Four Freedoms

[Plane]

You're skipping from one point to another.  I was addressing the issue of whether raising the tax on those who earn $250K a year would make any difference to the overall employment situation, and I demonstrated that it would not. 

Not really , the tax is out of the funds availible for new hires so it certainly reduces the potential for new hireing.

Joe's ambition to own his own business is slowed by paying taxes , more taxes slow him more , at some point the taxes cross the margin at which he will never be able to buy the business , and at an even greater point it crosses the point at which he would be unable to build it himself.

Kennedy reduced Taxes a lot and the effects were terriffic , why is this forgettable?

[Michael Tee]

<<Not really , the tax is out of the funds availible for new hires so it certainly reduces the potential for new hireing.>>

? ? ?   The TAX is on Joe's earnings from the business.  The more the business spends on new hires, the less money there is for Joe's salary and/or dividends, and the less Joe's annual income.  Once the annual income dips to $250K or less, there is no tax increase for Joe at all.  If he DOESN'T hire new people, there's more money to pay Joe, and he will be taxed at the higher rate, unless he chooses not to distribute some of the profits to himself, leaves it in the company and keeps his income under $250K (but then can't access the funds for his own use.)

<<Joe's ambition to own his own business is slowed by paying taxes , more taxes slow him more , at some point the taxes cross the margin at which he will never be able to buy the business  . . . >>

Haven't we already been through this?  If JOE is too fucking greedy to work for $250K before taxes, SOMEBODY ELSE will be all too happy to work for $250K before taxes, even if this year it won't net him as much after tax as it did the year before.  From a $250K annual income, regardless of the tax on it, there will be plenty left over to support somebody (maybe not Greedy Joe) very nicely.  It's really Joe's choice to buy or not to buy - - somebody else will jump at the chance if he passes, maybe paying less because Joe backed out.

 <<and at an even greater point it crosses the point at which he would be unable to build it himself.>>

Joe won't bother to build a business which could earn him up to $250K in pre-tax annual earnings WITH ABSOLUTELY NO TAX INCREASE to contend with?  Well, fuck Joe!  Plenty of other plumbers would jump at the chance.  WILL jump at the chance.  Not everybody needs $250K per year just to live on.

<<Kennedy reduced Taxes a lot and the effects were terriffic , why is this forgettable?>>

I think you also forgot the circumstances in which JFK was able to reduce taxes - - the U.S. in the wake of WWII was still swimming in unprecedented prosperity, with the biggest share of the world's export trade that it has ever enjoyed.  You didn't see a single Asian car on American roads, gas and everything else was relatively cheap and the demand for consumer goods, pent up during the war, had been making everyone rich.  You may have noticed, today times aren't so good.  You've got a half-trillion dollar deficit and the costs of the Iraq war, although deferred, will have to be paid at some point, in the total sum of $3 trillion.  Your balance-of-payments situation is pretty sick, you're a net borrower, not a net creditor . . .    Must I go on?

[BT]

I think you also forgot the circumstances in which JFK was able to reduce taxes - - the U.S. in the wake of WWII was still swimming in unprecedented prosperity, with the biggest share of the world's export trade that it has ever enjoyed.

You once again shoot from the hip.

Kennedy took over during a recession.

[Amianthus]

I was addressing the issue of whether raising the tax on those who earn $250K a year would make any difference to the overall employment situation, and I demonstrated that it would not.

You haven't "demonstrated" anything; you stated an opinion as if it were fact.

You did the same thing when minimum wage increases were being debated a while back, and the facts are in on that - employment at the low end (where the minimum wage jobs are) is down. Even before the current financial meltdown.

[Plane]

You may have noticed, today times aren't so good.  You've got a half-trillion dollar deficit and the costs of the Iraq war, although deferred, will have to be paid at some point, in the total sum of $3 trillion.  Your balance-of-payments situation is pretty sick, you're a net borrower, not a net creditor . . .    Must I go on?

What part of this is a higher tax suppose to help?

[Xavier_Onassis]

What part of this is a higher tax suppose to help?
==========================================

If you owe more on a credit card than you earn, and then you get a raise, what part of your raise helps your debt situation?

[Xavier_Onassis]

Kennedy reduced Taxes a lot and the effects were terriffic , why is this forgettable?

Okay, let's set taxe rates for individuals and corporations just where JFK set them.

They would be higher for everyone than where they are now.

[Michael Tee]

<<Kennedy took over during a recession. >>

Yeah but "the fundamentals of the economy were strong."

The U.S. was in much better shape then than it is now.  Balance of payments and trade, relative lack of foreign competition.

[richpo64]

>>Yeah but "the fundamentals of the economy were strong."<<

As they are now. According to Barney Frank anyway.

[Xavier_Onassis]

Yeah but "the fundamentals of the economy were strong."<<

As they are now. According to Barney Frank anyway.

===================================
That is what McCain said, just before he said the opposite.
SOME fundamentals are strong, others are not.

Americans still work longer hours and get fewer benefits from increases in productivity than anyone else in the first world, they get fewer days of vacation, and they have a lot more difficulty getting a union to represent them.

Financial institutions, on the other hand, pay their execs huge salaries for screwing things up.

[_JS]

I was addressing the issue of whether raising the tax on those who earn $250K a year would make any difference to the overall employment situation, and I demonstrated that it would not.

You haven't "demonstrated" anything; you stated an opinion as if it were fact.

You did the same thing when minimum wage increases were being debated a while back, and the facts are in on that - employment at the low end (where the minimum wage jobs are) is down. Even before the current financial meltdown.

And were they trending down before?

Job growth (loss) studies have been mixed on minimum wage. I explained this to Plane, though he refused to let go of HS economics. Many studies in the 1990's showed a marked increase in job growth, wages, and profit after the minimum wage increases at the state level and the federal increase.

[Michael Tee]

<<Americans still work longer hours and get fewer benefits from increases in productivity than anyone else in the first world, they get fewer days of vacation, and they have a lot more difficulty getting a union to represent them.>>

This is all true, but most of the poor saps don't even know it.  Their MSM hardly mentions the subject and the percentage of the working class that are union members is way down from its peak level which was probably in the 1940s or 1950s.

It's really interesting to me how all the supposed "frontier values" of hard work and self-reliance have been skillfully mobilized and turned against the working class by their exploiters and the poor dumb schmucks don't even know how they're being fucked over.

This morning on the "Your Money" segment of CNN, this Heidi Collins or Kollins babe was interviewing some expert on the economy and/or the election and they got onto the topic of how Americans tend to vote their pocketbooks and so how the economy has become the dominant issue in the election and fear (of hard times) the dominant emotion, and the guy made the interesting point that in Europe, where they have real socialists often in power, the electorate is a lot less fear-driven even in bad times, because of the government safety net - - they have free medical care, if they want to send their kids to university, all the kids need to do is pass the entrance exams, the tuition is taken care of by the government, and subsidized low-income housing is freely available. 

Yet the MSM has the U.S. public so terrified of "socialism" that mere mention of the word is enough to end the discussion.  Anything that looks like socialism is "bad."  These poor dopes are brainwashed better than Pavlov's dogs.

[richpo64]

>>Americans still work longer hours and get fewer benefits from increases in productivity than anyone else in the first world, they get fewer days of vacation, and they have a lot more difficulty getting a union to represent them.<<

I suppose Bush invented this? Oh, it must of been Cheney. 

This media driven mania about the state of the economy serves one purpose, scaring people into voting for the Messiah Barry O. Barney Frank admitted as much. He's looking forward to being able to spend, spend, spend when Barry turns the bowling alley into a basketball court. Then he's said they'll just tax those rich folks more to pay for it.

[Plane]

<<Kennedy took over during a recession. >>

Yeah but "the fundamentals of the economy were strong."

The U.S. was in much better shape then than it is now.  Balance of payments and trade, relative lack of foreign competition.

So when our economy is weaker it needs more taxation ?

That seems like prescribeing leeches for anemia.

[Michael Tee]

<<So when our economy is weaker it needs more taxation ?>>

No, when your treasury is approaching the "empty" mark it needs more money.

<<That seems like prescribeing leeches for anemia.>>

It's more like prescribing a transfusion to a guy who's lost 50% of his blood.