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Census finds record gap between rich and poor

Record gap between rich and poor? Neo-liberal solution? Drive down wages so that the rich can have more money to pay out.
 
Boo Radley said:
No, that wasn't a good point. Sorry. Just as there are few pruely socialistic governments in the world, they are few if any pruely capitalistic governments in the world. One reason for this is that both have problems that lead lead countries to have to mix the two economic forms. This doesn't make any country a socialist country. And it is a lie to say it does.
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You're being disingenuous. I wasn't calling this country socialist. I was calling those programs socialist because their defense comes from socialist ideas.

From the beginnings of this country it has been clear that capitalism needed some form of regulation
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Proof?

and adjustments have been made ever since, regardless of party BTW. But, politicians have used the tactic of scaring people about socialism for nearly as long as the country has been in existence. All the while both parties have done exactly the same in terms of policy on this issue. No one has led us to a completely capitalistic society.

The tactic is old, unoriginal and dishonest. There's no real way around that.
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I don't care that both parties have socialist leanings.
 
ender1 said:
We have never had this much debt before. Prior to the 16th our income was enough. Now we owe, I dont want to even know how much, and we need to pay it back. A consumption tax will not fix this. The poor dont have it and the middle class is going broke. The rich are the only ones with any money left. That is because the government has been purchased by corporations and the rich.

Your statement on everyone suffering:::
Everyone but the rich seam to be suffering. Thats why everyone is screaming for them to pay more. Over the last hundred years there has never been such a long strech of time with taxes this low for the upper income groups. Its not realistic to keep this up.

I am a true and loyal libertarian. I want a small responsible government where we dont have to have these conversations. Republicans and Democrats are both to blame for this issue. If we sent representatives to DC without them getting there by being paid for we would be much better off.
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He just wants a libertarian that shows arguments in favor of the current system as I usually do against the interventionists, but you don't hold back and you say that you don't defend this system either. It's a perfectly valid position.
 
TurtleDude said:
you really want to parasitize the rich apparently. what we need is to get rid of the ability of a majority to vote up the taxes of the minority
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Big corporations have gotten rich because of sweetheart deals with the government. There's no point in denying that. Corruption is a disgusting habit in this country.
 
mertex said:
Okay, here's a good article as to why the rich should pay more.

Super Taxes for the Super Rich

Some of what he says:

Surowiecki proposes not just reinstituting pre-Bush era tax rates on the rich, but going a step further and creating a super tax bracket for those making the mega bucks. Say 50% for those making $10 million or more. At a time when Washington and voters, if not the market, are growing increasingly worried about the deficit, I think the idea of a super tax rate for the super rich makes a lot of sense. Here's why:
First of all, as Suroweicki points out, the rich have been getting richer. And income inequality when it gets to extremes can add to all types of social ills like reducing the quality of healthcare and education.

Between 2002 and 2007, for instance, the bottom ninety-nine per cent of incomes grew 1.3 per cent a year in real terms—while the incomes of the top one per cent grew ten per cent a year. That one per cent accounted for two-thirds of all income growth in those years. People in the ninety-fifth to the ninety-ninth percentiles of income have represented a fairly constant share of the national income for twenty-five years now. But in that period the top one per cent has seen its share of national income double; in 2007, it captured twenty-three per cent of the nation's total income. Even within the top one per cent, income is getting more concentrated: the top 0.1 per cent of earners have seen their share of national income triple over the same period. All by themselves, they now earn as much as the bottom hundred and twenty million people. So at the same time that the rich have been pulling away from the middle class, the very rich have been pulling away from the pretty rich, and the very, very rich have been pulling away from the very rich.
While I know this is a little bit of a third rail, if taxes can redistribute some of that wealth at the very high end of the income ladder to social programs that end up improving education or paying for healthcare reform or creating jobs, that would be a good thing. Again, I know people hate this idea of redistributing wealth, but consider what that money is doing now. It is adding to our economic problems not helping. For the most part it is not money being spent and trickling down. Instead it just adds to that global pool of money that sloshes around our financial markets and creates all types of bubbles. So before that money was driving up the cost of houses. Now it is creating bubbles in gold and cotton and, if you believe it, Treasury bonds that could lead to other financial collapses. So not only does all that money concentrated with the rich not help us, it actually makes our economy prone to booms and busts, and less stable.
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Doesn't prove that the rich use proportionally more of the "general wealth." This is another subject entirely.

As for the ultra wealthy paying the same proportion on taxes, that is just not true.

Warren Buffett, world's second richest man and leading American entrepreneur, testified he paid a 16.5 percent federal tax rate on his billions while middle class workers at his company paid 25 percent. I include an illustration below from MoveOn.org that highlights Warren's point: tax loopholes and laws allow millionaires to pay as little as 15 percent while middle class workers pay 25 - 28 percent. Mr. Buffett added recently:
There's class warfare, all right, but it's my class, the rich class, that's making war and we're winning.
America's Wealthy Wage War Against the Middle Class

But Kyl does work hard for his friends. He would like to repeal the estate tax, so the country's millionaires and billionaires wouldn't ever have to pay their fair share of the tax burden. Most of them pay almost no taxes during their lifetimes--especially if their wealth is inherited and most of their income is financial. They get preferential rates for the taxes they do pay, they devise all kinds of scheme to defer payment (using loans to monetize assets that need not be sold til after death), and yet are the primary beneficiaries of the governmental stability and economy that ordinary folks' taxes pay for. The Republicans set the estate tax to return in 2011 at the pre-Bush tax cut rates and exemption levels.
ataxingmatter: Estate Tax--Kyl continues working for the ultra wealthy
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Someone's never heard of anecdotal evidence. Show me the statistics if you want to prove anything.
 
ender1 said:
No. I do find it offencive that people would leave this country if taxes go up. That the only thing this country has to offer is lower taxes. All I can think of is the people who gave thier lives to protect this country. Patriots who gave the ultimate sacrifice not for personal gain but for freedom. Freedom that gave these people the ability to aquired great wealth. So now that they have to give some back they say "Oh this is unfair I am leaving"

Good, I want them to leave. They have just spit on me, my family and my country. Good riddance. To me they are cowards and cry babys and we are better off without them.
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what statist nonsense. People have a duty to get looted by greedy politicians?
 
phattonez said:
Big corporations have gotten rich because of sweetheart deals with the government. There's no point in denying that. Corruption is a disgusting habit in this country.
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some have, some have not

silly generalization.
 
phattonez said:
Doesn't prove that the rich use proportionally more of the "general wealth." This is another subject entirely.



Someone's never heard of anecdotal evidence. Show me the statistics if you want to prove anything.
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the BUffett nonsense has been put to bed

he pays higher rates of taxes on like income than anyone making less than 250K

that he structures his income into lower taxed dividend or capital gains means he does pay less than say someone making 600K in salary alone but he still pays the same rate on salary as that other person and more on his salary than his secretary

he also pays millions in taxes-he sure doesn't use millions in government services
 
TurtleDude said:
some have, some have not

silly generalization.
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Regulations helps ALL big businesses. Not some, all. Small businesses have a tougher time dealing with regulation than large ones.
 
phattonez said:
Regulations helps ALL big businesses. Not some, all. Small businesses have a tougher time dealing with regulation than large ones.
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true, just as union wages hurt smaller businesses

but claiming that big businesses are helped because they are more able to handle red tape is not an argument in favor of government

BBL
 
TurtleDude said:
true, just as union wages hurt smaller businesses

but claiming that big businesses are helped because they are more able to handle red tape is not an argument in favor of government

BBL
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Who's been claiming that?
 
Mertex, seriously? I hope you understand that people get what they work for and some do not. But still who said anything about life being fair? What people deserve is the chance and people in the states do have that chance. I just see a lot of people in this thread who are complaining about not being rich so they get angry for the rich being rich. You gotta hustle if you want money. Or get a degree that does not have tens of thousands of people studying like something in Eng.
 
phattonez said:
Regulations helps ALL big businesses. Not some, all. Small businesses have a tougher time dealing with regulation than large ones.
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It looks like you are claiming that big businesses are helped because they are more able to handle red tape. After reading back through the other posts, I assume you are protesting that you are not arguing in favor of the government.

Ok, but I think you're wrong to assume that ALL big businesses got that way by getting sweetheart deals from the government.
 
phattonez said:
Doesn't prove that the rich use proportionally more of the "general wealth." This is another subject entirely.
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You said in your post that I responded to that you knew they benefitted more, so now you are changing your stance?

phattonez said:
I mean, the rich do benefit more, but they pay the same proportion of their income, so a higher total amount.
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Someone's never heard of anecdotal evidence. Show me the statistics if you want to prove anything.
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Why don't you show me some evidence that they don't. I at least gave you some credible articles, you haven't provided squat, just deflection.
 
TurtleDude said:
what statist nonsense. People have a duty to get looted by greedy politicians?
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And what kind of nonsense would this be? "People have a duty to get looted by greedy corporations, the ultra wealthy and the politicians that coddle them."
 
Ever heard this joke?


G0d comes to the White House and tells the President that he's going to end the world in 48 hours. The Prez holds a press conference. The newspapers and TV news shows all go with some variation of this headline...

"G0d says world to end tomorrow.... women, minorities and the poor hardest hit by the news." :mrgreen:
 
mertex said:
And what kind of nonsense would this be? "People have a duty to get looted by greedy corporations, the ultra wealthy and the politicians that coddle them."
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we get the fact you don't do very well in the current system

blaming corporations for your failure to prosper is lame
 
FederalRepublic said:
Ok, but I think you're wrong to assume that ALL big businesses got that way by getting sweetheart deals from the government.
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Not all (I can't claim all with any certainty), but many. And they all benefit from regulations. The solution isn't more government, it's much, much less.
 
mertex said:
You said in your post that I responded to that you knew they benefitted more, so now you are changing your stance?
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A progressive tax rate would require non-direct proportionality. Prove it.

Why don't you show me some evidence that they don't. I at least gave you some credible articles, you haven't provided squat, just deflection.
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Proving a negative is impossible. Prove your claim.
 
mertex said:
And what kind of nonsense would this be? "People have a duty to get looted by greedy corporations, the ultra wealthy and the politicians that coddle them."
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No corporation takes your money by force. None.

The government, however . . .
 
TurtleDude said:
we get the fact you don't do very well in the current system
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you cite this as fact, counsel. then establish this fact. show us that he does not do well

blaming corporations for your failure to prosper is lame
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what is your evidence to establish that he does not prosper

and being unable to provide proof of your "facts", you might do well to ponder this excerpt from the distionary.com definition of projection:
... 11. Psychology . a. the tendency to ascribe to another person feelings, thoughts, or attitudes present in oneself, or to regard external reality as embodying such feelings, thoughts, etc., in some way.
b. Psychoanalysis . such an ascription relieving the ego of a sense of guilt or other intolerable feeling.
...
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phattonez said:
He just wants a libertarian that shows arguments in favor of the current system as I usually do against the interventionists, but you don't hold back and you say that you don't defend this system either. It's a perfectly valid position.
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Then please give another solution. The poor dont have any, the middle class is going broke. I want lower taxes for everyone and a government that lets its adult citizens to be free to choose the life they want. But how do we pay back the 13 plus trillion in debt we have.
 
TurtleDude said:
the BUffett nonsense has been put to bed

he pays higher rates of taxes on like income than anyone making less than 250K
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Put some facts out to back up your nonsense.

Twenty years later, the capital gains tax breaks are back with a vengeance-- the top tax rate on capital gains is 15 percent, less than half the 35 percent top rate on regular income-- and Berkshire Hathaway chairman Warren Buffett is ringing the same bell:
Last year, Buffett said, he was taxed at 17.7 percent on his taxable income of more than $46 million. His receptionist was taxed at about 30 percent.
By most accounts, the driving factor behind his super-low tax rate is that virtually all of his income comes in the form of capital gains.

Talking Taxes: Buffett: The Rich Pay Too Little

that he structures his income into lower taxed dividend or capital gains means he does pay less than say someone making 600K in salary alone but he still pays the same rate on salary as that other person and more on his salary than his secretary
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What you mean is "he would pay the same" - what you fail to acknowledge is that most wealthy people don't. Not if their earnings mostly come from capital gains.

he also pays millions in taxes-he sure doesn't use millions in government services
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The government plays an important part in helping him make his riches. Sure, he probably doesn't have to use Medicare, but you're fixed on the social programs alone. I already listed all the benefits people like Buffett derive from our form of government, that you want to deny it just shows thickheadness and unwillingness to give up the nonsense that rich people hoarding more of their money helps you and me and the country. It has been proven wrong.

They still enjoyed their tax cuts in 2008 and 2009, so where are the jobs that allowing them a lower tax rate brings? Where are the businesses that are supposed to be stirred by their tax cuts. If it wasn't for Obama's recent bill to help small businesses get loans, they wouldn't be able to because banks weren't lending, the rich people are hoarding their money, the only thing they are stimulating is their own bank accounts.
 
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