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228 comments:
1 – 200 of 228 Newer› Newest»That's a shame.
Oh no! How will we ever survive this impending lawyer shortage?!
This is exactly why I went to law school. It makes me sad just to think about it.
I'm glad you have tenure, Althouse, so that we needn't restrain our glee.
Yep, but my debt was only $10,500.
Sounds like fertile ground for a class action.
There's always a lot of used cars that need selling. At least there were, before Obama crushed them all.
I'm just curious if someone, perhaps Althouse, can provide some justification or value for spending $125,000 on a law degree. That, of course, doesn't count the $X thousands of dollars spent on an undergraduate degree.
Much is said about oil companies, pharmacy companies, etc and price gouging but post-secondary education not only seems to get a pass on exorbitant fees and tuition, their are demands for more funding.
Overall, it's a good thing... not necessarily for the prospective students, but for the rest of us.
Too many lawyers leads to too many lawyers looking for something to do to justify their existence, and that something is an overly-legalized society and too damned many lawsuits.
One of the least attractive features of our generally attractive hostess at this blog is her desire to drag everything into the legal grinder. This is why issues like gay marriage, which the electorate defeated repeatedly, won't die. Ditto, the bizarre bullshit of feminism, race and sex quotas, etc., all of which are really explained by the desire of lawyers to make money.
The discrimination and bigotry derby is just lawyers hustling to make a buck at the taxpayers' and employers' expense.
The bubble had to burst. If legal services become the dominant product of your economy, you're in trouble. And, we are in trouble.
How long before the undergraduate education bubble explodes?
This is amazing. Although I tend to trust The Market, I really didn't believe that it would place a limit on the number of lawyers. THREE CHEERS FOR THE MARKET!!!
Thank goodness my daughter graduated in 2006 and has been gainfully employed in a secure government job since.
As far as student loan debt goes, yes it's going to keep her working for a while yet. That third year of law school is the most expensive and for what really?
Hilarious. Well, it looks like those who have specialized in teaching non "practical" areas of the law may be in for a nasty surprise. How will we ever get social justice if that happens?
Clearly, we just need more laws.
Thank goodness my daughter graduated in 2006 and has been gainfully employed in a secure government job since.
While I understand you point of view, and congratulate your daughter on her good luck, that's a pretty dismal statement, and another indication of how deep in the shit we are.
Re: Bru:
This is exactly why I went to law school. It makes me sad just to think about it.
I, in contrast, went to law school for the best of reasons -- when I was born my grandmother's soothsayer prophesied that I would have a career in the law. So I went to law school. It's worked out more or less so far.
West Virginia?
"...perhaps Althouse, can provide some justification or value for spending $125,000 on a law degree. That, of course, doesn't count the $X thousands of dollars spent on an undergraduate degree. "
What's always forgotten is the loss of income, savings, experience, and opportunity cost of all those years of professor support.
If alternative tracks other than college were explored and supported, the young ones and the society would be hugely better off with a little diversity of thought and paths after high school.
Think for yourselves kids and be creative. Today all the knowledge of the world is at your fingertips. You don't need someone to hand feed it to you in slow motion watered down with political agenda.
I wonder if someone like Althouse with her strong understanding of what's on-line, self discipline and knowing how things have changed, would choose to get her education at today's prices and speed.
I'm 70 years old. I sit stunned in amazement that anyone goes to college anymore, let alone graduate school. The costs are insane...bat-shit crazy. I'd say it is now impossible, period, to pay one's own way through school without monster debt. In the Jurassic days of the 1960's many of us went to school on our own dimes, sometimes working full time and going to school at night. Financial aid was severely limited.
WTF happened?
Did the easy availability of loan money feed the price inflation? Has the education itself vastly improved?
What?
I wonder if someone like Althouse with her strong understanding of what's on-line, self discipline and knowing how things have changed, would choose to get her education at today's prices and speed.
Althouse hit the jackpot.
She graduated just before the boom in the legal market, and at just the right time to benefit from the feminism racket.
Less lawyers?....isn't that a good thing.
I agree with Kevin. I think Althouse buried the real lead:
"Research is faster and easier, requiring fewer lawyers, and is being outsourced to less expensive locales, including West Virginia and overseas."
Did the easy availability of loan money feed the price inflation?
That's just about the entire explanation.
Has the education itself vastly improved?
No, the quality of education has dramatically diminished.
All you have to do is look at the vast sums of money and featherbedding jobs involved in the Diversity scam at colleges.
...gainfully employed in a secure government job...
This absolutely begs for the Dana Milbank contest treatment.
The big KC law firms have been laying off attorneys for about three years. It's shocking to me some of the jobs my friends with excellent credentials and experience have had to take.
Did the easy availability of loan money feed the price inflation? Has the education itself vastly improved?
Yes.
No.
Enrollment is also declining -- after a big rise -- at the local tech college.
It'll be an interesting couple of years.
Aridog said...
Did the easy availability of loan money feed the price inflation?
Yes
Has the education itself vastly improved?
Not even close.
Gotta be a good lawyer joke in there somewhere..
But the joke is on the lawyers, or at least the law universities.
Maybe..
What are new lawyers called?
Burger flippers!
Capitalism and free markets needs lawyers all day long. That system creates legal work as fast as lawyers can process it.
What we are seeing is the sunset of capitalism and free markets. Obama is setting us up to be serfs to his Government run fascist thugs from the top down.
So, what phony crap can we conjure up to create a new bubble?
Sorta what happened to me circa 1980, except:
1. I had about $15K in total debt (worked full time the whole way) and paid that off in a couple of years despite making s*** money.
2. Opened my own firm immediately, have not had a boss since, made decent money, and am overall very satisfied with how it worked out. I got out of it just what I wanted going in.
What we are seeing is the sunset of capitalism and free markets.
Actually, what we are seeing is the dramatic decline in the need for human labor as a result of technology.
A process that will only accelerate.
At least four years overdue, and they should get rid of worthless administrators and diversity leeches as well.
I also doubt that this is going to happen, just law schools will be accepting worse applicants. Until you shut off the the federally guaranteed loans with no questions asked, the "market" for education going to correct.
But hey at least Althouse gets to keep her salary, benefits, and probably pension.
Thank goodness my daughter graduated in 2006 and has been gainfully employed in a secure government job since.
Yeah, she got hers, screw everyone else. It's a good thing that the government doesn't have to respond to ecnomoic conditions otherwise that sweet paycheck, awesome benefits, and defined pension would be in jeopardy, just like the private sector.
Yeah, she got hers, screw everyone else.
Inga didn't say that.
I thought her "daughter" was a Corpsebabe
Inga has multiple daughters. Pls don't force us to learn their names.
Second year I took Corporations. The professor had a Ph.D. and a J.S.D. and he was working on some other advanced degree at the time. He was a pretty smart guy.
I can vividly recall him talking about risk preference and then breaking away and directly addressing the class and saying: "You are all risk averse and that's why you're here, studying law."
And I remember thinking to myself: "No, this is the riskiest thing I've ever done in my life."
That was 1991.
Inga: Why would your daughter's job as a government lawyer be "secure?" Why would it be more secure than an associates job in a large private firm?
What we are seeing is the sunset of capitalism and free markets.
Fortunately we'll never see the end of free market capitalism.
And I remember thinking to myself: "No, this is the riskiest thing I've ever done in my life."
Which pretty much proved his point.
Shouting Thomas said...
Yeah, she got hers, screw everyone else.
Inga didn't say that.
"Secure government job" is the part that rankles, contrasted with the private sector. The happiness expressed over that amounts to relief that her daughter won't have to face the vagaries of the private sector.
Edutcher, I have three daughters, one, my eldest is a Corpsman, one is a stay at home mother with a degree in art history, my youngest daughter is an attorney, who graduated from Florida State in 2006, she did her last year of law school at UW Madison.
I also have a son who is in the trades, a Millwright.
As for my daughter has hers so now screw you, no just "screw yourself".
Medicine is next.
Wages are going to be slashed in the next 2 years, and the average med school debt is north of $160,000. Unsustainable.
I'm guessing that this year will be the first time that graduating specialists won't find a job in their specialty, and that in less than 2 years, MDs will go on strike.
Obamanomics has been great.
The happiness expressed over that amounts to relief that her daughter won't have to face the vagaries of the private sector.
Well, yeah, and that's pretty sensible. The private sector really sucks right now.
If you're lucky enough to escape it and have a secure job, you are right to praise and thank God.
I don't begrudge the folks who've been fortunate enough to escape the general descent into uselessness.
My daughter's friends who she took the bar with, who have stayed in Madison and were working in private practice have all lost their jobs, yes I am grateful she got a government job and so is she, she's still working.
I use services like Legalzoom.com all the time. I have never been disappointed once. I also use lawyers on a daily basis, and well... I hope legalzoom type companies keep growing.
I have formed a number of corporations recently for example, some via lawyer and some by online service. Same result, but with online being a fraction of the price and faster.
The other thing is that any given lawyer can make a mistake by poor knowledge or just carelessness, but the online service is automated and due to it's nature, it has to be thoroughly vetted by the time you get there. They are much less likely to make a clerical mistake or just forget something, and you have to remember that much of the work at a firm is done by paralegals and even no-legals.
So, I'll ask again.
Is there any real work we can do to escape this shithole, or do we just need to invent another useless bubble?
Government jobs aren't so secure as you'd think. I've read here that you can't fire an employee, yet as a Fed I fired three. Amazing, no?
Right now almost government wide, including the military, all "term" and temporary employees are having pink slips prepared, right along with contracted employees. By the way, a soldier or Marine is a "term" employee...and the Marines are about do drop 20,000 of them. The Army, Navy and Air Force will follow suit.
The fact is that the economy of so fucking bad even a bloated bureaucracy has to shed bodies.
But you won't hear that from Obama or anyone of his ilk. No suh..Fahwaaad!!
Ah the imaginary family tree, how touching.
I doubt Dr. Phil will be getting involved to unravel her lies however.
http://espn.go.com/college-football/story/_/id/8900688/ronaiah-tuiasosopo-says-was-love-manti-teo
A couple of notable celebrities have been beating the tech/vocation drum for years now. It's looking more and more like they were ahead of their time.
PMJ imagines he's a human being.
So does Edutcher.
Hell, they could be related for all I know.
Scott M, you make a terrific observation. My son is a Journeyman now, as the older Millwrights are dying and/or retiring, he being a rarity now, gets full time work and plenty of overtime. He makes more money than I did as a nurse, with a MSN.
Yay! Less competition!
We are in the midst of a much bigger crisis than we imagine, and it really isn't about conservative versus liberal.
It's about the rapid decline of the need for human labor as technology takes over.
It takes a half-insane drunk to lay it out and Fred does. This starts out looking like a gun control rant, but keep going.
Can't they become democrats, or lobbyists, or Rachel maddows or something?
Raising hand; went to law school in the 80's because I couldn't get into med school and didn't know what else to do. Physician assistant wasn't an option yet or I would have taken that route. When someone asks me about law school nowadays, they get a pretty strong lecture about the unconscionable high rate of law school tuition and the fact that AT BEST, 50% of law school grads will get law jobs.
When I was hired, my state-school degree was fine. The people who are getting hired at my workplace in recent years include a high percentage of Ivy League grads, many of whom also have other impressive degrees such as from the London School of Economics.
The answer is to get these people on the government dole. Paul Krugman would approve.
According to this June 2012 WSJ article, unemployment of law grads varied widely between schools.
2011 UW Mad graduates had a 5.51% unemployment rate.
Villanova 23.41%.
Harvard 2.23%
DePaul 20.69%
Northwestern 3.83%
Marquette 6.52%
Notre Dame 3.16%
U Iowa 5.46%
Syracuse 9.33%
Friedman's right. People are going to need to be more entrepreneurial. Law school isn't good for that. Most college is not either.
The key to being entrepreneurial is to ignore government regulations. Hire illegals, pay cash under the table, run personal expenses through your business, etc.
If you're lucky enough to escape it and have a secure job, you are right to praise and thank God.
I don't begrudge the folks who've been fortunate enough to escape the general descent into uselessness.
The mere fact that a government job is so secure is part of the problem. That it is celebrated as such should be a warning bell for everyone.
Read anything about the public pension crises' in this country. If that doesn't make you think that there is a problem with 'secure government job', nothing will.
Celebrating the downfall is very much a selfish 'screw you' thing.
Florida State's unemployment rate is 2.15. That's not bad.
Pogo, those rates are for grads that have jobs, not law jobs. Like if you go to medical school, but work as a health insurance claims person.
Not that lawyers need sympathy, but these numbers are important for people deciding whether law school is worth it. For a long time, good data on this was not available, because it wasn't in the school's interest to aggressively collect it.
Inga said...
Scott M, you make a terrific observation. My son is a Journeyman now, as the older Millwrights are dying and/or retiring, he being a rarity now, gets full time work and plenty of overtime. He makes more money than I did as a nurse, with a MSN.
Now this is worth celebrating.
How many millwrights does it take to pay for one government lawyer?
Pogo,
Law school employment data is less reliable than Enron's financial statements.
Look at the median salary and whether the job taken needed a law degree. The median salary is down. Not worth the money at any of those schools.
The chilling bit of the day is that Inga's daughter's job is "secure." Because, as she rightly observes, the job is lock solid safe. You can be sure that they would stop issuing food stamps before they would begin to eliminate people on the government payroll. She can work where she is until she retires, have a very decent pension and never suffer the night sweats that she might get the old heave ho. There. You. Have. It.
I noted the 'law jobs versus not-law' distinction.
I was interested mainly in the wide disparity between schools.
I wondered if those numbers were as false as the ones that comprised USNews rankings.
As much as I hate to do it, I am a big enough man to admit when I am wrong. I no longer doubt the existence of claimed offspring.
I continue to stand by all my assertions and opinions regarding physical appearance, mental capacity, and value to society.
That is all.
Anybody who goes to a liberal arts school for anything other than an MRS degree is an idiot.
Inga said...
So does Edutcher.
Hell, they could be related for all I know.
Never said I was human. In fact, I'm one of those superior beings like the She-Wolf of the SS' Messiah.
Difference is, I know Right from Left.
PS We've gone from one "daughter" to 3 and a son.
I'm waiting for Lee Majors to appear.
Michael, despite what you might long for, we still need government and government lawyers. Until and if government is privatized, even in that case they would employ numerous lawyers.
Shouting Thomas shouted...
It's about the rapid decline of the need for human labor as technology takes over.
Here is a more sensible explanation, without the drama or paranoia or insanity or drunkenness.
Peak jobs. The inevitable solution is more income distribution by the government, which will be necessary to support all those whose livelihoods are obsoleted. Or else: ???!
About the only thing I don't know about Inga's daughters is whether or not they wax.
And that's none of your business Chip! My son shaves.
His face.
"Thank goodness my daughter graduated in 2006 and has been gainfully employed in a secure government job since."
No gov't job should be secure. They should be highly competitive to get and be retained by merit and acheivement. This even goes for those of us in the military.
Shouting Thomas said:
"...what we are seeing is the dramatic decline in the need for human labor as a result of technology.
"A process that will only accelerate."
Yes, and yes.
For once I can wholeheartedly concur with Mr. Thomas.
It's rather glib to delight in the current and coming losses of jobs for lawyers and those involved in legal education, but as a recent story on 60 MINUTES showed, automation and robotry is taking over many of the jobs that haven't already been outsourced. These are trends that will continue and will accelerate, as ST says.
Science fiction stories of decades ago depicted a future world where technology performed the brute functions formerly performed by human labor, allowing humans at large to live lives of ease and leisure, our wants easily satisfied by the flick of a switch or the push of a button. Unfortunately, the reality is that humans being what we are, animals who behave according our appetites and primal drives, those who are already wealthy beyond measure simply want to amass yet more wealth for themselves, and society is arranged by them for their advantage. The disappearance of the need for human labor will not provide for most us the benefit of lives of ease and leisure, but will simply put most of us into destitution and want.
It won't be so easy to laugh when your job and the jobs of your friends, family and loved ones disappear, and you find yourselves living a New Calcutta right here in America, (or wherever else in the world you may be).
I agree Tosa Guy. If you think it was easy getting her job, you'd be wrong. There was plenty of competition. As for her job performance, she has worked hard and done well.
Robert,
I will grant you that the Industrial Revolution was not without significant problems, and that owners often screwed their employees.
That said, do you believe we'd be better off without it? Do you believe we'd be better off without further technological advances? You sound a little like a Luddite, and I don't think I would have ascribed that view to you.
Yes. Someday the Bilderburgers will own all the world's robots, and sell their output only to each other.
How they'd prevent the rest of us from producing and trading w/ each other, and why they'd be so intent on building robots instead of hiring all us unemployed humans at cheap wages will forever remain unsolved mysteries.
How they'd prevent the rest of us from producing and trading w/ each other, and why they'd be so intent on building robots instead of hiring all us unemployed humans at cheap wages will forever remain unsolved mysteries
That's how the pyramids were built, you know. All of the bots had long since broken down by the time the Ceti Alphans realized that the indigenous naked apes reproduced at a fast enough rate to make manual, back-breaking labor ridiculously cheap.
At any rate, Robert, what would your prescription be? More people toiling away at back breaking labor in the mines and corn fields? If technology can't be stopped, what do you think ought to happen? If you could pass a law, what would it say?
The disappearance of the need for human labor will not provide for most us the benefit of lives of ease and leisure, but will simply put most of us into destitution and want.
There is no such disppearance. Rather we trade (for example) the need for human labor to use hand tools to a need to for human labor to operate and maintain more effective machinery. It's the very ability to produce more per human that drives increased production and consumption.
"I agree Tosa Guy. If you think it was easy getting her job, you'd be wrong. There was plenty of competition. As for her job performance, she has worked hard and done well."
If it is a secure job due to her performance, that is fantastic. It should not be secure in any other way. We the people deserve only outstanding performers working for us. Anything less breeds contempt for the people these employees serve.
The Green Revolution dramatically reduced the number of humans needed to grow the same amount of food as before.
What's so weird is how people decided to stop starving to death and just eat the extra food.
Even weirder is how all those former farmers found new jobs.
The bubble bursts for the law education market and the legal labour market because in a tanking economy a sector that does not produce tangible benefits usually will have to go first.
Many bright young people go to law schools because of the prestige the society place on lawyers over other kinds of profession.
In Australia you have to choose in your last two years of high school your subjects which will determine your acceptance to a particular course in the university. When my son was deciding on his choices, I mentioned to my son the path to doing a medical degree or law and that there is this prestige in being a lawyer or a doctor, he asked why. He chose engineering and graduated and got a job a week after his graduation.
You people are in for a rude awakening. Here's how the future will play out. More and more cities will start have to either layoff people or declare bankruptcy. There will be the usual whining and crying from the elites that "NO! You cannot lay the City Orchestra off!" Do with less ploice men, firemen, and EMS!" And because these are the people with the strings of power, it will be so.
But the laws of finance are unstoppable. More layoffs will occur, even the beloved orchestra. Especially when people start dying in fires. (I'm talking real people. Not the poor that die from such economic apartheid that exists now...poor people don't count) People who OWN a house with a basement, and a backyard, and neighbors who aren't crack dealers.
You know...white people.
So the layoffs will come to city bureaucracy, state bureaucracy.
The dirty little secret of these bureaucracies is that they have been pushing EOE for so long and as true believers that their hiring rates are way out of line of the racial distribution of the country.
The old joke about the NYTimes end of the world headline comes to mind..."World Ends TOMORROW!!! Women and Minorities Hardest Hit!"
The race baiters like JJJr., and Tavis Smiley, Taureen(or whatever his name is) and let's not forget Morgan Freeman, will scream bloody murder about how unfair it is to layoff so many hard working people.
It will be hard to tell if they're apoplectic, or orgasmic...a little of both is my guess.
There will be plenty of lawsuits then. Even enough to keep Inga's children busy on both sides.
Maybe, just maybe. after the smoke clears, liberal leftist will have learned that the government can't fix everybodies problems.(I know...I'm a dreamer)
I use services like Legalzoom.com all the time. I have never been disappointed once. I also use lawyers on a daily basis, and well... I hope legalzoom type companies keep growing.
I hate to admit it, but from time to time I will refer clients to that. Not everyone needs a lot of time and money spent on some routine documents.
On the other hand, I've made money when people have saved a few hundred by using Legal Zoom, when their situation called for more scrutiny.
Ps.
CNN will say its because of ethnicity, and small audience...but not ethnicity.
The disappearance of the need for human labor will not provide for most us the benefit of lives of ease and leisure, but will simply put most of us into destitution and want.
This will only happen to people who cannot learn new skills or adapt to new realities. It's not easy at all - I watched my Dad go through it, and it sucks, especially if you've got a family to provide for. But you cannot wish it away. You can't be a buggy whip maker all your life.
Science and Engineering graduate education is still free to those who work hard.
I quit my job and went to UT Austin law school in 1979 because it was FREE and I felt like an idiot paying taxes for the FREE education of others.
"This will only happen to people who cannot learn new skills or adapt to new realities...You can't be a buggy whip maker all your life."
No, but what does one do when the replacement jobs for buggy-whip makers are performed by robots?
It's not merely a matter of learning new skills; when even lawyers jobs can be replaced by nonhuman alternatives, none of us can assume there will be replacement jobs for us in the future. One can hope there will be, but present trends portend harsh realities ahead for those of us who aren't already facing the harsh realities of today.
I, for one, welcome our new robot overlords.
(It had to be said. And I do welcome you guys. Really. I've got WD-40 in the pantry.)
Robert, some people have to draw up the blueprints for robots. Others have to assemble the robots. Others have to service the robots. Parts wear out on robots.
Metal must be cast, and then the metal must be milled.
People have to deliver raw parts for the robots to assemble. Assembled parts must be distributed. I'm getting tired thinking about all of the work.
No, but what does one do when the replacement jobs for buggy-whip makers are performed by robots?
Who knows? But whenever there are changes in technology, there are different opportunities. Buggy whip makers would never have anticipated that their grand children would write computer code for a living. I never imagined the internet, and cannot imagine what will come down the road. There are no guarantees about working (being self employed, I'm acutely aware of this) but that can't be changed.
"At any rate, Robert, what would your prescription be? More people toiling away at back breaking labor in the mines and corn fields? If technology can't be stopped, what do you think ought to happen? If you could pass a law, what would it say?"
I have no realistic desirable prescription. Unrealistically, I can only hope for a society where our necessities of food and shelter are provided by public wealth. Realistically, I can only imagine a future where 90% of the world's population (or more) live in grinding poverty and privation, or where huge swaths of the globe's population die off from mass epidemics, from starvation, from being poisoned by the earth, water, and air, and from calamitous global wars where masses are incinerated by nuclear weapons.
People have to deliver raw parts for the robots to assemble. Assembled parts must be distributed.
Not for long
Basically, in the not so distant future, there will not be a lot of repetitive, brute force work. Mr. Cook is correct on that score. Whatever jobs there will be will require the use of creative thinking and reasoning abilities.
"Science and Engineering graduate education is still free to those who work hard"
Same for DIY business education. You only pay if you screw it up, but there can be great reward for doing it right, and you don't have to wait to start, or write a resume.
I can also imagine a future where our technological society collapses and humans will have to revert to lives of grinding manual labor to survive, a return to the middle or dark ages.
Robert Cook said...
... calamitous global wars where masses are incinerated by nuclear weapons.
There you go. You can draw up blueprints for underground bunkers. Run a backhoe to dig the hole. Set up forms and then get the cement truck in there and pour the walls, floor and eventually the ceiling.
"Science and Engineering graduate education is still free to those who work hard."
Hell, we pay our students.
Realistically, I can only imagine a future where 90% of the world's population (or more) live in grinding poverty and privation, or where huge swaths of the globe's population die off from mass epidemics, from starvation, from being poisoned by the earth, water, and air, and from calamitous global wars where masses are incinerated by nuclear weapons.
This +1000!
jimbino said...
I quit my job and went to UT Austin law school in 1979 because it was FREE and I felt like an idiot paying taxes for the FREE education of others.
Which explains his comments here at Althouse.
I use services like Legalzoom.com all the time. I have never been disappointed once. I also use lawyers on a daily basis, and well... I hope legalzoom type companies keep growing.
This is going to sound quite biased, and probably is, but please, please do not use Legalzoom. com for patent applications. You get what you pay for, and in the case of patent applications, that means close to useless. It was bad enough before the passage of the Patent Reform (AIA) last year, but this March, we go to a first-to-file system, with a loss of the grace period that allowed you to sometimes recover from a Legalzoom.com patent application.
But, for a lot of things, yes, I use them myself, and have suggested that clients use them too.
"That said, do you believe we'd be better off without it? Do you believe we'd be better off without further technological advances? You sound a little like a Luddite, and I don't think I would have ascribed that view to you."
I'm certainly not a Luddite. I think it's not technology that needs to be re-thunk, but our economic paradigms and arrangements.
"Robert, some people have to draw up the blueprints for robots. Others have to assemble the robots. Others have to service the robots. Parts wear out on robots."
The more powerful out technology and instrumentalities become, the less need for human intervention, and the fewer humans needed overall.
Allen S is rightly pointing out the myriad of jobs that cannot be laid off to machines. The doomsday thinking of many is really a nostalgia for a world that departed many years ago and was in decline for more before that. Manufacturing plants continue to be constructed here in the south and continue to hire legions of people, train those people and pay them. Around those plants spring up suppliers of all sorts, each of them making something that cannot be made by a robot or they are making robots to fix robots.
Inga: You are right about the need for govt. lawyers!! Every day these assholes in DC "help" us by passing more and more laws that no one knows about and which, when they do, require them to hire lawyers to fight the government lawyers. Awesome
If its true that they are first up against the wall when the revolution comes... lets look at the bright side.
The carnage will have been greatly diminished... and credit will have to go to Obama for having prevented a catastrophe.
Law school employment data is less reliable than Enron's financial statements.
Especially when the unemployed grads are too demoralized to respond to their alma mater's survey.
I will admit to being lucky. When I first looked at going to law school, my grades weren't up to it, despite having top notch LSATs. So, I went to business school first, had a career in computer software, and then went nights to LS, which resulted in no debt and no real opportunity loss due to three years not working. My opportunity costs were in my first 3-4 years of getting trained, when I was parenting and working for another patent attorney part-time to get trained. Result was maybe $15k of debt, and then I got a good paying corporate job.
What we need is 'Professor Protection and Affordable College Act' law passed.
Heh!
The economy is just going to keep shrinking.
Much is said about oil companies, pharmacy companies, etc and price gouging but post-secondary education not only seems to get a pass on exorbitant fees and tuition, their are demands for more funding.
There's a simple reason for that -- people need affordable food, medicine and transportation just to go about their everyday lives. When prices go up, they get their hate on for the providers.
When law school prices go up, it hurts future lawyers. Few Americans are sitting around thinking "what can we do to help the poor oppressed lawyers of America".
Curiously, I was on the tail end of the boom, graduating college in '97.
Liberal arts college. History major. Was intending to go to law school. Took the LSAT. Did well (mid 90s percentile).
Went to seminary instead.
Maybe I was on the front end of the trend.
The money isn't better, but it was much more fulfilling.
Parts constantly wear out on robots. Drill bits, taps, dies, diamond tipped this and that are only good for so long. A person has to replace those things. Products have to be measured to check on the correct sizes. Adjustments have to be made.
I constantly go through bits, taps and dies on just work that I do around my place.
These concerns about automation have been repeated verbatim for hundreds of years, and we just keep getting richer, safer and with more leisure time.
The real problem we have now, and which may get much worse, is not that people have nothing to do for pay - new markets will be created the same as ants will always dig - it's that people now want paid for doing nothing, and getting them that gig is a burgeoning occupation.
Re: Robert Cook:
No, but what does one do when the replacement jobs for buggy-whip makers are performed by robots?
Put your savings into robots. And IP.
It's really just a version of the problem that confronts many aging societies today -- how to secure future resource streams for a population that is disproportionately retired and unable to work. Substituting robotic labour for human labour is one alternative. Investment in capital goods overseas -- factories and enterprises and so on -- is another. Or even just development or acquisition of intellectual property that can be licensed out long after it was originally created.
A lot of that tuition though at most law schools is gouging. Kid just got accepted to a STEM PhD program at a major state university that also has Med, Vet, Dental, and Pharmacy schools (and, yes, STEM PhD programs appear still to be free). My memory of tuition was that Vet and Dental schools were notably higher, Med school significantly less, and Law school notably higher than most other grad schools at that University. And, law school is a school that has little in special requirements, outside the ABA mandated library and tenured/adjunct faculty ratio, and first year core classes can sometimes be as large as 50 students. No labs, like those in STEM, Medicine, etc.
A friend of mine who teaches law, but also has a PhD in Economics, points out that for many universities, law schools and business schools are the big cash cows, funding much of the rest of their respective universities, including undergraduate, but esp. the rest of the graduate programs. You just don't see the class sizes combined with a lack of physical requirements such as labs in most other graduate programs.
The market for law schools is crashing, along with, or really lagging a couple years, the market for lawyers, and esp. new lawyers. Really started being noticeable, at least to those of us on the outside, last spring, when a number of decently ranked law schools didn't finish filling their 1L classes until sometime last summer, something that was almost unheard of outside the very lowest tiers a couple of years earlier.
How many things are like education that have grown dramatically in price while shrinking in value and quality? This is only possible with government subsidy.
Health care will soon follow the path education has.
Mythical Jeep project
Re: Bruce Hayden:
A lot of that tuition though at most law schools is gouging.
Well, it's priced at what people will pay for it. And helped by the fact that many people go into law go into law precisely because they cannot do math.
One more thing - in response to Pogo's employment question.
Law school graduate employment statistics have been a decent scandal over the last couple of years. One big problem has been self-reporting - those with good lawyerly type jobs are much more likely to respond to questionnaires than those who don't. Another, I think, is that I believe that employment counted towards the schools rankings in the US News and World Report ranking (traditionally the most influential ranking), and, along with most everything else, the schools game the heck out of their responses in order to claw their way up the rankings. There are apparently ongoing attempts to clean things up, and, yes, lawsuits for fraud, false advertising, etc., because law school graduates are, well, attorneys.
That's awesome Allen, and I know exactly why you do it - because you can, and that irks some people.
Nice work Allen! I think the Cat lady has Jeep envy.
I do it because I have all of this money coming in every month. I'm like, what the hell, why not.
Well, it's priced at what people will pay for it. And helped by the fact that many people go into law go into law precisely because they cannot do math.
Well, maybe that was the reason that I came out of LS debt free - I had an undergraduate degree in mathematics, and by that time, an MBA.
But, it has been a failing with lawyers for a long time. My father, with an undergraduate degree in business, practice law for almost 50 years, and that was one of his common complaints. Of course, his business degree was also probably part of why he spent much of his practice with S&Ls, and esp. mortgage lending. Still, I grew up with tales of attorney, and, yes, judicial, innumeracy.
No, but what does one do when the replacement jobs for buggy-whip makers are performed by robots?
The only scenario in which that happens is if robots themselves are able to design, build, and maintain the next generation of robots.
What one does, at that point, is either "enjoy a life of endless leisure" or "get wiped out by our new robotic overlords", depending on how dismal your view of the future is. :)
Correction: January 31, 2013
An earlier version of this article misidentified those at the Vermont Law School who would be subject to layoffs and buyouts. It is the staff, not professors.
(Giggle)
The professors have a better union.
Yet the cost of law school is driven largely by the professors and their needs, which of course exceed direct compensation. And in some schools by the profit skim to help fund the rest of the university.
I had several great teachers in law school, and no bad ones. They worked hard to do it right. It's not clear to me whether that experience has been available to the preponderance students as legal education expanded. If this destructive new wave culls the hangers on and weak links, great. But I'm not sure it will work that way.
garage mahal said...
Realistically, I can only imagine a future where 90% of the world's population (or more) live in grinding poverty and privation, or where huge swaths of the globe's population die off from mass epidemics, from starvation, from being poisoned by the earth, water, and air, and from calamitous global wars where masses are incinerated by nuclear weapons.
This +1000!
And these guys say the right is nuts.
The triumph of technology in providing humans with a life of leisure and recreation is coming, and it's odd that, instead of receiving it as a triumph, we are now viewing it as a tragedy that takes away our reason for existing.
I'm a pretty old fashioned guy, as you know, about the need for people to work.
That "work" is going to have to be considerably redefined, and a new method of distributing the basic necessities divorced from the need to work will have to be found.
What the answers are here, I don't know.
A class action lawsuit will be along shortly. Large institutions, misleadingly marketing a worthless product, leading people into penury. Somebody's going to go for it. There've already been some failures to launch and one or more of these many unemployed lawyers will have another go.
In other words, we are equally on the precipice of a new era of freedom and leisure...
or on the precipice of a fall into chaos...
or somewhere in between.
The answer is up to us.
And these guys say the right is nuts.
That was sarcasm. I'm actually an optimist, I don't take part in the all the doom and gloom. Maybe if everyone quit trash talking the economy it would get better. Just a thought.
Mahal career advice: Go into sales and just give it a try. It's not as hard as you think and you can make a ton of money.
If you look at what has happened so far with advances in productivity and automation, we don't lose things to work on, we change to things that are less essential and more in service to our leisure and whimsy. Most people at one time worked exclusively producing food and shelter. Then later we worked on the machinery to do those jobs, and gradually we have moved to where a lot of us work to create products and services that we could live without, but choose not to. We work not out of necessity now, but out of desire more than ever, and we work on pure survival almost none of the time. That's progress.
Maybe if our President stopped trash talking the people who make an economy it would do better. Just a fact.
The necessities still get made for us, but now we have all kind of toys as well. More people work on art, music, consumer products, and things of pure joy and fun than ever in history. And more people work to extend our lives than ever too, so that we need more toys, and art and Viagra.
Now if they would stop writing new damn laws!
Maybe if everyone quit trash talking the economy it would get better. Just a thought.
The economy is not a petulant teenager. It doesn't underperform because mean people yell at it.
Without automation do you think you would have had all this time to screw around on a blog?
You would be out sticking a pig in the bush, and I'm not talking about Viagra this time.
We could use some Darwinism at the top of the business world. If you cry like a baby because mean old Obama said you should pay more in taxes you shouldn't be in business to begin with.
Pull yourself up by the bootstraps and get it done! Stop relying on politicians to massage your ego and feelings. Or go sell tampons and leave the rest of us professionals the hell alone.
"It's about the rapid decline of the need for human labor as technology takes over."
At the start of the 20th century, most Americans had jobs following mules around to make food. By the middle of that century, most of those jobs were gone, but the result was not unemployment. People found other productive things to do. What is different now is that, rather than find productive things to do, an awful lot of people are finding secure government jobs. Since their "work" is not subject to market discipline, they can continue to waste resources and harass their betters indefinitely.
garage mahal said...
Maybe if everyone quit trash talking the economy it would get better. Just a thought.
Yeah. Or maybe if government quit spending so much everyone would stop worrying about eventually having to pay for it. Just a thought.
Once again, I'll state that a life of leisure, introspection, play and self-fulfillment is a worthy goal.
We need to overcome our fear of that goal and figure out how to get there.
Now if they would stop writing new damn laws!
The White House claims that $1 worth of regulation produces $3 worth of economic growth. I wouldn't count on them easing up on the regulation anytime soon. Why would they, when they think saddling businesses with regulations helps the economy?
They've already added more regulations than the Clinton and Bush administrations combined, and we've got four years left to go.
" If you cry like a baby because mean old Obama said you should pay more in taxes you shouldn't be in business to begin with. "
That's the problem with the economically illiterate, they think rich people are the ones hurt, because they do the bitching, but they're just passing on the message, like they do with taxes. We thought you would like to know when your getting screwed.
We could use some Darwinism at the top of the business world. If you cry like a baby because mean old Obama said you should pay more in taxes you shouldn't be in business to begin with.
It's not primarily the bloated plutocrats at the top of the business world who complain about income tax rates -- the Warren Buffetts and George Soroses of the world. Most of them have already amassed massive fortunes which are not subject to taxation (until they die). It's the people still on the way up who care -- the challengers. Taking more and more of their income just makes it easier for those who already have huge fortunes to stay on top. And they're happy, I imagine, to sacrifice a bit of income now, to keep the challengers down. After all, if they really need it, they can just ask the President to give them a targeted tax break. And he will, of course.
Cook and garage live in their own version of the Blair Witch Project, except the imaginary ghoul is the imminent threat of mass poverty.
Then there's reality:
The overall percentage of the population of the developing world living below $1.25 a day (the standard for extreme poverty) in 2008 is 22%, slightly more than half its value in 1990, while 52% lived below $1.25 in 1981.
But mass starvation is just around the corner. The lucky ones will be killed gently by robots.
The economy is not a petulant teenager. It doesn't underperform because mean people yell at it.
He heard that the problem was that the economy's "depressed".
That's the problem with the economically illiterate, they think rich people are the ones hurt, because they do the bitching, but they're just passing on the message, like they do with taxes
So when your poor widdle feelings are hurt by Obama and by lefty commenters on the internet you [and others] take it out on the employees? Like kicking the dog? Like I said I think we need to weed out some psychopaths at the top.
The die is cast. The dramatic expansion of the welfare state and, ultimately, nationalized healthcare, are done deals.
I may not like it, but I've always been one to adapt to reality, because reality sure isn't going to adapt to me.
So, the only question for me is, how to find freedom and prosperity under the new reality.
Revenant said...
They've already added more regulations than the Clinton and Bush administrations combined, and we've got four years left to go.
That was a first three year comparison.
The White House claims that $1 worth of regulation produces $3 worth of economic growth...Why would they, when they think saddling businesses with regulations helps the economy?
Do they think that? Or do they just say whatever comes to mind knowing their voters will work as hard as they must to not undertand?
"We could use some Darwinism at the top of the business world."
I agree fully. Tell the President that his friends like those at Solyndra are Dodo birds.
"'E's not pinin'! 'E's passed on! This parrot is no more! He has ceased to be! 'E's expired and gone to meet 'is maker!
'E's a stiff! Bereft of life, 'e rests in peace! If you hadn't nailed 'im to the perch 'e'd be pushing up the daisies!
'Is metabolic processes are now 'istory! 'E's off the twig!
'E's kicked the bucket, 'e's shuffled off 'is mortal coil, run down the curtain and joined the bleedin' choir invisibile!!
THIS IS AN EX-PARROT!!"
" you [and others] take it out on the employees?"
No we print more money, right. I sent Obama a letter asking for instructions on how to do that at home. I'm sure he's busy, but I expect an answer any day.
Re: garage:
So when your poor widdle feelings are hurt by Obama and by lefty commenters on the internet you [and others] take it out on the employees? Like kicking the dog? Like I said I think we need to weed out some psychopaths at the top.
I don't think feelings have anything to do with it. I think the point being made here is that when the President does something typically idiotic, ultimately rich people aren't the ones who bear the brunt. They'll pass on the costs, and some of them will tell anyone who cares to listen exactly why those costs are going up. It's just business.
The ones who really do bitch and moan generally aren't the rich rich. It's the small businessmen who are finding themselves squeezed because the businesses they built aren't going to be profitable any more, if they have to pay for compliance with Obama's boneheaded policies.
So Garage, if I get this right you think the economy is bad just because people think it is, but it's really not.
As I've made clear I'm doing fantastic. Our business has never been better, but when the government takes more than half the profit and and then gives it to rich investors to plunder pretending to run businesses, and to bloated bureaucracies to slow us down, then that hurts me, and you. I'm just smart enough to know it.
Freedom day, presently it's similar to an April Fool's joke, literally, it's April 1st, oops that was fast 17th it is now, and you're just beginning to work for yourself, up to April 17th you were working for the government.
All those people in government doing all those things that they do. Whatever that is, it pays well.
I love Google Earth. Go to Washington and regard it from above. Waaaaaay above, then down, zip zip zip down down down. That looks like a good street. Up up up, down down down up up up it's better than a dream, you can control it and at some point of all that up and down the whole city does take on the aspect of an Alien facehugger.
So then If you cry like a baby because Obama said pay more taxes you shouldn't be in business to begin with.
Begins to sound like a very good idea. Crying aside.
It's still all right to bitch like mature adults because some silly little socialist jackass who appreciates ¡nothing! about businesses imagines it fine to do what he can do to fuck with them.
It will be May 17th until Freedom day and then June 17th and then July 17th, and eventually it will sink in, even for you.
There are always opportunities for the clever and industrious. Even the massive corruption of the Obama admin that bagoh refers to can be an opportunity, if you just know how to play it.
I'm not really into fixing things on a big level, or solving the problems of humanity. I'm into making things work for myself and my family.
The opportunities are still out there. Part of the opportunity, now, is knowing how to play the corrupt, overstuffed system being put in place.
Manboobs Mahal says
"We could use some Darwinism at the top of the business world. If you cry like a baby because mean old Obama said you should pay more in taxes you shouldn't be in business to begin with."
Lots of stupid to parse out here, lets stat with the most obvious. Obama isn't just some retard sitting at his computer bitching about the success of other people (like Garage), he is in the most powerful position in what's left of the free world. Not only does he say you should pay more, but he already got one tax increase and has been talking about more. If you can't recognize the difference between feelings being hurt by speech and having a larger portion of earned income taken backed by the power of the state then you are beyond hope.
You do serve a purpose though, a much bigger (and not just because you are 220 lbs) punching intellectual punching bag than Inga, who I can no longer in good conscience make fun of.
I can only feel pity now for a sad old woman with a family history of menal illness wasting away in poverty, whereas your eager embrace of stupidity and self inflicted overweight status make for a much more satisfying target.
Well the downsizing at law firms has been happening for years now so this should come to no surprise to anyone. Michelle Obama, herself a former big law associate, said presciently in 2008:
Don’t go into corporate America. You know, become teachers. Work for the community. Be social workers. Be a nurse. Those are the careers that we need, and we’re encouraging our young people to do that. But if you make that choice, as we did, to move out of the money-making industry into the helping industry, then your salaries respond. 'Faced with that reality, she adds, “many of our bright stars are going into corporate law or hedge-fund management.'
She also said: Barack Obama will require you to work. He is going to demand that you shed your cynicism. That you put down your divisions. That you come out of your isolation, that you move out of your comfort zones. That you push yourselves to be better. And that you engage. Barack will never allow you to go back to your lives as usual, uninvolved, uninformed.
I guess they mean business.
Hey! I was one of those guys back in the 80's! What a deal!
As I've made clear I'm doing fantastic. Our business has never been better
Great to hear. Sounds like Cali is doing real well after progressives took the state over:
California contributed more than 15 percent of the nation’s new jobs between October 2011 and October 2012 - adding more jobs in 12 months than Texas and the rest of the other top-10 fastest-growing states combined - while home building is bouncing back and demand for houses is increasing. Link.
And..
Of the 171,000 new jobs the entire U.S. added in October, 27 percent were in California. And since the beginning of the year, California has added nearly 300,000 jobs, outperforming Texas by a decent margin and outpacing New York by more than 2 to 1. Link.
132,000 new businesses were created that same year—second highest per capita in the nation, tied with Texas, and behind only Arizona. And that was California's down year.
"The White House claims that $1 worth of regulation produces $3 worth of economic growth."
That's right up there with "A dollar in tax cuts is a dollar taken out of the economy." Laura D'Andrea Tyson, Chair of President Clinton's Council of Economic Advisers
Barack Obama will require...[T]hat you put down your divisions.
This was the disingenuous part: Never once has he told his loyal followers to "put down your divisions"--he still stands for only half the country. Ultimately, this is why he may fail.
The very next paragraph @ garage's link is this:
However, in a truly healthy recovery, the U.S. would be adding 300,000-400,000 jobs each month. And a lot of those jobs would be in California. So an overall sluggish rate of hiring is keeping the state's unemployment rate in double digits.
California's unemployment rate as of the article garage links to was 10.1%, more than 2 percentage points above the national average.
But it's doing great, really. Ab fab.
"Great to hear. Sounds like Cali is doing real well after progressives took the state over."
95% of our business is from other states, because what was here left entirely due to regulation and taxes. And the liberals took over decades ago leading to said regulations and taxes. I watch it happen, so I don't need misleading statistics.
Nobody here in CA buys any of that bullshit you posted as proof of a strong state. It just shows how bad it has been. States like Texas didn't add as many jobs because they never lost any in the recession that killed us here. Everybody here knows it's a mess. The good part is that a lot of the stimulus money came here to prop us up, and you are gonna pay for that. Thanks.
My company will be leaving the state. As soon as we cross the boarder we will save enough money to give every employee a big fat raise. Now should I stay and pay that tax or move? What would you do?
Garage illustrates the point that when you catch somebody talking out their ass about something you know about--that you live and work with--then you know he's a phony elsewhere.
Maybe next time those lawyers won't become politicians who vote to bring the economy down.
Maybe next time those lawyers won't become politicians who vote to bring the economy down.
That fits Barack Obama (and Michelle) to the tee! Good call, Ritmo! High Fives!
O Ritmo Segundo said...
Maybe next time those lawyers won't become politicians who vote to bring the economy down.
That fits Barack Obama (and Michelle) to the tee! Good call, Ritmo! High Fives!
[I had to repost your quote in case you get deleted again]
Nope, Ritmo. They're at it again.
Good point, Chick! You never know when dissent will be quashed here! Catching on quick!
STEM PhD programs aren't the only ones that are free. At the Ivies (and possibly some other schools) every PhD student in every subject gets free full tuition, health insurance, and about 5 years worth of stipends to live on. The students usually get the first 2 years of the stipend without having to do anything extra, like a grant, after which they have to assist in teaching a couple of courses a year. The stipends vary in amount by academic department, with the STEMs getting more. I think the stipend for the liberal arts students is currently about 20K/yr. --- a bit tough in places like Manhattan, but still, you probably could graduate with minimal or even no debt.
As I recall, it was Columbia that first made this deal the norm for all its PhD students, because they were dropping out like flies due to having to take on too many outside jobs to pay for the degree and to live on. The other Ivies soon followed, with (no surprise) the richest of them all, Harvard, being the very last to adopt this system, kicking and screaming all the way.
While one might think someone getting a PhD in, say, Dante at one of these schools is dumb in terms of opportunity lost or future job prospects, at least they're not so dumb as to go into crippling debt over it --- like, apparently, law students.
My company will be leaving the state.
Yes, we've all heard.
"Like I said I think we need to weed out some psychopaths at the top."
I've suddenly got the short prince from Shrek in my head, "Some of you may die.... but that's a risk I'm willing to take."
No matter what happens, the "psychopaths" at the top will be the last to fall... but it's soooo worth it. Right? The "minions" can fall left and right like in a movie, and it's hardly worth noticing.
The morality of the guy at the top is irrelevant (in case I was being far too obscure.) If the "monster" is a monster or just misunderstood... this crusade to stick it to the rich requires hordes of expendable foot soldiers... but no one cares about that. If the rich guy can be brought down, if the monster is defeated... well, all the dead around its feet are the fault of the monster and not the *sshole who sent them all to their deaths.
If the mighty fall but at the cost of another 100 people out of work... well, the "mighty" was a psychopath and it was necessary to *get* him... right?
"My company will be leaving the state.
Yes, we've all heard."
I know. Me too. I hear it every day.
I have nearly 100 people right now and growing, and they have extended families, and own homes. They have mixed feelings about moving, but I don't. The company exists for them, so it's not really up to me. If they don't want to leave we won't. It's their money. If they want to make less and pay it to to CA then we stay. I am currently investing in other businesses though, and that will all be out of state. California loses, and it will go broker.
But I ask you again: What would you do - pay your people more, or pay more taxes?
Sounds like Cali is doing real well after progressives took the state over
I hate to break this to you, but the progressives took over the state twenty years ago.
We're in the early part of the year, now, when the state traditionally fudges its numbers to look like things are going great. This convinces people to agree to more spending. In the second half of the year, we hear how economic growth and tax revenue "unexpectedly" failed to meet projections, necessitating tax increases. That's been the routine for the last decade or so.
On a side note -- don't trust job figures that fail to distinguish between private-sector and public-sector job creation. :)
If you cry like a baby because mean old Obama said you should pay more in taxes you shouldn't be in business to begin with
The funny thing is that the same people who make comments like that turn around and scream in impotent rage when corporations offshore their hiring and keep their profits overseas.
Personally, whenever I hear a leftie start whining about job losses overseas, I smile. Hey, the people who lose their jobs mostly vote for lefties anyway, so fuck 'em. :)
"That's been the routine for the last decade or so."
I know. Its to the point now, where at least a good portion of the people in-state just laugh when they do that, but suckers outside who aren't used to seeing it over and over fall for it.
But we have an incredibly dense electorate in CA, who you can lie to repeatedly, and then at the last minute say it for the children, or the environment, or "progress, and they fall for it like a tourist at three-card monte.
I hate to break this to you, but the progressives took over the state twenty years ago.
Ah-Nuld Schwarzenegger - PROGRESSIVE WARRIOR!
Terminator of the Conservative Cause.
Hey, the people who lose their jobs mostly vote for lefties anyway, so fuck 'em. :)
That's funny.
I know of really only two people who were stupid enough to escalate hassles at work over petty issues in a bad economy, thereby losing their jobs. Both right-leaning Republican types. Neither one having a personal problem with collecting unemployment, either.
"Blame someone else," should just be the standard Republican credo. Also, "It's NEVER our fault."
They sure do like responsibility. For others. For themselves, they just ask that you judge them humbly, if at all. Because doing anything less would just be too divisive. And mean.
And not hypocritical enough.
"Ah-Nuld Schwarzenegger - PROGRESSIVE WARRIOR!"
Pushed and signed the only global warming, cap and trade, energy cost doubling, stupid leftist law in any of the 50 states. Created a public spending disaster, married a Kennedy relative, cheated on her with the maid. Made his money in Hollywood.
You decide.
But I ask you again: What would you do - pay your people more, or pay more taxes?
Pay your people more and stay in California.
Actually I wouldn't tell you what to do. But, if you did move, why not Wisconsin? We have one party Tea Party rule. There are virtually no taxes on manufacturing. But for some reason we keep sucking every month on job reports. Minnesota has less people and more jobs than Wisconsin.
Realistically, I can only imagine a future where 90% of the world's population (or more) live in grinding poverty and privation, or where huge swaths of the globe's population die off from mass epidemics, from starvation, from being poisoned by the earth, water, and air, and from calamitous global wars where masses are incinerated by nuclear weapons.
Small point: Terminator was a movie, not reality.
The funny thing is that the same people who make comments like that turn around and scream in impotent rage when corporations offshore their hiring and keep their profits overseas.
Propose that they just get the shit taxed out of them even higher for doing that. Put in a "low-wage labor" tax to make up the difference for those all important profits.
Some of you might think this naive, and self-defeating. What I find naive and self-defeating was the push to do so much damn business with China in the first place. This happened in the 1990s.
Maybe it was inevitable. Trade is good. But the impetus was not just that. We were told that if we didn't do enough business with them to build their own middle class, then they would have gone to war with us.
I say we should have just taken our chances with that, and opened up business with countries who aren't single-mindedly fixated on an obsessive, Communist-totalitarian race to the bottom. There are many of those, both in the third world and outside of it.
Created a public spending disaster,
Oh! Just like Bush? Wonderful!
married a Kennedy relative,
Republicans NEVER marry Democrats. Just ask W.
...cheated on her with the maid.
And Republicans never cheat.
But Schwarzenegger did proudly drive a Hummer and put gay rights on permanent hold.
Care to trot out any more cliches in your Cliche War today?
Pay your people more and stay in California."
You do realize you can't spend the same dollar twice unless you work in D.C.
" why not Wisconsin?"
You know, because of this blog and the host's photos, I'm really tempted personally. It looks beautiful in Madison. And retaining Walker was a very encouraging move by the majority of the people.
But, getting people used to living in 70 degrees year round to go there would be impossible. The jobs will move to Nevada or Florida with zero income taxes (how do they do it?). But me? Maybe I will move in next to Meadehouse and start writing an expose'.
I have to fly to Chicago next month for a deposition, and was thinking maybe of driving to Madison for kicks.
The markets are self correcting. As it is, America is lousy with lawyers. Our judiciary is infested with liberal flunkies, and the law is now seen with contempt usually reserved for journalists.
Those of you may see a pattern developing here: every institution taken over by leftists is now teetering on collapse!
Journalism? Fah! The papers don't even pretend to be objective anymore and many are slowly going broke because nobody in their right mind will pay for the crap they produce.
The law? You can kill a man in cold blood and not spend a day in jail.
The universities? Diploma mills, cranking out intellectual poseurs and papered twits. The education bubble is on the verge of collapse!
Market corrections and the pain associated with them are directly proportional to the idiocy of the people suffering them.
Americans have the vote; they could have averted much of what is in store for them long ago - but stupid people must learn the hard way. Those of you with useless degrees had better learn to handle a broom and a mop.
Ritmo, do you realize that you didn't actually dispute any of my points about the Governator. He's always been a Hollywood liberal, he just played a conservative for a few months until the CA electorate spanked him for it, and shot down all his budget reforms that would have prevented the disaster we have now. I can't even blame him - he tried...a little.
But me? Maybe I will move in next to Meadehouse and start writing an expose'.
LOL! You go Joe! Althouse could video Meade erecting a wall.
Terminator of the Conservative Cause.
He terminated it, alright.
What? I didn't hear that. You want "video of Meade erecting" what?
Ah-Nuld Schwarzenegger - PROGRESSIVE WARRIOR!
You might want to look at his actual record instead of his movie persona. Just a suggestion. :)
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