How equal should Ireland be?

Qualitymark

Let me add another question to this:

How much do you need to live a good life?

Annasopra

Vitaliorange wrote: »

Thanks for the reply Tiddlypeeps.

By extension a minimum wage causes unemployment, not as much a 50 euro minimum but it still causes unemployment. At least with more jobs available people have an opportunity to get on jobs ladder and work their way up, otherwise they could just rot in unemployment.

When costs drop so will prices because drop. Society would be better overall. With more tax money collected and less welfare paid money could be put aside for people who aren't in a position to help themselves such as the disabled.

The welfare rate could be kept at a rate to meet minimum standards, which is too much in Ireland.

What evidence is there that a minimum wage causes unemployment?

UCDVet

I feel like people are just plain wrong about 'equality'. People are not equal. We will never be equal. I'm not as big as a guy who weighs 105kg or as fast as a guy who can run a 10k in 30 minutes.

There was a time when people talked about equal *rights*. But now, we mostly just hear about equality.

If there are two groups of people and you can find a difference - we think 'Racism!' or 'Sexism!' or 'corruption'. We're not looking for equal rights, we're looking for equality. And equality doesn't exist.

Two people are not the same. They are not equal. One employee is better than another. Groups of people *do* exhibit differences in attitudes and behaviours. Irish culture is NOT EQUAL to German culture. Differences aren't bad. Differences are what makes life interesting.

People talk about things like, 'How much money does someone need?' - and the implication being we could take money from the rich, give it to the poor, and make things 'equal'. But that ignores the fact that people are good at stuff and other people aren't. It's silly to think that someone like myself (not too smart, not too driven) SHOULD make as much as my boss or my boss's boss - both of whom are way more talented than me, work way harder, and are way more driven.

This is the exact same mentality that many criminals use to justify their actions. 'Look at yer man - he's got two TVs, I've got none. I'll steal it - and then we will be equal'. That's wrong.

I support equal rights, and to a lesser degree, equal opportunity. In the eyes of the law, we should all be equal; the only differences society should acknowledge are the ones that are a necessary result of biology. If I'm blind, sure, treat me different. But that's because somethings require sight.

Instead of being upset that a CEO earns 10x more than you; look at what rights of yours were violated. Where you unable to attend school because of your skin colour? Were you forced, by the government, to work as a store clerk because your Father was a store clerk?

We should look at why the CEO earns 10x more.

UCDVet

mango salsa wrote: »

What evidence is there that a minimum wage causes unemployment?

http://www.voxeu.org/article/minimum-wage-and-employment-dynamics
Our calculations show that this ten percent increase in a state’s real minimum wage, relative to its regional neighbours, causes a 1.2% reduction in total employment relative to what it would have been

t represents about 23,000 fewer jobs for the average state

Vitaliorange

mango salsa wrote: »

What evidence is there that a minimum wage causes unemployment?

http://www.forbes.com/sites/jamesdorn/2013/05/07/the-minimum-wage-delusion-and-the-death-of-common-sense/

CruelCoin

What are you terming as poorest?

Homeless? Any ratio of ****-all is still going to be ****-all.

I'd determine equality relative to effort. If you spent your youth riding behind the bike shed and knacker drinking, dropping out at 16, blah blah, then no, i don't care how little you have, you may have less again.

I would like a purely meritocratic system. Payment relative to deservedness.

Tiddlypeeps

UCDVet wrote: »

I feel like people are just plain wrong about 'equality'. People are not equal. We will never be equal. I'm not as big as a guy who weighs 105kg or as fast as a guy who can run a 10k in 30 minutes.

There was a time when people talked about equal *rights*. But now, we mostly just hear about equality.

If there are two groups of people and you can find a difference - we think 'Racism!' or 'Sexism!' or 'corruption'. We're not looking for equal rights, we're looking for equality. And equality doesn't exist.

Two people are not the same. They are not equal. One employee is better than another. Groups of people *do* exhibit differences in attitudes and behaviours. Irish culture is NOT EQUAL to German culture. Differences aren't bad. Differences are what makes life interesting.

People talk about things like, 'How much money does someone need?' - and the implication being we could take money from the rich, give it to the poor, and make things 'equal'. But that ignores the fact that people are good at stuff and other people aren't. It's silly to think that someone like myself (not too smart, not too driven) SHOULD make as much as my boss or my boss's boss - both of whom are way more talented than me, work way harder, and are way more driven.

This is the exact same mentality that many criminals use to justify their actions. 'Look at yer man - he's got two TVs, I've got none. I'll steal it - and then we will be equal'. That's wrong.

I support equal rights, and to a lesser degree, equal opportunity. In the eyes of the law, we should all be equal; the only differences society should acknowledge are the ones that are a necessary result of biology. If I'm blind, sure, treat me different. But that's because somethings require sight.

Instead of being upset that a CEO earns 10x more than you; look at what rights of yours were violated. Where you unable to attend school because of your skin colour? Were you forced, by the government, to work as a store clerk because your Father was a store clerk?

We should look at why the CEO earns 10x more.

That's a very long rant combating a point I don't think anybody made. I don't think one single person in this thread has stated that top level executives should be paid the same as the people on the bottom floor.

Why do people keep assuming only the extreme options exist, there is plenty of middle ground.

The issue is not that a CEO earns 10x more it's only an issue when the CEO earns 10x more when the people on the bottom floor cannot sustain a reasonable standard of living from their wage. i.e. companies like Wallmart.

CruelCoin wrote: »

What are you terming as poorest?

Homeless? Any ratio of ****-all is still going to be ****-all.

I'd determine equality relative to effort. If you spent your youth riding behind the bike shed and knacker drinking, dropping out at 16, blah blah, then no, i don't care how little you have, you may have less again.

I would like a purely meritocratic system. Payment relative to deservedness.

What sort of solution do you suggest to combat unemployment and poverty? Just leave them too it and let them fend for themselves?

KyussBishop

UCDVet wrote: »

http://www.voxeu.org/article/minimum-wage-and-employment-dynamics
Our calculations show that this ten percent increase in a state’s real minimum wage, relative to its regional neighbours, causes a 1.2% reduction in total employment relative to what it would have been

t represents about 23,000 fewer jobs for the average state

"relative to what it would have been", i.e. 23,000 fewer jobs in growth, in the average state in the US.

That doesn't say any jobs are lost, it says job growth in the private sector occurs more slowly (and at a tiny rate of 1.2%):
"Minimum-wage policies may not cause an immediate shock to employment, as is often feared, but a reduction in the rate of net job growth."

So the minimum wage doesn't cause a loss of jobs/unemployment, it causes a loss in the growth of jobs in the private sector - something that is easily countered with a government provided jobs program, which gives people work until the private sector picks up (such a jobs program even helps the private sector pick up, by keeping the workers skills fresh, and giving them wages to spend in the private sector).


With a single-digit change in the rate of unemployment growth either way (though we really would need to see a study on the effects of removing the minimum wage to see if it would not be counteracted by the loss of wages), we'd be waiting forever for the private sector to provide enough jobs for the unemployed - government could do it in a very short space of time with jobs programs, funded with the method I've previously mentioned several times.

KyussBishop

Vitaliorange wrote: »

http://www.forbes.com/sites/jamesdorn/2013/05/07/the-minimum-wage-delusion-and-the-death-of-common-sense/

James Dorn of Cato, another Koch founded/funded/run think-tank/propaganda-institute.

Vitaliorange

KyussBishop wrote: »

James Dorn of Cato, another Koch founded/funded/run think-tank/propaganda-institute.

Another convenient excuse to not have to rebutt the arguments made.

KyussBishop

Again, resurrecting something from my first post in this thread:
Since society has enough actual physical resources to provide pretty much everyone with a decent, sustainable quality of life, why the hell should this not be provided, regardless of a persons moral qualities?

Start with that, consider just the physical resources at hand in the economy and how they can be distributed equitably, and then consider money, which is what controls the distribution of these resources:
If there is such an abundance of these physical resources, that everyones needs can be met for a comfortable quality of life, yet this is not done because of how money is managed, then that is a mismanagement of money in the economy.


The economy is there to work for the benefit of society, not society to work for the benefit of the economy and those that have greater control over it - the economy should be shaped, and its resources distributed, to work for the benefit of the people in it (all of the people, not disproportionately for the select few who, again, have greater control over it).

Once those basic needs are met, there are still plenty of resources left over in the economy, for rewarding entrepreneurs and capitalistic CEO's - such a society isn't mutually-exclusive/incompatible with a capitalist economy, that allows people to become ridiculously wealthy.

KyussBishop

Vitaliorange wrote: »

Another convenient excuse to not have to rebutt the arguments made.

Yes because he is a paid shill, working for an institute that is known for anti-science and anti-intellectual propaganda.

I wouldn't entertain a Tobacco industry representative telling me smoking is good for me, that would be a waste of time - I'm not going to entertain the arguments of a Cato shill, who is no better.

Barely Hedged

KyussBishop wrote: »

Forget money for a moment, and think about the raw physical resources we have in our economy, and think of how much better off people could be if they were distributed more equally.

Sounds simple, when you think of the raw physical resources and products that make up the economy, seems like there's more than enough for a happy and equitable life for everybody.

Now consider money: Money controls the distribution of all those resources (it even controls the distribution of workers, who get to produce those resources), and despite the resources (and workers) being plentiful, for some reason there are a lot of people who do not get enough of the money (or enough work), to get an equitable share of the resources in society.


Looking at distribution, based on resources: Looks easy to make an equitable society.
Looking at distribution, based on money: Looks impossible to have an equitable society, so many intractable/abstract economic problems that nobody really seems to understand.


If you want to see how equal society can be, look at how you can distribute the physical resources/products (and the labour that works-with/produces them), if you want to see how society is deliberately kept in an unequal state, look at how the teaching of economics and management of money, is corrupted by politics (it is quite an ugly mess - as you will see on any economic discussion on boards, which is dominated by right vs left politics).

Economics tries to model human behaviour in macro and micro scenarios.

A more equal distribution of raw physical resources is surely a very simplified analysis of human behaviour. In this scenario all humans will work as equally hard to produce physical resources and then distribute them freely. I dont think this is the case. People have a large range of differing abilities and over time the better able humans will want to share less of what they produce and want more for themselves? This scenario provided assumes model stability.

Basing the analysis on money is the most accurate. A population of humans are a litany "intractable/abstract" problems and trying to model it is next to impossible.

If a model fails, its useless. I dont know why people propose a stable model for aggregate human behaviour.

KyussBishop

Barely Hedged wrote: »

Economics tries to model human behaviour in macro and micro scenarios.

A more equal distribution of raw physical resources is surely a very simplified analysis of human behaviour. In this scenario all humans will work as equally hard to produce physical resources and then distribute them freely. I dont think this is the case. People have a large range of differing abilities and over time the better able humans will want to share less of what they produce and want more for themselves? This scenario provided assumes model stability.

Basing the analysis on money is the most accurate. A population of humans are a litany "intractable/abstract" problems and trying to model it is next to impossible.

If a model fails, its useless. I dont know why people propose a stable model for aggregate human behaviour.

I'm not talking about equal distribution of resources, or the theory/interpretation you put forward there; I'm talking about the abundance of physical resources, and that the capability is there to distribute a portion of them, to meet a decent minimal standard of living for pretty much everyone, while still having plenty of resources left over for capitalist markets/economies to compete over.

Basing economic analysis on money is wrong, plain and simple - the physical resources (including labour), and the efficient combination of those resources, is what economics is all about - money just decides the distribution of those resources.


As for economic models: All the ones you see in textbooks and studied in college today pretty universally don't apply to reality, because they make various plain-wrong assumptions, such as people holding rational/accurate expectations about the future, markets tending to move towards 'equilibrium' (when in reality they move towards disequilibrium), and economies being 'linear' rather than 'dynamic' (which, compared to weather forecasting, is like expecting clouds to move linearly, in a straight line, instead of dynamically, i.e. chaotically depending on the dynamics of the system they are in).

I know a fair bit about what is wrong with economics, macroeconomics, and economic modelling - and the solutions to these problems, that 'heterodox' economists have developed and are developing today; there's a surprising amount of economics that is just holding on to long outdated theories, which have never been true in reality.

KyussBishop

Also, to add to that: You shouldn't model economies from human behaviour first (which is arguably not possible), you should start with macroeconomics to get an overall view of the economy, and how money moving between the public/private/external sectors work; economists like Steve Keen are doing that very successfully, while using that to show large faults in todays dominant economic theory.

One of the big things mainstream economic theory today gets wrong, is how money actually works - economic theory/models today tend to ignore banks, debt and money, which is why you need to start with macroeconomic models, because they actually include this.

steddyeddy

I don't mind the fact that people who do more qualified jobs get paid more however some people are seriously overinflating the worth of CEOs and consultants. I think that Ireland should be equal in as far as everyone should have the same chance to get a good education,skill set but unfortunately Ireland is not equal in that sense.

Barely Hedged

KyussBishop wrote: »

I'm not talking about equal distribution of resources, or the theory/interpretation you put forward there; I'm talking about the abundance of physical resources, and that the capability is there to distribute a portion of them, to meet a decent minimal standard of living for pretty much everyone, while still having plenty of resources left over for capitalist markets/economies to compete over.

Basing economic analysis on money is wrong, plain and simple - the physical resources (including labour), and the efficient combination of those resources, is what economics is all about - money just decides the distribution of those resources.


As for economic models: All the ones you see in textbooks and studied in college today pretty universally don't apply to reality, because they make various plain-wrong assumptions, such as people holding rational/accurate expectations about the future, markets tending to move towards 'equilibrium' (when in reality they move towards disequilibrium), and economies being 'linear' rather than 'dynamic' (which, compared to weather forecasting, is like expecting clouds to move linearly, in a straight line, instead of dynamically, i.e. chaotically depending on the dynamics of the system they are in).

I know a fair bit about what is wrong with economics, macroeconomics, and economic modelling - and the solutions to these problems, that 'heterodox' economists have developed and are developing today.

What are the abundant physical resources? Not an exhaustive list, but the top two that you think are most capable of having a portion of them distributed. Consequentially, im interested to know how this will contribute to improving minimal living standards.

Does the distribution of money not provide an insight into intractable human behaviour which is a vital parameter in economic analysis i.e. propose some results from analysis but how likely will these results play out in reality? Surely it must be a consideration, large or small.

Assuming linear underlyings in an economic model, still probably explains the principal components of the behaviour that the model is trying to explain. Most of the time the dynamic models are just tweaks explaining, as they are supposed to, higher order impacts. In reality when sh1t hits the fan or you have to make tough decisions (such as the government in Ireland in the past 6 years) all these nice to have higher order get dismissed. Theres a lot of things we'd like to see happen to make society more equal but in practice people who make the decisions, to affect said society, ask - how much will it cost?

Vitaliorange

KyussBishop wrote: »

Again, resurrecting something from my first post in this thread:
Since society has enough actual physical resources to provide pretty much everyone with a decent, sustainable quality of life, why the hell should this not be provided, regardless of a persons moral qualities?

Start with that, consider just the physical resources at hand in the economy and how they can be distributed equitably, and then consider money, which is what controls the distribution of these resources:
If there is such an abundance of these physical resources, that everyones needs can be met for a comfortable quality of life, yet this is not done because of how money is managed, then that is a mismanagement of money in the economy.


The economy is there to work for the benefit of society, not society to work for the benefit of the economy and those that have greater control over it - the economy should be shaped, and its resources distributed, to work for the benefit of the people in it (all of the people, not disproportionately for the select few who, again, have greater control over it).

Once those basic needs are met, there are still plenty of resources left over in the economy, for rewarding entrepreneurs and capitalistic CEO's - such a society isn't mutually-exclusive/incompatible with a capitalist economy, that allows people to become ridiculously wealthy.

People won't work for nothing, its basic human behavour. People won't exchange the fruits of their labour for nothing in return. The quantity of products in the economy isn't static, without potential to earn profits production plummets.

Can you explain what the resources are you speak what determines how these resources are distributed?

Tiddlypeeps

Vitaliorange wrote: »

People won't work for nothing, its basic human behavour. People won't exchange the fruits of their labour for nothing in return. The quantity of products in the economy isn't static, without potential to earn profits production plummets.

Again... nobody is saying that people shouldn't be able to profit from their work.

Qualitymark

Vitaliorange wrote: »

People won't work for nothing, its basic human behavour.

Umm, what are all the volunteers who give enormous amounts of time, dedication and work doing? Some of these are employed people, some are unemployed; all are hugely dedicated.

Incidentally, did anyone see the letter in today's Irish Times about homelessness from Pádraig Ó hUiginn, former Secretary of the Department of the Taoiseach?

http://www.irishtimes.com/debate/letters/tackling-homelessness-1.1624505

<snip>The problem could be alleviated if the same solution were adopted that Albert Reynolds, when he was taoiseach, and I, when I was secretary-general of his department, together with the Defence Forces chief of staff found when a couple, sleeping rough, froze to death. We organised for the Army to collect people sleeping rough and bring them to premises in Grangegorman which were heated, had toilets and showers and where they were fed from Army field kitchens. This provision lasted two years.<snip>

Vitaliorange

Tiddlypeeps wrote: »

Again... nobody is saying that people shouldn't be able to profit from their work.

Thats what would be needed if KB's plan were to work. It's utterly ludicrous and devoid of coherent logic.

Vitaliorange

Qualitymark wrote: »

Umm, what are all the volunteers who give enormous amounts of time, dedication and work doing? Some of these are employed people, some are unemployed; all are hugely dedicated.

Incidentally, did anyone see the letter in today's Irish Times about homelessness from Pádraig Ó hUiginn, former Secretary of the Department of the Taoiseach?

http://www.irishtimes.com/debate/letters/tackling-homelessness-1.1624505

Thats an exception and not applicable to the economy overall. How many people will farm for free?

Qualitymark

Can I ask my supplementary question again? How much do you, personally, need to live well?

Vitaliorange

Qualitymark wrote: »

Can I ask my supplementary question again? How much do you, personally, need to live well?

I don't know.

Qualitymark

Vitaliorange wrote: »

I don't know.

I'd find it a little hard to judge how we should live if I didn't know how much I needed to live well myself. Don't you?

KyussBishop

Barely Hedged wrote: »

What are the abundant physical resources? Not an exhaustive list, but the top two that you think are most capable of having a portion of them distributed. Consequentially, im interested to know how this will contribute to improving minimal living standards.

Does the distribution of money not provide an insight into intractable human behaviour which is a vital parameter in economic analysis i.e. propose some results from analysis but how likely will these results play out in reality? Surely it must be a consideration, large or small.

Assuming linear underlyings in an economic model, still probably explains the principal components of the behaviour that the model is trying to explain. Most of the time the dynamic models are just tweaks explaining, as they are supposed to, higher order impacts. In reality when sh1t hits the fan or you have to make tough decisions (such as the government in Ireland in the past 6 years) all these nice to have higher order get dismissed. Theres a lot of things we'd like to see happen to make society more equal but in practice people who make the decisions, to affect said society, ask - how much will it cost?

It's not about equally distributing one (or two/three) specific sets of resources, it's about picking a societal goal (such as everyone being able to be provided with shelter/heat, food, medical facilities, education etc.), and distributing a portion of societies resources to meet those needs (and leaving the rest to be distributed based on market demands).

The resources are there in abundance, for providing that - it is the management of money that prevents it.
The most important 'resource' there is in the economy, is labour, and there is such an abundance of that right now, that could be put to work on other resources providing useful services and doing useful work.


What you've said about money on the second line isn't clear at all: To understand the full potential of an economy, you look at its physical resources - how labour (one 'resource'), can be combined/put-to-work with all the other resources available to the economy.
Money is the what is used to put those 'resources' together, and what is also used to decide how those resources should be distributed within the economy; when you're not making full use of those resources (i.e. when you're not at full employment), the distribution of money is being mismanaged.


Assuming linear anything in an economic model, is assuming something which isn't true in reality, and is wrong by default. Economies are dynamic/chaotic systems (like the weather), so you need to use dynamic modelling, or your model is wrong - dynamic modelling doesn't just 'add' to linear models, that doesn't make sense; dynamic models are mathematically built from the ground-up, not tacked on to linear models.


Our government has plenty of available means of funding, even while we are in the Euro, and Europe stuck in political deadlock (and without added burden of interest or public debt, since the linked method of funding is not counted as debt), to provide the jobs program I speak of for starters.

When you want to run an economy well, the question is "What's the most efficient way to put all the resources (labour/production/physical-materials) together, to meet our economic goals?", so you start by making full use of all the labour you have (because if you don't, you're not running the economy efficiently, your GDP is below maximum potential), and you ask "How much will it cost?" for deciding where to allocate all of those resources (for deciding why people should be put to work doing 'x', instead of 'y'), not how much of the resources you will allocate (because you always want to maximize use of resource, to the point of full employment - to maximize economic output).

KyussBishop

Vitaliorange wrote: »

People won't work for nothing, its basic human behavour. People won't exchange the fruits of their labour for nothing in return. The quantity of products in the economy isn't static, without potential to earn profits production plummets.

Can you explain what the resources are you speak what determines how these resources are distributed?

Nobody has ever proposed that people work for nothing - I've described and linked to a means by which government can fund a jobs creation program, right now, in my post right above.

KyussBishop

Vitaliorange wrote: »

Thats what would be needed if KB's plan were to work. It's utterly ludicrous and devoid of coherent logic.

No, that's your straw-man based on your complete ignorance, and your jumping to conclusions/assumptions about how what I put forward would be implemented. Ask if it would be implemented in a particular way, don't jump to (worst-case) conclusions, just so you can sneer.

Typical ignorant nonsense you encounter in these discussions:
Sneer/play-down what the person is saying first, find out and understand what the person is actually saying/proposing later.

Qualitymark

In general, I suspect that "You're a fool and a villain and I want you to listen to what I have to say" doesn't work too well!

KyussBishop

Qualitymark wrote: »

In general, I suspect that "You're a fool and a villain and I want you to listen to what I have to say" doesn't work too well!

In my case, if that's how my own post comes across, it's more that I'm less interested in debating with a quality of argument low enough, that the poster is deliberately misrepresenting what I say - I usually have no interest debating/convincing those posters, more find it frustrating that they use dishonest methods of argument, to try and discredit my posts in other peoples eyes (and in general, lead to lengthy fruitless debates which may drive useful discussion away).