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Too Hot for TED: Income Inequality

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Re: Too Hot for TED: Income Inequality

#211

Post by nooneelse »

dgreensp wrote: post #164
akeefer wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wait a minute: you say that our expenses versus income is too high, but then also say that higher taxes won't solve anything? Unless you're arguing that higher taxes won't increase government income (which is a totally specious argument that people make all the time, but which isn't backed up in the least by any actual historical analyses), then higher taxes absolutely could solve the deficit problem. Federal tax rev…

The point is, if the government manages its money poorly, it should make better decisions rather than taking on more money. If I tell you, "Fred is always running out of money; in fact, he's deep in credit card debt," your immediate response is not going to be "He should get a raise so he can pay off that debt" or "Here, give this money to Fred."

If Fred's boss comes and offers him a raise, you would tell Fred not to take it? No, of course you wouldn't. If Fred were working up the nerve to ask for a raise or apply for a better paying (or second) job, you would shut him down? No, of course you wouldn't, because any of those would help him in his efforts to re-balance his books. And I assume you would know that due to you not being an idiot. Well, I guess I also need to assume you have Fred's best interests at heart too.

So your analogy doesn't just do work for your position; it clearly cuts both ways.

Re: Too Hot for TED: Income Inequality

#212

Post by nooneelse »

confluence wrote: post #182

Relevant answer I found on Quora: http://www.quora.com/Who-creates-wealth-Entrepreneurs-invest... The world is more complex than a lot of the arguments that people have on this issue. One side appears quite facile and naive in their hero worship of entrepreneurs/investors at seeing/creating the future (when the chances are they merely bump into it along with many others). These are almost universally young people who…

Interestingly enough, the framing of the Quora question leaves out "the buyers" as part of the critical circle for wealth creation. That is the role that, I thought, Hanauer's talk was pointing out is played by the middle class. Perhaps the Quora question meant to capture them as "the workers", but that, according to my interpretation of the talk, mislabels their most critical role.

Re: Too Hot for TED: Income Inequality

#213

Post by Drbble »

crusso wrote: post #144
smsm42 wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

SS is funded by separate tax, but if there's a shortcoming, it is filled from the general budget, and if there's a surplus, it goes into general spending - so this distinction is an accounting fiction, both are incomes of the same government and as long as government fulfills its obligations nobody cares how the money got there. When SS starts running negative cash flow, the govt would have to refill that. Right now…

> as long as government fulfills its obligations nobody cares how the money got there I care. If they increase our debt or just start printing extra money, they have fulfilled their obligation to SS while screwing the rest of our economy pretty hard. > has very little meaning except taking part of the money out of circulation for no reason Very little meaning except having the government follow rules of financial dis…

> If they just start printing money

too late. Inflation and QE already happened.

Re: Too Hot for TED: Income Inequality

#214

Post by Drbble »

smsm42 wrote: post #193
crusso wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> as long as government fulfills its obligations nobody cares how the money got there I care. If they increase our debt or just start printing extra money, they have fulfilled their obligation to SS while screwing the rest of our economy pretty hard. > has very little meaning except taking part of the money out of circulation for no reason Very little meaning except having the government follow rules of financial dis…

For financial discipline it does not matter, government will borrow anyway because it can, and it will print money anyway because it can. Because borrowing and spending is politically easier than not spending. US government does not have any savings - taxpayers are its savings account. And as long as substantial amount of people think that raising taxes is a way to solve the problem of runaway government spending - t…

http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_is_satiation_therapy

Re: Too Hot for TED: Income Inequality

#215

Post by aeturnum »

georgieporgie wrote: post #56
aeturnum wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Though I support the idea that wealthy people should pay high taxes, perhaps even higher taxes than they do now, I think it's also worth noting that the US already gets 70% of all its taxes from the top 10%[1]. As long as we're keeping capitalism, I don't buy the argument that simply being rich is wrong. I'm also fairly skeptical of set limits on income, as setting those limits is very hard. What goes into it? How mu…

I think it's also worth noting that the US already gets 70% of all its taxes from the top 10% Why is that worth noting? That only further demonstrates the income inequality in the United States. Furthermore, wealth is far more important to take into account than income in any discussion of taxation or inequality. Also, I have yet to hear anyone make an argument that sounds anything like "simply being rich is wrong."

It's worth noting when talking about how the wealthy should pay their "fair share." That discussion should at least consider what percent of all taxes they pay.

Also, I have some friends who grew up very poor and who believe pretty strongly that it's wrong to own an excessive amount of money while others go hungry. Though I think they make good points, that's not my view.

Re: Too Hot for TED: Income Inequality

#216

Post by dfc »

philwelch wrote: post #189
dfc wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Corn farmers who grow corn for human consumption, feed and ethanol are all the same? Small family farmers are the same as giant agri-business farms? Corn farmers in Iowa are the same as corn farmers in New York?

Their interests are aligned. I'm just making an empirical argument: corn farmers have managed to get themselves a damn good deal from Uncle Sam at the expense of practically everyone else in the world, while George Soros hasn't.

Iowa primaries...

Re: Too Hot for TED: Income Inequality

#217

Post by freshhawk »

toyg wrote: post #73
freshhawk wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you are seeing this through European eyes. This is the kind of thing that gets you yelled at, threatened and told you're the "kind of [people] ruining america" if you talk about it in the US. It's not controversial among people who are educated in the subject, but among the general amerian public it's incredibly controversial.

The problem is that the feedback loop between US and Europe ends up being very unbalanced: American thinkers are hugely influential in Europe, but European ones get disqualified in the US almost by default because they're "socialists". This is a problem for us Europeans as much as for you.

They aren't disqualified by any thinkers you would want to listen to, but yes, in general they are.

Americans, in broadly general terms, aren't interested in non-American things. Or intellectual anything. So yeah, combine those two together and you get the worst of those two general trends.

Re: Too Hot for TED: Income Inequality

#218

Post by Tycho »

wvenable wrote: post #185
Tycho wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the money is in bank accounts, then it is contributing to the economy. One of the worst economic problems of recent years has actually been the lack of money just sitting in reserve to give the banks stability.

> If the money is in bank accounts, then it is contributing to the economy. It is, but only in the most limited fashion. Money sitting in bank accounts is doing very little to improve unemployment. Buying physical goods would be much better for that. > One of the worst economic problems of recent years has actually been the lack of money just sitting in reserve to give the banks stability. In a way, that's true altho…

So arguably investment activity can merrily continue with low capital ratios at the banks (assuming they can effectively manage the securitisation of loans and/or the market stays hungry for them), but what happens when you reach an economic crisis? Such as in Greece right now where there are runs on banks. That's where having more deposits helps and where the potential downside is catastrophic rather than merely non-optimal.

Re: Too Hot for TED: Income Inequality

#219

Post by smsm42 »

tommorris wrote: post #198
smsm42 wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The idea of "tax the rich" is hardly needs or worth spreading - you can't open a newspaper or turn on the TV without seeing another extremely well paid TV pundit preaching it to you. It's not new, not original, not revealing and not illuminating. It's something you can read in any speech of any left-wing politician. I'm glad TED refuses to become a platform for election-campaign speeches and resists hijacking its pla…

So all the libertarian sea-steading, private space missions and transhumanist Singularity madness isn't politics but just neutral science, right?

I have very little idea what you are talking about, because your apparent attempt of being sarcastic makes it your point a bit unclear, especially when you at the same time try to put words in my mouth and assign to me points that I never made. But if you're talking about Transhumanism described here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transhumanism then indeed I can see very little connection to current politics - I don't know any prominent Transhumanist politician and any currently debated law that had any Transhumanist intentions or ideas behind it. If you know any, please feel free to point them out, it would be very interesting to consider.

Re: Too Hot for TED: Income Inequality

#220

Post by eli_gottlieb »

Daniel_Newby wrote: post #178
anthonyb wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They're fat because they can't afford decent food and have to eat crap. Assumptions don't get you anywhere.

They get fat by not having enough money for food?! Seriously?! Do you think they spend so much on lottery tickets because the rich so unfairly keep them out of derivative trading?

Do you think they spend so much on lottery tickets because the rich so unfairly keep them out of derivative trading?

Hmm... the blatant gambling nature of both of those makes it a good analogy.

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