99%? Who wants to be a part of the 100%?

Originally posted by Cinaed
reply to post by EarthCitizen07

 

I don't think the average conservative is against taxation. What we are screaming is THE TAX CODE AND METHOD NEEDS REFORMED but not to punish law abiding citizens! Personally I support the Fair Tax which basically does away with income tax and the IRS and uses an amendment to the constitution so the gov cant raise it without consent of the people.

Certain things are not taxed and luxury items are taxed the most. This would truly bring about the rich paying their *fair share*, they are after all the ones that can afford such items!

Poor people would pay very little tax and still have assistance programs....programs where the horrible waste and fraud is cleaned up!

Point in example: In my state, every person on public assistance for families with children get 3, count them THREE letters via the us mail for every written correspondence sent. So if they send out a mass mailing about a single issue, EACH recipient gets THREE letters...... and there are ZILLIONS of things like this.

The medicaid racket is just sickening! I know a man whose son was born with no eyes. Through all the programs out there they are actually fairing pretty well, they have access to most things he needs. So, why is a *vision test* required every yr for this recipient? the young man HAS NO EYES!!! Yet the gov is mandating the gov to pay for this....to ensure he still qualifies

the bottom line is you and I are paying for this kind of thing, all through the system there is stupidity like this and GOSH what a lot of paperwork and people get paid for making sure this young man does not grow eyes!

And dumbest of all...even though he has no eyes whatsoever...he still has to re certify every so often (every 2 yrs I think) and go through a whole battery of stuff...to make sure he is REALLY disabled, paying many people for services in no way needed....Since the family qualifies for all the benefits out there, it is the tax payer paying the gov to provide many services not needed by anyone, paying gov workers very well to do so....and charging ridiculous prices....

I mean even if you deem a vision test be needed every 5-10 yrs..how much should a agency bill for a visit where they take one look and the test is over? then you have all the benefit programs workers that must be paid to collect this paper and shuffle it around all the different agencies the family gets the benefits from...to other workers getting paid to shuffle papers....

And you think the fraud is found out and punished?? not by a long shot

How many things like that prevent those truly in need from having the funds available to them?

Clean up the hundreds of billions going to this kind of BS and there would be more monies for all the programs!

It is not just the poor milking the system, it is also the gov itself! In order to grow bigger government...

The point being our current tax dollars are not being spent wisely at all.....

Moderators sorry for quoting such a long post but I think it is necessary in this case to prevent off-topic drift and confusion.

Yes there is lots and lots of waste and the tea party folks do make good arguments SOMEtimes, but the stunt they tried to pull this summer with the assistance of the republicans cost america a drop in credit worthiness and almost a general default. Never in our history do I recall something like this happening before. It was uncalled for and quite a big cheap shot to the face of obama and the democrats. In fact it was an international embarrasement.

Fact is government NEEDS to do away with waste, not necessarily social welfare programs though. Cutting down on the cia budget which is classified as well as bringing back our troops would be a great start imo. Another step would be to stop corporate welfare, except for extraordinary circumstances, which 9 times out of 10 banks and other corporations do NOT qualify. President bush and president obama have spent about 4 trillion in combined stimulus and TARP payments, yet few jobs seem to have been created and lots of bonuses given to executives despite their failures. It used to be you got a bonus only when you performed very well, now its "give me bonus or I leave" extortion.

Just because our tax dollars get wasted to a large degree because of interest payments, does not mean we should stop paying and let government fail. It could cause anarchy and chaos for years till a new system develops. The best option is to expose the corruption and demand accountability.

Originally posted by Cinaed
reply to post by daskakik

 

I tossed out vague general figures because I am using my sister as an example not parading her private financial data. How you come to the conclusion of how much money she brings home is beyond me... I said she either is, or is close to being worth 1ML. My entire reason in bringing up my sister was she will be affected by this cap. Those are all you need to know about her private info...

It does not matter what she is worth. Do you not get it yet? What matters is the NET income and nothing else.

Property taxes is for local government, not state or federal, and depends on many factors. Also I assume corporations and individuals pay a different rate.

The rest is your assumptions based on your own implied calculations of numbers.

He was trying to point out that you can deduct a lot items from the net income to further reduce the taxable income bracket.

The laws speaking about are federal regs coming out all over the place. When I was doing property management I was reading about the proposed regs that would affect my job.

What I read was a whole buch of BS worded to SOUND like environmental/green items....In short in the guise of environmental safety the gov was forcing all the property owners to change how remodel jobs are accomplished. Any building older than 1978 would have massive new environmental safety requirements that could only be met by those who paid for the gov trained certification of this *safety* job description.

It means not even a hole could be repaired in a wall without paid gov certified safety worker there.... who of course became worthy of their high wage because they paid the gov for the privilege

If you can't see where things like that lead I don't know what to tell you

I will agree here at least partially. USC and state statues are getting out of hand big time! We need "smaller government".

reply to post by EarthCitizen07


All I was pointing out is the assumptions made about what I said were wrong. I chose the words I chose to NOT divulge actual numbers and personal information

So the tax cap of $250,000 DOES affect her.... why on earth would I even post the original post if she was not directly affected? Why would she be selling a house at a loss and taking such a hit if she did not fear what this law will do to her?

People did not care for my choice of words to keep her info private, and they made assumptions based on it that were incorrect

What part of this don't YOU get. I am pretty sure my sister and I know a bit more about it that someone that is reading a VAGUE statement and making all manner of assumptions based on what they felt I said.

Clarifying the law does affect her was apparently pointless.

Originally posted by Cinaed
reply to post by EarthCitizen07

 

So the tax cap of $250,000 DOES affect her.... why on earth would I even post the original post if she was not directly affected? Why would she be selling a house at a loss and taking such a hit if she did not fear what this law will do to her?

Actually all you said was that she was worth almost a million and that she believes she will be affected by the law. She might be going through all those fiscal gymnastics because she doesn't understand the law or the difference between equity and income.

What I do see is you flip-floping. I said that if someone is making a 6 digit income then why would they close their business. You said that the money made was put back in the business. That means it isn't personal income and does not put her in the $250,000 bracket so she isn't affected by that law. It's one or the other but you are trying to make it seem like it's both.

Originally posted by Cinaed
reply to post by NoHierarchy

 

It is in no way about blaming the poor! It is about reminding people it SHOULD be about blaming the CROOKS...not the people that know how to make money!

Everyone AGREES the corporations are the problem. The difference between my view and your viewpoint beyond that is I say keep going and get ALL the crooks. You are saying and get the RICH!

I refuse to go after law abiding citizens simply because they have something I lack. I want CROOKS punished not the law abiding successful INDIVIDUAL

Why is it you refuse to acknowledge poor people can be crooks too?? or if you will, they still get a pass from you BASED on INCOME rather than how they make their money...Legally or ILLEGALLY

WHERE OH WHERE did I say "Let's get the rich!!!" ???

I'm ALL FOR getting the crooks... but simply "getting the crooks" and dusting off our hands is NOT a long term solution to the very systemic/root problems we face. In order to solve our problems in the long-term, we must target the ROOTS of why/how these crooks are able to do what they do. Part of this is Capitalism, Corporatism, Wall Street, corruption of politics, the wealth gap, etc. etc. It's not simply about a few bad apples, the bad apples are not a defect, they're a natural byproduct of our system. Yes, I want the rich to be taxed more... but do I want them lynched/imprisoned simply for being RICH? NO WAY. You must also keep in mind that there are many LEGAL activities going on (at least economically) that are TERRIBLY unethical/immoral and SHOULD be illegal. There are also many ILLEGAL things people engage in that are consensual, harmless, and moral/ethical (for instance, civil disobedience). You should read my thread on here:

Do the rich DESERVE their money?

reply to post by Mourninwoody

I believe It works by loaning money to high risk persons then repackaging the loans with others, bribing moody's to give their stamp of approval and selling the loans to investors as AAA quality.

Yep, that is what was happening. Fanny and Freddie were involved too, with their "unlimited" funds provided by us, the taxpayers. Those GSEs bought tons of those "mortgage-backed securities."

I don't know all the details of this whole situation--and it was a complicated one--but didn't the whole thing start because of government "pressure" on certain lending institutions to lower their lending standards? I mean, moneylenders have been at their trade for thousands of years and they generally don't willingly make bad loans, it's not good for business. In this case it seemed to me like the lenders were merely the middlemen, at least in the beginning. The Gov't said, "If you don't make these loans, we'll audit all your books and paperwork for the next ten years. You'll have guys in IRS suits crawling all over your files, and teams of government lawyers thinking up new reasons to take you to court. But if you do make the loans, it won't be a liability to your business. Package 'em up and we'll buy 'em off you through Fannie or Freddie. John Q. Public will pick up the tab."
Once that idea caught on, the swindlers swarmed in, and made fortunes in commissions. I guess that is where the "predatory lending" idea comes from....but it seems to me those guys were a symptom of the problem, rather than the cause of the problem.

I could be totally wrong, of course...but when it comes to economic trickery, it's a good bet that the root of the problem is bad economic policy, not greedy swindlers.

reply to post by EarthCitizen07

Gold and silver are not enough to accomodate all the currency in circulation in the USA alone, so how will there be enough for foreign currencies?

Huh? Maybe I'm a bit slow tonight....this doesn't make sense to me. It doesn't have to accommodate all the currency in circulation. Going back to a "metal" standard where our money is all backed by some kind of valuable metal--gold, silver, nickel, etc.--just means that the value of those metals will adjust automatically through market forces until they accurately represent the current buying power of the economy of the country as a whole. The paper currency we have now will cease to have any meaning at all...and if a "new" paper dollar is printed, each one will represent a set amount of metal and therein gain value. The current "dollar value" of gold or silver will mean nothing, because the current dollar value will cease to exist...so you can't use those values to say there isn't "enough" gold or silver.

Originally posted by Cinaed
reply to post by EarthCitizen07

 

All I was pointing out is the assumptions made about what I said were wrong. I chose the words I chose to NOT divulge actual numbers and personal information

So the tax cap of $250,000 DOES affect her.... why on earth would I even post the original post if she was not directly affected? Why would she be selling a house at a loss and taking such a hit if she did not fear what this law will do to her?

People did not care for my choice of words to keep her info private, and they made assumptions based on it that were incorrect

What part of this don't YOU get. I am pretty sure my sister and I know a bit more about it that someone that is reading a VAGUE statement and making all manner of assumptions based on what they felt I said.

Clarifying the law does affect her was apparently pointless.

Like I said before and others are hinting at too, you are flip-flopping with strawman arguments and vague assumptions. If you were interested in an honest discussion you would clarify your beliefs and ask others to do the same.

Everything in life has limits and is relative to something else. The world is not black and white! Unless you have something extremely meaningful to say for a change, then I will unsubscribe from this thread and declare myself the victor.

reply to post by Tsurugi


You should watch some youtube videos on the rothschild dynasty to understand how they have manipulated gold and silver certificates to the fiat currency we have today. It was, and still is, based on fractional reserve banking.

The concept is based on the principle that at any one given time, not all the customers will come in to cash their gold-silver certificates in exchange for gold-silver, thus the creditor is free to issue much more certificate than the actual reserve items.

It makes no difference if money is backed up by something or if it is allowed to fluctate according to market forces. Fiat currency is backed by the goodwill of the banks/government and recognised as legal tender by the people. The market forces can be natural or they can be artificial. If they are artificial it means a group of people are using fiction to cause instabilities and profit from that. The second case is where the ethical problem arises.

Further it makes no sense to me to fix the price of currency on something that has no method of valuation other than the certificate method of the past. But like I said in my previous post, there is not enough precious metals to go back to such a system.

To fix the current system all one has to do is nationalise the FED and collect the prime rate from the commercial banks directly, without allowing commercial banks the right to hold shares in the fed thus siphoning the weath for themselves. Interestingly enough some disinfo agents are now alleging that the profits are dumped into the USA Treasury, but what about the past 90 years? Where did that money go if not to the bankers pocket?

I honestly would not relly on ron paul as a source of truth. The man is controlled opposition who speaks truth in measured quantities and mixes it with elite agendism, such as the theory of competing private currencies. Libertarians are for the privatisation of industry rather than anything remaining public.

After you and others watch the rothschild videos than read about abraham lincoln and the greenbacks he issued during the civil war debt-free, which according to some historians was the real reason he was killed and not some furious rebel seeking revenge.

reply to post by EarthCitizen07

Of course the world has many shades of grey! I have my views and you can disagree with them and argue against them, it is still the way I see it. I do not agree with lots of people but there is no reason to bash their beliefs in my world....

The biggest flip flop I see is in those claiming to want equality across the board yet are also very unsympathetic with a small group of fellow citizens that have done nothing wrong, simply have more than others. This does NOT include the lawbreakers and the swindlers.

My idea of equality is a world where we punish criminals without discriminating.... Citizens need to get more involved to change the laws and method of governance... globalism is not the answer but that is where we are heading. The reason for that is about control, money and bloodline.....

We need both sides of the coin in political view to have success

I lean toward the conservative side of Libertarianism.... we need left and right leaning opinions to ever hope to strike a balance and stay in the *shades of grey* No one side is completely correct....

You want to talk black and white???? too far left OR too far right is what you get in a black/white world....and currently what our country is doing...polarizing

Personally I dont believe there is any stopping the path we are on... to me it boils down to the far left will fast track the coming global government...the right will slow it down but still end up there. And if I am totally wrong about that...even if I have it backwards

We will still end up in the same place.

In your posts about following the money and the families involved I agree with you almost 100% but we are completely opposite in view of how to best deal with it.

Call my points whatever you want. It doesn't change the outcome in the least

reply to post by NoHierarchy


If they earned it honestly

YES

reply to post by beezzer


Reality is much stranger than fiction.
Most people are generally very kind and helpful, they believe what people tell them and then there are those who knowingly lie and cause harm to others, the 99% vs 1% concept is merely a way of making this dichotomy tangible.

It's the most obvious fact that we're all on this planet together although I think that this dichotomy is a useful one if people remember it's only a way of understanding something, it isn't "the something" itself.

I agree the divisive nature of this isn't helpful, although it becomes helpful where people do not recognize this dichotomy yet.

This is an educational movement and nothing more as of yet,

since no one in the media/government etc.. is talking about the issues, the real issues without misdirection or outright lies people have taken a stand, they want to know, .. and they want to stop unfair and unjust practices throughout our planet. It's a noble cause.

But we really need to become more organized, we need an intelligence arm, and a system among ourselves that emulates our desired outcome.

reply to post by NoHierarchy


I am not saying we do not need to change the laws! I also would say it is the fault of we the people the laws have gotten so out of hand... as a nation we grew complacent because things didn't seem to affect us

Now they affect us. I maintain the people have a hand in being responsible for the state of affairs as well as the government and the FED

fixing it without making things worse? Is that even possible...I don't think it is...

Visit my thread here and go to my last post (bottom of first page) to see what the 99% really looks like.
Including pics from a local grass roots OWS protest.

www.abovetopsecret.com...

Its not about rich vs poor, they can have their money, they earned it. However, when that money starts influencing government to favor the 1% instead of the other 99% then we have a problem.

reply to post by EarthCitizen07

You should watch some youtube videos on the rothschild dynasty to understand how they have manipulated gold and silver certificates to the fiat currency we have today. It was, and still is, based on fractional reserve banking.

I understand the fractional reserve concept. The good thing about fractional reserve is that, given a legal environment containing strong property/asset laws, it massively boosts economic growth by allowing money to operate in many different directions at once.

The person or persons who deposit the money into the bank have legal ownership of it and usually gain some sort of interest from it, so the money is working for them.

The bank lends the money out and charges interest for it, so the money is working for the bank.

The person who got the loan from the bank is (for instance) an entrepreneur who is looking to expand his existing business. The loan provides the capital for him to do so, whereupon he hires many people temporarily (to build a new building perhaps) and a few people permanently (regular employees). So the money is working for the entrepreneur...and also for the contractors and new employees he hires, though not on a direct level.

The same dollar is working directly for three different people at once; the money supply is effectively tripled, without any increase in the amount of money in circulation...which is good, because increasing the supply of fiat money in circulation lowers the value of all fiat money of that type(inflation). Fractional reserve banking is currently the most "economical" way to address a demand for money without devaluing that money in the process.

The concept is based on the principle that at any one given time, not all the customers will come in to cash their gold-silver certificates in exchange for gold-silver...

Or, in the modern world of floating paper money, not everyone will come in and demand all their cash all at once, in what is known as a Bank Run. It does happen, but it's rare, and is easily solved using another method for allowing money to work on several levels at once...insurance. In this case, the insurance is purchased by the banking firm. I don't know how other countries do it, but in the U.S. the FDIC pretty much put a stop to banking runs.

...thus the creditor is free to issue much more certificate than the actual reserve items.

Typically the bank (or "creditor" as you say) is required to maintain a certain percentage of total deposits physically on hand, and may then loan out the rest. They are not supposed to lend more than they have(and there is more than law to deter most people from doing this, as it is not an economically sound business model...at least not in a sane legal environment).

It makes no difference if money is backed up by something or if it is allowed to fluctate according to market forces. Fiat currency is backed by the goodwill of the banks/government and recognised as legal tender by the people. The market forces can be natural or they can be artificial. If they are artificial it means a group of people are using fiction to cause instabilities and profit from that. The second case is where the ethical problem arises.

Okay, I'm not quite getting this paragraph. What do you mean by "allowed to fluctuate according to market forces?" Fiat money, for the most part, fluctuates in value according to amount in circulation, not market forces...in other words, whoever controls the mint controls the value of that currency, the rate of change in value of that currency, and the direction of the rate of change.
You say "Fiat currency is backed by the goodwill of the banks/government and recognized as legal tender by the people." Correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought fiat money is, by nature, "backed" with nothing except the word of law of the government that printed it. The government recognizes its currency as "legal tender" and, through the laws that government enforces, requires its citizens to recognize it as well. That is what makes it "fiat" money...it has value only because the governmental power structure commands it to be so by fiat...which is to say, by decree. There is no "goodwill" involved, nor is any necessary. And the people have no legal choice but to recognize that money...until such time as they work to change the laws that put that money in play, that is.
You say "the market forces can be natural or they can be artificial." I don't think that's right either. There is no such thing as an "artificial market force." If it's artificial, it's not a force of the market. That aside, I do agree that it is unethical to conceal true market functions and forces by artifice, for whatever reason. This is my primary problem with practices such as Quantitative Easing and Stimulus.

reply to post by EarthCitizen07


(continued from this post)

Further it makes no sense to me to fix the price of currency on something that has no method of valuation other than the certificate method of the past. But like I said in my previous post, there is not enough precious metals to go back to such a system.

Precious metals already have value. They do not require a certificate to have that value. The "value" of any product or service can be measured by calculating how much of a given currency can be had in exchange for that product or service at a given time. But that currency, or certificate, or whatever, does not confer value upon the product or service. The value exists because of the demand for that product or service. For instance, gold has many properties that make it desirable--conductivity, corrosion resistance, malleability, aesthetics. These properties cause people to want gold--they create a demand for it. Gold, like everything else, is finite in supply, so people must compete with each other in various ways in order to obtain it. Therein lies the value. It is not "set" by a certificate, or anything else. If we add another desirable property to gold--if we give it legal standing as a representation of buying power, by making it money--then the demand for gold will rise, and the value of gold will rise accordingly.

When a paper currency is "backed" by some value standard, such as gold or other precious metals, the relationship between the paper and its backing is measured using weight or mass, not "value". One Newbuck = 1 gram pure gold. So the buying power of the paper currency is defined by the value of the set amount of gold it is backed by. You seem to think it's the other way around...like the "certificates" were what defined the value of the gold they represented. Not the case. And that is why you cannot say "there aren't enough precious metals" to use them as money and currency backing.

You mention Ron Paul, libertarians, etc. I'm not sure why. I'm not an RP supporter, nor do I consider myself a libertarian...though I do have some agreements with them, primarily on the "get the damn gov outta my life, and everyone else's lives too" subject.

You mentioned Lincoln and the "greenbacks." I'm familiar with that history. It doesn't change my original point, which is that saying "there aren't enough precious metals" to use them to back currencies is a false statement.

Originally posted by MrRamblinRose
Its not about rich vs poor, they can have their money, they earned it. However, when that money starts influencing government to favor the 1% instead of the other 99% then we have a problem.

But in reality, the 99% have way more money, in the aggregate, than the 1%. In the U.S., total net worth of private individuals is estimated at $53 trillion for 2011. The Forbes 400 have an estimated combined net worth of $1.5 trillion.

Very rich people are a minority. They are a financial minority as well. The overall success of lobbying pursuits by organizations such as the NRA, which is primarily funded by millions of small $10-$50 donations by its members, show that the financial power of the %99, as a group, is a force to be reckoned with, as opposed to the financial lobbying power of the numerous wealthy/famous people who have publicly voiced opposition to NRA goals.

Originally posted by Tsurugi

When a paper currency is "backed" by some value standard, such as gold or other precious metals, the relationship between the paper and its backing is measured using weight or mass, not "value". One Newbuck = 1 gram pure gold. So the buying power of the paper currency is defined by the value of the set amount of gold it is backed by. You seem to think it's the other way around...like the "certificates" were what defined the value of the gold they represented. Not the case. And that is why you cannot say "there aren't enough precious metals" to use them as money and currency backing.

But there has to be enough troy ounces of gold and silver to BACK-UP the currency in circulation. Certificates only confer ownership to the gold and silver, nothing else! For example you take your valuables to a safe deposit and everything in that safe deposit belongs to you.

Then the people who ran this deposit scheme realised that barely anyone came to claim their gold/silver so they gradually converted the certificates into currency. This is how fractional-reserve banking came to be established and the same principles apply today minus the actual gold and silver. Today it is purely fiat currency backed only by the goodwill of the government, bankers and people.

I use the term goodwill loosely. Simply it means faith, just like religious people have faith on their idols. Monopoly money could be legislated into use if everyone agreed, rather than federals reserve notes or USA Treasury notes as during the civil war.

Originally posted by Tsurugi

Originally posted by MrRamblinRose
Its not about rich vs poor, they can have their money, they earned it. However, when that money starts influencing government to favor the 1% instead of the other 99% then we have a problem.

But in reality, the 99% have way more money, in the aggregate, than the 1%. In the U.S., total net worth of private individuals is estimated at $53 trillion for 2011. The Forbes 400 have an estimated combined net worth of $1.5 trillion.

Very rich people are a minority. They are a financial minority as well. The overall success of lobbying pursuits by organizations such as the NRA, which is primarily funded by millions of small $10-$50 donations by its members, show that the financial power of the %99, as a group, is a force to be reckoned with, as opposed to the financial lobbying power of the numerous wealthy/famous people who have publicly voiced opposition to NRA goals.

No. You are wrong. Way wrong. At least 50% of all the currency in circulation is held by the 1%!

It is called trickle down economics because a few crumbs fall off the table and the scavengers fight like dogs to prevent starvation. Old money stays old and new money becomes old as well. The babyboomers are useful idiots for the evil elite. By evil elite I mean billionares and trillionares!