I miss Jobst

On 4/24/2011 9:18 AM, Frank Krygowski wrote:
On Apr 24, 8:51 am, J. D. wrote:
On Sat, 23 Apr 2011 08:58:39 -0700 (PDT), Frank Krygowski


What I do claim is that tax rates should be higher on people that have
far more money than they need. The claims are quite different, but
you appear to be conflating the two.

Again Frank, how do you define "more money then they need".

I'll try illustrating with a couple simple cases, just as an example.

Consider one man who has a wife, a child, a 1500 square foot home in
an average American city, a reliable compact car, and a decent job
with a salary of (say) $40,000 per year. He's lucky enough to have
good medical coverage, he buys decent but not extravagant food, takes
a modest family vacation most years, and has a 25" TV, a stereo, small
garden, and heck, let's give him a fine bicycle, one that cost $1000.
His family has good health.

Boringly average, right? He has what he needs.

A different man with a wife, child, 2800 square foot house, a Cadillac
plus a Mini Cooper, good family health, a 60" home theater system, a
set of golf clubs, two Cervelos, dines out twice a week, rents a
cottage on St. Thomas each year and a salary of over $160,000 has more
money than he needs. In fact, so does anyone making more than the
first guy, assuming roughly similar family responsibilities.

The third man has a 60,000 ft² main home with a $500,000 home theater,
an Olympic size pool, servants/cooks/armed security, and 9 private holes
out back; a 7,500 ft² apartment in the City, a 10,000 ft² condo in
Aspen, a 20,000 ft² vacation home on the Riviera, and a 5,000 ft² lodge
in the mountains, is taken to the airport in a private helicopter, where
he is flown in his private jet, or to the marina where he is sailed by a
dedicated crew in his 100-ft yacht, owns one each of all the limited
production Ferrari models, more artworks than a small museum, and whose
"work" consists of getting paid $20,000 plus travel (by private jet) and
lodging (5-star hotel suite) for attending half-day board meetings,
followed by a $250 restaurant meal with a
$500 wine bill. And yes, he custom orders his bicycles for $10-15K each.

Now will the third man really suffer by paying more taxes? Does he
really contribute so much more to society that the middle class
professional making $55K/year for 3,000 hours of work?

Now I'm familiar with teenagers whining "But Dad, I _need_ that new
leather jacket!!!" I'm sure you're just as capable of whining in
favor of those making high incomes, but it would be no more
reasonable.

What about children whining because it is cold in the winter and there
is no heat, when the toilet stop working and there is no money for the
plumber, when there is no hot water for a shower, when they are cold but
lack a warm coat, mittens and boots, when they are hungry but there is
not enough food, or when there is no home to stay in? Millions of
children live this way in grinding poverty in the 21st Century US,
despite overall plenty. Primarily due to greed of those who live like
the third man.

I've been talking about this and what I see as blanket condemnations
of corporations under the heading of corrupt, not caring, unethical,
etc. and to date seem to read only general statements that have
enough holes in them to throw a bullocks through.

Opinions vary. I'm willing to put aside questions of ethics or
corruption for now. All I'm saying is, the U.S. should return to the
progressive tax policies it had in (say) the 1950s and 1960s. Or if
you prefer, the progressive tax policies in effect in most Western
European nations. In both cases, they seem to work fine.


Frank, you are a communist. Fox News says so.

As a further detail, U.S. CEOs should be paid on the same ratio to
average worker compensation as the CEOs of most Western European
companies.

sarcasm

More communism!

/sarcasm

You have yet to explain why you reject the policies that have worked
so well in the past, and are currently working so well in other
countries. Your hand-waving about the poor, persecuted corporations
and wealthy aren't cutting it.

sarcasm

Marxist!

/sarcasm

All I'm doing is asking simple question: Who, what, where and when.

That wasn't a question. That was a list of interrogatives. You're
just flaffing, because your arguments are indefensible.

J.D. Slocomb appears to be living in a past world, tinted by memories
that never were.

--
Tºm Shermªn - 42.435731,-83.985007
I am a vehicular cyclist.

On 4/24/2011 7:51 AM, J. D. Slocomb wrote:
On Sat, 23 Apr 2011 16:15:41 -0500, Tºm Shermªn™ °_°
" wrote:

On 4/22/2011 7:38 AM, J. D. Slocomb wrote:
On Thu, 21 Apr 2011 15:25:29 +0100, Clive George
wrote:

On 21/04/2011 14:20, J. D. Slocomb wrote:

I believe that you are playing word games. Both Microsoft and Hathaway
are corporations and while their founders certainly have considerable
publicity that is not really an indication that no one else is kind
hearted. In about 1949 a representative of GE came to my high school
and held a meeting with the upper two classes in which he stated that
given a reasonable grade level that GE would finance an individual's
collage education assuming that one studied a subject that GE
specified and contracted to work for a period for GE upon graduation.
.
While this is proof on nothing in particular it does show that a
general classification of "corporations aren't kind" is not entirely
correct.

Correction : it shows that in 1949, corporations were prepared to invest
in people in that way.

Things have changed in the last 60 years - whereas back then there was
growth, and a good supply of decent jobs, now there's a shortage of
jobs, and guess what? The corporations aren't as generous as they used
to be.


Of course not. After all they aren't St. Peter and even he denies
some.

But, for all this talk about nasty greedy corporations remember that
they are corporations and have a duty to their stockholders. If you
hold any shares do you want to wake some morning with a nice note that
as the company has decided to play nice with their employees there
will be no dividends paid this year? There goes your $3,000 bicycle
and you'll have to be happy with the old $1,000 one.

How does obscene levels of executive compensation help the stockholders?

And why should shareholders be guaranteed a profit at the expense of
labor? It is not the shareholders' duty to *not* buy stock in
questionable enterprises? Or do you believe in government welfare that
guarantees investors a profit, while stomping on labor?

Obviously you have no investments. Shareholders are not guaranteed a
profit. They only get a dividend check if the company makes a profit.

Actually, all my retirement is in the form of stocks (401K and employee
stock).

Nice try, please play again.

You are obviously unaware that when the US government bails out
corporations that would otherwise go bankrupt, the jobs of the workers
are *not* protected as part of the agreements. The government is
guaranteeing stockholder investments, not jobs.

How so at the expense of labour? After all there wouldn't be a need
for labour at all if the shareholders hadn't invested in the company.

Ignoring the fact that almost all stock purchases on Wall Street are
re-selling by investors, and not IPO's to raise capital.

So the share holders essentially created the jobs and now these poor
people didn't have a job, and now do are complaining about it? Let
them go back to what they were doing before they went to work for the
company.

Other, better run companies can take the place. Or better yet, turn the
assets over to the workers if the corporation goes bankrupt, and let
them run it as a cooperative enterprise (which has worked well in
Argentina for the last decade).

Corporate charters need to be revised so they also have a duty to make a
profit in an ethical manner.

You use the word, but what, exactly, are these ethics that you speak
of?

Do I need to point out the obvious?

--
Tºm Shermªn - 42.435731,-83.985007
I am a vehicular cyclist.

On 4/24/2011 11:58 AM, Ron Ruff wrote:
On Apr 24, 6:51 am, J. D. wrote:

It seems to me that during the recent financial activities it was
reported that an assembly line worker for one of the major automobile
company cost the company some $65 an hour. Now granted, this included
an allowance for medical treatment and retirement fund but still,
isn't that enough to get by on?

That is one problem with labor unions, and why I do not advocate them.
Many people are working for minimum wage though... no benefits. And
many people can't even get those jobs.

It was a big eye-opener for me when I worked at a national park a few
years ago... when the unemployment rate was supposedly ~3%. Wouldn't
that indicate that the job market was favorable to workers? Perfectly
good employees (I'd have no qualms about hiring any of them to work
for me) earning $5.25/hr were abused and mistreated and fired, by
management who appeared to simply enjoy that they could do it. When
they ran out workers, they'd go to the half-way house in Las Vegas and
ship up some new warm bodies that we'd have to spend a lot of time
training... and then they'd get fired 2 weeks later for either a silly
reason or for failing a drug test (duh).

There are several ways to combat the abuse of petty workplace tyrants:

- Strong unions,
- Enforced worker protection laws,
- Social safety net, so employers can not get workers who are simply
desperate for living expenses (and therefore tolerate the abuse).

Note that all three are common in the European Union, but are missing
for the most part in the US. I guess the Europeans are either smarter
than the USians, or have more democratic governments.

--
Tºm Shermªn - 42.435731,-83.985007
I am a vehicular cyclist.

On 4/24/2011 1:14 PM, Ron Ruff wrote:
On Apr 24, 11:15 am, Peter wrote:
They obviously were in desperate need of a union.

Actually no... what is needed is laws that create a socio-economic
environment where such management behaviors are no longer rewarded.
Take care of the whole country with one stroke.

Or guaranteed jobs at a living wage for anyone who was willing to work.

--
Tºm Shermªn - 42.435731,-83.985007
I am a vehicular cyclist.

On 4/24/2011 12:09 PM, Dan O wrote:
On Apr 24, 5:51 am, J. D. wrote:
On Sat, 23 Apr 2011 16:05:58 -0500, Tºm Shermªn™ °_°



" wrote:
On 4/23/2011 6:46 AM, J. D. Slocomb wrote:
On Fri, 22 Apr 2011 09:26:13 -0700 (PDT), Ron Ruff
wrote:

On Apr 22, 6:50 am, J. D. wrote:
Poor proof -- I have a friend who left home when he was 16 years old
and went to work in the oil well drilling trade. Today, some 50 years
later, he enjoys a salary of something over $1,000 a day. Now given
that he left home with no money to amount to anything, and given that
he, on his own, studied and learned the drilling business, and given
that he has, at his own cost, attended every drilling seminar or
course offered, and given that he, in the past, left well paid jobs to
take lower paid jobs to broaden his experiences, and in short, hoisted
himself by his own shoestrings, why is it justice to burden him with a
higher tax rate then someone who has sat, complacently, idling his/her
time away at an unskilled job for the same period?

The impasse is that some of us are discussing economics and sociology,
and you are stuck in philosophy and morality. You also seem to be
missing precisely what the outcome of your ideas would be.

Wealth redistribution is necessary because in a capitalist economic
system the natural wealth disparity is extremely high. Without it we
would resemble the poorest 3rd world country, with a few very wealthy
and most just barely surviving. This depresses the entire economy
because people this poor are not effective consumers.... and
production=consumption. It is no accident that every wealthy country
in the world has extensive wealth redistribution... more than the US
in fact... in spite of the fact that redistributing wealth is messy
and involves a lot of waste.

But yet Bloomberg reports that in 2010 the US has some 4.7 million
millionaire households, the highest in the world.

Or less than 1% of the population is truly rich (using the $5M
threshold). The bottom 90% can sod off, I guess.

After WW I Great Britain destroyed the Gentry's family fortunes using
punitive taxes. One would assume that having distributed the wealth
that Great Britain's economy is better then the U.S.?

But I do believe that I understand your point - to put it in everyday
language the bulk of the population is a bunch of unimaginative, lazy
individuals who won't exert themselves to get ahead and thus if money
isn't taken away from the people who have it and given to these lazy
drifters they won't have enough money to buy their daily can of beans.

What are you smoking? I want some.

No, most people work hard for little reward, while those who become very
rich are generally sociopaths who care little for how many and how much
they hurt others in doing so.

Why do people work hard for little reward? Do you mean that while they
were at their job they were aware that they weren't receiving an
adequate wage? Or that in retrospect you feel that they were
insufficiently rewarded? If the former, why didn't they leave?


If you had any clue what it was to be a working man you wouldn't have
made that crack eariler about "idling away" instead of being some kind
of go-getter.

snip

In general, the lower the pay, the harder and more dangerous the work
(e.g. farm labor).

--
Tºm Shermªn - 42.435731,-83.985007
I am a vehicular cyclist.

On 4/24/2011 1:05 PM, Ron Ruff wrote:
On Apr 24, 8:01 am, Peter wrote:

I'm not sure what you mean by AMA "monopoly", currently less than 25% of
US doctors and medical students are members.

Who grants medical licenses and decides who is able to practice and
who isn't?

Or artificially limits medical school enrollment, licensing of foreign
trained doctors, etc.

The numbers of doctors per capita in the US isn't markedly different
than similarly wealthy countries. Currently, when entering their
profession, US doctors are carrying something like 250K in debt.

Why all the debt? Is that really necessary?

No. The high debt is the result of collusion limiting the number of
students in programs. If there was a free market in medical education,
the cost would be much lower.

In addition, to be a general practitioner does not require the extra
years of specialized training and expense.

Unless religious schools are explicitly excluded from voucher programs,
the use of vouchers supports them. In a zero-sum scenario, funding is
moved from public to private, and many private schools are religious.
You can't avoid that issue.

It's very easy to avoid. Make it a rule. It isn't allowed in public
schools now.

Without collective bargaining, it's the individual worker (teacher,
doctor or other) negotiating with large organizations (corporate, city,
etc.), that's a distinct imbalance of power.

You seem to be missing my point. I'm not advocating getting rid of
unions and replacing them with nothing. But that the benefits that a
union would typically bargain for would be universal and national.

Where do you think the reductions in working hours came from?

What difference does it make? You don't need individual unions for
that. The laws regarding minimum wages and work hours are in fact
universal.

There are no limitations on working hours for "non-exempt" employees,
which can include lower level supervisory and professional positions
that are not well paid nor offer the perks of high level professional
and management jobs.

Productivity growth helps workers in the long term because it raises
wages -- that is only true if the gains are distributed.

Of course.

In many
markets, there is no natural incentive to distribute those gains to
workers.

None whatsoever actually. Employers only wish to reduce wages as much
as possible.

And for many, to maximize control of workers, both in and outside the
workplace.

Unions are an important hedge against excessive retention of
earnings and/or excessive cost cutting by employers.

Why must unions do it? They are a grossly inefficient means of doing
so.

Cooperatively owned businesses with management reporting to the workers
is a better solution.

Again, who lobbies for all those things? Certainly not the industries
and bureaucracies. You can take any issue -- child labor, minimum wage,
worker safety, work week hours, etc. and trace its history and find
unions behind all the advances. Without unions, workers just compete
with each other. With unions, workers compete with management. The first
case is lopsided, not the second.

Most of the benefits are a matter of national law. In socialist
countries they have much more extensive benefits that are a matter of
national law.

This is what I advocate.

These social-democratic (not socialist) countries also typically have
strong labor unions.

Extensive public benefits... making the need for a job much less
onerous. Obviously high taxes are needed.

But that lessens the power the rich have over the poor!

Use vouchers where possible to enhance the freedom of people to choose
and improve efficiency.
Raise the minimum wage.
Reduce the work week (progressively) such that the unemployment rate
would stay at a low level.
Restrict trade so that capital and work does not keep pouring out of
the country to places that have slave labor.
Abolish labor unions.
Get rid of the *requirement* for professional licenses. Let people
decide what licensing requirements they are willing to pay for.
Allow employers to hire and fire employees as they see fit.

There are more details, but that is the basic idea.

These measures will accomplish a few very desirable and often
(unnecessarily) opposing goals:
Greatly improve man-hr efficiency for providing services and products,
by removing restrictions on employers to hire and fire, and keeping
wages high. If you can be replaced by a machine, then you will be.
High wages and a short work week. Way more free time.
Low unemployment.
More freedom for people to choose public benefits.

Within a generation we could be working half as much and living
better. We should have started this project 30 years ago instead of
taking the opposite turn.

Read "For Us, The Living" by R.A. Heinlein.

--
Tºm Shermªn - 42.435731,-83.985007
I am a vehicular cyclist.

J. D. Slocomb wrote:
On Sat, 23 Apr 2011 15:55:16 -0500, Tºm Shermªn™ °_°
" wrote:

On 4/23/2011 6:46 AM, J. D. Slocomb wrote:
On Fri, 22 Apr 2011 09:48:32 -0700 (PDT), Frank Krygowski
wrote:

On Apr 22, 8:31 am, J. D. wrote:
On Thu, 21 Apr 2011 09:40:41 -0700 (PDT), Frank Krygowski


You haven't told us what you've paid for your most expensive bike.
But I'll point out, there have always been people who have put a high
personal value on one item, so much so that they've spent a good part
of their meager wealth to acquire it. One of my riding buddies has a
stable of bikes that most here would envy, but he has little else.
He's unemployed much of every year, his annual income is poverty
level, and he has some pretty serious medical problems.
You are evading the subject. I was pointing out that the assessment of
title of "rich man" usually turns out to actually mean "more money
then me" and that anyone who fritters away $1,000 on a Bicycle must be
RICH.
I understand your point. And I don't buy it at all. You won't find
any formal dictionary equating "rich" and "more money than me." And
you won't find anyone in America with an IQ above 85 who thinks a
$1000 bike is proof of being rich.

I wasn't referring to a dictionary...
and probably the $1,000 bicycle was a bit out of date too (got one
myself :-) but my point is still valid that to most/many people "Rich"
simply means more money then me. And I've heard the remark "He's rich"
made by people earning anywhere from $1.00 a day to millions a year
and they were all referring to people that simply had more money then
they did.

$1,000 will not even buy an entry-level performance recumbent bicycle or
lower-mid level trike, and will only buy an entry-level FS MTB or a
mid-level road bike or hard-tail MTB.

Besides, my proposal for income tax rates wouldn't be binary. I'd
favor a continuous function relating tax rates to total income. (I'd
actually begin by examining policies in developed countries around the
world to see what works best, but I know that's too detailed for this
discussion.)

If you want to judge whether a person's rich, look at their annual
income and/or the total value of their possessions.
Poor proof -- I have a friend who left home when he was 16 years old
and went to work in the oil well drilling trade. Today, some 50 years
later, he enjoys a salary of something over $1,000 a day.
OK, over $360,000 per year. You can't seriously be saying he's not
"rich." That's certainly not a counterexample.
Of course he's rich (but his bicycle only cost $500 :-) but my point
was here is a guy that started out the poorly educated son of a
subsistence farmer near Calgary (no electric lights when a child) and
solely through his own efforts got to where he's got a quid or two.
Why is it proper to tax him at some higher rate then anyone else -
after all everyone had the same opportunity to leave home as a kid and
work his ass off, doesn't one?

And much of his income was due to luck. Most people that work hard do
not make much money.

I have no idea how much of his success was due to luck, certainly it
is a factor. On the other hand, one who does his job well and works
hard quite frequently does have good luck.

Cheers,

John D. Slocomb
(jdslocombatgmail)


Or at least seizes opportunity better and gets past
adversity better, assuming a normal mix of both.

--
Andrew Muzi
www.yellowjersey.org/
Open every day since 1 April, 1971

J. D. Slocomb wrote:
On Sat, 23 Apr 2011 09:29:39 -0700 (PDT), Frank Krygowski
wrote:

On Apr 23, 7:46 am, J. D. Slocomb wrote:
On Fri, 22 Apr 2011 09:48:32 -0700 (PDT), Frank Krygowski

Besides, my proposal for income tax rates wouldn't be binary. I'd
favor a continuous function relating tax rates to total income. (I'd
actually begin by examining policies in developed countries around the
world to see what works best, but I know that's too detailed for this
discussion.)
If you want to judge whether a person's rich, look at their annual
income and/or the total value of their possessions.
Poor proof -- I have a friend who left home when he was 16 years old
and went to work in the oil well drilling trade. Today, some 50 years
later, he enjoys a salary of something over $1,000 a day.
OK, over $360,000 per year. You can't seriously be saying he's not
"rich." That's certainly not a counterexample.
Of course he's rich (but his bicycle only cost $500 :-)
Thereby shooting down your claim that the value of one small
possession is a valid earmark. Thanks for that!

but my point
was here is a guy that started out the poorly educated son of a
subsistence farmer near Calgary (no electric lights when a child) and
solely through his own efforts got to where he's got a quid or two.
Why is it proper to tax him at some higher rate then anyone else -
after all everyone had the same opportunity to leave home as a kid and
work his ass off, doesn't one?

So why should the less aggressive, stay at homes, take a job I hate,
folks deserve a lower tax rate?

It seems that your system penalizes anyone with gumption and rewards
those who are slackers.
I'm sure there are wealthy whiners who consider taxes to be
"punishment." And we see that there are apologists for the wealthy
who do the same.

I don't view it that way at all. I am, by most standards, now a
fairly prosperous guy. I invariably vote for tax issues, knowing that
I will pay more than many will as a result. I do it because I value
the resulting services and benefits.

I see no reason to differ here.

In my mind, it's similar to going to lunch with a friend. I've
certainly picked up the tab for people who were in worse financial
shape than I. I've also donated significant amounts of money to
causes I believe in, because I want that work to continue. To a
degree, the reason I do these things is because I can afford to, even
though I realize many of the people who benefit will not have been
donors.

And I see no reason not to donate money to causes who actually spend
the money for the purpose intended and have a reasonable overhead.

What's the opposite approach? "Hell no, I won't give money to fund
the police force. I want to spend it on gold plating my bicycle
instead." To me, that's selfish enough to be immoral.

You open an interesting subject. Why does it seem that today the
average citizen is so upset with the Police? When I lived in New
Hampshire I certainly had nothing but respect for the police. Sure I
came from a small town and probably knew all the police there but the
State Police were just as well respected.

And, if I hadn't liked something about the town police there was
nothing to prevent me from taking my complaints to the Town Head, and
if I didn't like that I could have taken it to a member of the state
legislature (liven in the next place).

What's changed?

Now given
that he left home with no money to amount to anything, and given that
he, on his own, studied and learned the drilling business, and given
that he has, at his own cost, attended every drilling seminar or
course offered, and given that he, in the past, left well paid jobs to
take lower paid jobs to broaden his experiences, and in short, hoisted
himself by his own shoestrings...
Fine! That's how some people become rich. He took those steps, and
was lucky enough to have them pay off. Others acquire wealth in other
ways.
Nope he took those steps and because others weren't making the same
effort that he was he is a success.
You oversimplify. Do you seriously believe that everyone with that
amount of ambition and diligence becomes wealthy? Do you seriously
believe that everyone who becomes wealthy does so only because of
ambition and diligence?

I could give a detailed account of two people with almost precisely
the same professional qualifications, one being about five years older
than the other. The younger was harder working by any measure,
probably a bit more intelligent, put in longer hours, and certainly
learned more about the business than the older. But the older retired
far wealthier, because of luck as manifested in more family money to
start with, and changing economic conditions allowing much more return
on investments when young. Business contract changes were also a big
factor.

Many of the wealthy interpret wealth as proof of superiority, and you
seem to be buying that ludicrous idea. I'd suggest the way to
demonstrate moral superiority is by a willingness to share wealth.
Taxes is one way to do that.


Police seem to be a 50-50 mix of thugs with batons & badges
and starry eyed do-gooders, both on the same 'team':

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/l...,5712066.story

A quick perusal of newspapers would show plenty of both
types. Your average guy can't readily tell them apart until
it's too late.


--
Andrew Muzi
www.yellowjersey.org/
Open every day since 1 April, 1971

-snip snip-

On 4/24/2011 7:51 AM, J. D. Slocomb wrote:
I thought I had mentioned that I don't live in the U.S

Tºm Shermªn™ °_° wrote:
Yes, so you should not comment on what you do not know.

pot, kettle, black, Israel etc.


--
Andrew Muzi
www.yellowjersey.org/
Open every day since 1 April, 1971

Peter Cole wrote:
On 4/24/2011 8:51 AM, J. D. Slocomb wrote:

On Sat, 23 Apr 2011 09:46:33 -0400, Peter Cole
wrote:

On 4/23/2011 7:46 AM, J. D. Slocomb wrote:
On Fri, 22 Apr 2011 10:06:29 -0700 (PDT), Ron Ruff
wrote:

On Apr 22, 10:56 am, Peter wrote:
The point is well made though, 5 guys "earned" $2B in
compensation, and
in so doing caused trillions in damages around the world. 5 guys
created
all that suffering out of their own greed. They should be publicly
executed (full global TV coverage), and the system that allowed such
obscene leverage should be broken and scattered. Instead, these
guys are
getting lunches at the White House.

More proof that the takeover is complete.


So, what's new? Has there been a government that was not catering to
special interests?

Corruption ebbs and flows, we're currently on a flow tide and going over
past high water marks.

Perhaps in dollar terms but the government has had fairly continuous
scandals since they started in business, with the Conway Cabal in
1777.

There's been nothing on this scale, absolute or relative, ever. That's
what people have to get through their skulls.

We absolutely agree. Here are your 'hopeless change' graphs:
http://www.usgovernmentspending.com/...icit_brief.php

--
Andrew Muzi
www.yellowjersey.org/
Open every day since 1 April, 1971