Furlough Food

[ftballman125]

Exactly, numbers are only as good as the counters. But keep drinking the cool aid boys and girls everything will be ok

Again, being in control of evidence is a good way to prevent one from being hoodwinked by the Kool-Aid mongers. So, give me some evidence. Otherwise, quit mongering your Kool-Aid.

 

[jarheadhunter]

I'm still waiting to hear why I should have more sympathy for workers that have been out of work for a whole ten days now than I should for those who have been out of a full time job for years?

So you feel the same way about people that have been out of a job for years? No one here said you should have "more" sympathy or any at all for that matter. But, To say "In my opinion these furloughs should be larger and permanent, that's all. You won't change my mind" just doesn't sit right with me. I could care less if you have any sympathy for me, but to say you think I should loose my job permanently is where I have the problem. I just don't understand how someone can wish something bad on someone else?

 

[Ray]

The problem with the size of our government is Joe Public. He whined and cried and made demands on congress and congress responded in kind by creating laws.

My non excepted position is directly related to Joe Public's demands on his his government. If it was not for Joe, I would have a completely different career.

 

[littlebuf]

I just don't understand how someone can wish something bad on someone else?

I suppose I could say the same to you. We should just keep up business as usual, be owned by China, crush our children with the debts were racking up and do nothing about it? To be clear I don't want you to lose your job, I want the government to do there's

 

[TEmbry]

Does anyone here truly believe government is going under because of the number of people working for them instead of the number of those dependents NOT working for them?

As mentioned, keep drinking the koolaid I suppose.

 

[jarheadhunter]

I suppose I could say the same to you. We should just keep up business as usual, be owned by China, crush our children with the debts were racking up and do nothing about it? To be clear I don't want you to lose your job, I want the government to do there's

You see the difference is that I never said I want to be owned by China and crush our children with debt.

I agree with you the government is messed up right now. I know that it's not because of Federal workers like me though. You can think what you want and you could furlough every Government employee right now and it wouldn't do anything to solve the problems we have.

 

[jarheadhunter]

Does anyone here truly believe government is going under because of the number of people working for them instead of the number of those dependents NOT working for them?

As mentioned, keep drinking the koolaid I suppose.

Exactly he acts like the Federal Employees are the reason the country is in debt. Give me a break. You want to cut the Government start at the top. That's where the trimming needs to be done. The people that aren't getting furloughed and can't even do one of the main jobs they are assigned to do and make a budget.

 

[sk1]

Does anyone here truly believe government is going under because of the number of people working for them instead of the number of those dependents NOT working for them?

As mentioned, keep drinking the koolaid I suppose.

the dependents and foreign aid money are my biggest issues, we have too many of our own problems to support the rest of the world right now. while the federal employees should maybe be streamlined in some areas, even if we were permanently furlough'd as littlebuf would like--it wont solve anything, it's such a small percentage of the problem.

 

[DWarcher]

Again, being in control of evidence is a good way to prevent one from being hoodwinked by the Kool-Aid mongers. So, give me some evidence. Otherwise, quit mongering your Kool-Aid.

Unemployment is calculated only by those drawing payments...once they fall off of the unemployment rolls, they are no longer counted.

 

[ftballman125]

...foreign aid money are my biggest issues, we have too many of our own problems to support the rest of the world right now....it's such a small percentage of the problem.

FYI, total foreign aid as a percentage of the federal budget hasn't topped 2% in years. If you don't want to worry about small percentages, then I wouldn't be too concerned about aid. Most of that goes to supporting our military allies, anyway. http://foreignassistance.gov/aboutthedata.aspx

And, if a tin-hatter is concerned that these foreign aid data are made up too... well, they'd have to be VERY made up to be anywhere close to the major issues: social security, medicare/medicaid, and defense spending.

 

[Eagle]

I know these numbers aren't exact, but earlier this year, when sequestration was set to kick in, the furloughing of all 800K government employees for 22 days was barely going to make a dent in the amount of money that sequestration called for being cut, something like 600 million of the 85 billion needed to be cut (not even 1%). As others have said, our salaries, benefits, whatever are not the problem, the socializing of everything and handouts on the other hand are the problem.

 

[ftballman125]

Unemployment is calculated only by those drawing payments...once they fall off of the unemployment rolls, they are no longer counted.

Sort of.

Even if a person falls off the unemployment rolls, if they still answer the questions under 'Who is not in the labor force?' indicating they still fit unemployment criteria, they will be still counted as unemployed. See here: http://www.bls.gov/cps/cps_htgm.htm

But, the concern was that this somehow majorly changed between 1982 and now, and as far as I can tell, it didn't.

Also, there are other measures of unemployment that attempt to account for the long-term unemployed/underemployed. I agree that those measures should be used as well. Lots of people don't have jobs that aren't counted.

 

[jarheadhunter]

FYI, total foreign aid as a percentage of the federal budget hasn't topped 2% in years. If you don't want to worry about small percentages, then I wouldn't be too concerned about aid. Most of that goes to supporting our military allies, anyway. http://foreignassistance.gov/aboutthedata.aspx

And, if a tin-hatter is concerned that these foreign aid data are made up too... well, they'd have to be VERY made up to be anywhere close to the major issues: social security, medicare/medicaid, and defense spending.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_foreign_aid

 

[littlebuf]

http://www.downsizinggovernment.org/overpaid-federal-workers



More interesting reading. Since we're posting links. Here's one of my tin foil hat sites I visit.

 

[ftballman125]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_foreign_aid

Look at a link I post before you respond with a link of your own.

Then, look at the magnitude of the numbers you are seeing in each link. You will quickly realize that you posted a link supporting my initial claim.

As it says on the wiki article, in 2011 total military and economic foreign assistance was 49.5 billion. The total budget in 2011 was, as can be clearly seen in the link I provided, was about 3.4 trillion dollars (mandatory+discretionary spending). Do the math and you can easily see that foreign aid (both military and economic) still comes out under 2%. How can that be? It's because defense spending is categorically not counted as foreign assistance. The military assistance that is included is far buying some bombs for Israel, and what not. Defense spending is how we fund our wars.

If we're going to get facts straight, rather than just argue, it helps to pay close attention to points being made. The facts are important.

 

[ftballman125]

http://www.downsizinggovernment.org/overpaid-federal-workers

More interesting reading. Since we're posting links. Here's one of my tin foil hat sites I visit.

The CATO institute is definitely not a tin-foil hat place. They do a good job not being factually incorrect. You'll also find that the facts I provide are quite consistent with the facts the CATO institute will provide.

Just the facts, jack.

 

[ftballman125]

All I'm trying to point out is that sound factual arguments can be made both in support of smaller government and in support of larger government. I'm not really into making arguments one way or the other on public forums, but it does irk me when arguments are made that try to disabuse a person of their ideas with factually incorrect statements. That's what the Kool-Aid mongers do.

 

[jarheadhunter]

Look at a link I post before you respond with a link of your own.

Then, look at the magnitude of the numbers you are seeing in each link. You will quickly realize that you posted a link supporting my initial claim.

As it says on the wiki article, in 2011 total military and economic foreign assistance was 49.5 billion. The total budget in 2011 was, as can be clearly seen in the link I provided, was about 3.4 trillion dollars (mandatory+discretionary spending). Do the math and you can easily see that foreign aid (both military and economic) still comes out under 2%. How can that be? It's because defense spending is categorically not counted as foreign assistance. The military assistance that is included is far buying some bombs for Israel, and what not. Defense spending is how we fund our wars.

If we're going to get facts straight, rather than just argue, it helps to pay close attention to points being made. The facts are important.

I never said anything against what your claiming. However you say that Defense spending is how we fund our wars. That IMO is Foreign aid. Going in and trying to fix someone else's problems.

 

[ftballman125]

I never said anything against what your claiming.

You edited your post before I finished my reply, sneaky guy

 

[littlebuf]

The CATO institute is definitely not a tin-foil hat plac.

You don't say...