There are also a crapton more government services now than there was in 1900 as well. Pretty much comes down to "Ok I don't like high taxes but which services could we do without?".

I'm sure alot of people have seen this infographic before http://www.wallstats.com/deathandtaxes/

I don't want to poopoo these numbers too much, but why don't they make this a credible argument and cost adjust this for inflation?

Seems to me that $20 in 1800 would be something like a couple of thousand dollars in the early 1900's, which would then easily be $10,000 by the year 2000.

Average pounds per year of Sugar Consumption
1700: 4 lbs
1800: 18 lbs
1900: 90 lbs
2000: 145 lbs
2009: 156 lbs

Cancer, Heart Disease, Diabetes, Dementia, etc. were all virtually nonexistent several hundred years ago. Life expectancy figures you've likely heard where people only lived to be 35, etc. are complete B.S. High infant mortality rates, accidents, and infectious disease dramatically skew the life expectancy downward. Those subsets of the population not affected by these outside factors lived to be in excess of 80-100 years old without any incidence of cancer, heart disease, diabetes - the so called "diseases of civilization." Here is a table of ages of deaths for a population of Inuit from the Moravian Church in Labrador
and the Russian Church in Alaska, 1822-1836:

Aleuts, Unalaska district
Died ages 1-4 -- 92
Died ages 4-7 -- 17
Died ages 7-15 -- 41
Died ages 15-25 -- 41
Died ages 25-45 -- 103
Died ages 45-55 -- 66
Died ages 55-60 -- 29
Died ages 60-65 -- 22
Died ages 65-70 -- 24
Died ages 70-75 -- 23
Died ages 75-80 -- 11
Died ages 80-90 -- 20
Died ages 90-100 -- 2

People who lived in the jesus damn Artic 200 years ago, had zero access to fruits or vegetables and subsisted on a diet of 100% meat (fish, seals, whales, etc.) for their entire lives. 25% of them lived to be over 60 years old, with some living past 90...in a freaking igloo!

In one study of terminally ill patients, patients who were so close to dying that any treatment (including no treatment) was deemed ethical, an intervention method consisting of the complete removal sugar from their diets (think about what most hospital diets consist of for a second) was introduced. Those patients living past the first week (most were so far gone, they died before the study could even start) had their tumors either regress enough to be surgically treated, or experienced full remission. Patients who were previously given less than a week to live were now cancer-free simply by removing sugar from their diets.

Cancer cells have been shown in many studies ( including this one http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?artid=296896) to have a disproportionally higher number of insulin receptor cells. Cancerous cells are "successful" mutations from an evolutionary perspective in that they lead to massive cell propagation. However, most cancerous cells have no method of internal cell metabolism, and must subsist and grow almost exclusively on energy supplied by blood glucose (hence the elevated receptor count). Essentially, cancerous cells are "parasites." By removing all sources of glucose from the body, and entering a state of ketosis, where acetone bodys supply energy to the cells as opposed to glucose, the cancer cells starve; dying or slowing growth to the point where the body's immune system can sucessfully remove them.

Long story short, you wanna live to be 100, stop drinking so much f*ing soda.

>> ^Skeeve:
>> ^Hawkinson:
hold on, its a private club, right? My private property isn't open to the public either, I have a strict "no leprechauns" policy.
It's important to recognize the difference between private and public spaces, we certainly get enough "police violating peoples rights" videos to know that your lawn is your lawn, and you can do whatever the hell you want on it. Being an asshole is not against the law.

It's not against the law to be an asshole, no. But when a group pays $1900 to swim in your pool and you kick them out you are being a major douche bag, whatever reason you choose to give.


That was my point. I didn't give a reason for their behavior, how about this: they are racists. Being racist is not against the law. I'm not clear on the point of this video, or why it is news worthy? Did they say the money wasn't returned and there is a lawsuit pending? Do they use public money? Are they associated with anything wholesome/political? I need something like that to sink my teeth into, otherwise it's just clucking my tongue at my intolerant neighbors.

>> ^Hawkinson:
hold on, its a private club, right? My private property isn't open to the public either, I have a strict "no leprechauns" policy.
It's important to recognize the difference between private and public spaces, we certainly get enough "police violating peoples rights" videos to know that your lawn is your lawn, and you can do whatever the hell you want on it. Being an asshole is not against the law.


It's not against the law to be an asshole, no. But when a group pays $1900 to swim in your pool and you kick them out you are being a major douche bag, whatever reason you choose to give.

>> ^pipp3355:
This year in papakura, there were no deaths during the easter period.
Easter: the resurrection of Jesus from the dead on the third day from his crucifixion.
Atheists: just a coincidence?


Wow, you convinced me!

The number of accidents in papakura during easter in 2009 are somehow connected to events in a collection of stories written 18-1900 years ago!

A M A Z I N G

I wonder if Jesus said to the disciples;
"you dudes think this resurrection is the shit, just wait till' 2009 and you live in Papakura, New Zealand. During this period, you will have a 0% chance of being in a car(next big thing, just watch) accident!

Unfortunately, if we hadn't ruined the idea of the US/UK as a peacekeeping force by going blindly into iraq in a quest for oil, we'd still have the ability/opportunity to walk into a middle eastern country and claim that we were doing it "for the people".

Hell, i'll even be cynical and say our governments probably wouldn't go into any country "for the people" anymore, britain especially has lost the credibility we had around the mid 1900's to stand up for international injustice. So maybe we wouldn't have done it anyway, but now we don't even have the choice.

It'd take a LOT more than this to push things to the point where the UK/US could go near to helping out with force. Especially with the leading parties in Iran free to go around saying "Nope, nothing to see here, this is Britain's fault, stop scaremongering. There's no riots and no unrest, just leave us alone."

The trouble is, i'm sure many are crying out for help in that country, i'm sure many would like THE RIGHT KIND of help. But they wouldn't trust us to give it. And worse still, they can't even ask us for it, because the leadership they're protesting against is controlling everything right now. It's gonna take a serious escalation before anyone can "try to help".

Then you're saying democracy isn't a good idea? Or is it only a good idea when a party you're complacent about wins?

Suddenly the media is averse to political parties receiving money for funding: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1191424/BNP-5million-cash-boost-party-celebrates-Euro-election-successes.html and apparently violence against a party chief has become normal in Britain: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UQOfykEImeg

It is unfortunate but inevitable that it has come to this, but the "right wing" will become increasingly prominent until the parties who've enjoyed decade-long governances realize that it is the common man who is most affected by their social engineering attempts. I can assure you that chauffeured MP and MEPs do not often take the bus with rowdy Africans or witness first-hand the injustice of affirmative action.

To anyone who has violent objections (or any objections at all to these "right wing" parties' right to exist), please imagine you were alive 50 years ago when minorities were fighting for the right to vote or 100 years ago when women had few legal rights.

Would you have been against them? Most probably, because that was the orthodoxy at the time.

Those concepts were primitive in retrospect, but the majority thought like that. It was only by perseverance that women and minorities swayed the tides and established what are today commonly accepted principles of equality.

Imagine that in 100 years from now it turns out multiculturalism was indeed a catastrophic failure that not only destroyed once healthy societies but so diluted European culture that it ceased to exist, that dozens of countries who've contributed so much to humanity have become so ethnically identical that they've lost all discernible elements.

Suppose people like the BNP voters are correct, just as women were in the early 1900s. If most people could go back in time, I'm certain they'd at least provide the Suffragettes at least some respect and dignity.

I'd expect any civil person to exercise that same respect for ideas outside the current orthodoxy today.

If it were not for people who challenge the status quo, nothing in the history of the world would have ever changed.

bcglorf: "Let's not pretend that for all the atrocities committed by the Jews and Zionists in 1940's Palestine there weren't just as many atrocities perpetrated against them by Arab Palestinians. It was a mess both then and now."

Qualm:Even hard-core Israeli apologists like Benny Morris don't believe that. It is no mild understatement to say this is not historically accurate.
...
bcglorf: "Your insistence that it was just a series of murderous rampages initiated by Zionists against friendly Arab Palestinians is what's been exposed here."

Qualm:I never make that claim.


Okay, I don't see a whole lot of room in between the above statements for ambiguity. I've openly stated, more than once, that Zionists and Israelis have committed numerous atrocities, through the 1940's(and before and since for that matter). Yet when I point out that similarly atrocities where committed against them by Arab Palestinians, you suddenly balk at the notion. Do you or do you not recognize that the violence and atrocities committed in Palestine from 1900-1948(and again onwards for that matter), included a very large proportion of tit for tat and revenge/self defense motivations from BOTH sides.

That's my reading of history, and it seems pretty consistent(and unbiased) with all of human history. The Jews and Zionists were more aggressive/violent/defensive given their treatment in Europe and status as a minority in Palestine. Similarly the Arab Palestinians had been under the yoke of either the Ottomans or the British and were also more aggressive/violent/defensive as a result. Neither of those are any excuse for the atrocities committed, it's just a much stronger motivation for their societies than a simple Zionist campaign to expunge the Arabs and Arabs defending themselves. It's much simpler than the Zionist position of Arabs bent on annihilating all Jews. The truth is in the middle of those, do you reject the whole of this?


Rougy:Your obdurate unwillingness to admit that Israel is at fault for anything is what is really being exposed here.


Really? I repeatedly condemn the atrocities they've committed. Up thread I've repeatedly referenced atrocities committed by them from before 1948 through to the present day as a given. I referenced the most recent invasion up thread saying There's a lot of undeniable evidence the IDF need to be prosecuted for crimes committed in the recent offensive.


You are pro Israel, right or wrong, and that is clear as day.


No, I'm anti-Hamas, there's a very big difference. If you'd like me to condemn all of Israel just out of 'fairness' I won't. That'd be the equivalent of condemning all Palestinians, which is the workings of a racist. I condemn Hamas specifically as a horrific organization that manages to kill more of it's own people than anyone else. An equivalent condemnation would be of Avigdor Lieberman and his Yisrael Beiteinu party as racists and a horrific evil, I'll happily condemn them as strongly as Hamas as they chant 'Death to Arabs' with as much vigor as Hamas chants 'Death to Israel'.

^If you read Gabriel Ash article there closely you should notice something. He takes EVERYTHING negative Morris' historical account says about Israel and declares it fact beyond contention. He then also declares EVERYTHING positive Morris' historical account says about Israel and declares it the working of a depraved and racist/colonial mind. That doesn't give you any pause?

Here's the bigger picture of 1948, since the context is important and cliff's notes versions are generally the tool of propagandists from either side. Palestine, under British rule, had both Jewish and Arab Palestinian's living there in 1900 already. By the 1940's, the Jewish population was growing, but still a minority that was being mistreated. By the mid 1940's the Nazi genocide was in full swing, and more European Jews came to Palestine as refugees. Many of them entering the country illegally, but under the circumstances I find that difficult to condemn. Among the European Jews, Zionist's had risen up as a result of European oppression and their ranks were filled by those who believed only a Jewish state would ever recognize the rights of Jews.

Low and behold as the majority of them settle in Palestine, the majority Arab Palestinians are mistreating them terribly. Is it really much of a wonder that this boiled into a civil war between Jewish and Arab Palestinians? Is it really a nefarious act of conquest by the Jews, or is just a tragic series of events with hate begetting more hate, over and over again? Let's not pretend that for all the atrocities committed by the Jews and Zionists in 1940's Palestine there weren't just as many atrocities perpetrated against them by Arab Palestinians. It was a mess both then and now. I find it hard though to go back to that time and place all the blame on Jewish Zionist aggression. It's even harder when in '48 those Jewish Zionists declared their acceptance of a UN proposed 2 state solution, only to have all the neighboring Arab countries declare a united war to eliminate them. Given just how many of those Jewish people had just come from a Nazi dominated Europe and there might be some legitimate concerns for their own survival playing a role from that point forward, no? Was that really merely Zionist fear mongering?

Look at the whole history and there are no easy answers like some might like to think. How do you blame the Jewish people for fleeing Europe and defending themselves aggressively in Palestine after? How do you blame the Arab Palestinians for feeling threatened, especially after the British had been ruling over them as a colony until then? It's a mess, and blaming one side or the other is ignorance or personal bias.

How exactly do you propose Einstein would have tested his theory of general relativity back in the early 1900s?

It wasn't until very recently, using atomic clocks on a plane and one on the ground was the general theory of relativity proven to be right.

The same invisible theory surrounds the existence of the Higgs particle.

Tags for this video have been changed from 'barcelona, city, train, vintage, 1900s, 1908' to 'barcelona, city, train, trolley, streetcar, vintage, 1900s, 1908' - edited by SlipperyPete

notarobot,

I think Graph 3, the curve Consumer Price Index (blue) supports your theory about the break from the Gold standard. The CPI is rising slowly prior to 1976, and very sharply thereafter. The Consumer Price Index is a measure of the average cost of common items, and is used to calculate Inflation. This curve also reiterates your calculations about the price of money between 1900 and 2006. I only have the data plotted from 1950 onward, but looking at the 1950 value you can see that the CPI is about 24, while in 2009 it is about 211.

The rate of inflation is calculated as ((B - A)/A)*100. Where B and A are values of the CPI for two different time periods.

In effect, this says that if you could buy a gallon of milk for 30 cents in 1950, that same gallon of milk would cost you $2.63 in 2009. If you had instead saved that 30 cents over the years, it would only buy you 15 oz of milk.

^imstellar28: I think the event that happened around 1970 was that the US dollar was no longer tethered to the gold standard. I believe the apparent jump in the country's GDP may also have devalued the currency significantly.

* *
Here's some info from a comment I made on this video. I had come across a site that estimated what the value of money is and was, and how that has changed over the years and played with it's currency value calculator. Seems to be relevant.


In 1900, $100.00 from 2006 is worth:
$4.04 using the Consumer Price Index
$4.71 using the GDP deflator
$1.51 using the value of consumer bundle
$0.88 using the unskilled wage
$0.61 using the nominal GDP per capita
$0.16 using the relative share of GDP
In 2006 $100.00 from 1900 is worth:
$2,476.66 using the Consumer Price Index
$2,124.46 using the GDP deflator
$6,602.73 using the value of consumer bundle
$11,412.86 using the unskilled wage
$16,316.15 using the nominal GDP per capita
$64,073.94 using the relative share of GDP
In just over 100 years, the dollar has lost between 96 and 99.8 percent of its value, depending on how you measure. Meaning that a penny in 1900 more then likely worth more then a dollar today.
The source I used does not measure the last two years, as the most recent data is not yet all finalized. I can only imagine what 2007 and 2008 have done to the value of money.
As a share of the U.S. GDP, I could happily live on $100 per year of 1900's money.

Imstellar,

As always you misinterpret data to fit your perceptions.

Real GDP growth has doubled from 1970 to 1990 check BEA, national debt has only increased larger then a fraction of total GDP from 1980 to 1990, with massive debt growth from 1990 to 2000. These levels however are still below levels of World War 2.

Your example really however applies when it comes to the recent so called growth from 1997 to 2007, as real wage increases were nonexistent, so was real stock market growth on the S&P 500. So instead of the economy expanding the US economy has been fueling growth with borrowing. At the same time credit card debt started overtake real wages, with massive increases from 2003Q1.
http://www.businessweek.com/the_thread/economicsunbound/archives/2009/02/the_failure_of_1.html

Your idea that private enterprise can solve these issues is again wrong, given that the Progressive movement brought government intervention to sustain fair markets and competition which lead to break ups of monopolies. Bringing forth agencies like the FDA, FTC and the Interstate Commerce Commission. The Federal Reserve was created to control tariffs and antitrust cases. All these agencies came about in the 1900s and were responses to citizen requests after laissez-faire economics in the 1800s, they also paved the way for the roaring 20s. Before you start complaining about the the government extending the great depression a recent study showed that only 20% of professional economists hold that view, and even then they claim that they Fed should have been the one to instigate change by reducing interest rates and allow credit back in the economy but this is in hindsight with development of Monetary policy in the 50s and 60s.

Furthermore, I never advocated for socialism in the US because it is not going to happen, what I said was socialistic policies, the capitalistic component is not being removed from the US unlike what you seem to believe. Its called a Mixed economy for a reason. There is no pure capitalistic or socialistic economy in the world bar Cuba and some failed states, the closest capitalistic state in the world is actually Singapore.

You keep saying '2%' unemployment.

The unemployment problem is far more severe, but you are underestimating its very nature, the stimulus package was created to save or create 3.5 million jobs, the unemployment figures currently place it at 4.4 million (half of this in the last 4 months) since the start of the recession.

With levels spiking to 8.1 as I mentioned earlier in single month, the highest level since 1983. This strikes at consumer confidence, and further reduces consumption and aggregate demand, not to mention that it means that more foreclosures are coming. Consumption is already taking a hit as confidence plummets and expenditure is being relegated to essentials (however I think the electronics sector will still thrive, especially the video games market, it has been shown to be fairly recession proof unless EA goes crazy and starts to buy up other companies).

Not only are layoffs large but there is increasing firms that are simply coming out of entire market sectors. The Labor department has stated that Unemployment benefits will not recover lost jobs but more must be spent on actual job retraining to realign the US economy with trend factors over the last 10 years, 4.5 billion is in the stimulus package for job retraining. That is still too low as in current dollars $20 billion a year went to job training in 1979, compared with only $6 billion last year.

This recession will fundamentally rebuild the economy, even with unemployment benefits and a sudden resurgence in consumer confidence there is not enough credit available to allow a short term return to employment. Which again necessitates the large fiscal policies we are seeing enacted.

Education will also play a vital role in this, am an advocate of centralized educational standards. I disagree with educational avenues in the US, which usually require graduates to graduate with massive debt which they repay for several years afterward. Not to mention that systems like the SAT and No Child Left behind have only created a system where children learn more about test taking then actual acquisition of knowledge. But this is another debate entirely which I don't really feel like expanding on right now.

Finally. Again to reiterate what I said about the 'let them fail' ideas with regards to the banking system. The Treasury still has not made up its mind how it will cover the toxic debt, the Fed let Lehman Brothers fail and see what happened, the entire finical sector melted down and dragged several other big firms with it. There is talk of letting Citigroup fail, that is a huge bank, and the actual cross exposure is not clearly relevant if its allowed to fail. It could drag the rest of the financial sector with it. However there is clear rallying right now as Citigroup posted a profit, with markets perking up.