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Billionaire Paying Less Tax Than Working Class? Why?

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Greetings!

Hopefully, many of us heard of offshore bank accounts in news etc and here we see its example https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/10/06/opinion/income-tax-rate-wealthy.html. Yes, the ration of tax paid by the richest 400 American is less than the working class. Especially when I saw the mentioned graph, I noticed the ration is decreasing gradually with every year and in my opinion, offshore bank accounts are safeguarding these tax eaters.

Secondly, I noticed the IRS didn't take serious steps against these rich people as compared to the actions they take against the middle class. I remember how much worrying situation it was at my home when we received a tax audit notice by the IRS. We took it seriously, hired a good IRS tax attorney and got further guidelines from here https://defensetax.com/ and sort out this matter but it was a challenging situation for us. The main purpose to share my own story about IRS notice is to tell you how much things are only being followed by middle-class and these rich elite eats the tax money. How cruel? I am disappointed. I think we must put pressure on the government to put more taxes on rich class and turn off their offshore accounts. 

AlofRI



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  • MayCaesarMayCaesar 5967 Pts   -   edited October 2019
    I do not think many people know the tax system well, otherwise they would understand why the rich often pay lower effective tax rates and why it is justified. They think that rich people simply find some loopholes in the law, something overlooked by the lawmakers, and exploit them for their own gain - while the regular people cannot do that, because they do not have enough money to hire an experienced tax attorney.

    The actual reason wealthy people sometimes pay lower tax rates than the middle class is because the vast majority of their net worth is invested in assets with variable levels of liquidity. Assets are taxed differently from the regular job income, because assets in themselves are not income. You cannot take an asset and buy something at a grocery store with it, you have to first convert it into currency, and it is at the conversion step that most of the actual taxation occurs.

    Suppose you buy a house for $200,000. 5 years later you sell it for $250,000. Now, if you just cash the money in or put it on your bank account, then you have to pay the tax off the $50,000 of your profits, and possibly another tax off the $250,000 capital gains. However, if, instead, you immediately buy a $230,000 house and only put $20,000 on your bank account, then, depending on the exact situation, you might be able to write it off and either pay no tax from that, or pay some small tax off the $20,000.

    The reason billionaires pay lower taxes than their net worth growth might suggest is because they always trade assets for other assets; that is how they become rich in the first place. Bill Gates does not have $100b sitting in his bank account, he probably has a few millions there, and everything else is scattered among millions investments. Were him to want to purchase something for $10b, chances are he would have to first spend a couple of years just finding buyers for his assets, so he could actually collect the required amount. Many of these investments have a very low liquidity, meaning finding a buyer for them is extremely hard and takes a long time.
    More so, these investments constantly jump and drop in value. One year Bill Gates may see his assets grow in value, only to see the market plunge a year later and lose a few billion dollars. Were we to always tax yearly profits, people would have to pay the tax off the same investment many times over, and were we to also give tax credits for yearly losses, the government would become far more broke than it already is. Profit in the world of investments is very different from profit in the world of salaries, and today's profit may be tomorrow's bankruptcy.

    There is a reason why assets with non-perfect liquidity are generally taxed lower than personal income. You would not want your salary taxed as much as it is now if it took you 2 years of negotiating to actually receive it, would you? The work you have to do in order to obtain it is already a high enough "tax".

    NOW, what happens if Bill Gates actually does cash in on his $10b to buy something for himself? See, NOW he has to pay the same tax as everyone else does on his profit and personal income. NOW he is going to pay much higher tax than almost anyone else, because he is much wealthier than almost anyone else.

    So do not misdirect your emotions. There is no trickery here. It is not like the rich people enjoy luxurious lives they have not paid taxes for. They have paid for every penny they have ever spent on themselves, much more than you have paid for every of your spent pennies. The difference is, the amount they have spent on themselves is negligible, compared to the amount they have invested in others. If you manage to invest 99.99% of your yearly salary into others, then you will also get to enjoy lower effective tax rates.

    And please, do not say, "Oh, but I am not a billionaire, I cannot afford that". Hundreds thousands people have done so. They have lived like broke people for a couple of decades, saving every penny and investing it in various assets - and eventually they got to the stage where their passive income is more than enough for them to live off, and they can literally invest 100% of their salary in other people, to increase their cash flow.
    Everyone can do that. Billionaires are just much better at this, they have some incredible skills and talents few other people have, and they generally have started doing it much earlier in life than most other people.

    If you want to enjoy the tax benefits the rich people do, then you have to make a lot of sacrifices in order to get to the point in your financial life where you can afford to buy far more assets than you buy consumer goods and services. Punishing those people who have made all those sacrifices with taxing them again, and twice at that (once for purchasing assets, and once more for selling them), would be absolutely illogical.
    AlofRIZombieguy1987SuperSith89Ampersand
  • CYDdhartaCYDdharta 1823 Pts   -  
    This didn't sound right to me.  It turns out there's a reason it didn't.  The "study" is bogus.

    As the American Institute for Economic Research’s Phil Magness noted, these findings are at conflict with decades of existing literature on taxation. For instance, the Congressional Budget Office has the top 1%’s total tax burden at 33.3% in 2016, while Saez and Zucman have that at a comparably lower 30%. Additionally, Saez and Zucman have overestimated the poor’s tax burden. The CBO has the bottom 20%’s federal tax burden at 1.7%, while the duo argues that rises to an astonishing 25% with state and local taxes included. While state and local taxes are regressive (the top 1% pay 7.4% of their income in it and the bottom 20% pay 11.4%), that’s a far stretch from 25%. And in reality, when you factor in transfer payments and benefits, the poor technically pay negative tax rates.

    Furthermore:

        Bear in mind that Saez and Zucman have not yet officially released their figures or their underlying methodology.

        First, as Zucman recently admitted on Twitter, their series removes the refundable portion of the earned income tax credit (EITC) from the bottom quintile’s federal tax burden. He claims this was done to separate the alleged “muddle” of transfer payments from the mix when looking at tax data, yet this produces highly misleading results.

        The EITC is an intentional feature of the federal tax system designed to reduce its burden on the poor and provide eligible filers with an offsetting payment, thereby increasing the income tax’s overall progressivity. It is administered directly through annual tax return filings to the IRS and functions as an income-chained poverty-alleviation measure. For these reasons, the CBO incorporates the refundable EITC payment into its federal tax-distribution figures and has consistently done so over the past 40 years.

    The average EITC benefit is over $3,000, meaning they over estimated the tax burdens of its beneficiaries by at least $3,000.

        The second problem arises from Saez and Zucman’s treatment of data in the last two years. As noted, the most recent CBO release is from 2016. Yet Saez and Zucman purport to present more recent estimates, including last year.

        There’s a reason why the CBO series lags in date. The IRS has yet to release its official income tax statistics for 2018, which raises the question of how Saez and Zucman are able to present estimates for a year in which we have extremely incomplete data.

    And that’s not all. Magness also notes that Saez and Zucman claim to have data on the top 400 income earners dating back to the 1960s, but the top 400 earners have only been tracked since the 1982 by Forbes Magazine, and the IRS’ data on the top 400 earners begins in 1992.

    Furthermore, Saez and Zucman can’t even seem to agree with themselves. As economist Wojtek Kopczuk noticed, their prior published research on taxation just last year estimated far higher rates than this recent headline-grabbing study. For example, they estimated that the top 0.01% paid an average tax rate of 40.8% in 2014, but now claim the figure is 29.4%. What possibly could’ve caused them to revise his estimates downward? Whatever the reason is, they haven’t told us.
    https://bongino.com/bogus-viral-study-claims-billionaires-are-paying-less-tax-than-the-poor-under-trump/


  • @BonitaVanhooser ;
    Why?

    Lager portions of their earnings go to people who have been skilled in preserving and protecting income in general. Realistically the issues the United States of American face is the displacement of value that must be placed on the registered receipts of National Debt. 
  • AmpersandAmpersand 858 Pts   -  
    A disproportionate amount of wealth also gives people a disproportionate amount of political power.

    This creates a dialectic between the economic policies which would benefit the rich, which are countered by the forces in society which support the economic policies which benefit ordinary people. The issue is that the typical left-wing Capitalist response is only to put a greater tax burden on the wealthy to help pay for egalitarian measures that help everyone like healthcare, education, etc. This still leaves a minority class of wealthy powerful individuals able to lobby and eventually push back against a progressive taxation system.

    The only way to do away with this permanently is to do away with the Capitalist class itself and aim for radical social and economic egalitarianism. If there is no ultra-wealthy capitalist class, there will be no-one advocating to punish the ordinary workers who actually power the economy by forcing the tax burden on to them.
  • piloteerpiloteer 1577 Pts   -   edited October 2019
    @Ampersand

    Or we could take the tax burden off everybody, which would negate your whole socialist caste system.  
  • AmpersandAmpersand 858 Pts   -  
    @piloteer

    No country is ever going to get rid of all forms of taxation. Nor should we want them to as it would cause absolute havoc and chaos as all forms of governance and control broke down due to there being no way to pay for them.

    Not only that but it would be counter productive to try and do so. Taxes don't just get taken from you, they are in turn then spent on public services that benefit you. 
  • piloteerpiloteer 1577 Pts   -  
    @Ampersand

    I agree with your last argument, but I don't see how an acceptance of taxes is somehow an acceptance of a caste economic system. All systems of governance needs to be economically maintained. It would be disingenuous of me to say all taxes are evil, and all social programs should be cut, but if the point of the taxes and the programs are for "economic protection", then just know that I understand what that phrase is actually code for. It really means enforced socioeconomic status quo.    
  • AmpersandAmpersand 858 Pts   -  
    @piloteer

    Your claim that socialism is a caste system is unevidenced and flawed. Capitalism is inherently a "caste system", not socialism. Capitalism requires there to be, at the very least, a capitalist class who own the means of production and enrich themselves from the work of the labourers. That's not some obscure criticism or rant against capitalism - it's the very definition of any capitalist system.

    That isn't the case in socialism where the means of production are collectively owned.

    A society  can also be "caste based" on other grounds, for instance regardless of its economic policies a country which was structurally supportive of one particular racial group over others could be considered "caste based" but this would be based on it's political system and would be the case regardless of its economic system.

    Also economic protection seems to be a meaningless term you have just made up. Not only am I not aware of any such thing, but even trying to google it just comes up with references to protectionism which an economic position in regards to tariffs and imports/exports rather than any kind of income tax on citizens.
    Plaffelvohfen
  • SuperSith89SuperSith89 170 Pts   -  
    @MayCaesar Well I believe this debate is over with, idk why people are arguing further.  
  • piloteerpiloteer 1577 Pts   -  
    @Ampersand

    Just so we're clear here, socialism is an economic system, as well as a political system, and a philosophical ideology. Socialism was created as a "transitional" system. It's true purpose is to turn a capitalist system into a communist system by imposing restrictions on businesses and individuals. The political agenda inherent in socialism can be summed up as institutionalised altruism. It's focus is on laws that are intended to stifle competition and force people to work for the "common good" instead of for their own self interest. Although the nazis would be an obvious exaggeration in this case, the 25 point nazi party programs that dealt with economic matters espoused the true ideals of socialism. It specifically called for laws that enforce socioeconomic status, or an "order of rank". The 24th point of the program had the words "the good of the community before the good of the individual" in capital letters to drive home the true ideology espoused by socialism. It also called for a "healthy middle class" and it demanded laws intended to ensure the middle class would be solidified as a socioeconomic class that can't be competed against by "profiteers". Socialism is specifically intended to create a economic caste system.

    If whatever "capitalist class" you're talking about can be infiltrated by lower classes through competitive business, then it is in no way a caste system. If anybody can become a part of that socioeconomic class, then it's not an elite club, or a caste system. By raising prices, and minimum wages, and taxes, we also raise the cost of living, which leaves smaller companies less opportunity to grow and be competitive with larger companies. Raising the cost of living keeps us entrenched in our socioeconomic status when we have less money to be able to start our own small businesses. It is competition that allows people of less economic means the opportunity to become wealthy by starting their own businesses. It is "cooperation", and "protecting the middle class" that takes away the opportunity for competitive business, and instead trades it with the services of social programs and work benefits. "Protecting the middle class" is a nice way of saying we'll give the workers their paid vacation time so they'll and learn to get comfortable in the positions they'll be stuck in for life. I guess it boils down to whether we would rather the opportunity to become wealthy, or laws that ensure our comfort in the socioeconomic class we will remain in for life. I choose wealth!!!       
  • AmpersandAmpersand 858 Pts   -   edited October 2019
    @piloteer

    You don't seem to be aware of even basic definitions of socialism.

    In your post you go off on an unevidenced rant not about socialism, which refers to an economic system where the means of production are owned by the workers, but against liberalism or capitalism. Individual variants of socialism can have different and specific criteria and views, but those don;t apply to socialism as a whole. Socialism being a transitional state to Communism for instance is a feature of Marxism specifically, not other variants of socialism put forward by other economists, activists and politicians. For many Socialism is the ends, not the means. Minimum wage is also an economic policy - one usually implemented in Capitalist countries. it could be used in socialist countries too, but it's something that most modern countries have regardless and your random aggression towards it (again ill-informed and lacking facts) just damages your own argument.

    I would also point out that the first victims of the Nazis were socialists and communists and that you seem to be uncritically swallowing Nazi propoganda wholeheartedly - the 24th point of their programme being about freedom of religion of all things something which any person with a bit of sense would review and think that perhaps the Nazis didn't actually mean seriously. The argument you are actually making is that because the Nazis, who killed and hated socialists, said they were pro-middle class and supported a middle class the only obvious thing to do is believe whatever the Nazis tell you and then also randomly believe it applies to socialists as well for no explicable reason?

    That you put "Capitalist class" in scare quotes as if it's some evil invention rather than a basic description of people and the economic function they perform is bizarre and of course none of your wild illogic is in any way grounded in reality. Like how you claim Capitalism isn't a "class system" because despite it having obvious stratified classes there is some movement between them, but for some reasoning doesn't apply to socialist countries because that would be inconvenient for you, wouldn't it? Tell me, exactly how is it that even in the USSR of all places pretty much every single General Secretary came from a poor peasant or labourer background? 
  • billbatardbillbatard 133 Pts   -  
    rich people are all crooks
    The passion for destruction is also a creative passion. Mikhail Bakunin

  • piloteerpiloteer 1577 Pts   -   edited October 2019
    @Ampersand

    It seems you've forgotten what we're actually discussing, and instead went on a rant about my last post instead of addressing the issue. I never claimed capitalism is not a class system, I claimed socialism is an economic caste system. I will now address the arguments you've made to refute that claim. Whoops, wait a minute, you didn't refute it. It seems like you're more interested in critiquing my argument rather than address the points of the discussion we're having. Have you dropped that point altogether and instead dove right into defending the "merits" of socialism and you don't mind that socialism is a caste system with the mindset of "not everybody can own a house on the hill?

    The definition of socialism does not specifically state that all workers MUST own the means of production for it to be a socialism. If companies are regulated by the community as a whole, then that also fits the description of socialism. Just because private ownership still occurs doesn't mean it's not a socialist system. Most companies in most western countries are regulated by the community as a whole. Minimum wage laws, paid vacation and sick time, medical leave, restrictions on firing without just cause, restrictions on deciding who cannot be hired, and a whole slew of labor laws are representative of the regulations placed on businesses by people who were voted into office by the community as a whole. Even if you don't believe that fits the criteria of a socialist system, that doesn't matter because it most certainly does not fit the criteria of a capitalist system at all. I think your understanding of socialism is incomplete. Whether regulations are put on companies by the state, or the community as a whole, it automatically renders it not capitalist system in any way. 

    So my arguments regarding minimum wage laws are somehow "ill-informed and lacking facts"?!?!? So far we've only gotten a statement from you that claims my argument is not factual, but if you understood what makes a claim factual, you'd understand yours does not fit the description of a factual claim because thus far, it's just a claim. It can be easily demonstrated how and why minimum wage laws raise price. Obviously the cost of production goes up for companies who have employees who pay rates go up along with the minimum wage. The companies have to choose how much of the loss to their profits they will absorb, and how much they will pass on to their customers. Beside an increase in prices, minimum wage laws also may cause low wage workers to lose hours, or even lose their jobs altogether. Higher minimum wage laws may also decrease the national output because of fewer work hours and jobs lost. These arguments are verified by the congressional budget office.
    https://www.cbo.gov/publication/55410

    The nazis didn't hate people simply because they were socialists. They hated democratic socialists, and socialists who weren't ethnically "pure", but the nazis themselves were socialists. hitler and goebbles both condemned the evils of capitalism frequently, and all nazis espoused the ideals of collectivism while rejecting any notions of individualism or self interest. Regardless of their policy of privatizing government agencies and services, they implemented strict regulations on how much products could be sold for, how much all German workers were paid, who could buy the products or use the services and how much, and where the materials or foods needed to be bought from, and for how much. With all these measures in place, the nazis effectively controlled how much profit the owners were allowed to make. Even though the nazis got a lot of support from small business owners, that didn't stop them from  putting regulations on small businesses and instead encouraging industry wide businesses without competition. Those policies do not fit the description of capitalism in any way, but it does fit the description of socialism quite nicely.

    As far as modern capitalist countries using minimum wage laws, you'd have to describe these modern capitalist countries to me because I don't know of any. Most countries are socialist in some manner. There is a stigma that surrounds socialism in most western countries, especially the US. But that taboo seems to be aimed at the term socialism only, but not the ideals of socialism. So we just embrace the ideals of socialism while rejecting the term socialism itself.  For the duration of my entire life, I've lived in a socialist country that calls itself capitalist, and the same is true for my father. My country has had social-security since the great depression, along with minimum wage laws. We have so many social programs that it would take up to much space to list them on this thread. All companies are regulated, and all workers cannot be paid below a certain rate. The only way a country can truly be a capitalist one is to not have those regulations in place and allow businesses to be fully competitive with each other which in turn brings the price of products down and keeps the cost of living low for all consumers, which is what everyone of us is. We are all consumers!!!!             
           

                
  • AlofRIAlofRI 1484 Pts   -  
    This country was founded back in 1776. Around that time, one of the founders wrote, at the time, thee book on capitalism. Adam Smith wrote:

    "The necessities of life occasion the great expense of the poor. They find it difficult to get food and the greater part of their little revenue is spent getting it.

    The luxuries and vanities of life occasion the principle expense of the rich and a magnificent house embellishes and sets off, to the best advantage, all the other luxuries and vanities they possess.

     It is not very unreasonable that the rich should contribute to the public expense, not only in proportion to their revenue,, but something more than that proportion."

    That was the kind of thinking in the "founding days". Over the years that wealth has managed to "buy" certain rules that allow them to circumvent that kind of thinking and put the burden on the "little people", while THEY consider that new yacht or Bentley. :angry:

  • CYDdhartaCYDdharta 1823 Pts   -  
    AlofRI said:
    This country was founded back in 1776. Around that time, one of the founders wrote, at the time, thee book on capitalism. Adam Smith wrote:

    "The necessities of life occasion the great expense of the poor. They find it difficult to get food and the greater part of their little revenue is spent getting it.

    The luxuries and vanities of life occasion the principle expense of the rich and a magnificent house embellishes and sets off, to the best advantage, all the other luxuries and vanities they possess.

     It is not very unreasonable that the rich should contribute to the public expense, not only in proportion to their revenue,, but something more than that proportion."

    That was the kind of thinking in the "founding days". Over the years that wealth has managed to "buy" certain rules that allow them to circumvent that kind of thinking and put the burden on the "little people", while THEY consider that new yacht or Bentley. :angry:


    AlofRI
  • AmpersandAmpersand 858 Pts   -  
    piloteer said:
    @Ampersand

    It seems you've forgotten what we're actually discussing, and instead went on a rant about my last post instead of addressing the issue. I never claimed capitalism is not a class system, I claimed socialism is an economic caste system. I will now address the arguments you've made to refute that claim. Whoops, wait a minute, you didn't refute it. It seems like you're more interested in critiquing my argument rather than address the points of the discussion we're having. Have you dropped that point altogether and instead dove right into defending the "merits" of socialism and you don't mind that socialism is a caste system with the mindset of "not everybody can own a house on the hill?     

                
    The topic is "Billionaire Paying Less Tax Than Working Class? Why?" What you are discussing and the actual topic are two very different things.

    Also unless you mean that socialism is based on the hereditary social classes in Hinduism (which would probably only be the third craziest claim you've made this discussion), you are using a definition that is analogous with class and are just making meaningless semantic point with your argument of caste vs class.

    Also I've already pointed out in my prior post, using your own logic, how your argument is incorrect. Pretending I didn't make the argument is childish and does your position no favours. 

    You stated that because Capitalism allows people to move between classes, it is not a caste system.

    I pointed out how there was movement between classes in socialism, using the example of the General Secretaries of the USSR (the most senior position, analogous to the US President) were all born into poor peasant families, labourers, serf, etc. This is an obvious example of people transcending classes to a tremendous degree. Ergo by your own logic, socialism cannot be a caste system.

    Whether you will actually respond to the argument this time or just strawman again remains to be seen.

    piloteer said:
    @Ampersand

    The definition of socialism does not specifically state that all workers MUST own the means of production for it to be a socialism. If companies are regulated by the community as a whole, then that also fits the description of socialism. Just because private ownership still occurs doesn't mean it's not a socialist system. Most companies in most western countries are regulated by the community as a whole. Minimum wage laws, paid vacation and sick time, medical leave, restrictions on firing without just cause, restrictions on deciding who cannot be hired, and a whole slew of labor laws are representative of the regulations placed on businesses by people who were voted into office by the community as a whole. Even if you don't believe that fits the criteria of a socialist system, that doesn't matter because it most certainly does not fit the criteria of a capitalist system at all. I think your understanding of socialism is incomplete. Whether regulations are put on companies by the state, or the community as a whole, it automatically renders it not capitalist system in any way.             

    An illogical and ultimately semantic argument.

    You are taking an inconsistent biased position on economic systems. According to your claims,  If the means of production are in anyway controlled or regulated by the community or the workers then it's socialism. On the other have, if the means of production are in anyway controlled by investors/owners using capital to purchase ownership, that doesn't qualify it as Capitalism for you. You are treating the application of these two systems completely different, a system has to be 100% pure to count as Capitalist, while according to you if there is even one regulation applied to companies then it is Socialism. The popular definitions of these concepts do not follow this and you appear to be making them up as you go along; they even contradict your 

    That shows a clear bias and unwillingness to treat economic policies rationally and the same and has absolutely no relation to how economists or people who know what they're talking about define the two systems, but let's just think what your policy would mean for a moment.

    In effect, Capitalism would not exist and has never existed by your definitions. There is not today nor has there even been a society founded uncompletely unregulated businesses and therefore in effect every nation on earth today counts as socialism. Of course this throws your own statements where you've talked about Capitalism as if is a real thing with real existing examples into the trash. For instance how can you show that people can move from one class to another in Capitalism if no Capitalist nation has ever existed for this to serve as an example. It is also inane because you'd need words to describe all the different types of socialism which puts you in a situation where you're almost describing countries like the USA and the UK how myself and other normal people would describe them, but instead of calling them "Capitalist" you would call them "Socialist systems which happen to have lots of means of production owned by people investing Capital". It makes no actual difference to how any of the countries operate, your vast weird argument based on your own made-up definitions just results in you giving things different names with no practical difference except the confusion and argument it causes as well as the posioning of the well when you try and ascribe facism to socialism.


    piloteer said:
    @Ampersand

    So my arguments regarding minimum wage laws are somehow "ill-informed and lacking facts"?!?!? So far we've only gotten a statement from you that claims my argument is not factual, but if you understood what makes a claim factual, you'd understand yours does not fit the description of a factual claim because thus far, it's just a claim. It can be easily demonstrated how and why minimum wage laws raise price. Obviously the cost of production goes up for companies who have employees who pay rates go up along with the minimum wage. The companies have to choose how much of the loss to their profits they will absorb, and how much they will pass on to their customers. Beside an increase in prices, minimum wage laws also may cause low wage workers to lose hours, or even lose their jobs altogether. Higher minimum wage laws may also decrease the national output because of fewer work hours and jobs lost. These arguments are verified by the congressional budget office.
    https://www.cbo.gov/publication/55410

    Here we see you getting very angry at objective reality as you dispute my claim that you had no facts.

    If you honestly presented facts prior to this post I'm responding to now, go back and quote them. Oh, what's that? You can't because you didn't actually present any, hence your rambling defence here and the final presentation of one link to back up your point of view after I called you out?

    I don't even get why you're making such a big deal of this. You didn't present any facts to back up your claims. I called you out on it correctly and you responded and now provide at least one peice of evidence. it's good that you've now done so, but you did not do so before and no amount of complain is going to revise history.

    Looking at your actual link, I don't think you read it. For a start it is not a study on creating a minimum wage or a minimum wage vs no minimum, it's a study comparing 4 types of minimum wage. It makes absolutely no position or statement about removing the minimum wage and although the different possibilities have different benefits and downsides, each option is a different type of minimum wage. Not only that but in the range of options, the study points out that although increasing the minimum wage may result in job losses or lost hours, it may also have no effect at all. You seem to be focusing only on the upper range of numbers. Even for the $15 minimum wage option there is the potential for there to be no job losses based on the CBO estimate. Even if there are job losses there are ways to counter these with effective legislation. It points out teenagers just entering the job market as those who would be especially susceptible to the possibility of increased joblessness, which is why in many countries like the UK there is a lower minimum wage for young people so that employers have an incentive to hire them over more experienced old people and help balance the effects.

    Of course even putting aside where you haven't managed to even read the research correctly, there is the larger issue of relying on a single study about a single country at a single point in time. Take for example the IMF's analysis of the minimum wage hike in Japan. The conversation is not simply about whether a minimum wage is good or bad, but whether it is good or bad in specific situations. One study, even if it was perfectly accurate, about the minimum wage in 2019 in the USA under very limited criteria if simply increasing it to three set levels with no complementary legislation (like the aforementioned lower minimum wage for younger workers) tells us nothing about the minimum wage overall or in any other situation that occurs.

    Of course the final issue is that you have only a single study, which doesn't tell us much about the truth. In any area of investigation there will be lots of studies and there will almost always be at least a handful that disagree with the consensus. The best thing to do to get an overview is to look for a meta-analysis, a study of studies which analyses the data from multiple different studies and combines them for a wide overall review based on a huge amount of data that gives a far clearer picture than any single study. This meta-analysis of the USA based on 37 studies for instance finds "no support for the proposition that the minimum wage has had an important effect on U.S. employment" contrary to your claims and your single study. Similariliy another meta-analysis (this time in the UK) "finds no statistically significant aggregate adverse employment effect of the NMW".

    So well done, you finally provided a fact. You just didn't understand that fact or how to utilise or find facts when it comes to areas of scientific study and took a simplistic approach to the minimum wage itself with no understanding of the nuances involved all of which I feel adequately backs up my claim of you being ill-informed and lacking facts even now after you've presented your single link..

    piloteer said:
    @Ampersand

    The nazis didn't hate people simply because they were socialists. They hated democratic socialists, and socialists who weren't ethnically "pure", but the nazis themselves were socialists. hitler and goebbles both condemned the evils of capitalism frequently, and all nazis espoused the ideals of collectivism while rejecting any notions of individualism or self interest. Regardless of their policy of privatizing government agencies and services, they implemented strict regulations on how much products could be sold for, how much all German workers were paid, who could buy the products or use the services and how much, and where the materials or foods needed to be bought from, and for how much. With all these measures in place, the nazis effectively controlled how much profit the owners were allowed to make. Even though the nazis got a lot of support from small business owners, that didn't stop them from  putting regulations on small businesses and instead encouraging industry wide businesses without competition. Those policies do not fit the description of capitalism in any way, but it does fit the description of socialism quite nicely.            
    Please stop buying into Nazi propoganda. Literally every point here is based on "Well obviously if the Nazis say something then it's true" with no actual critical analysis along the lines of "Hmmm, I wonder if maybe they were lying and I should look at what they actually did" and pointedly making sure you ignore all the Nazi statements which disagree with you.

    You've already admitted that any country which imposes regulations is Socialist, so by your own definition (not actual definitions used by the rest of the world or people who know what they're talking about) sure Germany was socialist in WW2 but by that metric so was the USA, the UK, France, Poland, Belgium, Japan, China, etc, etc and all of them have remained socialist since .

    piloteer said:
    @Ampersand

    As far as modern capitalist countries using minimum wage laws, you'd have to describe these modern capitalist countries to me because I don't know of any. Most countries are socialist in some manner. There is a stigma that surrounds socialism in most western countries, especially the US. But that taboo seems to be aimed at the term socialism only, but not the ideals of socialism. So we just embrace the ideals of socialism while rejecting the term socialism itself.  For the duration of my entire life, I've lived in a socialist country that calls itself capitalist, and the same is true for my father. My country has had social-security since the great depression, along with minimum wage laws. We have so many social programs that it would take up to much space to list them on this thread. All companies are regulated, and all workers cannot be paid below a certain rate. The only way a country can truly be a capitalist one is to not have those regulations in place and allow businesses to be fully competitive with each other which in turn brings the price of products down and keeps the cost of living low for all consumers, which is what everyone of us is. We are all consumers!!!!             
                       
    You know plenty of capitalist countries which are capitalist by the normal and every day definitions we use to describe such countries, you just prefer to stick to your own illogical and weird definitions. Unfortunately definitions are only useful as a tool for mutual understanding and communication. We rely on the fact that when we discuss something, whether that's an apple of capitalism or something else, that we're talking about the same thing and so can have a discussion. If you are using different definitions of words from everyone else and have no rational reason to do so, then all you're doing is making meaningless arguments which serve to detract from any actual reasonable debate. There's no middle ground on which to even communicate about things like capitalism or socialism because you refuse to accept them for what they are.
  • MayCaesarMayCaesar 5967 Pts   -   edited November 2019
    @AlofRI

    The levels of taxation Smith was talking about was an order of magnitude lower than you assume. Recall that federal tax did not exist until after more than a century since Smith's death, aside from some minor experiments with 3-dash-5% taxes on the richest people during the Civil War times. Instead, Smith argued for very different types of taxes, many of which you would likely strongly oppose, such as tariffs. "Income tax" was not really a thing in the American economical thought until the socialists of early XXth century introduced this pseudo-economical concept, and with regards to other taxes, Smith favored extremely low rates.

    Would you be okay with 1-2% general tax rates today and ~50% tariffs? No? Then do not appeal to Adam Smith, because he wanted nothing to do with the kind of system you champion.

    I explained pretty well how the rich actually get to pay lower effective tax rates and why it is justified. You just labeled the post as fallacy and ignored it. At least do say what is wrong in my post. Perhaps you have a more up-to-date information on the US taxation system than me, and if so, I would like to hear the updates.
  • AmpersandAmpersand 858 Pts   -  
    @MayCaesar

    I could go into detail point-by-point on all the issues with what you've said (the idea everyone can invest enough to live off their investment dividends is particularly LOLsome) but there's no point because two very simple points counter everything you say.

    1) As with pretty much every post you make, you're just providing unsupported anecdotes and hypothetical without a single shred of evidence. Your opinion in and of itself is irrelevant. You need facts to back it up. Please see the burden of proof required in a debate.

    2) Your points are entirely about assets, e.g. wealth. Tax on assets is largely non-existent and where it does exist is very low and often regressive and isn't factored in to the calculations shown. If a billionaire has five hundred million dollars invested in stock this is wealth - not income. This would therefore not be included in the chart above and would not be a factor. The comparison of the lower tax paid by the ultra-rich is purely based on income - not wealth. You can clearly see this in both the article linked and the axes of the graph posted.
  • YeshuaBoughtYeshuaBought 669 Pts   -  
    Rich privilege has to end............................................................................................
  • piloteerpiloteer 1577 Pts   -  
    @Ampersand


    https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caste
    https://www.vocabulary.com/dictionary/caste system

    At no point did I refer to any kind of heredity system based on Hinduism, but that's just one kind of caste system. The structure of social classes based on heredity that was and is used in India predates the term "caste" society. A caste society or system does not refer to only that societal structure, but any society where the socioeconomic class you're born into is the one you will remain in for life. The term "caste" is also used to describe other forms of social structures other than the one used in India. 

    An economic caste system is what I'm referring to when I describe socialism. You haven't done anything to disprove that except make a half hearted attempt to prove socialism is not a caste system by claiming the rulers of the USSR all came from poor families. That is true, but most of them were born before the USSR existed, and they joined the communist party very early in the Russian civil war, so when the time came for a new General Secretary, those guys had been there to do all the thieving and stealing to cement their place in the Russian hierarchy. Aside from that, you really don't have anything to dispute my claim that socialism is an economic caste system. Andrew Carnegie was born into a poor family who all shared one room in a house shared by two families. He eventually became the richest person ever. His wealth greatly exceeded any of the wealth of the Russian General Secretaries combined. He gained his wealth in a capitalist society. The meager earnings of a few Russian thugs is completely dwarfed by the wealth of just one man, and he wasn't the only industrialist who was born dirt poor. 

    During the industrial revolution, there were no minimum wage laws, or mandatory healthcare laws, or forced paid holidays and vacations. Those things were at the discretion of the companies owners. But, at no other time in human existence were more people brought out of poverty and put into a place of relative wealth than during the industrial revolution. At no other time in human existence did the life expectancy rate go so high so quickly as did during the industrial revolution. For the first time in human existence, millions of people had money  to buy things they wanted instead of only things they needed, and it all happened in the span of one generation. The quality of food was far better, and these peoples lives were no longer dependent on how well the crop was that year. Everyone was richer, and even the poor could become vomit inducingly rich. Socialism was designed purposely to put a stop to economic freedom that lets the lower classes become profoundly wealthy without reservations about what socioeconomic status they were born in.                          



    ********Cap·i·tal·ism
    /ˈkapədlˌizəm/
    noun
    an economic and political system in which a country's trade and industry are controlled by private owners for profit, rather than by the state.**********

    I never said a true capitalist system has never existed, because they have, and I live in a country that once was. There was a time before minimum wage laws and regulations regarding who can be fired and for what reasons. We can all see below in the definition of socialism that when companies are regulated by the public as a whole, it makes it a socialist system. We can also clearly see in the definition of capitalism above that the only way for an economic system to truly be a capitalist system is if companies are controlled by the owners only. You told Mayaesar that his opinion in and of itself is not proof, yet you've provided no proof regarding your opinion  that definitions are only loosely based descriptions that are only truly defined by peoples attitudes, and they especially cannot be used literally. Perhaps you should brush up on the requirements of the burden of proof. There's a link in your post to Maysaesar.  

    so·cial·ism
    /ˈsōSHəˌlizəm/
    noun
    a political and economic theory of social organization which advocates that the means of production, distribution, and exchange should be owned or regulated by the community as a whole.**************

    I guess you're arguing that the majority of society does not understand this definition, so they apply their feelings to what they think socialism is and decipher their own definition?!?!?! Or maybe it's just you who doesn't have a clue about what you're talking about. From here it clearly shows us that a socialist system doesn't necessarily mean all companies must be owned by the workers. If trade and industry are regulated by the public as a whole, then that's also a socialist economy. If you have any real evidence that disputes the definition above, other than what you claim the public's feelings of it are, feel free to let us all see it. I bet it's gonna be scintillating. 

    David Hume was somewhat correct. Most people can't make objective arguments. But just because they don't understand objectivism, doesn't mean it doesn't exist. It's also worth noting that your argument doesn't even fit the David Hume description of a good argument because it doesn't even have empirical reasoning. So I guess all definitions are up to the public's interpretation only, and certainly not to be taken literally?!?!? And I guess you were crowned the Prince of Public Perception at some point. Sorry, I missed that ceremony. Although, I do think there are problems to be had when it comes to the public's interpretation, and who's the one deciphering those public sentiments. Like for instance, what if the person translating the public's interpretation is missing a chromosome, or worse, they're a limey. All kinds of misinterpretations could come about from this, and quite frankly, who gives a fu€k about peoples feelings anyway, this discussion isn't about feelings, it's about what socialism is and isn't? When you can prove to me that you actually know what most people think about what socialism is and isn't, and that those peoples feelings are somehow accurate, then I'll concede.  Until then, it's just your opinion.   


    https://www.commondreams.org/views/2019/02/07/america-already-socialist-and-thats-good-thing

    The link above is from a far left leaning news website that seems to agree with my claim that the US is, and has been a socialist country for quite some time. My argument that the US is a socialist country isn't far right rhetoric, it's objectively true, and it's truism is spread across party lines. A common criticism of FDR's policies was that they were socialist policies, and this is common knowledge.  https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism_of_Franklin_D._Roosevelt.  ;

    The point of the study on minimum wage increases wasn't necessarily to demonstrate how it affects employment, and I never said it was proof positive that minimum wages adversely affect employment, I merely said the study said it could. The real point of the study was to provide some evidence that the minimum wage increases prices. There are really 3 options employers have when they have employees who now must get paid more because the law says so. They either take a smaller profit, they cut back hours or lay people off, or they pass the cost onto the consumers. It's true that not all companies do choose the same option, but with so many companies competing for the same costumers, all those options are likely to be used, and all of them effect the consumers and the employers, and the ones with the increased pay.        

    In 1994, a study done by David Card and Alan Krueger found that "moderate" wage increases do not have any considerable effects on employment. Many studies since then have come to the same conclusion. However, those studies also find that more aggressive wage increases do effect employment, even when the increases are incremental over a certain amount of years. A study done by the NATIONAL BUREAU OF ECONOMIC RESEARCH in 2017 found that the minimum wage increase in Seattle in 2015 had no discernible effect on employment. But the follow up study done a year later, after another increase had taken effect showed that there was an effect on employment, and the bulk of the effect was on low wage workers. Most studies that show us there is no effect on employment from wage increases only show us the effect of "moderate" increases, which the study in my earlier post agrees with.       
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