gas over $4 is here! is $5 gas far behind ?

In article >, Jeffrey Turner wrote:
> Brent P wrote:
>> In article >, Jeffrey Turner wrote:
>>>Eeyore wrote:
>>>>AirRaid wrote:
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>>http://img248.imageshack.us/img248/9...dollarstp5.jpg
>>>>>
>>>>>High gas prices
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>You people haven't a clue what high gas prices are !
>>>>
>>>>You want to pay less ? Drive a car with better mileage.
>>>
>>>Idiot Reagan supporters backed gutting the CAFE standards.

>> CAFE could only be a failure. CAFE was an attempt to tell US car buyers
>> what they had to buy. This doesn't work out well, ever.

> Of course it would have worked. The auto makers would have built
> high-mileage cars and Americans wouldn't have had a choice but to buy
> them.

Americans reacted by buying lower fuel economy trucks.

>> CAFE is something supported ultimately by people who want government to make
>> decisions for them. There has always been a choice to buy cars with
>> better fuel economy.

> You don't have a choice if those cars aren't being made or are very
> expensive. If all cars were required to get good mileage then there
> would be inexpensive cars that got good mileage.

inexpensive cars that got good mileage have been around since there have
been cars. That choice has always been there. The expensive, nice cars
with good milage are the new thing. Usually it was assumed that if a
person had money for a nice car he wouldn't care about how much fuel it
used. Of course that has to do with changes in buyer preferences, not CAFE.

> Just because you're
> lazy and selfish doesn't mean the gov't shouldn't require better gas
> mileage standards.

What's with the personal attack? Oh, that's right, the failure of your
argument on the facts.

Jeffrey Turner wrote:
> Rudy Canoza wrote:
>> Jeffrey Turner wrote:
>>> Bill Bonde ( 'Hi ho' ) wrote:
>>>> Jeffrey Turner wrote:
>>>>> Bill Bonde ( 'Hi ho' ) wrote:
>>>>>> Jeffrey Turner wrote:
>>>>>>> Brent P wrote:
>>>>>>>> In article >, Jeffrey Turner
>>>>>>>> wrote:
>>>>>>>>> Eeyore wrote:
>>>>>>>>>> AirRaid wrote:
>>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>>> http://img248.imageshack.us/img248/9...dollarstp5.jpg
>>>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>>> High gas prices
>>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>> You people haven't a clue what high gas prices are !
>>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>> You want to pay less ? Drive a car with better mileage.
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> Idiot Reagan supporters backed gutting the CAFE standards.
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> CAFE could only be a failure. CAFE was an attempt to tell US car
>>>>>>>> buyers
>>>>>>>> what they had to buy. This doesn't work out well, ever.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Of course it would have worked. The auto makers would have built
>>>>>>> high-mileage cars and Americans wouldn't have had a choice but to
>>>>>>> buy
>>>>>>> them.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Abortion is a needed choice but not the choice of what car you
>>>>>> want to
>>>>>> buy?
>>>>>
>>>>> If a woman has an abortion it has absolutely no effect on my life.
>>>>
>>>> Are you ready to define all the laws that way?
>>>
>>> Let's put it this way, a woman's decision to have an abortion doesn't
>>> effect anyone but herself.
>>
>> That's debatable, but what you mean is, her decision to terminate a
>> human life inside her doesn't affect *you*. But then, a decision of a
>> woman living across town or across the continent from you to punish her
>> child by cutting of his ear *also* doesn't really affect you, yet
>> presumably you want the state to intervene.
>
> We have laws against cutting a person's ear off.

Logical fallacy: begging the question.


>
>>> I don't see any reason to regulate that.
>>
>> Thank you for your contorted defense of hedonism.
>
> Hedonism?

Yes.


> Not that I've got anything against hedonism, but most people
> don't put surgery in that category.

It isn't the surgery that's the issue. Nice try. It's
consequence-free ****ing - hedonism - that's the issue.


>>>>> On
>>>>> the other hand, the consequences for the planet, as well as U.S.
>>>>> foreign
>>>>> policy, of uncontrolled fossil fuel consumption are serious enough to
>>>>> warrant restrictions.
>>>>
>>>> Of course some people want to deal with these issues in a market based
>>>> manner, preserving personal freedom of choice.
>>>
>>> Meaning, if you've got enough money screw everybody else.
>>
>> No, not meaning that at all. Meaning, change the cost structu make
>> people pay the full cost of their activities; make people internalize
>> the costs that at present are external to their calculation. It works.
>
> And yet, it's generally opposed by people who want the "market" to set
> all prices and allocate all goods.

No, it isn't. Market-oriented economists strongly
support it. It's the idea behind "carbon credits" and
a variety of other pollution credit schemes.
Free-market advocates strongly support it.


> In other words, you're basically
> asserting in the abstract that "it works."

No, there are functioning schemes today.


>>>> Other people want to take
>>>> an authoritarian posture, having government define the sorts of
>>>> vehicles
>>>> that people can buy. Not only is the latter absurdly unrealistic,
>>>> it's a
>>>> poor way to deal with the problem.
>>>
>>> No, markets are notoriously bad at dealing with externalities.
>>
>> No, they're not, but a fundamentally anti-market person like you likes
>> to think so. What they're bad at dealing with are poorly or
>> inadequately defined property rights. It isn't a market problem at all;
>> it's a property rights problem, i.e., a law problem.
>
> Ooh, a loony Libertarian who has never studied economics.

I studied more economics than you could imagine.


>>> Auto makers could always try to serve customer wishes within the
>>> context of a more fuel efficient fleet.
>>
>> Define property rights such that consumers have an incentive to want to
>> economize on their use of fuel, and that fleet will exist without any
>> governmental compulsion.
>>
>>>>> Or do you like funding the people who fund
>>>>> terrorism?
>>>>
>>>> I'm not sure what you mean. I think that the influx of oil money to the
>>>> Middle East is overall of a moderating effect.
>>>
>>> That's a decidedly minority opinion.
>>>
>>>>>>>> CAFE is something supported ultimately by people who want
>>>>>>>> government to make
>>>>>>>> decisions for them. There has always been a choice to buy cars with
>>>>>>>> better fuel economy.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> You don't have a choice if those cars aren't being made or are very
>>>>>>> expensive. If all cars were required to get good mileage then there
>>>>>>> would be inexpensive cars that got good mileage. Just because
>>>>>>> you're
>>>>>>> lazy and selfish doesn't mean the gov't shouldn't require better gas
>>>>>>> mileage standards.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> People should be free to buy whatever vehicles they want. You
>>>>>> views are
>>>>>> clearly authoritarian.
>>>>>
>>>>> My views are clearly responsible. Your views are, strangely, along
>>>>> the
>>>>> lines of "if it feels good, do it" - not in the bedroom, where it
>>>>> has no
>>>>> effect on anyone else, but in the public sphere where consequences are
>>>>> dire.
>>>>
>>>> I think people should have freedom of choice when buying vehicles. I
>>>> think this because people should generally be free and because people
>>>> have legitimately different needs that they most understand what are.
>>>> Someone who lives in the country and has to regularly deal with
>>>> unplowed
>>>> snow-covered roadway would need, say, an SUV. Someone who lives in the
>>>> city might choose something else. It's all about choice.
>>>
>>> Or might choose an SUV, as impractical as that is. But that's what the
>>> advertising people and the car salesmen want.
>>
>> If they pay the full cost of driving the SUV, it's no business of yours.
>
> And how do we get anyone to do that?

Environmental taxes on fuel would be one way. I
personally favor steeply progressive annual
registration fees on high profile vehicles like SUVs
and vans, since one of the high, currently external
costs of the use of them is a degradation in visibility
for other motorists. Various schemes to charge higher
costs for parking the things - they require more room -
might work.

The point is, a simple ban is bad policy. If people
want them and are willing to pay the full cost, there's
no reason they shouldn't have them. Clintonistas like
you, though, like to control people's lives.


>>>> There are things that could be done to provide impetus to better decide
>>>> what is needed. I've previously discussed right-sized vehicles, which
>>>> basically means choosing the car or truck that fits the specific job
>>>> you
>>>> are doing at the time. This likely means not buying the lowest gas
>>>> mileage common denominator vehicles as is often done today but instead
>>>> having two or several. This could be incentivized by letting people pay
>>>> for insurance at costs defined by the most expensive to insure vehicle,
>>>> or letting them piggy back an EV's insurance on another vehicle.
>>>
>>> And where is the money for everyone to have several cars going to come
>>> from?
>>
>> Their own pockets. He wasn't suggesting otherwise.
>
> No. No hint that that would be a workable solution.

No evidence from you that it wouldn't be.


>>> And who is preventing the insurance companies from writing such
>>> policies?
>
> Couldn't answer this one, eh?

No one is "preventing" them, unless it's your fellow
Clintonistas in state insurance commissions who
regulate what insurance products may be sold. You
Clintonistas sure do screw up a lot of things, don't you?


>>>>>> It is exactly high fuel costs that pressure
>>>>>> people into more efficiency without taking away choice, and that's
>>>>>> exactly what you complain about.
>>>>>
>>>>> That was another option that Reagan didn't take a quarter-century ago.
>>>>> But in this country, with its horrible if not absent systems of mass
>>>>> transportation, high fuel prices hurt the people who are least able to
>>>>> afford them the most.
>>
>> No one has a "right" to a given standard of living.
>
> That's why your taxes should be higher.

No, not necessarily; it depends on the tax and the
purpose of it. What I mean is, if market forces raise
prices of things and my income doesn't go up
commensurately, that's just too bad. If my skills
don't fetch as much in salary as I'd like, too bad -
there should be no minimum wage at all. But if I
already am paying my full way, and a totalitarian like
you just wants to take my money because you feel you
know how it should be spent better than I, then that's
a violation of my rights.


>>>> You don't think that high insurance costs hurt those same people?
>>>> And by
>>>> forcing them to drive one car, optimized for nothing so it's going
>>>> to be
>>>> the lowest common denominator, you make the cost of gas more difficult
>>>> to deal with.
>>>
>>> High insurance costs? Nice tangent. And buying two cars, so cheap!
>>>
>>>>> The people who most need fuel efficient vehicles
>>>>> are the people who buy used, and therefor have the least effect on the
>>>>> products of the auto manufacturers.
>>
>> What people want - not "need"; no such thing as "need" - is the lowest
>> cost of ownership *and* operation.
>
> Uh, yeah, some people. If that's what people who wanted new cars were
> looking for we wouldn't have low mileage vehicles to start with.

incoherent


>>>> I've talked about this before, that the people who buy used, even
>>>> only a
>>>> couple of years, aren't the people that the automakers are building
>>>> for.
>>>
>>> Exactly. But they're most in need of the high mileage cars we would
>>> have had if Reagan hadn't eviscerated the CAFE standards.
>>
>> No, that's what they would most *like* - maybe. But along the way,
>> others who enjoyed having a wider array of choices wouldn't have had
>> their desires satisfied as well.
>
> Affordability is a big issue for most people who don't buy new cars.

It's a big issue for people who *do* buy new cars, doofus.


> "Desires satisfied"? Aren't you the one who was criticizing "hedonism"?

I was criticizing your legalistic defense of sexual
hedonism - your defense of the false belief that there
should be no consequences.


>>>>> Sure, this could all be compensated
>>>>> for through the tax system, but that defies experience.
>>>>
>>>> I think there are used cars out there that get good mileage.
>>>
>>> Not many. Certainly not enough.
>>
>> Not as many as you would like, perhaps.
>
> Gosh. That's as close as you've gotten to an intelligent comment.

No, I've made lots of them, all of them intended to
illustrate your totalitarian tendencies. That one was
actually a bit of a throwaway - it's obvious you simply
want to substitute your judgment, which you wrongly
think to be be based on some innate superiority of
vision, for others'.

Rudy Canoza wrote:
> Eeyore wrote:
>> "Fred G. Mackey" wrote:
>>> Eeyore wrote:
>>>> Rudy Canoza wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> There should be no minimum wage at all. It destroys
>>>>> employment and hurts poor people.
>>>>
>>>> LMAO !
>>>>
>>>> Yes, they'd be so much better off on $3 an hour !
>>>
>>> That would be better than being unenmployed.
>>
>> Could *you* live on it ?
>
> The choice isn't between $3.00 an hour (or whatever wage the person can
> get) and some artificially pegged higher wage; the choice is between
> $3.00 an hour and ZERO dollars an hour. If the work a person does only
> brings in $3.00 an hour in revenue, the employer isn't going to pay
> $7.50 an hour, thereby losing $4.50 an hour (actually, much more after
> payroll taxes) for every hour the doofus works; the doofus will be fired.
>
> Advocates of minimum wage laws just don't get it: they destroy
> employment. If you really don't think they do, then why don't you
> advocate a $50 an hour minimum wage?

It destroys sub-poverty employment. And keeps other wages from being
ratcheted down.

>>> But, of course, many jobs pay more than minimum wage anyway.
>>
>> That's not why it exists though is it ?
>
> It exists to help labor unions. It reduces the competition faced by
> unionized employees.

You want to be an exploited worker? But even states with "right to
[exploitation]" laws have minimum wages.

--Jeff

--
We know now that Government by
organized money is just as dangerous
as Government by organized mob.
--Franklin D. Roosevelt

Bill Bonde ( 'Hi ho' ) wrote:
> Eeyore wrote:
>>"Fred G. Mackey" wrote:
>>
>>
>>>But, of course, many jobs pay more than minimum wage anyway.
>>
>>That's not why it exists though is it ?
>
> Why minimum wage exists? No one can explain why that exists except due
> to some misguided altruism at other's expense.

Just because YOU can't understand the explanation, Bill...

--Jeff

--
We know now that Government by
organized money is just as dangerous
as Government by organized mob.
--Franklin D. Roosevelt

Jeffrey Turner wrote:

> Bill Bonde ( 'Hi ho' ) wrote:
> > Eeyore wrote:
> >>"Fred G. Mackey" wrote:
> >>
> >>
> >>>But, of course, many jobs pay more than minimum wage anyway.
> >>
> >>That's not why it exists though is it ?
> >
> > Why minimum wage exists? No one can explain why that exists except due
> > to some misguided altruism at other's expense.
>
> Just because YOU can't understand the explanation, Bill...

Maybe Bill doesn't realise that if you *can* pay less than minimum wage there
will be ppl lining up to do just exactly that and take advantage of the
disadvantaged.

It's hardly as if minimum wage is a job killer. In the UK, there's a lower
figure for kids AIUI that means thing like pare deliveroies can still exist
economically and those kids can get a bit more to spend on their interests.

Graham

Rudy Canoza wrote:

> Jeffrey Turner wrote:
>
>> Rudy Canoza wrote:
>>
>>> Jeffrey Turner wrote:
>>>
>>>> Bill Bonde ( 'Hi ho' ) wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> Jeffrey Turner wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>> Bill Bonde ( 'Hi ho' ) wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Jeffrey Turner wrote:
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Brent P wrote:
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> In article >, Jeffrey Turner
>>>>>>>>> wrote:
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>> Eeyore wrote:
>>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>>> AirRaid wrote:
>>>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>>>> http://img248.imageshack.us/img248/9...dollarstp5.jpg
>>>>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>>>> High gas prices
>>>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>>> You people haven't a clue what high gas prices are !
>>>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>>> You want to pay less ? Drive a car with better mileage.
>>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>> Idiot Reagan supporters backed gutting the CAFE standards.
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> CAFE could only be a failure. CAFE was an attempt to tell US
>>>>>>>>> car buyers
>>>>>>>>> what they had to buy. This doesn't work out well, ever.
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Of course it would have worked. The auto makers would have built
>>>>>>>> high-mileage cars and Americans wouldn't have had a choice but
>>>>>>>> to buy
>>>>>>>> them.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Abortion is a needed choice but not the choice of what car you
>>>>>>> want to
>>>>>>> buy?
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>> If a woman has an abortion it has absolutely no effect on my life.
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> Are you ready to define all the laws that way?
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Let's put it this way, a woman's decision to have an abortion doesn't
>>>> effect anyone but herself.
>>>
>>>
>>> That's debatable, but what you mean is, her decision to terminate a
>>> human life inside her doesn't affect *you*. But then, a decision of a
>>> woman living across town or across the continent from you to punish her
>>> child by cutting of his ear *also* doesn't really affect you, yet
>>> presumably you want the state to intervene.
>>
>>
>> We have laws against cutting a person's ear off.
>
> Logical fallacy: begging the question.

I think laws against cutting a person's ears off are a good thing and
should be enforced.

>>>> I don't see any reason to regulate that.
>>>
>>> Thank you for your contorted defense of hedonism.
>>
>> Hedonism?
>
> Yes.
>
>> Not that I've got anything against hedonism, but most people
>> don't put surgery in that category.
>
> It isn't the surgery that's the issue. Nice try. It's consequence-free
> ****ing - hedonism - that's the issue.

Ah. You just can't bear the thought that some woman somewhere is
****ing for fun and you're not involved. Why do you think that's any of
your business? Yet if you want to pollute the atmosphere, causing acid
rain, lung disease and global warming, that's your private affair? What
a piece of work.

>>>>>> On
>>>>>> the other hand, the consequences for the planet, as well as U.S.
>>>>>> foreign
>>>>>> policy, of uncontrolled fossil fuel consumption are serious enough to
>>>>>> warrant restrictions.
>>>>>
>>>>> Of course some people want to deal with these issues in a market based
>>>>> manner, preserving personal freedom of choice.
>>>>
>>>> Meaning, if you've got enough money screw everybody else.
>>>
>>> No, not meaning that at all. Meaning, change the cost structu make
>>> people pay the full cost of their activities; make people internalize
>>> the costs that at present are external to their calculation. It works.
>>
>> And yet, it's generally opposed by people who want the "market" to set
>> all prices and allocate all goods.
>
> No, it isn't. Market-oriented economists strongly support it. It's the
> idea behind "carbon credits" and a variety of other pollution credit
> schemes. Free-market advocates strongly support it.

Carbon credits don't even come close to covering the full cost of CO2
pollution remission.

>> In other words, you're basically
>> asserting in the abstract that "it works."
>
> No, there are functioning schemes today.

There are plenty of "schemes" all right.

>>>>> Other people want to take
>>>>> an authoritarian posture, having government define the sorts of
>>>>> vehicles
>>>>> that people can buy. Not only is the latter absurdly unrealistic,
>>>>> it's a
>>>>> poor way to deal with the problem.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> No, markets are notoriously bad at dealing with externalities.
>>>
>>>
>>> No, they're not, but a fundamentally anti-market person like you likes
>>> to think so. What they're bad at dealing with are poorly or
>>> inadequately defined property rights. It isn't a market problem at all;
>>> it's a property rights problem, i.e., a law problem.
>>
>>
>> Ooh, a loony Libertarian who has never studied economics.
>
> I studied more economics than you could imagine.

Ayn Rand doesn't count. Care to tell us how you assign property rights
to the air? Who has a right to sue and on what grounds? But, like I
said, the market really doesn't deal with pollution.

>>>> Auto makers could always try to serve customer wishes within the
>>>> context of a more fuel efficient fleet.
>>>
>>>
>>> Define property rights such that consumers have an incentive to want to
>>> economize on their use of fuel, and that fleet will exist without any
>>> governmental compulsion.
>>>
>>>>>> Or do you like funding the people who fund
>>>>>> terrorism?
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> I'm not sure what you mean. I think that the influx of oil money to
>>>>> the
>>>>> Middle East is overall of a moderating effect.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> That's a decidedly minority opinion.
>>>>
>>>>>>>>> CAFE is something supported ultimately by people who want
>>>>>>>>> government to make
>>>>>>>>> decisions for them. There has always been a choice to buy cars
>>>>>>>>> with
>>>>>>>>> better fuel economy.
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> You don't have a choice if those cars aren't being made or are very
>>>>>>>> expensive. If all cars were required to get good mileage then
>>>>>>>> there
>>>>>>>> would be inexpensive cars that got good mileage. Just because
>>>>>>>> you're
>>>>>>>> lazy and selfish doesn't mean the gov't shouldn't require better
>>>>>>>> gas
>>>>>>>> mileage standards.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> People should be free to buy whatever vehicles they want. You
>>>>>>> views are
>>>>>>> clearly authoritarian.
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>> My views are clearly responsible. Your views are, strangely,
>>>>>> along the
>>>>>> lines of "if it feels good, do it" - not in the bedroom, where it
>>>>>> has no
>>>>>> effect on anyone else, but in the public sphere where consequences
>>>>>> are
>>>>>> dire.
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> I think people should have freedom of choice when buying vehicles. I
>>>>> think this because people should generally be free and because people
>>>>> have legitimately different needs that they most understand what are.
>>>>> Someone who lives in the country and has to regularly deal with
>>>>> unplowed
>>>>> snow-covered roadway would need, say, an SUV. Someone who lives in the
>>>>> city might choose something else. It's all about choice.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Or might choose an SUV, as impractical as that is. But that's what the
>>>> advertising people and the car salesmen want.
>>>
>>>
>>> If they pay the full cost of driving the SUV, it's no business of yours.
>>
>>
>> And how do we get anyone to do that?
>
> Environmental taxes on fuel would be one way. I personally favor
> steeply progressive annual registration fees on high profile vehicles
> like SUVs and vans, since one of the high, currently external costs of
> the use of them is a degradation in visibility for other motorists.
> Various schemes to charge higher costs for parking the things - they
> require more room - might work.
>
> The point is, a simple ban is bad policy. If people want them and are
> willing to pay the full cost, there's no reason they shouldn't have
> them. Clintonistas like you, though, like to control people's lives.

Let's see, the Earth has about 5 billion years till the Sun goes nova.
There's an awful lot of opportunity costs involved in using up a gallon
of gas with that future potential. Not to mention the cost of the
environmental damage. I'm sure a fair price for a gallon of gas can be
calculated. You might even be able to afford one.

Oh, I'm far, far from being a Clintonista. Gosh, didn't he give you
NAFTA?

--Jeff

--
We know now that Government by
organized money is just as dangerous
as Government by organized mob.
--Franklin D. Roosevelt

Jeffrey Turner wrote:
> Rudy Canoza wrote:
>> Eeyore wrote:
>>> "Fred G. Mackey" wrote:
>>>> Eeyore wrote:
>>>>> Rudy Canoza wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>> There should be no minimum wage at all. It destroys
>>>>>> employment and hurts poor people.
>>>>>
>>>>> LMAO !
>>>>>
>>>>> Yes, they'd be so much better off on $3 an hour !
>>>>
>>>> That would be better than being unenmployed.
>>>
>>> Could *you* live on it ?
>>
>> The choice isn't between $3.00 an hour (or whatever wage the person can
>> get) and some artificially pegged higher wage; the choice is between
>> $3.00 an hour and ZERO dollars an hour. If the work a person does only
>> brings in $3.00 an hour in revenue, the employer isn't going to pay
>> $7.50 an hour, thereby losing $4.50 an hour (actually, much more after
>> payroll taxes) for every hour the doofus works; the doofus will be fired.
>>
>> Advocates of minimum wage laws just don't get it: they destroy
>> employment. If you really don't think they do, then why don't you
>> advocate a $50 an hour minimum wage?
>
> It destroys sub-poverty employment.

It destroys employment, period. It keeps people who
might earn some income from earning any income at all.


> And keeps other wages from being
> ratcheted down.

No, it puts downward pressure on wages of those who are
working at or only slightly above the minimum by
increasing the number of people out of work.

You really ought to study some labor economics before
running your ignorant yap.


>
>>>> But, of course, many jobs pay more than minimum wage anyway.
>>>
>>> That's not why it exists though is it ?
>>
>> It exists to help labor unions. It reduces the competition faced by
>> unionized employees.
>
> You want to be an exploited worker? But even states with "right to
> [exploitation]" laws have minimum wages.

You really are incoherent. Right to work - there is no
such thing as "exploitation", in the emotionally laden
sense you mean - doesn't get rid of labor unions.
Low-wage/low-skill labor is a substitute for
higher-wage/higher-skill unionized labor. Relative
prices are what matter, as anyone who has studied
economics - not you - knows. By raising the price of
low-wage/unskilled labor relative to unionized labor,
it makes the unionized labor look more attractive. If
a business can hire one $22/hour union thug, or four
$5/hour non-unionized high school dropouts who are as
productive as the union thug, the employer will hire
the four dropouts and save $2.00 per hour. But if the
minimum wage laws require him to pay $7.50 for the
dropouts when their labor only is worth $5.00, he'll
fire all four of the dropouts and hire the union thug.

Jeffrey Turner wrote:
> Bill Bonde ( 'Hi ho' ) wrote:
>> Eeyore wrote:
>>> "Fred G. Mackey" wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>>> But, of course, many jobs pay more than minimum wage anyway.
>>>
>>> That's not why it exists though is it ?
>>
>> Why minimum wage exists? No one can explain why that exists except due
>> to some misguided altruism at other's expense.
>
> Just because YOU can't understand the explanation, Bill...

The explanation is organized labor.

Jeffrey Turner wrote:
> Rudy Canoza wrote:
>
>> Jeffrey Turner wrote:
>>
>>> Rudy Canoza wrote:
>>>
>>>> Jeffrey Turner wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> Bill Bonde ( 'Hi ho' ) wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>> Jeffrey Turner wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Bill Bonde ( 'Hi ho' ) wrote:
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Jeffrey Turner wrote:
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> Brent P wrote:
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>> In article >, Jeffrey
>>>>>>>>>> Turner wrote:
>>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>>> Eeyore wrote:
>>>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>>>> AirRaid wrote:
>>>>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>>>>> http://img248.imageshack.us/img248/9...dollarstp5.jpg
>>>>>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>>>>> High gas prices
>>>>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>>>> You people haven't a clue what high gas prices are !
>>>>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>>>> You want to pay less ? Drive a car with better mileage.
>>>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>>> Idiot Reagan supporters backed gutting the CAFE standards.
>>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>> CAFE could only be a failure. CAFE was an attempt to tell US
>>>>>>>>>> car buyers
>>>>>>>>>> what they had to buy. This doesn't work out well, ever.
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> Of course it would have worked. The auto makers would have built
>>>>>>>>> high-mileage cars and Americans wouldn't have had a choice but
>>>>>>>>> to buy
>>>>>>>>> them.
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Abortion is a needed choice but not the choice of what car you
>>>>>>>> want to
>>>>>>>> buy?
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> If a woman has an abortion it has absolutely no effect on my life.
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Are you ready to define all the laws that way?
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> Let's put it this way, a woman's decision to have an abortion doesn't
>>>>> effect anyone but herself.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> That's debatable, but what you mean is, her decision to terminate a
>>>> human life inside her doesn't affect *you*. But then, a decision of a
>>>> woman living across town or across the continent from you to punish her
>>>> child by cutting of his ear *also* doesn't really affect you, yet
>>>> presumably you want the state to intervene.
>>>
>>>
>>> We have laws against cutting a person's ear off.
>>
>> Logical fallacy: begging the question.
>
> I think laws against cutting a person's ears off are a good thing and
> should be enforced.

You're still begging the question. You seem to revel
in committing logical fallacies.


>>>>> I don't see any reason to regulate that.
>>>>
>>>> Thank you for your contorted defense of hedonism.
>>>
>>> Hedonism?
>>
>> Yes.
>>
>>> Not that I've got anything against hedonism, but most people
>>> don't put surgery in that category.
>>
>> It isn't the surgery that's the issue. Nice try. It's consequence-free
>> ****ing - hedonism - that's the issue.
>
> Ah. You just can't bear the thought that some woman somewhere is
> ****ing for fun and you're not involved.

Has nothing to do with it, of course.


> Why do you think that's any of
> your business?

The ****ing isn't. How she handles the possible
consequence of pregnancy is.


> Yet if you want to pollute the atmosphere, causing acid
> rain, lung disease and global warming, that's your private affair? What
> a piece of work.

No, dummy. I've already told you how to handle those.
Of course, the optimal amount of any of those forms
of pollution is, of course, not zero, but you, being an
irrational fanatic, will try to argue that it is.


>>>>>>> On
>>>>>>> the other hand, the consequences for the planet, as well as U.S.
>>>>>>> foreign
>>>>>>> policy, of uncontrolled fossil fuel consumption are serious
>>>>>>> enough to
>>>>>>> warrant restrictions.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Of course some people want to deal with these issues in a market
>>>>>> based
>>>>>> manner, preserving personal freedom of choice.
>>>>>
>>>>> Meaning, if you've got enough money screw everybody else.
>>>>
>>>> No, not meaning that at all. Meaning, change the cost structu make
>>>> people pay the full cost of their activities; make people internalize
>>>> the costs that at present are external to their calculation. It works.
>>>
>>> And yet, it's generally opposed by people who want the "market" to set
>>> all prices and allocate all goods.
>>
>> No, it isn't. Market-oriented economists strongly support it. It's
>> the idea behind "carbon credits" and a variety of other pollution
>> credit schemes. Free-market advocates strongly support it.
>
> Carbon credits don't even come close to covering the full cost of CO2
> pollution remission.

"Remission"? Anyway, your unsupported assertion, if
true, merely means the scheme to internalize what are
now externalities isn't strict enough. It doesn't
invalidate the principle. The principle is sound.


>>> In other words, you're basically
>>> asserting in the abstract that "it works."
>>
>> No, there are functioning schemes today.
>
> There are plenty of "schemes" all right.

Yes, and many of them work extremely well. That just
infuriates you, doesn't it? You prefer the command
economy of totalitarianism.


>>>>>> Other people want to take
>>>>>> an authoritarian posture, having government define the sorts of
>>>>>> vehicles
>>>>>> that people can buy. Not only is the latter absurdly unrealistic,
>>>>>> it's a
>>>>>> poor way to deal with the problem.
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> No, markets are notoriously bad at dealing with externalities.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> No, they're not, but a fundamentally anti-market person like you likes
>>>> to think so. What they're bad at dealing with are poorly or
>>>> inadequately defined property rights. It isn't a market problem at
>>>> all;
>>>> it's a property rights problem, i.e., a law problem.
>>>
>>>
>>> Ooh, a loony Libertarian who has never studied economics.
>>
>> I studied more economics than you could imagine.
>
> Ayn Rand doesn't count.

UCLA.


> Care to tell us how you assign property rights
> to the air? Who has a right to sue and on what grounds? But, like I
> said, the market really doesn't deal with pollution.

But you are wrong - it deals very well with it.
Pollution credits trade on active markets. They work.
And that just kills you, arrogant Clintonista that
you are.


>>>>> Auto makers could always try to serve customer wishes within the
>>>>> context of a more fuel efficient fleet.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Define property rights such that consumers have an incentive to want to
>>>> economize on their use of fuel, and that fleet will exist without any
>>>> governmental compulsion.
>>>>
>>>>>>> Or do you like funding the people who fund
>>>>>>> terrorism?
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>> I'm not sure what you mean. I think that the influx of oil money
>>>>>> to the
>>>>>> Middle East is overall of a moderating effect.
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> That's a decidedly minority opinion.
>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>> CAFE is something supported ultimately by people who want
>>>>>>>>>> government to make
>>>>>>>>>> decisions for them. There has always been a choice to buy cars
>>>>>>>>>> with
>>>>>>>>>> better fuel economy.
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> You don't have a choice if those cars aren't being made or are
>>>>>>>>> very
>>>>>>>>> expensive. If all cars were required to get good mileage then
>>>>>>>>> there
>>>>>>>>> would be inexpensive cars that got good mileage. Just because
>>>>>>>>> you're
>>>>>>>>> lazy and selfish doesn't mean the gov't shouldn't require
>>>>>>>>> better gas
>>>>>>>>> mileage standards.
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> People should be free to buy whatever vehicles they want. You
>>>>>>>> views are
>>>>>>>> clearly authoritarian.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> My views are clearly responsible. Your views are, strangely,
>>>>>>> along the
>>>>>>> lines of "if it feels good, do it" - not in the bedroom, where it
>>>>>>> has no
>>>>>>> effect on anyone else, but in the public sphere where
>>>>>>> consequences are
>>>>>>> dire.
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>> I think people should have freedom of choice when buying vehicles. I
>>>>>> think this because people should generally be free and because people
>>>>>> have legitimately different needs that they most understand what are.
>>>>>> Someone who lives in the country and has to regularly deal with
>>>>>> unplowed
>>>>>> snow-covered roadway would need, say, an SUV. Someone who lives in
>>>>>> the
>>>>>> city might choose something else. It's all about choice.
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> Or might choose an SUV, as impractical as that is. But that's what
>>>>> the
>>>>> advertising people and the car salesmen want.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> If they pay the full cost of driving the SUV, it's no business of
>>>> yours.
>>>
>>>
>>> And how do we get anyone to do that?
>>
>> Environmental taxes on fuel would be one way. I personally favor
>> steeply progressive annual registration fees on high profile vehicles
>> like SUVs and vans, since one of the high, currently external costs of
>> the use of them is a degradation in visibility for other motorists.
>> Various schemes to charge higher costs for parking the things - they
>> require more room - might work.
>>
>> The point is, a simple ban is bad policy. If people want them and are
>> willing to pay the full cost, there's no reason they shouldn't have
>> them. Clintonistas like you, though, like to control people's lives.
>
> Let's see, the Earth has about 5 billion years till the Sun goes nova.
> There's an awful lot of opportunity costs involved in using up a gallon
> of gas with that future potential.

Not really.

Boy, you really are one shrill totalitarian, aren't you?


> Not to mention the cost of the
> environmental damage.

Calculable and capable of being internalized.


> I'm sure a fair price for a gallon of gas can be
> calculated. You might even be able to afford one.
>
> Oh, I'm far, far from being a Clintonista. Gosh, didn't he give you
> NAFTA?

Heh heh heh... Even the blind squirrel finds a nut
occasionally.

Rudy Canoza wrote:

> there is no such thing as "exploitation",

Oh really ?

Graham