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2013-08-24 Home Front: Culture Wars

How do we make people want to be successful?

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Posted by Fred 2013-08-24 00:00|| || Front Page|| [6 views ] Top

#1 Hello Carrot meet Stick, Hello people on federal welfare programs meet mr. u r cutoff, find a job or die.

Posted by Tyranysaurus Flomort4071 2013-08-24 00:45|| 2013-08-24 00:45|| Front Page Top

#2 This problem has bothered me for a long time. Not least because I grew up very poor. Poor as in, we were too poor to afford margarine, never mind butter. We ate beef dripping (lard) on our bread.

My solution is 2 tier welfare. Fairly generous help for a period for those who show willing and the wherewithal to get off welfare, and a 2nd tier for those who show no prospect of getting off welfare, not much above the old workhouses. Where people were given the basics to keep alive, as long as they followed the rules.

Basically, you have to make poverty suck again.

Posted by phil_b 2013-08-24 01:46|| 2013-08-24 01:46|| Front Page Top

#3 You can't build democracy in a Muslim country, and you can't fix these neighborhoods---things went too far.

Posted by g(r)omgoru 2013-08-24 03:53|| 2013-08-24 03:53|| Front Page Top

#4 I agree g(r)om. Surgical debridement possibly, then amputation. Even then the prognosis is not favorable.

Posted by Besoeker 2013-08-24 04:02|| 2013-08-24 04:02|| Front Page Top

#5 Well at least you had beef drippings Phil, we made do with left over Brylcream on our Martha Whites, and were damn happy to have it too.

Posted by Shipman 2013-08-24 05:37|| 2013-08-24 05:37|| Front Page Top

#6 Re: making poverty suck again....

That is the ticket. It always burns me when I hear some NPR-listening suburban pseudointellectual who pretends at real compassion and concern for the needy say that poverty is its own disincentive or that living in one of "those" places is punishment enough.

BS.

Welfare recipients, in historical context, have it easy. Relative to most of the billions of humans who have lived thoughout the existence of our species, these welfare louts have a great, great life. Adequate food, free medical care, adequate shelter, and endless entertainment and access to sex. To the reptile part of the brain, having all of these things equates to perfect contentment. Not having to work for these things represent heaven on earth.

Also, relative to what work has meant throughout history, the vast bulk of the public work force (with notable exceptions) and rent-seekers out there have a sickly simulacrum of a work ethic, and can get by being minimally productive or actually a drag on productivity, chronically tardy, show up to work drunk, etc. And now they earn more, on average, than the private sector from which they extract wealth for their cushy scenario (again, notable exceptions apply).

There was a time when poverty was, in fact, its own deterrent. There was a time when public employees were servants, not rulers. Not the case in any developed country any more.

The truth of things is a that little over half of humans will work because it's in their nature. Another 40% will work if they must to eat. Another 5% won't work even if it means starving. We now have a system where the 40% and the 5% can goof off and do their work poorly or not at all and still get food and shelter even if they proudly declare they won't work.

We need to design the system so that unless you do your job well and work hard you are on the street losing weight. The folks whose nature it is to work have nothing to worry about. The ones who only work to stave of starvation will have a proper and strong incentive to be productive. And the slugs? Oh well. Let the hand wringers feed them, if they desire, with their own after-tax money if that matters so much to them.

The left's attitude, that species of envy of the self-made rich which pretends to be a moral concern for the "needy", has hamstrung our once great country. It needs to go away pronto. If not, the West will.

Posted by no mo uro 2013-08-24 06:37|| 2013-08-24 06:37|| Front Page Top

#7 It's been recognized for 1500 years as one of the seven deadly sins. It's one of the reasons the 'academics' and pols moved charity from the church to the state, because the church held people accountable for their behaviors to include suffering the consequences of their choices -

Sloth (Latin, Socordia) can entail different vices. While sloth is sometimes defined as physical laziness, spiritual laziness is emphasized. Failing to develop spiritually is key to becoming guilty of sloth. In the Christian faith, sloth rejects grace and God.

Sloth has also been defined as a failure to do things that one should do. By this definition, evil exists when good men fail to act.

Over time, the "acedia" in Pope Gregory's order has come to be closer in meaning to sloth. The focus came to be on the consequences of acedia rather than the cause, and so, by the 17th century, the exact deadly sin referred to was believed to be the failure to utilize one's talents and gifts. Even in Dante's time there were signs of this change; in his Purgatorio he had portrayed the penance for acedia as running continuously at top speed. - wiki

Posted by Procopius2k 2013-08-24 07:26|| 2013-08-24 07:26|| Front Page Top

#8 Well, we could help make people want to be successful by NOT helping to make them want to be unsuccessful.

Think of the "ethic" implied by such things as a "gentleman's C" or by the don't keep score, everybody gets a trophy soccer leagues.

Trying harder to get ahead is frowned upon by the establishment in the schools as it is in union work. You can't "lay too many bricks" or you get in trouble. Everyone must reduce to the lowest common denominator. Accomplishment cannot be rewarded.

Different people will react differently to these pressures but the movement toward entropy is hard to beat.

Posted by AlanC 2013-08-24 08:40|| 2013-08-24 08:40|| Front Page Top

#9 How do we make people want to be successful?

I you have 5 EBT cards in your pocket, drive a new Escalade, your rent is paid by the gov't, and your kids have a full scholarship to Tech, you've already achieved success.

Posted by Besoeker 2013-08-24 08:59|| 2013-08-24 08:59|| Front Page Top

#10 Test for Success:

1. Lift your right foot off the floor from where you are sitting. Begin rotating it at a comfortable speed, in 10-12 inch clockwise circles.

2. At the same time, write a 14-18 inch number 6 with your right hand in the air.

If your rotating right foot changes direction, your brain is quite likely programmed for success.

Posted by Besoeker 2013-08-24 09:27|| 2013-08-24 09:27|| Front Page Top

#11 Politicians don't want people to be successful or the 'poor' to be uplifted. The entire 'war on poverty' is designed to prevent this from happening.

If they were to actually 'solve' the problem then they would not have an entire class of people totally dependent on them to 'solve the problem'. Nor would they have any issues to beat their opponent over the head with.

It's kind of like a rat-catcher who only catches enough rats to keep the population down - but not entirely exterminate the problem.

Problem for us - the rat-cathers aren't even trying anymore. In fact they are spreading corn and bread to feed the rats.

Posted by CrazyFool 2013-08-24 11:03|| 2013-08-24 11:03|| Front Page Top

#12 How do we make people want to be successful?

Stop paying them to live as lazy, useless parasites. Do that, and the problem will quickly solve itself.

Posted by Dave D. 2013-08-24 11:27|| 2013-08-24 11:27|| Front Page Top

#13 The policies if this country deter building wealth. If there was a flat tax there would be a huge incentive to work not just one job but two.

When the country moves more and move toward Detroit eventually bankruptcy will occur. God help us all.

Posted by Airandee 2013-08-24 11:32|| 2013-08-24 11:32|| Front Page Top

#14 Problem is, there are not enough jobs to get them off the stoops, what with the blue and white collar jobs being eliminated by continuing productivity increases, to say nothing about offshoring.

What is the nature of the 21st century economy? On what basis will the non-creatives be paid?

Posted by KBK 2013-08-24 18:33|| 2013-08-24 18:33|| Front Page Top

#15 If your rotating right foot changes direction, your brain is quite likely programmed for success.

Uh oh.

Posted by Shipman 2013-08-24 19:22|| 2013-08-24 19:22|| Front Page Top

#16 #15 If your rotating right foot changes direction, your brain is quite likely programmed for success.

Uh oh.

Feets, don't fail me now.

Posted by Zenobia Floger6220 2013-08-24 21:49|| 2013-08-24 21:49|| Front Page Top

#17 And you walked 5 miles to school, uphill both ways, barefoot in the snow, right, #5 Ship? ;-p

Posted by Barbara 2013-08-24 22:21|| 2013-08-24 22:21|| Front Page Top

#18 Bingo, CF!

Posted by Barbara 2013-08-24 22:24|| 2013-08-24 22:24|| Front Page Top

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