6 ms·

I don't think anybody pays them "to remain unemployed". But in most countries they receive social welfare while out of work. You could have them go break large

by welanes 10y ago

I don't think anybody pays them "to remain unemployed". But in most countries they receive social welfare while out of work. You could have them go break large rocks into smaller rocks if you have an ideological bent against people being unemployed but unless those rocks can be sold to somebody for more than what unemployment benefit is there's no incentive. Edit: Agree with the comments below. Rather than being idle there's many ways society could harness the skills and manpower of the unemployed for socially value adding, but perhaps not financially profitable, ventures.

dkarapetyan 10y ago
OP's point was they can do useful work but that useful work is not deemed worthy by the cult of the green pyramid with the eye so non-cult members pay the bill.
foota 10y ago
I think the point is that it's inefficient to pay people to do nothing when we could be paying them to do something.
yummyfajitas 10y ago
But not the money to pay for these jobs....But in most countries they receive social welfare while out of work. See the contradiction here? We could put these people to work engaging in labor that is valuable, but not as valuable as the cost of their welfare. I.e. pay them $7.25/hour to do $5/hour worth of labor (net cost to society = $2.25/hour). Yet we don't. Instead we pay them to play video games (net cost to society $7.25/hour). https://bfi.uchicago.edu/news/scholar-profile/faculty-spotlight-erik-hurst https://bfi.uchicago.edu/news/scholar-profile/faculty-spotli...
- douche 10y ago
  Bring back the CCC https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civilian_Conservation_Corps https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civilian_Conservation_Corps
  - elihu 10y ago
    I would like to see something like that. Not as a replacement for welfare or unemployment compensation, but as a program where anyone who needs a job right now for whatever reason can get one easily. In the Portland area we have a large park (many square miles) that's being over-run by English ivy, and that's not going to be fixed without a lot of people going out and pulling it up by hand. If the city were to pay a bunch of workers with nothing better to do minimum wage it might be a lot cheaper than paying a team of regular permanent employees, and it could address part of the unemployment (and possibly some of the homelessness) problem.
- lastyearman 10y ago
  So you would like government to compete in private markets with tax payers money?
  - vkou 10y ago
    Common infrastructure is typically not considered to be a private market.
    - lastyearman 10y ago
      Don't know the details about US but around here government uses private contractors to build infrastructure. Using the unemployed would be competing against said contractors and make their employees unemployed instead.
  - yummyfajitas 10y ago
    No, I'd like the government to stop paying people to do nothing, and instead pay them to provide government services. Rebuild our crumbling infrastructure, provide child care to working women, left wing types have a huge laundry list of things they'd like the government to do more of. I'd also like to replace as many (currently overpaid) government workers with welfare types as possible. Why pay $50k/year to a unionized govt janitor when you can just order someone currently on welfare to do the same job for no extra money?
    - selimthegrim 10y ago
      Try doing this with the MTA or LIRR workers or the prison guards and see how far you get in the next election before they strike and clog up the city.
      - yummyfajitas 10y ago
        I agree that shutting down certain criminal organizations may be politically infeasible, since they can hold us hostage to keep their gravy train running. When I say they are criminal organizations, I refer to organizations with rates of disability fraud as high as 97%. http://mtaig.state.ny.us/assets/breaking_news/Newsday_7-23-13_Retirees_Timely_Departures.pdf http://mtaig.state.ny.us/assets/breaking_news/Newsday_7-23-1... http://www.independentsentinel.com/a-must-read-federal-judge-commends-crook-in-lirr-gravy-train-case/ http://www.independentsentinel.com/a-must-read-federal-judge... https://nypost.com/2014/08/06/nearly-all-lirr-workers-have-disability-payments-approved/ https://nypost.com/2014/08/06/nearly-all-lirr-workers-have-d... What I'd suggest is that if they don't cause trouble, we don't send them to jail.
- sedachv 10y ago
  The Japanese government is doing exactly literally what the parent comment describes - paying people to dig up and break apart rocks: http://www.japantimes.co.jp/life/2013/05/19/environment/the-other-costs-of-concrete/ http://www.japantimes.co.jp/life/2013/05/19/environment/the-... This has been extremely destructive to the environment and has not done anything for the Japanese economy for the last 20 years. It has been effective as a way of transferring taxpayer money to construction company presidents' pockets.
  - yummyfajitas 10y ago
    Perhaps Japan provides all possible government services and there is literally nothing more it could possibly do of any value. Is the same true of the US? Are those anti-government republicans right? Will it be actively harmful if the US government does even one more thing?
  - DashRattlesnake 10y ago
    > The Japanese government is doing exactly literally what the parent comment describes - paying people to dig up and break apart rocks That's actually not the same thing. The parent comment's "have them go break large rocks into smaller rocks" carried the connotation of useless make-work. Your link describes a facet of concrete production, which is hardly useless.
    - sedachv 10y ago
      > Your link describes a facet of concrete production, which is hardly useless. Here is the key part of the article: "critics claim this is merely a reversion to the LDP’s traditional policy of pork-barrel spending on concrete structures" Concrete itself has no inherent value. In Japan concrete is being used to ruin the natural environment as part of government make-work schemes, with very little discernible material benefit: https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg15320645-500-forum-land-of-the-rising-concrete-the-concrete-pourers-of-japan-are-going-berserk-says-fred-pearce/ https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg15320645-500-forum-la... https://welovecarbondioxide.wordpress.com/2015/10/15/japans-great-wall-and-the-renamed-liberal-democratic-party-to-the-liberal-concrete-party/ https://welovecarbondioxide.wordpress.com/2015/10/15/japans-... http://joshnjaxnjapan.blogspot.com/2010/03/concrete-rivers-of-japan.html http://joshnjaxnjapan.blogspot.com/2010/03/concrete-rivers-o...
- fineIllregister 10y ago
  What "welfare" are you talking about? I don't know of any social assistance in my state that goes to individuals who can work but aren't working. Medicare would be close, but in practice that's very difficult to qualify for, and covering health care is a far cry from "pay[ing] them to play video games."
  - vkou 10y ago
    If they aren't supported by the state, they are supported by their families.
    - fineIllregister 10y ago
      I don't see how that's a relevant response to my comment, as it doesn't answer my question. It's not really a matter of public policy, unless you're suggesting we some how legally prevent people from supporting family members who aren't working.
      - 2k03kv4r5p 10y ago
        I think the implied answer here is you increase taxes, thereby funding the jobs for unemployed people and also making it harder for families to afford to support the unemployed.
      - vkou 10y ago
        My point was that even if the state doesn't pay someone to sit around, and play video games all day, in a high-unemployment economy, family members will. Either that, or the person in question dies homeless.
  - yummyfajitas 10y ago
    Widespread disability fraud is one way. http://apps.npr.org/unfit-for-work/ http://apps.npr.org/unfit-for-work/ The fact is that the poor aren't working yet they are consuming. http://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/library/publications/2015/demo/p60-252.pdf http://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/library/publication...
- logfromblammo 10y ago
  There is a tiny flaw in your reasoning. I will give you a hint as to what it is. Prison inmate workers may earn about $4.73/day in the US. If you pay someone $7.25/h to do nothing, that might be considered an incentive payment to not do work that does net harm to society. While it would always be better to pay the $7.25 for something that might benefit the economy less in absolute terms, there is no "zero" that can be used to calculate a "net" cost of social welfare. Playing video games is not plowing a large vehicle through a crowd of people, or mixing fertilizer with #2 fuel, or strapping tiny backpacks filled with thermite and moisture-sensitive primers to bats, or cooking meth, or cooking krokodil desomorphine, or turning tricks in the park bathroom, or pooping in the neighborhood swimming pool. One person can be very destructive, or at least thousands of dollars worth of annoying, before anyone would bother stepping in to check them.
  - yummyfajitas 10y ago
    Strangely, generous welfare isn't preventing Islamic terrorists from blowing up Europe on a regular basis. But lets take your claim as given, namely that some classes of people are so dangerous if we don't pay them they'll harm us. If I thought you were right, then I'd probably turn to the Brexiters and Trumpkins for a solution. Are you really claiming that the poor are basically just gangsters and terrorists?
    - logfromblammo 10y ago
      Hungry and/or angry people commit more crimes. That's just axiomatic. Desperation will cause those who had formerly been following all the rules to try something different in order to improve their situation. So social welfare as a bribe mainly helps that marginal fraction that would only shoplift if they absolutely couldn't pay. And there are a lot of people like that. It won't do anything about those who would shoplift for thrills, even if they could buy the whole shop, and it won't do anything about those who would light it up just to watch it burn. Those are relatively few. I'd estimate at least 90% of people living under the poverty line would never choose to commit a violent crime or property crime if their survival needs were assured. Malum prohibitum crimes and regulatory infractions are another story. Having more money means you can smoke higher-quality marijuana, and usually with less police interference. Having more money means you can pay speeding and parking fines without spending any nights in the county jail. "Poor people" are not just one big homogenous group. They have their righteous saints and their sleazy lowlifes, and everything in between, just like every other economic class. The former deserve society's help, whereas the latter can sometimes be bribed to behave better. Welfare doesn't stop the terrorism that still happens in places that have welfare, because those terrorists aren't murderously mad about being poor. It certainly stops food riots, at least until the system collapses. The crime in the Chavez-unraveled Venezuela is quite different from terrorist activity in Europe.

by welanes 10y ago

dkarapetyan 10y ago

OP's point was they can do useful work but that useful work is not deemed worthy by the cult of the green pyramid with the eye so non-cult members pay the bill.

foota 10y ago

I think the point is that it's inefficient to pay people to do nothing when we could be paying them to do something.

yummyfajitas 10y ago

But not the money to pay for these jobs....But in most countries they receive social welfare while out of work. See the contradiction here? We could put these people to work engaging in labor that is valuable, but not as valuable as the cost of their welfare. I.e. pay them $7.25/hour to do $5/hour worth of labor (net cost to society = $2.25/hour). Yet we don't. Instead we pay them to play video games (net cost to society $7.25/hour). https://bfi.uchicago.edu/news/scholar-profile/faculty-spotlight-erik-hurst https://bfi.uchicago.edu/news/scholar-profile/faculty-spotli...

douche 10y ago
Bring back the CCC https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civilian_Conservation_Corps https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civilian_Conservation_Corps
- elihu 10y ago
  I would like to see something like that. Not as a replacement for welfare or unemployment compensation, but as a program where anyone who needs a job right now for whatever reason can get one easily. In the Portland area we have a large park (many square miles) that's being over-run by English ivy, and that's not going to be fixed without a lot of people going out and pulling it up by hand. If the city were to pay a bunch of workers with nothing better to do minimum wage it might be a lot cheaper than paying a team of regular permanent employees, and it could address part of the unemployment (and possibly some of the homelessness) problem.
lastyearman 10y ago
So you would like government to compete in private markets with tax payers money?
- vkou 10y ago
  Common infrastructure is typically not considered to be a private market.
  - lastyearman 10y ago
    Don't know the details about US but around here government uses private contractors to build infrastructure. Using the unemployed would be competing against said contractors and make their employees unemployed instead.
- yummyfajitas 10y ago
  No, I'd like the government to stop paying people to do nothing, and instead pay them to provide government services. Rebuild our crumbling infrastructure, provide child care to working women, left wing types have a huge laundry list of things they'd like the government to do more of. I'd also like to replace as many (currently overpaid) government workers with welfare types as possible. Why pay $50k/year to a unionized govt janitor when you can just order someone currently on welfare to do the same job for no extra money?
  - selimthegrim 10y ago
    Try doing this with the MTA or LIRR workers or the prison guards and see how far you get in the next election before they strike and clog up the city.
    - yummyfajitas 10y ago
      I agree that shutting down certain criminal organizations may be politically infeasible, since they can hold us hostage to keep their gravy train running. When I say they are criminal organizations, I refer to organizations with rates of disability fraud as high as 97%. http://mtaig.state.ny.us/assets/breaking_news/Newsday_7-23-13_Retirees_Timely_Departures.pdf http://mtaig.state.ny.us/assets/breaking_news/Newsday_7-23-1... http://www.independentsentinel.com/a-must-read-federal-judge-commends-crook-in-lirr-gravy-train-case/ http://www.independentsentinel.com/a-must-read-federal-judge... https://nypost.com/2014/08/06/nearly-all-lirr-workers-have-disability-payments-approved/ https://nypost.com/2014/08/06/nearly-all-lirr-workers-have-d... What I'd suggest is that if they don't cause trouble, we don't send them to jail.
sedachv 10y ago
The Japanese government is doing exactly literally what the parent comment describes - paying people to dig up and break apart rocks: http://www.japantimes.co.jp/life/2013/05/19/environment/the-other-costs-of-concrete/ http://www.japantimes.co.jp/life/2013/05/19/environment/the-... This has been extremely destructive to the environment and has not done anything for the Japanese economy for the last 20 years. It has been effective as a way of transferring taxpayer money to construction company presidents' pockets.
- yummyfajitas 10y ago
  Perhaps Japan provides all possible government services and there is literally nothing more it could possibly do of any value. Is the same true of the US? Are those anti-government republicans right? Will it be actively harmful if the US government does even one more thing?
- DashRattlesnake 10y ago
  > The Japanese government is doing exactly literally what the parent comment describes - paying people to dig up and break apart rocks That's actually not the same thing. The parent comment's "have them go break large rocks into smaller rocks" carried the connotation of useless make-work. Your link describes a facet of concrete production, which is hardly useless.
  - sedachv 10y ago
    > Your link describes a facet of concrete production, which is hardly useless. Here is the key part of the article: "critics claim this is merely a reversion to the LDP’s traditional policy of pork-barrel spending on concrete structures" Concrete itself has no inherent value. In Japan concrete is being used to ruin the natural environment as part of government make-work schemes, with very little discernible material benefit: https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg15320645-500-forum-land-of-the-rising-concrete-the-concrete-pourers-of-japan-are-going-berserk-says-fred-pearce/ https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg15320645-500-forum-la... https://welovecarbondioxide.wordpress.com/2015/10/15/japans-great-wall-and-the-renamed-liberal-democratic-party-to-the-liberal-concrete-party/ https://welovecarbondioxide.wordpress.com/2015/10/15/japans-... http://joshnjaxnjapan.blogspot.com/2010/03/concrete-rivers-of-japan.html http://joshnjaxnjapan.blogspot.com/2010/03/concrete-rivers-o...
fineIllregister 10y ago
What "welfare" are you talking about? I don't know of any social assistance in my state that goes to individuals who can work but aren't working. Medicare would be close, but in practice that's very difficult to qualify for, and covering health care is a far cry from "pay[ing] them to play video games."
- vkou 10y ago
  If they aren't supported by the state, they are supported by their families.
  - fineIllregister 10y ago
    I don't see how that's a relevant response to my comment, as it doesn't answer my question. It's not really a matter of public policy, unless you're suggesting we some how legally prevent people from supporting family members who aren't working.
    - 2k03kv4r5p 10y ago
      I think the implied answer here is you increase taxes, thereby funding the jobs for unemployed people and also making it harder for families to afford to support the unemployed.
    - vkou 10y ago
      My point was that even if the state doesn't pay someone to sit around, and play video games all day, in a high-unemployment economy, family members will. Either that, or the person in question dies homeless.
- yummyfajitas 10y ago
  Widespread disability fraud is one way. http://apps.npr.org/unfit-for-work/ http://apps.npr.org/unfit-for-work/ The fact is that the poor aren't working yet they are consuming. http://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/library/publications/2015/demo/p60-252.pdf http://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/library/publication...
logfromblammo 10y ago
There is a tiny flaw in your reasoning. I will give you a hint as to what it is. Prison inmate workers may earn about $4.73/day in the US. If you pay someone $7.25/h to do nothing, that might be considered an incentive payment to not do work that does net harm to society. While it would always be better to pay the $7.25 for something that might benefit the economy less in absolute terms, there is no "zero" that can be used to calculate a "net" cost of social welfare. Playing video games is not plowing a large vehicle through a crowd of people, or mixing fertilizer with #2 fuel, or strapping tiny backpacks filled with thermite and moisture-sensitive primers to bats, or cooking meth, or cooking krokodil desomorphine, or turning tricks in the park bathroom, or pooping in the neighborhood swimming pool. One person can be very destructive, or at least thousands of dollars worth of annoying, before anyone would bother stepping in to check them.
- yummyfajitas 10y ago
  Strangely, generous welfare isn't preventing Islamic terrorists from blowing up Europe on a regular basis. But lets take your claim as given, namely that some classes of people are so dangerous if we don't pay them they'll harm us. If I thought you were right, then I'd probably turn to the Brexiters and Trumpkins for a solution. Are you really claiming that the poor are basically just gangsters and terrorists?
  - logfromblammo 10y ago
    Hungry and/or angry people commit more crimes. That's just axiomatic. Desperation will cause those who had formerly been following all the rules to try something different in order to improve their situation. So social welfare as a bribe mainly helps that marginal fraction that would only shoplift if they absolutely couldn't pay. And there are a lot of people like that. It won't do anything about those who would shoplift for thrills, even if they could buy the whole shop, and it won't do anything about those who would light it up just to watch it burn. Those are relatively few. I'd estimate at least 90% of people living under the poverty line would never choose to commit a violent crime or property crime if their survival needs were assured. Malum prohibitum crimes and regulatory infractions are another story. Having more money means you can smoke higher-quality marijuana, and usually with less police interference. Having more money means you can pay speeding and parking fines without spending any nights in the county jail. "Poor people" are not just one big homogenous group. They have their righteous saints and their sleazy lowlifes, and everything in between, just like every other economic class. The former deserve society's help, whereas the latter can sometimes be bribed to behave better. Welfare doesn't stop the terrorism that still happens in places that have welfare, because those terrorists aren't murderously mad about being poor. It certainly stops food riots, at least until the system collapses. The crime in the Chavez-unraveled Venezuela is quite different from terrorist activity in Europe.