5 ms·

Taxing the rich (even more than they are already which IMHO is a lot) is just punishing success and rewarding failure.

by axod 16y ago

benohear 16y ago
It depends a wee bit on how you got rich. Taxing the financial industries close to 100% wouldn't strike me as punishing success.
- axod 16y ago
  Why? Are you saying it's easy to make money if you're just providing financial services? :/
  - benohear 16y ago
    No, I'm saying the industry as a whole failed.
    - axod 16y ago
      I don't think that's true at all. Several banks did fantastically, announced record profits etc. The industry as a whole didn't fail, some particular institutions did.
      - benohear 16y ago
        The way the bailout was sold to us was that if these failing institutions were allowed to collapse, they would have brought down the rest with them. I actually hold that to be true and for me that equates to an overall failure of the industry.
        axod 16y ago
        I know it's how it was sold, but I disagree with it. We should have let the bad companies fail and the good ones succeed.
    - jimminy 16y ago
      The whole industry didn't fall. It was about a dozen extremely large insitutions, and the extremely small institutions that depended on that group. There were institutions in the middle who weren't involved in the mess. See BB&T, as an example, they were actually forced by the government to accept a bailout, as to make it seem like the whole industry failed.
      - javert 16y ago
        Agreed. The whole industry bailout was a huge punishment to BB&T, which otherwise probably would have profited tremendously from taking over much of the business of the failed banks.
      - benohear 16y ago
        By the way, as I understand it, there's a difference between "the whole industry" and "the industry as a whole"
davorak 16y ago
With out the community and the government those opportunities to get rich would not exist. If the perfect world the rational rich person might realize this and protect and improve the system that allow people like himself to be possible.
- javert 16y ago
  The government only helps the rich to the degree that it provides courts, police, and military. Beyond that, it's looting them.
  - dhugiaskmak 16y ago
    So true. Everyone knows that every businessman has completely bootstrapped from scratch all of the roads, utilities, schools, hospitals, scientific research, and a thousand other things that they took advantage of to make their fortunes. No one else made any contributions to their success and that's why it's only fair that we should be required to hand over a significant portion of our incomes to them.
    - javert 16y ago
      That's right, let's justify stealing from businessmen based on the fact that they grew up in a society that was already stealing from businessmen. None of the things you mentioned need to (or should) be funded by loot. In fact, utilities and hospitals didn't used to be in the U.S., and only partially are now. The US education system is a stagnant cesspool that still uses a model developed in the Middle Ages. And the government expropriates more wealth created from non-government funded scientific research, than it generates from funding scientific research. Look, nobody has a duty to serve as a sacrificial animal to anybody else. You do not have the right to demand that businessmen sacrifice for you or for society.
      - vannevar 16y ago
        I agree. I think the first thing we need to do to bring about your utopia is to bring back personal liability and eliminate the corporate entity (which after all is a construction of government). Then if a businessman's activities injured someone, we could be sure that a court could strip them of their personal assets in order to compensate the victims of their negligence.
scythe 16y ago
The rich are taxed a lot? They're taxed at a lower level than any other time in the past twenty years -- that's not a lot. The richest people around today -- Gates, Jobs, Ellison, Buffett -- made a significant portion of their money during a time (the '90s) when the top marginal rate was higher than today's. Clearly, that didn't stop them!
pistoriusp 16y ago
Exactly, this kind of thinking freaks me out. They want to take property from people who have earned it precisely for having earned it! It's theft, it's looting, and it's slavery! You cannot take one man's property and give it to another based on need.
- Pinckney 16y ago
  By living and working in a country such is America, you are accepting a social contract: if you do well, you will be taxed, if you do poorly, you will at least receive some services to support you. This strikes me as an entirely reasonable contract, though there are others that are different. In Abu Dubai, you can do well, and keep all your money, or do poorly and wind up in debtor's prison. To complain that you're taxed too heavily after you have already become wealthy and secure strikes me as akin to looking back on your healthy, illness free life and complain that you should get a refund on your insurance payments, since they didn't do anything for you. The above is not to argue that one system is superior to the other, but rather that you're in one, and very probably complaining about it now that you know you're well prepared enough that it's clear that you'll probably never be destitute. In a perfect world, we might ask everyone how much risk they want. Unfortunately, so much is determined in your youth. You (I assume) grew up in a family that raised you well, and left you with reasonable earning potential. If we just asked everyone at 18, we would wind up with an upper class that would rarely suffer financial failures, and would accept risk, and those who know they won't get rich on their own, and accept no risk, and so for the most part, this system would be unfundable. As a compromise, and as many of us feel quite strongly that it's simply not acceptable to have people destroyed when they suffer financial ruin, we have some basic social services.
  - mike_esspe 16y ago
    As long as you can't leave this contract (with your property), it's not a voluntary contract. With the same logic you can justify slavery.
    - khafra 16y ago
      If you get your property by exploiting the contract, then get to leave the contract instead of paying your side of it, it's not worth much as a contract.
izendejas 16y ago
Of all those that agree with such argument, I'd like to get an answer to these questions: 1) have you traveled to a developing|third-world country? 2) if you haven't, you should. if you have... 2a) what price tag do you put on first-class infrastructure that makes your business run smoothly, not to mention make it safer to deliver? 2b) what price tag do you pay to ensure that you have a well-nourished and healthy work-force that is more intelligent, stronger and efficient? 2c) what price tag do you pay to ensure that everyone has access to a world-class education (again, compare to a third-world country, I know ours sucks compared to others') that is again, more knowledgeable, more creative, etc and will one day help you boost margins, compete globally, etc? And I could go on... You see.. safety goes hand in hand with: 1) economic stability 2) health (ever wonder why some people risk their own lives to cross borders? their families are starving/dying!) 3) education 4) and much more than just a strong military, uncorrupt/just police/court system And those things cost money. If you'd rather grow wealthy in another country, I dare you to try! And if you're already wealthy and you think taxing you more is unfair, I dare you to move to countries like Mexico where many business owners now have to pay "taxes" to drug gangs or else, they just don't go to prison, they get killed! I'm not arguing that our tax system doesn't need reform or that current rates are fair, I'm arguing that if you want to be wealthy one day or are already, it's in your best interest to contribute more. Consider it an investment where you can. Yes, surely there is waste, but focus on that, don't whine about the fact that you're getting punished because YOU ARE NOT... you were rewarded with all these great opportunities and public goods and services you seem to take for granted, that's all (again, see my first question above).
- sixtofour 16y ago
  2d) a workforce that is relatively well off enough that there's little incentive for them to steal your assets or time. Edit: 2e) comfortable enough not to wage revolution against your ass.
- benmccann 16y ago
  You're arguing that education, infrastructure, and a non-corrupt court system is responsible for this country's success, which may well be true. However, only a tiny amount of spending is on those things. 85% of spending is on social security, the military, and medicaid. We could cut all of those things dramatically without a corresponding decrease in the country's economic output.
sixtofour 16y ago
Then why does Warren Buffet famously say that his [effective?] rate is lower than his secretary's?
bermanoid 16y ago
A flat tax rate, by charging a higher dollar amount to the rich person than the poor person, is still punishing success and rewarding failure, because the rich person pays a hell of a lot more for the same services than the poor person. I propose that we charge everyone an equal dollar amount, that's surely the only way to be fair - after all, if you go out to dinner with five people and rack up a $200 bill, everyone pays $40, that's "fair". Right?
- vlisivka 16y ago
  No. It depends on how much someone eat. Imagine company, which has 10000 shareholders. You own 10% of company. Company needs some financial helps, e.g. $250M. How much you should pay? $100? $250M/10000?

Taxing the rich (even more than they are already which IMHO is a lot) is just punishing success and rewarding failure.

by axod 16y ago

Taxing the rich (even more than they are already which IMHO is a lot) is just punishing success and rewarding failure.

It depends a wee bit on how you got rich. Taxing the financial industries close to 100% wouldn't strike me as punishing success.

axod 16y ago
Why? Are you saying it's easy to make money if you're just providing financial services? :/
- benohear 16y ago
  No, I'm saying the industry as a whole failed.
  - axod 16y ago
    I don't think that's true at all. Several banks did fantastically, announced record profits etc. The industry as a whole didn't fail, some particular institutions did.
    - benohear 16y ago
      The way the bailout was sold to us was that if these failing institutions were allowed to collapse, they would have brought down the rest with them. I actually hold that to be true and for me that equates to an overall failure of the industry.
      - axod 16y ago
        I know it's how it was sold, but I disagree with it. We should have let the bad companies fail and the good ones succeed.
  - jimminy 16y ago
    The whole industry didn't fall. It was about a dozen extremely large insitutions, and the extremely small institutions that depended on that group. There were institutions in the middle who weren't involved in the mess. See BB&T, as an example, they were actually forced by the government to accept a bailout, as to make it seem like the whole industry failed.
    - javert 16y ago
      Agreed. The whole industry bailout was a huge punishment to BB&T, which otherwise probably would have profited tremendously from taking over much of the business of the failed banks.
    - benohear 16y ago
      By the way, as I understand it, there's a difference between "the whole industry" and "the industry as a whole"

davorak 16y ago

With out the community and the government those opportunities to get rich would not exist. If the perfect world the rational rich person might realize this and protect and improve the system that allow people like himself to be possible.

javert 16y ago
The government only helps the rich to the degree that it provides courts, police, and military. Beyond that, it's looting them.
- dhugiaskmak 16y ago
  So true. Everyone knows that every businessman has completely bootstrapped from scratch all of the roads, utilities, schools, hospitals, scientific research, and a thousand other things that they took advantage of to make their fortunes. No one else made any contributions to their success and that's why it's only fair that we should be required to hand over a significant portion of our incomes to them.
  - javert 16y ago
    That's right, let's justify stealing from businessmen based on the fact that they grew up in a society that was already stealing from businessmen. None of the things you mentioned need to (or should) be funded by loot. In fact, utilities and hospitals didn't used to be in the U.S., and only partially are now. The US education system is a stagnant cesspool that still uses a model developed in the Middle Ages. And the government expropriates more wealth created from non-government funded scientific research, than it generates from funding scientific research. Look, nobody has a duty to serve as a sacrificial animal to anybody else. You do not have the right to demand that businessmen sacrifice for you or for society.
    - vannevar 16y ago
      I agree. I think the first thing we need to do to bring about your utopia is to bring back personal liability and eliminate the corporate entity (which after all is a construction of government). Then if a businessman's activities injured someone, we could be sure that a court could strip them of their personal assets in order to compensate the victims of their negligence.

scythe 16y ago

The rich are taxed a lot? They're taxed at a lower level than any other time in the past twenty years -- that's not a lot. The richest people around today -- Gates, Jobs, Ellison, Buffett -- made a significant portion of their money during a time (the '90s) when the top marginal rate was higher than today's. Clearly, that didn't stop them!

pistoriusp 16y ago

Exactly, this kind of thinking freaks me out. They want to take property from people who have earned it precisely for having earned it! It's theft, it's looting, and it's slavery! You cannot take one man's property and give it to another based on need.

Pinckney 16y ago
By living and working in a country such is America, you are accepting a social contract: if you do well, you will be taxed, if you do poorly, you will at least receive some services to support you. This strikes me as an entirely reasonable contract, though there are others that are different. In Abu Dubai, you can do well, and keep all your money, or do poorly and wind up in debtor's prison. To complain that you're taxed too heavily after you have already become wealthy and secure strikes me as akin to looking back on your healthy, illness free life and complain that you should get a refund on your insurance payments, since they didn't do anything for you. The above is not to argue that one system is superior to the other, but rather that you're in one, and very probably complaining about it now that you know you're well prepared enough that it's clear that you'll probably never be destitute. In a perfect world, we might ask everyone how much risk they want. Unfortunately, so much is determined in your youth. You (I assume) grew up in a family that raised you well, and left you with reasonable earning potential. If we just asked everyone at 18, we would wind up with an upper class that would rarely suffer financial failures, and would accept risk, and those who know they won't get rich on their own, and accept no risk, and so for the most part, this system would be unfundable. As a compromise, and as many of us feel quite strongly that it's simply not acceptable to have people destroyed when they suffer financial ruin, we have some basic social services.
- mike_esspe 16y ago
  As long as you can't leave this contract (with your property), it's not a voluntary contract. With the same logic you can justify slavery.
  - khafra 16y ago
    If you get your property by exploiting the contract, then get to leave the contract instead of paying your side of it, it's not worth much as a contract.

izendejas 16y ago

Of all those that agree with such argument, I'd like to get an answer to these questions: 1) have you traveled to a developing|third-world country? 2) if you haven't, you should. if you have... 2a) what price tag do you put on first-class infrastructure that makes your business run smoothly, not to mention make it safer to deliver? 2b) what price tag do you pay to ensure that you have a well-nourished and healthy work-force that is more intelligent, stronger and efficient? 2c) what price tag do you pay to ensure that everyone has access to a world-class education (again, compare to a third-world country, I know ours sucks compared to others') that is again, more knowledgeable, more creative, etc and will one day help you boost margins, compete globally, etc? And I could go on... You see.. safety goes hand in hand with: 1) economic stability 2) health (ever wonder why some people risk their own lives to cross borders? their families are starving/dying!) 3) education 4) and much more than just a strong military, uncorrupt/just police/court system And those things cost money. If you'd rather grow wealthy in another country, I dare you to try! And if you're already wealthy and you think taxing you more is unfair, I dare you to move to countries like Mexico where many business owners now have to pay "taxes" to drug gangs or else, they just don't go to prison, they get killed! I'm not arguing that our tax system doesn't need reform or that current rates are fair, I'm arguing that if you want to be wealthy one day or are already, it's in your best interest to contribute more. Consider it an investment where you can. Yes, surely there is waste, but focus on that, don't whine about the fact that you're getting punished because YOU ARE NOT... you were rewarded with all these great opportunities and public goods and services you seem to take for granted, that's all (again, see my first question above).

sixtofour 16y ago
2d) a workforce that is relatively well off enough that there's little incentive for them to steal your assets or time. Edit: 2e) comfortable enough not to wage revolution against your ass.
benmccann 16y ago
You're arguing that education, infrastructure, and a non-corrupt court system is responsible for this country's success, which may well be true. However, only a tiny amount of spending is on those things. 85% of spending is on social security, the military, and medicaid. We could cut all of those things dramatically without a corresponding decrease in the country's economic output.

sixtofour 16y ago

Then why does Warren Buffet famously say that his [effective?] rate is lower than his secretary's?

bermanoid 16y ago

A flat tax rate, by charging a higher dollar amount to the rich person than the poor person, is still punishing success and rewarding failure, because the rich person pays a hell of a lot more for the same services than the poor person. I propose that we charge everyone an equal dollar amount, that's surely the only way to be fair - after all, if you go out to dinner with five people and rack up a $200 bill, everyone pays $40, that's "fair". Right?

vlisivka 16y ago
No. It depends on how much someone eat. Imagine company, which has 10000 shareholders. You own 10% of company. Company needs some financial helps, e.g. $250M. How much you should pay? $100? $250M/10000?