nemafakei

Hello all you lurkers. Just a quick note to let you know Beccy (my partner of several years) and I have agreed on a plan to get married. As is the custom, I thought I'd let the old-timers at Fed2k know.

Wolf, I'm not sure your conclusions quite hold. It may be that a large proportion of the economy was 'off the books' (there are black markets, informal economies, etc. everywhere else too, mind). When this sector grows big enough, it becomes difficult to pretend it isn't there. I would imagine many Greeks would like to live in a country that didn't have many of these problems, but we . I should also point out that there will be significant variation within the country between those who benefitted from underreporting and those who didn't (many working class people won't have such high incomes to underreport, meanwhile they will have been suffering from the food inflation much more), while the austerity is going to be financially most difficult for the people with the least in savings and for those most dependant on public services. As individuals, it's hard to do a lot about that. "And what did they do? Blamed everyone in sight who wasn't Greek." I remember listening to someone who'd come to the UK after the protests in 2010. It was fairly clear then that people mostly blamed politicians, and I suspect anti-German stuff is probably noise being generated to deflect blame. Maybe it's working, I don't know.

"So the Union must be wanting over $100 million in increases otherwise Canada post would have given in at the start." From the article, it's that Canada Post wants to cut that wage you quoted by 20%. This is a defensive strike that CP is prepared to pay - lots - to win, it looks like a deliberate attempt to break the CUPW. British Airways tried to do the a similar thing recently, and they had a pot of money to absorb losses that was bigger than the terms they were fighting over. In the end, they lost the money, terms stayed more or less the same and the CEO left. Something you've also got to bear in mind with manual industries like the post is that the top salaries for experienced postal workers aren't that much different from the starting salary. At the end of the day, you've got to make ends meet, pay for food, home, shelter, family, all on that wage. That $23 seems to be about the median wage for Canada, and remember that postal work is not only physically demanding, but you're also paying a premium for unsociable hours and for trustworthiness (I should point out here I'm arguing purely from market economics).

Andrew - most unions nowadays organise across employers in the same sector. The aim is in the medium term to improve terms across the industry. Obviously, unions are going to fight to defend terms and conditions if they're threatened, even if they're above the industry average, and naturally, in workplaces where there is a strong union there will be better terms which will be better defended so there will always be some disparity - but that is often just a matter of less well organised workplaces - like Eras', from the sounds of it - needing to catch up. Another important reason why public sector workers are especially important is they're usually the ones who are looking out for public services. Service user groups, where they exist, are often small and have few resources, and importantly, very little actual power. Politicians are up for a quick photo op when a service opens, but cutting budgets, even if it's a really bad idea, is always going to reap political rewards. Between elections, unions are pretty much the only opposition a majority government has to worry about. "I also don't like the mentality of do as little as possible. See some garbage on the floor? If it is not your job to pick it up then you can't pick it up otherwise the janitor will file a complaint (for doing his job)." "Work to rule" encompasses several things, and this is sort of one of them. Where you have good industrial relations, and sufficient staffing to manage the workload, then you don't tend to see this. The solution is normally not to get angry at the person who's sticking to their job description, but for the person who has decided that employing enough janitors is a luxury.

Why is, say, a school teacher less essential than, say, someone who makes disposable packaging for mobile phones that will be obsolete in a few years? And just who are these mythical public servants who do nothing? Other than perhaps a few politicians and senior managers, that is? Just because you work in an office doesn't mean you don't need a union. From health grounds, there's growing evidence of the various mental health problems resulting from office work, not to mention musculoskeletal disorders. And because of this persistent image of office workers who doing nothing (probably because office work is actually quite varied in product and difficult to describe), everyone's looking for ways to make you into an 'efficiency saving'. And many of the basic issues - pay, hours, holidays, sick leave, respect, etc. - are all the same.

Hm, I'm not keen on that the section on autism at Los Horcones. Not sure if it qualifies as treatment, it's really an education programme to drill into autistic children how not to behave autistically. Seems a bit creepy. The Twin Oaks one looks reasonably positive, though, and yes, even if it's not explicitly anarchist or socialist, the right sort of political awareness is clearly there in the community. As Edric points out, Communes are limited, but I'll go further and say even - or especially - if they're 'self-sufficient' they risk drawing people away from the struggles that the rest of society faces without meaningfully challenging the system as a whole. On the other hand, they're useful as explorations of what's possible in more egalitarian societies, and can, if successful, be good examples.

Pretty busy, but I like to check in regularly to lurk. I tend not to have the inclination to post so much nowadays.

Dante, Sandchigger, keep things civil. If you have nothing to add, then don't add anything.

Wilders needs something to differentiate his PVV from the VVD else his voter base is just islamophobic VVD voters. One of his headline policies is not raising the pension age, which the three major parties are in favour of. He's also got some other populist policies. The PVV allows the right block to cover more political ground without committing to much; Wilders' only realistic coalition options are VVD and CDA (with possible SGP support), so basically, he's going to need to drop popular policies and he knows it. So Wilders doesn't much want to participate in government right now, he wants to wait until his hand is stronger.

Well done! Have you considered rewriting it in javascript?

Nice packaging - plastic or cardboard? Open the box, let's see what the mouse looks like.

There and 4.15, I see what you mean, but I'm not convinced it isn't coincidental. Moreover, if they wanted to put it in there's a section around 3.30 where it could actually fit a lot better.