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America...Too Cocky?


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Today i was reading about China and their Economy, as compared to the United States and ours.

China, if you wern't aware, just passed Germany AND Japan up for the second largest economy in the world. Both Germany and Japan were always considered "untouchables". USA is of course number one still, but most economists predict the US getting hopped by china in the next few years also.

 

USA is a very cocky nation about how much better we are than the rest of the world, because we have been like this since we can all remember. Kids today are being brought up in the schools being taught that the US is THE BEST. I also read that the USA has THE LAZIEST teenagers in the world (of course probably opinion, not backed by too much fact)... but if u look at it, it is very true. Teenagers are not willing to work for the minimum wage jobs anymore. We end up giving these jobs away to Immigrants, or Old retired people, who are having trouble making a living. I think the united state's attitude has gotten way too cocky, and the way parents are raising their kids now-a-days is not right. Most kids now are being raised with WHATEVER they want. They are spoiled to death, given everything their parents can actually afford to give them. So now when they get to the age that they have to go out on their own and make a living, they are being very lazy, and trying to live off their parents that much longer. Kids barely have to do chores anymore, punishments for stuff they do wrong are VERY minimal, and easy for them to slip out of, and usually as soon as they turn 16, they have a brand new car. Most students in high school drive better cars than their teachers do.

 

Most people blame the teens for being lazy, and saying that is why our economy is falling, and going to continue to fall, and China is going to hop us. I feel that the blame should be put into the hands of the parents. Kids are not independant anymore. They are being brought up with everything, not having to move a muscle for it and its pathetic, and it does not teach good work ethic. Is it our kids, or the parents?

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Well, I'm not american and I'm pretty tired right now but love to give my 2 cents:

 

China already left us behind? Which measure was used? I'd think in terms of the gross domestic product it's pretty easy for China to get second and eventually first. Per head income would be of interest, I bet their numbers are close behind those of middle Africa there.

 

Why should the reason for this be found in the US (or Germany or Japan for that matter)? Every company wants to maximise its profit, and so does every individual.

 

Lets take the US (250 million citizens), Germany (85 m) and Japan (uh too lazy to look it up, 120 m perhaps?) together, thats 455 m people compared to China's 1.1 billion. Perhaps they just claim the wealth that we had for a few centuries. The theorie of globalisation says that their wealth will grow, and ours will fall just a bit, and we all will live happily together. The theorie of Alexa says that companies will put pressure on their workers and will keep the salaries low thus preventing this (the sheer masses of workforce there will make this sure). And of course looking at the Chinese villages shows that the bit wealth for a few in the big cities brought even more poverty to the villages.

 

More work less pay will achive nothing, I say. I hated the students in their big cars, though! :angry:

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haha, no actually, in economics class we have been talking about this a lot.

China is like the US was a long time ago.

Full of entrepenuers, and everyone is working.

the government is giving lots of money to the families farming to keep them farming, and its easy for them to farm becuase th government is giving them equipment and technology they never had before.

this is making it easier for the kids of farmers to actually leave the farms and go off to college and get an education, and go out into the business world (as most of them are)...

 

i dont remember how they measured it...

but it was something like the productivity of the government and its economy or something, i totally forget :P

 

im just trying to bag on the parenting of now-a-days, kids are FAR too lazy...and i blame it all on parenting...

 

honestly, its ridiculus...

 

my parents had me doing chores until i was 16...at 16 they gave me a choice...if i got a job, and payed 25% of all my paychecks to them for room and board, i wouldnt have to do chores anymore (i hated chores so of course i did it)...now...almost EVERYONE else at my school, NEVER did chores in their lives, and most of them dont have jobs...the ones that do, dont pay for room and board, and they actually still recieve money from their parents when they need it. i understand the parent caring and trying to keep the kid outta debt and able to get what they want...but it woulda never gotten that bad if u didnt give them stuff in the beginning...

 

it sucks...i have what i feel is an amazing car...its a 1989 Acura Legend...i payed for it on my own, with money i saved from my job...it cost me $2200...and i was soooo happy...but every day, when i drive up to school, i get to see a million brand new BMW's and stuff, and it is totally lame...

 

it makes me feel so good to know i actually worked for my money, and everything i have...my parents dont give me a penny...

 

i pay my own car insurance, my own cell phone bill, and still 25% of everything i earn for room and board.

 

i barely have any spending cash, and my parents could care less...

it sucks cuz everyone around me is loaded with money, and the worst thing is, none of its theirs, its all their parents...

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it sucks...i have what i feel is an amazing car...its a 1989 Acura Legend...i payed for it on my own, with money i saved from my job...

 

it makes me feel so good to know i actually worked for my money, and everything i have...my parents dont give me a penny...

 

i pay my own car insurance, my own cell phone bill, and still 25% of everything i earn for room and board.

 

i barely have any spending cash, and my parents could care less...

it sucks cuz everyone around me is loaded with money, and the worst thing is, none of its theirs, its all their parents...

 

 

 

Uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh........

 

please read this and respond?

 

:blink:

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haha, thats cuz my parents are dead poor man...

we are living OFF my dad's social security checks, thanks for bringin that up though ;)

both parents dont have a job...

too old to get one...

my dad is actually tryin to get a truck drivers licence, just to bring in a lil more cash flow for the family...

he is 64...

we have lived off his social secuirty checks for the past year and a half...

and $630 started coming to me a month, because i turned 18, and was still in school...

out of that $630...i have to give my parents $200 each month (more than 25%) and without the other $430...i would not be able to pay all my bills like car insurance, cell phone, my car (im still making payments)...

so yah...

but i really dont feel i needed to get into that much about my financial situation...but since u brought that stuff up...whatever...

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America is an empire of evil. Cold war was never over. And its absolutely fare that it was got over by industrious chinese. In Russia we say:

When it's light, they produce; when it's dark they...Uhh, you know.

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Lots of different issues here, from the personal to the political.

 

Economies are compared based on gross domestic product because that's part of what role they will play on the global political stage. China will slow down a bit when they seperate the yuan from the dollar and because of their inefficient (corrupt) government system. But they (and the less often mentioned India) look like they will be the major powers of years to come. In fact you could say China is already the no.1 superpower since they hold a lot of US debt.

 

On another level you seem to be talking about entrepreneurial culture. In Holland this is simply one of the many subcultures, not a national kind of thing. But there is a group of people that have that can-do attitude or are simply born with a habit of starting businesses left and right (something the working class people I grew up with are usually very cautious about). Apart from that, there are the immigrants. The Turkish are generally known to be quite industrious, but they're now being overtaken by the Polish in number of businesses started by immigrants.

 

Anyway, when I see someone on MTV crying because she didn't get the brand new car she wanted for her 18th birthday, then I don't think she'll go far indeed. (Then again, that's what I thought about Paris Hilton too, and she's making more money than I ever will.) But entrepreneurial culture can be passed down through the generations. Many of the people I met when I was involved in a startup were upper class, or at least very well educated.

 

(BTW - interesting you'd use the phrase empire of evil. As for what they say about the Chinese, in Holland they say 'as de Chinese nie so sauwe kese sauwe d'r niet sofeel Chinese wese' - which is quite untranslatable :P )

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haha, no actually, in economics class we have been talking about this a lot.

China is like the US was a long time ago.

Full of entrepenuers, and everyone is working.

the government is giving lots of money to the families farming to keep them farming, and its easy for them to farm becuase th government is giving them equipment and technology they never had before.

this is making it easier for the kids of farmers to actually leave the farms and go off to college and get an education, and go out into the business world (as most of them are)...

Sorry but I doubt the following: Everyone is working (for pay, not as a peasant), peasants are better off now (e.g. the whole service businesses including doctors go to big cities and are leaving the villages because of the higher wages there), farmers kids can easily go to college now or get jobs in the big cities (as far as I know they are deliberately held in the villages - if they would all stream into the cities... :o )

 

America is an empire of evil. Cold war was never over. And its absolutely fare that it was got over by industrious chinese. In Russia we say:

When it's light, they produce; when it's dark they...Uhh, you know.

Well, I certainly try to citicise when criticism is due, but hearing how evil america is from a Russian, and comparing it to China is quite a laugh. If I'd start talking about them both.....

 

In case the GDP of China has really already overhauled those of Germany and Japan, then I claim it's not the way to measure economy. The mere groth of residents is not a good indicator for a strong economy.

 

As for the lazy teenagers, are personally you observing them in the streets, or is this just hearsay? Today's kids seem strange to me too, but I tracked it back to me getting old :mellow: .

The only thing I find disgusting is how they are raised to be consumers from start. 12 years old and no cell phone? Outcast! I'm lucky I didn't grow up in such times. Kids today learn that you have to be the most beautiful and incredibly rich (show it by buying expensive BS) to be accepted. I blame their behaviour (if it at all got worse compared to 'us' back then) on that.

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LOL :lol::lol::lol::lol::lol::lol:

 

 

I agree with NiXsa..

 

It is common knowledge that Finland is the best country in the world.... :mellow:

 

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America is an empire of evil. Cold war was never over. And its absolutely fare that it was got over by industrious chinese. In Russia we say:

When it's light, they produce; when it's dark they...Uhh, you know.

 

 

Cold war was never over?!!!..(Goes to look up USSR/CCCP on a current map)

 

 

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Oh, you still believe in that disgruntling joke?

and if serious, CCCP is gonna be restored, but now on basis of... for now, let's call it democracy.

The first step would be reunion of The Russian Federation and Belorussia. Not as if i said that it's gonna happen very soon...

and btw, we still have a lot of good old A-bombs :)

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haha, i love the russians!

everything to them is about fighting...

and you honestly think that those few A-bombs u have are anything?

america has 100x more than u do, AND we have this neat little thing called the hydrogen bomb...has russia gotten that yet (i honestly dont know)...but that would blow your whole country away...

 

why is russia so violent in everything they do...

u guys think your little world is perfect (yet they are doing VERY poorly both economically and socially)...and it seems like violence and hate are two HUGE parts of russian culture...

am i wrong?

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Oh, you still believe in that disgruntling joke?

and if serious, CCCP is gonna be restored, but now on basis of... for now, let's call it democracy.

The first step would be reunion of The Russian Federation and Belorussia. Not as if i said that it's gonna happen very soon...

and btw, we still have a lot of good old A-bombs :)

 

Dude ya lost, deal with it. The wall came down, Capitalism has spread, the Russian Mafia is as powerfull as ever.

 

I got two words for ya...Ronald Reagan .

 

Check mate comrade ;)

 

GGSpasbathx

 

 

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lol, no idea :P

it started from what i watched in economics the day i wrote it. talking about china's huge change in the way they run things, and how at the rate they are going, they are gonna be the USA of the 20th century, to this, the 21st century...

 

but then i kinda started throwin in topics that were discussed from that class about how lazy american teens are...and then that got me into b!tchin about spoiled brats everywhere... :D

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Russia has a little less power than USA, it's true, but still enough to destroy all the Earth. By a-bombs i meant all nuclear power(of course we've got h-bombs). But you didn't get what i mean. I mean COLD war, a race of weapons.

and i didn't mean that ussr is gonna be EXACTLY as it used to be.

BTW, i'm not that much keen on American presidents, what did Raegan do?

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haha, see thats the thing that trips me out...

 

russians seem to be the wackiest people on the face of this earth.

 

for some reason, u guys LOVE violence. and you have this obsession with blowing the whole world up...

 

u know, if u did, u guys would be gone too...right?

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