Subject:
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Re: From Richard: "It's all bad news - Chaos is my fault"
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.off-topic.debate
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Date:
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Fri, 28 May 2004 19:54:17 GMT
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Viewed:
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1815 times
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In lugnet.off-topic.debate, Lindsay Frederick Braun wrote:
> 80% mortality? Not likely. In fact, the opposite is true;
> that's what's helping the problem of overpopulation along.
> The real pushing force is the *labor value* of children; in
> agricultural societies--or, better put, societies that still
> maintain agricultural values systems, which would include
> most of the "third world"--children equal a support system
> for the family. At least, that's how it's supposed to be in
> a subsistence or near-subsistence economy; beyond the goal
> of accounting for pre-reproductive-capacity death, you also
> have the positive goal of producing kin that equal social and
> economic capital. It's not a cold calculation (children = $$)
> but rather one that's made without concern for money itself.
Are you sure about that? Children have very little labor
value in our society, and I still see the have-nots reproducing
faster. You've hit ONE reason, but not nearly ALL reasons.
> This is part of the reason that wealth has almost always
> been the chief correlation to low reproductive rates--the
> wealth itself provides those benefits, and children are a
> net drain for the first 14-18 years of their lives on the
> family economy. Sure, some do defy that trend, but even in
> the poorest countries infant/pre-18 youth mortality is not
> even close to eighty per cent.
Hmm, is that wealth the cause, or the result? Or are they
both the result of something else? I'm going with answer 3.
> As for what Don pointed out--that the have-nots reproduce
> faster--that has always been true; but the conclusion he draws,
> that it will swamp the "haves," is only so if the labor of the
> added population does not add value to the total system. Given
> that it does so, and at least at present faster than the rate of
> both inflation and rich-poor imbalance, some of those "have nots"
> will continue to become "haves"--it is more a ratio than a hard
> and fast number. If you want examples, just look at those
> immigrant communities of the 1960s and 1970s in Britain and
> the USA, or better yet, look at the last 10 years in South Africa,
> and the total wealth creation.
I hope you're right, but I have trouble believing it. It seems
so difficult to measure.
> What is the statistic that appeared in the Independent today?
> If your surname is "Patel" in the UK, you are something like
> four times more likely to be a millionaire than if your surname
> were "Smith," despite there being ten times as many Smiths.
>
> So yeah, it's both worse and better than you think. The real
> solution is for the "have have haves"--those in the West who
> make the millionaires look dirt-poor--to stop collecting such
> obscene wealth, and use some of it for job creation in the areas
> with those "capitas." The problem is not that they don't want
> to work and succeed, but overwhelmingly that unemployment is
> kept high so that wages may be kept unfeasably low and, thus,
> profit margins obscene, which in turn gives the "obscene-haves"
> their obscene, er, havings.
That's one of my pet peeves with the republicans. They do a
good job of pruning the trees so they produce more fruit, but
then they like to claim ownership of the trees. The democrats,
on the other hand tend to distribute more fruit, but let the
trees fall into disrepair. And of course those distributing
the fruit always keep more for themselves.
> The answer to the problem isn't communism or capitalism; rather,
> it's a healthy sense of moral responsibility to those who make
> the wealth of the insanely rich possible. If for nothing else,
> I have respect for Bill Gates for a certain acceptance of that
> (though only to a point).
Or bring back the Death taxes. Make 'em decide between a charity
of their own choosing, or the nasty government beaurocrats. If
you could find a politician selfless enough to do this, I'd probably
vote for 'em. The wealth does us no good if it stagnates in a
few lucky pockets. Put it back into the society that generated
it.
Don
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