Is the Purpose of Taxes to Raise Revenue or Punish the Rich?

Under the gold standard, the purpose of taxes was for the Government to get revenue in order to spend. Under our current fiat system, taxes are nothing more than an inflation control. That is why the Govt can spend ridiculous amounts with out raising taxes. There is no reason to raise taxes right now.

The Govt making money is not necessary for economic growth.

 

Your complete lack of understanding of the liberal agenda just reflects poorly on you, not your ficticious slander of liberals.

I mean, would you really give credit if some liberal posted that the right wing want to return to sweatshops, child labor, workers being killed on a daily basis and slavery.

But I will waste my time, although I feel anyone who would make such a post is too closed minded to understand.

Right now the government is getting the lowest percentage of GDP as tax revenue in 50 years. Since the government is running massive deficits, it makes sense to increase this number.

Right now the top 10% are paying the lowest tax rates they have paid in 80 years, since before the great depression. That would lead one to believe this group could have their taxes increased.

Right now the top 10% are receiving the largest percentage of the national income than they have in 80 years also. The top 10% earns over twice the income than the bottom 50% of the country. It only makes sense that the top 10% pays more taxes.

Listen to any smart and informed economist, listen to the Obama bi-partisian debt commision, listen to the bi-partisian gang of 6, or even listen to republican economic research, every informed source on the matter says the the best way to balance the budget is with both spending cuts and tax increases.

There is absolutely no desire to "punish" anyone.

Next, look at the economic facts. President Bush cut taxes and during 8 years of his presidency, he created 1.1 million jobs. President Clinton raised taxes and during 8 years of his presidency he created 22 million jobs. The facts just don't support that tax cuts create jobs or tax hikes kill jobs. PERSONAL tax rates for the rich don't effect jobs. The right wing talking point that you have never been hired by a poor man is BS. You have never been hired by a rich man either, you have been hired by corporations. To strngthen this nation, corporations need to grow, not a small percentage of individuals bank accounts.

So the liberal desire for a balance approach of mostly spending cuts combined with tax increases is the best way to reduce the deficit. That is it.

It is people who draw a line in the sand on a position that is illogical, less effective in solving the problem they say they want to fix, while being more harmful to the country, that are ill informed and even unpatriotic.

I mean, I have read many ultra right wingers here say they want to default on the nations debt and destroy the country, and it seems mostly that they want to do this just to be anti-Obama. And the tea party and republican flirtation with default has been very bad for this country. Hurt the economy. And IMO, anyone who wants to harm the country for partisian political gain is a traitor.

And you arguement that raising personal taxes will cripple the economy and lower revenue is just plain false. Facts don't support it. So I would suggest you stop having others tell you simple talking points and look at the facts. Listen to informed sources, rather than partisian ones.

 

No you want to punish the successful because the democrats try to stop the American dream with their entitlements and regulations

 

I show proof you just do not accept the truth

 

Nope. If I were "rich", I'd expect to be taxed much more than the middle class.

The problem is whether or not the taxes were used appropriately.

Lastly, you are simply making simple-minded accusations out of raw emotion.

 

Apparently, it's as easy for you to give away what you didn't earn as it is to rationalize taking what you didn't earn.

 

They are always made scarce due to companies wanting to make them as unavailable as possible, so that they can charge as much as possible. If you deny that, consider this: why would a company (private or public, either one) want to sell something that is highly available?

What any company, private or public, government or private business, wants to do, is hoard as much as possible.

The thing is, that's acceptable in moderation. The following, however is a quote from someone who themselves was a strict capitalist (from another forum):

"Greed is good. Unregulated greed is bad".

Tell me that you understand this.

The question is, how costly is it, in terms of resources, labor and time, to renew it? Being renewable doesn't mean it's renewable fast or efficiently enough.

IMHO, you don't have the right to simply go out and capture vast quantities of valuable natural resources and then gouge others just to use them. That's not exactly "theft" as it is commonly understood, but it's wrong.

It doesn't matter whether this is done by the government or by a random unknown guy on the street. It's wrong.

 

If you sit on your ass and capitalize on others' labor, that's not "earning" 100% of it IMHO.

Also, measures like this would never be necessary if it weren't for siliconmagician's beloved Corporatism that is plaguing this Earth.

 

The reason I oppose raising taxes for the "rich" is that I know that in the eyes of Democrats, I am "rich."

When Clinton raised taxes on the "rich" my taxes went up. This was after he broke his promise to give us a "middle class tax cut."

When Bush lowered taxes for everyone, I got a check for $800 in rebated taxes. I used the money to take my family to Utah, where we saw a rodeo and rode horses.

I know that almost every dollar the government spends is wasted on something I don't support. Money goes to farmers so they won't grow crops. Money goes to oil companies so they will build windmills. Money goes to single mothers with five kids so they don't have to get husbands with jobs.

 

Apparently, you can rationalize skipping right to the part where the person is actually sitting on his ass while his workers work. There was much sacrifice which took place prior to that part.

Building equity through risk taking and sacrifice should not be punished in the manner you support, nor should it be characterized in the way you are.

And it's a good thing it is, or you wouldn't be typing on your store-bought computer telling us all about how evil it is.

 

You do realize that there are far fewer jobs available (especially in entry-level and tradesman positions etc.) in this country now and in the 2000's, than when Clinton was in office, right?

 

Flourescent Non Sequitur.

 

This is a difference in philosophy, but I don't think having that much control over wealth is ever good. Just like having a large individual control over force/power is never good.

Henry George got it spot on, IMHO, when he said "What has destroyed every previous civilization has been the tendency to the unequal distribution of wealth and power."

umm..why are smaller businesses necessarily less effective than huge monopoly businesses?

Where's the logic?

Don't answer that. There is none.

The reality is that if the world were run by a much larger number of much smaller businesses, there'd be a lot more competition between businesses, yet the wealth disparity would decrease substantially.

 

Why is it that whenever wealth disparity becomes greater, most people are doing poorly and jobs become a lot more scarce (especially jobs that are available to common people such as entry-level and tradesman jobs)?

Frankly, I care much more about the common man than I do the Big Man.

 

Actually there is a massive shortage of skilled tradesmen. It is estimated that the US needs another 500,000 electricians and 300,000 plumbers right now for over $100Billion in construction projects that are on hold because of a lack of these workers. You can thank the "right to work" laws for this.

 

I see "Now Hiring" signs everywhere. I think people would rather stay on the dole than work for a living.
The US is in short supply of engineers and doctors, that's why many of these positions are filled by foreigners.

 

I'm sure that is what happened.

Right around late 2008 and 2009, about 8 million people all of at the same time decided to get lazy, quit their jobs, and live off that generous unemployment benefit. That's why unemployment got to 10% and its at 9%.

Conservative economics works. If you ignore reality.

 

No I state facts. We do not have an income problem we have a spending problem

 

Then why are recruiters not able to fill available positions while PrezBO keeps insisting on extending jobless benefits?

The left has lost touch with reality a century ago.

 

Show proof of this. Explain how right to work is to blame

 

Because those 8 million people got lazy and decided to live off those luxurious welfare benefits, of course.

There's no unemployed. Just freeloaders who won't work for a living.

That's the conservative view, isn't it?

We should just cut them off from all benefits. That worked great in the Great Depression.

 

The shortage of skilled workers has been expected to show up about this time as the inevitable result of decades of anti union activity and the steady wage declines in manufacturing and construction once the unions were pushed out. In the past it was the unions that provided the bulk of training in these skills but as they declined they closed their training programs and the workers trained in the 70s and 80s became the last generation to be trained on these skills in large numbers.

Now they are retiring en mass and, as predicted, promised, warned a generation ago, there is no one to take their place.

Engineering News Record, a very conservative construction business journal has been writing about this since the 1990s. As far back as 1998 they estimated a shortage of 500,000 electricians and 300,000 plumbers was holding up $50Billion in new construction and things would only get worse over the next few decades as few replacement workers were being trained because many unions closed their training programs or disbanded in the right to work states and those in other states were not training more than replacements for retiring members.

 

No we should sstop growing government and help the private sector create jobs.

Obama's job plan will continue the failed policy of growing government and helping unions

http://radioprogres.com/?p=1252

 

Most people aren't cut out to be engineers and doctors, and you shouldn't expect them to be. The average person isn't really intellectually that apt, to be perfectly frank. But then, you shouldn't expect them to be like that, or else let them starve; that's not right.

Thing is, low-level jobs are being replaced by machines. That's not the problem. The problem is that if you expect people to make money in proportion to what they do for a job, millions of people will starve because of machines replacing their jobs, and this especially applies to people who

A. weren't born with much and need a low-level job to start out with, and

B. ordinary (and especially low) intelligence people who aren't cut out for some kind of highly tech-savy job.

Do you see the overall point? If you have a society where people only make money in proportion to what they themselves produce, that's fine, but if that same society has machines replacing everyone's labor, how can you reasonably expect everyone to, themselves, produce much? Even hard working and dedicated people?

That's a self-destroying society. The only people who would have much of a chance of being prosperous, eventually, would be the ones who happened to already own those machines. Anyone else would be screwed.

That's not acceptable IMHO.

 

You mean illegals doing construction jobs for less pay. If this was true people would be going to trade schools and states would help with student loans.

I think this mostly union talking points and complete BS