tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4900303239154048192.post7473602050056520279..comments2024-03-06T06:34:42.881-05:00Comments on EconoSpeak: Obama and Shorter Working TimeUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4900303239154048192.post-28329708892086715412008-06-17T23:00:00.000-04:002008-06-17T23:00:00.000-04:00@E. Gandy:That blog isn't about "white culture." I...@E. Gandy:<BR/><BR/>That blog isn't about "white culture." It's about something like Progressive Yuppie White Culture. There is no such thing as purely white culture. Every culture shared by SOME white people is a type of white culture. It has an adjective in front of it. <BR/><BR/>Here's a better, more insightful blog than the one you mentioned; its writer often deals with this lack of a purely white culture:<BR/><BR/><A HREF="http://stuffwhitepeopledo.blogspot.com/" REL="nofollow">Stuff White People Do</A>Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4900303239154048192.post-46490267228522996102008-06-07T09:55:00.000-04:002008-06-07T09:55:00.000-04:00The issue of hours of work is not all that complic...The issue of hours of work is not all that complicated, and is, in my opinion, a no-brainer. The "core business" of government is the economy, and the president is the CEO. In no business would you find administrative costs absorbing 20-45 percent of the total value produced - shareholders would not stand for it.<BR/><BR/>Well, we are the shareholders of this "business," and it is silly we allow government to add such heavy costs to everything we buy domestically and everything we export overseas.<BR/><BR/>Shorter work time is, first, a policy aimed at reducing the heavy burden we all bear resulting from the vast expansion of government - a burden experienced each time we try to make a purchase or compete with low wage producers. (Who should be our customers, not our suppliers.)<BR/><BR/>I don't imagine Obama will realize this; there is just too much "noise" in the system from mainstream economists, pundits, soothsayers, and ossorted special interests.<BR/><BR/>If the only legacy this guy leaves is being the first black president, he will miss a much an opportunity here to elevate himself to the likes of Lincoln and FDR. (And, in his own way, Reagan - who identified government as the problem.)Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4900303239154048192.post-80738968224609970002008-06-05T14:09:00.000-04:002008-06-05T14:09:00.000-04:00My favorite along these lines is the "No poor man ...My favorite along these lines is the "No poor man ever gave me a job" defence of wealth. The notion of employment as gift is so wrong on so many levels. For one thing is implicitly concedes the power argument from the start.<BR/><BR/>And I would agree with e. gandy, there is indeed a white culture, or at least a white American culture, the problem is that cultural elites dismiss it as being lowbrow or kitsch and so assign no value to it as opposed to Irish pub music. I am not one to worship at the alter of small town White America, in a lot of cases that culture is a product of driving your best and brightest out leaving the bland behind but it is not any less real for all that. It is just hard to describe without coming off looking like a condescending coastie looking down over flyover country.Bruce Webbhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13222670342780912788noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4900303239154048192.post-86384792410042464422008-06-05T04:35:00.000-04:002008-06-05T04:35:00.000-04:00I've heard something along similar lines before. I...I've heard something along similar lines before. In most of the world there was Nobility, so the common people were far more open to ideas of getting their fair share and removing privileges. But in the US wealth redistribution was opposed because it could be so easily painted as favoring a black underclass.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4900303239154048192.post-4625507937275907822008-06-05T02:19:00.000-04:002008-06-05T02:19:00.000-04:00'There is no such thing as white culture. There's ...<I>'There is no such thing as white culture. There's Italian cooking, English theatre, Irish pub music and Dutch painting but no white culture"</I><BR/><BR/>There is a white culture: <BR/><BR/>http://www.stuffwhitepeoplelike.com<BR/><BR/>You're just so caught up in it that you can't see it, but it's there.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4900303239154048192.post-45185373132247092102008-06-04T18:12:00.000-04:002008-06-04T18:12:00.000-04:00Frederick Douglass analyzed the white working clas...Frederick Douglass analyzed the white working class ethic in his autobiography. His take was that the plantation owners fostered racism among the poor whites as way to distract them from the fact that they were in a no win situation.<BR/><BR/>As Douglass explained the working class whites could never compete against people who were being paid <B>nothing</B>. The residue of this still exists.<BR/><BR/>The other author who also understood the work dynamic was Max Weber in his book "The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism". He traced the idea that work was fulfilling back to Calvin and his ideas of salvation through work.<BR/><BR/>One of the ways to "solve" our employment problems would be to redefine how much work constitutes a job. There have been many attempts, the French lowered the workday down to 35 hours and shortened the days worked. Business hates this, but the public seems to like it.<BR/><BR/>A more utopian arrangement can be found in Edward Bellamy's novel "Looking Backward". His ideas were quite popular after the book came out, but he died before a lasting movement could get started. Basically he suggested everyone getting the same pay, but the more unpleasant the job the fewer hours needed to be worked to earn it. He also expected retirement after 20 years.Robert D Feinmanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11811511835460945217noreply@blogger.com