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Monday, May 18, 2009

Mike, Charlie, and a tax on the poor

Three thoughts, two directly from the Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, one as a derivative thought.

Mike Teavee
Willy Wonka says, "You. You're Mike Teavee. You're the little devil who cracked the system."
Mike Teavea says, "All you had to do, is track the manufacturing dates, offset by weather and the derivative of the Nikkei index. A retard could figure it out."
and, "Die! Die! Die! In the end, I only had to buy one candy bar."
The fact that he doesn't like chocolate only makes me more impressed by him.
Ok, he has some rough edges. From appearances, he hasn't been brought up very well, but the kid is busting with potential. He's a genius who should be snatched up by the CIA who could turn his powers for the good against various crime cells and terrorist organizations.
Anyway, my point is that Mike is portrayed as a villian who cheated to get the ticket. In my mind, he is the only one who earned it.
So, Meridy tried to help me understand. She said people might think he cheated because he wasn't the "lucky winner" the contest envisioned. This leads us to the lucky lotto winner...

Charlie
Willy Wonka says, "And you, well you're just lucky to be here, aren't you?"
Charlie says......well, I couldn't find any good quotes from him. He did share his birthday chocolate with his family. That is commendable.
But my point with Charlie has to do with his economic mishaps. He is a poverty sticken boy whose father, the family's only breadwinner, is out of work. So he wins the lottery. He gets a Golden Ticket, and he squanders it.
Now you are, no doubt, in an uproar about me saying he squandered his golden ticket. Hear me out. This Golden Ticket has a dollar value on the market. You'll see, if you watch the videos, that he is offered $500 by someone who is trying to sucker him. I'm pretty sure a lot of people would be willing to pay millions of dollars for that ticket. Let's put a price tag on it, say, 2 million dollars. He could sell that ticket, buy a real house for his family out in the country where his grandparents' failing health could improve. He could set up an annuity to support his family for years. He could set up a college fund (for self-actualization purposes if nothing else) for himself and pay for his father to get some training so he could be more valuable in the workforce. Does he do it? No. He spends that 2 million dollars and a trip to a chocolate factory. Talk about fiscal irresponsibility. This leads us to the unlucky lotto victims.

I was listening to NPR the other day --ok, once in a while I listen to NPR, sorry. Anyway, they were discussing whether or not Nevada should implement a state lottery to help pay for education. One guy called in and said that's what the progressive jackpots at the casinos are. I think he's right, but the commentators all wanted a lottery. I wanted to call in and say, "I have never heard anyone put forth this argument against having a lottery, and I think people should hear it. A lottery is like a tax on the poor."
In the name of education, state governments are miseducating the poor. Maybe my expectations of the gov. are too high.
Here is a quote from an article that says what I'm talking about,
"studies show that the heaviest lottery players -- the 20% of players who contribute 82% of lottery revenue -- disproportionately are low-income, minority men who have less than a college education. That has fueled a vociferous anti-lottery movement. "It really is government undercutting what government's role should be," which is encouraging people in financial straits to be responsible with their money, says Tom Grey of the National Coalition Against Legalized Gambling."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=03MuzHC-mWA&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DJuTx3CTXeI&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xad7iOBfI2c&feature=related
http://www.google.com/search?ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&sourceid=navclient&gfns=1&q=lottery+and+poverty

7 comments:

Sheri said...

Very interesting post. Thanks for writing it.

Ashley Miller said...

Regarding Charlie's squandering his ticket:

Doesn't he end up earning the factory (OK, so he just doesn't do anything naughty or disobedient) and being able to provide for his family in a completely sustainable, ongoing way? I mean, seriously, when is candy going to go out of business? :) Selling his initial ticket would probably have yielded much lower monetary results.

Nate said...

I can't argue with his results, but I maintain the decision was bad. No one knew what the extra special prize was, and they all knew they had a one in five shot at it.
So, would you bet big money on a 20% shot at whatever I have in this box?
Charlie did, and he won big.
Still, who likes chocolate anyway?

Ashley Miller said...

Me. I like chocolate. So there. :)

Jacob Miller said...

Yeah. It totally could have ended up like UHF. "And what is in the box??! NOTHING! ABSOLUTELY NOTHING! YOU'RE SO STUPID!"

Also, the lottery is a way for poor people to give back money that was redistributed to them! Just kidding. Some economists refer to it as the stupid tax because the payoffs are far lower than almost any casino game and usually only the uneducated play the lottery. I think it shows how government programs work: "I'm going to rip you off even more than the immoral people in private enterprise!"

Project Maniac said...

Even if Charlie did end up selling he ticket would he have been smart enough and disciplined enough to set up an annuity? I argue no because he was a very impressionably boy. He being the nice boy he is would have given it to his parents, or his parents would have told him what to do with it. It doesn't say what kind of people his parents are so who knows what would have happened to the money.

And I thought Mike was really really annoying even though he was highly intelligent.

Nate said...

Good points Lori. I'm probably expecting too much of Charlie. Being a character in a Roald Dahl story, he probably played his cards just right. Step one, be a poor, unfortunate little kid. Step two, do something incredibly abnormal (eg. plant a giant peach, learn to levitate objects, take a tour of a very strange chocolate factory). Step three, sit back and let it all work out for you.