Fiscal Cliff Deal Reached

Off Topic Politics & World Issues
301

[quote]smh23 wrote:

[quote]Jewbacca wrote:

[quote]smh23 wrote:

[quote]Jewbacca wrote:

[quote]smh23 wrote:

[quote]MaximusB wrote:

The idea of people paying their fair share should be zoomed in, as in California the top 15% pay 80% of the taxes.
[/quote]

What percentage of the total wealth do the top 15 percent command?[/quote]

Who cares? How is that relevant to the standard of living of others?[/quote]

If someone has 80 percent of the wealth, and wealth is what is taxed, would it not stand to reason that this person would pay 80 percent of the tax?[/quote]

Wealth is not taxed.

Income is taxed.

And income is taxed disproportionately, such that the top 50% of incomes pay 100% of the income tax (give or take 1% or so).[/quote]

Wealth–income, property, capital gains, inheritance etc. Nearly everything except what’s stored under the mattress.

By the way, the bottom 50 percent controls how much of the wealth in the United States?

1.1 percent as of 2010.[/quote]

How much do they deserve to control?

1.1%.

Keep punishing prosperity and you’ll get less of it.

WOW!

That’s a shocker isn’t it?

302

[quote]ZEB wrote:

[quote]smh23 wrote:

[quote]Jewbacca wrote:

[quote]smh23 wrote:

[quote]Jewbacca wrote:

[quote]smh23 wrote:

[quote]MaximusB wrote:

The idea of people paying their fair share should be zoomed in, as in California the top 15% pay 80% of the taxes.
[/quote]

What percentage of the total wealth do the top 15 percent command?[/quote]

Who cares? How is that relevant to the standard of living of others?[/quote]

If someone has 80 percent of the wealth, and wealth is what is taxed, would it not stand to reason that this person would pay 80 percent of the tax?[/quote]

Wealth is not taxed.

Income is taxed.

And income is taxed disproportionately, such that the top 50% of incomes pay 100% of the income tax (give or take 1% or so).[/quote]

Wealth–income, property, capital gains, inheritance etc. Nearly everything except what’s stored under the mattress.

By the way, the bottom 50 percent controls how much of the wealth in the United States?

1.1 percent as of 2010.[/quote]

How much do they deserve to control?

1.1%.

Keep punishing prosperity and you’ll get less of it.

WOW!

That’s a shocker isn’t it?[/quote]

Are you finding it this difficult to follow my meaning?

Jewbacca: “And income is taxed disproportionately, such that the top 50% of incomes pay 100% of the income tax (give or take 1% or so).”

smh23: [I’m adding material here to help you understand]: If the top 50 percent are paying a disproportionately large amount of the tax, then it must be true that the bottom 50 percent are paying a disproportionately small amount of the tax.

In 2009, the bottom 50 percent paid only 2.25 percent of the federal income tax.

However, they accounted for only 1.1 percent of the total net worth in 2010.

They are paying little and they have little [For perspective, it took a salary of $34,338 to be in that top 50 percent in 2012]. This doesn’t seem disproportionate to me.

See what I’m saying?

I don’t want to start a discussion about job creators and what people deserve here. My point is simple.

303

[quote]Jewbacca wrote:

Two questions:

  1. How far off base was my wild-ass guess that you are a trainer/friend of trainers of the kept women?[/quote]
    Not a trainer. Acquaintance of some. I have thought about becoming a trainer, but I don’t have the patience. Most people are not willing to work hard in the gym.

[quote]Jewbacca wrote:
2. Have you re-considered the validity of a tax system based on “getting-those-awful-bitches”?*
[/quote]
I sound bitter. But I’m not. I actually was raised with one parent who came from a monied family. Country clubs, housekeepers, the right way for a lady to cross her legs . . . It never sat well with me. And I ran in the opposite direction when I was an adult.

[quote]MaximusB wrote:

I don’t think you suck at debate. [/quote]
Yes, I do.

[quote]Tiribulus wrote:
This lady and I agree on absolutely nothing I’ve seen so far.
[/quote]
It’s true. I’m very liberal. But I live a most conservative life. I have very much a “live and let live” attitude. I try to appreciate differences even if I don’t always understand them. My moral underpinnings are not based on Christianity, but I live a squeaky clean life and truly try to follow the Golden Rule. You’d probably be pleasantly surprised if you met me.

304

kpsnap:

I hope you don’t leave.

Your insights…and most importantly your PERSPECTIVE on Life…would without question be valuable to this Forum…

Mufasa

305

Snap,

Please consider, that the very large majority who post in PWI are men. It would be nice to see more women post here, it is without question that we (men and women) think so far apart that we truly are from different worlds.

Another point of view would be nice.

306

[quote]kpsnap wrote:

[quote]Tiribulus wrote:
This lady and I agree on absolutely nothing I’ve seen so far.
[/quote]<<< I live a squeaky clean life >>>[/quote]I’m pretty sure you and I have very different ideas of what that means. Not trying to be gratuitously antagonistic. Just honest. [quote]kpsnap wrote:<<< and truly try to follow the Golden Rule. >>>[/quote]Ok.[quote]kpsnap wrote:<<< You’d probably be pleasantly surprised if you met me.[/quote]My dear, I wouldn’t be the least bit shocked to learn that your entire life is one thousand times more stable, peaceful and generally “moral” than mine ever was without Jesus. I wouldn’t be surprised at all. We’d probably like each other. I’m told I’m actually a fun guy. Even by most of the unbelievers I know. My customers love me. You seem a pleasant enough lady as well. I get along personally just fine with liberals. It’s people who dishonor the name of my God that I cannot suffer to persist unchallenged.
I also do not hold myself up as some paragon of purity. No Ma’am. The difference between myself and anybody else is the Lord. He gets all the praise, honor and glory. I left a wake of breathtaking wreckage in my past. Every syllable I’ve typed to somebody else is to me first.

Lemme ask you. Why do you think you suck at debating? What is it about the act of taking and defending a position/s that you see yourself as ill equipped for? I promise I am not picking a fight or setting you up. I am sincerely interested.

307

[quote]smh23 wrote:

[quote]ZEB wrote:

[quote]smh23 wrote:

[quote]Jewbacca wrote:

[quote]smh23 wrote:

[quote]Jewbacca wrote:

[quote]smh23 wrote:

[quote]MaximusB wrote:

The idea of people paying their fair share should be zoomed in, as in California the top 15% pay 80% of the taxes.
[/quote]

What percentage of the total wealth do the top 15 percent command?[/quote]

Who cares? How is that relevant to the standard of living of others?[/quote]

If someone has 80 percent of the wealth, and wealth is what is taxed, would it not stand to reason that this person would pay 80 percent of the tax?[/quote]

Wealth is not taxed.

Income is taxed.

And income is taxed disproportionately, such that the top 50% of incomes pay 100% of the income tax (give or take 1% or so).[/quote]

Wealth–income, property, capital gains, inheritance etc. Nearly everything except what’s stored under the mattress.

By the way, the bottom 50 percent controls how much of the wealth in the United States?

1.1 percent as of 2010.[/quote]

How much do they deserve to control?

1.1%.

Keep punishing prosperity and you’ll get less of it.

WOW!

That’s a shocker isn’t it?[/quote]

Are you finding it this difficult to follow my meaning?

Jewbacca: “And income is taxed disproportionately, such that the top 50% of incomes pay 100% of the income tax (give or take 1% or so).”

smh23: [I’m adding material here to help you understand]: If the top 50 percent are paying a disproportionately large amount of the tax, then it must be true that the bottom 50 percent are paying a disproportionately small amount of the tax.

In 2009, the bottom 50 percent paid only 2.25 percent of the federal income tax.

However, they accounted for only 1.1 percent of the total net worth in 2010.

They are paying little and they have little [For perspective, it took a salary of $34,338 to be in that top 50 percent in 2012]. This doesn’t seem disproportionate to me.

See what I’m saying?

I don’t want to start a discussion about job creators and what people deserve here. My point is simple.[/quote]

They should be paying less I agree, but not that much less. They should be paying the same percentage as the top half. Again, when you punish prosperity you get less of it. Is that so difficult for you to understand?

308

[quote]MaximusB wrote:
Snap,

Please consider, that the very large majority who post in PWI are men. It would be nice to see more women post here, it is without question that we (men and women) think so far apart that we truly are from different worlds.

Another point of view would be nice. [/quote]

Not so sure, if it wasn’t for women there wold not have been a democrat elected since LBJ. They want government to take care of them. And the more of them who have children out of wedlock the more they want from government.

309

[quote]smh23 wrote:
I don’t want to start a discussion about job creators and what people deserve here. My point is simple.[/quote]

The top 50% of incomes collect about 56-60% of total incomes and pay 99% of tax.

You “simple” point regarding accumulated wealth (being that the top 50 have about 85% of the accumulated wealth if you want accurate statistics) is that the top 50% have saved or otherwise created wealth and you want to re-distribute (aka steal) to the people who have not created wealth or lived beyond their means and not saved by unfairly taxing the income of people.

A school teacher who puts away a couple hundred dollars a month instead and drives a crappy car can easily move into the upper 10% of wealth-holders in her lifetime.

All it takes is personal discipline and responsibility.

310

[quote]Jewbacca wrote:

All it takes is personal discipline and responsibility.

[/quote]

Ha ha what do those two things mean to the entitlement class? Just words on a computer screen.

311

[quote]Jewbacca wrote:

[quote]smh23 wrote:
I don’t want to start a discussion about job creators and what people deserve here. My point is simple.[/quote]

The top 50% of incomes collect about 56-60% of total incomes and pay 99% of tax.

You “simple” point regarding accumulated wealth (being that the top 50 have about 85% of the accumulated wealth if you want accurate statistics) is that the top 50% have saved or otherwise created wealth and you want to re-distribute (aka steal) to the people who have not created wealth or lived beyond their means and not saved by unfairly taxing the income of people.

A school teacher who puts away a couple hundred dollars a month instead and drives a crappy car can easily move into the upper 10% of wealth-holders in her lifetime.

All it takes is personal discipline and responsibility.

[/quote]

Yeah, so I’ve heard.

Earners in that bottom 50 percent in 2012 made less than $34,388 per year. Good luck squeezing more tax revenue out of that.

312

[quote]smh23 wrote:

[quote]Jewbacca wrote:

[quote]smh23 wrote:
I don’t want to start a discussion about job creators and what people deserve here. My point is simple.[/quote]

The top 50% of incomes collect about 56-60% of total incomes and pay 99% of tax.

You “simple” point regarding accumulated wealth (being that the top 50 have about 85% of the accumulated wealth if you want accurate statistics) is that the top 50% have saved or otherwise created wealth and you want to re-distribute (aka steal) to the people who have not created wealth or lived beyond their means and not saved by unfairly taxing the income of people.

A school teacher who puts away a couple hundred dollars a month instead and drives a crappy car can easily move into the upper 10% of wealth-holders in her lifetime.

All it takes is personal discipline and responsibility.

[/quote]

Yeah, so I’ve heard.

Earners in that bottom 50 percent in 2012 made less than $34,388 per year. Good luck squeezing more tax revenue out of that.[/quote]

That’s a lot of money, more than I made as young officer. I gave 10% to charity and saved 10%.

And supported a wife and a baby.

Everyone needs to pay their fair share, just because it’s fair, no less than 15% after deductions. It needs to hurt everyone.

313

[quote]Jewbacca wrote:

That’s a lot of money, more than I made as young officer. I gave 10% to charity and saved 10%.

And supported a wife and a baby.

Everyone needs to pay their fair share, just because it’s fair, no less than 15% after deductions. It needs to hurt everyone.[/quote]

Respectfully, and without taking away from the fact that your story is one that can and certainly should be emulated, I doubt that $30,000 is today what it was then. And I’m not familiar with the particulars of Israeli military service (if that’s where you served), but soldiers can generally stretch modest incomes much further than civilians if housing is provided or subsidized by the state (again, I don’t know if this was the case, or if there is an equivalent to BAH).

Regarding “it needs to hurt everyone”: 15 percent hurts me a hell of a lot more than it hurts my father, and it hurts him hell of a lot more than it hurts his lawyer, and it hurts his lawyer a hell of a lot more than it hurts Mitt Romney, and so on. There is certainly a point at which someone’s income is so paltry that taxing it becomes flatly stupid (why tax somebody on the cusp of food stamp eligibility, for example, if they then turn to public assistance and begin taking more than was given in tax?).

That said, you won’t find me arguing that everybody who can pay should pay. My duty to the tax collector is no less real than yours or Bill Gates’. But the notion that the poor aren’t paying their “fair share” and the apparatus should somehow shift downward so as to relieve the burden on the hapless wealthy is simplistic.

314

[quote]Mufasa wrote:
kpsnap:
I hope you don’t leave.
Your insights…and most importantly your PERSPECTIVE on Life…would without question be valuable to this Forum…
[/quote]
Thanks.

[quote]MaximusB wrote:
Snap:
Please consider, that the very large majority who post in PWI are men. It would be nice to see more women post here, it is without question that we (men and women) think so far apart that we truly are from different worlds.
Another point of view would be nice. [/quote]
I agree that men and women often see the world quite differently. I think that’s by design, though. Yin and yang. It’s unfortunate that so few women post here.

[quote]Tiribulus wrote:
Why do you think you suck at debating? What is it about the act of taking and defending a position/s that you see yourself as ill equipped for? I promise I am not picking a fight or setting you up. I am sincerely interested.
[/quote]
I don’t see this as picking a fight at all. I don’t believe I have much talent because I tend to focus more on ancillaries and don’t effectively make the connection to the main points. Once it’s pointed out, I can see it. I also let emotion take hold more than it should. And I do live a really clean life. You’d probably be hard pressed to prove me wrong. Just because I have liberal viewpoints doesn’t mean I live a wild lifestyle.

[quote]ZEB wrote:
if it wasn’t for women there wold not have been a democrat elected since LBJ. They want government to take care of them. And the more of them who have children out of wedlock the more they want from government. [/quote]
Lovely blanket statement.

[quote]smh23 wrote:
There is certainly a point at which someone’s income is so paltry that taxing it becomes flatly stupid (why tax somebody on the cusp of food stamp eligibility, for example, if they then turn to public assistance and begin taking more than was given in tax?).
[/quote]
I agree with this.

315

[quote]MaximusB wrote:

[quote]Tiribulus wrote:

[quote]MaximusB wrote: I don’t think you suck at debate, but I can assure you that you will get better by default by hanging around here. Just like weights, practice makes perfect. [/quote]I agree and with Aragorn too. This lady and I agree on absolutely nothing I’ve seen so far, but I certainly like to see people hang around here. Her recognizing a natural deficiency in the area of debate, about which there is nothing to be ashamed, induced some respect from me actually. Sincerely. Self abasing honesty, when honest, is disarming.
[/quote]

I certainly don’t want her to feel like she shouldn’t post because she feels like she sucks at this, I like getting all sorts of feedback.

I just don’t want the vile stuff we see (basically what VT Balla does when he comes in.)

I have seen all sorts of people here disagree, but it should not be nasty or personal.

Shit, I think Pitt has probably some of the thickest skin in this place from all the shit he has taken, but he handles it well. If he came out West, I would buy him a beer, while still calling him a lunatic. [/quote]

LOL i abandon this cesspool for a couple weeks, and Max still can’t stop thinking about me.

And now we’ve moved on to justifying stiffing a hard working waiter who is servicing you because you are pissed off at the government (not even knowing the server’s political affiliations?) LOL…and the server is better off if you come in and give him a 5% tip than nothing at all? LOL…too funny…

316

[quote]kpsnap wrote:

[quote]smh23 wrote:
There is certainly a point at which someone’s income is so paltry that taxing it becomes flatly stupid (why tax somebody on the cusp of food stamp eligibility, for example, if they then turn to public assistance and begin taking more than was given in tax?).
[/quote]
I agree with this.[/quote]

As someone who is vastly more fiscal conservative than both of you, I agree as well. There is better sense of “fairness” in a progressive tax system. I wouldn’t care if we switched to a flat tax, but I also know it won’t happen so…

That being said, I believe the point Jewbacca is trying to make, and it is a good one, is why so many people are net takers the system either fails or the burden on the givers becomes so high they themselves are taxed into the taker bracket. (This ignores the whole danger of democracy, when the poor are the majority and vote for bad policy and people out of ignorant self interests.)

A better use of time would be to shift focus from who pays what percentage, to one of “grow the pie so more people make enough to pay taxes”. (The other benefit here is people start paying more attention when Uncle Sam seems to be “coming for them” too.)

You can’t just “tax the rich” your way out of fiscal mess like we have. It won’t work, and there are plenty of youtubes and articles that outline the basic math.

317

[quote]countingbeans wrote:

You can’t just “tax the rich” your way out of fiscal mess like we have. [/quote]

I agree unequivocally. Good post.

318

[quote]smh23 wrote:
But the notion that the poor aren’t paying their “fair share” and the apparatus should somehow shift downward so as to relieve the burden on the hapless wealthy is simplistic.[/quote]

The basic truth is that we’re all paying too much government is too big and doing too much That aside, the rich are paying an incredible amount more than they should. And by punishing them for their success as is the Obama mantra the economy will stay in the doldrums…or worse.

319

[quote]kpsnap wrote:

ZEB wrote:
if it wasn’t for women there wold not have been a democrat elected since LBJ. They want government to take care of them. And the more of them who have children out of wedlock the more they want from government.

Lovely blanket statement.[/quote]

Merely stating a fact, if you can’t handle the facts you’re in the wrong place!

320

[quote]smh23 wrote:

[quote]countingbeans wrote:

You can’t just “tax the rich” your way out of fiscal mess like we have. [/quote]

I agree unequivocally. Good post.[/quote]

Then stop advocating the wealthy pay even more. As you say this will not get us out of the mess that we are in. And in fact will dig a deeper hole. If I have say 100-k less to add to my business because I have to give it to the government that harms the economy as that is money I would have used for expansion which means jobs. And there are millions like me who are now pulling back because of the inexperienced wonder boy who occupies the Oval Office.