The defining issue of this election: the flat tax

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > C-SPAM > The defining issue of this election: the flat tax

Top City Homo: Oct 15, 2014; Ramrod XTreme

PT6A posted:

I think a flat tax is a bad idea, but I also don't understand why we (the US and Canada both) use tax brackets instead of a perfectly simply continuously variable tax rate based on income. The current system is so open to misunderstanding with regards to the irrational fear of being bumped into the next tax bracket, and now that everyone has access to at least a calculator, I don't see much of a reason to use a bracketed system instead of a system where the tax paid on income is a smooth function of taxable income.

translate this paragraph for us idiots

# ¿ Sep 27, 2015 23:57

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# ¿ May 10, 2024 20:35

Top City Homo: Oct 15, 2014; Ramrod XTreme

government should be funded by in app purchases through the creation of fun casual games.

# ¿ Sep 28, 2015 00:01

Top City Homo: Oct 15, 2014; Ramrod XTreme

Lord of Pie posted:

Yeah but then I'd have to go fix my grandma's facebook so she stops getting everybody's notifications from Wedding Dronestrike Saga

invite your friends for a free hellfire missile strike!

# ¿ Sep 29, 2015 06:35

Top City Homo: Oct 15, 2014; Ramrod XTreme

�The necessity for a government to tax in order to maintain both its independence and its solvency is true for state and local governments, but it is not true for a national government.� Beardsley Ruml, Chair Federal Reserve Bank of New York (1937-1947)

�There is never a risk of default for a sovereign nation that issues its own free-floating currency and where its debts are denominated in that currency.� Mike Norman, Chief Economist for John Thomas Financial

�Central banks can issue currency, a non-interest-bearing claim on the government, effectively without limit.� Alan Greenspan, Chair of the Federal Reserve (1987-2006)

�There is no inherent limit on federal expenses and therefore on federal spending�When the U.S. government decides to spend fiat money, it adds to its banking reserve system and when it taxes or borrows (issues Treasury securities) it drains reserves from its banking system. These reserve operations are done solely to maintain the target Federal Funds rate.� Monty Agarwal , managing partner and chief investment officer of MA Managed Futures Fund

�As the sole manufacturer of dollars, whose debt is denominated in dollars, the U.S. government can never become insolvent, i.e., unable to pay its bills. In this sense, the government is not dependent on credit markets to remain operational.� Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis

hth

nod federal taxes needed

spend all the money

# ¿ Oct 11, 2015 01:39

Top City Homo: Oct 15, 2014; Ramrod XTreme

Dr. Stab posted:

I posit that the flat tax isn't flat at all.

A true flat tax: Everyone pays the government $3,000. Doesn't matter whether you have a business, are an infant, or homeless. Everyone pays. Nobody doesn't pay. That should clean up IRS operations.

That's a direct tax and it has to be proportional to population size or it's unconstitutional

Hth

# ¿ Oct 23, 2015 21:08

Top City Homo: Oct 15, 2014; Ramrod XTreme

Triglav posted:

Well, it's a balancing act, but it's not a subsidy. It's rewarding positive conduct. If there were no benefits to investing, fewer people would do it and economic growth would slow. And if there were no benefits to keeping investments in the market, the market would be more volatile and any crashes would be harder. In a crash, someone may see their previously profitable asset beginning to lose money, but they'll keep it in the market because they'll lose even more to taxes if they pull it out too early. If the asset is no longer profitable by the time they pull it out, well that's a capital loss and the IRS will let them recoup up to $3,000 in losses on their taxes.

Money kept in the market keeps businesses open and people employed. What the IRS loses on one person's capital gains taxes, it makes up in other people's taxes. So long-term capital gains are considered investments and treated beneficially, while short-term capital gains are considered profiteering and given no benefit.

Even things like capital gains tax deferrals can be positive. I remember reading that George Soros may currently owe some seven billion dollars in deferred taxes, due 2017. But the government will get substantially more in 2017 than if they taxed him annually, because the less frequently someone's taxed, the more they make over time, and the larger sum both they and the government receive in the end. It's a mutually beneficial arrangement.

Consider the idle rich. They're either losing money or living off dividends from their investments. They may be sunbathing on a yacht all day, but their money's at work in someone else's pocket, and the government's collecting taxes off that person, the idle rich's dividends, anything either of them buy, and anyone either of them employ. For the IRS, it's a web of small revenue streams of greater value than a single large stream.

And when that idle rich person dies, their heirs lose 40% of anything above five million dollars. That five million dollar leeway keeps the estate tax from hurting successful families who may have amassed a few million dollars in assets between houses, cars, businesses, etc, while still keeping any would-be aristocratic class in check.

it doesn't actually work that way
the idle rich invest in the global economy but their investments in generate money for them instead of useful economic activity

# ¿ Nov 8, 2015 22:35

Top City Homo: Oct 15, 2014; Ramrod XTreme

Triglav posted:

How do you define useful economic activity?

An American investor buys a thousand lots of stock in an American cellphone company, funding research and development and the ultimate fabrication of a South Korean computer chip to be soldered in China with Indonesian tin, all so an American consumer can uselessly tweet a pizza emoji for their own momentary enjoyment.

But each level of the operation was priced, invested, and taxed by local authorities and businesses. In aggregate, countless people benefit, domestically and internationally, all from an American consumer's desire to tweet a pizza emoji, an American company's desire to profit, the American company's foreign supply chain's desire to profit, and the investor's desire to profit. Maybe some or all of these companies were founded whole or in part by grants from local government, in an attempt to spur economic activity. Who knows.

And so the consumer works enough to buy a cellphone with their taxes-withheld paycheck, paying sales tax at the point of sale. The company profits, which local, state, and federal governments tax. After taxes, the company issues its investor a dividend, which state and federal governments tax as income. Later the investor sells their stock in the company at a profit to another investor, which state and federal governments tax as capital gains.

Whether or not an economic activity is useful, money's still green.

ill let robert reich explain it

https://vimeo.com/141725998

password is Bernie2016

# ¿ Nov 9, 2015 01:34

Top City Homo: Oct 15, 2014; Ramrod XTreme

Triglav posted:

Many traders are superstitious, believing they can read patterns in the noise, talking about dojis and fibonacci ratios. They'll buy and sell from other traders based off the patterns they convince themselves into seeing on their charts, while other traders on different charts trade off completely different patterns. Both can make and lose money doing this. Both end up giving their brokerages lots of money in commissions. But traders, both human and computer, are also what provide market liquidity to speculators and investors, who are buying and selling for limitless other reasons.

A stock issued a hundred years ago is still tightly connected with the activity of the current company. If the company's worthless, so's its stock. Fundamentals and future outlooks are constantly changing with each quarterly earnings report, press release, news article, and so on. A positive outlook brings capital, while a negative outlook takes it away. If a single outlook changes for one company, outlooks change for everything else as well. Everything effects everything, so buying or selling a stock moves other stocks, indices, currencies, commodities, futures...

The larger the timescale, the more efficient the market, but from moment to moment the market is irrational and inefficient. Traders make their money by playing those inefficiencies and acting on news faster than others. But even on larger timescales you have inefficiencies and irrationalities. For example, Tesla Motors hemorrhages money with little to show for it, but their stock price keeps going up. Some want them to succeed and will keep feeding them money until they do. Others are following the herd, seeing numbers get larger. Some others maybe just think the cars are nice and others will find them nice too. There's infinite reasons why someone may buy or sell a stock. Traders and brokerages are just there to make it possible.

The password doesn't seem to work.

whoops try lowercase: bernie2016

# ¿ Nov 9, 2015 02:51

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# ¿ May 10, 2024 20:35

Top City Homo: Oct 15, 2014; Ramrod XTreme

Triglav posted:

Ah yeah, I saw that on Netflix some time ago. Good show, I agree with a lot of it.

Even something as simple as increasing wages and benefits across the board is a virtuous cycle that helps the economy and improves people's lives. Happy and healthy workers making good pay means more productive and satisfied workers working longer and buying more goods and services.

But I suppose that creates a lot more waste, too. I don't think economic activity should undermine our responsibility to the biosphere and future generations. As is, it unfortunately seems to.

And also unfortunately, it seems dangling a reward on a stick in some mutually beneficial direction is the only way to get people helping those they'll never come in contact with. Dissatisfaction is a major motivator. Someone will toil for satisfaction. If they're dissatisfied enough, perhaps they'll even toil for scraps. And maybe those meager scraps will keep them dissatisfied and willing to toil.

But I think there's a layer of nationalism that must be overcome too. Is a happy worker in America more important than a happy worker in Bangladesh? Can a Bangladeshi be paid more if an American's willing to spend more? Would the American be willing to pay the Bangladeshi more if the American could afford to spend more? Would the poorest American happily accept a 39.6% global income tax to improve conditions in Bangladesh?

i don't know

economies in general are best managed on a local or national scale and trade is best done between equally developed nations that want to specialize. for example, an african free trade block is much better than a USA African free trade block and a USA Canada free trade block is much better than US Mexico trade block

increasing the standards of living can be achieved if the goal is not to plunder poorer nations

in any case, free trade has barely benefited the 3rd world

http://www.economist.com/blogs/economist-explains/2014/09/economist-explains-0

# ¿ Nov 9, 2015 17:58

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > C-SPAM > The defining issue of this election: the flat tax