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Occupy Toronto (pg. 7)
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| nacarter |
I have little faith in these protesters inspiring change when they can't even accurately identify the "enemy". A Fortune 500 CEO is just some guy in a job who will be turfed the moment the stock dips 10 points. Yes he's paid a lot, but his job is no more secure (maybe even less) than anybody else.
What inspires this push for material wealth at a societal level? In America, you can point to the fact that 25-30% of the population believes that wealth is a blessing from God. The hardcore protesters (mostly anarchists and hard-left socialists) can't understand why their message can't hit critical mass. Well, what do you expect when you characterize the people whose hearts and minds you need to sway as irrational hayseeds who need to step out of the dark ages? If you characterized me that way, I'd tell you to off too.
When I worked as a lobbyist for EGALE, I spent a great deal of time talking with social conservatives. You can't fight a battle effectively unless you identify what the opposition finds fault with in your position. You use this information to build a counter-argument couched in their language, with imagery that they can indentify with. This legwork changed many opinions and led to a strong change of opinion in a relatively short period of time.
My point? You want to change the social consciousness, you need to use the tools that society gives you - not the ones you wish it had. You want to combat a society that touts Prospertiy Gospel as a source for social and economic policy, you need to counter it with the Social Gospel. As much as unions want to claim that they are the ones that built the social safetynet in the 20th century, a more thorough reading of history shows that most of these gains were the result of liberal minded clergy selling the message to the masses in the early part of the century. |
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| The Highroller |
Paul Krugman slams the 1% in America and their political enablers:
Here
For those wondering what people have to protest about in Canada
| quote: | Income inequality rising quickly in Canada
By TAVIA GRANT
Globe and Mail Blog
Conference Board of Canada says gap between rich and poor has been rising more rapidly in Canada than in the U.S. since the mid-1990s
The gap between the rich and the rest is growing ever wider - with the chasm increasing at a faster pace in Canada than in the United States.
That's the conclusion of a Conference Board of Canada study Tuesday, which says income inequality has been rising more rapidly in Canada than in the U.S. since the mid-1990s.
Its global analysis found that Canada has had the fourth-largest increase in income inequality among its peers. Between the mid-nineties and late 2000s, income inequality rose in 10 of 17 peer countries - including Canada. It remained unchanged in Japan and Norway, and declined in five countries.
"Even though the U.S. currently has the largest rich-poor income gap among these countries, the gap in Canada has been rising at a faster rate," noted Anne Golden, president and chief executive, adding that high inequality raises both "a moral question about fairness and can contribute to social tensions."
Of total world income, 42 per cent goes to those who make up the richest 10 per cent of the world's population, while 1 per cent goes to those who comprise the poorest 10 per cent, it says.
Tuesday's report landed on the same day the U.S. Census Bureau said the 46.2 million Americans in poverty last year was the largest in the 52 years that data has been published.
Countries with very high inequality are clustered in South America and southern Africa. Countries with low inequality are mostly in Europe. Canada and the U.S. have medium income inequality, the report says.
While plenty of prominent economists in the U.S., including Nobel Prize winner Joseph Stiglitz and University of Chicago professor Raghuram Rajan, have devoted much analysis to the growing income gap south of the border and its economic impact, the issue has not garnered much attention in Canada.
Today's report offers little explanation on why the income gap is growing more rapidly in Canada than elsewhere. Broadly, it says market forces and globalization are increasing disparity, along with institutional shifts such as dwindling unionization rates and stagnating minimum wages.
It also doesn't delve much into what's happened with the gap in recent years. Part of the challenge is finding solid statistics - national data on income levels is typically two years out of date. The most recent figures, for 2009, show Canadian poverty rates started to rise again in the recession after a decade of improvement.
Canada's income gap is a worry to several business leaders, as discussed in this story [http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news.../article2011940] I wrote with Anna Mehler Paperny in May.
A separate Conference Board report published in July showed the richest segment of Canadians increased their share of total national income while poor and middle-income individuals have lost ground since 1993.[/u]
The Conference Board uses a measure of income inequality called the Gini index. It calculates how the distribution of income deviates from a perfectly equal distribution. A Gini index of 0 means that every person in the society has the same amount of income while 1 would show that one person has all the income.
A country with low inequality has a Gini index of 0.3 or less while those above 0.4 point to a high-disparity country. Canada's Gini index hit 0.320 in the late 2000s from 0.293 in the mid-1990s. During the same period, the United States' Gini index rose to 0.378 from 0.361.
Income inequality, along with corruption, were named as the two most serious challenges facing the world at this year's World Economic Forum in Davos. |
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/repo...article2163938/
As you can see, income disparity is growing fast in Canada. Furthermore, the concentration of wealth among the rich is a global problem: a problem that people all around the world are getting fed up with. |
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| jon jon |
| quote: | Originally posted by The Highroller
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nice post, I was wondering if u were gonna post in this thread haha I also wasn't sure which side you were gonna be on :p |
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| Skipper |
| quote: | Originally posted by twentypercent
The banks should fail, just as people are allowed to fail.
It's called free markets.
Only when the big boys up, they want corporate socialism. |
People don't realize if the US banking system fails then we're looking at a second great depression. I'd characterize you as one of these people.
YES American financial institutions gambled and lost. YES they were bailed out after many people at the top got rich. But to allow them to go under would be catastrophic for absolutely everyone, including every single one of those people protesting.
I heard on the news that all but GM have paid back their bailouts. Can anyone confirm/deny? |
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| jon jon |
| quote: | Originally posted by The Highroller
Paul Krugman slams the 1% in America and their political enablers:
Here
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this is the best thing I've read so far on the subject, brilliant... |
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| Skipper |
| quote: | Originally posted by SPANIARD
I just want to add that not only is Chris Hedges 1000X smarter, braver, honest and courageous than someone like Kevin O'Leary, he's also not known for his economic critiques (his main writings are on religion and American foreign policy). It's so shameful that Kevin O'Leary can't even make a rebuttal on the most basic issues that are at hand when he is paid to talk about the economy on National TV and instead sticks to ad hominem attacks. Good on Hedges for not wanting to come back on because he is 100% right (sadly) about the 'Fox News' type treatment he recieved. |
He is paid to be controversial. In no way is he employed as a news reporter. CBC has stated this countless times.
Christ the Canadian audience is so hyper sensitive... "OMG HE CALLED SOMEONE A NUTBAR!!! SO OFFENSIVE!!! IMMA WRITE A COMPLAINT TO GET HIM FIRED!!"
I personally find him entertaining. Loved seeing him get shut down after all the he has dished out on air - it's all just entertainment. |
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| jon jon |
| who knows if any change will come about from these protests, but either way i'm sure the super rich are paying attention to this very closely, that would make me sleep less comfortably that's for sure... it's so wild to see history repeating itself |
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| jon jon |
| quote: | Originally posted by Skipper
He is paid to be controversial. In no way is he employed as a news reporter. CBC has stated this countless times.
Christ the Canadian audience is so hyper sensitive... "OMG HE CALLED SOMEONE A NUTBAR!!! SO OFFENSIVE!!! IMMA WRITE A COMPLAINT TO GET HIM FIRED!!"
I personally find him entertaining. Loved seeing him get shut down after all the he has dished out on air - it's all just entertainment. |
so true, I didn't see it that way at all
| quote: | Originally posted by Skipper
Christ the Canadian audience is so hyper sensitive... "OMG HE CALLED SOMEONE A NUTBAR!!! SO OFFENSIVE!!! IMMA WRITE A COMPLAINT TO GET HIM FIRED!!" |
lol!!!!!!!!!!!!! |
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| Skipper |
| quote: | Originally posted by jon jon
who knows if any change will come about from these protests, but either way i'm sure the super rich are paying attention to this very closely, that would make me sleep less comfortably that's for sure... it's so wild to see history repeating itself |
In the US, yes, the super rich are probably annoyed and nervous.
In Canada...I dunno. We have income disparity, but that's never going to go away. Nor should it. (There needs to be an incentive for higher education and harder work.) Highest earning Canadians pay the highest taxes, in both absolute dollars and percentage, and that contributes to the social benefits structure that many Canadians rely on. Everyone's got a beef about something but in Canada we have it pretty damn good.
(And I say this as an unemployed person! ;) ) |
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| Skipper |
| quote: | Originally posted by jon jon
so true, I didn't see it that way at all
lol!!!!!!!!!!!!! |
Yeah, the Lang & O'Leary Exchange is not meant to be a news broadcast. If you watch it regularly you know Amanda factually states what happened in the markets that day and then asks Kevin for his opinion. If you don't like his opinions you should watch CBC news and not a debate show.
How many times has Rick Mercer poked fun at all kinds of different countries/groups of people?
Kevin O'Leary on the euro crisis: "When are these people going to stop eating canapés and get to work?" lol. |
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| jon jon |
| quote: | Originally posted by DeleteFromUsers
I think the lack of specific demands is a feature, not an omission.
The Occupy movement is requesting a fundamental change in how people treat people, in my opinion. Such broad concepts will have thousands or millions of answers and will take generations to accomplish.
Removing the fiction of innate alliances - political and religious borders, for instance. The realization that every person, regardless of race, religion, etc. has the right to be safe and healthy and educated. To understand that those who are successful are not successful solely on their own merits and hard work but rather that their success is largely a product of the society in which they have become successful and that very society has the right to participate in that success.
These are enormous ideas which apply to every human on the face of this planet. The burdens of past prejudice and tribalism will forever cripple humanity's evolution if we continue on our current path. We must change. |
I've re-read this post like 400 times, it's really profound, at least to me... |
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