Romney rich friend says inequality good for U.S.

[Abraxas]

Not preventing them from getting rich, but taking away what they already have. And Bowfinger did:


http://forums.anandtech.com/showpost.php?p=33392021&postcount=12

Well, that is what taxes do. They take money people have. Then they do stuff with it. How else would taxes work?

If you are talking about taking several hundred years to do it, you may have a shot at being successful. Anything sooner would require the writing of a law making it illegal to have more than X dollars.

Actually, technically it wouldn't. All it requires is that median income growth for America be higher than the median income growth for the top percentage point of wealth. That would not require a hard upper limit.

This is where we diverge. I see no problem with people becoming wealthy. Bill Gates was not born rich, he is self made.

One, I never said I have a problem with people being wealthy.

Two, the idea of a self made man is a myth. Unless he was born, lived, and died without human contact, he benefited from thousands of years of knowledge, skills, and technology developed by human civilization. He benefited from the lives and sacrifices of those who built America. He benefited from the tax dollars that went into the public school systems that he and his workers learned from, the roads that allowed them to get to them, the police and fire protections afforded to him as part of living in civilization. He existed as a brilliant and functioning example of a system, not as a system unto himself. Taxes are not punishment, they are not theft, they are the membership fee for living in the civilization that allowed you to get enough wealth to tax in the first place.

 

[Abraxas]

That's just the point. Revenue has continued to climb yet all it does is make a bigger Government. The answer to the problem isn't bigger handouts anyways. We need to get the people off dependency.

Is it? Tell me, the tax revenue that went into the GI Bill following WWII, did it make the government bigger? Did it create dependency?

 

[nehalem256]

Which liberals? Who wants to give aid to those who do not deserve it? Who decides who does not deserve it?

If you are suffering because of the logical consequences of your own poor life choices you dont deserve aid.

Who decides who gets aid now? I would assume the same people would decide who was deserving based on the previous criteria.

 

[nicolaskl]

Two, the idea of a self made man is a myth. Unless he was born, lived, and died without human contact, he benefited from thousands of years of knowledge, skills, and technology developed by human civilization. He benefited from the lives and sacrifices of those who built America. He benefited from the tax dollars that went into the public school systems that he and his workers learned from, the roads that allowed them to get to them, the police and fire protections afforded to him as part of living in civilization. He existed as a brilliant and functioning example of a system, not as a system unto himself. Taxes are not punishment, they are not theft, they are the membership fee for living in the civilization that allowed you to get enough wealth to tax in the first place.

It's amazing how many people don't understand this.

 

[Phokus]

Dear Poor People and the Middle Class,

Please eat shit. It's good for you.

Sincerely,

Republicans everywhere.

 

[Matt1970]

A basic difference between right-wingers and the sane are that the sane appreciate the benefits of some wealth for people who should get it, but understand that extreme wealth ultimately is at the expense of others and harmful to the people, while the right thinks that wealth grows on trees and if someone has $50 trillion and owns every company in the US and most of the real estate, it doesn't hurt anyone - any concerns are just 'envy' by those who don't have it.

If the right were correct about wealth being magically unlimited, everyone can have 100 servants, including the servants - then their politics would make a lot more sense.

Save234

Except you have never proven how the rich actually take from the poor or middle class. The poor aren't taxed and the money given to the rich. Even if the Government is controlled by the rich, show me one law that takes money out of the hand of the poor? Every tax cut you bitch about for the rich has also come with a tax cut for the poor and middle class.

 

[Matt1970]

Dear Poor People and the Middle Class,

Please eat shit. It's good for you.

Sincerely,

Republicans everywhere.

The Republicans have consistantly cut taxes for the middle class as well. Arguement fail

 

[Abraxas]

If you are suffering because of the logical consequences of your own poor life choices you dont deserve aid.

Who decides who gets aid now? I would assume the same people would decide who was deserving based on the previous criteria.

And here we are back at poor life choices. What constitutes a poor life choice? Working for a company that goes under, investing in a company that turns out to be fraudulently altering its figures, having a medical event, brought on by working in a mine or a plant that used asbestos before anyone knew any better? I think this is part of our disagreement, I'd wager you feel a great deal more of the poor got what they deserved than I do.

See, that's just it, I don't have a problem with the government giving aid to people and filtering that aid through a screening process. You seem to diverge at the first point.

 

[nehalem256]

And here we are back at poor life choices. What constitutes a poor life choice? Working for a company that goes under, investing in a company that turns out to be fraudulently altering its figures, having a medical event, brought on by working in a mine or a plant that used asbestos before anyone knew any better? I think this is part of our disagreement, I'd wager you feel a great deal more of the poor got what they deserved than I do.

See, that's just it, I don't have a problem with the government giving aid to people and filtering that aid through a screening process. You seem to diverge at the first point.

So, one of your "poor choices" is already covered by unemployment insurance(which is a good filter in and of itself). And another is a past problem (asbestos). And the other, proper investing would mean not putting all of your money in one investment, which means that having a company alter its figures may be a bit annoying, it will be no where near catastrophic. And if you did decide to put all your money into one super amazing cant miss investment; I believe we call that greed.

Now, lets look at what the latimes says.

http://articles.latimes.com/2011/jan/02/opinion/la-oe-mcmanus-twous-20110102

Brookings economists Ron Haskins and Isabel Sawhill studied the noneconomic components of poverty and came up with a rule. "If young people do three things — graduate from high school, get a job, and get married and wait until they're 21 before having a baby — they have an almost 75% chance of making it into the middle class," Haskins said.

Add in those things plus no drug/alcohol abuse and no no-fault divorce and I think we have pretty good expectations of how we should expect people to live their life if they want society to help them. If you refuse to follow reasonable rules of society then you shouldnt expect anything from it.

 

[dmcowen674]

Let em eat cake

 

[nageov3t]

Let em eat cake

cake is awesome, I fail to see the problem.

 

[dmcowen674]

cake is awesome, I fail to see the problem.

Me too but try and live on it.

 

[Jhhnn]

If you are suffering because of the logical consequences of your own poor life choices you dont deserve aid.

Who decides who gets aid now? I would assume the same people would decide who was deserving based on the previous criteria.

So, uhh, children made poor life choices when they picked their parents? Really?

 

[Jhhnn]

Except you have never proven how the rich actually take from the poor or middle class. The poor aren't taxed and the money given to the rich. Even if the Government is controlled by the rich, show me one law that takes money out of the hand of the poor? Every tax cut you bitch about for the rich has also come with a tax cut for the poor and middle class.

You ignore the "free market capitalism" side of it all. People need to eat, to keep from freezing in the winter, to have a roof over their heads, to have medical and dental care. Increasingly, they need the means to obtain information and to communicate electronically.

Our society grants license to wealth to make their livings through ownership of the physical & intellectual property, the means of producing & distributing those things. They profit from it in a way indistinguishable from taxes, which is where govt gets their money.

One law that takes money out of the hands of the poor? There are many- sales taxes, sin taxes, excise taxes, licensing "fees", mandatory auto insurance, energy taxes- the list goes on from there.

Repub tax cuts? It works like this- you get a dime, I get $100K. That's "fair", isn't it?

 

[CallMeJoe]

..."Brookings economists Ron Haskins and Isabel Sawhill studied the noneconomic components of poverty and came up with a rule. "If young people do three things — graduate from high school, get a job, and get married and wait until they're 21 before having a baby — they have an almost 75% chance of making it into the middle class," Haskins said"...

The corollary of this is that they can do all these things correctly and still have a >25% chance of staying poor.

 

[Jhhnn]

So, one of your "poor choices" is already covered by unemployment insurance(which is a good filter in and of itself). And another is a past problem (asbestos). And the other, proper investing would mean not putting all of your money in one investment, which means that having a company alter its figures may be a bit annoying, it will be no where near catastrophic. And if you did decide to put all your money into one super amazing cant miss investment; I believe we call that greed.

Now, lets look at what the latimes says.

http://articles.latimes.com/2011/jan/02/opinion/la-oe-mcmanus-twous-20110102



Add in those things plus no drug/alcohol abuse and no no-fault divorce and I think we have pretty good expectations of how we should expect people to live their life if they want society to help them. If you refuse to follow reasonable rules of society then you shouldnt expect anything from it.

Nice catch-22 in that- the "get a job" part.

http://bls.gov/news.release/youth.nr0.htm

Youth labor force participation rate is at 59.5%, so 75% of that is 44.6%, meaning that a majority of young potential middle class people are missing the most important part of the equation you cite...

Something you'll find a way to ignore completely, I'm sure.

 

[cybrsage]

Well, that is what taxes do. They take money people have. Then they do stuff with it. How else would taxes work?

They take money people earn. The money you already have, say that you earned last year, is no longer taxed. If I have $1 billion (after taxes) which I earned last year and paid taxes on last year, what are you going to do to tax that money again?

Actually, technically it wouldn't. All it requires is that median income growth for America be higher than the median income growth for the top percentage point of wealth. That would not require a hard upper limit.

The only way to make this happen is to write a law saying the rich cannot earn more than X dollars.

Two, the idea of a self made man is a myth. Unless he was born, lived, and died without human contact, he benefited from thousands of years of knowledge, skills, and technology developed by human civilization.

It is an idiom. Obviously, everyone is made by their mother and their father. The rest of society really has nothing to do with how a man is made, except in the few cases where a doctor also helps create the man...but that is not the norm.

 

[nehalem256]

Nice catch-22 in that- the "get a job" part.

http://bls.gov/news.release/youth.nr0.htm

Youth labor force participation rate is at 59.5%, so 75% of that is 44.6%, meaning that a majority of young potential middle class people are missing the most important part of the equation you cite...

Something you'll find a way to ignore completely, I'm sure.

You do realize that you are including 16 year olds right? And college students? And that even in 2008 it was only 65.5%.

But let us play your little labor force participation rate game. Maybe the reason they have so much trouble finding a job is because liberals encourage a labor force participation bubble?

 

[nehalem256]

It is an idiom. Obviously, everyone is made by their mother and their father. The rest of society really has nothing to do with how a man is made, except in the few cases where a doctor also helps create the man...but that is not the norm.

Liberals think that people should feel guilty if their parents actually fed and paid attention to them. Having parents that actually care about their children is called "privilege" :\

Its straight from the communist manifesto. Destroying the family is essential to "equality"

 

[Jhhnn]

You do realize that you are including 16 year olds right? And college students? And that even in 2008 it was only 65.5%.

But let us play your little labor force participation rate game. Maybe the reason they have so much trouble finding a job is because liberals encourage a labor force participation bubble?

Liberals? Or the economic necessity of Reaganomics?

The BLS link is just one source- it's widely acknowledged that the employment situation for young people is bleak, putting the lie to your original song & dance routine.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124181970915002009.html

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/19/business/economy/19grads.html

I could cover the page with links, but you'd just dance off in some other direction...

So, uhh, what are the much worshipped Job Creators! doing about it, anyway? Well, other than hoarding cash, buying govt bonds, & buying Repub politicians, promoting "austerity" & a beatdown for the middle & working class?

Inequality? The best time to be rich is when everybody else is broke, and America's wealthiest are striving to make it so.

 

[fskimospy]

Two, the idea of a self made man is a myth. Unless he was born, lived, and died without human contact, he benefited from thousands of years of knowledge, skills, and technology developed by human civilization. He benefited from the lives and sacrifices of those who built America. He benefited from the tax dollars that went into the public school systems that he and his workers learned from, the roads that allowed them to get to them, the police and fire protections afforded to him as part of living in civilization. He existed as a brilliant and functioning example of a system, not as a system unto himself. Taxes are not punishment, they are not theft, they are the membership fee for living in the civilization that allowed you to get enough wealth to tax in the first place.

This is really all that needed to be said. Thread over. (not that it hasn't been fun to see the crazy explosion and all.)

 

[Jhhnn]

Two, the idea of a self made man is a myth. Unless he was born, lived, and died without human contact, he benefited from thousands of years of knowledge, skills, and technology developed by human civilization. He benefited from the lives and sacrifices of those who built America. He benefited from the tax dollars that went into the public school systems that he and his workers learned from, the roads that allowed them to get to them, the police and fire protections afforded to him as part of living in civilization. He existed as a brilliant and functioning example of a system, not as a system unto himself. Taxes are not punishment, they are not theft, they are the membership fee for living in the civilization that allowed you to get enough wealth to tax in the first place.

As eskimospy offered, well said. He's also right about the usual explosion of delusion, unfortunately.

 

[nehalem256]

Liberals? Or the economic necessity of Reaganomics?

Unless you are arguing that Ronald Reagan became president in 1967 then clearly no.

One will note that the rate rose from ~59% -> ~64% before Reagan. And from ~64% -> ~66% during Reagan.

 

[Matt1970]

One law that takes money out of the hands of the poor? There are many- sales taxes, sin taxes, excise taxes, licensing "fees", mandatory auto insurance, energy taxes- the list goes on from there.

Repub tax cuts? It works like this- you get a dime, I get $100K. That's "fair", isn't it?

I highly doubt that any Corporation lobbys governemnt for more taxes so once again you completely fail. If you want to argue for less taxes I suggest you start by signing up for the Republican party. 🙂

 

[cybrsage]

This is really all that needed to be said. Thread over. (not that it hasn't been fun to see the crazy explosion and all.)

As eskimospy offered, well said. He's also right about the usual explosion of delusion, unfortunately.

Only if you pretend English is not a languague. If you do, then what you both say makes sense. If you actually believe English is a language, then you both fail more miserably than Janet Reno in a beauty contest.