Redistribution of American Wealth

Discussion in 'Political Opinions & Beliefs' started by cirdellin, Aug 6, 2020.

  1. modernpaladin

    modernpaladin Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    I'd settle for an investigation into how she got wealthy. All congresspeople, in fact, who make more than their wage as a congressperson, should have their financials subject to scrutiny.

    This would be an excellent first step in addressing the factors that allow the nonproductive (and counterproductive) to become wealthy.
     
    Last edited: Aug 6, 2020
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  2. Pred

    Pred Well-Known Member

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    Very true. At some point you just can’t spend the money and you’re just accumulating wealth for the sake of accumulating wealth. You’re just collecting really expensive **** and filling up homes you don’t live in. I don’t want to stop anyone from doing it. But if those people did something with the money it would be nice. Buying expensive homes is still supporting the people who build and renovate them. Buying expensive cars and yachts pays those making them and caring for them.
     
  3. Thought Criminal

    Thought Criminal Well-Known Member Donor

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    ??!?

    Who, or what, is a tax professional? Are you saying that the H&R Block guy, at Walmart, should be deciding how much money is acceptable for one person to have?
     
  4. Thought Criminal

    Thought Criminal Well-Known Member Donor

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    I suppose we could take excess money away from the people who build hospital wings, university buildings, art museums, fund symphony orchestras, and provide scholorships. Then, we could use that money to pay thousands of bureaucrats to do that job. They could hire their cousins to build structures, or become artists, or Immunologists. Just think of all that economic activity!
     
    Last edited: Aug 6, 2020
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  5. Booman

    Booman Banned

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    They want to abolish the people they always turn to to fund their newest entitlement.
     
  6. nra37922

    nra37922 Well-Known Member

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    I really dislike Pelosi's politics and think that she is a vain self serving, hate filled POS. But in this area I will say 'God love her' make as much as you legally can Nancy and I wish I had as much as you.
     
    Last edited: Aug 6, 2020
  7. Giftedone

    Giftedone Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    120 Million is a fair chunk - no one in her lineage will need to work for many generations on that kind of Cash - but I don't think this is too much.

    When you are talking 120 Billion - now we are talking too much - Then there are families with Trillions - and this is out of the ballpark.
     
  8. cirdellin

    cirdellin Banned

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    Interesting idea.
     
  9. cirdellin

    cirdellin Banned

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    My suspicion is that it may be inheritance as I’ve never heard anything about any businesses she is or has been involved in.
     
  10. cirdellin

    cirdellin Banned

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    Well I’ve opined much about my support for a flat tax which would equal the playing field and likely having her paying more. Like most wealthy people, she probably has people scouring for tax loopholes.
     
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  11. Reiver

    Reiver Well-Known Member

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    Nancy is a supporter of neoliberalism. That says rich is never enough, using market fundamentalism to accentuate 'beggar thy neighbour' class conflict.

    What should happen? Depends on whether you wear slippers or a beret. The moderate position is a focus on progressive taxation as a correction for the market failure of inefficient inequalities. A radical, however, might quote Marx: "Accumulation of wealth at one pole is, therefore, at the same time accumulation of misery, agony of toil slavery, ignorance, brutality, mental degradation, at the opposite pole, i.e., on the side of the class that produces its own product in the form of capital". Then we shouldn't blubber about the inequalities as it is a natural part of capitalism. Those suggesting otherwise, so I'm told, effectively become 'useful idjuts' in the false game of democracy.
     
  12. Bowerbird

    Bowerbird Well-Known Member

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    It is not Now or ever about “taking money away” but proportional taxes and keeping greedy little trotters out of the public coffers
     
  13. Bowerbird

    Bowerbird Well-Known Member

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    That does not get up MY nose (and being an Aussie I lean far further toward socialism than the average American)

    what gets up my nose is when they get bailouts from the government when “the little guy” is struggling
     
  14. cirdellin

    cirdellin Banned

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    Taxing is by definition taking money away.
     
  15. cirdellin

    cirdellin Banned

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    To be fair, I did some research and found Pelosi’s money mostly comes from her husband Paul Pelosi and his real estate dealings (which is ironic but a digression I won’t indulge right now)
     
  16. cirdellin

    cirdellin Banned

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    Here, I pay about the same amount in taxes that I paid when living in the States but government services here seem more abundant.
     
  17. Reiver

    Reiver Well-Known Member

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    Proportional taxes, given the diminishing marginal utility of income, are irrational. It is a bleeding insult for America, given her extreme banana republic inequalities.
     
    Last edited: Aug 7, 2020
  18. cirdellin

    cirdellin Banned

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  19. cirdellin

    cirdellin Banned

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    Proportional taxes give governments sizable amounts of cash while also allowing businesses the incentive to grow.

    So called progress taxes effectively are a punishment for success and positively disincentivize.
     
  20. cirdellin

    cirdellin Banned

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    I agree that the “too big to fail” concept was welfare for American Corporations.
    Those big companies that got bailouts were mismanaged and should have been left to market forces to rip them apart. The bailouts were not capitalism and the managers who created the mess demanded and were assured of their multi million dollar sign on bonuses.
    They should have been standing in the unemployment line.
     
    Last edited: Aug 7, 2020
  21. Reiver

    Reiver Well-Known Member

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    You're seriously giving me the supply side economics mantra, despite it being a proven failure? What did that deliver? Extreme inequalities? Check! Short term profiteering creating a structurally deficient economy? Check! A wage-productivity gap? Check!
     
    Last edited: Aug 7, 2020
  22. Giftedone

    Giftedone Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Need to do something - the inequity is getting too big - many negative consequences this can have.
     
  23. cirdellin

    cirdellin Banned

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    Inequality of income does not equal unfairness of income. This is where envy enters the picture and enabled by government seizure.
    Looking at wealth as a static property like just one pie that can be split only so many ways creates the popular misconception that if one is rich, it means someone else has gotten their share of that pie.
    I find that facile.
    Wealth is created.
     
    Last edited: Aug 7, 2020
  24. cirdellin

    cirdellin Banned

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    Well what do you have in mind?
     
  25. Reiver

    Reiver Well-Known Member

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    Your position isn't based on anything credible. For example, you give the standard work incentives bobbins despite two facts. First, the economics shows that any disincentive effect is actually on the poor. You want to reduce disincentives you need progressive tax. Indeed, given the backward bending labour supply curve, progressive tax will also increase incentives to work on richer deciles. Second, you ignore the wage-productivity gap. This demonstrates that America is awash with economic rent. It automatically ensures inefficiency and inequity goes hand in hand.


    There is no distinction between the private and public sectors in the US. It has a centralised private sector bureaucracy. Politicians work to maintain the status quo, one dominated by market power.

    To have a point you'd need exchange theory to dominate. That would either mean you accept some perfectly competitive hogwash or neoliberal's market fundamentalism. That same fundamentalism ensures the likes of Nancy! You're going around in circles. Isn't that a tad facile? ;)
     

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