511–520 of 694 posts
And because of it we'll never be able to rework income inequality - because we've all wanted to be on top of it since childhood.
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I completely agree, but for totally different reasons. If a major function of government is to protect our property (land, savings, boats, cars, etc...), then it could be said the more property we have the more we benefit from government protection and the more we should pay. Another function of government is to facilitate trade. For this service, ALL transactions should be taxed (including payroll). If you look at t…
Transaction taxes drive vertical integration (as this reduces the number of bites at the apple along the supply chain). I don't think that's always a bad thing, but it does violate a principle of fairness that I hold, which is that substance matters over form. If Starbucks owns coffee plantations, roasters, logistics, stores, the cup of coffee you get might be untaxed prior to you paying for it. If a competing coffee…
If there are two layers in my coffee bean acquisition I'm losing the profit made at every layer, so of course I would want to own those layers and capture that profit before we even add a 1% tax.
But vertical integration comes at a risk, which is why only the biggest players will attempt it.
Now, add a 1% transaction to those two layers. You're now losing 2.01%. But at each layer you're already losing 15% net profit made by your supplier. I'm not sure you would change your perspective on vertical integration for 2% when you're already leaving 15-20% on the table.
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Taxes are what give fiat currencies their value. No taxes, no fiat currency. If you don't believe me, consider why the US dollar has value at your local store and the Monopoly dollar doesn't.
Thats a terrible to reason to have or increase taxes. If you eliminated paper currency altogether in one fell swoop, the next day you would have another one replace it, be it bitcoin, gold or cigarettes.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chartalism [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modern_Monetary_Theory
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Robots aren't capable of doing everything people can do yet, but as they become more capable, what and how are displaced unskilled workers supposed to do if they can't get any job at all? Starve to death under a bridge? Not everyone can handle social or intellectual labor. I think this is why UBI is essential: prevent riots and meet people's basic needs so they're not pennyless and sleeping rough.
Your statement "not everyone can handle social or intellectual labor" is a larger sociological problem. If we insist that the only people allowed to participate in the labor market are college educated white guys, maybe; I don't see that statusquo continuing. The hoops some members of this forum will jump through to convince themselves that building CRUD apps is some zenith of intellectual might just continues to ast…
Have you ever been in any kind of teaching role, or observed some students at tutoring labs? Some people are just unteachable/not cut out for it.
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The real problem though isn't wealth inequality, it's income inequality. If someone has a billion dollars that's invested in various stocks, and never tries to withdraw that money, leave him alone. The day he decides to sell his investments and start buying private jets, that's the time to tax him on his income. The argument against a wealth tax, is that it penalizes savers, and rewards spenders. Which is not what we…
> The real problem though isn't wealth inequality, it's income inequality. I disagree. Wealth provides financial security to an even greater degree than high current income. Wealth provides the means to move your family to a place where they will be safe and thrive. Wealth provides a means to start the next generation with a leg up, financially, socially, and academically. High current income can go away next year fo…
Yes, but unless you're talking about a wealth tax in excess of 10%, this is not going to change. Someone with multiple millions of dollars in diversified investments will always be financially secure, unless we're considering drastic measures like a communist revolution.
Regarding all the benefits of wealth you mentioned, note how these benefits only arise when the investor liquidates his investment. Hence my point that instead of taxing wealth when it is being productively invested, tax the wealth at the point of liquidation instead.
I'm also in favor of high estate taxes, but that's an entirely different tangent.
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UBI is a bad attempt to patch a broken capitalist system that has no regard for the humans within it. It may delay riots, but people's basic needs still won't be met.
What would you suggest as an alternative if there were only enough jobs to support 20-30% of people .. including professional jobs like doctors/radiologists/lawyers being displaced?
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Why must we 'fully' trust the state? We just have to trust it more than the markets.
States have killed many more people than markets have.
First, it's much easier to get a rough idea of how many people states have killed than markets, to be sure. But many wars are fought and nations are conquered (and, for that matter, created) for market-driven reasons: oil, tea, diamonds, slaves, to name a few egregious examples off the top of my head. Millions of people have died throughout history that would not have if states were not acting to protect, expand, or create markets.
Second, while it's probably harder to get a rough idea of how many people states have saved than markets have, the number is not inconsequential. I certainly wouldn't suggest states are forces for unrequited good--there's copious valid criticism of them across the political spectrum--but I would suggest that they're hardly forces for unrequited evil, either.
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Transaction taxes drive vertical integration (as this reduces the number of bites at the apple along the supply chain). I don't think that's always a bad thing, but it does violate a principle of fairness that I hold, which is that substance matters over form. If Starbucks owns coffee plantations, roasters, logistics, stores, the cup of coffee you get might be untaxed prior to you paying for it. If a competing coffee…
I get what you're saying, but profit creates the same motivation for vertical integration. If there are two layers in my coffee bean acquisition I'm losing the profit made at every layer, so of course I would want to own those layers and capture that profit before we even add a 1% tax. But vertical integration comes at a risk, which is why only the biggest players will attempt it. Now, add a 1% transaction to those t…
I wonder if we wouldn't see a shift in grocery store form with the substance remaining as today.
Rather than buying a bottle of Coke from Star Market, you might be buying a consigned bottle of Coke, with Star Market serving only as the marketplace (avoiding Star buying the bottle from Coke), and where Coke is paid directly by you as part of the transaction. Grocers operate on a terribly thin net margin as it is. They would have a lot of incentive to avoid additional transactions in the supply chain (and there's some societal benefit to keeping grocery prices low).
I'm not so much arguing against [though I do oppose a transaction tax] as I am brainstorming how the implementation of such a tax would create different behaviors in the market to compensate or avoid the tax.
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What would you suggest as an alternative if there were only enough jobs to support 20-30% of people .. including professional jobs like doctors/radiologists/lawyers being displaced?
Sounds like it could be great, terrible, or somewhere in between in the future you describe. I'm a socialist by upbringing, hopefully we would be smart enough to organize our society such that we take care of those most vulnerable among us. Currently we make a modicum of effort towards this, and vilify the working poor as lazy, no good scum, despite how they often work much more than those who earn more than them.
I voted for Bernie personally -- not a full out socialist... but I do think single payer + ubi + free college makes sense -- take the stress out of living paycheck to paycheck... at least somewhat... Not saying make everyone a millionaire and inflate the crap out of thnigs...but there needs to be some equilibrium...
One good policy might be capped CEO pay at say 200 * average employee salary. In this way - for CEO to get a raise, average salary must go up -- this can happen either by raising across the board or by moving more people to management and increasing upward mobility. Any money the CEO makes over 200* from that company is taxed at 100% including benefits, stocks, etc...
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Not OP, but I have an idea of what they're getting at. Another word for savings is "deferred consumption". If I earned 1000 dollars this month, and spent 700, I have 300 in savings, or, put another way, I deferred consuming 300 of those dollars. Now, 300 in a checking account doesn't do anyone any good but me, but if I took half of that money and invested it w/the bank at a 7%/year interest rate, I'd be investing $15…
That said, the banks + federal oversight encourage money to be created out of thin air, which makes it easy to spend money, and makes it impossible to incentivize deferred consumption. So, everyone spends money, no limits on it, and we all get to ride the waves between economic booms and economic crashes. Honest question -- how does the Austrian school reconcile the slow growth of the US economy during and immediatel…