USA a land of opportunity- think again with this article

[momopi]

Ah, but what are they doing, these 42 people? Are they at school studying for some in demand degree? Are they getting an ESL diploma to go and work in Saudi Arabia? One needs to see how those 42 have been living and what they have been doing to get ahead.

I suspect a number of them stay home and rant on the internet, fingers itching to write crappy comebacks like "is there enough jobs in Saudi Arabia for every unemployed person" and such.

[Cornfed]

Of 100 men who were born into poverty in the US, 58 will climb out of poverty and 42 will stay in poverty as adults.

Ah, but what are they doing, these 42 people? Are they at school studying for some in demand degree? Are they getting an ESL diploma to go and work in Saudi Arabia? One needs to see how those 42 have been living and what they have been doing to get ahead.

There is no way of knowing what if any degrees will be in demand in one or two year's time, so the idea that one can study an in-demand degree and be guaranteed a career is ridiculous. As to stuff like teaching EFL in Saudi, the bar is always being raised. If you are lucky enough to find yourself ahead of the curve with your qualifications then good for you, you win the lottery. If not then by the time you qualify, your qualifications probably won't be good enough any more.

Tell me something. At what point do we conclude there is a systemic problem? Society only collapses one job, one business, one marriage at a time. Therefore there will always be some guy you can point to with a happy marriage, great job, running a successful small business ... until there isn't. Does it really make sense to keep blaming the victims until literally the last person in the world is unemployed and starving? Might we not want to make some systemic changes before that?

[djfourmoney]

The symptoms and the answers are not clear-cut or even defined well; that's the problem.

First you have to define success -

Success to some is owning a home and being on the path to owning it free and clear. For others, its to have seven digits next to their name, believing it will solve all their economic problems, which is not true it creates NEW ones.

I believe I mentioned it before, but I have been listening to the free first hour of the Dave Ramsey show lately. I am constantly shocked by seemingly successful Americans, usually White that call into the show with low six digit combined incomes who have serious debt/outflow problems.

The basics and I thought more people would know this; its about what goes out and not so much what comes in. If you're nickled and dimed constantly, you might not notice it (.15 here, $1 there) but it adds up. I also agree with Ramit Sethi that denying yourself Starbucks and other extreme money saving tactics aren't popular otherwise more people would do it. Its also the reason why people remain fat but hate it. They really don't wanna track how much and what they eat.

The first thing you have to define is what you believe is success.

For myself its in stages, first up to is finding a wife, which I believe is the hardest, most complicated thing you can accomplish. Becoming rich I feel is relatively easy in comparison. Find a product or service that solves a problem with your own business is by far the easiest and most uncomplicated way to become rich.

It also seems hard because you need to come up with a product or service. This is why developing countries are attractive, serving a burgeoning middle class while making a product affordable to the lower classes is largely inexpensive to do in those countries. Believe me simply things we take for granted like clean, functioning bathrooms will put you far ahead of your competition. Providing customer service that North Americans are accustom too is another area we have an advantage.

On the web (making your life portable) could be almost anything. But the important thing is low startup cost. This means no debt to repay which gets you into profit quickly once your idea catches fire. Things like teaching people seemingly difficult things to do is a easy way to make money. Isn't your time valuable? The sky's the limit, I have seen people charge as much as $5,000 to as little as free. In fact Mark's webinars are free, he makes money on those that believe in his system of finding a wife in Ukraine and that is $5,000. He has roughly 15-20 people every other month, that's $75-$125K.

I agree with Devil Dog, too many excuses are made for not succeeding. This why if you say "I am traveling to X" and how many people say "I wish I could do that..." They actually could but either they did or somebody else planned their lives out for them. For a long time in this country making it was owning a home, 2.2 children, some savings and now with both parents likely working two late model cars.

There are plenty of examples of that lifestyle costing $100,000 or more and as I said callers to Dave Ramsey's show confirm that. Its also proved out by a study that was posted here from some school explaining why people don't travel if they have a house, one car (C segment compact car) and two kids on $50,000.

Many have estimated it only cost $10-24K to live as a single guy in America. That's more or less correct -

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xVHIGYgD ... re&index=5[/youtube]

So its very important to define what you believe is success. From grammar school onwards you are asked what you want to do, but seldom told how to accomplish these goals.

http://www.daveramsey.com/new/baby-steps/

[djfourmoney]

Of 100 men who were born into poverty in the US, 58 will climb out of poverty and 42 will stay in poverty as adults.

Ah, but what are they doing, these 42 people? Are they at school studying for some in demand degree? Are they getting an ESL diploma to go and work in Saudi Arabia? One needs to see how those 42 have been living and what they have been doing to get ahead.

There is no way of knowing what if any degrees will be in demand in one or two year's time, so the idea that one can study an in-demand degree and be guaranteed a career is ridiculous. As to stuff like teaching EFL in Saudi, the bar is always being raised. If you are lucky enough to find yourself ahead of the curve with your qualifications then good for you, you win the lottery. If not then by the time you qualify, your qualifications probably won't be good enough any more.

Tell me something. At what point do we conclude there is a systemic problem? Society only collapses one job, one business, one marriage at a time. Therefore there will always be some guy you can point to with a happy marriage, great job, running a successful small business ... until there isn't. Does it really make sense to keep blaming the victims until literally the last person in the world is unemployed and starving? Might we not want to make some systemic changes before that?

The easiest thing to do and the public as whole is already in favor of is to eliminate most debt.

Higher education in most of the develop world is low cost or free. Here its a means for some people to get enormously wealthy off others while not providing much of any welfare or services in the process. Eliminate the middle man, if the Gov can afford to give out loans, it can afford to provide free education to everybody who wants it.

The mere fact that we are blaming the victims of our education system by saying they got the wrong degrees does not expose the real problem.

We already on the road to a Universal Health Care system. Unfortunately you have two choices. Either remain within 130% of poverty to qualify for Medicaid or the subsidy to buy insurance on the exchanges. Or you can just make a ton of money and not worry about it. At this point, the former is more attractive than the latter.

I am already enrolled into Medicaid but it has caveats so I don't really recommend it.

Health care is a real problem that needs to be solved completely. But as with many things in America we always try a "market" solution before coming up with the REAL solution.

Four Weeks Paid Vacation; again one of the few countries that don't make this mandatory. Easily affordable by the majority of companies in America.

Basic Income; already under discussion in Europe (Switzerland). A few Conservatives including Bill Still are in favor of a basic income which would cost about $41 Billion dollars a year. But if you eliminated many of the social programs like welfare, stopped bailing out banks and stop borrowing money we could easily afford this.

It would be $20,000 a year for everybody and an undefined age. I believe its 16 or 18 years old.

These sorts of things will have to be done anyway. By the end of the decade kiosk will start appearing at places like McDonald's. You won't have many of those low paid service sector jobs available anymore. We won't stop allowing people into the US and we won't tell people to stop having children, so this is the best solution going forward.

With money in pocket, no debts from school or illness, it will be far easier for people to do something productive. It will also lower the cost of living by quite a bit.

As I said these things have broad support, they just need a Congress willing to pass these things into law. Right now they are far too dependant on the wealth elites in this country who are interested in keeping the status quo.

[momopi]

We already on the road to a Universal Health Care system. Unfortunately you have two choices. Either remain within 130% of poverty to qualify for Medicaid or the subsidy to buy insurance on the exchanges. Or you can just make a ton of money and not worry about it. At this point, the former is more attractive than the latter.
I am already enrolled into Medicaid but it has caveats so I don't really recommend it.
Health care is a real problem that needs to be solved completely. But as with many things in America we always try a "market" solution before coming up with the REAL solution.

Something I learned years ago is that many doctors are terrible with computers and technology. Despite their higher income, they tend to buy the lowest spec computers from Dell and other places. My dentist was still using his Dell with 512MB and wondered why it was running so slowly.

When I was laid off in 2008, my doctor offered to treat me (chronic tension headache and foot injuries) in exchange for working on his computers in the office. I ended up upgrading all of his computers and setup an online store to sell his herbal supplements. I maintained the relationship and, next week I'll probably go to his house to patch his travertine tiles (I have the same tiles at my house and would not recommend it to others if you mop your floor).

For my dentist, I replaced his old Dell with an used Dell P4 w/4GBs RAM. Suddenly his dental application is running like a hamster high on drugs. ;p Traded him the computer for dental work.

===============================================================================

If anyone is interested in making a little extra income, you can do travertine tile patching:



Yes, it's almost as easy as the video. Go to your local hardware store and ask for some damaged travertine tiles to practice on. The stone pro product will NOT result in a perfect color match, so make sure you inform the customer and charge less than the pro's. Clean the tiles, patch, then apply sealant.

Travertine tiles became popular in recent years, but they have natural air holes in them and with age and mopping, you'll find small holes popping up here and there. Call the professionals in your area and see how much they charge, then charge less for a um... semi-pro job. ;p

Order supplies here: http://www.stoneproonline.com/

[Cornfed]

As a 1.5 gen immigrant from Taiwan, the American Government is under no obligation to protect my family's economic status. If I or my descendants (in the future) were to slack off, I expect the government to import labor from India or another country to replace me.

Agreed. In fact it was an outrageous act of treason for you to be imported in the first place. Surely there were Americans who could have bought hippy tea and participated in Nerf gun battles, or more could have been bred and trained to do so.

Tell me, you say if you slack off (more so) that it would be OK to replace you with other foreigners. Who is to do the replacing and for whose benefit? Suppose natural-born Americans wanted to start their Nerf gun battles at 3.00 rather than 4.00. If that were the majority opinion, why should the economy not be structured around it? If the people at the top disagree with it, why should they not be replaced?

I'm really interested in your take on this. You seem to have the mentality of your typical plantation nigger, which is probably why the scumbags at the top prefer you to a real American.

[ladislav]

Shall we agree that availability of opportunities is a relative term then? For example , America clearly has more opportunities to advance than Somalia or the run-away republic of Transnistria. It has more opportunities than Gaza. Would you agree with it?

Would you agree that a stateless Palestinian stuck in Gaza with phosphorus bombs falling on his head has fewer opportunities there to set up a successful business than in Akron, OH where such Palestinians get 1) US citizenship in several years 2) loans and grants to go to school 3) SBA loans up to 6 million dollars to start a business.

Do you agree now? I think you would.

Now, will Americans have better prospects than, say, Kuwaitis for a better life? No! Compared to Kuwait, it's not as good. How about Qatar? the UAE? No way! Can't even compare.

Will Americans have better chance of a future than Luxemburgians? Or Norwegians? Probably not.

So, America is a land of (greater than some other specified place) opportunities. This is why you don't see many Qataris or Luxemburgians cross the River Grande at night.

[Tsar]

Shall we agree that availability of opportunities is a relative term then? For example , America clearly has more opportunities to advance than Somalia or the run-away republic of Transnistria. It has more opportunities than Gaza. Would you agree with it?

Would you agree that a stateless Palestinian stuck in Gaza with phosphorus bombs falling on his head has fewer opportunities there to set up a successful business than in Akron, OH where such Palestinians get 1) US citizenship in several years 2) loans and grants to go to school 3) SBA loans up to 6 million dollars to start a business.

Do you agree now? I think you would.

Now, will Americans have better prospects than, say, Kuwaitis for a better life? No! Compared to Kuwait, it's not as good. How about Qatar? the UAE? No way! Can't even compare.

Will Americans have better chance of a future than Luxemburgians? Or Norwegians? Probably not.

So, America is a land of (greater than some other specified place) opportunities. This is why you don't see many Qataris or Luxemburgians cross the River Grande at night.

I agree. Arranging all the countries into three general classes for opportunity for the average person, America would be a second-tier country. America has the greatest opportunity for rich people, is a second-tier country for the average person, and the worst industrialized western nation for poor people. So if a person had no choice and was to be poor, then America isn't the place. But a poor person in America is better off than a poor person in Africa.

One thing is that the opportunities in America keep shrinking. It's a banana republic, the poor and average people pay a higher relative percent compared to the people with $10 million+ net worth especially the billionaires, and all the good jobs keep going to cheap labor. Unemployment is very high and good jobs are scarce. Young generations will have much less opportunity and will do much poorly than their ancestors (especially those from 1950s-1990s where employment and income were better and actually could buy more). Also, small business keeps declining because of over-regulation, high market saturation, and high start-up costs. Why must debt and credit be a way of life in America and the West? Credit, loans, and fiat currency artificially inflate prices and it only benefits the people at the top of the socioeconomic pyramid that has the wealth.

[Cornfed]

Shall we agree that availability of opportunities is a relative term then? For example , America clearly has more opportunities to advance than Somalia or the run-away republic of Transnistria. It has more opportunities than Gaza. Would you agree with it?

So what do we do? Just keep pointing to other loser societies that are worse off until we are finally at the bottom of the heap?

[ladislav]

So what do we do? Just keep pointing to other loser societies that are worse off until we are finally at the bottom of the heap?

Just soberly assess the realities of life in the USA and the real magnitude/quantity of opportunities without any embellishments. Then see how we can use what we still have left and combine it with opportunities that other countries can provide us with.

It used to be that everything was available in the US. Now it is no longer with the case, so we just quilt our world with the US being one piece in the clove. It has worked for me and many people I've known.

I agree. Arranging all the countries into three general classes for opportunity for the average person, America would be a second-tier country. America has the greatest opportunity for rich people, is a second-tier country for the average person, and the worst industrialized western nation for poor people. So if a person had no choice and was to be poor, then America isn't the place. But a poor person in America is better off than a poor person in Africa.

The things with 1st tier countries is that they, by and large, are not open to outsiders. It's hard to immigrate there; hard to become a citizen and even if you do, you will still never be one of them. America is also a bit like that but you can't compare it with say, Kuwait. You can never be a Kuwaiti. Even if you become a citizen. Many people have been born there but are still not them.

Same with Sweden, Switzerland, etc. Great countries for locals. They won't give you much as a foreigner.

And the reason the locals get so much is because they have small population there. America has 300 million.

[djfourmoney]

Latin America is where the new "Middle Class" is burgeoning. A recent article/video stated that married couple that worked in a VW plant in Mexico made a combined income of $30,000. They had a house, two kids and two cars (yes discounted VW's but so what).

$30,000 in many of the major cities in America will barely afford you a decent apartment, occasional dining out and maybe some sort of used car because its likely that apartment is 15-20 miles from where you work. If you have school debt to service, then you'll have to reduce rent even more or forgo having a car at all, otherwise you're just the delaying the inevitable.

School Debt is not forgivable in bankruptcy, you can thank Congress under GWB and GWB + Bankers for that.

You should pay off your school debt, it will impact your credit score which increases your interest rate, not good.

I don't know why people are so resistant to changing. It pretty obvious if you have been doing something for a decade and you haven't experienced any success, you should try different tactics. Doing anything in America unless you have invented a product/service that is needed, its unlikely you'll become rich here is like rearranging the deck chair on a certain ship.

The outcome will be the same no matter what you do.

Banks survive mostly on people servicing debt; credit cards/revolving charge, education debt, automobile loans and home mortgages.

Ladislav is right, the middle class pays the bulk of taxes in America. The upper middle class is really getting squeezed now as a result of the sequiser deal made end of last year.

The best way to become wealthy in America is to own your own business period. If a company can afford to pay you six digits, how much are they making compared to you?

There are simple things you can do in other countries that will make you a ton of money. You can teach people almost anything and charge for it. Not my job to tell you how, unless you wanna pay a consulting fee. Google is your friend.

In the video I posted earlier, it cost about $23K to be a single guy in America. Really if you need more than this, you need to revisit your priorities. I can understand needing more in places like New York, San Francisco and Los Angeles but the cut/quality of woman won't really improve at higher levels. This is proven by so many guys who make more still have the same problems poorer men do despite making more than the $50K threshold.

Education is expensive, so is health care, how you suppose to avoid those things? Mmmkay I guess you can go the full MGTOW route but what would that solve?

With so many opportunities in life to spend them in one location and dating one type of woman just seems FOOLISH.

[djfourmoney]

We already on the road to a Universal Health Care system. Unfortunately you have two choices. Either remain within 130% of poverty to qualify for Medicaid or the subsidy to buy insurance on the exchanges. Or you can just make a ton of money and not worry about it. At this point, the former is more attractive than the latter.
I am already enrolled into Medicaid but it has caveats so I don't really recommend it.
Health care is a real problem that needs to be solved completely. But as with many things in America we always try a "market" solution before coming up with the REAL solution.

Something I learned years ago is that many doctors are terrible with computers and technology. Despite their higher income, they tend to buy the lowest spec computers from Dell and other places. My dentist was still using his Dell with 512MB and wondered why it was running so slowly.

When I was laid off in 2008, my doctor offered to treat me (chronic tension headache and foot injuries) in exchange for working on his computers in the office. I ended up upgrading all of his computers and setup an online store to sell his herbal supplements. I maintained the relationship and, next week I'll probably go to his house to patch his travertine tiles (I have the same tiles at my house and would not recommend it to others if you mop your floor).

For my dentist, I replaced his old Dell with an used Dell P4 w/4GBs RAM. Suddenly his dental application is running like a hamster high on drugs. ;p Traded him the computer for dental work.

===============================================================================

If anyone is interested in making a little extra income, you can do travertine tile patching:



Yes, it's almost as easy as the video. Go to your local hardware store and ask for some damaged travertine tiles to practice on. The stone pro product will NOT result in a perfect color match, so make sure you inform the customer and charge less than the pro's. Clean the tiles, patch, then apply sealant.

Travertine tiles became popular in recent years, but they have natural air holes in them and with age and mopping, you'll find small holes popping up here and there. Call the professionals in your area and see how much they charge, then charge less for a um... semi-pro job. ;p

Order supplies here: http://www.stoneproonline.com/

Interesting, maybe I should cold-call some general practitioner and dental specialist to ask about their computer systems and would that be interested in increasing productivity? SSD's have come down in cost and that would speed up the majority of task.

I would agree that most doctors are not using multi-media and social media like they should, after all its a customer based business...

[djfourmoney]

We already on the road to a Universal Health Care system. Unfortunately you have two choices. Either remain within 130% of poverty to qualify for Medicaid or the subsidy to buy insurance on the exchanges. Or you can just make a ton of money and not worry about it. At this point, the former is more attractive than the latter.
I am already enrolled into Medicaid but it has caveats so I don't really recommend it.
Health care is a real problem that needs to be solved completely. But as with many things in America we always try a "market" solution before coming up with the REAL solution.

Something I learned years ago is that many doctors are terrible with computers and technology. Despite their higher income, they tend to buy the lowest spec computers from Dell and other places. My dentist was still using his Dell with 512MB and wondered why it was running so slowly.

When I was laid off in 2008, my doctor offered to treat me (chronic tension headache and foot injuries) in exchange for working on his computers in the office. I ended up upgrading all of his computers and setup an online store to sell his herbal supplements. I maintained the relationship and, next week I'll probably go to his house to patch his travertine tiles (I have the same tiles at my house and would not recommend it to others if you mop your floor).

For my dentist, I replaced his old Dell with an used Dell P4 w/4GBs RAM. Suddenly his dental application is running like a hamster high on drugs. ;p Traded him the computer for dental work.

===============================================================================

If anyone is interested in making a little extra income, you can do travertine tile patching:



Yes, it's almost as easy as the video. Go to your local hardware store and ask for some damaged travertine tiles to practice on. The stone pro product will NOT result in a perfect color match, so make sure you inform the customer and charge less than the pro's. Clean the tiles, patch, then apply sealant.

Travertine tiles became popular in recent years, but they have natural air holes in them and with age and mopping, you'll find small holes popping up here and there. Call the professionals in your area and see how much they charge, then charge less for a um... semi-pro job. ;p

Order supplies here: http://www.stoneproonline.com/

Interesting, maybe I should cold-call some general practitioner and dental specialist to ask about their computer systems and would that be interested in increasing productivity? SSD's have come down in cost and that would speed up the majority of task.

I would agree that most doctors are not using multi-media and social media like they should, after all its a customer based business...

[momopi]

Tell me, you say if you slack off (more so) that it would be OK to replace you with other foreigners. Who is to do the replacing and for whose benefit? Suppose natural-born Americans wanted to start their Nerf gun battles at 3.00 rather than 4.00. If that were the majority opinion, why should the economy not be structured around it? If the people at the top disagree with it, why should they not be replaced?
I'm really interested in your take on this. You seem to have the mentality of your typical plantation nigger, which is probably why the scumbags at the top prefer you to a real American.

Obviously you don't subscribe to real Americans like Milton Friedman. Feel free to join the left-wing socialist opposition like Naomi Klein, I'm sure she'd just love your mentality. Do you only buy from worker cooperative businesses?


p.s. Hippie Tea and nerf wars is SO yesterday. We're drinking coconut water now.

Interesting, maybe I should cold-call some general practitioner and dental specialist to ask about their computer systems and would that be interested in increasing productivity? SSD's have come down in cost and that would speed up the majority of task.
I would agree that most doctors are not using multi-media and social media like they should, after all its a customer based business...

Sure, the worst thing that can happen is they say no.

[Cornfed]

Obviously you don't subscribe to real Americans like Milton Friedman. Feel free to join the left-wing socialist opposition like Naomi Klein, I'm sure she'd just love your mentality. Do you only buy from worker cooperative businesses?

An incorporated company operates under government charter and, in exchange for special protections such as limited liability, is supposed to serve the public interest. Historically, corporations were created for worthy public projects such as constructing canals and were subsequently wound up when the project was completed. There is nothing left-wing about this, apart from perhaps the granting by the government of a corporate charter in the first place. Moreover, to do business companies are ultimately dependant on natural resources which are the common heritage of the rightful citizens of the host country.

Clearly modern corporations serve neither the public nor shareholders, but exist simply to enrich a tiny parasitical (and largely hereditary) elite, and have secured all manner of unwarranted advantages over others via alliances with corrupt regulators and the banking system to allow them to do this. You seem to think this is a good thing, that the elite are the rightful owners and proprietors of all a nation's resources and that if ordinary citizens being replaced by foreigners and starving to death allows some CEO to do another line of cocaine or hire another hooker, then this is just fine. Why is it in our interests to see it this way? In the movie Braveheart the Wallace character says "You [the elite] think that the people of Scotland exist to secure your position, but I think your position exists to secure their freedom". Why is this not a more profitable way to see it?

Of course as essentially an itinerant foreign laborer and effective corporate ward, you perhaps would be justified as viewing yourself as having no rights and existing at GovCorp's sufferance, buy why should others see themselves like that? What is the payoff?

As for Milton Friedman, with the benefit of hindsight it is fairly clear that he was just another hand-rubbing Jew rationalizing Jewish kleptocracy.