Random Thoughts (Political Edition)

And Fuck yeah 900 a month you can totally live off that in Boston right? RIGHT?
How is that even remotely relevant? And the answer to your question is yes, btw - you can definitely get by on $900/mo in Boston. It won't be a life of luxury but that's what happens when you are on public assistance.
 
How is that even remotely relevant? And the answer to your question is yes, btw - you can definitely get by on $900/mo in Boston. It won't be a life of luxury but that's what happens when you are on public assistance.

900 a month in Boston? With how many roommates? Isn't avg rent for a one bedroom close to 700 a month? I guess if you were on public assistance housing, SNAP and TANF but as a single male without kids you couldn't be on all those programs in the first place.


The fact is the rate of fraud for public assistance programs is pretty low. Its hard to get an exact figure on it because it is so politically charged but I have some number for straight fraud quoted at around 2% for unemployment insurance. That makes sense as you have to jump through a few hoops to get it. Other studies say it is higher at around 20% or more for TANF but that the higher number is the result of bureaucratic errors and incompetence. The real number is pretty probably pretty small and on par with the fraud in any other large program. Any idea what the overall level of insurance fraud is? Any big system will have bad people trying to game the system. That is why we have people that are in charge of investigating fraud and catching the perpetrators.


Keep in mind most of these public assistance programs are block grant programs for the states to administer. If there is a problem with large amounts of fraud then the individual state agencies should be fighting to get the money back. The feds set some of the guidelines and the states build upon those then administer the system. Eliminating or vastly reduce federal aid that helps people in need either temporarily or for longer periods of times because of disability or age because some state agencies are not competent enough to administer them is stupid.

One of the arguments on the right against most forms of public assistance is that it is rife with fraud and plenty of times anecdotal evidence of people gaming the system, like the illegal immigrant who should not have been on those programs in the video, is used as an example. We don't try to sshutdown the military when rampant fraud is exposed, or when they lose a billion dollars cash in Iraq, we go after the individuals responsible and attempt to correct the loopholes that let it happen.


If you want to have an argument that they money could be better directed into job training or perhaps relocation assistance then I am up for that. Perhaps tying the continued reception of various types of aid to job retraining or substance abuse therapy when it is needed would be helpful. Show me data that cutting money from a certain program and moving it to another program and/or creating another program gets a bigger bang for the buck and I will be all for that. Just cutting off money to people who still can't find a job because demand in this economy is still to low is not going to help things. Telling people who have been out of work for over a year that sorry we can't provide unemployment benefits to you any longer because we can't afford it when ten year treasury bills are still below 3% is not an acceptable answer. The US can still borrow below the rate of inflation in for five years or less. We can afford to bridge the gap a bit longer. Extended UI has NEVER been cut when long term UI was this high.

You can't just try harder to find a job when there are still three job seekers for every job opening.
 
$900/mo in Boston.
I paid $750/month for a room in Somerville, and it wasn't a large one. In fact, the hot yoga teacher renting me the room even rented it to me at a $50 loss because her flatmate guilt-tripper her because she left too much of her stuff in it.
 
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DrGrip - Somerville is far from cheap.


900 a month in Boston? With how many roommates? Isn't avg rent for a one bedroom close to 700 a month? I guess if you were on public assistance housing, SNAP and TANF but as a single male without kids you couldn't be on all those programs in the first place.
It depends on where you live. I have a pretty nice spacious apartment in a nice-ish safe part of the city and we signed for under 700/person. We looked at multiple other apartments that weren't as nice but they were around the $600 mark. Some of the worse neighborhoods get even lower. Food is what, $100/mo/person, tops? Bills can be managed under $100/mo. It won't be a life of luxury but its certainly possible. That said, where did the $900 figure come from and how did we get on the topic of the cost of living in Boston?


We don't try to sshutdown the military when rampant fraud is exposed, or when they lose a billion dollars cash in Iraq, we go after the individuals responsible and attempt to correct the loopholes that let it happen.
:think: I don't think I've ever suggested shutting down all of these programs. I'm happy to help those that need it. Drastically reform, however, is something that I do support.


Just cutting off money to people who still can't find a job because demand in this economy is still to low is not going to help things. Telling people who have been out of work for over a year that sorry we can't provide unemployment benefits to you any longer because we can't afford it when ten year treasury bills are still below 3% is not an acceptable answer.
You can't just try harder to find a job when there are still three job seekers for every job opening.

See, this is something I actually disagree with. Three seekers for every opening implies that all three are actively seeking employment, which is not the case. I honestly refuse to believe that in one year someone can't find any work. High school students and college kids can find work somehow, can't they? And before you say that a part-time job is not enough to live on, I'd be happy to support someone who is working but is still struggling to get by. Instead, people tend to scuff at the idea of an "inferior" job. Do you know what I did when I graduated from college? I went to the local liquor store where I worked the summer before and lined up a job hauling empty cans and broken bottles from the return room to the trash bins. Luckily I found another job but I was not about to sit on my ass for a year complaining that I can't find any employment. Don't forget also that this isn't just about unemployment benefits - I don't have too much of a problem with those. What I do have a problem with is welfare, foodstamps, and EBTs. I have a problem with single moms popping out more and more kids they can't afford in order to get more benefits. Too many assistance recipients drive nicer cars than I do, have better TV and internet than I do, wear nicer clothes than I do, all on my dime. Public assistance does not entitle you to a life of luxury; this is wasteful and fraudulent behavior and no, I can't possible support it. The system needs drastic change. Our current setup provides little, if any, incentive to get a job and stop receiving benefits.

edit: oops, that was a little rant, eh?
 
DrGrip - Somerville is far from cheap.



It depends on where you live. I have a pretty nice spacious apartment in a nice-ish safe part of the city and we signed for under 700/person. We looked at multiple other apartments that weren't as nice but they were around the $600 mark. Some of the worse neighborhoods get even lower. Food is what, $100/mo/person, tops? Bills can be managed under $100/mo. It won't be a life of luxury but its certainly possible. That said, where did the $900 figure come from and how did we get on the topic of the cost of living in Boston?

In the video the sheriff/reporter said he was illegally getting 900 dollars in total benefits and you said you wondered why you even had a job. Hence the assumption you could make it in Boston for 900 a month. I just assumed you watched the whole video you posted and paid attention to it.

:think: I don't think I've ever suggested shutting down all of these programs. I'm happy to help those that need it. Drastically reform, however, is something that I do support.

The typical ra-ra from the right/libertarians is that this fraud means we should drastically cut and eliminate most public assistance programs because the people on them don't really need them. They are moochers and if just eliminated the programs then they would get a job and pull themselves up from their own bootstraps. They are just defrauding the system.

Now if you don't think that then well oh wait what did you right down here.

Man that is just exactly the same thing that I was talking about.

Its the whole lucky poor fallacy.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lucky_duckies



See, this is something I actually disagree with. Three seekers for every opening implies that all three are actively seeking employment, which is not the case. I honestly refuse to believe that in one year someone can't find any work. High school students and college kids can find work somehow, can't they? And before you say that a part-time job is not enough to live on, I'd be happy to support someone who is working but is still struggling to get by. Instead, people tend to scuff at the idea of an "inferior" job. Do you know what I did when I graduated from college? I went to the local liquor store where I worked the summer before and lined up a job hauling empty cans and broken bottles from the return room to the trash bins. Luckily I found another job but I was not about to sit on my ass for a year complaining that I can't find any employment.

I did the same thing when I got out of college. I worked for my old shop and worked at night at UPS too so I could pay off my credit cards and buy my first new car at 24. I was working 80 hours a week non-peak season and over a 100 hours a week peak. But we both had two big things going for us. We were young and college educated oh and being white help. All of those things help.

The unemployment rate for people with a college degree right now is 3.3%. For those with only a HS diploma it is 7.1% and if you don't even have a HS Diploma it is 9.8%. http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t04.htm

That chart is for age 25 and up so it lines up with the age demos. Not everyone can go to college nor should everyone. I wish there was more support for trade schools in the US that weren't all for profit private schools ripping people off.

The long term unemployed, and there are millions of them that were laid off at the height of the recession, have the hardest time getting work and many of them are older as well. People in that 55 plus age range are just dropping out of the labor force and retiring early or going on disability.

The unemployment rate for blacks is about double that for whites. And young black males are even higher.

You have never been in a position to hire and fire have you? On those low skill entry level jobs there is a lot of turnover. MY first stint at UPS we had a new training class just about every week. Our turnover rate was in the 70% range before new hires hit their 30 day seniority date. Granted that was a very tough physical job but back a decade ago you could get that job anywhere at just about any UPS hub 52 days a week.

When I left UPS in July we weren't allowed to hire. We needed to bad but Atlanta wouldn't let us. Not enough volume. We could only hire temp workers starting a week or so before Thanksgiving though to the first week of December. Even then they only let us hire a handful maybe 10 or 12 people. Nearly all of those would be let go after the new year. Maybe one or two would stay on. The same thing happened this peak and they got killed. I still talk to my old boss on a fairly regular basis. They needed to hire more but Atlanta is too skittish so they couldn't. My old air hub is run on 40% fewer union hourly employees then before the recession and 50% fewer management employees. They are doing probably 70 to 80 percent of their old volume with fewer people.

I don't know what my old ground hub is doing but they might be slightly better. Ground volume has come back 100% or more as a lot of companies shifted to cheaper shipping alternatives. Its why UPS has done better then FedEx. Much better ground network at UPS.

I see the same thing in the car business. We have openings on a semi-regular basis but the turnover is still very high. All those entry level jobs are. The last time we had interviews for salespeople at our big dealership 30 people showed up for two slots. We hired those two and one quit within two months the other got fired two months after that. Couldn't make enough money because it is hard to start out as a salesperson in the car business if you have no experience. The turnover is probably 50% every six months.

I see half a dozen resumes a week and it isn't even my primary job to hire and fire but I have input. Our company HR guy sees 100s for all positions in the company per month. In a month maybe three or four get hired.

Our Subaru store is kicking ass they are doing 50% more volume then before 2008 but that is because Subaru is just hitting everything out of the park. Kind of crappy cars but super cheap, AWD, plus good mileage is just what New Englanders want.

Even with all that volume they turn over about 30% of their salespeople in six months.

Our other big dealership that I used to work at is doing 80% of their peak volume with half as many people. Half as many managers and well less then half as many sales people.

The dealership I run now is doing slightly more volume with a 30% smaller sales force. The service side is doing more business with one less tech and no shop helper.

Tons of people are looking for jobs all the time but plenty of businesses got lean during the recession and figured out how to do more with less. Our service manager is begging to hire one more tech but they won't let him.

Don't forget also that this isn't just about unemployment benefits - I don't have too much of a problem with those. What I do have a problem with is welfare, foodstamps, and EBTs. I have a problem with single moms popping out more and more kids they can't afford in order to get more benefits. Too many assistance recipients drive nicer cars than I do, have better TV and internet than I do, wear nicer clothes than I do, all on my dime. Public assistance does not entitle you to a life of luxury; this is wasteful and fraudulent behavior and no, I can't possible support it. The system needs drastic change. Our current setup provides little, if any, incentive to get a job and stop receiving benefits.

edit: oops, that was a little rant, eh?

http://www.fns.usda.gov/pd/18SNAPavg$PP.htm

The avg SNAP benefit is 133 per person. When was the last time you ate on 133 a month? I might have done it in college when I was really broke a couple of times but I don't know for sure.


Why don't you try this http://feedingamerica.org/get-involved/hunger-action-month/snap-challenge.aspx

See if you can do it.

The avg TANF benefit for Mass in 2013 for a single parent family of three was $618. That is 26.4% lower in real dollars then the benefit in 1996.

http://www.cbpp.org/cms/?fa=view&id=4034

Mass is one of the higher ones too. In Texas or Arkansas it is barely $200 for a single parent family of three.

That is not living the high life no matter what you think.
http://www.mass.gov/eohhs/gov/departments/dta/cash-assistance.html

Transitional Aid to Families with Dependent Children (TAFDC) is a state and federally funded program which provides cash assistance to families with children and pregnant women in the last 120 days of pregnancy, with little or no assets or income. It is operated under the federal Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) block grant and is described in the Commonwealth's TANF State Plan. Participants receive child care and transportation support associated with job assistance and can access a number of supportive referrals to substance abuse and mental health services, and domestic violence specialists.

As part of TAFDC, participants may be required to perform a work-related activity in order to receive benefits. DTA provides job assistance to TAFDC participants including job training, job search, and placements into jobs. Other key services include Access to Basic Education, English for Employment, Graduate Equivalency Diploma (GED) assistance, work readiness and skills training. It is especially important for clients to gain employment during their time on TAFDC as recipients are limited to 24 months of assistance in any continuous 60-month period. DTA offers many job assistance programs to provide clients with access to employment and training opportunities.

To be eligible for TAFDC, a recipient must:

Meet certain requirements including:
Have at least one dependent child under 18 or 19 (including teen parents) OR
Pregnant women with no children (the child is expected to be born within 120 days of the application)
Meet income and asset limits
Be a U.S. citizen or a legal immigrant
Live in Massachusetts

That is the Mass guidelines and every state is different. I repeat the states set up these guidelines as TANF, emphasis on the temporary, is a federal block grant program. Some states require that the individual have basically no assets. Kind of screws them if they want to try and safe up money for a decent cash car or first/last plus security on an apartment.
 
Cultural relativism, and it's companion piece, communitarism, have a real problem because there are some things that people from most cultures (but not from all) deem morally wrong with good reasons. "Morally" as in "deontologically" wrong.

(Splice)

Using your strong concept of cultural relativism, there is no way to criticize their set of beliefs as what it clearly is: wrong, depraved and the product of an evil society.

Not trying to bring up an old topic, but still.

I believe that is my point. No matter what you say or how you assert your morals on another, what they choose to believe is always correct. No matter how depraved you might feel it is. Culture is taught, practiced, and learned. It is fluid. You can say the beliefs are wrong and we can quantify negative effects of cultural behaviors, but it doesn't make them wrong. You can quantify it as wrong according to your culture, but (i perceive) your perspective is rather blind. Cultural beliefs exist because they were taught and provided individuals with a certain degree of success in a culture.

I don't agree with your facts. I think they are hollow. You can only know what you learn and what you've been taught. Even though I don't practice the religion of my home state, I still retain many of the behaviors I was taught, even though many people will tell me they are "wrong." I don't think you can rectify this discussion (as stated before) to a few numbers.

(related to politics because passing judgement (law) based on personal ideologies and theologies should always be thoroughly pondered because of their potential negative effects)

I actually don't know shit.

- - - Updated - - -

The avg SNAP benefit is 133 per person. When was the last time you ate on 133 a month? I might have done it in college when I was really broke a couple of times but I don't know for sure.

Depending on what you eat, yeah, I think you could eat off of that. Wouldn't be kingly, but possible. However, when you are struggling making ends meet... That is probably not enough. I prefer simple staples when I eat, but sometimes a candy bar or two could make the difference in a stressful situation (life situation). Now trying to decide what is enough for each person is the tough part of this issue. I worked in retail for a few years and I can tell you that needs vary.

I think the screening process should be streamlined, but I think there should be a higher emphasis placed on personal responsibility. I'd be mad if my wife ignored her responsibilities with our money, so I can see why people would be unhappy hearing that a total stranger is abusing the seemingly free help.

I knew a guy in Utah who was screwed out of government help. They told him he couldn't get on stamps because he worked and was attending college. However, if he quit work, or quit school, they'd give him foodstamps and help him pay his rent. Sadly, it prompted his move into the military and he died in training (accident), leaving behind two girls and a wife. Can't help but wonder if he had had assistance to finish school if he would have joined.
 
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The U.S. remains a religious nation -- with about seven in 10 Americans classified as very or moderately religious -- and the nation's residents as a whole are about as religious now as they were in 2008. The religiousness of the nation's residents, however, does vary substantially by state and region. The most religious areas continue to be the South, the state of Utah, and the Midwestern Plains states, while the least religious areas are mostly in New England, the Pacific Northwest, and other Western states.

These regional variations are quite stable and look generally the same now as they did six years ago. They reflect basic state cultures that are highly persistent, even as states experience demographic changes through births, deaths, and migration.

http://www.gallup.com/poll/167267/mississippi-religious-vermont-least-religious-state.aspx

I look forward to seeing how this poll turns out over time (it started six years ago).
 
I have a cousin who is a US Post Office truck driver.
His quote - My guess would be for the postal inspectors. They do carry firearms and would need ammo for training purposes. But knowing the post office we will pay more for it than joe smoo on the street. And i don't think i would be clicking on the vendor link or you might get to meet an inspector lol.
 
Barry Ritholtz, who you should follow on twitter as he is super smart, was on The Daily show at the end of last week. They were doing one of those debate segments where they have two people debate an issue remotely but don't tell one person who the other is.

The debate was raising the minimum wage something Mr. Ritholtz is for and on the against side they brought in Peter Schiff. Mr. Schiff perdeicatably said some pretty stupid things one of which I saw coming a mile away and just couldn't believe the hole he was digging himself into.



The segment is here.

http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/tue-january-28-2014/wage-against-the-machine

You can read some the behind the scene stuff from Barry here


http://www.ritholtz.com/blog/2014/01/how-i-ended-up-on-the-daily-show/

And an after action report here http://www.ritholtz.com/blog/2014/01/follow-up-daily-show-blowback/

Obviously the, "paying the mentally retarded two bucks an hour," line from Schiff gets the most attention but saying in a free market society there is always enough food was equally as ridiculous.

The problem with Schiff is that to him in his straight jacketed libertarian thinking those things are fine and absolutely true. The way he was squirming when he talked about paying the mentally retarded two bucks an hour means he knows it sounds bad but to him it is how the world should work.
 
I recently listened to him on the Joe Rogan podcast, and Joe kept calling his ideas ridiculous and silly.
 
Sucks to be spied on, eh?

[video=youtube;MSxaa-67yGM]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MSxaa-67yGM[/video]

Key part three minutes in.
 
Fuuuuuuuuck.... lol

It was only a matter of time before something like this happened.
 
Yes and the reactions are quite funny, too. Nobody is really taking is serious here - with the Americans seemingly believing the UN could pacify the Ukraine :rofl:

On the accusation of the EU being too careful and slow, one European politician (cannot the name) summed it up: "Sometimes it's better to just put the gun on the table instead of shooting first and asking later."
 
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Not to clutter up the "sporty" Olympic thread, I will leave my absolute favourite bit of Olympic news here:

Dmitry Kozak, the deputy prime minister responsible for the Olympic preparations, seemed to reflect the view held among many Russian officials that some Western visitors are deliberately trying to sabotage Sochi's big debut out of bias against Russia. "We have surveillance video from the hotels that shows people turn on the shower, direct the nozzle at the wall and then leave the room for the whole day," he said. An aide then pulled a reporter away before Mr. Kozak could be questioned further on surveillance in hotel rooms. "We're doing a tour of the media center," the aide said.
Source: Wall Street journal

The article goes on with quoting a Russian official trying to debuke that, but well...
 
Switzerland thinks they have too much immigration, which is funny because it's Switzerland and their immigration basically consists of wealthy Europeans "draining their welfare". :lol:
 
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