Society
Exploring "Why" questions about Society
481 articles
Why has communism always failed?
Communism fails because it doesn't properly take into account human nature. It assumes that all things being equal enough people will choose to be a producer rather than a consumer when given the choi
Why does protesting work? You see massive nationwide protests when there is civil unrest, but why can’t the government just ignore it until the protestors give up?
Protesting isn't about getting the government or entity you are protesting to change because of the protesters. They will always be dismissed as a minority opinion and troublemakers. It is about getti
Why is the legal age of consent for sex less than the legal age to watch pornography?
Laws usually don't have to make sense. It is what the politicians and the lobbyists can make the people think are concerns.
Why is having money in tax havens like Swiss Bank accounts considered bad if it is not actually illegal? If it is illegal why is there a Swiss Bank?
Depositing income into Swiss Bank accounts for the purpose of avoiding taxes is illegal, but there may be other reasons for wanting to keep money overseas and secret/secure. Also, Swiss banks are gove
why are there only ever 2 or 3 NFL games available on tv each Sunday, instead of 5-10 like for college games?
> many games available on standard cable packages like college? Because they make more money the way it is currently setup. It's pretty simple at that.
Why do people sometimes have to pay the government on their tax return, even though they already take their taxes from the persons pay checks?
There are two different things going on. First, throughout the year, the government is trying to predict how much you will end up owing in taxes (based on what you fill in on form W-4). Ideally, it'll
Why do companies pay money to create stock photography that is extremely unlikely to be used?
People take photos of things they think are not already available. They upload them on stock photo sites, hoping some day someone wants to use that photo and buys it off them. The photographer gets pa
Why isn’t wasting tax payer’s money considered to be embezzlement?
Embezzlement means that you're taking money for your personal gain. Most tax dollar waste cases are just spending money on things that they were supposed to spend money on anyway, but too much of it i
Why is there one section of the audience at Obama’s State of the Union that never stands up or applauds when everyone else does?
There are three groups in the chamber: The democrats - they will rise in support of anything the president says, that they agree with (which is pretty much all of it) The republicans - they will rise
why does high school start so early in the morning (mine started at 7:30am) when the typical job starts at 9am?
I've always been told growing up that it's done on purpose so that parents have time to drive their kids to school and school buses don't interfere with rush hour traffic. And elementary, middle and h