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"Is the U.S. Due for Radically Raising Taxes for the Rich?"


I realize that you have a goose to cook, but at least be honest about your facts. As many people realize a price on a good should be seen relative to income. The suite at the Ritz is cheap for many that have lived there, but not so for others. In the case of military spending it is true that we spend more than other countries and more than we fairly should relative to rich countries in Europe or Japan. But the spending is not so very high in a historical context, if you put it in reference to the economy funding it and look at the history and not a small section selected to fit a populist demand.
US Government Defense Spending History with Charts - a www.usgovernmentspending.com briefing
 

Read and quickly forgot.

M... r... a...
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Yes, of course.

Greenbeard said:
Not all policy ever is explained by your preferred "corrupted/bought by the rich" narrative.
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When its corrupted, it is typically not explained at all. Which is governmental trickery of high quality in LaLaLand on the Potomac ...
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joG said:
But the spending is not so very high in a historical context, if you put it in reference to the economy funding it and look at the history and not a small section selected to fit a populist demand.
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I beg to differ.

In the original posting of the budget-pie I noted also the relative weight of DoD expenditures in respect to other agencies. It is in this manner that we see/understand national priorities. (The Replicants had Obama by the short-'n-curlies in the HofR, from which issues all budget legislation - not by law, but by custom.)

The relative gaps are enormous comparatively, and (to me) beyond comprehension. This country has other far-more-important priorities that are not being addressed.

And some people (present company excluded of course) need a full-scale riot with many deaths in the streets to understand the real misery that abounds in this rich land of ours. How selfish can a nation get?

Then the people turn around and say in wonderment, "Hey! There's somethin goin down out there!"
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Lafayette said:
And so ... ?
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Well it's important to remember. Also over 75% of the budget in WWII was going toward the war. Shall we go back to that as well?
 
American said:
Well it's important to remember. Also over 75% of the budget in WWII was going toward the war. Shall we go back to that as well?
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OK, but last time I looked, the US was NOT at war - and yet 52% is still going to the DoD.

It's NOT the best policy - not by a longggggg shot. We can accomplish other and better objectives with the money ...
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Lafayette said:
OK, but last time I looked, the US was NOT at war - and yet 52% is still going to the DoD.

It's NOT the best policy - not by a longggggg shot. We can accomplish other and better objectives with the money ...
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That's bull**** and you know it. Try reading the US Constitution some time, to see what is #1 for the federal govt.

 
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BTW, it's none of your business anyway what we spend our taxes on.
 
American said:
That's bull**** and you know it. Try reading the US Constitution some time, to see what is #1 for the federal govt.
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Tiresome argument, employed every time someone on the Right can't convey a reasonable one ...
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Lafayette said:
Tiresome argument, employed every time someone on the Right can't convey a reasonable one ...
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You wouldn't understand apparently. Your thinking is horse****, and has nothing in common with running a constitution republic. Get back to me after you've taken an American civics class. Leftwing socialism is tired, useless and doesn't work. Have a nice day.
 
American said:
Leftwing socialism is tired, useless and doesn't work. Have a nice day.
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The usual blah, blah, blah from the Imbecilic Right.

Cretins stuck somewhere in the age of Genghis Khan with their "might is Right" rational of governance. And to do so, they envelop themselves in Ole Betsy with a copy of the Constitution under one arm.

A pathetic sight it is with immense distortion of First Principles marked by a true tyranny by the Moneyed Princes of Darkness who seek to manipulate the political process towards their own ends.

That is, the maintenance of an unfair and unjust governance "status quo" and complete disrespect of the economically disenfranchised ...
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American said:
That's bull**** and you know it. Try reading the US Constitution some time, to see what is #1 for the federal govt.

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Source of the pie-chart please - you cook the books? Anyone can diddle a pie-chart.

Give the Source!
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iguanaman said:
So Trumps whole campaign is a lie and there is no problem with incomes of the middle class? How absurd can you get? ]
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Trump's house of cards is falling down around his ears.

The Dork hasn't paid a cent in taxes in more than two decades!?! And 40% of the American people want him to run the nation?

From the New York Times (1 Oct., 2016), here:
Careful nonetheless, "would have allowed" does not mean he "was allowed" (to not pay taxes). But, if indeed dismissed from the payment of taxes, the accusation means that we, the sheeple (aka "taxpayers") have subsidized his financial existence for the past two decades.

If true, this has to be the largest Tax Rip-off in the history of American nation ...
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Fletch said:
Aside from satisfying your wealth envy, why should taxes be raised at all? Deficits are good, after all, so just let people keep what they make and increase the deficit.
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My "wealth envy"? If you only knew the truth.

Deficits mean you are mortgaging the future of your children. Do you think that the world will forever buy T-notes?

Some countries in the EU, with high debt-loads prior to the Great Recession had the same puerile idea - borrow to pay off the debt. Which is why they went "bust" when, with the GR, euro interest rates skyrocketed. They are still paying the damages ... and the EU is doing what the US did - called Quantitative Easing.

Quantitative Easing, meaning printing money and exchanging country debt for it. People like you think this is the easy-way-out. It isn't. From the cited article above:
In any recuperative economic scenario, there must be the will of consumers to expand consumption. When that longing returns after a deep, deep recession it takes a donkey's age for consumers to regain their previous spending habits.

Once bitten, twice shy ...
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The middle class & rich have been taking it up the azz long enough.

A hand up is a good thing, but we have been handing out free rides to the lazy for far too long.
 

Yes, comparing the fiscal expenditures of nations does help understand their priorities, but also shows where they see necessary to take responsibility, where others abdicate it or where they see fit to bribe the population for votes like in the social democracies by promising benefits that are not sustainable and must later be . This happens in the US too, where social spending is quite high. Social spending on health care is probably higher in the US per beneficiary than in Germany. In any event, the relation of military spending to GDP in the graph I posted falsifies most implications of your graph. And as European countries on the whole have not been shouldering their fair level of responsibility the US has been forced to do so. The reduction in spending relative to GDP partly reflects resistance in the US to maintaining the level of protection that the country has been affording the Europeans and other allies.

You go on about gaps that you see and hate. I am not going to look up the numbers now, but a few years ago a German friend was going on about the inequality thing too. So I pulled the numbers and compared the German and US ones by quintile. It turned out that, while the bottom quintile in the two countries had practically the same PPP buying power per person after transfers and tax all the higher quantiles had a higher income in the US. The gap he spoke about was due to most people doing better while the low incomes were the same.

The US is a federation of States much as is the EU albeit standing more united, better organized and far better constituted. If you then look at the income levels and distributions after transfers across the EU and compare those with the US, you might find that the US is doing okay, though, it is not a raging priority for the state to take responsibility for their lives from the individuals. While some member states are flush and happy all around, I recently saw stark poverty the kind of which we can hardly imagine in Romania and Spain. While the measures of income disparity are quite nice in the EU for each country, overall the disparity is huge. Last year there were reports in German public television of Greeks not being able to receive medical attention for cancer or heart disease. No medication. I am told recently that this urgency is improving now, but your crap about the " relative gaps are enormous comparatively, and (to me) beyond comprehension" in the US is hooey or just plain ignorance if not willfully destructive hostility. The country is very large with a very large and divers population. Of course there are differences and it is good so.

The stuff and similar things about race or health you expound is partly the reason for the exaggerated level of discontent in some quarters of the US. It gives people the feeling that there are educated people that think they should get presents that are being held back maliciously or that black lives don't matter to whites, because whites are ignorant, selfish and mean. It heats up the emotions and gives people the feeling they are somehow being cheated and robbed. Agents provocateurs might be an expression no longer in vogue, but it fits the situation well. I presume you know this.

So, why do you broadcast stuff like your graphs? The insinuations are destructive as the interpretation you give is simplistic and often hides the truth more than it reveals. There is a lot wrong in the US. No question about it. But the simplifications you provide just make the problems look simple to deal with. They aren't and you proposals will just cause more harm while weakening the country.
 

Loving communism invented by a German idiot who never implemented nor lived under his own insane philosophy of government.
 
Taxing google to buy more jet fighters from Boeing doesn't seem very compelling a reason to raise taxes on anybody. Unless the higher taxes are coupled to something new, then it is same crap, different day.
 
What does "due" even mean in the context of enacting policy?
 
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No it isn't, looter. Stop counting other people's money.
 
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