> Too much socialism, not enough capitalism
I'm somewhat in agreement there, here there is too much hatred of anyone who tries to make money, we are very backward in that department.
Unfortantly, that rather stifles development, though I can understand why the poor hate the rich, as most of my rich friends are pretty unpleasent individuals who have got to where they are by often underhanded means.
We do have capitalism, just the wrong sort
> There was nothing preventing you from becoming an
> industrial/economic/technological power house
Agreed!
Though trying to motivate an entire country to get back on its feet is proving a little difficult..
Even though we are on double the minumn wage, we had to give up our car as it was beyond our means to afford the fuel for it, let along the cost of parts to fix it!
You don't mention your housing costs though ? (That accounts for some 40% being spent from our income.)
> You have self government
That reminds me of the South Park episode;
http://www.southparkzone.com/episodes/8 ... -Turd.html
> Their money gets invested in the economy to make my life better.
But does it though...
As I said, I have plenty of rich friends, they tell me what they invest their money in, and its nothing to help the poor at all. They like to put an awful lot of into property, high rents, thats making our lives better how ?
Or they invest in businesses.. look for an undervalued asset, buy it, sack a load of workers to boost short term profitability, sell it on for a fast buck.
None of them want to invest in anything long term to help people and themselves, their concern is the price of shares tomorrow, not whether Johnny down the road has a job to put food on his table or not, the I'm alright Jack approach.
I used to think it was envy, but having studied it a little, I notice that once someone gets some wealth, the majority change from pleasent, help their neighbour types, to penny pinching misor who would do over their own granny if it made them an extra buck or two.
Didn't Bill Gates make his money by exploiting and taking credit for the work of someone else to get started...
(This does seem a common theme, its more about political maneuvoring and social skills, than actual ability to do the work, as long as you can steal someone else's hard work, you got it made!)
Its a little unclear whether Japan started the war, or if the US really wanted to start a war with Japan..
http://www.threeworldwars.com/world-war-2/ww2.htm
And there was me thinking the dropping of a couple of nukes on Japan was a show of force to the Russians, and little to do with any surrendering going on in the background..