the progressive workers' strike

[SPman]

Cool, where's my prize?

You get to be first against the wall...............

[cowboyz]

The NZ attitude that anybody who has some money is evil and runs sweatshops is just small island thinking as a result of years of social engineering that have turned a lot of you into good for nothing, pathetic puppets.

Fact: There will always be poor people. You can't change that. So, get of your lazy arses and do something with your meaningless lives. What ever happened to self responsibility and accountability?

Stupid islanders. (That's NZ for the simpletons)

I don't think this is true at all. Just because I have some money tucked away for the future doesn't mean I have to be an arse to those less fortunate. I can see how people can get tied up on the merry-go-round and while the ride seems entertaining at first, you just end up going round in circles.

If you aint got the rubber, no hubba hubba.

You can get benifits for low income + kids.

If you budget you can raise 3 kids on $11.50 and save.

50 hour week at 11.50 = 575

Less tax of 20% (it might be less but thats my tax rate and im low/ non existant income)

Tax @ 20% of 575 = 115

Income after tax per week $460

Plus benifits (no idea how much this is but i'd guess at 200 a week? more for more than 2 kids?)

Plus income/child support from other parent.

so you'd be on at least 800 a week after tax.

thats 41 grand a year. SORTED.


The point is bringing a kid into this messed up world is a very serrious event. I personally don't think enough planning/ effort is put into the decion making. Yeah I know this is a hard thing to do, its as hard as my cock on a friday night mate.

Lets recalculate that on a 40 hour week. After all, if you are not the kind of person who can speak up for yourself and just a quiet worker and want to put your faith in others who you think can do a better job at working out the contract side of things then chances are you will only get a 40 hour week. Now we are at $360 per week. Just lost 100 bux there. Then there is rent to pay and the increase in everything else (groceries, petrol for instance) and that leaves SFA for everything else.

All fair saying that the government can cough up the change in benefits but that means that the taxpayer (yep, thats my money they are taking and don't seem to have any accountability on where they spend it) has to fork out for it while big, overseas companies post $100M profits. Why not scrap the family assistance policies and make the minimum wage something that families can get somewhere with. I am talking $500 per week in your hand to put a figure on it.

That has to be the most arrogant post that I have seen on this Site..

Couldn't agree more. It is outstanding that someone can be so concieted.

Cool, where's my prize?

Your prize is knowing that there is a guy you don't know sitting in front of his computer somewhere in the country thinking.. What a fucking tosser...

Tomorrow you will go do whatever you do on Tuesdays.

Oh yeah. If you are paying $1M in taxes then you have an extremely large organization or you need a new accountant.

[Finn]

Cowboyz, I'm not talking about people with 2 tv's. I'm talking about people that have achieved something great. What do we do? We knock them down. Why? Because we are mostly a pathetic race of non achievers so quick to blame big business, overseas investment and SUV's.

As for going around in circles, I have no idea what you're on about.

Your minimum wage increase idea won't work for the "less fortunate". They'll just spend more on booze, pokey’s and getting more into debt. Education is the only answer but we don't have any schools, just cultural centres preaching mediocrity.

Thanks for the advice on getting a better accountant. I thought PWC were pretty good.

[cowboyz]

The 80s and 90s were are generation of buy now, pay later. We are seeing the consequence of it now. You are right about education. Look at the facilities that are around these days. Absolutely ridculous. We have all sorts of "training providers" who do not actually teach anything of value just so people can clock up a "student" loan that they will never pay back. This is not as simple a problem as you are trying to make it sound.

A little while ago I was involved in negotiating the union contract on behalf of the floor staff at Foodstuffs. The first draft offered by Foodstuffs stated that the pay increase will be 2.5% in line with CPI. Unfortunately the CPI in Dec 05 was 3.2% It is blatent negotiation tactics like this that I object to. The general staff had no idea what inflation was/is or even where to find it out. They would have gone along with the idea and been worse off and none the wiser. In the end we settled on 3.5%. A good deal for the employer. I would have liked to see it closer to 7% but that is what you get. Bargining in good faith is good business. When I was farming I never had a deal go across the table more than twice. It is different when you are dealing with your own money and do not have the responisibilty of 100 staff and their families on your shoulders. I have been known to be the easiest in the world to deal with and a complete bastard. Depends which side your on and what the deal is. At the end of the day, business is business. I can honestly say that in the 16 years milking cows I never screwed anyone. Sometimes the deal didn't go their way, sometimes I had to take a hit but at the end of the day it was all done above board and everyone I dealt with knew exactly where I was coming from.

If you don't know where I am coming from with the roundabout theory maybe that shows how uneducated some of your comments on this thread sound.

[Finn]

If you don't know where I am coming from with the roundabout theory maybe that shows how uneducated some of your comments on this thread sound.

I'm a facts man. I don't do theory and to the best of my knowledge, don't own a roundabout.

You'll enjoy this story... A couple of weeks back, this imbreed was aimlessly driving his shitbox car and pulled out in front of me. I let him off and then without indicating, tried to push into my lane thinking I would back off. I didn't and held my ground in our gas gusling, shiney SUV. He hit the brakes and got really angry and tried to undertake me on a merging lane. I used the power of the 4.8l V8 and forced him to almost run off the road. Later, at a set of lights he pulled up beside us and got out of the car. He yelled "Do you think you own the fucken road?" to which I replied "Well if I do, I certainly own a lot more of it than you yah fucken peasant". He went nuts.

Another under achiever put in their place.

[Lou Girardin]

Cowboyz, I'm not talking about people with 2 tv's. I'm talking about people that have achieved something great. What do we do? We knock them down. Why? Because we are mostly a pathetic race of non achievers so quick to blame big business, overseas investment and SUV's.

Let's assume for a moment that 'great' equals making lots of dosh. Now name some NZ people who've done great, starting with nothing. And, just to make it interesting, they still have to reside in NZ.

[Finn]

Let's assume for a moment that 'great' equals making lots of dosh. Now name some NZ people who've done great, starting with nothing. And, just to make it interesting, they still have to reside in NZ.

Depends on what you mean by lots of dosh. According to Labour, you're rich if you earn over $40k. Anyway, assuming that "great" equals dosh, then quite a few. The problem is keeping them and their money here in NZ. Inevitably, a lot of them get sick of the place and leave, like so many people that don't even earn lots of dosh.

[The Pastor]

All fair saying that the government can cough up the change in benefits but that means that the taxpayer (yep, thats my money they are taking and don't seem to have any accountability on where they spend it) has to fork out for it while big, overseas companies post $100M profits. Why not scrap the family assistance policies and make the minimum wage something that families can get somewhere with. I am talking $500 per week in your hand to put a figure on it.

There is an economic reason why you cant just pay everyone more money. Im not by anymeans an economist, but to my way of thinking if you increased the min amount people get payed, every one else will want more, and then since company's are paying more they will rise the prices, just adding to inflation.

[cowboyz]

bollocks. To start with companies can at least conform to inflation. Secondly if min wage for workers who work for a corporation or company over xx employees was upped then these companies and their shareholders will just have to accept that the extreme profits they are making are going to be cut into.

[Finn]

bollocks. To start with companies can at least conform to inflation. Secondly if min wage for workers who work for a corporation or company over xx employees was upped then these companies and their shareholders will just have to accept that the extreme profits they are making are going to be cut into.

Yeah cause all companies make extreme profits. So when did you graduate from the School of Ideoligy?

[Ixion]

The problem with this is that the minimum wage is a very artificial construct, and does not really work.

In a market economy (I don't approve of it, but it's what we are stuck with. For the moment. ), the "minimum" wage should be set by demand for labour. There would still need to be a government set minimum , to cover special cases like workers in training, sheltered workshops etc. But the *effective* minimum, the figure that an employer could offer and have any hope of getting staff is set by supply and demand.

If a government mandated minimum is greater than this market figure, eventually the system flies apart.And , one way or another, the real minimum comes in much closer to the market figure than to the government one.

And, in NZ, the market minimum is much less that the government mandate .

And yet, even the government minimum is nowhere near sufficient for a worker to provide for a family on.

Why ?

A number of reasons. All mostly traceable to government interference, and incompetant interference at that.

Firstly, the government buyin to a low wage economy, competing with Fiji, Vietnam, China, Phillipinnes, instead of Europe.

And comcomitant total failure of the education system, which makes not even a pretence of preparing the majority of young people for a productive life.

And gross overtaxation, mainly to fund a rampant social welfare system totally out of control.

To pay for all the benefits, taxes must be high . Obviously, it is workers who must pay the bulk of them. But since wages are low, workers are left with insufficent money after tax ,even with both adults in the family working, to survive on. So, instead of reducing taxes, the government tries to bolster things up with more welfare handouts, to the workers. Thus requiring higher taxes again. So the worker is yet more heavily taxed ,in some cases (and only some) getting back a small portion of the extra tax he has paid.

In most countries (and certainly in NZ when I was young) workers earning minimum wages paid no tax . Here, they pay 20%. And in reality the tax take is far higher than that figure indicates, since NZ , once again , unlike most countries, and the NZ of my youth, provides no personal or spousal allowance to offset the tax demand.

But , you say, if the market minimum wage is lower than a survival wage, that indicates there are too many workers for not enough jobs ? Yes indeed says the Business Round Table, we must reduce wages so as to generate more jobs. OK say the government, go for it. So wages are forced down further. But, now poverty is even more widespread. So the government increases taxes to pay more benefits.

And you know what ? No matter how much you drive down wages, the promised jobs never appear.

Because , the key is IT IS NOT CORPORATIONS THAT GENERATE EMPLOYMENT in a successful economy. It is the small trader, the self employed tradesman.The entrapreneur

In successful economies, it is easy for a worker to set up in business for himself. At first, there is only him. But, if he works hard, after a bit, he can take someone on (a partner) to help him. Now there are two jobs. And thus it grows.

This does NOT happen in NZ. Why? Because in this country government interference and stupidity makes self employment, and small scale trading a living hell. So great is the bureaucracy, so intense the red tape, so many the hoops the small trader must jump through that that path is ineffective.

And the final nail in the coffin of NZ living standards? Globalisation. Our government has knowingly sold the people of this country into slavery to the multinational corporations.

[cowboyz]

I never said all companies make extreme profits. The big ones too and obviously yours does. You don't pay tax unless your making money so with a million dollars heading the governments way you are making some serious cash.
Ixion brings up another excellent point about small business, or the self employed. Raising the minimum wage is tough for the little guy. You will find that most of the time a guy who is starting out can't afford to pay higher wages (but you also find that these guys have not been in business long enough to become wankers yet and treat their empolyees better) and thats why I am an advocate for having a different min wage for companies over xxx empolyees. The ones that are seriously making money with the idea that the wage bill is just a easy way to price cut. I said it when I started working and I will say it again. You can't save money by cutting wages.

[Finn]

I never said all companies make extreme profits. The big ones too and obviously yours does. You don't pay tax unless your making money so with a million dollars heading the governments way you are making some serious cash.
Ixion brings up another excellent point about small business, or the self employed. Raising the minimum wage is tough for the little guy. You will find that most of the time a guy who is starting out can't afford to pay higher wages (but you also find that these guys have not been in business long enough to become wankers yet and treat their empolyees better) and thats why I am an advocate for having a different min wage for companies over xxx empolyees. The ones that are seriously making money with the idea that the wage bill is just a easy way to price cut. I said it when I started working and I will say it again. You can't save money by cutting wages.

You're clearly a lefty and support wealth distribution. What have you failed at in life to think like this? Get out of the dark ages man.

Can't you see the ideology in what you’re saying? NZ is already not competitive on the world stage, so here we go again, lets screw business some more. The lefties have already inflicted a system that stifles growth, both individually and with business.

The climate in NZ is too cold to grow coconuts, so we better pull our heads out of our arses if we really want to succeed.

And yet again, we have another strike. This time its the radiologists. Good one NZ.

Kiwi - the flightless bird. Very fitting.

[rogson]

A cynic would say the Unions have realised Labour's run is coming to and end and they are therefore not going to get anymore employee friendly legislation. So, in the time honoured tradition of everyman for himself - this Union is doing just that.

Watch this space.........

[terbang]

Finn your a capitalist and others are more socialist, get over it or catch the next plane out... Whilst your investment may be of some use to this country, your attitude towards other people isn't. I wonder if you would see other people differently if you were to be able to make 5 and 1/2 feet.
The progressive lockout is really about an AUSTRALIAN company that has been taking full advantage of a cheap labour market here in NZ, no doubt to the advantage of of AUSTRALIAN shareholders. They are obviously trying to make it cheaper (where do I buy some shares in them) by not negotiating with their NZ employees and locking them out. Once again an Aussie company thumps Kiwi's and they will win in some way or another. Kiwi labour gets poorer and as time goes by poor people can eventually become more desperate and whether it be jealusy or survival it makes little difference as our crime rates climb. The likes of Finn then gets a bullet betwwen his eyes, rather than just a verbal attack, for shooting his mouth off about motorway ownership. He has to build a bigger fence and up his security and his costs go up. Take look at where way our crime stats are heading in sympathy to our economic profile.