So what do you support?FallenMorgan wrote:
I don't support redistribution of wealth in a pure communistic form. The Republicans and others would like to give the rich tax cuts and the like.
- Index »
- Community »
- Debate and Serious Talk »
- A Place So Rich and Decadent That You'll Get Diabetes Going There
Because it worksFallenMorgan wrote:
I don't support redistribution of wealth in a pure communistic form. The Republicans and others would like to give the rich tax cuts and the like.
By giving rich people access to their money, they are free to re-invest in a way that accelerates the economy, creating jobs for the people you want to help.
Democrats want to dump the money into the bottomless pit that is the lower class. They may spend the money for temporary benefit, but it won't help them get a better job, or a better education, only better alcohol to forget their troubles.
Cutting taxes for the rich is one thing, but what often happens in addition to that is Republicans will subsidize the rich. That's taking things too far.S.Lythberg wrote:
Because it worksFallenMorgan wrote:
I don't support redistribution of wealth in a pure communistic form. The Republicans and others would like to give the rich tax cuts and the like.
By giving rich people access to their money, they are free to re-invest in a way that accelerates the economy, creating jobs for the people you want to help.
Democrats want to dump the money into the bottomless pit that is the lower class. They may spend the money for temporary benefit, but it won't help them get a better job, or a better education, only better alcohol to forget their troubles.
Commonwealth Edison is subsidized to keep electricity prices at an acceptable level that is not easily influenced by fuel market trends. There's a method to the madness.Turquoise wrote:
Cutting taxes for the rich is one thing, but what often happens in addition to that is Republicans will subsidize the rich. That's taking things too far.S.Lythberg wrote:
Because it worksFallenMorgan wrote:
I don't support redistribution of wealth in a pure communistic form. The Republicans and others would like to give the rich tax cuts and the like.
By giving rich people access to their money, they are free to re-invest in a way that accelerates the economy, creating jobs for the people you want to help.
Democrats want to dump the money into the bottomless pit that is the lower class. They may spend the money for temporary benefit, but it won't help them get a better job, or a better education, only better alcohol to forget their troubles.
Subsidize how? (Honest question)Turquoise wrote:
Cutting taxes for the rich is one thing, but what often happens in addition to that is Republicans will subsidize the rich. That's taking things too far.
Edit: oh, I see what you are talking about.
Last edited by SenorToenails (2008-06-13 23:32:05)
All utilities should be open markets. There should be no subsidizing of industry in this country.S.Lythberg wrote:
Commonwealth Edison is subsidized to keep electricity prices at an acceptable level that is not easily influenced by fuel market trends. There's a method to the madness.Turquoise wrote:
Cutting taxes for the rich is one thing, but what often happens in addition to that is Republicans will subsidize the rich. That's taking things too far.S.Lythberg wrote:
Because it works
By giving rich people access to their money, they are free to re-invest in a way that accelerates the economy, creating jobs for the people you want to help.
Democrats want to dump the money into the bottomless pit that is the lower class. They may spend the money for temporary benefit, but it won't help them get a better job, or a better education, only better alcohol to forget their troubles.
Corporate welfare.SenorToenails wrote:
Subsidize how? (Honest question)Turquoise wrote:
Cutting taxes for the rich is one thing, but what often happens in addition to that is Republicans will subsidize the rich. That's taking things too far.
Yea, I figured that's what you meant.Turquoise wrote:
Corporate welfare.SenorToenails wrote:
Subsidize how? (Honest question)Turquoise wrote:
Cutting taxes for the rich is one thing, but what often happens in addition to that is Republicans will subsidize the rich. That's taking things too far.
I live in a $700,000 house atm... it's a dump.S.Lythberg wrote:
The waste of some people is absolutely staggering though, I can sympathize with both sides of this issue. I've been on food stamps, and I've lived in a $700,000 house, so I've had experience on both sides as well. The issue at hand is why some of our countries richest citizens feel the need to separate themselves from the very society that made them rich, and waste their money on goods that are priced absurdly high for only a small gain in quality.
Wahhh!!!! Cry more.My last paycheck had 23% of my gross pay taken for taxes
And I suppose most of Europe and Australia doesn't work?S.Lythberg wrote:
Because it worksFallenMorgan wrote:
I don't support redistribution of wealth in a pure communistic form. The Republicans and others would like to give the rich tax cuts and the like.
By giving rich people access to their money, they are free to re-invest in a way that accelerates the economy, creating jobs for the people you want to help.
Democrats want to dump the money into the bottomless pit that is the lower class. They may spend the money for temporary benefit, but it won't help them get a better job, or a better education, only better alcohol to forget their troubles.
Money creates more money and the more money you have the more money you earn and the wider and wider the income gaps grows. Without redistribution of wealth there is no way someone less fortunate could have a hope in hell of succeeding. and WORKING HARD does Sweet Fuck All, so don't bother using it as an excuse.
If I have just $1 million, I could put it into the bank and earn $80,000 a year by doing NOTHING. To earn $80,000 a year in a job would require at least an upper middle management job or working 70 or so hour weeks.
EDIT: let me explain this now, because a can see a lot of Americans goings... So? just work a 70 hour week. And sure you could, but spending close to 65% of your waking time at work (which doesn't even include travelling time) leaves no time for family, friends, relaxing and is not a healthy way to live. (and BTW this is assuming an above $20/hour income, so well above minimum wage).
Going the upper middle management route will require a degree of some type. To get a Degree will require 3-5 years and in that time you still have all your expenses. Assuming you live as basic as you can that will still require an income around 20k-25k a year, you will be uneducated, unskilled labour, so shouldn't expect much more then minimum wage (which I believe is about $6 in the US). So to earn your 20k a year will require you to work 60+ hour week and then go to uni on top of that, where they recommend you spend 1-2 hours per unit on each week. ie 25-50 hours. Again leaving no time for anything but work. And even after you have your degree you need to spend time in junior management ect for a number of years before you get the required promotions and wage increases to get your desired 80k a year.
Last edited by DrunkFace (2008-06-14 00:39:49)
the money has to come from somewhere. if you redistribute wealth so everybody has at least 1 million and they all put it in the bank and reap the benefits you're either going to have the entire system shutdown or such massive inflation that you're just back where you started.DrunkFace wrote:
I live in a $700,000 house atm... it's a dump.S.Lythberg wrote:
The waste of some people is absolutely staggering though, I can sympathize with both sides of this issue. I've been on food stamps, and I've lived in a $700,000 house, so I've had experience on both sides as well. The issue at hand is why some of our countries richest citizens feel the need to separate themselves from the very society that made them rich, and waste their money on goods that are priced absurdly high for only a small gain in quality.Wahhh!!!! Cry more.My last paycheck had 23% of my gross pay taken for taxesAnd I suppose most of Europe and Australia doesn't work?S.Lythberg wrote:
Because it worksFallenMorgan wrote:
I don't support redistribution of wealth in a pure communistic form. The Republicans and others would like to give the rich tax cuts and the like.
By giving rich people access to their money, they are free to re-invest in a way that accelerates the economy, creating jobs for the people you want to help.
Democrats want to dump the money into the bottomless pit that is the lower class. They may spend the money for temporary benefit, but it won't help them get a better job, or a better education, only better alcohol to forget their troubles.
Money creates more money and the more money you have the more money you earn and the wider and wider the income gaps grows. Without redistribution of wealth there is no way someone less fortunate could have a hope in hell of succeeding. and WORKING HARD does Sweet Fuck All, so don't bother using it as an excuse.
If I have just $1 million, I could put it into the bank and earn $80,000 a year by doing NOTHING. To earn $80,000 a year in a job would require at least an upper middle management job or working 70 or so hour weeks.
You take $10,000 off someone earning $500,000 a year and it's hardly going to effect them. You then give that $10,000 to someone earning $20,000 a year and its the difference between having a reasonably comfortable life and not being able to pay the mortgage and getting kicked out on the street having no where to live.Ender2309 wrote:
the money has to come from somewhere. if you redistribute wealth so everybody has at least 1 million and they all put it in the bank and reap the benefits you're either going to have the entire system shutdown or such massive inflation that you're just back where you started.
EDIT: my point wasn't everyone should have a million dollars or be earning 80k a year. It is just that making money with money is so much easier, then working for it and those struggling have no chance to catch up to those who were lucky enough to be born into wealth without some assistance.
Last edited by DrunkFace (2008-06-14 01:02:55)
you aren't addressing the issue of inflation.DrunkFace wrote:
You take $10,000 off someone earning $500,000 a year and it's hardly going to effect them. You then give that $10,000 to someone earning $20,000 a year and its the difference between having a reasonably comfortable life and not being able to pay the mortgage and getting kicked out on the street having no where to live.Ender2309 wrote:
the money has to come from somewhere. if you redistribute wealth so everybody has at least 1 million and they all put it in the bank and reap the benefits you're either going to have the entire system shutdown or such massive inflation that you're just back where you started.
regardless, if i make 500,000 a year its my 500,000 that i worked for. why should i give it to you because you chose to do four years of college and i stayed in the game for eight? thats hardly fair.
if you can't afford the mortgage you bought something you shouldn't have. the problem is that people in 1st world countries have a sense of entitlement that is unjust. if you make 20,000 a year get a small house. if you know its going to be tough to pay the mortgage, rent. better yet, create a special savings account and put a few thousand in a year until you have a reasonable amount to enable the reduction of your mortgage.
reduce your waste and be smart and you'll do fine. expect what you don't deserve and you'll have trouble. i personally know somebody who blew a 250,000 dollar salary on fast food and indulgencies. not a single penny in savings, blew it all every year.
the point there is that rich people aren't rich because they make a lot of money. they're rich because they use their money wisely.
give a man a fish...
Take an hour out of your day to learn how the US economy works. The rich tend to be massively subsadised, rely hopelessly on the public sector for innovation and new ideas and get huge bailouts when they fuck up.
Socialism is alive and well in the top end of US society, it's only the poor majority that don't get in on the act.
lets clarify something here. when you say rich, are you talking about bill gates rich, or doctor smith down the lane rich?PureFodder wrote:
Take an hour out of your day to learn how the US economy works. The rich tend to be massively subsadised, rely hopelessly on the public sector for innovation and new ideas and get huge bailouts when they fuck up.
Socialism is alive and well in the top end of US society, it's only the poor majority that don't get in on the act.
i'll assume the second, for which you're massively wrong. the rich aren't subsidized; companies are. like others have said before, there's good reason for it. subsidization ultimately creates jobs, and bailouts prevent a loss of jobs. as well, subsidization makes life possible for the poor, seeing as without it energy prices would be unbelievable, meaning everything else would be too.
I work at a bikeshop. For $10 you can get a quick release skewer. For $135 you can get a quick release skewer that's a few grams lighter and comes in a pretty colour.
I product rep once showed us a set of $5,000 wheels. That's more than three times what my bike is worth.
I product rep once showed us a set of $5,000 wheels. That's more than three times what my bike is worth.
There seem to be two issues here:
Why do some people feel the need to spend grotesque amounts of money on useless crap?
Super luxury, gold plated everything, obscene consumption. At the height of the Japanese economic boom there was a fad for sprinkling powdered gold on food - pure waste with a horrible environmental impact.
I don't get it, I think there must be something fundamental missing from these peoples lives if they think the latest form of consumption will improve their bloated corpulent lives.
My contribution is I've always made a very conscious effort not to judge people by their job, car, house, clothes etc.
Should the rich be taxed to fund the poor? Communism at one extreme, US capitalism at the other.
Tricky, I think most european countries are roughly right, the US gives too much to the rich and too little to the poor, so there is a huge underclass and a tiny number of people who by hard work or luck live lives of gross excess.
Why do some people feel the need to spend grotesque amounts of money on useless crap?
Super luxury, gold plated everything, obscene consumption. At the height of the Japanese economic boom there was a fad for sprinkling powdered gold on food - pure waste with a horrible environmental impact.
I don't get it, I think there must be something fundamental missing from these peoples lives if they think the latest form of consumption will improve their bloated corpulent lives.
My contribution is I've always made a very conscious effort not to judge people by their job, car, house, clothes etc.
Should the rich be taxed to fund the poor? Communism at one extreme, US capitalism at the other.
Tricky, I think most european countries are roughly right, the US gives too much to the rich and too little to the poor, so there is a huge underclass and a tiny number of people who by hard work or luck live lives of gross excess.
Fuck Israel
The rich are the top few percent. Doctors on the other hand are an interesting seperate issue. They are massively overpaid in comparison to Europe, largely due to protectionist measures that prevent qualified foreign doctors from moving to the US and undecutting their wages, unlike the majority of the populace who are actively being played agaisnt foreign workers to undercut their wages, see NAFTA for details. Just allowing doctors to be paid roughly the same as in Europe (still giving them greater buying power due to relative cost differences) would save the US about $80 billion a year.Ender2309 wrote:
lets clarify something here. when you say rich, are you talking about bill gates rich, or doctor smith down the lane rich?PureFodder wrote:
Take an hour out of your day to learn how the US economy works. The rich tend to be massively subsadised, rely hopelessly on the public sector for innovation and new ideas and get huge bailouts when they fuck up.
Socialism is alive and well in the top end of US society, it's only the poor majority that don't get in on the act.
i'll assume the second, for which you're massively wrong. the rich aren't subsidized; companies are. like others have said before, there's good reason for it. subsidization ultimately creates jobs, and bailouts prevent a loss of jobs. as well, subsidization makes life possible for the poor, seeing as without it energy prices would be unbelievable, meaning everything else would be too.
Remember, with regard to subsadising, it makes equal sense to subsadise poor people. They'll use their extra money to buy more stuff, meaning rich people sell more stuff, stimulating the economy and creating jobs in the exact same way. It also has a secondary benefit of making the lives of poor people better. The larger the disparity between the rich and poor becomes, the more it makes sense to subsadise the poor instead.
If you don't bail out a big company and let them go down the tube, you open up their market share for either new businesses or existing businesses that are sensible enough not to need a bailout, allowing them to expand and hire more people.
I honestly don't get it. You're saying it is easy to get rich? Then why doesn't everybody do it?S.Lythberg wrote:
why don't you try to get rich, rather then try to get their money?
it's not that hard...
I know for a fact that where I live, it's damn hard to earn the extra buck.
What makes it so easy for you over there?
ƒ³
It's not that it's easy...It most certainly isn't. The point is -- Why should money be taken from those who earn it and given to those who didn't?oug wrote:
I honestly don't get it. You're saying it is easy to get rich? Then why doesn't everybody do it?
I know for a fact that where I live, it's damn hard to earn the extra buck.
What makes it so easy for you over there?
Money can be made by many means, earning being just one.Why should money be taken from those who earn it and given to those who didn't?
Not everyone who 'earns' money really does deservedly.
A guy at school went straight to work in the city - because his daddy knew someone - he got a job trading currencies. Was he worth $200k a year? I doubt it, but thats what he 'earned'.
Fuck Israel
In the UK the scheme of (excluding VAT etc) National Insurance (fixed amount for everyone as far as I know) and PAYE (Pay as your earn). It's done in segments, so if you earn, say up to £20000 you are taxed on a percentage of for example, 22%. If you earn £100000, you are taxed on the first 20k at that percentage, and then for the next 20k a slightly higher percentage - so it varies for everyone.
The system appears to be working as a whole but I don't believe the rich should be taxed overly more ...
The system appears to be working as a whole but I don't believe the rich should be taxed overly more ...
If we both do the same thing and you work more than me then it's only fair that you get paid more and that you get to keep what extra $ you make. But society is not as simplistic. You have major corporations whose profits are measured in billions, while people die on the streets because they can't afford a meal.SenorToenails wrote:
It's not that it's easy...It most certainly isn't. The point is -- Why should money be taken from those who earn it and given to those who didn't?oug wrote:
I honestly don't get it. You're saying it is easy to get rich? Then why doesn't everybody do it?
I know for a fact that where I live, it's damn hard to earn the extra buck.
What makes it so easy for you over there?
I understand that this kind of social injustice is part of the system that keeps the world moving forward. Yet, if we want to call ourselves civilized - above the level of other animals in the jungle - we need to make sure that the laws of the jungle do not apply in our society. That the motives for progress do not widen the gap between the haves and the have-nots. Instead we need to find ways to bridge that gap and if possible, to eliminate the extremes on both sides.
ƒ³
I never realised diabetes was closely linked to decadence.
It's not easy here, but... it is easier in America because we sacrifice social safety nets and educational infrastructure in favor of lower taxes and more opportunities for entrepreneurship. In general, economic mobility is higher in America than in most other nations, but this creates a somewhat Darwinian societal structure.oug wrote:
I honestly don't get it. You're saying it is easy to get rich? Then why doesn't everybody do it?S.Lythberg wrote:
why don't you try to get rich, rather then try to get their money?
it's not that hard...
I know for a fact that where I live, it's damn hard to earn the extra buck.
What makes it so easy for you over there?
Granted, the older I get, the more I start to favor it. Smaller government and lower taxes are usually good things.
Yeah well... I'm no fan of the government myself tbh... and I see where you're coming from in not wanting to give them any money... It would be a miracle to see even a tenth of what they get from taxes used for the common good.Turquoise wrote:
Granted, the older I get, the more I start to favor it. Smaller government and lower taxes are usually good things.
Yet, I think the Swedish model is clearly the best. So ideally, if politicians weren't the selfish greedy motherfuckers that they are around here, I'd go for that.
ƒ³
- Index »
- Community »
- Debate and Serious Talk »
- A Place So Rich and Decadent That You'll Get Diabetes Going There