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We always make taxes targeting groups of people ever heard of people being married? ever heard of subsidies etc the idea that we are now attacking the rich is absurd, historically the rich has done nothing but attack the less rich in order to amass more wealth monarchy anyone? The ideas of debt and often what happened when debt was wiped out was rebellions against the ones who would be collecting debts ie the rich, ever wonder why communism had growing popularity, because for centuries on end those who became wealthy amassed more wealth then used that wealth to oppress other people.
3 things that have known to always contribute to economic growth,(the idea of lower and raising taxes hurts/helps or w.e economic growth is crap esp in the cutting area)
scientific breakthroughs
education/training
creation and maintenance of infrastructure
On science it's largely left to the private sector, although government does fun it ie grants to colleges and shit like nasa which has contribute a shit ton of stuff which has made it's way into the private citizen to create and alter and build a business around
education/training, now what enrolls more people private schools or public schools? Sure jobs train and fund people for such ventures but not on the scale of government
And infrastructure is a no brainier, although bad management of invests like helping the railroads in the US was a failed vesture, shit like the monopolies to allowing people to have electricity and running water did wonders for the economy, along with building bridges and roads to help people move around.
GI bill and the us highway acts did more for the US economy and the creation of a middle class then the private sector could ever do.
It's never your money, governments are there to act as judges and enforcers to make people all play by the same rules and foster an environment for people to do trade and live their lives, ie pursuit of happiness, the government created your so called money and it regulates it, shit we be trading cows or some shit or having 100 currencies by 100 banks that don't accept each other.
The problem is people look at what direct democracy has done to california created laws/mandates that don't have funding so people have to pull money from other area's such as education and infrastructure.
People are the problem they want services but they don't want to pay for such services. Now should those in half million dollar cars etc pay more and more to prevent people from putting their heads on a pike, yes. As long as they can still be wealthy i don't see the issue people can still be richer then other people but people should not be able to have greater influence then the government because then they will influence it =p
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On September 20 2011 03:13 R3demption wrote:Show nested quote +On September 20 2011 02:53 Craze wrote:
And the government allows you to donate to charity and write it off because they believe it is a good use of your money. How can you be so blindly zealous to a cause that you attack a man for giving away his money to people in need?
Warren Buffet is happy to pay more taxes while he lives, but he wants his wealth to go to the Gates foundation so that it can be used to further human development worldwide when he dies. He's a noble guy, and you attack him for it. He is very noble indeed. What I don't get is attacking the super rich bastards who horde all their money and don't donate to charities. Do I like this behavior? ABSOLUTELY NOT. They are selfish. But how can you believe in something that punishes someone just because they have a lot of money. Taxes that specifically target anyone based off of anything (race, sex, education, and even INCOME, is prejudicial in my eyes). What happened to the right to property? I don't like rich and greedy men, but those are life styles, not crime. And otherwise I know a lot of families who are suppppperrrr rich and who do a lot for charities and foundations and who support a lot of people with employment. But most importantly, if you keep passing tax laws that specifically target someone based on their income (e.g. Someone makes a lot of money, tax them more because it doesn't hurt as bad) then you open the flood gates to taxing everyone else based on external factors as well, which is not a pretty direction to go in and is not the power I would like to give to the government. On the point of "the government knows best what to do with our money": What? This is completely untrue. Hello? The best decision makers are the people, read some history books and you'll find this out. The only reason the Government exists is because the people have established it. As long as corruption exists (the cynical side of me says it will always exist) the Government will always fail to make better choices than the people would. But sometimes Government is the worser of two evils (its a safer way than anarchy). My sources: none. Not an economics major, just what was said are opinions and what I believe in.
It has nothing to do with "punishing" rich people. It's a simple matter of practicality.
Let's play a game. Let's say there's, what, 100 people arguing in this thread, k? Let's pretend that those 100 of us are the population of the United States. Let's also simplify things by pretending that as a nation, we have $100 total, as a representation of our entire national wealth. This $100 doesn't represent mere liquid assets, but includes all of our collective worldly possessions, property, land, etc.
I'll be the richest. I have $40, and I represent the top 1% of the country. The next guy has say, $10, then the next 5, then maybe 4, 4, 4, 3, 3, 2, etc etc. The poorer half of you, (so 50 of you), have $2.50 split up between yourselves. For simplicity's sake, we'll say you each have 5 cents.
Now we collectively, as a nation, are $15 in debt, or we're spending $15 more than we have. I have $40 in my various assets. There are 50 of you out there with a whopping 5 cents to your name. Where are we going to pull money from? There were folks earlier in the thread jokingly implying that if you want to tax the rich, you should tax everyone, so why not tax first grader's lunch money? Fine, do it, but you'll collect jack shit. We could take EVERYTHING the poorer half of this country has, ALL OF IT. Not their money, but every goddamn thing they own on this Earth, and we'd still be over budget.
When so many people are so poor, and so few few few people are SO rich, there just isn't anywhere else to get that money from. You can argue that we can make up the deficit entirely via spending cuts, but the amount of cuts we'd have to do is enormous.
If I've got $40, and 50 of you out there have 5 cents each, why is it so unreasonable to ask that I chip in a little more? I mean, we could take allllll your money, and still be in debt, or we could take a piece of my money, and balance our shit. We could render a whopping 165 million people destitute, or we can raise taxes on a few hundred thousand people who proportionately have way way more than their fair share of wealth. There are only so many places we can get that money from, and it's sure as hell not the poor.
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On September 20 2011 03:53 Haemonculus wrote:Show nested quote +On September 20 2011 03:13 R3demption wrote:On September 20 2011 02:53 Craze wrote:
And the government allows you to donate to charity and write it off because they believe it is a good use of your money. How can you be so blindly zealous to a cause that you attack a man for giving away his money to people in need?
Warren Buffet is happy to pay more taxes while he lives, but he wants his wealth to go to the Gates foundation so that it can be used to further human development worldwide when he dies. He's a noble guy, and you attack him for it. He is very noble indeed. What I don't get is attacking the super rich bastards who horde all their money and don't donate to charities. Do I like this behavior? ABSOLUTELY NOT. They are selfish. But how can you believe in something that punishes someone just because they have a lot of money. Taxes that specifically target anyone based off of anything (race, sex, education, and even INCOME, is prejudicial in my eyes). What happened to the right to property? I don't like rich and greedy men, but those are life styles, not crime. And otherwise I know a lot of families who are suppppperrrr rich and who do a lot for charities and foundations and who support a lot of people with employment. But most importantly, if you keep passing tax laws that specifically target someone based on their income (e.g. Someone makes a lot of money, tax them more because it doesn't hurt as bad) then you open the flood gates to taxing everyone else based on external factors as well, which is not a pretty direction to go in and is not the power I would like to give to the government. On the point of "the government knows best what to do with our money": What? This is completely untrue. Hello? The best decision makers are the people, read some history books and you'll find this out. The only reason the Government exists is because the people have established it. As long as corruption exists (the cynical side of me says it will always exist) the Government will always fail to make better choices than the people would. But sometimes Government is the worser of two evils (its a safer way than anarchy). My sources: none. Not an economics major, just what was said are opinions and what I believe in. It has nothing to do with "punishing" rich people. It's a simple matter of practicality. Let's play a game. Let's say there's, what, 100 people arguing in this thread, k? Let's pretend that those 100 of us are the population of the United States. Let's also simplify things by pretending that as a nation, we have $100 total, as a representation of our entire national wealth. This $100 doesn't represent mere liquid assets, but includes all of our collective worldly possessions, property, land, etc. I'll be the richest. I have $40, and I represent the top 1% of the country. The next guy has say, $10, then the next 5, then maybe 4, 4, 4, 3, 3, 2, etc etc. The poorer half of you, (so 50 of you), have $2.50 split up between yourselves. For simplicity's sake, we'll say you each have 5 cents. Now we collectively, as a nation, are $15 in debt, or we're spending $15 more than we have. I have $40 in my various assets. There are 50 of you out there with a whopping 5 cents to your name. Where are we going to pull money from? There were folks earlier in the thread jokingly implying that if you want to tax the rich, you should tax everyone, so why not tax first grader's lunch money? Fine, do it, but you'll collect jack shit. We could take EVERYTHING the poorer half of this country has, ALL OF IT. Not their money, but every goddamn thing they own on this Earth, and we'd still be over budget. When so many people are so poor, and so few few few people are SO rich, there just isn't anywhere else to get that money from. You can argue that we can make up the deficit entirely via spending cuts, but the amount of cuts we'd have to do is enormous. If I've got $40, and 50 of you out there have 5 cents each, why is it so unreasonable to ask that I chip in a little more? I mean, we could take allllll your money, and still be in debt, or we could take a piece of my money, and balance our shit. We could render a whopping 165 million people destitute, or we can raise taxes on a few hundred thousand people who proportionately have way way more than their fair share of wealth. There are only so many places we can get that money from, and it's sure as hell not the poor.
Thanks for explaining it like you would to a bunch of 1st graders.  Helped me! Lol
I see nothing wrong with the super rich chipping in a bit more. If I was rich, I would gladly help out. Stop being so greedy.
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On September 20 2011 03:53 Haemonculus wrote:Show nested quote +On September 20 2011 03:13 R3demption wrote:On September 20 2011 02:53 Craze wrote:
And the government allows you to donate to charity and write it off because they believe it is a good use of your money. How can you be so blindly zealous to a cause that you attack a man for giving away his money to people in need?
Warren Buffet is happy to pay more taxes while he lives, but he wants his wealth to go to the Gates foundation so that it can be used to further human development worldwide when he dies. He's a noble guy, and you attack him for it. He is very noble indeed. What I don't get is attacking the super rich bastards who horde all their money and don't donate to charities. Do I like this behavior? ABSOLUTELY NOT. They are selfish. But how can you believe in something that punishes someone just because they have a lot of money. Taxes that specifically target anyone based off of anything (race, sex, education, and even INCOME, is prejudicial in my eyes). What happened to the right to property? I don't like rich and greedy men, but those are life styles, not crime. And otherwise I know a lot of families who are suppppperrrr rich and who do a lot for charities and foundations and who support a lot of people with employment. But most importantly, if you keep passing tax laws that specifically target someone based on their income (e.g. Someone makes a lot of money, tax them more because it doesn't hurt as bad) then you open the flood gates to taxing everyone else based on external factors as well, which is not a pretty direction to go in and is not the power I would like to give to the government. On the point of "the government knows best what to do with our money": What? This is completely untrue. Hello? The best decision makers are the people, read some history books and you'll find this out. The only reason the Government exists is because the people have established it. As long as corruption exists (the cynical side of me says it will always exist) the Government will always fail to make better choices than the people would. But sometimes Government is the worser of two evils (its a safer way than anarchy). My sources: none. Not an economics major, just what was said are opinions and what I believe in. It has nothing to do with "punishing" rich people. It's a simple matter of practicality. Let's play a game. Let's say there's, what, 100 people arguing in this thread, k? Let's pretend that those 100 of us are the population of the United States. Let's also simplify things by pretending that as a nation, we have $100 total, as a representation of our entire national wealth. This $100 doesn't represent mere liquid assets, but includes all of our collective worldly possessions, property, land, etc. I'll be the richest. I have $40, and I represent the top 1% of the country. The next guy has say, $10, then the next 5, then maybe 4, 4, 4, 3, 3, 2, etc etc. The poorer half of you, (so 50 of you), have $2.50 split up between yourselves. For simplicity's sake, we'll say you each have 5 cents. Now we collectively, as a nation, are $15 in debt, or we're spending $15 more than we have. I have $40 in my various assets. There are 50 of you out there with a whopping 5 cents to your name. Where are we going to pull money from? There were folks earlier in the thread jokingly implying that if you want to tax the rich, you should tax everyone, so why not tax first grader's lunch money? Fine, do it, but you'll collect jack shit. We could take EVERYTHING the poorer half of this country has, ALL OF IT. Not their money, but every goddamn thing they own on this Earth, and we'd still be over budget. When so many people are so poor, and so few few few people are SO rich, there just isn't anywhere else to get that money from. You can argue that we can make up the deficit entirely via spending cuts, but the amount of cuts we'd have to do is enormous. If I've got $40, and 50 of you out there have 5 cents each, why is it so unreasonable to ask that I chip in a little more? I mean, we could take allllll your money, and still be in debt, or we could take a piece of my money, and balance our shit. We could render a whopping 165 million people destitute, or we can raise taxes on a few hundred thousand people who proportionately have way way more than their fair share of wealth. There are only so many places we can get that money from, and it's sure as hell not the poor.
I agree it's most practical to take the money of the people that have the most money if you're trying to raise revenue, but that doesn't make it not "punishing" the rich. Leave the spin to the Washington politicians 
Also your scenario ignores the alternate way of balancing the budget which is to cut spending.
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On September 20 2011 03:53 Haemonculus wrote:
We could take EVERYTHING the poorer half of this country has, ALL OF IT. Not their money, but every goddamn thing they own on this Earth, and we'd still be over budget.
Translation: We're spending way too much fucking money.
If I've got $40, and 50 of you out there have 5 cents each, why is it so unreasonable to ask that I chip in a little more? I mean, we could take all your money, and still be in debt, or we could take a piece of my money, and balance our shit. We could render a whopping 165 million people destitute, or we can raise taxes on a few hundred thousand people who proportionately have way way more than their fair share of wealth. There are only so many places we can get that money from, and it's sure as hell not the poor.
It sounds like you are in favor of a Balanced Budget Amendment. That's great ! Unfortunately, in the real world we live in, the Democrats do not want a Balanced Budget Amendment because they want to spend more. Therefore, in the real world, there will never be a "balance our shit" moment, and next year we will have the $115 incoming and spending of about $140. Then what ? This is why Republicans fight these tax increases, without significant controls on the amount of spending.
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The gini coefficent of the USA, which measures the inequality / equality of liquidity distribution (0=equal, 1=unequal), is as high as in some african countries. Buffet once said he has a lower tax rate than the people who calculate them. It would make a big difference.
btw here is the gini coefficent world map (of the CIA):
![[image loading]](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/59/Gini_Coefficient_World_CIA_Report_2009-1.png)
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Hey, for the record, I'm plenty for spending cuts, and I dislike the democratic party almost as much as I dislike the GOP.
But look at the proposed spending cuts. Take a look at the numbers, and you'll find out that we're spending hours and hours arguing over cuts that amount to mere fractions of our debt.
At the end of the day you've just got to wonder if it's justified for one person to have $40, while 50 people have 5 cents a piece.
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On September 20 2011 04:16 BlackJack wrote:Show nested quote +On September 20 2011 03:53 Haemonculus wrote:On September 20 2011 03:13 R3demption wrote:On September 20 2011 02:53 Craze wrote:
And the government allows you to donate to charity and write it off because they believe it is a good use of your money. How can you be so blindly zealous to a cause that you attack a man for giving away his money to people in need?
Warren Buffet is happy to pay more taxes while he lives, but he wants his wealth to go to the Gates foundation so that it can be used to further human development worldwide when he dies. He's a noble guy, and you attack him for it. He is very noble indeed. What I don't get is attacking the super rich bastards who horde all their money and don't donate to charities. Do I like this behavior? ABSOLUTELY NOT. They are selfish. But how can you believe in something that punishes someone just because they have a lot of money. Taxes that specifically target anyone based off of anything (race, sex, education, and even INCOME, is prejudicial in my eyes). What happened to the right to property? I don't like rich and greedy men, but those are life styles, not crime. And otherwise I know a lot of families who are suppppperrrr rich and who do a lot for charities and foundations and who support a lot of people with employment. But most importantly, if you keep passing tax laws that specifically target someone based on their income (e.g. Someone makes a lot of money, tax them more because it doesn't hurt as bad) then you open the flood gates to taxing everyone else based on external factors as well, which is not a pretty direction to go in and is not the power I would like to give to the government. On the point of "the government knows best what to do with our money": What? This is completely untrue. Hello? The best decision makers are the people, read some history books and you'll find this out. The only reason the Government exists is because the people have established it. As long as corruption exists (the cynical side of me says it will always exist) the Government will always fail to make better choices than the people would. But sometimes Government is the worser of two evils (its a safer way than anarchy). My sources: none. Not an economics major, just what was said are opinions and what I believe in. It has nothing to do with "punishing" rich people. It's a simple matter of practicality. Let's play a game. Let's say there's, what, 100 people arguing in this thread, k? Let's pretend that those 100 of us are the population of the United States. Let's also simplify things by pretending that as a nation, we have $100 total, as a representation of our entire national wealth. This $100 doesn't represent mere liquid assets, but includes all of our collective worldly possessions, property, land, etc. I'll be the richest. I have $40, and I represent the top 1% of the country. The next guy has say, $10, then the next 5, then maybe 4, 4, 4, 3, 3, 2, etc etc. The poorer half of you, (so 50 of you), have $2.50 split up between yourselves. For simplicity's sake, we'll say you each have 5 cents. Now we collectively, as a nation, are $15 in debt, or we're spending $15 more than we have. I have $40 in my various assets. There are 50 of you out there with a whopping 5 cents to your name. Where are we going to pull money from? There were folks earlier in the thread jokingly implying that if you want to tax the rich, you should tax everyone, so why not tax first grader's lunch money? Fine, do it, but you'll collect jack shit. We could take EVERYTHING the poorer half of this country has, ALL OF IT. Not their money, but every goddamn thing they own on this Earth, and we'd still be over budget. When so many people are so poor, and so few few few people are SO rich, there just isn't anywhere else to get that money from. You can argue that we can make up the deficit entirely via spending cuts, but the amount of cuts we'd have to do is enormous. If I've got $40, and 50 of you out there have 5 cents each, why is it so unreasonable to ask that I chip in a little more? I mean, we could take allllll your money, and still be in debt, or we could take a piece of my money, and balance our shit. We could render a whopping 165 million people destitute, or we can raise taxes on a few hundred thousand people who proportionately have way way more than their fair share of wealth. There are only so many places we can get that money from, and it's sure as hell not the poor. I agree it's most practical to take the money of the people that have the most money if you're trying to raise revenue, but that doesn't make it not "punishing" the rich. Leave the spin to the Washington politicians Also your scenario ignores the alternate way of balancing the budget which is to cut spending.
the explanation given is great but you don't seem to understand it. if 1% can get to the point to own half the country something went wrong before. terribly wrong. it is not punishing to even it out by taking from people that have that much money that they can NEVER spent it in their whole life. actually if you knew economics this is dead money. if it was given to the lesser half they would actually SPENT it on USEFULL things thus strengthening the economy in the country.
which brings me to your second point: if you cut spending, especially so called welfare for the poor, you will cripple your own economy because there will be less demand for the things a healthy economy produces.
people have to realise that countries CAN'T be run like companys. if you cut the spending your economy will suffer because a government is still one of the biggest consumers. after keynes theory which every person involved in economics will have heard of a government HAS to spend MORE money if a country is in a recession to strengthen the demand. if it decides to not spend money but to even cut spending the country will have an even bigger recession because there is even less demand and thus less workers required which leads to even less demand and so on...
a government is not supposed to be run like a company since it can't go bankrupt without causing major trouble in the society which will eventually lead to civil wars. or did you all forget about history this fast again?
On September 20 2011 04:18 Kaitlin wrote:Show nested quote +On September 20 2011 03:53 Haemonculus wrote:
We could take EVERYTHING the poorer half of this country has, ALL OF IT. Not their money, but every goddamn thing they own on this Earth, and we'd still be over budget. Translation: We're spending way too much fucking money. Show nested quote +If I've got $40, and 50 of you out there have 5 cents each, why is it so unreasonable to ask that I chip in a little more? I mean, we could take all your money, and still be in debt, or we could take a piece of my money, and balance our shit. We could render a whopping 165 million people destitute, or we can raise taxes on a few hundred thousand people who proportionately have way way more than their fair share of wealth. There are only so many places we can get that money from, and it's sure as hell not the poor. It sounds like you are in favor of a Balanced Budget Amendment. That's great ! Unfortunately, in the real world we live in, the Democrats do not want a Balanced Budget Amendment because they want to spend more. Therefore, in the real world, there will never be a "balance our shit" moment, and next year we will have the $115 incoming and spending of about $140. Then what ? This is why Republicans fight these tax increases, without significant controls on the amount of spending.
republicans don't understand economy at all. they are there to serve the super rich. and you actually believe them? there is at least one big topic nobody but the republicans would complain if it would be cut and noone would get hurt: military budget....
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On September 20 2011 04:41 fleeze wrote:Show nested quote +On September 20 2011 04:16 BlackJack wrote:On September 20 2011 03:53 Haemonculus wrote:On September 20 2011 03:13 R3demption wrote:On September 20 2011 02:53 Craze wrote:
And the government allows you to donate to charity and write it off because they believe it is a good use of your money. How can you be so blindly zealous to a cause that you attack a man for giving away his money to people in need?
Warren Buffet is happy to pay more taxes while he lives, but he wants his wealth to go to the Gates foundation so that it can be used to further human development worldwide when he dies. He's a noble guy, and you attack him for it. He is very noble indeed. What I don't get is attacking the super rich bastards who horde all their money and don't donate to charities. Do I like this behavior? ABSOLUTELY NOT. They are selfish. But how can you believe in something that punishes someone just because they have a lot of money. Taxes that specifically target anyone based off of anything (race, sex, education, and even INCOME, is prejudicial in my eyes). What happened to the right to property? I don't like rich and greedy men, but those are life styles, not crime. And otherwise I know a lot of families who are suppppperrrr rich and who do a lot for charities and foundations and who support a lot of people with employment. But most importantly, if you keep passing tax laws that specifically target someone based on their income (e.g. Someone makes a lot of money, tax them more because it doesn't hurt as bad) then you open the flood gates to taxing everyone else based on external factors as well, which is not a pretty direction to go in and is not the power I would like to give to the government. On the point of "the government knows best what to do with our money": What? This is completely untrue. Hello? The best decision makers are the people, read some history books and you'll find this out. The only reason the Government exists is because the people have established it. As long as corruption exists (the cynical side of me says it will always exist) the Government will always fail to make better choices than the people would. But sometimes Government is the worser of two evils (its a safer way than anarchy). My sources: none. Not an economics major, just what was said are opinions and what I believe in. It has nothing to do with "punishing" rich people. It's a simple matter of practicality. Let's play a game. Let's say there's, what, 100 people arguing in this thread, k? Let's pretend that those 100 of us are the population of the United States. Let's also simplify things by pretending that as a nation, we have $100 total, as a representation of our entire national wealth. This $100 doesn't represent mere liquid assets, but includes all of our collective worldly possessions, property, land, etc. I'll be the richest. I have $40, and I represent the top 1% of the country. The next guy has say, $10, then the next 5, then maybe 4, 4, 4, 3, 3, 2, etc etc. The poorer half of you, (so 50 of you), have $2.50 split up between yourselves. For simplicity's sake, we'll say you each have 5 cents. Now we collectively, as a nation, are $15 in debt, or we're spending $15 more than we have. I have $40 in my various assets. There are 50 of you out there with a whopping 5 cents to your name. Where are we going to pull money from? There were folks earlier in the thread jokingly implying that if you want to tax the rich, you should tax everyone, so why not tax first grader's lunch money? Fine, do it, but you'll collect jack shit. We could take EVERYTHING the poorer half of this country has, ALL OF IT. Not their money, but every goddamn thing they own on this Earth, and we'd still be over budget. When so many people are so poor, and so few few few people are SO rich, there just isn't anywhere else to get that money from. You can argue that we can make up the deficit entirely via spending cuts, but the amount of cuts we'd have to do is enormous. If I've got $40, and 50 of you out there have 5 cents each, why is it so unreasonable to ask that I chip in a little more? I mean, we could take allllll your money, and still be in debt, or we could take a piece of my money, and balance our shit. We could render a whopping 165 million people destitute, or we can raise taxes on a few hundred thousand people who proportionately have way way more than their fair share of wealth. There are only so many places we can get that money from, and it's sure as hell not the poor. I agree it's most practical to take the money of the people that have the most money if you're trying to raise revenue, but that doesn't make it not "punishing" the rich. Leave the spin to the Washington politicians Also your scenario ignores the alternate way of balancing the budget which is to cut spending. the explanation given is great but you don't seem to understand it. if 1% can get to the point to own half the country something went wrong before. terribly wrong. it is not punishing to even it out by taking from people that have that much money that they can NEVER spent it in their whole life. actually if you knew economics this is dead money. if it was given to the lesser half they would actually SPENT it on USEFULL things thus strengthening the economy in the country. which brings me to your second point: if you cut spending, especially so called welfare for the poor, you will cripple your own economy because there will be less demand for the things a healthy economy produces. people have to realise that countries CAN'T be run like companys. if you cut the spending your economy will suffer because a government is still one of the biggest consumers. after keynes theory which every person involved in economics will have heard of a government HAS to spend MORE money if a country is in a recession to strengthen the demand. if it decides to not spend money but to even cut spending the country will have an even bigger recession because there is even less demand and thus less workers required which leads to even less demand and so on... a government is not supposed to be run like a company since it can't go bankrupt without causing major trouble in the society which will eventually lead to civil wars. or did you all forget about history this fast again? Show nested quote +On September 20 2011 04:18 Kaitlin wrote:On September 20 2011 03:53 Haemonculus wrote:
We could take EVERYTHING the poorer half of this country has, ALL OF IT. Not their money, but every goddamn thing they own on this Earth, and we'd still be over budget. Translation: We're spending way too much fucking money. If I've got $40, and 50 of you out there have 5 cents each, why is it so unreasonable to ask that I chip in a little more? I mean, we could take all your money, and still be in debt, or we could take a piece of my money, and balance our shit. We could render a whopping 165 million people destitute, or we can raise taxes on a few hundred thousand people who proportionately have way way more than their fair share of wealth. There are only so many places we can get that money from, and it's sure as hell not the poor. It sounds like you are in favor of a Balanced Budget Amendment. That's great ! Unfortunately, in the real world we live in, the Democrats do not want a Balanced Budget Amendment because they want to spend more. Therefore, in the real world, there will never be a "balance our shit" moment, and next year we will have the $115 incoming and spending of about $140. Then what ? This is why Republicans fight these tax increases, without significant controls on the amount of spending. republicans don't understand economy at all. they are there to serve the super rich. and you actually believe them? there is at least one big topic nobody but the republicans would complain if it would be cut and noone would get hurt: military budget....
the problem is that the states dont aggregate reserves in the boom period which is another dictum of Keynes (the forgotten one)
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On September 20 2011 04:41 fleeze wrote:
republicans don't understand economy at all. they are there to serve the super rich. and you actually believe them? there is at least one big topic nobody but the republicans would complain if it would be cut and noone would get hurt: military budget....
As far as our military budget, the way things are going, I'd probably be ok with pulling our military support out of everywhere except S. Korea, Japan, Israel, and maybe England. But when we fight a war, we unleash everything we've got. Pull out of the U.N. We need to stop trying to spread our influence in places it's not wanted.
I'd also like to see a 100% tax on political contributions and all "soft money" as well. That will put a damper on things. Also, I'm good with capping the charitable contribution deduction at about $20,000. That way, middle class people can still get savings from contributing to charity, but the "super rich", such as the professional athletes, Hollywood actors and actresses, the Al Gores of the world can no longer avoid taxes by contributing to their own "private foundations". I'd also like to see a cap on the prices of going to the theater to watch a movie at $3. It's too damned expensive to go to the movies and us middle class people are overpaying just so rich hollywood types get more money. Oh, and tickets to professional sports games should be no higher than $4. Too much money is being paid by middle class fans that goes directly into the pockets of those rich owners and the millionaire athletes. These are some ideas I have. Now, they aren't Warren Buffett-esque, but I wonder how you guys feel about these ideas.
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This man is a member of congress. I just don't understand how anyone who isn't super rich could oppose this. As I said earlier, this tax increase only affects 450,000 people compared to 144 million who filed taxes. I'm sure a bunch of members of congress who oppose this would see their taxes go up. It just seems like selfishness at it's finest. It's just baffling to me how this plan, which makes things fair and doesn't put a larger burden on the middle class in considered class warfare. Can anyone please explain this? I really hope Americans don't stand for this. It's time for people to wake up!
Edit: This is an inside look as to how the super rich live. They claim they don't need anymore money and that they view earning money as a game at this point. It's hard to believe they would even feel the tax increase at all.
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the more money you have the easier it is to get more, the less the law plays a role and the more influence you have to keep the status quo
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On September 20 2011 04:28 Haemonculus wrote:
Hey, for the record, I'm plenty for spending cuts, and I dislike the democratic party almost as much as I dislike the GOP.
But look at the proposed spending cuts. Take a look at the numbers, and you'll find out that we're spending hours and hours arguing over cuts that amount to mere fractions of our debt.
At the end of the day you've just got to wonder if it's justified for one person to have $40, while 50 people have 5 cents a piece.
Key word justified: No it is not just.
Because I am an idealist and like to fantasize in about our world being about righteousness and good and morals and honor (all the fluffy stuff). I would say that if that guy earned his 40$ legally and those 50 people earned their 5 cents then what's wrong here? Its not fair for the people with just 5 cents just as much as its not fair for them to ask for more money from the 40$ guy. You have to work for money. If you're not able to work or are too poor to live then yes you need support, but don't tell me 90% of our country is in this state and NEED the money from the 40$ guy. Our country is in debt because we (THE GOVERNMENT) spend/consume more than we make. Practicality reasons that we need more money so yes tax the hell out of whoever has that money, BUT this is not truly just unless the 40$ guy spent all that money which he did not, the government did.
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On September 20 2011 05:06 BillClinton wrote:
the more money you have the easier it is to get more, the less the law plays a role and the more influence you have to keep the status quo
Nooooo... Mo' money mo' problems bro.
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Who would be up for cutting spending on our leaders and politicians? They are supposed to be civil servants... Our founding fathers founded and worked for the country on their own dime.
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I can't believe how incredibly moronic the vast majority of people are. Seriously. Considering how much we've advanced as a society in just about every respect, it's straight up dumbfounding how many idiots there are.
There is absolutely no moral precedent or logical line of thinking that can reasonably lead anybody to believe that the "rich" should pay more (higher %) in taxes. NONE. They don't use any more roads than any of us. As a matter of fact... in terms of actual government services (the stuff our taxes go towards), the rich probably use far LESS than the poor and middle class. Why should they pay more? Because they can afford it? ARE YOU SERIOUS? What an arbitrary and, quite frankly, dangerous slippery slope. Where do you draw the line?
Also, you all seem to confuse "more taxes" with a higher tax RATE. The rich already pay unfathomably higher taxes than everybody in terms of actual value simply because they have so much more that is being taxed. Not to mention they are ALREADY paying more as a % of total income. I guess none of you understand this concept?
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On September 20 2011 03:53 Haemonculus wrote:Show nested quote +On September 20 2011 03:13 R3demption wrote:On September 20 2011 02:53 Craze wrote:
And the government allows you to donate to charity and write it off because they believe it is a good use of your money. How can you be so blindly zealous to a cause that you attack a man for giving away his money to people in need?
Warren Buffet is happy to pay more taxes while he lives, but he wants his wealth to go to the Gates foundation so that it can be used to further human development worldwide when he dies. He's a noble guy, and you attack him for it. He is very noble indeed. What I don't get is attacking the super rich bastards who horde all their money and don't donate to charities. Do I like this behavior? ABSOLUTELY NOT. They are selfish. But how can you believe in something that punishes someone just because they have a lot of money. Taxes that specifically target anyone based off of anything (race, sex, education, and even INCOME, is prejudicial in my eyes). What happened to the right to property? I don't like rich and greedy men, but those are life styles, not crime. And otherwise I know a lot of families who are suppppperrrr rich and who do a lot for charities and foundations and who support a lot of people with employment. But most importantly, if you keep passing tax laws that specifically target someone based on their income (e.g. Someone makes a lot of money, tax them more because it doesn't hurt as bad) then you open the flood gates to taxing everyone else based on external factors as well, which is not a pretty direction to go in and is not the power I would like to give to the government. On the point of "the government knows best what to do with our money": What? This is completely untrue. Hello? The best decision makers are the people, read some history books and you'll find this out. The only reason the Government exists is because the people have established it. As long as corruption exists (the cynical side of me says it will always exist) the Government will always fail to make better choices than the people would. But sometimes Government is the worser of two evils (its a safer way than anarchy). My sources: none. Not an economics major, just what was said are opinions and what I believe in. It has nothing to do with "punishing" rich people. It's a simple matter of practicality. Let's play a game. Let's say there's, what, 100 people arguing in this thread, k? Let's pretend that those 100 of us are the population of the United States. Let's also simplify things by pretending that as a nation, we have $100 total, as a representation of our entire national wealth. This $100 doesn't represent mere liquid assets, but includes all of our collective worldly possessions, property, land, etc. I'll be the richest. I have $40, and I represent the top 1% of the country. The next guy has say, $10, then the next 5, then maybe 4, 4, 4, 3, 3, 2, etc etc. The poorer half of you, (so 50 of you), have $2.50 split up between yourselves. For simplicity's sake, we'll say you each have 5 cents. Now we collectively, as a nation, are $15 in debt, or we're spending $15 more than we have. I have $40 in my various assets. There are 50 of you out there with a whopping 5 cents to your name. Where are we going to pull money from? There were folks earlier in the thread jokingly implying that if you want to tax the rich, you should tax everyone, so why not tax first grader's lunch money? Fine, do it, but you'll collect jack shit. We could take EVERYTHING the poorer half of this country has, ALL OF IT. Not their money, but every goddamn thing they own on this Earth, and we'd still be over budget. When so many people are so poor, and so few few few people are SO rich, there just isn't anywhere else to get that money from. You can argue that we can make up the deficit entirely via spending cuts, but the amount of cuts we'd have to do is enormous. If I've got $40, and 50 of you out there have 5 cents each, why is it so unreasonable to ask that I chip in a little more? I mean, we could take allllll your money, and still be in debt, or we could take a piece of my money, and balance our shit. We could render a whopping 165 million people destitute, or we can raise taxes on a few hundred thousand people who proportionately have way way more than their fair share of wealth. There are only so many places we can get that money from, and it's sure as hell not the poor.
Seriously? You impose a higher tax PERCENTAGE on the rich because that's where the money is? You're already gonna get more from them because they HAVE more. Nobody complains about the rich losing more real dollars to the government... they complain about the higher percentages.
Where you're wrong is the implied idea that we have to tax somebody to get our shit together. False. We have to stop spending. That's all. How is it fair,moral, or even LEGAL to say to somebody "Well.... WE fucked up but YOU have to pay for it"?? How can you possibly support an idea like that? It boggles the mind that so many people share this view....
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On September 20 2011 06:55 Holophonist wrote:
I can't believe how incredibly moronic the vast majority of people are. Seriously. Considering how much we've advanced as a society in just about every respect, it's straight up dumbfounding how many idiots there are.
There is absolutely no moral precedent or logical line of thinking that can reasonably lead anybody to believe that the "rich" should pay more (higher %) in taxes. NONE. They don't use any more roads than any of us. As a matter of fact... in terms of actual government services (the stuff our taxes go towards), the rich probably use far LESS than the poor and middle class. Why should they pay more? Because they can afford it? ARE YOU SERIOUS? What an arbitrary and, quite frankly, dangerous slippery slope. Where do you draw the line?
Also, you all seem to confuse "more taxes" with a higher tax RATE. The rich already pay unfathomably higher taxes than everybody in terms of actual value simply because they have so much more that is being taxed. Not to mention they are ALREADY paying more as a % of total income. I guess none of you understand this concept?
Do not worry. Your dad can still afford you a nice Volvo to drive little sluts around. You wont be missing out on anything major. Be happy no one is taking your shit yet, you are allowed to pay and relax yourself after.
User was temp banned for this post.
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EPT
