I had no idea Scott Walker was so popular

[Dinner]

I'm not sure about declaring donations. It kind of encourages retaliation by supporters of the other side. There are websites where you can get maps of a particular candidate's donors' residences. It's scary.

If you're gay or believe in equal rights why shouldn't you retaliate against bigots who are attempting to keep you as a second class citizen? Further more, why doesn't the public have a right to know and thus allow the market to punish bad actors? Let there be complete transparency and then let everyone make up their own minds and if some companies get punished by consumers for political activities then that is just the free market at work.

[Kuciwalker]

I'd say I would make some what more in Canada, Australia, or Saudi Arabia if the American tax system would allow me to do so but the double taxation problem makes that not worth while or more likely a wash (depending on actual income levels). I'm still doing very well in the US but could make more if I moved to a place like Alberta but then I'd have the problem of both Canada's IRS and the US IRS trying to pillage my earnings. The US only exempts something like the first $70,000 in foreign earned income from US income taxes making it difficult unless you renounce US citizenship (something I'm not prepared to do).

Your job is very peculiar in that regard, Oerdin. Most people aren't geologists.

[giblets]

Except that same website also shows data for the UK which I bothered to run against Norway before posting. Having lived in both countries I can confidently say its full of **** re cost of living. The cost of the most basic items in Norway is way above comparable levels in the UK including as a proportion of income.

What the website is actually talking about is how much inflation each country had between 2005 and 2010, I think.

[Dinner]

It's ~10k$ more than Norway, Oerdin.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of...y_average_wage

Someone is so poorly educated he does not understand the difference between the average and the median.

[Dinner]

FACT - DD is more wrong than Oerdin.

He usually is but that doesn't stop him from talking BS constantly.

[The Mad Monk]

I'd say I would make some what more in Canada, Australia, or Saudi Arabia if the American tax system would allow me to do so but the double taxation problem makes that not worth while or more likely a wash (depending on actual income levels). I'm still doing very well in the US but could make more if I moved to a place like Alberta but then I'd have the problem of both Canada's IRS and the US IRS trying to pillage my earnings. The US only exempts something like the first $70,000 in foreign earned income from US income taxes making it difficult unless you renounce US citizenship (something I'm not prepared to do).

Soon not even that will save you.

Senators to Unveil the ‘Ex-Patriot Act’ to Respond to Facebook’s Saverin’s Tax ‘Scheme’

Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., has a status update for Facebook co-founder Eduardo Saverin: Stop attempting to dodge your taxes by renouncing your U.S. citizenship or never come to back to the U.S. again.

In September 2011, Saverin relinquished his U.S. citizenship before the company announced its planned initial public offering of stock, which will debut this week. The move was likely a financial one, as he owns an estimated 4 percent of Facebook and stands to make $4 billion when the company goes public. Saverin would reap the benefit of tax savings by becoming a permanent resident of Singapore, which levies no capital gains taxes.

At a news conference this morning, Sens. Schumer and Bob Casey, D-Pa., will unveil the “Ex-PATRIOT” – “Expatriation Prevention by Abolishing Tax-Related Incentives for Offshore Tenancy” – Act to respond directly to Saverin’s move, which they dub a “scheme” that would “help him duck up to $67 million in taxes.”

The senators will call Saverin’s move an “outrage” and will outline their plan to re-impose taxes on expatriates like Saverin even after they flee the United States and take up residence in a foreign country. Their proposal would also impose a mandatory 30 percent tax on the capital gains of anybody who renounces their U.S. citizenship.

The plan would bar individuals like Saverin from ever reentering the United States again.

“Eduardo recently found it more practical to become a resident of Singapore since he plans to live there for an indefinite period of time,” Tom Goodman, Saverin’s spokesman, told Bloomberg News in an email.

Last year 1,700 people renounced their U.S. citizenship.

http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2012/05/senators-to-unveil-the-ex-patriot-act-to-respond-to-facebooks-saverins-tax-scheme/

Asher might have some problems, as well...

[rah]

I think this poll was more recent on opinions for minimum wages

[Elok]

If you're gay or believe in equal rights why shouldn't you retaliate against bigots who are attempting to keep you as a second class citizen? Further more, why doesn't the public have a right to know and thus allow the market to punish bad actors? Let there be complete transparency and then let everyone make up their own minds and if some companies get punished by consumers for political activities then that is just the free market at work.

So, if a fellow in Nebraska contributes a large sum of cash to a pro-choice, pro-SSM, gun-control-favoring candidate's campaign, the public in the area have a right to know what that fellow has been doing (along with his address) and decide whether to "punish the bad actor"?

[Dinner]

Yeah, let it all be above board and let them decide if they want to boycott him or not. My prediction is once people learn their actions might have consequences most people & corporations will stop donating to extremist causes and instead will only publicly support something everyone can agree is good like the save fluffy baby kittens foundation. The hate speech will grind to a halt or at least the funding of political hate speech will once everyone has a right to know who is funding these things. Sun light is the best disinfectant.

[Elok]

That would be true if the general public bothered to look into these things. Instead the lunatic fringe from each side makes the effort; I suspect the boycotts and the added business from like-minded Americans roughly cancel out. On the rare occasion that the general public catches wind, there's a brief Facebook-fueled OMGdon'tsuppportthesemonsters campaign that vanishes as soon as the next scandal appears in roughly a week. Also, it's probable that some of the larger donors get a certain number of death threats from the aforementioned fringe. That's about it.

[Dinner]

As a practical matter, yeah, the general apathy can be hard to over come but I still believe greater transparency is better then less transparency. It puts everything above board and on the record instead of what we have right now with Super PACs funded by special interests with conflict of interests funding disinformation about climate change science (just one example). They'd still get to fund their lies and disinformation but at least everyone would have the right to know it's ExxonMobil and Koch Industries which are funding 90% of the bull****.

[DaShi]

Hmm, not sure who I should support and pretend that I would have made all the same arguments as despite demonstrating no previous expertise in this subject and many others. Because, I'm so smart, you know.

[C0ckney]

The point wasn't a causal relation; it was that lots of other things like income inequality vary widely between developed nations, it seems plausible that income inequality would too.

you could just as easily say that the economies of first world countries have many similarities and therefore it's plausable that it wouldn't. neither statement is very convincing taken on its own.

[C0ckney]

1) What you are calling "income" is actually a combination of both wage income and incorrectly measured capital income, which are very different things.

2) "Income" generally excludes the effects of government transfer payments and in-kind government services (e.g. medical care).

3) People with higher incomes tend to save much of it rather than consume it. These savings are then taxed repeatedly through taxes on capital gains and investment income. A lot of the remaining savings are never actually drawn down by the savers, and are left to charity, etc.

i don't understand what you're driving at here.

4) Think about it. Look at the lifetime incomes of super-wealthy. Human beings are just incapable of actually spending that kind of money on personal consumption. What exactly is Warren Buffet going to do with his billions, construct a mansion on the Moon?

this isn't true. the wealthy have a huge number of things they can and do spend their money on. even your average billionaire can buy a more ostentatious yacht or sink an enormous sum of money into a premier league football team.

[Dinner]

An interesting perspective from a very rich venture capitalist who spoke recently at TED.