Quote:
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Originally Posted by Telluride
<b>What are the majority's best interests, in your opinion?</b>
Anyway...
I said nothing about isolationism. What I'm proposing is less government at home and a general policy of non-interventionism abroad. I'm not interested in cutting off contact and/or commerce with other nations. I believe that our government should generally butt out of the lives of American citizens and shouldn't be meddling in the affairs of other nations, either.
However, I believe this plan would be unpopular with "the powers that be" and they would oppose it.
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I believe in using the political power of the sheer numbers of the wealthless and powerless to offset the wealth and influence of those who have skewed the distribution of both in their favor, and redirecting government to discouraging private interests from interfering with what it could be doing to end the selfish interference of private insurers and their allied lobbyists in healthcare coverage. These interests have defrauded Medicare and conspired to fix prices that medicare pays "the healthcare industry".
They are also the reason that so many are uninsured, despite the US spending more per capita on healthcare, than any other developed country, including countries that offer government guaranteed health coverage for all....
I support this:
Quote:
http://216.239.51.104/search?q=cache...s&ct=clnk&cd=5
.......With an eye to Thomas Jefferson's warning against the antidemocratic "aristocracy of our moneyed corporations," the United States needs to return corporate taxes to the levels in force during the Eisenhower administration. We also need to increase the top marginal tax rate for the super-rich to about 50 percent. This would still be far below the top marginal income tax rate of 91 percent during the Eisenhower administration.
Repealing the tax cuts given to the super-rich would return more than $85 bilomglion per year from the richest 5 percent of the population. Returning to corporate tax rates in force during the Eisenhower administration could increase tax revenues by roughly $110 billion more per year. Returning to a 50 percent top marginal inomgcome tax rate far below the top rate in the Eisenhower administration could capture as much as $90 billion more per year from the richest 2 percent of the population.
At the same time, we should provide tax cuts to the 150 million hard-working workers who are struggling because they can't afford to buy all they need. Millionomgaires don't need additional spending money. Workers, middle-class Americans, and the poor do. Their spending will stimulate the economy more effectively, help busiomgnesses, and be more fair to the Americans who need fairness the most. There is amomgple economic evidence that putting money in the pockets of average Americans stimulates the economy much more than further lining the pockets of the rich........
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....<b>because I believe this:</b>
The post below, oon this thread:
http://economistsview.typepad.com/ec...stice_for.html
Quote:
http://economistsview.typepad.com/ec...html#c19017872
Blissex says...
«Maybe something could or should be done about extremely high CEO incomes. But it isn't illegal, and who does it really hurt?»
Well, according to some statistics, the [reported] income share of the top 1% of earners (average income $1,000,000) has doubled from its historical level of around 8% to around 16%.
<b>This has largely happened at the expense of the bottom 40% (but not only) of earners (average income $24,000), who are now getting around 12% of the total.
If the top 1% of earners had contented themselves with their 8%, then the bottom 40% incomes would have grown by more than 50%, creating a lot more consumer demand (high earners spend a much smaller proportion of their income than low earners) and making a lot of welfare programs unnecessary.</b>
Now the argument is that of course the hard working people who earn an average of $1,000,000 a year have doubled their productivity, while the bottom 40% of earners have continued to be inefficient and lazy as ever. :-)
Hey as ''economics'' tells us, the only determinant of compensation is productivity! :-)
«If we had a flat tax,»
But on this planet the country called USA has a flat tax system: the total tax take is about 27-29% for all income groups.
Many taxes are much heavier on low earners (sales taxes, state taxes, payroll taxes can be 2 times higher as a percentage of income for the bottom 20% than the top 1%) than on high earners, and federal income tax is a minority tax that is almost the only one that is mildly progressive.
http://www.dollarsandsense.org/archi...902dollar.html
«people with extremely high incomes might actually pay their whole tax bill,»
Astonishing observation: not paying your whole tax bill on this planet in a country called the USA apparently is a felony, for which the little people can go to jail (and sometimes even the big people who are not discreet enough, poor Leona).
«and that would help all of us.»
I doubt so; if the wealthy paid all their taxes honestly there might be mass hysteria, quite a few deaths because of a heart attack, rains of frogs, and other equally unnatural phenomena... :-)
Posted by: Blissex | June 26, 2006 at 06:41 PM
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...I also believe that a consumption tax, just as an abortion ban, has a greatly lesser effect on those with the means to travel beyond the jurisdiction of the tax or the ban. Thus, the only practical way to tax is during the "receipt" phase, on earnings, or upon inheritance.
I also do not believe that the governnment is "broken" or "incompetent". It has intentionally been made to appear that way....via appointments of "Cronys" (no Regent Univ. "grads" among Bush's nine new white house lawyers....not-a-one)....and via tax cuts and a ramp up in spending....from '81 to '93, and from '01 until now. Treasury Debt increase from oct. 1, 1999 to 9/30/00 was $18 billion, and now it's $500 bilion annually.
If government is by nature, incompetent, why do conservatives and libertarians still support entrusting it with oversight and management of the world's most powerful military? Seems like a contradiction......