On the other hand, lots of poor people work their asses off. — Erik

Under my scheme the working class will have more income from paying no tax on it.

You don't have a scheme. You want to give 1.7 trillion* in tax revenues mostly to the rich (because that's where they'd go.) Now show us the numbers how your increased sales tax would more than make up for that.

*Data here: https://www.thebalance.com/current-u-s-federal-government-tax-revenue-3305762

No, they wouldn't. They pay about 35% of their income in income tax. There is no way your increased consumer taxes on some goods would more than counterbalance that. You're making stuff up again. Or, if you think it would, provide evidence. Show us the number — Baden

They would buy the most stuff therefore must pay the greater tax.

Yes of course I am making this up. No nation has implemented my plan.

Think of farmers. Farmers growing essentials. Essentials that are not taxed. Farmers that are not taxed on their income.

Essential farm based food is not crap. Cheaper good food for poorer people.

This may be getting a bit off topic but one of the strange things I've noticed about the genuinely wealthy - at least since I've been around "old money" over the past 10 years - is their general avoidance of the sort of status symbols so admired by the poor and middle classes within America.

They'll send their kids to $40,000 elementary schools, they'll go on lengthy trips around the world, etc. but they'll also drive average cars, wear average clothes, etc. They're so comfortable with their wealth as it's been passed on through their family for generations, that they lack the insecurity of those who need to show off.

So I have a foot in both "worlds" in the US - the "elites" and the "deplorables" (where I grew up) - and am uniquely situated to recognize the different cultural markers and guiding values defining each group.

No nation has implemented my plan. — raza

The reason why is obvious. But there's no point just asserting. Show us the numbers. Back it up with evidence or it's just more hot air like when you claimed Trump had higher popularity ratings than May in the UK.

This sycophantic worship of rich elites by the likes of raza I really don't get even though Zizek (seeing as Street brought him up) reckons it's Calvinism's fault. To a European, it's insane. — Baden

Well I'm just an "average" American who grew up in the belly of the beast (suburban Los Angeles) and it's insane to me too. Doesn't seem like it'll ever change, unfortunately.

That federal government is expensive to run. It mostly exists to control private citizens and private business.

My scheme would help eliminate the need for such expensive control.

This would be the reason a government would not want my plan.

They do not want people to be more free. Their control makes them personally rich and tyrannical along with it.

Government's idea is for larger government. And who pays for that?

My scheme reduces amount of government agencies - reduces government control of work.

More hot air. Show us the numbers. Data. Presumably you've calculated all this and are not just making it up as you go along, right? So, show us your calculations.

(Saying you have an economic scheme but no numbers behind it is like saying you have a philosophical scheme but no rational basis behind it.)

More hot air. Show us the numbers. Data. Presumably you've calculated all this and are not just making it up as you go along, right? So, show us your calculations. — Baden

You need to merely go about your day and imagine the plan. Imagine paying an extra 40% on a new laptop and paying half the price for your food and electricity.

What you save on no tax on income you can also easily pay the extra 40% on the new laptop while the workers who brought that laptop to the store, + plus the store workers, are not paying tax on their income.

You will enjoy work more without income tax. You may become more productive as a consequence of work satisfaction.

This might make you more happy.

More happy may make you feel more charitable - may feel like helping your neighbor out more.

What do control bodies such as governments and politicians want for humanity? Well, politicians are usually lawyers. They are inherently adversarial.

They want people to form tribes. They want insecurity so that people seek them for security - which gives them more control over citizens.

It's psychology, in the final analysis.

(Saying you have an economic scheme but no numbers to back it up is like saying you have a philosophical scheme but no rational basis to support it.) — Baden

Economics is psychological.

Psychology first, economy follows. That is the rationale. In fact it is essentially philosophically based.

Still no data, no statistics, no overall numbers. :yawn:

I better help you out because it's clear now you don't have any numbers or even a vaguely clear idea of what they are.. Excise and sales taxes currently bring in less than 7% of government tax revenue and individual income tax brings in about 50% of tax revenue in the US*. But you think raising sales taxes can turn that less than 7% of revenue into more than the 50% of tax revenue that you would lose by charging zero income tax. And you think just paying an extra 40% on goods like laptops etc would close that gap. Do you realize how hare-brained that is and that you'd actually have to raise sales tax so much and make everything so expensive to theoretically close that gap that in practice no-one would be able to afford the goods and therefore no-one would buy them and sales tax revenue would actually go down if you attempted that?

*https://taxfoundation.org/federal-tax-revenue-source-1934-2018/

Of course, economics has nothing to do with actual data and numbers. You just think up some semi-plausible sounding psychology, apply that to your country and voilà, everybody gets rich. Thanks for that. :up:

This may be getting a bit off topic but one of the strange things I've noticed about the genuinely wealthy - at least since I've been around "old money" over the past 10 years - is their general avoidance of the sort of status symbols so admired by the poor and middle classes within America. — Erik

I can't remember where I read it but this is a genuine phenomenon - something like 'status symbol creep': as status symbols of the rich become more widely acknowledged, what counts as a status symbols shifts in order to maintain that symbolism. And the shift in spending form the rich has moved from goods and tangibles to services, insurance, 'experiences' (holidays, etc) and education instead: things that are harder to 'see', but end up 'opportunity hoarding': it's no longer goods which are exclusive, but the means to accumulate them. Anyone can save up and buy a Prada bag. Good luck sending your kid to Harvard.

People are so fickle and narcissistic that they go for the latest thing just to have the latest thing. — raza

Or they want something that's in good condition and still in warranty.

The "poor" require incentive IF they desire new stuff. — raza

Being poor is incentive enough. This notion that the poor are poor because they're not trying hard and have no reason to do better is nonsense.

And, of course, the problem with making things more expensive is that less people will buy them, which will weaken the economy. If the people can't afford to buy your TVs then your business won't grow and the rich business owner isn't going to create all these jobs you say he will. Republican policies like trickle-down/supply-side economics don't work.

I better help you out because it's clear now you don't have any numbers or even a vaguely clear idea of what they are.. Excise and sales taxes currently bring in less than 7% of government tax revenue and individual income tax brings in about 50% of tax revenue in the US*. But you think raising sales taxes can turn that less than 7% of revenue into more than the 50% of tax revenue that you would lose by charging zero income tax. And you think just paying an extra 40% on goods like laptops etc would close that gap. Do you realize how hare-brained that is and that you'd actually have to raise sales tax so much and make everything so expensive to theoretically close that gap that in practice no-one would be able to afford the goods and therefore no-one would buy them and sales tax revenue would actually go down if you attempted that? — Baden

Not everything more expensive. And we would throw away less. We may want to produce less new junk. We may want to chase our tails less. We may want to just cook and eat good food.

When we chase our tails less we will less want useless new shiny stuff which we use to try to numb our violated senses - violated from chasing our tails - numbing our sense of insecurity.

Less stress from paperwork related to bureaucracy around job systems.

We all can be like undocumented workers where we work for the pay we get - straight cash.

Straight cash means less government which means less government taxpayer's expenses.

trickle-down/supply-side economics don't work — Michael

There is always trickledown. There is nothing wrong with it. It is natural.

the problem with making things more expensive is that less people will buy them — Michael

You will have more income to buy things.

The thing is that there would be more choice. There is no choice if every worker has to pay tax on income.

Whereas there IS choice as to whether to buy a taxed something or not.

It makes no sense to limit choice.

Limiting choice is limiting freedom.

This notion that the poor are poor because they're not trying hard and have no reason to do better is nonsense. — Michael

There is not one reason for being poor.

And some who appear poor to your eyes may be secretly quite happy, relatively, comparatively. What, for instance, are the suicide rates for the "upwardly mobile"?

US economy is a more than reasonable measure. — raza

Inflation hits 6-year high, wiping out wage gains for the average American

The 2.9 percent inflation for the twelve-month period ending in June is a sign of a growing economy, but it’s also a painful development for workers, whose tepid wage gains have failed to keep pace with the rising prices.

The cost of food, shelter and gas have all risen significantly in the past year. Gas skyrocketed more than 24 percent, rent for a primary residence jumped 3.6 percent and meals at restaurants and cafeterias rose 2.8 percent.

Prices have risen roughly at the same rate as wages, erasing any gains workers may have hoped to realize via bigger paychecks.

...

For workers, more pain may be coming, as economists are concerned that prices could rise further due to President Trumps tariffs on many foreign imports. Trump put a 20 tariff on foreign washing machines earlier this year, and the inflation report Thursday showed more than a 13 percent spike in laundry equipment over the same period last year.

“Expect rising transportation costs to start getting passed on to us, along with the tariff induced jump in costs,” said Peter Boockvar, chief investment officer of Bleakley Advisory Group.

Then there's the $437 billion of buybacks due in the next quarter, a new record after the previous quarter set a new record with $242 billion.

Why are these companies spending hundreds of billions on buybacks instead of on increasing wages or investing for future jobs? Because these tax cuts are never about helping the average worker. It's about helping the very rich become richer.

Yup that's exactly right. I've never quite felt at home where I live now to be perfectly honest, and I think it's largely due to a sense of (lower) class awareness that I never had before moving here.

I do think the place is pretty anomalous - I've heard it has the highest percentage of kids going to private schools over public than any other city in the country - but it's definitely related to those less tangible things like access to elite schooling, to frequent and distant travel, and the like.

There are however certain things about living around old wealth that I find to be far superior to living in the suburbs - most significantly, there's a certain quirkiness among the inhabitants that I find congenial. Not uncommon to have a great conversation with a random stranger about philosophy, or history, or science, etc.

So lots of really artsy, intelligent, and intellectually-informed people in this area who (because they already have it) aren't obsessed with business and making money. Somewhat akin, I imagine, to the old aristocracies. But yeah, I also feel like (and am) "the help."

There is always trickledown. — raza

Laughs ensue.

You will have more income to buy things. — raza

You suggested a 30-40% tax on anything but the necessities, but the current tax rates in America are:

10% $0 – $9,525
12% $9,526 – $38,700
22% $38,701 – $82,500
24% $82,501 – $157,500
32% $157,501 – $200,000
35% $200,001 – $500,000
37% $500,001+

So how is not having to pay 10-24% in income tax going to mean that you have more income to buy things that are 30-40% more expensive?

The suburban life is really different here in Thousand Oaks where every other car is a Maserati or high end BMW or sone such.

It's further up there if you like next to North Ranch. But, I always liked living in Reseda rather than Westlake more, due to the fact that everyone seems more friendly instead of pretentious about their status. Cities just do that for some reason.

Yes that's true. We have family friends who live in your area and they're total snobs. We've visited them a few times and it's definitely a "higher end" sort of suburb relative to where I grew up, which is in the east San Gabriel Valley.

These days I live just 10-15 miles away from my hometown (I'm in the Pasadena area now), and as mentioned it's a much different world in essential ways. Lots of museums, JPL, Cal Tech, non-corporate bars and restaurants, unique architecture, privately owned bookstores, etc. I do prefer it to the cookie-cutter homes and strip malls where I was raised.

And yet I feel like I can relate to working class people who grew up in cities like mine more than I can to the blue bloods I'm around now. Something about those shared life experiences (going to public schools, getting a job at sixteen, working while going to college, etc.) makes me much more comfortable on the whole around working class people - regardless of racial differences - over the affluent and highly-educated white people in these parts.

I watched this as you made it sound like Strzok came off badly but the Republicans were destroyed here. And in the video you presented it was Gohmert who was told to take his meds as he went nuts on attacking Strzok for adultery. The same Gohmert who sucks up to porn star fucking Trump. What a scumbag. :vomit:

https://www.msnbc.com/mtp-daily/watch/podhoretz-on-gohmert-that-s-scum-to-ask-about-strozk-s-wife-during-house-fbi-hearing-1275830851783

Jebus, Trump really smeared one into Mays face today, didn't he?

He pissed on her in the article and then told her it was raining in the press conference. I'm watching the press conference now. He just called his own interview fake news, and then said he was confused and thought the UK wouldn't be able to trade with the US. You might as well have a chimpanzee up there. He has no idea about anything including what his own words meant or why he said them.

I think this protest is bigger than his inaugaration:

You know, no matter how small a piece of shit may be in your soup, it's still a piece of shit in your soup.

Well, Trump humiliated himself and Boris will be the one eating the shit soup in the end, so all good I guess.

Trump is a bastion of capitalism who will come down from the heavens on a chariot made of gold riding the righteous Messianic light of the unfettered free market, vaporising every left wing zealot below, restoring order and balance to this Earth and giving to our fragmented life a gravitas, a high seriousness, a divine significance, an emancipatory power that can unshackle us from the self limiting, deterministic and suffocating stranglehold that is Marxism, socialism and the left, allowing us to reach our fullest and truest potential and ambitions.