The rich are different — and not in a good way, studies suggest

[sangha]

The rich are different

The rich are different — and not in a good way, studies suggest

Psychologist and social scientist Dacher Keltner says the rich really are different, and not in a good way: Their life experience makes them less empathetic, less altruistic, and generally more selfish

In fact, he says, the philosophical battle over economics, taxes, debt ceilings and defaults that are now roiling the stock market is partly rooted in an upper class "ideology of self-interest."

“We have now done 12 separate studies measuring empathy in every way imaginable, social behavior in every way, and some work on compassion and it’s the same story,” he said. “Lower class people just show more empathy, more prosocial behavior, more compassion, no matter how you look at it.”....

...There is one interesting piece of evidence showing that many rich people may not be selfish as much as willfully clueless, and therefore unable to make the cognitive link between need and resources. Last year, research at Duke and Harvard universities showed that regardless of political affiliation or income, Americans tended to think wealth distribution ought to be more equal.

The problem? Rich people wrongly believed it already was.

This explains a lot about what's wrong with this country

 

[OscarB63]

Americans tended to think wealth distribution ought to be more equal.

I tend to think wealth distribution should be determined by the effort you put into acquiring it. If all you do is sit back and complain about how much someone else has....you don't derserve very much yourself. :shrug:

 

[AdamT]

I tend to think wealth distribution should be determined by the effort you put into acquiring it. If all you do is sit back and complain about how much someone else has....you don't derserve very much yourself. :shrug:

So then you would favor a 100% estate tax?

 

[imagep]

I tend to think wealth distribution should be determined by the effort you put into acquiring it. If all you do is sit back and complain about how much someone else has....you don't derserve very much yourself. :shrug:

You know, I agree 100%.

If all you do is sit back and live off of your inheritance or daddies money, well, that doesn't show much effort. When it comes to money issues I am 100% a conservative, except for taxes. Income distribution tends to be warped in capitalism because of the nature of humanity. In a perfect world, with no human character faults, we could have a perfect market and income would be fairly distributed based upon productivity and merit. Unfortunately, we don't live in a pefect world, thus there is a need for a tax policy which guides income distribution towards the goal of it being determined by productivity. This can be accomplished in three ways:

1) Inheritance should be taxed at the same rate (or higher) as income from work.

2) Capital gains should be taxed at the same rate (or higher) than income from work.

3) Income which is significantly above the norm for our socieity ($400k/yr) should be taxed at a rate that is significantly higher than income which is within the norm.

Any and all taxes should be as low as they can be and still operate our government on a reasonable well balanced budget.

 

[OscarB63]

So then you would favor a 100% estate tax?

why? how much effort did the IRS put into acquiring the estate? the estateholder put in the effort. he/she should decide what happens to it, not the govt.

 

[OscarB63]

This can be accomplished in three ways:

1) Inheritance should be taxed at the same rate (or higher) as income from work.

it already is

2) Capital gains should be taxed at the same rate (or higher) than income from work.

they already are

3) Income which is significantly above the norm for our socieity ($400k/yr) should be taxed at a rate that is significantly higher than income which is within the norm.

again, it already is.

 

[imagep]

it already is

Nope. It isn't.

they already are

Not in the USA. Has Alabama sudceeded from the Union again?

again, it already is.

again, you are on drugs.

I can only assume that you are now going to present some sort of twisted logic way of defending your incorrect statements.

 

[TurtleDude]

You know, I agree 100%.

If all you do is sit back and live off of your inheritance or daddies money, well, that doesn't show much effort. When it comes to money issues I am 100% a conservative, except for taxes. Income distribution tends to be warped in capitalism because of the nature of humanity. In a perfect world, with no human character faults, we could have a perfect market and income would be fairly distributed based upon productivity and merit. Unfortunately, we don't live in a pefect world, thus there is a need for a tax policy which guides income distribution towards the goal of it being determined by productivity. This can be accomplished in three ways:

1) Inheritance should be taxed at the same rate (or higher) as income from work.

2) Capital gains should be taxed at the same rate (or higher) than income from work.

3) Income which is significantly above the norm for our socieity ($400k/yr) should be taxed at a rate that is significantly higher than income which is within the norm.

Any and all taxes should be as low as they can be and still operate our government on a reasonable well balanced budget.

These sort of suggestions are most likely not the result of sound economic thinking but rather spite towards others who have done better than those who advocate such nonsense

Libs and the envious never ever want to evaluate what value people receive for the taxes they pay

Its purely based on From each according to their ability (as decreed by the libs)

 

[Ikari]

I tend to think wealth distribution should be determined by the effort you put into acquiring it. If all you do is sit back and complain about how much someone else has....you don't derserve very much yourself. :shrug:

That's not a bad idea, right? I mean, you'd need large estate and death taxes to do this because you don't want people sitting back and complaining about how rich they are when all they ever got was daddy's money and never did a day's work in their life. Right? Innovation and work drive the system, lax behavior and laziness hamper it. If people should acquire wealth based proportionately on the effort they put forth to get it; then there has to be a very large drain of money so that it cannot build up in families without continued investment of work and innovation.

 

[Ikari]

it already is



they already are



again, it already is.

hahahhahahahahahahahahhahaha

 

[OscarB63]

That's not a bad idea, right? I mean, you'd need large estate and death taxes to do this because you don't want people sitting back and complaining about how rich they are when all they ever got was daddy's money and never did a day's work in their life. Right? Innovation and work drive the system, lax behavior and laziness hamper it. If people should acquire wealth based proportionately on the effort they put forth to get it; then there has to be a very large drain of money so that it cannot build up in families without continued investment of work and innovation.

see my comment above. how much effort did the govt put into acquiring those estates? why should the govt get to take what others have earned in order to give it to those who have earned nothing?

 

[TurtleDude]

That's not a bad idea, right? I mean, you'd need large estate and death taxes to do this because you don't want people sitting back and complaining about how rich they are when all they ever got was daddy's money and never did a day's work in their life. Right? Innovation and work drive the system, lax behavior and laziness hamper it. If people should acquire wealth based proportionately on the effort they put forth to get it; then there has to be a very large drain of money so that it cannot build up in families without continued investment of work and innovation.

The government certainly has less effort into taking stuff that was already taxed. There should be no estate or death taxes

 

[imagep]

why?

because if we are to have a government, we have to have taxes. Since inheritance tax causes no real damage to anyone, other than to remove an unearned windfall, inheritance is the least damaging of all forms of taxation. Every dollar of inheritance that we fail to tax away is a dollar that we have to tax in another form, such as the work tax. Why would anyone on earth prefer to pay a tax on income that they work for, as opposed to pay a tax on a windfall that they recieve from luck?

how much effort did the IRS put into acquiring the estate? the estateholder put in the effort he/she should decide what happens to it, not the govt.

No, sorry, the estate holder passed away. He no longer gives a rats arse about what happens to his estate. Dead people don't have rights, and even if they did, it would be ludicris to put their rights over the rights of the living. If the living have to pay taxes, then there is most certainly nothing wrong with the dead paying taxes.

 

[OscarB63]

hahahhahahahahahahahahhahaha

really? last time I inherited anything, the "estate tax" was nearly 50%. how many people pay 50% on income from work?

under our current "progressive" tax code, those at the upper end of the income bracket pay significantly higher % than do those within the norm (considering that 47% of income from work is taxed at ZERO PERCENT, any tax those making over 400K pay is significantly above the norm.)

 

[Tucker Case]

I tend to think wealth distribution should be determined by the effort you put into acquiring it.

why? how much effort did the IRS put into acquiring the estate? the estateholder put in the effort. he/she should decide what happens to it, not the govt.

These two statements are incompatible with each other.

The recipient of inheritance has put in little to no effort towards acquisition.

Also, the the government can legitimately claim that they put in quite a bit of effort into acquisition due to defense spending alone. The estateholder would not have had the opportunity to acquire said wealth without such defense spending.

 

[Ikari]

see my comment above. how much effort did the govt put into acquiring those estates? why should the govt get to take what others have earned in order to give it to those who have earned nothing?

Because government takes. And you're looking to use it to enforce this "wealth is proportional to effort" ideal. Fair enough. But under that ideal, you have to have large estate and death taxes along with inflation and other means by which you can drain wealth away. That thus means that to keep wealth you have to put in energy to maintain, to grow it, it requires even more effort. Under such case, wealth can be proportional to effort, just as you wanted.

 

[Aunt Spiker]

The rich are different



This explains a lot about what's wrong with this country

Hmm - fascinating.

You could describe some poor people the same way: less empathetic, selfish and less altruistic. . . of course -these last two are interchangeable, not two separate qualities.

 

[OscarB63]

because if we are to have a government, we have to have taxes. Since inheritance tax causes no real damage to anyone, other than to remove an unearned windfall, inheritance is the least damaging of all forms of taxation. Every dollar of inheritance that we fail to tax away is a dollar that we have to tax in another form, such as the work tax. Why would anyone on earth prefer to pay a tax on income that they work for, as opposed to pay a tax on a windfall that they recieve from luck?



No, sorry, the estate holder passed away. He no longer gives a rats arse about what happens to his estate. Dead people don't have rights, and even if they did, it would be ludicris to put their rights over the rights of the living. If the living have to pay taxes, then there is most certainly nothing wrong with the dead paying taxes.

why on earth should the govt get to tax income twice?

 

[TurtleDude]

because if we are to have a government, we have to have taxes. Since inheritance tax causes no real damage to anyone, other than to remove an unearned windfall, inheritance is the least damaging of all forms of taxation. Every dollar of inheritance that we fail to tax away is a dollar that we have to tax in another form, such as the work tax. Why would anyone on earth prefer to pay a tax on income that they work for, as opposed to pay a tax on a windfall that they recieve from luck?



No, sorry, the estate holder passed away. He no longer gives a rats arse about what happens to his estate. Dead people don't have rights, and even if they did, it would be ludicris to put their rights over the rights of the living. If the living have to pay taxes, then there is most certainly nothing wrong with the dead paying taxes.

specious argument-death confiscation taxes not causing harm to anyone.

YOur nonsense ignores the fact that the only people subjected to the death tax are the ones who paid heavily during their lifetime

 

[Tucker Case]

last time I inherited anything...

Why would you accept anything you did not earn through your own effort?

 

[OscarB63]

Hmm - fascinating.

You could describe some poor people the same way: less empathetic, selfish and less altruistic. . . of course -these last two are interchangeable, not two separate qualities.

It's easy to be altruistic when you don't have anything to give away. :shrug:

 

[Ikari]

really? last time I inherited anything, the "estate tax" was nearly 50%. how many people pay 50% on income from work?

under our current "progressive" tax code, those at the upper end of the income bracket pay significantly higher % than do those within the norm (considering that 47% of income from work is taxed at ZERO PERCENT, any tax those making over 400K pay is significantly above the norm.)

Capital gaines is not taxes more than regular income either. There's a reason why the marginal tax rate turns over and goes down at sufficient wealth. Because once you can start defining the bulk of your income as bonuses and capital gains, you start paying less percentage of taxes. Which is why people like Buffet can have a lower marginal tax rate than their secretaries.

 

[Tucker Case]

YOur nonsense ignores the fact that the only people subjected to the death tax are the ones who paid heavily during their lifetime

rof The dead are not subjected to anything on Earth once they are dead. Also, corpses cannot own things.

 

[TurtleDude]

These two statements are incompatible with each other.

The recipient of inheritance has put in little to no effort towards acquisition.

Also, the the government can legitimately claim that they put in quite a bit of effort into acquisition due to defense spending alone. The estateholder would not have had the opportunity to acquire said wealth without such defense spending.

You are making a statement unsupportable by facts

Many heirs have helped create wealth. For example, a successful doctor whose wife put him through medical school and whose kids might miss having a father during their childhoold because he is working 75 hours a week to build up his medical practice

 

[OscarB63]

Why would you accept anything you did not earn through your own effort?

who says I did? you have no idea how much effort I put into helping my parents acquire and maintain their estate.