US Politics

[TheMightyEthan]

But the thing is hard work doesn't automatically transform into wealth, even when it's something society very much needs. Just look at farmers, work their asses off to produce products without which we would all die, yet they're lucky if at the end of the season they've got enough money to plant again next year.

 

That's a bit of a stereotype. There are plenty of farmers or even farming corporations that do pretty darn good for themselves.

 

Yes, you need government regulation to make sure that there is a chance for people to advance in the world. I think sometimes conservatives forget this. I do however think there is plenty of room for people in america to work hard and get ahead. I studied engineering and make decent money doing it. Would I have bothered to go through all that schooling if I could have made just as much money by working at gamestop? No, I would not. It was the incentive of money that made me go do engineering and it's because so few other people can't or wont bother to be engineers that I make good money for doing it. Would you have bothered to go through all the extra years of law school and the bar exam and all of that if you weren't going to be compensated for all of it? I doubt it.

 

Well I'm not saying we should flatten everyone's income to $40k across the board or anything like that, I'm just saying that we should be providing certain things for those who can't afford it, and that people who make more money are in a better position to give up some of it. I also didn't mean to imply that hard work has nothing to do with your wealth, just that they're not directly proportional.

 

*Edit* - And actually the main reason I went to law school was to try and find something I would enjoy doing. At the time I didn't think I'd make any more money as a lawyer than I would have as an engineer (though then the 2008 crash happened and lots of engineers started getting laid off, but that's just luck, it had nothing to do with me working harder).

Edited March 16, 2012 by TheMightyEthan

[madbassman39]

But your not taking all of their extra earnings from them.

 

Lets say you tax an average of 20% (all numbers are made up so I don't have to use a calculator) on someone who makes 200k (person A), then they pay 40k in taxes. You tax someone 10% of 75k (person B), they pay 7.5k in taxes. Those making 200k still have 160k to spend on what every they want, those making 75k still have 67.5k on what ever they want.

 

Who has the opportunity to spend on a wealthier life style? Person A can spend 160k, Person B can spend 67.5K. Person A can chose to live an identical life style as Person B, but Person A will have 92.5k dollars extra a year to spend on what ever they want.

 

I am not saying tax Person A 62.5% and Person B 0% so they both end up with 75k. In my scenario Person A can live a much better life style, even though they pay twice as many taxes (percentage wise) than Person B

[Yantelope V2]

Yes, your numbers are sound. I'm arguing that just because that person can live fine on more money doesn't make it okay to take a larger percentage of their money. In my book "because they can afford it" doesn't make it an okay reason to make one person fork over a larger % of their income than the guy next to him. The whole reason for a % tax is just that, everyone is paying an identical level of money in relation to what they make.

 

The only argument I can see you making is that there is some baseline of acceptable living and everything above that is luxury. 60k is enough to buy a house and two cars and live well but 100k is 40k more than that and they can be spending it on whatever they want! The only point I'm trying to make is that while it seems an extra 40k of money is enough to buy you another house and double your wealth expenses don't really scale like that. Ask anyone who has a family. As life goes you tend to make more money but you never seem to build up a ton of money in the bank mostly because as the typical family grows its expenses grow. If I am single making 60k I would have way more spending money than if I am married and have two kids and make 80k. I used to think in college that if I made 60k I'd be super comfortable and have nothing to worry about money wise but now that I have a mortgage and two cars (both used, one paid off) and my second kid on the way I can tell you that expenses compond as you get older and try and build your wealth so if my tax burden were to double as my wealth had grown steadily it would definitely hurt me.

[deanb]

But no one said you had to have two kids and two cars. If you're having kids you can't afford that's kinda your own fault.

Also does US not have any form of tax credits/child benefits for families?

[TheMightyEthan]

It does, but they haven't been raised since the 70's (IIRC, I could be wrong. It's been a long time is the point).

[Mr. GOH!]

All I'm saying, yant, is that without the current set of laws, the distribution of wealth would be different. Indeed, without any laws enforcing contracts and providing a solid underlying order, businesses would not create as much wealth. Thus the current wealthy benefit from the law. We all get the stability, but the wealthy get the capital. They are not the Elect, ordained by God. They are clever folks, perhaps, but ultimately beneficiaries of the underlying social order.

 

Just because we believe in evolution does not mean that we believe in social Darwinism. Evolution is value-free and operates blindly as a function of the universe. Just because a thing survives does not mean it is morally good.The social order, unlike physical laws, is amenable to change and direction, preferably by agreement among its members.

Edited March 17, 2012 by Mr. GOH!

[Battra92]

But no one said you had to have two kids and two cars. If you're having kids you can't afford that's kinda your own fault.

Also does US not have any form of tax credits/child benefits for families?

 

http://www.irs.gov/newsroom/article/0,,id=106182,00.html

The Child Tax Credit is an important tax credit that may be worth as much as $1,000 per qualifying child depending upon your income.

 

If I could fix the tax code, I would change it to be less based on income and more based on consumption. The problem is that the income tax is used more as a social welfare system and not to run essential government programs such as the military and the interstate highway system.

 

Prior to the income tax the Feds got most of their money from tax on alcohol but as more and more towns and states went dry they had to find a new source of income.

[Mister Jack]

http://www.theonion.com/articles/voters-slowly-realizing-santorum-believes-every-de,27518/

[Yantelope V2]

http://www.theonion....every-de,27518/

 

Everytime I hear about another one of Obama's programs I think of this.

 

http://www.theonion.com/video/in-the-know-should-the-government-stop-dumping-mon,14289/

[Faiblesse Des Sens]

Why blame Obama for that? That's been true of every politician ever.

[Luftwaffles]

Whenever I hear people get mad about how much Obama's spending, I sort of wonder where they were for the 8 years prior to his election.

[Battra92]

We were there. Many Republicans stayed home in 2006 simply because they were frustrated with Republicans acting like Democrats.

 

I also find it amusing that many of my Democrat acquaintances are still bringing up Bush as if he was running again. He's sort of the Farmer Jones for Napoleon Obama.

[Thursday Next]

Why amusing? He was the last Republican President and the last President. They say you're only as good as your last whatever so bringing up Bush will continue until the US elects another Republican, or at least someone who is not Obama.

[Yantelope V2]

Whenever I hear people get mad about how much Obama's spending, I sort of wonder where they were for the 8 years prior to his election.

 

Just because we're republicans doesn't mean we we are only mad at democrats over spending. There were plenty of people, myself included, who were not happy with the spending that the republicans did in the 2000's. G.W. Bush was not a fiscal conservative.

[Luftwaffles]

Whenever I hear people get mad about how much Obama's spending, I sort of wonder where they were for the 8 years prior to his election.

 

Just because we're republicans doesn't mean we we are only mad at democrats over spending. There were plenty of people, myself included, who were not happy with the spending that the republicans did in the 2000's. G.W. Bush was not a fiscal conservative.

Many Republicans stayed home in 2006 simply because they were frustrated with Republicans acting like Democrats.

 

But you seem to think of excessive spending as a democrat thing to do?

 

I know those are Battra's words, not yours, but it seems unreasonable to think of spending as historically worse for one party than another.

[Yantelope V2]

It seems to me that democrats more than republicans want to expand spending as much as possible. The exception to this is the military which Republicans always seem to want to expand. I think there is waste in all branches of the government including the military. The problem is that so many republicans have bought into wasteful spending on education, welfare, medicare, dept. of energy, those sorts of things. Yes, you're right, the parties today are more similar than they used to be. Reagan ran on a campaign of eliminating the dept. of energy and the dept. of education and was unable to kill either one. Most of these big expensive departments have been set up by democrats though as I recall. Carter for one started the DOE I believe.

[TheMightyEthan]

Especially considering that under Clinton we were running a surplus (yes I realize the economy was doing a lot better then too).

 

*Edit* - That was @Sporkwaffles.

Edited March 19, 2012 by TheMightyEthan

[TheMightyEthan]

Here's an interesting graph (from Wikipedia):

 

 

It looks like up through WWII the perception that Democrats spend and Republicans cut back was fairly accurate, but after that it kind of breaks down.

 

*Edit* - To be clear that's debt and not spending, and the debt can also be lowered by increasing revenue rather than decreasing spending.

 

Another trend I'm noticing is that it seems that during good economic times (20's, 50's-60's, 90's) the debt tends to come down, and during bad times (30's, now) and major wars (WWI, WWII) it tends to go up. There is that 80's increase that seems to go against that though.

Edited March 19, 2012 by TheMightyEthan

[Luftwaffles]

I'm just kind of in the camp that spending is neither inherently republican or democrat, spending is just something done in office.

 

Republicans spend. Democrats spend. Sometimes democrats spend more. Sometimes republicans spend more. It just seems odd to assign the title of spending more to a single party when really, spending is just something politicians do.

[Yantelope V2]

Well, it seems to me that right now the Democrats wish to go on spending more and the Republicans are campaign to spend less so if you ask how that affects me then I'm inclined to vote for someone who will cut spending.

[TheMightyEthan]

Yeah, I guess when they say that what I hear is "we'll cut spending on social programs but increase military/law enforcement spending" which is :/

Edited March 19, 2012 by TheMightyEthan
Can't find right emote.

[Yantelope V2]

Yes, there need to be cuts around the board. Any reasonable conservative should agree that there is plenty of waste in the military budget. I'm not an expert to say what cuts should be made but yes, there is a lot of waste in the military just like every other operation the government runs.

[Battra92]

Especially considering that under Clinton we were running a surplus (yes I realize the economy was doing a lot better then too).

 

Well a lot of that can be attributed to Newt Gingrich and congress. Hell, I'd take another Clinton back in office if we had the 92 Congress back!

 

There are two types of Republicans, really. There are the fiscally conservative Republicans (Jim DeMint, Marco Rubio, Rand Paul etc.) and there are those who really just want to be in charge and manage the big government (John McCain and George H. W. Bush) Then there are the centrist types like Olympia Snowe and Scott Brown. W was all over the board and it's hard to pin him down as far as fiscal issues are concerned.

 

What I find amusing is how people rail and howl against the Bush tax cuts forget that Obama extended them (with a Democrat congress no less.)

[Battra92]

Yes, there need to be cuts around the board. Any reasonable conservative should agree that there is plenty of waste in the military budget. I'm not an expert to say what cuts should be made but yes, there is a lot of waste in the military just like every other operation the government runs.

 

Indeed.

 

One branch of the Federal government that should be modernized, changed and given a complete overhaul is the Post Office. If ever there was a better example of government mismanagement it's the Post Office. While their business model worked relatively well (never once receiving Federal funds) when they had a monopoly for over 200 years, it's obvious that something is broken if they can't turn a profit. FedEx and UPS seem to do just fine and they have to pay sales, gas, property and other taxes while the post office, IIRC, does not.

[TheMightyEthan]

They would be turning a profit if Congress weren't using them as a piggy bank, making them pre-pay 75 years worth of retirement benefits. They were turning a profit until that law was passed.