EPTAnd to me it seems as if they will never ever agree on anything. Reminds me of german politics (guess it's similar in every other country) just like.. five times more extreme.
The US debt (proper debate) - Page 10
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amatoer
Germany212 Posts
And to me it seems as if they will never ever agree on anything. Reminds me of german politics (guess it's similar in every other country) just like.. five times more extreme. | ||
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Gaga
Germany433 Posts
On July 25 2011 05:17 sleepingdog wrote: Even though it (well, obviously) can't be explained in simple words in a thread like this, it goes kinda like this way. (following one poster above) Yes, governments could - in theory - say, screw it, we just don't pay you back. But this would mean that people would completely lose confidence in money itself, because "the government" (used in a very wide sense) is, obviously, inherently involved in monetary government. Meaning, if the government just started ignoring its own debt, then soon the money won't be worth more than the paper its printed on. Or in most cases nowadays - the dataframes were the account-numbers are saved. Economy would go back to barter transactions, which would be...well...bad  No, what happens in those cases is called monetary reform. As an example look what happened in germany after their hyperinfaltion after WW1 and after WW2. obviously it's still a huge loss of trust and has drastic consequences. | ||
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TheDraken
United States640 Posts
On July 24 2011 04:25 jmack wrote: It's pretty clear at this point large INTERNATIONAL banks / financial sectors are guilty of fraudulent banking, or at least swindling millions of people out of TRILLIONS and disregarding any respect for their customers interests. Deregulation is retarded. Retarded. Do you know what the word greed means? What did people think would happen if they allowed the greedy to run free? Tax the rich; hard. There should be large government SPENDING not CUTS ( cuts is moronic ). And before anyone claims I don't know what is it I'm talking about let me paint you a picture: You are currently allowing the government to tell you that if the rich get tax CUTS they will create jobs; what jobs? What jobs and where are they? Deregulation and wealthy tax cuts have been around for a decade and now that the bubble has burst it's clear the attempt was a complete failure. With that in mind, you're allowing your ELECTED officials to present more ideas following the same broken logic. No corporation can create jobs if there's no demand for their product ( regardless of how much the company pays it's CEO's ) IF THE PEOPLE WHO BUY THE PRODUCTS HAVE NO MONEY. A serious move towards a socialist ( don't be ignorant and overreact to the word; go do some research and tell me it isn't a more ideal system we should be striving to move toward ) nation is a great way to actually recover the economy. This is not just information I am posting on TL forums; it is being screamed at you by those stuck behind the main stream cable media. No matter what your beliefs, no matter what they are; I have a hard time believing ANYONE supports the notion that millions should go hungry/poor while working 60hrs a week for minimum wage while CEO's of THE BANKS collect half billion dollar bonuses for doing nothing. The banks and their CEO's are the modern day version of medieval lords of land, seemingly immune to the law and collecting absurd wages based on the misuse and exploitation of their slaves. Yes we're slaves; we're slaves living on the illusion that we're free and that one day we can be the "wealthy". I look forward to your views, discussing them and reflecting on my own. + Show Spoiler + Yes I am angry and disgusted. The more I learn about our system the sweeter the word "revolution" sounds. As a member of the American "rich", I can tell you that your blind rage will only cause further damage to the economy since you clearly do not understand the environment at the top. There is a MASSIVE difference between an American millionaire and a billionaire. One is 1,000 times poorer than the other. To put them in the same income bracket (making 250k or over) and raising taxes on all of them is disproportionately unfair to the millionaires who do not walk away with the corporate profits you have described above. Most American millionaires are people who have been very successful managing a company of 100 employees or less, and they are not the type of people shipping jobs overseas. The real problem is the convention of classifying corporations as "people" with their own monetary and legal rights. The obscene profits posters have listed belong to corporations. Not people. Almost no one is walking home with a billion dollars more in their pocket at the end of the year. If you think that you can just tax the hell out of those few that in fact do walk away with that much, you'd be sorely disappointed by the small pool of people you're trying to tax from. The things that need to change are corporate taxes and corporate regulations, not personal income taxes. Even if you got your way and taxed the hell out of us "rich", you still wouldn't fix anything. There just aren't enough of us to make any appreciable dent on the debt. Besides, personal income taxes would only hurt the lower portion of the top 1%, since the higher up you go the more people earn money through capital gains. I don't see anyone talking about capital gains taxes, which are far lower than income taxes. Please educate yourself before raging on the internet and spewing unfounded hatred. It disgusts me to see people engage in blind "me against them" fanaticism when they clearly have no idea what they're talking about. Few deny that trickle down policy didn't work, but to think that chopping off the top 1% and feeding it to the bottom will fix everything is just crude ignorance. | ||
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Keifru
United States179 Posts
>No mention of the Death And Taxes Poster This thing is pretty damn snazzy. http://www.wallstats.com/deathandtaxes/ I actually wish I could afford to spring for it every year he makes a new one. The current 2011 poster is out- it shows the Federal Spending all with nice proportionate circles, as well as percent change from last year (and it seems the 2011 one has the decade-long change for programs that he could find.) | ||
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Gracksaurusrex
United Kingdom171 Posts
On July 25 2011 03:00 travis wrote: Why is it a fail post? I was asking questions. Sorry I am not a genius and don't already know everything like you. Even still, mr genius, you didn't even answer my post - and I don't know wtf a "guit" is, even after trying to look it up. For knowing very little about this topic I have a feeling that you actually know even less than me still. Ok maybe I was a bit rude, but saying things such as "isnt money made up anyways?" is kind of silly What I mean by a gult (yes i used an i instead of a l by mistake), is gult edged securities which make up a large proportion of governments debts around the world. And is basically another word for bonds To answer your question (which i guess i did not do), debt itself does not matter too much, it is the ABILTY governments have to pay it back. Your next question was " what if it was never paid back?". Simple answer, the government will have to pay it back at some point because that is the whole way the bonds system works Bonds are basically like shares the businesses are buying in the government, however the government decides when they are paid back. Argueably I am not a complete expert on this topic, but I fell that I have enough knowledge to be able to make a post on thie thread | ||
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amatoer
Germany212 Posts
Yes, you're bankrupt. | ||
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Gaga
Germany433 Posts
The economic problem with the rich getting richer and richer (actually it's not the people earing much, but the people having much on the bank) is actually not too hard to understand. Problems arise if the interest on huge amounts of money exceeds the spending from that money into the economy so that it grows bigger and bigger. Because somone has to hold that amount of money as debt (thats what most people do not get ... but its a must in our monetary system) and needs to be able to earn the interst of his debt... if hes not able to pay it from the spend interest of whoever owns the wealth, he goes bankrupt or has to make new loan. It's a mathematical problem you cannot get around it. The later is what the world is doing while the few rich get richer and richer and the state as the deptor of last ressort gets more and more problems to pay the interest... only delaying and worseing the problem. | ||
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Deleted User 124618
1142 Posts
For years politicians have been more than eager, on both sides, to promote taking more and more and more debt, because "it increases growth" or something. I never understood why it's a good idea, and I take great satisfaction in the fact that I have always been very careful about taking personal debt. So what is my attitude on this whole debt crisis? Let me take out my popcorn, snacks, sit down and sip a cold drink while I watch the world panic while scrambling for solutions. The realization that taking debt may actually have bad consequences, the consequences of selfishness and carelessness are not fun, have hurt a lot of people and will hurt a lot more. But in the end, I think it's for the good. The world wars brought the EU together, and taught us the value of human rights. I hope this debt crisis will teach some fiscal responsibility for both sides of the pond. But whatever happens, I have an itchy feeling that I am about to live history. I'm going to be very happy if my prediction doesn't happen, but if it will.. well. If people have forgotten that history, that has happened, wasn't some seperate reality, then they are going to get a very rough wake-up call. The stupidity that resides in the human nature, that caused the World Wars to happen, that caused all those genocides, hasn't disappeared anywhere, even if it doesn't take the form of a new war. | ||
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jon arbuckle
Canada443 Posts
- I only saw this now, but Boehner pushing for a "Federal Revenue Ceiling" designed to limit "any future tax increase" (link). The next in a long line of cynical GOP gestures to stymie the Dems and prevent reconciliation (q.v. CCB, the existence of Eric Cantor). - As of 9:07am, the United States has lost its AAA credit rating (link). In order to have retained it, the United States should have devised a long-term solution to the debt (GOP pushing for a short term ceiling rise) and should likely have done so before now. With Greece on the fast track to default, I think I'm going to nap for a decade. | ||
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RoarMan
Canada745 Posts
On July 25 2011 06:08 TheDraken wrote: As a member of the American "rich", I can tell you that your blind rage will only cause further damage to the economy since you clearly do not understand the environment at the top. There is a MASSIVE difference between an American millionaire and a billionaire. One is 1,000 times poorer than the other. To put them in the same income bracket (making 250k or over) and raising taxes on all of them is disproportionately unfair to the millionaires who do not walk away with the corporate profits you have described above. Most American millionaires are people who have been very successful managing a company of 100 employees or less, and they are not the type of people shipping jobs overseas. The real problem is the convention of classifying corporations as "people" with their own monetary and legal rights. The obscene profits posters have listed belong to corporations. Not people. Almost no one is walking home with a billion dollars more in their pocket at the end of the year. If you think that you can just tax the hell out of those few that in fact do walk away with that much, you'd be sorely disappointed by the small pool of people you're trying to tax from. The things that need to change are corporate taxes and corporate regulations, not personal income taxes. Even if you got your way and taxed the hell out of us "rich", you still wouldn't fix anything. There just aren't enough of us to make any appreciable dent on the debt. Besides, personal income taxes would only hurt the lower portion of the top 1%, since the higher up you go the more people earn money through capital gains. I don't see anyone talking about capital gains taxes, which are far lower than income taxes. Please educate yourself before raging on the internet and spewing unfounded hatred. It disgusts me to see people engage in blind "me against them" fanaticism when they clearly have no idea what they're talking about. Few deny that trickle down policy didn't work, but to think that chopping off the top 1% and feeding it to the bottom will fix everything is just crude ignorance. So having millions of dollars is not enough? Just because someone has 1000x more than you doesn't mean you're in a bad situation, there are many people who are 1000x poorer than you, people who can't even afford to come online and post their opinions ffs. I'm not mad at anyone, I feel like people who have lots of money must have done something to get there and I can totally respect that. Chopping off the top? Will taxing the rich really hurt them that much? Let's think, even at a 50% tax someone who rakes in 1 million dollars still has a lot more than someone who rakes in 100,000 dollars at 10% tax. I know I'm giving a crude example but the I think the messege is very simple. Maybe it's my twisted view of ethics or what I think is right or wrong but I do feel like those with the many, or those at the top have a responsibility to take care of those at the bottom. Do you know what greed is? Greed is saying your rich and then complaining about the deficit between you and the billionaires. Many people would love to be able to even think about this. America is in trouble and as someone said there's no one really willing to help if we compare this situation to Greece's economic trouble, it's something the republicans and democrats have to work out and this rate both parties are just fighting each other. Economic classes aside at the end of the day you're all fellow Americans, are you just gonna watch your country just crumble? I don't have the answers or solutions nor do I even know much about economics, but TheDraken I think you have to consider everything on the table. | ||
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whitelly
Czech Republic50 Posts
As a member of the American "rich", I can tell you that your blind rage will only cause further damage to the economy since you clearly do not understand the environment at the top. There is a MASSIVE difference between an American millionaire and a billionaire. One is 1,000 times poorer than the other. To put them in the same income bracket (making 250k or over) and raising taxes on all of them is disproportionately unfair to the millionaires who do not walk away with the corporate profits you have described above. Most American millionaires are people who have been very successful managing a company of 100 employees or less, and they are not the type of people shipping jobs overseas. The real problem is the convention of classifying corporations as "people" with their own monetary and legal rights. The obscene profits posters have listed belong to corporations. Not people. Almost no one is walking home with a billion dollars more in their pocket at the end of the year. If you think that you can just tax the hell out of those few that in fact do walk away with that much, you'd be sorely disappointed by the small pool of people you're trying to tax from. The things that need to change are corporate taxes and corporate regulations, not personal income taxes. Even if you got your way and taxed the hell out of us "rich", you still wouldn't fix anything. There just aren't enough of us to make any appreciable dent on the debt. Besides, personal income taxes would only hurt the lower portion of the top 1%, since the higher up you go the more people earn money through capital gains. I don't see anyone talking about capital gains taxes, which are far lower than income taxes. Please educate yourself before raging on the internet and spewing unfounded hatred. It disgusts me to see people engage in blind "me against them" fanaticism when they clearly have no idea what they're talking about. Few deny that trickle down policy didn't work, but to think that chopping off the top 1% and feeding it to the bottom will fix everything is just crude ignorance. "rich"? so you think you are poor man?Hell i make 9 000 dollars a year.Anyway ,if we talk about "taxing rich" i mean "tax everything up from 250 000 or something,including company,fund,fond,bank i do not know what else. So i hope uneducated mass is correct this time. And yes,What would you do about debt then? | ||
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Cubu
1171 Posts
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DeepElemBlues
United States5079 Posts
Some Monday morning links: - I only saw this now, but Boehner pushing for a "Federal Revenue Ceiling" designed to limit "any future tax increase" (link). The next in a long line of cynical GOP gestures to stymie the Dems and prevent reconciliation (q.v. CCB, the existence of Eric Cantor). From the very first paragraph of the link: Last week’s grand-bargain discussions between House Speaker John Boehner and President Barack Obama included a highly unusual feature, according to two people familiar with the situation: a ceiling on future federal revenues, in order to limit the size of any future tax increase. You say that this was a "cynical ploy" to stymie Democrats and prevent reconciliation, ostensibly by making ridiculous demands. First of all, there is no evidence that this was anything more than something brought up in discussion. Of course, the Democrats are certainly not 'cynically' attempting to 'stymie' Republicans by doing things like declaring spending on Obamacare off the table. No, not at all. Of course both sides are trying to stymie the other and jockey for position as the party not to be blamed by the public. Now we go to the Times. http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/23/us/politics/23fiscal.html Mr. Obama said Mr. Boehner had stopped returning his calls when it became clear that rank-and-file House Republicans would not agree to raise revenues on wealthy Americans as part of a debt-reduction deal, despite Mr. Obama’s concessions on reducing future spending for Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. The dispute is over raising taxes now, not some idea John Boehner threw out in negotiations that was not part of any deal at all. - As of 9:07am, the United States has lost its AAA credit rating (link). In order to have retained it, the United States should have devised a long-term solution to the debt (GOP pushing for a short term ceiling rise) and should likely have done so before now. Jim Rogers saying it's so doesn't make it so. Also he didn't even say that, he said that "in effect" the US has already lost it's AAA trading, in other words that the market has been behaving as if that has happened. Of course there is a difference between what Jim Rogers says the market is doing and what the market would do if "in effect" became "officially." Jim Rogers also has an interest in Jim Rogers making money off commodities trading, a place where people who still have money come to dump it in bad times. Also, you are being misleading. First of all, the debt ceiling isn't measured in time, it's measured in dollars. So a "long-term" debt ceiling rise would just be a large increase in the debt ceiling. Second, whether or not the rise is large or small is totally irrelevant, Moody's and the IMF and others have already said multiple times that it is the rate of increase of the US debt that is the problem. A "long-term" ceiling rise would do nothing to fix this. So, no, the GOP pushing for a "short-term ceiling rise" is not the reason the USA's AAA status is in danger, the reason it is in danger is because we went from having yearly deficits of around half a trillion dollars to having yearly deficits of a trillion and a half dollars in a very short time, and that is expected to rise to even more. Runaway debt spending is what threatens the USA's credit rating, not a lack of 'long-term' (okay look it's just nonsensical talking about that way it's driving me crazy) ceiling rise. To be honest there are a lot more reasons why you're being misleading, like the GOP already having put two debt-reduction bills through the House that the Democrats totally rejected (those rejections being the reason we are 'racing against the clock' now as the Democrats have for ~800 days introduced not a single budget bill. Most of those 800 days they controlled both houses of congress, and for the entirety of them have been in control of the Senate). By hashing out a deal on a budget they could have already worked out most of the issues now being disagreed over. But congressional Democrats didn't introduce a budget of their own and also shut down any GOP attempts to do so. Now that the GOP is in charge of the House they've just done the same thing in the Senate, refuse to introduce a bill of their own and shut down any bills that come from the House. We could have had a deal on spending last year so the debt ceiling this year would be the non-issue it almost always is, but Democrats wanted to play chicken. They've found out too late that the GOP was playing for keeps this time and now they're panicking. | ||
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Agathon
France1505 Posts
On July 26 2011 00:57 Cubu wrote: So if the american economy crumbles, what's gonna happen to other countries? I think it will not append. But if it does, it wouldn't be nice to see, except if your government is a bit competent. Mine is not :D | ||
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shell
Portugal2722 Posts
Subprime bubble and maddoff etc.. was it in europe? do you know why most euro banks, ireland and iceland went down? Because of american funds... And your rating agencys?? WTF you even talk about that? Where were they with Madoff? or with the subprime bubble? That's right the rating agencys gave them AAA+ (the best credit there is) Americans are trying real hard to put EU down and our euro but maybe you will lose and the dollar gets creamed! | ||
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shell
Portugal2722 Posts
On July 24 2011 04:25 farvacola wrote: Having people recognize the burgeoning debt as a problem is not the issue, not here in the US anyway. From what I gather, a huge number of people consider debt in general to be a horrible, terrible thing, when in fact the role that it plays in a healthy economy is vastly misunderstood. Unfortunately, partisan politics here in the United States revolves around buzzwords and "hot topic" issues, and for conservatives, the national debt is an easy jumping off point, as it allows them to attack taxes and government infrastructure all at once. Furthermore, instead of actually attempting to educate the masses in regards to the nature and function of debt in a healthy economy, they boil these issues down to mere "yes/no" or "good/bad" questions, further hurting any actual understanding, The worst part of all this, far and away, is how a huge number of Americans blame the lower and middle classes for the debt problem. Republican fear-mongering in regards to government programs has created a horrible socio-political environment, one in which those who are on desperate times are somehow most responsible for the nation's debt. Take this scenario for instance: A lot of republicans like to cite the recent data that suggests that 47% of Americans avoided federal income tax entirely, be it through entitlements or deductions that are part of the social safety-net. (additionally, a great many people think that all recipients of welfare or medicare are drug addicted pariahs, when in fact are usually simply disadvantaged minorities.) Anyways, back to the point. That 47% that avoided federal income tax? They make up a combined 2.99% of the economy in monetary terms, meaning that even if that entire 47% were properly taxed it would be a mere drop in the bucket. So, one may ask, where is the debt coming from, who isn't paying up? The answer is obvious and simple, big business. Corporations are singlehandedly killing this country through their tax evasion and savvy tactics, and if you doubt me, here is a small sampling of companies and their avoided government dues. 1) Exxon Mobil made $19 billion in profits in 2009. Exxon not only paid no federal income taxes, it actually received a $156 million rebate from the IRS, according to its SEC filings. 2) Bank of America received a $1.9 billion tax refund from the IRS last year, although it made $4.4 billion in profits and received a bailout from the Federal Reserve and the Treasury Department of nearly $1 trillion. 3) Over the past five years, while General Electric made $26 billion in profits in the United States, it received a $4.1 billion refund from the IRS. 4) Chevron received a $19 million refund from the IRS last year after it made $10 billion in profits in 2009. The list goes on and on, some analysts suggest that if businesses in the US were held accountable for moving taxable infrastructure overseas and avoiding proper taxation, literally EVERY SINGLE monetary problem would be solved, and the national debt could be totally annihilated in a few years. In the end, the problem is political in nature. The people of the United States have the means necessary to solve these financial problems, only the maneuvering of political parties (mostly Republicans but Democrats are just as guilty for not bringing these issues to the forefront) occludes the visibility of those in power taking advantage of those who are not, and instead we are endlessly embroiled in class and racial conflict, all in the name of partisan politics. inb4 TL;DR lol wow i didnt't know this!! how can you guys accept this? If this is true it's even worse for the USA then MadofF.. because this a huge robery against the people of USA!! fucking disgracefull | ||
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Teejing
Germany1360 Posts
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gueva RA
Ukraine19 Posts
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integrity
United States1014 Posts
On July 26 2011 01:25 Teejing wrote: Honest question: Would would happen if debts just would be erased? the people who the debt is owed too will be pissed | ||
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HoodedAvatar
Canada115 Posts
not a good idea, because the investors who are owed money would not be pleased at all.. the only way to erase debt is by defaulting, and that not only ruins ur credit rating but also, leads to no future investment in ur coutry. Just look at germany after world war 1. Thats what happens when u erase debt. | ||
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