newsflash: free market capitalism is what happens when government does nothing to prevent it.

(11-24-2017 08:21 PM)EagleX Wrote:  

(11-24-2017 07:44 PM)DavidSt Wrote:  

(11-24-2017 07:35 PM)stinkfist Wrote:  

(11-24-2017 07:33 PM)DavidSt Wrote:  The tax cuts from Reagan to now Trump have left many people behind while the wealthy have grown. My parents made less than $10,000 a year in the 1980s, and the economy sucks. They both worked their butts off at minimum wage. Reagan's tax cut did nothing for us. It helped placed a gap between the middle class and the wealthy, As it is, the Middle Class are slowly shrinking into the working poor. George W. Bush's paid tax holiday put us into another Great Depression. What did the companies used the money for from the tax cuts? Give CEOs and board members higher pay raises, and buy back stock from investors to inflate the prices of their companies. They never reinvested any money towards the business. That is why Hostess went out of business because of the corruption in the CEO/board members.

And Trump's crowing about the 401 K's growing? Only a small number of people in this country have it, and only a few people who invests in the stock market. The majority of people think the Wall Street is a bunch of crocked crooks that steals money from people and refuse to invest in it. Do you blamed people because of the likes of ENRON?

seriously.....your expectation level is aptly defined by this post....

YOU are the numbers WE are trying to elevatel.....

however, all you see is pig vomit.....can't fix you *******.....

have a good ******* day....

Well, the Republicans keep rolling out these same old ideas that does not work. Seriously, we need a overhaul of our economics for the whole system to work for everybody. As it is? It does not work for everybody. Republicans picked winners and losers, and the majority of this country are the losers.

Don't know how old he might be, but I bet he'd be a big fan of Robert Reisch who used to talk about the workforce in terms like, "XX% of the workforce GETS XX% of the wealth."

The man would rather have swallowed a rotten clam before using the word earned.

Same economist who told us Obamacare was not going to add substantially to the debt?

So what is the Donkey's tax plan? I'm waiting.....

(11-24-2017 07:44 PM)DavidSt Wrote:  

(11-24-2017 07:35 PM)stinkfist Wrote:  

(11-24-2017 07:33 PM)DavidSt Wrote:  The tax cuts from Reagan to now Trump have left many people behind while the wealthy have grown. My parents made less than $10,000 a year in the 1980s, and the economy sucks. They both worked their butts off at minimum wage. Reagan's tax cut did nothing for us. It helped placed a gap between the middle class and the wealthy, As it is, the Middle Class are slowly shrinking into the working poor. George W. Bush's paid tax holiday put us into another Great Depression. What did the companies used the money for from the tax cuts? Give CEOs and board members higher pay raises, and buy back stock from investors to inflate the prices of their companies. They never reinvested any money towards the business. That is why Hostess went out of business because of the corruption in the CEO/board members.
And Trump's crowing about the 401 K's growing? Only a small number of people in this country have it, and only a few people who invests in the stock market. The majority of people think the Wall Street is a bunch of crocked crooks that steals money from people and refuse to invest in it. Do you blamed people because of the likes of ENRON?

seriously.....your expectation level is aptly defined by this post....
YOU are the numbers WE are trying to elevatel.....
however, all you see is pig vomit.....can't fix you *******.....
have a good ******* day....

Well, the Republicans keep rolling out these same old ideas that does not work. Seriously, we need a overhaul of our economics for the whole system to work for everybody. As it is? It does not work for everybody. Republicans picked winners and losers, and the majority of this country are the losers.

The whole system to work for everybody is one of those platitudes that may sound good, but in practice it is utter BS. The only way to make it "work for everybody" is to take from the producers and give to the moochers. From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs, yeah, right. That works great until the producers get tired of being stolen from. In theory, theory works well in practice. In practice, it doesn't.

How about let's make the system work for those who work? And give everybody the opportunity to work and earn the fruits of his/her labor.

By the way, exactly what republican ideas have been tried and didn't work?

It works when whoever wants to work can work and whoever works can run a family of however many s/he wants. In other words, it works when population growth is the equilibrium.

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Wait, a Cal-Berkley economist doesn't think a republican tax plan will work? Shocking to say the least.

As far as number of people in a 401k, that is a reflection of the financial stupidity of Americans. Nearly 79% of working Americans have that benefit available to them, two thirds of those people don't take advantage of it. Those are the same people that cry that the government should do more for them. God forbid that they actually do a little financial planning for themselves.

(11-24-2017 10:45 PM)banker Wrote:  Wait, a Cal-Berkley economist doesn't think a republican tax plan will work? Shocking to say the least.

As far as number of people in a 401k, that is a reflection of the financial stupidity of Americans. Nearly 79% of working Americans have that benefit available to them, two thirds of those people don't take advantage of it. Those are the same people that cry that the government should do more for them. God forbid that they actually do a little financial planning for themselves.

I actually had not researched that stat (was unaware).....first time I've seen that ratio...

that's somewhat disheartening in a variety of scenarios.....

is the cost of necessary goods too high relative to income.....

are people simply not confident moving forward....

too many puppies under a roof....

I could go on and on..........am fairly certain most will get the gist......

The problem is food prices went up, rent went up, utilities went up, health insurance went up and so forth since the 1980s. The wages did not. I belong to a family that were the working poor who can't afford everything. When your dad gets paid monthly working for the school district as a head custodian, about $200 have been taken out of his paycheck for SS, Medicare, state taxes and payments into a fund for retired school workers. He takes home roughly under $1000 a month. After all bills paid? There was not enough money to buy food for the rest of the month. I have gone without food for 3 days straight. It is not a laughing matter. Being a kid with no food to eat is not right. Try buy things with less than a $1000 a month to see how far you can stretch the money. That was when food prices jumped big time. I remember we could get a gallon bottle of milk for 99 cents, and by 1989, it was like $5 a gallon. Used to get a pack of 10 hot dogs for 59 cents, it went up over a $1. I remember hamburger was at 59 cents a pound. It went up to 99 cents a pound, and they raised the prices back when the mad cow illness struck, but when it was over, the meat did not went down in price. These companies said when the disaster of floods and all that are over? The price of food would come back down. They lied. The food companies are price gauging their consumers.

(11-24-2017 05:25 PM)Hambone10 Wrote:  

(11-24-2017 04:22 PM)Redwingtom Wrote:  

Quote:In a new poll from the University of Chicago's Booth School of Business, 38 economists from schools including Yale, MIT and the University of California-Berkeley weighed in on contentious points about the GOP tax plans.

On one question, the economists were asked whether enacting "a tax bill similar to those currently moving through the House and Senate" would lead to a "substantially higher" rate of economic growth a decade from now than it would otherwise.

Only two percent — or, 1 out of 38 economists — agreed. 36 percent were uncertain, 33 percent disagreed, and another 19 percent strongly disagreed. (The remainder did not answer.)

That one economist who agreed also didn't do so without reservations: while a lower corporate tax rate would likely grow the economy, he wrote, he also said it was "another matter" whether the plan is "fair" in how it spreads the benefits of tax cuts. A recent analysis from the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center, for example, shows the senate proposal disproportionately benefiting some of the richest Americans.

Economists were much more certain about what the tax bills would do to the debt. They were asked whether a tax bill like those in the House and Senate right now would leave the U.S. debt-to-GDP ratio (a common measure of how large the national debt is) "substantially higher" in a decade than otherwise.

On this, fully 43 percent agreed that it would leave the debt level higher, and another 45 percent strongly agreed. Only 1 economist was uncertain. None disagreed.

But there's a catch here, yet again with the one economist who stood alone. That economist, Stanford's Liran Einav, told the Washington Post that he "didn't read the question properly" and in fact agreed with his peers.

Poll: Economists Unanimous That Debt Would Balloon Under GOP Tax Plan

Hint to the author of the article.... If you don't think an economic stimulus plan is going to grow the economy.... which most of these guys think it wouldn't, then OF COURSE they're going to say it's going to grow the debt/GDP. Those two things go hand in hand. Presenting them as if it's an addition is misleading at best.

Another point that is misleading is that the bar for agreement is set at 'substantially higher a decade from now'. One could obviously think that it will improve the economy in the short term, but not the long.... or that it would improve the economy, but not 'substantially' and still decide 'no'. One also assumes that no other taxation or changes would take place over the next ten years... which is silly


So really, all this says is that if we do this and only this, these guys think we're going to be in worse shape in 10 years than we are now.

I can't think of one single republican who disagrees.

Now, choosing a few of thousands of possibilities and options (from the right alone) that nobody on this forum is qualified to address and even those 38 economists would give you 38 different opinions, if you do this to stimulate the economy thus allowing us to cut back on the social safety net and the bureaucracies that support it allowing us to cut public support spending... and if the demand for labor encouraged some 60-65 yr olds to continue to work somewhat and delay retirement (by choice) and ESPECIALLY if we're able to pass a VAT or other consumption tax, then they'd likely reach very different conclusions.

The bigger question is why it's 38 and not 500? Why these 38? Why all (it seems) in academia? Why were industry economists (whose ability to project such things is how they make a living, as opposed to merely teaching the various methods of doing so) seemingly excluded and does the number change if they are included?

I suspect the reason these were selected is that this is a purely academic exercise. Industry economists would insist they could make assumptions about what such things would lead to... like I described.... which this poll specifically excluded.

That's how you know it's crap. NOTHING happens in a vacuum

Bravo.

This sounds, smells, reeks of a CBO style “analysis”.

Let me see, looking at this proposal as it stands now would do x,y and potentially z.

Uhhhhh, hey boss? Some guy back East, Fed Wonk guy, invented this thing called “e-mail” and they’re trying to tie it into something theyre calling the “World-Wide Web”.

Does that change any of this?

Nah, why would it? People still gotta drive to the store to buy records, or pay their Quarter to make that phone call, right?!?

Group: Har, har, har! Good point boss!


So much complete garbage.

Economists, and to the prior post weather describers, are better suited to trying to ‘splain WTF just happened, how and bigger-why?

Not making predictions for 2027 when they can’t agree on whether FDR’s approach worked well, or the Kennedy model was more successful.

The pointy-heads are still writing books on both... IOW’s, more useless, nauseating akademick navel gazing.

But!, thanks for posting! OP.

(11-24-2017 07:10 PM)HeartOfDixie Wrote:  It doesn't take an expert to see that this new plan is pretty light on "new."

The arguing over it is pretty disingenuous because there isn't actually a lot here.

This is mostly true as well.

Tinkering around the edges.

But, two things that stand out more than “1182.00$” per household- rolls eyes...

Cutting the “corporate” tax rate to 20% or even less for bringing off shore monies back here, even 5%. Why not? Found money is found money.

2. Ending the immoral “estate” tax. The last wishes of law abiding, hard working for a lifetime, people that have already paid innumerable and near uncountable taxes on a life of hard work should be confiscated by “our” government? To be handed out to whom? Others more deserving than ones heirs?

How the f%** does that work?

If folks believe in that schit, then fine. Give it away to the local cat shelter or whatever you’d like. What possible “right” does someone else have to decide what citizens of THIS Country do with their money and/or property?

I’d sooner burn the north 40 to the ground than hand it over to tyranny like that.

This tax plan doesn’t go nearly far enough. That’s its biggest problem...

(11-24-2017 07:33 PM)DavidSt Wrote:  The tax cuts from Reagan to now Trump have left many people behind while the wealthy have grown. My parents made less than $10,000 a year in the 1980s, and the economy sucks. They both worked their butts off at minimum wage. Reagan's tax cut did nothing for us. It helped placed a gap between the middle class and the wealthy, As it is, the Middle Class are slowly shrinking into the working poor. George W. Bush's paid tax holiday put us into another Great Depression. What did the companies used the money for from the tax cuts? Give CEOs and board members higher pay raises, and buy back stock from investors to inflate the prices of their companies. They never reinvested any money towards the business. That is why Hostess went out of business because of the corruption in the CEO/board members.

And Trump's crowing about the 401 K's growing? Only a small number of people in this country have it, and only a few people who invests in the stock market. The majority of people think the Wall Street is a bunch of crocked crooks that steals money from people and refuse to invest in it. Do you blamed people because of the likes of ENRON?

God, I hope you don’t vote.

Or drive on public roadways for that matter.

Bless your heart.

(11-24-2017 07:44 PM)DavidSt Wrote:  

(11-24-2017 07:35 PM)stinkfist Wrote:  

(11-24-2017 07:33 PM)DavidSt Wrote:  The tax cuts from Reagan to now Trump have left many people behind while the wealthy have grown. My parents made less than $10,000 a year in the 1980s, and the economy sucks. They both worked their butts off at minimum wage. Reagan's tax cut did nothing for us. It helped placed a gap between the middle class and the wealthy, As it is, the Middle Class are slowly shrinking into the working poor. George W. Bush's paid tax holiday put us into another Great Depression. What did the companies used the money for from the tax cuts? Give CEOs and board members higher pay raises, and buy back stock from investors to inflate the prices of their companies. They never reinvested any money towards the business. That is why Hostess went out of business because of the corruption in the CEO/board members.

And Trump's crowing about the 401 K's growing? Only a small number of people in this country have it, and only a few people who invests in the stock market. The majority of people think the Wall Street is a bunch of crocked crooks that steals money from people and refuse to invest in it. Do you blamed people because of the likes of ENRON?

seriously.....your expectation level is aptly defined by this post....

YOU are the numbers WE are trying to elevatel.....

however, all you see is pig vomit.....can't fix you *******.....

have a good ******* day....

Well, the Republicans keep rolling out these same old ideas that does not work. Seriously, we need a overhaul of our economics for the whole system to work for everybody. As it is? It does not work for everybody. Republicans picked winners and losers, and the majority of this country are the losers.

Fine.

So tell us your plan. What is your take on what will “work for (your) everybody”?!?

If you got that figured out, why aren’t you out pimping your plan somewhere? You’d be the next leftist billionaire!

Get busy!

(11-24-2017 07:33 PM)DavidSt Wrote:  The tax cuts from Reagan to now Trump have left many people behind while the wealthy have grown. My parents made less than $10,000 a year in the 1980s, and the economy sucks. They both worked their butts off at minimum wage. Reagan's tax cut did nothing for us. It helped placed a gap between the middle class and the wealthy, As it is, the Middle Class are slowly shrinking into the working poor. George W. Bush's paid tax holiday put us into another Great Depression. What did the companies used the money for from the tax cuts? Give CEOs and board members higher pay raises, and buy back stock from investors to inflate the prices of their companies. They never reinvested any money towards the business. That is why Hostess went out of business because of the corruption in the CEO/board members.

And Trump's crowing about the 401 K's growing? Only a small number of people in this country have it, and only a few people who invests in the stock market. The majority of people think the Wall Street is a bunch of crocked crooks that steals money from people and refuse to invest in it. Do you blamed people because of the likes of ENRON?

Your parents problem had nothing to do with Reagan lowering income taxes.
Their problem was income period. I made more money than your Dad, mostly working part time during college and full time in the summer, painting houses and working at Best Buy type store from 85'-89'. No the economy did not suck. Your parents were the problem. Did they actually have babies during this time? LOL

The only economist whose opinion I trust is that of Walter E. Williams from George Mason University.

(11-24-2017 07:33 PM)DavidSt Wrote:  The tax cuts from Reagan to now Trump have left many people behind while the wealthy have grown. My parents made less than $10,000 a year in the 1980s, and the economy sucks. They both worked their butts off at minimum wage. Reagan's tax cut did nothing for us. It helped placed a gap between the middle class and the wealthy, As it is, the Middle Class are slowly shrinking into the working poor. George W. Bush's paid tax holiday put us into another Great Depression. What did the companies used the money for from the tax cuts? Give CEOs and board members higher pay raises, and buy back stock from investors to inflate the prices of their companies. They never reinvested any money towards the business. That is why Hostess went out of business because of the corruption in the CEO/board members.

And Trump's crowing about the 401 K's growing? Only a small number of people in this country have it, and only a few people who invests in the stock market. The majority of people think the Wall Street is a bunch of crocked crooks that steals money from people and refuse to invest in it. Do you blamed people because of the likes of ENRON?

You want a bigger tax cut when you essentially pay no taxes? Uh. Ok

I can spend your money better than you can.

This is the base philosophy of a lot of economists.

(11-25-2017 07:15 AM)SuperFlyBCat Wrote:  

(11-24-2017 07:33 PM)DavidSt Wrote:  The tax cuts from Reagan to now Trump have left many people behind while the wealthy have grown. My parents made less than $10,000 a year in the 1980s, and the economy sucks. They both worked their butts off at minimum wage. Reagan's tax cut did nothing for us. It helped placed a gap between the middle class and the wealthy, As it is, the Middle Class are slowly shrinking into the working poor. George W. Bush's paid tax holiday put us into another Great Depression. What did the companies used the money for from the tax cuts? Give CEOs and board members higher pay raises, and buy back stock from investors to inflate the prices of their companies. They never reinvested any money towards the business. That is why Hostess went out of business because of the corruption in the CEO/board members.

And Trump's crowing about the 401 K's growing? Only a small number of people in this country have it, and only a few people who invests in the stock market. The majority of people think the Wall Street is a bunch of crocked crooks that steals money from people and refuse to invest in it. Do you blamed people because of the likes of ENRON?

Your parents problem had nothing to do with Reagan lowering income taxes.
Their problem was income period. I made more money than your Dad, mostly working part time during college and full time in the summer, painting houses and working at Best Buy type store from 85'-89'. No the economy did not suck. Your parents were the problem. Did they actually have babies during this time? LOL

Yeah, if your parents, as adults, were both making minimum wage, then THEY had the problem, not the economy. Statistically speaking something like 3% of minimum wage jobs are held by adults working full time.

Also, tax cuts done affect those who pay no taxes. A cut of 0 is still 0.

And if people would rather rely on social security instead of a 401k, then they're idiots. I'd love to be rid of SS so that I could invest that extra 6.5% into retirement, plus probably get a raise of some sort since my employer wouldn't have to pay the other 6.5% to SS as well.

(11-25-2017 09:02 AM)Claw Wrote:  I can spend your money better than you can.

This is the base philosophy of a lot of economists.

Yep. That is literally why they are hired. Technocrats... everything managed, no risk... perpetual 1% growth.

Sent from my SM-G955U using Tapatalk

(11-24-2017 07:33 PM)DavidSt Wrote:  The tax cuts from Reagan to now Trump have left many people behind while the wealthy have grown.

How, pray tell, do "tax cuts" "leave many people behind"?

Quote:My parents made less than $10,000 a year in the 1980s, and the economy sucks. They both worked their butts off at minimum wage.

The minimum wage was $3.10 in 1980 and rose to $3.55 in 1981. If they both made the minimum wage, they were both working something less than full time if they made less than $10,000 together, which is what you seem to be suggesting.

Quote:Reagan's tax cut did nothing for us. It helped placed a gap between the middle class and the wealthy, As it is, the Middle Class are slowly shrinking into the working poor.

Oh really? How so? The problem with academics like Piketty and Saez who come up with studies purporting to show this is that there is only one source with data of sufficient granularity to support such a study, and that is the IRS tax database. And yes, it does show income of the "wealthy" rising dramatically after the 1986 Bill Bradley-Dick Gephardt (both democrats) tax reform bill. Why? Because that law not only lowered tax rates dramatically, it also changed the definitions of income dramatically. As a result, many sources of income that the "wealthy" had not previously reported now had to be included, and many deductions that they had previously used to shelter income from taxation were no longer available. Over the decade of the 1980s, the top tax rate went from 70% to 28% and the share of the total tax burden paid by the "wealthy" went UP 7%. Why? Because as their rates went down, their income got redefined. So at the lower rates, they ended up paying more. That's actually a case where lowering tax rates produced higher tax revenues. Unfortunately, a lot of republicans seem not to have understood that it was the redefinition of income that offset the lower rates.

Quote:George W. Bush's paid tax holiday put us into another Great Depression.

Oh, really? How so? The crash of 2008 was caused by defaults on home loans. What did Bush's tax cuts do to cause that? I was not a fan of the "Bush tax cuts" because 1) they were not accompanied by spending cuts, and 2) they were not focused on growth. But they didn't cause the recession job 2008. And what turned it into a lengthy recession with slow recovery was Obama's "stimulus" spending. We've tried "stimulating" our way out of two recessions in history--1929 and 2008. Those are the two that had the slowest recovery. Why? How about all that deficit spending scares the crap out of investors, who know that somebody is going to have to foot the bill someday, so they are spooked out of investing in recovery?

Quote:What did the companies used the money for from the tax cuts? Give CEOs and board members higher pay raises, and buy back stock from investors to inflate the prices of their companies. They never reinvested any money towards the business. That is why Hostess went out of business because of the corruption in the CEO/board members.

They reinvested all right, just not in the US. They reinvested in other countries where costs, including taxes, were lower. Yeah, the jobs sewing up Nikes went to third world sweat shops. But if sewing up Nikes is our economic future, we are in a world of hurt. The way to restore the middle class is to bring back middle class jobs. You can't build a middle class on the minimum wage. The way to bring back middle class jobs is to make the ROI in investing in providing those jobs better here than it is elsewhere. You can bluster all you want about requiring US companies to keep jobs here. But if there costs here are higher than their competitors' costs overseas, all you are doing is driving them out of business. And when a company's CEO and officers are corrupt, it is supposed to go out of business. That's how the world works.

I'm not sure what dream land you live in where companies continue to lose money indefinitely so they can pay workers above market wages while keeping prices below market, but the sky must be different color there. Because everywhere the sky is blue, that won't work. Not ever.

Quote:And Trump's crowing about the 401 K's growing? Only a small number of people in this country have it, and only a few people who invests in the stock market. The majority of people think the Wall Street is a bunch of crocked crooks that steals money from people and refuse to invest in it. Do you blamed people because of the likes of ENRON?

One thing we need is a super 401k where everybody has a piece of the rock. That is the only way that we will ever actually address wealth equality. Do like Sweden and add a privatized component to social security.