[CSM] The Big Shift (to the Right)

No, it's just because divvying up what "benefit" people receive from the government is incredibly ****ing stupid and basically impossible to do in terms of either accounting benefit or economic benefit with any consistency . Bill Gates, as a stockholder of a public company (itself a creature of purely legal, state-sanctioned creation, but whatever) wouldn't have been able to do the same if he lived in a place like Mogadishu for many millions of reasons...and his entire oeuver cannot be divorced neatly into "THIS PART CAN HAZ RELY ON GOV" and "THIS PART WAS PRIVATELY DONE WITH NO ASSISTANCE" - pretty much every single thing he ever did relied, in some form, on government protetion, intervention, or whatever, and since he does a sh-tload of things that require protection, it's not surprising that he's going to be doing a lot more than most, and benefits the most, just like he probably pays more taxes than most (of course, at a far lower rate than you or I....)

But whatever, there's no point in explaining this to you seem to have it all worked out in your head with the way the distribution works out, richie riches are at the top of the moral scale and poorie poors are at the bottom. Not really an explanation so much as a rationalization, but who cares.

$1 more than your AGI last year.

 

Not addressed to me, but I'd say the top 0.5% of net worth individuals in America.

 

Amazing how I never said he did not benefit more than most, isn't it? Try a simple thought experiment. If Microsoft and all of its employees moved to Madeupistan next year (and even created an endowment to pay for an equal number of people to be educated from birth through college) which could be amortized over 22 years and counted in favor of the US government, do you think the US books would look better or worse for the next fiscal year? Some of your points make no sense whatsoever. What is the drain on the US government to have publicly held corporations? I am not denying that it is a purely legal state sanctioned creation, or even that Bill Gates gets some benefit from it's existence, but I would say the government derives a net benefit from the existence of the corporate form. Individuals being screened from liability would not seem to be a huge drain on the US coffers and would be more than outweighed by the tax revenue created by these corporations, but maybe you are thinking of something I am not.

My point has nothing whatsoever to do with morality. It is pure math. It is the revenues received from a person and the costs generated by the person. Rich people pay more taxes. I postulate that they are a higher net revenue stream to the US government than poor people. Apparently you disagree, since you responded to that point with a multipost argument, though for some reason all of your responses have little if anything to do with this point. If you don't disagree, there is no point in continuing this. If you do disagree, I would love to see any evidence in support of the original assertion I objected to (one which was not even yours).

Yay, I am on the ATF (according to Fisher) net benefit to the government side of the ledger.

 

SM, the wealthy are paying their lowest tax rate on their income in many decades. Heck, their tax bill was sliced and diced while we were fighting two wars in the middle of what some might call a national emergency. Do you think that's fair? Is it fair that they're paying a lower rate than they were after the Reagan tax cuts? How far is "low enough?" I'm pretty well off compared to some people, but many truly wealthy folks pay a lower rate than I do. Is that fair? I'm willing to pay my fair share of taxes. Why shouldn't they?

 

While I fundamentally agree, more taxation is not the answer. Eliminating, or at least greatly reducing, the shelters, subsidies and tax gimmicks would be the better way. For example, we have billion dollar anti-smoking programs, but we subsidize tobacco farming with more billions.

 

You postulate this but you are unwilling to support it by undertaking the enormously difficult task of coming up with a true estimate of who (whoever "who" is..people? corporations? You don't know) derives what and who doesn't from what resource, instead adhering to an incredibly lazy methodology of taking folks on public assistance, labeling them as net losers, socializing other costs to get to an outcome that you like that also happens to coincide with every 16 year old randian's spoogefest.

Take the corporation itself. Obvoiusly a corporation exists but for the grant of the state license. THe state license only means something if a state has a valid system of law enforcement. How much then from regular law enforcement expenditures, from court clerk salaries to prisoner meals to traffic lights - do we chalk up to their side of the ledger? Do we just divide it up by the number of corporations or do we do it by enterprise value or book value or discounted cash-flow analysis? Or do we just send it back to the shareholders themselves. These are the types of questions you must answer, my young postulator.

I don't envy you not wanting to do the math of who benefits more from what, it's overwhelming, which is a sign that your idea is stillborn.

 

Is the arguement that Poor or Dependant people are less of a tax burden than Rich people?

I've sort of lost track of what exactly the dispute is about. If it's simply about the above statement, I would bet courtside tickets to a Rockets game that Poor people are more of a tax burden. Someone else can do the math for me and anyone can feel free to take me up on the bet if you can back it up.

 

Yeah, I've been looking for someobody to "do the math" - it seems like there's a severe shortage of people willing to do so! Including those who know what the answers are without doing the math.

It looks like you're one of those people! Why don't you do the math and I'll surely reflect on your offer to buy you things.

 

Lol...So we both are standing by an assertion that we are both too lazy to back up. At least I offered an incentive:grin:

 

You're talking about 400 people in the entire US population of over 300 million paying "only" 1.5% of the taxes? And what do the lower 60% pay? I bet it's something close about 1.5%, too.

You know, there's probably a reason why they're targeted. I'm just going to leave it at that.

Well, I'm currently working on my Masters and I'll agree it is expensive but it's a worthwhile investment. Like I said before, budget, invest and save. I've worked hard to get where I'm at now and I've got many connections.

 

Yeah, because you know, it's cool to gloss over the fact that 400 people in the US own more than 180 million Americans.

Incidentally, the bottom 50% I know pay around 3.5%, so we can call it an even 5% of the tax burden. Ever since the Bush Admin., the average tax rate for the top 400 Americans keeps on going down and down.

http://blogs.forbes.com/robertlenzner/2011/07/25/the-400-richest-americans-pay-an-18-tax-rate/

Depending on what you are doing your Masters in, you're either going to become a very high-powered workhorse for the top 0.5% or yet another exploited college grad with dwindling job prospects, and crushing student debt. To break into that echelon is nearly impossible, even with the hard work you've put in.

I applaud your effort though. I just hope you realize others do put in the same work too...and get unpleasant results not of their own fault, but because of the system of chronic youth underemployment, and burgeoning job requirements. If it so happens that you too are trapped in this cycle, and credit card companies start sending you pre-authorized cards, I suppose you'll know why though.

 

Post #2 says it all.
The answer is right here.

 

What does fair mean to you? I don't want to use ambiguous terms like fair. How about "do they pay more than they use?", which has been my point all along? I do think the wealthy are paying more than they use, subsidizing the rest of us schlubs.

Are they paying a lower rate in federal income tax, or a combined total of all taxes? Or both? I don't know enough about your specific situation to comment. The highest marginal rate is on the highest income, so if you are talking about income tax, then people with much more income that you should be paying higher rates. If you are talking about including things like payroll taxes, it is because there is a cap on what you put in and what you get out for SS, because it is like a (not very good) mandatory retirement investment, not a normal tax. If you are talking about lower rates on capital gains, I suppose they could be treated as normal income, but the current system is meant to encourage investment. I don't know that calling cap gains income has been on the table. Etc.

I agree, this is more along the lines of something one would do as a doctoral thesis than a post on a message board.

This does not follow from the above. I have no inclination to try and prove string theory here either, but that doesn't mean it is not a valid concept. There are simply some efforts that are worthwhile to undertake to post on Clutchfans and some that are not. I choose not to try to calculate every expenditure by the US government which benefits Microsoft, how much of each expenditure is used up by Microsoft, and how much Microsoft and all its employees and shareholders pay into the system.

The fact that states and nations try to get corporations to headquarter within their borders is a good indicator to me that they see them as a net positive. How many nations try to get poor people to immigrate?

 

I think it depends on what people are being asked to do. In these economic troubled times when the govt. is looking to cut spending primarily on programs that will hurt the middle and lower classes, and when we are funding two wars, then I believe there is sacrifice to be made.

With the programs being cut, the only people that are sacrificing are the poor and middle classes. So fair would be having the wealthy sacrifice as well. If we all sacrifice, we all have a shared interest in things like the wars, and govt. spending. Everyone having an interest may change people's positions on certain policies.

 

Sacrifice is defined as getting fewer entitlements?

 

When it comes to helping drive down the deficit and debt, that would be what it is in the minds of most Republicans. However it should be other things such as increased revenue on the wealthy as well.

 

How about the fact that as of now, the largest number of Americans are living below the poverty line since the government took records?

How about the fact that about 3 out of 5 personal bankruptcies in the United States are due to high medical bills?

How about the fact that 45,000 Americans die a year because of a lack of health insurance?

oh, I think average people have sacrificed plenty, but it's astonishing to see a top class of people have mouthpieces like you and the Tea Party to fight for them. They are a large reason why the deficit exists through their reckless encouragement of Wall Street financial chaos, and yet they are still given their tax cuts, despite the fact that they pay on average around 18% of their income in tax, since Bush tax cuts managed to give them a 15% capital gains tax, which only fuels speculative bubbles that will lead the country to another failure sometime soon.

 

Spread the blame around if you wanna be honest with yourself. The Dems are just as muddy. You can fault both parties because they both are propped up by the Wall Street Lobby. Which bubble are you suggesting that the Bush tax cut is responsible for? I'd go along with the idea that it didn't help or it prolonged the problem(s).

Wall Street needs more regulation.

 

Yeah, the Dems aren't bloody doing that much either, as I have often noted. I myself am not a big fan of Frank-Dodd and how it is (not) being implemented, but it should be pointed out that at least the Dems tried to regulate Wall Street, and even if it was just a watered-down Glass-Stegall, at least on the surface, they're trying to do the right thing.

The Bush tax cut bubbles refer to the fact that capital gains taxes were slashed to 15%, which led to a higher incentive for cash to flow to speculative cash flows. In fact, the uber rich now derive a large part of their incomes off of the gains from those cash flows. The problem with that is that inherently, asset bubbles of any kind are unstable. With so much cash flowing everywhere, products like CDOs, and credit-default swaps started popping up, and well, down the rabbit hole we go.