Obama Tax Plan a Frontal Assault on Entrepreneurs • Hacker News Board

Re: Obama Tax Plan a Frontal Assault on Entrepreneurs

#21

Post by DanielBMarkham » Sat, Oct 11, 2008, 5:23 PM UTC

maxklein wrote: post #16

jobeirne wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Health care is not a human right. It is not my obligation to make sure that you survive.

Humans are successful because we don't leave our dead, sick, wounded or crippled behind. We won because, instead of doing like other animals and letting the weak or old die alone, we continue to help them and learn from them. We help other humans who are too weak to be helped. It's part of our primal human nature. When you say that it's not your obligation to make sure I survive, you are saying you want to try it the…

Rights are those things that are inherent parts of being a human. When something infringes on my rights, the power of the state is used to maintain them. We have rights to represent the minimal amount of state-sanctioned force that is required to keep us all civil.

You cannot have a right to goods and services that somebody else currently owns. Using the power of the state to acquire medical goods and services is not a basic necessity of being a human.

We've lived millions of years without the state caring for our daily health. We can live millions more without the state and we'll be just be fine.

For a constitutionally-trained lawyer to say that is to engage in demagoguery over substance. We have a problem with health care -- some free market principles do not work when you are dying. But cartoon solutions and slogans are not going to fix complex problems. Mark my words: we'll just end up more in debt, more frustrated, and more vulnerable to even more bullshit promises.

Re: Obama Tax Plan a Frontal Assault on Entrepreneurs

#22

Post by gabrielroth » Sat, Oct 11, 2008, 5:31 PM UTC

DanielBMarkham wrote: post #21

maxklein wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Humans are successful because we don't leave our dead, sick, wounded or crippled behind. We won because, instead of doing like other animals and letting the weak or old die alone, we continue to help them and learn from them. We help other humans who are too weak to be helped. It's part of our primal human nature. When you say that it's not your obligation to make sure I survive, you are saying you want to try it the…

Rights are those things that are inherent parts of being a human. When something infringes on my rights, the power of the state is used to maintain them. We have rights to represent the minimal amount of state-sanctioned force that is required to keep us all civil. You cannot have a right to goods and services that somebody else currently owns. Using the power of the state to acquire medical goods and services is not…

> cartoon solutions and slogans are not going to fix complex problems.

Good point. E.g.: "Competition will cause insurance companies to drop price and increase service. Innovation will come to insurance and new and different types of policies will enter the market, making it even more competitive. Consumer behavior will cause people to shop for insurance and minimize costs while trying to increase coverage."

Re: Obama Tax Plan a Frontal Assault on Entrepreneurs

#23

Post by qwph » Sat, Oct 11, 2008, 5:35 PM UTC

jobeirne wrote: post #11

thinkcomp wrote: post #6

This is simply ridiculous. The author clearly hasn't filled out IRS Form 1120S lately, or any other tax form that actually might be applicable to entrepreneurs. Furthermore, I don't really care if angel investors and venture capitalists have to pay more taxes on their successful investments. There's a difference between investing and inventing. In regard to health care, adding more tax incentives (read loopholes), th…

Health care is not a human right. It is not my obligation to make sure that you survive.

Health care is not a human right.

You may want to read Article 25.1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights before reconsidering that statement.

Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services, and the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability, widowhood, old age or other lack of livelihood in circumstances beyond his control.

http://www.un.org/Overview/rights.html

Re: Obama Tax Plan a Frontal Assault on Entrepreneurs

#24

Post by maxklein » Sat, Oct 11, 2008, 5:46 PM UTC

DanielBMarkham wrote: post #21

maxklein wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Humans are successful because we don't leave our dead, sick, wounded or crippled behind. We won because, instead of doing like other animals and letting the weak or old die alone, we continue to help them and learn from them. We help other humans who are too weak to be helped. It's part of our primal human nature. When you say that it's not your obligation to make sure I survive, you are saying you want to try it the…

Rights are those things that are inherent parts of being a human. When something infringes on my rights, the power of the state is used to maintain them. We have rights to represent the minimal amount of state-sanctioned force that is required to keep us all civil. You cannot have a right to goods and services that somebody else currently owns. Using the power of the state to acquire medical goods and services is not…

If I were to have an accident or to fall sick right now, I'd worry about my health, and nothing more, because I live in a country with socialized healthcare. If this were to happen in the U.S, I'd have tens of thousands of dollars of debt. To work my way out of this debt would make me a slave for years.

Support for social heathcare is to recongize that one day you may be in the same position. In fact, when you are a really old man, you WILL be in that position. You'll be on a pension and you'll have lots of illnesses. I pay 8% of my income so that this never has to be a worry.

Social healthcare may not be a fundamental human right, but it's a hell of a convenient thing!

Re: Obama Tax Plan a Frontal Assault on Entrepreneurs

#25

Post by davidw » Sat, Oct 11, 2008, 5:49 PM UTC

icey wrote: post #14

On one hand, this seems like it's linkbait to a poorly researched article. On the other hand... see hand number one.

And it's also very much politics, something that doesn't belong here. To properly discuss the candidates, parties, and whatnot, you can't stop at their economic policies that might affect people here, but have to consider foreign relations, civil liberties, and a slew of other things that would just bog this site down. Back to hacking.

Re: Obama Tax Plan a Frontal Assault on Entrepreneurs

#26

Post by akbar5919 » Sat, Oct 11, 2008, 6:59 PM UTC

andreyf wrote: post #15

anamax wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> for something useful such as building High Speed Rail in California According to http://www.cahighspeedrail.ca.gov/images/chsr/20080121152955... , the system can't pay back the bonds that are currently on the ballot, bonds that cover less than half of the projected construction costs. Since such projections almost always overestimate revenues and underestimate construction costs, the real gap will be even larger. S…

If high-speed rail in CA made financial sense, why wouldn't a for-profit enterprise be interested in doing it? Because there are externalities which a private company can't benefit from, but that people benefit from.

They benefit, but not enough to pay for it?

More importantly, what's the difference between "private company" and "people?"

Re: Obama Tax Plan a Frontal Assault on Entrepreneurs

#27

Post by akbar5919 » Sat, Oct 11, 2008, 7:04 PM UTC

qwph wrote: post #23

jobeirne wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Health care is not a human right. It is not my obligation to make sure that you survive.

Health care is not a human right. You may want to read Article 25.1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights before reconsidering that statement. Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services, and the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disabi…

If you're quoting the UN on human rights, you've already lost.

Current members of the UN Human Rights Council:

China Cuba Ghana Nigeria

Re: Obama Tax Plan a Frontal Assault on Entrepreneurs

#28

Post by jobeirne » Sat, Oct 11, 2008, 7:06 PM UTC

maxklein wrote: post #19

jobeirne wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wrong. Humans are successful (when we are successful) because we use our inherent ingenuity to serve our individual ends and wants without infringing on those ends and wants of others. Maybe these desires include caring for others, which is often the case, but requiring someone to care for another is to strip that person of their natural freedom. Learn to make distinctions between what is common and what is general.

You have a very fundamental misunderstanding of biology. Really fundamental. You think a desire such as "caring for others" is somehow a personal choice? Or that God implanted it in us? Caring for others is a biological neccessity of our type of animal - it's why we live, it's why life continues. There is no such thing as natural freedom. We are born in a collective, we die in a collective and we are nothing without…

What we're talking about is human ethics, and what you just spouted back at me was a muddled vomit of sociology, if that.

Re: Obama Tax Plan a Frontal Assault on Entrepreneurs

#29

Post by maxklein » Sat, Oct 11, 2008, 7:21 PM UTC

jobeirne wrote: post #28

maxklein wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You have a very fundamental misunderstanding of biology. Really fundamental. You think a desire such as "caring for others" is somehow a personal choice? Or that God implanted it in us? Caring for others is a biological neccessity of our type of animal - it's why we live, it's why life continues. There is no such thing as natural freedom. We are born in a collective, we die in a collective and we are nothing without…

What we're talking about is human ethics, and what you just spouted back at me was a muddled vomit of sociology, if that.

You think you know it all, but you forget that all you know is one perspective. Have you ever actually walked in another mans shoes? Not observed, but walked.

Being a web developer does not make you intelligent. Insulting people who disagree with you shows stupidity.

You have a lot to learn, but it's only experience that can teach you that stuff.

Re: Obama Tax Plan a Frontal Assault on Entrepreneurs

#30

Post by jobeirne » Sat, Oct 11, 2008, 7:31 PM UTC

maxklein wrote: post #29

jobeirne wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What we're talking about is human ethics, and what you just spouted back at me was a muddled vomit of sociology, if that.

You think you know it all, but you forget that all you know is one perspective. Have you ever actually walked in another mans shoes? Not observed, but walked. Being a web developer does not make you intelligent. Insulting people who disagree with you shows stupidity. You have a lot to learn, but it's only experience that can teach you that stuff.

"You think you know it all." "Insulting people who disagree with you shows stupidity."

Self-referential. I dig it.