What in the hell is the deal with taxes. . . .

originally posted by: BlueJacket
not worth arguing with the ignorant.

If I am ignorant please enlighten me with your scintillating knowledge of our country.

I guess I'm not touting the Fox News brain washed mind "Taxes are bad boo hoo. Government is too big boo hoo. AOC is communist boo hoo..."

Do have anything meaningful to say or just drivel?

a reply to: Lumenari

Well said. I appreciate your ability to keep your head...

a reply to: dfnj2015

seriously, stop. You know nothing about me. But you are telling us all, about yourself.

best of luck

originally posted by: dfnj2015

originally posted by: BlueJacket
not worth arguing with the ignorant.

If I am ignorant please enlighten me with your scintillating knowledge of our country.

I guess I'm not touting the Fox News brain washed mind "Taxes are bad boo hoo. Government is too big boo hoo. AOC is communist boo hoo..."

Do have anything meaningful to say or just drivel?

I'll give you a Pro Tip at this point...

Sleep whatever you are doing off and come back tomorrow.

That thin film of credibility you had is gone right now.

Because in the really real world, more taxes are bad for the average citizen, the bigger the government the worse it becomes and AOC is an actual communist.

Call it a night!

originally posted by: Lumenari

originally posted by: dfnj2015
a reply to: Lumenari
Obviously you did not watch the video because you have no idea what your are talking about.

Obviously I read the book... the video you have posted 435834573498573948 times so I watched it once and it's bullsnip.
They cherry-picked a few quotes from 3 of his books and strung them together for stupid people.
You are capable of reading my post.
So before you go any further I suggest you read Capital.
Then before you post silly things you can at least have an informed opinion of what you are trying to sell.

I thought the video I posted was pretty even handed. It wasn't a blind devotion to communism but it highlighted the main criticisms laissez faire capitalism. Surely you can accept there are some negatives to having of laissez faire capitalism where the billionaires use lobbyists to control public policy.

I am not selling anything. I know what I believe based on my own experiences. I remember what life was like in the 1970s. Money was just worth more. I had a friend who bought a small airplane from his CD interest income. Things are different today. Everything is crazy expensive since oil went up to $140/barrel. Healthcare costs are out of slight.

You have to at least admit healthcare has been rising much higher than inflation. And worker's raises have barely kept up with inflation. Just the cost of healthcare alone is a huge burden on the worker making the median wage than any increases in taxes over the same period. I read some article that some medical procedure cost $3000 in a foreign hospital and $56,000 in a US hospital. I think there's some kind of price fixing and gouging of the consumer but you probably think it's just fine.

I think you are being blind or something if you do not think wealth inequality is so much more worse now than it was in 1970 when I started working.

originally posted by: Lumenari

originally posted by: dfnj2015

originally posted by: BlueJacket
not worth arguing with the ignorant.

If I am ignorant please enlighten me with your scintillating knowledge of our country.

I guess I'm not touting the Fox News brain washed mind "Taxes are bad boo hoo. Government is too big boo hoo. AOC is communist boo hoo..."

Do have anything meaningful to say or just drivel?

I'll give you a Pro Tip at this point...

Sleep whatever you are doing off and come back tomorrow.

That thin film of credibility you had is gone right now.

Because in the really real world, more taxes are bad for the average citizen, the bigger the government the worse it becomes and AOC is an actual communist.

Call it a night!

I'm sure with people who are brain washed and math illiterate I have no credibility. You can make all the ad hominem attacks you want. But the facts simply do not support your right wing delusions. The fact is taxes are not as important as inflation and wages. This graph proves it:

Purchasing Power of the Consumer Dollar

I'm not just making this up. The data is there. And the data represents what happened in my personal experiences. What else is left for you to say other than, "you have the wrong opinion you are an idiot". But I am not making up the data.

If we got rid of all federal payroll taxes tomorrow it would not make a shred of difference. The CEOs would just keep raising prices while keeping worker's wages depressed. I'm not sure what the answer is going to be. It's almost as if we need government to step in and legislate free-markets back into the economy to break up the cartels and monopolies. But that is obviously not going to happen unless the dollar collapsed to nothing. The corporate communism is not going to go away.

originally posted by: BrianFlanders
The government is essentially a giant leech upon the backside of humanity. Whether it needs to exist or not is irrelevant to the basic fact of what it is and what it does and why it is and does that. You need to understand that the government doesn't give a rat's ass about you unless it can find a way to manipulate your existence to it's advantage. You're nothing more than food to it.
This is important to understand because the government's activities are not always going to be (usually won't be) in your best interest. They will simply manipulate you into believing that they are.

I have a close friend who is an FBI agent. He's really terrific at his job. He was able to stop a big terrorist attack through one of his informers and some amazing detective work. I'm not sure everything about government is bad.

I think consumer protections are pretty good too. I think too many people are willing to make a buck at other people's expense. Again, I think government has a role to play.

I think government has a big role to play in making sure we do not have any monopolies or cartels gouging the consumer or price fixing wages. The problem we have in this country is Corporations ARE the government. We do have communism in this country but it's NOT the kind that is in the workers favor. Do you honestly think we too much socialism or communism in this country when the worker has practically zero political power? Money talks and the politicians listen to the lobbyists representing the billionaires.

The problem is not excessive taxation in this country in my opinion. The bigger problem is we have too many cartels and monopolies making the worker making the median wage be a poverty wage.

Just look around. People have no savings. Everyone is broke all the time. Everyone is a few paychecks away from being homeless on the street. Everything costs way too much. If you don't think things nowadays cost too much then we do not have much to talk about.

a reply to: DBCowboy

I AM pro giant meteor!

Look, this was just a rant and maybe I was a bit too harsh.

So I would like to formally apologize to everyone who is pro giant meteor.

It was insensitive of me.

a reply to: DBCowboy

Open flight paths for all giant meteors even if they're unwilling to collide.

Anyways taxes is easy. It's to make the overbloated government feel needed. If people weren't taxed into the red, they'd probably be able to start sustaining themselves entirely.

You want to know who's really taking advantage of the system? It's not the folks down there at the welfare office. It's all those 'non-essential' government employees and representatives who waste our money with their bullcorn.

Just sayin'...giant meteor doesn't take my money and give it to someone else..

95% of the US tax code is designed to enhance and preserve the wealth of those in power.

And by “those in power”, I do NOT mean the lackeys we elect to office.

Think about it.

That's the thing about taxes.

I largely agree with Thoreau about taxes: I'm willing to pay taxes for public services. Do I want maintained roads, infrastructure, and schools? Yes.

In addition, do I want health care? Yes. Do I want a military? Yes. Do I want these things paid for and the people who do them to be paid? Yes. Do I like paying taxes? Hell no. Do I think I pay too much in taxes? Yes. Local, state, federal taxes. How can these things be reasonably paid for if not for taxes? Should food be taxed? No. Should utilities be taxed? No.

However, do I want taxes on every single little freakin thing that the government can possibly find a way to tax? Hell no. Tax here, tax there, buy this, go here, entertainment taxes, taxes everywhere, it's ridiculous.

Then again, the loopholes are equally enraging. Me paying 25-35% of my income while a corporation that makes hundreds of millions pays ZERO. F that. That is not right. That's where the problems are, in part.

originally posted by: ketsuko
Your money is the most tangible marker of your freedom and liberty.

Take that control it, and they are taking control of the fruits of your labor and basically saying they own you.

Thank you -- and amen!

The individual income tax on earned income has to go. And with it, all the ridiculous license fees and everything else that keeps folks from making a living on their own terms -- not as corporate serfs. We have a right to make a living for ourselves and our families. No one has the right to the fruits of our labor... the sweat off our brow.

If they must tax the people, then tax them on unearned income. But really it should be corporations taxed... not given our hard-earned tax dollars in the guise of "credits" and "deductions" and other loopholes. Our "taxes" are paid via the corporations and businesses we patronize and support. (It's not like corporations pay taxes from anything except the money made from customers...) It further ensures that the businesses we want and need and serve our interests are the companies that grow and thrive. Not the corporations who pay off our critters the best.

I don't know about the whole giant meteor thing. I think it would probably just make the humans who survive giant meteor resistant. Kind of like the bacteria that survive antibiotic treatment.

What in the hell is the deal with taxes. . . .

The oldest form of legitimate rape.

a reply to: DBCowboy
I especially hate it because the roads are crap here. I thought tax money was supposed to go to fixing them.

a reply to: Skid Mark

They recently raised the registration fee here 30 dollars a vehicle saying it is for the roads. That in itself pizzed me off. Then instead of putting the money in a fund for roads only they put it in a slush fund. Now our new democratic governor wants to raise gas taxes along with other taxes.
I cant afford all this stupid.

a reply to: Boadicea

But why would you want to be taxed on unearned income?

I have a retirement account that will be helping survive in my old age. That money was all at one time earned income. I've already been taxed on it once. Now it will have to sit in accounts, investment accounts, and generate income for me to help support me in retirement.

Why would you want me to be taxed *more* because I'm relying on income money invested to support me now that I'm too old to support myself with earned income? Why is that money now *less* honest than it was when I earned it?

I know your remark was aimed at those who are very wealthy, but most people who depend on investment monies, unearned income, are actually more like retirees who did earn their money that they're now depending on because they can no longer earn it through labor.

a reply to: DBCowboy

firstly, We the People, are being conned.



second, that con has been extended to pile cash off the budget and into the city county state etc control.



anyone who reads this.

pick your city, county, state, fire dept, police, colleges, university, water ways, bays, rivers, parks, around you.

read the CAFR and see the already paid tax money not being used to feed back to in your regular budget,no no, my friends this goes back into that side of the ledger. Delaware has 1 million shares of Apple & Microsoft owned by the state paid by state taxes earning a capital gain that you would be taxed on, yet thats does not feed back into the tax system to lower taxes.. then they purchase those products ..and tax you again to do so..

and Thirdly, that stuff you call money, is not what a Citizen a hundred years ago would consider money.. it is debt. all of it with two signatures making it a "species" IOU of money.



backwards times my fellow Citizens.

originally posted by: ketsuko
a reply to: Boadicea

But why would you want to be taxed on unearned income?

I wouldn't. I don't. Note my comment:

If they must tax the people, then tax them on unearned income.

I'd rather not see the people taxed at all. But if it must be done, then tax the income created via man's laws, not nature's laws. And for this purpose, I would not tax interest earned on savings, because saving and storing and rationing is perfectly in line with nature's law... as Aesop's fable "The Ant and the Grasshopper" tells us! It would benefit our economy as a whole if we returned to savings based economy, rather than the speculation and gambling we currently have. Saving for a rainy day is far more practical and productive than gambling for a rainy day.