EPTIf you really wanted to reflect the desires of society you would keep state intervention to the bare minimum and let people sort things out themselves.
European Politico-economics QA Mega-thread - Page 234
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Incognoto
France10239 Posts
If you really wanted to reflect the desires of society you would keep state intervention to the bare minimum and let people sort things out themselves. | ||
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maartendq
Belgium3115 Posts
On August 05 2015 04:10 Incognoto wrote: The state doesn't reflect the desires of society unfortunately. If you really wanted to reflect the desires of society you would keep state intervention to the bare minimum and let people sort things out themselves. The biggest flaw in that line of thinking is that it assumes that every individual wields an equal amount of influence over society. In other words, it assumes that things like charisma, (inherited) wealth, power etc don't factor into things. That this is wrong is proven again and again in the US, where policy making tends to favour those parties who can hand out the biggest bribes (let's face it, lobbying is just legalised bribery). If you're a highly talented and educated individual you will be able to earn more than here in Western Europe, but if you're a less educated manual labourer, you're better off living in a region where collective bargaining assures you a fair salary and social protection. I agree that the state by itself does not fully reflect the desires of society, but the state kept in check by a civil society does a very good job at that. Also while WhiteDog might be a tad cynical, he often makes a lot of good points, and is easily one of the best posters in this thread. | ||
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WhiteDog
France8650 Posts
On August 05 2015 04:10 Incognoto wrote: The state doesn't reflect the desires of society unfortunately. If you really wanted to reflect the desires of society you would keep state intervention to the bare minimum and let people sort things out themselves. The state doesn't always reflect the desires of the society - as I've pointed out by saying that the state is dominated by a few. But I still prefer an imbalanced struggle to control the state over the land of the free where the strong pursue their own interests which is utter domination. | ||
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warding
Portugal2395 Posts
Since I'm pretty sure you're not going to do that and if you did you'd stand to lose a lot of money: you're wrong. Elon Musk hasn't 'overhyped his company' to the level of fraud and neither could he, since there are strict rules about marketing publicly traded stock. The company is valued where it is because a lot of people who manage a lot of money are convinced of the value he's created. Speaking of which, value is different from having 'proven business models' (ie. Facebook before becoming hugely profitable with advertising), and since when is selling cars NOT a proven business model? cLutZ I find your definition of rent-seeking to be way too broad and your analysis way too cynical. - Every car manufacturer has access to these subsidies. Elon hasn't lobbied the government to get a monopoly or an unfair advantage. Others have failed at creating electric cars that take advantage of those subsidies - he succeeded through the company's own merit; - If the true cost of fossil fuel consumption is not accounted for in the price of gas, isn't the government effectively subsidizing traditional car makers, in detriment of electric cars? Same point with SolarCity - isn't regular energy consumption already subsidized since the prices don't really reflect the true costs of the consumption of energy? - It's hard for me to believe that an outsider in markets dominated by already huge players (energy, auto, space) can actually lobby the government in his favor against huge and established lobbying machines; - Every big market has government interference. Influencing that interference in your favor is rent-seeking. I find it very hard to believe for the reason above that such an interference is the main reason his ventures have been successful - he received none such interference in Zip2 or Paypal before. Finally, he was able to create huge amount of wealth and innovation in markets that had been stagnant for decades and where many others have failed. To disregard that as 'rent-seeking' is cynical to say the least. | ||
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Acrofales
Spain18292 Posts
But discussing Elon Musk's businesses seems hugely offtopic here, so I will leave it at that. I am surprised the thread has not yet discussed the Russians shooting down the MH17 tribunal. What should be the next step in bringing the assholes that fired a rocket at a passenger plane to justice? | ||
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Gorsameth
Netherlands22373 Posts
On August 05 2015 06:12 Acrofales wrote: I agree with warding here. Elon Musk may be rather unsympathetic (insofar as his public appearances go, I fully think he is), I don't think his businesses are unscrupulous, and I furthermore think that his businesses are technologically innovative. But discussing Elon Musk's businesses seems hugely offtopic here, so I will leave it at that. I am surprised the thread has not yet discussed the Russians shooting down the MH17 tribunal. What should be the next step in bringing the assholes that fired a rocket at a passenger plane to justice? I would guess it hasnt been discussed because no one is surprised they did it. There will never be justice imo. The simple fact that the Ukraine conflict is a shadow war means there is to much silence and denying happening to ever get close to the truth, let alone a suspect or conviction. | ||
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WhiteDog
France8650 Posts
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Acrofales
Spain18292 Posts
On August 05 2015 06:31 WhiteDog wrote: The talk around Elon Musk is just a strawman to me. The guy give money to both republican and democrates, he basically created tesla thanks to US taxpayers money - through a loan - and above all he is certainly not a representative of the 1%. Overall, the 1% is not full of schumpeterian entrepreneur, but rather good girls and boys who happens to earn tons of money thanks to their daddy and mommy and who pay people to play with that heritage and make it grow. Fairly certain Elon Musk is a representative of the 1%. He may not be representative of what the 1% stands for to you, but he is clearly in the 1% (actually, in the 0.01%, and probably in the 0.0001%), which makes him equally valid a representative as any other member. If we look at the Forbes list, Bill Gates is the top of the top 1%. I think he and Elon Musk followed similar roads a generation apart. | ||
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Simberto
Germany11839 Posts
On August 05 2015 06:20 Gorsameth wrote: I would guess it hasnt been discussed because no one is surprised they did it. There will never be justice imo. The simple fact that the Ukraine conflict is a shadow war means there is to much silence and denying happening to ever get close to the truth, let alone a suspect or conviction. Also, we are not allowed to talk about the Ukraine war because Putins trolls are too good at what they do, as you can easily see in the closed Ukraine thread. | ||
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warding
Portugal2395 Posts
Acrofales I think he meant that Elon Musk was not born rich, which is true. EDIT: Also, bringing up these examples of rich ass heirs who contribute little to society actually enhances my point on taxation of personal income. If they're useless to society then they're not really going to create a lot of wealth, so they won't have a lot of personal income to declare. You have to tax them through consumption. You can tax inheritances, but that can be really messy for small family businesses. | ||
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LegalLord
United States13779 Posts
On August 05 2015 06:20 Gorsameth wrote: I would guess it hasnt been discussed because no one is surprised they did it. There will never be justice imo. The simple fact that the Ukraine conflict is a shadow war means there is to much silence and denying happening to ever get close to the truth, let alone a suspect or conviction. You can go see how fast the MH17 thread degenerated if you want to see why no one discusses it here (and FWIW, that is quite a loaded statement to pass off so casually). Try it and I'm sure you will get banned very quickly. On the other point, I will say that it seems like at this point we are discussing semantics and sentiment more than any substantial points, so I will leave it there. | ||
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WhiteDog
France8650 Posts
On August 05 2015 06:40 Acrofales wrote: Fairly certain Elon Musk is a representative of the 1%. He may not be representative of what the 1% stands for to you, but he is clearly in the 1% (actually, in the 0.01%, and probably in the 0.0001%), which makes him equally valid a representative as any other member. If we look at the Forbes list, Bill Gates is the top of the top 1%. I think he and Elon Musk followed similar roads a generation apart. I'm not saying he is not in the 1%. Let me give you an exemple, there may be a young woman in the 1 %, she is not a representative of the 1% because they are almost all male and old. By representative I mean someone who has the characteristics, the behavior of the group, that is a good representant of the average characteristics of the group. Elon Musk is not, just by the fact that he is young (well 46 is pretty young) and did not inherite his fortune. On August 05 2015 06:45 warding wrote: The strawman was just created by you, who said anything about the 1%? The point was that high marginal taxation on personal income penalizes capital investment and entrepreneurship. The original point on Elon Musk was that he created Tesla and SpaceX by investing all the money he had made with Zip2 and Paypal which wouldn't have been possible had that money been taxed. While he did get a loan from the government, that was not his only source of financing and had the economy not been in a recession, he'd probably have gotten that from private sources at the time. Tesla is now worth 33Bn USD so it's not like it would have been a bad investment. Acrofales I think he meant that Elon Musk was not born rich, which is true. Let's assume that the effect of an increase in marginal taxation will trouble the projects of the Elon Musk of the world - if he is a schumpeterian entrepreneur like you seems to believe. Then can you prove me that the negative effect of the marginal taxation will completly offset the positive effect that an increase in marginal taxation will have on the majority of the 1% that do not work nor use their money to invest and take risks but rather suck up a big part of the wealth produced by the society ? You perfectly pointed out previously that the society is pretty stagnant today : this has a lot to do with the fact that there is tons of sleeping in banks, and tons of dude who earn their money through finance rather than innovation. EDIT: Also, bringing up these examples of rich ass heirs who contribute little to society actually enhances my point on taxation of personal income. If they're useless to society then they're not really going to create a lot of wealth, so they won't have a lot of personal income to declare. You have to tax them through consumption. You can tax inheritances, but that can be really messy for small family businesses. You're greatly undermining the remuneration of capital. A society without taxation just does not work - and Piketty's book pointed that pretty well. | ||
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Evil_Sheep
Canada902 Posts
On August 05 2015 06:12 Acrofales wrote: But discussing Elon Musk's businesses seems hugely offtopic here, so I will leave it at that. I am surprised the thread has not yet discussed the Russians shooting down the MH17 tribunal. What should be the next step in bringing the assholes that fired a rocket at a passenger plane to justice? There is no next step, and there will be no justice. MH17 was a casualty of war, and the issues at stake completely eclipse one flight. The West will almost surely not directly intervene militarily in Ukraine so no one will ever be apprehended (unless Putin in the future decides to offer up some scapegoats in a trade.) The important effect of MH17 was to catalyze opinions in Europe and make them realize what they're dealing with, instead of sitting on their hands and pretending Putin is a good guy they can deal with like they would've liked to pretend. | ||
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warding
Portugal2395 Posts
My overall point is that we should set up the taxation to not be distortionary. I think a progressive taxation scheme could be achieved with negative income taxes and higher consumption taxes (in the US, in most of Europe it's already pretty high) rather than very high personal income taxes. EDIT: Earning money through capital shouldn't be punished, you don't want to create incentives against saving and investing. Wouldn't you rather tax the consumption of luxury goods? Or simply have a high consumption tax if that's too messy? | ||
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Faust852
Luxembourg4004 Posts
On August 05 2015 06:31 WhiteDog wrote: The talk around Elon Musk is just a strawman to me. The guy give money to both republican and democrates, he basically created tesla thanks to US taxpayers money - through a loan - and above all he is certainly not a representative of the 1%. Overall, the 1% is not full of schumpeterian entrepreneur, but rather good girls and boys who happens to earn tons of money thanks to their daddy and mommy and who pay people to play with that heritage and make it grow. I think you are kinda harsh toward Iron Man. The guy kinda single handedly push the automobil sector toward electric vehicules. This being one of the main factors of the current energy revolution. Guy is a genius and is revolutionizing the way we will drive in 10 years. | ||
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WhiteDog
France8650 Posts
On August 05 2015 06:55 warding wrote: WhiteDog, but aren't those different taxations? If someone isn't creating wealth, then he's not paying a lot of personal income tax either. My overall point is that we should set up the taxation to not be distortionary. I think a progressive taxation scheme could be achieved with negative income taxes and higher consumption taxes (in the US, in most of Europe it's already pretty high) rather than very high personal income taxes. Hum for me receiving capital revenu is not producing wealth. It's still income. Consumption taxes touch more heavily the few people that are forced to spend - the poorest. It's a well known non progressive taxation and it hinders growth. And the economy as it is is not stable. That taxation being distortionary is an argument that only stand if you consider the economy without any distorsions (without taxation or the state) to go to the equilibrium - stable and efficient. But I'm not from that church and it just does not work that way. I'm all with you to tax luxury goods. Let's go warding, we agree, let's go on the street and ask for an increase an luxury goods. We'll get them ! On August 05 2015 06:55 Faust852 wrote: I think you are kinda harsh toward Iron Man. The guy kinda single handedly push the automobil sector toward electric vehicules. This being one of the main factors of the current energy revolution. Guy is a genius and is revolutionizing the way we will drive in 10 years. I don't disagree - to be perfectly clear I don't really know about the man. I just said that in the 1 %, there are 1 000 Paris Hilton for 1 Elon Musk. | ||
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warding
Portugal2395 Posts
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WhiteDog
France8650 Posts
On August 05 2015 07:03 warding wrote: I don't understand your second point. So you don't believe in equilibriums and stability, fair enough, but does that somehow mean that you don't believe agents respond to incentives? Could you explain this a little bit? No agent responds to incentives, but you say that the taxation create distorsions. Those distorsions, in your mind, change the course of the economy : but from where ? to where ? If you consider that the economy is stable as it is, or efficient, then distorsions will always lead the economy toward a less efficient and less stable situation : distorsions are just plain bad. If you consider the economy to be pretty messy, inefficient, rarely if ever at equilibrium, plaggued by "irrational exuberences", then distorsions are not necessarily bad - they change the course of the economy from a state A to B. As I've told you, maybe an increase in marginal taxation rate has negative effect on the Elon Musk of the world, but if you consider the economy as it is to produce more heirs than schumpeterian entrepreneurs, then I'll gladly accept the distorsions. | ||
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LegalLord
United States13779 Posts
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warding
Portugal2395 Posts
The Elon Musks vs the filthy heirs is a false point. There is a way to tax the lazy heirs if that's what you wish. It's not through high marginal tax rates on income and it doesn't have to be through capital gains tax. You don't have to kill the Elons to get to the Hiltons. | ||
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