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What's the difference between nominal dollars and real dollars?
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Feb 14, 2013 23:01
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Tab8715 posted:What's the difference between nominal dollars and real dollars? Nominal dollars aren't adjusted for inflation; real dollars are. So when you look back 50 years and see that something cost a nickel, comparing that to today's price without accounting for inflation isn't particularly helpful. e: To answer your initial question about cost of goods increasing so there's no benefit, things don't work out that way. Virtually all goods and services have more than just minimum wage employees to factor into the costs of their goods. A study of how things would look if Wal-Mart had to increase it's minimum pay to $12 per hour finds that if they passed 100% of that increased cost to consumers, the average price increase would be 1.1%, which amounts to $0.46 per shopping order at Wal-Mart for the average consumer. Meanwhile workers currently earning below $9 an hour would see an increase of $3,250 to $6,000 annually. That's a substantial benefit for people working below the poverty line for virtually no impact on consumers assuming even the worst case scenario. Mo_Steel fucked around with this message at 23:13 on Feb 14, 2013 |
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Feb 14, 2013 23:05
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Tab8715 posted:What's the difference between nominal dollars and real dollars? Nominal dollars are literally the number of dollars you're holding, and real dollars are a representation of their purchasing power. For example, and I'm just making up numbers here because I'm on my phone, a quarter in the Olden Days could buy you a loaf of bread. In nominal dollars, you had 25 cents. In real dollars, that quarter was "worth" $2 dollars, the price of a loaf of bread in today's market. In the dystopian future, a jillion dollars will buy a loaf of bread, but you won't effectively have the spending power of a jillion dollars by today's standards. Still just $2. That's why people are saying "even if you raise nominal wages, inflation will make it so your real wage stays the same." Edit: beaten by someone with ~numbers~ and ~facts~
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Feb 14, 2013 23:17
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Plastics. posted:FWIW, all 5 of my jobs through high school and college were at mom and pop companies, and at every single one I was paid a few dollars over minimum wage, even as a lowly shelf-stocking teenager. At the restaurants, the servers were paid almost a dollar above their pathetic minimum, or were given the full $7.25. A minimum wage hike wouldn't necessarily have affected them. I know it's anecdotal, but I like to think small company owners can't in good conscience work side-by-side with employees while sending the message "You're worth as little as I can get away with paying you." Or maybe they just didn't have the resources to cope with high employee turnover. That's good and that's the same situation I had as well but it's very anecdotal. Mo_Steel posted:Nominal dollars aren't adjusted for inflation; real dollars are. So when you look back 50 years and see that something cost a nickel, comparing that to today's price without accounting for inflation isn't particularly helpful. That's the study I posted and I was shot back with "Well, why not raise the minimum wage to $100 an hour?" 
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Feb 15, 2013 01:29
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What's the counter argument to the right-wing talking point about the rich being the "job creators?" I saw some youtube video where this rich businessman (his last name was Schiff or something) was arguing with the Wall St. protestors and he kept going back to this, like "I've created hundreds of jobs, how many have you created?"
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Feb 15, 2013 02:00
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Tab8715 posted:That's the study I posted and I was shot back with "Well, why not raise the minimum wage to $100 an hour?" I'm no economist, but personally, I'd probably only want to work 10 hours a week if I could get $100 an hour. My employer would have to hire 3 more people to cover the rest of my shift, and 3 more people to cover every single employee who behaves the way I do. I don't know if the labor supply is large enough to handle that kind of thing. Now, if wages were high enough that people like me wanted to only work 30 hours a week, working five 6-hour days, that might not be terrible. My employer would have to hire a fourth shift, that'd create five or six new jobs. In short, let's not go crazy, we can increase wages a little bit and see what happens. Edit: To actually be a resource: Here's a model for labor supply:  As you can see, the higher the wages, the fewer hours that people want to work. It's like the laffer curve but actual economics instead of being bullshit that got pulled out of the collective asses of Arthur Laffer, Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld. Dr. Arbitrary fucked around with this message at 02:41 on Feb 15, 2013 |
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Feb 15, 2013 02:34
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actionjackson posted:What's the counter argument to the right-wing talking point about the rich being the "job creators?" I saw some youtube video where this rich businessman (his last name was Schiff or something) was arguing with the Wall St. protestors and he kept going back to this, like "I've created hundreds of jobs, how many have you created?" This is used a talking point for many things, most commonly not taxing the rich. All capitalists create jobs. They need other people's labor in order to turn a profit. This is not remarkable or commendable. What is the argument they're making around this talking point? Judakel fucked around with this message at 02:50 on Feb 15, 2013 |
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Feb 15, 2013 02:46
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actionjackson posted:What's the counter argument to the right-wing talking point about the rich being the "job creators?" I saw some youtube video where this rich businessman (his last name was Schiff or something) was arguing with the Wall St. protestors and he kept going back to this, like "I've created hundreds of jobs, how many have you created?" The rich don't create jobs. They just control the capital other people need to create jobs. Here's an even richer person calling it out as BS at a TED talk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Wc9bWc-WRs Demand creates jobs. People spending money creates jobs. As he says, hiring people is the last course of action for any capitalist. You only do it when demand finally necessitates it. Amused to Death fucked around with this message at 04:34 on Feb 15, 2013 |
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Feb 15, 2013 04:32
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Amused to Death posted:Demand creates jobs. This is why immigration should be liberalized heavily, to quickly generate more demand and create a long-term source of demand for goods and services.
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Feb 15, 2013 04:39
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shots shots shots posted:This is why immigration should be liberalized heavily, to quickly generate more demand and create a long-term source of demand for goods and services. Demand is the amount of money that consumers/businesses/governments/other countries are willing to spend to purchase goods and services from businesses, so unless the immigrants are coming in with large stocks of cash or other assets they won't generate much demand at all.
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Feb 15, 2013 05:21
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Judakel posted:This is used a talking point for many things, most commonly not taxing the rich. All capitalists create jobs. They need other people's labor in order to turn a profit. This is not remarkable or commendable. I think it was something about this person saying he was taxed plenty, and that the amount he got to keep was fair given how much he had contributed to the economy with this "job creation."
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Feb 15, 2013 05:54
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For anyone who is curious this is the video he is talking about. Its mostly Schiff being a giant rear end in a top hat for the better part of two hours and pick apart simple arguments of people who are for the most part less educated (but not necessarily ignorant) on the subject of economics than him. This is about par for the course for Peter Schiff. Frankly I could go over this entire video for hours pointing out all the times that he is wrong, there are hundreds and hundreds of them. The whole thing is just a giant mess of him making assertions and basic liberterian arguments while smugly talking about how he started his own company so gently caress the poors. Unfortunately Peter Schiff has become rather famous in the last half decade because he was 'right' about the housing bubble. I've actually done numerous posts on the forum about this and the gist of it is that Peter Schiff is right because he is a broken clock. Like Gerald Celente and most of the other liberterians who called the bubble, he called it because he is continually bear market. If you select any time period in the last decade or more you can almost certainly find quotes from Peter Schiff talking about how terrible things are going to be, about how "X" is going to crash and hyperinflation and, and, and. He predicted the housing bubble in that he saw that there was a bubble and said "Hey guys, things will go to poo poo." If you want to tell who actually predicted the bubble, look at the people who put their money down on it, or who were at least hit least hard by it. Schiff took as big a hit as anyone. quote:What's the counter argument to the right-wing talking point about the rich being the "job creators?" I saw some youtube video where this rich businessman (his last name was Schiff or something) was arguing with the Wall St. protestors and he kept going back to this, like "I've created hundreds of jobs, how many have you created?" While most people have already addressed this I will add to the latter half of it. The great thing about the fact that he continually says that he has created hundreds of jobs is that it is a lie. Euro Pacific Capital, Schiff's company, employs 53 people. Even more hilariously is that he can't even effectively say that he takes money for his hedge fund and uses it to help start businesses, unless those businesses are in china, because EPC's primary focus is "to offer globally diversified investment options to discerning retail investors and forward thinking institutions." EPC primarily deals in Non-US stocks and national bonds, with slight dabbling in currency and precious metal speculation. Peter Schiff actively takes money out of the US economy and sends it overseas, then bitches about how he is a job creator etc. I absolutely loving hate this man and would not spit on him if he were dying of thirst. Did I mention his wealthy father who helped him with a large trust fund and got him his first job is in prison for tax evasion? Yeah...
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Feb 15, 2013 07:08
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Soviet Space Dog posted:Demand is the amount of money that consumers/businesses/governments/other countries are willing to spend to purchase goods and services from businesses, so unless the immigrants are coming in with large stocks of cash or other assets they won't generate much demand at all. This is basically the supply-side argument in a nutshell, so if you believe in demand-side economics, you must necessarily disavow this belief.
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Feb 15, 2013 13:26
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Something I hear thrown out a lot when talking about healthcare is the claim that European style UHC programs are actually worse because they take forever to get you to a doctor, usually backed by some anecdote or whatever. Could someone give me some idea to what degree this claim is true/false and where it comes from?
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Feb 15, 2013 18:09
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"A doctor" is generally very easy to reach. Non-critical surgery often gets you on a waiting list, however. I mean, people have their GPs and can see them within a couple of days, or they can go to the ER in an emergency.
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Feb 15, 2013 18:43
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It's easy to keep wait times down, all you have to do is make sure people don't go to the doctor  http://www.commonwealthfund.org/~/m...l_update_v2.pdf quote:Americans were the most likely to say they had access problems because of cost. Half (51%) said they had problems getting a recommended test, treatment, or follow-up care; filling a prescription; or visiting a doctor or clinic when they had a medical problem because of cost. U.K. patients were the least likely to report having these problems (13%). Americans were significantly more likely to have out-of-pocket costs greater than $1000 for medical bills (34%), as opposed to only 4 percent of adults in the U.K. The next highest on the list after us was New Zealand at almost 15 points below us.(The UK was the lowest) I mean whatever our wait times are(I believe in general they're below average, but not for everything), it's also a reflection of the fact a huge part of the population just isn't going to doctors, and people with awesome insurance or lots of money are getting more elective surgery while people who need medical poo poo done to them are staying at home.
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Feb 15, 2013 19:04
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Thanks, those two posts pretty much gave me material for a decent rebuttal - particularly the bit about our wait times being so short because half of us just suffer through poo poo. Not that anything's likely to shut up the bootstrapper assholes for long, but it makes me feel better, at least.
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Feb 15, 2013 19:07
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Keep in mind as well that issues with wait times in UHC countries (and I speak specifically about Canada, since that's where I've done most of my research) stem at least partly from triage-centered models of health care, where the system is largely focused on addressing health concerns as they become critical (which usually results in lots of hospital building and physician training) instead of trying to stave off illness in the first place via primary care. Hospitals and physicians are the two biggest pieces of the Canadian health care budget across the country. It's got little to do with the universal aspect and a lot to do with where the system has focused itself.
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Feb 15, 2013 20:22
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If you want to be passive aggressive you could always post this: http://www.pluralofanecdote.com/ Basically you trade slightly longer wait times on non-critical issues with not going loving bankrupt when you get sick, with the added bonus that people visit the doctor earlier and more often and therefore treat disease when it's easier and cheaper to do so. The idea that someone with a bleeding head wound or a broken arm or impaled by a spike will have to wait for care in a UHC country is ridiculous, and the assertion that it's better for people to go bankrupt for something they can't control (like cancer or an injury) just so someone doesn't have to wait as long for a joint replacement is borderline evil. Around 60% of bankruptcies are due to medical bills, even though 75% of those people had health insurance. EDIT: Here's an image from http://blog.jonudell.net/2010/01/06/two-interpretations-of-us-health-care-cost-vs-life-expectancy/ using OECD's numbers for healthcare expenditures and life expectancy. (The article is about using WHO's data with OECD data and possible problems it causes. I'm not sure what causes the discrepancy, possibly how they accounted for income differences?)  Regardless of what numbers you use the US pays way way more than anyone else and doesn't even get the best results. DarkHorse fucked around with this message at 20:55 on Feb 15, 2013 |
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Feb 15, 2013 20:30
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Ooh, that's excellent. Thanks a lot. It helps that most of the bootstrapper assholes I know like to think of themselves as just the most wonderful christians, so maybe that'll make them a bit easier to guilt. (It probably won't.  )
Spiritus Nox fucked around with this message at 21:13 on Feb 15, 2013 |
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Feb 15, 2013 21:10
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shots shots shots posted:This is basically the supply-side argument in a nutshell, so if you believe in demand-side economics, you must necessarily disavow this belief. What are you babbling about, demand side is all about aggregate demand which is a monetary thing. You seem to be implying Say's law, which demand side says doesn't work once you include money.
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Feb 15, 2013 21:16
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DarkHorse posted:Basically you trade slightly longer wait times on non-critical issues with not going loving bankrupt when you get sick, with the added bonus that people visit the doctor earlier and more often and therefore treat disease when it's easier and cheaper to do so. Don't UHC countries (specifically Britain) also have weird pseudo-insurance for the wealthier people, where if you get that you get special nicer hospitals and are automatically bumped to the front of the line? Spiritus Nox, if your friend is really hung up on the wait times (and I'm actually remembering this correctly) you might be able to convince them by mentioning that they can always pay their way out of the wait times. Plus it's bootstrappy too because more money = better (wait times) than!
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Feb 16, 2013 00:50
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Parallel Paraplegic posted:Don't UHC countries (specifically Britain) also have weird pseudo-insurance for the wealthier people, where if you get that you get special nicer hospitals and are automatically bumped to the front of the line? Spiritus Nox, if your friend is really hung up on the wait times (and I'm actually remembering this correctly) you might be able to convince them by mentioning that they can always pay their way out of the wait times. Plus it's bootstrappy too because more money = better (wait times) than! UHC sets minimum standards not maximum limits, would be the idea.
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Feb 16, 2013 01:35
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Parallel Paraplegic posted:Don't UHC countries (specifically Britain) also have weird pseudo-insurance for the wealthier people, where if you get that you get special nicer hospitals and are automatically bumped to the front of the line? It's not pseudo-insurance. It's plain old private health insurance and private medical care.
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Feb 16, 2013 01:51
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Install Gentoo posted:It's not pseudo-insurance. It's plain old private health insurance and private medical care. I guess it's just weird to me because I live in America and that seems much more, I don't know, sensible Anyway yeah, as was pointed out UHC doesn't replace all insurance, it just sets minimums so people don't have to choose between going bankrupt or dying of a treatable illness. If your bootstrapper buddies can't at least agree that some minimum should exist, they're basically saying they're okay with just letting the poor die because they didn't self reliance hard enough, and you probably won't be able to win them over no matter what you do.
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Feb 16, 2013 03:44
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Soviet Space Dog posted:What are you babbling about, demand side is all about aggregate demand which is a monetary thing. You seem to be implying Say's law, which demand side says doesn't work once you include money. Of course there will be money, the immigrants will find legal jobs and spend their money here if we allow them to.
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Feb 16, 2013 03:47
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One of the interesting things about having a hybrid system of state and private healthcare is that private hospitals have been known to magic up waiting times out of thin air to aggravate public patients into paying for healthcare.
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Feb 16, 2013 03:54
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shots shots shots posted:Of course there will be money, the immigrants will find legal jobs and spend their money here if we allow them to. If the immigrants could find legal jobs that paid money without simply taking jobs that would have otherwise be filled (which ceteris paribus doesn't change demand at all, and could actually decrease it if increased competition drove down wages), there wouldn't be unemployment and you wouldn't need the immigrants to "generate demand" in the first place.
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Feb 16, 2013 03:54
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A couple weeks ago I was hanging out with my peers when the topic of the auto industry came up. Seeing how all my peers are smarmy business majors, one pipes up that the unions need to "admit" that they are "equally" as responsible as management is for fighting with each other and tanking the American auto industry and everyone else nodded in agreement. I decided to state that in an economic system where companies were employee-owned the entire employee-owner rivalry is done away with, but feel that the entire premise that labor was just as much at fault as management is of questionable veracity. Is my gut feeling right? If so, how would I go about convincing people who have probably completed A+ projects and reports on the auto industry that unions aren't a bad thing?
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Feb 16, 2013 04:00
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Soviet Space Dog posted:If the immigrants could find legal jobs that paid money without simply taking jobs that would have otherwise be filled (which ceteris paribus doesn't change demand at all, and could actually decrease it if increased competition drove down wages), there wouldn't be unemployment and you wouldn't need the immigrants to "generate demand" in the first place. There would be new jobs created due to the additional demands of a bunch of new people living in the area. Arguing that capital is needed for this to happen is supply-side economics. Think about it: You are arguing that since there aren't jobs, a bunch of additional labor won't help the economy. It's another way of saying that more capital per worker is needed, which is a supply-side argument.
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Feb 16, 2013 04:09
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Since when the hell has aggregate demand been supply side, and endogenous growth theory been demand side? How can there be involuntary unemployment under your model of the economy?
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Feb 16, 2013 04:17
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Soviet Space Dog posted:Since when the hell has aggregate demand been supply side, and endogenous growth theory been demand side? How can there be involuntary unemployment under your model of the economy? You are just looking at it from the angle that immigrants would not bring anything to aggregate demand (this is wrong) and that jobs are limited by available capital and/or "job creators", which would be a supply side argument.
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Feb 16, 2013 05:03
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Barnaby Barnacle posted:A couple weeks ago I was hanging out with my peers when the topic of the auto industry came up. Seeing how all my peers are smarmy business majors, one pipes up that the unions need to "admit" that they are "equally" as responsible as management is for fighting with each other and tanking the American auto industry and everyone else nodded in agreement. I decided to state that in an economic system where companies were employee-owned the entire employee-owner rivalry is done away with, but feel that the entire premise that labor was just as much at fault as management is of questionable veracity. Is my gut feeling right? If so, how would I go about convincing people who have probably completed A+ projects and reports on the auto industry that unions aren't a bad thing? Jealousy is a huge factor too, since many UAW members do very well, for jobs that are relatively low skill and do not require a degree. It can be a bitter pill to swallow to know that some dude who attaches doors to Fords makes more then you do after you paid 40k for a degree. The standard answer of "well then form a union yourself!" only can go so far since for many people that is rather unlikely. I'm very pro union, but the UAW will pull poo poo like getting guys their jobs back after they were drinking on the job in factories full of machinery. Pretty much anyone can agree it is just to fire them at that point. It is also the union's job to ensure everyone gets their fair treatment, but there is a point where that is reached and now you are going too far.
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Feb 16, 2013 05:14
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Does anyone have good resources on the history (and benefits) of unions, particularly in the US? What about modern unions and their benefits? What are examples of unions who serve to discredit the idea of unions? Basically, I know a good number of people who think they are unnecessary in modern times... but I'm not seeing that. I would like to be able to argue more effectively in the future.
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Feb 16, 2013 06:40
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I want to make an argument based on the low interest rates the government pays for its bonds. Unfortunately I don't know what bonds I should be looking at or how to read the tables. Any advice?
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Feb 16, 2013 21:17
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Kudaros posted:Does anyone have good resources on the history (and benefits) of unions, particularly in the US? What about modern unions and their benefits? What are examples of unions who serve to discredit the idea of unions? The simplest answer is that unions are a critical constituent unit of the broader labor movement. Here's a post from earlier in the thread covering the barest of basics. It's tailored a bit more towards "right to work" stuff, but the middle paragraphs are of general interest. There's also a link at the bottom to the story of the Flint sit-down strikes, a historical episode with which everyone discussing union action should familiarize themselves. The EPI published some stats on the benefits of unions in 2003 and 2012. "The weekend" is probably the single most striking (ho ho) thing attributable to union action. They also tend to improve compensation — in all terms: pay, benefits, paid time off, etc. — and they make certain other interesting options available to workers. For a less common example, consider a case where some employees want to work long hours, and this puts pressure on other workers to also increase their hours, despite preferences to the contrary. A union could help to organize such differences internally, such that everyone's preference can be more easily met without any workers signaling low quality. Even the most pro-business economist you can find will acknowledge that this is an unequivocal upside, and even a competitive advantage over non-union shops. Aeolius fucked around with this message at 06:00 on Feb 17, 2013 |
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Feb 17, 2013 05:49
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So uh, how do you respond to someone who says "Aren't trans people like furries? They're just living a fantasy that makes them happier." I know that there were some studies looking at biological causes for that so could anyone link me to it? And I guess just in general how do you argue with someone who takes the "transgender people are fake" viewpoint?
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Feb 17, 2013 06:27
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Arbitrary Coin posted:So uh, how do you respond to someone who says "Aren't trans people like furries? They're just living a fantasy that makes them happier." I know that there were some studies looking at biological causes for that so could anyone link me to it? A swift punch to the throat? Anyway you can always start with Wikipedia and go from there (the citations, etc), specifically the parts on the brain studies that have been done: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transgender#Brain-based_studies http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Causes_of_transsexualism Basically we can see that their brains are actually measurably more "female" or "male" than their physiology would suggest. They don't just think "gee I'd like to be a girl" like a furry thinks they'd like to be a fox, they measurably have more feminine brains. We even think we know why - differences in the timing and amount of certain chemicals in the womb, to start.
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Feb 17, 2013 06:57
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I posted the "what would happen if Walmart paid $12 an hour minimum" study earlier today on my Facebook because I thought it was really intriguing. After talking down to someone who complained about "snot nose teenagers not needing $12", it took 12 hours for someone to make the $100 an hour quip. Thankfully, I was able to point out how that was invalid due to this thread so thank you all for having a thread where discussion can happen.
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Feb 18, 2013 03:38
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I am writing this thing about feminism for a paper, and I need some striking examples about horrible injustices done to women, both modern and ancient. Everything from misogynistic quotes from famous thinkers and world leaders to acts of violence. Thanks a bunch.
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Feb 18, 2013 18:03
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