The Mentally Disabled State Of Texas (Loud And Clear)

Um... Unions are NOT the #1 killer of business...

Do you have ANY documentation showing that its even on the radar of what kills businesses?

Incorrect, this is why you people should stay the f*ck out of business.

Labor and energy are the biggest drivers of cost. Their both essentially the same thing, how much does it cost to do X unit of work. In countries where the cost of labor is low the cost of everything else is also low. In countries where the cost of labor is astronomical, the cost of everything else skyrockets. To be productive a society needs two things, cheap energy and cheap labor.

Just consider an industry and trace all it's costs, from the very bottom to the top. Energy and labor drive everything and act as cost multipliers.

I'm speaking from personal experience having lived in / around many countries where the cost of labor is low.

You can cry, scream and stamp and your feet in rage, but fact remains it's the biggest killer of business investment. Unions in their current form kill business's. Their a giant leach who's only goal is to suck profits out and redistribute it. This would be acceptable if they provided something of tangible worth. Some value added service. They provide none of that, hire a union employee and you must pay them high wages to sit on their *** all day while being unable to fire them for cause. Or do we even need to start talking about the teachers sitting in empty rooms for years while still collecting pay checks.

There is a huge reason the IT industry has adamantly refused to unionize.

This is to all the liberals who think their "owed a job". Screw you, you are not owed jack sh!t. Your not owed food, a roof over your head, money, a job, a family or a sunny day. You can not have your cake and eat it too. Life is competitive, you need to be competitive to succeed. Demanding that the government force business's to give you jobs even though you have zero desire to perform and enhance yourself is just asking those of us who do to subsidize your mediocrity.

Nothing boils my blood faster then a bunch of *** demanding I pay for their lifestyle while simultaneously demanding I bow to their political religion. College educations do not entitle you to a good paying job.

You want success? Go f*cking earn it yourself.

1. Europe is a continent
2. EU is comprised of 28 countries, 23 use the Euro.
3. Ireland was the free market enthusiasts prodigal child before 2007 and Sweden was proclaimed as a disaster waiting to happen. Which country is doing better today?
4. You are talking out of your *** about the military infrastructure in the EU. I guess all those troops and nations supporting the US troops in their various military actions don't exist.
5. The pure capitalist market does not work empirically. There must be checks and balances between politicians, businesses, and regulations.
6. There needs to still be regulation and I'm baffled as to why people says that is not needed today. 2007 we had pets dying from contaminated food and lead paint on children's toys. Are there some regulations that are stupid? Absolutely. Does that mean they all should go away? No.

None of the people you're addressing have said or implied anything even in the ballpark of this. You sound like a kid screaming in the toystore because he thinks he earned his ninja turtle more than the other kids.

Here take your anger out on this guy:

This guy.

Bull.

I guess you are not familiar with H1B1 visas. You know those visa's that are given to foreign workers who have the "right" skills that companies in the US can't find, oh, and they work super cheap. Yes, those leaked documents where CEO's detail how to avoid hiring US workers, those don't exist.

I guess you are not familiar with the law that was passed in Congress in 20061990 that stripped overtime protection away from people who "work with computers".



edit:
Saevel most of what you just said is a Texas longhorn
a point here, a point there
nothing but bull in between

To be fair one is a fixed salary and generally fixed salary employees don't get overtime unless its worked into the arrangement. At least in exempted industries, which computer analysts are far from the only ones.

Unless you are one of the industries/jobs where overtime pay is not allowed (from amending the Fair Labor Standards Act), that is not true. Or you opt out in your contract, but I'm not sure about how that works

Fair Labor Standards Act

Edited above. Edit And from what I'm reading, salaried employees with overtime are the exception rather than the rule. Edit2 the whole system is somewhat convoluted.

Please don't even try. The Military's there are little more then honor guards. They don't have any tactical nor strategic capability to speak of and would get railroaded in any modern force on force engagement. Lots of bluff and bluster, no actual substance. The USA needs to unilaterally dispense with all the defense agreements of that region, I'd even strongly consider removing itself from the UN. No need to pay obscene amounts of money developing and maintaining a capable world class military only to have the very people you built it for snub their nose at you.



We never disputed this. Liberals do not want checks and balances, they want free handouts and wealth redistribution. Case in point, the ridiculous desire to have companies owe you a permanent job-for-life.


Again nobody is saying remove all regulations, merely remove the politics from the current regulatory arms. There are more insane regulations then sane ones. This is what happens when you create a bureaucratic entity and don't place oversight limitations on it. It grows and grows and ever seeks to acquire more power and grow more.

Your point about Ireland is hilarious. You do realize the vast majority of the worlds wealth is funneled through there? The people don't see a dime of it of course, it's all about shell companies and other tax evasion schemes. Irish shell business's are the most profitable in the world.

At the end of the day the entitlement mentality is out of control. Everyone is thinking their owed something for the grand accomplishment of popping out of their mothers womb. Can't get a job? Give me more government money. Made a bad decision and got pregnant in school, give me more government money. Made a bad career choice or utter lack of one, give me more government money.

That money must come from somewhere. Someone must be paying for it. The ones paying are the ones who made smart choices even if they were unpopular with their peer groups at the time. The ones who busted their ***'s off and become successful. This liberal fantasy of a bunch of white upper-class people having all this money that needs to be taken is just that, a fantasy.

This is hardly true even if you discount france and britain which are classified as global military powers.
Not every liberal wants a contracted job for life. Not every union provides one.

The act was amended in 2004 to include more "lower" management for most industries. There are also several class action lawsuits pending and some where defendants have been awarded.

Overtime bill pits needs of high-tech employers vs. workers

You have no idea what you are talking about. Do research because I do know what I am talking about and what you are saying is crap.

Seriously?
As stated before, lets assume equal competence or productivity.

Lets take a simple case, and look at clothing, with two workers. Both workers make 100 units/hour. Worker A gets $1/hr, B gets $10/hr.
Labor, Price/unit, production (A): $0.01
Labor, Price/unit, production (B): $0.10
Paying the worker 10USD vs 1USD results in a price increase of 0.09USD.
Now, lets say that for whatever reason (lets say a region known for producing cotton has a fire/earthquake/tsunami/hurricane/flood/crop blight/insects/war), the material cost increases by the same factor. We'll assume a base material cost of $1/unit. and call the cases C, D.
Material, price/unit, production (C): $1
Material, price/unit, production (D): $10
Per unit price has increased by 9USD.

Labor and energy are the only two factors driving everything?

Keep trying, your failing pretty badly here.

Your misinterpreted the fair labor act. We're not entitled to the OT multiplier but still paid for work delivered. I work 48 hours in a work week then I'm paid for those extra 8 hours. I know this because there are times when I'll put in 60~80 hours in a week for a hot project, and paid for all of them at standard rate.

I'm well familiar with H1B1 visa's. Welcome to globalization, your competition is everyone in the world. And BTW H1B1 folk aren't "cheap", they just don't come with the overinflated sense of entitlements. Their also the drive through cashiers of the IT industry. Essentially the bottom rung of workers with the minimum skill sets required to perform the basic jobs. Most are just key pounders (IT wise) hired for bulk coding. The only people who should be worried about them are folks with no real IT skills or hobbies.

Please continue trying to explain my own industry to me, the ignorance is fun to watch.

The reason the IT industry has resisted unionization is that it places a cap on individual progression. Careers in the industry are made by working your *** off during off-time, building your own labs and conduction your own side projects. You can not expect your company to teach you about your next job, you need to do that on your own. Maintaining knowledge and skill proficiency of current and upcoming technologies is the responsibility of the individual. The most important question I ask when interviewing potential hires is what side projects and research they work on during personal time. It trumps all certifications and past work experience as it tells me how much effort they put into learning new things. A union would utterly destroy all that, it would create a work environment of seniority not accomplishments & capability.

Lower management in those industry already awarded overtime though. It's expanding the scope within the industrys that already pay it. The lawsuits, per the article, are attempts at clarifying aspects of outdated law.

I kinda work with the various members of the UN Military. Their crap, way to small and nearly zero capability. Right now your national pride is showing more then anything.

I don't get what you're saying. Kara said you were exempted from OT multiplier, which is what you just confirmed? OT is a separate issue for salary versus hourly. You can receive OT pay in either case, depending on a number of factors.

Ireland =/= businesses
Ireland = its citizens

Read up on the 1880-1920 timeline in the USA, you really have no idea what unchecked capitalism is.

I put myself through college, working and going to school FULL-TIME and built a successful small business. My clientel dried up almost instantly when the housing market crashed. You could argue I was getting paid out of the pot of dirty money from the housing bubble, but I built cars, it was just coincidence that many of may patrons were in the housing market. I then had to take one of those amazing Bush era "trickle down economics" jobs just to pay the bills.

I've seen both ends of the spectrum of capitalism, get out and see the world, you have a lot of opinions with very little experience or fact behind them.

More liberal hamstering.

IE:


You read one thing and mentally inserted more to justify your position. Labor and Energy are the two greatest drivers of cost, essentially their the same thing though. Look long and hard at manufacturing and construction costs. Materials is nothing compared to labor / energy. And service sector is pretty much just labor / energy.

You took a risk and got burned, welcome to the world. Did you think you would be 100% guaranteed work for the rest of your life? Most small business's fail, most successful business's are run by people who failed many small business's first. Or did you quit after the first go around?

The raw level of entitlement coming from you guys is just insane. It's like you expect everything to just come to you and then demand government protections. Anyone who argues otherwise just has you practice cognitive dissonance and alter everything they say such that it agrees with your view of the world. (I never argued for unchecked capitalism btw, that's 100% you guys).

This discussion is why I can't stand liberals. All you do is circle jerk about things.

By the way, the Millennium Challenge 2002 says hi.

Do any other of the individual nations have the same capabilities of the US? No. Do they need to? That is a different question. Also, remember EU != UN. Are EU forces being reduced beyond feasible limits? Possibly, depending on what is considered necessary, and the threats they need to confront individually.

It was merely an example of how someone with an earned education and intelligently built business can get screwed by a corrupt and unchecked system. Guess what, I didn't go cry for a handout, I took a job and stuck with it.

You're the one saying that unions are the main killer of businesses and that government regulations are evil, etc. You haven't advocated any amount of oversight in any of your arguements.

AND once again, I'm not a liberal. I have conservative stances on virutally every aspect of politics. What I am is a pragmatist.

Ok you guys have no idea what a military is for. It's to protect your country from an invading one. The last major test of European Military had all of you fail so miserably that you had to beg the USA to defend you from an aggressor not once but twice. And yes beg is the operative word to use here.

A country should always be capable of defending itself from foreign aggressors. It's not a question of if but when someone decides their the next incarnation of Alexander the Great and goes about the process of creating another empire. The only way to prevent this is to ensure those would-be-emperors have no feasible way to create their empire. Having a paper tiger military isn't going to do that. Just ask the Kuwaitis & Sauds how that feels.

Right now everyone is banking on being protected by the US Military should any other nation become aggressive (Gulf War being the most recent example). They've long since reduced their military to laughable paper standards. What little tactical capability they possess is overshadowed by the utter lack of strategic assets and capability. A serious military would steamroll right through Europe. Your various national leaders know this, that is why they pursue mutual defense agreements with the USA, agreements were their not really adding anything of value. Free usage of airspace is pretty much all the US gets out of those agreements btw.

This is why I'm 100% behind removing all mutual defense agreements of the European nations and pretty much ignoring that entire continent. No need to subsidize that entire region.

If I have a production run of a million units, the NRE and production labor cost is insignificant compared to the material cost. That's why you can spend hundreds of man-hours optimizing designs for cost and production streamlining. If you have a production run of a dozen or so units, then you have nothing to distribute the NRE costs among, and labor drives the particular balance. I can't think of anything at the moment apart from IT service sector or raw material/component fabrication where energy plays more than a fractional part, and again is usually able to be distributed among products.

So no, the answer is that it simply @#$*king depends, just like most other things in life.

If you don't have a physical product to distribute (i.e. books, software, financial instruments), then you could argue that labor and energy are the two driving factors.