25 replies to this topic

[NanuqoftheNorth]

Nick Hanauer, one of the founding investors of Amazon.com provides a different view on who actually is responsible for creating jobs in our economy. He is speaking at the TED (Technology, Entertainment and Design) Conference in Long Beach, California, March 2012.

[natty]

I've always found it silly to refer to the rich as job creators. It's overly simplistic.

[cookinwithgas]

The rich are job creators, but they can arbitrarily decide on when jobs are needed - for their own needs - vs. investing somewhere else for their own gain, etc.

If the middle class has the money to spend and theres a better idea out there, a middle class person will invent it and be able to market it for their own gain, instead of having some rich guy steal it via lawyers and decide whether it should be brought to market or tucked away so as to not compete with their own idea.

It seems so simple. To this day the rights utter fascination with defending the absurdly wealthy is one of the great mysteries of modern human nature to me.

[cookinwithgas]

"....I may make hundreds of times more than the average worker, but I don't buy hundreds of times more stuff...."

[rodeo]

This idea that the rich are job creators is laughable. Hiring more people is a last resort for business that they do begrudgingly when they absolutely have to. Every new position they have to create or fill is a million bucks down the drain for them. Slashing jobs and firing people lowers operating costs and increases revenue. The only time hiring takes place is when you are forced to expand or else let another company do it and take over that share. If some business owner goes around hiring a bunch of people just to be a job creator for the good of the community, he is going to fail.

Demand creates jobs. Where does demand come from? From the consumers. The workers. They create the job, they fill the job for a wage that nets the "creator" a profit, and then they consume the product. Meanwhile the "job creator" acts like they're doing you the favor by allowing you a living wage when all they've done was invest money that was rightfully earned by the worker in the first place.

[cookinwithgas]

Communist.

[NanuqoftheNorth]

Sadly, when you realize that a large number of Americans base their decision of who to vote for off simple bumper sticker catch phrases like, Obama Is Dividing America, Stop the War on Job Creators, Stop Obama Care Death Panels, and Drill Baby Drill!, it is hard see a way to turn this country around.

Almost half the population votes against their own best interests!

Why do they want to go right back to the policies that have decimated the wages of 99% of Americans over the last 30 years?

[Floppin]

It's a good thing that TED decided not to release this video. We can't let the common people believe that the rich don't really care about them.

[d-run]

It's a good thing that TED decided not to release this video. We can't let the common people believe that the rich don't really care about them.

I was going to post this in your other thread, but figured this is the one it will be discussed in. TED chose not to publish this speech and a lot of people didn't like that. They got creamed on a bunch of websites, I saw it on Reddit. The curator, Chris Anderson, posted this as a response to criticism, so I'll pass it along so people can hear both sides of the argument.

At TED this year, an attendee pitched a 3-minute audience talk on inequality. The talk tapped into a really important and timely issue. But it framed the issue in a way that was explicitly partisan. And it included a number of arguments that were unconvincing, even to those of us who supported his overall stance. The audience at TED who heard it live (and who are often accused of being overly enthusiastic about left-leaning ideas) gave it, on average, mediocre ratings.

We discussed internally and ultimately told the speaker we did not plan to post. He did not react well. He had hired a PR firm to promote the talk to MoveOn and others, and the PR firm warned us that unless we posted he would go to the press and accuse us of censoring him. We again declined and this time I wrote him and tried gently to explain in detail why I thought his talk was flawed.

So he forwarded portions of the private emails to a reporter and the National Journal duly bit on the story. And it was picked up by various other outlets.

TED in my opinion is pretty open to different ideas and like Chris said in the link, if they would have just published it a lot less people would have seen or cared about it.


http://tedchris.post...s.com/131417405

[NanuqoftheNorth]

The only reason this wasn't released earlier was the leaders of TED didn't think it was in their best interests to do so.

TED didn't want to run the risk of alienating powerful 1%ers that do not share Nick Hanauer's views.

TED has been receiving quite a bit of bad press recently for not releasing it though.

I do know Nick has also been on a several networks recently discussing the same ideas in a related book, The Gardens Of Democracy.

Perhaps the popular response Nick Hanauer has received on his book tour, plus the external pressure from the media, convinced TED it was not "Class Warfare" to show some courage and support the majority of Americans in regaining their dignity.

[NanuqoftheNorth]

I was going to post this in your other thread, but figured this is the one it will be discussed in. TED chose not to publish this speech and a lot of people didn't like that. They got creamed on a bunch of websites, I saw it on Reddit. The curator, Chris Anderson, posted this as a response to criticism, so I'll pass it along so people can hear both sides of the argument.

TED in my opinion is pretty open to different ideas and like Chris said in the link, if they would have just published it a lot less people would have seen or cared about it.

http://tedchris.post...s.com/131417405

What should be unconvincing to the American Public is that the massive redistribution of wealth in our society from the middle class to a relatively minuscule portion of population is in anyone's long term best interests.

Economists have known for hundreds of years that this type of imbalance in wealth is dangerous, including the father of modern capitalism, Adam Smith.

The way our society's wealth has been intentionally stolen through the manipulation of our country's laws and tax regulations over the last 40 years is not in the best interests of anyone that believes in a healthy economy or a healthy democracy.

[d-run]

I don't know the real reason why it wasn't published, but is it that hard to believe it just didn't make the cut? They don't publish every talk on their website. The dude, in my opinion, isn't a great public speaker. There is nothing ground breaking in the talk, he is just talking about supply and demand. Plus some of it is a little "disingenuous" as he likes to say. His final point was that a lot of wealthy people pay about 15% because of capital gains and the such, but real Americans pay a 35% income tax. Well, most of the people who qualify for the 35% bracket (over 372,000/year) are probably investing and not by any stretch of the imagination "average" Americans.

[NanuqoftheNorth]

I don't know the real reason why it wasn't published, but is it that hard to believe it just didn't make the cut? They don't publish every talk on their website. The dude, in my opinion, isn't a great public speaker. There is nothing ground breaking in the talk, he is just talking about supply and demand. Plus some of it is a little "disingenuous" as he likes to say. His final point was that a lot of wealthy people pay about 15% because of capital gains and the such, but real Americans pay a 35% income tax. Well, most of the people who qualify for the 35% bracket (over 372,000/year) are probably investing and not by any stretch of the imagination "average" Americans.

Some good points. Nick is not the best speaker and the way he utilized the 35% tax bracket was somewhat disingenuous. Having said that, his point about the financial elite paying a smaller percent of their income than many middle class workers still rings true.

In more moderate times, say 40 years ago, what he is saying would have been considered a given by most Americans.

Today, with the 1% Job Creator and Class Warfare, mantra being constantly put forward by the Plutocrats and the GOP, Nick Hanauer's views are considered, heresy, radical or at least unconventional by many.

Including this little gem:

[rodeo]

TED is a rather liberal gathering (as any erudite crowd is going to be) and has had just as biased talks as this one. I don't have any reason to believe they just didn't post it because it wasn't popular or good.

[NanuqoftheNorth]

Here are a couple of articles that touch on why the video was not released to the general public until now.

http://business.time...-article-latest

TED curator Chris Anderson referenced the Gates talk in an e-mail to colleagues in early April, which was also sent to Hanauer, suggesting that he didn't want to release Hanauer’s talk at the same time as the one on contraception.

Hanauer’s talk “probably ranks as one of the most politically controversial talks we've ever run, and we need to be really careful when” to post it, Anderson wrote on April 6. “Next week ain't right. Confidentially, we already have Melinda Gates on contraception going out. Sorry for the mixed messages on this.”

In early May Anderson followed up with Hanauer to inform him he’d decided not to post his talk.

There is more here...

http://www.nationalj...uality-20120516