Let's be honest. The average American doesn't mind paying taxes to the government for some things. Like national defense or infrastructure like roads. They probably don't mind paying for the CDC and a few other programs that our founding fathers would have never imagined as part of government responsibility.
However, there is something very wrong about a system of taxation that doesn't have a thing to do with actually providing basic infrastructure and services, but, instead, holds the tax paying citizens up at gun point and tells them that they will give a part of their salary in taxes so the government can redistribute it to the worker behind them because it is their patriotic duty.
That is not capitalism. That is not democracy. That is not freedom. That is Socialism. That is Soviet politburos run by the proletariat. That is highway robbery at gun point with the stinking thief telling you that you are supposed to like being robbed! I say "at gun point" because the government has the power to arrest, confiscate or otherwise ruin your life if you do not comply with their demands. So, if you don't like this new "redistribution of wealth" tax program, you have two choices: stop working or stop paying taxes. One of them will make you poor and the other one will get you put in jail.
No American worth their salt, who claims to believe in our constitution or the founders ideas should be accepting that idea as anything but Anti-American. It is one thing to argue about who pays the taxes to support our government and how much, but it is quite another for a politician to out and out say that he is going to take someone else's money and "spread the wealth around" as if he was freaking Robin Hood.
Even people who are not in the higher income ranges that Sen. Obama proposes to raid should be utterly appalled. What he is suggesting is several things. First, he is suggesting that we institute what amounts to a "welfare state", but in this welfare state, the people who the state believes might need assistance, don't have to apply or prove that they meet any criteria to obtain that assistance. Obama's plan basically by-passes any set of controls and automatically assumes that anyone making under a certain income automatically qualifies for assistance from the state. Not only do they not have to pay taxes, they will get back in addition what may equal up to 1/3 of their current income from the state. Money they never paid into the government in the first place, but comes right out of someone else's hard earned income.
This is the grand "trickle up" economics of Sen. Obama. Second, what Sen. Obama's plan is saying is that, if you work hard and finally get to the point where you are making a comfortable income, you are responsible for the people who haven't made the same choices. Not just "responsible" in terms of choosing to assist, but responsible, by law, to support someone who is not a member of your family or someone you decide to help, but someone the government is telling you must have your money more than you.
His assumption is that people aren't making the same amount of money because the system is unfair and they do not have the same choices as anyone else. In fact, he is insisting that freedom to choose, the freedom of "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness" doesn't exist at all. In one fell swoop, he is wiping out the very premise of our founding and insists, instead, that people be rewarded for making either bad choices or, in many cases, simply choices in life style, education and occupation.
There are a lot of people who are thinking that this is a good idea. Largely because they do not fall into that upper tax bracket right now or because they fall into the tax bracket where Sen. Obama intends to redistribute someone else's money. Many are nodding their heads to Sen. Obama's plans thinking this is a great idea. That is mostly because they see this "tax plan" as getting more money back from the government and not taking it from somebody else who lives down the street.
As Sen. Obama puts it, "just a few", a "small percentage" of people and businesses will be affected. In effect, he's telling people who are going to get this "tax credit" (hand out) not to feel bad that the government is going to stick up some people for their money because it is "only a small percentage" of people who are going to be robbed. So, it's like a felon telling the court that, yes, he robbed people at gun point, but nobody got shot and he gave the money to a bunch of people who he believes needed it. That's not a crime, is it?
Then, there are all those who are like me who don't get the tax credit but also aren't in the first income tier about to be robbed. We are supposed to shut up and say nothing because it isn't we who are being robbed. Except, anyone with any comprehension of what usually happens with these programs knows that sometime in the near future, after we have continued to work hard and advance in our careers and income, we will automatically become the government thief's next victim.
We don't even have to make the bad choice of walking down a dark alley in a bad neighborhood at the wrong time of night flashing wads of cash. You can just set at your desk at work and wake up one morning to discover that you've been robbed. Or worse, look forward to the day when the thief decides that he has had such an easy time of robbing "the few", he might as well expand his victim pool to include the next level. That thief, Sen. Obama dressed up as Uncle Sam, will have to start robbing us at this level simply because the people he is purporting to support with the money will have grown exponentially either through census growth or because Uncle Sam is going to classify more people as "needy". That is standard practice for the government. Once the government starts a program, they are unlikely to end it. Mostly because those in government always think they know how to fix things better than the other 99.9% of the citizens.
Finally, let's be very honest about these types of income swaps. The government really isn't Robin Hood who robs from the rich to give to the poor. The government is much more like Fagin from Great Expectations. He says he's going to take care of the poor orphans, but, in reality, he keeps 90% of the ill gotten gains and gives the orphans thin gruel to survive on. The fact of the matter is, if the American people really wanted to help someone who was not making as much money, they would be better off taking 10% of their pay check, stand on a corner downtown every Friday and throw it into the air. It would be just as randomly as helpful and at least they would know all of it actually went into somebody's hands to spend directly on themselves or their families.
Still, lets be at least honest about what Sen. Obama is suggesting that we do. He is suggesting that armed robbery, euphamistically known as "Obama's tax plan", is "fair", "social justice" and "patriotic". My friends, that is not only anti-American, that is down right Venezuelan.
However, there is something very wrong about a system of taxation that doesn't have a thing to do with actually providing basic infrastructure and services, but, instead, holds the tax paying citizens up at gun point and tells them that they will give a part of their salary in taxes so the government can redistribute it to the worker behind them because it is their patriotic duty.
That is not capitalism. That is not democracy. That is not freedom. That is Socialism. That is Soviet politburos run by the proletariat. That is highway robbery at gun point with the stinking thief telling you that you are supposed to like being robbed! I say "at gun point" because the government has the power to arrest, confiscate or otherwise ruin your life if you do not comply with their demands. So, if you don't like this new "redistribution of wealth" tax program, you have two choices: stop working or stop paying taxes. One of them will make you poor and the other one will get you put in jail.
No American worth their salt, who claims to believe in our constitution or the founders ideas should be accepting that idea as anything but Anti-American. It is one thing to argue about who pays the taxes to support our government and how much, but it is quite another for a politician to out and out say that he is going to take someone else's money and "spread the wealth around" as if he was freaking Robin Hood.
Even people who are not in the higher income ranges that Sen. Obama proposes to raid should be utterly appalled. What he is suggesting is several things. First, he is suggesting that we institute what amounts to a "welfare state", but in this welfare state, the people who the state believes might need assistance, don't have to apply or prove that they meet any criteria to obtain that assistance. Obama's plan basically by-passes any set of controls and automatically assumes that anyone making under a certain income automatically qualifies for assistance from the state. Not only do they not have to pay taxes, they will get back in addition what may equal up to 1/3 of their current income from the state. Money they never paid into the government in the first place, but comes right out of someone else's hard earned income.
This is the grand "trickle up" economics of Sen. Obama. Second, what Sen. Obama's plan is saying is that, if you work hard and finally get to the point where you are making a comfortable income, you are responsible for the people who haven't made the same choices. Not just "responsible" in terms of choosing to assist, but responsible, by law, to support someone who is not a member of your family or someone you decide to help, but someone the government is telling you must have your money more than you.
His assumption is that people aren't making the same amount of money because the system is unfair and they do not have the same choices as anyone else. In fact, he is insisting that freedom to choose, the freedom of "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness" doesn't exist at all. In one fell swoop, he is wiping out the very premise of our founding and insists, instead, that people be rewarded for making either bad choices or, in many cases, simply choices in life style, education and occupation.
There are a lot of people who are thinking that this is a good idea. Largely because they do not fall into that upper tax bracket right now or because they fall into the tax bracket where Sen. Obama intends to redistribute someone else's money. Many are nodding their heads to Sen. Obama's plans thinking this is a great idea. That is mostly because they see this "tax plan" as getting more money back from the government and not taking it from somebody else who lives down the street.
As Sen. Obama puts it, "just a few", a "small percentage" of people and businesses will be affected. In effect, he's telling people who are going to get this "tax credit" (hand out) not to feel bad that the government is going to stick up some people for their money because it is "only a small percentage" of people who are going to be robbed. So, it's like a felon telling the court that, yes, he robbed people at gun point, but nobody got shot and he gave the money to a bunch of people who he believes needed it. That's not a crime, is it?
Then, there are all those who are like me who don't get the tax credit but also aren't in the first income tier about to be robbed. We are supposed to shut up and say nothing because it isn't we who are being robbed. Except, anyone with any comprehension of what usually happens with these programs knows that sometime in the near future, after we have continued to work hard and advance in our careers and income, we will automatically become the government thief's next victim.
We don't even have to make the bad choice of walking down a dark alley in a bad neighborhood at the wrong time of night flashing wads of cash. You can just set at your desk at work and wake up one morning to discover that you've been robbed. Or worse, look forward to the day when the thief decides that he has had such an easy time of robbing "the few", he might as well expand his victim pool to include the next level. That thief, Sen. Obama dressed up as Uncle Sam, will have to start robbing us at this level simply because the people he is purporting to support with the money will have grown exponentially either through census growth or because Uncle Sam is going to classify more people as "needy". That is standard practice for the government. Once the government starts a program, they are unlikely to end it. Mostly because those in government always think they know how to fix things better than the other 99.9% of the citizens.
Finally, let's be very honest about these types of income swaps. The government really isn't Robin Hood who robs from the rich to give to the poor. The government is much more like Fagin from Great Expectations. He says he's going to take care of the poor orphans, but, in reality, he keeps 90% of the ill gotten gains and gives the orphans thin gruel to survive on. The fact of the matter is, if the American people really wanted to help someone who was not making as much money, they would be better off taking 10% of their pay check, stand on a corner downtown every Friday and throw it into the air. It would be just as randomly as helpful and at least they would know all of it actually went into somebody's hands to spend directly on themselves or their families.
Still, lets be at least honest about what Sen. Obama is suggesting that we do. He is suggesting that armed robbery, euphamistically known as "Obama's tax plan", is "fair", "social justice" and "patriotic". My friends, that is not only anti-American, that is down right Venezuelan.
Is that anything like a Brazilian?
*snicker*
0>;~}
"wealth" ? I thought , one president, 2 wars and a handful of bankers put an end to that.
Hey, I tagged all seven of them, fair and square...
if someone likes that, fine. The idea that the government feels it is necessary to promote it, blows big chunks.
Sure, there was contraction, but I didn't take a bath, because I wasn't invested in trash. Well, not true, there is some Waste Managment stuff in there, I believe, but my money wasn't sitting in trash paper underpinning bad loans.
My position this year isn't a whole heckuva lot worse than last year, and because I hadn't bought too much house for my ability to pay, the New Castle mortgage is still getting paid on time and the Old Castle mortgage is getting paid on time - and the equity still builds. But I didn't buy either of them as investments, nor have I borrowed heavily against them.
So, for the nonce at least, I'm comfortable, and the wealth is holding steady.
Not dismissing the seriousness of the problems for some people, and the the ones who let themselves get talked into stuff that seemed a good idea at the time.
And the businesses who need the credit loosened up to maintain cash flow for otherwise healthy enterprises.
If you played on the margin, you're hurting. If went with conventional investing, you're not that bad off.
The numbers are huge, but it's not 1929 yet, either.
Of course, there were the 'more equal' party bosses who had the humble 'public servants' salary but so many 'in kind' benefits such as getting the great food unknown to many fellow citizens for the price of that crappy kolbasa and other stuff from the 'special distribution' stores. If you had an access to the borough party dining room, for the same 50 kopek you could get a veritable feast and not the garbage one would get in the factory's general cafeteria. The price difference were paid by the those less equal citizens, 'gray masses', through the system of 'built-in' taxes (your salary was the amount left after the gov't took what it deemed necessary to pay for all the stuff it needed).
The faces of the common Hungarians were... not happy to say the least....
This Dollar Stores goods ncluded a wonderful (awful) communist knock off of Old Spice after shave, called "Russian Spice" (made in East Germany). A bottle of which I proudly gifted to the armorer during a wonderful ski trip to Garmisch.
Wonder if the Armorer ever had the cajones to actually apply said Russian Spice to his nubbles after a shave?
I work for a large industrial supply company. We have profit sharing as a benefit instead of 401k contributions or traditional employer-funded pensions. The corporate gurus feel that profit sharing encourages employees to keep costs down and sales up. Since our profit sharing account is funded based on a percentage of profit, it does work for most of us. Our retirement accounts are funded on an annual basis, and we are allotted a percentage of our annual income. Better sales = higher percentage allotted. In essence, we are profiting from how much effort we put into our jobs.
The downside is, if you go Enron, then no profits to be allotted at the end of the day. It has its risks, but then, so do 401ks and other investment strategies. I don't see my company going out of business, so I'm happy with the profit sharing.
And as a company, we've made our targets for at least 20 years now, so we've had full distributions.
I am against that, very strongly.
The joke is on the left, though. It doesn't bring down capitalism at all. It helps increase profits. Hahaha!
Though I agree, the government doesn't need to have anything to do with it.