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This is a pretty novel application of horseshoe theory, where somehow MBAs and the poorest among us are in the same bucket? Stalin would be proud. Send them al

This is a pretty novel application of horseshoe theory, where somehow MBAs and the poorest among us are in the same bucket? Stalin would be proud. Send them all to the salt mines. Hahaha. Pretty awesome to read this on HN, the juxtaposition is quite funny.

MrOwen 3y ago
I didn't get "poorest" out of gp's mention of welfare recipients. I took it to mean corporations who rely on government subsidies to make a profit, a good example being the huge percentage of Walmart workers on gov food assistance. I think you also get tax breaks for hiring people on welfare programs so it's almost like double dipping welfare on Walmart's end.
- RecycledEle 3y ago
  By "welfare recipients," I mean poor people on welfare who could work if they had a better attitude. I mean the kind of people that were offended when I offered them each a cheap flashlight during a power outage. (We were all standing outside.) One of them said he would take what he wanted. He demanded the very best flashlights that money could buy. I declined, and I guess he thought I was tougher than him, so he eventually left after some more posturing. I never got his name. I mean the kind of people who fake injury claims and collect disability for the rest of their lives, under 8 different identities. Their names were Tony and Theon.
  - MarkMarine 3y ago
    [flagged]
  - toofy 3y ago
    do you also see, as the parent brought up with “… huge percentage of Walmart workers on gov food assistance.” and i’ll stick with walmart here for the sake of continuity, the other well know instance where walmart has a significant drain on local police departments. target brand stores, in the same neighborhoods don’t have this problem. target stores have significantly more people employed, which leads to a significant reduction in theft—would be thieves see an employee organizing, cleaning, stocking, etc… in just about every direction they look which discourages them from stealing. walmart just externalizes the cost onto the local police departments allowing walmart to bring in more profits. do you consider what the parent pointed out, intentionally hiring below poverty wages, and the externalizing basic business costs onto local, often small town, police to be “welfare leeching?” what about the companies who go out of their way to hire armies of accountants and lawyers to play games in order not to pay taxes? what about the companies who engage in wage theft? there has been a number of reputable studies which show that wage theft may absolutely dwarf other forms of theft such as shoplifting. if you consider these things leeching, then i think your point probably stands. but if one of those groups is not a leech, yet the other is, i don’t think your point stands at all. if you do consider the instances i brought up to be leeches, which do you think “leeches” more? companies across the board who go out of their way to avoid taxes, wage theft, and externalizing costs? or poor people on welfare?
  - pjc50 3y ago
    > One of them said he would take what he wanted. He demanded the very best flashlights that money could buy This is such a bizarre encounter that it's hard to take it as representative of anything other than one weirdo.
RecycledEle 3y ago
I group those who do not contribute to society into the group that does not contribute to society. This group ranges from Congress to homeless drug addicts.
- MarkMarine 3y ago
  Welcome to the revolution brother. Read about the Bolshevik Revolution, the theory and literature behind it, the thoughts and goals of the people behind it and I swear you’ll find kinship. Personally, when I see someone who needs help, be it neighbor with a flat tire or a homeless person asking for a couple bucks as I walk by, I try to provide it. I often talk to people with some Venn Diagram intersection with your world view (as I know it thus far) and usually they’d literally give the wheel off their car to help the first subject in that hypothetical, and sometimes even go out of their way to give a sandwich to the second… but when it comes to policy they are so much more cruel. That’s my word for it, others call it pragmatic, or the free market. I’m not saying that because I think I am one of the group who contributes, or one of the better, or what have you. Honestly, the sum total of my life has been going to war as a combatant, working for a defense contractor making missiles, working for a couple startups and large companies that you could sun up as selling advertising in novel ways, selling makeup, and getting people to pay slightly less for college if it’s online. Recently I’ve made a couple of new people that I hope to raise to be better contributors than I. But that’s it, I have no illusions that I’m some saint. So, long preamble, but my point is that many of us don’t contribute to society, and don’t contribute in far more pernicious ways than a homeless drug addict. In comparison with a homeless drug addict my contribution to society has probably been markedly more detrimental, considering I used automation to deploy it on a mass scale. In closing, look in the mirror, and unless you’ve been curing cancer, maybe cut the drug addict a break.

MrOwen 3y ago

I didn't get "poorest" out of gp's mention of welfare recipients. I took it to mean corporations who rely on government subsidies to make a profit, a good example being the huge percentage of Walmart workers on gov food assistance. I think you also get tax breaks for hiring people on welfare programs so it's almost like double dipping welfare on Walmart's end.

RecycledEle 3y ago
By "welfare recipients," I mean poor people on welfare who could work if they had a better attitude. I mean the kind of people that were offended when I offered them each a cheap flashlight during a power outage. (We were all standing outside.) One of them said he would take what he wanted. He demanded the very best flashlights that money could buy. I declined, and I guess he thought I was tougher than him, so he eventually left after some more posturing. I never got his name. I mean the kind of people who fake injury claims and collect disability for the rest of their lives, under 8 different identities. Their names were Tony and Theon.
- MarkMarine 3y ago
  [flagged]
- toofy 3y ago
  do you also see, as the parent brought up with “… huge percentage of Walmart workers on gov food assistance.” and i’ll stick with walmart here for the sake of continuity, the other well know instance where walmart has a significant drain on local police departments. target brand stores, in the same neighborhoods don’t have this problem. target stores have significantly more people employed, which leads to a significant reduction in theft—would be thieves see an employee organizing, cleaning, stocking, etc… in just about every direction they look which discourages them from stealing. walmart just externalizes the cost onto the local police departments allowing walmart to bring in more profits. do you consider what the parent pointed out, intentionally hiring below poverty wages, and the externalizing basic business costs onto local, often small town, police to be “welfare leeching?” what about the companies who go out of their way to hire armies of accountants and lawyers to play games in order not to pay taxes? what about the companies who engage in wage theft? there has been a number of reputable studies which show that wage theft may absolutely dwarf other forms of theft such as shoplifting. if you consider these things leeching, then i think your point probably stands. but if one of those groups is not a leech, yet the other is, i don’t think your point stands at all. if you do consider the instances i brought up to be leeches, which do you think “leeches” more? companies across the board who go out of their way to avoid taxes, wage theft, and externalizing costs? or poor people on welfare?
- pjc50 3y ago
  > One of them said he would take what he wanted. He demanded the very best flashlights that money could buy This is such a bizarre encounter that it's hard to take it as representative of anything other than one weirdo.

RecycledEle 3y ago

I group those who do not contribute to society into the group that does not contribute to society. This group ranges from Congress to homeless drug addicts.

MarkMarine 3y ago
Welcome to the revolution brother. Read about the Bolshevik Revolution, the theory and literature behind it, the thoughts and goals of the people behind it and I swear you’ll find kinship. Personally, when I see someone who needs help, be it neighbor with a flat tire or a homeless person asking for a couple bucks as I walk by, I try to provide it. I often talk to people with some Venn Diagram intersection with your world view (as I know it thus far) and usually they’d literally give the wheel off their car to help the first subject in that hypothetical, and sometimes even go out of their way to give a sandwich to the second… but when it comes to policy they are so much more cruel. That’s my word for it, others call it pragmatic, or the free market. I’m not saying that because I think I am one of the group who contributes, or one of the better, or what have you. Honestly, the sum total of my life has been going to war as a combatant, working for a defense contractor making missiles, working for a couple startups and large companies that you could sun up as selling advertising in novel ways, selling makeup, and getting people to pay slightly less for college if it’s online. Recently I’ve made a couple of new people that I hope to raise to be better contributors than I. But that’s it, I have no illusions that I’m some saint. So, long preamble, but my point is that many of us don’t contribute to society, and don’t contribute in far more pernicious ways than a homeless drug addict. In comparison with a homeless drug addict my contribution to society has probably been markedly more detrimental, considering I used automation to deploy it on a mass scale. In closing, look in the mirror, and unless you’ve been curing cancer, maybe cut the drug addict a break.