[MasterP]

Raven said:

MasterP said:

Raven said:

I have a 5970 and 2 24” monitors….so….yeah.

Notice that is well outside what he said he wanted to spend. Like 3x more than he wanted to spend.

 

Nice effort though.

 

Oh no you misunderstand me. I wasn’t suggesting…just needlessly gloating:D

Tell you what, how about if you don’t needlessly bash our inadequacies and we won’t needlessly bash yours

[MasterP]

Nickname said:

lol masterp uses wiki for his sources

And yet no one proves what I post to be factually incorrect. I know there are three versions of the truth but Wiki has yet to steer me wrong.

[MasterP]

If you already know the facts it doesn’t take a whole lot of research to post here. Just a quick confirm from wiki and you’re done.

[MasterP]

Raven said:

I have a 5970 and 2 24” monitors….so….yeah.

Notice that is well outside what he said he wanted to spend. Like 3x more than he wanted to spend.

 

Nice effort though.

[MasterP]

I’m done with this thread. No one’s actually reading my posts, they’re just skimming and scanning. Bitey thinking I called him an Obama supporter is a prime example of how well people are paying attention.

 

When you guys want a real discussion on this, let me know. Scanning my posts for key words and replying completely out of context is not what most call a discussion.

[MasterP]

Bitey said:

Also many of your posts are very insinuating about my support to Obama and calling me a socialist. Listen my ideas for how we get the Nation out of debt may run parallel to the ideas of some socialists, that does not make me a socialist, that makes me a person with ideas that run parallel to socialism. Honestly I haven’t looked at what a socialist is at all, these are ideas from my head based on how I see things.

 

You called me an Obama supporter somewhere, I am not accusing anyone of changing posts, but I know what I saw. If I saw it wrong then whatever considered it ignored.

I never once called you an Obama supporter. Not once. I mentioned Obama only in the context that your ideals can’t/won’t come to be under his administration.

 

You are, however, a socialist. Go look it up, I promise your ideas are textbook, old-school socialist. On that note, I was making conservative arguments long before I had even heard the term. It all boils down to how you were raised and the mentality ingrained by your parents.

[MasterP]

Bitey said:

I am loling at this entire post, every thing you say is not a counter argument it is simply a dodge, as I was trying to say before there are arguments for it and against it, there are points in history where it has proven to work and where it hasn’t.

So citing examples of turning a failing economy around by doing the exact opposite of what you propose is not a counter-argument, it’s a dodge? When has lowering taxes ever not helped the economy? When has it ever increased unemployment?

 

Bitey said:

I am done with this, instead of trying to find a good alternative all you do is bash what I say and tell me I am wrong no wonder people get annoyed with you.

So the exact opposite of what you propose isn’t a good alternative? I said use the 1929 tax code, guess you ignored that. Since you want me to spell it out, I’ll do so. Lower personal federal income taxes to 25% max and lower corporate tax to 5%. I would say cut the tax on the poor to something really low but the poor already don’t pay taxes so there’s really no point.

 

Bitey said:

It’s quite an easy discussion about how we can get the nation out of debt, your way has worked in the past and so has mine, I propose an in between and I am wrong?

You can’t say “do this when this happens and do this when that happens”. Who determines when to have high taxes and when to have low taxes? Who’s job is it to lower the taxes back down? Who’s supposed to enforce the lowering of taxes? What we need is a system that’s PERMANENT, one that is always in place and doesn’t change based on how arbitrarily good or bad someone thinks the economy is. Since there’s always going to be poor people, there’s always going to be someone who thinks taxes on the rich aren’t high enough. Even if 99% of people aren’t poor and the economy is great, there’s still that 1% of poor that would make a racket about raising the taxes back up. Would that 1% be enough to raise taxes back to 90%? Your proposal creates a ton of questionmarks and leaves the entire tax code vulnerable to arbitrary interpretation.

 

Bitey said:

Also stop making assumptions about me I read your entire post but unlike you I don’t break apart every single *edited*ing thing you have to say and try to tear it apart. I hear what you are saying and some of it makes sense other parts is straight up garbage

It had nothing to do with you not tearing my post apart. I said that because your reply read like you hadn’t read it. For instance, how my “garbage” is supported by fact and history.

 

By the way, what did I post that’s “grabage” and where is your evidence?

 

Bitey said:

I like how you conveniently ignored the part about you defending the wealthy, anyone who defends the wealthy is a *edited*ing idiot.

What’s wrong with me defending people who earned their wealth themselves? Their success should be an inspiration that ANYONE can be successful in this country but instead of trying to create your own success you’re trying to destroy theirs. Why is that? What gives you the right to take the wealth and success from someone who’s worked all their life for it? When you work hard all your life and have enough to retire at 55 how would it make you feel if someone in their early 20s came knocking on your door and said that it wasn’t fair that you’re rich and they’re poor and demands that you pay their health insurance for life and finance their early retirement? It would *edited* off 99% of Americans, would it *edited* you off?

 

Bitey said:

I don’t care that they got that far honest to goodness working, you know what, they still did it in this country, and now that they can they send jobs to china, oh wait weren’t they supposed to be creating jobs?

Not every rich person sends jobs to China, in fact, the majority of business owners that do outsource are the ones that already avoid paying taxes, as I discussed earlier. I also discussed why they send jobs overseas and offered an alternative to keep them from doing so. You talked about Steve Jobs and how he dodges taxes, do you really think Apple computers are built in the US? No… they’re built in China by third party companies.

 

If corporate taxes were low enough to warrant doing so, they would build them in the US. That would create JOBS. Same goes for GM, Ford, Chrysler, HP, Dell, the list goes on. If they build it in the US they have to pay taxes on it at every step. They’re taxed when they buy the solder, taxed when they buy the chips, taxed when they buy the plastic, by the time the consumer buys a product it’s typically been taxed at least 5 times, for PCs as much as 10. If they build it in China and ship it over here all they pay is the cost of frieght. Why? Because other countries actually WANT manufacturing jobs and set their tax rates to encourage business. They encourage growth, as in, lowering the taxes as you employ more workers. In the US, as a company grows, the taxes get higher. Why would you expand a business in this country knowing that your profits would decrease because of higher taxes? It makes no sense at all.

 

Instead of having lawyers as representatives, why don’t we start electing businessmen and entrepreneurs to congress? Every time one is put up for election the media and special interests rips them apart and a ambulance chaser gets elected instead. If the government was run more like a business by people that actually knew how the economy and businesses worked we wouldn’t have most of the financial problems that we do.

 

Bitey said:

And if my family has to get by on barely nothing then why can’t we rely on the wealthy to help with that?

Because you don’t need to. My family was where you describe yours to be 40 years ago. You can’t acquire wealth or prosperity overnight, and if you did you’d squander it like every lottery winner does. It takes decades of work. You may never really enjoy the fruits of your labor but you can at least ensure that your children, or grandchildren, never have to live in want like you did. Hollow words now but I promise you in time they’ll become much more relevant.

 

Trust me, my family knows how your family feels. My grandfather came back from Germany without a diploma, married, and with nothing to his name but an old car. He cleaned aluminum vats at Alcoa for 30 years and not long ago got cancer from it. The difference? He invested every penny he earned and made the family live like paupers for it. He paid the $120,000 for cancer treatment in cash without a complaint or flinch.

 

If you get nothing else from this post, get this, you don’t have to crutch yourself on someone else to be successful in life. Not only will you be more successful earning it yourself, you’ll feel a hell of a lot better about it. For example, if a professor posted the answers to the test online before giving the test, would you look at them? Of course you wouldn’t. Would you feel better when got an A on the test without cheating? Of course you would. The victory is hollow without the effort.

 

Bitey said:

You’re arguments really are full of holes, stop making excuses for someone who has everything and realize the situation it puts others and how it makes them feel. If everyone did that, we’d live in a different place.

So wait. Because some are rich and others aren’t we should punish the rich to make the poor feel better? Do you have any pets? Well I don’t and it makes me feel bad so I’m going to send Animal Control to your house to take your pets away because it’ll make me feel better. How does that make you feel? EVERYONE has something that someone else wants; wealth, family, friends, love, XBOX, pets. What if you having a fiance makes me feel bad, is it then fair for me to do something to take that away from you? By your own logic, yes it is. What if Nickname being married makes me a sad panda, is it ok for me to try to take that from him? You say example is not relevant but is it really that different? Nickname worked on that relationship for 8 years, what’s the difference between earning love and marriage and earning wealth? Many would argue that a loving wife is wealth…

 

Bitey said:

Proof that you can’t talk to a person who isn’t in a position of nothing. You aren’t in it anymore who gives a *edited* if you were at one time, everyones situation is different. I honestly believe that if you sat there and told me that you didn’t want help when your family was hurting you would be lying to my face.

So because I earn a few dollars an hour more than you I’m wealthy and don’t understand anything about being poor? *edited* you *edited*.

 

And btw, no, we didn’t want help. You know why? Because we knew that we had to create our own success, that no one else would create it for us. No amount of temporary aid creates permanent success, just a permanent crutch.

 

Bitey said:

One CEOs bonus would keep me in good condition for almost 5 years. Where it would last that CEO about 30 minutes, this is the difference that people live every day, you clearly don’t understand or see that.

I understand. What I don’t understand is why that matters. 5 seconds of income from Steve Jobs would keep me good for a year but I’m not Steve Jobs and I’m not going to get his money. So why does it matter? What I don’t understand is the mentality that beacuse I have less than someone else that obligates me to take it from them. The grocery store has more food than I do so does that entitle me to go take food for free? If you think it does, try it, but don’t be surprised when reality kicks you in the *edited* for it.

 

I bet you’ve even cursed a power company before during a high-usage month, those *edited* corporations charging high rates for something that should be freer than it is. What you don’t realize is the government controls their rates. What you also didn’t know is almost every power company will NOT turn you off for nonpayment during the hottest and coldest months. It’s called corporate mandated compassion for the poor. Hard to grasp, I know, but it does exist.

 

The difference between me and you: If the government mailed everyone a $5,000,000 check the first question you’d ask is “where do I sign” and the first question I’d ask is “why is this mine”.

[MasterP]

Ephraim said:

MajorMajorMajor said:

Who says socialism is bad?

Anybody keeping on eye on Greece.

What happened in Greece? Oh yeah that’s right, socialism failed. High taxation of the wealthy to support free healthcare and early retirement for the working class destroyed the economy and drug the Euro down for the entire continent nearly 15% overnight.

 

Just beacuse it’s either failed or is failing in every other country means nothing though, it’ll work here. We’ll do it “correctly”… meaning in 50 years we’ll be like Canada who is re-privating their healthcare system. Mainly because socialized medicine is expensive and not working…

[MasterP]

NuRayZ said:

again it’s not all about money masterp, what did we have to show for those 8 glorious years of tax cuts, war, and spending?

The highest Dow Jones in the history of the stock market. I’d say that’s at least worth something…

 

Bitey said:

I’m just gonna stop commenting completely until MasterP realizes that I am not an Obama supporter

Where did I say you were an Obama supporter? Please, link it and I’ll apologize. What I said was none of what you wanted would happen under Obama, which pretty much implies you to be the exact opposite of an Obama supporter.

 

From the tone and content of the rest of your reply it looks like you didn’t actually read my reply earlier. It looks like you saw some Great Depression history that didn’t jive with what you thought you knew so you skimmed down until you saw Obama mentioned then raged.

 

Bitey said:

It’s pointless for me to argue if all you are going to do is bash me because you think I support Obama, I am neither a socialist nor a conservative.

If you like high taxes, “big brother” government, and “make everyone equal” government programs then by definition you are either socialist, marxist, or communist. Your posts and ideals are textbook socialism. Go read what socialism means because you are it, you fit the definition almost exactly.

 

Since you didn’t read my reply in the other post I’ll quote it here:

MasterP said:

While there’s nothing wrong with socialism in theory, in practice it fails miserably every time. Sorry, I mean it just, does.

 

There’s always going to be an upper class and a lower class. The most successful countries in history are those with a middle class, something that socialist countries generally destroy very quickly. We can switch to socialism, and everyone will be happy for a while, but after the love affair is over you’ll find that those that were the upper class still are and everyone who didn’t measure up is now essentially slave labor. I guess everyone being poor is fairer than the 13-17% we average now, unless you’re in the 83-87% who isn’t.

 

Sorry to be so mathematical about this but that’s how you’ve got to look at it. There’s always going to be poor people, and there’s always going to be rich people. Your goal in life should be to get as high as you can without stepping on others. If you give all your money away while being poor, you’ll always be poor, and the overall good you do for society will be minimal however if you focus entirely on yourself until you’ve planted your feet in solid financial ground you’ll be in a much better position to actually do some good for the less fortunate. Yes I’m a greedy *edited*, yes I hoard my money, but that means that when I want to give to a good cause I actually have the money to make a difference. Everyone can give $5 to a cause but its the people that give $500 that keep those causes alive.

 

Bitey said:

What I can’t stand for right now is the inability for conservatives to see that the obnoxiously wealth are killing our economy. Do you not realize that defending them makes you look like a complete jack *edited*? Let’s defend the guy who sits on a throne instead of the guy who makes an honest day to day living, YEAH THAT MAKES PERFECT SENSE, GOD I BET THE GUY ON THE THRONE IS PERFECT AND HAS DONE NOTHING WRONG HE DESERVES ALL OF THAT MONEY!

What you fail to realize is that the vast majority of the wealthy got it by honest, day to day living. The difference being they targetting their labor into more productive enterprises or simply rose the corporate ladder better. What you’re saying is that since they’re more successful than you are, as a nation, we should punish them with 90% taxes. How is that fair? Who determines what is and is not “wealthy”? What happens when people start thinking that anything above minimum wage should be taxed 90%? Surely you don’t think THAT’S fair…

 

Bitey said:

I didn’t say Mellon’s sole reason for doing the tax cuts was to lower what he paid, I am sure he had many other alternate reasons, I was just pointing out how much he saved in doing so, I am sure that was a pretty big reason for him doing it too though. “Oh hey look I can save about $800,000 dollars just by giving all the wealthy a tax cut, we deserve it we have been spending money in this country for a while.” And so they have, again I cannot deny some of his other reasons, they do make sense.

So again I ask, are you saying Mellon’s primary reason for creating the biggest short-term economic boom in this country’s history was for personal tax savings? Will you not admit that what he did was smart for the economy as a whole and not just for his own wallet?

 

Bitey said:

So here is the honest to God truth, when the economy is down, we need to tax the *edited* out of the rich. When it is up and we are in peace times, national debt is down, give them a tax cut. I think that is a fair solution for everyone.

So you haven’t read anything I’ve posted here. Go re-read my first post which details how and why that policy doesn’t work and gives a historic example of when the exact opposite worked beautifully. I’m not going to waste my time retyping it, it’s not what you want to hear and puts a giant crack in your view of reality so I’m not really expecting you to read it. At least pretend like you did though so you aren’t saying the same things over and over after being proven wrong by your own historic example.

 

Bitey said:

Also please provide links MasterP cause I honestly think you made up about 70% of your entire post.

Everything I posted is supported by textbooks, wikipedia, and google. Sorry it hurts but socialists and liberals rarely know their history which is why your policies continually destroy our economy and those “greedy rich” conservative policies always spark growth cycles in it.

 

NuRayZ said:

thats the thing bitey if you aren’t with them you are against them. That’s the conservative mentality. their way or the *edited*ing highway. the know it all party man.

Last I checked you can’t raise tax on the “wealthy” to 90% AND lower them to 25% at the same time. I know the liberal perspective is hard to support with facts and examples in threads like this but at least try posting something constructive. Instead of random pop-shots at opinions, supported by facts, that you don’t like.

 

I give kudos to Bitey for posting coherent sentences that aren’t entirely made out of talking points. He at least expresses his own opinion and as wrong as I may think, it’s his and his alone. Not identical in every way to that of half the people on TV and in Washington.

[MasterP]

So wait, you itemize Obama’s tax cuts and ignore Bush’s? That alone proves your analysis to be 100% biased. You also conveniently left out Obama’s payouts to unions and special interests as well as the 2 car companies he bought with taxpayer money. I’m sure you meant to include those…

 

Liberal 101:

Lesson 1 – When you can’t win a debate, bash Bush.

Lesson 2 – When in doubt, bash Bush.

Lesson 3 – When there’s blame to be had, blame Bush.

Lesson 4 – Never let an opportunity to bash Bush go to waste.

 

It’s pretty sad that out of everything that’s been posted and everything you could have bashed, you chose to bash Bush, someone that is not a focal issue in this thread.

 

If you want to compare deficits, let’s do so graphically. It’s pretty obvious where Obama starts…

 

Just curious though, when are we going to start seeing some economic improvement? Obama said that without the stimulus, the unemployment rate would increase to, what was it? 7 percent? Well he got his stimulus and we went to 10 percent unemployment anyway. I’m sure this is all Bush’s fault but where did all that money go? The American people are starting to feel like Terry Benedict in Ocean’s 11: “What happened to all that money?”

 

By the way, Obama’s war spending is getting up there too, you know. He could have simply pulled us out of the Middle East and that alone would have balanced the budget. You can bash Bush all you want about the wars but if your guy isn’t stopping them he’s every bit as much to blame.

 

This whole war thing is a nice aside but how about we stay on topic. Bitey wanted a discussion about the economy and class system, not the Middle East.

[MasterP]

Bitey said:

Also your “history” is quite skewed. Yes as a conservative you would have me believe that the taxing of the rich hurts the economy. This is true when the rich are actually spending money and creating jobs. When the rich do not spend money and are not creating jobs we need a higher tax on the rich to fuel the economy. Instead sending everything to China and other foreign countries to “cutback” on their “debt”.

Jobs are going overseas because our corporate tax rates are the highest on the planet. Literally. It makes no sense to do business in America when you can do it in China who has less than a 5% corporate tax rate. Couple near zero tax costs with the low-cost labor and what you get is a no brainer in the production world. I wouldn’t build a factory in America, and I’m about as pro-America as you can get.

 

Bitey said:

Industrialist Andrew Mellon led the charge to lower the tax rates on the wealthy in the 1920s. He claimed that doing so would increase overall tax revenues and stimulate the economy. The top rate was eventually cut from 73 percent in 1921 to 25 percent in 1926. Mellon alone saved $800,000 a year in taxes as a result.

Somehow I knew you’d claim that because he was rich that his sole motivator was to decrease his own taxes. Maybe it had something to do with him being a financial prodigy, turning failing businesses into profitable businesses and owning a bank before he was 30. No, his financial advice can’t be because he actually knew how the market worked or how business owners felt, it was solely because he was a greedy banker that wanted more money. He used his greedy banker hoarded money to fund the creation of businesses in oil, steel, shipbuilding, construction, metal refining, coal, and industrial waste. He also used his hoarded greedy gold to back several people later inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame.

 

Yeah it had nothing to do with ANYONE else. You realize how big of a jackass that argument makes you look, right?

 

Bitey said:

Unfortunately, Mellon’s tax cut was a disastrous idea for most Americans. Income was distributed upward, into too few hands. The money was used for speculation in the stock market rather than the creation of jobs. The ultimate result was the Great Depression.

So let me get this straight. Cutting the tax on the poor down to .5% actually DECREASED the money they had? That makes absolutely no sense at all. Please, enlighten us to where that money went.

 

Interesting that you’d mention the stock market as the reason for the Great Depression because in April of 1930 the market had returned to where it was in early 1929. So all things being equal, the only people who actually lost money in the stock market crash were those who panicked and sold for pennies on the dollar. What really happened was people spent everything they had when they market started doing good and panicked and sold out for very little when it corrected. It wasn’t business losses in the market that caused the initial problems with the 1929 recession, it was loss of consumer confidence that caused the people to stop spending and investing their money and instead hoard it, like what you bash greedy bankers and businesses for doing. The lack of market investments caused the early 1930 gains to slide in later years and lack of spending caused many businesses to close. The Federal Reserve made many extremely poor decisions on the outset of the recession that caused it to turn into a depression and our international trade was severaly hurt when Great Britain went back to the gold standard with unrealistic pre-WW1 parities to the market value, essentially setting the trade value of $5 per £1. At the worst part of the current recession, the pound sterling never went above $2 per £1. International trade was completed killed after some dumbass thought they could get more revenue and passed the Smoot–Hawley Tariff Act which led other countries to create retaliatory tarifs.

 

It was not the “rich” that caused the Great Depression. If anything it was the poor people having more money and acting like rich people that caused it. There’s nothing wrong with the poor or “middle class” acting like the rich but they *edited* well better have the backing to support it or an exit strategy ready.

 

Bitey said:

Tax rates were raised to help pay for World War II and they stayed high in the postwar years.

Tax rates were not raised to pay for WW2, they were raised in an attempt to increase federal revenue during the depression. Notice in my last post it mentioned that by 1935 the tax rate was at 80% again.

 

Bitey said:

From the end of the war until 1962, the top rate was 91 percent. Those tax rates, unthinkably high today, coincided with the longest period of prosperity in U.S. history, the creation of a middle class and substantial public investment in education and infrastructure.

Longest period of prosperity? Yeah ok. Here’s some reality for you, there’s been a middle class since at least the end of the Civil War, probably as soon as the War of 1812, if not sooner than that. There’s always been people who weren’t poor but at the same time weren’t considered “rich” or “ruling class”. To say that back then you were either a slave or a slave owner is dubious at best because we all know there were many who fell between those distinctions.

 

The substantial investment in education came as a result of the baby boom and the infrastructure increase was caused by the massive increase in available, and cheap, manual labor after WW2. Rather than see unemployment rise 10-15% they put them to work. I mean you CAN brag about them but it’s not really a valid brag because even the most conservative presidents would have done the same.

Bitey said:

There are a lot of facts in history about taxes and things, you say to look at the numbers so look at the numbers. The fact is if the rich are taxed higher the economy does better.

So our economy was terrible leading up to the Great Depression then. That contradicts 99% of historians but I’m sure you know best…

 

So taxes on the rich have been steadily increasing the last few years, notice how the stock market is magically not getting any better? Everyone at work was really excited when the market hit 11,000 a while back and I’m like “yeah it was 14,000 when Bush was in office” and the office got silent. When the song was “taxcuts for the wealthy” the market was doing great but when it changed to “tax hikes for everyone making over $250,000 $200,000 $150,000 $225,000 ?” well, the market has been tanking ever since. I mean I love the low market, I’m investing like crazy, but it’d be nice if you’d let up on the rich taxes so the market can go up again.

 

Bitey said:

Now what I will agree with Mr. Mellon about is that having higher tax does encourage the rich to dodge these taxes and look for loopholes. Steve Jobs for example is getting paid $1 a year by Apple for being CEO since his return in ’97. Where he makes his money is in dividends, he holds the biggest share of Disney stocks there is, about 138 million of them and hasn’t sold any. He pulls in about 48 million per year from that, and since this is technically a “Corporate” type of income he only gets taxed about 15%.

Thanks for agreeing with me that if taxes were lower more rich people would pay them.

 

Bitey said:

My proposal is to find a happy medium, clearly right now it isn’t good enough because the nation is still in debt and we still have people that are obnoxiously wealthy. It’s like we are sitting on a *edited*ing gold mine, but we are all like, “Mmmm, you know what let’s not go into that.”

Well see here’s the problem. Obama has not once, but twice, increased the debt ceiling for the federal government. When he took office, Obama instantly tripled the yearly deficit left by Bush and in his first 2 years will have spent 11% more than Bush did in his 8 years. Lowering the debt or creating a fair tax system isn’t going to happen under this guy so you can pretty much kiss goodbye any idealism you’re holding on to for at least another 2 years or until after the next revolution if Obamacare isn’t abolished.

[MasterP]

Close Dice but no. It’s much more thought out than that

[MasterP]

By the way, I’ll bet anyone $20 that it doesn’t feel good to give.

[MasterP]

Like I said, no one who proposes higher taxes on the rich actually know their economic history. Since you obviously don’t know, it’s time for a history lesson.

 

Since you bring it up, let’s discuss the 1920s…

 

The federal income tax was created in 1913 with a tax rate of 7%, by the end of WW1 it was 77% for people making $1 million/year or more. To put that in perspective for you, that would be people making $150 million per year today, not even close to where you’re whining about. Treasury Secretary Mellon, then the 3rd highest income taxpayer in the US behind Ford and Rockefeller, said “The history of taxation shows that taxes which are inherently excessive are not paid. The high rates inevitably put pressure upon the taxpayer to withdraw his capital from productive business.” He proposed sweeping and drastic federal income tax reductions which got strong support from President Coolidge, who argued that “the wise and correct course to follow in taxation and all other economic legislation is not to destroy those who have already secured success but to create conditions under which every one will have a better chance to be successful.”

 

Wikipedia said:

The Mellon plan

Mellon came into office with a goal of reducing the huge federal debt from World War I. To do this, he needed to increase the federal revenue and cut spending. He believed that if the tax rates were too high, then the people would try to avoid paying them. He observed that as tax rates had increased during the first part of the 20th century, investors moved to avoid the highest rates—by choosing tax-free municipal bonds, for instance. As Mellon wrote in 1924:

 

“The history of taxation shows that taxes which are inherently excessive are not paid. The high rates inevitably put pressure upon the taxpayer to withdraw his capital from productive business.”

 

If the rates were set more reasonably, taxpayers would have less incentive to avoid paying. His controversial theory was that by lowering the tax rates across the board, he could increase the overall tax revenue.

 

Andrew Mellon’s plan had four main points:

1.Cut the top income tax rate from 73 to 24 percent

2.Cut taxes on low incomes from 4 to 1/2 percent

3.Reduce the Federal Estate tax

4.Efficiency in government

 

Mellon believed that the income tax should remain progressive, but with lower rates than those enacted during World War I. He thought that the top income earners would only willingly pay their taxes if rates were 25% or lower. Mellon proposed tax rate cuts, which Congress enacted in the Revenue Acts of 1921, 1924, and 1926. The top marginal tax rate was cut from 73% to 58% in 1922, 50% in 1923, 46% in 1924, 25% in 1925, and 24% in 1929. Rates in lower brackets were also cut substantially, relieving burdens on the middle-class, working-class, and poor households.

 

By 1926 65% of the income tax revenue came from incomes $300,000 and higher, when five years prior, less than 20% did. During this same period, the overall tax burden on those that earned less than $10,000 dropped from $155 million to $32.5 million.

 

Mellon’s policy reduced the public debt (largely inherited from World War I obligations) from almost $26 billion in 1921 to about $16 billion in 1930, but then the Depression caused it to rise again. By 1935, Franklin Roosevelt had gone back to high tax rates and wiped out Andrew Mellon’s initiatives. The top tax rate went to 80% by 1935 and the federal government increased excise taxes in an attempt to make up for the lost revenue.

Just so we’re clear on that last part, economists now believe, by a large majority, that FDR’s economic decisions doubled the length of the Great Depression. Part of that was the tax code changes he implemented. Actually most of it was but I also give credit to the fact that FDR was a colossal dumbass.

 

I’m going to stop right here and let you flounder around on the history you thought you knew. I’m perfectly fine with going back to the 1929 tax code, it reduced the burden on the poor, encouraged the rich to be more productive to society, and lowered the national debt. Problem is, it did those by doing the exact opposite of what you propose.

[MasterP]

NoDice said:

yeah, whats so wrong with the rich giving money to everyone? no one in that video seemed upset giving or receiving money. its really a win win if you take the time to get out of your snob bubble. I mean [returns later to figure out the rest of his troll comment]

They’re giving away lobbyist money…

 

troll fail

[MasterP]

In essence, this is how Obamacare passed.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z0ZszEYBBD0

[MasterP]

Why would you get high if you know you already have psychological issues? That’s like taking an unstable computer and overclocking it.

[MasterP]

NuRayZ said:

But whats the percentage if you fall under the excise amount? I’m still inclined to believe you won’t get taxed, but maybe i’m reading it wrong.

Unless it specifically states that you won’t get taxed for it, NEVER assume the government won’t tax you on it. Leaving it out entirely means they’re coming back later to add a tax once the storm blows over and Fox News quits watching.

 

lol

[MasterP]

I may be interested in buying your old card.

[MasterP]

NuRayZ said:

NuRayZ said:

god i hate you.

lol I know

 

[MasterP]

So I was wondering why my browser always got really laggy in threads where major was active so I looked at the properties of his avatar. Did you know that *edited* thing’s 2MB big?

[MasterP]

That’s a nice summary and all but how about posting what’s actually in the text? You know, the text they voted on, not a staffer’s cliff notes version.

 

It’s going to be really hard to find, mainly because they don’t want you actually reading it for yourself.

 

The problem with Cliff Notes is they typically leave out important details that still make their way to the tests. The Cliff Notes for Great Gatsby is especially lacking in this regard.

[MasterP]

MasterP said:

I’m going to stick with the “I’m right until you prove me wrong with actual references and page numbers” routine.

[MasterP]

NuRayZ said:

http://www.healthreform.gov/documents/section1401_highcostplan.pdf

 

there is where it is i think

 

edit: maybe not

 

my bad it’s 10,200 and 27,500. LARGER than previously estimated.

What I see there is a list of revisions with no context as to where they actually go. Maybe post what’s actually in the legislation.

 

NuRayZ said:

for more information please email: advocacy@cose.org

You realize COSE used to advocate AGAINST mandating healthcare coverage and forcing employers to provide health insurance to their employees, right? So now if I want more information about government mandated coverage I need to contact their advocacy group? Can you say sell outs? I’m pretty sure they don’t represent the majority of their small business members who will now be required to offer coverage to their employees.

 

The unintended consequence with small businesses that no one is talking about is that all these companies that are on the mid-20 employee threshold are going to fire people to get below where the government requirement is. It’s terrible but that one extra employee creates a massive expense for the company and you can’t blame any company that fires a $30k/year worker to save $120k/year in insurance costs. Like I said it’s terrible but with the economy the way it is and the housing market crash coming next year it becomes a simple numbers game: employee 24 workers and fire a few or go out of business with 25-30.

 

NuRayZ said:

like you always say: go research yourself

Yeah see I did and couldn’t find what you found which is why I asked where you found it. Google didn’t readily tell me I was wrong and when it did there was no evidence to support the opposing viewpoint. I’m going to stick with the “I’m right until you prove me wrong with actual references and page number” routine.

[MasterP]

NuRayZ said:

but let’s get back to the topic at hand. Cadillac high premium plans. And go read again dude, they tax after 8500, or 23,000 for families. If you don’t hit that mark with your insurance plan, you don’t get taxed. hell technically you don’t get taxed anyway, your insurance company or business does.

Like I said before, please post a page number in the legislation. Since you know you’re right, this shouldn’t be hard.

 

 

NuRayZ said:

These high premium plans are ridiculous. they pay maybe a little more than the average american, and get *edited*load in return. Detuctables? laugh. 0 detuctables, copays averaging 10 dollars, anything you can imagine paid for (acu *edited*ing puncture, message therapy, even TANNING?!). And yet you have a problem with taxing that kind of luxury? that more people can have health insurance now, but because we are taxing luxury bull*edited* it’s wrong?

That’s almost what I have on my HSA and it’s far from a “cadillac” plan.

 

NuRayZ said:

the average american (who gets insurance through their employer) has 699 dollar detuctables, an average of 20 dollar copays, and can’t get covered for a *edited*ing cough. Spreading the wealth health around isn’t that bad of an idea man. Besides, their Cadillac premiums may go up 1,000 dollars annually, or maybe their deductible goes up from 10 to 30.

Very few republicans have a problem with the added limitations placed on the insurance industry. The problem is that everyone who remains on a private plan, regardless of how “luxurious” it is, will see the cost of their insurance rise an average of 30% in the next 4 years directly because of this. This *edited* affects everyone, including the innocent middle class that actually likes what they have. That’s what I have a problem with. Obama said I can keep my insurance, and while that in itself is a partial lie, he never said anything about the cost of my plan staying where it’s been for the last 4 years. Regardless of what the Messiah may tell you, it IS possible to help the poor without *edited*ing everyone else.

 

Bitey said:

I am not and have never been a liberal, I am a *edited*ing *edited*ed off American, who can’t believe that someone like you would call me arrogant. I don’t think I deserve *edited* from you, I am ASKING FOR HELP, when the *edited* will you get that?

You didn’t say anything about needing help. Your posts sounded entirely like you were playing the blame game. If you need help there are plenty of ways out there to get stuff. What you can’t do is slap the wealthy across the face, call them greedy *edited*s, and then ask them for help paying your bills.

 

Bitey said:

Poor people are BEGGING for help from the rich, saying “hey man, I know I don’t deserve it but I am in a bad place at a bad time in a bad way, please help”. Oh sorry that not good enough for you, you want me to shine your shoes massah? Seriously get off your *edited*ing high horse.

You really think I’m making much more than you right now? Really? You might be surprised…

 

 

Bitey said:

It ain’t as easy as you claim it to be and arrogant text book responses about investment 101 is quite offensive, not everybody took that class.

Class? No. I learned from Google. All it takes is being curious about finances and taking the time to see what the experts, who made their own fortunes, did to get them and how they kept them through tough times. If I wanted to be an *edited* I’d have gone into how big your IRA account should be at this point in your life if you want to be one of those “rich *edited*s” when you hit 65.

 

Bitey said:

just because I believe in a world where the rich choose to share there wealth instead of horde it doesn’t make me a liberal. It makes me someone who cares for other people.

It actually makes you a socialist. While there’s nothing wrong with socialism in theory, in practice it fails miserably every time. Sorry, I mean it just, does.

 

There’s always going to be an upper class and a lower class. The most successful countries in history are those with a middle class, something that socialist countries generally destroy very quickly. We can switch to socialism, and everyone will be happy for a while, but after the love affair is over you’ll find that those that were the upper class still are and everyone who didn’t measure up is now essentially slave labor. I guess everyone being poor is fairer than the 13-17% we average now, unless you’re in the 83-87% who isn’t.

 

Sorry to be so mathematical about this but that’s how you’ve got to look at it. There’s always going to be poor people, and there’s always going to be rich people. Your goal in life should be to get as high as you can without stepping on others. If you give all your money away while being poor, you’ll always be poor, and the overall good you do for society will be minimal however if you focus entirely on yourself until you’ve planted your feet in solid financial ground you’ll be in a much better position to actually do some good for the less fortunate. Yes I’m a greedy *edited*, yes I hoard my money, but that means that when I want to give to a good cause I actually have the money to make a difference. Everyone can give $5 to a cause but its the people that give $500 that keep those causes alive.

[MasterP]

Bitey said:

Glad the lucky few have it so easy. If he had enough money to start his own company than he wasn’t in any position to complain.

Typical liberal responce, “oh he must have had money if he started a company”. Yeah ok, we banked 2 inheritances and lived like paupers for years before he got laid off. Why? Because he saw how his employer spent money and knew it was unsustainable. So yeah, take every penny your parents don’t spend on staying in your house with power and food and put that in the bank. After a couple years you’ll really be surprised just how much even the “poor” in our society squander. About 1/5 of the uninsured in this country make over $60,000/year and what’s sad is they never understand where it all goes.

 

Bitey said:

We have to work every day to not have everything we own torn out from under us, be in that position and then say, “Oh no you just work your *edited* off and then everything is fine”. Bull*edited* again

Before getting laid off my parent’s household income was a little over $30k/year. If that’s not working hard enough or being poor enough I don’t know what is.

 

 

Bitey said:

Six years ago my Dad still had a job didn’t have to worry about *edited* and the economy was not in the state it currently is in.

You’re implying that it’s the taxpayer’s fault your dad didn’t plan ahead or save money for a rainy day. No offense, but exactly why should I be responsible for someone else’s poor judgement? I’m sure at the time everything was all sunny and great but it’s basically common sense in the investment world to have at least 6 months of living expenses in the bank with around 2 years of expenses being an ideal reserve. You may not get that new TV and your 18 year old may get to drive the family minivan, but when *edited* goes bananas you’ve got breathing room and don’t have to worry about money.

 

Bitey said:

What he probably had that both I and my father lack was a reserve of money, and the knowledge of something to put it into to create his own business.

You get reserve money by saving. You save by not spending a penny more than is required to keep a roof over your head and food in your cabinets. Anything else you got, like a TV or a car, nice Christmas presents, those are luxuries. The TV we had until I left for college was older than I was…

 

Bitey said:

Because what I would want to do with my wealth is make sure I am taken care of, I don’t need a lot. Notice I said need, I made spoil myself a bit but everything else I had would go into charities, scholarships, things like this.

When/if you ever get money that song and dance will change. Drastically. That’s a 20 year inb4 but it never fails. Also, you do realize that rich people donate to charities and scholarships right, I mean by your definition Bill Gates is like the best guy in the world. The way you people begrudge others for their success and expect and demand they share it… it’s downright arrogant. If I build computers out of wood in my garage and from that create one of the largest computer companies in the world, that’s MY success. You played no part in that success so who are you to take that from me?

 

Bitey you like completely derailed this thread, talking about CEOs and student loans. Open another rant thread and vent in there. You just completely let Nurayz off the hook and that *edited*es me off more than your textbook liberal targetting of the rich.

[MasterP]

Bitey said:

I don’t think all the player’s have played their hands yet, to be quite honest.

 

If it is just as you say you are right it sucks, but I still don’t think all the cards are on the table yet.

What wouldn’t be played yet? The more time goes by the more this gets worse. There’s nothing new getting put in this bill so there are no new cards to be played. All we can do is learn about the cards currently in play and every other week something new and downright devastating for the middle class gets brought to light because now ordinary people have the time to actually read the legislation.

 

What does student loans have to do with insurance? Sorry you went to a public school, sorry you didn’t have the money so some rich guy gave you the money and let you pay him back over time, sorry you aren’t happy that you got $50,000-100,000 in charges for education from the GOVERNMENT. I love how everyone gets all upset about this whole student loan thing and blames rich people and the banks when the GOVERNMENT is the one that is continually raising the price of public education. Sure 50 years ago no one had student loans, you think it’s the fault of rich people and banks that the price is now higher than it was then? Also remember that 50 years ago if you couldn’t afford college, you didn’t go. Back then you didn’t need a college degree to be successful in life, it just meant you had to work your *edited* off with your hands instead of your mind. Guess what’s changed since then? Nothing. If you work your *edited* off you don’t need a college degree, not then, not now, not ever.

 

This whole “screw the rich” is just a smoke screen that I’m honestly surprised so many are getting lost in. The richest are the ones LEAST hurt by this provision and the poorest amoung us are absolutely devastated. About six years ago that was my family down at the poverty line, my parents spending almost half their income on the family’s insurance, so I know *edited* well how bad the current system sucks. The difference? Instead of *edited*ing about how bad things were my dad started his own company, worked his *edited* off, and now has a company worth 15-20 million. You going to say my dad is a greedy *edited*? Btw, guess what kind of college degree he has? Oh wait, he doesn’t have one, he just worked his *edited* off…

[MasterP]

NoDice said:

why is being taxed on a luxury a bad idea?

 

or is it a bad idea just because you are money hungry?

This is another part of the “insurance tax on everyone”. If you have insurance as a company benefit, you get taxed on it. If you can’t afford insurance, you get taxed for not having it. The only way to win here is to buy your own, oh wait, once this starts you can’t buy any new private plans, you have to get a government sponsored plan.

 

Bitey said:

Anything that takes the money out of the obnoxiously wealthy people’s hands is just fine by me, I am sick and tired of the rich getting richer, the poor suffering, and the middle class becoming non existent. If changing that means socialism then *edited*ing bring it on.

This takes money out of EVERYONE’S hands, from the Bill Gates’ of the world down to the toilet scrubbers making mimimum wage. You say it’s good to have a tax on EVERYONE that directly hurts the middle class then complain about the middle class disappearing. Well no *edited* the middle class is dying, it’s because of the throngs of voters like you that think *edited* like this only affects the wealthy.

 

And talk about bashing the poor, if you can’t afford insurance you get taxed $695 or 2.5% of your gross (pre-taxed) income for it. Obama cares about the poor so much he created a new tax just for them…

 

Why is it that 2/3 of Americans are in favor of repealing Obamacare? Maybe because it doesn’t do *edited* for another 4 years and sticks the middle class, yes the average ordinary middle class workers, with the entire *edited*ing bill.

 

Ever stop to think why almost every state is broke? They raised the taxes on the wealthy thinking that alone would solve their problems. If your elected leader has a (D) beside his name that’s short for “dumbass that doesn’t know economics or history” because both history and economics classes will tell you that lowering taxes on the wealthy RAISES the tax income and raising taxes on the wealthy LOWERS the tax income. Something to do with the wealthy spending their money in the US economy, creating jobs, forming companies, that sort of thing.

 

NuRayZ said:

inb4 this was a chain email to scare the american people. Definitely taken out of context.

 

“go look at the bill….I like how the email doesn’t include all the details… like if youre on a individual plan anything that the COMPANY pays that is over $8500 is taxed… (yes the company not the individual)…I don’t know about you but my company’s portion is nowhere near $8500 and if you on a family plan anything over $23000 is then tax.

So you combat chainmail with another chainmail?

 

How about you go find the provision that specifically states those limitations on who this tax hike affects. I couldn’t find them, and Adobe Reader’s search feature looked really *edited* hard too. I also found the numbers you were talking about, only they weren’t the numbers you listed so I don’t know if the OP “chain letter” is a lie or not, maybe it is, but whoever you got your quote from was definately lying.

 

Here’s a biggie that makes absolutely no sense at all. Flexible insurance plans, like HSAs, are an extremely smart move because it forces you, the consumer, to shop around for the best prices on doctors and drugs. Obama was extremely pushy on this subject and spoke at length about making prescriptions drugs cheaper and getting people to buy over-the-counter meds if they do the same thing. So why is that people on flexible insurance plans are now banned from filling claims on over-the-counter drugs? Obama has now made it more beneficial for me to get a $200 bottle of allergy medicine on a prescription than a $5 box of Claritin D. How *edited*ed up is that?

[MasterP]

And everyone wondered why I was so against Obamacare…

 

Inb4 “*edited* MasterP you were right this is a bad idea”

[MasterP]

What Steam forgot to mention is that most games advertised as Mac compatible don’t actually run in Mac OS.

 

You can spend 3-4 hours per game changing start parameters and tweaking system settings OR you can spend 1 hour installing Windows7 in Bootcamp and play it flawlessly. You decide.

[Author]

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