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S&P Downgrades US Credit - Page 14

Forum Index > General Forum
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ket-
Profile Joined April 2010
97 Posts
August 06 2011 09:23 GMT
#261
I think your problem was just pinpointed, America


On August 06 2011 18:14 KwarK wrote:
If you're a member of the American electorate then I think I'm beginning to understand why the credit rating is getting downgraded.


Same. Sad but true :l
HiyA is bestest.
Scriptix
Profile Joined December 2010
United States145 Posts
August 06 2011 09:41 GMT
#262
We can only blame ourselves for electing these imbeciles. I really hope fellow voters learn their lessons and open their eyes to who they are electing, and actually think for themselves. Maybe I am expecting too much....
Klogon
Profile Blog Joined November 2002
MURICA15980 Posts
August 06 2011 09:42 GMT
#263
On August 06 2011 18:14 KwarK wrote:
Show nested quote +
On August 06 2011 17:31 nemo14 wrote:
On August 06 2011 17:26 0mar wrote:
On August 06 2011 17:25 nemo14 wrote:
On August 06 2011 17:06 0mar wrote:
On August 06 2011 10:12 EnderCraft wrote:
On August 06 2011 10:01 DKR wrote:
On August 06 2011 09:58 On_Slaught wrote:
I hope the tea party people are happy.


This.

The Tea Party is less than 20% of congress. Please don't be so naive to think that this is all the Tea Party's fault.... They're apart of the problem, but so is the rest of our government. All of them...



err, yes it is. They can effectively block any legislation because of the ruckus and noise they make. It's even worse in the Senate where one person can effectively lockdown the entire Senate because of the current filibuster rules.

The Democrats brought an extremely conservative budget with 4 trillion in cuts across the board including SS/Medicare/Medicaid but since it had 1 trillion dollars in tax revenue, the GOP whole-scale rejected it. The Tea Party is going to destroy America.

Are you saying that the democrats wanted to put more money into the budget with new taxes in order to take more money out of the budget with cuts? That doesn't sound right, even to me.



It was 4 trillion dollars in cuts with 1 trillion dollars in added revenue to offset the cuts.

If by "revenue" you mean "taxes" then why didn't they propose cutting 3 trillion and not adding any burden to the taxpayers at all? Why do the cuts need to be offset?

Because 4+1 = 5 whereas 3+0 = 3. 5 > 3.

If you're a member of the American electorate then I think I'm beginning to understand why the credit rating is getting downgraded.


Change "electorate" to "Congress" and it starts to become even more clear because I can assure you that there are many in Congress right now that did not fully grasp this idea.
RvB
Profile Blog Joined December 2010
Netherlands6272 Posts
August 06 2011 09:43 GMT
#264
On August 06 2011 18:11 sekritzzz wrote:
Wow this is such a big deal. I'm wondering where investors will go and everything seems shaky. Sovereign bonds are shaky, stocks will be shaken by this news too, real estate people still seem to not trust it after the 2008 crash. Seems like gold or the CHF is the only semi-decent investment to at least preserve your money.


This downrating has been coming for quite a while now though.. the rating bureaus warned weeks ago that this would happen. So I doubt the stock markets will go down that rapidly since a lot of it is probably already taken into account.
Kaitlin
Profile Joined December 2010
United States2958 Posts
August 06 2011 09:53 GMT
#265
On August 06 2011 17:37 RaLakedaimon wrote:
Job markets so fucking shitty I wonder if things can pick up one day, sad to see things just continuing to get worse because we all choose to pick horrible leaders, or maybe there just is never a good alternative to those shown to us. Hate to see all of us average Americans having to deal with shit like this since we aren't the ones that got any benefit before our economic downfall. May not be right but fuck I hate rich people in this country.


The richest 1% of the country pays more in income taxes than 95% of the country, combined. How much is enough ?
Kaitlin
Profile Joined December 2010
United States2958 Posts
August 06 2011 10:00 GMT
#266
On August 06 2011 18:06 eNbee wrote:
Show nested quote +
On August 06 2011 17:31 nemo14 wrote:
On August 06 2011 17:26 0mar wrote:
On August 06 2011 17:25 nemo14 wrote:
On August 06 2011 17:06 0mar wrote:
On August 06 2011 10:12 EnderCraft wrote:
On August 06 2011 10:01 DKR wrote:
On August 06 2011 09:58 On_Slaught wrote:
I hope the tea party people are happy.


This.

The Tea Party is less than 20% of congress. Please don't be so naive to think that this is all the Tea Party's fault.... They're apart of the problem, but so is the rest of our government. All of them...



err, yes it is. They can effectively block any legislation because of the ruckus and noise they make. It's even worse in the Senate where one person can effectively lockdown the entire Senate because of the current filibuster rules.

The Democrats brought an extremely conservative budget with 4 trillion in cuts across the board including SS/Medicare/Medicaid but since it had 1 trillion dollars in tax revenue, the GOP whole-scale rejected it. The Tea Party is going to destroy America.

Are you saying that the democrats wanted to put more money into the budget with new taxes in order to take more money out of the budget with cuts? That doesn't sound right, even to me.



It was 4 trillion dollars in cuts with 1 trillion dollars in added revenue to offset the cuts.

If by "revenue" you mean "taxes" then why didn't they propose cutting 3 trillion and not adding any burden to the taxpayers at all? Why do the cuts need to be offset?


I think your problem was just pinpointed, America

Now let's all get together and have a countries with massive deficits party, mine is invited too sadly!


By the problem being pinpointed, are you referring to the principle of the limited role of the federal government and therefore limited income taxes ? I can't speak for other countries, but in the U.S., limited government and limited taxation is kind of a founding principle.
StendHalArt
Profile Joined May 2011
New Zealand55 Posts
August 06 2011 10:02 GMT
#267
i read in the OP that interest rates for the USA will increase. But whats the main problem of a decreased rating? Like why is it important to have a higher rating?
Bands that will change your life: The National, Arcade Fire, Phoenix (More to come)
stevarius
Profile Joined August 2010
United States1394 Posts
August 06 2011 10:08 GMT
#268
On August 06 2011 19:00 Kaitlin wrote:
Show nested quote +
On August 06 2011 18:06 eNbee wrote:
On August 06 2011 17:31 nemo14 wrote:
On August 06 2011 17:26 0mar wrote:
On August 06 2011 17:25 nemo14 wrote:
On August 06 2011 17:06 0mar wrote:
On August 06 2011 10:12 EnderCraft wrote:
On August 06 2011 10:01 DKR wrote:
On August 06 2011 09:58 On_Slaught wrote:
I hope the tea party people are happy.


This.

The Tea Party is less than 20% of congress. Please don't be so naive to think that this is all the Tea Party's fault.... They're apart of the problem, but so is the rest of our government. All of them...



err, yes it is. They can effectively block any legislation because of the ruckus and noise they make. It's even worse in the Senate where one person can effectively lockdown the entire Senate because of the current filibuster rules.

The Democrats brought an extremely conservative budget with 4 trillion in cuts across the board including SS/Medicare/Medicaid but since it had 1 trillion dollars in tax revenue, the GOP whole-scale rejected it. The Tea Party is going to destroy America.

Are you saying that the democrats wanted to put more money into the budget with new taxes in order to take more money out of the budget with cuts? That doesn't sound right, even to me.



It was 4 trillion dollars in cuts with 1 trillion dollars in added revenue to offset the cuts.

If by "revenue" you mean "taxes" then why didn't they propose cutting 3 trillion and not adding any burden to the taxpayers at all? Why do the cuts need to be offset?


I think your problem was just pinpointed, America

Now let's all get together and have a countries with massive deficits party, mine is invited too sadly!


By the problem being pinpointed, are you referring to the principle of the limited role of the federal government and therefore limited income taxes ? I can't speak for other countries, but in the U.S., limited government and limited taxation is kind of a founding principle.


Oh boy....

He's referring to the poster's inability to do basic math.

4 trillion in cuts + 1 trillion in additional revenue(taxes/whatever) = 5 trillion in deficit reduction. The guy said 3 trillion in cuts instead of 5 in cuts because he subtracted the increased revenue from the proposed cuts which is lol-worthy.


He's implying Americans can't do basic math and probably referring to the same thing with Congress.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Art_of_Kill
Profile Joined September 2003
Zaire1232 Posts
August 06 2011 10:14 GMT
#269
On August 06 2011 09:49 Klogon wrote:
We need to make sure that the politicians who stalled for bullshit political reasons all need to never step a foot in Washington again. The level of political gaming during such a crucial time was just absolutely unacceptable. Gosh, another blow to economy after the turmoil today/yesterday.

And it seems S&P has not downgraded it yet and will review its math:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424053111903366504576490550023165380.html?mod=WSJ_Home_largeHeadline

EDIT: Nvm, it was indeed downgraded.

yep!
as non american i followed this and to be honest it was like some fucking kids, who just wanted to shit on barack obama
i dont know how such people got such a position in the goverment to be honest, but i hope in the next election the folks will not vote for them!
TLT07 ===> *winner* <===TLT08
Mauldo
Profile Blog Joined January 2011
United States750 Posts
August 06 2011 10:19 GMT
#270
On August 06 2011 18:53 Kaitlin wrote:
Show nested quote +
On August 06 2011 17:37 RaLakedaimon wrote:
Job markets so fucking shitty I wonder if things can pick up one day, sad to see things just continuing to get worse because we all choose to pick horrible leaders, or maybe there just is never a good alternative to those shown to us. Hate to see all of us average Americans having to deal with shit like this since we aren't the ones that got any benefit before our economic downfall. May not be right but fuck I hate rich people in this country.


The richest 1% of the country pays more in income taxes than 95% of the country, combined. How much is enough ?


And yet they own how much capital? I look at it this way; play Final Fantasy VII. You can level up materia and sell them for a huge profit if you pick the right one. Let's go with the "All" materia. It sells for 1.7 million gil at max level. Sell ten of these, and you have 17 million gil. But honestly, how much gil do you need in the damn game? Half of that? The extra is just laying around. Why not increase their taxes to where that money is actually used, instead of the money being "invested" into "jobs" that these richest in America "create" while actually cutting thousands upon thousands of jobs and giving themselves millions in bonuses because they "earned it".

This happened because S&P saw what the American people is starting to see. When you've got Boehner and the rest of the sane (or as sane as you can get in Congress) Republicans being held by the balls by the Tea Party freshmen into demanding unrealistic cuts without any new taxes it's absurd. Why not raise taxes to pre-Bush levels? How about pre-Clinton? All of those would be lower than when Reagan was president.

I leave the thread with this. I worked for two months the summer of 2010 (I would have this summer, but no one would hire me in this marvelous Reaganomics economy) for a factory. I made around 2000 dollars before taxes. In federal and state and local tax I lost around 400 dollars before the temp agency took their cut. Around tax refund season I got 132 dollars back. So I paid a good 250 dollars in taxes. Okay, whatever. I accept that. I know it's not much compared to what people with actual, regular jobs pay.

But really, if I pay that much, won't the bigger corporations pay more? As in, more than 250 dollars in taxes?

GE, a multi-national and multi-billion dollar company, reported 14.2 billion dollars in international revenue and 5.1 billion dollars in revenue that occurred here in the United States. How much did they pay in taxes? Zero dollars. 0. Null. Not even a cent. Not only that, but the United States paid them 3.2 billion in tax refunds. They paid less taxes than I did, and they got a tax refund how many times higher than I did? They paid fewer taxes than every middle-class and poor person in the United States.

How is that even fair. How. And when the Democrats want to close enough tax loopholes to help make up a trillion dollars in revenue (a move that, if you read the New York Times article I link below, Reagan did when he found out back during his time in office that GE and other huge corporations were dodging taxes by loopholes and other means) the Tea Party holds everyone up with a bunch of "Well then fine, let's let America default." And when they're told that might crash the American economy, and along with it the world's economy, they shrug. They want to start a global great depression because a few millionaires and billionaires might have to actually pay the taxes they were supposed to pay when the tax code was written up.

Closing tax loopholes isn't raising taxes. It's stopping the cheats from cheating us anymore. But, you know, they "create jobs" with that money. Tell that to the numerous unemployed in this country. Especially explain that to the numerous "99ers," the people who have gone over their alloted 99 weeks on unemployment benefits. Because they're just lazy assholes who want to starve. That sounds about right.

New York Times article on GE income taxes
cYaN
Profile Joined May 2004
Norway3322 Posts
Last Edited: 2011-08-06 10:35:25
August 06 2011 10:31 GMT
#271
About damn time. Time to actually be fiscally responsible over there. gl

Edit: edited out the parts about Greece, doesn't really matter and im probably wrong anyways
Integra
Profile Blog Joined January 2008
Sweden5626 Posts
August 06 2011 10:39 GMT
#272
On August 06 2011 18:53 Kaitlin wrote:
Show nested quote +
On August 06 2011 17:37 RaLakedaimon wrote:
Job markets so fucking shitty I wonder if things can pick up one day, sad to see things just continuing to get worse because we all choose to pick horrible leaders, or maybe there just is never a good alternative to those shown to us. Hate to see all of us average Americans having to deal with shit like this since we aren't the ones that got any benefit before our economic downfall. May not be right but fuck I hate rich people in this country.


The richest 1% of the country pays more in income taxes than 95% of the country, combined. How much is enough ?

Whatever it is, it's not enough since it's the rich people that gotten you into this in the first place.
"Dark Pleasure" | | I survived the Locust war of May 3, 2014
Evilmystic
Profile Joined September 2010
Russian Federation266 Posts
Last Edited: 2011-08-06 10:40:57
August 06 2011 10:40 GMT
#273
On August 06 2011 19:19 Mauldo wrote:
+ Show Spoiler +
On August 06 2011 18:53 Kaitlin wrote:
Show nested quote +
On August 06 2011 17:37 RaLakedaimon wrote:
Job markets so fucking shitty I wonder if things can pick up one day, sad to see things just continuing to get worse because we all choose to pick horrible leaders, or maybe there just is never a good alternative to those shown to us. Hate to see all of us average Americans having to deal with shit like this since we aren't the ones that got any benefit before our economic downfall. May not be right but fuck I hate rich people in this country.


The richest 1% of the country pays more in income taxes than 95% of the country, combined. How much is enough ?


And yet they own how much capital? I look at it this way; play Final Fantasy VII. You can level up materia and sell them for a huge profit if you pick the right one. Let's go with the "All" materia. It sells for 1.7 million gil at max level. Sell ten of these, and you have 17 million gil. But honestly, how much gil do you need in the damn game? Half of that? The extra is just laying around. Why not increase their taxes to where that money is actually used, instead of the money being "invested" into "jobs" that these richest in America "create" while actually cutting thousands upon thousands of jobs and giving themselves millions in bonuses because they "earned it".

This happened because S&P saw what the American people is starting to see. When you've got Boehner and the rest of the sane (or as sane as you can get in Congress) Republicans being held by the balls by the Tea Party freshmen into demanding unrealistic cuts without any new taxes it's absurd. Why not raise taxes to pre-Bush levels? How about pre-Clinton? All of those would be lower than when Reagan was president.

I leave the thread with this. I worked for two months the summer of 2010 (I would have this summer, but no one would hire me in this marvelous Reaganomics economy) for a factory. I made around 2000 dollars before taxes. In federal and state and local tax I lost around 400 dollars before the temp agency took their cut. Around tax refund season I got 132 dollars back. So I paid a good 250 dollars in taxes. Okay, whatever. I accept that. I know it's not much compared to what people with actual, regular jobs pay.

But really, if I pay that much, won't the bigger corporations pay more? As in, more than 250 dollars in taxes?

GE, a multi-national and multi-billion dollar company, reported 14.2 billion dollars in international revenue and 5.1 billion dollars in revenue that occurred here in the United States. How much did they pay in taxes? Zero dollars. 0. Null. Not even a cent. Not only that, but the United States paid them 3.2 billion in tax refunds. They paid less taxes than I did, and they got a tax refund how many times higher than I did? They paid fewer taxes than every middle-class and poor person in the United States.

How is that even fair. How. And when the Democrats want to close enough tax loopholes to help make up a trillion dollars in revenue (a move that, if you read the New York Times article I link below, Reagan did when he found out back during his time in office that GE and other huge corporations were dodging taxes by loopholes and other means) the Tea Party holds everyone up with a bunch of "Well then fine, let's let America default." And when they're told that might crash the American economy, and along with it the world's economy, they shrug. They want to start a global great depression because a few millionaires and billionaires might have to actually pay the taxes they were supposed to pay when the tax code was written up.

Closing tax loopholes isn't raising taxes. It's stopping the cheats from cheating us anymore. But, you know, they "create jobs" with that money. Tell that to the numerous unemployed in this country. Especially explain that to the numerous "99ers," the people who have gone over their alloted 99 weeks on unemployment benefits. Because they're just lazy assholes who want to starve. That sounds about right.

New York Times article on GE income taxes


Gonna quote something from your source:
“In a rational system, a corporation’s tax department would be there to make sure a company complied with the law,” said Len Burman, a former Treasury official who now is a scholar at the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center. “But in our system, there are corporations that view their tax departments as a profit center, and the effects on public policy can be negative.”

That's a very strange look on corporate goals actually. Maximization of profits and minimization of expenses are main goals of any business and they will use every legal way to reach these goals. Blaming corporations for that is ridiculous.
Senorcuidado
Profile Joined May 2010
United States700 Posts
August 06 2011 11:05 GMT
#274
On August 06 2011 19:40 Evilmystic wrote:
Show nested quote +
On August 06 2011 19:19 Mauldo wrote:
+ Show Spoiler +
On August 06 2011 18:53 Kaitlin wrote:
Show nested quote +
On August 06 2011 17:37 RaLakedaimon wrote:
Job markets so fucking shitty I wonder if things can pick up one day, sad to see things just continuing to get worse because we all choose to pick horrible leaders, or maybe there just is never a good alternative to those shown to us. Hate to see all of us average Americans having to deal with shit like this since we aren't the ones that got any benefit before our economic downfall. May not be right but fuck I hate rich people in this country.


The richest 1% of the country pays more in income taxes than 95% of the country, combined. How much is enough ?


And yet they own how much capital? I look at it this way; play Final Fantasy VII. You can level up materia and sell them for a huge profit if you pick the right one. Let's go with the "All" materia. It sells for 1.7 million gil at max level. Sell ten of these, and you have 17 million gil. But honestly, how much gil do you need in the damn game? Half of that? The extra is just laying around. Why not increase their taxes to where that money is actually used, instead of the money being "invested" into "jobs" that these richest in America "create" while actually cutting thousands upon thousands of jobs and giving themselves millions in bonuses because they "earned it".

This happened because S&P saw what the American people is starting to see. When you've got Boehner and the rest of the sane (or as sane as you can get in Congress) Republicans being held by the balls by the Tea Party freshmen into demanding unrealistic cuts without any new taxes it's absurd. Why not raise taxes to pre-Bush levels? How about pre-Clinton? All of those would be lower than when Reagan was president.

I leave the thread with this. I worked for two months the summer of 2010 (I would have this summer, but no one would hire me in this marvelous Reaganomics economy) for a factory. I made around 2000 dollars before taxes. In federal and state and local tax I lost around 400 dollars before the temp agency took their cut. Around tax refund season I got 132 dollars back. So I paid a good 250 dollars in taxes. Okay, whatever. I accept that. I know it's not much compared to what people with actual, regular jobs pay.

But really, if I pay that much, won't the bigger corporations pay more? As in, more than 250 dollars in taxes?

GE, a multi-national and multi-billion dollar company, reported 14.2 billion dollars in international revenue and 5.1 billion dollars in revenue that occurred here in the United States. How much did they pay in taxes? Zero dollars. 0. Null. Not even a cent. Not only that, but the United States paid them 3.2 billion in tax refunds. They paid less taxes than I did, and they got a tax refund how many times higher than I did? They paid fewer taxes than every middle-class and poor person in the United States.

How is that even fair. How. And when the Democrats want to close enough tax loopholes to help make up a trillion dollars in revenue (a move that, if you read the New York Times article I link below, Reagan did when he found out back during his time in office that GE and other huge corporations were dodging taxes by loopholes and other means) the Tea Party holds everyone up with a bunch of "Well then fine, let's let America default." And when they're told that might crash the American economy, and along with it the world's economy, they shrug. They want to start a global great depression because a few millionaires and billionaires might have to actually pay the taxes they were supposed to pay when the tax code was written up.

Closing tax loopholes isn't raising taxes. It's stopping the cheats from cheating us anymore. But, you know, they "create jobs" with that money. Tell that to the numerous unemployed in this country. Especially explain that to the numerous "99ers," the people who have gone over their alloted 99 weeks on unemployment benefits. Because they're just lazy assholes who want to starve. That sounds about right.

New York Times article on GE income taxes


Gonna quote something from your source:
Show nested quote +
“In a rational system, a corporation’s tax department would be there to make sure a company complied with the law,” said Len Burman, a former Treasury official who now is a scholar at the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center. “But in our system, there are corporations that view their tax departments as a profit center, and the effects on public policy can be negative.”

That's a very strange look on corporate goals actually. Maximization of profits and minimization of expenses are main goals of any business and they will use every legal way to reach these goals. Blaming corporations for that is ridiculous.


It's actually not just their goal, but their obligation to their shareholders to maximize profits. However, I think the point the author was trying to make is that those loopholes shouldn't exist. GE shouldn't get to pay no taxes just because they're good at manipulating the system. I'm not mad at them for that, I would want to maximize profits too if I were in their shoes, but I think the system should be fixed so that it isn't possible anymore. Now, the amount of money corporations pour into lobbying to make sure these tax cuts and loopholes stick around is something to be upset about, but you could also paint that as "maximizing profits" I suppose.
hifriend
Profile Blog Joined June 2009
China7935 Posts
Last Edited: 2011-08-06 11:10:14
August 06 2011 11:09 GMT
#275
On August 06 2011 20:05 Senorcuidado wrote:
Show nested quote +
On August 06 2011 19:40 Evilmystic wrote:
On August 06 2011 19:19 Mauldo wrote:
+ Show Spoiler +
On August 06 2011 18:53 Kaitlin wrote:
Show nested quote +
On August 06 2011 17:37 RaLakedaimon wrote:
Job markets so fucking shitty I wonder if things can pick up one day, sad to see things just continuing to get worse because we all choose to pick horrible leaders, or maybe there just is never a good alternative to those shown to us. Hate to see all of us average Americans having to deal with shit like this since we aren't the ones that got any benefit before our economic downfall. May not be right but fuck I hate rich people in this country.


The richest 1% of the country pays more in income taxes than 95% of the country, combined. How much is enough ?


And yet they own how much capital? I look at it this way; play Final Fantasy VII. You can level up materia and sell them for a huge profit if you pick the right one. Let's go with the "All" materia. It sells for 1.7 million gil at max level. Sell ten of these, and you have 17 million gil. But honestly, how much gil do you need in the damn game? Half of that? The extra is just laying around. Why not increase their taxes to where that money is actually used, instead of the money being "invested" into "jobs" that these richest in America "create" while actually cutting thousands upon thousands of jobs and giving themselves millions in bonuses because they "earned it".

This happened because S&P saw what the American people is starting to see. When you've got Boehner and the rest of the sane (or as sane as you can get in Congress) Republicans being held by the balls by the Tea Party freshmen into demanding unrealistic cuts without any new taxes it's absurd. Why not raise taxes to pre-Bush levels? How about pre-Clinton? All of those would be lower than when Reagan was president.

I leave the thread with this. I worked for two months the summer of 2010 (I would have this summer, but no one would hire me in this marvelous Reaganomics economy) for a factory. I made around 2000 dollars before taxes. In federal and state and local tax I lost around 400 dollars before the temp agency took their cut. Around tax refund season I got 132 dollars back. So I paid a good 250 dollars in taxes. Okay, whatever. I accept that. I know it's not much compared to what people with actual, regular jobs pay.

But really, if I pay that much, won't the bigger corporations pay more? As in, more than 250 dollars in taxes?

GE, a multi-national and multi-billion dollar company, reported 14.2 billion dollars in international revenue and 5.1 billion dollars in revenue that occurred here in the United States. How much did they pay in taxes? Zero dollars. 0. Null. Not even a cent. Not only that, but the United States paid them 3.2 billion in tax refunds. They paid less taxes than I did, and they got a tax refund how many times higher than I did? They paid fewer taxes than every middle-class and poor person in the United States.

How is that even fair. How. And when the Democrats want to close enough tax loopholes to help make up a trillion dollars in revenue (a move that, if you read the New York Times article I link below, Reagan did when he found out back during his time in office that GE and other huge corporations were dodging taxes by loopholes and other means) the Tea Party holds everyone up with a bunch of "Well then fine, let's let America default." And when they're told that might crash the American economy, and along with it the world's economy, they shrug. They want to start a global great depression because a few millionaires and billionaires might have to actually pay the taxes they were supposed to pay when the tax code was written up.

Closing tax loopholes isn't raising taxes. It's stopping the cheats from cheating us anymore. But, you know, they "create jobs" with that money. Tell that to the numerous unemployed in this country. Especially explain that to the numerous "99ers," the people who have gone over their alloted 99 weeks on unemployment benefits. Because they're just lazy assholes who want to starve. That sounds about right.

New York Times article on GE income taxes


Gonna quote something from your source:
“In a rational system, a corporation’s tax department would be there to make sure a company complied with the law,” said Len Burman, a former Treasury official who now is a scholar at the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center. “But in our system, there are corporations that view their tax departments as a profit center, and the effects on public policy can be negative.”

That's a very strange look on corporate goals actually. Maximization of profits and minimization of expenses are main goals of any business and they will use every legal way to reach these goals. Blaming corporations for that is ridiculous.


It's actually not just their goal, but their obligation to their shareholders to maximize profits. However, I think the point the author was trying to make is that those loopholes shouldn't exist. GE shouldn't get to pay no taxes just because they're good at manipulating the system. I'm not mad at them for that, I would want to maximize profits too if I were in their shoes, but I think the system should be fixed so that it isn't possible anymore. Now, the amount of money corporations pour into lobbying to make sure these tax cuts and loopholes stick around is something to be upset about, but you could also paint that as "maximizing profits" I suppose.

Funny, I guess in effect that just means corporate entities have larger power rather than this mythical "big government" everyone was so afraid of.

I wonder whether corporations driven only by profit would make better decisions for the general population than democratically selected representatives..
Romantic
Profile Joined January 2010
United States1844 Posts
August 06 2011 11:11 GMT
#276
Oh no! Hopefully this isn't like the Japan downgrade where their bonds got even cheaper!
Blix
Profile Joined September 2010
Netherlands873 Posts
August 06 2011 11:14 GMT
#277
On August 06 2011 18:53 Kaitlin wrote:
Show nested quote +
On August 06 2011 17:37 RaLakedaimon wrote:
Job markets so fucking shitty I wonder if things can pick up one day, sad to see things just continuing to get worse because we all choose to pick horrible leaders, or maybe there just is never a good alternative to those shown to us. Hate to see all of us average Americans having to deal with shit like this since we aren't the ones that got any benefit before our economic downfall. May not be right but fuck I hate rich people in this country.


The richest 1% of the country pays more in income taxes than 95% of the country, combined. How much is enough ?


I would be interested in the source for this statement.
Conquer yourself not the world. - Descartes
OsoVega
Profile Joined December 2010
926 Posts
August 06 2011 11:20 GMT
#278
It's not like it shouldn't have been down graded long ago.
sunprince
Profile Joined January 2011
United States2258 Posts
August 06 2011 11:22 GMT
#279
On August 06 2011 20:09 hifriend wrote:
Funny, I guess in effect that just means corporate entities have larger power rather than this mythical "big government" everyone was so afraid of.

I wonder whether corporations driven only by profit would make better decisions for the general population than democratically selected representatives..


There's nothing inherently wrong with corporations being profit-driven. The issue is that the tax loopholes exist.

To use a Starcraft analogy, I wouldn't blame players for using an OP strategy. Rather, I'd blame Blizzard for not balancing properly and hope for a patch.

Yet somehow, in all this talk about the debt problem, 'patching' the corporate tax loopholes isn't even on the table.
Necrosjef_
Profile Joined March 2011
United Kingdom8 Posts
August 06 2011 11:26 GMT
#280
What's funny is the typical American reaction to this.

"We own the rest of the world blah blah blah"

"Credit rating agencies are stupid"

"China kills baby girls"

The thing is the rest of the world isn't so easily misdirected as you guys are. Time to face up your mistakes and be prepared to be homeless. No one is going to bail you out, no one cares about you, you brought this on yourselves and damn you fucking deserve it.

User was banned for this post.
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