Why is wanting to keep what you earned greed, but wanting what you didn't earn isn't?

[Dragonlady]

I love how the right-wingers all complain about the amount of taxes paid. Americans pay the lowest rate of taxes of anyone in the G8 and yet they bitch whine about taxes and "big government" more than ANYONE ELSE.

You can't be the biggest superpower in the world without big government. You can't manage of country of over 300 million people without big government.

Last but not least, banana republics with almost no government, work for the aritocracy and no one else. If you want to live in a safe society where citizens are protected and relatively safe, it takes tax dollars to produce that level of security and regulation.

 

[Mr Natural]

The best country clubs charge the highest dues.

 

[DiamondDave]

I love how the right-wingers all complain about the amount of taxes paid. Americans pay the lowest rate of taxes of anyone in the G8 and yet they bitch whine about taxes and "big government" more than ANYONE ELSE.

You can't be the biggest superpower in the world without big government. You can't manage of country of over 300 million people without big government.

Last but not least, banana republics with almost no government, work for the aritocracy and no one else. If you want to live in a safe society where citizens are protected and relatively safe, it takes tax dollars to produce that level of security and regulation.

No.. some of you pay lower taxes than other countries.. many here pay upwards of 50% in forms of taxation.. which is ridiculous.. except to those who think socialism is just and viable and you see those great countries with a 40+% tax, 20%VAT, etc and stifled success

You don't need extra government agencies and assumed powers that were not chartered in the constitution to run a large country.. would you need a larger military or court system than what yo have in Belgium or another small country? Yes.. Do you need a federal dept of education, a plethora of entitlement agencies, etc? Hell no

Yes.. it takes tax dollars for law enforcement, national defense, a court system, etc for the security of a nation.. it does not take redistribution schemes for the sake of governmental power

 

[Mac1958]

.

What neither side of this debate seems willing to admit is that it should be about equilibrium - finding the proper balance between a insuring a reasonable safety net, guaranteeing a level playing field, avoiding the cultural decay of generational dependence on government and avoiding too much bureaucratic drag on our economic system.

But no, the lefties always want "more", the righties always want "less". Black & white, either/or, binary thinking that will never find common ground, because cooperation is confused with capitulation.

Our problems won't find a solution until the True Believers aren't controlling the debate.

.

 

[MikeK]

No.. some of you pay lower taxes than other countries.. many here pay upwards of 50% in forms of taxation.. which is ridiculous.. except to those who think socialism is just and viable and you see those great countries with a 40+% tax, 20%VAT, etc and stifled success

[...]

You're a smart fellow, Dave. So I'll ask why in your opinion are the socialist nations regarded as the happiest in the world?
World's Happiest Places - Forbes

 

[OohPooPahDoo]

Do you need a federal dept of education...

You need something like that to administer federally subsidized and/or backed student loans and grants.

 

[kwc57]

And what's this "earned" crap about anyway? The Koch's inherited their wealth. Trump was born into wealth. They didn't earn anything. And most of the rich that didn't inherit their wealth are probably overpaid anyway. Doctors have bloated salaries. Most businessmen do. They pay themselves too much, and pay their employees too little.

I reject the whole laughable notion that the rich are "earning" anything.

Koch Industries has 67,000 employees on their payroll. Boy, their old man must have been really, really rich for them to still be paying salary to that many people for this many years without earning anything since. Or maybe Koch manufactures money. Yeah, I bet that's it. They don't earn anything, they just print money.

You're an idiot.

 

[JakeStarkey]

If we put a poor man in jail for a year for stealing bread, how high should we build the gallows for the rich man who steals from greed?

 

[BorisTheAnimal]

I love how the right-wingers all complain about the amount of taxes paid. Americans pay the lowest rate of taxes of anyone in the G8 and yet they bitch whine about taxes and "big government" more than ANYONE ELSE.

You can't be the biggest superpower in the world without big government. You can't manage of country of over 300 million people without big government.

Last but not least, banana republics with almost no government, work for the aritocracy and no one else. If you want to live in a safe society where citizens are protected and relatively safe, it takes tax dollars to produce that level of security and regulation.

Sure you can, if you follow the Constitution TO THE LETTER and weaken the Federal government and allow states to handle their own domestic social issues.

 

[JakeStarkey]

I love how the right-wingers all complain about the amount of taxes paid. Americans pay the lowest rate of taxes of anyone in the G8 and yet they bitch whine about taxes and "big government" more than ANYONE ELSE.

You can't be the biggest superpower in the world without big government. You can't manage of country of over 300 million people without big government.

Last but not least, banana republics with almost no government, work for the aritocracy and no one else. If you want to live in a safe society where citizens are protected and relatively safe, it takes tax dollars to produce that level of security and regulation.

Sure you can, if you follow the Constitution TO THE LETTER and weaken the Federal government and allow states to handle their own domestic social issues.

Sorry, Boris, the Articles of Confederation are gone, and the Civil War and the Civil Rights era ended forever the dream of a decentralized USA.

 

[Londoner]

The OP doesn't understand the unbelievably massive investment the public makes in the private sector.

It starts with the world's most advanced industrial infrastructure. That is, the OP seems like he can't explain how dependent profit makers in the southwest are on say the Hoover Dam. Nor does the OP understand the unbelievably massive military investment in stabilizing the 3rd world so that our private sector can profit off cheap labor and raw materials. Nor does the OP understand the technology that flowed from the Cold War Pentagon and NASA budgets into commercial applications.

Try asking the OP where (say) the satellite system that undergirds our telecommunications sector comes from and you will get a blank stare.

Try asking the OP about the government investment in aerospace (or biotechnology or agribusiness), and again... you will get a blank stare.

Try asking the OP about the massive wartime manufacturing base that was created for WWII and then converted to domestic commercial applications.

The OP is likely young, and hasn't had much advanced education. He doesn't understand that before you can explain what money is yours, you have to itemize what amount was indirectly supplied by government.

He also doesn't understand the lobbying process. Most large corporations flock to Washington to suck at the taxpayer's teat (see massive subsidies). And when things go wrong, the heavily subsidized private sector gets massive bailouts.

Given how little the OP knows about the relationship between the private sector and government, and how that relationship translates into huge profits for the private sector, it's no wonder he goes around framing truly kindergarten-level questions.

 

[OODA_Loop]

Private sector paid taxes paid for the government who built the infrastructure with private sector labor for use by the private sector and the public.

 

[bripat9643]

If we put a poor man in jail for a year for stealing bread, how high should we build the gallows for the rich man who steals from greed?

We don't put anyone in jail for stealing a loaf of bread, moron.

 

[bripat9643]

The OP doesn't understand the unbelievably massive investment the public makes in the private sector.

The "public" doesn't invest a dime that it hasn't first taken from the private sector, so your entire post is a non sequitur.

 

[JakeStarkey]

Your comment is the non sequitur, bripat.

You are not on even your mediocre game today: very subpar, son.

 

[Londoner]

Private sector paid taxes paid for the government who built the infrastructure ....

Obviously

My point is this:

In order to identify how much of your paycheck is yours and how much goes to the "house" for its contribution, you have to be able to list exactly what you are getting from government. The problem is that most of the "followers" in the anti-tax movement can't list even 10% of what they get from government for their tax dollars, so they can't effectively answer the question.

To understand the value of your taxes, you need an itemized list of what you're paying for. Try asking someone who gets the majority of their information from the Rightwing media to list what they get from government, and they will just get angry - but they won't be able to provide anything even close to a comprehensive list. So I don't understand how they are so confident in their anger.

 

[Luddly Neddite]

 

[OODA_Loop]

To understand the value of your taxes, you need an itemized list of what you're paying for. Try asking someone who gets the majority of their information from the Rightwing media to list what they get from government, and they will just get angry - but they won't be able to provide anything even close to a comprehensive list. So I don't understand how they are so confident in their anger.

Taxes = infrastructure and protection of private property rights

Not = social entitlement.

You can be for one and not the other and not be anti-tax.

 

[Londoner]

Listen, corporations want massive subsidies and bail-outs from the government. However, they don't want to pay for it. So they pump money into talk radio for the purpose of agitating morons about taxes.

Take Walmart for instance. Over 50% of their goods are manufactured in Third World countries or China. The reason for this is the cheap labor – ultra cheap labor. Ask a talk radio Republican what the military cost is for stabilizing the Third World which supplies corporations with labor and raw material and you will get a blank stare.

Walmart likes getting services like this from the government, but they don't want to pay for it. So they invest in the Rightwing-message-machine which uses its considerable media assets to confuse people about taxes.

"Get your government hands off my Medicare"

 

[bripat9643]

Private sector paid taxes paid for the government who built the infrastructure ....

Obviously

My point is this:

In order to identify how much of your paycheck is yours and how much goes to the "house" for its contribution, you have to be able to list exactly what you are getting from government. The problem is that most of the "followers" in the anti-tax movement can't list even 10% of what they get from government for their tax dollars, so they can't effectively answer the question.

We don't get more than 10% of what we pay in taxes. Most of the money goes to feed parasites and ticks on the ass of society.

To understand the value of your taxes, you need an itemized list of what you're paying for. Try asking someone who gets the majority of their information from the Rightwing media to list what they get from government, and they will just get angry - but they won't be able to provide anything even close to a comprehensive list. So I don't understand how they are so confident in their anger.

I can give you a comprehensive list of stuff I get that I actually want.

1. Protection from foreign enemies
2. Police protections
3. The courts.

That's it.