Most of our thinking consists of a set of responses that I call subroutines. We’ve learned those by education or experience and we can now call them up from memory in response to whichever task we need to accomplish.
Consider the routine of an ordinary day. We get up, brush our teeth, shower, get dressed, have breakfast, start the car and drive to work. During all of this there is no need for any original thinking. It’s all programmed, including driving to work. You can carry out all of these while using your conscious mind for other purposes. Thinking about plans for the evening, or carrying on a conversation, or for some even making a phone call or texting or putting on makeup or eating breakfast on the way.
And during the course of a week, you’ll face nothing at all that hasn’t got at least a partial subroutine in memory. New customer? Routine operations to deal with that. Complaining customer? You’ve seen it before.
Short of suddenly facing a man with a gun or similar unknown event, you’re not faced with a necessity to really think. And when you ARE faced with an emergency (choking victim, drowning person, rescuing someone from a car crash, whatever), most have no subroutine that fits the situation and so they freeze, unable to decide on a course of action. Famously, advice says to do something, even if it’s wrong,because doing nothing is guaranteed to be wrong. But even taking that decision is difficult, because there are inhibitions about making wrong decisions.
For each selected subroutine, there is an expected outcome. It’s a part of a series of probabilities that range from desired outcomes to undesired outcomes. We can modify those subroutines to an extent and even learn new ones that diverge from what we already have in memory. At the same time, there are inhibitions that in themselves are subroutines. Those inhibiting subroutines can vary from mild to absolute prohibitions based on what we’ve acquired as we go through life.
Consider an example: if you’ve been to a public pool recently, you’ve probably observed a child climb up on the diving board. The child ascended the board because he/she wanted the thrill, but then froze when they realized that the water was quite some distance below. Intellectually, they’ve seen others jump or dive, and they want to do that; but fear inhibits that first attempt. Jump? Or face ridicule if they choose to climb back down the steps? They may wait for some time, frozen and unable to make a choice…but then for those who DO jump or dive, they realize that the fear is unfounded. And then they climb back up the ladder. This time, there’s a subroutine to use that tells them they can jump safely and not suffer hurt. They never freeze in place again. There may be a subroutine that urges caution, but absolute prohibition won’t be there.
It’s the same with any fearful thing. Do it just once, and you’ve learned how to deal with the fear. Training and practice can provide that first partial subroutine, and after someone has once added it to their own store in memory, it’s always there. And small steps may be better because they fall within the ‘comfort zone’ of that learned subroutine.
It doesn’t have to be fear that’s the inhibitor. In some cases, it’s simple confidence. Watch a young boy deciding whether to remain with his male friends or go ask a girl to dance (inhibitor here is fear of ridicule or rejection), and then look at older boys who’ve already gone through this and learned how to deal with the question. They’re confident…and it shows.
I’ve concluded that much of success is based on a suite of learned subroutines that we can call on at need; and failure is attributable to the lack of those.
Chemistry also plays a part, particularly the balance of hormones that circulate in our blood as we grow and develop.
Can knowledge of this system of subroutines be used, or even taught?
Yes. It’s the basis for such programs as Outward Bound. Students are exposed to frequent challenges and as they overcome those they gain subroutines that can be used in future to address any similar challenge. Simply undergoing challenges that require courage weakens any subroutine that might prohibit future responses to challenges. Military training addresses this through ‘confidence courses’ and challenging courses for Rangers, Seals, Special Forces, and Pararescue operators.
And knowing what you’re doing can help an individual direct his own development and acquire the confidence that will turn losers into winners in life.
A lot of people are investigating what I cannot, chemistry of thought and how hormonal levels can affect that. So instead I concentrate on a sort of users manual. I know chemistry makes a difference; a friend recently described what happens when he takes his periodic shot to adjust his testosterone levels. He said that for a few hours he simply avoided people because the shot increased his aggression levels. He’s quite an easygoing man, but according to what he reported, he has to control the urge to punch someone. So he avoids people lest he lose his temper.
As I was developing the model I’ve described, it occurred to me that criminals and other anti-social people lack the inhibitors that ‘normal’ people do. Without inhibitors they indulge whatever impulse occurs to them, whether it be aggression or robbery or rape or murder. I also considered whether ‘mental illness’ or conditions such as autism might reflect the inability to form archived memories or those subroutines. And for a few, the archived memories may be formed and not modified when we encounter new conditions. For most of us, forming a new memory or modifying an existing one means that earlier forms are deleted. But for those with eidetic memory, perhaps they’ve bypassed that destruct function? No idea; and I’m exploring ideas that I can’t truly understand in the way that I’ve earlier described.
Archive for the ‘Uncategorized’ Category
Thoughts on Thinking
October 19, 2012Global Warming Experiment, updated
September 21, 2012Continuing to work on my counter to the greenhouse effect/global warming.
I’m not as happy with my test prototype as I was. I did what every researcher should do, gather lots of data. The difference between shaded and sunny earth temperatures is clear, in the range 15ºC to 20ºC in late afternoon, but I’m getting readings from the plastic surface that are much higher than I think they should be. Meantime, the plastic is cool to the touch, indicting that it’s not absorbing heat. I want to make sure that the plastic isn’t converting incoming short-wave solar radiation to long-wave infrared, which would defeat the purpose of the panel, increasing albedo (reflected energy) while limiting insolation (absorbed energy). I’m using an infra-red based thermometer, so I’m getting information that an ordinary contact thermometer wouldn’t give. I plan on trying one of those today.
I was thinking as I drove down the interstate that it would be simple to line both sides of the interstate with panels. And then it occurred to me that we’ve been changing the insolation/albedo equation already. Black, rough-textured asphalt absorbs insolation more and decreases albedo. And we’ve got thousands of miles of that crossing our southwestern deserts. I don’t know that anyone has documented this; heat island effects of cities is known, but I suspect the square meter count of absorbent surfaces outside of cities is at least as great as the square meter area within urban urban areas. Part of the resistance to acceptance of the greenhouse effect is that it depends on what is essentially a trace gas, Carbon dioxide. All the trace gases amount to only 1% of the atmosphere, and so it’s difficult to see how that can change planetary climates so drastically. But if you add in the increase in insolation/decrease in albedo caused by urban heat islands, deforestation, and highways, then it begins to make the phenomenon more understandable.
Meantime, it’s late in the season now; winter is going to be similar to what I measure in the mornings, temperature differences of only 5ºC or even less. I will plan on putting up a series of perhaps 5 panels in the spring using mirrored plastic rather than the off-white translucent plastic I’ve been using. I began with this because it was cheap and I already had it on hand. It has done one thing, given me preliminary measurements to serve as a baseline while I attempt to improve the efficiency of the panels.
Global Warming: a Cheap, Easy, Temporary Fix
August 29, 2012I’ve been thinking about global warming. The US Meteorological Service has now changed its official stance and states that global warming is at least partially caused by human activity. That got me to thinking, and so I’ve now posted an idea in two Facebook groups I’m a participant in.
Global warming means that we will see more drought, more intense and more giant storms, and a general change to the surface of the Earth with disruption of food supply and probably an increase in hunger for those who live in marginally-productive countries. I suspect that in time we’ll find a long-term solution, but in the short term, there’s going to be a lot of human misery and death and loss of wealth among the developed nations. So even a temporary fix would be useful, until the science and engineering is available to provide a longer term solution.
I know how to fix global warming. The worst problem I foresee is not cost or efficiency, but the resistance of people and politicians. This idea needs no new science, but it does need an reinterpretation of existing science.
I’ll begin with an overview of the greenhouse effect. Global warming depends at bottom on that. Global warming is simply a slight rise in efficiency of the trapping process of the insolation.
So what is the greenhouse effect, and why does it work? Much solar radiation passes through the atmosphere without being absorbed; that’s how we can use it to see. This radiation has a certain set of bandwidths, the colors that can be separated by a prism or rainbow. There are also ultraviolet and most interesting for our viewpoint, infra-red radiation. This is, in essence, radiated heat. It’s easy to demonstrate; you can feel it on your skin, and you feel its absence when a cloud shades the sun. It strikes the earth and is differentially absorbed or radiated back to space. Dark farmland, for example, absorbs heat quite efficiently; water less so, although what is absorbed is also released in the form of latent heat in evaporation (this is what fuels hurricanes, and usually begins off the coast of Africa in the northern hemisphere). Sunlight striking sand is partially reflected, and that which strikes snow and ice is almost totally reflected.
Reflected sunlight, like incoming sunlight, is not efficiently absorbed by atmospheric gases. It’s still at the same frequency/wavelength as it was when it came in, so it passes through the atmosphere and back to space. Photos taken from space use this reflected energy.
But what of the energy that strikes the ground and is absorbed? It heats the Earth’s surface. That’s easy to prove; take a walk on a warm day barefoot, you can feel it. I also once used the heat-trapping effect of color (black plastic tubing to design and build a solar heater for my swimming pool in El Paso; 300′ of 2″ irrigation tubing, coiled on the roof of my porch, then a system of pipes to connect this to the pool circulation pump, and so whenever I used the pool filter, I also got free heat. Very efficient; I often swam as early as February and as late as November in El Paso, in West Texas).
The Earth not only reflects incoming radiation, it also radiates. It must; this is how the Earth disposes of absorbed radiant heat and also heat from the interior. But because it has a temperature that’s different from that of the sun, it radiates in a different bandwidth. The soil doesn’t glow, but you can feel the heat radiating in the evening; very pleasant. This radiation is at a wavelength that is readily absorbed by water vapor, Carbon dioxide, and Methane. Absorption of radiated heat is the greenhouse effect.
So it occurred to me that the way to interrupt the greenhouse effect was to change the albedo selectively; to reflect, rather than to absorb, the incoming radiation. The best place to do this is in the band of deserts that surround the Earth, at about 30º north and south of the Equator. The tropics, the band from 23.5º north to 23.5º south through the equator, generates its own albedo change through cloud production. But the deserts are often clear; no clouds, no rainfall, just heat absorption.
If we could change that pair of desert zones from a strongly-absorbent to a reflective zone, it should reduce the greenhouse effect and hence reduce global warming.
This is the science. Change not global warming, instead change the Earth’s greenhouse effect.
I came up with a way to do this. It depends on the fact that not all parts of the Earth absorb energy equally. Change the part that is most energy-absorbent, you have a much greater effect on the greenhouse effect than you would have if you attempted to change the greenhouse effect by, for example, working at the poles.
I would first begin with a small test unit and gather data; one day, then a week, then ideally over the course of a year. What seems practical in theory might not work in reality.
So I intend to build a test unit. I will then gather the data, interpret it, put it into graphs and then present it. Only data needed is temperature, preferably from electronic thermometers taking readings from under the reflective panel and one or more readings outside it but nearby. Simply put, to change the planet’s temperature, I would build large numbers of frames, preferably of aluminum, but wood would also work. Across these I would stretch 2-mil reflecting mylar film (one roll, $35 from Amazon, 50″x50′). Support the panels above the ground. For the test plot, perhaps a meter above ground; for actual use, two or three meters up. Make small units, say 5m x 5m. Install, move on. They can be manufactured over Winter, begin installation in early Summer, hope to last a year at least. They should be installed for maximum effect around the world on all land surfaces that are currently desert. At the designed height, they would not interfere with passage of humans and animals below them. I would slant them at about 13º facing South in the Northern hemisphere, facing North in the Southern Hemisphere. It is not necessary to wrap the entire planet in these; the beauty of it is that it’s cheap and each installation has some small effect. The shaded land won’t be harmed; it’s desert, hence not used for anything except grazing.
Feel free to circulate the idea and run it by experts. The only thing I ask is that if you’re using my work, I get credit for my input.
I built a test panel and installed it today, Sep 15 2012. I used salvaged plastic and wood and fastened the plastic to the wood with staples, then wrapped the plastic once around the wooden end pieces to keep the staples from ripping through the plastic. I put up four T-posts that I had on hand, installed guy ropes to stabilize and tension the panel, and then clamped the end boards to the T posts. The panel is approximately 50cm above the ground. I have posted photos on my Flickr page.
I took first readings this afternoon about 3pm. The differences between the shaded ground and plastic (those read approximately the same) and the sunny ground alongside the panel were 12.5 C degrees. I’ll be making more precise measurements using the sensors of the digital thermometers. But I conclude that this afternoon I became the first person to deliberately reduce the greenhouse effect, and global warming, by a small but measurable amount.
On the 2012 Elections: Issues
August 27, 2012I wrote this reply to a friend named Harry in a group on Facebook:
Read what you wrote, Harry. “Obama is now seeking…” and “suggesting that he’s grabbing the taxing power for himself.” You don’t’ say that Obama has usurped the powers of congress, you imply motives for actions (not documented, except by your opinion; and not really knowable in any case; we can only judge actions, not motives) and some vague suggestion based on no cited evidence.
Be honest; how far would you get in court with that sort of argument?
What you’re left with is a single answer: Congress. Not Obama, but Congress. Fact.
And we all know what Congress has done, or more properly has not done. While earning the opinion that this is the worst Congress in modern history.
They have refused to consider Obama’s jobs bill. Fact. Easily verifiable.
They have taken no independent action to push the economy for jobs. Fact.
Indeed, public sector jobs have declined, but private sector jobs have risen steadily. Not fast enough, but then note who has the greater power to affect the economy. There are literally thousands of citations to confirm that; it’s not an unsubstantiated claim by me, as you have made in your post. Both working together, Congress and presidency, could have done more, but we also know that this Congress has had one aim, to deny Obama a second term. That’s been their aim, and it’s colored every thing they’ve done in the past two years. They’ve repeatedly said so. Fact. Easily verified.
Two horses harnessed together by the Constitution; but one pulls forward, the other balks and sits down. And then claims that it’s the other who is responsible for going nowhere.
Congress has had the power, and has not used it. They have done many things beloved to the right regarding Obamacare and abortion and women’s rights, although they’ve acted to block both of the last two in any bill that’s pushed forward. They’ve also blocked immigration reform. They have generated no bill to do anything about the economy. Fact. Easily verifiable.
Not one.
Despite the fact that THEY have the ability to do that. Obama couldn’t stop them if he wanted to. Presidents don’t control Congress; if anything, it’s the other way around. Congress holds the power of the purse. Presidents can, at most, influence Congress. But nothing can stop Congress from passing a bill to create jobs. They have that power and are answerable only to the voters. They can even override a presidential veto. Of course, first they have to send a bill forward. And they haven’t. Fact.
The Republican Party controls Congress. They can generate financial bills in the Republican controlled House. They have blocked bills in the Senate through use of the filibuster. They have blocked presidential appointments and they used the filibuster to block the bipartisan immigration reform bill. Fact.
Facts. Not opinions. Except for that one statement that the president and Congress, working together, could have done more.
And this is something that no amount of rhetoric can change. Something that Romney and Ryan don’t want to talk about. Ryan might have put something into that budget he brought out of committee to create jobs. He did not.
On Economic Trends: The Disappearing Labor Market
August 21, 2012We really don’t have a good economic model for what’s happening now. I’ve got my own, but I doubt that I have all the facts. I’ve taken some of the things that Krugman has written about and some that Stiglitz has written (actually Stiglitz quoted ME once; I had published a paper dealing with economics on the International Mensa Forums two years ago), and there are a couple of other economists. But there’s no real consensus.
I’ve come to believe that the root problem is capitalism itself. Let me defend that before you scream too loudly.
Capitalism seeks ever higher profits, ever greater efficiency. That’s what the ‘market’ requires. If efficiency lags, then the capital flows elsewhere; Krugman would agree with this, I think.
What this really means is that human labor is first depressed in value by exporting of jobs, then by the ultimate export, having the jobs done by machine. Even China, home of cheap labor for a generation, is now mechanizing factories.
This puts people out of work. Where do they go?
Historically, when the Industrial Revolution began, they left the land and took jobs in industry, manufacturing goods. When mechanization hit the remaining farms (in the US, as an example), farmworkers left the land and moved to cities and worked in industry again.
But now the industrial jobs are rapidly disappearing. There are service jobs, but they pay little, in most cases not enough to live an independent life.
The few jobs left in manufacturing are increasingly high-tech, many of them involving computer control or robot maintenance and engineering. Not for the uneducated, in other words.
Even construction, long a place for unskilled labor, is changing. Where once half-a-dozen men with shovels and rakes and tampers filled potholes, now three men in a machine do ten times more potholes and do them better.
Force all those former employees to find work in domestic service-industry jobs and all you do is depress labor prices even more.
What to do with our excess labor? I’ve said that it can only be employed in making items for trade, and that will work for a time. What isn’t made for the domestic market can be made for the export market. But the trend is clear: humans are being forced out of the labor market. That’s the real economic problem.
And we don’t have any place left for them to go and nothing for them to do. And no idea among politicians or even economists that this is the early stage of a trend that will only get worse.
There’s a real shortage not of managerial talent or clerical support; that group is overstaffed. The shortage is in engineers and scientists and technologists who can work with the engineers to build their designs. There are jobs for such right now…but colleges aren’t graduating enough of them. Instead, they concentrate on things that may make the student feel good, but without requiring the sheer work that a degree in math or science or engineering entails. Ethnic studies? Even education as a major? Not much work required. As an example, note that many education majors take classes that are deliberately dumbed down; math for education majors, science for education majors, etc. Education departments encourage this; it requires a Dean’s approval to count a MAJOR course toward a degree or teaching field instead of the ‘for education majors’ courses. I know…I did that. I took the full-on biology, physics, and geology courses. I didn’t go beyond second-year physics classes, essentially still elementary level but different, astronomy instead of physics II. At that point the math requirements would have meant dropping other things, biology or geology. And the GI Bill wouldn’t have paid for classes that weren’t required for me to graduate within 4 years, so I went with the broad education approach rather than the concentrated approach that would have led to a physics or math minor.
So economists and universities and politicians aren’t really addressing the trend. Industry is taking the first steps to do this; they’re offering training courses to prep people for unfilled jobs. This isn’t yet widespread, but I suspect it will grow. Meantime, some foreign specialists are immigrating to take the jobs that Americans aren’t qualified to do because of lack of education. China and India and even Japan and Korea are providing the MD’s and the engineers and scientists that our universities aren’t providing. And, since those divisions are expensive, universities continue to emphasize ethnic studies and gender studies and social studies…cheaper; more grads.
Comments?
Political commentary
August 20, 2012To me, there’s an issue of character about Romney and also Ryan. Bluntly, I don’t see anything I’d label as character about either. And I’m not at all sure that Romney’s evasions are always legal. Show the records; let investigators dig into them.
Meantime, it may be very satisfying to boot Obama. But what will you replace him with?
What will Romney do? He won’t say. So we’re asked to ‘trust’ a man of no demonstrated character to take principled stands regarding jobs and housing and immigration and education? A man who famously has said he’s not concerned with the poor, that he likes firing people, that he thinks we don’t need cops and firemen and teachers? Who would turn more social programs over to the rapacious healthcare insurance executives and for-profit entities to teach children? To care for old people at the end of life? We’ve see what their objective is: profit. Anything else is secondary. We’ve seen rebates from companies that spend less than 80 of the money they collect on healthcare for people; that, after paying executives tens of millions per year. Trust the man who thinks this is good? A man who led the offshoring of jobs? Who deliberately wrecked companies so he could loot the bones, regardless of the human cost?
No character. No ethic, other than personal profit first. No morality beyond “I’ve got mine!” And no openness from a man who conceals great wealth offshore and who now asks you to trust him.
Obama has made some mistakes by not being bold enough, in my judgment. Romney? He’s going to cost lives and increase national misery by exponential amounts.
It’s discouraging that others refuse to recognize this.
Facebook Essay, August 15 2012
August 15, 2012Kind of the problem with Greece and Spain and Portugal. Ireland, too; none of them have robust manufacturing sectors. Spain, for example, has a number of highly-developed greenhouses on the South Coast that provide produce to the north of Europe, but their homegrown Fiat (Seat) isn’t exported very much if at all. Some touristy stuff manufactured, but nothing like what Finland does. Finland produces cell phones, has a heavy shipbuilding industry to produce cruise ships, stuff like that, and it’s comparatively tiny. You simply cannot have an economy nowadays that lives and dies with food production; one bad harvest year can virtually wipe out the nation. The economy must be diversified and must have a manufacturing base that’s competitive with the world. Some of that manufacturing must be for export; tourism brings in foreign exchange, but again, you’re now dependent on forces beyond national control. You must attract tourists, but they must also be able to afford to come for a stay. When their economy tanks, so does yours, if this is your source for foreign exchange.
And of course, that economy must be ‘balanced’ if it’s to remain viable over years. It has to have a domestic market (this is where China lags; small domestic market for what they produce, large export market), an export market (the US and Western nations have the domestic market, but the export one has lagged badly), and in so doing, you spread your economy worldwide. Only when the world economy tanks does yours feel the pinch.
I notice Romney is now claiming that if he’s elected, the US will be exporting petroleum within a few years. Duh. It’s going to happen, regardless. I could be president, or my dog could be; it will still happen because production is rising as old fields are revived by fracking. Plus there’s more offshore and in the Arctic, and sooner or later those will be exported. Gas too…right now, it’s so cheap that the gas producers aren’t really making much of a profit.
A long term problem that hasn’t been addressed by anyone: what do you do with all those people, all those workers, when you no longer need them for production? Virtually everything is becoming mechanized and roboticized; this is even affecting China which long relied on cheap human labor. What to do? Eventually, you’re going to need some sort of dole system or you face rioting and revolution. You cannot simply tell millions of people that they aren’t needed, go starve quietly in the corner and don’t bother your betters.
Such jobs as ARE available require advanced eduction. Not everyone s suited for this, but we must make certain that everyone who CAN benefit from education has access to it. And then somehow the fruits of that education and those machines must be available to sustain those who aren’t suited for functioning in a high-tech, high-education world. There must be some sort of work found even for the unemployable. If this seems unacceptable, then think about involuntary sterilization to reduce world populations. Unacceptable too? Whatever is done, it won’t be nice, or comfortable, or simple. Maybe global warming will do it for us; kill off a few billion, make much of the Earth uninhabitable for a time. Or trigger a global cooldown which will do the same.
I don’t see any chance that our political ‘leaders’ will do anything worthwhile. Any of them.
Financialists and the Entitlement Nation
August 1, 2012“On the campaign trail, Mitt Romney mocks it as “a social welfare state” and an “entitlement nation.” He rails that it smothers entrepreneurs and innovators. And he says it is simply not working. The target of Mr. Romney’s dismissiveness: Europe. And he warns ominously that if the United States is not careful, the country may end up just like it. ”
The above quote is from an article published in the NY Times, Aug 1 2012. It caused me to think about Mitt Romney and what his campaign and his comments have revealed about the man.
Entitlement nation. Mr Romney and his supporters use that term. One contributor complained that President Obama’s policies would ‘take my money and give it to those animals’.
Who is entitled to what?
Three groups, it seems to me, are involved if you’re to understand that view. Much ado was made about President Obama’s comments regarding entrepreneurs, “You didn’t build that.” He should have said, as Elizabeth Warren said, “you didn’t build that alone.” Both understand that there is more to building a company and creating wealth than simply identifying an opportunity, the root of entrepreneurship.
The economy needs all three, the entrepreneurs who see a need and move to provide for that need, and the capitalists and the production workers.
Perhaps that ‘need’ is imaginary, but never mind; advertising will sell us what we don’t really need. At any rate, it’s presumed that the entrepreneur takes the risks and so is entitled to rewards, whatever he/she can milk from the system. That concept gets lip service in the USA.
But the first thing many of these entrepreneurs do is set up a shield to limit their exposure to risk. It’s called a corporation or partnership or LLC. Limited Liability is the name of this game.
Entrepreneurs then seek financing from the third group, who also like limits to any liability (forgotten is the concept of ‘risk capital’; they expect guaranteed income from their money).
With financing, the entrepreneur is now poised to hire workers. Capital and entrepreneurship together cannot produce anything at all. But because workers are presumed to be interchangeable cogs to be slipped into the machine and removed at will, both classes have forgotten that production is at least equal to the other two parts…and production workers cannot milk the system for all that the market will bear. Only they have an upper limit to income.
And that attitude must change. The ‘entitlement’ part of that entitlement nation concept deals with the social support network that production workers need to gain some of the fruits of their labor. And some of the financing for that social support network comes from entrepreneurs and financialists. Both groups resent this in large part.
The American worker is at least as important as the other two parts. Financialists consider it ‘my money’ without regard to how that came to be and are adept at protecting money through political chicanery. The entrepreneur is lauded publicly but the financialists understand that it’s about money; the more you have, the more important you are, and the money is the source of that importance so therefore those who have little money have little importance. Once a company ‘goes public’, i.e. sells shares, the financialists now own what the entrepreneur built. And still at the bottom of all of this is the guys and girls who manufacture cars and steel and roofing and plumbing units and who install and maintain all of it. They are the ones who support the nation, generate the economic activity, and pay much of the taxes, but for some reason, the financialists see no need for them to BENEFIT from those tthings. Hence, ‘entitlements’. Somehow, they view the worker as a parasite unless he’s directly being exploited (and employment exploits; there’s no concept of sharing or equality involved. Employees are expected to produce a profit for employers to pay the entrepreneurs, the management elites after companies become publicly traded, and the financialists who own stock and sit on Boards of Directors).
The separation between groups is becoming greater all the time. The financialists at one time invested in a company and helped to make it profitable, and as it profited so did they; wealth was created. International finance in the 1970’s consisted of about 90% risk capital invested in development and creation of wealth, 10% speculation (gambling). That’s now reversed, according to Noam Chomsky; 10% is invested in development, 90% gambling. The gamblers, financialists, no longer involve themselves in creation of wealth so that their profits have some justification. It doesn’t matter; profits spend, regardless of how they are acquired.
And somehow the gamblers see everyone else as unimportant in their view of society.
Mitt Romney is the poster child for this view.
Understanding this may help you understand why he holds the opinions he does, and says and does the things that he does.
A Simplified Tax Plan
July 27, 2012Fix the tax laws, Congress. That should be job one. Do that, then with the additional income, put people to work. Infrastructure needs investment, and it’s easy to make it domestic-only. American firms, American workers, no outsourcing or offshoring.
Dump all of the tax laws, all the thousands of pages, in favor of a revised tax on businesses and individuals. Instead of 39% (only the simple-minded ever pay that), reduce it to, say, 15%…but make that a gross-receipts tax. And tax anyone doing business in America by requiring merchants selling foreign-produced goods to collect the tax.
Real competition; no more deductions for the jet the executives use or their cars or spectacular salaries and bonuses or golden parachutes or business lunches. Loopholes only allow creative accountants to hide anticompetitive measures that protect big business. Compete, GE, and Caterpillar and Big Oil and Big Pharma and Big Agriculture, or go under.
And for income taxes, a small tax for the poor, a bigger one for middle class people, a larger one for the wealthiest…and no loopholes. If it’s money, it’s income. All loopholes were put in because of bribes paid to congresscritters; throw them out. This is necessary because not everyone is a stockholder, hence subject to the effect of the ‘business taxes’.
It’s not that 9-9-9 nonsense. But it would work.
For anyone hiding assets offshore, put in a real penalty: say, 150% of the hidden assets. Pay part of that to people who report the hidden assets. And any American company doing business offshore, require that they bring those profits home within a year. For Google and similar who establish ‘Home offices’ overseas, consider them foreign companies and establish a tax basis for them; say, 25%, which is about the average collected by foreign governments. But keep the gross-receipts standard. And watch them move back home quickly. In most cases, it only means acknowledging that the home office was always in America; only a tax shelter was ever overseas.
But no loopholes. For any exceptions to tax law, require that a separate bill be introduced in the House and passed by 70% of the Senate. Sixty-five percent? OK; but make it a separate law that every legislator must vote on and the vote must be public.
See how easy that is? It increases participation, increases competitiveness, streamlines business, puts everyone in the game of government;.
And if I can think of this, why can’t Congress?
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