May 2015 Provincial Election Thread v2

[CliffFletcher]

Originally Posted by jammies

Of course one change is not going to solve a huge, complex and evolving problem. I think it has a chance of mitigating the problem, though, and of being a small part of a general solution - there will come a day when this issue of the unskilled and semi-skilled being seen as superfluous to the economy will become critical. Anything done to even slightly lessen the impact of that coming change has to be contemplated.

Once somewhere in the neighbourhood 50 per cent of people have no secure employment that provides for their needs because their skills aren't necessary, we'll have to make a fundamental decision:

The remainder of society (the 20 per cent who are well off and the 30 per cent who scramble desperately to get into that group) can cut themselves off from the mob entirely. Gated communities, private schools, private hospitals, no-go zones - the whole shebang. Or we recognize that we need to provide some sort of living wage to all people, if only to keep our consumer market economy running.

[polak]

Wouldn't it be easier to say sign some sort of international accord banning the automation of certain jobs to protect workers?

Seems like it'd be easier than trying to maintain that segregated world or just paying for people to live.

[rubecube]

Originally Posted by polak

Wouldn't it be easier to say sign some sort of international accord banning the automation of certain jobs to protect workers?

Seems like it'd be easier than trying to maintain that segregated world or just paying for people to live.

Depends on if you think that working for a living is a more worthy moral ideal than not being greedy.

[polak]

Originally Posted by rubecube

Depends on if you think that working for a living is a more worthy moral ideal than not being greedy.

Well capitalism won't really work if they decide to go full steam ahead. There aren't any jobs that are safe from automation besides the arts (wouldn't that be ironic. Art students are the only ones that can get jobs in the future) and law?

Who is going to buy the products and services if no one has jobs?

[rubecube]

Originally Posted by polak

Well capitalism won't really work if they decide to go full steam ahead. There aren't any jobs that are safe from automation besides the arts (wouldn't that be ironic. Art students are the only ones that can get jobs in the future) and law?

Who is going to buy the products and services if no one has jobs?

Which is the point CliffFletcher was making. If you don't provide a living wage for people, eventually everything will crumble because no one will be able to put anything into the economy. It's sort of the basis of post-scarcity economics.

[Coach]

Originally Posted by polak

Well capitalism won't really work if they decide to go full steam ahead. There aren't any jobs that are safe from automation besides the arts (wouldn't that be ironic. Art students are the only ones that can get jobs in the future) and law?

Who is going to buy the products and services if no one has jobs?

This is the point where money becomes obsolete, and we worry about humanity's progress moreso than our individual standing as compared to each other.

How that would be structured is difficult to envision. It would honestly have to be some crazy point between communism and facism where a company like Google or Amazon basically runs all of our services, and everything we do would be "sponsored" by them in a way.

I'm writing a fiction novel called "The Morality Algorithm" that explores this type of concept, where your wealth is determined by your net benefit to society. Feel free to PM if you're interested!

[rubecube]

Originally Posted by MattyC

This is the point where money becomes obsolete, and we worry about humanity's progress moreso than our individual standing as compared to each other.

How that would be structured is difficult to envision. It would honestly have to be some crazy point between communism and facism where a company like Google or Amazon basically runs all of our services, and everything we do would be "sponsored" by them in a way.

I'm writing a fiction novel called "The Morality Algorithm" that explores this type of concept, where your wealth is determined by your net benefit to society. Feel free to PM if you're interested!

Yeah, I'm going to be doing some reading of the "Culture" series by Iain Banks over the holidays. It's sci-fi, but deals with some of these themes.

[linecook]

Originally Posted by jammies

That just leaves the door open for immigrant Vadim, who works his wife, son, and two daughters at Vadim's Hardware, and pushes Tim into bankruptcy and his employees into the unemployment line.

Vadim not only has lower employee overhead (he pays his family in room and board) but buys cheap, crappy products from his cousin Khadim back in India, products that are cheaper than what you find at Home Hardware or Rona because they are poor quality, but good enough for the uninformed buyer. Thirty years from now, "Vadim's" is a brand on par with Walmart, and you cna no longer buy a decent bandsaw unless you go to a specialty import shop that sells outrageiously expensive German machines.

In short: Taking our jerbs! Our jeeeeeeeerrrrrrrbbbbbs!

It's funny you chose a bandsaw as an example, coincidentally I just bought one on lunch break. It's a General International brand but the red one. Made in China

[VladtheImpaler]

Originally Posted by Resolute 14

Given we are talking about order takers at fast food restaurants, I would argue the computer screens offer no worse service, on average, than lowly trained menial staff does. And yes, it increases profits. The cost to install and maintain those machines is lower than the cost of such menial labour. That's why the labour is being replaced - it does not offer much value.



You're assuming that every business paying a non-livable wage is making boatloads of money. This latest minimum wage debate began with a story of a small business owner who is being forced out by the government making his business unfeasible.

I think these guys' understanding of economics and business is similar to (or perhaps comes from) Elton John's in "Levon" - you know about how Levon spends all his time counting all the money he makes "from selling cartoon balloons in town".

[Dentoman]

Standard and Poors just dropped Alberta's credit rating to AA+.
What result usually comes of these ratings drops?

[Derek Sutton]

Originally Posted by puffnstuff

How many minimum wage jobs are actually 40 hr per week? Are there numbers on this?

It believe it is only like 2% of people working 40 hrs make minimum wage. The problems lie with those full timers in the $12- $14 / hr and their managers who are making $15-$17 /hr. Where do busnieses/ business owners go from here?

[CaptainCrunch]

Originally Posted by Dentoman

Standard and Poors just dropped Alberta's credit rating to AA+.
What result usually comes of these ratings drops?

Basically the cost of borrowing money increases, and you pay more interest to service your loans.

So it pretty much automatically means that the borrowing to spend infrastructure plan for the province is going to cost more.

This drop isn't a significant one yet, Alberta is still seen as a good borrowing risk. Its more of a warning then anything else.

If you want to see massive drops, Ontario and Manitoba have seen pretty big credit rating drops. In Ontario its really going to screw up their budget at some point.

[RubberDuck]

Originally Posted by Dentoman

Standard and Poors just dropped Alberta's credit rating to AA+.
What result usually comes of these ratings drops?

Here's a link:

http://www.calgaryherald.com/industr...035/story.html

Didn't see that coming...

[CaptainCrunch]

Originally Posted by RubberDuck

Here's a link:

http://www.calgaryherald.com/industr...035/story.html

Didn't see that coming...

Pretty much means that 1 out of 30 working age people in this province lost their job this year.

Very depressing.

[RubberDuck]

Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch

Pretty much means that 1 out of 30 working age people in this province lost their job this year.

Very depressing.

I meant to post this link in reference to the credit rating:

http://calgaryherald.com/news/politi...wngraded-by-sp

That other link I accidentally posted is definitely more depressing though.

[CampbellsTransgressions]

Good to see our beloved Wildrose leaders have already got their shots in at the NDP. Ric Definitely-not-Wildrose McIver also got some words in. These parties really ought to stop being childish and they really ought to start picking smarter battles, especially when their members are the reason we're in this mess and have to run a 6 billion dollar deficit.

I don't get it. S&P pointed largely to oil revenues as the reason. Hell, the "average economic prospects" actually sounds pretty sweet if you're to believe the WR about the future of our province under the NDP.

While I'm sure the NDP raising every tax they can think of played a role, it wasn't the only reason we got downgraded and it certainly wasn't the major reason.

Edit: Although I think Ceci got his words mixed up:

"Our province is carefully controlling its costs and is focused on protecting health, education and jobs. We have a balanced fiscal plan."

Should really say:

"Our province is carefully controlling its costs and is focused on protecting health and education jobs. We have a balanced fiscal plan."

[CaptainCrunch]

It goes further then that Campbell.

They didn't like the budget that the government put out, we know that there was an exaggeration in the price of Oil in there, and it goes towards an increase in borrowing and debt.

Are the oil prices a big factor in this? Absolutely, but the mass infrastructure borrowing, and the borrowing to cover the day to day administrative costs of government were a pretty big factor as well, and those were defined before the floor fell out again.

[V]

Originally Posted by chemgear

Heh, that fourth comment.

Dick Beaeson taught me economics for my MBA. Smart mf'er. He can also party harder than rubecube. Just an absolute champ.

[CampbellsTransgressions]

Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch

It goes further then that Campbell.

They didn't like the budget that the government put out, we know that there was an exaggeration in the price of Oil in there, and it goes towards an increase in borrowing and debt.

Are the oil prices a big factor in this? Absolutely, but the mass infrastructure borrowing, and the borrowing to cover the day to day administrative costs of government were a pretty big factor as well, and those were defined before the floor fell out again.

You know, if a Wildrose member just repeated your last line in one of their statements, I wouldn't mind them going on the offense. As it is, they sound very petulant and provide no substance.

I don't care to defend them borrowing to cover the cost of government. We know they won't cut public sector salaries, and went as far as to reverse the cuts that the PCs had already made.

I do think spending on infrastructure is the right thing to do, assuming that the money is spent efficiently and not just handed out to friends of the government. We have an infrastructure deficit caused by PC governments dating back to Don Getty that is causing inefficiency in our services and costing us money. With many private sector companies having cut wages by 10% or even 20% and with copper, steel, oil, and pretty much every other commodity at a low, now is an ideal time to spend. It's unfortunate that this had to come with a credit downgrade, but borrowing is still going to be cheap and doing it now should save us money in the long run.

[rubecube]

Originally Posted by V

He can also party harder than rubecube.

I mean you can check with jammies on this one, but I doubt it.