Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

 CptJake wrote:
You see that it is actually pretty constant in recent times (look at the 2005 constant dollar column). Down turns in revenue collection have more to do with over all economic conditions in the country than tax rates.

If you tax more, you get more. It's a really basic thing that a lot of people have tried to invent complex reasons to deny, but they're basically all junk (the Laffer Curve argument, for instance, that tax revenues decline when taxes are too high has actually been studied in extensive econometrics analysis, and found that the tax rate at which that is true is somewhere north of 75%).

Interesting to note that revenue collected went up every year Reagan was in office.

It's not very interesting at all if you know anything about the subject beyond eyeballing a graph. We can actually split out all the various kind of taxes, in effect controlling for the effect of economic growth during the period, and see which tax groups increased more or less during the period. The rate for FICA grew from 6.13 to 7.65%, and FICA revenue grew 140% over the decade. While in the area where Reagan cut taxes - income tax, the overall increase was 91%, below the overall 98% increase in taxes over the decade.

And before you say 'well revenue still went up'... revenue increases every decade. That's what an economy with a growing population and growing productivity is going to produce. The overall 98% increase is actually on the lower end of decades in the 20th century, which is quite strange when you consider the economic growth driven by the computing revolution and the release of the economy from ultra-tight monetary policy aimed to crack hyperinflation.

It isn't lack of revenue that drives the deficit. Especially not lack of revenue due to tax rates.

Once again, revenue minus expenditure equals deficit. Straight up grade school maths. If you want to reduce the deficit, then you can either reduce spending or increase revenue. Either is an option... and so is doing both.

And if you want to look at what's changed in the US to drive up deficits since 1980;

Honest question: How much of a person's or corporation's income do you think is 'fair' for the Feds to take, and if the country agreed to those rates, would you be happy forcing the Feds to only spend an amount equal to or less than revenue brought in?

As has already been explained many times across countless threads, fair is just a failed way of looking at the issue. It's just as much of a fail as asking what level of income inequality is fair, and what is unfair. They are economically irrelevant questions.

The question is what rate of tax best provides for as much of the welfare of society as possible, while discouraging as little work and investment as possible. That is to say, if an overall tax rate of 30% provides you with a good level of social services, infrastructure, defence and all the rest, without causing economic disincentives greater than the good, but an overall tax rate of 31% would result in little improvement in social services etc relative to the increase in economic disincentives, then 30% is probably bang on.

From my own view of the US, well you could pretty easily shift back to taxes at 20% of GDP, just by reforming capital gains tax and raising taxes on the top 1%. That would probably be a decent base to return your economy to long term stability.

 sebster wrote:

 CptJake wrote:
You see that it is actually pretty constant in recent times (look at the 2005 constant dollar column). Down turns in revenue collection have more to do with over all economic conditions in the country than tax rates.

If you tax more, you get more. It's a really basic thing that a lot of people have tried to invent complex reasons to deny, but they're basically all junk (the Laffer Curve argument, for instance, that tax revenues decline when taxes are too high has actually been studied in extensive econometrics analysis, and found that the tax rate at which that is true is somewhere north of 75%).

Random fact: The reasoning bush tax cuts were originally made because the surplus was to big. When congress was arguing whether to let the one cuts for the whalthy expire, the justification was... wait for it, wait for it... the deficit was to big.
The justification shifts, yet the bottom line remains the same.*


*That sentence was word for word from a column by Ruth Marcus, but is was so good I had to use it.

An interesting article from the NY Times business section.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/03/business/the-middle-class-is-steadily-eroding-just-ask-the-business-world.html?_r=0

TL/DR: The top 20% are doing very nicely, thank you, while the middle classes are cutting back more. Economic recovery is difficult to sustain on the consumer spending only of the well off.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
An interesting article from the NY Times business section.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/03/business/the-middle-class-is-steadily-eroding-just-ask-the-business-world.html?_r=0

TL/DR: The top 20% are doing very nicely, thank you, while the middle classes are cutting back more. Economic recovery is difficult to sustain on the consumer spending only of the well off.

Well thats what happens in a consumer economy when you starve the consumers. The rich simply don't buy enough to offset the vast majority of the middle class holding on to their pennies. However, fi you give people money to spend it just might come back to you.

Can we try some trickle up economics for a change? Trickle down just doesn't seam to be working AT ALL!

Can we try some trickle up economics for a change?

Nah. That has no ring to it. What about;

Reverse Gravity Economics

 LordofHats wrote:

Can we try some trickle up economics for a change?

Nah. That has no ring to it. What about;

Reverse Gravity Economics

Trickle up sounds like trying to hit the ceiling with pee.

Studies have always shown a good bottom to mid spending base is good for the economy and prosperity.

Thing is the rich don't need the middle and bottom to get even more rich, so to them we might as well just "Pull ourselves up" as it were.

 Alexzandvar wrote:
Studies have always shown a good bottom to mid spending base is good for the economy and prosperity.

Thing is the rich don't need the middle and bottom to get even more rich, so to them we might as well just "Pull ourselves up" as it were.

I don't know if I agree with you there. The riches income comes from investments usually in markets and production. If people are not buying markets don't exist fro investment to grow.

 Andrew1975 wrote:

I don't know if I agree with you there. The riches income comes from investments usually in markets and production. If people are not buying markets don't exist fro investment to grow.

You don't need real productivity or low-end consumption for the rich to get richer. They just need to dump money in the stock market (the majority of which is held by the top 10%) and let it keep going up up up!

Compare the market caps and revenues of tech companies like Twitter, Pinterest, LinkedIn, Facebook, etc. and tell me there isn't a problem.

That's just funny money. Stocks and shares are worth nothing until you sell them, then you need a buyer to give the price you want.

The exception is when you use shares as security to borrow cash. You still owe the cash, though, rather than the shares, and if the value of the shares fell below the cash sum borrowed you would be underwater.

Someone more historically minded should point out that the downfall of so many civilizations in history, including Rome, had roots in those inequalities and the fallout from it, or efforts to keep that inequal status quo.

WWII Germany wasn't trying to equalize wealth, it was trying to grab money for its regime and war machine.

I really don't see it as a war ... I see it as trickle down doesn't work. We need to realize this and stop giving wealthy people and corporations a butt load of breaks and treat em just like everyone else.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Let's face it the rich do NOT want to create jobs. If you give them a break or more money they will just use that to give ridiculous bonuses to themselves and their CEOs. I believe you can only build from a solid foundation ,bottom up. The only way to do that is to stop working on the already complete roof and actually build the house up first. It's no different in an economy. You can't have consumers if no one is buying. You can't have Jobs if no one is willing to make them and you certainly can't have a healthy employment rate If a lot of people have to have multiple jobs to sustain themselves making it impossible for someone without a job to even obtain one job.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
I see it mostly as a post WWI and Pre Nazi Regime type deal. We have this sort of Oligarchy we like to call a democracy, and It's probably not even anyone's fault anymore besides the Big business and wealthy people who had in the past set this sort of financially corrupt version of the American government and still maintain it. People say the US are cutting in the wrong places but they mean things like medicare should be cut. I disagree, we should cut and shut out all the special interest groups and such we supply with money for stupid things like how to make breast enlargement more efficient (for real?) and the US should start focusing on our infrastructure economically and literally. I am so done with the constant exaggeration and scare tactics of these people who just wanna keep feeding their pockets so they feed us this BS and expect us to say " oh , yeah we should listen to him we are being Nazis or socialists" ....It's stupid , most people In my country don't even know how the government works or any type government for that matter (besides a dictatorship of course) and blindly follow people with these clear and bias agendas.

And so castles, made of sand, slips into the sea, eventually.

Love Jimi Hendrix too.

You know this thread disappoints me. 14 pages on an original post about Nazis and the 1% and mostly everyone is still reasonably polite and on topic.

 Vertrucio wrote:
Someone more historically minded should point out that the downfall of so many civilizations in history, including Rome, had roots in those inequalities and the fallout from it, or efforts to keep that inequal status quo.

WWII Germany wasn't trying to equalize wealth, it was trying to grab money for its regime and war machine.

I tried that. Seaward insists there's no comparison between similar events in the past because they were not modern America. Never mind the similarities of events and forces in play.

 BaronIveagh wrote:

 Vertrucio wrote:
Someone more historically minded should point out that the downfall of so many civilizations in history, including Rome, had roots in those inequalities and the fallout from it, or efforts to keep that inequal status quo.

WWII Germany wasn't trying to equalize wealth, it was trying to grab money for its regime and war machine.

I tried that. Seaward insists there's no comparison between similar events in the past because they were not modern America. Never mind the similarities of events and forces in play.

Hey, if you want to go the Marxist historian route, more power to you. It's just as hilariously inaccurate today as it was when I had to study the method in college, but don't break the streak and let that stop you.

Pointing out that class inequality has had negative effects that historically helped bring about the downfall of empires is hardly Marxist. Go ahead and try to explain the fall of the Han dynasty without addressing the crippling poverty of the populace at all. Focusing on it on its own in a vacuum is bad history (you can't explain the fall without addressing the rise of Buddhism either, or the political corruption of Han government that prevented any of the empires problems from being resolved), but ignoring it is just as bad.

 LordofHats wrote:
Pointing out that class inequality has had negative effects that historically helped bring about the downfall of empires is hardly Marxist.

Attributing all historical events to class conflict is, however. And the claim that we're going to fall because we're repeating the class warfare that led to the downfall of the Roman Empire or Marie Antoinette's France is both something a Marxist historian would say and incredibly incorrect.

No one in the thread attributed all historical events to class conflict. Read what was posted;

Someone more historically minded should point out that the downfall of so many civilizations in history, including Rome, had roots in those inequalities and the fallout from it, or efforts to keep that inequal status quo.

This is far from equating all historical events to class conflict. It's a perfectly valid statement. Many Empires (and other states for that matter) find the origins of their downfalls in class conflicts. We could broadly attribute almost all Imperial dissolutions to a combination of political corruption, class conflict, and frontier stress. Pick any collapsing Empire and you'll find all three.

 LordofHats wrote:
No one in the thread attributed all historical events to class conflict. Read what was posted;

I'd advise you do to the same, though I know going back more than one post is asking a lot.

This is far from equating all historical events to class conflict. It's a perfectly valid statement. Many Empires (and other states for that matter) find the origins of their downfalls in class conflicts. We could broadly attribute almost all Imperial dissolutions to a combination of political corruption, class conflict, and frontier stress. Pick any collapsing Empire and you'll find all three.

Assuming you define "class conflict" broadly enough (to be useless), that's true. And not at all helpful, as is true for most deterministic readings of history.

I'd advise you do to the same, though I know going back more than one post is asking a lot.

Then quote the post you were referring to instead of the one you quoted. I can't read your mind (and this thread is 14 pages).

Assuming you define "class conflict" broadly enough (to be useless), that's true. And not at all helpful, as is true for most deterministic readings of history.

I'm honestly defining it not that differently from the perspective of Marxist history. To often people boil 'class conflict' to rich vs poor, but then who can blame them cause that's all we tend to use the term for in our media. Historically, class conflict is broad. Societies comprise numerous classes and social orders, and to find them in conflict to some degree is pretty standard. EDIT: The problem with the Marxist view is that it focuses on economics of class to the exclusion of others. Class is economic, cultural, and political. Marx didn't complete ignore the later two, but he attempted to apply a modern economic system of class into timeline where that system was a very recent development.

Lets even go the untraditional route and look at how the Roman Republic became the Roman Empire. First, you take a privatized military system (creating a distinct military class), a horribly poor urban populace that struggles to get by (the urban poor), farmers who mostly work the lands of city elites or have no jobs because growing slave use (unemployed poor I guess) and a bunch of super rich families who do whatever they want and don't care about everyone else (the WASPs of the 1st century ). Now, throw in Gius Julius, who directly and indirectly takes the former three groups and turns them on the later and you tear apart an oligarchy and wait a few years for Palpati- I mean, Augustus to turn it into an Empire. And the military class wasn't poor by any means. Especially under the command of a successful leader like Julius, it was an incredibly lucrative line of work (assuming you lived). They just had 0 reason to listen to the political establishment over the guy(s) giving them their bread and butter. And that exact same conflict dynamic pops its head back up at the end of the Pax Romana.

Its not very challenging to observe the roles of class conflict in political collapse.

 Seaward wrote:

Attributing all historical events to class conflict is, however. And the claim that we're going to fall because we're repeating the class warfare that led to the downfall of the Roman Empire or Marie Antoinette's France is both something a Marxist historian would say and incredibly incorrect.

Pointing out that there are direct parallels between historical events and current ones is hardly 'Marxist history'. You seem to be confusing 'Marxism' with common sense, A system that favors one class, race, creed, or religion over another will always lead to instability. This is true of inequality of any sort. When you can go to court, and tell them that you shouldn't be punished because you're rich/a member of a party/a member of a particular faith/and so on, and get off, then you are going to have problems.

You can claim it's marxist in the sense that in the two examples, ie the French Revolution and current events in the US the area of inequality is class, but it's just as true if it was based on faith, ethnicity, or any other population demographic. I selected the French Revolution example because it's following the same pattern of economic events and political ineptitude very closely.

Let me put it a different way.

You jump off a cliff and fall.

Another guy jumps off a cliff a hundred years later in another country, and he's not gonna sprout wings and fly away. If you have a set of similar actions in similar conditions, it's not unreasonable to suggest that there will be a similar outcome.

 BaronIveagh wrote:
Pointing out that there are direct parallels between historical events and current ones is hardly 'Marxist history'.

No, it isn't. It's incorrect, in this case.

You seem to be confusing 'Marxism' with common sense,

And you seem to be unaware of what Marxist historiography is.

Let me put it a different way.

You jump off a cliff and fall.

Another guy jumps off a cliff a hundred years later in another country, and he's not gonna sprout wings and fly away. If you have a set of similar actions in similar conditions, it's not unreasonable to suggest that there will be a similar outcome.

And this is another problem. You actually believe there are relevant similarities between 18th century France and 21st century America.

 Seaward wrote:

And you seem to be unaware of what Marxist historiography is.

Since you're using it with a capital 'M' I might suggest that it is in fact you who have no idea, since I at no point suggest the end result is a classless society. I see nothing either Marxist or marxist in pointing out that two events that are very similar might have very similar outcomes as well. Unless you're suggesting that Cause and Effect are somehow inherently Marxist.

 Seaward wrote:
And this is another problem. You actually believe there are relevant similarities between 18th century France and 21st century America.

Well, since I already named them, yes. You have not actually disproved any of my cited similarities, you just accused me of being Marxist for pointing them out. Or are you going to suggest that Frenchmen are subhumans who don't have the same reactions to societal and economic pressures as white anglophone protestants? Because it sounds like you're preaching cultural relativism while I'm talking about punctuated equilibrium in the context of society. Historically speaking, any time a society is stressed through inequality, the eventual result is sudden, and often violent, change. The only real difference between societies is how long the bomb ticks before it blows up, if left uncorrected.

 BaronIveagh wrote:
Since you're using it with a capital 'M' I might suggest that it is in fact you who have no idea, since I at no point suggest the end result is a classless society. I see nothing either Marxist or marxist in pointing out that two events that are very similar might have very similar outcomes as well. Unless you're suggesting that Cause and Effect are somehow inherently Marxist.

What two events are those, pray tell? The French Revolution is similar to...what, that's happening today?

Well, since I already named them, yes.

No, you didn't.

You have not actually disproved any of my cited similarities, you just accused me of being Marxist for pointing them out.

There's nothing to disprove. You didn't even make a cogent point. You made a shockingly superficial statement in the form of, "Oh, Marie Antoinette didn't care about poor people, so it's exactly like today!" Then you ranted on about how we'll all be sorry when the revolution comes.

Keep pretending the fantastical ravings of the downtrodden are some high-minded historical parallel all you like. Doesn't make it so.

 Seaward wrote:

There's nothing to disprove. You didn't even make a cogent point. You made a shockingly superficial statement in the form of, "Oh, Marie Antoinette didn't care about poor people, so it's exactly like today!" Then you ranted on about how we'll all be sorry when the revolution comes.

Keep pretending the fantastical ravings of the downtrodden are some high-minded historical parallel all you like. Doesn't make it so.

Nice strawman.

Considering the subject or this thread is current events and the poor/middle class/wealthy divide in the US and how certain classes are favored, I wouldn't think you really needed me to point out what I was making the comparison to.

And no, I stated that something you said about the poor was a echo of Marie Antoinette's infamous 'let them eat cake' and then pointed out that did not turn out too well for her. Your response was there were no similarities to the two events, which I replied with:

 BaronIveagh wrote:

So there are no parallels with a country with a tax system that favored a privileged elite forcing the tax burden of several wars on the middle and lower classes during an economic downturn, while it's incompetent and fractious government tried to play politics with an increasingly unhappy and desperate public?

No, clearly no grounds for comparison there at all. Certainly not between the Committee of Thirty, backed by wealthy Parisians agitating to stack the deck in their favor because the People are sovereign, and the tea party backed by wealthy Americans trying to stack the deck in their favor because the People are sovereign. Nope, no comparisons there at all.

If you want me to get even more specific...

Louis the 16th came into the throne facing a massive debt from two wars run by his predecessor, and had outlays that exceeded revenue. Poor harvests and failing infrastructure lead to the rising prices of food, which lead to an increasingly desperate public who at the same time was being taxed heavily due to a tax code that shifted most of the tax burden for France onto them.

He attempted reforms, but was too indecisive and tended to back down, and was thwarted by opposition from the parliment, who spread false and misleading information via pamphlets about Louis and his government to stir up the public. Louis appointed Necker as the comptroller, who promptly informed the king (and everyone else) that the middle class and poor could not support more taxes, and that the tax exemptions for the wealthy would have to be closed in order to stabilize things. The opposition seized on a relatively minor error in the report and forced Necker out of office. His successor tried to spend France out of it's financial crisis, but quickly realized this would not work, and so proposed a flat tax, which was shot down by the same people that had Necker replaced.

The political games between parties in favor of reform and parties opposed continued (little factoid, the reason that conservatives are called the right wing is that the monarchy's supporters tended to be eated together on the right hand side of the Assembly) until at first peaceful protests, and then mass rioting took place. Things seemed to cool off for a while, but then the Great Fear set in, with people hoarding supplies and the public blaming, and even attacking, the wealthy for their situation. Things went to gak from there.

I'm not sure if I have to explicitly spell out the similarities there, but they seem pretty self evident.

 BaronIveagh wrote:
Nice strawman.

Considering the subject or this thread is current events and the poor/middle class/wealthy divide in the US and how certain classes are favored, I wouldn't think you really needed me to point out what I was making the comparison to.

I have no idea what you're making a comparison to, actually. There's no revolution currently occurring here, no matter how much you wish one would, and the economic and political situation is considerably different.

If you want me to get even more specific...

Not specific. Simply educated. Comparing the Tea Party with revolutionary Parisians - people on opposite ends of the political spectrum - alone is enough to make it clear you have absolutely no idea what you're talking about.

 Seaward wrote:

Not specific. Simply educated. Comparing the Tea Party with revolutionary Parisians - people on opposite ends of the political spectrum - alone is enough to make it clear you have absolutely no idea what you're talking about.

In this case the political spectrum is irrelevant.

 Seaward wrote:

I have no idea what you're making a comparison to, actually. There's no revolution currently occurring here, no matter how much you wish one would, and the economic and political situation is considerably different.

I hate to point this out, but Revolutions don't just suddenly appear. And how is the situation really that different? I just pointed out the many ways it was the same. You have not disproved these, just attacked my intelligence, political leanings, and level of education.

 Seaward wrote:

Not specific. Simply educated. Comparing the Tea Party with revolutionary Parisians - people on opposite ends of the political spectrum - alone is enough to make it clear you have absolutely no idea what you're talking about.

Clearly more education than you have, considering that I seem to be able to grasp the idea that the same political slogans can be used by both liberals and conservatives, and that liberals can be just as easily manipulated to serve an agenda as conservatives can.

While the Council of 30 was liberal, they were a puppet of wealthy Parisians who sought personal benefit from shifting the tax burden back to the church and the nobility. The Tea Party serves much the same purpose for the wealthy now, pushing an agenda that is to the benefit of the wealthy. The only difference is that in Pre Revolution France, wealth did not necessarily equate political power. So it behooved them to embrace liberalism. In the US the wealthy already hold real power, so it makes more sense for them to create a conservative organization. Since the US doesn't have the Church and Nobility to shift the tax burden onto, they shift it onto the poor and middle classes instead.