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Yeah, screw that. Capital taxes are at record lows and they want to make it lower at the cost of Medicare and Medicaid. They are parasites at this point. If th

Yeah, screw that. Capital taxes are at record lows and they want to make it lower at the cost of Medicare and Medicaid. They are parasites at this point. If they think they can find lower taxes than 22% they are happy to leave. As if they aren't already avoiding taxes.

robocat 2y ago
I will respond by https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Splitting_(psychology) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Splitting_(psychology) myself. Do Medicare and Medicaid exist without businesses? I'm from New Zealand and our society causes problems for our socialised healthcare. Businesses are symbionts: productive societies accept some costs from businesses so long as the society get more gains. Why do you look at money as though that is all that matters? Who measures the benefits we get from modern society? Finding downsides and complaining about them is too easy. Looking for upsides is less popular. Every poor person I've met avoids taxes.
- johnnyanmac 2y ago
  >Do Medicare and Medicaid exist without businesses? In a purely technical sense, yes. Because you don't necessarily need an American salary to pay taxes that cover these facilities. It was very much a concerted effort for most other non-govt Healthcare to be tied to often American jobs. Which of course causes a cacophony of problems when less employers are even offering full time work. >Why do you look at money as though that is all that matters? It does not, but business these days sucked up enough money that it's starting to affect basic survival, let alone any pursuit of happiness. There's no point finding upsides when the common person is is so low on the totem pole. Making hypotheticals of "well look on the bright side, you're not dead" doesn't help either. When America starts using that wealth to make sure no one in a first person country isn't dying on the street, we can discuss the subtleties of capitalism. >Every poor person I've met avoids taxes. Well I can't speak for New Zealand. You can't tax a poor person with no income. That's how bad the situation is here.
  - robocat 2y ago
    > Because you don't necessarily need an American salary to pay taxes that cover these facilities. That is a weirdly employee centric view. I'm talking about the US economy. American salaries depend on American businesses. America has some of the best healthcare available in the world. If US businesses are fucked due to the beliefs of citizens (or whatever else), then the US socialised healthcare is fucked too. There's plenty of poorly run countries to compare against (including Cuba where I discovered their lies about their healthcare first-hand as a tourist). NZ socialised healthcare is okay but our economy is not improving and regardless of our desires for more, the social benefits have no choice but to match our economic output. > it's starting to affect basic survival, let alone any pursuit of happiness Only if you're one-eyed. US citizens are the rich. In a fair world we would tax all Americans at 90% and redistribute that to the poor in the rest of the world. Maybe same for NZ too (Wikipedia shows that NZ's disposable median income is ⅔ that of the US however it also strangly says that NZ's median wealth is nearly double that of the US -- I'm guessing because houses are more unaffordable in NZ). Income is usually a better measure within an economy of useful output (economies can't really save for next year). The US federal poverty line is about $16000 for one person - a hell of a lot of money for people in many countries. > Making hypotheticals of "well look on the bright side, you're not dead" doesn't help either. I guess you're referring to my comment "Compare yourself to a dead king - what is fair?". My obfuscated point is that few people (maybe narcissists) would give up their modern life to live in past poverty. Antibiotics, freedom, technology, access to the intellectual output of the world. We are mostly a lot better off than the past. Most people don't value that instead they are money-centric (as many of your comments are). Most people seem to compare themselves to people that are wealthier than themselves and then complain about how they are not getting their fair share. Few people compare themselves against the global poor and then talk about how much they should share their wealth downwards. They talk about how others should share their wealth - they rarely seem to consider how they should share their own wealth. Especially ironic given that it appears that the majority of commenters on HN are the wealthy of the world (and often part of the tech overlords - e.g. YC). The US is often a parasite upon other countries. If you were to say that the US pays it back to poor countries with technology (mostly from rich companies), then you would be implicitly arguing that wealthy US companies deserve to be wealthy. I recall that weapons are the biggest US export (nice!) I guess I'm saying is really take care not to kill your geese laying golden eggs (even if you think the geese seem to be keeping too much golden egg to themselves): the socialised good that you have depends on those geese (US businesses). The bad is bad but don't destroy the good. An economy is a delicate balance - as shown by many failed economies. > When America starts using that wealth to make sure no one in a first person country isn't dying on the street I've think I've answered that here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43148513 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43148513 Cheers https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_wealth_per_adult https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_wealth_pe... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Median_income https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Median_income
robocat 2y ago
I just read a better response to the parasites claim (find the second occurance of the word): https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/why-i-am-not-a-conflict-theorist https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/why-i-am-not-a-conflict-the... So What Does Drive Political Disagreement? If you’ve read The Psychopolitics Of Trauma, you already know my answer to this: it’s all psychological. People support political positions which make them feel good. On a primary level, this means: \* Successful people want to hear that they deserve their success. \* Unsuccessful people want to hear that successful people don’t deserve their success, lied / cheated / nepotismed their way to the top, and are no better than they are. \* People want to knock down anyone who makes a status claim to be better than them. People want to feel like their own identity group is heroic net contributors, and that their outgroup are villainous moochers. People want to feel like their own identity group deserves more power. * People want to feel like their preferred lifestyle and policies have no negative implications at all and they don’t have to feel guilty about them. * People want to feel like they’re part of a group of special people poised to change the world, and everyone else is hidebound bigots who resist temporarily but will eventually be forced to recognize their genius. People want to virtue-signal: demonstrate that they have the good qualities that their ingroup considers most important. * But people also want to vice-signal: demonstrate their willingness to breezily dismiss the supposedly good qualities that the outgroup considers important.

robocat 2y ago

I will respond by https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Splitting_(psychology) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Splitting_(psychology) myself. Do Medicare and Medicaid exist without businesses? I'm from New Zealand and our society causes problems for our socialised healthcare. Businesses are symbionts: productive societies accept some costs from businesses so long as the society get more gains. Why do you look at money as though that is all that matters? Who measures the benefits we get from modern society? Finding downsides and complaining about them is too easy. Looking for upsides is less popular. Every poor person I've met avoids taxes.

johnnyanmac 2y ago
>Do Medicare and Medicaid exist without businesses? In a purely technical sense, yes. Because you don't necessarily need an American salary to pay taxes that cover these facilities. It was very much a concerted effort for most other non-govt Healthcare to be tied to often American jobs. Which of course causes a cacophony of problems when less employers are even offering full time work. >Why do you look at money as though that is all that matters? It does not, but business these days sucked up enough money that it's starting to affect basic survival, let alone any pursuit of happiness. There's no point finding upsides when the common person is is so low on the totem pole. Making hypotheticals of "well look on the bright side, you're not dead" doesn't help either. When America starts using that wealth to make sure no one in a first person country isn't dying on the street, we can discuss the subtleties of capitalism. >Every poor person I've met avoids taxes. Well I can't speak for New Zealand. You can't tax a poor person with no income. That's how bad the situation is here.
- robocat 2y ago
  > Because you don't necessarily need an American salary to pay taxes that cover these facilities. That is a weirdly employee centric view. I'm talking about the US economy. American salaries depend on American businesses. America has some of the best healthcare available in the world. If US businesses are fucked due to the beliefs of citizens (or whatever else), then the US socialised healthcare is fucked too. There's plenty of poorly run countries to compare against (including Cuba where I discovered their lies about their healthcare first-hand as a tourist). NZ socialised healthcare is okay but our economy is not improving and regardless of our desires for more, the social benefits have no choice but to match our economic output. > it's starting to affect basic survival, let alone any pursuit of happiness Only if you're one-eyed. US citizens are the rich. In a fair world we would tax all Americans at 90% and redistribute that to the poor in the rest of the world. Maybe same for NZ too (Wikipedia shows that NZ's disposable median income is ⅔ that of the US however it also strangly says that NZ's median wealth is nearly double that of the US -- I'm guessing because houses are more unaffordable in NZ). Income is usually a better measure within an economy of useful output (economies can't really save for next year). The US federal poverty line is about $16000 for one person - a hell of a lot of money for people in many countries. > Making hypotheticals of "well look on the bright side, you're not dead" doesn't help either. I guess you're referring to my comment "Compare yourself to a dead king - what is fair?". My obfuscated point is that few people (maybe narcissists) would give up their modern life to live in past poverty. Antibiotics, freedom, technology, access to the intellectual output of the world. We are mostly a lot better off than the past. Most people don't value that instead they are money-centric (as many of your comments are). Most people seem to compare themselves to people that are wealthier than themselves and then complain about how they are not getting their fair share. Few people compare themselves against the global poor and then talk about how much they should share their wealth downwards. They talk about how others should share their wealth - they rarely seem to consider how they should share their own wealth. Especially ironic given that it appears that the majority of commenters on HN are the wealthy of the world (and often part of the tech overlords - e.g. YC). The US is often a parasite upon other countries. If you were to say that the US pays it back to poor countries with technology (mostly from rich companies), then you would be implicitly arguing that wealthy US companies deserve to be wealthy. I recall that weapons are the biggest US export (nice!) I guess I'm saying is really take care not to kill your geese laying golden eggs (even if you think the geese seem to be keeping too much golden egg to themselves): the socialised good that you have depends on those geese (US businesses). The bad is bad but don't destroy the good. An economy is a delicate balance - as shown by many failed economies. > When America starts using that wealth to make sure no one in a first person country isn't dying on the street I've think I've answered that here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43148513 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43148513 Cheers https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_wealth_per_adult https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_wealth_pe... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Median_income https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Median_income

robocat 2y ago

I just read a better response to the parasites claim (find the second occurance of the word): https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/why-i-am-not-a-conflict-theorist https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/why-i-am-not-a-conflict-the... So What Does Drive Political Disagreement? If you’ve read The Psychopolitics Of Trauma, you already know my answer to this: it’s all psychological. People support political positions which make them feel good. On a primary level, this means: \* Successful people want to hear that they deserve their success. \* Unsuccessful people want to hear that successful people don’t deserve their success, lied / cheated / nepotismed their way to the top, and are no better than they are. \* People want to knock down anyone who makes a status claim to be better than them. People want to feel like their own identity group is heroic net contributors, and that their outgroup are villainous moochers. People want to feel like their own identity group deserves more power. * People want to feel like their preferred lifestyle and policies have no negative implications at all and they don’t have to feel guilty about them. * People want to feel like they’re part of a group of special people poised to change the world, and everyone else is hidebound bigots who resist temporarily but will eventually be forced to recognize their genius. People want to virtue-signal: demonstrate that they have the good qualities that their ingroup considers most important. * But people also want to vice-signal: demonstrate their willingness to breezily dismiss the supposedly good qualities that the outgroup considers important.