TED Community » David Saia

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• A comment on Conversation: On average are the CEO's of the top 100 companies worth their salary?

  Nov 28 2011: I understand that the history of America's development was more than the tax issue. As a student of history, I'd summarize it as an attempt to make our way without oversight and intervention. In short, it was a place where greed was unchecked, and not reserved for the wealthy.
  
  No matter how long the debate, I'll never agree that high taxes lead to greater achievement. At the same time the tax rates were high we began buying anything and everything- personal spending on products that are still in our land fills was high as well. It was when what we had became the measure of the person instead of what we are and who we are. That was when the rich got richer and the country produced a government of platitudes and of inattention to the needs of the poorest of us. It is also when we created lifeless public spaces and the shopping mall, and the individual was reduced to a cog in the wheel, culture and religion and family began tearing apart under the strain of expecting the government to be all things to all people. We rely too much on government, and vote for people wholly unable or unwilling the concern themselves with real life in America. They want only to be re-elected. We have lost our reliance on ourselves and the value of community. When half of what we earn goes to the government, there is no point in working, at least working for money.
  
  Andrew, we will, I suspect, never agree on these issues and should likely stop. As it's your thread, please feel free to have the last word.

• A comment on Conversation: On average are the CEO's of the top 100 companies worth their salary?

  Nov 27 2011: Revolution against unrestrained taxation is what created this country, and we are right back where we were. No one- and I mean no one- can tell us where our money is going when we pay taxes, so it is without representation. Not to mention that our "representatives" have no awareness of the people they represent as they do not live among them. If everything is fine and dandy why do senators and congressmen have health insurance their own districts or state's populations cannot, for the most part, afford? Remember, the 1% don't want estate taxes and are content with the richest Americans paying the least taxes- just ask Warren Buffet who pays less taxes than his secretary. Face it- it is a dying system from an outdated philosophy of modernism. We must embrace the new post-modern age and free ourselves from our masters to decide how we want and need to live. Relax, it won't happen in our lifetimes, and certainly not here. At least we can agree to disagree, right?

• A comment on Conversation: On average are the CEO's of the top 100 companies worth their salary?

  Nov 26 2011: Andrew- I believe there is no compassionate capitalism. That's the problem. It is about getting more and eventually the most, for money having the extreme level of value it has in capitalism ultimately corrupts, first in small ways and then in huge, nation-bending ways. True innovators are not motivated by money exclusively- perhaps by work, or by invention, or by helping people, but if the goal is getting rich, or at least getting more money, then it will stop short of innovation. I agree that meritocracy has to win out to save the planet, but it will be hard to sell it to America after so many years of thinking competitively and motivated by the "me" and mine. It is an old "modernist" notion that has corrupted all who touch it. We used to have the idea that we were different from "undeveloped" nations and it was "right" to go in and show them how to improve their societies. Actual cultures will ultimately reject the help because the cost is too great- usually resulting in subordinating their uniqueness into a larger whole that is insensitive to their needs and lifestyles. We have to think in a community based way, not a national way, for nations as we understand them are an illusion of unity that feeds the corporate machine and are therefore promoted as real- at great expense. We are a collection of small communities and cultures- the melting pot did not work . . . . did it? That's just my opinion.
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  A comment on Conversation: Will Bankers or the People dominate economic decision making? What is the Future of Democracy?

  Nov 23 2011: There are no true democracies- that's why the question cannot be answered. Capitalist republics are not what is meant by democracy- and they have led us into the pitiful state we are in now.
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  A comment on Conversation: Who should rule the world? Central or local authorities?

  Nov 23 2011: We are moving toward the importance of local rule- small, interrelated communities that cooperate with each other but live how they choose based on culture and the uniqueness of their popular make-ups. We are a post-modern world, though we are ruled as if we are some mythical global community. That idea is only relevant in the abstract. The system we have is unable to represent our divergent cultures, and breeds corruption at all levels. I urge you to read "Grassroots of Post-Modernism". I was written in the late 90's but accurately describes the harm caused by trying to make us believe we are all the same. We are losing culture, we are losing community and the responsibility of each of us to our neighbors. We want our representatives to solve all our problems for us, and look at the state of things now! It is a system that benefits the powerful and the rich and seeks to make us whole and content with material things and temporal platitudes that are as thin as paper and as empty as space. Unfortunately it has to crash and burn before it can change at this point.

• A comment on Conversation: On average are the CEO's of the top 100 companies worth their salary?

  Nov 23 2011: They are the 1% that is radically out of touch with the rest of us. The question to me is how much is enough? Is there an amount of income we could be satisfied with? I think anyone who gets grossly overpaid as the example you described has no appreciation of the value of money- not that is is important, but that it is actually unimportant. One year of a salary like that can radically change our world if it was put back into the world. Yet we live in a country that values corporations as individuals- which is absurd- and whose leaders cannot even put aside political party affiliations to fix our broken economy. We simply live in a broken system with megalomanical leaders who represent no one but themselves and simply want to keep their jobs without doing their jobs. Like the fallacy of extending tax cuts for the rich because it will stimulate the economy- a fact that has never been proven by anyone. As long as the rich get theirs, screw the rest of us. 2012 will be a very interesting year when it all crashes and burns . . . .at least it seems to be heading that direction doesn't it?

• A reply on Conversation: Why don't universities use their knowledge in practice?

  Nov 16 2011: "Political" and "debate" are mutually exclusive terms. Politicians get elected by platitudes and then govern to repay those who got them there- which isn't us. Pick any one of the GOP debates this year and tell me any one of those people could govern better than you or I. Napoleon said that to attain political office one needs to display absolute pettiness and to govern properly one needs to display absolute greatness- and the two traits are rarely found in one individual. We're great at the former but lousy at the latter- because truly great individuals want no part of the circus of politics. These people could care less about our children b/c they can afford whatever education they choose, as opposed to the rest of us.
  
  Perfect example, a serious contender for the GOP nomination can't remember his own proposals (Perry)- because they are not real- they are "tested" to be what people want to hear and taught to him, but he can't speak on his own- like GW Bush, remember where that got us as a nation? Last night he proposed an 18% spending reduction b/c he said it was the average of a GDP history of spending- except that it isn't- 18% is the average tax collection revenue, not the GDP, and it would kill the economy. Yet, it sounded good so everybody clapped like trained seals. The education we need comes from the homes of INTERESTED parents, not elected officials. It's too important to be part of the circus.
  
  That's just my opinion, and I may be wrong. Peace, Casper.

• A reply on Conversation: What is the difference to culture if, instead of promoting rights and entitlements, we enforced duties and obligations to each other.

  Nov 15 2011: awesome perspective . . . . a great thing for fiction to flush out. Thanks, Tim.

• A reply on Conversation: What is the difference to culture if, instead of promoting rights and entitlements, we enforced duties and obligations to each other.

  Nov 15 2011: Come on, Tim. Give me more than that. Don't wait to tell me until I catch up on my reading . . . .

• A comment on Conversation: What is the difference to culture if, instead of promoting rights and entitlements, we enforced duties and obligations to each other.

  Nov 15 2011: Finally, I guess my point is that there is a huge difference between "empowering" people with rights they can pound their fists to enforce, and engendering children with the idea that they have a duty to each other and to the land and to their communities. The former empowers only bitterness while the latter enforces understanding, compassion, respect, and cultural identity. That seems clear, at least to me, from at minimum a psychological perspective. We can contribute a dollar to causes that seem correct, and then we feel better and go about our lives thinking we are making a difference - but do we teach our children why or show our children where the problem lies, or show them what it means to lead a good life . . . .?
  
  Hey, the US is young- we may still get there.