(03-02-2020 11:36 AM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  

(03-02-2020 11:05 AM)OptimisticOwl Wrote:  Always fun to sit back and listen to people argue over what what I meant and what I said. Sometimes, some of them are even right. Sometimes, not.

Lad, all I can say to you is WHOOSH. You took my words so far out into left field it is impossible to talk. So let's move on. I respect your ability to listen to the other side.

IMO, "pay their fair share" always means pay MORE. "equitable" always means "pay a larger proportion".

We have a pretty good safety net now, especially when compared to the Era of Immigration. If your venture doesn't work, declare bankruptcy - nobody is going to put you in jail. You can get food and shelter, and if you want, you can try again, as my Dad did. For hundreds of years, people came here to settle farms, open delis, open businesses of all sorts. They took giant chances with no safety net other than family, friends, and church. I doubt Levi Strauss went to California because there was no chance of failure. People took chances to get ahead, because getting ahead was like winning the lottery. The lack of a safety net did not stifle entrepreneurism. What I am hearing is more like, please buy a ticket, if you don't win the lottery, you will get your ticket refunded.

I did my Master's on the difference, psychologically, between entrepreneurs and managers. or, if you will, the difference between people with skin in the game and those who don't. I don't see a cradle making any difference to whether or not person A will take a chance or not.

If you want to encourage entrepreneurism, instead of making failure easy, why not reward success? Lower the taxes for start ups, relax some regulations, give a struggling fledgling enterprise a chance. Let people deduct losses from other income, a la Trump. Si much made of him taking losses, but that is part of the warp and woof of making decisions - tax consequences. A friend of mine tried to open a take out restaurant. He went with take out because the location he could get had just three parking spaces. But then regulators made him designate 1 (or 2?) of them as handicapped, and build a ramp. he closed in six months. Regulators don't care about shoestrings or helping businesses survive. Good food, too, especially the flautas. One reason I went into real estate was the tax treatments there. They were beckoning me to come in - capital gains, depreciation -nowadays the socialist government is beckoning me to stop being unfair. I guess I could have just buried my cash in a coffee can, the safe thing to do.

Why are you looking at these issues as if they are mutually exclusive?

I don't see why these two issues are mutually exclusive in your mind. Changing the regulatory environment to be more encouraging of business growth (a la the parking minimums you mention) can be done while also changing the social safety net to better protect individuals from unforeseen consequences.

Seems like a weird response to me. I post that changing our social safety net would increase the likelihood of people starting small businesses. You respond by talking about the need for regulatory reform.

As the Old El Paso commercial posits - why not both?

NEW YORK CITY!!!!

One of my former ventures was a company that made Mexican food. (since sold)

I guess these days we would have to call it Hispanic Food.