The Glade 4.0

The country is already falling apart, Lex. That's the problem certain parties who believe in fiat currency can't really ignore. There is no global recovery; there is no domestic recovery. No one mentioned that last year's GDP growth was negative when corrected for inflation right? Of course not, because that would destroy the lies coming out of Washington.

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So what should we do? Go out in the backyard, plant a garden, and pray?

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"Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own." Jesus of Nazareth

Gardens are always a good idea.

Fresh tomatoes, peppers, spices. mmm

Just be careful with the watermelon though. It grows like a goddamn weed.

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Holy shitsnacks!

A slightly shrinking economy doesn't indicate collapse.

Ooooo! Are you TRYING to antagonize the man?

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"Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own." Jesus of Nazareth

Of course it's a huge difference from defaulting on its payment obligations. The government can just print money to give to its subsidiary corporations to avoid default. That doesn't make it any less bankrupt, nor spell any less trouble for us, the people holding US currency in our banks.

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

RangerDave:

No, there's really no difference at all between the truth and my observations of the FDIC. It's bankrupt incapable of meeting its obligations. You do know that bank closings and failures out going to outstrip 2009 numbers this year right?

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It does if the entire root of your economy has as a requisite continual growth.

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“The duty of a patriot is to protect his country from its government.” - Thomas Paine

So instead you want to pay 40% of your income in taxes?

Just sayin'.

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Well Ali Baba had them forty thieves, Scheherezade had a thousand tales
But master you in luck 'cause up your sleeves you got a brand of magic never fails...
...Mister Aladdin, sir, What will your pleasure be?
Let me take your order, Jot it down -You ain't never had a friend like me
█ ♣ █

Actually, an economy with 0 growth can be just fine. That could mean it is fully developed. (It could also mean that sociopolitical factors are preventing it from being further developed)

Would you rather live in an impoverished African country with 10% growth, or the United States with 0% growth?

Oh snap!




That depends on a number of factors you're not considering.

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“The duty of a patriot is to protect his country from its government.” - Thomas Paine

This little modification makes it a pretty accurate statement for most people, sadly...

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Sail forth! steer for the deep waters only!
Reckless, O soul, exploring, I with thee, and thou with me;
For we are bound where mariner has not yet dared to go,
And we will risk the ship, ourselves and all.

The tax burden is a lot less than it would cost me if I had to buy it all privately, not only because it's all handled for me and I don't have to spend days of my life on managing all these little things, but my employer also subsidizes a lot of these programs. And no, I would not get that money if these programs didn't exist, an employer pays you the minimum possible, cutting taxes on your employer does not mean you get a raise.

I'm fairly certain that 40% more free and clear take home pay would significantly improve your standard of living. But, you know, that's just me. Unless you want to argue your employer would pay you less all of a sudden.

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Employers don't pay taxes, they simply push them off to one of three groups. I won't go into it, but if you fight for what you're worth at all - yes you would.

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"...but there exists also in the human heart a depraved taste for equality, which impels the weak to attempt to lower the powerful to their own level and reduces men to prefer equality in slavery to inequality with freedom." - De Tocqueville

Elmarnieh:

That's also false. Employers actually pay taxes.

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Seriously, if the portion of your income that goes to income tax was suddenly available to you because there was no income tax - regardless of the percentage - your employer would be like "well now we're just going to reduce your salary to what your net was before it was repealed because you don't need it anymore?" Not if they don't want their workforce to walk out en masse. Any company with half a brain will keep your wages where they are and snatch the best employees leaving other companies. Not only that, but anyone with a contract or a union won't have it happen anyhow.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

Of course, sooner or later someone is going to say that taxes are what we pay for the social contract and having more money means we need to pay a bigger percentage. So, before that happens, let me point out that the wealthy still employ people, drive entrepreneurship, promote research, and ultimately fund what's going on for the rest of the world. Trickle Down Economics in that sense is an absolute reality. Wealth is pooled to create earning opportunities for everyone else. The problem with taxes in the United States is only partly the income taxes. What I want to know: why is there no ***** about actual regressive taxes like Medicare and Social Security, which absolutely do marginalize/dis-empower the poorest segments of our labor force? It would seem to me, at least if people wanted to be consistent, that those arguing against a flat consumption tax in the 11% Range (all that's needed to meet revenue growth based on current spending trends to keep the budget growing at 5% annually) would be the most favorable option among those parties. Yet, when push comes to shove, they'd rather keep a 27% minimum payroll tax on the bottom 80% of earners.

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Because too many people do not actually believe you can get more revenue from lower taxes. They just look at that 11% and see it's lower than 27% and the "bullshit" meter comes on for them because it sounds too good to be true.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

Do you disagree?

I'm not in favor of large government and I don't want to advocate for an environment that ignores personal responsibility, but there is a social contract that needs to be considered.

That said, I'm all for cutting social security, medicare and medicade to the bone and then some if we could use the money to pay off our debt.

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In time, this too shall pass.

That assumes a perfectly competitive labor market, in which workers have perfect information and can easily and freely move from one job to another. Obviously, that's not reality. Labor is sticky - people don't quit their jobs and uproot their families easily. Moreover, there's also price competition for the products those employers sell. So in practice, some of the "extra" money would be kept by employers in the form of higher profits, some would pass through to employees in the form of wages, and some would pass through to consumers in the form of lower prices. The exact split would, of course, vary by industry, region, company, etc.

It doesn't assume anything at all. The buisness is currently paying you a certain amount. That's what you've agreed on with them. They can't change that just because your taxes went down, even if they went down to 0. Even in those cases where it's not outright breach of contract, you're just asking for trouble by cutting pay when the buisness isn't in financial trouble itself. Buisnesses don't normally chop wages because of tax cuts; there's no reason they'd be able to just because of a complete cut, especially since a sudden elimination of income tax would mean it was being replaced by some other tax.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

Some segment of society has to lose out on the consumption tax. You cannot seriously claim that we could substantially lower taxes across the board and have government revenues actually go up. If that were possible, it would have been done already. The only reasons it wouldn't are black-helicopter conspiracy theories like the government deliberately accepts less money so they can push high taxes to keep the people enslaved.

The market doesn't need to be perfect. I bet you can list the highest paying companies in your region and those who offer the best benefits packages right now. If you stretched I best you could list companies with intangible benefits like "treating people right" or "valuing their employees." People talk and companies build reputations.

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That isn't true either. There's no conspiracy theory required; simply the fact that both the average person and politicians do not really accept the idea that a lower tax rate might increase revenue, even if the tax method changes completely.

There's also the attractiveness of the ability to cut taxes or hike taxes, especially on "the rich" and "corporations" as political football. If the tax rate was both A) fairly low and B) provided plenty of revenue there'd be no tax cuts or hikes to campaign on.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."