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  1. #81
    Quote Originally Posted by Dacien View Post
    I don't think the problem is business-minded people in government, though, as RAWRF suggests. I think the problem is intrinsic to government, that the money they collect is not earned the same way you or I earn money, or as a business does. Most of us are careful with our money because we had to work for it. We've seen time and time again the results of dumping millions of dollars into the hands of politicians. Bridge to Nowhere comes to mind. Less well-known examples are everywhere. Supervisors blowing hundreds of thousands on their Facebook pages (*cough* Zev Yaroslavsky *cough) may not seem like a lot, but when you add it all up, it makes a big difference. Like raid buffs.
    Yeah and private businesses never waste money.

    That's why a starbucks opened across the street from another one in my town before closing a week later.

  2. #82
    Deleted
    Can't believe people are defending this.. I'm speechless..

  3. #83
    Quote Originally Posted by Wells View Post
    Yeah and private businesses never waste money.

    That's why a starbucks opened across the street from another one in my town before closing a week later.
    Well as I've said, that's their money to do with as they please. They're only accountable to themselves. Government is accountable to us. Well, they're supposed to be.

  4. #84
    Quote Originally Posted by Dacien View Post
    Well as I've said, that's their money to do with as they please. They're only accountable to themselves. Government is accountable to us. Well, they're supposed to be.
    Waste is the inevitable by-product of any human endeavor. That doesn't mean we can't try to cut back on it or take measures to counter it, we should, but we should stop getting our panties in a wad or acting like its some horror unique to government.

  5. #85
    Old God endersblade's Avatar
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    And then they go and do something like this.

    I was friends with the supp-O on one of the ships I went out on when I was in the Navy. He used to let me giggle over their supply requests. $3,000 for a hinge for a toilet? Really? That thing better be made of solid freaking gold. $100 for a shower curtain? Fo' real yo?

    When the equipment I worked with would break, instead of putting in a req form, we'd just go to radio shack, drop $3,000 or so, and save the Navy about 15-20 grand.

  6. #86
    Quote Originally Posted by Wells View Post
    Waste is the inevitable by-product of any human endeavor. That doesn't mean we can't try to cut back on it or take measures to counter it, we should, but we should stop getting our panties in a wad or acting like its some horror unique to government.
    That it isn't is irrelevant to me. It's only my business when we're talking about government. I don't like looking at lost dollars in my paycheck, so they damn well better be doing something good with that money.
    Last edited by Dacien; 2011-09-22 at 09:58 PM.

  7. #87
    Quote Originally Posted by Dacien View Post
    That it isn't is irrelevant to me. It's only my business until we're talking about government. I don't like looking at lost dollars in my paycheck, so they damn well better be doing something good with that money.
    Well most of your paycheck reductions aren't for taxes that pay for this kind of thing anyway.

  8. #88
    Deleted
    Quote Originally Posted by Wells View Post
    Yeah and private businesses never waste money.

    That's why a starbucks opened across the street from another one in my town before closing a week later.
    If a private business wastes money, it most likely means that some corporate fatcat is less a couple thousand dollars. When government does it, it's from the taxpayers.

    If the private business is too wasteful, it'll go out of business. The government has no competition, except other governments.

  9. #89
    Quote Originally Posted by Diurdi View Post
    If a private business wastes money, it most likely means that some corporate fatcat is less a couple thousand dollars. When government does it, it's from the taxpayers.
    Waste is waste, if you think the workers don't suffer from corporate waste you've probably never held a job.

    Hell those corporate fat cats are in all likelihood the least effected by waste, as they tend to enjoy rather cushy contracts.

  10. #90
    Deleted
    Quote Originally Posted by Wells View Post
    Waste is waste, if you think the workers don't suffer from corporate waste you've probably never held a job.
    Hell those corporate fat cats are in all likelihood the least effected by waste, as they tend to enjoy rather cushy contracts.
    Yes, the employee may also suffer if the corporation wastes itself towards bankrupcy. He may get unemployed. So what? New corporation, that is more efficient comes along and hires him up.

    The consumer/customer is the biggest winner.

    In b4 Wells is against survival of the fittest amongst companies.

  11. #91
    we should go back old school and do like we did to get out of the great depression

    have the government higher the unemployed people to build massive projects so they have money to spend, and let it circulate the economy, but 14 trillion is a hell of alot of spending lol

  12. #92
    Quote Originally Posted by Diurdi View Post
    Yes, the employee may also suffer if the corporation wastes itself towards bankrupcy. He may get unemployed. So what? New corporation, that is more efficient comes along and hires him up.

    The consumer/customer is the biggest winner.

    In b4 Wells is against survival of the fittest amongst companies.
    Nice attempt at shifting the point. Every group of humans creates waste. Starbucks is no different from the federal government. When a developer in my home town decided he didn't want to finish work on a new mega store because the city wouldn't change a road at public expense for him he boarded it up and left a huge plywood box in the middle of a dirt field. In the dead center of town. Property values tanked to the point where the entire area was blighted.

    His company is still going and the box is still there, mostly covered in spray paint now. Waste happens everywhere, but conservatives get this ridiculous double standard going on.

  13. #93
    Deleted
    Quote Originally Posted by Wells View Post
    Nice attempt at shifting the point. Every group of humans creates waste. Starbucks is no different from the federal government. When a developer in my home town decided he didn't want to finish work on a new mega store because the city wouldn't change a road at public expense for him he boarded it up and left a huge plywood box in the middle of a dirt field. In the dead center of town. Property values tanked to the point where the entire area was blighted.

    His company is still going and the box is still there, mostly covered in spray paint now. Waste happens everywhere, but conservatives get this ridiculous double standard going on.
    So this developer made an investment mistake. He poured alot of resources in vain. Shit happens, he's the one who took the hit. I have a hard time believing that made property values tank rofl. The funny thing is that the low FED interest rates probably made him start the project.

    Also, Starbucks is way different from the Federal Government. If Starbucks wastes money, starbucks suffers. Competitors eat up starbucks and the consumer wins. If Govt. wastes money, the Taxpayer suffers. No one can really do anything about it and the people lose.

  14. #94
    The whole "$16 per muffin" thing is nothing more than a myth.

    http://motherjones.com/kevin-drum/20...ar-muffin-myth

    It happens everywhere at any conference. So really, this is nothing more than a non-issue.

  15. #95
    So this developer made an investment mistake. He poured alot of resources in vain. Shit happens, he's the one who took the hit.
    You must have stopped reading my anecdote half way through. His stupidity and spite had a direct monetary impact on hundreds of people around his project.

    The funny thing is that the low FED interest rates probably made him start the project.
    Nope, this was well before that, but I really do admire your willingness to bend over backwards to blame the government. They really did force him to start the project.

    If Starbucks wastes money, starbucks suffers. Competitors eat up starbucks and the consumer wins
    or.....starbucks wastes money and then eats the loss and lives to waste another day.

    If Govt. wastes money, the Taxpayer suffers. No one can really do anything about it and the people lose.
    not sure what authoritarian hell hole you think the US to be.

  16. #96
    The Lightbringer Arganis's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Dacien View Post
    Because it's indicative of a financially irresponsible mentality, which in these times is quite worrying. It's not like it's any surprise, but the spotlight needs to be shone upon things like this.

    ---------- Post added 2011-09-21 at 03:09 PM ----------



    Because it's my money they took that they're wasting.
    If only $16 was the worst of it...

    The problem here isn't financial irresponsibility, it's the system itself. It isn't working and the financial crisis is just a symptom.
    Facilis Descensus Averno

  17. #97
    Deleted
    Quote Originally Posted by Wells View Post
    You must have stopped reading my anecdote half way through. His stupidity and spite had a direct monetary impact on hundreds of people around his project.
    Whatever you do in an economy, it has monetary impacts on people. That's because the value of your property is not something objective but the combined information of hundreds to millions of subjective values.

    Quote Originally Posted by Wells
    Nope, this was well before that, but I really do admire your willingness to bend over backwards to blame the government. They really did force him to start the project.
    FED has had low interest rates long before that. And ofcourse no one forced him. But with low FED interest rates, a project will appear to be profitable, when in the long run it's not.

    Quote Originally Posted by Wells
    or.....starbucks wastes money and then eats the loss and lives to waste another day.
    Oh god, you don't understand anything about competition do you?

    Quote Originally Posted by Wells
    not sure what authoritarian hell hole you think the US to be.
    For some reason govt. keeps wasting more and more money regardless of what people say.

  18. #98
    Quote Originally Posted by Dacien View Post
    http://www.washingtonpost.com/politi...hiK_story.html

    $16 Muffins
    $10 Cookies
    $5 per Swedish Meatball

    For every one of these examples, how many are unknown? When people talk about government inefficiency and waste, this is a good example of what they mean. It isn't government's own money, so they aren't compelled to spend wisely.

    When operatives stay in other countries they stay in 5-star hotels and buy $15 cans of coke. A story ran a while ago discussing how they had info from a few anonymous agents that they were running up 10,000$ tabs daily on a mission in europe.

    ---------- Post added 2011-09-22 at 06:13 PM ----------

    Quote Originally Posted by Wells View Post
    Nice attempt at shifting the point. Every group of humans creates waste. Starbucks is no different from the federal government. When a developer in my home town decided he didn't want to finish work on a new mega store because the city wouldn't change a road at public expense for him he boarded it up and left a huge plywood box in the middle of a dirt field. In the dead center of town. Property values tanked to the point where the entire area was blighted.

    His company is still going and the box is still there, mostly covered in spray paint now. Waste happens everywhere, but conservatives get this ridiculous double standard going on.
    Your post is a series of non-sequitirs and true statements of the obvious which don't mean your central idea is true.

    Why would a developer have any control over if a mega-store finishes or not? The stores are in control. If the stores don't approve of a design, the land isn't purchased and the store isn't built. The developer buys land and pitches it to the mega-store and local municipalities for corporation approval, at which point they choose to build on that land. Claiming a developer (like there's a single "he" regarding it) is the sole responsibility in that case is foolish. If anything, that developer prematurely built before all terms were agreed with, and there really isn't much power there.

    Your city has garbage laws if the government can't claim imminent domain, and a crap government if they don't. Imminent domain could have easily been invoked when that "box in a dirt field" started lowering property values: "The power to take private property for public use by a state, municipality, or private person or corporation authorized to exercise functions of public character, following the payment of just compensation to the owner of that property."

    Did you ever think that maybe the gov. stood to profit from the cheap purchase of blighted lands? If they had any sort of investment and were standing to lose money, they'd easily take over the land for the better good.



    Everything in the known universe creates waste.

    The difference between Starbucks and the federal government is that starbucks, being for-profit, has incentive to spend resources to discover and solve waste issues.

    The US government sees waste as "the cost of doing business" because they are playing with other people's money and they can just print money. When you see any sort of "here's the US government's budget" it's 100% false. There are classified budgets and undisclosed budgets that aren't included in those lists (or else you'd be able to see how much money is being spent, aka, it wouldn't be secret anymore).

    The government will never, ever, lose spending power. Sure, they cut humanitarian and welfare projects but the government is very good at securing funding for those things it believes it "needs" to operate as is. And so you can blab all you'd like about the "ridiculous double standard" of conservatives, but the issue with them is that they hyperanalyze anything that they have no interest in maintaining while ignoring the waste in the things they support. So naturally that will be pointed out repeatedly: budget increases for schools is "bad" but having the rich receive tax breaks and luxury perks "good." The problem isn't one of waste, its of what is acceptable expenditure and what isn't. Obviously both sides of the moronic bi-partisan system believe they stand for the correct answer.

    I don't know why this is being politicized at all - it is the government in total that needs to be assessed and reduced. All presidents have created massive amounts of waste (campaigns themselves are huge sources of waste). All of them have approved and signed off on gluttonous, self-profiting budgets.


    When various parties had full control, they could have easily fixed tons of issues. Of course they didn't, they used their power to profit their constituents (corporations, not the public).

  19. #99
    Whatever you do in an economy, it has monetary impacts on people. That's because the value of your property is not something objective but the combined information of hundreds to millions of subjective values.
    Exactly. So where are the threads and constant whining about private sector waste? Why do we treat government waste like its something special?

    FED has had low interest rates long before that. And ofcourse no one forced him. But with low FED interest rates, a project will appear to be profitable, when in the long run it's not.
    This was in the early 90s when interest rates were subsantially higher.

    Oh god, you don't understand anything about competition do you?
    Of course I do, don't be an asshole. What I also understand is that through market dominance a corporation can be in a position where they can create a substantial amount of waste before they open themselves up to enough risk to lose their position.

    For some reason govt. keeps wasting more and more money regardless of what people say.
    Citation required. But I know your knowledge of US history is rather limited. Our government actually performs better in many ways than it did in the past.

    Like just yesterday I linked you a GAO report showing the foodstamps program running at its most efficient levels.

  20. #100
    Quote Originally Posted by Diurdi View Post
    For some reason govt. keeps wasting more and more money regardless of what people say.

    It's because when you vote you sign over all rights management to a proxy who doesn't have to be or do anything they promised when you voted for them. No politician will ever match a constituent's desires 100% anyway.


    There is no way for an individual to control how much funding any government program gets. All you can do is pick a candidate that's supposed to have similar beliefs and hope they do that.


    Obama was very ANTI-HOMELAND SECURITY in his campaign until homeland security did that "test the air" and "thousands of staff" smoke and mirrors show at his inauguration, he ended up cutting none of that funding, DHS still monitors us, those laws were never overturned completely.

    When you're in power, it is always better to err on the side of caution, especially when you're constantly being fed (potentially bogus) reports of danger, no matter what the cost to the general people is.

    ---------- Post added 2011-09-22 at 06:21 PM ----------

    Quote Originally Posted by Wells View Post
    Exactly. So where are the threads and constant whining about private sector waste? Why do we treat government waste like its something special?
    Because government waste is wasting tax dollars. private waste is not. what is hard to understand about that? The word "private" means there are people (stockholders, corporate officers, owners) who are the ones who should be concerned with the waste because its altering their profits.


    When the government wastes all you can do is vote for someone else to hope they stop wasting your money. That's not a good system.

    That's why you see "constant whining" about it, it's called "it is a problem."

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