4 ms·

I'm thinking more of those who make, say $200k, and are content with solving puzzles all day long without caring for much else. Those who can make a difference

I'm thinking more of those who make, say $200k, and are content with solving puzzles all day long without caring for much else. Those who can make a difference who don't care what difference they're making. Awakening is the opposite term for what that is. Rising the corporate tax until when? until businesses are barely profitable? that's effectively confiscating the technology and letting them run it more efficiently than the state can, that's the road to the new communism. Minimum wage reform, same thing. Plus, this is all economic suicide if we look at the rest of the economy, not just the automation-enablers, but that would be going too off-topic here. Yes, this all sounds like today because we're on our way to that dark future. And we're calling it awakening apparently, see why I said people would be oblivious to the shift?

logn 12y ago
Many tech companies pay 0% in taxes. Some pay a negative tax rate. The wealthy pay about 10-20% effective taxes. The tax burden has been shifted to the middle class. And this isn't considering inflation, which taxes everyone except those on the inside (basically, banks and owners of gov't contracting companies). Fixing these problems isn't communism. It's a return to mid-20th century American policies. With this type of reform in place, it's a lot easier to envision a nice future where some people get $200K/yr to solve puzzles, and others get a $40K/yr minimum wage to blog about their day. Edit: and aside from basic income or minimum wage, this is how I think a lot of people should be paid -> https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8708820 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8708820
- alvarosm 12y ago
  And it will keep on being shifted to the middle class until it disappears. The "rich" don't have enough money to maintain a subsidized economy, the middle class does. As for the big companies, they use so-called tax loopholes to defer tax payment and keep foreign-sourced income offshore. They'd get taxed when/if that money reenters the US. And you can be sure they'll be taxed eventually as uncle Sam gets more needy to run a subsidized economy. State interventionism with FATCA and so on will only grow until there will be no way for them to avoid taxation.
- jerf 12y ago
  "The tax burden has been shifted to the middle class." That does not correspond with the latest news I've seen: http://www.aei.org/publication/new-cbo-study-shows-rich-dont-just-pay-fair-share-pay-almost-everybodys-share/ http://www.aei.org/publication/new-cbo-study-shows-rich-dont...
  - logn 12y ago
    I wouldn't expect a conservative think tank to frame the issue any other way. He's an alternate take: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/05/22/chart-shows-corp-taxes-grossly-unfair_n_3321737.html http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/05/22/chart-shows-corp-ta... Payroll taxes now make up 35 percent of all federal government tax receipts, up from 11 percent in 1950. Corporate income taxes, meanwhile, now make up less than 10 percent of federal revenue, down from about 26 percent in 1950. Keep in mind, your article and mine are only counting federal taxes. The middle class pay a higher proportion of their income buying things than the rich, so they're hit harder by sales taxes. Same goes for property taxes. And many states tax low income workers on income even though the IRS cuts them a break. One should also factor in court costs and fines for petty crimes. There's gasoline tax and toll roads as well. These are all regressive. Edit: the shift I mean is from corporations and super wealthy to the middle class generally. I would agree that upper middle class (doctors, lawyers, etc) probably carry most of the weight on taxes and the lower middle class gets many breaks (for good reason, though).
    - dubfan 12y ago
      At least the conservative think tank is up front about their bias, unlike HuffPo.
    - jerf 12y ago
      "I wouldn't expect a conservative think tank to frame the issue any other way." You do realize that's a symmetric slur, right? Besides, from what I've seen in general the US is already the most progressive taxing country in the world. Like so many other "liberal" issues, there's never any stopping point, never enough, which is an incredibly dangerous way to operate (and is a great deal of the reason why we're in the final 10 years of liberal dominance as it is now tearing itself apart, because there is never enough, there can't be enough, there mustn't be enough, and if that means it must push beyond all bounds of reason or rationality, so be it...). And also, if the taxation level is a problem, given that our government spends radically more than it is taking in on taxes as well, maybe the government shouldn't be spending so much? Maybe the reason we are in such an economic funk is that we route too much wealth to the government, for it to expensively and poorly try to figure out what to do with it for us? Here's the symmetry: But of course I wouldn't expect a liberal source to even consider the possibility that handing all the money over to a centralized entity to disburse remains something that we have neither evidence nor experience to suggest is a particularly fantastic way to get things done at this scale. I'd also observe the numbers are from the CBO, not the think-tank in question.

logn 12y ago

Many tech companies pay 0% in taxes. Some pay a negative tax rate. The wealthy pay about 10-20% effective taxes. The tax burden has been shifted to the middle class. And this isn't considering inflation, which taxes everyone except those on the inside (basically, banks and owners of gov't contracting companies). Fixing these problems isn't communism. It's a return to mid-20th century American policies. With this type of reform in place, it's a lot easier to envision a nice future where some people get $200K/yr to solve puzzles, and others get a $40K/yr minimum wage to blog about their day. Edit: and aside from basic income or minimum wage, this is how I think a lot of people should be paid -> https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8708820 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8708820

alvarosm 12y ago
And it will keep on being shifted to the middle class until it disappears. The "rich" don't have enough money to maintain a subsidized economy, the middle class does. As for the big companies, they use so-called tax loopholes to defer tax payment and keep foreign-sourced income offshore. They'd get taxed when/if that money reenters the US. And you can be sure they'll be taxed eventually as uncle Sam gets more needy to run a subsidized economy. State interventionism with FATCA and so on will only grow until there will be no way for them to avoid taxation.
jerf 12y ago
"The tax burden has been shifted to the middle class." That does not correspond with the latest news I've seen: http://www.aei.org/publication/new-cbo-study-shows-rich-dont-just-pay-fair-share-pay-almost-everybodys-share/ http://www.aei.org/publication/new-cbo-study-shows-rich-dont...
- logn 12y ago
  I wouldn't expect a conservative think tank to frame the issue any other way. He's an alternate take: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/05/22/chart-shows-corp-taxes-grossly-unfair_n_3321737.html http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/05/22/chart-shows-corp-ta... Payroll taxes now make up 35 percent of all federal government tax receipts, up from 11 percent in 1950. Corporate income taxes, meanwhile, now make up less than 10 percent of federal revenue, down from about 26 percent in 1950. Keep in mind, your article and mine are only counting federal taxes. The middle class pay a higher proportion of their income buying things than the rich, so they're hit harder by sales taxes. Same goes for property taxes. And many states tax low income workers on income even though the IRS cuts them a break. One should also factor in court costs and fines for petty crimes. There's gasoline tax and toll roads as well. These are all regressive. Edit: the shift I mean is from corporations and super wealthy to the middle class generally. I would agree that upper middle class (doctors, lawyers, etc) probably carry most of the weight on taxes and the lower middle class gets many breaks (for good reason, though).
  - dubfan 12y ago
    At least the conservative think tank is up front about their bias, unlike HuffPo.
  - jerf 12y ago
    "I wouldn't expect a conservative think tank to frame the issue any other way." You do realize that's a symmetric slur, right? Besides, from what I've seen in general the US is already the most progressive taxing country in the world. Like so many other "liberal" issues, there's never any stopping point, never enough, which is an incredibly dangerous way to operate (and is a great deal of the reason why we're in the final 10 years of liberal dominance as it is now tearing itself apart, because there is never enough, there can't be enough, there mustn't be enough, and if that means it must push beyond all bounds of reason or rationality, so be it...). And also, if the taxation level is a problem, given that our government spends radically more than it is taking in on taxes as well, maybe the government shouldn't be spending so much? Maybe the reason we are in such an economic funk is that we route too much wealth to the government, for it to expensively and poorly try to figure out what to do with it for us? Here's the symmetry: But of course I wouldn't expect a liberal source to even consider the possibility that handing all the money over to a centralized entity to disburse remains something that we have neither evidence nor experience to suggest is a particularly fantastic way to get things done at this scale. I'd also observe the numbers are from the CBO, not the think-tank in question.