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Submitted via IRC for TheMightyBuzzard
In an age of political animus, increasing hostility toward "others," and 24/7 media coverage that seems to focus on the negative, a recent article in Frontiers in Psychology provides a glimmer of hope, particularly for those who live in the United States.
Written by Yale University academic Gabriel Grant, "Exploring the Possibility of Peak Individualism, Humanity's Existential Crisis, and an Emerging Age of Purpose" aims to clear up two competing views of today's cultural narrative in the United States. First is the traditional view of the next generation—millennials—whom many view as individualistic, materialistic, and narcissistic. Some even refer to millennials as "Gen Me" in response to those who develop their "personal brand" with selfies and social media posts.
In stark contrast there is a view of millennials as rejecting selfish values and leading America into a "great age of purpose." Unlike previous generations, simply earning money is not enough for them—significant data shows that younger people are searching for purpose in their lives and their work. Consider the fact that the non-profit group 80,000 Hours (whose name represents the amount of time spent at work in the average lifespan) even exists. 80,000 Hours provides career advice to help young people build careers with social impact. Universities and businesses are increasingly following this path to help millennial workers achieve their goal of finding purpose in their lives.
Both sides can provide reams of anecdotal evidence that supports their view of millennials, and until recently, there have been few studies on the issue. In his article, however, Grant theorized that Google's digitization of millions of books and the Ngram Viewer, a tool that shows how phrases have appeared in books, could allow a quantified analysis of culture over the past two centuries, and he used this approach to quantitatively test the popular notion that a drive for purpose is increasing. What he found is encouraging.
Yeah, because people with a healthy ego would never possibly do volunteer work...
Source: https://opensource.com/article/17/10/rise-open-source
(Score: 5, Informative) by Thexalon on Tuesday October 10 2017, @03:23PM (6 children)
Alternately, we could just try doing what they did:
1. Tax upper-range incomes around 90%. Also heavily tax corporate profits.
2. Have about 1/3 of all workers with union representation, with the rest of them able to organize if they want to.
3. Have generous government funding for scientific research.
4. Make it really cheap for people capable of going to college to go to college.
5. Provide a way for blue-collar workers to get into a business and train so that not going to college is a viable career path.
6. Use tariffs to push companies who want to sell to Americans to hire Americans to make the things they're selling.
In this modern age, we'd probably want to add in something about health care, since right now that's where about 15% of the economy goes to, which is much more than any other country and much more than the US spent in the 1950's and 1960's. Also note that the taxes I just mentioned would put a big crimp in the roughly 25% of the economy currently going to the financial sector, compared to the roughly 5% that went to banking back in the 1950's and 1960's.
The main reason we don't do any of that is that the rich people that would become less rich as a result of these policies have been bribing the politicians for decades to not do that.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 3, Funny) by crafoo on Tuesday October 10 2017, @04:49PM (3 children)
How about instead, we do the following:
1. Tax breaks for top 10%
2. Bust the unions. Start with the public sector. Continue through automotive. Outsource to break the rest.
3. Cut scientific research. Maybe a bit for DARPA. Politically fund the rest to rationalize politically-desired actions.
4. Make it "cheap" for everyone, qualified or not, to go to college. Select for race & gender instead of aptitude. Shackle these people with 20+ years of debt that cannot be forgiven.
5. Outsource all blue collar jobs possible. Automate the rest.
6. TPP-like initiatives to sell out the US economy in favor of destructive, corpratist globalist agenda.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 10 2017, @05:29PM
Don't forget, deny the science if it conflicts with your policies.
(Score: 2) by Thexalon on Tuesday October 10 2017, @05:43PM
We've been on that road since about 1980, so we're bound to find out, like it or not.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Tuesday October 10 2017, @05:57PM
6. TPP-like initiatives to sell out the US economy in favor of destructive, corpratist globalist agenda.
Honestly, I think TPP was a bit demonized. It was a bad deal to be sure, mainly because it had so much MAFIAA-friendly crap in it, but the initial idea wasn't bad. You already *have* a "destructive, corporatist globalist agenda" now with trade with China, and they're dominating the world economy now. The idea behind TPP, and the reason so many other countries were pissed at the US for dropping it, was because it was a way for them to unite against China's economic dominance.
1. Tax breaks for top 10%
Instead, we should have big tax *increases* for the lower and working classes. Anyone making less than 6 figures should be getting 3x as many taxes, while those making over $100k get the same or a cut. Republicans should push this plan by pointing out that "God loves rich people more and blesses them with abundance, so poorer people should pay more for all the problems they cause, instead of expecting God's chosen people to subsidize them, which is Socialism". About half the voters will happily agree to this and vote GOP, even when they're poor and working class themselves. Make sure to throw in something anti-abortion, stuff about how all gun control is evil and wrong, and homosexuality should be suppressed, and Americans will **happily** vote for a giant tax increase for themselves.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by tomtomtom on Tuesday October 10 2017, @06:42PM
I think you forgot...
7. Pay women and minorities significantly less and give them significantly fewer protections and lower levels out of work benefits
8. Be the one industrialised country which didn't see significant damage to its own infrastructure during a major war, thus giving you a competitive advantage
9. Force those other industrialised nations to take loans from you and use them to buy American exports (the Marshall Plan, Lend-Lease, etc)
The global set of circumstances America found itself in at the end of the war were quite unique and played a large part in its economic success of the post-war era. Much of Europe had to wait until the 60s to catch up, Japan the 70s and the communist world took into the 90s and 00s.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday October 11 2017, @02:46AM
Let us note, once again, that rich people rarely paid that marginal rate due to tax loopholes and fraud. For example, despite that "90%" tax bracket, income tax revenue has stayed nearly constant [mises.org] (see second and third figures) as a fraction of GDP.
While you might pine for the days of widespread tax fraud, this sort of punitive tax rate merely means that any rich will either move their wealth out of the country, or just not earn it in the first place. I think it is also ridiculous to suppose that rich people are going to work to invest in businesses when they get so little personal gain out of them.
Needless to say that is probably the worst idea you have on that list. But there's more.
This is typical cargo cult economics. Let's duplicate a few things that we conveniently remember about the 1950s and 1960s, and somehow the planes will come back. But I guess if you're in the organized crime business, a resurgence of labor unions will work out nicely.
We already have that. When you're calling for stuff that is already happening and has been happening for the past 70 years, you have to wonder what rock you've been hiding under.
I propose we return student loans to a normal loan status. No abusive bankruptcy discharge conditions and no government subsidies. Then anyone capable of going to college can afford to.
Already done.
That worked ok in the past, but it results in considerably higher prices for Americans who buy that stuff.
Sure, let's dump more money into it and up the regulations so that we have an even greater fraction of our economy sliding into that.
I think that nails this whole thing. It's not about improving peoples' lives. It's envy - about sticking it to the rich.