The Rich, are rich BECAUSE of ME!

[KevinKohler]

I think this is great. A liberal learning how to live on less without talk of the greedy 1% or can't do anything without government help etc. There is hope! Not sure about that diet though, probably would be farting up a storm eating cabbage and beans...

The beans would create the gas, and the cabbage would make it smell REAL nice. Duch Oven, anyone?

 

[KevinKohler]

I can not say for sure how much I'll need. Can anyone tell me how long I'll live? What costs will be 25 years from now?

Funny, lol. When I think about greed, for some reason, I think about food. And dogs. All dogs are greedy. A dog will literally eat themself to death, if you let them.

 

[Bob Blaylock]

50¢ to cut down two trees and cut them up? What is minimum wage these days? Around $8/hour, I think. At $8/hour, 50¢ would buy only 1/16 of an hour, or three minutes and forty-five seconds of labor. I'm sure this gentleman considers his time and labor to be worth more than $8/hour, but even assuming he does not, are you going to claim that he can cut down two trees, and cut them into the necessary pieces, in only 3¾ minutes?

He didn't even pay his employees an hourly wage. He paid by the foot. That .50 cents was chain saw gas cost.

One way or another, the work was done, of cutting down these trees, cutting them into appropriate pieces, and assembling those pieces into a finished product. This work didn't just happen by itself. This man did that work, or his employees did. In making the claim that it only cost $15 to produce the product that this man then sold for $200, you seem to be completely disregarding the cost and value of the labor involved, which very likely made up a significant majority of the total cost of producing that product. Labor doesn't just grow on trees. Labor consists of a human being, doing actual work, and this human being is going to expect to be paid a fair amount for the work that he does.

You are either being intellectually dishonest, in failing to include this in the stated cost of producing a product, or else you are being amazingly, unbelievably ignorant.

That is rather the point of running a business, isn't it?

Not necessarily. If it was then there would be no ice rinks, bowling alley's, theatre's [sic] etc etc as those types of buisnesses [sic] are not known for thier [sic] money making opportunities. When was the last time that you heard of multiple AJ's Bowling Alley's all owned by a the same multi-millionaire?

I don't think there is, in the entire world, a facepalm big enough for this.

 

[Kal'Stang]

One way or another, the work was done, of cutting down these trees, cutting them into appropriate pieces, and assembling those pieces into a finished product. This work didn't just happen by itself. This man did that work, or his employees did. In making the claim that it only cost $15 to produce the product that this man then sold for $200, you seem to be completely disregarding the cost and value of the labor involved, which very likely made up a significant majority of the total cost of producing that product. Labor doesn't just grow on trees. Labor consists of a human being, doing actual work, and this human being is going to expect to be paid a fair amount for the work that he does.

You are either being intellectually dishonest, in failing to include this in the stated cost of producing a product, or else you are being amazingly, unbelievably ignorant.

Hmm...I'm telling you that he didn't figure in hourly wage because he paid in measurements instead (by the foot) and you continue to push the hourly bit. Do you have a reading comprehension problem or something? Fine. You want to go hourly wage plus material cost? Lets do that. From start to finish it took 15-20 mins to cut down the trees and cut them into lengths. It took about 10 mins to debark the logs. (hence why he paid by the foot...otherwise the person debarking the tree would not make enough money to make the job worth having) It took about an hour and a half to put the bed together. Seriously...not hard to make a basic frame for a bed ya know. So that is a total of 2 hrs worth of work done. At the time I worked there the minimum wage was $6.25. Times that by 2 and you get $12.50 for 2 hours worth of work done. Plus .50 cents worth of gas makes $13.00 even. Remember...he got the wood from his own land so did not have to pay for that wood. So cost to him for the logs themselves was $0. Nails are worth about .10 cents each..sometimes more...sometimes less...just depends on the size of the nail you get and whether it was galvanized or not. At minimum you need 16 nails but we'll go to 20 just to be nice. Thats $2.00. Which brings our total to $15.00. Now if you want to be a real stickler about the time I suppose you could add an extra half hour in there in case there are any set backs, transportation of logs, etc etc. But not much more than that. So just for the heck of it and to be nice (again) we'll add an extra $3.13 to the total cost. Oh wait..almost forgot the cost of the glue. The glue that he bought was by the gallon and cost about $10.00 per gallon (give or take a few cents). However he obviously did not use a FULL gallon worth of glue on the bed so we'll just say that he used roughly .50 cents worth of glue. So all in all by being very generous on my figures the over all total cost was around $18.63.

So, any more questions? Is this more to your liking? Seriously dude....unless you've done this kind of work yourself you don't know what the hell it is you are talking about.

I don't think there is, in the entire world, a facepalm big enough for this.

Not my fault that you think that everyone is out to do nothing more than make tons of money. You really shouldn't push your idealism's onto the rest of the world ya know. (btw...the reason I used "AJ's Bowling Alley" for a name is because we do have one in the town I live in. And trust me when I say that making bookoo bucks is the farthest thing from the owners mind).

 

[Bob Blaylock]

Hmm...I'm telling you that he didn't figure in hourly wage because he paid in measurements instead (by the foot) and you continue to push the hourly bit. Do you have a reading comprehension problem or something? Fine. You want to go hourly wage plus material cost? Lets do that. From start to finish it took 15-20 mins to cut down the trees and cut them into lengths. It took about 10 mins to debark the logs. (hence why he paid by the foot...otherwise the person debarking the tree would not make enough money to make the job worth having) It took about an hour and a half to put the bed together. Seriously...not hard to make a basic frame for a bed ya know. So that is a total of 2 hrs worth of work done. At the time I worked there the minimum wage was $6.25. Times that by 2 and you get $12.50 for 2 hours worth of work done. Plus .50 cents worth of gas makes $13.00 even. Remember...he got the wood from his own land so did not have to pay for that wood. So cost to him for the logs themselves was $0. Nails are worth about .10 cents each..sometimes more...sometimes less...just depends on the size of the nail you get and whether it was galvanized or not. At minimum you need 16 nails but we'll go to 20 just to be nice. Thats $2.00. Which brings our total to $15.00. Now if you want to be a real stickler about the time I suppose you could add an extra half hour in there in case there are any set backs, transportation of logs, etc etc. But not much more than that. So just for the heck of it and to be nice (again) we'll add an extra $3.13 to the total cost. Oh wait..almost forgot the cost of the glue. The glue that he bought was by the gallon and cost about $10.00 per gallon (give or take a few cents). However he obviously did not use a FULL gallon worth of glue on the bed so we'll just say that he used roughly .50 cents worth of glue. So all in all by being very generous on my figures the over all total cost was around $18.63.

So, any more questions? Is this more to your liking? Seriously dude....unless you've done this kind of work yourself you don't know what the hell it is you are talking about.

So, you're not going to give a straight answer as to what he really paid for the labor.

It does sound to me like you are seriously lacking in any basis on which to estimate the true cost of making each item.

The wood, for example, which you insists was essentially free. It wasn't, really. It was an asset of some value, of which he happened to own a finite amount, in the form of live trees. However much of it he used for one purpose, such as making a bed to sell, was that much that he didn't have to use for some other purpose, such as burning in his fireplace, or enjoying the shade of it as a still-living tree.

He had a limited amount of this resource, as well as a limited amount of his own labor and that of his employees. He could use it only to make a limited number of beds.

As it happens, his beds were in such demand that people were willing to pay $200 for as many of them as he could make. You earlier estimated a cost to make each bed at $15, and now $18.63. I think you are still seriously lowballing by failing to properly account for the value of the wood that he used, and the value of the labor that went into them.

You started by suggesting that he should sell his beds for a lower price. Why would he do that? If he can get $200 each for as many as he can make, then it would be dumb to sell them for less.

Not my fault that you think that everyone is out to do nothing more than make tons of money. You really shouldn't push your idealism's onto the rest of the world ya know. (btw...the reason I used "AJ's Bowling Alley" for a name is because we do have one in the town I live in. And trust me when I say that making bookoo bucks is the farthest thing from the owners mind).

Perhaps he doesn't imagine that he's going to be über wealthy, but surely he has bills to pay like everyone else. He needs to keep a roof over his head, and food on his table, and clothes on his back. He probably would like to have a few luxuries here and there as well. From where does he expect to get the money to pay for these things? Is this not one of the purposes for which he runs his bowling alley? If his bowling alley was losing money, taking in less than it costs him to run it, do you suppose he would continue to run it?

 

[Kal'Stang]

You know you're reaching right?

1: Tree's are a renewable resource. IE not finite.

2: Making enough money to pay the bills does not equal to wanting to make tons of money.

 

[Bob Blaylock]

You know you're reaching right?

1: Tree's are a renewable resource. IE not finite.

How much land does he own, and how much of that is he using to grow trees? And if he wasn't using that land to grow trees, what else could he be doing with it? How many trees does he currently have that are of sufficient size and quality to be cut down and used to make beds, and how long did they take to grow to that size? If he cut down all of his trees now, how long would it take for him to grow new trees of sufficient size to replace them? Whether you understand it or not, whether you will acknowledge it or not, these trees do represent an asset, that has substantial value; and this value has to be counted in the cost of making whatever it is that he makes out of them.

2: Making enough money to pay the bills does not equal to wanting to make tons of money.

Irrelevant. The point is that making money is certainly a major reason, if not the primary reason, for running any kind of business. And it would just be stupid to intentionally run a business to make less money than it could easily otherwise make. It would be stupid for your carpenter friend to sell his beds—of which he can make a limited amount—for $100 each, when there are enough people who will easily buy them for $200.

 

[Kal'Stang]

How much land does he own, and how much of that is he using to grow trees? And if he wasn't using that land to grow trees, what else could he be doing with it? How many trees does he currently have that are of sufficient size and quality to be cut down and used to make beds, and how long did they take to grow to that size? If he cut down all of his trees now, how long would it take for him to grow new trees of sufficient size to replace them? Whether you understand it or not, whether you will acknowledge it or not, these trees do represent an asset, that has substantial value; and this value has to be counted in the cost of making whatever it is that he makes out of them.

Already told you how much land he's got. If managed correctly it is more than enough to suit his needs and still have steady work.

Irrelevant. The point is that making money is certainly a major reason, if not the primary reason, for running any kind of business. And it would just be stupid to intentionally run a business to make less money than it could easily otherwise make. It would be stupid for your carpenter friend to sell his beds—of which he can make a limited amount—for $100 each, when there are enough people who will easily buy them for $200.

No its not irrelevant. The discussion is about greed and charging people more than is needed correct? Do the math. Besides...you just argued my point for me. If making money is not the primary reason then that means there is something going on other than Greed. Even a non-profit business needs money to pay the bills. But running one does not mean that you are doing so in order to make tons of money.