Golgafrinchan solution..
... lets get building the B Ark quick :)
Silicon Valley may well be the center of the technology universe, but it's no longer the locus for technology jobs. That honour now goes to the Washington DC area, according to new research, followed by New York and with a range of other metro areas growing their tech presences at a torrid pace. In short, while Silicon Valley …
You have a false premise that government is non productive. Its not profit making, but exists to facilitate the functioning of the rest of the state.
Try moving around a city without a government and see how far you get without being mugged, burned or just starving due to the anarchic conditions meaning there isn't enough food.
Oh, and the city wouldn't have come into existence without a government to manage it. Private roads don't tend to go very far, the profit motive isn't there...
So, government is productive, if you allow the meaning of productive to go beyond the extremely narrow definition of 'profit making'.
This article is about growth in head count, not GNP. So the arguments around whether government expenditure should be included do not apply.
He's right, your wrong. Communism proved you were wrong by being a complete and utter failure in every country in which it was attempted. Government only exists by taking money from those who are productive.
But then you knew that when you pointed out that the state wasts money on things that would not be built if people had a choice how their money was spent. Also I've moved around many 3rd world cities but the only place I've been mugged is in London. But then in those 3rd world countries they shoot muggers instead of waiting for the police to fail. I guess adding a bit of danger to a muggers life is a disincentive.
Ooh. What fun!
"He's right, your wrong. Communism proved you were wrong by being a complete and utter failure in every country in which it was attempted. Government only exists by taking money from those who are productive."
Setting bad grammar aside for the moment, you are making an equally fallacious argument as the OP. Yours is summarised nicely here -> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accident_(fallacy)
Just because you consider communism to be a failure, doesn't mean that all government is a failure. To believe otherwise is really showing a lack of intellectual rigour.
FWIW communism ran for 80 years in Russia, and has run for 90 years in China. I wouldn't call that a failure, as most world democracies have been in existence for far less time.
Imagine what the large cities of the world would turn into if there was no government?
"But then you knew that when you pointed out that the state wasts money on things that would not be built if people had a choice how their money was spent"
I certainly did not. I pointed out that government support the activity of the state by building things that there is no incentive for private individuals and companies to build. This is extremely different. If the government didn't perform these services, society would collapse.
"Also I've moved around many 3rd world cities but the only place I've been mugged is in London. But then in those 3rd world countries they shoot muggers instead of waiting for the police to fail. I guess adding a bit of danger to a muggers life is a disincentive"
You have a broad brush idea of the '3rd world'. Its not some kind of hellhole with no government.
It's a totally outdated idea in any case (1st = western democracies, 2nd= communist, 3rd= neutrals), there's a reason the term used now is 'developing world'.
There are very, very few places on earth without governments, for a good reason, people will construct one if one doesn't exist, because they are necessary.
By all means pretend that we could all happily live without governments in place, but don't expect me to join your delusion on the strength of your misguided and selective arguments.
Its about financing and incubation. Nowhere else in the US even comes close to Silicon Valley as far as venture capital and seeing a start up through various stages of development like SV can---other places can brag about having a bunch of tech support and customer service jobs related to the industry but as far as decision making, engineering & the infrastructure to bring all aspects together and bring innovations to the global market, Silicon Valley reigns supreme by quite a distant margin.