You misspelled "useless discussion".

On that note, here's my one contribution to this thread: RRRRRAAAAAGGGGGGEEEEEE. MILD MANNERED RRRRRAAAAAAGGGGGGEEEEE.

*Cough*

I know he's used one in the past. And by all accounts, neither of the convention speeches had much in the way of actual points. Anyone can mouth rhetoric coherently, that's the point of rhetoric, that it doesn't need outside prompting.
LOL

This parts from a private funding speech of Romney is much more interesting than any convention speech because it is much more honest.
http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2012/09/secret-video-romney-private-fundraiser

I even find it not particularly offending. Typical rich against poor class warfare. Nothing special. As he says correctly, the problem is that the majority is poor usually.

The only part where I had to laugh:
"if we win on November 6th, there will be a great deal of optimism about the future of this country. We'll see capital come back and we'll see—without actually doing anything—we'll actually get a boost in the economy"

A boost without actually doing anything. Do voters still believe in fairy tales?

As silly as it may sounds, I think he's right. Even without doing anything, if Romney wins capitals will flow again in the US, if Obama wins the markets will turn to more interesting countries. It may sound harsh but the reasons are:

1. that Romney is white and Obama is black: racism can be concealed but it still exists, and the main powers are still white.

2. Obama is for welfare state and Romney not. Investors will fear that their money will end in the sink hole of the welfare in one way or another.

That said, I hope that Romney will win. I don't see him much as a racist as a libertarian. Obama is still young and will have maybe other chances in the future, but if he wins now he's going to import the failing european welfare model in the US. He should reconsider all this in a pause of four years.

I think this it's not a simple welfare bad/ no welfare good question. In germany there is a reasonably large welfare system, cheap food and currently enough jobs for almost all. There have been worse times.

I doubt that the unemployment rate would make a jump overnight if Romney would be elected or any other thing would happen that could resemble a sudden boost. I am also certain that racism is not really existent in economy - it's all about money no matter where it comes from or where it goes as long as the profit is maximized. Racism is political.

Surely policy changes can increase or decrease investments. The question would be who really has the better policy. It's not only about welfare. There are also benefits from having it. After all we are all in the same boat somehow. But we just shouldn't expect too many immediate effects, whoever wins. That's my gut feeling. The result should be judged in about two years or so.

Are you sure about that?

As far as government models are concerned, I guess it's a case of "to each his own." A model which works relatively well for one country at a point in time might not be suitable for another, depending on a number of variables. I trust the Obama Administration to have some understanding of this, but I guess there is a lot to be learned as well.

I actually agree with a lot of what Romney's saying there. That 47 percent figure seems crazy high though.

And right after that he states this: " If the president gets reelected, I don't know what will happen. I can—I can never predict what the markets will do. Sometimes it does the exact opposite of what I would have expected"

Nice logic there.

Of course it can become worse in the future. We don't have natural resources in germany and the population ages rapidly with not enough babies born each year to sustain the number of inhabitants the ratio of workers to seniors will get worse. Also our economy is critically dependent on the car industry and with less oil in the world the switching to electric engines in cars is still not a simple thing. But the educational system is okay and the technological level is high. The salaries aren't too high and traditionally people are saving money. The long term unemployment benefit is only 400€ plus housing plus health coverage per month. However the costs of living are quite low. One can manage to live from it, but a job will always be better. Also the governmental deficit is relatively low. So everything could be better, but it also can go on for awhile.

What I think is that a certain level of welfare is just the right thing. It improves conditions and makes people actually more productive. I strongly believe in it. It's good for the economy unless you are a chinese kind of regime that gives a crap about their people.

It might well be that many European states including Germany are above this optimal level, but my guess is that the US is rather below. One example is universal health care. I'm grown up with it and I would never have dared to think that it could be pure evil.

So all in all one shouldn't say that always less welfare is better. Here in Europe yes, now in the US no. I might anticipate a slump if Romney would be elected because even more people will get laid off and even less people will consume things. The economy would just stop like a jammed machine.

I like to think that some welfare might work better against some issues (i.e. social contrasts) which may lead to bigger problems sooner or later.

I also think it's important that the majority has a sense of justice and reliability regarding the welfare system and its results. Generally speaking, system vulnerability to exploit by unauthorized users must be kept down, and the threshold / conditions for welfare access must be held at a reasonable level. At least this is how I see it as a (supportive) commoner with limited knowledge of the whole thing.

For me if I trade security against salary then I realize that security has a very high value for me. Like an insurance that's worth something. Even if I loose a job I will not end on the street. The worries of it would make me ill otherwise. But having a security net can be strongly motivating. It can also be demotivating but this is just a question how large the distance between paid work and welfare is. If it is larger than a certain value there are enough incentives. However if the difference is too large, i.e. if welfare is too low, I will start looking for another place to live.

That's populist bullshit. I should know - I've been at both ends of the spectrum and I can assure you that being unemployed is no cake-walk. Sure, I've heard the claims from rags like Bild and people quoting from it of people buying 46" TVs, expensive cars etc., but everyone who apparently "knows" this, heard it from someone who knows someone who knows someone. Sure, there are isolated cases where people have managed to game the system, but these are attributable to mistakes made by public officials, not problems with the system itself.

ALG I is fairly generous, yes, but it's really is only a stop-gap and only lasts one year. It's still always less than your last recorded income (two-thirds, to be precise).

ALG II is an absolute nightmare. It's calculated on the basis of what bean counters deem to be the absolute minimum acceptable standard of living and is absolutely no reflection of reality. For example, they reckon you can feed yourself properly on 130 euros a month.

So, no, it's not more profitable to live off welfare than a paid job. There are very few jobs out there that pay less than €1500, and the misconception has probably come about by comparing the ALG I of an employee who earned €2500 a month against the actual income of one earns €1500 a month. In this case, the unemployed person will be earning more than the employed person, at least for the first year. But getting fired will always leave you worse off.

Pretty much this.