Hal 9000

Remember this quote; "I do not agree with what you have to say, but I'll defend to the death your right to say it."

Maybe he just needs to be more subtle in his approach or his delivery of ideas.

How can you look at the real truth of who is paying into the tax system and say that?

I think we have the classic conundrum of "should we buy someone a fish or a fishing rod". The left are always looking for the band-aid solution, while the right are always trying to help people help themselves.

Minimum wage was about 3.40 in 1980, went up to 3.65 in 1981. Which translates to about the same as today. Housing I know for a fact is cheaper - renting anyway, if house prices are up, that's an indication of market and interest rates. Im not sure what interest rates for buying houses were in the mid-late 80's, but I know people were elated when the rate dropped to 7-8%. That's not really an issue for minimum wage earners anyway. BTW - I'm not crying...never have, but young "victims" like squid have no idea just how good they've got it in todays world.

I know how economists work. They'll say the average pair of jeans is 60$, A bottle of coke is 2$ and an average bottle of wine is 15$ etc etc. The fact is; you can dress quite nicely in clothing from Old Navy where jeans are generally about 30$, you can buy a 6 pack of coke bottles for about 4$ at Walmart and most people drink wine valued at about 10$ or less. Then they don't account at all for those things we were paying back in the day that are generally free now such as movie and music downloads. If people are paying on average more for their phone service, it's because they are paying for a $500-1000 for the phone with unlimited internet and nationwide calling etc etc. that's their choice. The average price of a car may have gone up 250%, but the interest rates, financing options and low payments make them more affordable than ever. Find me someone on minimum wage that doesn't have a full a cell phone package and a 52" plasma TV.

It's useless because you simply don't want to hear it. Do I have to prove that a cd cost 25 bucks or that icbc didn't finance insurance . Another one, my first new snowboard in 1990 cost 700$, today you can buy one for about 4-500$. A pint of beer was $4, today they're about 7$. More anecdotes that you'll bury your head in the sand to.

I'm sure some people did cruise through the 80's, my parents did. I'm talking about life from a low income perspective which is where I was in the late 80's. You can't really believe that everything in the 4$ hr era was simply 40% of the cost of today. Globalization, free trade and competition has helped all the low income people. Groceries dropped significantly when companies like superstore and Walmart came around. I haven't even got into the other side where people now get gst refunds and child tax credit. How about education and bursaries, that stuff is all easier to come by today.

How fucking old are you?

In the 80's when minimum wage was 4.00$ or close to, we simply didn't have or couldn't afford the standard of living that the low income wage earners of today have, here are some examples; 1) Food - you can talk about the bread and milk index all you like, but when we were making minimum wage a Big Mac combo cost about 4$ as did a 2 pc. chicken dinner (3pc dinner about $5.50) from KFC - 1 hour work. A pizza was about 10$ or 2.5 hours work. Today you can buy those meals for about 3/4 of an hours work - even a pizza you can get for less than 10$. 2) Car - in the mid 80's, I had a 6 year old car. Paid about 2800$, and made payments of about $180 p/m (with a co-signer) because lenders wouldn't give more than 4 years on a used car. Today, anyone can lease a new car for less than $200 p/m. - And, insurance? That was still $7-800 bucks, and ICBC didn't finance so you basically had to save that money if you wanted insurance - most of us were dangerously uninsured. 3) Music - If you wanted music in your apartment, you would have to put out no less than $1000 for a stereo (a CD player alone would run nearly $500). Then, you had to buy tapes at 12$ each or CD's for 25$. You'd get together with your friends and tape each others CD's and then pack around a bunch of tapes. Today, An iPod is what $150-200, CD's are about 12$, but who bothers when you can download every song in the world for free. A 500$ computer and speakers for 1-200$ will give you what you need. No $300 boombox and 5 pounds worth of D-cell batteries, just charge up your bluetooth speaker/iPod and head to the beach. 4) TV - A 26" box TV was about 700$ in 89' (I know because I had a loan with a finance company for one). The 32" was $1000. Today, you can buy a big screen plasma for about 500$ - even lower if you watch the prices. But, To actually get cable, you didn't have different companies offering you freebies to be a client, no! In fact, you had 1 company and they usually made you pay a deposit of $100-150 (25 hours work - minimum) just to get hooked up, then cable was $35-40 p/m easily. Today, you can get a modest package for about the same cost and no need for a deposit (in fact, they might give you a free x-box). Renting movies required a paid membership, and then they were about $3.50 or 4$ (1 hour work) for new releases. Today, you can get Netflix for a month for less than 1 hour work. 5) Phone - Generally the same as TV, pay a deposit of about another $100 (25 hours work) and pay about $30 per month (basic plus rental and call waiting) (long distance charges could be 17-20 cents per minute). Until BC Tel allowed Sprint to come in phone charges were through the roof. Sprint gave us 12 cents per minute and we were skeptical. 6) Clothes - Jeans were easily $30-40 bucks as were sweatshirts and t-shirts were $10-15. We could've gone to K-Mart or Zellers, but their stuff was shite. We had no Walmart, Winners, or Old Navy. I go to Old Navy and still 30 years later pay 30$ or less for jeans and 10$ for t-shirts. Jackets, and shoes have come up but not 250%. In fact, my first Doc Martins were nearly $200, I've bout 3 pairs in the last 5 years paying no more than $110 each. 7) Furniture - My first set (pine couch, chair and table) was in "89, it cost $1200 and had to be financed. 2 years ago I bought a better set for my family room at the Brick for about $700. 8) Vices - I think smokes will cost you about 3/4 hour work, but back in the 4$ hour times, they cost 4$ (1 Hour work), I think beer might be the same, but wine - you couldn't get a decent bottle of wine with 1 hours wage, today you can get a good wine for about 8 bucks. Weed, 40 a quarter, 80 and 1/8th - maybe 70 at best. 9) Rent - Almost forgot, my apartment was 500$ per month plus expenses, today the exact unit is $750.. So, you can ask for cites and talk about the bread/milk index or gas prices, but what I wrote is real expenses for when I moved out and made my way - It was tough. You needed a roommate (maybe more) to have any sort of frills at all - we had no discount stores, dollar stores and most everything else was from government regulated monopoly companies like BC Tel, and ICBC and the single cable company for your area. The fact is; anyone making minimum wage has it better than we did in the 1980's, they're just more entitled now. Capitalism, competition and technology has made it possible to afford things that we never could back then.

I think the article does show that in relative terms minimum wage was lower in the 80's. But, beyond that, actual cost of living has either remained the same or is even lower than the 80's.

Bull, living in the low income bracket is easier today than ever before. I grew up in the 80's, when minimum wage was 4.00$. If people are living with their parents, it's because that's what they want to do. Youth today are weak, soft and entitled. And, people like you are enablers for buying into it.

First off, welcome to the elite 10%. Of course, you can live easier on 80K than 40K, but that's not really the issue. The issue is about the widening gap between classes. My point is that percentage wise, you can give much more to the lower income people and still have a widening income gap. A doctor who gets a minor increase of 10-15% might see a wider gap between him and someone making 40K with a 100% increase in income. The NDP can always play the "widening gap" card - and they do.

If somebody making 40k per year increases their income by 50% and someone who makes 80K sees their income increase by 26%, you can still argue that the pay gap is widening. It's all about cherry picking stats.

Since when have the young voters ever voted conservative? I voted NDP as a youth, it's just what you do.

No, in fact most drunk drivers are arrested after being pulled over for 1) no headlights and 2) not signalling. Her behaviour and agitated state makes it reasonable that she could've been under the influence.

No, i was talking about the top 10% and he dragged out the tired old cliche of rich getting richer - I want to know if he considers me rich...and greedy, abusive...whatever. Here's some facts; the top 10% ($80,000) pay 55% of all income tax, the top 5% ($100,000) pay 40% and the top 1% ($250,000+) contribute 23% of all federal income taxes`. Those numbers are at an all time high. The bottom 50% of money earners contribute about 4% to the entire federal tax system - the lowest rate ever. This whole rich (above 10%) mistreating the poor is pure horse sheet. P.s - I have a cite from 2005, can't find the most recent cite right this minute.

Seriously, give me a number! 50,000 per year, 100K per year, 200K, 300K per. maybe top 20%, 10%, 5%? Lets put some value on wealth.

Why didn't he arrest the first driver in the video? This woman was being combative and all she was getting was a warning. He even started to just give her the ticket twice and she was just a bitch. A cop can ask you to get out of the car and you must comply. BTW - She actually did start hitting him while she was in the car.

OOps, implements!

Disorderly conduct, obstruction and harassment are arrestable offences - you choose. Then she followed up with resisting arrest. I think she even kicked and spit on him, but i'm not really sure. He could've thought (and why not) that she on drugs. No, she deserved to go to jail.

If they were to win a wrongful death case, it'll be because she had implants in her cell that she used to whack herself - not because she was taken into custody. She was obviously mentally unstable.

Really, you don't think she was a little unreasonable? I can tell you first hand, if she was a man, she wouldn't have been given so many chances.

I hate quoting wikipedia, but this is probably as likely a scenario as anything else offered. Suicide by cop is a suicide method in which a suicidal individual deliberately behaves in a threatening manner, with the goal being to provoke a lethal response from a law enforcement officer.[1]

police a. A body of government employees trained in methods of law enforcement and crime prevention and detection and authorized to maintain the peace, safety, and order of the community. "authorized to maintain the peace, safety, and order of the community". The cop was doing what he is required to do, police.