Save Europe Day

[Valmy]

I like to think on the "southern lazy dimwits ruining everything until their hard working northern neighbors bitchslap them, dragging them screaming and crying into a proper state, establishing a better federation in the process" line

Yeah that is more like the 1930s to the 1980s not the Civil War.  The South spent the next 70 years or so after the Civil War being mad about the Civil War and stubbornly resisting industrialization.

[Tamas]

I don't know much about the ACW - would you mind giving a brief summary of the argument?

I like to think on the "southern lazy dimwits ruining everything until their hard working northern neighbors bitchslap them, dragging them screaming and crying into a proper state, establishing a better federation in the process" line

We already know that you're so fucking ignorant regarding the crisis that it hurts, no need to reinforce that notion over and over again.

relax I am not serious.


To be serious, the allegory is correct in only one regard: we need to decide on the kind of Union we want or else the shit will hit the fan.
Either go for more fiscal unity or less, the current one does not appear to work very well.

[The Larch]

I don't know much about the ACW - would you mind giving a brief summary of the argument?

I like to think on the "southern lazy dimwits ruining everything until their hard working northern neighbors bitchslap them, dragging them screaming and crying into a proper state, establishing a better federation in the process" line

We already know that you're so fucking ignorant regarding the crisis that it hurts, no need to reinforce that notion over and over again.

relax I am not serious.


To be serious, the allegory is correct in only one regard: we need to decide on the kind of Union we want or else the shit will hit the fan.
Either go for more fiscal unity or less, the current one does not appear to work very well.

It's already grating to be on the receiving end of condescending crap from a German in an internet forum, but from a Hungarian? Fuck that shit. 

[Admiral Yi]

Spain's problem is not laziness and greediness (AFAICT), it's that job security nonsense that makes it impossible to hire new staff.

[The Larch]

Spain's problem is not laziness and greediness (AFAICT), it's that job security nonsense that makes it impossible to hire new staff.

Young people and almost anybody hired in the last 15 years or so already have minimal job security, yet they aren't getting hired anyway.

[Sheilbh]

If you're looking for a unionalogy, Tamas, I think Articles of Confederation and Hamilton's time in Treasury serve better.

Anyway noone's attacking member states' rights so ACW clearly doesn't work.

[Tamas]

Spain's problem is not laziness and greediness (AFAICT), it's that job security nonsense that makes it impossible to hire new staff.

Young people and almost anybody hired in the last 15 years or so already have minimal job security, yet they aren't getting hired anyway.

On that, an other sweeping generalization (I love those!) is that frankly, there isn't enough need for work. We have a lost of production work moved to the 3rd world, and even it it wasn't, even Construction requires less manpower than it used to.

[Valmy]

Anyway noone's attacking member states' rights so ACW clearly doesn't work.

No one was attacking the member states' rights in the ACW either.

[Tamas]

Anyway noone's attacking member states' rights so ACW clearly doesn't work.

But we will have to reduce those rights or reduce the Union. Indecision and non-mandatory "rules" are digging our graves.

[grumbler]

Anyway noone's attacking member states' rights so ACW clearly doesn't work.

No one was attacking the member states' rights in the ACW either.

Correct.  States (in the US) don't have rights.  Their governments have powers.  Same is true of the Federal government.

[Ideologue]

Spain's problem is not laziness and greediness (AFAICT), it's that job security nonsense that makes it impossible to hire new staff.

Young people and almost anybody hired in the last 15 years or so already have minimal job security, yet they aren't getting hired anyway.

That can't be true.  When you don't provide generous protections to new workers, firms go into a delirious hiring frenzy, knowing that they can fire anyone who doesn't work out.

Just like they're doing the U.S.!

[grumbler]

But we will have to reduce those rights or reduce the Union. Indecision and non-mandatory "rules" are digging our graves.

The ACW analogy works to the extent that some member states think that other member states are taking advantage of the pooled power/wealth to advantage themselves at the expensive of the whole (or major portions of the whole).  You are correct that this is unsustainable, even if it is only a perception.

[grumbler]

That can't be true.  When you don't provide generous protections to new workers, firms go into a delirious hiring frenzy, knowing that they can fire anyone who doesn't work out.

Just like they're doing the U.S.! 

Suddenly, it smells a lot like straw in here.

[Ideologue]

I'll bet it does, Scarecrow.

That's not a strawman argument.  It's a direct attack on what Yi considers to be the core of the problem in Spain, an element that--if removed--would solve Spain's issues.

I find the assertion dubious, as it certainly did not prevent a major contraction in the U.S. job market despite an overall lurch into recovery.  Even though I agree with him substantially that mandated job security is not necessarily a very good thing, I don't think it's Spain's problem (especially given, assuming that Larch is right, and I'll defer to him on issues about employment law in Spain, that such protections don't even exist).

[The Larch]

I'll bet it does, Scarecrow.

That's not a strawman argument.  It's a direct attack on what Yi considers to be the core of the problem in Spain, an element that--if removed--would solve Spain's issues.

I find the assertion dubious, as it certainly did not prevent a major contraction in the U.S. job market despite an overall lurch into recovery.  Even though I agree with him substantially that mandated job security is not necessarily a very good thing, I don't think it's Spain's problem (especially given, assuming that Larch is right, and I'll defer to him on issues about employment law in Spain, that such protections don't even exist).

It'd help if Yi qualified what he thinks is "job security nonsense". The job market in Spain since the 90s, when the job market was liberalized under the 1st PP government, is essentially two-tiered. There's, very broadly speaking, a privileged tier of people with very high job security, consisting mostly of middle aged people in fixed contrats and public workers, and there's another tier of younger workers in temporary contracts with very little job security. Getting rid of somebody from the first group is extremely expensive, getting rid of somebody from the second group is extremely easy.