Tucker Carlson on Bernie Sanders

[_EAllusion]

Republicans currently are aiming at reducing eligibility for SNAP benefits that would kick a few million people off the rolls. If Bernie's plan was in effect, this would be a massive win for companies like Amazon. Right now, it's neutral to them. How do you think those companies would lobby the government if Bernie's plan was in place with respect to benefits? Good, someone like Ajax might say. But it's insanely counterproductive to what Bernie Sanders supposedly wants. It's not thought out at all. He's going with it anyway because it plays well to economically ignorant rubes whose anti-corporate sophistication doesn't rise much above "Get the bastards!"

To me the story here is Tucker Carlson's piece. Sanders is doing what he's always done and demonstrating the kind of extreme left naïve economic positions that put elements of his voting block on par with Trump voters in my opinion. But FOX NEWS shifting to such a populous statement? Wow. I'm honestly flabbergasted by that.

Part the Fox angle here is singling out Amazon, which President Trump does a lot, because Jeff Bezos owns the Washington Post and they are the best press outlet for damning coverage of Trump. Another part of the Fox angle is the unintended consequence of Sanders' plan actually being liked, which is to stigmatize welfare benefits and mount opposition against them further. And the final part is what you are focusing on, which is affinity for populist demagoguery.

[_cinepro]

Here's what I don't get.

Currently, government revenue is paid mostly by the rich.

https://taxfoundation.org/summary-lates ... 16-update/

The top 10% of earners pay ~70% of the income tax. The bottom 50% of earners pay less than 3% of the income tax.

So to a great degree, the assistance that these Amazon workers are getting is coming from the top 10% (the rich). It's not coming from the bottom 50%.

But if this law is enacted and Amazon and Walmart adjust their prices to account for it, then the costs for the increased wages (and decreased welfare payments) will be spread among all Amazon and Walmart customers. I couldn't find the data, but if we assume that Amazon customer spending is spread more evenly among different earning groups (and from observation I know Walmart customers come from all walks of life), then this bill would have the effect of reducing the current welfare system's transfers from the rich to the poor, and instead spreading those costs to the less rich Amazon and Walmart customers through higher prices.

That might be a fairer way to do it, but as a not-rich Amazon and Walmart customer, I'm not sure I'm 100% in favor of that outcome. The current system has the effect of rich people subsidizing consumer spending for the poor. Eliminating that could raise costs for the poor and middle class through higher prices.

[_ajax18]

Regardless, I, for one, am tired of my tax dollars going to snap programs for people working full time. It's part of the reason I never step inside a Walmart and don't use Amazon.

Schmo does the fact that I agree with you make you want to take a hard look at yourself in the mirror?

[_Doctor CamNC4Me]

Regardless, I, for one, am tired of my tax dollars going to snap programs for people working full time. It's part of the reason I never step inside a Walmart and don't use Amazon.

Schmo does the fact that I agree with you make you want to take a hard look at yourself in the mirror?

Why? This is all that would be staring back in his cold, dead, black eyes:



- Doc

[_canpakes]

... as a not-rich Amazon and Walmart customer, I'm not sure I'm 100% in favor of that outcome.

While refreshingly honest, that’s precisely the problem.

[_Some Schmo]

Regardless, I, for one, am tired of my tax dollars going to snap programs for people working full time. It's part of the reason I never step inside a Walmart and don't use Amazon.

Schmo does the fact that I agree with you make you want to take a hard look at yourself in the mirror?

I'm not phased by agreeing with you on this. For one thing, I suspect we're coming at it from different angles. I was very specific about full time workers. I still think the snap program is necessary, whereas I suspect you'd be fine with getting rid of it completely.

But we've agreed on a few things before. Contrary to what you think, I hate wasteful spending, seemingly more than you do.

[_huckelberry]

That really was bananas to watch. Fox News showed it's shifted it's allegiance from what has been the neoconservative dominate view to the unbelievable irony of Donald Trump led populism. It's so bizarre it seems like none of it can be really happening outside of bad TV programming.

Hi honorentheos, I can see you have a point here. On the other hand the video made me think Carlson may have been thinking through the lens of Ayn Rands take on corrupt forms of capitalism, crony capitalism, as pictured in Atlas Shrugged. If so it would not be a new point of view as the book has been influencing conservative views for over fifty years.

[_honorentheos]

That really was bananas to watch. Fox News showed it's shifted it's allegiance from what has been the neoconservative dominate view to the unbelievable irony of Donald Trump led populism. It's so bizarre it seems like none of it can be really happening outside of bad TV programming.

Hi honorentheos, I can see you have a point here. On the other hand the video made me think Carlson may have been thinking through the lens of Ayn Rands take on corrupt forms of capitalism, crony capitalism, as pictured in Atlas Shrugged. If so it would not be a new point of view as the book has been influencing conservative views for over fifty years.

I think his argument is pretty straight forward, and 180 degrees from what one would expect to hear on Fox News over the years.

In it, he basically starts with an argument right out of Karl Marx's play book: The massively wealthy industrialists profit off of exploitation of their workers. Then he draws the line from this Marxist point to tell the viewer that THEY are also being exploited by these industrialists through the need of taxpayers to fill the gap between the wages these corporations are willing to pay and what it takes to survive. Turns out, Tucker Carlson is a Marxist.

Then it turns out he's also a post-modernist because he clearly doesn't believe in truth in any meaningful way. He turns the narrative completely on it's head when he states that large corporations are the backbone of "progressive lunacy". No longer are the billionaires job creators. They're oligarchs profiting off of the average Fox News viewer.

Tucker Carlson isn't an objectivist. He's a post-modern Marxist.

[_honorentheos]

Here's what I don't get.

Currently, government revenue is paid mostly by the rich.

https://taxfoundation.org/summary-lates ... 16-update/

The top 10% of earners pay ~70% of the income tax. The bottom 50% of earners pay less than 3% of the income tax.

So to a great degree, the assistance that these Amazon workers are getting is coming from the top 10% (the rich). It's not coming from the bottom 50%.

But if this law is enacted and Amazon and Walmart adjust their prices to account for it, then the costs for the increased wages (and decreased welfare payments) will be spread among all Amazon and Walmart customers. I couldn't find the data, but if we assume that Amazon customer spending is spread more evenly among different earning groups (and from observation I know Walmart customers come from all walks of life), then this bill would have the effect of reducing the current welfare system's transfers from the rich to the poor, and instead spreading those costs to the less rich Amazon and Walmart customers through higher prices.

That might be a fairer way to do it, but as a not-rich Amazon and Walmart customer, I'm not sure I'm 100% in favor of that outcome. The current system has the effect of rich people subsidizing consumer spending for the poor. Eliminating that could raise costs for the poor and middle class through higher prices.

Or, the argument goes, companies could be more beholden to their workers than their shareholders and fill in the gap from their profit margins. I know there are plenty of economic arguments that explain why it isn't that simple. But that is the point behind Sanders' bill and the Tucker Carlson piece. The viewer's taxes shouldn't be funding the gap between what the company is willing to pay it's workers and what constitutes a living wage. In the world where Sanders' bill becomes law, the current tax system would also be structured much differently.

Even as things are, though, it isn't fair to say that the bulk of the burden already falls on the wealthiest Americans. See below for example -



The bracket carrying the largest percentage of the burden aren't those making $2million or more. It's those just making six figures. And the effective tax rate for a person making over $10 million is less than the $500k to $2m if one looks at the data. Tossing out gross percentages like that isn't telling a meaningful story.

It isn't difficult math or really opaque thinking to recognize that to a person making $24k a year, 5% of their income matters a hellavalot more than 28% does to a person making $5 million even if the person making $5 million is paying 60 times in taxes what that other household made as gross income that year. Given the choice between paying $1.4m to have $3.6m or paying $1,200 to have $23k, every one of us on this board would pay the $1.4 million.

ETA: It should also be depressing as hell that over 40% of tax returns filed fell in that lowest bracket.

[_EAllusion]

Honor -

You have to appreciate that Carlson's white power hour is Brietbart (i.e. Steve Bannon) style commentary. They tend to have a Sanders' style economic streak in them where some traditional left-wing positions meet populist demagoguery. That's weird for Fox circa 2012, but if you think of Fox as a clearing house for contemporary conservative propaganda, it makes more sense.