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Most people get poorer, and many die. Survival requires a minimum level of food, water, and shelter, so there's the floor. The ceiling gets lower as the oil depletes and the economy contracts. Human and animal labor will replace most machinery, so ignoring the needs of workers meets hard limits of crop failure, product failure, sabotage, and open violence. Aristocrats who refuse to learn that basic lesson are likely to give themselves Darwin Awards.
No, it isn't. I posted a link to the Fed Gov's own spending spreadsheet.
Yes, it was wrong. According to your own link, for 2019 fiscal year (which is now):
688.6+197.9 (just under "National defense" and VA, so not all) = 886.5 billion
Then account for the share of interest on debt (yes, you have to): 123.5 billion
The sum exceeds 1 trillion already.
And then add all the hidden expenses (portions of homeland, "international security", not included retirements ) listed in my link. Government link also in there.
Most people get poorer, and many die. Survival requires a minimum level of food, water, and shelter, so there's the floor.
Here is something to think about. Yes there is a floor and that floor is written into the tax code via the standard deduction which the gov't determines to be the floor needed to live on. Anything above that gov't believes you can afford to give gov't part of your income.
In 2018 the standard deduction was $12,000 for single filers and married filers filing separately, $24,000 for married filers filing jointly and $18,000 for heads of household above these $$ you can afford to give gov't a percentage according to the tax tables.
In 2019 For single taxpayers and married individuals filing separately, the standard deduction rises to $12,200, and for heads of households, the standard deduction will be $18,350, . ... 35 percent, for incomes over $204,100 ($408,200 for married couples filing jointly). Above these numbers you can afford to give gov't a percentage. The percentages were lowered.
Sales tax (a 25% national VAT like European countries have would work well in the US) is the only valid option, as clearly explained by many economists including the UC system's Peter H Lindert, PhD, in his book, Growing Public: Social Spending and Economic Growth since the Eighteenth Century. A VAT tax and other regressive forms of taxation like a flat income tax rate paid by all, etc., are the only ways to widen the tax base to generate enough tax revenue to fund massive, generous social programs without harming economic growth.
That is precisely the reason why European countries tax MUCH more regressively than does the US. Look at the chart. There IS a distinct pattern:
It's plain as day that the more regressive the tax system, the more progressive the social spending programs redistribution of wealth. And, conversely, the more progressive the tax system, the less progressive the social programs spending wealth redistribution. And that should be common sense. The fewer that pay a disproportionate amount of the tax revenue, the less tax revenue there is to spend on such programs.
That also, in turn, exacerbates income inequality, such as we see more in the US than in European countries. Another economist explains why that is... The liberal case for regressive taxation
And that's EXACTLY what has happened in the US.
Your argument reminds me a lot like those who argue a vote for a candidate who has no chance of winning office. If/when we either have a significant candidate or legislation that might lead to a significant change to our tax code, I'll be more inclined to consider the change. Until then, everyone's dream of how they would change things if they were king is just not where I am inclined to devote my focus. Instead, I devote my attention to our present choices in terms of candidates and policy that might actually "move the needle" in the direction of better rather than worse. Nothing more any of us can really do pragmatically speaking.
Once more, that misattributed quote was along the lines of all modern day liberal solutions. "Qu'ils mangent de la brioche" was a "limousine liberal" solution for the food shortages in Paris prior to the French Revolution. The "problem" was that cheap bread the poor could afford was in short supply, so the bakers of Paris were ordered to sell expensive bread and pastries, like brioche for specific example, at the same price as cheap bread if they ran out of affordable bread. If they cannot afford cheap bread, then let them eat brioche.
The cheap bread shortage was, of course, caused by government because the crown had spread the military out far and wide under the combined reigns of Louis 14-16, and grain was being purchased below cost or outright commandeered to provide supplies to the military, to the point that grain prices went crazy, thus making cheap bread a huge profit loss for bakers, who chose to use their ever more costly flour on more profitable baked goods like brioche and other fancy pastry.
So government causes the shortage, then the price spike for input good, and how do they solve it? By blaming the capitalist and ordering them to operate at a loss, which ended up bankrupting many bakers in Paris, thus making the entire problem that much worse, like any proper government "solution" always does.
And this entire discussion is the same thing. The poor suffer from access to stuff they want for whatever reason, so what kind of force can we apply to the rich such that the gap between the two populations will close? And in the end, the exact same ting will happen as did in pre-Revolution France - less stuff will be available because you have declared that profit should be punished, which is not exactly motivating for people who produce excess in order to profit. Make profit painful, and they will cease producing excess. When that happens, shortages will happen, and the gap will be the least of your worries, as starvation drives the poor to all new heights of "activism."
You have an interesting perspective I certainly have trouble sharing, but thanks for the lesson not needed anyway...
I think we all know the quote and what it means to most people most generally speaking despite the debate about who said it and why, if it was actually said by the Queen of France in the first place. The quote reflects a lack of regard for the poor and poor understanding of their situation.
I think you are also trying to suggest that what prior or present governments lead by monarchs have done all equates to what all governments tend to do regardless their structure or make up. I have a hard time with that notion as well, though we all know no government is perfect.
My focus is on how we can improve what we have to work with, for the sake of all concerned, not just the poor. Not just the rich. That's all...
Irrelevant. He merely followed European countries' tax laws which let the wealthy evade FAR more in taxes than does the US.
That's why European countries' taxes on individuals have a REGRESSIVE Kakwani Progressivity Index rating, while the US does not.
Irrelevant regarding progressive vs regressive, but still interesting as it shows the character of greedy people, as posted earlier many CEO's are psychopaths, and in this case even one with fascist traits.
Well, I don't think all European countries have such tax laws, there is no EU-wide, federal tax law, unfortunately.
I can live with it when you put it that way (regressive based on the Kakwani Progressivity Index) because that already indicates to readers that you are using an exotic, alternative index and not challenging the established terms and their usage.
They're also used to buy votes. Democrats are using taxpayers' own money against them to buy votes that conflict with taxpayers' best interest. 2/3 or more of those receiving public assistance benefits are Democrats while only 1/4 or less are Republicans. And LBJ KNEW that when he implemented the public assistance programs. The entire point was to capture a large swath of votes for the Democrats of which a highly disproportionate percentage would be minorities.
Hard not to consider these numbers as you do, but it's also hard to consider them only as you do...
When you look at how many people are "hurting" in America, a reported 50 percent who can't even afford a $500 emergency expense, an estimated 40,000,000+ Americans living in poverty, many more barely keeping their nose above water, how do you promote policy or legislation on their behalf that doesn't also mean their votes?
This is to say that just because a policy or legislation promotes the welfare of POC, gays, the poor, etc., and therefore their votes doesn't mean the policies and legislation are wrong or just about getting votes.
Whether the ideas are in "conflict with taxpayers' best interest" is another matter, but if you start by discrediting all progressive ideas as simply an effort to gain votes/power, whatever the rest you want to argue about what is in "conflict with taxpayers' best interest" can hardly be considered objective reasoning.
No doubt that argument too, is highly subjective and cause for significant debate, as this thread does a good job of demonstrating...
You have an interesting perspective I certainly have trouble sharing, but thanks for the lesson not needed anyway...
I think we all know the quote and what it means to most people most generally speaking despite the debate about who said it and why, if it was actually said by the Queen of France in the first place. The quote reflects a lack of regard for the poor and poor understanding of their situation.
I think you are also trying to suggest that what prior or present governments lead by monarchs have done all equates to what all governments tend to do regardless their structure or make up. I have a hard time with that notion as well, though we all know no government is perfect.
My focus is on how we can improve what we have to work with, for the sake of all concerned, not just the poor. Not just the rich. That's all...
What I just read into your writing is you don't really care about the FACTS... as long as you believe your intentions are in the right place, facts be damned. Wow.
Furthermore, how you simply ignore the FACT that most of the economic problems we have in this nation were and are CREATED by government interference with the free market, yet you insist on MORE government interference with the free market simply amazes me.
That list of yours remains completely aspirational at this point....
The wealth gap gives too much power to a very select group. They have been using that power to increase their power to the point we see today where the very wealthy are picking and choosing who gets into power and how they vote once there.
We see just a handful a families subverting the the US, twisting our democracy and stacking elected and appointed positions with their lackeys.
Trickle down has been perverted into Trickle UP. Our system favors capital over labor at every turn.
Rewarding the holders of capital is fine, as long as it does not come at the expense of labor and that is precisely what it does today.
40 years of anti worker policies , employment at will, breaking unions, loss of pension plans, weakening social safety nets have resulted in the situation we have today. Ie the bottom 80% just hanging on and the top 0.1% having more assets than 150 million americans!
what we need is to restore some balance. Americans should not be working checkouts at 73 just because their medical copays are too high...
Workers are carrying all the risk, corps and the uber wealthy are hoarding all the wealth...
It is very hard not to recognize the substantial influence that very small but powerful and wealthy special interest groups have on our system of government, quite contrary to what I believe our founding fathers had in mind when they put our government system into motion.
Again, we don't need to "kill the goose that lays the golden eggs," but we can probably do better than to allow one person out of 100 to end up with 99 out of 100 golden eggs!
My daughter is working towards a degree in social work. Last night, I started flipping through her text on social welfare policy. Damned if it didn't start (sort of, chapter 3) with the constitution, analyzing both it and subsequent legislation for what they said about the American attitudes that, in the end, determine what happens today.
It added another tidbit to my earlier thread comments on American political culture. Agriculture. Individualism. Attitudes towards the poor. In contrast to Europe, most early settlers had access to land with former indentured servants pushing west. The Jeffersonian democratic concepts so often quoted today are based on perceived values from that time. There was work for those willing to seek it. The farmers themselves were early capitalists of sorts. That individual farmers today might comprise single digits - if that - of the total American population may make these observations appear completely irrelevant. And maybe they are for this thread - until they show up in a ballot box in 2019.
One other "social worker note." An extremely conservative friend completed her MSW. Decades later, she's still infuriated at the teachers who she perceived were teaching that her values were wrong ... that her thoughts were in error. My assumption is that the professors were trying to impress on the students that they could not impose their judgments on another population IF they were to be effective change agents.
Pass this quote along to your daughter for me...
"I am certainly not an advocate for frequent and untried changes in laws and constitutions, I think moderate imperfections had better be borne with; because, when once known, we accommodate ourselves to them and find practical means of correcting their ill effects. But I know, also, that laws and institutions must go hand in hand with the progress of the human mind. As that becomes more developed, more enlightened, as new discoveries are made, new truths disclosed, and manners and opinions change with the change of circumstances, institutions must advance also, and keep pace with the times."
"We might as well require a man to wear still the coat which fitted him when a boy, as civilized society to remain ever under the regimen of their barbarous ancestors."
--Thomas Jefferson to Samuel Kercheval, 1816.
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