I got a job that will do until I get something better.

[Pax]

Just so you know Ben. IMHO you can't be a good christian, good american, good manager/leader, good salesman or good teacher if you are racist. In fact, there is really little you can actually do competently while maintaining your current thought patterns.

[Kuciwalker]

Almost no professional jobs outside the government sector have defined benefit plans nowadays.

I'm not sure how true this is; my firm is focused mostly on public and multiemployer (i.e. union) plans, but my dad's practice is mostly corporate plans. They have gotten rarer, sure, but there are still plenty around.

The reason they're evil is that they often turn into (or start out as!) ponzi schemes

In a competitive labor market a pension plan can't turn into a Ponzi scheme. The incidence is fully on the owners of the firm (or the taxpayers). And unions only restrict entry to a [labor] market, not exit from it, so they can't effectively hold wages down.

edit: I suppose unions restrict exit in the sense that you have to forfeit the benefits of union membership, but I don't think it's a big deal that pensions may force employees to give up that...

[Al B. Sure!]

I do not think you are joking. I think you truly believe what you just said. and by definition I think you are a racist. "ADJUST FOR MINORITIES" !!!! You must be ****ting me. So a white texan is better than a black or hispanic texan. They're all ****ing Texans. So much for unity. So much for united we stand, divided we fall. In fact, the low score of minorities shows that Texas is probably full of racist teachers like yourself that look at their minority students as less than a person and therefore don't make the ****ing effort too teach them. You cannot have less academic expectation from a person based on race. That also means you have less expectations if you hire them or don't hire them because your expectations are less . Saying that you did good for a black guy is bull****. I hope you are not teaching now. If so please resign!!
By the way, I'm black and my SAT scores were 1090(1988) and 1140(1992) a little above the national averages of 1006 and 1001.

Have you met Dave Floyd, Oerdin, and Heraclitus?

[Pax]

Ben,
I want to apologize to you for some of the things I wrote earlier today. It is a fact that blacks and hispanics score lower on tests like the SAT. I'm not disputing that. It's just we can't lower our expectations or look at a score and go "Oh, that's good for a hispanic." We need all the scores to be good scores and we need to expect/demand that our students learn and our teachers teach regardless of race. That is one of the ways to a better USA.

[Ogie Oglethorpe]

Agreed Pax, our expectations that any person can achieve should never be shaken. That said I think the references Ben was alluding to are from a refutation of a Krugman NYT piece that stated how terrible the Texas school system was and attempted to link that to the frugal educational expenditures. While the rebuttal analysis did infer that minorities showed poorer overall performance the author of the piece clearly and in numerous places did not attempt to infer that it was a function of inherent racial aptitudes and abilities but moreover indicated that the poorer performance likely was a proxy measurement of comparitive disadvantages of socioeconomic status, poverty, racism, and family structure to name a few. That being said in order to compare outcomes of educational performance one has to consider these effects. It is in effect the same arguement that all teachers describe when discounting one size fits all metrics such as no left behind accountabilities. That being that teacher performance should consider how well they educated a given population of students (in effect how many grade levels have they been able to progress their given population of students).

[-Jrabbit]

I voted janitor. For no particular reason.

It's what I did as my campus job for one year back in college.

[MrFun]

So what are you doing?

Alright, I am going to be working as a janitor for a cleaning service company, The Millard Group.
I'll be vacuuming, dusting, and cleaning some windows at a clinic.

I have evening shift and it pays only $8.50 - after Social Security and taxes, I think it will come out to be about the same as my unemployment insurance. I'm only going to be working thirty hours, instead of forty - would have liked to have forty hours for more income.

[Ogie Oglethorpe]

Good for you Fun.

Being in the work force is the best way to network yourself for better opportunities and is good for your own personal morale.

[Lorizael]

It is a sufficient, not a necessary condition.
And no.

You mean to say there is dignity to be found beyond work? Poppycock I say!

[Sava]

work where you are freely paid

Can you define this concept?

Every commodity comes from the Earth, it grows on trees. But we don't have any land. The owners sell us commodities they get for free. The money is fake. It is issued to the owners for free. But they lend it to us at interest. We pay them for something they receive for free. Owners don't move their commodities. We do. Owners don't make things with their commodities. We do. Owners don't enforce the rules we consent to live by. We do.

Owners benefit by this system. We don't.

You don't own anything. Nobody on this forum does. Perhaps less than 1,000 people in this world could be considered owners. Everyone else is an employee, a slave, or an inheritor. Some have management authority.

I just would prefer concepts like "free" be clearly defined.

"Dignity" may as well be a brand name on a t-shirt. I suppose if you convince the slaves they have dignity, they will continue to work for you... not you personally, because I happen to know you are just another drone. Ambitious... but still a servant... very proud the master lets you sleep inside.

[The Mad Monk]

You have clearly never worked the land. Nothing is free.

[Pax]

MrFun,
congratulations!!! The job market can be tough. When I first retired from the Navy. The best job I could get was assistant manager at Bojangles(Fast Food Chicken). I had to do all of the things you're doing as a janitor, plus make biscuits, chicken, assorted sides and take **** from customers so be proud of yourself. Many people don't have a job at all.

[Pax]

P.S. much respect too you.

[Ben Kenobi]

I want to apologize to you for some of the things I wrote earlier today. It is a fact that blacks and hispanics score lower on tests like the SAT.

Thank you.

I'm not disputing that. It's just we can't lower our expectations or look at a score and go "Oh, that's good for a hispanic." We need all the scores to be good scores and we need to expect/demand that our students learn and our teachers teach regardless of race. That is one of the ways to a better USA.

My point is that minority students are doing better in TX than they are elsewhere. I'm a minority myself as I am disabled. Do I think that they should settle? Hell no. If I had settled for doing what was expected of me, I'd have gotten nowhere in life. I've been called deaf and dumb, ******, etc, many times, including by teachers. The attitude that they can just get by, pisses me off. I failed two this year because of that. I actually had one of the parents send me a gift after I failed her child.

[Pax]

Can you define this concept?

Every commodity comes from the Earth, it grows on trees. But we don't have any land. The owners sell us commodities they get for free. The money is fake. It is issued to the owners for free. But they lend it to us at interest. We pay them for something they receive for free. Owners don't move their commodities. We do. Owners don't make things with their commodities. We do. Owners don't enforce the rules we consent to live by. We do.

Owners benefit by this system. We don't.

You don't own anything. Nobody on this forum does. Perhaps less than 1,000 people in this world could be considered owners. Everyone else is an employee, a slave, or an inheritor. Some have management authority.

I just would prefer concepts like "free" be clearly defined.

"Dignity" may as well be a brand name on a t-shirt. I suppose if you convince the slaves they have dignity, they will continue to work for you... not you personally, because I happen to know you are just another drone. Ambitious... but still a servant... very proud the master lets you sleep inside.

Sava, I agree with you too a great extent. But I think we must have dignity and pride. Too this end, if we can support ourselves we should be proud. If we are working on being able to support ourselves we should be proud. But most of all if we are living in a society where the cards are so stacked against us as far as ownership I believe we should not define ourselves by what job we have but by whether or not we are happy with our lot in life. For instance, I love ham and cheese sandwiches. I don't want and probably can't afford to eat squid, caviar and etc. So why should I aspire to that if I don't really want it. Of course there are other high priced items I do want like another motorcycle, so therefore I am not satisfied until I get those things, right? Probably not, because even if I got another motorcycle I would still want one more and so on. But when all is said, I am happy and satisfied for the most part because I know I am going in the direction I choose whether I have a boss or not.