Re:POLITICS: Having Babies

[Guest guest]

Aven--Excellent points! Too bad the government will NEVER stop grabbing our

personal wealth! Case in point--my OWN inheritance, which was SLASHED to give

about half of it to strangers (lawyers, government, etc.)! That's not where I

want MY money going! Marilyn

[Guest guest]

You hit the nail on the head, Heidi. The use of day care from birth is

just necessary for many folks these days. It is sad, and it seems it's

all happened so quickly. One hundred years ago, women just didn't

work. Of course, they couldn't vote either. I don't think any of us

would want to go back to all of that, but there has to be some happy

middle ground where society values the upbringing of children without

stealing them away from mothers, making a commodity of child rearing in

the process.

And why does it seem the politicians who tout " family values " are often

the ones refusing decent wages and other pro-family measures to citizens?

Deanna

> One of my major theses in life is that our society

> is unsustainable because it does not support women having

> children and all that implies (breastfeeding, caring properly for

> a helpless infant, bonding). Further, because of the high

> survival rate, if women DID have children at the rate we COULD,

> biologically, we would run out of resources and space.

>

> I don't know the solution. As a society, we have to find a solution

> though, or the kids are doomed.

>

>

> Heidi Jean

>

>

>

>

>

[Guest guest]

In a message dated 11/26/04 10:46:15 AM Eastern Standard Time,

hl@... writes:

> And why does it seem the politicians who tout " family values " are often

> the ones refusing decent wages and other pro-family measures to citizens?

____

~~~~> Most people don't receive their wages from politicians. Most people

are employed in the private sector, so your question seems to be founded on a

non-sequitor.

Chris

____

" What can one say of a soul, of a heart, filled with compassion? It is a

heart which burns with love for every creature: for human beings, birds, and

animals, for serpents and for demons. The thought of them and the sight of them

make the tears of the saint flow. And this immense and intense compassion,

which flows from the heart of the saints, makes them unable to bear the sight of

the smallest, most insignificant wound in any creature. Thus they pray

ceaselessly, with tears, even for animals, for enemies of the truth, and for

those

who do them wrong. "

--Saint Isaac the Syrian

[Guest guest]

In a message dated 11/26/04 11:39:52 AM Eastern Standard Time,

sahmomof8@... writes:

> The answer isn't more government

> intervention--it's a change in our personal value system, combined with

> creative ways

> to survive on one income and/or a family home business, and/or creating a

> " blended family " where several generations live together, and work and

raise

> the

> kids together (such as the home we're trying to create right now for

______

~~~~~> I think your hitting a much more important nail even squarer on the

head here. What defines a " decent wage " is not its nominal value, but how it is

spent, and how it is made more or less efficient through lifestyle.

The total pool of wealth has increased enormously over the last half-century,

but many people are still struggling to make ends meet. Why? At least part

of the answer is that families have increasingly fallen apart. People leave

home earlier and marry later, get divorced more often, and are more likely to

be single. Living with parents until marriage, using grandparents as

baby-sitters, marrying early and staying married to the same person, etc, all

increase

the value of an income by combining resources within the family to a mutual

benefit.

Think of all the money that is wasted by a young person's desire to live

independently and resistance to settling down that gets spent on renting a place

without contributing to future home ownership, that could instead be saved

towards a home while living with parents, and paid towards a mortgage that will

eventually result in a debt-free home ownership with a wife and family, while

the wife may have a second income that contributes. (I should note here that I

could have reversed the genders here and I don't mean to make one or the other

contribution " secondary. " ) And think of how much better that family will be

able to support a second generation once the home is owned and they are not in

debt.

It's at least worth considering that the falling apart of the family

structure has paralleled the growth of the welfare state. The latter might not

have

been the only contributing factor to the former, but it certainly allowed it to

a much greater degree. Increasing government intervention to force employers

to give greater wages to people who " need " them to survive in this derranged

nihilism toward the institution of family will only exacerbate the problem by

allowing people to give in to a greater degree to their hedonistic desires to

maximize their present fun and independence without regard to whether their

future and their children's future can afford it.

Chris

____

" What can one say of a soul, of a heart, filled with compassion? It is a

heart which burns with love for every creature: for human beings, birds, and

animals, for serpents and for demons. The thought of them and the sight of them

make the tears of the saint flow. And this immense and intense compassion,

which flows from the heart of the saints, makes them unable to bear the sight of

the smallest, most insignificant wound in any creature. Thus they pray

ceaselessly, with tears, even for animals, for enemies of the truth, and for

those

who do them wrong. "

--Saint Isaac the Syrian

[Guest guest]

In a message dated 11/26/04 2:40:32 PM Eastern Standard Time,

s.fisher22@... writes:

> If you were referring

> to American women, I don't know what they were all doing a hundred years

> ago, but I imagine the only ones who truly didn't work were upper class

> women who could afford not to. Perhaps knows what occupied them a

> hundred years ago since he has a history degree...

____

~~~~> You are exactly right. The " cult of domesticity " was a movement

started by women meant to empower women by giving them a sphere of their own.

It

was entirely a middle class movement, because ordinary women could not afford to

not work.

Chris

[Guest guest]

How bout this? We get rid of income, inheritance, and

property taxes so normal families would have a chance to

build wealth and pass it on to their kids - wealth in the form

of large properties with room for several houses or home-

based livelihoods. A paid-for house and/or a home-based

business could become a typical wedding gift from the

parents!

Family businesses and homes are

constantly being lost to inheritance taxes - and this idea

comes straight from the Communist Manifesto! Marx

understood that government grows strong at the expense

of family; it's too bad Americans don't.

Aven

> Deanna--I think YOU hit the nail on the head here! Our government will

NEVER

> espouse " family values " --it's not profitable! And look at all the WOMEN in

> politics who either are childless by choice, or are leaving THEIR tiny ones in

> the care of strangers (or maybe family members who already RAISED their

kids!)

> so they can " fulfill " themselves! Bah! The answer isn't more government

> intervention--it's a change in our personal value system, combined with

creative ways

> to survive on one income and/or a family home business, and/or creating a

> " blended family " where several generations live together, and work and

raise the

> kids together (such as the home we're trying to create right now for

> ourselves). Daycare from birth is a CRIME against children, plain and

simple. More moms

> should know they have options, single moms or not, to work from home, or

to

> live in communal groups where the children have a stable base of

> " family " --biological or not--to be nurtured in. All the government handout

programs do is

> separate moms from their children, give them the idea that the government

can

> raise them better than they can, and the situation spirals from there. One

> intervention leads to another, and that's criminal. Gee, do ya think I have

strong

> opinions on this? Marilyn

>

>

>

[Guest guest]

In a message dated 11/26/04 6:56:16 PM Eastern Standard Time, cah@...

writes:

> ~~~But, they didn't go out to work much at all until after womens' lib.

> That's my point. I wasn't talking about rights. I was talking about what

> actually happened.

____

~~~~> And I wasn't really making a direct response to your point, so much as

using it to make a related point. If I recall it correctly, I agreed with

your point in that respect, except your seemingly implied point that the vote

was

a paramount milestone in the movement for the freedom of women.

Chris

[Guest guest]

In a message dated 11/26/04 11:57:16 PM Eastern Standard Time,

heidis@... writes:

> Part of it may be government intervention, but a lot of it is also supply

> and demand. Housing prices have tripled in my neighborhood, in 2 years.

> I couldn't afford to buy my house now! Someone did a study on standards

> of living, and concluded that most things are cheaper now, but the two

> things that make people need to work more and more are housing costs

> and health care costs, both of which have skyrocketed.

>

____

~~~~> You're contrasting two things that ought to be thought of as

complimentary. The " supply and demand " of money is determined by government

intervention in the money market, upon which the demand for housing rests.

Chris

[Guest guest]

In a message dated 11/26/04 4:49:15 PM Eastern Standard Time, cah@...

writes:

> They began to see going out to work as something more highly prized than

> not having to go out to work. The vote was won many years before some women

> decided they wanted careers outside the home. I don't see a relationship

> there.

>

____

~~~> Women had the right to work before and after women's lib. Working

rather than not-working is not more important than the right to vote, but having

the right to choose to work or not to work is. And by right to work, I don't

mean the right to work for an employer who doesn't want you to work for her or

him, but rather the right to work for those who will accept the person's work.

But what was much more important, and fought for first by feminists in

England and America around the same time and same stage of the feminist

movement,

was the married woman's right to own property. This was fought for first, and

rightly so, because the right to own property is requisite to the right to be a

free and acting person.

The right to vote, on the other hand, is nothing but the right to participate

in criminal activity. It's only done at most once a year, and most people

vote less than this or not at all. The people who do not vote do not have less

meaningful lives because of it, and well over 99% of a person's life is spent

doing things that do not include voting and are not related to voting.

Chris

[Guest guest]

In a message dated 11/26/04 4:49:38 PM Eastern Standard Time, hl@...

writes:

> Bravo, Chris. You have made some very fine points here. But about the

> minimum wage: Companies are outsourcing even some good paying

> engineering jobs to countries with lower overall wages. So, I think

> regulation must reign in major corporate greed to some extent. You are

> correct that employers pay wages, but if they are not regulated, we will

> be living in polluted squalor in that kind of laissez-faire world.

_____

~~~~~> Of course, it should, for perspective, be considered that the choice

to employ people in other countries is a reciprocal choice between the

employer and those willing to work for that employer in those countries. Are

the

workers in these countries as greedy as the employers? Or, are the employees

who

would retain these jobs if government were to intervene as greedy as these

employers for wishing to use force to retain their higher-paying jobs?

Does it make any difference in how greedy any of the three groups are that

the only one wanting to use force to alter the outcome of freely chosen actions

is the latter group?

If we are better off in America with restrictions on capital movement, should

my state of Massachusetts also fight to retain jobs in MA by using force

against the greedy companies that want to move a plant to, say, New Mexico? If

trade is better off restrained within a country, is it better off restrained in

a state? Is it, in turn, better off restrained within a county? A city?

Town? Neighborhood? Street? To avoid a problem of unemployment and reduced

wages, should my grandfather, as the patriarch of the family, require my family

to only provide jobs to, or work for, other family members?

My mother could pay me an extremely high nominal wage if she was paying me

with a family currency that my grandfather was printing. Of course, by

retaining trade within my family, I wouldn't be able to buy very much with it.

My

wages would decline if we traded with our neighbors, but I would be able to buy

more with them, if we were also able to buy the goods our neighbors produce

more efficiently than the same goods in my home.

Massachusetts used to be dominated by shoe-making jobs. When machines became

involved, that put the majority of shoe-makers out of jobs. My state also

used to be dominated by factories, but they all moved to the South where

electricity and labor were cheaper. Out of greed, of course, the Southerners

were

allowed to steal away New England capital.

Oddly, to some, the people in my state seem to be much better off, and have

newer, better-paying jobs now, not to mention our shoes are much cheaper

relative to a weeks pay than they were in the 1830s.

Chris

[Guest guest]

>And why does it seem the politicians who tout " family values " are often

>the ones refusing decent wages and other pro-family measures to citizens?

>

>Deanna

I always wonder about that too! Also since I'm pretty obviously " progressive "

it gets me when people think it's weird for me to cook and stay with the

kids! However, I DO work ... I don't think it's good for women to " just stay

home " ...

that really was NOT the norm in the old days. Women stayed closer to the house

....

and did farming, some hunting, the cooking, and basically ran things while the

guys

were off adventuring. Most " manufacturing " (weaving, basketry, sewing, making

cooking utensils) was also women's work. And in the farm economy, women and

kids were just as hard working as the menfolk.

It's only in the " industrial age " where " work " has become separated from home

life. Even so, the early Swiss clocks, for instance, were made with piecework

that

was distributed to households that were snowed in for the winter. We are trying

to get back to a more " house centered " life, and basically it's working. It is a

far

more satisfying life too!

As for the politicians etc ... really, only a few simple changes need to be made

so women can stay with their kids more. In Asian countries you see the Mom's

working the kitchen in restaurants with a baby on their back and a couple

running

around (the older ones helping). Having health insurance more available to

self-employed

folks (by whatever method) would be a BIG step forward, and building

new paradigms for work (which is already happening: more big companies are

using " work at home " strategies which also save them money). In " The Baby Book " ,

one of the authors is the mother of 10 (!) children, and is also a doctor and

lecturer,

and practices attachment parenting. (OK, I suspect she has a housekeeper!).

Heidi Jean

[Guest guest]

> Re:POLITICS: Having Babies

>

>

>

>You hit the nail on the head, Heidi. The use of day care from birth is

>just necessary for many folks these days. It is sad, and it seems it's

>all happened so quickly. One hundred years ago, women just didn't

>work.

I'm sure you mean they didn't work outside_the_home, right? AFAIK, women

have always done much of the work in the world. In Africa for example, I

read some years ago that women grow 80% of the food. If you were referring

to American women, I don't know what they were all doing a hundred years

ago, but I imagine the only ones who truly didn't work were upper class

women who could afford not to. Perhaps knows what occupied them a

hundred years ago since he has a history degree...

Suze Fisher

Lapdog Design, Inc.

Web Design & Development

http://members.bellatlantic.net/~vze3shjg

Weston A. Price Foundation Chapter Leader, Mid Coast Maine

http://www.westonaprice.org

----------------------------

" The diet-heart idea (the idea that saturated fats and cholesterol cause

heart disease) is the greatest scientific deception of our times. " --

Mann, MD, former Professor of Medicine and Biochemistry at Vanderbilt

University, Tennessee; heart disease researcher.

The International Network of Cholesterol Skeptics

<http://www.thincs.org>

----------------------------

[Guest guest]

> -----Original Message-----

> From: Aven [mailto:twyllightmoon@...]

>

> Family businesses and homes are

> constantly being lost to inheritance taxes - and this idea

> comes straight from the Communist Manifesto! Marx understood

> that government grows strong at the expense of family; it's

> too bad Americans don't.

To be fair, immoral as they are, inheritance taxes directly affect only a

small minority of families. The real cost of the inheritance tax to most

people is indirect. The primary effect of the inheritance tax is to prevent

the intergenerational accumulation of wealth. The typical leftist regards

this as an unmitigated good independent of any revenue is may raise for the

government. In fact, intergenerational accumulation of wealth is much better

for the poor than it is for the rich. Here's why:

Economic growth is driven by savings and investment. The more people save,

the faster the economy grows, and the easier it gets to earn a living. That

wages are so much higher today than they were in 1900 has nothing to do with

unions or minimum wage laws. It's because of increases in the pool of

available capital, made possible by savings and investment.

In general, people with a lot of money tend to keep it tied up in

investments. People with less money--particularly the recipients of

government largesse--tend to spend it. So when the government taxes large

inheritances and spends it, the effect is to shift money away from savings

and towards consumption, ultimately hindering economic growth, which means

that real wages will rise more slowly, or perhaps even fall.

Ironically, the people clamoring loudest for " living wages " are the very

same ones demanding policies--high taxes, regulations, increases in

government spending--that would make it much more difficult for the economy

to grow enough to allow unskilled workers to earn the equivalent of

$10/hour.

[Guest guest]

> -----Original Message-----

> From: Deanna [mailto:hl@...]

>

> You hit the nail on the head, Heidi. The use of day care

> from birth is just necessary for many folks these days. It

> is sad, and it seems it's all happened so quickly. One

> hundred years ago, women just didn't work.

If I'm not mistaken, they also usually didn't try to raise children on their

own. These are the reasons why day care is " necessary " today when it wasn't

before:

1. Single parents. With few exceptions, anyone raising a child on his own

needs day care. I could be wrong, but I believe that this is a relatively

new phenomenon. It's my understanding that in the past, an unmarried woman

becoming pregnant would either marry the father or give the child up for

adoption.

2. Higher expectations. One person can support a pretty big family at $6 per

hour and 80 hours per week, as long as they're willing to accept a 1900

standard of living. Most people want better than that, though, and they

don't want to work 80 hours per week to get it. Even in families where a

perfectly good standard of living is possible on a single income, people

sometimes want the extra money, and are willing to give up at-home parenting

to make it. Hence we have two-income families.

3. Government intervention. I suspect that it's illegal to lease the kind of

housing that was standard among the poor in 1900. This drives up housing

costs. Taxes drive down real wages. Government has also driven up medical

costs (again, a 1900 medical plan should, in theory, be fairly cheap).

Given that it's never been easier to avoid or put off having children than

it is today, and that it's never been easier to earn a living than it is

today, I'd say that those who finds themselves in situations where day care

truly is necessary must have made some bad choices to get there.

> Of course, they

> couldn't vote either. I don't think any of us would want to

> go back to all of that but there has to be some happy middle

> ground where society values the upbringing of children

> without stealing them away from mothers, making a commodity

> of child rearing in the process.

Society doesn't value anything. Individuals value things. And no one steals

children away from mothers. They voluntarily give them up for a time in

order to free up that time to earn money. " Making a commodity of

child-rearing " is just anti-business rhetoric. First, it's not a commodity.

A commodity is a good for which all brands are equally preferable. I don't

believe that this is the case with day care. Second, even if it is a

commodity for some parents, it is they, and not the businesses, which have

made it so through their choices.

> And why does it seem the politicians who tout " family values "

> are often the ones refusing decent wages and other pro-family

> measures to citizens?

What politician has ever refused decent wages to citizens? Politicians don't

pay wages, except to government employees. Or do you mean that some

politicians have refused to pass laws making it a crime to offer someone a

job at a wage which you, in all your wisdom, do not deem acceptable?

[Guest guest]

This is why I believe general economics should be a required course in school,

at the high school level, with just as much importance as social studies, math,

science etc. (I'm not talking about household economics here.)

Carol

Ironically, the people clamoring loudest for " living wages " are the very

same ones demanding policies--high taxes, regulations, increases in

government spending--that would make it much more difficult for the economy

to grow enough to allow unskilled workers to earn the equivalent of

$10/hour.

[Guest guest]

>2. Higher expectations. One person can support a pretty big family at $6 per

>hour and 80 hours per week, as long as they're willing to accept a 1900

>standard of living. Most people want better than that, though, and they

>don't want to work 80 hours per week to get it. Even in families where a

>perfectly good standard of living is possible on a single income, people

>sometimes want the extra money, and are willing to give up at-home parenting

>to make it. Hence we have two-income families.

>

>3. Government intervention. I suspect that it's illegal to lease the kind of

>housing that was standard among the poor in 1900. This drives up housing

>costs. Taxes drive down real wages. Government has also driven up medical

>costs (again, a 1900 medical plan should, in theory, be fairly cheap).

Part of it may be government intervention, but a lot of it is also supply

and demand. Housing prices have tripled in my neighborhood, in 2 years.

I couldn't afford to buy my house now! Someone did a study on standards

of living, and concluded that most things are cheaper now, but the two

things that make people need to work more and more are housing costs

and health care costs, both of which have skyrocketed.

Heidi Jean

[Guest guest]

Yes, major faux pas. Oopsie.

Deanna

>

> I'm sure you mean they didn't work outside_the_home, right? AFAIK, women

> have always done much of the work in the world. In Africa for example, I

> read some years ago that women grow 80% of the food. If you were referring

> to American women, I don't know what they were all doing a hundred years

> ago, but I imagine the only ones who truly didn't work were upper class

> women who could afford not to. Perhaps knows what occupied them a

> hundred years ago since he has a history degree...

>

>

[Guest guest]

, would you want to see the US back in the pre Fair Labor

Standards Act of 1938? How " living " the minimum wage is debatable. But

the need for *a* minimum wage, the abolishment of child labor and

maximum hours provisions is something I don't think is debatable in the

industrial/technological age. I'm just curious about your take on this.

Deanna

>

> Ironically, the people clamoring loudest for " living wages " are the very

> same ones demanding policies--high taxes, regulations, increases in

> government spending--that would make it much more difficult for the

> economy

> to grow enough to allow unskilled workers to earn the equivalent of

> $10/hour.

>

>

>

>

[Guest guest]

While I agree with what has pointed out, I think there is another

element involved. No one ever seems to mention the fact that back in the 60s

and 70s many women went to work because of 'Women's Lib', which made them feel

like working was something they'd been deprived of doing. (In addition to it

being something done by those who had a single parent family, which, as

says, wasn't as common at that time.) Even today, people seem to associate

women's 'right' to work with women's right to vote. They began to see going out

to work as something more highly prized than not having to go out to work. The

vote was won many years before some women decided they wanted careers outside

the home. I don't see a relationship there.

I don't see the idea of 'stay-at-home moms' as an archaic idea. It's a matter

of choice, not of what is old-fashioned or not old-fashioned. (I dislike that

term by the way - stay-at-home moms - it's already gathering a negative

connotation. Of course, 'working moms' is too. That's because many have a

tendency to think it HAS to be one way or the other, so those two contingents

are 'at each other's throats' so to speak. I personally believe it should

simply be a matter of choice.)

I think everyone should be able to choose their own path in life, and most do,

whether they realize it or not. However, the volume of women entering the work

force in the 60s and 70s, lowered wages for everyone in the long run. It's

simply an element of supply and demand - more workers, more competition for

jobs, therefore lower wages. And, of course, what follows that is the necessity

for two worker households, (at least in the short term of history), in order to

maintain the same lifestyle people had in the 50s when only one person worked,

in so many cases. (I know that many people are maintaining a 'better' lifestyle

now than in the 50s, but part of that is only because many are not saving any

money and are living on credit, neither of which were common in the 50s. If

they were not spending most of what they make and buying so many things on

credit, I believe their lifestyles would be very similar to those of the 50s.)

Again, I'm not on one side or the other. It's just the way it has become, and

the above is part of the reason it has become that way. It's a lot of things

that combined to change the course of history......as it usually is when things

change.

Carol

If I'm not mistaken, they also usually didn't try to raise children on their

own. These are the reasons why day care is " necessary " today when it wasn't

before:

1. Single parents. With few exceptions, anyone raising a child on his own

needs day care. I could be wrong, but I believe that this is a relatively

new phenomenon. It's my understanding that in the past, an unmarried woman

becoming pregnant would either marry the father or give the child up for

adoption.

2. Higher expectations. One person can support a pretty big family at $6 per

hour and 80 hours per week, as long as they're willing to accept a 1900

standard of living. Most people want better than that, though, and they

don't want to work 80 hours per week to get it. Even in families where a

perfectly good standard of living is possible on a single income, people

sometimes want the extra money, and are willing to give up at-home parenting

to make it. Hence we have two-income families.

3. Government intervention. I suspect that it's illegal to lease the kind of

housing that was standard among the poor in 1900. This drives up housing

costs. Taxes drive down real wages. Government has also driven up medical

costs (again, a 1900 medical plan should, in theory, be fairly cheap).

[Guest guest]

Bravo, Chris. You have made some very fine points here. But about the

minimum wage: Companies are outsourcing even some good paying

engineering jobs to countries with lower overall wages. So, I think

regulation must reign in major corporate greed to some extent. You are

correct that employers pay wages, but if they are not regulated, we will

be living in polluted squalor in that kind of laissez-faire world.

Deanna

>

> ~~~~~> I think your hitting a much more important nail even squarer on

> the

> head here. What defines a " decent wage " is not its nominal value, but

> how it is

> spent, and how it is made more or less efficient through lifestyle.

>

> The total pool of wealth has increased enormously over the last

> half-century,

> but many people are still struggling to make ends meet. Why? At

> least part

> of the answer is that families have increasingly fallen apart. People

> leave

> home earlier and marry later, get divorced more often, and are more

> likely to

> be single. Living with parents until marriage, using grandparents as

> baby-sitters, marrying early and staying married to the same person,

> etc, all increase

> the value of an income by combining resources within the family to a

> mutual

> benefit.

>

> Think of all the money that is wasted by a young person's desire to live

> independently and resistance to settling down that gets spent on

> renting a place

> without contributing to future home ownership, that could instead be

> saved

> towards a home while living with parents, and paid towards a mortgage

> that will

> eventually result in a debt-free home ownership with a wife and

> family, while

> the wife may have a second income that contributes. (I should note

> here that I

> could have reversed the genders here and I don't mean to make one or

> the other

> contribution " secondary. " ) And think of how much better that family

> will be

> able to support a second generation once the home is owned and they

> are not in

> debt.

>

> It's at least worth considering that the falling apart of the family

> structure has paralleled the growth of the welfare state. The latter

> might not have

> been the only contributing factor to the former, but it certainly

> allowed it to

> a much greater degree. Increasing government intervention to force

> employers

> to give greater wages to people who " need " them to survive in this

> derranged

> nihilism toward the institution of family will only exacerbate the

> problem by

> allowing people to give in to a greater degree to their hedonistic

> desires to

> maximize their present fun and independence without regard to whether

> their

> future and their children's future can afford it.

>

> Chris

>

>

[Guest guest]

> I don't see the idea of 'stay-at-home moms' as an archaic idea. It's

> a matter of choice, not of what is old-fashioned or not old-fashioned.

> (I dislike that term by the way - stay-at-home moms - it's already

> gathering a negative connotation. Of course, 'working moms' is too.

> That's because many have a tendency to think it HAS to be one way or

> the other, so those two contingents are 'at each other's throats' so

> to speak. I personally believe it should simply be a matter of

> choice.)

My entire website is based on this: http://www.thenewhomemaker.com/

Lynn S.

------

Lynn Siprelle * web developer, writer, mama, fiber junky

http://www.siprelle.com * http://www.thenewhomemaker.com

http://www.democracyfororegon.com * http://www.knitting911.net

[Guest guest]

But wouldn't it be suicidal for government

schools to teach economics? Unless they really

mangled it, of course.

Aven

> This is why I believe general economics should be a required course in

school, at the high school level, with just as much importance as social

studies, math, science etc. (I'm not talking about household economics here.)

> Carol

>

>

>

> Ironically, the people clamoring loudest for " living wages " are the very

> same ones demanding policies--high taxes, regulations, increases in

> government spending--that would make it much more difficult for the

economy

> to grow enough to allow unskilled workers to earn the equivalent of

> $10/hour.

>

>

>

>

>

>

>

>

[Guest guest]

> How bout this? We get rid of income, inheritance, and

> property taxes so normal families would have a chance to

> build wealth and pass it on to their kids - wealth in the form

> of large properties with room for several houses or home-

> based livelihoods. A paid-for house and/or a home-based

> business could become a typical wedding gift from the

> parents!

>

> Family businesses and homes are

> constantly being lost to inheritance taxes - and this idea

> comes straight from the Communist Manifesto! Marx

> understood that government grows strong at the expense

> of family; it's too bad Americans don't.

>

> Aven

That's not foreign. Industry, capitalism and job chasing did that. Was

brought up 40 years ago in New England believing that the most important

thing you can pass onto your children is a home with land to feed themselves

and skills to bring themselves through lean times. Unfortunately, few live

their lives that way, understand it, see it all as property, know no roots

to anywhere and have strong ties to everything that goes against that.

Wanita

[Guest guest]

>>If I recall it correctly, I agreed with

your point in that respect, except your seemingly implied point that the vote

was

a paramount milestone in the movement for the freedom of women.

Chris<<

~~~:-) If you knew me better, you'd know nothing we've been talking about would

be a paramount milestone to me, especially now. The point I was trying to make

about the vote, (that evidently was lost somehow), was that it and women going

to work had little to do with each other. They've been linked together as if

they go hand in hand, and I feel they're unrelated to each other. I wasn't

saying one was any more important than the other, OR, for that matter, that

either one was even important at all in the grand scheme of things. They're

both just a part of history. My only real point was that the womens' movement

had a great influence on women going to work......that it hasn't only been a

high divorce rate that's caused it. And, that womens' entrance into the work

force pretty much in 'droves' in the 60s and 70s has greatly influenced the wage

rates.

Because I was a young woman during that period, it was literally a drama

unfolded before my eyes. Nearly all the young women in my Mother's generation

got married and never worked, regardless of status. I thought it would be that

way in my generation too, so was very surprised when all my friends got jobs

instead. (I was one of those who got married and didn't go to work until

several years later, after a divorce.)

Carol

[Guest guest]

> -----Original Message-----

> From: Deanna [mailto:hl@...]

>

> , would you want to see the US back in the pre Fair

> Labor Standards Act of 1938?

I'm not sure I understand the question. Certainly I'd like to see the laws

repealed, and federal spending reduced to pre-WWI levels (< 5% of GDP). Or

are you asking whether I'd like everything to be exactly the same as it was

then? That the latter would follow from the former is a post hoc fallacy.

To give me an idea of where you're coming from, what do you think would

happen if the United States repealed all labor laws? Conversely, what do you

think would happen if a very poor country such as Ethiopia ($700 per capita

GDP) adopted US labor laws?