The mindset behind trickle down economics in the US

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LoveNotHate
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08 Aug 2019, 11:44 pm

blazingstar wrote:

When I hear people complain about taxes, I think, as above, don't these people have sewers, clean water out of a tap, roads, interstate highways, firefighters, etc?

Then I hear people who complain, I don't have children, why should I pay for schools? Well, who do you think educated your police, firefighters, your doctors and dentists, your gas station attendants, the construction workers who build those roads, the plumbers who unstop your toilet, the people who repair our roads and bridges, etc?

We all benefit from our taxes and I never mind paying my share. I may disagree about how it is allocated, but I don't mind paying.

I think about …

$500 toilet seats, endless military interventions, 500 million wasted on bankrupt Solyndra, Trump's Space Force, Trump's Wall, fiscal irresponsibility, lack of accountability, limited oversight, national debt at 22 trillion …

You would prefer your money go to Donald Trump to spend for you?


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beneficii
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08 Aug 2019, 11:50 pm

LoveNotHate wrote:
cberg wrote:
I call that private healthcare. :roll: We have a medical industry in this country, in other more civilized countries, medical industry stops at the hospital door because taking people's money to benefit private interests is harmful. If the government is not taking your money, private interests will take more of it because they represent unregulated greed.

You want Donald Trump to have your money or you?


It won't be Donald Trump that has it, unless he embezzles it in violation of the law (beyond his salary, of course).


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LoveNotHate
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08 Aug 2019, 11:57 pm

beneficii wrote:
LoveNotHate wrote:
cberg wrote:
I call that private healthcare. :roll: We have a medical industry in this country, in other more civilized countries, medical industry stops at the hospital door because taking people's money to benefit private interests is harmful. If the government is not taking your money, private interests will take more of it because they represent unregulated greed.

You want Donald Trump to have your money or you?


It won't be Donald Trump that has it, unless he embezzles it in violation of the law (beyond his salary, of course).

He sets agency budget requests.

Also, he successfully redirected money to build his WALL ( despite Congress not authorizing it).

For example, your tax contributions are going towards Trump's agenda, such as hiring more Border Patrol agents, and building more jails for illegal aliens.


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beneficii
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09 Aug 2019, 12:11 am

LoveNotHate wrote:
beneficii wrote:
LoveNotHate wrote:
cberg wrote:
I call that private healthcare. :roll: We have a medical industry in this country, in other more civilized countries, medical industry stops at the hospital door because taking people's money to benefit private interests is harmful. If the government is not taking your money, private interests will take more of it because they represent unregulated greed.

You want Donald Trump to have your money or you?


It won't be Donald Trump that has it, unless he embezzles it in violation of the law (beyond his salary, of course).

He sets agency budget requests.

Also, he successfully redirected money to build his WALL ( despite Congress not authorizing it).

For example, your tax contributions are going towards Trump's agenda, such as hiring more Border Patrol agents, and building more jails for illegal aliens.


So what are you suggesting I do?


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LoveNotHate
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09 Aug 2019, 12:26 am

beneficii wrote:
LoveNotHate wrote:
beneficii wrote:
LoveNotHate wrote:
cberg wrote:
I call that private healthcare. :roll: We have a medical industry in this country, in other more civilized countries, medical industry stops at the hospital door because taking people's money to benefit private interests is harmful. If the government is not taking your money, private interests will take more of it because they represent unregulated greed.

You want Donald Trump to have your money or you?


It won't be Donald Trump that has it, unless he embezzles it in violation of the law (beyond his salary, of course).

He sets agency budget requests.

Also, he successfully redirected money to build his WALL ( despite Congress not authorizing it).

For example, your tax contributions are going towards Trump's agenda, such as hiring more Border Patrol agents, and building more jails for illegal aliens.


So what are you suggesting I do?

I am explaining why I prefer to keep my money, because, mostly, likely, it is not going for beneficial things that I support.


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Antrax
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09 Aug 2019, 12:59 am

There is a real need for a government. There's a reason we don't have an anarcho-capitalist society (which would devolve into Feudalism). There's also the reality that for most things market systems will outperform government administration. Command economies have pretty universally failed in the long run. Market economies have done well in the long run.

The government needs taxes to operate. The relevant questions:

1) What is the optimal form of taxation.

2) What is the optimal amount of taxation.

3) What things should the government be spending its money on.


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beneficii
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09 Aug 2019, 4:32 am

LoveNotHate wrote:
beneficii wrote:
LoveNotHate wrote:
beneficii wrote:
LoveNotHate wrote:
cberg wrote:
I call that private healthcare. :roll: We have a medical industry in this country, in other more civilized countries, medical industry stops at the hospital door because taking people's money to benefit private interests is harmful. If the government is not taking your money, private interests will take more of it because they represent unregulated greed.

You want Donald Trump to have your money or you?


It won't be Donald Trump that has it, unless he embezzles it in violation of the law (beyond his salary, of course).

He sets agency budget requests.

Also, he successfully redirected money to build his WALL ( despite Congress not authorizing it).

For example, your tax contributions are going towards Trump's agenda, such as hiring more Border Patrol agents, and building more jails for illegal aliens.


So what are you suggesting I do?

I am explaining why I prefer to keep my money, because, mostly, likely, it is not going for beneficial things that I support.


So if one person doesn't support appropriations for something, then we shouldn't appropriate money for it?


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LoveNotHate
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09 Aug 2019, 4:47 am

beneficii wrote:
LoveNotHate wrote:
beneficii wrote:
LoveNotHate wrote:
beneficii wrote:
LoveNotHate wrote:
cberg wrote:
I call that private healthcare. :roll: We have a medical industry in this country, in other more civilized countries, medical industry stops at the hospital door because taking people's money to benefit private interests is harmful. If the government is not taking your money, private interests will take more of it because they represent unregulated greed.

You want Donald Trump to have your money or you?


It won't be Donald Trump that has it, unless he embezzles it in violation of the law (beyond his salary, of course).

He sets agency budget requests.

Also, he successfully redirected money to build his WALL ( despite Congress not authorizing it).

For example, your tax contributions are going towards Trump's agenda, such as hiring more Border Patrol agents, and building more jails for illegal aliens.


So what are you suggesting I do?

I am explaining why I prefer to keep my money, because, mostly, likely, it is not going for beneficial things that I support.


So if one person doesn't support appropriations for something, then we shouldn't appropriate money for it?

That would be ideal.

That would end spending on dumb stuff, like wars.

However, it's good enough to know that I will spend my money better than TRUMP.


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blazingstar
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09 Aug 2019, 5:18 am

LoveNotHate wrote:
blazingstar wrote:

When I hear people complain about taxes, I think, as above, don't these people have sewers, clean water out of a tap, roads, interstate highways, firefighters, etc?

Then I hear people who complain, I don't have children, why should I pay for schools? Well, who do you think educated your police, firefighters, your doctors and dentists, your gas station attendants, the construction workers who build those roads, the plumbers who unstop your toilet, the people who repair our roads and bridges, etc?

We all benefit from our taxes and I never mind paying my share. I may disagree about how it is allocated, but I don't mind paying.

I think about …

$500 toilet seats, endless military interventions, 500 million wasted on bankrupt Solyndra, Trump's Space Force, Trump's Wall, fiscal irresponsibility, lack of accountability, limited oversight, national debt at 22 trillion …

You would prefer your money go to Donald Trump to spend for you?


What I said is: I may not agree on how it (taxes) is allocated. In my 65 years, Trump has only been in office for two of them. More important than the golden toilet seats are the vast number of benefits we now take for granted.


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09 Aug 2019, 10:49 am

Humans in the capitalist system can be sued.
Humans in the government can not.
How anyone believes that the same humans acting within the government without recourse for negative action are somehow going to automatically act more morally are baffling creatures.



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09 Aug 2019, 4:36 pm

Antrax wrote:
cberg wrote:
The richer the minority gets, the less money is circulating.


I'm sorry this is strictly speaking not accurate and represents a fundamental lack of understanding of economics. It is possible for the minority to get richer, while the majority also gets richer, and for more money to circulate. This is in fact was has happened in the american economy over the last 80 years.


If the above is accurate, Antrax, how do you reconcile the fact that the wealthiest people in the top 1% keep increasing their wealth, way over the increase of others.

Here is a quote from Wikipedia, but there are many more sources which make this claim:

In Inequality for All....Reich states that 95% of economic gains went to the top 1% net worth (HNWI) since 2009 when the recovery allegedly started.[10] More recently, in 2017, an Oxfam study found that eight rich people, six of them Americans, own as much combined wealth as half the human race.[11][12][13]

From what I read, the "wealth gap" is increasing, and the rest of us are just getting by.


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LoveNotHate
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09 Aug 2019, 4:48 pm

blazingstar wrote:
Antrax wrote:
cberg wrote:
The richer the minority gets, the less money is circulating.


I'm sorry this is strictly speaking not accurate and represents a fundamental lack of understanding of economics. It is possible for the minority to get richer, while the majority also gets richer, and for more money to circulate. This is in fact was has happened in the american economy over the last 80 years.


If the above is accurate, Antrax, how do you reconcile the fact that the wealthiest people in the top 1% keep increasing their wealth, way over the increase of others.

Here is a quote from Wikipedia, but there are many more sources which make this claim:

In Inequality for All....Reich states that 95% of economic gains went to the top 1% net worth (HNWI) since 2009 when the recovery allegedly started.[10] More recently, in 2017, an Oxfam study found that eight rich people, six of them Americans, own as much combined wealth as half the human race.[11][12][13]

From what I read, the "wealth gap" is increasing, and the rest of us are just getting by.

The rich invest their money, so they get poorer or richer based on asset price changes.

Assets rebounded from 2009 to 2019


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LoveNotHate
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09 Aug 2019, 5:00 pm

How do we teach poor people to live below their means, save and invest their money ?

That's how we lift them up.

Image


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blazingstar
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09 Aug 2019, 5:03 pm

LoveNotHate wrote:
blazingstar wrote:
Antrax wrote:
cberg wrote:
The richer the minority gets, the less money is circulating.


I'm sorry this is strictly speaking not accurate and represents a fundamental lack of understanding of economics. It is possible for the minority to get richer, while the majority also gets richer, and for more money to circulate. This is in fact was has happened in the american economy over the last 80 years.


If the above is accurate, Antrax, how do you reconcile the fact that the wealthiest people in the top 1% keep increasing their wealth, way over the increase of others.

Here is a quote from Wikipedia, but there are many more sources which make this claim:

In Inequality for All....Reich states that 95% of economic gains went to the top 1% net worth (HNWI) since 2009 when the recovery allegedly started.[10] More recently, in 2017, an Oxfam study found that eight rich people, six of them Americans, own as much combined wealth as half the human race.[11][12][13]

From what I read, the "wealth gap" is increasing, and the rest of us are just getting by.

The rich invest their money, so they get poorer or richer based on asset price changes.

Assets rebounded from 2009 to 2019


Are you saying the increase in wealth gap is solely due to increase in the value of assets already on hand?


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LoveNotHate
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09 Aug 2019, 5:15 pm

blazingstar wrote:
LoveNotHate wrote:
blazingstar wrote:
Antrax wrote:
cberg wrote:
The richer the minority gets, the less money is circulating.


I'm sorry this is strictly speaking not accurate and represents a fundamental lack of understanding of economics. It is possible for the minority to get richer, while the majority also gets richer, and for more money to circulate. This is in fact was has happened in the american economy over the last 80 years.


If the above is accurate, Antrax, how do you reconcile the fact that the wealthiest people in the top 1% keep increasing their wealth, way over the increase of others.

Here is a quote from Wikipedia, but there are many more sources which make this claim:

In Inequality for All....Reich states that 95% of economic gains went to the top 1% net worth (HNWI) since 2009 when the recovery allegedly started.[10] More recently, in 2017, an Oxfam study found that eight rich people, six of them Americans, own as much combined wealth as half the human race.[11][12][13]

From what I read, the "wealth gap" is increasing, and the rest of us are just getting by.

The rich invest their money, so they get poorer or richer based on asset price changes.

Assets rebounded from 2009 to 2019


Are you saying the increase in wealth gap is solely due to increase in the value of assets already on hand?

Yes, assets like stocks are at record highs now.

Take Bill Gates, he owns 64 million shares of Microsoft.

on Dec 31, 2008 , the stock was at 19.44.
on Aug 9, 2019, the stock is at 135.28

So, he made, (135.28-19.44) * 64 million = 7.4 Billion just in this investment


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09 Aug 2019, 6:18 pm

LoveNotHate wrote:
How do we teach poor people to live below their means, save and invest their money ?

That's how we lift them up.

Image


Because poor people are without extra income, they hardly have enough to invest or even save anything after buying the essentials. And even if they do spend money on "vices" like alcohol or Tabasco, or just entertainment, who can fault them for wanting to have a little happiness in their lives?


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