Being soft in a whimpy thing to do but the statistics may actually endorse such an approach.[
/quote]
Wouter, this is such a fuzzy comment. Please, its just too "feel good". Its like people saying we should all be nice. Its true, but what does that comment do to advance the argument?
This is a conviction, not a fact. Both blocks showed better growth rates at times. I think over the last few months EU grew better than US and before that it was the other way around. So what is "consistently?
Overall, since WWII on the average.
In addition ; what does it matte that one area scores 9 % growth while another scores 5 % ? Growth is growth and having more sex also does mean it is better as well ! In many situations it is the quality that counts not the quantity.
Higher % of home ownership. Higher per captia income. Higher level of discretionary income. All on an average over the whole society. A true measure of "quality of life"? Maybe not, but that goes to a more theological discussion again. It is an objective measure of the elusive "quality of life" concept.
How about you guys counting also the employed persons after 6 months ? There is alot of hidden unemployment in the USA, everybody knows this. In europe ALL person are counted not just the ones who are still on government unemployment benefits.
Wouter, all measures on unemployment show the US rate consistently lower than that of Europe.
In addition, how bad is it really to have a few % more unemployment ? It is certainly not keeping the Euro exchange rate to the dollar down. Sure, lower will be better, but that doesn't mean that higher is bad.
If you're sure "lower will be better" than logic dictates higher will be something other than better...worse?
Opinion poles, PFffww. Highly overrated in my opinion. Opinion poles also show that people believe nuclear wapons were found in Iraq, while this is patently untrue. These things are often better as a measure of general intelligence if not common sense.
Maybe highly overrated, but one of the only ways to measure, overall, the thoughts of a large group of people. The opinion poles about weapons in Iraq prove my point. My comments were about the beliefs of Europeans, not some objective point of fact. If opinion poles about WMDs were wrong, they still were right in that they reflected what people
believed. That is what the polls I referred to show.
The birth rate among ethnic Europeans and it not sustaining itself have far more potent economic and cultural causes; this has been developping over the last few decades. You can't tell me that Europeans have been gloomy about the future ever since, 1960's.
Birth rates have been declining in the West for decades. My point is that in Europe they are declining faster. Anthropoligist will tell you that a culture that doesn't replicate itself, is going downhill. Maybe Europe is just ahead of the US; I hope not. Declining birth rates, coupled with polls showing the
opinions of many Europeans to negative about the future, should be cause for some alarm and reflection. I'm not throwing stones at Europe; most in the US consider Europe part of our cultural history (I'm German and Scotch). I bring these points up as an argument that perhaps our more free, capitalistic society may have benefits in the long term as evidenced by these points.
Besides, thank good we have negative population growth overhere. It was beginning to get a little crowded. Population growth would not have been sustainable much longer either.
Than why have you imported so many mid east immigrants to help supply your diminished labor force? You haven't helped your overcrowding, but, as pointed out in other posts on this thread, created great assimilation problems.
[ My general comment on government getting out of people's way to let them unleash their potential.]
This is just another utopia. Check the inventiveness in "the projects" for example.
It proves my point about the inventiveness of human beings, their creativity and self interest drive. Thankfully, most humans have these drives or the human race would nevere have gotten this far. The drug addicts or lazy people who will not strive are a minority. The projects only prove the point and emphasize the need for following rules.
And Ireland is not a social democracy ? Also it didn't get billion of aid from the European union, a socialist project if there is one. This is not an example of a nation getting on top by being left to their own devises and being subjected to pure capitalism.
Remember ; having free markets is not the same as being capitalist.
Wouter, you are probably right here. Ireland is more an example of how lowering taxes and freeing up markets created an economic boom. It may have been helped by grants, but couldn't be sustained without the tax and regulation reform.
Before we get into another touch the flag and cry a tear over opportunity and personal responsibily moment here, allow me to state that for each succes story I can point you to many stories showing the opposite.
Sarcasm doesn't add to the discussion. To be sarcastic, I might reply that your above comments are mean spirited and therefore unbecoming of an all-caring socialists; you might hurt my feelings and cause me to take up an addiction. [End of sarcastic reply.]
Wouter, you can always find a counter example to any proposition. I am not arguing from individual example but from thoughtful ideas, backed by some statistics which support them on the whole
Can it happen, Sure ! Will it happen to everyone or even the majority ? Hell no ! And we all know that.
If you mean by "it", greater economic good from individuals less fettered by government, I agree and I submit that the economic statistics of the US indicate that it is working for a large majority of our society here in the US. In support I mention the history of Communism here in the US. The Soviets tried very hard to develop a workers revolution here in the US. They infiltrated the labor unions and had US citizens working very hard on their agenda, believing that they could create the same worker's "paradise" here in the US. The fatal problem they encountered is that although workers resented their rich bosses, they wanted to be rich themselves. Instead of a revolution to bring down the rich class, the workers wanted help to get themselves into that class. And history has proven that for the vast majority in the US, this dream came true (at least getting to the middle class).
Another thought, when talking about poverty, one forgets that it, in the US, it is transient for most people. People who are poor in their teens and twenties, generally work themselves out of that state and become middle class (economicaly) as they get older. In our country it is a very small number of the total poor, that remain in that state for long parts of their lives.
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I didn't claim it was perfectly functioning here, just better than in many other places in the world.
Yes well we are all doing better then Bangladesh, Dominican republic, Kazachstan, Algeria and what not else. Doing better than many other places in the world still doesn't mean that you are doing better then Europe in general.
Don't make stupid comments. Either stupid or stupidly mean. My argument is that we are doing better than the European example.
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We have many distortions of the free market here and some lead to real economic problems. In general, though, barriers to entrepeneurism are much lower in the US than in Europe and that's a good thing.
You keep telling us, but why exactly ? Cuban victums of Katrina are already back in shape. Poor families in North-Eastern US get heating fuel support form Venezuela instead of their own government. You are one of the few nations to even hand out food stamps, you are the only one doing so in the group of "western nations". Must I go on ?
A weather disaster has nothing to do with the argument. Your statements near the end of my post begin to border on a rant. As I said before, very unbecoming of such a cultured socialist European in response to such an uncivilized, violent American. There I got the two sterotypes out on paper for you. Regarding Venezula, I guess if you're not from the US you can be forgiven for not recognizing political theater when you see it. Food stamps? part of our social welfare program, which is total is less than your European example. Have you been paying attention?
I'm also a sucker for Bill Gates succes stories and the freedom to start you own business and risk a 67 % failure rate, but how exactly do a handful of great stories help out the larger group of people who fail ? They can't eat these stories, they won't keep them warm, and it certainly doesn't help their kids break out of poverty. Lets face it, if you drop out of high school then you chance at being a succesful entrepeneur are not really promising.
