Outstanding post. It points out a salient fact. The current Republican Party is fighting tooth and nail not for the middle class, certainly not for the working class, and they damned well aren't fighting for the poor, the elderly, the children from disadvantaged families... they are fighting for the wealthy. They are bellowing to the world that taxes in this country are too high. That the very idea of raising taxes on the small percentage of the population making over $500,000 a year is an abomination. They ignore the FACT that taxes on that group are the lowest in many decades. That they are lower than they were under Reagan. That while they babble on and on about how horrific raising taxes on anyone would be, their "God," Mr. Reagan, raised taxes several times during his two terms in office. Are the wealthiest in this country a burden on our society? Damned right they are. Why? Because they are paying historically low taxes, at lower rates than they were under Reagan, at far lower rates than they were under Eisenhower. They are a burden because when this country is facing an enormous deficit, they skate right past their responsibility to help alleviate that deficit. They've brainwashed millions through their surrogates in the Republican Party and the mass media that they control so much of to suppport continuing this unprecedented largess from a completely skewed tax policy in their favor. Why do I say brainwashed? Because the vast majority of the mob supporting them will be hurt by the very policies pushed by the wealthy. School funding slashed. That hurts the middle class, the working class, the poor attempting to bring themselves up in society, to make themselves less of a "burden" on society and, ironically, the wealthy themselves, who find it increasingly difficult to find workers educated enough to work in the increasingly sophisticated jobs of today. Of course, the wealthy corporate culture have at least part of an answer for that, one that might do in the short run. Sending those jobs overseas. Honestly, while I respect most of those here who support these policies, not their stance on the issue, but them personally, I am astounded that otherwise intelligent people are buying into the nonsense spewed by those in control of the Republican Party. They aren't being helped personally. They are seeing their public schools crumble, so they must either hope their children are smart enough to make it into a public magnet school, or are willing and able to spend many thousands of dollars a year on private schools for their children, money they could be investing for their retirement, for the college education of their children, for the support of their elderly parents, for countless other things. And that's just one result of the policies they spend so much time defending. And how many of you would be directly affected by raising tax rates just to the levels they were under Reagan, much less under Eisenhower? I'm truly amazed.
Everyone does, it's the essence of the American dream. "work hard, and you will be rich." Too bad it's not true. Working hours are increasing as real earnings are decreasing for middle class citizens. 400 Americans own more than the bottom 60% of America.
You don't have to be "rich" to live well off. Live within your means and budget well. Get an education and get a better job.
Instead of going through your block of irrelevance above, I will just go here where I can cut to the chase. I didn't ask you to total up the expenses of one person and compare them to another, I asked for an example of a poor person who was less burdensome than Bill Gates. Your answer was non-responsive. You are only looking at one side of the equation. Bill Gates pays a lot more into the system than someone who is a ward of the state. In fact, he likely pays a lot more into the system than he gets out of it, directly or indirectly. Therefor he is less of a burden on the system than someone who pays in little to nothing and gets out a little bit. I am a much bigger burden on the system than Bill Gates, and I don't receive any direct assistance from the government. That it because you are not a burden on a system you are funding. Here is where you show you are arguing against a straw man. Go back and re-read my posts in this thread (or more likely read them for the first time, if this is really what you got out of them). I specifically said that (for example) trucking companies "use up" more of our interstate highway system than average people. I understand it is easier to argue against someone complaining about welfare queens, but that wasn't what I (or anyone in this thread) was doing.
Really? Why don't you do the accounting then if you are so sure of this? Microsoft paid about $445 m (7%) of its profits in taxes last year. You're telling me that Microsoft is only via all the reasons we outlined before, benefitting from about $445 mm dollars or so of government services? That, if we took away the government, and had no schools, sewers, road, police, etc - Microsoft could probably spend a lot less and create its own virtual state which could replace all these services for its 10's of thousands of employees? Really? I highly doubt that. $445 mm might sound like a lot to you, but it's actually chump change in terms of microsoft's expenditures (world wide it spends $13 bb/year on sales and marketing, to give you an idea). Stupidmoniker - it's hardly incumbent on me to go back and make up a straw man argument to find you saying something silly- you dig that hole yourself when you advocate idiotic concepts like how the governmetn should engage in no borrowing whatsoever and other bits of silliness, which seem to be motivated by some sort of morality play on your part. Based on your past posting and stated preferences, and your willingness to mete out your moralizations on the bbs - therefore it is not remotely surprising for you to call the weak (unless of course they're a fetus) out as (loathsome) recipients of "burden" spendings; while other consumers of government goods and services are nothing of the kind, despite the fact that a dollar of service is as burdensome on the state as any other burden. There's no straw man, it's what you said.
Of course you probably should also include all the personal income taxes Gates and the 10's of thousands of Microsoft employees paid.
Oh let's definitely do that, can you do the math? I'm tired of having to do all of the heavy lifting in this thread. We need to establish what the independent state of microsoft actually costs - if it's as little as you seem to think, perhaps we can present your findings and figure out why the U.S of MS hasn't seceded from the U.S.A which does nothing but take, take, take while it just gives, gives, gives.
Is there some reason you are not including taxation of capital gains and dividend income by miscrosoft stockholders, property taxes paid by microsoft stockholders and employees, income taxes paid by microsoft employees and officers, etc. in your analysis (besides the fact that you are trying to color the outcome I mean)? You act as though Microsoft Inc. is the recipient of 100% of the benefit of any expenditures made on the education of all Microsoft employees. Perhaps you might want to take another look at your accounting. The good old ad hominem attack. I suppose when you get called out on attacking a straw man, it behooves you to switch tactics, though making another fallacious argument is not the direction I would have preferred you go. Maybe next you will throw out a red herring like abortion. Yep, a red herring. And full circle to a straw man. I did not say one dollar spent on roads was less burdensome than one dollar spent on food aid. Go back and try again.
Ok - what are those numbers then? I eagerly await your response. And please, feel free to allocate education as you see fit as well. No, you said that the wealthy "benefit" from spending, but in a separate category, the non-wealthy "burden" us with spending. Poors must be accounted for from one side of the ledger, richie riches are on the other side. I get it perfectly.
I don't have the inclination to look up all of those numbers. Someone made the assertion that the rich are a greater burden than the poor. I said that I doubted that assertion and challenged anyone to prove it with one example of a poor person that was less of a burden than Bill Gates. The burden of proof is not on me, it is on the person making the assertion. You chose to try to take up that burden and failed miserably. You can try again or not, but I am not going to shift the burden to disprove others' unfounded assertions onto myself. Apparently you have no more substantive arguments (not that your prior fallacious arguments were all that substantive) so you have decided to try and argue semantics. My point all along has been that how much of a burden someone is on the government is determined by the difference between what they get in and what they take out. Both the rich and the poor derive benefits from spending. Both the rich and the poor contribute tax monies (it is very difficult to pay absolutely zero taxes). I would say those who tale more out than they put in are a burden. I doubt the assertion that the rich are further into the negative column than the poor.
OH NOES YOU DINT-NINT...did you just pull out the time-honored burden-shifting argumetn of the Internet Rules of Civil Procedure....? You're not even applying them correctly! I'll definitely take this up with the court of Internet Appeals. And yet you're utterly unable and unwilling to determine what these figures are in any meaningful way.
Yes. You are welcome to try to track down all of the taxes of whatever sort are paid by Microsoft and its employees and shareholders and to try to quantify all of the expenses incurred on behalf of Microsoft by the United States government and compare the two if you like. I do not choose to engage in such an exercise. Perhaps you are right and Bill Gates and his ilk are a real drain on the US government and we would be living in a real utopia if Microsoft and all of the other megacorporations just like it would relocate to some other sucker country and allow the working poor to build up huge government surpluses.
Well, tell that to the top 400 Americans who control more wealth than 60% of lower-class Americans, and yet pay about 1.5% of the taxes in this nation. Tell that to the credit card providers who specifically target poor credit-individuals, and the mortgage brokers who sold sub-primes like they were hotcakes while misrepresenting them. Guess who profited off of that? As for an education, forget it. What with the current trend of masters becoming the new bachelors for signaling, the usurious rates on school loans, and the excruciating tuition on "for-profit" institutions such as basically any law school minus the T-14 or hooray hooray, devry, a post-secondary education has become nothing more than a way to turn American scholars into cash cows, or if they're lucky and bright enough to find their way to the Ivy League or similar tiers, workhorses for the top 0.5%. There's law school graduates who spend upwards of $200,000 and countless years of effort to waiter tables. The American Dream is dead, if it ever lived. And yet, funnily enough, more resentment is put on the poor and middle-class, than the ultra-rich.
Thread derailed. Bringing in roadways and other infrastructure used by the 'public' is a poor attempt in making the point your trying to make. I do get your point though, Sam. This arguement is at the heart of the dispute that divides the two political parties. But back to the topic: I agree there is a trend to the right. For the most part I've always considered myself to be right of center. But recently I've had a change of heart about those in power who claim to stand for the same ideas that I do. It's become painfully clear that the current political system has been corrupted by ruthless capitalistic practices under the guise of a 'free unregulated market'. Both parties are full of shikaka. The Big Banks own us. Period. And now the trend is towards a two class teir of debtors and debtees. We're watching the biggest money grab in history go down, if the check mate hasn't already been set. The 'redistribution of wealth' that the left craves for is happening. Unfortunately it's not what was envisioned. And the phonyness of the right is so blatant (Tea Party) that I'm just disgusted with them all. I despise Boehner as much as I despise Pelosi. Two AssClowns. Mix in a president who's at Wall Street's beck and call (not like Bush wasn't either) and it's a great big clusterphuk. I still believe that there is majority that is leaning to the right for many reasons, mostly financial. But there isn't a party that truly represents these people. There never will be. The idea of a Nation united is long gone. Or at least that's my cynical view.
And it's sickening that the top 0.5% are allowed to use a labor force outside of the US to avoid paying the taxes that a small business would have to pay. It's not an even playing field. At some point we've got to wake up as a nation and recognize what they are getting away with reap that tax revenue. The ultra rich have no boundaries and are pretty much exempt.
Perhaps rather than doggedly sticking with your theory, you ought to consider the fact that you're too frustrated to do the rather complicated (because it requires millions of arbitrary decisions) accounting on your theory indicates that your theory is not really a viable one.
Or perhaps I just really do have no interest in even the preliminary steps in which I would "only" have to track down the tax returns for thousands of Microsoft employees (since for some reason you want to include the primary school education of every Microsoft employee, as though Bill couldn't find educated employees without the American public school system, which is largely not funded by the federal government anyway run-on parenthetical). I stand by my shot in the dark challenge to anyone who wants to prove that the rich are more burdensome on the US government than the poor. Here is another question for you, since you didn't want to tackle the last one. At what wealth and/or income level (according to your burdensome rich theory) is the break even point. Approximately where do people go from being the (on average) contributing poor to the (also on average) draining rich?
