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Welfare pays better then min. in most states


Sakari

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The Socialist Party of America should be running your country.

Id prefer you were joking about this part.

The nanny welfare state is a big problem in America and a big reason why were headed down the road we are. And to help you get a better grasp of whats going on across the pond your gonna be hard pressed to find someone that believes we are existing in a capitalistic society or even a democracy anymore.

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your gonna be hard pressed to find someone that believes we are existing in a capitalistic society or even a democracy anymore.

Surely that's a good thing?

Capitalism is all very well and good so long as you can compete and it relies on the assumption that competition is the driving force behind any society. Capitalism condemns those who are unable or unwilling to compete.

"Advocates of capitalism are very apt to appeal to the scared principles of liberty, which are embodied in one maxim: The fortunate must not be restrained in the exercise of tyranny over the unfortunate" Bertrand Russell

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Compare these 2 Presidents the first was refereed to as the Great Satan. The second Hitler and even some have gone as far as to claim hes the antichrist....But what can be learned from this video is this change has come about slowly and there is only true way out of it anymore. This is what we have...........

This is where were going as a people. Love us or leave us. No cares gonna be lost here.

[media=]

Edited by AsteroidX
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Well we obviously have a fundamental ideological difference here.

As for Reegan his savage capitalist policies greatly influenced Thatcher (Hitler and the antichrist rolled in one) whose time in power led to mass unemployment and privatisation of industry in the UK the effects of which are still being felt today.

"Capitalism is the astounding belief that the most wickedest of men will do the most wickedest things for the greatest good of everyone" John Maynard Keynes

Edited by yearofthehater
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You missed my point completely but if you hang around these boards long enough youll gather where I come from. Now as for me its a sunny day and Im out to help a neighbor.

We dont have to be a nanny state to help eachother !!

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lol, so capitalism doesn't work, well neither does the socialism, or we would not see millions come to capitalistic usa, from socialist countries, or to be precise former socialist countries.

Edited by aztek
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lol, so capitalism doesn't work, well neither does the socialism, or we would not see millions come to capitalistic usa, from socialist countries, or to be precise former socialist countries.

How perceptive of you to spot that a flawed system and its flawed response both failed to work out.

The flaw lies deeper than both ideologies.

Br Cornelius

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The answer is quite simple and yet cloaked in layers upon layers of stupid crap....

Do you need the state to help you? Do you need a food and/or utility card? Then here is what needs to happen...can happen.

We need to fix some bridges and some damns...want a check?...show up for work. Don't want to work?....then you need a special disclaimer as to why....(single mothers)...if you cannot work and cannot provide a reason why not....you get nothing...zero....

We can do what needs to be done if we just do it. There are those that do not want to work and laugh at those that do...make it hard for them to do that...

There are those that want to work and cannot....well we have tons of municipal things that need to be done...pay them to do it.

I have szero patience for this conversation...we all know we have things that need to be done. If you want a GOV check, you need to be ready to do those things...or else...nothing. No work...no check....

Get over your "oh the babies" bullsh!t....the parents need to work or everyone is institutionalized...period....

You work...you eat...no work....no food....get used to that ideal cause it is coming soon to a region near you....

Edited by Jeremiah65
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Kinda need jobs to do the work thing and if the government started fixing bridges and roads without the contractors then a whole lot of people will start screaming socialism.

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The answer is quite simple and yet cloaked in layers upon layers of stupid crap....

Do you need the state to help you? Do you need a food and/or utility card? Then here is what needs to happen...can happen.

We need to fix some bridges and some damns...want a check?...show up for work. Don't want to work?....then you need a special disclaimer as to why....(single mothers)...if you cannot work and cannot provide a reason why not....you get nothing...zero....

We can do what needs to be done if we just do it. There are those that do not want to work and laugh at those that do...make it hard for them to do that...

There are those that want to work and cannot....well we have tons of municipal things that need to be done...pay them to do it.

I have szero patience for this conversation...we all know we have things that need to be done. If you want a GOV check, you need to be ready to do those things...or else...nothing. No work...no check....

Get over your "oh the babies" bullsh!t....the parents need to work or everyone is institutionalized...period....

You work...you eat...no work....no food....get used to that ideal cause it is coming soon to a region near you....

Kinda need jobs to do the work thing and if the government started fixing bridges and roads without the contractors then a whole lot of people will start screaming socialism.

The fixing bridges and roads has come and gone.

How do I know?

I moved to Oregon to work on the McColough bridge. Cathodic protection. Funded by the Fed grant, to States. We completed one haf of the bridge ( South side ). ODOT is out of money and can not do the other half. Pistol river is now getting cathodic protection, as that job is much less.

project_mccullough3.jpg

http://McCullough Br...t and painting.

edit to add : Jobs like these are considered " prevailing wage " jobs. ( google it )......The jobs I did were anywhere from $41.00 a hour to $48.00 a hour pay. Those jobs at any " normal " construction place would be $14.00 to $ 17.00 a hour, if you are lucky.

This is your tax dollars being spent badly, and the Government letting it happen. That is a lot of money that could go elsewhere. Now, think about how many " prevailing wage " Government jobs are out there right now, I guarantee a lot of them.

Edited by Sakari
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Prevailing wage is the average pay counting benefits in a given area. It is suppossed to include the cost of health insurance, retirement, etc. Not all of those benefits are visible on the check as well. Health insurance and retirement are usually paid for by the employer so they can claim a tax benefit from it. So that 41-48$ could be 14-17$ on the paycheck with the rest being benefits. A contractor that normally doesn't provide any benefits and pockets the difference in pay is actually forced to pay the difference on "prevailing wage" jobs. You would be surprised at what contractors bill people. My roommate in college worked for mediacom as a installer. They paid him 10$ an hour but was billing him to corporate customers for 100$ an hour. My total price is around 42$ an hour with benefits and my contactor bills me out at 60$-70$. You didn't think that your boss sold your labor at cost, did you?

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Total Number of U.S. States where Welfare pays more than an $8 per hour job: 40

Number of U.S. States where Welfare pays more than a $12 per hour job: 7

Number of U.S. States where Welfare pays more than the average salary of a U.S. Teacher: 9

So this is a direct argument for raising the minimum wage.

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Prevailing wage is the average pay counting benefits in a given area. It is suppossed to include the cost of health insurance, retirement, etc. Not all of those benefits are visible on the check as well. Health insurance and retirement are usually paid for by the employer so they can claim a tax benefit from it. So that 41-48$ could be 14-17$ on the paycheck with the rest being benefits. A contractor that normally doesn't provide any benefits and pockets the difference in pay is actually forced to pay the difference on "prevailing wage" jobs. You would be surprised at what contractors bill people. My roommate in college worked for mediacom as a installer. They paid him 10$ an hour but was billing him to corporate customers for 100$ an hour. My total price is around 42$ an hour with benefits and my contactor bills me out at 60$-70$. You didn't think that your boss sold your labor at cost, did you?

Well, lets say at the end a lawsuit was settled. And, the company that did the cathodic part will never do a job in Oregon again. That is from a ODOT higher up.

As for how it works. Each job is assigned a prevailing wage pay, from clean up to welding. Every hour is documented by each employee of what they did for the day. The State, or Fed is billed for the labor costs. The employer makes more, as the labor costs were in the bid. Employers do not have a choice, and the pay is mandated by law, so no, they can not charge more to the State or to the Feds when it comes to the labor pay.

As for no insurance or retirement, that extra $30.00 a hour was well over what I paid for insurance and retirement. Sorry, a extra $340.00 a day is enough for a month of insurance alone.

Prevailing wage is a rip off to tax payers, I sure loved the paychecks, but I now know what it really is.

So this is a direct argument for raising the minimum wage.

Exactly.

Edited by Sakari
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Sorry if I was a bit confusing, the amounts I stated for my college roommate and I were what the companies typically charged its customers not the prevailing wage rate. Another example that you could easily go check on would be an auto mechanic. They bill you for 50-60$ an hour for labor but don't pay their mechanics that rate. Prevailing wage jobs have the price set as the average by the government as you stated. The whole point of prevailing wage is to take the price of labor and benefits out of the equation of getting the job done, the side effect being that the wages have to be paid to the worker instead of pocketed by the company as cost of labor.

I am kind of curious on what the lawsuit was about. It shouldn't be about the price of labor because that was already set at a fixed amount because of the prevailing wage.

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You also have to realize that this is the reported industry average. Workers in Oregon apparently make 41-48$ an hour on average doing that particular job. That number might be skewed a little high because companies that under cut on labor don't generally report their rates because that would lower the industry average and the advantage they have of cheaper labor would disappear.

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Workers in Oregon apparently make 41-48$

Hogwash. ODOT is a Government job. It is one of the better jobs in Oregon however......They also use Prison labor whenever they can. Which is $1.15 an hour.

Edited by AsteroidX
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Hey, don't shoot the messenger. I am just explaining what prevailing wages are using the numbers that Sakari provided. They are similiar to Iowa though, so I believe his numbers to be true. And remember that 41-48$ an hour might actually be 14-17$ on the check with the additional expense being benefits, training, etc. The number is what companies provide the government as to the expense of labor per hour. My company for example bills me at 70$. Pays 45$ for my retirement, insurance, wages, Osha training classes, etc. What I get on the check is 25$. The 45$ is what it reports to the government as my wage for the purposes of determining prevailing wage.

As for the prevailing wage itself. The government takes the average and then says you have to pay your worker the average pay either in wages or benefits. For companies that don't do benefits this translates into a straight pay raise. So if someone were to do my job and my pay was the prevailing wage, they would get paid 45$ an hour.

Edited by Gromdor
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Hogwash. ODOT is a Government job. It is one of the better jobs in Oregon however......They also use Prison labor whenever they can. Which is $1.15 an hour.

Asteroid, I made that pay, on a prevailing wage job. That is not even close to what Oregon wages are. Not sure if you read everything.

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Dont get me wrong ODOT is a great job. One of the few and Im just mentioning they outsource alot of there contract work which is good for the contract workers as they get prevailing wage instead of there measley $12 for cement work. So yeah Ive heard its cushey.

But if your a vetted ODOT employee your gonna be getting PERS and the whole package. Just its a Government job which kinda disqualifies it from the average Joes problems.

Its just I live in Oregon and I know what the average workers are getting around here and I know theres a huge disparity between the State workers and the Public sector. But it was cool Wallmart offered to hire returning vets as its so hard to fond a job in the first place. :tu:

Yes Sakari it took me a moment to figure out what you said.

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Dont get me wrong ODOT is a great job. One of the few and Im just mentioning they outsource alot of there contract work which is good for the contract workers as they get prevailing wage instead of there measley $12 for cement work. So yeah Ive heard its cushey.

But if your a vetted ODOT employee your gonna be getting PERS and the whole package. Just its a Government job which kinda disqualifies it from the average Joes problems.

Its just I live in Oregon and I know what the average workers are getting around here and I know theres a huge disparity between the State workers and the Public sector. But it was cool Wallmart offered to hire returning vets as its so hard to fond a job in the first place. :tu:

Yes Sakari it took me a moment to figure out what you said.

ODOT over saw the work, as it was a State Highway bridge job. We did not work for ODOT. They did the inspections, and made sure specs were correct. They do not get near that pay. I do wish I worked for ODOT though :)

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ODOT over saw the work, as it was a State Highway bridge job. We did not work for ODOT
Im glad you got that job. Oregon has beautiful bridges. Thats the one on the coast right ? You mean they only finished half of it ? Last time I went by they were just past the roadway shoulder.

The guy that designed the bridges along the coast has a decent reputation. Its worth the effort to keep them up as they are so beautiful.

This pic brings back memories of the coast.

http://www.coos-bay.net/bridgesoforegon.html

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IF ODOT has people doing those jobs as well, their pay would be used to figure prevailing wage as well. This includes PERS and the whole package. If they go to a prevailing wage job they would get paid their normal rate because PERS and their regular package would all count against the 41-47$ total. Another thing- if ODOT is the largest and most steady employer from those jobs it is quite possible that they are setting the average prevailing wage rate themselves.

The reason I learned all of this is because I went to a prevailing wage job myself and was wondering why I didn't get 45$ an hour but Joe off the street did.

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Im glad you got that job. Oregon has beautiful bridges. Thats the one on the coast right ? You mean they only finished half of it ? Last time I went by they were just past the roadway shoulder.

The guy that designed the bridges along the coast has a decent reputation. Its worth the effort to keep them up as they are so beautiful.

This pic brings back memories of the coast.

http://www.coos-bay....esoforegon.html

Long story short. My parents have lived on the coast for 34 years. ( retired here ) I lived in Sparks,Nevada, we had lost our jobs with little notice ( recession ) and were going to lose our home. I took that job in hopes of saving our home. It was a 2 year job, and the plan failed. The pay was good, the job was the worst I had ever had in my life. ( I am 47, worked full time since 17 ). If it were run by decent people, it would have been a god job.

We are still here, although it has been and still is a ruff ride.

The coast is nice, I have all ways loved the Salmon fishing. I miss my grand kids, and my son, and the home we thought we would live our lives out in. We are just in survival mode really.

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I lived in Sparks,Nevada,

Funny we migrate almost the same trail. I was down in Panther Valley, Reno..and Reno proper for a few years. I still have family living there and am needing to make another High Desert excursion soon. I miss Hot August Nights.

Yerp survival mode here myself.

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