>From: "Rik Burke" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] >To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >Subject: Re: Housing Out of Reach >Date: Tue, 24 Sep 2002 00:32:13 +0100 > >Erik said: > > > > Well, it's not quite random. It's relevant, in the way I argued. Do >you > > > disagree with the conclusions I drew from it? > > > > Yes. As I said, it is irrelevant. Maybe I should have been less > > glib. I'll try again. You had my interest until you started quoting > > irrelevant statistics. Then you lost it. It is better to give no > > statistics that irrelvant statistics. If you want to make a point to me, > > you'll need to quote relevant statistics. Otherwise, I will probably bow > > out of the discussion. > >Fair enough. But glib is also thowing back an argument in someone's face >without explanation, to my mind. > >I don't mind you taking issue with my extrapolations (and I note you've not >taken issue with anything else I raised in my original mail). I fully >admitted what I'd said wasn't *directly* applicable as soon as you and >others asked. My point, however, I think still stands. Which was that 60% >of >the US population earn les than twice the minimum wage, or thereabouts. And >the fact that they aren't a one-parent family doesn't mean that it's easy >for a single person with no kids to survive. If you want to take issue with >that, fair enough, I'm interested to hear your views on this. I'm not >claiming I know everything about the matter. But coming at me all verbal >guns blazing isn't convincing. > >Convince me that the orginal stat was irrelevant. I don't want a slanging >match here, I want to learn. > >And if I'm sure enough about my position, then to educate. But believe me >when I say I'm feel on the back foot. > >Rik.
Just a run-down: The original stat is irrelevant because: - Less than 40% of the US is single-parent two-child househoulds, therefore there's no proven overlap. "60% of the US population earns less than twice the minimum wage" is a relevant statistic, if you can show that the majority or even more than 40% of people cannot live on that. Actually, that statistic alone is worth something, but the addendum of the one-parent two-child comment made it seem (to me at least) like you were trying to prove something that wasn't there. Sum up: "60% of people under 2x minimum wage" = bad "A Family of one parent and two children cannot subsist on that" = irrelevant The conclusion you drew was also rather unsubstantiated, as it depended on the one-parent two-child required income. That's (I believe) why it's not a fair conclusion. -Russell _________________________________________________________________ Send and receive Hotmail on your mobile device: http://mobile.msn.com _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
