Honest question for those of you that still work. You've fought very hard to see taxes raised. I'm sure many of you spent a lot of money contributing to Democrat campaigns. Why don't you go ahead and pay more taxes now before the law takes effect? Why do you need a law that forces you to pay more taxes? Wouldn't that be a better means to share your wealth that you've worked and saved to produce?
For those of you that no longer have to work for a living, why don't you go back to work and send your paychecks directly to Latin America, Africa or elsewhere?
Honest question for the left
Honest question for the left
And when the Confederates saw Jackson standing fearless like a stonewall, the army of Northern Virginia took courage and drove the federal army off their land.
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Re: Honest question for the left
Hugh Nibley claimed he bumped into Adolf Hitler, Albert Einstein, Winston Churchill, Gertrude Stein, and the Grand Duke Vladimir Romanoff. Dishonesty is baked into Mormonism.
Re: Honest question for the left
ajax, why don’t you just dig your own well, lay your own roads, build your own bridges, and generate your own power?
Get on that, man.
Get on that, man.
Re: Honest question for the left
The OP reflects a worldview that is akin to that of the narrow minded, willfully ignorant and soon to be jailed far right individuals who broke into the US Capitol building on January 6, who were roaming around inside the looking for a politician to take hostage and deciding to take selfies and smear their feces around when they failed to find one.
Civilized countries operate under a social contract, some of which is legislated and some of which is by culture and tradition. Germany, where I lived with my family for several years is one such country. The Scandinavian countries and Australia are other good examples.
Having experienced the fruits of right wing fascism in WWII, and out of postwar necessity, Germany developed a social contract that respects the rights of all citizens, without regard for status or education, tries to ensure that all are educated to a level commensurate with their natural ability, and provides for most basic necessities of all who are willing to work. Those disabled, especially in conflict, are granted special status in many areas and taken care of.
The social contract allows for some degree of social engineering. For example, as a foreign worker, I was obligated to put aside money from my salary each month, which amount was matched by the government. This was so that foreign workers would not be reliant on welfare when it was time to return to their home country. To encourage a population sustainable birth rate, families received an allowance from the government for each child. At work, the basic salary could be substantially increased by performance bonuses according to agree upon criteria.
A sustainable social contract says that those who make more must contribute more in taxes. When America was" great", in the good ole days that the far right claims to long for, highest marginal corporate tax rate was 91%. The top marginal personal income tax rate then was about 16%.
Those on the far right who bitch about taxes should realize that their cult leader gave the rich on the right exactly what they wanted and screwed the middle and working classes. Consider that Trump's Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) reduced the top corporate income tax rate from 35 % to 21%. (Remember that it was 91% in the good ole days.) More than 80% of these tax cuts went to millionaires. The latest 2020 Corona virus relief package was even worse, with 99% of the benefit going to the top 1% in income.
The best response to the troll questions of Ajax is that what you used to call the left (which in the good ole days was the center) wants only to have a workable and fair to all social contract re-established in this country.
Since we saw what the right can do for social cohesion and sustainability on January 6, maybe it's time we gave some of the center policies and culture a try.
Let's leave the right wing selfishness, stupidity and pseudo-Christianity behind, recognize and acknowledge the value of education and rationality and move on as a country.
Civilized countries operate under a social contract, some of which is legislated and some of which is by culture and tradition. Germany, where I lived with my family for several years is one such country. The Scandinavian countries and Australia are other good examples.
Having experienced the fruits of right wing fascism in WWII, and out of postwar necessity, Germany developed a social contract that respects the rights of all citizens, without regard for status or education, tries to ensure that all are educated to a level commensurate with their natural ability, and provides for most basic necessities of all who are willing to work. Those disabled, especially in conflict, are granted special status in many areas and taken care of.
The social contract allows for some degree of social engineering. For example, as a foreign worker, I was obligated to put aside money from my salary each month, which amount was matched by the government. This was so that foreign workers would not be reliant on welfare when it was time to return to their home country. To encourage a population sustainable birth rate, families received an allowance from the government for each child. At work, the basic salary could be substantially increased by performance bonuses according to agree upon criteria.
A sustainable social contract says that those who make more must contribute more in taxes. When America was" great", in the good ole days that the far right claims to long for, highest marginal corporate tax rate was 91%. The top marginal personal income tax rate then was about 16%.
Those on the far right who bitch about taxes should realize that their cult leader gave the rich on the right exactly what they wanted and screwed the middle and working classes. Consider that Trump's Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) reduced the top corporate income tax rate from 35 % to 21%. (Remember that it was 91% in the good ole days.) More than 80% of these tax cuts went to millionaires. The latest 2020 Corona virus relief package was even worse, with 99% of the benefit going to the top 1% in income.
The best response to the troll questions of Ajax is that what you used to call the left (which in the good ole days was the center) wants only to have a workable and fair to all social contract re-established in this country.
Since we saw what the right can do for social cohesion and sustainability on January 6, maybe it's time we gave some of the center policies and culture a try.
Let's leave the right wing selfishness, stupidity and pseudo-Christianity behind, recognize and acknowledge the value of education and rationality and move on as a country.
Last edited by DrW on Sat Jan 16, 2021 5:13 pm, edited 2 times in total.
"Generally speaking, the errors in religion are dangerous; those in philosophy only ridiculous." (David Hume)
"Errors in science are learning opportunities and are corrected when better data become available." (DrW)
"Errors in science are learning opportunities and are corrected when better data become available." (DrW)
Re: Honest question for the left
Honest question for those of you that still work. You've fought very hard to see taxes raised.
haven't put much effort into it, personally.
not a dime.I'm sure many of you spent a lot of money contributing to Democrat campaigns.
A fair question, and I'm glad you asked it. You and Droopy and a few others never took an economics class, and so you've never learned about market failures. Markets do the heavy lifting driving the economy, but they can't solve every problem. One vexing problem for free markets is called the "free rider" problem. You, of all people, should know about this one, but you don't. And I swear, Ajax, you could learn about this stuff at even the most die-hard conservative universities. Most of the market failure models I'm familiar with were devised by free-market economists.Why don't you go ahead and pay more taxes now before the law takes effect? Why do you need a law that forces you to pay more taxes? Wouldn't that be a better means to share your wealth that you've worked and saved to produce?
Anyway, there are certain things that society needs that aren't solved well by markets, such as roads. This is because I can invest all my money in roads, but res and cam can use the roads just as much as I do. They can "ride for free" while I go broke. Doesn't that irk you, Ajax? But if I'm not going to be the sucker and pay for the roads, then we've got nothing. Nobody wants to chip in. So what do we do about that? We can all come together, and as rational human beings realize the incentive problem here, and say, okay, let's make a law, we'll call it a tax, and the tax will force all of us to chip in a little bit to solve this problem. And if the roads look like hell, we can come to the town council meeting and demand taxes be raised a little to patch things up.
Isn't that what Bill Gates and Warren Buffet are doing? Their vastly disproportionate wealth in part has been driven by increasing momentum that executives have to negotiate their paychecks while average workers are kept down by the market power of big companies. There is no great solution for this, but a temporary patch, at least, would be to tax the rich. That would kill two problems you have with one stone.For those of you that no longer have to work for a living, why don't you go back to work and send your paychecks directly to Latin America, Africa or elsewhere?
But by all means, don't let me stop you from yelling "Stolen election!" and throwing yourself into that big fence surrounding the capitol next Wednesday.
Re: Honest question for the left
charge a tollOne vexing problem for free markets is called the "free rider" problem.
And when the Confederates saw Jackson standing fearless like a stonewall, the army of Northern Virginia took courage and drove the federal army off their land.
Re: Honest question for the left
What, on every road? Even the one outside your front door?
Tell you what, to make it simple and avoid administrative costs, why don't we just charge everybody a flat rate toll? I mean, everybody benefits from the roads in many ways, even if they don't own a car.
We could call the toll a 'taxidapanation' from the Greek words for 'charging for journeys'. Or to keep it snappy, a 'tax'.
Maksutov:
That's the problem with this supernatural stuff, it doesn't really solve anything. It's a placeholder for ignorance.
Mayan Elephant:
Not only have I denounced the Big Lie, I have denounced the Big lie big lie.
That's the problem with this supernatural stuff, it doesn't really solve anything. It's a placeholder for ignorance.
Mayan Elephant:
Not only have I denounced the Big Lie, I have denounced the Big lie big lie.
Re: Honest question for the left
Are you saying that taxes only go to pay public goods that everyone should benefit from? Roads, police, military?Anyway, there are certain things that society needs that aren't solved well by markets, such as roads. This is because I can invest all my money in roads, but res and cam can use the roads just as much as I do. They can "ride for free" while I go broke. Doesn't that irk you, Ajax? But if I'm not going to be the sucker and pay for the roads, then we've got nothing. Nobody wants to chip in. So what do we do about that? We can all come together, and as rational human beings realize the incentive problem here, and say, okay, let's make a law, we'll call it a tax, and the tax will force all of us to chip in a little bit to solve this problem. And if the roads look like hell, we can come to the town council meeting and demand taxes be raised a little to patch things up.
Right now I'm paying a pretty penny in property tax. Supposedly I benefit from this in that my daughter gets to attend a well funded school. But what actually happens in reality? My daughter gets bussed 45 minutes through heavey traffic every morning into the ghetto and the ghetto kids get bussed out to the nice new school half a mile down the road from my house. Yet you'd still contend I'm better off than if I simply used the tax money I now pay to pay for her to attend a private school?
But this really is beside the point. You don't have any kids in school at all do you Gad? Whether I choose to be a deadbeat Dad or I'm paying my "fair" share, you're still paying. You don't seem very concerned about free riders in this case? And since you likely believe our schools are underfunded, wouldn't the smartest thing for you to do be to overpay your property taxes voluntarily without waiting for a legislation to force you since adequate funding of public schools would create a better workforce for you to hire from and reduce your risk of violent crime?
Last edited by ajax18 on Sat Jan 16, 2021 6:10 pm, edited 1 time in total.
And when the Confederates saw Jackson standing fearless like a stonewall, the army of Northern Virginia took courage and drove the federal army off their land.
Re: Honest question for the left
I don't consider myself part of the left, and I voted no on Arizona's Proposition 208, which still ended up passing in this state. I did vote for Biden/Harris, and I believe that Federal taxes are eventually going to have to be raised with the National debt now over 27.6 trillion dollars.ajax18 wrote: ↑Sat Jan 16, 2021 3:05 pmHonest question for those of you that still work. You've fought very hard to see taxes raised. I'm sure many of you spent a lot of money contributing to Democrat campaigns. Why don't you go ahead and pay more taxes now before the law takes effect? Why do you need a law that forces you to pay more taxes? Wouldn't that be a better means to share your wealth that you've worked and saved to produce?
For those of you that no longer have to work for a living, why don't you go back to work and send your paychecks directly to Latin America, Africa or elsewhere?
Re: Honest question for the left
So what are you waiting for? Why not start paying more now voluntarily?and I believe that Federal taxes are eventually going to have to be raised with the National debt now over 27.6 trillion dollars.
And when the Confederates saw Jackson standing fearless like a stonewall, the army of Northern Virginia took courage and drove the federal army off their land.