Wow, it's a wonder everyone doesn't go into teaching, since it's so awesome. If only word got out about how easy teachers have it and how great the pay is, maybe there wouldn't be teacher shortages in critical needs areas and in urban and rural school districts. My husband did work in the private sector before he went into teaching. He made much more money then and we had better insurance. He's not in a union. And, frankly, I've never heard him whine about his job nearly as much as you whined about his job just now. Sorry, people bashing my husband is a particular peeve of MINE.

I wouldn't. Kai would be a cute nickname for it, though (umm, assuming I'm pronouncing it right in my head). My personal favorite old fashioned boys name with an "ez" in it is Ezra. I keep almost talking DH into it.

Okay, okay--you're winning me over here :). I guess he's a bright enough kid that I can explain the differences between what he's learning in class and what he's learning at home. Alright--Galore Park is my frontrunner at this point. If anyone wants to talk me into something else, though, I'm all ears.

Very good point, but I don't think their budget is that restricted. Actually, their budget looks downright extravagant compared to mine, but we prioritize things differently, and eating out is something that gets cut out of their budget faster than it would out of ours. I don't think the money they'd be out of pocket would be a hardship for them at all...although it's possible they would see it as unnecessary spending. Hmm....

Right, but I'm not planning on spending that much on a gift for them (because my stepmother usually pre-emptively talks to me about it and we decide together not to exchange expensive gifts). It's not really a choice between this and another kind of gift certificate; it's a choice between this and a couple of jars of homemade jam (okay, probably we'll still give them the jam either way). With restaurant.com, I could get them a $25 gift certificate for just a few dollars with a coupon code. They're not really that complicated (there are restrictions like that you can't use it for alcohol or tip, usually); the main thing is that it wouldn't cover the entire cost of the meal--usually the way it works is you have a $25 gift cert. and you have to spend at least $35 total--so they'd still spend $10 plus tip.

For those of you familiar with restaurant.com, would you give certificates to someone as a gift? My dad and stepmom have had a tough couple of years financially, and I know they don't get to go out to dinner that often. My stepmother is completely computer illiterate (she doesn't even have e-mail!), so I've told her about restaurant.com before, but I'm pretty sure she'd never get on there and figure it out for herself. My Dad knows plenty about computers, but isn't the type to look up great money saving tips online, you know? We haven't been exchanging big gifts the past few years; last year they got my kids something small and nothing for me and my adult brother. I think we made them cookies and gave their younger kids something small. So there's no big obligation with gift giving, is what I'm saying. All of that said, I thought a rest.com certificate might be something inexpensive I could give them that they would enjoy. But is there something...weird or tacky about giving restaurant.com certificates as gifts? They're still going to be out of pocket at least $10 + tip, and there are all the restrictions to figure out--is it more trouble than it's worth? Am I overthinking this? I usually am ;)

We dated for 3 years before we got married; 2 before we got engaged. We were 23 and 24 when we got married. My kids? I dunno. I wouldn't do anything differently for myself, but it will definitely make me nervous if my kids decide to get married before their mid 20's. Looking back, I think we were very lucky that we grew up together as well as we did. That doesn't have anything to do with length of dating, though...I think we'd been together a perfectly acceptable amount of time; we were just young. It's an interesting question....I wonder if people who are older need less time together before marrying because they're more likely to know what they're looking for?

Well, owing to the fact that I am a giant dork, I happen to have my folder from 12th grade English right here. (I mean, I had to go down to the basement to get it, but I knew where it was). This was AP English, so most of our papers were supposed to be preparing us for the AP exam and, as such, had very specific topics. I don't have the actual assignments, only my papers, but it looks as if one assignment, for example, was to write about whether Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead is a play about dignity or a play about despair. Another deals with the differences in tone between "To His Coy Mistress," "Loveliest of Trees," and "To the Virgins, To Make Much of Time." (incidentally, this reminds me of why my high school English teacher rocked and why I was so much better prepared for college than most kids). I think that's really how it should be for most high school kids. Very few of them are able to choose a topic and come up with a good thesis without some direction (at least, very few of the freshman comp students I taught in grad school could do it. In fact, even when I pointed them toward a thesis like with the examples I gave, they generally couldn't do it). In 11th grade, I remember, we had a year long project where we chose an American author, read books throughout the year, then wrote a 10-15 page paper in the spring. For that, we were on our own (I picked Jack Kerouac. Shudder).

We also both have three boys, I see. I imagine the war stories about life with three boys could unite us more than disagreements about economics could divide us ;)

Oh! See?--unclear! I meant the rhetoric from politicians--not here!

To be clear (and I worry I'm not being, because I'm on my second glass of wine), I'm not arguing the economics either way (right now), I'm arguing about the rhetoric (because I'm a trained literary critic ;))--that I find it disingenuous (on both sides).

I'm not making an argument as to whether a progressive tax structure DOES stick it to the rich, though, I'm just saying that's not the purpose of it. And Teddy Roosevelt agrees with me ;) People can and do argue about whether a progressive tax structure does what it is supposed to do or not, of course. But that's my point; you're making an economic argument in favor of lower taxes on investments, not one based on fairness. To me, it seems much fairer to reward hard work with lower taxes than a propensity for risk taking or, in my case, dumb luck. I bought the house because I needed a house to live in; I sold it because I wanted to move. If I were to ask you, divorced from this conversation, which was a more noble attribute and more worthy of reward: being a hard worker or enjoying gambling, what would you say? My point is that conservative economists and liberal economists are, generally speaking, all arguing about what works best for the economy, not making moral judgments about fairness and right and wrong. They disagree on what works best, but that's where the argument really lies--not in what's more "fair"

As an example, the same people who decry the unfairness of a progressive income tax are generally big proponents of lowering the capital gains tax, even though long term capital gains taxes are lower than the tax on earned income. To me it seems less fair to pay a higher percentage of the income you earn by working in taxes than the income you earn by....having money to start with. The argument in favor of lower capital gains taxes isn't that it's more fair; it's that it's better for the economy because it encourages investment. Again, disclaimer, that's my very lay-person understanding of it. DH and I sold a house in Boston at exactly the right time a few years ago and made a whole bunch of money. We made this money because we got lucky with our timing, not because we had worked for it. But we didn't owe a cent of taxes on it. It doesn't seem fair to me that, had I earned the same money by getting an extra job and working 80 hours a week, I would have paid 25 or 36% of it in taxes, but I paid nothing because I sat in a house for 3 years. But that's how our tax structure is set up.

That's oversimplifying. You're talking only about federal income taxes. That 47% does pay medicare and medicaid, sales tax, property tax, state and local income taxes, and social security...social security is actually a regressive tax; i.e. lower income people pay a higher percentage of their earnings for it than higher income people. People on all sides of the debate like to talk about taxes in terms of "fairness" but really I think the actual decision making process has less to do with what is fair and more to do with what makes the economy work the best. A progressive tax structure isn't about sticking it to the rich, it's about ensuring a strong middle class so that people have the income to BUY the stuff businesses are selling. It's the same reason Henry Ford paid his workers more and sold his cars cheaper; it wasn't because he was a nice guy (he wasn't)...it was because then there were more people who could afford his cars. There are disagreements and arguments about where to strike a balance of course, but ultimately I don't think the policy makers who are setting tax structure are nearly as sentimental about the whole thing as us regular folks who pay them tend to be. I'm no economist, of course (though if I were a US economist the odds are quite high that I would favor a progressive tax structure ;)), but that's how I see it.

But you didn't have any problem with other taxpayers helping you go to college so that you could enjoy that kind of economic mobility? Economic mobility was more possible in the past because of government programs that supported it and helped create a strong middle class--stuff like pell grants, stuff like the GI bill. People have trouble getting ahead if they can't afford college. People have trouble getting ahead if they have no insurance and crippling health care costs, too.

I'm trying right now to make it through Larry M. Bartel's Unequal Democracy: The Political Economy of the New Gilded Age (I know, sounds like a page turner, right?)...it deals with a lot of these issues. The part I'm reading right now (depressingly close to the beginning) argues that economic mobility has been declining in the US for decades and that, fervent belief in the American Dream notwithstanding, countries like Canada, Norway, Germany, maybe even Great Britain have greater economic mobility than we do.

I'm surprised this argument doesn't get more play in public discussions. It seems to me that our system of having health insurance tied to employment is awful for businesses. It makes it very difficult for businesses here to compete with overseas companies that don't have huge health insurance costs, and it strongly discourages entrepreneurship. I know we've considered some kind of self employment more than once and not really been able to get anywhere with it because of health insurance concerns.

a hopeful bump. anyone?

:iagree: I guess I've never really understood why the same people who have no issue driving on public roads and calling the police when their house is broken into draw the line at health care. Very few people would suggest that their tax dollars shouldn't pay for the police to find an abducted child, yet if that same child gets cancer, it's suddenly beyond the scope of government to help them. As for cutting costs, if it were me, I'd take a look at other countries with lower health care costs than ours (that would be pretty much all of them) and then look at the ones that get good results--lower infant mortality, higher quality of life, good patient satisfaction, longer life expectancies (that would be most other industrialized countries)--and I'd see what they were doing. But that's just me.

I love the name Ephraim, but I've never been able to get DH into it. I've never met a real life Ephraim, so I don't really have preconceptions. I have an Ari with a very Jewish last name who's not Jewish (his grandfather is; he's named after his great-grandfather...sort of), though, so I guess I'm less inclined to make assumptions about religion based on names than I might be otherwise.

freecycle?

Mine's up!

You mean besides chocolate, right? soy sauce and pizza

All three of my boys (9, 7, and then 5) are getting crocheted Totoro hats from Etsy (they requested them). They're also getting a kitten, which they don't know about, which means that all other presents will go largely unnoticed in the enormous excitement (although they're not actually getting the kitten until after Christmas, but they'll find out about it). Other stuff: Harry Potter legos Lego Creationary stuffed Totoro for DS5 I think I'll ask my mom to get them Epic Mickey for the Wii books (DS9 loves Do Not Open and Pick Me Up, so I'm thinking another one by the same people)

Wow. That's really cynical. I'm pretty middle of the road re: vaccines (we're selective/delayed around here), so I don't usually get involved in these threads. But I absolutely do take public health and "other people's children" into account when I make my decisions. I'm not alone in this, and I'm not being dishonest.