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Location: San Ramon, Seattle, Anchorage, Reykjavik
2,254 posts, read 2,734,754 times
Reputation: 3203
Quote:
Originally Posted by MinivanDriver
Let's see.
The Soviet Union
Maoist China
North Korea
Zimbabwe
Cuba
Venezuela
Pre-Thatcher Great Britain
And the list goes on and on. Economies that are failures or, in the case of Great Britain, rescued before failure. So Thatcher was on the money.
Socialism is seductive, but it boils down to this: "I want that and I want those other people to pay for it." Yet the 1% pay a disproportionately greater percentage of income taxes than their share of income. https://www.cnbc.com/2015/04/13/top-...ome-taxes.html
The other problem? Once people learn that they can vote themselves bread and circuses on the backs of someone else, they do so with regularity. After all, it's not their ox being gored.
But there are consequences. All you have to do is look at the fate of high tax states such as New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, and Illinois, where a steady refusal to provide sane tax levels to businesses and the highest earners caused their taxpayers to flee. If you have a WSJ subscription, read this. The numbers are staggering. https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-gre...ape-1510614707 This shouldn't be surprising to students of economic history, for one of the fallacies of blithely raising taxes is that taxpayers will begin trying to circumvent higher taxes.
In truth, the defenders of socialism as an economic model are little better than rationalizers for its failures. If you read most of their arguments, it can be paraphrased to read as: "Well socialism didn't work in this particular instance because of [fill in the latest convenient excuse here]." And if an economic theory requires such rarefied conditions to succeed, how valid is it?
I have to laugh. Our entire capital intensive economy is based on a house of cards called debt. And when you are in debt you're broke. Our country is broke. Our president is in all likelihood broke and has cash flow to live on based on other people's money (banks and ill advised investors). Many of our small businesses and large corporations are broke. And 75+% of our citizens are broke. I don't care what kind of economy anyone touts. It can't support that negative equity forever.
Well, nobody claims that only wealthy people work. But it does point out that socialism requires punitive levels of taxation for the key producers. In truth, there aren't a lot of trust fund babies out there, by the way. Most people who enjoy wealth in this country at this time have indeed earned it through education, through making smart career choices and by taking calculated risks.
The Boston Globe had an article during the last "tax reform" debate (when Obama repealed GWB's rates and the IRS reverted to the Clinton rates -- which is essentially the 2017 federal tax status quo). The Globe noted that reverting the top rate to 39.6% or even 50% doesn't raise enough revenue for all of the pie-in-the-sky plans that the progressive left wants.
To get there, you have to raise taxes significantly on the professional class. There's just not enough money among the top 1% to get an additional 10 trillion (or whatever) for anything approaching socialism, even at punitive rates. It's got to be punitive on the top 25%. Punitive meaning 50% federal plus local income taxes AND 20% national sales taxes plus local sales taxes. Basically, Europe.
This is a level of taxation that America will never tolerate. And this is before any debt repayment or deficit reduction.
Well, nobody claims that only wealthy people work. But it does point out that socialism is requires punitive levels of taxation for the key producers. .
The hardworking Americans are the key producers. Not just "the wealthy".
And no tax has to raise enough to do virtually anything imaginable in order to be worthwhile. What we have here is yet another case of utterly failed imagination.
The Soviet Union
Maoist China
North Korea
Zimbabwe
Cuba
Venezuela
Pre-Thatcher Great Britain
And the list goes on and on. Economies that are failures or, in the case of Great Britain, rescued before failure. So Thatcher was on the money.
Socialism is seductive, but it boils down to this: "I want that and I want those other people to pay for it." Yet the 1% pay a disproportionately greater percentage of income taxes than their share of income. https://www.cnbc.com/2015/04/13/top-...ome-taxes.html
The other problem? Once people learn that they can vote themselves bread and circuses on the backs of someone else, they do so with regularity. After all, it's not their ox being gored.
But there are consequences. All you have to do is look at the fate of high tax states such as New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, and Illinois, where a steady refusal to provide sane tax levels to businesses and the highest earners caused their taxpayers to flee. If you have a WSJ subscription, read this. The numbers are staggering. https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-gre...ape-1510614707 This shouldn't be surprising to students of economic history, for one of the fallacies of blithely raising taxes is that taxpayers will begin trying to circumvent higher taxes.
In truth, the defenders of socialism as an economic model are little better than rationalizers for its failures. If you read most of their arguments, it can be paraphrased to read as: "Well socialism didn't work in this particular instance because of [fill in the latest convenient excuse here]." And if an economic theory requires such rarefied conditions to succeed, how valid is it?
Pre-Thatcher Britain! You don't know what you are talking about do you lol.
A flat rate on all discretionary income, or all spending above the 20th percentile, unless they have more than two children. If they have more than two children, I would start taxing them at the 20th percentile of spending for a family with two children.
So your problem isn't that parents aren't paying their "fair share," it's that you disagree with the how the current ax system works. Correct?
Hubby took forever to check out of Walmart today. He buys his pet food there. When I told him I almost gave up on him he told me he was unlucky enough to get behind a Hispanic woman who had five WIC cards and used them all?? Could she be five different people or be pretending to be five different people. He assumed she was buying for herself and four other qualified people.
When I mentioned how we taxpayers are being ripped off and cheated into paying for illegals, he said it will not continue because we are coming to the point it is going to destroy our country. This keeps up and pretty soon there won't be a country.
Ah yes, the uneducated diatribe ranting against a minority group. How original!!
ROTFL
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