"In the U.S. it is socialism for the rich and free enterprise for the
poor" by Gore Vidal. He added that the rich are living off the federal government (contracts and tax breaks...).
I definitively agree with him. Your opinion?BS, it is redistribution for all, primarily from the vast middle both up to political donors and down to potential bully boys and followers.
I saw Ronald Reagan speak at Devonshire Downs in the SFValley when I was a college student. He was so great. I believe that the trickle down theory works when morals are in place. Sadly, without morals we will all become slaves of somebody.
Redistribution should end up in people's pockets. Was it where it ended up?
Everybody can be an eloquent orator but if their speeches are not followed with actions in favor of the people and the American society where's the point?
The difference between Obama and Bush is that at least the latter was transparent. We knew what to expect. With Obama, it was confusion. Now I know that he works for private interests.The fact that trickle down does not and can not work has nothing to do with morals. It is a theory which enslaves, whether or not morals are involved.
Kathryn
I did not particularly care for Reagan, but like you, I admired his insight and his Constitutional stand.If he thought trickle down could ever work the man was totally lacking in anything even vaguely resembling insight.
John
What is it, precisely, that causes you so much hate when it comes to America? Obviously, you have no use for America, her history or culture. What do you have value for? You are very good at the spewing of venom and the regurgitating of tired rants. What is it that you stand for? Do you have any principle that you would be willing to share or defend. Accusations are not principle,especially when they are loaded with half or no truths, which, it appears, is your specialty.
Let us assume that you could build your Utopia, what would be those principles. And would you be willing to defend those truths? If not, you simply have no value in criticizing anything.Don't be so paranoid (and so insular) our "leaders" promoted trickle down and it failed totally though that didn't change anything.
John
No it did not fail, but you have. You can only respond with accusations. You do not seem to have any depth in your thinking other then to find or fabricate a fault. Build something. Stand for something. Give some indication that you are other than what you appear.If it wasn't a failure then why have rich got richer whilst everybody else has seen their incomes fall? That really sounds like a failure to me, unless that was the intent all along.
There is plenty of depth to my thinking, far more than goes on in the minds of those who parrot their beliefs, you know the sort of thing I mean "the poor are all lazy and responsible for their own predicament".
What do you stand for? You give some indication that you are other than what you appear.Actually, after consideration, you are correct. I make the erroneous assumption that others are as informed as I am. This is obviously not the case and I promise to work harder to inform in future.
A profound and considered comment that leaves me in awe.
John, If these people think Reagan was so great well that surely speaks for itself and they are as unknowing as he was.
"Trickle down" is a phrase attached to supply side economic theory that completely misses every point there of. Calvin Coolidge, John f. Kennedy and Ronald Reagan all understood that when more money is left in the hands of those who earned it economic activity increases. That increased economic activity results in the economy, as a whole, expanding and becoming more complex.
Decreased government involvement in the economy results in a far more dynamic economy. Crony capitalism, as we are witnessing now in the US with massive wealth transfers to bogus renewable energy companies, as well as, banks/insurance/finance/investment entities too-large-and-too-generous-to-Democrats-to-fail OR the, all too common, pittance for your vote welfare state create massive distortions in the flow of dollars, goods, services, property, labor, etc.... The single largest monolithic power in the economy is the Federal Government with its multi-trillion dollar capital fund.retief
Throw in the Federal Reserve and we are in total agreement.The Federal Reserve System is separate and far more insidious.
Look up the definition of insidious and you will see that it isn't just 80%.
In what way the Federal Reserve and the government are not the same entity working for the same interest?
The Federal Reserve System is not run by the Federal Government.
Who are you alluding to in your reference "... who earned it..."?
Decreased government involvement is capitalism in what way is it a success since now all the US companies are leaving the country with an income tax of ONLY 9,9%?
Reagan was a great inspirational speaker. It was a testament to his leadership. Many credit his economic policies as the thing that turned the economy around after Carter. Trickle down was the cover story for the military build up and the federal deficit that went from Carter at 59 billion to Reagans 4 trillion. Morals had nothing to do with it when you see how the war machine bank rolled our so called recovery. If we put another Republican in without any reforms we will repeat the whole thing again.
The end result of Reagan's military build up was the freedom of Eastern Europe. Reagan's picture hangs next to Pope John Paul II in many Polish households, for a good reason. Winning a war without firing a shot, BRILLIANT!!!!!
It depends on who benefited. Did we gain freedom for the Poles against deficit spending to enslave your kids. If you owned stock in military contractors the economic freedom you would have gained was great. BRILLIANT INDEED, on the backs of your children's children.
You mean the children I got to have because there was no war with the Soviet Union? That there is no Soviet Union? That my friends and their families could come here, freely, from the now defunct, communist Eastern Europe and contribute to America as doctors, engineers, teachers, etc...? Hell yes, BRILLIANT!
Rhamson, come on you think like him down deep. We just have to trigger it. You pressed his button and here is the typical American that praises a government that contracts corporations for billions and that give pennies (and I'm generous) to the indigents. He doesn't see the biggest picture but... I have to acknowledge it is for the better when our government will give him the ebola vaccine he will take as well as his children... It is Darwinism at its purest.
And very expensive. Even with raising taxes he was able to triple deficit spending three fold to over three trillion. BRILLIANT!!!
Maybe we could revere his Voo Doo economics with a dash of reality?
Reagan has nothing to do with the "success" of the eighties. If it was the case then why won't we apply the logic of his cabinet. I doubt like many of us (I'm not sure that many is appropriate for the statement) that a simple actor could define a winning policy concerning our economy.
Now, if the policy applied was not the cause of our success then the conjuncture is the hero. As we will have a interest on Kondratieff's theory, we will see that economies follow patterns and therefore a logic.
Rhamson, to be realistic, you'll have to say Reagan was lucky, he took his tenure at the right moment as he was riding the next upwave. It clearly means that we don't control the economy, it does control us.
Halliburton has contracts with the government (pricy ones). Oil cartels have tax breaks in spite of the billions achieved in revenues. Is it still BS? If Buffet asked the government for an increase of the taxes affecting the rich doesn't it show a breach or a failure in the system?
How does redistribution affect the lower class?On this I'm more inclined to agree with retief. Redistribution is not socialism, it's redistribution.
The only point I'd disagree with is the redistribution downwards, the poor still have what little cash they have taken off them and given to the rich. They essentially are given a government loan which they then repay to the private wealthy.Can you be more explicit as for your understanding of redistribution?Since the poor has the least of redistribution, meaning less intervention from the government, the free enterprise concept definitively is part of their life.
My understanding of redistribution is simply taking something off one person and giving it to another.
Whether it involves government intervention of the trading of baubles and knick knacks it makes no difference, it is redistribution.Ok, then, in what way isn't it part of socialism?
There is no mechanism in socialism for taking money off the poor to give to the rich.
"Capitalism is the unequal distribution of wealth.
Socialism is the equal distribution of poverty." Winston Churchill
Socialism is the 'control of production and the means of production.'. With this understanding define "Control." of business and 'control" of the means of production, people.Expecting one of the privileged class to say anything either positive or truthful about socialism is akin to expecting the Pope to say something positive about atheism!
This one is so absurdly simple that I can't believe that you do not understand it.
Control of business, purely the business is controlled by those who have a real interest in the success of the business rather than shareholders or owners whose interest is purely financial and who will sell out to asset strippers if the price is right.
Control of the means of production isn't divorcable from control of the business.
Taxes don't discriminate. In both socialistic and capitalistic economies people pay taxes.
Yes, still BS. Just because a few hypocritical billionaires want to manipulate public opinion to insulate themselves from criticism does not mean that the property of said billionaires should be taken to redistribute to those who do not own it. Warren Buffett knows he placating critics by his seeming contrition while actively avoiding taxes by exploiting existing tax breaks. Buffett owes back taxes.
If you want to hold up Buffett as a paragon of tax avoidance, you would have a point. If you want to hold him up as some moral authority on honesty, than you are as easily deceived as everyone in the liberal press.
http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2 … taxes.aspx
http://www.forbes.com/sites/realspin/20 … erse-past/What about the property of none billionaires being taken off them and redistributed to billionaires?
Governments are nasty bit of work, aren't they. Taking from one and awarding to another for no better reason than to secure a little political support.
Once more, I have to agree. Let's not make a habit of it
I suspected you weren't as fouled up as you pretend.
Why? what?
I don't pretend to be fouled up, why should I?Put some salve on that touchy nerve, it was sarcasm, mate. One of the internet's greatest weaknesses, its inability to convey sarcasm.
Oh heck, here we go agreeing again, sorry.
I have a nice ale waiting for noon-plus-one-minute, I will heft a pint for you.
Any charts about the source of federal revenues in the US will state that the individual income tax is 46,2%, the payroll tax is 34,5%, the corporate income 9,9% (it decreased again) and other taxes for 9,4%, is it still BS?
I know who Buffett is.Absolutely still BS, corporate income tax is a pass through. Corporations are tax collectors not tax payers. The money drained away from higher wages, increased dividends, more capital investment by corporate taxation and massive regulation encourage corporations to be cautious and seek any possible means for preserving profits, hence tax inversion moves to places like Canada.
Companies leave the US to preserve the profits they have earned out side the US from the taxes assessed against repatriated profits. The current US corporate tax rate is the highest in the world.
http://www.kpmg.com/Global/en/services/ … table.aspxIndeed if the corporations govern the country they are the real tax collectors and I guess you are right. They bought congress, the president and its cabinet... therefore it explains why all the laws tend to benefit them and among them the 9.9% tax rate.
And where does go the capitalized money? Offshore accounts, bribes...? With whose money are they fattening from? People's money put in banks, given to taxes...
Apparently, you don't know what you are talking about.
France rate 33,3%, Australia 30%, Germany 29,8%, Japan 38,01%, Russia 20%...http://www2.deloitte.com/content/dam/De … s-2014.pdf
http://www.oecd.org/tax/tax-policy/tax- … ateCaptial
http://www.forbes.com/sites/realspin/20 … itiveness/
http://www.tradingeconomics.com/country … e-tax-rate
I was mistaken in one thing, the UAE has a higher corporate tax rate.(I would wager that they do not tax income earned abroad, like the US. Most countries don't)
It never ceases to entertain when lefties talk about business buying government. At best it is a pas de deux at worst it is the overwhelming power and organization of government that twists the relationship into pimp-government and whore-business. It is the government that will beat a business to death, what business can beat the government to death? What businesses work in such concert as to distort the entirety of the government? It is one of the most foolish and persistent fantasies of the left the somehow business controls government when entire sectors fall on the word of the government.I see that righties are not better in understanding the privileged relationship between a bought government and corporations. Halliburton works with Obama, yes or no? Former Blackwater today Academi as if it changed their image or branding works for the government yes or no?
I guess Righties are less informed than Lefties, aren't they?
For a government to accept to be robbed by the Federal Reserve there must be collusion between both entities, don't you think? Because at the end, the bill is for people, isn't it? Why does a leftie understand what a rightie doesn't?
Bell is one example among a plethora of corporations controlling the government. They imposed their monopoly through the legislative.
No, I'm sorry I do not agree with that. Socialism is nothing to do with hand outs for doing nothing except perhaps for having more influence than the next man.
What about the American concept of socialism? In the US socialism is synonymous of hand outs, especially to the people.
Actually not! I have spoken with American socialists and they are no different to socialists in any country.
With the hatred of socialism so apparent in the USA I wonder why any right wing party would institute socialist policies!
I thought you were a little above swallowing all the lies put about by those in power Maxoxam.
Can you show me in this document where they promote handouts?
http://socialistparty-usa.net/I was referring to the uninformed conservative majority of the US. The same majority that still thinks that Russia is still communist economically.
I'm sorry, once again the internet fails to reveal irony.
Yes, maxo I agree, I remember the big bank bailouts of the eighties, when the money changers made a bad call and the tax payer bails them out. Who believes that they would have shared their bounty with the rest of us had they been successful? Yes, indeed ,profits under capitalism and socialized losses. The right winger continues to have us believe that the 'system' is even handed. There has been always been war between rich and poor, maintaining a balance of resources is what keeps revolution and economic upheaval at bay. The American success of maintaining the middle class is what allows capitalism here to work.
+1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 SPOT ON!
We don't need to go that far in history. 2008 is another vivid example. Since the middle class is dying what do you will be our future or to be more precise the future of the American economy?
Maxo, as for the direction, I am dismal about it. Unfortunately , the pinball table is slanted toward more economic inequity, not less. It is just that the conservatives are more in hurry to bring on the apocalypse. The value of labor in so many fields is in decline, I see feudalism in our future. Feudalism is just a step above slavery. Without infusing the demand portion of the economy, there can be no real recovery. The conservatives are ridiculous in thinking that handing money over to the big shots will result in their investment in the economy and fix things. Hardly !
Indeed I couldn't agree more with you. Finally someone who reasons rationally, who can project himself in a near future using common sense. Unfortunately, we don't represent the majority and it does sadden me.
Absolutely agree with this. Nick Hanauer a billionaire venture capitalist wants to see the minimum wage raised to at least $15.00 per hour. He says he can only buy so many pairs of pants and automobiles and that will have no affect on the economy.
Consumerism requires money to be in the hands of the consumer to spend and to cycle the money through the economy. The investor will not invest in a workforce that an economy will not support. Putting more money in the investors hands will stop there. The lie still circulates that the tax breaks to the rich (job creators) will allow them to invest, invent and hire more people. It won't if there is no one to who can afford to buy the product.Wait for all the nay sayers claiming that he is wrong and by extrapolation, lower wages will stimulate the economy!
It is about as ridiculous as basing the cost of "items" to be adjusted to the consumers income. A flat tax would make the playing field level so all are able to purchase equally and be taxed the same way. Many are against it including the huge tax industry and legal system who make their living off the injustice of it all.
A flat tax would be grossly unfair to the low paid, and the wealthy!
Ridiculous. It is the only fair way to execute a fair tax equally on all. If you make $15,000 a year or $15,000,000 a year you will be contributing proportionally to the government.
With no deductions it is proportionate to your income.
If you are talking about what is leftover that is up to you. You can't fault someone who has more because they earn more anymore than you can reward those with less taxes who earn less. Proportional enumeration is the only fair equation. Now if you are talking about what people are being paid that is another issue entirely. You cannot mix the two as the answer will slight one and reward the other.
Which is exactly what you propose!
The idea that somebody on the minimum wage should pay exactly the same proportion as, say, somebody earning hundreds of thousands a week is extremely regressive.You could not be more wrong. What you propose rewards more for less and wreaks of social engineering relying on a third entity to determine the difference. The proof is what we have where the poor void of deductions and dodges effectively allow those more affluent to pay literally nothing while the poor pay at a much higher rate. This is not working and penalizing the poor for being just that.
But you don't rectify any of what you say by a flat rate tax, you increase it. Whereas now in most countries the poor pay little or no tax you propose a massive increase.
Or do you propose wage increases to offset the increase in tax paid?There are plenty of plans out there that allow certain baselines and deductions but the general rate would hover around 17% to 19%. I currently pay around a 23% tax rate which would change with my deductions elimination and be adjusted down to the maximum. With the poor you have to find what that minimum would be based on their particular income and conditions. There are always qualifiers that must be met. One that is set there can be no exceptions for the poor or the rich.
http://www.ctj.org/html/flatsum.htm
As far as the minimum wage is concerned it would help immeasurably with both taxes and economic growth. You will never get both at the same time.If you allow exceptions-baselines and deductions then it is no longer a flat tax. It just favours the rich and does nothing for the poor.
What exactly wont you ever get at the same time? It reads like taxes and growth but it's pretty obvious that we have had some of the fastest growth when taxes have been high (for the rich).It is obvious you did not read the piece I was offering. The flat tax applies to those above a certain threshold. This protect harsh penalties on the poor. I don't know what you won't get when it will raise the taxes for the rich on an equal basis. Don't get caught up on the definitions but rather focus on the cures. Don't worry omewhere along the way you will be right
Changing direction slightly, why exactly do you want to give the all ready wealthy even more money at the expense of everybody else?
You can't give somebody what they already have. They have an income based on whatever it is that got them there. What you can do is require them to contribute equally to what is determined to be their share of the tax burden. Taxing them disproportionally is an unfair and dangerous to the economy.
But the truth is that people aren't taxed disproportionately. For equal amounts of money everybody is taxed at the same rate. For example, in the UK everybody pays exactly the same amount of tax on the first £10,000,
the next bracket everybody who earns in that bracket pays the same amount as everybody else in that bracket.Ah but the proof is in the deductions that change the amount of tax that people in that bracket pay. This essentially in some cases relieves them from paying little or no tax at all. How is that fair to others within those brackets? We have an adjusted rate based on deductions and loses which essentially can afford some refunds. How is that fair? Bigger risk and or poor management can return an income?
But that applies across the board, not just to low earners!
Low earners typically do not have the same deductions nor the accountants that can get them more. Which by the way is also a deduction.
Most deductions were designed as a form of social/economic engineering, using the tax laws to produce a social impact the politicians wanted. There are only a handful that were designed to benefit individuals, whether poor or rich, people or corporations.
Given that, why have any deductions at all? Make a single deduction to allow the poor to keep enough of their earnings to live on and eliminate all the rest. If the govt. wants to engineer society, let them write a check to the person/business - above board for all to see and criticize.Exactly? If you mean that a poor taxpayer that can't start a business and get a tax deduction in starting a solar energy business or a charity your exactly does not match. If a poor family that has no deductions for medical expenses yet is allowed to charge off the expenses by the hospital getting reimbursed by the State is the same as a rich person who pays the full deductible and monies over the maximum is the same I would question the exactness in your answer. The rich person can get so many more tax dodges merely because of their spending habits. That is where the inequality exists.
And you propose to reduce that by reducing the amount of tax that the rich pay!
Actually, the predictions and assumption is that the rich will pay more in taxes than they do now. At a lower percentage, yes, but without all the deductions the total bill will go up.
How can you reduce nothing? The tax dodges already lower that. If they were eliminated they would pay more. Maybe we are not connecting or I am not understanding you.
I confess that I don't quite understand how a tax break, leaving the rich still paying more for the same service as the poor, is "living off the government". Can you elucidate?
I also don't quite understand how a contract to provide a product or service of equal value to the payment is "living off the government".Don't you know that all property belongs to Die Staat and therefore any that you are permitted to keep is a gift from your benevolent rulers. I think you need a little trip to the Gulag... I mean re-education camp.
Well, yes, but I don't have to like it. I suppose you're right - I do need "re-education" - but then I still use the word "freedom".
This should help in your reformation.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Newspeak_wordsAh yes. It's been many years since I read that - perhaps I'd better renew my acquaintance with Mr. Orwell.
Is it proportionate? And again why do people pay 44,6% and corporations only 9,9%? That should be your logic? Are you Halliburton? Academi? Exxon?
Can you be more precise and include a clear example that fits reality?Do you pay proportionate for a box of corn flakes? A used car? A cell phone?
No? When then should we expect some to pay proportionate for services from the state? Just because the and we want them to pick up our share so we'll have more left?No you don't pat proporionately for a box of cornflakes, the guy on $4000 a week pays the same as the guy on $400 a week, where's the justice in that?
At the time when the conservatives mistakenly introduced the Poll Tax, a conservative friend of mine was outraged. "Why should I pay the same as some doley in a council house? I'm worth much more than he is".A Poll Tax? We might need a little clarification, it has been 50 years since there has been a Poll Tax in the US and its primary purpose was discourage Southern Blacks and poor Whites from voting.
I'm not in the US so however long ago you had a poll tax in the USA is irrelevant. It was however, introduced to discourage the poor from voting.
I would gladly discourage those who receive the entirety of their living from the government, without exchanging any labor or goods for that living, from voting. It represents a clear conflict of interest, just as any sole proprietor who receives a government contract should not vote.
Who mentioned those receiving the entirety of their living from the government?
There are plenty of poor who work.
Anyway, what is all this about people not being able to vote to lift themselves out of their situation?I thought I was rather clear. I was addressing myself to a specific portion of the population. A conflict of interest is just that. It isn't merely to improve one's lot, but to increase the taking of another's property for purposes of direct transfer. I think a poor person who doesn't vote for decreasing the taxes on his employer is a fool. How better to improve one's lot than to improve the over all climate for employers.
I suppose you think that by cutting taxes on employers that their increased wealth will trickle down and benefit the workers! Maybe in a perfect world that would happen but this world isn't perfect. All that would happen is that employers would have more money and their workers would have less from increased taxes to cover the short fall from their employers reduced contributions.
It would truly be a fool who voted to increase their own tax burden.The mere use of the phrase "trickle down" reveals a lack of understanding of how, why and how fast money moves. Employers do not pay taxes. Businesses are tax collectors not tax payers.
I know money moves up faster than it moves down!
I agree, business are not tax payers, they are tax collectors, witness, say, Amazon in the UK who have received far more of the British tax payers money than they have paid in taxes.That is another issue. Governments tend to favor those who can help politicians feather their nests. Money moves, in, about, around, up, down and through. It is this movement that facilitates all economic activities from the grandest to the tiniest. That is why the fewer taxes the better.
Lower and fewer taxes reduces the power and influence of both business and government.
Well, Retief, it is good that you don't run things and make that determination. I guess for the many that live on social security, military and government pension, their reward is disenfranchisement? Not on your life!
Military and government pensions are part of the compensation for employment, so there your thinking is flawed. Social Security is only a paid to program for the first few years after retirement. Most everyone will out live the contributions they personally made to Social Security long before they die, so yes during the years that they are receiving a direct transfer payment from the taxpayers I would disenfranchise them. It is a conflict of interest.
How is permitting those who directly benefit from an increased taking of another's property a say over how much is taken a good thing? Just one of many reasons America is lost and has been for a long time, thanks to childish liberal notions of fairness.Social security bothers you but it doesn't bother you that our corrupt government pays millions to subcontract corporations. Social security goes to people. YOU ARE THE PEOPLE, aren't you?
How wonderfully simple things must be for you. Corporations bad. Fire bad.Friend Good. Government good. Government and people good. Government and corporation bad.
Any time the government hands out money for no other reason than to pick winners and losers, i.e. GM and Welfare, than it is acting against the interests of liberty. When government employs a more efficient means to accomplish a specific goal in its purview - subcontractors to build highways or air craft carriers, it is acting with the best interest of the country in mind.
The taxes that make Social Security possible are TAKEN from me at the point of a gun(if you don't buy that try not paying your taxes) and awarded to someone who did nothing for that property but claim it and own a vote that they threaten to use if they don't get my money.
If every penny I have paid into Social Security had gone to my 401k instead of into the pocket of someone whose vote was for sale, I would have retired by now.
Never mind, business bad, government good.I don't think liberty or freedom is the driving force here; rather it is control of the masses via government.
Just a note on the side - govt. does not hire subcontractors. It hires contractors who then subcontract some of the work.Good government is not about control, liberal government is all about control. We are witnessing the continued evolution of the control state. How long before the Obama people get control of the internet, as has been their goal for years.
Obama said it, "We can't drive our SUVs and eat as much as we want and keep our homes on 72 degrees at all times... and then just expect that other countries are going to say OK. That's not leadership. That's not going to happen."
He and his ilk, not excluding Republicans who voted to kill the light bulb in favor of the very dangerous mercury vapor CFL, will take control of everything. The absurdity that other countries have anything to say about how Americans live is another indication of how far liberals will go to institute a tyrannical state. Their basic tendency is toward autocratic, tyrannical government.
side note - you are correct and some contractors are unique in the breath and scope of what they do - like the reviled Halliburton.You know that, I know that (except that CFL lamps are "very dangerous") - others find that government is the salvation to all mankind's problems, and the more government the better we will be. At least if government operates the way they think it should...
The move toward mercury and lithium in all the "green" products threatens to introduce a greater concentration of heavy metal contaminants into the environment than ever. The good old, inefficient, incandescent light bulb was hardly the great polluter. The CFL is full of mercury vapor and that will eventually find its way into the water. Greenies pretend to hate pollution but have fully endorsed some of the most environmentally dangerous changes.
Governments have NEVER operated that way. I reiterate the salient point by quoting the GREAT George Washington.
"Government is not reason; it is not eloquent; it is force. Like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master."
Just about all one needs to know about government. About all one needs to know about liberals is that they have a child's understanding of reality. What happened before them is irrelevant, at best or evil, at typical and worst and that they alone know what is best. If you don't agree you are mean."The good old, inefficient, incandescent light bulb was hardly the great polluter."
Except that it required additional quantities of nuclear waste, CO2 production, dam operation and other pollutants that the greenies conveniently "forget" to mention. Incandescent lighting was the primary reason for closing off half of Niagara falls into electricity production, after all, and without better forms of light bulbs we would be needing a great deal more power production than the almost obscene amounts we use now.Really, wow, for a second I forgot what whining sounded like. Electricity is an amazing thing and so easy to produce. Nuclear plants are awesome! France, the great template for leftist-statist goals, derives the bulk of its electricity from Nuclear power. The carbon that enviro-weenies cry over isn't warming anything, if you bother reading the actual research about REALITY, rather than listen to the control agenda. The attack on carbon is a direct attack on productivity and prosperity.
Forcing one light bulb out of use by law is not producing a better light bulb, it is deciding what formerly free, Americans are permitted to buy. Wood, whale oil, tallow and wax were all replaced as heat or light sources by superior sources like coal and oil not because the government stripped its people of freedom and force the change, but because the economic and, therefore, practical superiority of those alternatives were realized.
The CFL is not a superior alternative to the incandescent bulb, even if the government forces limitations on energy production. It is an inferior product, unreliable, over priced and full of a dangerous, long term environmental pollutant.What do you know about France? France follows like a dog the U.S.. It also exported the ebole virus on their land. Isn't it convenient? This virus travels with our military partners, what a wonderful coincidence! It also kills its citizenry pretending that terrorists are out there to get them.
Socialist country since when? Hollande is like Obama, the only people benefitting from his position are the ones who greased him.
Enviro-weenies? Here is a GOOD American, the kind that cares about his country, his people, his children. The perfect example of cowboys immortalized by a certain brand of cigarettes that advertise our deaths. The perfect epitome of what the rest of the world sees in us. Always denigrating the person that thinks differently with which argument? None, as always.
If nuclear energy is not dangerous (coming from an expert obviously) why don't you go in the core reactor of Fukushima take a selfie and come back, I pay your travel ticket?
There's plenty other sources of energy but the collusion between Obama (the puppet) and the oil cartel have decided otherwise. We have to milk the cow.
Anytime the government pays $30 million Halliburton " to "assess pumps and infrastructure in the city and construct a facility to support recovery efforts" " in New Orleans during Katerina for instance, or that by " June 2006, Blackwater had raked in some $73 million from its Katrina work for the government- about $243.000 a day."... indeed corporations are not on the market for humanitarian reasons. So don't give me an uninformed argument.
Is it the best bidding that our government can do. When it comes to slash people's benefits that is to say yours, they are generous when it comes to select a company that is pretending to participate in a reconstruction effort they accept their SCANDALOUS rates. In that case, why wouldn't they follow the corporations' behavior i.e. contract foreign companies to do a much better work at a lower price?
If every penny allocated to wars and war profiteering corporations were to go to your pocket, you'd be Bill Gates.
NO NO NO NO NO NO NO!!!!
I am me, me alone,singular, unique and individual - not some collective ant to scurry about begging for the government to leave me a few crumbs of what I, ME ALONE, have produced. I am not "The People" as in The People's Republic of .... There is no collective possible without brutality and tyranny. There is no The People....
Which "reality" are you referring to? Holden speaks factual whereas you thrive in imaginary.
Where's the equality in forcing one to pay more than another for the same product? Should we also charge based on skin or eye color, or maybe on how tall a person is?
But don't you see, you are arguing for one paying more than another for the same product!
You are arguing for one man paying say 5% of his income for the same product that is costing another 0.5% of his income.And the darker the skin, the more should be paid. The taller, the more, and the heavier the more.
Personally, I believe all should pay the same - I'll leave it to the socialists to decide which people should pay more, and why, but don't expect me to agree.In the UK the powers that be decided that an equal fine for the same offence was grossly unfair. A fine that one person could pay immediately with no detriment to the person being fined might financially cripple another and cause extreme hardship.
I suppose you think that unfair and that all should be fined exactly the same amount.Actually, I have considered that idea with general approval.
We punish by years in jail, or hours of community service - why not income from hours worked? But I'm still not sure how we go from equal $ for a bag of popcorn to paying more for government services. They seem equivalent to me, whether from private sources (where cost would be equal) or government (where the price suddenly goes way up but only for select groups).
People should only be paid based upon merit i.e. what they have EARNED either through education, work experience, passing a qualifying test, and a combination thereof.
While I don't think anyone would disagree with that, we were discussing what the cost is to maintain government and all its programs. Some people are required to pay more - I asked if that should be based on skin color, weight or something else as well as wealth.
It should be based upon wealth only. While the wealthy pay taxes, much of the onus in taxes to support such government programs falls upon the middle and upper middle classes. However, some extreme liberals even want MORE taxes from the wealthier classes in American society to support the "downtrodden, oppressed" poor "who should live a life of dignity."
One can say that it is the middle and upper classes who SUPPORT the poor. The Great Society that was instituted by Lyndon Johnson with the purpose to moving the poor out of poverty have degenerated into social program which enable poverty and tax the hell out of the middle and upper middle classes. Welfare should be a temporary respite; however, welfare as we now know it is multigenerational.
A study showed that over 40% of welfare recipients have been on welfare for 4 years or more. This is ridiculous. Welfare should be for those who can't work because of physical, mental, or emotional disabilities, for the elderly, and the temporarily unemployed. Those who are healthy physically, mentally, and emotionally SHOULD work, pure and simple. American society has gotten worse since the mass implementation of welfare. As any thinking person knows, there is a mass corruption in the welfare system, particularly at the local and municipal level.Did you leave out a word in your first sentence? Why should taxes be based on wealth - "from each according to his ability"?
Taxes should be based on only one thing, the minimum amount of money necessary for the minimum amount of government necessary. That varies in definition, of course, by we ran passed the minimum amount of government necessary about 80 years ago and right down the rabbit hole into Wonderland, without ever doubting or looking back.
People never realize that it is government that endangers their freedom.You misunderstand; the question is what the tax bill should be for a specific individual. Wealth based? Income? Skin color? Some other arbitrary attribute?
And yes, anytime there is a group of people, government both gives and takes away freedom. The trick is to maximize the first and minimize the second, all while too many people find it their duty to control the actions of others for no more reason than they want to.No, government cannot give freedom. Freedom is the natural condition of Man. Government can only limit freedom to insure a civil order which permits the maximum freedom within a social structure without creating either a tyrannical or chaotic state. Freedom is not a product of government but the reverse, government is a product of freedom and the desire to insulate as much of that freedom as possible.
It doesn't matter so much where the money to run government comes from, but whether it impinges on the maximum freedom within the civil social order.Disagree. People do not normally live in harmony without a government of some kind; anarchy prevails and the strongest individual runs over the rest.
Whereupon government appears and, by instituting and enforcing freedom restrictions provides more freedom than anarchy did. Which is why I said government provides while taking away."Government can only limit freedom to insure a civil order which permits the maximum freedom within a social structure without creating either a tyrannical or chaotic state."
me
"Government is not reason; it is not eloquent; it is force. Like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master."
"We shall be left nearly in a state of Nature, or we may find by our own unhappy experience, that there is a natural and necessary progression, from the extreme of anarchy to the extreme of Tyranny; and that arbitrary power is most easily established on the ruins of Liberty abused to licentiousness."
George Washington
For once I agree with your statement however I disagree as for the provenance of money because it is where our government has flawed. Bought by the corporations it only presages corruption.
Somebody's ability to pay tax is usually related to wealth!
Again, you just showed how unfair society is. Why would people be paid differently? Why is a lawyer paid more than an electrician? Which added value does he bring? Who did decide that intellectual work is superior to manual? Why did poor people pay more for a product than the rich since their purchasing power is inferior? Why do they have to pay sales taxes that discriminate nobody?
Is a car worth no more than a box of corn flakes? We don't actually buy the labor so much as the fruits of that labor, and the fruits vary with every individual. Thus every individual job is worth a different amount, just like the corn flakes and car are.
The market place determines value; a much better judge than some committee somewhere in the bowels of government.
I'm not aware that the poor pay any more than the rich for the same product. Indeed, the rich generally pay more because their purchase includes a more expensive store. Now if you reference volume purchases, then you are discussing two different products and the rich definitely pay more. They get more, too, but then that's what you expect with a higher price.
Not sure what you mean by sales taxes that discriminate nobody. Just like a graduated income tax, sales tax discriminates against the rich by forcing them to pay more for the same government services.I just saw that Holden explained it to you already. If someone earns $2000 per month and another 8300 and if both pay $1000 for rent, you will understand that one will end up with one thousand for the whole month and the other with $7300. And I don't refer to the inflation, sales taxes...
No the rich are NOT the consumers. It is a false conception to assume that they are the ones that consume quantitatively. It is the same assumption that states that African American people are the minority that depend on government aid whereas it was documented that it is the Caucasian population.
Sales taxes are applied on everybody whatever their economical status.You're getting closer, with the idea that both pay the same $1,000 for the same "product".
All that is left is to explain why it matters how much is left after that purchase. You seem to be operating under the concept that after buying that box of corn flakes everyone should have the same amount left in their wallet, but life doesn't work that way. Why is the amount for taxes any different than other purchases?
You keep repeating this 9.9% figure when the corporate tax rate is 40%. I provided sources, would you do the same ?
Yes we know the theoretical tax rate is 40% (though one source says 35%) but how much do they actually pay?
I googled it like you and saw plenty of charts that concurred with my source versus yours? Why would Buffett for instance ask the corporations to pay more if it is close to the individual income rate? Do you understand that your number doesn't fit the reality, does it?
"You don't have to be an economist to appreciate that this is fundamentally a redistribution of wealth, from the productivity of Foxconn workers to the shareholders. What that means is that the employees of Foxconn don't just make our phones; they also fund our portfolios."
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/what-happen … -suicides/You know, I always believed the USA to be more egalitarian and far less class concious than these forums actually lead me to believe!
Perhaps. Or perhaps you decide class based on wealth, where most Americans won't. What that wealth has bought, yes, but not wealth in and of itself. Only at the higher wealth levels to people seem to think they are better, but that's because they find some kind of intrinsic value in simply having wealth.
From what I see on these forums I'd have to disagree and say that you do decide class based on wealth, probably even more so than we do.
You probably don't see it as class but as a nation you do seem to look up to wealth.I would understand wilderness' opinion if he was part of the corporatist elite.
That is indeed true. The wealthier one is, the more intrinsic and extrinsic privileges he/she has, not only for himself/herself but his/her immediate family. When one is wealthy, he/she receives more respect and deferrence. He/she often lives in areas where there are amenities that aren't present in less wealthy neighborhoods. He/she can eat better quality food, wear better quality clothing, and have a higher premium quality of health and medical care. He/she can also afford better quality of education for his/her children. Wealth has its perks and privileges.
However, in American society, wealth is not always static generationally. There are wealthy children who become poorer, even impoverished due to their lack of ability and industriousness. Not all wealthy parents carry their children socioeconomically throughout life, some disinherit their children because their children aren't up to snuff. Whereas there are those who come from very humble, even impoverished beginnings who become wealthy i.e. Dr. Wayne Dyer, Oprah Winfrey, Mark Wahlberg, Warren Buffett,Jay-Z etc. through their own efforts.
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