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Anthony Bourdain on not having debt

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Re: Anthony Bourdain on not having debt

#251

Post by faceyspacey »

tinco wrote: post #209
rsync wrote: post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Nobody likes paying high taxes, but I don’t mind." I think there's an important distinction to be made between two different sorts of "high taxes". One is a high absolute amount of taxes - you made millions of dollars in a year and therefore your absolute tax payment is relatively quite high. The other is a high percentage tax rate. I don't mind paying a high absolute rate of taxes - I think that is the scenario in…

every 60 minutes I work, ~30 minutes of that work product is appropriated by government How about every 60 minutes you work, 30 minutes of that is spent establishing the world around you? From the opportunities you had as a young person, and those of your children, to the safety and security of your adult life. Half of your product is yours to spend freely, the rest goes towards the idea that you don't even have to t…

Except for here in the states 25% of the taxpayer money is going to military, intelligence and debt from past wars we know to have been bad ideas and knew all along were bad ideas.

And let's just say another 25% is misspent. In a country this big and bloated, that's also likely a low ball figure. But overall, only 50% of taxpayer money is going to anything remotely properly executed and needed.

That said, our public schools suck, we invest nothing in research, we don't provide healthcare until your old, and our interstate highways were built 70 years ago, and state and local governments handle needed construction now, yet they take the smallest percentage of our taxes. Some states like Nevada don't even charge state income tax.

In my view I'd be way happier paying taxes if this was managed right. That means cut military spending by 90% knowing we are never going to need an aircraft carrier again while completely evacuating the Middle East, and the state local government's charge more since they will be more effective at putting it to use.

Taxes should be no more than 30% total (federal, state + local) like the Apple App Store.

Yea, likely not happening any time soon. But that's what is correct imho.

Re: Anthony Bourdain on not having debt

#252

Post by lmm »

marknutter wrote: post #135
p_eter_p wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People always say this, but nobody can ever point to a solid example. Do you have hard numbers that government social programs are less efficient than charity?

Ask yourself this: is the government efficient with its defense spending? If the answer is no, why would it be any different with its social programs?

Are private charities more efficient with their defense spending?

Re: Anthony Bourdain on not having debt

#253

Post by idiot_stick »

jdavis703 wrote: post #18
nkozyra wrote: post #12

Debt is a manifestation of risk. As general financial advice, "don't take on debt" is akin to "don't take risks." It depends. On a lot of things.

Going into debt to vacation in the Caribbean (which is what he did) is not the same as using it to say start a business or get an education.

>Going into debt to vacation in the Caribbean (which is what he did) is not the same as using it to say start a business or get an education.

They differ only if the metric you choose to measure against the debt is "money". But some of us do things for other than money; happiness comes to mind.

Re: Anthony Bourdain on not having debt

#254

Post by marknutter »

Lagged2Death wrote: post #181
marknutter wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nobody ever argues that roads, railroads, and highways are an unfair tax burden. It's such a ridiculous straw man. The beef that most Libertarians have with government spending is with entitlement programs.

Why don't roads count as an "entitlement program?"

Because they are taxed largely based on usage (gas tax).

Re: Anthony Bourdain on not having debt

#255

Post by jMyles »

vinhboy wrote: post #17

> Nobody likes paying high taxes, but I don’t mind. How refreshing. I agree with him. Paying my taxes is a point of pride for me. It's a repayment for all those years I was poor and the government paid for me to live and go to school.

> Paying my taxes is a point of pride for me. It's a repayment for all those years I was poor and the government paid for me to live and go to school.

Spoken like someone who wasn't on the receiving end of bombs, troops, torture, imprisonment, or theft to enrich the already rich - you know, the bulk of government spending.

I pay my taxes in order to avoid being a victim of state violence, but when I do, I say a prayer for the victims of my failure to be strong enough to do the right thing, which is to deprive the state of the means to do evil.

Re: Anthony Bourdain on not having debt

#256

Post by ska »

mi_noi_noi wrote: post #218
ska wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a common fallacy, which hurts the ability to reason usefully about problems like those in this thread (regardless of where you fall on the "size of government" issue). The fallacy is in imagining it is meaningful to separate money (earned or otherwise) from the system of government it was generated in. Your ability to "earn the money" is fundamentally tied to this system, and if you change one, you change the…

I think you are the one who is ahistorical. Even in the most failed of government systems, anarchist societies and black markets: people engange in economic activity ("earn money"). You don't even have to look at history, you can look around the world today with failed states and black markets. Wherever there are people there is economic activity ("earn money"). If there is no state, groups and individuals take upon…

I think you missed the point I was trying to make, so I will try again.

[edit: I had a longer response but realize it opened up a bunch of side issues that weren't helpful]

The economy and the system of government it operates in (yes, including black/grey markets) are fundamentally intertwined in ways that make it hard to reason about separately.

What I'm objecting to are statements that boil down to: "If we all paid X less tax I would have X more dollars which we could do as we please with". In general this is hopelessly naive.

For what it is worth, both your examples of failed states and cryptocurrrencies (which do not, yet?, operate as currencies) support exactly what I am talking about, not the converse.

The attempt to divide an conquer in thinking about economies and government is useful but so far not completely successful. When it leads to people making silly inferences, it is problematic. So yes people talk about them as if they were separate, because it is easier. But that is not the same as having separated them.

Re: Anthony Bourdain on not having debt

#257

Post by tyleraldrich »

comice wrote: post #225
ianai wrote: post #47

There was a point where financing the government was a patriotic act. People would give other people War Bonds as presents. But now the patriotic thing is to trash talk which ever party is in the administration and wax poetic about governmental corruption. You can't have it both ways. You can't say no to financing your government and scorn corruption. Either you're okay paying for your government, you're okay with so…

Taxes do not finance the US government. The US government creates money to finance itself. Taxes destroy money (and create demand for dollars, which is important :) Hyperinflation doesn't happen when there is too much money, it happens when there isn't enough stuff to buy with it. Lots of ignorance of monetary theory on HN!

> Taxes do not finance the US government. The US government creates money to finance itself.

Source for this claim? I've never heard this before and it sounds quite absurd.

Re: Anthony Bourdain on not having debt

#258

Post by jMyles »

ianai wrote: post #47

There was a point where financing the government was a patriotic act. People would give other people War Bonds as presents. But now the patriotic thing is to trash talk which ever party is in the administration and wax poetic about governmental corruption. You can't have it both ways. You can't say no to financing your government and scorn corruption. Either you're okay paying for your government, you're okay with so…

It seems like you have omitted the scenario that seems most likely by dint of the evolution of the internet: not needing a government at all.

Re: Anthony Bourdain on not having debt

#259

Post by deadbunny »

xapata wrote: post #139
refurb wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure if you're living in the US, but I do and I have the exact opposite viewpoint. The amount of waste, corruption and poor planning by the gov't makes me feel like I'm throwing money away. I'd rather give it a charity since then I'd know a majority of it had an impact. I think if the gov't was a bit more efficient and could be shown to be good stewards of money I'd probably hate paying taxes a lot less.

In my experience, every large organization is terribly managed and inefficient. The government not noticeably different. I guess I'm saying I don't mind paying taxes. I consider the tax rate when choosing how much to charge my customers. I'm sure you do the same when choosing a job. If you paid less in tax, you'd earn less money. Obviously not at a 1:1 ratio, but it's something to keep in mind.

Spot on,anecdotal evidence ahoy but I'm a contractor so I move around a lot in the last few years I've worked for a government department, a mid stage medical startup, a late stage startup, a large corporation, and a very new startup.

The efficient ones have been the smaller companies in everything from decision making to process. The gov department and large corp are Kafkaesque nightmares where getting an account is a 3 page form and a 5 day SLA.

At the medical startup I was given a laptop and asked for a PR by the end of the day, at the large corp I didn't get a laptop for a week and even then I didn't get logins (yes, logins...) to the code repo for another week.

Governments are inefficent because they are made up of lots and lots of people, same as large companies. Everything needs to be triple checked, rubber stamped and have all people in the chain cover their asses because if anything goes wrong it's very important not to be anyone's fault (but it's definitely someone's fault. This isn't a blame free post mortem here!)

Re: Anthony Bourdain on not having debt

#260

Post by Scea91 »

zymhan wrote: post #249
coredog64 wrote: post #237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd counter that all of that together represents a very small portion of that 50% overall tax rate.

Well, you also got to wage wars in various countries via drones and residual troop deployments and special operations. That takes up quite a bit. Also, you got to enjoy having a basic pension after retirement, as well as free healthcare for the elderly and poor. Who wants to live in a country with a bunch of poor and old sick people who can't afford food and healthcare? That sounds depressing as hell.

If you are in high a tax bracket you are actually paying way more to pension than you get back. If you saved the money yourself you would be better off.
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