Anything that costs money isn't helping. You're going after something that isn't even the worst offender though. United States foreign policy has done more damage than welfare could ever hope to but I guess you'd rather blame poor people.

I completely agree we need a change with the system. I'm not happy with the way things are being run right now either. Any system is subject to human flaw. That's my arguement, how is this system going to change the fact that your corporations are 'facist' and greedy? How are you going to convince people that this system is any better than the one we have? How long will it work before it fails?

You seem pretty dead set on your approach, and as usual are being very pretentious and non-receptive of other peoples views, I've come to expect nothing more from you. You know where I stand, I think we should be more concerned with fixing the systems already in place rather than jumping ship for something we don't know that will work. Slavery also has nothing to do with capitalism or democracy, so why even mention it?

You're the one arguing for an extreme sort of capitalism and against progressive tax. It's laissez-faire policies like those that fueled the South's reliance on slavery. It was about productivity and profit not humanity. It's the same idealism that you're espousing. That's why I mentioned it.

If you don't understand how Communism is going to change greedy corporations then again, your showing your own ignorance of political history and theory. By promoting worker ownership and placing corporations in the hands of the people you eliminate that greed because the institutions of society are now under democratic control as opposed to autocratic control. They would exist then to serve the masses as opposed to the corporate elite.

It's not blaming the poor people. It's not about being poor at all. It's about people who care, and are economically concious, and people who aren't and don't care. Basically, to look at the country as a team, some people pull their weight and some don't. Some people hog the damn ball and don't let anyone else have it. That's the problem in a nutshell from where I see it. I also agree that he foreign policy has caused a ton of problems.

You're looking at the wrong class when it comes to hogging the ball. The top five percent control over ninety percent of the wealth in the United States.

Thats who I was reffering to, or at least trying to in my analogy, and your stats are a little off, it's unbalanced, but not that unbalanced.

As of 2004.
http://www.faculty.fairfield.edu/fac...thIncome07.gif

Source: Survey of Consumer Finances

No. What did you do there?

@ Tore, quickly:

Something notable about American government representatives. Local government has a far greater effect on the day to day life of people and almost always the people who make up local government are local people who represent their constitutes well. It's much easier for a small coutry with a pretty common ancestry like Norway to find people to "represent the citizens on a national level then a global melting pot of manifest destiny like the United States.

@ All

I am going to try and bring everything full circle here.


What Sleepy Jack and Wayfarer (are Tore ideologically) are arguing for is a complete changing of philosophy in American government and economics, I believe an overhaul of the current system would produce quicker and more mass appealing results.

What are the tangible negative effects?:
I don't have a problem with the class system, it's an inevitability when you give people complete freedom. It's unfortunate I suppose, but I don't see many negative consequences of it other then a ideological inequity. However the beauty of America in my opinion is that you can exist outside the class system if you choose to. A single man\woman making $30,000 a year before taxes can live a very good life in Michigan (and much of the United States); own a house (mortgage obviously), drive a new or relatively new car, and still have money left over after the essentials to save or spend on entertainment and hobbies. You don't even need a college degree to make that kind of money. A full-time cook at my neighbors restaurant makes $15\Hr. That's right about $2500 a month or $30,000 a year. Teachers are often considered underpaid but a first year teacher at the public high school I last taught at makes a starting salary of $27,000 and that's for 9 1/2 Months of work.


Bottom Line to me:
I can still get what I want and help others get what they want without telling anyone else what they can or can't do. Socialism is a bully. It says I (the government) know better then you and can do everything (slight hyperbole) better then you. I am not okay with that and neither are a lot of Americans, particularly those like me who have come from very humble beginnings. I've never felt like there was anything realistic I could not accomplish if I was patient and disciplined enough and though I have certainly fallen short of some of my goals I never felt like it was because the system held me back, it was because someone else out performed or outworked me.

Again it's about motivation & options to me:
I have less money, I have fewer options and if the more money I make, the higher I am taxed on each dollar, the less likely I am to work to my full potential.
Now I do respect the altruistic nature of the opposing view. Putting the basic needs of everyone above the freedom of choice of the few or at least lesser population. But I don't feel like that's necessary, I don't believe everyone deserves to be treated equal though. I think the rules should be the same for everyone, but those who abuse the system should not be a burden to those who enhance it.

I hate to sound heartless and I hope I don't:
Of course not all people on welfare or government assistance abuse the system. But many do. Sure not all wealthy people are generous and hard working, but many are, a much greater percentage then I've heard anyone here acknowledge.

I think the fundamental difference in opinions here is this:
I trust the people to do a better job then the government.
Those in favor of bigger government do not.
We can all agree the current system is broken.
We can all agree that equality whenever possible is an admirable goal.
We can all agree that personal choice freedom is a good and valuable thing.

I'm not sure there is much more to it all then this, let me know what you guys think.

The top 20% controlled 85% of the wealth is only a little unbalanced? And that's only from 2004, before Bush/Obama started giving billion dollar bail outs and the tax cut shifted those figures even more than they already had. The divide between classes has been getting bigger and bigger since the mid-seventies. It's not really arguable nor is the inequality, seeing as the United States has one of the biggest wealth gaps of all the industrialized nations.

Why can't we all just share the wealth without the intervention of the government?

Ummm...the US has a progressive tax system. You've lost me.

I don't think it's progressive enough. I was more talking theoretically there, when you get into in practicality then yes it is technically progressive and technically the United States isn't even a capitalist country (in the same sense that there's never been a country that is completely socialist, communist, etc.) I was hoping this thread was more abstract but either way I think crash_override's assertion that the United States is overly-progressive as is is a bit silly considering the inequality of wealth in our society.

i'm totally with you on this :clap: ESPECIALLY in regards to true self-discipline.

on the other hand i AM heartless, especially when it comes to government assistance. there are some people who legitimately need it and that's fine, there are plenty of others who see it akin to an allowance just like the one they were 'supposed' to be getting from their parents so they can enjoy partying like they did when they were teenagers for as long as possible.

an active social life is not a fundamental human necessity. when i worked customer service for an american credit card company it always astounded me when we'd get monthly 'budget' breakdowns as to why this person couldn't make the minimum payment on their credit card. i only ever remember seeing a single budget (ONE) that had the individual living at a lower quality than myself (in 3 years at that job). everyone else had at least 1 car (if not 2 or 3), multiple phones, and basic cable, along with allowances for going out for meals once or twice a month.

so no... i'm not in favour of providing those 'needy' people with a chunk of my wealth (i've also been seeing the current north american economic downturn coming for about 5 years because of this attitude).

yes it would be nice if we could all live in some hippie technicolour dreamworld where everyone looks out for everyone else and we're all just one big happy family that lives happily ever after and no one has to grow old and die and everyone can be 17 forever and do what they want whenever they want.

the reality of the situation is, everyone get old, tired, and dead. as i get older and more tired i'm less inclined to give a hand out to someone who just wants to screw around for as long as possible. the government is not a babysitter.

You're basically saying the rich don't deserve to be rich. Your just taking away people's basic rights now. If your going to do all that you might as well change the name of the country why you're at it. Your idea of complete reform is not only implausable, but un-American.

Um so? I'm pretty sure I said all that on the first page. I'm kind of surprised it took you this long to realize that I don't like/believe in classes.

The top 5% from the graph shown have roughly 20% of the income but pay oer 90% of the income tax. How much more progressive would you want it?

[and I agree that the numbers have changed from there, but for this argument I'm using the given numbers to issue an example to the point]

I have to say Ethan, as a "rich" person, the taxation system is definitely not slanted in my favor, I pay twice the percentage relative to my income in taxes as minimum wage workers.

Are you telling me you think I should pay more?

In 2004 the top 5% was paying only a bit over half the income tax* - not 90% but they also have more income then the bottom 80% so...it's not exactly as progressive as it appears. If you receive more income then the bottom 80% all together then naturally you're going to be paying more in income tax.


*Who Pays Income Taxes? See Who Pays What

Even if you were paying the highest tax bracket, 35% and (quick math here, federal minimum wage is 6.55, assuming they work a 46 hour week, which is the average amount of hours a person works per week then they make 301.30 a week, times that by four then by twelve then they're making 14,462.40 a year. Which places them in the 15% bracket.) So that means, assuming you're in the highest tax bracket, that your percentage is 2.3 times as much as there's - seems unfair right? But keep in mind if you're in the 35% tax bracket then you're also making $372,950 a year to their 14,462.40 a year. Which is 25 times as much income as they are, so paying 2.3 times more of a percentage isn't exactly a big deal no?

It's still unfair.

Property tax does not work that way, sales tax does not work that way, vice tax does not work that way. Why does income tax?

By the way that's only federal income tax your considering; more then 42% of our household income this year went directly to taxes. Furthermore how much income I make should be not be used against me. I make more then minimum wage workers because I got good grades in school, went to college for six years, worked my ass of for very little money, went back to college for 4 more at night to start a new career and worked my ass off putting in extra hours to be taken seriously and given a chance to make the money i eventually was able to. Essentially the first 35 years of my life working and scrambling to put myself in a position to not have to worry about money once I got this age, I should not be rewarded for that?

That all being said I don't mind paying more, especially if it helps other people, but it really strikes me as whiny and disrespectful when people tell me I should have to carry an even heavier percentage.

I know that's not what your doing and I know your position comes from an unselfish place not a selfish one, but I do want to relate how your perspective when take to an absolute makes me and people like me feel.

I only considered federal income tax because of the different state minimum wages and tax standards and so on. Washington, my state, has no income tax but rather a sales tax (which I disagree with.) I don't really want this to turn into an anally/complex discussion on a variety of taxes to figure out who makes what and is paying what and the difference and if it's equal, progressive, or regressive. It would be kind of pointless seeing as most of this thread is theoretical.

I don't think any of my ideas are going to be accepted into the United States government and when I vote I'm not voting for the Socialist Party, Socialist Workers Party or the Communist party. I'll vote for Ralph Nader or since he's getting old whichever Republican/Democrat appears the most fiscally responsible and least aggressive on foreign policy. I'm getting kind of sick of discussing this for a variety of reasons so I'm going to stop now.

Sounds good to me, I really enjoyed the discussion. Look forward to the next one.

It's a mixed economy; mostly capitalist w/ socialized roads, schools, and medicine.

Somehow, a lot of laissez faire capitalist's calling card is Adam Smith, yet they forget that Adam Smith was very cautious about too little government oversight. He believed in government intervention, to keep too much power out of people like Morgan's and Melon's hands, to keep greed, monopolies, oligopolies, and collusion in check.

Inuzuka: in one of your posts you said something like - 'money makes you happier, maybe' That's ridiculous: money gives you access to better food, better schools, better health care. Are these not advantages?:confused:
Also, some of you talk about handouts. People want to work. Have you ever pulled up to a stoplight in some city, and seen a guy with a rag and a few teeth jump up and run to your car, with the chance that he might make .50 cents or so? Do you think that pays better than your average 9-5? Do you not think it's humiliating for this person to be sneered at, to be completely ignored by half the people driving by, when all he wants to do is make a little cash.

People want to work, and everyone ought to be given the chance to work making at least $10 per/hr. with benefits, with the option to unionize. A strong middle class is what built up our economy. Under FDR all the way up until Carter we had that because the highest tax bracket paid over 70% beyond $3 mil./yr. Also, corporations had to pay an extremely high rate on profits, either that or they had to reinvest that money back into the company. That equalled more machines, and more factories, and more jobs. That's before Reagan came in and dismantled everything. During his administration, we were only able to keep the illusion of a strong economy, by him bilking S.S. $ and putting it into debt, which he was growing at an alarming rate. He rounded up 4x as much debt in his 8 years, as the country had ever accumulated in it's entire 200 previous years of existence. This is your conservatives' free market hero?

Stem cell research, and public option health care would go a great deal towards helping some of these heavier people lose weight through surgery, or reversing genetic dispositions. You don't think these people who are so overweight that they can barely move around their house are ashamed? You think they like living like that? You think they're just too godd*amn lazy? What arrogance.

What? Adam Smith believed that the government which governs best is the government that governs least, as Jefferson put it and that an unseen hand would keep the market okay (a lie) as opposed to any intervention. It was Keynes, not Smith, who called for oversight and regulation.

Last time I ever come to your side in an argument.
No, if you look it up, Adam Smith believed strongly in government oversight.
It's in Thom Hartmann's book Screwed. You'd like it, he mostly talks about failed Reaganomics, and getting back to a strong middle class through unionization, and reversing Reagan's tax cuts. A lotto #'s in that book. :thumb:

No Philosophy or Political Science book agrees with you. Adam Smith didn't agree that the government had to regulate to ensure that monopolies and the like wouldn't be created. He specifically stated that the free market would take care of that itself - that's what the unseen hand idea of his was all about.

From Economics for Dummies:

'He believed in invisible hand yada yada...............But Smith was not naive. He believed that businnessmen prefer to collude rather than compete whenever possible, and that governments have a very important economic role to play in fostering the robust competition needed for the invisible hand to work its magic. He also believed that governments must provide essential public goods, like national defense, that aren't readily produced by the private sector.'

too easy :tramp:

I think one of the points the anti-socialists don't see in this thread is that in a more socialistic America, you guys would have more. Some of the millions that lil Wayne spent on getting diamonds in his teeth, Bill Gates spent on some mansion or hundreds of other rich people spent on their palaces would go to your health care, your kids education, your roads, your pensions and so on.

The idea is if USA was a more socialist democracy, you wouldn't suffer because the system would more than anything take from the top where there's an excess and feed more into the bottom where people don't have enough. Lil Wayne, Paris Hilton and Martha Stewart might get a little worried, but frankly they don't need all their billions to do just fine. They could still run businesses and create jobs for people and so on without the extreme excess. The little socialism would take from you guys, you would get back and since you also get something from all those at the top, it's a net bonus to the middle and lower classes.

Of course for that to happen, something would probably have to change in the american mindset. Right now it sounds like some of you would rather have less today and have the opportunity to become as rich as Oprah than having much more now traded for the mere opportunity of becoming filthy rich instead of Oprah rich.

I want Bill Gates and Oprah to become mega rich if they did not they'd not have spent the billions of dollars they have building schools, hospitals and parks around the United States and the World, that's better then giving i to our government and handing out check for nothing to a bunch of unemployed unmotivated people.

Above all else Tore, the more I see the argument, the more immoral it becomes, it's stealing really, to take only from the top and give only to the bottom. Robin Hoodesque sure, but it's still theft.

In a socialist society it takes a lot longer to become wealthy and as you mentioned the ceiling is lower, the major difference in philosophy is I don't believe giving people money makes them better off, in fact I think it cripples them. That's how Paris Hilton ended up like she did.

While they can make schools, they only do so for portion of their money. The government could use all of it (not all their money, but if they had the same amount). I chose names that are known and so how they appear outward and spend their money is important, but think of all those rich people in the background who don't build schools and don't give back to the society.

I can't say I agree that it's stealing. These people live in a society in which they could grow and have success. Could they make that kind of cash if they were living alone in a cave somewhere? Oprah's money comes from the pockets of the people of America, society lifted her up. Considering the immense excess she has, it's only fair she should return some of that wealth to the society that brought it in the first place.

You can say that money comes back in the form of schools and so on, but the general trend is it doesn't. As Sleepy Jack posted, it's been accumulating on the top more and more since the 70s - obviously there's some kind of positive feedback loop which is taking wealth from the bottom and feeding the top layers of society and that trend will pull USA deeper into the pit unless you can somehow turn the tide. Some of the that wealth gathering in people at the top is wealth which is lost from society - until it's given back.

edit :

Compared to your America, I live in a very socialist society. Here I'm a student which means I don't have a job and get by on a government loan which I only have to pay back part of in the future when I'm working so yes, I'm smooching off the state (my biology education is free - payed for by the state). I don't feel bad about it because when I buy something, I pay money to the government and when I get hired as a biologist, I'll give back to the government in the way of taxes. What comes around goes around, but in the end most people are net givers to society which makes it better for all.

Now, I've been to America and I was not surprised to see it wasn't exactly like Seinfeld or CSI, but after visiting and staying with 3 different families in New York, I was surprised to see that my living standards as a student in Norway are higher than any of those 3 families and these are people with real jobs. America is a country with vast amounts of natural resources and everything else going for it, so I think there's probably something that could be improved on.

My point is living in a socialist country, I'm already quite well off. There's more to go around for everyone - well, almost - we don't have any Paris Hiltons here (who is richly rewarded by the US society by the way).

edit :

I hope I'm not offending anyone, but I get a bit irked when I see all these suggested and predicted problems with wealth redistribution and more socialistic politics because I'm not experiencing any of these issues myself. I think we do experience the suggested benefits however. I admitted I don't know everything about America and that there's stuff I could learn, but maybe there are some lessons you guys could learn too from outside your borders.

I was hoping you'd cite the Wealth of Nations or something he actually wrote. Again, I've seen nothing aside from your book for dummies that says that.

don't worry, you're damn polite compared to all the neo-communist wankers out there. :)

i think one of the major hurdles which prevents a large-scale socialist policy from being accepted into our economic policy is that it's almost an antithesis to the American dream -- the ideology that if you work hard, success and a good quality of life will follow. that's not to say that other people can't afford to have a decent living, but intrinsic to many Americans is the idea that the means to provide for yourself is well within your own power and certainly your responsibility, not the government's.

Just like Paris Hilton.

Yes.

Good to see you back, unfan.

socialism wouldn't have prevented that walking, talking cunt from being a cunt.

At least she wouldn't have been paid for it. Imagine the Simple Life, 24/7. She has no other marketable skills anyway.

Really good post Lucifer Sam (Top of page)

Good point. Earlier in the thread JJJ pointed out that Warren Buffett and Bill Gates are the 2 richest men in America, and give a lot to charities and such.

I think it's worth pointing out that these men are both staunch Democrats, and thus, less likely to be big free marketers. I'm not sure with Gates, but I'm pretty sure Buffett is on record as referring to the current tax code as 'insane', and he feels it is his civic duty to pay a lot more, especially since he gets most of his from capital gains, and they're only taxed at like, 15%.

You're right that Buffett does feel it's his duty to give back, but he is in favor of a flat tax, he was upset (really he was) that he was only taxed 18% (because of capital gains which as you correctly noted are taxed at a considerably lower rate) of his income. Buffett believes in philanthropy and does have a disdain for the widening gap between the elite rich and the middle class. But his solution is an equitable tax system and accountability from the wealthy to the soceity that allowed them to attain such wealth.