October 12, 2012
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The Effects of Socialism
I have been debating with Obama supporters for some time online, mostly on news articles, and I have come to the conclusion that sometimes I use too many big words for them. So I am going to break this down as simply as possible, and use pictures so that no one will get lost. Of course I do not expect to persuade any Obama supporters, but what I can do is make everyone aware of what exactly they are voting for.
I have been hearing lots of talk about raising taxes on the rich, as if it were a magic wand that will magically cure all of the financial problems and create jobs. So let us take a moment to step back and look at how this actually works. This is going to be a lesson in real life, plain and simple. I will try to keep the big words and ideological catch phrases to a minimum.
There are three types of people concerned here, the employer, the employed, and the unemployed. They will be represented as follows:
Under the best of circumstances the amount of unemployed people is low, but there are still always those who are unemployed.
This picture represents where people are in the economy:
The group on the left is a large business/corporation, the group in the middle represents people who are unemployed for any reason, whether they lost their job, never had one, or are freshly out of college, and the group on the right represents a small business. The goal of the people in the center SHOULD be to join the group on the right or the left, or if any of them are smart enough, to do something really good that people will pay them for so that they can get more work and more work until they have so much work that they need others to help them do it (which means they can hire people). So basically they want to change their color to blue or red, but most people don’t have what it takes to be red so they will become blue.
Now let’s say there are too many people in the middle section. Why is that? The economy is poor so hiring slows. How do we fix it? Along comes a politician and says that lot’s of people are suffering, and he says that the red guys are not paying their “fair share” and he correctly points out that they have a higher standard of living than the blue guys and black guys. He says that he can take a lot more money from the red guys before they are hurt on a personal level, and that by redistributing it to black guys, and a few of the lower income blue guys, then he can reduce the amount of guys in black.
So here it comes, the Good Ship Government to take some more money:
While he’s at it, he is also going to take some money from some of the blue guys who make higher salaries, but not as much. When this happens, some of the people in blue and black cheer, because they think the guys in red and the higher paid blue guys are undeserving, and that they should have their money taken away from them. This is what those guys get for being greedy.
While I’m at it, let me put myself in the picture. You can put yourself in the picture wherever you fall, but there is me, a middle manager for a small business.
So here we are, the government is sucking out money from these high earning guys, and some of the low income and unemployed guys are cheering. If you stare at it long enough you can almost hear the sucking sound of money going into G. Of course my taxes have not gone up, and in fact they may even be cut. Some of the lower earning people are getting tax cuts, some may even be getting extra money from the government, and all the men in black are getting money from the government. The solid pink lines represent money flowing out of the government to people:
What happens next? Well, the employers now have less money in their hands, which means that they cannot afford to spend as much money as they used to spend, which means that they cannot afford to have all the employees they used to have. They may cut expenditures in other ways, and perhaps raise the price of their services, but some people are going to have their paychecks or their jobs cut.
The big business will downsize, but it will probably still survive, and the people who were laid off can now receive money from the government, but it will not match what they previously made.
For the small business things will be worse. The small business owner now has less money to pay the costs of running the business, and to pay his employees. Of course losing a single employee is a much bigger loss for the small business, so the owner is faced with three choices:
1) He can retire, since his business is no longer generating revenue then the most he can expect out of trying to continue is to end up becoming personally bankrupt.
2) He can go try to work for a big business. Since he has above average skills and intellect to begin with he is more likely to get a position than a fresh college grad or someone trying to enter a different field of employment.
3) He can leave the country and take everything he has left.
But whichever he opts for, the effect on his employees is still the same:
So now I’m out of a job, and so is everyone else. At that point do I care about whether or not I got a tax cut? Not really. Am I glad to be eligible for welfare, foodstamps, or state run medical care? Not really. Am I better off? Not really. Is anyone? Not really.
So here is what it looks like now:
Rather than stimulating the economy there are now a good deal more people unemployed and on welfare, or at least eligible for it. The government now has more people to support, but less money to do it with, which means that things will only get worse rather than better. People who are unemployed now have more people to compete with for an even more limited supply of jobs. This is why conservatives are saying that socialism is trickle up poverty.
I hope everyone can understand this, and I hope that I have made this simple enough. A vote for Obama is a vote for unemployment.
Comments (47)
This ignores that money spent hiring people is 100% tax deductible as a business expense and that it’s only personal income that’s being taxed, and that money given to the poor and middle class they then spend on the employer’s products and services increasing demand and allowing him to hire more people. And it’s ignoring that taxes are not being raised on the rich to simply give cash to the poor, but to provide educational and training opportunities so they can better their situation which helps everyone because employers then have more skilled workers making more money and therefore spending more money on their products and services. The rich in the US want to have their cake and eat it too, they want to put nothing into the ground and sell the crops year after year.
The relationship between the rich and the poor is symbiotic (at least it should be), not parasitical. This equation of yours simply ignores the positive effects of “socialism” and pretends like in a modern, high-tech economy everyone can just go be an engineer or go be a doctor like it’s nothing. In the old days skilled workers would train (for free) the younger generation as apprentices so they could carry on their specialized work. Now they just point to young people with no money and say “go to college! Oh, and I’m not adjusting the minimum wage to keep up with inflation so the shitty entry level job you have to work your way through college will have a paycheck that continually decreases in value while the cost of living goes up.” Now instead of the people who have already succeeded training the next generation they have to pay a few percentage points more in taxes so they can get affordable college *loans*. The result is that the rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer.
The notion that high unemployment is being caused by obama’s evil socialism is just insane, unemployment has dropped by 2% over obama’s first term and went up dramatically under the previous republican administration.
@agnophilo - The key word concerning employees is that they are an expense. And that expense is paid, not with tax breaks, but with wealth that is created by doing business.
Since tax breaks just allow employers to keep money they have already earned, they do nothing to reduce the basic cost of labor, which is salary and benefits.
Taxes on labor like Social Security, unemployment, Medicare and Medicaid all add to the cost of each employee. And income and corporate taxes are costs of doing business in addition to labor costs.
Low tax rates stimulate economic activity because they all wealth creators to keep their money and build their businesses.
@agnophilo - The fact is that paying employees is a perennial cost, not a one time cost, and taxes are also perennial, which means that the more that gets sucked out for taxes the less there is to go to employees or new employees. Giving money to poor people redistributes wealth but does not generate any. They go out and spend it on food and entertainment, which helps the retail industry a little, so maybe if you want to be a retail associate you’re fine with this, although it if the government keeps on sucking the money away then eventually there is no more money to suck, and even the retail jobs will become scarce.
What educational opportunities do you think the government is creating? Listen, I have been through college twice. I have not been able to do ANYTHING with my degrees. Why is that? Because there are too many people competing for a limited number of jobs. More taxes on employers means less jobs, not more. It’s a basic fact.
Only communists think that social stratification that stems naturally from varying abilities is indicative of parasitical relationships. If you’re a producer you are not a parasite, if the government is giving you money for free then you are a parasite. I never said that everyone should be engineers or doctors, the fact is that most people do not have the aptitude for that sort of work, which is why those people get paid more and they usually have few difficulties getting a job. So you don’t have a degree yet? Even if you get one it doesn’t mean your circumstances will improve at all. I have 2 degrees and in the last 3 years they have not gotten me one job. On my second degree I had a 4.0 average, academic honors, and good letters of reccomendation. What did I get for it? Nothing. You may very well go to college, make straight A’s, and then go straight back to working retail. The way things are now is not the way they used to be. The only hope of fixing this problem, is to let employers keep their money so that they can invest it. Would I also like to have a tax cut? Absolutely. But if I lose my job does it still matter if I got a tax cut? Not at all. Better to cut taxes for everyone then to just hand money to people who aren’t working. All that does is cause the permanently unemployed class to grow.
@PrisonerxOfxLove - How does hiring more people and building your business help an employer when demand for their products is no higher than it was last week? How does giving bill gates a million dollars increase demand for his products?
And how does graduating fewer skilled workers every year help the economy?
@Ambrosius_Augustus_Rex -
“The fact is that paying employees is a
perennial cost, not a one time cost, and taxes are also perennial, which
means that the more that gets sucked out for taxes the less there is to
go to employees or new employees. Giving money to poor people
redistributes wealth but does not generate any. They go out and spend
it on food and entertainment, which helps the retail industry a little,
so maybe if you want to be a retail associate you’re fine with this,
although it if the government keeps on sucking the money away then
eventually there is no more money to suck, and even the retail jobs will
become scarce.”
You get that the more things retailers sell the more they buy from other sectors like agriculture and manufacturing, right? This argument makes no sense.
“What educational opportunities do you think
the government is creating? Listen, I have been through college twice.
I have not been able to do ANYTHING with my degrees. Why is that?
Because there are too many people competing for a limited number of
jobs. More taxes on employers means less jobs, not more. It’s a basic
fact.”
It depends greatly on what industry you’re going into and what the demand is in that industry. Some degrees are next to worthless, others you can’t get a job without the degree. And any increase in supply will lag behind an increase in demand. If there’s a town with 1 grocery store that sells enough food to feed 50 people and 50 more people move into town, the demand for food will go up until someone opens up a new store. By the same token if the bottom 50% of the country (most of the consumers of basic products) have lost 2/3 of their economic wealth over 40 years of reaganomics, demand will be low. What did you go to school for if you don’t mind me asking?
“Only communists think that social stratification that
stems naturally from varying abilities is indicative of parasitical
relationships.”
So mitt romney’s a communist?
“If you’re a producer you are not a parasite, if the
government is giving you money for free then you are a parasite.”
Show me someone who doesn’t benefit from the government in many ways and I will show you a homeless crazy man who lives in a cave and survives by drinking his own urine.
“I
never said that everyone should be engineers or doctors, the fact is
that most people do not have the aptitude for that sort of work, which
is why those people get paid more and they usually have few difficulties
getting a job.”
I didn’t say everyone should be either. I think everyone should have the opportunity to work for it though. Someone said on a blog once that american “socialism” is the equivalent of giving every student an A+ regardless of how well they do on the test – I think it’s more the equivalent of letting everyone be able to study for and take the test in the first place.
“So you don’t have a degree yet? Even if you get one it
doesn’t mean your circumstances will improve at all. I have 2 degrees
and in the last 3 years they have not gotten me one job. On my second
degree I had a 4.0 average, academic honors, and good letters of
reccomendation. What did I get for it? Nothing. You may very well go
to college, make straight A’s, and then go straight back to working
retail. The way things are now is not the way they used to be. The
only hope of fixing this problem, is to let employers keep their money
so that they can invest it.”
The average CEO in the 70′s made about a hundred times as much as their average employer. The average CEO after 30 years of reaganomics, before the crash, made about 300 times as much as the average employer – wasn’t that about the time you were looking for a job with your new degrees? Did the richest people in america being 3 times as rich relative to their workers and paying the lowest tax rates in recent history help you to find not just a job but a good one?
“Would I also like to have a tax cut?
Absolutely. But if I lose my job does it still matter if I got a tax
cut? Not at all.”
I think we’ve been conned into thinking the rich are irreplaceable. Myspace was the most popular site in internet history with the highest value ever recorded. When it died a hundred other social networking sites popped up to take it’s place, several of which outdid it. The idea that we have to bribe the already massively rich with tax cuts so they’ll be nice and hire us is insane. We should be going out and making our own jobs not begging for scraps from rich assholes. But again due to decades of reaganomics the table is tilted so far toward big business that entrepreneurs get squeezed out by big companies. Fuck billionaires, tax them and do whatever it takes to bolster the poor. Do you think more minimum wage jobs with disappearing pensions and no health benefits is a recipe to lift people out of poverty? You complain about the service industry being so shitty but want to give every mall owner a tax cut.
“Better to cut taxes for everyone then to just hand
money to people who aren’t working. All that does is cause the
permanently unemployed class to grow.”
No, lowering the wages of the poor through inflation and not regulating dishonest business practices and letting the cost of healthcare expand exponentially and leaving millions uninsured makes the permanently unemployed class grow.
@agnophilo - Taxes have nothing to do with demand. That’s why tax policy is called “supply side economics” when applied to stimulate the economy.
Reducing taxes reduces the cost of doing business and frees up capital for investment.
Taxation sucks money out of the private sector where wealth is created.
Consequently, tax rates must be low for all people if the economy is to boom.
@agnophilo - Well let’s see, production is mostly overseas, and farming is mostly automated. Also, when demand is low for goods and services prices will drop to compensate. When demand is high them prices will go up, if production is increased then prices may go back down or inflation may occur. Anyways, the money is already in the economy before the government takes it. Taking it away from employers and giving it to the unemployed still limits how many people the employers can hire. Even if there is more of a demand they still can’t hire more people to fill it. But let’s say they do hire more retail associates, hypothetically, is that what you want to spend the rest of your life doing? I hate working retail. I would rather join the war effort in afghanistan and risk getting blown up then work retail ever again.
I’m really trying to make sense out of that statement. When it comes to college education the supply is way ahead of the demand. It didn’t used to be that way but that is the way it is now. Part of it could be due to outsourcing of production, which means that less administrators and overseers are needed domestically + an increase in worthless degrees which have no practical application. Let’s say, hypothetically, that you get a business degree, or a degree in business management. You graduate from school, and then you are in competition with all the other graduates, AND a good deal of people who are older and more experienced but lost their jobs due to cutbacks, and you are also in competition with people who graduated one or two years before you did who do not yet have decent jobs and are still on the market. Let’s say you get a history degree or an English degree, if you do then you can forget about getting a job anywhere because those are not career oriented degrees. Let’s say you get a degree in art or theater, then you can forget about having a job. Pretty much the only degrees that will get you a job after school are either scientific or technical degrees. Degrees in medicine, engineering, or computer science. That’s about it. The first set of degrees I mentioned (business & liberal arts) are the sorts of degrees that people with average level intellect or sub-average level intellect will get, which is why more people will get them and why they will not pay as well. The second set of degrees I mentioned require superior intelligence, which means that fewer people are capable of getting them and thus the demand for them is greater than the sullpy (hence the better pay and greater liklihood of getting work). What sort of degree is it that you want to get? If you want to get a scientific degree then there is hope for you, if not then you’re just wasting your time and money. I’m kind of hesitant to spill what I actually got my degrees in online, but I will say that the second degree was for a field that historically always had vacancies and opportunities. It not until about 3 or 4 years ago that it changed.
How does my comment about communism tie in with Mitt Romney? Please explain.
Your response has nothing to do with my comment. If you contribute positively to the economy then you are a producer, if you are a net drain on the economy then you are a parasite. People who run and start businesses are not parasites, they are the very backbone of the economy.
See I disagree with socialism. If you are incapable of providing good opportunities for your children on your own then don’t have any. Reproduction is optional. You shouldn’t produce burdens for other people to have to pick up. I’m 31 years old, and I am just now about to get married in a few months. I have never had sex with anyone. I’ve had a few girlfriends, but I never got married because I was never making enough to get by. It’s called personal responsibility. Also, not everyone has the intellect to go to college. Some people are only cut out for manual labor. There are lots of people who go to college, work for a degree, get a worthless degree, and end up either on the government tit or working in retail again. But to be fair, there are also lots of smart people who are forced into retail because there is a shortage of jobs, and an oversupply of qualified people. The thing to do is bring production back to the US, and cut off immigration of unskilled laborers. This practice of bringing in hordes of unskilled workers from the 3rd world while outsourcing production to the 3rd world is completely asinine, and it’s driving down the value of our money and the standard of living here.
I got my first degree in 2005, and I got a job with it (in the field I was trying to get into) even though I was not technically qualified for it, because back then there was still some demand. After 2 years of that I went back to school to get some formal training so that I could return to my field and make more money, and in 2009 I went back to look for work. But after that I was unable to get a job in my field. The door is closed, and i have to compete with people who have 10 or 20 years of experience, as well as increasing numbers of college graduates each year who are also looking for work. My plans totally backfired, and now I make less money rather than more. Since I graduated I have worked some really crappy jobs. I worked retail for a year, and I even worked construction for a few weeks. Construction BTW is awful even if you are in good physical shape. I finally got a job working as an office manager for a small business, and I recently got raised to $14/hour, but I can’t boast at all because the only reason I got even this job was through personal connections rather than merit or education. I have nothing to be proud of, and no great or even mediocre achievments. I’m just a small guy (economically), in the lower bracket of what can be considered middle class, struggling to get by, and barely holding onto the job I have. But what I do have I want to hang onto. My boss is one of the people Obama wants to tax. If he goes under then I go under, it’s as simple as that.
Letting someone keep their own money is not a bribe. If I see you walking down a dark ally and decide not to beat you up and run off with your wallet am I bribing you? See, you people on the left talk about billionares, or millionares, and use all sorts of rhetoric about 1%, but none of those people exist as an island. Those are the people who employ others, and they got where they are because they have greater intellects than the average person. The reason we have social stratification and specialization of labor is because we have varying abilities and intellects. Also, it’s not just billionaires who will get Obamas new tax dumped on them. It’s anyone who makes over $200,000 a year, including small businesses, and including the one I work for. That’s why a lot of big businesses will downsize, and many small businesses will go out of business. What is it you think I will do if my boss goes out of business? I don’t want to live off the government, and in fact I refuse. I’ll tell you what I will do. I had a few job offers for work overseas. I have been turning them down because my family is here, but if there is no work for me here other than retail then there is no place for me here. If my boss goes out of business, I’m packing my bags and going overseas, and since the economy will probably only go from bad to worse then I will probably stay there until retirement. But, if I have to stay there until retirement, I’m sure not coming back tot he US to retire. No way. If I get driven out by the government, then the government isn’t getting one cent of my money. But I digress. If you don’t want to beg for scraps from assholes then why do you want to take money from the government? There is a contradiction in your position my friend.
OK, let’s say we break all the billionaires and redistribute the money to the poor. Now all the money is gone. The service industry gets a short term burst, and then that money is gone and there are no more billionaires. Alright, let’s do the same and also break the millionares. The service industry gets another short burst, and then it’s done. Now, you want people to start a new business, but what’s the incentive for them to do so if the government is going to break them? There is no incentive. Would you rather live in a USSR type society where the government runs and owns everything and you have to wait in bread lines? I’m just curious. Listen, you tax these people too much and they are going to close down or leave. We have already seen some of that in the news, like Eduardo Severin taking his stuff and going. That sort of stuff is not good for the economy.
The soclalist policies cause inflation. Pumping more money into the economy without having the goods or services to back it up causes inflation. Redistribution of wealth is about as clever as printing more money to compensate for a recession.
@agnophilo - What you do not understand is what a tax deduction is. Its not money given to you. Its simply that no one can tax you one money you nver made. The cost of an employee is part of the cost of making money. You are only taxed on the profit not on loses. When you raise taxes, more of your profit is taken from you, leaving you less not. If your margins are low and they often are it makes doing business a wast of time, you certainly are not going to be giving out raises when your making less and you very well might go out of business all together .
@Ambrosius_Augustus_Rex - What is sad is that I know your efforts are wasted but you did a great job
@Ambrosius_Augustus_Rex - Well, I see from your little chart that you’re a racist!
Seriously, I don’t know why the govt. doesn’t push for people to enter trade schools. I actually made more money than my sister, who was a teacher, with a trade school degree. I daresay my car mechanic makes quite a bit more money than the Average Joe.
If you should like some graphs, I can supply them. Unfortunately, M. is thick. For me, socialism boils down to morals. You help your neighbour, or you have the govt. steal from you to give to your neighbour.
Wow, dangle a pretty trinklet like “the economy will increase” and fools will rush to grab it before they discover it is an illusion.
Right now the billionaires are pushing aside their competitors and making more money because they sort of have a monopoly. To add insult to injury a lot of billionaires are offshoring their jobs and parking their money offshore.
Did many people grouse when the facebook guy took out his earnings and claim he was a Brazilian? Someone who makes money off of America and leaves the country is an ungrateful wretch. (maybe he wants to help Brazil?)
Oh wait Colonialism is the way to get economic advantage? Actually Spain got too rich and you know how well they did with their Spanish Armada….
The sun has stop shining on the British Empire and the Americans are thinking up new ways to circumvent all its competitors. Look how America decided how to push hi def television. The Japanese developed a way to have high def and the US pushed the digital Hi def system.
Looks like the Americans are losing their auto business advantage. The Europeans want to steal the Aviation industry away from Boeing. You guys are arguing over the pennies while the main dollars are being stolen away from the American economy.
If economics were this simple we wouldn’t have any problems… On the surface it might seem it is so, but what makes an economy work has more to do with the collective will of the people than with the distribution of coins and paper. When individuals are rewarded for their efforts they will continue to produce. When they are punished they will pursue a different course. When the trend is to reward productivity then economies flourish. When productivity is punished, economies fail.
Gov, controls over productivity come about in the forms of taxes, tax breaks, social welfare programs, regulatory legislation etc.
A large industrial employer might provide thousands of well paying jobs for a community. The community might enjoy decades of prosperity. At the same time this industrial giant might very well be poisoning the environment and killing these very same citizens. In steps the regulatory agencies and imposes burdens on the corporation and in response the corporation is forced to downsize…
We never seem to know what is best for us… Yet we plod foreward believing our own individual world view is the correct one.
I enjoyed your post and agnophilo’s counterpoints, even if on many levels I think he misses the point entirely.
One has only to look at income disparity. It was proportionally the same in 1929 and 2008. 1929 marked the start of the Great Depression. 2008 marked the start of the Great Recession. The Reagan appointed economic adviser who sold Reagan on trickle-down economics admitted after the 2008 crash that he was wrong. Alan Greenspan apologized for being wrong after the 2008 crash. The NFL is the most successful sports model in the U.S. NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell attributes the success of the NFL to a balance of capitalism and socialism. Take your argument up with them. I’m just the messenger.
obvious point: businesses to not pay employees out of their personal income. to say that taxing the income of business owners more affects their ability to hire more employees is idiotic.
“I have not been able to do ANYTHING with my degrees. Why is that? Because there are too many people competing for a limited number of jobs. More taxes on employers means less jobs, not more. It’s a basic fact.”
it’s really pathetic that you’re blaming your failure on the government, while simultaneously making generalizations that people who support socialist policies blame the rich for THEIR failures. maybe you just picked the wrong field to get into, or you don’t have enough connections, or you aren’t willing to work hard enough to get that job you desire. either way, i don’t think you have anyone to blame but yourself. no employer is going to hire someone unless they need them. businesses aren’t charities… they aren’t going to hand out jobs because they feel sorry for the unemployed.
also..
“ Let’s say you get a history degree or an English degree, if you do then you can forget about getting a job anywhere because those are not career oriented degrees. ”
i’m not sure you understand how post-graduation life works. no intelligent college graduate looks for jobs that only relate specifically to their major, or even their general degree. most of my immensely successful friends got jobs in other fields. getting a college degree does not limit your future. only you can do that to yourself.
It is funny because I work in an organization and my wife works in an organization that is owned by people who are not citizens of the U.S. They came here to make money. I have mentioned this before and some people have said if they don’t like it, they can leave and go back to their country. They struggle to make the connection that some of those jobs will go with them.
This is a great post.
Judging by the comments above, you should have used less words and more pictures.
The only way to solve the world’s crisis is to exterminate lots of humans.
I agree with this. however, as said above I believe, this is talking about paying the employee. Do you know how much CEO’s make in proportion to the lowest level employee. 50 years ago it was about 40:1 and now it is something like 300-400:1.
http://thinkprogress.org/economy/2012/05/03/475952/ceo-pay-faster-worker-pay/
http://thinkprogress.org/economy/2012/04/19/467516/ceo-pay-gap-2011/
The problem here is really greed. People at the bottom who would rather take free money than do work are greedy and lazy. The people at the top who make six figures a year are greedy because what they should do it lessen their own salaries and give more of that money to the lower level employees who cannot afford insurance, food, or childcare.
But instead of doing this and lessening their income, which is already high, they choose to fire employees to keep their high salaries. thus, more people are out of work but also those left have to pick up the slack, so they are now doing more work for less pay. I worked at a discount retail store, so I know this is exactly how it works. And it sucks. I think there should be limits on the CEO and if the CEO wants a raise, then everyone from the bottom up gets a raise. Why? Well, if the business is doing good enough for the CEO to get a raise, then it means the people in the corporations are doing a good job and should be compensated.
@trunthepaige - Thanks, yes I’m not going to win any leftists, but I might be able to help the fence sitters.
@Kellsbella - Or they could be Power Rangers, you never know.
There are some countries where they segregate students based on intelligence, and the students with lower intelligence end up going to a trade school or just being done after high school. I think it’s a good idea myself.
@PPhilip - Well given the choice between lower taxes and higher taxes I’m going to go with lower taxes, which carries immediate benifits. While I do recognize that there is no quick fix for the economy, there is no mistaking the fact that raising taxes is not going to encourage employers to hire new people.
@flapper_femme_fatale - Taxing the owners and the business are both factors in whether or not the business will survive. Of course my illustrations make it look like the guy at the top is being taxed because 1) the guy at the top is the driving force behind the business and 2) the average Obama supporter is pretty simple, so I didn’t want to make it too abstract.
I’m not blaming the government for my failure, I’m blaming them for the current economic failure and the fact that things have become so ridiculous. Of course given that I haven’t said what my field is people can only guess what the problem is and where it is, but I will say this, it was a field that was stable and in constant need of new workers up until about 3 or 4 years ago. The fact that it was affected the way it was by the recession is unprecedented. I had a job there before I gave it up to go back to school, and then everything crashed so it was ultimately a waste of time.
While it is true that a lot of people get jobs unrelated to their field, my second degree was vocation specific and carried certifications with it, and I already had a degree for the sake of having a degree to begin with. Historically people who went into that field got a job, although they sometimes had to relocate. Now that is no longer the case. I blame myself for giving up my job to go back to school, I blame the government for destroying the economy. Anyways, I also have a job in another field, and while it’s OK it’s not really satisfying or enjoyable. If Obama puts my boss out of business, then I’m not going to go back to school or suck on the public tit while I go begging for some other job and competing with people who have appropriate degrees and years of experience. I’m going to go overseas and that will be it. The government won’t get any tax revenue from me at that point, and I won’t retire to the US so they won’t be able to tax my savings and investments either. I told Agnophile the same thing.
Also, I’m not really sure but did you just accuse me of looking for handouts? People on my side of the political spectrum generally do not do that.
@Aloysius_son - Yes I agree. It is more complex than raising and lowering taxes, and at the heart of the matter whatever behavior your incentivise you will get more of. So if you incentivise personal success and people being entrepeneurs then you will get more of that. If you incentivise living off government handouts and having lots of children then you will get more of that. I just wanted to deal with the tax issue for this entry, of course I’m not going to let them get any rest on other issues as well.
Yea, Agnophilo is very civilized and he’s good at stating his points, the only problem is that he’s on the wrong side. If he came over to our side then it would really help the cause, but I don’t think he will. Most of those people are stuck thinking in that way and cannot be reached with any amount of reasoning or even emotional appeals. They are just in a different world. The only real point in debating with them is to reach fence sitters.
@TheTheologiansCafe - That’s interesting. I am also working for people who are not US citizens. Yes everyone needs to stop and consider the effects that the policies will have on businesses. People on the left are so eager to drive these guys out of business without thinking about how it will effect the people who work for them. It seems like they just want to work for the government and wait in breadlines every other morning.
You know I think you’re right. I tried to make it simple, I really did.
@RulerofMasons - Uh, what?
This assumes that the United States is a true capitalist country. It’s not. It’s a social democratic republic, and as long as there are programs in place such as social security, medicare, medicaid, federal (and state) guidelines, regulations, and other means of enforcement, it’s going to remain that way.
It’s not just for individuals – subsidies, grants, mandates, and quotas are all socialist in nature thus making every country in the world socialist to one degree or another.
While your infographic does well to highlight what many business owners and Republicans like to show what happens, it’s not quite the whole story: government gives back a large proportion of revenues to businesses as well. It’s not the one-way street you would like to show it is.
Finally, there is an economist graph called the “Laffer Curve” which highlights how higher tax rates don’t necessarily equate with higher revenues, as those who stand to lose more engage in practices to hide or limit their taxable liability. So, I don’t necessarily agree with “must raise taxes on the rich!”, but I do think the number of deductions and other tax breaks the wealthy (those earning more than $250,000) can access should be limited or closed. When you’re in the situation we’re in – with a budget deficit year-on-year and a growing debt, there has to be a two-pronged solution: raising revenues and cutting spending. You can’t do it one way or the other; it has to be a joint venture. Obama’s plan does more to meet this criteria than what little we have of Romney’s plan.
If instituting tax breaks on all Americans stimulated the economy, then the Bush years (after his tax cuts) should have seen record growth and increasing job opportunities for all – but that wasn’t the case, and after deregulation and the crash from the sugar-high of the tax cuts receded, we ended up in a crippling recession that we’re slowly emerging from. Even if you don’t agree with the methodology of finding out the unemployment rate, you can’t deny that ever since Obama took office the numbers have been declining – a positive trend.
Oh, one last point: “A vote for Obama is a vote for unemployment” is not supported by the facts. More jobs have been created/saved under his administration than the previous administration, the unemployment rate has been falling, and there have been 31 consecutive months of job creation. Above all that, while Democrats have been in office they’ve collectively created 20 million more jobs than Republican administrations.
More dead people mean less fighting for resources. Let the extermination begin!
Best case scenario, Romney gets elected, more jobs are created, the unemployment rate would still be high, and these people will be a huge problem eventually. Rather than wait for a zombie apocalypse, we should exterminate those left behind a peaceful death, like injection. Why do we continue to talk about politics and avoid the issue that we cannot sustain over population for too long? Everyone is avoiding the issue, you are no different than a democrat, things are about to collapse and all you can do is say “hey, let’s vote republican, maybe the collapse would be temporarily solved.”
You really want to solve the world’s problems? Then rid the world of all criminals and bums, not by shooting them with bullets, but an injection. Anyone who sees differently is just waiting for the collapse and not putting up a fight. By ridding the world of parasites, at least a huge load of weight is taken off from those who produce.
Good debate.
@RulerofMasons - That’s a very early 20th century way of thinking. If I were an evolutionist I would probably agree with you, but as it stands right now I don’t really believe that sloth should be a capitol offense, although I do believe that they should receive zero benifits from the state. One way your way of thinking is correct, in that we have growing numbers of stupid people who are reproducing at an alarming rate, while intelligent people are having less kids, but there is a way to fix the problem without just killing all those people.
First of all, what we need to do is cut all the 3rd world immigration, at least when it is unskilled workers. We need to then deport all of the illegal immigrants that are here. Once the immigration is dealt with then we need to cut all the welfare and footstamp programs. Those people can then move into filling the unskilled labor jobs like construction, cleaning bathrooms, doing yard work, etc., because they will no longer have to compete with immigrants. Our birthrate in the US is at equilibrium, so cutting off immigration will keep us from getting overpopulated, and the lack of welfare will deincentivise excessive reproduction among the poor.
@Ambrosius_Augustus_Rex -
“Taxing the owners and the business are both factors in whether or not the business will survive. “
i’m not disagreeing with that. what i’m disagreeing with is your decision to place business owners on a pedestal and and allow them to contribute less in exchange for creating jobs. if you can’t run a business successfully without being taxed in a fair and equal manner, you shouldn’t be running a business.
“I’m going to go overseas and that will be it.”
*shrug* good for you? i don’t see what that has to do with the discussion.
“Also, I’m not really sure but did you just accuse me of looking for handouts?”
it would seem so. you accuse the government of taxing business owners too much, and that’s the reason why you don’t have a job related to your education. what makes you think that less taxes would solve that issue? no intelligent business owner is going to hire employees unless they actually need them. any extra money saved by lowering taxes will just be added to profit. a business’ success has more to do with whether their product or service is desired. and successful business wtih in-demand products and services will hire regardless of what the tax rate is.
@Ambrosius_Augustus_Rex - Mexico is very over populated. We’re going to dump lot’s of mexicans back to their good for nothing country? That is not the answer. We must pass a law that will allow the extermination of immigrants, although in my opinion, we have plenty of citizens that could use the gas chamber… I know what I am saying will never happen and I know it sounds cruel, and I myself do not have what it takes to take away any life, but, the reality is, demands that we take extreme measures, and simply shipping immigrants back to mexico is like putting more water on a bucket that is already full. And to cut off welfare programs puts many people in serious danger, it would be more merciful to kill them quiet frankly. My method is much more humane, if we allow them to breed children, that is just more people to go to prison, do violence, cheat the system, ect. I am appalled that our government has allowed things to go this far, and rather than face the issue, we are feeding the problem like a blob. Those who are righteous and honest must take a stand.
@RulerofMasons - I understand the logic of what you’re saying, but I cannot advocate mass killings like that. Cutting people off to fend for themselves is one thing, having their blood on your hands is another, and the thing is, that it’s a slippery slope. Maybe your son can’t get a job after college for a few years so th government decided to put him down. How would you feel about that? We can eliminate the drain aspect without eliminating the people. The natural support base for down and outers is family and religious institutions. Let those institutions help, and keep government out of it. With my plan, we don’t have to murder anyone, and we can also put all those lazy people to work. Once they are starving for food then all of a sudden working at the berry farm or Wallmart will start looking really good.
I’m a moral objectivist with a Biblical world view, so I tend to believe that human life is sacred and we shouldn’t kill people except for defense and retribution for cime, and I also believe that everyone should work for their own living. Helping people is good, but it needs to be on a private basis, and it needs to be based upon personal convictions rather than compulsion. What goes on in Mexico is not our problem or responsibility. Let them figure out how to run their own country and we will run ours. We can take the troops out of te Middle East and put them on the border with Mexico. After that no more Mexicans will get in, they are not as cunning or hardcore as Islamic fundamentalists, and they don’t have the same kind of terrain in their favor.
@flapper_femme_fatale - OK, fair and equal is not what you want. What you want is for some people to be a heavy burden while others have to pay nothing, and still others will receive money for free. An example of fair and equal is the Biblical principle of tithing, where everyone pays 10% of their earnings to God. If the state imposed a tax system like that then I would be fine with it. So let’s say you raise taxes, or double them like Obama wants, on businesses and everyone making over 200,000. Now you have businesses shutting down, more people out of work (including me), parents having a harder time putting their kids through college, and more people depending on the state for welfare. But that’s OK with you because in your subjective judgment they don’t deserve to be succesful if they can’t afford the taxes. See, the way I see it is if someone isn’t working then thy dont deserve to have money.
It’s just plain silly to accuse people on the right of having an entitlement mentality when you know that that is the constituency that the other guys are appealing to. Come on now. Anyways, I don’t expect to have anything for free, but the fact is I never had difficulty getting a job before 2009. Never at all. I got a job in my desired field before I was even technically qualified for it, but after I went back to school and graduated with a 4.0 average and gleaming references, nothing. Of course some of the blame falls on me for bad timing, and not going to school for a proper degree in the first place. BUT, the blame for the moribund state of the economy falls on Obama and his goons. Yes they had some problems to begin with, but rather than make things better they made them worse. Much MUCH worse. So I charge Obama with ruining the economy. Even if I’m not in the picture, the economy is wrecked. The only reason I mentioned myself was for illustration purposes. Take me out of the picure if you want, and you still have a moribund economy with rising unemployment and out of control Federal deficit. But I digress.
It’s a left wing stereotype that any extra money businesses get goes to their profit margins and is horded. The fact is they also use the money to invest and to expand the business. But on the other side if they are losing profits then it negates the point of them staying in business. During an economic downturn they might hold back on expanding the business for a while because things are uncertain, but once the recovery becomes more apparent they will begin to cautiously expand. Raising taxes during an economic downturn is about as useful as using blood letting to cure a hemopheliac.
@Ambrosius_Augustus_Rex -
“What you want is for some people to be a heavy burden while others have to pay nothing, and still others will receive money for free. “
free? last i checked, there are work requirements for welfare recipients. i fully support them.
“ Now you have businesses shutting down, more people out of work (including me), parents having a harder time putting their kids through college, and more people depending on the state for welfare.”
i’m not convinced that every business owner is suddenly going to go bottom up because they have to pay more in taxes. presently, business owners and the wealthy have lower tax rates than they’ve EVER had in this country. if businesses could succeed in the 1950s (and they did) while the top wealthy had a tax rate of 91%, i don’t see why they’d fail to do so today. history does not back you up on your argument.
“ But that’s OK with you because in your subjective judgment they don’t deserve to be succesful if they can’t afford the taxes.”
i don’t think that’s any more subjective than your decree that the poor deserve no financial assistance. whereas you seem to want to dole out financial assistance based on merit, i want to do so based on need. a guy who owns his business is not in worse shape than an unemployed guy living out of his car. i’d rather see my taxes go to help the latter, rather than the former.
“It’s just plain silly to accuse people on the right of having an entitlement mentality when you know that that is the constituency that the other guys are appealing to. “
i call it like i see it. and i find it funny that you don’t have an ACTUAL argument proving me wrong.
“The fact is they also use the money to invest and to expand the business. “
and neither of those things involve hiring employees unnecessarily.
@flapper_femme_fatale - Last time I checked there were generations of people sucking on the government tit, and that’s parasitism.
The tax rate has gone through a series of fluctuations, bu the fact remains that lower taxes are better for business, and that higher taxes are not only negative incentives on success, but they could potentially submerge businesses which sprung up under conditions of lower taxes. That means more peope unemployed. No matter how you slice it higher taxes means more unemployed. Who cares if they get free handouts from the government? I would rather be dragged to death behind a car then live off government handouts. It’s just wrong on multiple levels. Here is another way of thinking about it. How do you think your standard of living and purchasing power would be affected by your income tax being doubled? Or the government taking 40% of each paycheck? Will you have more purchasing power or less? Simple question.
Financial assistance? Like Obama giving govenment money to bail out GM, or Goldman Sachs, or AIG? Listen, I am 100% against government assistance to private individuals or businesses, which includes welfare and foodstamps. Now you know so you can make a mental note of that and remember not to bring it up again. What I am for is letting both people and businesses keep their own money. Letting someone keep their own property is neithe “giving” nor is it “assistance.” If I see you walking down a dark alley alone and decide not to knock you over and run off with your purse does that mean that I’m assisting you or giving you anything? No, it means I’m making a conscious decision not to hurt you. The same goes for the government and tax cuts. “Take from each according to his ability and give to each according to his need.” That’s what you’re thinking right? Well, that’s communism, and there are communist countries in the world. Maybe you should examine how they work, and what sort of standard of living and production quality they have there.
I would rather no one get free handouts from the government. I would also rather keep my job. I care more about keeping my job then some bums getting free handouts. Also, if my boss goes out of business then that means the government will actually get less money. They will lose tax revenues from the business, and from me because I won’t be making money and more and will have to leave the country to get work again.
The burden of proof falls on the person making the positive claim. So tell me, where did I say that anyone owed me a job? Provide a quote and link. Go through all my journal entries and comments if you want, and you won’t find anything. I told you very clearly that I don’t agree with handouts, and I never said that a job is something that anyone is entitled to. I also stated that if I lose my job then I don’t expect to be able to find another, and that I will have to go overseas. If you think I said something else then build a case against me using concrete evidence. Otherwise I’m going to have to call you out for name calling.
If they expand their business then they have a need for new employees. That’s how it works.
Socialism sounds ok on paper, but it never seems to do what it claims — one of its main claims is to make income more equal for all, but as the US gets more socialistic, the income disparity gets larger not smaller.
One thing it’s good at is parasitizing, which bugs me personally, because I’m a microbiologist and if anyone’s going to enter into a parasitic relationship with the ‘system’ it aught to be me.
It seems true that socialism gets rid of the small companies, so we’re left huge corporations — the kinds of places where I don’t fit in.
@Ambrosius_Augustus_Rex -
“Last time I checked there were generations of people sucking on the government tit, and that’s parasitism. “
“The tax rate has gone through a series of fluctuations, bu the fact remains that lower taxes are better for business, and that higher taxes are not only negative incentives on success, but they could potentially submerge businesses which sprung up under conditions of lower taxes. “
any sources? these are just opinions, after all, unless you have some statistics or studies to back it up.
“I would rather be dragged to death behind a car then live off government handouts. “
so…? it’s not your place to make that decision for any other citizen eligible for welfare.
“How do you think your standard of living and purchasing power would be affected by your income tax being doubled? Or the government taking 40% of each paycheck? Will you have more purchasing power or less? Simple question.”
not much. one, at only $9.50/hr, my purchasing power sucks anyways. two, i have plenty of extra funds as it is that currently go towards my debt. i already live well below my means. if my income dropped for any reason, i’d be able to tap into that without falling behind. three, it would largely depend on what other benefits i’d get. if those extra taxes were used to improve public transportation in my area, for example, i could sell my car and save the $600/month i pay on my auto loan, maintenance, and gas. that’d be a fantastic trade-off. i don’t mind taxes, provided they go to something that benefits me.
“Maybe you should examine how they work, and what sort of standard of living and production quality they have there. “
Germany’s doing pretty fantastic. Britain as well. i’d probably have a better standard of living here than there. that’s my ideal setup. and they aren’t communist.
“The burden of proof falls on the person making the positive claim.”
i’m stating my opinion: you appear to want to have a job regardless of whether said job is in demand. i’d consider that as much of a handout as unemployment. and for someone who made a TON of positive claims without any proof whatsoever, you’re the pot calling the kettle black.
lowering taxes doesn’t increase demand. it increases supply.
@flapper_femme_fatale - Here are some sources showing how tax rates have changed over the years:
http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_was_the_highest_tax_rate_in_US_history
http://www.taxpolicycenter.org/taxfacts/displayafact.cfm?Docid=213
In that second one you can see how tax rates rose leading up to the Great Depression.
Here is a graph showing the unemployment rate from 1948 to 2007: http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_5aAsxFJOeMw/RnP5BWhHV1I/AAAAAAAAAVo/Y3ybB9DJZ5E/s1600-h/us-unemployment-rate-Jan-1948-May-2007.GIF
Here is a graph showing the unemployment rate from 2000-2012: http://www.catalystanalytics.com/blog/usemployment/ (2nd graph)
Here is one where you can compare the recovery of the Reagan Era vs. the recession of the Obungle era: http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-bwa3CjRBcn0/T1whIqNm-VI/AAAAAAAALYo/4c-f9DP-kjs/s1600/UnemploymentRate_FRED_Feb2012_659px.jpg
I suggest opening up the chart listing the tax rate in one tab while opening up the graphs in others so you can refer to and from. The thing you need to keep in mind is that small businesses are going to be hurt the worst by taxes being raised, and people working for small businesses can kiss their job goodbye. My guess is you have a retail job, and in your case your retail chain will probably survive Obama for a while, as big businesses can weather higher taxes but I expect that hiring for new people will be cut back. I know this because I have worked many retail jobs myself, and the last one I worked post Obama. So many applications were turned in on a daily basis, and by that I mean a stack which was over a foot high by the end of each day. Most of those applications were trashed without even being looked at.
People like me, who work for small businesses, will probably lose their jobs. We will have the choice between begging (and I do mean begging) for retain work, begging for government handouts, or leaving the country. For me the best choice is leaving the country, because the first choice will not let me support a family, and the second choice is immoral.
So yes, your purchasing power and your standard of living is growing to drop if you suddenly have to pay an additional 20% in taxes. You know it’s the truth. The same happens for businesses, large or small.
Germany and England are both crowded and doomed. If you live there you pay much higher prices for a smaller living space, and if you lose your job in Germany you could be forced into prostitution. But that being said, feel free to go there if you want. You would probably fit right in in England with their multiculturalism, speech laws, and rampant oikophobia. Another benifit of being there is that you could have a real life thriller. You could watch the riots from your cramped apartment, and when you go outside you might get an adrenaline rush as you wonder if you’re going to get your head bashed in or raped by the barbaric rioters, many of which are 3rd world immigrants. You know it’s funny, because back when England was still English the upper classes used to engage in an activity called “slumming” where they would deliberately go into dangerous neighborhoods to feel a thrill of fear. Well, in modern England the opportunities for slumming are so much better. You should go there and give it a try. If you do take a camera and upload your experience on youtube so that I can also share in the joy.
Yes I would like to have a good job regardless of what the demand is, and yes I would like to get back into my field. Whatever opportunity I get I’m going to take, and if a better one comes along I’m going to take that. That isn’t parasitism or seeking handouts, it’s opportunism and enlightened self interest. Handouts are when you get something you didn’t work for or earn. Your attempts to paint me in the same corner as welfare recipients are sloppy and unjustified. If I lose my job because Obama taxes my employer out of business then my anger toward Obama and his supporters is justified. don’t you think? If they tax my employer out of business then whose fault is it that I lost my job? I think you’re just grasping for straws trying to come up with clever yet thinly veiled insults, and that’s fine, but I am going to call you out on it.
@monobeam - I agree entirely. Have you read 1984? That book pretty much hits the nail on the head with socialism. At it’s core the left wing is inherently feudalistic, but much more bent on putting mechanisms in place to preserve the status of the elite than any other ideological system which has ever existed.
Nice. If you’re a microbiologist then you must know all sorts of grim details about parasitism, and if you have experience with identifying parasites on one level you can probably easily identify them on any level. I once made up a saying: “The tics need the dog but the dog doesn’t need the tics.” That pretty much sums up the relationship between welfare recipients and the producing elements of society.
Yes! And I work for a small business so I don’t want to lose my job.
Yes, I read 1984 and saw the movie.
How about this from microbiology: an addiction module is like this: it is a piece of extra-chormosomal DNA that gets into a bacteria cell. The bacteria does not need this little circular DNA thing, but the little piece of DNA needs the bacteria. Now the little piece of DNA makes a toxin that would kill the bacteria, and it also makes an antidote to this toxin. If the bacteria divides and does not copy this little non-essential piece of DNA then toxin kills the cell, because the toxin lasts longer than the antidote. So, the bacteria is sort of stuck carrying this extra junk in its cell that it cant throw out but doesn’t wanna keep, and it has to copy it every time it divides — a sort of addiction.
Now if big brother squeezed the masses and collected all the money, and gave it (the antidote) back in exchange for our loyalty (propagating socialism), then we are left asking what’s the toxin in this system. Well, a person could be deprived of food, clothing, and shelter, but it is a difficult ‘toxin’ to fit in our scenario. Maybe you have some ideas?
@Ambrosius_Augustus_Rex -
“In that second one you can see how tax rates rose leading up to the Great Depression.”
it would seem your sources contradict each other. according to the first, tax rates fell prior to the Great Depression. actually, the second one shows the same thing: lower tax rates than previously for 1925-29.
it also appears that when the unemployment was the lowest it’s ever been (1953-ish), the tax rate was 92%. that doesn’t really back up your claims.
“My guess is you have a retail job, and in your case your retail chain will probably survive Obama for a while, as big businesses can weather higher taxes but I expect that hiring for new people will be cut back.”
nope. i work for a small business, with fewer than 50 employees. but frankly, i don’t care much if it goes under. i’ve never had trouble finding a job, even in this economy. i have in-demand skills and lots of connections. worse case scenario: i apply for Americorps or the military. i don’t think my boss should have it any easier than the rest of us.
“So yes, your purchasing power and your standard of living is growing to drop if you suddenly have to pay an additional 20% in taxes. You know it’s the truth. “
again, not really. if my taxes went up, i’d make up for it by 1) getting a second or better-paying job or 2) applying less to my debt (i’d still be able to meet the minimum payments). i highly doubt there would be things i buy now that i would suddenly be unable to buy then.
“Germany and England are both crowded and doomed. ”
considering how much it seems you hate other countries, i see no reason to give your opinion any weight.
“ If I lose my job because Obama taxes my employer out of business then my anger toward Obama and his supporters is justified. don’t you think? “
the stats you linked to aren’t very convincing that businesses can be taxed into non-existence. and if your skills are in high demand, why be upset if one business goes under? assuming you got your job of your own merit, it should be relatively easy to find a new one.
“ I think you’re just grasping for straws trying to come up with clever yet thinly veiled insults, and that’s fine, but I am going to call you out on it. “
*shrug* i’m just stating my opinion of you. the more you throw a fit about it, the more it seems like i’m right. considering the judgments you make of me, i think i’m being fair.
@flapper_femme_fatale - You have to keep in mind that demographics have changed drastically since then, and in addition, production has moved overseas. What do you think drove it there? That being said, from the last graph I sent you can see how Reagans policies ended the recession, and how Obamas have escalated a new one.
So basically you are a full on party loyalist and for you having the party win is more important than your own personal well being. I commend you for your loyalty, but it is severely misplaced. The job you have is more secure than the job you MIGHT have. If you don’t care if you lose your job then there is nothing I can say. As for me, I’m going to be getting married soon so I would prefer to keep my job. If the Democrats suddenly became the party jobs and prosperity then I would switch to them, but for the forseeable future they are going after a radically different constituency. I also don’t feel any obligation to lose my job so that bums can get a short term burst of money they didn’t work for.
Oh right, I have blanket hatred of other countries, which is why I’m willing to go work overseas if things get bad here, and also why I am importing my wife from overseas. I do have a blanket hatred of socialism and cultural marxism. But OK, don’t listen to me. Look up “riots” and “austerity measures” in conjunction with England and find out for yourself. But I was 100% serious about you fitting right in over in England. Just be careful that you don’t hurt anyone’s feelings while you’re there because you might just get put in jail.
Finding a new job is one thing, finding a job that will support a family is another. You can find a job at Wallmart easily enough, which is fine if you want to live with roommates and don’t plan on starting a family, and if you have easy access to public transportation, but if you want to start a family it won’t do. You can also find work in a temp agency even if you don’t have a business, accounting, or management degree (which I don’t). If you stay with it for long enough you MIGHT be able to find permanent stable work. In my field the amount of qualified applicants outnumbers the availability of jobs, so I’m doing something else. Right now I’m an office manager for a small business. If that goes under, I’m gone, and the Fed gets no more tax revenue from me. I can’t afford to be unemployed or underemployed for a long duration of time, not with a wife to support, and especially if she gets pregnant. I can’t afford to gamble on maybe’s, and neither can many other men who are trying to support families through hard work.
I tend to respond to every argument. If your opinion is not an argument then you should not state it as though it were a fact or argument.
@Ambrosius_Augustus_Rex -
“You have to keep in mind that demographics have changed drastically since then, and in addition, production has moved overseas. What do you think drove it there?”
so you admit it… the tax rate does not have a direct effect on the unemployment rate. as to why production moved overseas, labor is cheaper in other nations. unless you’re willing to do your job for $1/hour, i’m not sure how you plan to compete. the only way to keep jobs from going overseas is to make it illegal for US businesses to hire labor in other countries.
“So basically you are a full on party loyalist and for you having the party win is more important than your own personal well being.”
i value other things than money, or the particular job i have now. the only reason i still work here is because it’s convenient and fits around the schedule of what DOES matter to me: continuing my education. my personal well-being is more grounded in my friends and family, which will continue to be there no matter what job i have or who i vote for. i also care about more than the economy: equal rights for LGBT, abortion access, healthcare, education, etc. social issues like those are my deal-breakers. since most fiscal conservatives are also social conservatives, i’d never vote for one.
“If your opinion is not an argument then you should not state it as though it were a fact or argument. “
i thought we all learned in 3rd grade how to tell the difference between a fact and an opinion…?
@flapper_femme_fatale - I admit nothing of the kind, and at this point I am just going to point you to my previous comments about how a loss of revenue is bad for business and limits both investment and hiring capabilities.
I disagree, because going overseas still requires shipping and transporation costs. Higher production costs, which were artificially escalated through taxes and union action are to blame for this.
OK party loyalist, this part of the conversation is done.
I thought we all learned in freshmen level philosophy courses not to state opinions as facts?
@monobeam - Really? I didn’t know there was a movie. Interesting. When was it made?
I would say that Big Brother/the Democrat Party is the addiction molecule, and the antidote is the money they give out to their constituency. The toxin is all the dependence minded people with entitlement mentalities who are threatening to riot if their welfare money is ever cut off. There have been people claiming they will riot if Obama loses. Also look at what happened in England. They had a government enact some austerity measures and all sorts of people went out and rioted. If you want to compare the welfare recipients to the addiction body then the toxin might still be their threats of violence combined with their increasing numbers.
@Ambrosius_Augustus_Rex -
“I admit nothing of the kind, and at this point I am just going to point you to my previous comments about how a loss of revenue is bad for business and limits both investment and hiring capabilities.”
but none of the links you provided back that up. the economic boom in the 1950s corresponds with a tax rate that’s more than double what it is now. and your response is that the demographics of the economy have changed (less manufacturing, more servicing). well, no shit. all that does is prove that we need to adapt or die. at best, you’ve proven that taxes have less of an influence than what jobs are available.
“I disagree, because going overseas still requires shipping and transporation costs. Higher production costs, which were artificially escalated through taxes and union action are to blame for this.”
i don’t see anything wrong with having standards for ourselves in terms of pay.
“I thought we all learned in freshmen level philosophy courses not to state opinions as facts?”
if you actually know how to tell the difference between a fact an opinion, it’s irrelevant how you state it.
@flapper_femme_fatale - My point is that the high taxes were and are a factor in jobs going overseas, and I also made a point about the Reagan years putting an end to a recession while the Obama years fueled one.
Nothing wrong with reasonable standards, but there is plenty wrong with overinflating prices. The latest example being those idiot teachers in Chicago. 70,000 a year for teaching is bloody ridiculous. My brother doesn’t make that much and he’s an engineer, and he actually has to work year around. Also, not being able to be fired for poor performance is also ridiculous, or no, it’s beyong ridiculous.
When it comes to liberals I have learned that there is no glass cieling for insanity. Liberals often don’t know the difference between opinion and fact, and often use emotions and opinions as support for arguments. There is no telling what is going on in the mind of a liberal. I have been told plenty of times that I should be killed, I’ve been wished to Hell, I had an atheist liberal become a theist long enough to wish that God would sink my whole state into the ocean, and I have encountered all manner of sexual deviants. My point is that I have heard so many crazy things said with full seriousness that I don’t take any level of insanity for granted. If you told me that you liked being sodomized by donkeys I would take your comment seriously.
@Ambrosius_Augustus_Rex -
“My point is that the high taxes were and are a factor in jobs going overseas”
a factor, not THE cause. you don’t seem interested in addressing other causes that are probably more relevant.
“70,000 a year for teaching is bloody ridiculous.”
i think it depends upon the district. like any other job, the cost of living in the area directly affects what you’re paid. Chicago is a terribly expensive place to live, especially compared to my city. here, the only teachers that’d make $70k work for private schools that cater to the rich.
“ My brother doesn’t make that much and he’s an engineer, and he actually has to work year around.”
not all teachers can take the summer off. my friend teaches, and her summer is full of seminars, training, summer school, and preparing lesson plans.
“ My point is that I have heard so many crazy things said with full seriousness that I don’t take any level of insanity for granted.”
i could say the same for conservatives.