Re: The Most Serious [x] Problem We Face Today
For conservatives, the term is the point.
For conservatives, the term is the point.
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The Most Serious [x] Problem We Face Today
- Thread starter FreshFish
- Start date
Re: The Most Serious [x] Problem We Face Today
Not quite.... for "religious" or "social" conservatives, the term does matter; however, for libertarian conservatives, economic conservatives, Constitutional conservatives, they really don't care much one way or the other, since it is a state issue not a federal one and a personal issue of conscience not a governmental one.
Not quite.... for "religious" or "social" conservatives, the term does matter; however, for libertarian conservatives, economic conservatives, Constitutional conservatives, they really don't care much one way or the other, since it is a state issue not a federal one and a personal issue of conscience not a governmental one.
Re: The Most Serious [x] Problem We Face Today
Then Marriage is for everyone...and 'religious unions' will be just for men/women.
That probably wouldn't fly with 90 percent of the overall right who is currently against it.
Then Marriage is for everyone...and 'religious unions' will be just for men/women.
That probably wouldn't fly with 90 percent of the overall right who is currently against it.
ScoobyDoo
NPC
Re: The Most Serious [x] Problem We Face Today
There are plenty of religious organizations that will marry you if you are Gay or Lesbian.
There are plenty of religious organizations that will marry you if you are Gay or Lesbian.
Re: The Most Serious [x] Problem We Face Today
If your all up in arms about homosexual marriage do what a lot of Europe does -- you have a civil ceremony on day 1 and a religious ceremony on day 2.
I believe right now the State says you may either have a civil person or a religious person perform the ceremony. Drop the religious as an option. Those who wish to get married in the Church can, but it won't matter on the tax form.
I'm still not in favor of homosexual marriage because I think its morally wrong. But there is wiggle room for the bankrupt if they want to be creative.
If your all up in arms about homosexual marriage do what a lot of Europe does -- you have a civil ceremony on day 1 and a religious ceremony on day 2.
I believe right now the State says you may either have a civil person or a religious person perform the ceremony. Drop the religious as an option. Those who wish to get married in the Church can, but it won't matter on the tax form.
I'm still not in favor of homosexual marriage because I think its morally wrong. But there is wiggle room for the bankrupt if they want to be creative.
bronconick
Yep, still here
Re: The Most Serious [x] Problem We Face Today
I know the first two dozen posts in this thread were pretty much a series of jokes about what the
"real" issue is, but there's something seriously sad that the last dozen or so posts in this titled thread are about farking gay marriage.
I know the first two dozen posts in this thread were pretty much a series of jokes about what the
"real" issue is, but there's something seriously sad that the last dozen or so posts in this titled thread are about farking gay marriage.
Re: The Most Serious [x] Problem We Face Today
I think the most serious (x) problem is when they say, solve for (x) and then they won't tell you what it is. That sucks.
I think the most serious (x) problem is when they say, solve for (x) and then they won't tell you what it is. That sucks.
bigblue_dl
Armed
Re: The Most Serious [x] Problem We Face Today
Even though I commented on the topic, I agree completely. Gay marriage is a trivial issues compared to many of the others, that there is no way to justify the government wasting time on it.
Re: The Most Serious [x] Problem We Face Today
Agreed. The government shouldn't spend all this time catering to such special interest groups. If the nation goes bankrupt, stuff like this will be like rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.
Re: The Most Serious [x] Problem We Face Today
The answer key is in the back of the book you dummy!
The answer key is in the back of the book you dummy!
Kepler
Si certus es dubita
Re: The Most Serious [x] Problem We Face Today
earlier, jokingly, I had said that "the most serious infrastructure problem we face today is that politicians cannot name repairs and upkeep after themselves, and so necessary maintenance budgets are starved so unnecessary showy projects can be built instead."
I saw an article the other day about electrical companies planning for service disruptions that could easily be caused by a major solar storm in 2013. It reminded me of how vulnerable we've become to infrastructure disruptions that result from too much centralization. We now have an integrated power grid, except that anyone who understands wave equations will tell you how unstable these grids can be...a small local disruption easily can cascade into system-wide instability under the "right" conditions.
Much of this danger could be ameliorated if we were not so centralized. The centralization is good for a system in which we have big generators in a few places; but we seem to want to move away from that model ("coal is bad, don't burn it!" "nuclear is dangerous, don't use it!"). Green energy is not conducive to a centralized grid structure (hydro works great where you have dams, geo is great if you have local vulcanism, etc.). Solar in particular works best on a small-scale local basis.
We have a big economic conflict over solar, since a few players want to control everything in an integrated top-down manner, while what works best in practice is a dispersed group of local contractors with local installations.
earlier, jokingly, I had said that "the most serious infrastructure problem we face today is that politicians cannot name repairs and upkeep after themselves, and so necessary maintenance budgets are starved so unnecessary showy projects can be built instead."
I saw an article the other day about electrical companies planning for service disruptions that could easily be caused by a major solar storm in 2013. It reminded me of how vulnerable we've become to infrastructure disruptions that result from too much centralization. We now have an integrated power grid, except that anyone who understands wave equations will tell you how unstable these grids can be...a small local disruption easily can cascade into system-wide instability under the "right" conditions.
Much of this danger could be ameliorated if we were not so centralized. The centralization is good for a system in which we have big generators in a few places; but we seem to want to move away from that model ("coal is bad, don't burn it!" "nuclear is dangerous, don't use it!"). Green energy is not conducive to a centralized grid structure (hydro works great where you have dams, geo is great if you have local vulcanism, etc.). Solar in particular works best on a small-scale local basis.
We have a big economic conflict over solar, since a few players want to control everything in an integrated top-down manner, while what works best in practice is a dispersed group of local contractors with local installations.
Re: The Most Serious [x] Problem We Face Today
The most serious employment problem we face today:
Where have all the workers gone?
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB100...18.html?mod=WSJ_hp_MIDDLENexttoWhatsNewsThird
If we had not lost those 5 million workers somewhere, then the unemployment rate would be substantially higher than the reported 8.2%.
The most serious employment problem we face today:
Where have all the workers gone?
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB100...18.html?mod=WSJ_hp_MIDDLENexttoWhatsNewsThird
If we had not lost those 5 million workers somewhere, then the unemployment rate would be substantially higher than the reported 8.2%.
bronconick
Yep, still here
Re: The Most Serious [x] Problem We Face Today
What's the number between 16 and 62? 65? 67? Is that up or down? We're hitting the front edge of the boomer retirement wave. 16 and up to infinity is an absolutely asinine way to estimate workers.
What's the number between 16 and 62? 65? 67? Is that up or down? We're hitting the front edge of the boomer retirement wave. 16 and up to infinity is an absolutely asinine way to estimate workers.
St. Clown
Ideas Posted are Likely Not My Own
Re: The Most Serious [x] Problem We Face Today
If we're not adding more than ~150,000 jobs/month, and the unemployment rate drops, you know people are dropping out of the workforce. At current population growth rates, we need at least 150,000 new jobs created each month in order to maintain current U rates when workforce participation rates remain flat.
I've long been an advocate that two numbers should be reported upon in each news article when unemployment rates are in the news. First is the unemployment rate, and second is the workforce participation rate. Then the reported could add some canned text explaining the difference between the two.
If we're not adding more than ~150,000 jobs/month, and the unemployment rate drops, you know people are dropping out of the workforce. At current population growth rates, we need at least 150,000 new jobs created each month in order to maintain current U rates when workforce participation rates remain flat.
Re: The Most Serious [x] Problem We Face Today
The statistic cited was over only the last two years.
also, I did not realize when I posted the link that one had to have a subscription to read the entire article. My bad, sorry.
Retirement was one of the possible causes they mentioned, before they then went on to note that 5.4 million retirees over a two year period is a very high number....it probably does explain part of the discrepancy but not the majority of it.
The statistic cited was over only the last two years.
also, I did not realize when I posted the link that one had to have a subscription to read the entire article. My bad, sorry.
Retirement was one of the possible causes they mentioned, before they then went on to note that 5.4 million retirees over a two year period is a very high number....it probably does explain part of the discrepancy but not the majority of it.
MinnesotaNorthStar
Minding the gap
Re: The Most Serious [x] Problem We Face Today
Only the odds and the teacher assigned only evens!!!! What was she thinking?
Re: The Most Serious [x] Problem We Face Today
In another thread I suggested that a particular economic condition that is receiving some attention in the news may not even be as big a problem as it's made out to be, and whatever kind of problem it is, it's not one of the ten most serious ones we face. Naturally I was then challenged to name my top ten...
! *
OK, so for a "serious" problem, I'm going to suggest two components: severity and likelihood. Collision of the earth with a giant comet would be extremely severe and highly unlikely; a flu epidemic would be highly likely and probably not severe enough to crack the top ten.
I don't have a formula, I'm scoring on gut reaction. Also, I reserve the right to change my list whenever I see a good suggestion from someone else...
after all, if you steal from one person it's plagiarism, if you steal from ten people, it's research!
So, my # 1 most serious problem is a bit abstruse and yet both fairly likely and highly severe: the paucity of capital around the world relative to the commitments it is called upon to honor (in other words, the international financial crisis, described in functional terms).
Premise A: world-wide, peoples' well-being is highly dependent on international trade (the parts to everything we use come from different places, people!)
Premise B: international trade is highly dependent upon the international financial system (people need to get paid!)
Objective fact: the international financial system is founded upon capital reserves.
Sounds pretty abstract....the entire international financial system is based upon a concept called fractional reserve banking. In other words, because most of the time a significant amount of the world's money supply is in circulation, financial institutions are required to back the totality of their "book" of obligations with only a fraction of that amount in reserve capital (it's this structure that makes a "run on the bank" so lethal). Typically, the ratio is around 20:3 or maybe 4:1.
So if the value of the world's capital held in reserves is reduced by 0.5%, the cumulative amount of commitments "backstopped" by that reserve capital is reduced by 2.0%. Most of the time, because most problems have been local, there's been enough resilience world-wide that we could ride through rough patches (also, and not so long ago, the proportion of the entire supply of capital commited to reserves was lower than the the proportion of the entire supply of capital committed to reserves today. if more reserves were needed, and the "price" offered was high enough, additional capital would step forward to "beef up" the reserves: see Buffet's investment in Goldman in the middle of the crisis). Set aside the math for a moment,and think of a pantograph: a small motion in one part becomes a substantially larger motion in another part (okay, maybe that's too obscure, too...<shrug>)
Anyway, the LIBOR "scandal" merely means that banks in 2007-2008 were uneasy about the solvency of other banks, which suggests that the source of their uneasiness might be inside knowledge of how close they themselves came to the brink...
This problem has receded but by no means is solved. The situation is exacerbated by the politics: all markets want to do is settle on a price. As long as politicians keep proposing gimmicks, then accurate pricing becomes well-nigh impossible, because politicians, from the markets' perspective, by their nature are irrational and unpredictible.
This has the potential to be severe, and the likelihood is scarily high.
Fortunately, this problem can be solved with honesty and resolute willpower: provide stability and accurate information, step out of the way, allow markets to price the results appropriately, and move on from there.
* which means one of my most serious problems right now is my tendency toward hyperbole when I get passionate, and the respondant tendency of others to then take me literally and challenge me to support my assertion....
In another thread I suggested that a particular economic condition that is receiving some attention in the news may not even be as big a problem as it's made out to be, and whatever kind of problem it is, it's not one of the ten most serious ones we face. Naturally I was then challenged to name my top ten...
! *OK, so for a "serious" problem, I'm going to suggest two components: severity and likelihood. Collision of the earth with a giant comet would be extremely severe and highly unlikely; a flu epidemic would be highly likely and probably not severe enough to crack the top ten.
I don't have a formula, I'm scoring on gut reaction. Also, I reserve the right to change my list whenever I see a good suggestion from someone else...
after all, if you steal from one person it's plagiarism, if you steal from ten people, it's research!So, my # 1 most serious problem is a bit abstruse and yet both fairly likely and highly severe: the paucity of capital around the world relative to the commitments it is called upon to honor (in other words, the international financial crisis, described in functional terms).
Premise A: world-wide, peoples' well-being is highly dependent on international trade (the parts to everything we use come from different places, people!)
Premise B: international trade is highly dependent upon the international financial system (people need to get paid!)
Objective fact: the international financial system is founded upon capital reserves.
Sounds pretty abstract....the entire international financial system is based upon a concept called fractional reserve banking. In other words, because most of the time a significant amount of the world's money supply is in circulation, financial institutions are required to back the totality of their "book" of obligations with only a fraction of that amount in reserve capital (it's this structure that makes a "run on the bank" so lethal). Typically, the ratio is around 20:3 or maybe 4:1.
So if the value of the world's capital held in reserves is reduced by 0.5%, the cumulative amount of commitments "backstopped" by that reserve capital is reduced by 2.0%. Most of the time, because most problems have been local, there's been enough resilience world-wide that we could ride through rough patches (also, and not so long ago, the proportion of the entire supply of capital commited to reserves was lower than the the proportion of the entire supply of capital committed to reserves today. if more reserves were needed, and the "price" offered was high enough, additional capital would step forward to "beef up" the reserves: see Buffet's investment in Goldman in the middle of the crisis). Set aside the math for a moment,and think of a pantograph: a small motion in one part becomes a substantially larger motion in another part (okay, maybe that's too obscure, too...<shrug>)
Anyway, the LIBOR "scandal" merely means that banks in 2007-2008 were uneasy about the solvency of other banks, which suggests that the source of their uneasiness might be inside knowledge of how close they themselves came to the brink...
This problem has receded but by no means is solved. The situation is exacerbated by the politics: all markets want to do is settle on a price. As long as politicians keep proposing gimmicks, then accurate pricing becomes well-nigh impossible, because politicians, from the markets' perspective, by their nature are irrational and unpredictible.
This has the potential to be severe, and the likelihood is scarily high.
Fortunately, this problem can be solved with honesty and resolute willpower: provide stability and accurate information, step out of the way, allow markets to price the results appropriately, and move on from there.
* which means one of my most serious problems right now is my tendency toward hyperbole when I get passionate, and the respondant tendency of others to then take me literally and challenge me to support my assertion....
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MountieBoyOz
Eater of Worlds
Re: The Most Serious [x] Problem We Face Today
I'll take a shot at this.
In seriousness, I think it's the general lack of civility we have towards each other when people have opposing viewpoints. It used to be that we could agree to disagree, but get on with helping and building a strong community. Nowadays, if someone says I don't agree with a point of view, they are called Un-American. (Both sides are guilty.) I recently saw a debate in one of the Houses in the UK and they were just ripping into each other's points about policy. However, I find a pic later on of the two sharing a pint. We don't compromise anymore and that's what I thought was pretty American about us. If we were this pigheaded back then, we'd still be arguing about how many houses of Congress there should be and how many reps we all get.
I'll take a shot at this.
In seriousness, I think it's the general lack of civility we have towards each other when people have opposing viewpoints. It used to be that we could agree to disagree, but get on with helping and building a strong community. Nowadays, if someone says I don't agree with a point of view, they are called Un-American. (Both sides are guilty.) I recently saw a debate in one of the Houses in the UK and they were just ripping into each other's points about policy. However, I find a pic later on of the two sharing a pint. We don't compromise anymore and that's what I thought was pretty American about us. If we were this pigheaded back then, we'd still be arguing about how many houses of Congress there should be and how many reps we all get.
Re: The Most Serious [x] Problem We Face Today
So my # 2 and # 4 "most serious" on the Top Ten list are distinct yet related:
# 2: "terrorism by fanatics". I want to offer this as a pretty wide-ranging category. Basically, it is any person or group willing and able to use explosives, biological weapons, chemical weapons, or nuclear weapons, indiscriminately.
# 4: all-out cyberwarfare. I'm talking sustained, serious, co-ordinated, wide-ranging attacks back and forth that entirely disable the internet, government vs government, probably conducted by proxies for plausible deniability.
(why oh why oh why did the US own up to Stuxnet???? stupid stupid stupid!!!!
)
So my # 2 and # 4 "most serious" on the Top Ten list are distinct yet related:
# 2: "terrorism by fanatics". I want to offer this as a pretty wide-ranging category. Basically, it is any person or group willing and able to use explosives, biological weapons, chemical weapons, or nuclear weapons, indiscriminately.
# 4: all-out cyberwarfare. I'm talking sustained, serious, co-ordinated, wide-ranging attacks back and forth that entirely disable the internet, government vs government, probably conducted by proxies for plausible deniability.
(why oh why oh why did the US own up to Stuxnet???? stupid stupid stupid!!!!
)