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Is this sustainable?

degsme

Council Member
how many nation over that span have moved to a supply side model... many..
None that are economically succesful.

Russia is supply side, Somalia is Supply side. No industrialized western nation is. nor is the PRC, nor is India. Of the BRIICs (Brazil, Russia, India, Indonesia, China, South Africa ) only Russia is supply side, and they aren't doing that well when commodity energy prices slump - oscillating between 8% down and 4% up over the last 2 years.
 

degsme

Council Member
it may accelerate..but then again it..seemingly..may not. The universal discord between kenesian (or pre suppy side, as it were) and the supply sider theorist...
Well there is very little (read no) evidence for Supply Side theories as functional in anything but a 3rd world commodity export model.
 

Figjam

Mayor
...too bad wages were not higher so the working poor could contribute to the tax burden.

...too bad we send cowards to congress who are too afraid for their over-privileged jobs to tackle needed tax reform...

...too bad teapublicans want to do away with national heath care and mandatory premiums to help offset some of the costs related to medicare - because pf, I am sure you know that through your existing health insurance premiums you pay for the uninsured...

...clearly if social programs are unsustainable, perhaps an overly-bloated military-industrial complex is also equally unsustainable...
 

degsme

Council Member
Fine -- so long as I don't have to pay in for all of my life. If I am forced to pay into the system all my life, you can't test my means to see if I can make use of it. The reason means aren't in the Social Security/Medicare system is that the politicians who created those systems wanted to avoid class warfare -- do you want to institute it?
Well Trap we agree on this.
 

PhilFish

Administrator
Staff member
if you say so.. but my understanding is that over the ensuing decades...40 some nations...Gbritain..Sweden, etc..have adjusted taxation. etc according to suppy side theorem....
 

degsme

Council Member
if you say so.. but my understanding is that over the ensuing decades...40 some nations...Gbritain..Sweden, etc..have adjusted taxation. etc according to suppy side theorem....
Yes they have adjusted their taxation.

No not in response to supply side.
 

fairsheet

Senator
sure..but why then in this 31 year trend of diminution have costs gone...up.... extortion and or barstool quarterbacking notwithstanding....
The ONLY cost that's gone up significantly - after adjusting for inflation, population, and all that - is healthcare. But - at least in terms of the last 30 years - I'd argue that the main cause of that increase, has been the expansion and improvement in the product itself, and not so much because non-taxpayers have been able to "leverage" themselves, more of the product. Therefore, I'm not seeing how the "47% vs. 53%" is germane.
 

trapdoor

Governor
that is a valid point that politicians at the time of creation of those programs thought that means testing =class warfare.
I do not.
How would it not? What incentive does someone making $200,000 a year have to vote in favor of Social Security or Medicare if they are to be excluded from its use. This is robbing Peter to pay Paul -- which ensures the loyalty of Paul, but not of Peter. That's as true today as it was 80 years ago.
 

connieb

Senator
Society by definition is about "dependence" and to claim otherwise runs in the face of some 4 million years of evolutionary history
Well, Merriam Webster defines it as:


1
: companionship or association with one's fellows : friendly or intimate intercourse : company
2
: a voluntary association of individuals for common ends; especially : an organized group working together or periodically meeting because of common interests, beliefs, or profession
3
a : an enduring and cooperating social group whose members have developed organized patterns of relationships through interaction with one another
b : a community, nation, or broad grouping of people having common traditions, institutions, and collective activities and interests
4
a : a part of a community that is a unit distinguishable by particular aims or standards of living or conduct : a social circle or a group of social circles having a clearly marked identity <literary society>
b : a part of the community that sets itself apart as a leisure class and that regards itself as the arbiter of fashion and manners
5
a : a natural group of plants usually of a single species or habit within an association



So, honestly I would say society is more about a mutually beneificial living arrangment then dependence. You have what I want, I have what you want... it makes sense to share with each other. However, if I had everything and you had nothing... well then, that would be about dependence.
 

888888

Council Member
According to the website, Thinking LIberally, in 2005, the 15 states with the highest rates of divorce voted for Bush, while 10 states with some of the lowest divorce rates in the country voted Democrat.

Another fascinating statistic is that Massachusetts, which allows gay marriage (to the demise of the Republican Party), has the lowest Divorce rate in the country."

The other thing I would like for people to think about, who is most likely to hide the fact that they had an affair or got divorced? I'm thinking that a democrat would be more likely to answer this question factually, as they are less worried about what others think.
 

trapdoor

Governor
Well Trap we agree on this.
I'm not certain that we do. What I said was you can't force me to pay into a system such as Social Security or Medicare throughout my working life, and then have the option to test my means at the end of my working life to see if I'm eligible to receive the benefits for which I've been paying. You said you agreed, but past statements would indicate you do not. Those past statements indicate that the money taken from individual citizens to pay for Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security are merely income taxation, linked in no way to the systems they are linked to by name. That being the case, there is no way logical reason the government can deny benefits to the taxpayer for any reason, means being first and foremost.

Obviously, this would lead to some sort of taxpayer rebellion, but it is the necessary outcome of the idea that Social Security taxation is not, in fact, designed to pay for Social Security but is merely an extension of the income tax.
 

kgswiger

Council Member
The Anasazi Indian culture of the Chaco Canyon period circa 1200 of the American Southwest disappeared before Columbus.

Anthropolgists have cited excessive taxation and government spending as one of the main causes of Anasazi collapse.

You people think America is "exceptional".....and "different"...............but history will have the last word.
Links to these anthropologists' papers, or I call bullshit. We don't even know what language they spoke. How do we know what their taxes were?
 

fairsheet

Senator
I'm not certain that we do. What I said was you can't force me to pay into a system such as Social Security or Medicare throughout my working life, and then have the option to test my means at the end of my working life to see if I'm eligible to receive the benefits for which I've been paying. You said you agreed, but past statements would indicate you do not. Those past statements indicate that the money taken from individual citizens to pay for Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security are merely income taxation, linked in no way to the systems they are linked to by name. That being the case, there is no way logical reason the government can deny benefits to the taxpayer for any reason, means being first and foremost.

Obviously, this would lead to some sort of taxpayer rebellion, but it is the necessary outcome of the idea that Social Security taxation is not, in fact, designed to pay for Social Security but is merely an extension of the income tax.
One of the essential premises of Social Security at its inception was that everyone would pay in and everyone would benefit. Without that, it never would have come into being. If one's an advocate for Social Security, he should be leery of any suggestion as to means testing. And if one's opposed to Social Security, he should be all for it!

Social Security "means testing", would crack the door wide open to those who advocate for some regime under which people could "opt out".
 

Days

Commentator
the reformed Roman Empire will rise again. Except now they call it the European Union.
 

trapdoor

Governor
The other thing I would like for people to think about, who is most likely to hide the fact that they had an affair or got divorced? I'm thinking that a democrat would be more likely to answer this question factually, as they are less worried about what others think.
The late Mrs. John Edwards might disagree.
 

degsme

Council Member
The late Mrs. John Edwards might disagree.
Singleton counter-examples are necessary to prove the validity of the data. If you LACK outliers then you had better suspect your data.

Note also that the states that voted for GWB (and McCain) ALSO

1) have the highest percentage of taxpayers with zero tax liability
2) have the lowest per capita GDP production
3) have the lowest per capita patent issuance (innovation and education)
4) have the poorest health outcomes
5) All but three have spent the last 2-3 decades living on Blue State welfare.

And why are we supposed to take the economic and liberty prognostications of these states seriously?
 

trapdoor

Governor
Singleton counter-examples are necessary to prove the validity of the data. If you LACK outliers then you had better suspect your data.

Note also that the states that voted for GWB (and McCain) ALSO

1) have the highest percentage of taxpayers with zero tax liability
2) have the lowest per capita GDP production
3) have the lowest per capita patent issuance (innovation and education)
4) have the poorest health outcomes
5) All but three have spent the last 2-3 decades living on Blue State welfare.

And why are we supposed to take the economic and liberty prognostications of these states seriously?
By the same token, most of the millionaires in Congress are Democrats. And?
 
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