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Originally Posted by jimhcom
The problem of disparity of wealth is one that has been studied thru the ages.
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Congratulations. You have mistakenly conflated wealth with earnings. They are not the same thing. The vast majority of millionaires are millionaires on paper only. They do not have millions of dollars in cash, rather they have millions of dollars in assets. Cash is an asset, but not all assets are cash. Their wealth is derived from their asset holdings, which would include real estate, stocks, bonds, precious metals and other tangibles and intangibles.
I know a millionaire. What did she do? Absolutely nothing.
Her father died and left her (an only child) 140 acres of land in Colerain Township. At the time, land sold for $1,800 per acre. About 12 years later the land was selling for $22,400 an acre. The land was worth $3,136,000 which made her a multimillionaire.
So, you would punish her for her evilness, and her brutality against the working man.
And what did she do? Nothing. She didn't wave a magic wand and chant a spell to make the land worth that much, nor did she bribe members of Congress, instead
you made it worth that much.
The oppressed Middle Class and its infantile desire to own 4,400 sq ft McMansions. That's what drove up the price of the land.
The oppressed Middle Class did it, not her.
Quote:
Originally Posted by jimhcom
The first thing we need to understand is that there are people in this world to which money, and the power money represents, is an addiction.
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Okay, then the proper solution is to set up and establish proper controls and mechanism to prevent abuses, not engage in mass punishment and punish the vast majority who do not engage in such abuses.
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Originally Posted by jimhcom
We now also see the beginnings of revolution throughout Europe and in the US.
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No, absolutely not. What you are seeing is merely mass protests, not revolutions. Revolution means "change."
If a fox is preying on your hens, the correct course of action is to erect a fence, a barrier, around your hens, not go to the fox's lair and chant "Kum-ba-ya" for hours on end.
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Originally Posted by jimhcom
There is simply no justification for any person to earn 2000X the median wage.
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Yes, there is. The fact that you are unable or unwilling to justify it doesn't mean that it cannot be justified.
If one person saved the Earth from an asteroid impact, and total annihilation, how much are their efforts worth to you?
It would be worth at least as much money as you made the rest of your life, and all of the assets you acquired, since you would not have been able to earn anything or acquire any assets unless that person saved the Earth.
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Originally Posted by jimhcom
No one on earth is worth that.
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I just disproved your thesis.
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Originally Posted by jimhcom
If a company can afford to pay a CEO 50 million, then they are not paying their rank and file who actually earn the companies profits enough. It is just that simple.
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No, they are paying their employees enough.
You're only looking that $17/hour the average American gets as "pay." You aren't looking at the $28/hour the average American gets as "compensation." Based on the information from BLS, the total pay and compensation for the average American hourly worker is $48/hour.
The real question is, how much will you earn over the course of your life-time, and how many assets will you acquire precisely because that CEO gets $50 Million per year?
You could replace the $50 Million CEO with a $3 Million CEO, but then you might lose your job and your home would be foreclosed upon, and your credit rating damaged, your life-style impeded and degraded.
How much is that worth to you?
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Originally Posted by jimhcom
While it is impossible to ever expect a company to fairly compensate all employees, taxation is the only available means to stop the ever-increasing greed and injustice.
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That's an absurd proposition.
In the first place, "fair" is highly subjective. There is no way to quantify or qualify "fair" because it is subjective. That which is "fair" is entirely dependent upon the knower, and for 100 people you would have 100 different views of what "fair" is and never be able to reach a consensus.
You also display an incredible ignorance of basic economics.
I might manufacture a product, and no matter what, no one on Earth will pay more than $5 for that product.
Because that is true, it places an inherent limitation on the amount of compensation for my employees.
I would like to pay you $75/hour to come into my fields and pick Bell Peppers, but I can't, because wholesalers will only pay me $1 for each Bell Pepper, because consumers will only pay between $1.49 to $1.99 for Bell Peppers.
And the peppers you pick aren't magically transported to the wholesalers, I have to pay truck drivers to take them to the wholesalers. And the more money I pay you, the more money I have to pay to Social Security, Medicare, unemployment insurance, worker's compensation insurance, your holiday pay and your vacation pay. So $75/hour ends up costing me almost $180/hour.
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Originally Posted by CosmicWizard
jimhcom wrote: While it is impossible to ever expect a company to fairly compensate all employees,....
How do you know it is impossible? Perhaps that is simply a negative expectation.
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No, it's just stupidity. Anyone who believes they deserve more in compensation is totally and completely free to seek such compensation, but that requires courage and the vast majority just don't have what it takes.
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Originally Posted by jimhcom
None of this happened in the 1960's, please explain why?
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But it did happen. You had several recessions because of it and as a result, Kennedy lowered the tax rate from 91% to 70% and government revenues increased, jobs increased, the GDP increased and so on.
And you cannot make such a comparison because the tax code was structured differently.
You are unaware of the number of deductibles from adjusted gross income and tax credits. Earnings taxes paid to cities and counties was deductible, so was State income taxes, city, county and State sales taxes, property taxes, the federal excise tax on tires, the State and federal excise taxes on gasoline, the interest you paid on credit cards, the interest you paid on loans, the interest you paid on mortgages, losses of capital gains, and the number of items that could be counted as a "business expense" were absolutely ridiculous.
So while the paper tax rate was 91%, the real tax rate was closer to 30%-45%, depending on the skill of your accountant and your exact circumstances.
Even after Kennedy lowered the tax rate to 70% and made a few minor adjustments to the tax code, the real tax rate was still 35%-45%.
If you're going to compare tax rates then and now, then you must also compare tax codes.
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Originally Posted by Cletus Awreetus-Awrightus
i am not bothered by the idea that smart , hard - working people achieve great success.
what bothers me is when smart, hard-working people grow so powerful that they are able to change the rules of the game in their favor, to the detriment of society.
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Okay, then again the correct solution is to erect barriers to prevent them from doing so, not punish everyone, even those who do not abuse their power.
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Originally Posted by cdelena
People do not have equal capabilities, responsible behavior, or dedication to earning their own way. Mandating equality in wealth is as stupid as mandating equal height, and destined to fail in ways that will be undesirable to all.
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The vast majority of poor are poor because they make very unsound and unwise financial decisions their entire lives, and because they also make very bad life choices on a repeated basis.
Many also lack motivation. The highlight of their life is to punch the time-clock, go burn a blunt, down a 6-pack and watch Big Time Wrestling or surf the web for porno.
You're not going to gain wealth or advance doing that.
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Originally Posted by Coldjensens
The truely obscenely rich people usually pay little or no taxes and that is not going to change unless the government gives up its ability to try to control people through taxes and goes to a flat tax.
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A Flat Tax is fundamentally unfair.
A lot of you seem to have extreme difficulty grasping a basic reality and truth, and that is that the cost of living and purchasing power parity in the United States is not uniform. It varies from city to city and State to State.
If this would be Luxembourg with 497,000 people and the cost of living and purchasing power parity were uniform through the entire gigantic country of Luxembourg, then you could levy a Flat Tax.
If this would be Denmark population 5.5 Million you could levy a Flat Tax because the cost of living and purchasing power parity are uniform. The same would be true in many other countries.
But this the United
States.
You can rent a double-wide trailer on 4 acres of land for $200/month in Boseman, Montana.
Can you rent a double-wide on 4 acres of land in New York City for $200/month?
No, you cannot. Why not? Because the cost of living and purchasing power parity are not the same.
Wow, what a concept.
Someone earning $150,000 in Ohio is wealthier than someone earning $250,000 in New Jersey. How can that possibly be? Cost of living and purchasing power parity. While the poor fool in New Jersey earning $250,000 and living paycheck-to-paycheck, the person in Ohio earning $150,000 has more disposable income and is not living paycheck-to-paycheck and has a better, richer, fuller life-style than the poor slob in New Jersey could ever dream of.
It's funny how credit card banks rate cities/regions as High COL/Low PPP, High COL/High PPP, Low COL, Low PPP and Low COL/High PPP but the federal government is too stupid to see that.
A Flat Tax would be grotesquely unfair to those living in areas that have an high cost of living, because they already have very little precious discretionary disposable income, and a Flat Tax would take what little they have away from them.
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Originally Posted by jimhcom
I continue to see the same nonsensical arguments that have perpetrated the growing disparity in income and wealth, and yet not a one of you can explain why from the great depression on to the 1980's we had both the highest tax rates and the best standard of living and wages for middle America that we have ever seen.
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That's because you are making a nonsensical comparison.
I and many others have repeatedly explained that the IRS Tax Code in the 1950s was vastly different that it is now.
It has been repeatedly shown that even though the theoretical tax rate was 91%, the real tax rate was 30%-45%, largely due to the extraordinary amount of deductions and credits one could take against adjusted gross income and assessed tax.
Houses in the 1950s were 1,200 to 1,600 sq ft. Today they are 4,000+ sq ft, so who has the higher standard of living?
America did not become a 2-car family until 1974, yet today many families have 3-5 cars, so who has the higher standard of living?
Again you display your ignorance of economics. The US did not fully complete industrialization until the 1960s. Prior to that time, your wages doubling about every 10 years or so would be expected. However, now that you are a post-Industrialized Nation, your wages will no longer double every 10 years. That, in addition to the fact that you have a global economy whether you like it or not, whether you want it or not, or whether you admit it or not, will result in a decline of wages, and there is nothing you can do about it.
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Originally Posted by jimhcom
We had much lower government deficits, we were able to build nearly all the dams, bridges, freeways, levees, and other infrastructure that today are in need of replacement.
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And that was before you had Medicare, and Medicaid, and a Department of Housing and Urban Development with a Section 8 Program, and before Food Stamps, and before you had a Department of Education, and before you had an EPA and before you had an OSHA and before you had a Department of Energy and before you had a Department of Health and Human Services, and before you had a Department of Veteran's Affairs and before you had a lot of spending programs that exist now but did not exist at the time.
You keep ignoring those "minor" details.
Quote:
Originally Posted by jimhcom
We still had wealthy people, just not obscenely wealthy.
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Yes, you did have obscenely wealthy people.
No doubt you live in a fantasy world. In 1976, Pete Rose was the highest paid baseball player earning $660,000 per year.
That is 43 times more than $15,300, which was what, the average salary of the American worker? No, sorry, wrong. $15,300 was the maximum cap on Social Security wages, meaning once you reached $15,300 you no longer paid the Social Security tax. According to SSA, the average wage in 1976 was $9,226.48
In 1955, the average wages was $3,301.44 per year and Social Security capped at $4,200 per year. There were people earning $500,000 to $1 Million in 1955 and minimum wage was $0.75/hour.
Quote:
Originally Posted by jimhcom
Being a stock broker or a real estate salesman is worth considerably less in my book than the blue collar workers repairing the electric lines after a storm or the jet engine mechanic who holds the lives of everyone who flies on the planes he works on. In fact I would go as far as to say a significant percentage of the wealthy deserve to have their wealth taken away.
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Yet without the stock broker or real estate broker, neither the jet engine mechanic nor the linesman would have jobs.
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Originally Posted by CosmicWizard
Dd714 wrote: Can you imagine what your theory will do to medical costs?
I imagine that medical costs would drop significantly if there was real competition in providing those services.
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Let's see. Sisters of Mercy own Mercy Hospital. Sisters of Mercy own Bethesda North Hospital. Sisters of Mercy own Bethesda East Hospital. Sisters of Mercy own Saint Luke East Hospital, and Sisters of Mercy own Saint Luke West Hospital.
Those are five full-service hospitals in the 3 Million population MSA that I live in now.
Sounds like competition to me (not - gag me with a freaking fork).
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Originally Posted by elamigo
No system is perfect, capitalism included.
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What the hell does Capitalism have to do with it?
Capitalism is a
property theory, and nothing more. Capitalism is not an economic system, nor could it ever be, since it is merely a property theory.
Capitalism has no bearing whatsoever on Supply & Demand, except to the extent that the government or others interfere and create impediments or restrictions that reduce either Supply or Demand.
Capitalism does not set or determine the prices of goods and services. That is determined by the economic system (Free Market, Command or Traditional) and by Supply & Demand.
Capitalism does not set or determine wages/salaries. Wages/salaries are a function of Supply & Demand for a particular skill-set and education level, and by the price consumers are willing to pay for a particular service or product.
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Originally Posted by elamigo
Capitalism will have people that will abuse the system at the expense of others.
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No, wrong.
Ever heard of the Soviet Union? The Eastern Territory (officially recognized as the Democratic Republic of Germany - DDR - in 1974 after the Soviets blockaded Berlin)? Romania? Czechoslovakia? Albania? Greece? The list is long and distinguished.
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Originally Posted by elamigo
What I can tell you is that where capitalism exists those countries have become the most successful, have the highest standards of living, have had longer lifespan, better medical systems, less birth deaths, higher caloric intatke, etc.
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That is not just Capitalism. It includes many other factors, such as government interference or the lack of, the geography of the country, the geology of the country, the attitude of its people, the intelligence level of the people, etc, etc, etc.
A "Capitalist country" with stupid consumers and an apathetic stupid electorate is going to fail.
You want proof?
I give you the United States of America.
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Originally Posted by bradykp
the CEO vs Employee gap is a topic because of the gap that exists today as opposed to 30-40 years ago.
i don't agree with what the OP is saying entirely, but the question I ask is why is a CEO today worth so much more than a CEO 30-40 years ago, in comparison to the employee?
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Gosh, I don't know.
Let's see. Proctor & Gamble. One facility. Then P&G opens and second and third manufacturing plant, all in Cincinnati, Ohio. Then P&G opens another and another, like the Kansas City Soap Plant.
More than 100 years after P&G opened their first facility, they have several hundred manufacturing facilities and offices in 37 different countries on 6 different continents employing literally an army of people.
All of those international laws, FNCs, treaties, tax laws, trade agreements, tariffs, duties, shipping across vast oceans, other legalities like the complexities of local tax laws (as opposed to the country's tax laws), and oh, all the customs and manners of a particular country or people.
Orchestrating this entire thing, this huge international scheme so that it runs efficiently and smoothly and makes profits for share-holders, so they can retire comfortably.
That's gotta be worth at least $8.35/hour right?
I mean anyone can do it. We're all born understanding international laws and FNCs, it's like inherent to our being or something.
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Originally Posted by bradykp
i agree with a lot of what you said right here. globalism has it's positives and negatives though.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by jimhcom
We had a system that worked in the 40's thru the 70's for all the people.
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Let us close our eyes;
outside their lives go on much faster.
Oh, we won't give in,
we'll keep living in the past.
-- Jethro Tull
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Originally Posted by Strelnikov
The middle and lower classes don't have millions of dollars to pay off Congress to pass laws favorable to them.
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The Middle and Lower Classes don't have the common sense to live within their means either.
They have destroyed themselves, and they have no one to blame but themeselves.