Gap between rich and poor rising faster in Canada

[Moonlight Graham]

I suspect a lot older, since I'm retired.

But thanks for the proposal. It made my day.

It's nice to be appreciated for my brain.

Lol hey no problem, maybe you, me, and my mom can hang out some time?

[jacee]

Lol hey no problem, maybe you, me, and my mom can hang out some time?

Exactly.

[jacee]

Well let’s use a little linear regression…………..If less(or none) investment was made, would there be an increase in jobs? Generally speaking, when the stock market is doing poorly, what’s the outcome in terms of employment in the workforce?

And though you try and separate companies and nations, this is a false dictum….Many Canadians, working in Canada, work for foreign companies……..Just as many people in other countries work for Canadian companies……….You can’t put the globalization genie back into the bottle……..Look at the result of the very few isolationist countries on the planet…..would you want to mirror conditions there?

Let's just say until there are enough good jobs in Canada to create as many consumers and taxpayers as we can, then we can't afford tax breaks for the wealthiEST so called 'job creators', corporate subsidies or corporate tax breaks.

And there will issues of predatory investors and their bankers/traders, bad employers - including Canadian ones elsewhere (eg mining) - and a few other things not quite worked out yet ... it's an evolving thing.

And the oil sands will be the single largest source of greenhouse gas emissions in North America, and second only to the total of all US and Canadian coal fired plants.

Ya ... there are some issues ... some conversations to be had.

Edited October 3, 2011 by jacee

[cybercoma]

Well let’s use a little linear regression…………..If less(or none) investment was made, would there be an increase in jobs? Generally speaking, when the stock market is doing poorly, what’s the outcome in terms of employment in the workforce?

The stock market doesn't determine employment. Less money for investment that leads to more money in the hands of consumers to spend on the products and services of companies would create more employment. Funny how Henry Ford knew this, but the corporate elite today seem to have lost sight of that fact. Edited October 3, 2011 by cybercoma

[blueblood]

The stock market doesn't determine employment. Less money for investment that leads to more money in the hands of consumers to spend on the products and services of companies would create more employment. Funny how Henry Ford knew this, but the corporate elite today seem to have lost sight of that fact.

Ford had to pay for those high wages because the us economy was going through the final stages of the industrial revolution where growth was similar to what china is going through today. There were not many countries in the world at that time with the same standard of living and growth as the usa, and many were not growing at all.

Google and apple have very generous salaries for their employees and among the best working conditions in the world, yet their stock prices are obscenely high and they're both sitting on a mountain of cash. Stock prices aren't a commodity, when stocks are placed on the stock exchange it is to raise money for expansion of the company whether its through increased valuation or production or both.

With foreign investment, other countries around the world are richer and can enjoy a higher living standard and thus produce and consume more. This benefits countries like canada and australia because the prices for the things we produce goes up. However in countries like in europe or the usa the price for their things goes down because of increased competition. Instead of the usa and europe adjusting production, they borrowed and spent on trinkets and here we are today. If the usa and ontario want to continue being the factory of the world, they need to cut costs of production to compete or get into another industry.

[GostHacked]

Google and apple have very generous salaries for their employees and among the best working conditions in the world,

No sure about Apple, because they can hire a company like Foxconn in China where they had to install nets around the building to prevent people from jumping to their deaths. Instead of preventing people from dying from jumping off the buildings, how about we prevent them from jumping in the first place. Call me crazy.

Apple will employ cheap foreign labour to make your Apple products.

yet their stock prices are obscenely high and they're both sitting on a mountain of cash.

Partly due to outsourcing. The same benefit other companies have had when they offshore jobs.

[Guest Derek L]

The stock market doesn't determine employment. Less money for investment that leads to more money in the hands of consumers to spend on the products and services of companies would create more employment. Funny how Henry Ford knew this, but the corporate elite today seem to have lost sight of that fact.

So you feel, if we stopped all forms of investment, Canadians would be better off? Ford was also opposed to unions and in favour of keeping company costs low…….His form of Capitalism is being carried out today……..in the third world.

But let’s go back to your theory on the stock market………….Care to explain? Periods where the stock market has tanked, many people have lost their employment correct? Why is that?

[Pliny]

"[T]he more civilisation advances, the more it is compelled to cover the ills it necessarily creates with the cloak of love, to embellish them, or to deny their existence [...] with the declaration: The exploiting class exploits the oppressed class solely and exclusively in the interest of the exploited class itself; and if the latter fails to appreciate this, and even becomes rebellious, it thereby shows the basest ingratitude to its benefactors, the exploiters." -Engels (1877) The Origin of Family, Private Property, and State

That there are classes is true. But, as much as Engels and Marx make the claim of class exploitation, who is exploiting who is never the monopoly of one over another. Wherever, Marxism was implemented, classes may have been redefined as the equal and the more equal, but it never resolved the problem of exploitation because it was entirely about the exploitation of all production by the State.

A society will not become productive or create wealth if it does not hold as one of it's first tenets the sanctity of person and property being inviolable. What does society gain if its government allows the exploitation of its people by some over others? If exploitation has been a problem is that not a failure of government to protect the sanctity of person and property? Does government not perceive any injustice? Should it then continue it's blindness and heed the demands of some to correct their claimed exploitation by instituting the exploitation of others? I'm certain it would be only too glad to do so if it bloats their coffers. "Taxing the rich" is simply a mantra that insists upon exploitation, and if the truth be that exploitation is a problem, the continuation of a government that is ineffectual, at best, and/or corrupt at worst.

[GostHacked]

It's hilarious to hear people talking about a French Revolution. What planet do you people live on? We just had an election and 40% of the population elected our government. I doubt that over 40% of the country wants to revolt. You hippies are so cute.

Well the other 60% who did not vote for Harper and Co mighty jut end up doing just that. Arab spring, European Summer, North American Fall??

[jacee]

http://www.whatis-theplan.org/t17603-occupy-bay-street-toronto

Just fyi

See "Occupy" thread.

[jacee]

So you feel, if we stopped all forms of investment, Canadians would be better off? Ford was also opposed to unions and in favour of keeping company costs low…….His form of Capitalism is being carried out today……..in the third world.

He is credited with " Fordism": mass production of inexpensive goods coupled with high wages for workers.

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Ford

Not quite the corporate war on workers we face today.

Ford knew who was buttering his bread, and buying his cars.

Corporations today don't have his brains.

If the workers aren't working for decent wages, they aren't buying.

Corporations are cutting themselves off at the knees.

Edited October 3, 2011 by jacee

[Guest Derek L]

Not quite the corporate war on workers we face today.

Ford knew who was buttering his bread, and buying his cars.

Corporations today don't have his brains.

If the workers aren't working for decent wages, they aren't buying.

Corporations are cutting themselves off at the knees.

People aren’t buying food? Iphones? Cars? Gasoline? Running shoes? Furniture?

Ford’s ideas are being implemented on a global scale………If someone is making $3hr in the third world, that’s better than what they were making before no? A factory worker in China is better off than a peasant farmer no?

As was the fear of Ford, unions are pricing themselves out of work in the manufacturing sector in the Western World…….

[blueblood]

Not quite the corporate war on workers we face today.

Ford knew who was buttering his bread, and buying his cars.

Corporations today don't have his brains.

If the workers aren't working for decent wages, they aren't buying.

Corporations are cutting themselves off at the knees.

No they're not, they are getting a bigger and bigger percentage of revenues overseas in sales and production from people who are willing to do the same work for less. Those people's standard of living is catching up to ours. As a result agricultural, mining commodities, and oil are going gangbusters, things canada happens to have an abundance of.

Its not the western world declining, its the rest of the world catching up.

[bush_cheney2004]

...Its not the western world declining, its the rest of the world catching up.

Yep...that's the way it most certainly is....compete or fall behind. Pity and sympathy not required.

[RNG]

Yep...that's the way it most certainly is....compete or fall behind. Pity and sympathy not required.

So the PIIGS mean nothing to you. Especially Greece?

[Moonlight Graham]

No they're not, they are getting a bigger and bigger percentage of revenues overseas in sales and production from people who are willing to do the same work for less. Those people's standard of living is catching up to ours. As a result agricultural, mining commodities, and oil are going gangbusters, things canada happens to have an abundance of.

Its not the western world declining, its the rest of the world catching up.

Some underdeveloped countries, such as the "Asian Tigers", have shown solid growth in GDP per capita, but mainly the tiny ones (Singapore, Taiwan, Hong Kong etc.) that seem to compare to Western countries in that stat. Are workers in countries like China and India really "catching up" that much? Both countries have high GDP totals, but their populations are also massive, so their GDP-per-capita is still very low, not even close to OECD countries. Can the average worker in China or India or even Mexico or Brazil afford to buy an Ipad?

[Guest Derek L]

Some underdeveloped countries, such as the "Asian Tigers", have shown solid growth in GDP per capita, but mainly the tiny ones (Singapore, Taiwan, Hong Kong etc.) that seem to compare to Western countries in that stat. Are workers in countries like China and India really "catching up" that much? Both countries have high GDP totals, but their populations are also massive, so their GDP-per-capita is still very low, not even close to OECD countries. Can the average worker in China or India or even Mexico or Brazil afford to buy an Ipad?

Has the standard of living for the average worker in China, India and Mexico improved over the last few decades? If one was able to wave a magic wand tomorrow, and pull all western corporations and their inherit jobs from these countries, what then would be the result to the standard of living for the average worker in those countries?

[cybercoma]

So you feel, if we stopped all forms of investment, Canadians would be better off? Ford was also opposed to unions and in favour of keeping company costs low…….His form of Capitalism is being carried out today……..in the third world.

But let’s go back to your theory on the stock market………….Care to explain? Periods where the stock market has tanked, many people have lost their employment correct? Why is that?

It's so much easier just making up people's positions and swinging at those, eh?

[cybercoma]

A factory worker in China is better off than a peasant farmer no?

Perhaps you should read Factory Girls: From Village to City in a Changing China by Leslie T. Chang. The answer depends heavily on what you mean by the entirely subjective "better off".

[cybercoma]

Its not the western world declining, its the rest of the world catching up.

And that might actually be the cas if China wasn't pegging its currency.

[cybercoma]

Yep...that's the way it most certainly is....compete or fall behind. Pity and sympathy not required.

If only the workers here would stop their bitching and take $3/day for labour, we wouldn't be in this mess, eh?

[blueblood]

And that might actually be the cas if China wasn't pegging its currency.

Point taken, if they weren't pegging their currency, the yuan would have far more purchasing power and thus the chinese would be better off. They flipped when the usa did QE2 because it drops the dollar vs the yuan. However, at the end of the day is an average chinese person better off now or when chairman mao was in charge?

Edited October 4, 2011 by blueblood

[Guest Derek L]

It's so much easier just making up people's positions and swinging at those, eh?

If I misinterpreted your intent, mea culpa……….So again:

But let’s go back to your theory on the stock market………….Care to explain? Periods where the stock market has tanked, many people have lost their employment correct? Why is that?

Perhaps you should read Factory Girls: From Village to City in a Changing China by Leslie T. Chang. The answer depends heavily on what you mean by the entirely subjective "better off".

Are people being dragged off the farms and forced into the factories?

If only the workers here would stop their bitching and take $3/day for labour, we wouldn't be in this mess, eh?

They don’t have to take it………there’s plenty of people on the planet.

[blueblood]

If only the workers here would stop their bitching and take $3/day for labour, we wouldn't be in this mess, eh?

Its wouldn't be 3 dollars per day, your forgetting about the cost of frieght from china. Also your forgetting about the purchasing power of 3 dollars per day in china vs 3 dollars in the usa.

Prices have to come down, but it won't be at that level because industries in the usa have to compete with each other. You couldn't get away with that in canada because there would be an exodus to the oil patch.

[jacee]

consumer confidence chart

Just curious ... does consumer confidence/purchasing matter to the corporate world anymore, or are all their markets elsewhere as well?

And I wonder what smaller businesses have to say about it?

Edited October 4, 2011 by jacee