As far as employer-provided, yes. Pay for your own damned health costs.
Next question.
Posted on 03/20/2005 8:11:01 AM PST by A. Pole
Second is to introduce national single payer system to relieve employers from the crippling burden and help workers to be more mobile and secure.
The third is to provide free full (tuition/room/board, no means test)scholarships for better 50% of students based on competition exams. This will enable American graduates to compete on the job market without burden of debt to pay.
And you say you are a conservative? How do you differ from Teddy Kennedy? Are you sure you dont belong on DU?
bookmark
He he. Losing the argument?
I just follow the logical conclusions from the present situation. USA industry cannot compete against countries with VAT, national health care and full student scholarships. The only alternative is restoring the traditional tariffs or imitating the competition.
And I am conservative on the moral/religious/social issues. On the matters of economy I am a pragmatic - whatever solution works best be it free market or liberal. (I personally tend to think that the mixed calibrated system is best).
Does Daddy know you're messing with his computer?
It's not them, it's free-market capitalism. /sarc
Yes, that puts it well. You've generalized from the specific case shown for autos. Mr. A. Pole makes the case that it's because Reagan threatened auto tariffs, in post 103, but a lot of auto plants have been built here, since Reagan. That answer doesn't wash for me. Also, it's worth noting that South Carolina exports BMWs to Germany and the world, and I think there are other manufacturers that do that sort of thing.
We'll end up like england. A glut of lawyers and insurance companies and a few land barons, and not much else.
I don't care what the rich snobby people say, we need manufacturing. All wealth is derived from the land. THat is a universal truth. THat means farming and the process of aquiring raw materials and transforming raw materials into finished product.
When you reach a point when your entire economy is based on accumulating wealth from paper and entertainment, you are headed down a dead end road. THat is a non-sustainable situation. It can be propped up for a period, but inevitably, it will implode.
We have already reached a point where our college educations are becoming pointless. More younger people are opting out of a traditional 4 year degree these days. They go to some accelerated program, and get just the minimum required to qualify for the promotion they are up for. And in the very technical fields, they don't even bother with that.
As far as employer-provided, yes. Pay for your own damned health costs.
Next question.
Thank you for your answer but I am only concerned about U.S. goods produced offshore and imported for sale here. I am not sure that you addressed that. If you did then it went over my head and I will revisit your reply. Thanks.
Let me just jump to the reason for my question.
Most "free traders" attempt to deflect arguments against sending production offshore and importing the finished product to sell to the American public by pointing to "insourcing."
"Look how many jobs Americans get from insourcing," they argue. "Other countries outsource to us. Outsourcing offshore is good," they triumphantly declare.
Yes indeed it is -- if the American companies were selling over there and not importing the goods for sale here.
Besides, if foreigners can do it here (insourcing) why can't those American companies do it.
True free trade has American companies producing and selling over there.
But "free trade" IMO is transferring technology, wealth, and production to developing countries in exchange for "cheap" labor. The goods are then exported to America for sale.
Intellectual property gets stolen and soon production shifts to foreign (as in Chi-com) enterprises that elbow American companies out of the way. They then become the exporters. IMO. Not good.
"That is why USA needs to change tax system into VAT."
There are no VAT proposals in congress that I am aware of (feel free to correct me if I am wrong) that replace our income tax and payroll tax system. They all want to add a VAT in addition to our current tax modes.
Furthermore, VATs have high compliance costs, also. Perhaps not as high as our current system, but certainly higher than the FairTax, which would be a National Retail Sales Tax collected at a single point with a uniform rate.
We can't stop progress just to make sure people have jobs.
If the wages do not grow, many workers will not be able to afford the health care - they will either get deep into the debt or go without it. So in the longer run they and others will support the national health care.
Today's America is very different from XIX. Health care is seen as a necessary part of the normal style of life. And people given choice between laissez-faire capitalism without safety net and socialism will chose the later unless the choice is taken away from them by Latin American style authoritarian regime.
Predatory oligarchical capitalism requires opression and use of force because of lack of popular consent. The New Deal policies defended the stability of American system and they were very successful in that aspect. The new freemarketeers move in the opposite direction.
Unfortunately you are right.
Furthermore, VATs have high compliance costs, also. Perhaps not as high as our current system, but certainly higher than the FairTax, which would be a National Retail Sales Tax collected at a single point with a uniform rate.
How is this going to fix the problem with trade/budget deficits, with rising costs of health care and with the workers losing ground?
No, he prefers your mom.
Commoditized industry comptetes only on price.
To hell with such "progress" which is changing USA into Latin America or XIX England. Nothing good will come out of it.
They were complaining 20 years ago about how hard the factories and mines were on the people.
They were complaining 20 years ago about how hard the factories and mines were on the people.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.