mame
Well-Known Member
Ah, I actually looked it up.. this is correct.
edit: did some more research... there used to be as many as 15 brackets. eh nevermind.
Where Is The PROOF That The Conservative Agenda Works?
- Thread starter mame
- Start date
edit: did some more research... there used to be as many as 15 brackets. eh nevermind.
Dan Kone
Well-Known Member
You're right. Math error on my part.
mame
Well-Known Member
The problem with privatizing medicare or social security is that you aren't going to save any money considering all you've done is throw the profit motive and an extra set of middlemen into the mix. Paul Ryan's plan doesn't save us any money. Simple things can be outsourced (many cities have outsourced trash disposal and janatorial services) and they'll save money - but things as big and complicated as our entitlement system need to remain in house.
Dan Kone
Well-Known Member
- (minus) stuff that accounts for 1% or less of the budget.
The people who make over 200,000 could be taxed 500 billion or so more tops. That would make us one of the highest taxed countries in the world almost overnight. That would be a very harsh and massive tax and would likely cause a recession due to less money being reinvested. You would still have to cut 700 billion from the budget to even break even. Are 700 billion in cuts what you would consider 'reasonable'? Really, the interest on the debt that has been borrowed to finance the bullshit that we don't need is a big part of what is dragging us down.
Do you see how little robbing all those people would help now?
mame
Well-Known Member
There is no serious solution to our debt that does not include increasing revenue.
Agreed. You must also cut the government by about 20%. That is just the fact of it.
Mr Neutron
Well-Known Member
there were as many as 26
Dan Kone
Well-Known Member
Well also major corporations pay almost no tax. Corporate tax used to account for over 30% of our revenue now it accounts for only ~7%.
You also have to remember that we are in a recession. This isn't a normal debt rate. Debt rates always increase during a recession. I don't believe there has ever been an exception to that in this country since the industrial revolution.
We aren't averaging that much debt per year, we don't need to raise average tax revenues by 1.4 trillion per year.
You have to accept the fact that there is going to be a deficit during a recession, because it is a fact. Even conservative hero Reagan ran unusually huge deficits during a recession. Why do you think this should be different than every recession in the history of our country? Why is it so important that the budget gets balanced right now. Any serious attempt to balance the budget right now will likely result in a double dip recession. Is it really worth potentially millions of people losing their jobs?
The deficit is a long term problem that should be addressed. But we have an immediate problem right now that is more important. We will not have the same revenue problems once the economy is recovered and people are back to work.
Dan Kone
Well-Known Member
We aren't "robbing" anyone. We are asking them to pay their fair share. Warren Buffet pays a lower % wages in taxes than his secretary. It's not robbery to correct that error.
When the wealthy did pay their fair share in taxes, we didn't have huge deficit problems. Those problems only came around when we started cutting their taxes.
Mr Neutron
Well-Known Member
Really, you're going to run out FDR's New Deal as proof as liberalism works, when FDR's New Deal prolonged the Great Depression by 7 years
Proof that adherence to the Constitution works=the first 122 yrs of our country.
Mr Neutron
Well-Known Member
Everyone is being robbed. When the Supreme Court has ruled against paying tax on wages and those taxes are enforced by confiscation of all property and incarceration, we are ALL being robbed.
"Warren Buffet pays a lower % wages in taxes..." I know the words are english but I just don't understand the meaning of this "... pays a lower % wages in taxes..." What does that mean? Proofreading is your friend.
The problems only came around when our elected officials started to sell out their convictions and ignored the Constitution.
mame
Well-Known Member
Wow. You cited the only evidence that Conservatives on this site have ever put forward ever in the history of ever.
Unfortunately for you, that paper(for it's main assertion, that the New Deal prolonged the Depression) has been discredited for a while now. You see, the UCLA paper has a good point(in that NIRA was bad) but basically, what the UCLA study concluded was that inflated prices and wages were the cause of the slowed recovery, and the NIRA which FDR signed into law was the cause of that inflation, resulting in a 60% weaker recovery. However, NIRA was deemed unconstitutional by the Supreme Court only two years later(and so was not in effect for the duration of the New Deal) and so the consensus has since been that while the NIRA policy was quite the blunder(having slowed the recovery, as shown... AND it was unconstitutional) - the rest of FDR's New Deal is considered a success. This is evidenced by it still being the fastest recovery in the history of the nation(Market forces alone have never produced that fast of a recovery, Imagine if NIRA was never signed into law... FDR's policies would have been deemed even more effective).
laughingduck
Well-Known Member
We need a flat rate for corporations, no welfare! And we need a flat rate for personal taxes, no deductions! Fair is fair, this would end the game the politicians have been using to divide and socially engineer.
You don't fix that by raising the tax %. You fix it by making the tax simpler with little to no write offs across the board. The entire IRS is a big game. Keep progressive taxation, fine. Make the first 20k tax exempt, whatever. Why do we have families making 60k that pay no taxes, but a couple without kids takes it in the rump? People should be responsible for themselves, not their neighbors. Why should a couple without kids hold the burden for the couple with kids? Should I get a tax write off for having dogs? You choose to have kids, you choose to buy a house, having dogs is little different.
With Warren Buffets Secretary, you have to remember Social Security isn't income tax, it is an insurance premium. You pay in to get the retirement. Rich people get the same benefit as poor people. Why would they pay more in?
Obviously you still haven't looked at the 2008 IRS compilation of who payed taxes and how much or you wouldn't suggest poor people pay more taxes. To do so is dishonest at best. The numbers reported are after breaks and loopholes and everything. How can we even have an informed discussion about who is paying what if you refuse to even look at the percents payed by the different groups as reported by the federal government? The answer is that we can't, and until you do you are just making it up as you go.
We could cut hundreds of billions and not even touch the economy right now. When you are broke and have to borrow money to keep living you don't keep your cable bill and 5 dollar a day star bucks coffee, you cut those items out. We could just walk away from the wars we are in and that would be a tremendous savings right there.
The corporate tax rate is 35%. All companies should pay 35% tax rate on their profit. Loopholes are there because our politicians on both sides are useless lowlifes.
The problem isn't running a deficit for one year, it is running a deficit every year for the last forever without actually paying anything off. Borrowing isn't a problem if repayment is the plan. We have no plan to pay it back - ever. I guess all we can do is just keep going until the dollar collapses and is worth nothing and a loaf of bread will pay off the trillions we have amassed. At least Obama can say something the last few presidents cannot. "I spent the most money of any leader in history of the world, not only spreading socialism, but spreading death, destruction, and starting wars. Democrats and Republicans alike should be proud of me" Is that Obama's way of being bipartisan? Do the worst things that both parties do?
Imagine if space monkeys had landed in Iceland 100 years ago, we would all be speaking Icelandic! Yea.. my grandmother used to tell me "If wishes were horses, beggars would ride" Keep wishing for revised reality lol.
mame
Well-Known Member
It's funny because that 2004 UCLA study is widely regarded by many to be a conservative attempt at revisionism. The New Deal as a whole had a positive effect on the economy. The study says that market forces would have been able to work at a pace 60% faster than they would have without NIRA in effect for those two years. That's all well and good, but how fast exactly do market forces move? The answer is, historically, at a glacial pace. That is why the New Deal is still credited with speeding the recovery of the great depression. There is no evidence to suggest that market forces alone could drop unemployment from over almost 24% to 14.6% that's 4 million people who gained employment in that time, the New Deal did, in fact, preside over the fastest recovery in history and to credit market forces alone is at best misguided and at worst sabotaging the future.
In response to that graph, if you look at debt as a percentage of GDP, our post WW2 debt was ~120% of the U.S. economy. Funny how inflation works (overstating our debt). Also, it seems war is expensive.
here lies a problem with conservative mindsets.
it's the idea that the government cannot operate under a budget deficit.
it's incorrect. the government can operate under budget deficits.
comparing the deficit level with the quick ratio used by investors is incorrect. this idea that the government operating under a budget deficit will lead to bankruptcy (like a corporation operating after continuous losses) is not correct. it is incorrect b/c we do not use the same accounting principles when dealing with government, as we do with corporations. simplistic conservatives argue as if it were the same thing.....
these spending cuts will have a devastating effect on the economy, and republicans want to ride that wave in the 2012 elections.
they're playing politics with our well-being..... it's deplorable....
it's the idea that the government cannot operate under a budget deficit.
it's incorrect. the government can operate under budget deficits.
comparing the deficit level with the quick ratio used by investors is incorrect. this idea that the government operating under a budget deficit will lead to bankruptcy (like a corporation operating after continuous losses) is not correct. it is incorrect b/c we do not use the same accounting principles when dealing with government, as we do with corporations. simplistic conservatives argue as if it were the same thing.....
these spending cuts will have a devastating effect on the economy, and republicans want to ride that wave in the 2012 elections.
they're playing politics with our well-being..... it's deplorable....