Eat the rich! Not so fast.

ORLY!?!

Master Loader
With all the turmoil going on throught the world. All the question about taxing the rich. And even regular folks and the rich concerned about their future in retirement. I bring you a video that will strike as all down as the the whereabouts of cash in our country.

http://www.theblaze.com/blog/2011/03/31/eat-the-rich-not-so-fast/

I apologize for bringing you another link from the blaze. But this has to been seen and thought about. Plus this video loads up faster here on the blaze then it does youtube, weird.

The time is coming, friends. That all we can conceive now is a lie. The blame to others is a lie and only a political standard of assualt against the wealthy. While Micheal Moore pours sweat out of every orifice and reminds us the country isnt broke but full of wealth and cash. Our government is the biggest of wheeler and dealers of wealth and spending it of all time.
 

curiousbrain

Well-Known Member
I could do a point by point rebuttal, but I think that would be very longwinded - even for me.

I will say, however, that there are a lot of singularly interesting statistics contained in that video; however, the way in which they are put together, and the conclusions reached, I disagree with.

For example, there is a point in the beginning where he takes all the revenue of the Fortune 500 companies and that just cracks February; but, later, when he takes the earnings of the American households which earn above 250k - what he implies is a meager 1.93% of the population - he generates 1.4 trillion bucks and knocks out about 4.5 - 5 months. That speaks volumes, I think, about the wealth gap. A case could be made that that is the way capitalism works (a case I might agree with), but to gloss over that fact is indicative of the bias.

Another example is that the government has to pay for everything the second it happens - which, as most who work at UPS know, there is a difference between the way things should be and the way things are operationally. Practically, the government is a master at kicking the can down the road, and rarely pays for things up front. Not to mention the fact that private investors pour money into the government through bonds, and it's not like the government is paying "out of pocket" for all these things it does per annum.

I like the video, don't get me wrong, but I wish it took a more honest look (edit: or, what I personally perceive to be honest - which is entirely subjective) at the issues - at the risk of being 90 minutes, instead of nine.

edit x2: Current Events forum?
 
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ORLY!?!

Master Loader
I could do a point by point rebuttal, but I think that would be very longwinded - even for me.

I will say, however, that there are a lot of singularly interesting statistics contained in that video; however, the way in which they are put together, and the conclusions reached, I disagree with.

For example, there is a point in the beginning where he takes all the revenue of the Fortune 500 companies and that just cracks February; but, later, when he takes the earnings of the American households which earn above 250k - what he implies is a meager 1.93% of the population - he generates 1.4 trillion bucks and knocks out about 4.5 - 5 months. That speaks volumes, I think, about the wealth gap. A case could be made that that is the way capitalism works (a case I might agree with), but to gloss over that fact is indicative of the bias.

Another example is that the government has to pay for everything the second it happens - which, as most who work at UPS know, there is a difference between the way things should be and the way things are operationally. Practically, the government is a master at kicking the can down the road, and rarely pays for things up front. Not to mention the fact that private investors pour money into the government through bonds, and it's not like the government is paying "out of pocket" for all these things it does per annum.

I like the video, don't get me wrong, but I wish it took a more honest look (edit: or, what I personally perceive to be honest - which is entirely subjective) at the issues - at the risk of being 90 minutes, instead of nine.

edit x2: Current Events forum?

Its only a short overview to that is earned, spent and what government spends.

Between small buisness and large buisness. There really isnt much difference. One gets taxed more then the other, depending how much they earn a year. The rich pay about 97% of the taxes in this country, due to how much they earn. Sure, look at it as they only get 20% while the rest of us get 32%. The problem there is they earn more thus pay more.

Most of these thoughts about percentage are based on the census. Age, sex and income apply. Thus mathmatics take place in percentage. It really doesnt mean an exact figure, but it does speculate towards that.

The short flim makes it obvious there is no way every American, no matter how rich or well off, could support the hunger of what this nation spends on a weekly basis. That the real fatcats are those in washington only to make it seem like everyone else should be the target.
 

TearsInRain

IE boogeyman
you can make whatever arguments you want, history has proven that taxing the rich at high levels is good for the economy and society in general

maybe it's not "fair", whatever that means, maybe it doesn't seem to make sense numbers-wise, but once you factor in human psychology, it works, and it has always worked

the reverse, giving tax breaks to the rich, has historically resulted in recession, economic bubbles, and social unrest

humans will never be perfect, profit-seeking, rationalizing, Ayn Rand-type heroes (can't form a society on sociopathy), so you might as well get used to it
 

curiousbrain

Well-Known Member
you can make whatever arguments you want, history has proven that taxing the rich at high levels is good for the economy and society in general

maybe it's not "fair", whatever that means, maybe it doesn't seem to make sense numbers-wise, but once you factor in human psychology, it works, and it has always worked

the reverse, giving tax breaks to the rich, has historically resulted in recession, economic bubbles, and social unrest

Thus, the fundamental problem of any person (especially for politicians) attempting to make a point/counterpoint: Prove it.
 

TearsInRain

IE boogeyman
Thus, the fundamental problem of any person (especially for politicians) attempting to make a point/counterpoint: Prove it.

you don't really get the meaning of a debate, do you?

but here,
on inequality:
http://www.reuters.com/article/2010/10/22/us-usa-economy-inequality-idUSTRE69L0KI20101022
on rich-psych:
http://www.cracked.com/article_18777_5-scientific-reasons-powerful-people-will-always-suck.html
and some political psych that connects, if you can see it:
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2011/03/18/3167785.htm
 

curiousbrain

Well-Known Member

You misconstrued the kernel of what I was trying to say: which is that you used phrases like "historically", "it has always", and "history has proven". Those are commonly used misnomer phrases; if you are going to use such phrases, the least you could do would be to offer an example or two that provide backing to such claims; as any sane person involved in a debate would (although, according to your criteria, that does not include me).

Additionally, my point was to highlight that most politicians use phrases similar to the ones listed above, and yet they make the exact opposite points. How can that be? Because the same datasets can be warped to support either side.

I do understand what a debate is, and I never said I disagreed or agreed with you, my comment was made to highlight the relative absurdity of trying to prove to anyone that anything is "historically" accurate in todays (political) context.
 
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Babagounj

Strength through joy
(Briefing Room) — President Obama’s 2012 campaign manager is asking top donors to give more money than they did during Obama’s first presidential campaign.
Jim Messina has been asking donors to contribute “north of $750 million,” according to the Chicago Sun-Times, which is about the amount Obama raised during his first presidential campaign. Some political observers have estimated Obama might need to raise as much as $1 billion this time around.
Individually, top Obama donors are reportedly being asked to donate $350,000 each, divided between Obama’s reelection campaign and to the Democratic National Committee, which is $100,000 more than they did on average in 2008.
 

ORLY!?!

Master Loader
(Briefing Room) — President Obama’s 2012 campaign manager is asking top donors to give more money than they did during Obama’s first presidential campaign.
Jim Messina has been asking donors to contribute “north of $750 million,” according to the Chicago Sun-Times, which is about the amount Obama raised during his first presidential campaign. Some political observers have estimated Obama might need to raise as much as $1 billion this time around.
Individually, top Obama donors are reportedly being asked to donate $350,000 each, divided between Obama’s reelection campaign and to the Democratic National Committee, which is $100,000 more than they did on average in 2008.

Yes sir, the cap on moneies raised and spent for presidential campaign is set at 600,000$. Yet Macain campaign was said to have spent just the cap, Obamas was said to send upwards onto or over a billion dollars. Its like superstars in the NBA. While one no name joe gets called for traveling for taking two steps. L james ( seen oftenly ) takes an obvious 3 or even 4 steps and never gets called for it.

I voted for macain because it was the lesser of two evils. Yet i'm glad Obama did get in or else they wouldve blamed everything on republicans again.

But ill explain next post about taxing the rich.
 
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ORLY!?!

Master Loader
you can make whatever arguments you want, history has proven that taxing the rich at high levels is good for the economy and society in general

maybe it's not "fair", whatever that means, maybe it doesn't seem to make sense numbers-wise, but once you factor in human psychology, it works, and it has always worked

the reverse, giving tax breaks to the rich, has historically resulted in recession, economic bubbles, and social unrest

humans will never be perfect, profit-seeking, rationalizing, Ayn Rand-type heroes (can't form a society on sociopathy), so you might as well get used to it

The rich get a break because they pay more taxes then the middle and lower classes. Thus there are willing to spend more back into development, either into their own company, into others or making new ones. In a successful economy, the rich provide taxes, jobs and securities onto retirement.
A country that gets more taxes does one thing with them, and thats spend, spend and spend some more. They hardly go anywhere else, such as into the pockets of the lowerclass. Spent on such things as infrastructure, like China has done with more bail out and tax money, as seen in this video.

http://utopianist.com/2011/04/chinas-deserted-mega-city-the-legacy-of-ghost-towns/

Obviously thats what China and any other country will do with extra money laying around. The same is said for America, as they panned out and cooked the books for people to own homes which the banks knew they could never pay for. Yet more of the blame goes towards on the crash to gas prices reaching record highs, thus uncovering everything else out there which government has pulled the wool over our eyes about this for years now. Which that topic being " where did the money go " allowing a host of scumbags out there to get even more media attention to come out and say " THE RICH DID IT, LETS EAT THEM ".

I'm sorry for posting this thread at UPS discussion. I thought more readers would be there at first, thus making your mods work a little harder at moving it where one might please.
 

wkmac

Well-Known Member
Liberal and progressive online journals over the past week or so have been buzzing — rightfully so — about the recent revelation that General Electric paid no corporate income tax at all in 2010. According to a recent GAO report, about a quarter of the largest American corporations paid no corporate income tax in 2005.
But that’s really just the way the system is set up. If you think about it, the corporate income tax really isn’t all that progressive. Just about all the tax loopholes and other tricks for avoiding taxation tend to favor the big boys at the expense of everyone else. Perhaps the single best way to avoid taxes is for transnationals to shuffle income to subsidiaries in the lowest-taxed jurisdictions, so transnationals already have a leg up on the smaller companies that operate primarily in the United States. And if you look at the largest tax deductions and tax credits, they go overwhelmingly to companies that are capital-intensive (the writeoff for depreciation), high tech (the R&D tax credit), or heavily involved in mergers and acquisitions (the deduction for interest on corporate debt).
What’s more, the largest corporations are least likely to suffer for whatever corporate income taxes they do pay, because they tend to be in oligopoly industries that practice tacit pricing collusion through the “price leader” system. This doesn’t require any conspiracies or secret meetings in smoke-filled rooms. When three, four or five large firms control more than half the market in a given industry, they tend to follow the pricing practices of the dominant firm. So prices in an oligopoly market are “stickier.” The practical effect is that the big firms in an oligopoly industry are able to use administered pricing based on a markup from their costs — including the corporate income tax — and pass them on to the customers. That’s essentially the same thing a regulated public utility does.
So the largest corporations are more likely to be able to just pass their taxes on to the consumer as a markup, and set themselves an after-tax profit over and above those expenses. Smaller corporations in the competitive sector, on the other hand, are price-takers rather than price-makers. This means that the corporate income tax on the large companies is mostly paid by the customer as part of the markup, whereas the smaller firms take more of a hit on their profits.
In other words, the “progressive” agenda of closing corporate income tax loopholes and raising rates on the big boys will have the unintended consequence of raising prices on the consumer without affecting corporate profits.
So what’s the solution?

Progressives Need to Rethink the Corporate Income Tax

IMO before one fully buys into the fallacy that taxation is just the means to make things aright again, one best fully understand the nature of Corporate Liberalism and the lessons of Corp. and Gov't collusions from Star Wars!

Remembering Corporate Liberalism
 

Babagounj

Strength through joy
Yes sir, the cap on moneies raised and spent for presidential campaign is set at 600,000$. Yet Macain campaign was said to have spent just the cap, Obamas was said to send upwards onto or over a billion dollars.
Yes there is a cap but only for those who take the federal gov't $$.
Which both said that they would, but bho changed his tune and excepted $$ for everyone in the world.
 

ORLY!?!

Master Loader
If taxes where to be set on those larger companies in turn you get wild inflation. Thats the ending cause of this. Both sides of the isle know this better then the average American. The bleeding heart Democrats and progressives make more of a show that they are fighting for the little guy, You know those types of people that up against those over paid CEOs, Bill Gates and various other examples out there.

Yet we tend to forget that those people making the big bucks turn others into rich and wealthy people. I mean come on, how many people has Bill Gates made fabulously wealthy? How many will become rich from his ideas and concepts. Only those willing to work with them, by them. Americans seem to be too damn lazy or dumb to understand that one cant have it all right now. That spending more then you make seems like a good terms to retire from. Thus they need more programs for it, 401k, pension plans etc etc.

Alike those school teachers in Wisconsin. If anyone be so kind to fetch some figures on how much they make yearly. They make enough money, yet they want more. Teachers always say they need more money, benefits and retirement perks. Well here in Florida the average teacher makes about 50,000 a year just from teaching. Thus granting them half pay after 30 years in. Now when a mass of them retire, you will be spending a ton on people just sitting at home and collecting. This is happening all over the united states. Before you know it the stuff hits the fan and someone wants to fix the problem by not spending as much or cutting back.

The numbers speak for themselves. If one would just peer into the budget planning for the USA it would make you all sick. Not to menction that most of it ends up and vanishes up into thin air.
 

ORLY!?!

Master Loader
Yes there is a cap but only for those who take the federal gov't $$.
Which both said that they would, but bho changed his tune and excepted $$ for everyone in the world.

Yep, btw love your sig, its the truth.

Funny that anyone could take tax dollars to run for president. That much really isnt enough by Americans standerds today.
 

Jones

fILE A GRIEVE!
Staff member
I don't know where that $600,000 figure is coming from, that's not even close to what either campaign spent. The cap was 84 million if the candidates accepted public financing, but that cap didn't include "soft money" which allowed McCain to actually spend way more than the cap even though though he took the federal money. Obama opted out of the federal money because he had such a monster fundrasing machine that he was still able to outspend Mccain by about 2 to 1 even with soft money factored in.
 

curiousbrain

Well-Known Member
To focus on the theory that "rich people create jobs" - what has always bothered me about that is then why is there any unemployment at all?

If wealth begets wealth, and the richest nation in the world has unemployment, then what hope is there for the rest of the world?
 
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