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I wonder how many of these "Job Creators" really believes that the wealthy create jobs, or if they are fully aware it's BS?

wmeredith 12y ago
“It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it.” ― Upton Sinclair[1] 1) http://www.goodreads.com/quotes/21810-it-is-difficult-to-get-a-man-to-understand-something http://www.goodreads.com/quotes/21810-it-is-difficult-to-get...
wodenokoto 12y ago
As far as I am to understand, most of the 1%'ers wealth is tied up in investments. And this is why they consider themselves the job creators. They invest in all sorts of companies and markets and without the initial investment to start a company, there wouldn't be anything for the middle-class to purchase with their middle class salary, not to say no one to pay that salary either. If they just bought gold and hid it in a vault, then I expect them not to consider themselves job creators.
- tdaltonc 12y ago
  If that's the idea, then I guess the members of working class should start calling themselves "wealth creators", "return creators", or "investment opertunity creators."
- krisdol 12y ago
  It's precisely why high income taxes on the wealthy should exist. With high income tax, they have an incentive to invest more money than they keep (rather than hand it over to the government). With low taxation, they can take a small hit and hoard whatever amount they feel like they should. Not taxing the "job creators" stops making them "job creators". Furthermore, keeping wages low prevents regular workers from ever becoming "job creators".
  - akmiller 12y ago
    The wealth disparity that is increasing is mostly due to investments and an extremely low capital gains tax. We can't just increase the income tax because the wealthiest 1% probably don't even have much of an income...they have capital gains from investments. Yes, the income tax needs to be increased (or actually more brackets need to be created) but we also need to raise the capital gains tax for higher amounts of capital gains.
  - sp332 12y ago
    I think you have something backwards. A high income tax on the rich would decrease the amount of money they get to invest, and also reduce their returns on that investment.
- pdonis 12y ago
  As far as I am to understand, most of the 1%'ers wealth is tied up in investments. And this is why they consider themselves the job creators. But this is a very inefficient way of creating jobs; that's one of the main points of the article. Most of the 1%'ers wealth is in investments that they do not actively manage. That has to be the case, because a single person just doesn't scale. There's no way any single person can efficiently determine how best to spend billions of dollars. But if you spread the billions of dollars out among thousands (or even millions) of people, they'll find much better ways to spend it--where "better" means "creating more wealth in aggregate".

wmeredith 12y ago

“It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it.” ― Upton Sinclair[1] 1) http://www.goodreads.com/quotes/21810-it-is-difficult-to-get-a-man-to-understand-something http://www.goodreads.com/quotes/21810-it-is-difficult-to-get...

wodenokoto 12y ago

As far as I am to understand, most of the 1%'ers wealth is tied up in investments. And this is why they consider themselves the job creators. They invest in all sorts of companies and markets and without the initial investment to start a company, there wouldn't be anything for the middle-class to purchase with their middle class salary, not to say no one to pay that salary either. If they just bought gold and hid it in a vault, then I expect them not to consider themselves job creators.

tdaltonc 12y ago
If that's the idea, then I guess the members of working class should start calling themselves "wealth creators", "return creators", or "investment opertunity creators."
krisdol 12y ago
It's precisely why high income taxes on the wealthy should exist. With high income tax, they have an incentive to invest more money than they keep (rather than hand it over to the government). With low taxation, they can take a small hit and hoard whatever amount they feel like they should. Not taxing the "job creators" stops making them "job creators". Furthermore, keeping wages low prevents regular workers from ever becoming "job creators".
- akmiller 12y ago
  The wealth disparity that is increasing is mostly due to investments and an extremely low capital gains tax. We can't just increase the income tax because the wealthiest 1% probably don't even have much of an income...they have capital gains from investments. Yes, the income tax needs to be increased (or actually more brackets need to be created) but we also need to raise the capital gains tax for higher amounts of capital gains.
- sp332 12y ago
  I think you have something backwards. A high income tax on the rich would decrease the amount of money they get to invest, and also reduce their returns on that investment.
pdonis 12y ago
As far as I am to understand, most of the 1%'ers wealth is tied up in investments. And this is why they consider themselves the job creators. But this is a very inefficient way of creating jobs; that's one of the main points of the article. Most of the 1%'ers wealth is in investments that they do not actively manage. That has to be the case, because a single person just doesn't scale. There's no way any single person can efficiently determine how best to spend billions of dollars. But if you spread the billions of dollars out among thousands (or even millions) of people, they'll find much better ways to spend it--where "better" means "creating more wealth in aggregate".