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Originally Posted by Sun Tzu
1. Is there a level that you feel everyone should be at?
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Yes. That level is nigh-unlimited physical goods. Approaching that level will be hard.
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2. Do you see it being wrong for one to have more than another?
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It can be wrong for one person to have more than another. It is not always wrong for one person to have more than another.
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3. Employers will obviously have a higher amount of wealth to employ others- should companies be run by the government and the driving force of entrepreneurship be disbanded?
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No.
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4. Not referencing disabled individuals- Are you of the opinion there should not be a single homeless person on the streets?
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People should be allowed to choose to be homeless. I'm not willing to make it illegal to be homeless.
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5. If people don’t want to work are you OK with society covering their survival costs?
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Sure -- the bare survival costs of a person are dirt cheap. It seems far cheaper to include dirt cheap survival costs than to work out how to reliably determine if a given person deserves to have their survival costs paid for due to circumstances beyond their control.
I'm against that kind of kruft.
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6. The way leadership and its philosophy change, respectfully every 4-12 years; which direction do you see innovation, creativity, and any other success coming from?
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I disagree with the premises of your question.
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7. If America was to have a Democrat President and Congressional majority for the next 50 years straight where would you see us at?
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I'd expect most of the political infighting would move to the primaries. And with the power for anyone to claim to be a member of the democratic party, the meaning of the party could change without the name changing.
In the short-to-medium term, I'd expect that the Republican party would go off the edge with Dominionists and white-supremest Racists (those two categories being the primary defining difference between the two parties at this point). It might even collapse after that long out of power, and a new party would come in.
With effective open primaries, the machinery of election might work well. If the primaries fail to be democratic, you'd end up with the usual problems with a self-perpetuating oligarchy, with power and resources concentrated in fewer and fewer hands as time progresses.
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Are there any liberals that think the “us vs. them” as it was put in another thread, is BS? I’m referring to the current monetary system based on the Federal Reserve and the electronic credits and paper notes with debt and interest already attached. Is it really conspiracy that America as a whole is under a system that perpetual debt is by design? If that is the reality, isn’t the constant energy placed on this ongoing social disagreement displaced?
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All cash is a promise that someone, somewhere will compensate you for the resources you gave away in exchange for the cash. The fact that every unit of cash is backed by a unit of debt that
someone owes is important to that being credible -- someone out there needs that cash to pay back their debts, or they will have all of their worldly possessions taken from them (bankruptcy). And if the person who justified the cash with their debt fails to repay it, then the bank that owned the debt now is obligated to destroy an equal amount of cash, which shifts the justification of your cash to a valid debt.
It isn't that tricky.
(And no, interest doesn't cause this to break down.
Alice Bob and Charlie live on an island.
Alice is a banker, and Bob and Charlie aren't.
Bob has 110 coconuts, and Alice and Charlie have nothing. Bob deposits them with Alice in exchange for a 5% interest rate!
Alice has 110 coconuts
Bob has 110 coconut-tokens
Charlie has nothing
Bob has 110 coconut-tokens deposited with Alice.
Charlie wants to build a rock farm. So Charlie asks Alice for a loan of 100 coconut tokens. Alice says "sure, but you will owe me 110 coconut-tokens in a year!".
Charlie takes the 100 coconut-tokens to Bob, and says "I'll pay you 100 coconut tokens in exchange for some materials to build my rock-farm". Bob says "sure!", then deposits his tokens in the bank.
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Bob has 210 coconut-tokens.
Charlie has 0 coconut-tokens, and a debt of 100 coconut-tokens, and a rock farm, and a year's worth of rocks.
Alice has 110 coconuts.
A year passes. Rocks grow.
Charlie needs to pay Alice back. So Charlie goes to Bob and says "I have rocks! Want to buy some for 110 coconut tokens?". These are good rocks, so Bob says "Yes!".
Bob has 105 coconut-tokens (he got 5% interest on his coconuts!)
Charlie has 110 coconut-tokens, and a debt of 110 coconut-tokens.
Alice has 110 coconuts, and Charlie owes her 110 coconut-tokens.
Charlie pays Alice back:
Bob has 105 coconut-tokens
Charlie has a rock farm.
Alice has 110 coconuts
Bob takes his 105 coconut-tokens to Alice, and asks for the coconuts back.
Alice gives Clarlie 105 coconuts.
Bob has 105 coconuts, and some nice rocks.
Charlie has a rock farm
Alice has 5 coconuts.
That is fractional reserve banking. We had interest going two ways, and despite this, the situation could be unrolled.