Issue 674 College Cartel: Loans September 9, 2015

Continuing our series, we step into the issue of college loans.  Here is my reasoning as to why this is a part of the college cartel scheme.

The Loans:  Loans are used to do many things.  You can use the money to open a business, buy a car, or fix your house.  But we also use it to afford expensive education like college.  We already know that college credits compound the amount of money needed to spend to get our degree and graduate thanks to my previous issue, but did you know it is rigged to be perpetually more expensive?  Apparently, whenever the federal government increases the size of the loans toward students, the colleges rack up their prices and then the government who is giving students financial aid increase that assistance (usually in the form of a loan) again.  In other words, the colleges know that they can just jack up their prices on everything and the government will pay for it.  Also, the banks who give out these loans are insured if students default.  So banks get money from the students as they attempt to payback their loans (with interest) and if they default, the government gives the bank money equal to the money lost (possibly including accrued interest).  You see what is happening here.  The college profits, the banks profit, but the students are stuck with unpayable loans and the government just keeps perpetuating the problem by giving out more money.

Conclusion:  The loan situation has devolved into a scam, and it has to stop.  This loan situation where some of my friends owe $100,000 dollars or more is absolutely ridiculous.  And you know what, it pisses me off.  I do not owe any debt thanks to a combination of me saving my money from first grade on up and stocks that my parents aided me in investing my own money in.  With that I paid $25,000 of my own money with my parents paying the rest.  But, if I did not have the credit requirement, and if the colleges priced their education services to meet with real affordable costs, I would potentially be at minimum, $10,000 richer (and my parents richer too).  Loans should not be required to get a degree, not like this which places people in poverty through debt.

Issue 673 College Cartel: Credits September 8, 2015

Colleges require not just specific classes to get your degree, but a specified amount of credits.  These credits are a scam to make you spend more money.  Here is my reasons as to why.

College credit scam:  You are going to college to get your degree in your particular field, but you are required to earn a certain amount of credits toward not only that degree, but a series of other fields like life sciences, math’s, and others.  Then on top of this, you need to earn whatever remaining credits in whatever classes are open that you can take.  I had to earn a total of 124 credits just to get graduate, but I was only allowed to take maximum of 45 credits toward my degree (I took 43) and if I went over, I would be penalized $1,000 per credit I go over.  Of course the degree also required additional credits to be taken in various classes with the idea of expanding our world view.  This was sound reasoning and these credits crisscrossed with those needed to graduate as well.  Problem, when I tried taking a minor, the credits, including the core ones for the classes I needed for the minor, did not count toward any of the minors I could have gone for.  I would have to take the same class twice in some instances just to achieve a minor in any field (The total number of minors I could have gotten if the system allowed for it was three minimum including European studies, domestic policy studies and finally foreign policy studies).  All the additional minors I could have taken would require me to take another year (money which me and my parents did not have, or would have had if not for the credit requirements and restrictions).  In short, the credit system, gypped me of my being able to become more marketable with respect to my degree (basically my college was charging $1000 per credit taken).  Also, I could have graduated a year and a half early if it was not for the credit system as well.  Can you imagine saving a year and a half’s worth of money toward a college?  I came in wanting to study politics, so I dived in and got all my requirements and the main course load done in the first year and a half leaving just basic requirements like language just to graduate.  But no, I had to stay, and wait to get the rest of my credits when I could have been applying for jobs over a year earlier.  I think you understand what I am getting at when I say, just give us a series of required classes for our degrees so we can get in and get out with a job as fast as possible.

Conclusion:  I may have come off as preachy, a or even standoffish here, but when you then compare the college degree to ones you can make yourself with online courses and certificate classes that are equivalent and cost significantly less, you begin to see that colleges with credit requirements force us to stay longer than needed.  It forces us to spend more than we should for a degree that we need to get a good job.

Issue 672 Business and cost Reductions September 7, 2015

Here we will discuss ways for businesses to reduce costs without having to go the extremes of shortening hours, or firing people.  Let us begin.

Cost reductions:

1) Receipts:  If your business has regular customers, you can do one of two things with your receipts.  The first is establish an email receipt for you customers so that you need not have to waste as much paper on a printed receipt (this can even be done through an app, and provide price comparisons between fellow and competing stores).  Alternatively you can team up with the banks to have something similar to an online receipt, but the bank will provide the itemized list on the electronic bank statements.  Both methods save tremendous amounts of paper, and thus provide savings for the business.

2) Paperless records: In many cases, business must keep track of sales and payroll.  By using an electronic record system, a business can reduce paper use, save space for more stock by not having to file as much away or waste time doing so.  These records can literally keep track of everything and provide the most up to date inventory records negating time and effort needed to check the inventory daily or weekly.  It is also possible for those same records to generate an order based on past sales which can then be reviewed before sending it out.

3) Cheaper goods: A business owner needs to be conscious of costs and thus get goods of quality from multiple sources (this also prevents in demand items from going out of stock).  As such, establishing a network of places to buy from is essential.  Alternatively, with 3D printing, you need only the schematics and base materials of a good to produce.  Therefor you can print items that are simple to make and sell like toys.  Most costs come from the manufacturing process (ex: car parts cost about 90% less when made with a 3D printer because labor and wasted material costs are removed), and thus cheap goods become even cheaper, thus making your business more competitive.

4) Eliminate brick and mortar:  Costs are also due to rent and property taxes.  As such, if you can run your business out of a cheaper location, like a show store, then you can mail out the rest to the customers from whatever you do not keep on site.  

5) Offer new services:  It is important to continuously offer new services that are demanded by customers.  By doing so, you can bring people into your place of business.  Older products that most people do not want can be sold at a discounted price to make up for lost revenue while the newer items make up for the lost profit.  

Conclusion:  These are just the base examples that modern businesses with internet access and new technology can use.  Elimination of things like coupons issued by the store or switching them to an account that can be used to buy coupons saves money as businesses need not print them out on a regular basis. Even an electronic display to automatically display price changes or more self-checkout systems can also reduce costs and provide savings.  Possibilities are endless, though as a consequence, less people will need to be hired as a result of overall efficiency.  But, if these efficiencies are used to expand business, then it negates that negatives and can even mean raises for current workers.

Issue 671 Human Machine ?! September 4, 2015

Are we declaring ourselves machines?  And is that dehumanizing us?  That is the question in today's issue.

Bio-machine:  Have you heard people and documentaries calling the human body a bio-mechanical machine?  I have, but perhaps we are hearing it too much.  You see, by calling us a machine, or relating our body parts to say a computer or a robot, we may be demeaning ourselves.  Machines are used for labor and making life easier, but when we begin to hear it about ourselves being machines, do we think less of ourselves?  Do we begin to see other people as less human and more as a cog in the machine for us to do one less thing?  I am concerned that maybe we are hearing that we are machines too much and that it is changing the way we view ourselves and each other.  

Conclusion:  When people hear something often enough they begin to believe it.  By hearing that we are machines we may come to the point that people see themselves as machines.  Morally speaking, this may result in people not seeing people anymore, and that leads in my opinion to a devaluation of human life.  Seeing people as less human is troubling and may lead to things like another eugenics movement or potentially worse if we do not take precautions.  Though there is also the potential for this to go the other way, and we elevate machines to a higher level, though this would potentially occur when artificial intelligence progresses further.  Words have power and it will be interesting and a little disturbing to see where we end up with this.

Issue 670 You're always in Church September 3, 2015

Have you heard the expression that you are always in Church?  Well here is a basic idea of what it means.

You're in Church:  Your body's a temple.  This means that your soul and your spirit reside in your flesh, and these are gifts from God (or whatever deity you follow).  If you do not have faith, then you can just simply go from the spiritual perspective and it becomes the spiritual nature of your inner self.  However, in both these instances, the moral teachings of your faith or nonbelief follow you.  They do not just exist while inside a holy place or your mind.  You must use and follow them everywhere you go.  As such, your good behavior is not limited to your reverence, your church or holy place for you carry that holy place with you.  You are that holy shrine.  If your actions and morals do not match, then are you truly faithful?  Are you moralistic?  No, for if your morals do not match, then you are a hypocrite and your word is worthless.  Our actions are meant to be carried out everywhere, not just in one place.

Conclusion:  Using the idea that your body is a church, and that God is always with you aids those who struggle with the idea that they must be moralistic or follow the ethical codes of behavior outside of the physical church.  Likewise, those of non-faith require a similar idea, but in this case society watching them to maintain their moral beliefs outside of the target audience of their behavior.  Basically, humanity is so flawed, that we need to believe we are being watched to maintain our own personal codes of conduct.  We need a reinforcement or else we forget how to be genuine.  Some may disagree, but think about it.  What is the backbone keeping us from misbehaving as the faithful?  It is God, and the belief that we will be punished for our sins.  Non-believers only have society or something else like reincarnation to maintain such a backbone, but that is assuming they even concern themselves with such beliefs.  Hence again, the body as a temple, God is with you always, and not wanting to be the unauthentic, hypocritical and un-moralistic person.

Issue 669 Your right to die September 2, 2015

If assisted suicide is legal, does this mean you have a right to die?  Let us discuss.

Do we have a right to die?:  Assisted suicide in hospitals is just that, suicide.  This form of suicide is meant to aid people in ending their physical suffering from disease or catastrophic injury. But if we have a right to have assisted suicide for physical pain, does this mean we have a right to end our lives any time we wish?  Basically, if you have a right to end your own suffering with help, then you have a right to end your suffering without help.  Additionally, you may commit suicide for whatever reason you now wish.  People can commit suicide for emotional, or even for insurance money as well (if a person has a right to die, then the insurance company must hand over the money in case of a suicide).  Basically, once they allowed assisted suicide to become legal, it becomes a double standard to allow only one form or one reason for suicide and not the others.  In other words, the door for the argument that we can choose how and when we die has been opened.

Conclusion:  With some States permitting assisted suicide it makes the argument easier to allow for assisted suicide for emotional problems.  Once that part of the argument has passed, it then leaps to the next level which makes it that insurance money cannot be denied beneficiaries of the suicide victim.  Basically, the law opens up lawsuits for this to happen.  Once this occurs, it can be surmised that people would be allowed to commit suicide on their own, and even given ways of doing so which cause the least amount of pain and suffering.  This will also mean special hospital rooms or other special facilities so that it can be proven that a person committed suicide and was not murdered (for insurance purposes and to negate the need for a criminal investigation).  Basically, you will be allowed to commit suicide so long as no one is harmed in the process.  This is the logical conclusion of the right to die debate.  The only issue left now is for someone to sue for the right to commit suicide for emotional trauma for it to occur and cause the dominos to fall into place.

Issue 668 Abortion: Potentially Bannable?! September 1, 2015

This issue will look at some facts about how many abortions are conducted at each stage of pregnancy and implications of abortions at each stage.  Let us begin.

Abortion facts:

1) In the first week to two weeks, the egg is not fertilized. The end of the 2nd week once the menstrual period starts to end is when a women is most likely to get pregnant.  As such, once sex occurs at the end of the menstrual period, the women has the highest chance to become pregnant (occurring in the third week at the end of menstruation).  An egg and sperm meet in the fallopian tubes at which time conception occurs. From there the fertilized egg commences cell division and descends the fallopian tubes.  Sperm which lives for up to five to six days may not have interacted with the egg yet however for the egg must be far enough down in the tube for this to occur.

Hormone treatments like birth control which prevent periods and the egg falling aid in preventing the fertilization of the egg.  Thus it acts as a form of contraception and is not abortion (I am fine with all forms of contraception that I know of). The morning after pill prevents the fertilized egg from settling in the uterine wall once it descends and can potentially be considered an abortion pill, but that is because it prevents the fertilized egg from latching onto the uterine wall.   Depending on your views, the morning after pill is abortion, but you are not considered pregnant until the fertilized egg has latched onto the wall.

2) Once latched to the uterine wall the fertilized egg develops further.  Upon week five the nervous system develops and can, depending on how fast development occurs, actually feel pain.  On week’s six to seven, the heart forms, limbs develop and sensory organs like eyes and ears begin to develop.  This is where right to life people want to be with, with respect to compromises.

In week five (their ideal goal) they want it banned for the child can feel pain.  Though some will settle for the heart as the heart pumping is generally a recognized symbol of a living being, and is most easily understood.  As such, abortion if it were to be banned at a stage of development, it would most likely be based on when the child is most recognizable as a living human, which would be once the heart forms in weeks six and seven and begins to beat.  Up to the first 12 weeks is the 1st trimester with 89 to 91% of all abortions taking place.

3) Weeks 13 to 27 is where final development of the body before growing ever larger.  7.8% of abortions happen here.  In this instance, the abortions here are largely unnecessary however as the woman's life is not in danger at all as far as what I have read is concerned.

4) With respect to the third trimester, this is where abortion is banned save for a woman's life being in danger.  In this case, only 1% to 1.4% of abortions occur here.  What should be understood as well is that as technology progresses, the need for this exception of saving the mother's life continues to shrink (thank God for science).

Obviously, after the third trimester, the baby is born. 

At this point I would like to add some facts about rapes and pregnancies from the Washington Post article "The claim that the incidence of rape resulting in pregnancy is ‘very low’".  In this case the article cites a 1996 study by the American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology, where 4,008 adult women were interviewed, with only five percent of them becoming pregnant among the ages of 12 to 45.  The study also included factors like drugs and alcohol, and was designed around finding out about actual sexual abuse (the definitions of rape actually varies per State and may include voluntary partners who may be a few years apart, and potentially even adultery which is still considered a sex crime in some places).  The study was done over the course of three years.  Based on this data from the article, it can be proposed that we can safely ban abortion even in light of potential rape victims as an exception and thus limit the abortion to the first trimester, or even before week five potentially depending on how conservative you are with science and beliefs.

(64,000 women were raped between 2004 and 2005, [3,200 potential pregnancies from rape here].  13 million in 2010 were either raped or were assaulted with intent to rape, but the article says that because of the varying definitions of rape, that 13 million is about half of what it is.  As such, taking that number [including attempted rape] 325,000 women potentially got pregnant from the assaults)

Conclusion:  So it is possible to ban abortion from week five on to uphold life when the nerves form.  It is possible to compromise to get it bannable on week six because of the heart being formed.  Before week five though is a push, and requires people to know more about their own biology and thus science to avoid becoming pregnant in the first place.  

People should be given information into ways to prevent becoming pregnant in the first place to negate the inevitable keeping of first trimester abortions for at least the first half.  However the 2nd trimester is bannable and the third looks likely to be bannable as well as technology advances to keep both mother and child alive in instances of potential life endangerment (remember, only about one percent are done in the third trimester).  So whether you believe through science or through religion, abortion at certain stages can be potentially banned.