Gripe of the day

[_Markk]

I field manage many projects throughout so cal, and visit one or two a day...from the Valley to San Diego...I woke up this morning and was watching local news and was greeted with the news that we have the absolute worse traffic in the world. What is sad is that we probably have one of the highest tax burdens in the world also. If it wasn't for fasttrak It wouldn't be worth it. To those who can't afford the 20- 30 bucks a day for fasttrak (paid by the company I work for) they have to sit in 2,3, or even 4 hours of traffic a day.

What is really crazy is that dirt is being moved (building) at a crazy rate in many or the suburbs, meaning more houses, more cars, longer rides.

When Pat Brown, Jerrys dad, was governor something like 20 plus percent of our tax dollars went to infrastructure, under Jerry, it is like 3%

https://www.usgovernmentspending.com/ca ... _pie_chart

Also when I looked at the chart, I noticed general government spending is at 3%, yet pensions are at 17%...wow, I have to digest that.

[_Doctor CamNC4Me]

More highways funded by pension monies? Is that what you're getting at?

- Doc

[_Markk]

More highways funded by pension monies? Is that what you're getting at?

- Doc

No, not at all...I was just bitching about percentage of infrastructure in our budget.

I just stumbled on the fact that we spend 3% on current government, and 17 % on past government workers in pensions...this is growing and I suppose the only way to keep up with it is tax us more to pay these pensions, and cut budgets for things the folks need, like new freeways. Not to mention road repair, So cal freeways and highways, especially in the LA areas are literally falling apart.

Also education is at 15%, does that include teacher pensions? I don't know.

I am not sure what the answer is Doc.

[_subgenius]

What is really crazy is that dirt is being moved (building) ...

the secondary point here is that dirt removal is a huge issue in the LA basin. In the past year we have seen it go from $32/yd to about $50/yd. The irony being that the Crenshaw Transit project (infrastructure project) is burdening an already burdened aspect of building...i wonder how many people understand that a considerable amount of excavated dirt is put on trains out of LA? or that there is such a business as being a "dirt broker"?

But yeah, those pensions yo...that is a true house of cards for the CA economy.

[_Doctor CamNC4Me]

More highways funded by pension monies? Is that what you're getting at?

- Doc

No, not at all...I was just bitching about percentage of infrastructure in our budget.

I just stumbled on the fact that we spend 3% on current government, and 17 % on past government workers in pensions...this is growing and I suppose the only way to keep up with it is tax us more to pay these pensions, and cut budgets for things the folks need, like new freeways. Not to mention road repair, So cal freeways and highways, especially in the LA areas are literally falling apart.

Also education is at 15%, does that include teacher pensions? I don't know.

I am not sure what the answer is Doc.

Debt financing, devaluation of our currency, austerity, and probably a bump in taxes for the wealthiest 5%. We'll have to keep importing cheap labor to keep this scheme going for a while. That's why the The Wall is so absurd.

- Doc

[_Themis]

Also when I looked at the chart, I noticed general government spending is at 3%, yet pensions are at 17%...wow, I have to digest that.

Not that surprising for an aging population. The best strategy is combat this is immigration of a younger population into the country. Especially given the huge debt. I use to think republicans were the party of fiscal conservatives, but the increasing spending and huge tax cuts show this is not true at all. This is not sustainable and will hurt the economy and the US ability to pay for things like health care or military. I may not like what he is doing, but Putin is doing a great job of trying to being down western democracies.

[_Maksutov]

Also when I looked at the chart, I noticed general government spending is at 3%, yet pensions are at 17%...wow, I have to digest that.

Not that surprising for an aging population. The best strategy is combat this is immigration of a younger population into the country. Especially given the huge debt. I use to think republicans were the party of fiscal conservatives, but the increasing spending and huge tax cuts show this is not true at all. This is not sustainable and will hurt the economy and the US ability to pay for things like health care or military. I may not like what he is doing, but Putin is doing a great job of trying to being down western democracies.

I see Republicans more as traditionalists than as conservatives. Unless the meaning of "conservative" has morphed entirely, which of course is possible. I see the big theocratic government of the Relief Society as radical.

[_subgenius]

We'll have to keep importing cheap labor to keep this scheme going for a while. That's why the The Wall is so absurd.

- Doc

Are you assuming that another method of import is impractical? or do have you not been paying attention to the near horizon - where the wave of automation is quickly swelling.

Let me explain:

A few years ago a stone supplier from China visited our office in an effort to earn our business. After the usual presentation we began the usual question/answer phase. One question we had was whether the machine facilities would be available for our review/inspection. The reply was rather blunt. They informed us that their work was all "by hand" and that the usual automation we were accustomed to was absent from their stone yard because - "we have too many people not to have them all working".

I have stated before on other threads, that the single most significant threat to American labor is automation....and it is cheap labor that does not have to be imported.

Nevertheless, there are still other sources for cheap labor than that which comes soaking wet from the Rio Grande.....perhaps you have also let go unnoticed the amount of Asians immigrating to America?

And what about these dirt brokers....dude...d i r t b r o k e r s.

[Guest]

I think the automation boogeyman is being overplayed by people who want Universal Basic Income to become a thing. As long as there are crap hole countries and we're willing to turn a blind eye to wage slave jobs and mass immigration we're not going to see robots doing all the labor intensive jobs for a loooooong time.

I dunno. Who knows. I think there are much, much, much bigger issues to deal with than whether or not McDicks is replacing a cashier with a touchscreen menu.

- Doc

[_Xenophon]

We can argue about Universal Basic Income but the research is pretty solid on job loss from automation(or more generally, productivity increasing) vs exporting being a very real thing(PDF warning). It is a problem and will only continue to get worse especially as automation begins to creep into those higher skill and service jobs that were previously "safe space". As has been noted on other threads, truck driving is one of the highest paid jobs a high school grad can hold and autonomous vehicles are not too far off to threatening this whole other class of blue collar workers.

A much more recent examining of this phenomenon conducted by American Enterprise Institute, if you're interested.

While there is evidence that the US trade deficit has contributed to some of the losses of manufacturing jobs since 2000, far more powerful even during this period has been the impact of faster productivity growth interacting with unresponsive demand for goods. For example, 985,000 US manufacturing jobs estimated to have been lost due to Chinese imports between 1999 and 2011 (Acemoglu et al. 2016) represent less than a fifth of the total loss of more than 5 million US manufacturing jobs over the same period.