Renegade

Who exactly did I insult? You? You'll need to point it out because I wasnt' aware that I had started. If your answers prove my point, do you not expect that I should point that out? Exactly what did I not answer honestly of your questions? Despite my requests you have not answered some of mine. Here are but a few you fail to address: There, can you read that now? Hmm, who's the one throwing out insults?

Do tell then how does it operate? No, what I said was the payout was rich. Rich is a relative word. I meant rich compared to what any other segment gets and certainly rich compared to what most other countries give seniors. I didn't mean only OAS, but here are but a few of the benefits which seniors are "entitled" to: OAS GIS CPP Medicare (This is worth far more to seniors than young people) Pension Tax Credits Pension Tax Splitting Home Adaptation for Seniors Independence Senior's discounts Senior's Drug plan subsidy

So now you have to reach into the 30s to justify your arguments that you should have OAS? You consistantly try and side-track the discussion with excuses and diversions. IMV, if there is anything to be learned out of the 30s, it is that people need to be prepared for financial collapse through their own savings and insurance. Not expect muncipalites to cater to their requests for handouts. Why, were people forced out of high-school or did they leave voluntarily? Were they blissfully ignorant that they required skills in order to earn better pay? Yes, I know the model well. It is still practiced in many countries. Have lots of kids, have them work the fields, and your kids support you when you retire. The only part you seem to be missing out on is the part where the kids support you when you retire. You would prefer that the taxpayer support your retirement. In spite of your denial, you did choose to have kids. You make that choice every time you have sex and opt to take the risk of pregnancy. You choose every time to opt to carry a pregnancy to term. You choose every time you opt to keep the baby instead of give it up for adoption. So if you couldn't afford 4 kids, you still made a choice to have them. Absolutely! You are advocating for a system where individuals do not have to take responsibilty and live with the consequences of their actions. It is irrelevant what age I am. I could be 18, I could be 90. It is just as much ageism to sterotype a person based upon their age as any other characteristic. If you have a rebuttal to my argument, put it forward, otherwise leave age out of it as it is not relevant. While it is magnamous of you to assign me credit for creating all our social programs, I can take no such credit. Most of the programs are holdovers from government spending gone wild in the late 60s and 70s, and has created numerous parasites in society who do no more than consume the fruits of another's labour.

So they are offshoring childcare? What an innovative concept!

It is an interesting statement. Are business free to set discrimminatory pricing? Is there any moral difference between offering a senior's discount and offering a "white person's" discount? Shoudl we be upset at the offering of one but not upset at the other? You can choose to look it at that way to justify the rich payout that seniors get, but in reality it doesn't operate that way. There is no accounting of who paid what into the system. People who have never paid can still collect most of the benefits. Further there is no guarantee that the benefits will stay in place in the future. It would seem to be a poor deal on the part of the payers to pay now based upon the expectation of future benefits which may or may not come. In fact the whole system is somewhat constructed as a pyramid scheme which depends upon more payors than payees. So we are in a a situation of either encouraging overpopulation or risk these financial schemes collapsing.

There is a reason many people today have both parents working. It is to afford to have kids, a decent life, and save for their retirement. So if I understand your correctly, despite haivng a low family income you and your husband decided to have four kids, and only one income? I would also suspect that you did not get life insurance coverage on your husband? Somewhat poor financial planning, wouldn't you agree? Isn't it your responsibilty to get an education or trade so that you are employable at a good wage? If you didn't finish high-school, who's fault is that? There is just as plenty to do today raising a family, yet families somehow manage to get it done, many with two working parents. Most people start with no home of their own, but struggle and save to get it. Forgive me, but I really don't see that the situation you were in is much different that the one many young couples are in today. You make choices and you make tradeoffs. If you make a choice to have 4 kids, be a stay-at-home parent, and not complete your education, you should have to live with the financial consequences. The reason is that welfare and OAS are conceptually exactly the same, except the thresholds and criteria are different. I see no reason why destitute people of any age shouldn't rely on the same program instead of having a discrimminatory one for those under 65. No it doesn't make me feel better at all. My preference is that nobody is on OAS or welfare and eveyone earned their keep. I've said before, that I view OAS and welfare as the same, they are both simply hand-out programs. So is your justification that OAS should exist, so that seniors are "not looked down upon"?

That is a misnomer. You don't pay into OAS any more than you pay into welfare, you simply pay taxes. If you were on minimium wage I suspect the taxes you paid were very little. If you worked at a salary above minimium wage prior to your husband's death, why did more of that not go toward retirement savings when you had two family incomes? Am I missing something? It is a kind of welfare if you simply get the benefit but don't pay the cost. So did your kids attend the schools paid for by your school taxes? Yep, I went to public school, and yep, my parents paid substantial school taxes to support those schools. I sure do, and I pay way more than my share, for the privlidge of driving on them. I may even be paying for the roads you use.

Then IMV, they are the ones who have more of an obligation to support you than the taxpayer. I'm sorry you didn't earn enough, however, old age is an entirely predictable event. I can understand that there may be a few lean years, but people have about 45 years of productivity over their lifetime where they can save for their retirement. If a pension plan is not provided by one's employer, one either needs to supply their own savings vehicle (eg RRSP), or find more lucrative employment. You still didn't address my question as to why you would think the taxpayer has more of an obligation to support you vs your kids. I'd appreciate a repsonse.

Precisely proves my point. The taxpayer is basicly funding a welfare scheme for a senior who is getting full room and board.

I have no idea. I can't speak for them. I don't plan or expect to be in a situation where I need their finanical support. BTW, Even though I was curtious enough to answer your question, you didn't answer mine. Please do so.

I would if my parents were destitute. Would your kids not do the same for you? Even though there is no OAS there is still welfare. As I've said OAS is not any different in concept than welfare. Why would the general taxpayer have more of an obligation to support you in your time of need than your family and friends?

Your analogy is not correct. Life Insurance is based upon risk, and transfering risk to the insurer. If you drop dead immediately after your coverage comes into effect, you still get paid with life insurance. CPP is structured more like a pension plan, in which payout is supposed to be reflective of contribution over the person's lifetime. OAS is neither like a pension plan nor is it like life insurance. Unlike life insurance, with OAS there is no requirement to contribute anything in order to collect. OAS is more like a welfare scheme for seniors. BTW, this whole line of discussion better belongs here: Seniors and Entitlement

You have stated it is a bad idea, but you do not state why. Enlighten us on why it is a bad idea for users to pay for the roads they use. Your answer is provided in this thread. max, I wouldn't have asked if I saw the answer elsewhere in the thread. Please be so kind as to quote what you mean.

will never come to fruition. You have stated it is a bad idea, but you do not state why. Enlighten us on why it is a bad idea for users to pay for the roads they use.

It is interesting that you differentiate ethnic gangs by race, but not so the Hells Angles. The Hells Angels are a white racist gang themselves. In essence what you are saying is that most violent gun crimes is gang-related. Most of the gangs form around something they have in common, race. This is true of both white and non-white gangs.

I think to answer your question you have to ask another "What should be the role of government vs the individual?" On a gradient, at one extreme, an anarchist would say that the government should play no role and all responsibility should be assumed at an individual level. Slightly left of an anarchist, a libertarian would say that the government should assume responsibilities in a few areas such as the protection of individual rights, but no role in other areas such as wealth redistribution. Extreme left-wing views would see the government having a role in virtually everything. Interestingly, many of the ideals of Libetarianism, lead to policies which match those of social leftists. (eg abortion, SSM, separation of church and state, etc) however Libertarianism fiscal policies would be very close to conservative fiscal policies.

Why would you include land acquisition cost when the land is not sold to the vendor? The land still belongs to the government. I can see an argument that says that the financing costs of the $100B over 99 years should be included in the lease price, but it doesn't make sense to me that the acquisiton cost should be included in a break-even analysis. Let me give you an example. Let say a landlord acquires a property for $100K, and can sell it 10 years later for $200K. Lets say it cost him $10K/year to operate the house, including mortgage and financing, taxes, house depreciation and all other costs. Even if he charges $8K/year in rental, he is still ahead by $80K at the end of 10 years. You should see that except for depreciation over the term, the acquition cost are not included. Since land does not really depreciate, I can't see how you would include acquisition costs.

The information in the wikpedia quote supplied in this thread shows the needs of the 905 users. I did not dispute that the 905ers need it. Given they need it, what should they do if they follwo your plan to boycott it?

That information is provide above in this thread from wikpedia. Thanks for pointing that out. Sorry I missed it first time. So it cost $1.6 Billion to build and they got $3.1B for it. The $3.1B includes the recovery cost and the 99 year lease. You cannot include the $100B cost for land acquision, as ownership of the land did not transfer to the 407 corp. I do agree however that the lease was underpriced. The $1.5B over building cost is remarkably low and it should not have been sold at that price.

I think it was discussed here : Libertarianism

So then what would the impact of your plan to boycott the 407? I don't understand what you mean by the 407 "bogs down the flow of traffic". You say that the 407 is needed, yet your plan is to get everyone to not use it. Makes sense doesn't it?

The taxpayer already paid a big chunk of the cost of building the 407. The taxpayer paid for building every other highway in the province, so those roads are "toll" roads already without paying extra (the profits of private corporations). I don't know all the details of the financing of the 407. Yes, the taxpayers paid for the building of the 407. How much of that outlay did they recover when the 407 was sold? As I've said, I don't have an issue with the government building an additional highway, but I think that it is appropriate to recover the costs of the outlay by charging tolls to users. Afterall, while all provincial taxpayers pay for the building of the highway, only a subset benefit from its use. It is just those who benefit are the ones who bear the cost. Now, I understand that it may be impractical at the moment, to toll every road and highway. I think that it will change in future. At some point we may be requred to carry a transponder which will track our use of the roads. At that point it will be easy to charge based upon usage.

My, my, aren't we bitter? Not only do we not want to use the highway, we don't want anyone else to use it either. People who use the 407 are well aware that there is no time gurantees, yet they use it anyway. I guess they must have decided the chance is worth it. Huh? Are you saying that if there was no 407 traffic would flow better?

Thanks, but no thanks. I don't care for the smell of your second-hand smoke. Yep, I bet I paid for your smokes and pot too by funding your welfare. BTW, did you forget to mention that 40oz'er each week as well? I can see that welfare money is well spent. You're welcome! Let's hope the constant smoke hasn't dulled your son's good sense and he doesn't do the same thing to his kid.

Was that before or after the welfare? Not only that, we would have taken away your son and given him to adoptive parents who would have been more responsible.