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Unemployment benefits: who's right?

What should be done about unemployment benefits?


  • Total voters
    53
  • Poll closed .
All insurance works this way. Like homeowner's, lots of people pay in, but not everybody benefits. I guess your problem with it must be its a public system. But it works, and I'm sure has helped a lot of people and the overall economy for the last two years+.

what bothers me is it is not an insurance plan anymore-its blatant income redistribution designed to keep more people dependent on the government while justifying to the weakminded that the government properly takes from some and gives to others.

keeping people dependent on the government is how dems create new voters
 
She would not be hired by a lot of companies because she is overqualified. As a waitress she most likely would have higher qualifications then most managers (depending on restaurant of course) and they would be very reluctant to hire her because of that

especially in this environment i doubt it; i have a friend who graduated law school and went to work as a waiter because there weren't any openings in his city. he was the fourth lawyer there, and there were at least two other people with masters degrees.

if you can get a highly skilled employee for a low price then you are economically suicidal not to do so.
 
especially in this environment i doubt it; i have a friend who graduated law school and went to work as a waiter because there weren't any openings in his city. he was the fourth lawyer there, and there were at least two other people with masters degrees.

if you can get a highly skilled employee for a low price then you are economically suicidal not to do so.

One federal attorney's office in Ohio has a former supreme court clerk working for FREE as an appellate division staff attorney. Why she agreed to work for free is beyond me since someone with that sort of credential normally commands big bucks at big big firms (some of the top firms give recruits with a SC clerkship a 20,000 bonus for example). maybe she hopes to get a job there when there is an opening and can afford it

but that she is doing work for free when others get 145K or so a year to do the same thing doesn't mean she is being taken advantage of. the opening was posted, dozens applied and she got the job fully knowing the terms
 
especially in this environment i doubt it; i have a friend who graduated law school and went to work as a waiter because there weren't any openings in his city. he was the fourth lawyer there, and there were at least two other people with masters degrees.

if you can get a highly skilled employee for a low price then you are economically suicidal not to do so.

Highly skilled lawyers do not always make for highly skilled waiters, nor would they always make for a good work environment.

A recent grad of course would be different then a lawyer with 10 years of practice behind him wanting the same position. One is just out of school, and most likely still has the attitude that would make for a good waiter. One that has worked in the field for 10 years is another story
 
Highly skilled lawyers do not always make for highly skilled waiters

then they are free to leave; it's not like they couldn't hire a theater major (who would make an excellent waiter) to do it.

A recent grad of course would be different then a lawyer with 10 years of practice behind him wanting the same position. One is just out of school, and most likely still has the attitude that would make for a good waiter. One that has worked in the field for 10 years is another story

that's completely up to individual attitude, not skill-set.
 
There's no such thing as underemployment. People are employed in the best job they can find at the time. If they were a lawyer and now are getting paid $10 per hour it is because their services as a lawyer are no longer worthwhile. Demands change, and production needs to match it.
 
in the meantime, i've had three of my fellow Marines not be able to make that turn; two shot themselves and a third drove his car head first into an 18 wheeler at about 85mph....

just realized i forgot one; my first team leader drank and drugged himself to death a year after he got out. damn, now i feel like a ****bag, sorry brandon. :(
 
Lets see...... what the difference between a DING on the ol paycheck
ORRRRRRRRRRRRRR
Realizing you could lose your ****ING HOME!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Good people that have done the best they can in thier life are losing thier HOME because of the lack of extended unemplyment benefitss. Unemplyment is at 9.8% in Illinois. Are you saying SCREW THEM?????????????
 
Depends on the circumstances. Ordinarily, no, it doesn't create jobs because it discourages people from working. But when unemployment is above 9% that's really not a problem. There are plenty of people who want to work who can't find jobs. So unemployment insurance will increase their purchasing power which will stimulate the economy, without as many of the typical negative effects (discouraging productivity).

Should we keep these unemployment benefit extensions in place for all time? No, most definitely not. But are they a good idea right here and now to stimulate the economy, while alleviating the hardships placed on those who are out of work? Yes.

This is total bull****, and you don't know it. The people you took the money from to pay out the unemployment benefits can just as easily spend the money and stimulate the economy. Learn to think.
 
There's no such thing as underemployment. People are employed in the best job they can find at the time. If they were a lawyer and now are getting paid $10 per hour it is because their services as a lawyer are no longer worthwhile. Demands change, and production needs to match it.

But what you're forgetting is the costs involved in for that lawyer to train as a lawyer. Which means they've likely gone into debt to get that training, but won't be able to pay that debt back working a $10 an hour wage.

On one hand, I agree with you about the changes in demand. But despite changes in demand of different job markets, the costs of that person's education is still retained.

So the question I have is how can changing and fluctuating job markets, and the wages and salaries of someone in that job market makes, get in tune with the costs of educating and training someone for that job market?
 
Lets see...... what the difference between a DING on the ol paycheck
ORRRRRRRRRRRRRR
Realizing you could lose your ****ING HOME!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Good people that have done the best they can in thier life are losing thier HOME because of the lack of extended unemplyment benefitss. Unemplyment is at 9.8% in Illinois. Are you saying SCREW THEM?????????????

Actually, people are losing their homes because of shady mortgage companies more than because of a lack of unemployment benefits.

But I know what you mean.
 
One choice should have been, "REPEAL THEM." Unemployment benefits are among the tons of things any government should never be doing.

Charity is NOT a legitimate function of government. It should be done solely by charities, churches, and other private entities.

Yeah, the way it used to be....but sometimes events occur that are beyond the abilities of charities.
Who would YOU let starve?
 
Lets see...... what the difference between a DING on the ol paycheck
ORRRRRRRRRRRRRR
Realizing you could lose your ****ING HOME!!!!!!!!!!!!!

been there, done that. when the business i was working for after college turned out to have been run by a thieving tax-cheating rotten (well, you get the picture), and shut down, i had already been working for a month-ish without pay, and what little savings i'd kept (i was stupid) had been depleted after another month. I had to move back in with my parents for a little bit while i waited to ship off to boot camp (that was my solution).

Good people that have done the best they can in thier life are losing thier HOME because of the lack of extended unemplyment benefitss.

no, people are at risk of losing their homes because they haven't secured the incomes necessary to keep making the mortgage payments. that could be an income issue (they haven't gotten and saved enough income), or it could be an outgo issue (they got more house than they could easily keep).

it's no more the fault of those not extending unemployment benefits than it is my parents fault for not giving me an extra grand or two so i could have kept my townhouse.

but it is typical of the entitlement mentality. the government has already extended to these people 99 weeks of sustenance. that's a hair shy of two years. but no matter how much they are given, they complain because they aren't given more.

that's what you do to your fellow Americans when you put them on entitlement programs; you turn them from self-reliant individuals into those who blame others for not taking care of them better.

Unemplyment is at 9.8% in Illinois. Are you saying SCREW THEM?

people in sub-sahara Africa live on less than a dollar a day. yet you haven't sold everything you own and passed to them the proceeds; choosing to live in a hut exposed to the elements as they do. why? are you saying screw them?
 
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There's no such thing as underemployment. People are employed in the best job they can find at the time. If they were a lawyer and now are getting paid $10 per hour it is because their services as a lawyer are no longer worthwhile. Demands change, and production needs to match it.

hmmm you don't think an argument can be made for those not working full time who seek to be? it seems to toss that out tosses out unemployment alltogether.
 
Yeah, the way it used to be....but sometimes events occur that are beyond the abilities of charities.
Who would YOU let starve?

from the guy whose sig says that speaking in absolutes is for absolute idiots ;)


the answer to your question is that charity tends to rise and fall in inverse proportion to government giving. the only time i am aware of in American history where feeding ourselves was a true difficulty was in the 1930's; when the Government gathered up and destroyed the food.
 
been there, done that. when the business i was working for after college turned out to have been run by a thieving tax-cheating rotten (well, you get the picture), and shut down, i had already been working for a month-ish without pay, and what little savings i'd kept (i was stupid) had been depleted after another month. I had to move back in with my parents for a little bit while i waited to ship off to boot camp (that was my solution).



no, people are at risk of losing their homes because they haven't secured the incomes necessary to keep making the mortgage payments. that could be an income issue (they haven't gotten and saved enough income), or it could be an outgo issue (they got more house than they could easily keep).

it's no more the fault of those not extending unemployment benefits than it is my parents fault for not giving me an extra grand or two so i could have kept my townhouse.




but it is typical of the entitlement mentality. the government has already extended to these people 99 weeks of sustenance. that's a hair shy of two years. but no matter how much they are given, they complain because they aren't given more.

that's what you do to your fellow Americans when you put them on entitlement programs; you turn them from self-reliant individuals into those who blame others for not taking care of them better.

Well, let's be a bit fair here. It doesn't help that our economy has moved away from manufacturing and towards a service economy. But that isn't the fault of those blue collar workers.

I mean if we keep outsourcing more and more of our economy overseas, it'll only be a matter of time before the only thing American workers can do to get jobs is to travel to those foreign countries.

Now, I understand where you're coming from. I don't like extended unemployment benefits either. That's why instead of just handing over unemployment benefits to people who are out of work, I'd rather use that money to put them to work on public works projects and get something out of it.

I don't mind people getting government money, but I'd rather they do something to earn that government money.
 
from the guy whose sig says that speaking in absolutes is for absolute idiots ;)


the answer to your question is that charity tends to rise and fall in inverse proportion to government giving. the only time i am aware of in American history where feeding ourselves was a true difficulty was in the 1930's; when the Government gathered up and destroyed the food.

That is most interesting. Could you please provide some factual documentation to support your claim about charity and government "giving" (and what exactly is that?) And what is this about the government gathering up the food and destroying it in the 1930's?
 
Well, let's be a bit fair here. It doesn't help that our economy has moved away from manufacturing and towards a service economy. But that isn't the fault of those blue collar workers.

I mean if we keep outsourcing more and more of our economy overseas, it'll only be a matter of time before the only thing American workers can do to get jobs is to travel to those foreign countries.

not necessarily so; since we signed NAFTA we've had low unemployment until now. it's not like suddenly all those companies realized at once they'd laid off the workers 7 years ago and stopped sending checks. throughout our history, it's been the limiting of international trade that has hurt us at home, and increasing it has only helped us.

and anywho, America remains the largest manufacturer in the world (in 2008 our manufactures were greater than China, Brazil, and India put together).

i remember stories coming out when it looked like UAW might fail before the government stepped in to give them a bunch of our money; they were calling in employment counselers to try to help retrain people, only to find that all these guys knew how to do (or ever expected to do) was push a button over and over again all day. now, i agree that guys like that will have a more difficult time adjusting than someone who has already had a more eclectic employment history; but that's not anyone else's fault. it's your and my responsibility to see to it that we have skill sets that make us employable.

Now, I understand where you're coming from. I don't like extended unemployment benefits either. That's why instead of just handing over unemployment benefits to people who are out of work, I'd rather use that money to put them to work on public works projects and get something out of it.

that is something else i don't understand. why are so many people getting paid by the government and yet there is trash on the side of our roads?

I don't mind people getting government money, but I'd rather they do something to earn that government money.

well i'm with you there. it's better for the government (reduces costs) and it's better for the people (makes collecting benefits more painful).
 
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That is most interesting. Could you please provide some factual documentation to support your claim about charity and government "giving" (and what exactly is that?) And what is this about the government gathering up the food and destroying it in the 1930's?

yeah. during the middle of the Great Depression, FDR's solution was to round up all the 'excess' food and destroy it. we still do it today :). ahh... old programs never die, they just slowly increase their budgets...

Tough Questions for Defenders of the New Deal
...
1. Why did FDR triple federal taxes during the Great Depression? Federal tax revenues more than tripled, from $1.6 billion in 1933 to $5.3 billion in 1940. Excise taxes, personal income taxes, inheritance taxes, corporate income taxes, holding company taxes and "excess profits" taxes all went up. FDR introduced an undistributed profits tax. Consumers had less money to spend, and employers had less money for growth and jobs.

2. Why did FDR discourage investors from taking the risks of funding growth and jobs? Frequent tax hikes (1933, 1934, 1935, 1936) created uncertainty that discouraged investment, and FDR further discouraged investors by denouncing them as "economic royalists," "economic dictators" and "privileged princes," among other epithets. No surprise that private investment was at historically low levels during the New Deal era.

3. Why did FDR channel government spending away from the poorest people? Little New Deal spending went to the South, the poorest region; most went to political "swing" states in the West and East, where incomes were more than 60% higher. The South was already overwhelmingly on FDR's side.

4. Why did FDR make it more expensive for employers to hire people? By enforcing above-market wages, introducing excise taxes on payrolls and promoting compulsory unionism, the New Deal increased the costs of employing people about 25% from 1933 to 1940 -- a major reason why double-digit private sector unemployment persisted throughout the New Deal era.

5. Why did FDR destroy all that food when millions were hungry? FDR promoted higher food prices by paying farmers to plow under some 10 million acres of crops and slaughter and discard some six million farm animals. The food destruction program mainly benefited big farmers, since they had more food to destroy than small farmers. This policy and subsequent programs to pay farmers for not producing victimized the 100 million Americans who were consumers.

6. Why did FDR make everything more expensive during the Depression? Americans needed bargains, but FDR signed the National Industrial Recovery Act to establish some 700 industrial cartel codes that forced consumers to pay above-market prices for goods and services. Moreover, he banned discounting by signing the Anti-Chain Store Act (1936) and the Retail Price Maintenance Act (1937).

7. Why did FDR break up the strongest banks? FDR broke up the strongest banks, which diversified with both commercial banking and investment banking. FDR's federal deposit insurance didn't stop bank failures, but it transferred the cost to taxpayers. About 90% of bank failures occurred because of unit banking laws that prevented small banks from diversifying through branches. Canada, free from branching restrictions, didn't have a single bank failure during the Depression...
 
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I had to move back in with my parents for a little bit while i waited to ship off to boot camp (that was my solution).



no, people are at risk of losing their homes because they haven't secured the incomes necessary to keep making the mortgage payments. that could be an income issue (they haven't gotten and saved enough income), or it could be an outgo issue (they got more house than they could easily keep). it's no more the fault of those not extending unemployment benefits than it is my parents fault for not giving me an extra grand or two so i could have kept my townhouse.

but it is typical of the entitlement mentality. the government has already extended to these people 99 weeks of sustenance. that's a hair shy of two years. but no matter how much they are given, they complain because they aren't given more.

that's what you do to your fellow Americans when you put them on entitlement programs; you turn them from self-reliant individuals into those who blame others for not taking care of them better.



?

We all know people who feel entitled, and they are a big part of the problem. Getting something for nothing is a disease that afflicts all of the "classes". Growing up in a world where there has always been a govt sponsored fall back position has made us weaker.
I knew long before leaving home that if I was to do well, it was all on me. Over my many years I have observed others spending money as tho it was always going to be there. That is good for the overall economy, sure, but not for your personal economy.
The sad part of this current recession, I see some people losing their homes for no good reason.
One guy lost his job due to poor health, after racking up a lot of medical bills. He refinanced his house to pay his, and his wife's, medical bills, then couldn't make the payments. Two things were wrong in his case. First, he is a veteran, 2 tours in Vietnam, and could have gone to the VA for his medical issues, plus gotten a lot of money in compensation for his illnesses that the VA presumes to be connected to agent orange. His wife's medical bills were only paid 80% by her insurance, but the 20% could have been paid for with just her income, if they hadn't refinanced the house to pay for his medical issues. He had/has earned benefits in the Veterans Administration that he still fails to use.

Another seemed to be a smart guy, but at the peak of the real estate mess, he refinanced his house, took the money out of his equity, and bought a new truck, a new minivan, and started a business. Too much optimism on his part. The 2 new vehicles were a waste, as he already had 2 fairly new cars that did not need to be replaced. His business failed, he lost the house, but he managed to play the system. They got divorced, put the house in his name, and walked away from it. His wife still had a clean record and a job, and they bought another new house on her credit score. This is a case where govt rules helped them play the system.

Another family filed bankruptcy, twice, leaving their bills behind, while living too well on credit cards. They actually sold a house at the peak of the market, had a lot of cash, and went thru it in about a year. Way too much optimism on their part.

If this current economic mess does anything good in the long run, it will have put unbridled optimism in its place, the "dustbin of history"...
 
We all know people who feel entitled, and they are a big part of the problem. Getting something for nothing is a disease that afflicts all of the "classes". Growing up in a world where there has always been a govt sponsored fall back position has made us weaker.

truth. it has also made us stupider, and more willing to take untenable risks.

I knew long before leaving home that if I was to do well, it was all on me. Over my many years I have observed others spending money as tho it was always going to be there. That is good for the overall economy, sure, but not for your personal economy.

that was me before i got laid off. i was making way more money than i needed, and i pretty much blew it all because... hey, i mean, it's always going to be there, right?

a painful lesson, but one well learned.

If this current economic mess does anything good in the long run, it will have put unbridled optimism in its place, the "dustbin of history"...

hopefully. hopefully people will have learned the dangers of debt and the benefits of savings. we shall see.
 
ahhh - the Cato Institute!!!

The ridiculous idea that consumers would have benefitted from farmers selling them food at prices far below what it costs to produce it fails to take in the long distance effects of such a thing. Everyone should well know that if farmers as a whole cannot produce goods and make a profit at them, there will simply be no goods in that field of production in the future. Sure, you get a cheap burger today but no beef at all in the future. FDR knew that and his economists knew that and his agricultural advisors knew that.

I wonder why the geniuses at the Cato Insititute do not know that.
 
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:shrug: it was merely the first link to come up. the fact that FDR thought that destroying food in the midst of the great depression to be a good idea (part of his general approach that the Depression was caused by us having too much stuff) is just basic history.
 
and it also was necessary to save the entire agricultural industry and get them on the road to profitability so that they could feed Americans for year after year after year.

Again. FDR knew that. Farmers knew that. Economists knew that. Agrucultural experts knew that.
Why does not the Cato Institute know that?
 
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