2010 Midterm Elections Thread

[PeppyGPhiB]

Well, we finally know who our senator will be for Washington - Patty Murray, returning for her, I think, fourth term. With this result I'm hoping that Dino Rossi goes away. I'm tired of voting against him - it's been three times now. Since eastern Washington likes him so much, I think he should run for something like mayor of Spokane.

Meanwhile, almost all of our congressional incumbants won, Democrat and Republican.

I'm curious what the voter turnout results were everywhere? In King County (Seattle and suburbs), they were expecting 68% of absentee ballots to be returned (our state is all-absentee now), but they're still counting the ballots and we're at 71% return rate already.

Our state voted down an income tax (though 35% voted for it and I think the issue will continue to come up), voted down an increase to our sales tax, and voted DOWN two initiatives that would have closed state liquor stores and permitted booze to be sold in every grocery, drug and convenience store. Sometimes my state surprises me! We legalized medical marijuana years ago and permit Joe Neighbor with a permit to grow it at home, but we want ONLY the state to sell booze.

[Elephant Walk]

Originally Posted by knight_shadow

*sigh*

Here, I'll break it down for the sake of argument...

9 * 40 = 360*4 = 1440$ per month pre tax.

This will be from my point of view in my area, since I talked about the 9$.

I live in probably the nicest apartment complex in town, but my apartment is 480 for two bedrooms.

so, 240$ with a roommate a month. (for the nicest place in town)
80 for energy, 30 for water. split two ways, 55$ a month.

For medical insurance, with a 500$ deductible it's 11 some dollars per check, so 44 dollars per month.

My car is a little bit nicer than someone on minimum wage but it's around 400 with full coverage every 6 months. We'll go with that, but that's probably quite a bit more coverage for a nicer car than someone on minimum wage...so, 66$ per month.

I think right now we're at 405 a month, if the math I did in my head is correct. That gives us about a thousand (or 250 a week) to play with, before Uncle Sam the dickface, food, and miscellaneous get involved. I'm sure I missed something, but I can't think of it right now. All this is for naught, as I could cut costs even more if I was minimum wage. For instance, the production plant is close to alot of lower range apartments that are 350 for two rooms. Because they're pretty close, it would be easy to trade in the car for a moped which would be easier on gas and obviously the needless insurance. If I were a healthy young adult, probably go for the thousand dollar deductible and pay 6 dollars a check, or 24 dollars a month.

[PeppyGPhiB]

Originally Posted by Elephant Walk

I live in probably the nicest apartment complex in town, but my apartment is 480 for two bedrooms.

Wow, where do you live? You *might* be able to find a studio in a bad part of town or in the hick part of my state for that. But my new husband and I live (for now) in a 2-bedroom apartment - spacious and updated interior, but building from the 1980s - in the suburbs of Seattle and pay $1,245 per month just for rent. And that's actually a really good deal around here considering our place is about 1,100 square feet.

[AGDee]

You forgot about the two kids. You're talking about a very young person, I'm talking about someone with a Master's or PhD who has worked for 25 years and has been laid off and now can't find a job for more than $9/hr. But it's their fault, because they were irresponsible. For a healthy young adult, you can live on practically nothing, I will agree but for how long?

The cost of living in Arkansas is among the lowest in the country. The year I bought my 1300 sq ft ranch fixer upper with no garage, on a small subdivision lot for $137,000 in one of the lower priced areas that is still safe, my brother bought a 2500 sq ft.newly remodeled colonial on 10 acres, lakefront with 5 camping/RV hookups that he could rent out if he chose for $110,000. My house on the east side or west side of the metro Detroit area would have been about $240K back then. With taxes and insurance, when I purchased my house, my house payment was $1500/month. Taxes and insurance alone are now $275/month. The LOWEST cost apartments, which are government subsidized, are $575 a month for a one bedroom, $900 for a three bedroom. Thankfully, interest rates have dropped so my mortgage is now only $950 a month.

Car insurance in Arkansas is clearly much cheaper too. My daughter's car has minimum coverage and if it was the only car in the family would be $728 every 6 months. More than $100 a month just for that and that's no car payment. The majority of jobs in this area are in the inner city with no livable housing nearby and no mass transportation. You have to have a car. Mopeds in 10 degree weather with 2 feet of snow are not an option either.

My heat/electric bill is $202 a month on the budget plan (equal payments throughout the year to avoid having a $400 bill in January and February and a $50 bill in April when no heat or A/C is needed). Water bill is $50 a month and I never water my lawn.

My health insurance is $75 per pay period plus deductibles and co-pays. Monthly prescriptions for my family = $200/month when I purchase them at the pharmacy in my building, which gives us a 40% discount on co-pays. 3 ER visits this year for my daughter= $375. Her MRI= $125. In the last month alone she's been to her doctor and two specialists at a total of $125 in co-pays.

Gas for me to get to work is $45 a week. I work 25 miles from my home because I don't want to live in a slum. My car payment is $245 a month and I put half down on one of the lower priced cars out there. Because I'm still paying on it, I have to pay for full coverage so I pay $1000 every 6 months.

I've blown your $9/hr budget just with my mortgage and utilities. I didn't include cable, internet or phone because I recognize that those are luxuries. Someone making $9/hr would never save enough to put half down on a car.

I know your answer is "move". The whole country can't live in Arkansas because there aren't enough jobs there. If we all moved to Arkansas, housing prices would skyrocket because demand would be so high.

You are living in a bubble.

[Elephant Walk]

Originally Posted by AGDee

You forgot about the two kids.

Two kids are irrelevant.

If you're throwing in cost factors that have to do with irresponsibility, you mind as well throw in someone who racked up thousands of dollars of debt too in your little idea.

You're talking about a very young person

Not really.

I'm talking about a single person. The costs would be the same for any single person except for perhaps 50 to a hundred more in healthcare a month.

You are living in a bubble.

And you are living in a shitty state.

I'm not denying anything about other states. Costs are higher, I'm sure. But I showed how it 9$ can be done in Arkansas which was the state I was referring to when saying that 9$ can be easy to live on. That might not be the same elsewhere, but my experience shows that the government is usually the one who removes the cheap living from others.

For example zoning regulations in Cleveland, driving up the cost of rent/price of doing business. In places where the government is removed from daily life, you'll usually see cheaper rents and a greater ability to live on 9$ an hour. This is where the argument comes full circle. I want to remove the things that your leaders have put into place which unintentionally hurt the poor consistently. You seek to keep them in place. The Michigan government has consistently voted towards economic statism which generally makes it quite difficult to help the poor. Your government has made it impossible to live. Not industries offering 9$ an hour. Your government.

[srmom]

Roofing is a really dangerous job and most roofers end up injuring themselves pretty badly or getting asbestosis or silicosis from inhaling all the crap they inhale. Tar burns are pretty awful too. Many jobs are paid better because they are hazardous.

Most roofers in this day and age are getting picked up out on the corner in front of the local Home Depot.

My point is, is that when union wages are so high that a business owner has to hire illegal workers to stay competitive in the marketplace, which is what is happening nationwide, those union wages don't mean squat, and in fact are hurting roofers who would rather hire Americans at a fair market rate and American non union manual laborers. See one example in excerpt of article below:

State governments that contract jobs paid for with stimulus money will be required to pay workers on construction projects union wages rather than market rates -- good news for workers but good news for not as many of them.

The Office of Management and Budget included in the $787 billion stimulus bill the Davis-Bacon provision, a 1931 law typically only used on federal highway projects. But under the new spending plan, Davis-Bacon will apply to all state and local jobs on energy, housing, agriculture or construction.

Higher costs per project mean fewer projects completed, especially since some "shovel ready" projects were bid as non-union jobs. Some local officials and economists say the union wage mandate means taxpayer dollars won't be stretched as far as otherwise was planned.

"All this recovery money being spent, you have a lot of hands out," said economist Jack Kyser. "And so people have said OK, this has to conform to Davis Bacon, which means prevailing wage. And so you get hung up. So as I say, you're going to have projects, but you're not going to have the money go as far as you'd wanted it to go."

Los Angeles County officials who received $8 million in Community Development Block Grant money to weatherize homes for low-income people said they typically bid the job low and pay about $15 an hour for a worker to caulk windows. However, under union scale, that job pays $25 an hour and $5 in benefits, so instead of repairing 100 homes, they might do 50 homes for the same price.

Elsewhere, the union wage for a plumber in Long Island is $45 an hour, the market rate is $30. In Las Vegas, the Davis-Bacon wage for a glass worker is $57 an hour, a job the Nevada State Housing division currently pays $15 to do.

Now, who's this helping? I guess the few lucky union members who get the jobs - forget the rest of the Americans who would take the work at the market rate, or the people who would benefit from the project.

That's the exact reason I used "unions" in general and in a global sense, and not any one specific union (or any specific subset of workers). Unions attempt to (and often do) serve their own membership admirably, but that's the whole point: they likely have a negative effect on the whole to benefit the few.

Exactly...

Anecdotes about 98 dollars an hour and drinking beer are as useful as "welfare queens" buying lobsters and driving brand new SUVs.

See my earlier post (2 pages ago) where I linked table of actual union wages, that is not anecdotal.

[PiKA2001]

http://www.myfoxdetroit.com/dpp/news...ed_20100923_dk

Just so no one can claim that my anecdote about drinking on the job is "opinion".

[Drolefille]

Originally Posted by PiKA2001

http://www.myfoxdetroit.com/dpp/news...ed_20100923_dk

Just so no one can claim that my anecdote about drinking on the job is "opinion".

So, are you extrapolating one incident to the whole and assuming this is how all union jobs are or not? That's the opinion part. Read the whole thing before "replying."

Knowing one person defrauds medicaid doesn't mean everyone or even most people are. Same principle.

[PiKA2001]

Originally Posted by Drolefille

So, are you extrapolating one incident to the whole and assuming this is how all union jobs are or not? That's the opinion part. Read the whole thing before "replying."

Uh NO. I posted that link to show that it happens, and that I wasn't pulling shit out of thin air.

I never said that ALL unions were "bad", but I do believe that some have overstepped their original purposes and have hindered non union folks or people not lucky enough to have a "in" find decent work. I'm a union employee myself, and while the union that represents me is good in the sense that it doesn't use bully tactics, i know that not all unions are like mine. Judging from your posts, you aren't from a union town because if you were you'd know that in some professions you have to be union in order to land a job that profession. I'm sure you've heard the term scab before right? Seriously though, try getting a decent contract or job as an electrician in Detroit without belonging to the IBEW...ain't gonna happen.

[Drolefille]

Originally Posted by PiKA2001

Uh NO. I posted that link to show that it happens, and that I wasn't pulling shit out of thin air.

I don't think anyone said that you were.

I never said that ALL unions were "bad", but I do believe that some have overstepped their original purposes and have hindered non union folks or people not lucky enough to have a "in" find decent work. I'm a union employee myself, and while the union that represents me is good in the sense that it doesn't use bully tactics, i know that not all unions are like mine. Judging from your posts, you aren't from a union town because if you were you'd know that in some professions you have to be union in order to land a job that profession. I'm sure you've heard the term scab before right? Seriously though, try getting a decent contract or job as an electrician in Detroit without belonging to the IBEW...ain't gonna happen.

I'm fully aware of how union professions work and why they work that way. I'm simply not talking about any particular profession, union, or job. You seem to be assuming a lot of things I'm not saying at all.

[AGDee]

Originally Posted by Drolefille

I don't think anyone said that you were.



I'm fully aware of how union professions work and why they work that way. I'm simply not talking about any particular profession, union, or job. You seem to be assuming a lot of things I'm not saying at all.

I think he may have been referring to srmom's post about getting roofers standing outside of Home Depot. That wouldn't happen here. Besides, the Canadians have it so good up there that they surely aren't trying to cross the border as illegal immigrants to get work!

[Elephant Walk]

Originally Posted by PiKA2001

Uh NO. I posted that link to show that it happens, and that I wasn't pulling shit out of thin air.

I didn't look at the link, but since it said Detroit I'll assume it wasn't talking about the NUMMI plant in California.

That place was absolutely miserable. They had union workers intentionally dropping bolts into sensitive places in the cars so that it would stop the line. If those bolts weren't found, they could have meant death for the driver. They just didn't want to work, so they thought that was a good idea.

[PiKA2001]

Originally Posted by Elephant Walk

I didn't look at the link, but since it said Detroit I'll assume it wasn't talking about the NUMMI plant in California.

That place was absolutely miserable. They had union workers intentionally dropping bolts into sensitive places in the cars so that it would stop the line. If those bolts weren't found, they could have meant death for the driver. They just didn't want to work, so they thought that was a good idea.

They say never to buy a car that was built on a Friday