tobetrained

Here's a live example to continue to price issue: Netflix to buy studio/steaming of Warner Bros Discovery, incl HBO Max. [think before following links] https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/ce91x2jm5pjo Here's the relevant snippet on how corporations, across industries chase lower prices: "Netflix estimates it will find $2-3bn in savings, mostly through eliminating overlaps in the support and technology areas of the businesses." Also know as firing people. So, what is the likely outcome? Will people say enough is enough and cancel both services as they're tired of big companies and profit and dividends? Or will they think, "Great, I can get almost 2-for-1 if Max gets combined with Netflix (or, at least, discounted)?"

What do you mean? No one, left, right, or center is under any illusion or disillusion? The sitting President's party has lost the mid-terms in 10 of the last 11 elections, since 1980. The only exception being 2002, post-9/11.

Agree to this, conceptually, as well as the detail you mention for pharma. But then "we" (a.k.a. society) fight over which social values... to abort or not to abort, for instance. Pharma, in detail, is a bit outta my comfort zone beyond what I shared in the other convo. The number you ref above, 13.8% vs 7.7% are generally in-line with that. but it's all perspective too. The difference with Pharma vs other industries is that the product lifecycle is riddled with failures, 80%-90% of tested drugs do not come to market (shared previously), and the very short time window before generic versions become available. Those two issues change relationships of acceptable profitability greatly. For instance, think what Google would have been -- or, really, Yahoo before it -- if Internet search had to be made "free" (to advertisers) or generic after something like 10 years. How much more would Google (etc) have had to charged advertisers -- or even users -- for their services in those first few years? Would they even have existed in any serious way? But you touch on something -- the scientists in the development chain -- and getting financially rewarded for their services. Absolutely agree. But that isn't just from industry. It's also from the Universities...who take the lion's share of revenue from any patented work. The last I read -- most institutions take like 75%+, but do not quote me on that number. Our higher education system is so messed up, re financing. What the scientists don't get should go back to the pot for future funding to lower taxpayer burden for new research (federal tax revenue allocation to research grants) and not to these failing institutions. I made other similar points on these topics in the "Independent" thread. No reason to repeat!

I don't have an issue with AI stories. The human guidance is what makes it good. But AI images and video are boring. It's basically just animation...and there's already animation. I like people and their flaws.

I'm far too rational and non-emotional, as I'm regularly told. I write as a speak. But in a debate or just a discussion (like this), I never direct anger at the other person nor personalize the convo. Someone willing to communicate deserves just that, communication. And, I'm always happy to be corrected when wrong and never take offense to that being pointed out. As far as Marxism, I wouldn't be able to do more than restate what I learned in school...while trying to remember that far back in doing so. You know, when we had pet dinosaurs, and the like. But Wolff describes himself as a Marxist economist. What I dislike about Marxism, socialism, and the warping of all that thinking in what communism became, is the exclusion of competition. Why socialism fails is it has no motivator for the population. Democracy was developed by the ancient Greeks as an outcome of their hyper-competitive culture. Additionally, it's hostile to commerce (markets) which, both then and now, allows average people/the masses to move beyond government dependence and its (positive or negative) coercion.

I'm gonna double-down on use of government, from property, to healthcare, to whatever. Even some Democrats are starting to see the error: [think before following links] https://www.politico.com/news/2025/11/30/license-plate-trackers-pushback-00670550 This came out over the holiday weekend, and I saw last night as I'm catching up on reading.

OK. I gave it my best to watch all of it. I got through ~30 minutes of the video -- or, one hour in real time taking notes and ranting to myself about the lies and misrepresentations. Seriously, I did give it a try. And, to be 100% clear, if any of this sounds angry it's directed at the Marxist and not at you @tallslenderguy. About 6 minutes in: I like how he described WWII and the aftermath highlighting the so-called American Empire. But he fails to put certain things together. Our middle class succeeded as, mainly, our manufacturing capacity was so strong as other nations has to rebuild. Clearly that ended. But he simplifies that to self-loathing. Part of the "end" was globalization -- our manufacturing being outsourced as corporations chased consumers chasing lower prices -- ans the other main part was that these troubled economies (past-WWII) began to recover. It has nothing to do with political or economic system. Any and all would have benefited. The misrepresentations continued. For instance: He talks about Venezuela and the (false) narrative it's America needing a military "win." This is an outdated leftist thinking re: military industrial complex and the like. For him to say Afghanistan, Iraq, and Ukraine are failures of the American military is an absolute disgusting joke relative to rationale for what's happening in Venezuela. And making that point is offensive. If you want, we can go into each. But, let's be clear at how stupid the comment is: the American military isn't in Ukraine, for starters. About 16 mins in he talks about SNAP. People on the left need to make up their mind: either it's a major part of those recipients' needs or it's not. I don't care which it is, just pick. About 21 mins he outright lies about the travel industry. Corporate travel revenue is about 35% to 40% of US total. And, since they pay higher ticket prices, a smaller share of tickets sold. But those are estimates for a number of reasons -- it's hard to detail. but he lied to make people more angry -- to make them more likely to sympathize with his coming argument. At 23:30 he outright lies and says employers set wages, his 3% argument. This isn't true. They're negotiation between individual workers and/or unions with management. Workers can leave any time for better pay -- and American workers DO...something others can't, like UK nurses who have regulated salaries which start at the poverty line -- thanks to socialism. The issue comes in as the hiring organization becomes larger. At 26 mins is his first time making the biggest lie that American elite set the price for goods sold. No, the market does. The market is people, us, consumers. Price is set by what we are willing to spend. It's not absolute one way or the other but see Soap comment at 30:30 note. At 27 mins in he outright lies about share of spend, according to UN, that should be on housing. It's 30%. Of course, he says, "20% maybe 24% on housing." This is what extremists do to make their point stronger. At 28 mins he talk about Vienna and property ownership. The idea of any government owning land is disgusting and fails to grasp history. I'm not saying there are easy solutions. But my god, for those who don't like Trump consider a world where he would have a say in land rights and your ability in where to live where you want. A viable government is not the idealized version but one which can withstand problems. Please! At 30:30 he talks about a soap ad. OK, so let's take this re: price. If Unilever or P&G execs set price and people just had to deal with it...there would be others, small, local, etc, who would come in and undercut them with lower-priced options. But they can't. Price has downward pressure because they large companies chase people. And people, consumers, chase lower prices -- even when the outcome is not what they don't want: big companies making profits and paying high executive salaries and offering shareholder dividends. And, at 32 mins with his misrepresentation of tariffs I just gave up. Tariffs can be considered like taxes, but on imports. But they are not taxes and American-made items do not get that hit. And, if he was being honest, he would talk about all the tariffs and VAT charged throughout European socialist countries. The biggest real problem with these tariffs is they were done through exec order and not via congress. To be sure, I'm not a conservative. I'm a Centrist. But this guy is just a partisan extremist.

To this comment and the earlier one referencing me, I forgot to mention, the bestest book ever published... Calvin & Hobbes: There's Treasure Everywhere Life-changing! You just gotta look! I'm part Greek... The Good Strife is an absolute motto.

@tallslenderguy I can't upvote or the like, so upvote to post above.

@Pozzible I was referring to the profit they had found by moving jobs overseas or importing cheaper alternative products to American-made. If a company saved $1.50/unit sold by moving a job overseas/producing overseas then it's fair to say it would cost them $1.50 (+inflation over the time frame difference) to bring it back here.

@Pozzible I'm not really sure what you mean? If we take outsourcing of manufacturing, for instance, the whole point was it's cheaper to produce products overseas (incl shipping those products back) than paying American workers to produce here. In terms of domestic production, the same issue -- globalism -- hit every other developed national around the world, regardless of economic or political system. But the point was companies chased profit by chasing consumers who themselves chased the lowest purchase price. Most consumer products already have domestically-produced options -- they're just more expensive. Adding more competitors to that price-point helps to drive down price (assuming a stable supply chain). And more domestic demand will increase the domestic supply chain (e.g., cotton farming for clothing), further lowering the price for the domestic price-point category. And the non-domestic products are still available, which set the price floor -- preventing price spikes and gouging from domestics. And as fewer people buy non-domestic, the basics of supply and demand kick in and their price goes down to become a more attractive option. This helps force domestics into lower prices too, for fear of losing customers to too great a price-gap. This is just how markets work. It's what Apple has been trying to do, in part, with its own processor -- as one of many examples. If the assumption is it's a problem that there is a stock market and major corporations with CEOs and bonuses and dividends, etc. Well, of course there will be. But the question is what size of company do you support now with your purchases: Do you go to Starbucks instead of an indie coffee shop? If so, how much do you really care? Do you pay with cash or do you pay with a card/digital wallet/app? If the latter set do you really care? Do you use Uber and the like or the local cab company? If the former set, do you really care? Do you use AirBnB and the like instead of hotels? If the former, do you care about the affordability problem? Nothing is perfect and everything is complex. But right now our collective choices are crap -- then we complain about the result of those choices.

I'm will watch the video to comment more rationally. But in the first two minutes I'm pulling my hair out! 😃 Can I ask, re: non partisan economy, Wolff is a stated Marxist... the modern translator of socialist and then communist thinking. What are your thoughts on that being not partisan? I might get there in the video, but it's my going-in concern. But here's the specific issue: he talks about the lefty issue of incarceration. I'm not getting into here whether (or not) it's a problem. Let's stipulate it is. But he then goes on a partisan attack of DOGE. The Federal prison and Federally-run immigration systems, at the start of 2025, were about 250k people. State and local prisons were 1.75 million. [think before following links] https://www.prisonpolicy.org/reports/pie2025.html These are the problems that get over-simplified for a quick political score. Both sides do it for sure. A fair question to him, but NOT you @tallslenderguy, what does DOGE have to do with our state and local prison systems? He's not an idiot... he's knows this very well, it's intentional manipulation. Like our election system, or education system, etc., we want decentralization.

I thought this was an interesting article which challenges -- not necessarily replaces -- notions about how to view the country today as well as the topic at hand. [think before following links] https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2025/11/23/kyrsten-sinema-maha-psychedelic-ibogaine-interview-00664454

And, if I may quadruple-down on my point. Take your comment here. Why should you feel the need to rationalize what you want to talk about? For those that don't want to see it, they can say "no mas." They can choose to view other things. They can choose to post things they want to discuss. They can ignore what they don't want to see. It's too easy to just complain without action. That complacency is another issue in a free society. I think, in a round-about way, I'm here getting back to your comment about participation in that other referenced thread.

@tallslenderguy those are AI videos, which is why those aging beauties look like beauties. I'm not saying the content is AI, necessarily -- just AI content-farms. Here's Wolff's direct site to see difference: [think before following links] https://www.democracyatwork.info/economicupdate In his latest, he talks about Capitalism as class warfare. And he points out its failure to society, which every "system" has. I wish there was more solution generation vs. problem identification in the commentary. It gets to our prior convo in "Independent" thread, in part. When are we -- the consumer -- also responsible for buying the products with the cheaper prices as opposed to American-made higher-priced items? Or, worse yet, when are we responsible for buying foreign-made sweatshop products sold by mass retailers? As employers chase their profits, when do we -- as individuals -- just say "no mas." Consider what AI will do to our society. And then see this retailer, an article I read this past week -- expecting to cut two-thirds of its workforce who already imports crap made overseas (a UK example): [think before following links] https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c98n28k9nz1o When will people "protest" by no longer buying? No mas. We incentivize companies everyday into making these profit-based decisions which hurt us -- by chasing the cheapest prices. For myself, if we supported domestic businesses -- esp. small businesses -- at the inevitable higher prices, all those profits would be turned back to wages paid to domestic workers, and that 'de-consolidation' would also mean fewer extremely wealthy people. That's a better solution -- not that there is only one solution -- to endless fights between a bloated government's tax system being fought with the bloated amount of super wealthy elites. And, in this last point, it's the 'average person' pocketing the wealth transfer and not either the government or super wealthy.