Do you really think social security will be there for you when you retire? Don't you resent paying in all your life knowing you probably won't see a dime?
No, it won't -- Social Security is the world's largest ongoing Ponzi Scheme. The money isn't going into an account someplace and earning interest, it's just going directly out to current recipients. And yes, I resent it. I could turn that money into more money if the government would only allow it. That's the unique quality of government -- it combines brute stupidity with great boldness.
What do you think about our 17 trillion debt and going higher all the time? Will there be an economic collapse?
The 17 trillion dollar debt is just more proof that the American government (like nearly all governments) is willfully corrupt. But this is a representative government, so Americans should be ashamed. We let it happen, and we're letting it continue.
Are you able to afford a house and have 2 cars and at least 2 kids?
I can buy a house, but whether I will be able to pay the property taxes is in doubt. Where I live (New York, the belly of the Democratic/Progressive beast) the property taxes can range in the 20k to 30k range -- per year, with no end in sight. Part of me considers taking my business to a more business-friendly state, but I have so much family here it's not a choice I can easily make.
Are you concerned about the huge transfer of middle class jobs to China and Mexico and other points? Does it bother you that the middle class is shrinking and the top 1% are getting even richer?
I don't care about the middle class, and I'll tell you why -- they hate me. So I hate them back just as fervently. It doesn't bother me one iota that jobs are transferring to China and Mexico, because I know those people, and they're harder working than your typical American. What the American worker should have been doing the last 50 years was training for a knowledge- and skills-based economy, something akin to Japanese workers. Instead, we invested in labor union laws that crush competition and innovation, eroding our work ethic, and an educational system that is designed to create people ready to man a 1950's era assembly line. We opted for security and class warfare over innovation. Unions built walls to keep a changing world economy OUT -- but the water kept on rising, and when those walls come down (and they inevitably will) instead of a destructive flood of change, we'll have a tsunami of change with which we cannot cope.
As for the 1%, I'm one of them (although likely on the lower, lower end of the scale -- maybe the 2%) and I can say that those people earned their wealth. I hope when the coming crapstorm arrives, that they fly off in a spaceship, leaving cannibalistic Progressives to scrabble through the post-apocalyptic ruins they created. We'll come back someday when their reign of stupidity is over. This is assuming I can purchase a ticket on the flight, perhaps in steerage, shoveling nuclear fuel into the reactor. In any case, I don't hate people who are wealthier than me solely on the basis of their wealth. Wealth is just a symptom of something else; intelligence in action.
Does the huge influx of Mexicans concern you? Are you pro-amnesty?
"Dey took mah job!"
I tend to see the world through the most honest mechanism I know -- market forces. I've hired and worked with Mexicans, and can say they were extremely hard-working. Most of the immigrants with which I've worked were very hard working and achieved success. This is because they come from places where you can work as hard as you want and you'll never get ahead of the guy next to you. So when they find a place (America) where working a bit harder actually gets them somewhere, they have reserves of energy you don't usually see in Americans anymore.
That said, I am not pro-amnesty. I'm pro-law. The current kabuki dance in Washington about 'comprehensive immigration reform' is nonsense on stilts. Had the government enforced the existing laws, a new set of 'comprehensive' reform laws wouldn't be necessary in the first place! A sane approach would be to set up registration centers for illegals, give them a six month windows to register, and anyone without a registration card would be summarily deported, period. This way we at least know who is in the country -- a basic security that government should be able to do. Second, we then review all these cases. The criminals and wastrels would self-deport; the people who came here looking for a better life, but broke the law in the process, could be allowed to remain.
I don't blame Mexicans for coming here illegally. If you open up a free buffet and hungry people start filling their pockets with food, is that really so surprising? They're behaving as market forces dictate. The U.S. government is to blame, not illegals, but they still should obey the law.
I'm 56, and I guess what I'm asking is what do you see coming down the line here in America? Do you think it will hit the fan soon, or do you think it will be business as usual?
I hold out hope that places like Texas will keep the American experiment alive. If America as a place, as an address, falls away, that's ok -- extremely sad, but maybe the people of America don't deserve the freedom they enjoy. My job as a father and husband is to make sure my family survives the collapse, or (ideally) profits from it. Is that evil, to want to profit from a collapse? In all honesty, I don't care what anyone thinks -- me and mine are going to make it. If that makes me evil, then I'm evil. You go be good and die with your scruples intact. I didn't engineer the collapse; my conscience is clear.
As for when it will happen -- it will be awhile yet. The government will keep on creating financial bubbles because they could never, ever just let the market take its course. Too many stupid Americans look to the government to 'Do Something' -- even though their every effort leads to more destruction. It's a bit like asking the government to 'Do Something' about a solar eclipse. They're certainly willing to take more power and do their best to stop the eclipse. It's not about results, it's about striking a pose, making a show. But when the collapse comes, it will be all the more horrible because people reacted so irrationally for so long.
And does it even matter whether you vote republican, democrat or independent or libertarian? Are you worred about the future of America?
I think the Democratic Party is close to creating an unassailable supermajority -- the mediocrities. Take the middle of the Bell Curve, and the left side of it, and what can the right half of the Curve's population do? Nothing. The dunces are in charge, and they demand more magic beans. As I said earlier, I'm more worried that the ideals of America survive, somewhere. I vote almost exclusively Republican because Libertarian candidates are so few and far, and some are just ... well, some of them are just crazy. I don't want no government, I just want a smaller, less powerful government -- like wanting a small dog because when it messes in the house its messes are also 'smaller'.
I'm just curious to know how young people think. I have no other motive for wanting to know. Thanks.
I'm not young, technically. I just barely made the threshold for this survey.
