A Lesson on Socialism

U

USFREEDOM911

MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN
An economics professor said he had never failed a single student before but had, once, failed an entire class. The class had insisted that socialism worked - and that no one would be poor and no one would be rich, a great equalizer for all, for society. The professor then said ok, we will have an experiment in this class on socialism.

He said that all grades would be averaged and everyone would receive the same grade so no one would fail and no one would receive an A. After the first test the grades were averaged and everyone was given a B. The students who studied hard were upset, and the students who studied little were happy. But, as the second test rolled around, the students who hadn't studied much for the first test had studied even less, and the ones who studied hard weren't motivated to study hard again, and they decided they wanted a free ride too; so they studied little. The second Test average was a D! No one was happy. When the 3rd test rolled around the average was an F.

The scores never increased as bickering, blame, name calling all resulted in hard feelings and no one would study for anyone else. All failed .... and the professor told them that the socialism they wanted would ultimately fail, as they had, because the reward of success normally goes to those that work harder, but when government takes the reward away; few will try so no one will succeed.
 
SmarterThanYou said:
one would think that as long as you've lived on the face of this earth and have been through the things that you have, you'd have a better understanding of human nature.
Click to expand...

I think the problem lies with the fact we encourage and reward such nature.

There are a number of things that can be ascribed to human nature such as the bully in kindergarten taking all the crayons or people pushing their way in line. We teach people to act differently.

If we rewarded altruism and heroism rather than celebrating the accomplishment of people who became wealthy promoting an inferior product or people who open a business, offer shoddy workmanship, then declare bankruptcy and open a new business the following year, which many home improvement companies do, society would change.

That's one of my pet peeves. For example, a person will open a roofing company. Guarantee their work for 10 or 15 years. A few years later they fold up the company. The warranty is no good and the money they made was sufficient to build themselves a new house but due to limited liability the house can not be touched to pay for warranty repairs.

IMO, the house should be treated as ill-gotten gains just as drug dealers lose anything purchased from their profits.

Another pet peeve is the idea anyone can open a company or run a business without any qualifications/experience. All this nonsense celebrating people who open small businesses. A lot of them have absolutely no idea what they're doing but they take unsuspecting people's money to pad their own pockets.

One example was an immigrant couple purchased an ice cream parlor near my home. I ordered a milkshake and saw the man put ice cubes in the blender container. When I confronted him as to "What the hell are you doing?":eek: he showed me a paper with typed notes on how to make a milkshake.

one cup of soft ice cream
one cup of milk
1/2 oz of chocolate syrup
one scoop of hard ice

The word "cream" was missing from the last ingredient so he thought "hard ice" meant ice cubes.

Before anyone gets the wrong idea I am a partner in a small business so I have nothing against small businesses. My complaint is society praises small businesses when more than a few are nothing more than people trying to scam the general population.

The acquiring of money is celebrated to the almost total exclusion of how it was acquired. Whether it's the local roofer knowing he'll be long gone when his inferior workmanship falls apart to a CEO of a multi-national company throwing all sorts of garbage in a package with a pretty ribbon and selling it as something special they know it's not right or fair or decent but our current society rewards that.

As Obama has said it's all about change. Fundamental change. We can't live under the same laws and customs from a time when acquiring a home involved jumping on a horse, riding as fast as one could, then hammering a stake in the ground.

We can call it Socialism or social policies or any other name but the fact remains changes have to be made and they're long overdue.
 
apple0154 said:
We can call it Socialism or social policies or any other name but the fact remains changes have to be made and they're long overdue.
Click to expand...


We'll be calling it fascism, because that's what it is. Public/Private partnerships will lead to even higher levels of corruption, despite your misguided belief that it's a good thing.
 
Sadly, this is what Obama wants for this country,

USFREEDOM911 said:
An economics professor said he had never failed a single student before but had, once, failed an entire class. The class had insisted that socialism worked - and that no one would be poor and no one would be rich, a great equalizer for all, for society. The professor then said ok, we will have an experiment in this class on socialism.

He said that all grades would be averaged and everyone would receive the same grade so no one would fail and no one would receive an A. After the first test the grades were averaged and everyone was given a B. The students who studied hard were upset, and the students who studied little were happy. But, as the second test rolled around, the students who hadn't studied much for the first test had studied even less, and the ones who studied hard weren't motivated to study hard again, and they decided they wanted a free ride too; so they studied little. The second Test average was a D! No one was happy. When the 3rd test rolled around the average was an F.

The scores never increased as bickering, blame, name calling all resulted in hard feelings and no one would study for anyone else. All failed .... and the professor told them that the socialism they wanted would ultimately fail, as they had, because the reward of success normally goes to those that work harder, but when government takes the reward away; few will try so no one will succeed.
Click to expand...
 
apple0154 said:
I think the problem lies with the fact we encourage and reward such nature.
Click to expand...
the problem lies with you thinking that you can simply 'change' human nature.

apple0154 said:
There are a number of things that can be ascribed to human nature such as the bully in kindergarten taking all the crayons or people pushing their way in line. We teach people to act differently.
Click to expand...
or the sense of accomplishment when one works hard their whole life to receive financial freedom and independence. You're going to lose the 'hearts and minds' of those you wish to persuade by denigrating human nature attributed to personal success.

apple0154 said:
If we rewarded altruism and heroism rather than celebrating the accomplishment of people who became wealthy promoting an inferior product or people who open a business, offer shoddy workmanship, then declare bankruptcy and open a new business the following year, which many home improvement companies do, society would change.
Click to expand...
You are doomed to fail adopting this mindset over human nature.

apple0154 said:
That's one of my pet peeves. For example, a person will open a roofing company. Guarantee their work for 10 or 15 years. A few years later they fold up the company. The warranty is no good and the money they made was sufficient to build themselves a new house but due to limited liability the house can not be touched to pay for warranty repairs.

IMO, the house should be treated as ill-gotten gains just as drug dealers lose anything purchased from their profits.
Click to expand...
so you think this one simple example is all you need to show people that their human nature is evil and should be discarded? by targeting the 'gains' from peoples hard work so you can simply confiscate them later, as shown by the example in the OP, you will most certainly wind up with the same results and the really sad part is that you fail to see the inevitability of that process.

apple0154 said:
Another pet peeve is the idea anyone can open a company or run a business without any qualifications/experience. All this nonsense celebrating people who open small businesses. A lot of them have absolutely no idea what they're doing but they take unsuspecting people's money to pad their own pockets.

One example was an immigrant couple purchased an ice cream parlor near my home. I ordered a milkshake and saw the man put ice cubes in the blender container. When I confronted him as to "What the hell are you doing?":eek: he showed me a paper with typed notes on how to make a milkshake.

one cup of soft ice cream
one cup of milk
1/2 oz of chocolate syrup
one scoop of hard ice

The word "cream" was missing from the last ingredient so he thought "hard ice" meant ice cubes.

Before anyone gets the wrong idea I am a partner in a small business so I have nothing against small businesses. My complaint is society praises small businesses when more than a few are nothing more than people trying to scam the general population.
Click to expand...
so to further impede peoples ability to pursue happiness and success, you want to impose huge license fees and 'training' costs before anyone can open a small business, and you expect that to work? All that is going to do is dissuade people from even trying to succeed, as in the OP above, and the really sad part is that you still fail to see that.

apple0154 said:
The acquiring of money is celebrated to the almost total exclusion of how it was acquired. Whether it's the local roofer knowing he'll be long gone when his inferior workmanship falls apart to a CEO of a multi-national company throwing all sorts of garbage in a package with a pretty ribbon and selling it as something special they know it's not right or fair or decent but our current society rewards that.

As Obama has said it's all about change. Fundamental change. We can't live under the same laws and customs from a time when acquiring a home involved jumping on a horse, riding as fast as one could, then hammering a stake in the ground.

We can call it Socialism or social policies or any other name but the fact remains changes have to be made and they're long overdue.
Click to expand...

and you still fail to see the correct changes. The changes to the system you want to see implemented will do nothing but stifle the majority of the populace who will see themselves restricted from success while those already major companies with all the money will be the only ones to control the economy, something that you said you wanted to see change.

how is it that you are so blind to the reality of those circumstances?
 
I've never seen such an attack on small businesses. It's totally absurd. They are the least corrupt business people.
 
apple0154 said:
I think the problem lies with the fact we encourage and reward such nature.

There are a number of things that can be ascribed to human nature such as the bully in kindergarten taking all the crayons or people pushing their way in line. We teach people to act differently.

If we rewarded altruism and heroism rather than celebrating the accomplishment of people who became wealthy promoting an inferior product or people who open a business, offer shoddy workmanship, then declare bankruptcy and open a new business the following year, which many home improvement companies do, society would change.

That's one of my pet peeves. For example, a person will open a roofing company. Guarantee their work for 10 or 15 years. A few years later they fold up the company. The warranty is no good and the money they made was sufficient to build themselves a new house but due to limited liability the house can not be touched to pay for warranty repairs.

IMO, the house should be treated as ill-gotten gains just as drug dealers lose anything purchased from their profits.

Another pet peeve is the idea anyone can open a company or run a business without any qualifications/experience. All this nonsense celebrating people who open small businesses. A lot of them have absolutely no idea what they're doing but they take unsuspecting people's money to pad their own pockets.

One example was an immigrant couple purchased an ice cream parlor near my home. I ordered a milkshake and saw the man put ice cubes in the blender container. When I confronted him as to "What the hell are you doing?":eek: he showed me a paper with typed notes on how to make a milkshake.

one cup of soft ice cream
one cup of milk
1/2 oz of chocolate syrup
one scoop of hard ice

The word "cream" was missing from the last ingredient so he thought "hard ice" meant ice cubes.

Before anyone gets the wrong idea I am a partner in a small business so I have nothing against small businesses. My complaint is society praises small businesses when more than a few are nothing more than people trying to scam the general population.

The acquiring of money is celebrated to the almost total exclusion of how it was acquired. Whether it's the local roofer knowing he'll be long gone when his inferior workmanship falls apart to a CEO of a multi-national company throwing all sorts of garbage in a package with a pretty ribbon and selling it as something special they know it's not right or fair or decent but our current society rewards that.

As Obama has said it's all about change. Fundamental change. We can't live under the same laws and customs from a time when acquiring a home involved jumping on a horse, riding as fast as one could, then hammering a stake in the ground.

We can call it Socialism or social policies or any other name but the fact remains changes have to be made and they're long overdue.
Click to expand...


The operative "human nature" here is the humans believing contrived tales to fit an end result. Whatever happened to the grading curve, it wouldn't fit the story or were they all 'F' students?
 
USFREEDOM911 said:
An economics professor said he had never failed a single student before but had, once, failed an entire class. The class had insisted that socialism worked - and that no one would be poor and no one would be rich, a great equalizer for all, for society. The professor then said ok, we will have an experiment in this class on socialism.

He said that all grades would be averaged and everyone would receive the same grade so no one would fail and no one would receive an A. After the first test the grades were averaged and everyone was given a B. The students who studied hard were upset, and the students who studied little were happy. But, as the second test rolled around, the students who hadn't studied much for the first test had studied even less, and the ones who studied hard weren't motivated to study hard again, and they decided they wanted a free ride too; so they studied little. The second Test average was a D! No one was happy. When the 3rd test rolled around the average was an F.

The scores never increased as bickering, blame, name calling all resulted in hard feelings and no one would study for anyone else. All failed .... and the professor told them that the socialism they wanted would ultimately fail, as they had, because the reward of success normally goes to those that work harder, but when government takes the reward away; few will try so no one will succeed.
Click to expand...

Proof?

The professors name?

Where did he/she teach?

How long ago did this happen?

sounds like just another urban legend to me.
 
USFREEDOM911 said:
An economics professor said he had never failed a single student before but had, once, failed an entire class. The class had insisted that socialism worked - and that no one would be poor and no one would be rich, a great equalizer for all, for society. The professor then said ok, we will have an experiment in this class on socialism.

He said that all grades would be averaged and everyone would receive the same grade so no one would fail and no one would receive an A. After the first test the grades were averaged and everyone was given a B. The students who studied hard were upset, and the students who studied little were happy. But, as the second test rolled around, the students who hadn't studied much for the first test had studied even less, and the ones who studied hard weren't motivated to study hard again, and they decided they wanted a free ride too; so they studied little. The second Test average was a D! No one was happy. When the 3rd test rolled around the average was an F.

The scores never increased as bickering, blame, name calling all resulted in hard feelings and no one would study for anyone else. All failed .... and the professor told them that the socialism they wanted would ultimately fail, as they had, because the reward of success normally goes to those that work harder, but when government takes the reward away; few will try so no one will succeed.
Click to expand...

Great analogy Free! This is exactly the end result of what socilaism will bring about left to its own course when tied to human nature, i.e. self centeredness. The collective, no matter how worthy the goal, will always devolve around the self.
 
USFREEDOM911 said:
An economics professor said he had never failed a single student before but had, once, failed an entire class. The class had insisted that socialism worked - and that no one would be poor and no one would be rich, a great equalizer for all, for society. The professor then said ok, we will have an experiment in this class on socialism.

He said that all grades would be averaged and everyone would receive the same grade so no one would fail and no one would receive an A. After the first test the grades were averaged and everyone was given a B. The students who studied hard were upset, and the students who studied little were happy. But, as the second test rolled around, the students who hadn't studied much for the first test had studied even less, and the ones who studied hard weren't motivated to study hard again, and they decided they wanted a free ride too; so they studied little. The second Test average was a D! No one was happy. When the 3rd test rolled around the average was an F.

The scores never increased as bickering, blame, name calling all resulted in hard feelings and no one would study for anyone else. All failed .... and the professor told them that the socialism they wanted would ultimately fail, as they had, because the reward of success normally goes to those that work harder, but when government takes the reward away; few will try so no one will succeed.
Click to expand...

*insert stupid hypothetical here*
 
SmarterThanYou said:
the problem lies with you thinking that you can simply 'change' human nature.
Click to expand...

Of course we can change human nature and who's to say what human nature is? If we look at different cultures, for example the way tribes in the Amazon share food, who is to say human nature isn't about sharing and we have just perverted it into some greedy, selfish way of life?

or the sense of accomplishment when one works hard their whole life to receive financial freedom and independence. You're going to lose the 'hearts and minds' of those you wish to persuade by denigrating human nature attributed to personal success.
Click to expand...

Not at all. If services were available to all, such as medical, food and housing, people would have a different goal. Maybe being honored by society? The focus would no longer be on “survival”.

How can we possibly expect people to care about society, in general, when society would see them on the street if their business failed?

]so you think this one simple example is all you need to show people that their human nature is evil and should be discarded? by targeting the 'gains' from peoples hard work so you can simply confiscate them later, as shown by the example in the OP, you will most certainly wind up with the same results and the really sad part is that you fail to see the inevitability of that process.
Click to expand...

If you’re referring to a warranty that is no longer honored because the person declared bankruptcy it’s not targeting a person’s gains. Their gains were obtained in a fraudulent manner, as in they cheated someone to get them.

Look at this idea of a “negative option” associated with many internet purchases. Sign up for, say, a coffee purchase and every month coffee is sent until one cancels. The problem is one has to phone to cancel and the line is always busy. Rather than be able to cancel on the net, the same way as one would join, the company deliberately makes it more difficult. Nonsense like that shouldn’t be allowed. That’s where I feel government intervention is necessary.

so to further impede peoples ability to pursue happiness and success, you want to impose huge license fees and 'training' costs before anyone can open a small business, and you expect that to work? All that is going to do is dissuade people from even trying to succeed, as in the OP above, and the really sad part is that you still fail to see that.

and you still fail to see the correct changes. The changes to the system you want to see implemented will do nothing but stifle the majority of the populace who will see themselves restricted from success while those already major companies with all the money will be the only ones to control the economy, something that you said you wanted to see change.
Click to expand...

When you buy a car do you go to the guy who has a trailer set up on a vacant lot with a few cars available or do you go to a reputable dealer? When you are laying out thousands of dollars for new appliances to do go to some hole-in-the-wall shop or a major retailer?

I have nothing against big business. I prefer to deal with big business because I know they’ll be there if something goes wrong. If my washing machine dies I’ll have a much better chance getting it replaced by a major retailer than the guy down the street with a small shop. He’ll want to tinker with it and try to repair it because he doesn’t have the same cash flow. The profit on the machine he sold me paid for his week’s groceries. No one is going to go hungry if a major retailer with 1000 stores nationwide exchanges my appliance so it’s not a personal matter with them.

As for small business I have no problem with a person’s success as long as it doesn’t come at the expense of others or mine. It's people who open a business and don't know a damn thing about the business. That's what I am against.
 
ZappasGuitar said:
Proof?

The professors name?

Where did he/she teach?

How long ago did this happen?

sounds like just another urban legend to me.
Click to expand...


So: instead of discussing the premise of the offering, you would rather just throw a hissy-fit. :tantrum:

At least you're staying true to form. :bdh:
 
apple0154 said:
As for small business I have no problem with a person’s success as long as it doesn’t come at the expense of others or mine. It's people who open a business and don't know a damn thing about the business. That's what I am against.
Click to expand...

what you're attempting to do is remove ALL, every single shred of, responsibility for the buyer to be careful of what they buy. why are you trying to create a class of people with no ability to think for themselves?
 
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