quarter a massive profit no matter how you look at it.

And apologies, not Walmart, Walton family are majority owner.

And the ones who leave generally drift from one shitty job to another.

it's not massiv profit! it's a matter of scale. arithmetic, my friend. walmart is HUUUGE. it feeds and clothes MILLIONS of people. they also sell BILLIONS AND BILLIONS in merchandise. they are a beacon of civilization in many places, especially rural areas who'd be fucked and at the mercy of predatory mom and pop stores without them (mom and pop are assholes, trust me. they overcharge, accept no returns, fuck you on the installment plan, and their warranties suck).

after walmart pays everyone including the gubmint, their profit margin is barely 3.3%.

right now there are savings accounts paying 2.35%. you could just open one and jerk off all day while accruing interest.

see:

https://www.pnc.com/en/personal-bank...AAEgI-ZfD_BwE#

walmart does A LOT OF FUCKING WORK to beat a savings account by less than 1%.

jeezus...

1 out of 30 days is a profit. on day 29 they break even. the other 28 they operate at loss.

how is this... aaaah!

proud walmart shareholder ready to divest lol.

[h8kurdt]

You're gonna defend Walmart and it's practices now? I'm out.

[!@#$%!]

Originally Posted by h8kurdt

You're gonna defend Walmart and it's practices now? I'm out.

 

[h8kurdt]

Originally Posted by !@#$%!

 

yey Walmart. The paradigm of society

Fact is Walmart managed to get to the size they are by destroying communities, by grinding down every Union and working person, through predatory pricing and making themselves the monopoly in towns. But hey, fuck mom and pop stores for charging items so they can actually make a living. Yup, Walmart, working so hard for your share money. Get some shares.in nestle whilst you're at it.

[GravitySlips]

Originally Posted by !@#$%!

and that's what i meant by some people invest on themselves. you acquire new skills and move up from minimum wage jobs as your career progresses. isn't it how it works? are you supposed to do the same thing now that when you were 20? gotta take some courses. move up in the world. treat the job like an entrepreneur.

I agree with this, and it's how I was able to pull myself out of a rut in my early/mid 20s.

However, it probably wouldn't have been possible without state-funded education. Not everyone can afford to just take a course, not everyone has the time to support themselves (working full-time) AND study on the side. I had barely a penny when I committed to going back to study. Thank fuck for evil Fox News "socialism"!

(as an aside, I had Swedish and Finnish friends at uni who got very generous monthly stipends from their governments for studying abroad at university. They got PAID to go to uni. Amazing what can be done when you actually look after your citizens).

[!@#$%!]

Originally Posted by h8kurdt

yey Walmart. The paradigm of society

Fact is Walmart managed to get to the size they are by destroying communities, by grinding down every Union and working person, through predatory pricing and making themselves the monopoly in towns. But hey, fuck mom and pop stores for charging items so they can actually make a living. Yup, Walmart, working so hard for your share money. Get some shares.in nestle whilst you're at it.

what communities did they destroy? the town where i used to do my shopping (i do mostly online now) has all kinds of stores and there is no monopoly and people shop like crazy. if anything walmart makes the town more attractive. community! a lot of the community works there.

there is plenty of competition to go around and obsolete models will always go away.

amazon and walmart and costco fighting for my online dollars is a magnificent thing....

and i still buy from “mom and pop” via amazon marketplace stores. oh, walmart offers a similar thing. same bike shop in philly sells the same item in both websites. who knew! some moms and pops are smart after all.

ps that chant looks like japanese workers hahaha. im not made for that kind of environment.

[!@#$%!]

Originally Posted by GravitySlips

I agree with this, and it's how I was able to pull myself out of a rut in my early/mid 20s.

However, it probably wouldn't have been possible without state-funded education. Not everyone can afford to just take a course, not everyone has the time to support themselves (working full-time) AND study on the side. I had barely a penny when I committed to going back to study. Thank fuck for evil Fox News "socialism"!

(as an aside, I had Swedish and Finnish friends at uni who got very generous monthly stipends from their governments for studying abroad at university. They got PAID to go to uni. Amazing what can be done when you actually look after your citizens).

the way i see it it works like a loan.

your govenment spends tax money on you, then it collects taxes from you as you make more money.

so in principle it works, no?

it wasn’t “free”—it’s really a loan.

[h8kurdt]

Originally Posted by !@#$%!

what communities did they destroy? the town where i used to do my shopping (i do mostly online now) has all kinds of stores and there is no monopoly and people shop like crazy. if anything walmart makes the town more attractive. community! a lot of the community works there.

there is plenty of competition to go around and obsolete models will always go away.

amazon and walmart and costco fighting for my online dollars is a magnificent thing....

and i still buy from “mom and pop” via amazon marketplace stores. oh, walmart offers a similar thing. same bike shop in philly sells the same item in both websites. who knew! some moms and pops are smart after all.

ps that chant looks like japanese workers hahaha. im not made for that kind of environment.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/...n-walmart-left

http://money.com/money/4192512/walma...g-small-towns/

And so on and so on

[Rob Instigator]

Originally Posted by !@#$%!

oh.




do you not save and invest your share of wealth?

investment and savings are for people who earn more than their expenses. I support a wife and a retired mom, and a house on one salary, and apart from work-mandate Teachers Retirement System of Texas, I have no real savings other than about $1,000 for emergencies.


401K's are a fucking LIE and useless unless a person is willing to put i around $15,000 a year or more, which is ridiculous for someone working a corporate gig at $30,000/year.

[!@#$%!]

Originally Posted by h8kurdt

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/...n-walmart-left

http://money.com/money/4192512/walma...g-small-towns/

And so on and so on

did you read the whole articles or just the headlines?

in the one where the express stores closed, some retailers will reopen (and others might move in. eg on my area, familly dollar and the like cover small communities)

in the second article, the economy in those towns dried up. walmart did the smart thing by moving. why would they keep a store with no shoppers?

again, maybe different stores will move in or maybe more people will buy online. making brick and mortar moot.

why do people expect things to stay the same forever? that’s the foolishness...

every change brings new challenges and opportunities. it’s always been like that. always always always. ALWAYS.

[h8kurdt]

It takes years of unemployment before anything positive can come out of it. Years of lives being ruined due to lack of work. Jeez, guess you loved Thatcher's closing of the mines "ah, sure something will come up. Don't worry about it"

So you don't think that Walmart should have some responsibility to the towns? This is a company who will happily spend years undercutting on their profits just to shut down local stores to have a monopoly. When they get that monopoly and decide "ah, didn't go as well as we thought it would. Shut down and fuck the town in the ass". This is exactly what you said you hated before. Government subsidised companies able to get a monopoly on towns.

Cold man.

[Dr. Eugene Felikson]

Originally Posted by Rob insigator

401K's are a fucking LIE and useless unless a person is willing to put i around $15,000 a year or more, which is ridiculous for someone working a corporate gig at $30,000/year.

As someone in his late 20s who has a few years work of an employer marched 401k tucked away, could you elaborate on this? Like how do you figure? Being an actual adult is new to me still

Ty rob