Tax the rich!!!

[KrazyHorse]

Absolutely right, there are only 30k people in the USA with a net worth of 30Mil +, which slants the numbers even more favorably in my favor. Thanks for catching that!

Are you smoking crack?

How does that have anything to do with your figures?

[Geronimo]

Originally posted by MRT144
as for the inheritance or estate tax, (death tax is silly because its not like the person is taxed when he dies. Imagine the scene: "well willy just kicked off, thatll be 1000 dollars. Oh he died of a gunshot wound...very sorry, its now 10000." It really is a tax on what you inherit and pass along. dolts.) im against it. what you do with your money after youre is your business. however, while youre alive, you i believe that a part of your income needs to go programs that benefit a large group of people.

forced alrtuism is far from the worst thing in the world.

wow, if this isn't a troll you an I appear to have exactly the opposite priority with respect to income tax vs. estate tax. Please explain why you think stealing someones hard work is a good thing while using money that used to belong to someone who is now dead and is being given to someone else who didn't work for it at all is bad. This should be interesting if nothing else.

[Berzerker]

Let's look at this from a non-ideological pragmatic approach:

Everyone in a community starts out with $100. Some people, being more inventive, more hard working, etc., figure out ways to turn that $100 into $1000 while others squander what they have. Now the people who squandered their money ask those who did not for help. The "rich" say, "sure, I've figured out a way to make farming more productive with this machine and I need help making machines". So they hire the less inventive who've squandered their money. Result: the "rich" get richer and their employees regain what they lost and more in addition to a better sense of hard work and responsibility.

Liberals come along and say that's unfair. We need to take what the "rich" person has and spread it among those who've squandered their wealth. Result: the "rich" person loses the capital they've worked to build up in preparation for expanding their business accompanied by the loss of jobs they would have created and the squanderers lose their jobs and their ticket to a better life all for a temporary, unsustainable gain.

Imagine how life would be if someone kept coming along every year to even out wealth. The productive would lose their production and lose their motivation to produce and the non-productive would sit back waiting for their yearly check and never learn the traits of the productive. What's the saying? Give a man a fish and he eats for a day, teach him to fish and he eats for a lifetime.

There's a reason Japan has been in the doldrums, they have a corporate welfare economy. The politicians prop up more inefficient businesses by taking from consumers and more efficient businesses. Look at what happened to Jaguar Motors when Hatcher ended their welfare. Jaguar had to improve or die, and they improved.

[Velociryx]

To GePap: Even if we assume that fully 36k of the 270k "new millionaires" are trust fund babies, that still leaves us with

36k trust fund millionaires
vs
234k boostraped ones

Again....which number is bigger? I know math's not my strong suit, so...help me out.



-=Vel=-

[Geronimo]

Originally posted by Velociryx
Absolutely right, there are only 30k people in the USA with a net worth of 30Mil +, which slants the numbers even more favorably in my favor. Thanks for catching that!

Further:

A 2002 study by Capgemini found that more than half of the high-net-worth individuals in the U.S. were "new money," or self-made millionaires. Inherited money is declining as a share of wealth in the U.S., according to the study, accounting for less than 20% of high-net-worth individuals in 2002.

taken from:

http://www.globalpolicy.org/socecon/inequal/2004/0615millionaires.htm

More? I'm beginning to enjoy this!

-=Vel=-

Well this helps me feel a little better. Maybe we aren't heading for an anti-meritocracy future dystopia after all.

[MRT144]

Originally posted by Geronimo


wow, if this isn't a troll you an I appear to have exactly the opposite priority with respect to income tax vs. estate tax. Please explain why you think stealing someones hard work is a good thing while using money that used to belong to someone who is now dead and is being given to someone else who didn't work for it at all is bad. This should be interesting if nothing else.

you have nothing to offer and contribute to society when youre dead.

[Geronimo]

Originally posted by MRT144


you have nothing to offer and contribute to society when youre dead.

...well yeah, exactly! So why do you like income taxes better than estate taxes?

[KrazyHorse]

Originally posted by Geronimo


Well this helps me feel a little better. Maybe we aren't heading for an anti-meritocracy future dystopia after all.

Don't believe it yet. Find out how they defined their terms...

[KrazyHorse]

Because with a correlation coefficient of 0.5 between intergenerational incomes the US is no meritocratic paradise...

[MRT144]

also...

berzerker, look at europe. they have a better than average welfare system. sure they arent economically impressive as the US, but i think it stands to reason they enjoy a better quality of life because they arent so focused on a rat race of money. Their governments provide the essentials so they can focus on more important things, like family, football, food, and fun.

[chequita guevara]

Originally posted by Velociryx
Again....which number is bigger? I know math's not my strong suit, so...help me out.



-=Vel=-

Okay, things have changed in the last decade and a half. It still remains to be seen whether this is a long term trend or one created by the internet bubble.

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by KrazyHorse
Because with a correlation coefficient of 0.5 between intergenerational incomes the US is no meritocratic paradise...

Did you miss my post? And Berz made the point about a dozen times now that people usually don't inherit wealth until after they're already well on they're way to being rich, or are already there.

[Velociryx]

Ummm....Che....not sure where you've been hiding bud, but in case you missed it on the news, the Internet bubble burst back in the 90's, and these guys made their fortunes AFTER that.



-=Vel=-

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by MRT144
also...

berzerker, look at europe. they have a better than average welfare system. sure they arent economically impressive as the US, but i think it stands to reason they enjoy a better quality of life because they arent so focused on a rat race of money. Their governments provide the essentials so they can focus on more important things, like family, football, food, and fun.

What gives you the right to determine that "family" is more important for me?

Funny, a liberal arguing for family values...

[MRT144]

Originally posted by Geronimo



...well yeah, exactly! So why do you like income taxes better than estate taxes?

there are no garuntees that at the end of the life, there will be taxable income.