Economy Trump tax cuts 6 months later: it was exactly what critics projected - everyone but the rich suffers

[Deleted member 159002]

No I used it in one specific example. Many people work very hard and receive little in compensation. That is not a tax issue.

I'm suggesting we tax every dollar of income the same and get rid of all the tax loopholes.

You were suggesting that if a person makes more money than someone else, he must be working twice as hard, and you argued against progressive taxation on that basis. You obviously were trying to make a desert argument against progressive taxation.

 

[Deleted member 159002]

So why should we have progressive taxation? Because the more money a person has, the less losing a certain amount of money impedes his ability to have a decent quality of life. If a billionaire is required to pay $1million in taxes, his opportunity to have a decent quality of life is less impeded than a couple dozen working class people who'd each have to pay thousands of dollars in taxes to provide the government the same amount of revenue. Does that make sense ODB?

 

[IReallyDoTrainUFC]

There's an entire branch of economics dedicated towards the study of human action and its effects on economic predictions, specifically those made by the Chicago school. Praxeology ain't it.

Yes it is. Praxeology is the study of human action.

More to the point, its progenitor Ludwig von Mises actually rejected the use of all empiricism in the study of human action, quite emphatically.

That's right. Because every chart or graph or empirical observation cannot account for or predict the cause of movement in the market: individual valuations. Also, no amount of testing and historical analysis can falsify the fact that 1+1=2. These facts must be derived from axioms, otherwise they can't be logical.

It's literally the mental masturbations of an Austrian crank who never met fascist he didn't like. It's just quaint to see someone so proudly proclaim that this is some noble pursuit that they care about.

That's just ignorant. Mises was a utilitarian libertarian and argued for it emphatically. I don't agree with utilitarianism as a method for arguing for a free society, I prefer a priori grounds, but it doesn't change the fact that Mises laid the groundwork for libertarianism.

 

[oleDirtyBast4rd]

The point of this back and forth is simply to illustrate just how little you understand the tax system. You have a rudimentary understanding of the concept of "progressive taxation" but no real grasp of how it is actually being applied.

You already agreed that some people use more infrastructure than others. Well, earning the 2nd $100k requires using more of the infrastructure to do it. As they use more of the infrastructure, they are actually increasing their percentage of use as well thus justifying higher rates.

So, imagine that a person uses 1 unit of a 10 unit road to make his first $100k, that's 10% of the road usage. If he uses another 1 unit of road to make a second $100k, he's increased the total road usage to 11 units and his personal usage to 2 units. Now he's using 18% of the road. If he added a 3rd unit, he'd be up to 25% of the road's total usage.

His second unit of road usage means he's responsible for a greater percentage of overall road usage and thus the 2nd $100k can't be taxed at the same rate as the 1st because he's no longer using the same 10% of the road.

Obviously, I'm just making up these numbers. But the point is that making the second $100k requires that there's an increase in the percentage use of the infrastructure. It doesn't remain flat.

You're assuming he needs the same amount of road to make that money.

His product could have doubled in value and he would be using the same amount of road. You would be, in effect penalizing him for no justifiable reason.

 

[oleDirtyBast4rd]

When you present an example and then say it's a bad example because it supports my point and not yours, that's not me squirming around. That's you been smacked in the face with reality, realizing you're wrong and then scrambling to find something that you claim makes you right.






I have it my head that you don't understand because your posts suggest that you don't understand.



Like here for example. I pointed out that whether I make $501k or I make $500 million I pay the exact same tax rate. I pointed out earlier that I pay the same tax rate on my 1st $100k as everyone else, regardless of how much more money I make than them in total. My first $100k isn't taxed more just because I made more. And my $500 million is taxed that same as someone else's $501k.

Our system does exactly what you want it to do. Your complaint no longer seems related to anything wrong with our existing system but to a imagined version that we don't employ.

Then dont answer back with the unit thing if you know I'm just being retarded. The thing is... we are having that discussion precisely because I understand a progressive tiered system.

 

[oleDirtyBast4rd]

You were suggesting that if a person makes more money than someone else, he must be working twice as hard, and you argued against progressive taxation on that basis. You obviously were trying to make a desert argument against progressive taxation.

Wrong

I was using it as an example. I dont care if he sat on his ass and the money grew in trees in his garden. Having more money shouldn't be penalized

 

[oleDirtyBast4rd]

So why should we have progressive taxation? Because the more money a person has, the less losing a certain amount of money impedes his ability to have a decent quality of life. If a billionaire is required to pay $1million in taxes, his opportunity to have a decent quality of life is less impeded than a couple dozen working class people who'd each have to pay thousands of dollars in taxes to provide the government the same amount of revenue. Does that make sense ODB?

Makes perfect sense. He can be taxed more because he can handle it.

Ends justify the means.

 

[IReallyDoTrainUFC]

Makes perfect sense. He can be taxed more because he can handle it.

Ends justify the means.

That makes no sense. Why would you confiscate the wealth of people who invest in businesses to create jobs, and give of themselves to help charities?

Why does the government confiscate wealth to begin with? Why does the government devalue currency with the Federal Reserve (thereby stealing wealth from people by decreasing their buying power)?

Think out of the box for a second. Why is it ok for any group of people to confiscate wealth from anyone? Is this moral?

If I put a gun to your head and told you to give me your iPhone so that I could give it to a poor person, would this be acceptable? Why do we mindlessly accept this kind of situation?

 

[oleDirtyBast4rd]

That makes no sense. Why would you confiscate the wealth of people who invest in businesses to create jobs, and give of themselves to help charities?

Why does the government confiscate wealth to begin with? Why does the government devalue currency with the Federal Reserve (thereby stealing wealth from people by decreasing their buying power)?

Think out of the box for a second. Why is it ok for any group of people to confiscate wealth from anyone? Is this moral?

If I put a gun to your head and told you to give me your iPhone so that I could give it to a poor person, would this be acceptable? Why do we mindlessly accept this kind of situation?

He seems to believe the ends justify the means. I was just saying I understood what he was saying.

Personally I agree with you that its sick

 

[Deleted member 159002]

Makes perfect sense. He can be taxed more because he can handle it.

Ends justify the means.

You're probably being sarcastic. So let me ask: When the government needs to raise revenue, why should it do it any a way that impairs people's opportunity to have a decent quality of life as opposed to in a way that doesn't?

 

[wonderbread]

 

[oleDirtyBast4rd]

You're probably being sarcastic. So let me ask: When the government needs to raise revenue, why should it do it any a way that impairs people's opportunity to have a decent quality of life as opposed to in a way that doesn't?

Because the government shouldn't get to decide when something impairs me or not.

Let's be honest, we are talking about forced "charity" here

 

[Deleted member 159002]

Because the government shouldn't get to decide when something impairs me or not.

Let's be honest, we are talking about forced "charity" here

If you're unhappy paying less than you would under a flat tax, donate your savings to the government.

 

[oleDirtyBast4rd]

If you're unhappy paying less than you would under a flat tax, donate your savings to the government.

You're kinda dodging my point with a funny

 

[Prokofievian]

Yes it is. Praxeology is the study of human action.

It's not the study of anything. To study something, the rubber should meet the road eventually: you should check if the predictions you make are accurate. Praxeology does the opposite of this. It instead makes ridiculous bullshit excuses in order to rationalize why we shouldn't even check if its predictions are correct, such as...

That's right. Because every chart or graph or empirical observation cannot account for or predict the cause of movement in the market: individual valuations. Also, no amount of testing and historical analysis can falsify the fact that 1+1=2. These facts must be derived from axioms, otherwise they can't be logical.

A little time out here: what's particularly funny is that you rolled up to the war room all ''ha, I bet these motherfuckers never heard of the austrian or chicago school of economics!''

It really feels like 2011 again.

That's just ignorant. Mises was a utilitarian libertarian and argued for it emphatically. I don't agree with utilitarianism as a method for arguing for a free society, I prefer a priori grounds, but it doesn't change the fact that Mises laid the groundwork for libertarianism.

Mises had one policy making job in his lifetime, and that was as an economic advisor to Engelbert Dollfuss in the early 30's. He only had the one job because, well, it didn't go so well when praxeology met practice. Shacking up with any fascist they can find all for the sake of ''Liberalism'' is actually a fairly common trend among classical liberals/libertarians: you have Mises supporting the Freikorps, Mussolini, Dollfuss (writing that they literally saved European civilization lololol); Hayek writing in support of Salazar and Pinochet; and ''the Chicago boys'' drawing up policy for Pinochet (with disastrous results, mind you).

 

[oleDirtyBast4rd]

This post is the best example of what has been going on the last few pages. You are 100% correct and it makes perfect sense.

However, the top % already pays a lot on taxes relative to their income. 30%. So if someone makes say 10 million dollars, they pay 3 million in taxes. What justification would there be to say to this guy "no you need to pay more, pay 6 million and take home 4 million because you can still live a nice life with that. Don't worry about what you planned to do with your own money. We need more from you, because the guy 4 miles away only made 30k"? Where do we draw the line with that logic? Billionaires? Multi millionaires? 500,000aires? Who makes the rules in this scenario on who should get taxed much more and by how much more?

You can't abuse tax brackets by telling rich people to be marginally rich.

This. It's a bunch of arbitrary BS. Then they have the nerve to demonize the very same wealthy people who pay taxes for the poor

 

[MicroBrew]

Used the numbers I used purely for example. I have no idea what farmer earns. I hope he's doing that well

I agree they benefit more, but they would be paying more under a flat tax.

The more you earn, the more of your money going towards roads etc.

I am undecided on the whether a Flat Tax is better than a Progressive Tax rate.

 

[Trotsky]

It's incredible that Trump is going to increase the deficit to nearly $1T/yr in the midst of no economic or military crisis, in fact the opposite, by the end of his first term, and not one of his supporters seem to care.

lol, shut up Rat Posterior

#rekt #checkmate

So poor people want to use all of these government programs, but dont even want to pay their fair share of taxes?

Your guys' ideas of fairness and equality are laughable.

What is the philosophical difference between your argument (that progressive taxation is immoral, therefore the ends are unjustified) and the argument that taxes in their entirety are unjustifiable?

The ends is that our country thrives and its citizens have a quality of life on par with the rest of the world's citizens. Under your fantasy of flat tax, our country's economy falters and hundreds of millions of people inevitably are reduced to squalor and suffering as wealth coagulates at the top.

So, in your moral appraisal, does an un-competitive United States where millions of people are poor and unable to access basic living necessities become justified as an ends by the "moral" means of flat taxation? Are those ends justified by the simultaneous ends that a small amount of people pay their "fair" share, divorced from the economic reality of our their wealth was historically built on assistance, on illegal activity, and on actions of their forefathers?

Your moral argument is bunk. At least our utilitarian argument makes sense under light scrutiny.

 

[MeatheadMike]

Because the government shouldn't get to decide when something impairs me or not.

Let's be honest, we are talking about forced "charity" here

Charity has nothing to do with what you are talking about. The rich are obviously benefiting more from our system than the poor, and taxes are used to keep that said system in place. For example by paying for a strong military.

If a foreign power were to take over the US tomorrow and completely replace our system, who would stand to lose and who would stand to gain?

It makes perfect sense that the people who stand to lose the most if our system were to collapse are the same ones who are paying more into preserving that system. That is not charity.

 

[Trotsky]

Being poor isn't immoral. I'm what most call poor currently, and I have a very fulfilling life.

Unfairly taking what people have rightfully earned is immoral.

And THIS is the center of your ignorance. You think that your completely uninformed definition of "rightful" controls, because it's the easiest to wrap your mind around.

And it's very easily deconstructed. Under your line of thinking, any line of income is legitimate, no matter whether it was acquired through coercion, exploitation, or assistance: the fact that it exists is self-authenticating. A slaveowner's kids could have $100 million in wealth that they invest and make fat returns on. 100 kids of former slaves could have $10 to their names each, even though their parents were the primary force in building the slaveowners' $100 million war chest. Yet you would say that taxing that $100 million and those $10 amounts equally is "fair" because the slaveowners' kids "rightfully earned" that money.