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Post 03 Jun 2016, 11:38 am

I go away for a short while and things take off.
Can I go back to what Dag said?

I am so out of touch???
How are things different now than they were 20 years ago (before cell phone domination)?
But wait, the only example given was that a phone was required to apply for a job, I pointed out that 20 years ago you required a land lane (and they were not free). How did employers contact you then if you had no phone? It's exactly the same now, please point to how I am out of touch here, I see no differences at all.
Plus, a good MANY employers require you to apply online only. Should we give free computers and internet service as well?

Please stick to your argument
I asked why it was REQUIRED to have a phone and the only reason given was for a job interview (what about once someone gets a job but is still poor?) That was the ONLY reason given and asked how it was different than 20 years ago, the reply was I am "out of touch". Yet nothing has changed as far as your example went now did it???
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Post 03 Jun 2016, 12:06 pm

Well, let me think why things might be different than 20 years ago...an employer is going to expect that they can phone you with the job offer. Ok, 20 years ago probably a person had a land line to call. And if they didn't they probably knew someone who could take the call for them. Today, probably few have access to a landline--owned of borrowed--and you really can't have someone accept messages on their cell phone for you. And as Dag noted if a person is staying at a shelter where there is a landline they probably aren't taking messages for them and if they did they might scare off future employers. As for Internet poor people can go to the library.

Beyond all that, I would note that Dags has been working for 20 years with the poor. I am betting that he has better insight into their problems than we do because of that experience. Now, that does not mean he is right, but I tend to be pretty cautious arguing with someone who has substantially greater experience than I do in a particular area.
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Post 03 Jun 2016, 12:42 pm

an employer expected to call you 20 years ago, no difference
no land line back then, same as no cell phone now

back then it was ok to use a friends phone, same now.

Nothing has changed now has it, just the type of phone you happen to have/not have.
Making outgoing calls has certainly changed as we have few pay phones left! But the example was an employer calling you with a job offer and nothing has changed as to that example.

The "change" is 20 years ago a phone was not considered a necessity, it was something we all wanted to have of course but why do we now need a cell phone? the answer ...you do not "need" one, you will not suddenly burst into flames if you don't own one now will you?

This is part of the problem with ever growing entitlements. People need and deserve a free phone, the indignity of not giving one to everyone!?
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Post 03 Jun 2016, 1:56 pm

Maybe it's just me but I see cell phones as being personal in a way that land lines aren't. So 20 years ago I could tell my neighbor hey someone might be calling me about a job take a message. Or wherever I live would have a landline. But you can't borrow a cell phone--I don't think that's a difference you have assessed.
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Post 06 Jun 2016, 6:04 am

you have no problem with a neighbor taking a message from a land line but that same message on a cell phone becomes a problem?
Nobody is "borrowing" the phone, they are simply asking the neighbor/friend to take a message,

If where you live used to have a land line, then it has a phone still, land line or cell, it has a phone to the office or the manager. If it was a single person home then that land line was paid for just the same as the cell phone can be paid for!

All the more reason to get a job and buy your own cell phone?
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Post 06 Jun 2016, 10:45 am

Seriously, Tom, you are now arguing that taking a message on a landline is the same as taking a message on a cell phone? Since landlines are not personal you don't necessarily expect the applicant to answer the phone, so it's no big deal when your neighbor says you're not there. They just assume you live there, you're not there, and you will call back. Calling a cell phone and someone else answers is jarring and makes the employer wonder about you. That's why I made the argument that a cell phone is personal in a way a landline is not.
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Post 06 Jun 2016, 11:17 am

If it is so important for everyone to have a cell phone, then have the government pay the cost of a basic flip phone for EVERYONE. After all, many elderly would need safety 911 access. There could be youth that need it for communication with parents and teachers. If you wanted a better phone, then the cost of that basic flip phone could be deducted from a smartphone plan. All things being equal.

The point is if it is SOOO important, then everyone should have that benefit.
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Post 06 Jun 2016, 11:36 am

So Bill Gates gets one too? I am not sure free cell phones are necessary (and certainly not for those with high incomes)--government subsidies for a basic cell phone based on low income would suffice.
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Post 06 Jun 2016, 11:43 am

As it is with these government programs... Unequal distribution. I am for everyone having phones provided. Apparently you are not.
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Post 06 Jun 2016, 11:50 am

sorry, there is no difference, none, zip, nada

Land line
Ring-ring
"Hello"

Cell phone
monday night football theme (my ring tone)
"Hello"

No difference!
Land lines are not personal??? If the land line comes in to my home, it certainly is personal
if the cell phone is to a place of employment it certainly is not personal
and WHY do you seem to assume one has to have a cell phone? I know a ton of people who still have land lines, an employer absolutely does not expect or even know if a phone number is a land line or a cell phone. Why are they going to assume it's a cell phone?

Face it, you are putting a lot of personal feelings behind this. A phone is a phone, a message is a message regardless of what method it arrived. and nothing has changed in that regard for the past umteen years. You can make a slight argument over needing one to call in sick, but that wasn't your "logic" was it?
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Post 06 Jun 2016, 12:15 pm

Technology has changed the way we live. that's not a political point, but a fact. Whether or not you think they are equivalents, or that the way things worked in the 80s is the way they should work now is immaterial.

It is now more expected that you are available by phone. Especially if you are applying for jobs.

Yes, we coped without them when we never had them, but things change. Maybe not noticeably for middle aged guys who already have work...
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Post 06 Jun 2016, 12:16 pm

Cell phones for Bill Gates or none for the poor and leaving a message on a cell phone is no different than a land line...I need a break.
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Post 06 Jun 2016, 12:16 pm

Government benefits are a necessary evil, and however they are structured, and whatever they include, they are less than ideal for both the recipients, the govt, and its citizens.

Details can be discussed forever, as you're doing, but I think are two more interesting questions:
1) What could the government do to reduce the need for government benefits (and I'm including all gov't benefits, not just those discussed here.) And,
2) What can individuals do to help those we care about break away from, or not start, government benefits. Or in other words, what's the best way we can help individuals?

I have few thoughts about the first question, and have no idea about the second: I see people making just terrible choices and then having completely avoidable tragedy befall them, and never connecting the cause and effect. Not sure what, if anything I can do about that, but I'd like to.
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Post 06 Jun 2016, 12:54 pm

Good questions, George.

With regard to the first question, pushing the minimum wage to $15 should get the working poor off of government benefits. Also, making it easier for workers to combine so they can bargain effectively to get effective wages. We also have to ponder globalization and the effect it has. I posted somewhere a link that showed our worker participation rate is very low right now, probably due to millions of jobs lost to Asian countries dumping good into our economy. We need a smarter trade policy that will not cost so many American jobs.

With regard to the second question, I think investments early in life are the way to go. I saw a study that indicates African-African mothers on average use a lot fewer words with their children when they are infants. Assisting impoverished children early in life so that they will be able to compete in an information economy is the most effective investment we could make. When kids graduate from high school and can barely read, have minimal skills, etc, it's probably too late at that point. We have to get to kids before they start school.

Of course there are a lot of people with drug and alcohol problems, but some of that is due to poor prospects I think. Some people are always going to make bad choices, but if they have a good job, a family, something to live for...the chances are lessened that they will seriously abuse drugs and alcohol.
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Post 06 Jun 2016, 2:56 pm

Geojanes
1) What could the government do to reduce the need for government benefits (and I'm including all gov't benefits, not just those discussed here.) And,
2) What can individuals do to help those we care about break away from, or not start, government benefits. Or in other words, what's the best way we can help individuals?


Some things do work better when they are universal...like health care. And since health care is a universal need, i think its one thing you take out of consideration. Education too.
Just about anything else would and could be reduced if:
- the value of labor is recognized and increased. starting with a $15 hr. minimum wage pegged to inflation.
The value of employees and their families is better recognized in offering paid maternity and paternity leave.
- the notion that shareholder value is the pre-eminent measurement of corporate performance and that quarterly and annual performance are the best ways to guage this...
I mean : Long term investment and long term palnning have suffered in North America and the UK since MBAs took over the business world and attempted to turn everything about business into into a science like math. But the best businesses long term were businesses started and run by engineers and entreprenuers who set out to build better cars, or better houses or better computers rather than worrying about the next quarters performance . Corporate culture could change and individuals would find that their places of employment had greater respect for their contribution, actually accepted their contribution and rewarded their investment in time into the company with an environment that made work pleasurable. And the company preformance would be stronger in the end.
- the end of tax breaks and loop holes for off shoring of corporate income, All it does is keep roughly 3 trillion dollars tied up in financial products instead of used in their home countries to: invest in R&D, reward employess better, contribute to the tax base .....enrich the economy!
- cooperative management councils in all businesses that provide intereaction between management and labor that allow for ideas to be communicated and productivity to increase.
- Ensuring that labor and management all benefit from increased productivity. Soemthing MBS have strangled over the last 40 years as all "productivity gains" went to the C class manager through bonuses and stock options...
- Any short term government subsidies to business have an expiration preset....
Any government grants for new business startups, and subsidies should provide the government with an investors return (shares) in perpetuity.
In this way, all boats rise, but especially those who've been shafted for 40 years... and when that happens a lot of govnerment programs to aid the poor will not be needed. WalMart workers won't be getting foodstamps anymore.