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Politics : The Trump Presidency -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Lane3 who wrote (15758)	4/22/2017 11:25:48 AM
From: Lane3	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 365066

America’s manliest industries are all competing for women By Danielle Paquette April 21 at 12:26 PM Baby boomers are retiring in droves, vacating construction sites and body shops and 18-wheelers. Now America’s male-dominated industries, faced with a looming worker shortage, are trying to tap talent that has traditionally found such working conditions hostile: women. The Iron Workers union this month leaped to the cutting edge of the effort, becoming the first building trades union to offer up to eight months of paid maternity leave to pregnant women and new moms. Not that many of their folks hauling rebar or scaling skyscrapers will take them up on the offer: Only 2 percent of the group’s 130,000 North American members are women. “The whole world is suffering the baby boomer retirement tsunami,” the union's president, Eric Dean, said. “All the construction trades are in competition for capable people. Wouldn't it be a distinct advantage for us to be the first?” By 2029, all of the baby boomers will be older than 65, meaning one-fifth of the U.S. population will have reached retirement age. Millennials, the workers who would replace them, aren’t as interested in pursuing careers in the trades. Enrollment in vocational education has dropped from 4.2 credits in 1990 to 3.6, according to the most recent data analysis from the National Education Association. The opioid epidemic, meanwhile, has zapped some of the male workforce because men are more likely than women to both use and overdose on illicit drugs. “You hear about a lack of job readiness, an inability to pass a drug test,” said Harry Holzer, a public policy professor at Georgetown University and former chief economist for the Labor Department. “It makes sense that these employers regard women as a group that expands the applicant pool and at a higher-quality level.” The Iron Workers want to attract and retain more journeywomen, who tend to quit at a higher rate, Dean said. The demographic represents a huge opportunity for growth, a way to bolster the future dues-paying membership. “We have to innovate,” he said, “if we want different results” Rest at washingtonpost.com

To: Lane3 who wrote (15758)	4/22/2017 11:34:32 AM
From: Wharf Rat	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 365066

Under Eisenhower, the Top Tax Rate Was 91 Percent. Rat's OK with 99% on earnings over $1B. He knows he wouldn't have a hard time living on $10M. Top corporate rate was 52%.

To: Lane3 who wrote (15758)	4/22/2017 12:11:22 PM
From: koan	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 365066

I think we should be guided by our great economists with regard to what the progressive tax structure should be. Guys like Joseph Stiglitz and Paul Krugman. The question you're asking is very complicated and I don't have a PhD degree in economics. But we know from the high tax structures on the rich in the 50's and Nordic countries they are not as bad as the right wing would have us believe. It is important to realize the reason the rich want less government is because they don't want to pay higher taxes for it. They don't need the social services. It is just like their wanting to pay lower wages. So they make stuff up. Many average Republicans do not make that connection. Trying to figure out where the tax structure should be for a society is going to depend on many variables of the rest of the disciplines of social science. For example, how the different tax structures affect our GDP growth, what is the payback for the increased productivity from a more highly educated populace, how would universal healthcare dovetail into the new tax structure. The mistake people make is thinking that they can know as much as a guy with a PhD degree in economics, generally speaking. They don't know, what they don't know. It is the same mistake people make when they challenge the atmospheric chemist with regard to global warming. And it is the same mistake anybody makes that thinks they know better than physicians how to cure cancer. The wise person uses the experts they have at hand to guide them. The wise person knows the limits of their knowledge and reaches out to others who know more. The wise person is cognizant of their ignorance, and the irony is the more knowledgeable a person becomes the more they realize how ignorant they are. And another irony, is the less educated a person is the more sure they are of their thinking. I just saw a report on CNN about the high number of climate deniers in Louisiana even though they are looking at the shoreline being wiped away from rising sea levels. Why is that? Education is a progressive discovery of our own ignorance. Will Durant The trouble with most people is that they think with their hopes or fears or wishes rather than with their minds. Will Durant Education is the transmission of civilization. Will Durant Message #15758 from Lane3 at 4/22/2017 11:22:17 AM something needs to be done e.g. a new progressive tax structure and social programs to aid the poor e.g. free education would be #1 on my list. That is also redistribution of income. Have you had any learning or given any thought to how progressive our income tax structure could get before progressiveness became a negative?