Accounting & Investing Info for San Antonio A & M
Friday Oct 28, 2011
The last time I checked Texas A & M Students were
mostly holding down jobs
often raising familiies
finishing college
assuming responsibility for their lives
And so the
Occupy Wall Street Crowd has a counterparty
the 53% that do pay taxes
Your take?
Data from a survey of 1,619 respondents from a survey placed on occupywallst.org suggests that there is a huge undercurrent of mainstream dissatisfaction with traditional political party affiliations as well a huge amount of support for radical change in the United States of America.
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92.5% of respondents either somewhat or strongly supported the protests with most respondents indicating strong support.
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1/4th of the sample (or 24.2%) participated in the Occupy Wall Street protests as of October 5, 2011.
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91.8% of the sample thinks that the Occupy Wall Street Protests will continue to grow.
In terms of demographic characteristics of the sample, we found that,
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64.2% of respondents were younger than 34 years of age.
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While the sample is relatively young, one in three respondents is older than 35 and one in five respondents is 45 and older.
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7.9% of respondents have a high school degree or less.
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92.1% of the sample has some college, a college degree, or a graduate degree.
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27.4% have some college (but no degree), 35% have a college degree, 8.2% have some graduate school (but no degree), and close to 21.5% have a graduate school degree.
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This is a highly educated sample.
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26.7% of respondents were enrolled in school and 73.3% were not enrolled in school.
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50.4% were employed full-time and an additional 20.4% were employed part-time.
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13.1% of the sample are unemployed.
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2.6% of respondents were retired, 1.3% disabled, 2.6% homemakers and 9.7% are full-time students.
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47.5% of the sample earns less than $24,999 dollars a year and another quarter (24%) earn between $25,000 and $49,999 per year.
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71.5% of the sample earns less than $50,000 per year.
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15.4% of the sample earned between $50,000 and $74,999.
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The remainder 13% of the sample earn over $75,000 with close to 2% earning over $150,000 per year.
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27.3% of respondents considered themselves Democrats, another 2.4% said they were Republican.
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Interestingly, a very large proportion of the sample, close to 70.3%, considered themselves Independents.
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66.4% in the sample agree somewhat or strongly that they regularly use Facebook.
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28.9% in the sample agree somewhat or strongly that they regularly use Twitter.
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73.9% in the sample agree somewhat or strongly that they regularly use YouTube.
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Our data suggest that the 99% movement comes from and looks like the 99%
http://occupywallst.org/
Just a sample of the people of occupy wall street done by a survey. Thought I would share. I will post a comment later.
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• This excerpt is taken from this web site:
http://history-world.org/french_revolution.htm
“The French people overthrew their ancient government in 1789. They took as their slogan the famous phrase “Liberte, Egalite, Fraternite”–Liberty, Equality, Fraternity. Equality, or doing away with privilege, was the most important part of the slogan to the French revolutionists. For equality they were willing to sacrifice their political liberty. They did this when they accepted the rule of Napoleon I. Fraternity, or brotherhood with all men, was also sacrificed. However, they did win equality before the law.”
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Is it not eerily familiar with the Wall Street Movement?
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Here is another excerpt from the same web site:
http://history-world.org/french_revolution.htm
“The French had good reasons for wanting equality. Before 1789 inequality was typical of the old government. The nobles and clergy were the privileged orders. They were exempt from such direct taxes as the taille, or land tax. Most taxes were paid by the Third Estate–a class that included peasants, artisans, merchants, and professional men. Even among these groups taxes were not equal. Some provinces were exempt from certain assessments, such as the gabelle, or salt tax. In addition, the collection of some taxes was made by contractors or tax farmers, and the tax gatherers collected whatever they could.”
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Is this not what is happening today? In today’s time it is the 1% that is the privilege ones. I am not saying that American’s are revolting against their government but they are revolting against the privilege class. Is today problem not like it was then? Is it not the hard working people that carry this nation on their back the same ones that are having trouble in this economic times while the privilege class got bail out by the government in the form of hefty bonuses dole out through the companies they work for while all the time running their company to the ground. When a man cannot support their family though his job and the wife has to go to work just to maintain decent housing, food on the table, and clothing for the family, then who is left to mind the children. It is the children that lose in this inequity. Is it not true that most taxes are paid by the working class while there are plenty of loop holes for the privilege few? How much money does one need? When is it enough? How much can I spent? All the money in the world will not make you happy but your family will enrich your life beyond your wildest dreams. Only one thing, one has to be able to give them the basic needs shelter, food and education.
• Posted by: Valentin Tristan |
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I question the objectivity of a slew of statistics that came from a site that is supported by the very entity it promotes. A similar survey done by an independent polling firm would be more convincing. Your statistics are about as valuable as asking the king if he is in favor of the rules he imposes on his subjects. Of course 92% of the respondents to the survey support the movement…they went to the site because they support the movement. Find some independent and objective data, and your information will carry more weight. Don’t get me wrong. If you believe in this movement, figure out a way to present it so that those who will apply critical thought to it might be convinced. So far, you haven’t convinced me your statistics have merit.
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This excerpt is taken from this web site:
http://blogs.wsj.com/metropolis/2011/10/19/who-is-occupying-wall-street-a-pollster-surveys-protester/
“Douglas Schoen, a veteran Democratic Party pollster who has also worked for Mayor Michael Bloomberg, sent a researcher from his polling firm down to Zuccotti Park last week to conduct what appears to be the very first professional survey of the protesters in New York. The face-to-face interviews with 198 people informed an essay by Schoen in The Journal’s opinion pages.
Schoen’s survey found that, in addition to the 15% of protesters who are jobless, another 18% consider themselves “part-time employed/underemployed” — for a combined total of 33% who are struggling in the labor market.”
In the Occupy wall street web site:
http://occupywallst.org/
“13.1% of the sample are unemployed” and “20.4% were employed part-time.” for a total of 37.5% which is close to Douglas Schoen survey. In Schoen survey he calls it double the national average of unemployed. The national labor rate is 9.1% which doesn’t account for under employ people or places like Michigan, California or Nevada which have higher unemployment according to http://www.bls.gov/web/laus/laumstrk.htm The states with the highest unemployment are the states with the highest population. Hmmmm!
Douglas Schoen survey wasn’t as in depth as Occupy Wall Street survey but the unemployment was one thing I found in common. The surveys were not apple to apples. Some people think of the protestors as disgruntle unemployed lazy people. Are they?
Here is another web site that looks into this.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/ali-hayat/occupy-wall-street_b_1064544.html
“Occupy Wall Street Movement: More Reasonable Than Radical” but you could have research this yourself.
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It’s good that you went and found a more independent source, but it is still a survey of people who support the movement. Surveying the protestors is like surveying the cheerleaders of a high school football team and asking them who’s going to win the game. The unemployment data is good, but if that’s all you can find in common with the OWS survey, how does that convince me that there is this “huge amount of support for radical change in the United States of America” as you put it? If you believe I can go out and research the information myself, then why make an argument in the first place? Convince me with professional and unbiased statistics taken from a sampling of Americans across the country using questions that aren’t skewed to lead to biased results; otherwise, your argument and overall presentation lacks merit.
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show me some survey that shows any different.
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You, sir, have the burden of proof in this debate. I have pointed out a flaw in your argument that there is huge support for radical change. The bias in your statistics and data is glaring. Can you not defend your point?
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Now now, let’s disagree with out being disagreeable!
I also noticed that someone did a heat image of the tents and discovered that most of the group had gone somewhere else to get a good night’s sleep. I recall that Cortez bemoaned that most of his men wished they were back in Spain with their girl friends in the comfort of a feather bed…..
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I offer my point without malice or disrespect to my opponent, Mr. Tristan. I enjoy a good debate and seek only the truth. That heat image story is funny. Perhaps the protesters can hire some homeless people to sleep in their tents for them so that the infrared scanners will think there are protesters sleeping there…
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Looks like I am doing all the work here. Only in America!! The survey says it represents 99% of Americans not that 99% were protesting. I just presented a point of view; you have presented nothing so far. I never said, if you read my post that I was for or against the movement, but I can understand their view. While I understand their view it does not mean that I am trying to convince anyone.
Thanks for the comments.
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That is exactly my point. The survey purports to represent the views of 99% of Americans, yet it is a survey taken by a website whose visitors support the view. It is a contention based on data that is inherently flawed. Someone reading your post above might come away thinking 99% of Americans support the OWS movement and the truth is that figure represents only the views of those who visited the site and chose to take the survey. It is not a statistically valid sample. I do thank you, as well, for engaging me in this debate. I’ll step away, at this point.
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I believe that Occupy Wall Street (OWS) are people who have jobs and those who don’t have jobs, but it is mostly the common hard working citizens tired of “The Big Businesses” getting all the breaks concerning the taxes and commercial laws. I remember one time when there was a charge on my AT&T bill that was not from AT&T, it was from another phone company. So, I called AT&T to remove this charge, but the AT&T operator said it is the law and that they could not remove it and that I had to call the other phone company to remove this charge on my AT&T bill. The AT&T operator that it is the law and from the government. That made me mad, and I told the AT&T operator that the people are the government. That is way the common citizens of this country are fed up with “Wall Street” and “The Big Businesses” because they all get the tax breaks and laws in their favor.
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Professor Elam 
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