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American Equity

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Re: American Equity

#331

Post by exelius »

derefr wrote: post #176
koolba wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Bill Gates' (to name a random American citizen) has a far larger share in the GDP than most other Americans. If you want to solve that raise your taxes on the rich and lift up those that are at the lowest end of the scale. That will have a lot more effect than some fiction where you get to do a bunch of make-believe bookkeeping. Or go a step further do what nobody has the balls to do: tax wealth That's what all the…

From the perspective of trying to get the budget balanced, taxing wealth is probably the single most efficient way to do it. From the perspective of the tax code as an incentive system , taxing wealth is a strange thing—it makes people feel less interest in becoming wealthy, and thereby causes fewer GDP-building things to happen! (This is also, for a similar reason, why economists don't like corporate taxes or trade…

Money and power (and the accompanying freedom they bestow upon the holder) have always been their own reward. Even in Communist systems, money was just replaced by "party capital" -- even if you were poor on paper, your power will lead to your children having more power.

Multiple incentives to be wealthy -- or worse, feedback loops to ensure the children of the wealthy maintain their advantage -- are just redundant.

Re: American Equity

#332

Post by kgwgk »

dnautics wrote: post #323
kgwgk wrote: post #320

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What he says is that high inflation makes posible for real wages to adjust (without cutting nominal wages) when such an adjustment is required. The price of labor fluctuates as the price of everything else, including capital, and when there is unemployment (lower demand of labor) wages would need to go down but they are “sticky”. These are cyclical adjustments.

And that mechanism doesn't work, unless their salaries don't keep up with inflation. Notably, this relationship is asymmetric, since there is no corresponding way to increase labor wages without giving a pay raise.

Salaries can grow faster than inflation at other times, keeping them aligned over the long term.

Re: American Equity

#333

Post by alistairSH »

derefr wrote: post #176
koolba wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Bill Gates' (to name a random American citizen) has a far larger share in the GDP than most other Americans. If you want to solve that raise your taxes on the rich and lift up those that are at the lowest end of the scale. That will have a lot more effect than some fiction where you get to do a bunch of make-believe bookkeeping. Or go a step further do what nobody has the balls to do: tax wealth That's what all the…

From the perspective of trying to get the budget balanced, taxing wealth is probably the single most efficient way to do it. From the perspective of the tax code as an incentive system , taxing wealth is a strange thing—it makes people feel less interest in becoming wealthy, and thereby causes fewer GDP-building things to happen! (This is also, for a similar reason, why economists don't like corporate taxes or trade…

taxing wealth is a strange thing—it makes people feel less interest in becoming wealthy, and thereby causes fewer GDP-building things to happen!

Citation? I know it feels correct, but is it actually correct in practice? Is there any evidence that the rare person who generates enormous wealth was motivated substantially by wealth (and not a drive to build something substantial or change the world)?

At least in the case of Gates, I suspect he would have built Microsoft even with slightly more onerous (to the wealthy) tax policy.

Re: American Equity

#334

Post by refurb »

evjim wrote: post #150

Homesteading act could still be applicable in modern times. Ownership of real property is low and a large part of most American's budget. If people didn't have to pay rent and mortgages every month, everybody but banks would be wealthier.

Not sure it would do a low income person much good to own 50 acres in the middle of nowhere.

Re: American Equity

#335

Post by frgtpsswrdlame »

touchofevil wrote: post #281
frgtpsswrdlame wrote: post #223

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hmm, well perhaps (I'm venturing into the unknown here) the problem isn't really protecting the majority from the minority (or vice versa) but protecting the weak from the powerful. When I see proposals like: >end gerrymandering, and reform campaign financing I think those are good because they weaken the powerful (the current majority party and the rich) to enable the weak. But I also believe that without the senate…

Well, the real question to me is do we think of people who live in Wyoming as "Wyomingers" and those in CA as Californians? I don't think so. We just think of everyone in the USA as Americans. So why should it be that some Americans (those who live in Wyoming) having outsized voting power over national laws? A minority of Americans is controlling the country via the methods I mentioned. It doesn't seem to be working…

>Well, the real question to me is do we think of people who live in Wyoming as "Wyomingers" and those in CA as Californians?

I think we talk about it that way all the time, both where I live (which is a lot closer to Wyoming than California) and in places which are closer to California that Wyoming. The common issues of the day are all ones of class division and I think that geographical division really plays into it. When we really split into Wyomingers and Californians though is when we start talking about any common political issue.

>We just think of everyone in the USA as Americans.

Oh lord, how I wish this were true. Do you think Californians treat me like a Californian? Or do you think that maybe they treat me a little bit different? And do you think when a Californian transplants here they get treated like a Wyoman? Or do you think they get treated a bit different? There's a divide there, the hundreds or thousands of miles between the coasts and the middle is more than a physical divide, it's also a cultural and political one.

>It doesn't seem to be working out very well. We need to make sure that the majority of Americans have veto power over things like electing Donald Trump, the current tax bill, the attempts to end Obamacare.

Let's be real here though, the above is completely partisan thinking. Look I'm basically as far left as they come and I live in deep red country - your impulse is totally wrong. Take a look at this map: http://i0.wp.com/metrocosm.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/el...

You want to take that map and give even more power to the blue spots? I don't see the fairness. The senate exists because the coastal elites who founded this country were smart enough to realize that coastal city elites would run the whole thing if it weren't for some mechanism to help rural areas balance the scale.

>So why should it be that some Americans (those who live in Wyoming) having outsized voting power over national laws? A minority of Americans is controlling the country via the methods I mentioned.

Because it makes sure they're heard, it's protecting a weak minority from a powerful majority. I can agree with you on all the other things like gerrymandering but the senate exists for a good reason - it forces you to care about all the people who exist in rural areas or "flyover country" instead of writing them off like you'd really like to.

Re: American Equity

#336

Post by kgwgk »

Retric wrote: post #322
kgwgk wrote: post #300

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You know that the large majority of credit card loans are given out by banks, right? https://www.nilsonreport.com/upload/TopIssuersofUSGPCC.3.jpg

Sure, but like GM's finance division making car loans; Credit Cards are a viable business even without access to depositors. Often the capital for many bank issued credit cards does not come from depositors at all.

Ok, so we don’t let banks loan money. I guess they may still take deposits but if they are not going to pay any interest people will keep accounts as low as possible.

On the other hand, all the financing needs will be covered by other means. These “non-banks” will have to obtain capital as equity and debt, maybe even loans from other non-banks, but certainly not as deposits.

What was the problem that we where trying to fix anyway?

Re: American Equity

#337

Post by taxtherich »

cryptonector wrote: post #271
taxtherich wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are wealth taxes in Switzerland, Norway, France, and the Netherlands, amongst others in Europe. They've been repealed in countries like Sweden and Austria, not because they were disasters, but because exceedingly wealthy people have a lot of influence. That's the only story. As such your claim that no such taxes exist is wrong; and your claim that they've been a disaster is also fallacious. p.s. your "ready for…

Can you show us a comparison of GDP growth rates, before and after wealth taxes were promulgated (and, where it happened, repealed)? Also, please, a comparison of GDP history between countries that have and lack wealth taxes. Near as I can tell Europe has lagged way behind the U.S. in economic growth since the 1980s. I remember back in the 90s when catching up to the U.S. was stated goal of the incipient EU. How did…

Man, I love you.

You state a total falsehood (that there are no wealth taxes), and a second falsehood that is, admittedly, subjective, (claiming that they were a disaster).

I point out that you were completely wrong about the objective claim you made, and you ignore that but demand evidence that I prove you were wrong about the other one, too? No way dude, you already proved that you're not here for an honest debate.

I think "disaster" is an appropriate adjective for your integrity.

Re: American Equity

#338

Post by ThomPete »

dnautics wrote: post #308
ThomPete wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Discouraging savings is actually the point. We should tax money that sits idle and provides tax benefits to money invested. If you can build wealth around being active rather than just reaping the benefit of interest of interests then that should be encouraged rather than just grabbing and keeping.

You would force people to consume? There's diminishing returns to that. At some point there are fewer worthwhile things to spend on and you start creating an system of make-work with the attendant environmental destruction and resource exhaustion. Free markets are neutral on these questions, it's policy that distorts social preference away from conservation and towards unsustainable growth that exacerbate the situati…

How would I force them to do it?

They would still make money if they kept them it would just be less beneficial than it is now. No long term capital gains as an example.

People with little money consume everything they have already, they have no choice, no retirements no nothing.

Re: American Equity

#339

Post by Retric »

logfromblammo wrote: post #294
Retric wrote: post #230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you misunderstood my comment. Banks are currently allowed to loan out a percentage of their deposits IE: they need to keep say 10% cash on hand and can loan say 90%. I am saying if your raise that percentage to 11% cash on hand not much changes. Then next year that becomes 12% cash on hand... until banks can no longer lend money. At no point in this process is physical wealth destroyed only shifting how loans…

If the reserve requirement is 10%, the banks actually loan 990%. That is not a typo. Of the deposit account, they keep 10% in the vault/Fed, and loan out 90%. Of that 90%, they keep 10% in the vault (9%), and re-loan 90% of it (81%). Of that 81%, they keep 10% in the vault (8.1%) and re-loan 90% of it (72.9%). Sum the series, and the effect on the money supply from loans and the reserve requirement is to divide the v…

In theory that's correct, but in practice banks re-sell loans all the time by packaging them as bonds. So total outstanding home loans has been decoupled from that equation.

Further, the velocity of money is important which reduce the multiplier in practice.

However, if your taking this seriously yes you need a curve which is why I said 100 years, but only listed 90 years worth of changes.

Re: American Equity

#340

Post by jjtheblunt »

jacquesm wrote: post #16

People already have a share in the GDP. That's what it is, the total domestic product, the sum of all the little parts. The problem is not that people don't have share in it (and this goes for every country, not just for the USA), but that they have a disproportionate share in it. Bill Gates' (to name a random American citizen) has a far larger share in the GDP than most other Americans. If you want to solve that rai…

I think your idea means well but might not be in touch with the rampant abuse of subsidies given to those who qualify to receive them. Google (or similar) "ebt card abuse" and it's shameless and appalling. I'd conjecture that the aversion to the idea of being able to "lift up those" so needy is itself just skepticism at the ability to do so, given the rampant fraud. That's totally a sad conjecture to make, I must say.
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