Question: Does anyone consider that this may be a bad test case?  Not that I'm advocating or negating either gun control theory right now, but...

The test case here is a metropolitan city in the United States.  There's not really an extensive border security issue there, allowing guns to be imported from neighboring states.

Remember, the argument in favor of gun control rests on the idea that we can eliminate guns entirely from a region.  In a city that bans guns yet allows a relatively unchecked border, the statistics will be biased against the gun laws: it means there is little to  prevent potential criminals from getting guns anyway, while only restricting those who do abide by the law.

To more accurately determine the effects of gun control, you would have to use a controlled environment: a city, state, or nation which made significant attempts to prevent guns from entering the region from outside.

@Key

If the flu mutates into something new, those vaccines are useless. 

http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/correlation.png

How do we know the money and vaccines given didn't cause H1N1 to be a flop?  Remember, gauging the effects of prevention methods is much more difficult than reactionary policies.

Talic, you're about an hour late with that.  I get it...

To everyone who thinks this is legitimate:

1: Why would Squirrrel post in Stefan's place when Stefan took the effort to type it?  So Stefan took the time to type out a message, then instead of hitting "post," copied and pasted it for someone else to post?
2: If you say "well, maybe Squirrrel wrote it," why is it in 1st person?

In short, if any of you want to have children, please consider adoption as a means to bring happiness to a child which already needs a home, while consequently preventing your genetic material from spreading to future generations.

One sentence posts without justifications for claims are stupid.

Major source of poverty: The human-technology development gap.

With the advances of both globalization and technological advances, global economies are undergoing massive reorganizations.  Industrial powers like the United States are suddenly being challenged in their competitive edge, with industrial age work being moved toward developing nations.  The factory, far from being an end in itself in development, is now seen to be simply a transitional phase in development, necessary to produce goods but not fully utilizing the potential of all humans, as it still required millions of human minds to be set to remedial tasks within the factory.

In its place, the developed world is seeing a transition to a knowledge-oriented economy.  Sectors such as banking are becoming increasingly important, fueling the investment that's ever so important in developing businesses quickly.  While computer manufacturing takes place in factories throughout the world, software and hardware development is almost exclusively within the developed world.  The 1st world is no longer the industrial center of the world.  Instead, it's the knowledge center of the world.
Ironically, we're on the brink of an interesting, more democratic economic crossroads: while in the industrial era, the average person was needed for their biological abilities (able to lift something), the modern era looks down upon those people, instead raising up what the worker as an individual brings to the forefront.  While factory work just needs you to be strong and work like a cog, much of the service industry wants you to be an individual, as they're paying to gain access to your intellectual capabilities.

But while the transition is a good thing in the long term due to the increased efficiency of all production, there are short term problems.  Look at the United States.  In the 70's, we were an industrial powerhouse.  In the 80's, we still had that place as a major center of industrialization.  Many workers who are seeing this transition are at a point where they can neither control it nor adapt to it.  A 45-year old who worked in a factory all his life, only to see his plant outsourced to Mexico... what is he supposed to do?  Any place he goes would require learning a host of new skills which, frankly, he may be too late in learning.  Even if he does decide to get a new position in a field like sales at Target or something, it creates another new problem: an oversupply of now-entry level workers.  That reduces the salary which a business can pay, due to the simple law of supply and demand.

So how do you fix problems like this?  You can't... well, not without either negating the benefits of global trade.  The best you can do is ride out the transition, and enjoy the long term benefits society will receive with the added supply to all fields, including production of goods and development of technologies...

Actually, perhaps that is the solution.  As increased specialization results in an increase in net production of resources, and globalization ensures those resources can reach regional markets easily, the supply of resources will expand, resulting in a decline in the prices for those resources.  Today, goods such as food, which used to take up a good portion of income for people, can be satisfied at extremely cheap prices.  Is the same true for all levels of manufactured goods?

So whatever we find can't have the sdk thing?

http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/correlation.png

When did Flint ever say he favored a civil war?

> Key wrote:

> So why is it doctors, teachers and such are saying they are underpayed?

When is the last time you've said to your employer "No, I'm fine.  In fact, you're paying me a ton more than I'm really worth!  Thanks a million!"

Well, that was short lived.  See ya, Deci!