# magellan01 - epitome of racist Republican **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [March 18, 2014, 2:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/magellan01-epitome-of-racist-republican/683975 "2014-03-18T02:08:02Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 30
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2014, 7:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/magellan01-epitome-of-racist-republican/683975/581 "2014-03-28T19:12:18Z")
> [@Fotheringay-Phipps](#): > > It’s not clear to me whether you’re agreeing or disagreeing with me. > > It would seem to me that what you write is consistent with what I’m saying. That being, that “it’s only a small distance from Point A to Point A+X”, when the same applies to any Point A on a long scale, is not a valid argument. > > But once you add the specific value of “a few thousand more”, then it will continue to be true that “a few thousand (additional) more will not hurt them”. So if you’re consistent with that approach, the sky is the limit. > > Of note, this does not apply solely to rich guys. You could apply it to anyone at any income level, though on a different scale. Let’s say you cut the family’s food stamps $1 a month. Is that going to hurt them? OK, let’s cut it. New starting point. Now: let’s say you cut it $1 a month. Is that going to hurt them? And so on. The specific value is NOT “a few thousand more”. That’s, basically, a mathematical description of the value (which is “a few thousand” plus “current tax rates”). That equals value X, which is the value being proposed. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2014, 8:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/magellan01-epitome-of-racist-republican/683975/582 "2014-03-28T20:49:24Z")
I think they’re calling your objection dumb, FP. ---
**Author:** ![Fotheringay-Phipps](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/d9b06d/32.png) [@Fotheringay-Phipps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fotheringay-Phipps)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2014, 9:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/magellan01-epitome-of-racist-republican/683975/583 "2014-03-28T21:21:09Z")
My main skepticism is of the first two words. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2014, 11:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/magellan01-epitome-of-racist-republican/683975/584 "2014-03-28T23:31:35Z")
> [@Fotheringay-Phipps](#): > > It’s not clear to me whether you’re agreeing or disagreeing with me. > > It would seem to me that what you write is consistent with what I’m saying. That being, that “it’s only a small distance from Point A to Point A+X”, when the same applies to any Point A on a long scale, is not a valid argument. The point is that, even though every increment is minor and not itself significant, we as humans have no problem putting our foot down when we decide it’s too much. If someone suggests raising NC sales taxes from 6.25% to 7.25%, it’s true that that’s only 1% more, and that 1% isn’t that significant. However, I’m not going to evaluate the difference, I’m going to evaluate the 7.25%. Do I think that’s too much? If they raise it to 8.25% will that be too much? 9.25%? 20.25%? The paradox doesn’t stop me from making a judgment. I decide where I personally draw the line, and sure, that place may be somewhat arbitrary, but that’s necessary. Objecting to a 1% raise in sales tax because raising it by 1% each time will eventually lead us to a 99.25% sales tax ignores the thousands-year-old solution to this paradox. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2014, 11:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/magellan01-epitome-of-racist-republican/683975/585 "2014-03-28T23:38:53Z")
> [@Fotheringay-Phipps](#): > > My main skepticism is of the first two words. Well, that’s fair since I was being polite and in fact am firmly of the opinion that they believe your objection is dumb, and I’m inclined to agree. ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [March 29, 2014, 3:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/magellan01-epitome-of-racist-republican/683975/586 "2014-03-29T03:05:02Z")
> [@Fotheringay-Phipps](#): > > No. Like anything else you would get diminishing returns, of course. As a practical matter there would be any number of other obstacles to instituting a 100% tax rate. > > As above, while I think the rationale could be reused ad infinitum, practical considerations would interfere. Like, the country would collapse, for example. > > But whether it’s literally and practically ad infinitum or just quite a long way from here is not really what’s relevant. Yeah, so to repeat, you’re saying that there is no practical way that they could ACTUAlLY use this argument ad infinitum but in theory, there is no internal mechanism that would prevent this argument from being used over and over again ad infinitum, despite the fact that it wouldn’t WORK over and over again, ad infinitum. > [@](#): > > Number of brackets is less important than the variation in rates between the brackets. We have a lot less of THAT too. > [@](#): > > And plus, there are all sorts of other progressive aspects of the tax code, e.g. the EIC and the per child tax credit phasing out at higher levels. Plus the various social assistance programs, as discussed elsewhere. Its STILL pretty flat even including all that. Are you confusing the progressivity of the tax SYSTEM to the progressivity of who is actually paying the taxes? Because the richest are paying a larger and larger share of income taxes, largely because they are commanding an even more disproportionate share of income. > [@](#): > > That doesn’t cut it. > > If Obama had said explicitly that he was addressing people who think all tax is theft, and I was objecting that this is not a serious position in today’s world, then you could respond by saying it’s a strawman. But there was nothing in Obama’s words that indicated that he was addressing such a position, and you’re just inserting this interpretation into his words. I’m not inserting anything into his words. I am ACCCUSING him of straw manning. We call each other on that sort of straw manning every day on this board. His arguments don’t aren’t really valid outside of that context. His statement isn’t an argument for increasing taxes, his statement is an argument for the existence of taxes. I am in not saying he meant to address the "taxes are theft’ crowd. I am saying that his statement really only makes sense if he was addressing a “taxes are theft crowd” so using that sort of argument is a logical fallacy because only a teeny tiny (but very vocal and influential) sliver of the Republican party thinks that all taxes are theft. > [@](#): > > But it makes no sense for him to make no mention of this and expect people to just figure out that he meant to address something that is not a serious position in today’s world, let alone a part of his current campaign. So your interpretation is very far-fetched. Its not my interpretation and I don’t think that is the message he was trying to get across. I think he was using an argument for the existence of taxes to support increasing already existing taxes. > [@](#): > > There’s rarely complete certainty about consequences, and economics is complicated enough as it is. Throw in a lot of short term self-interest and people will buy into whatever theory that allows them to continue to support their own interests. I think 'well just agree to disagree. I know too many politicians to think that they would bankrupt us if they could help it. > [@](#): > > I disagree. The rates of return on capital for safe investments is very low. After that you’re rewarding risk, which is something else. I didn’t say the rates of return on capital was too high. I said that the share that capital takes relative to the share that labor takes is too high. > [@](#): > > Obama didn’t get everything he wanted, with the HOR controlled by Republicans. But what he campaigned for was an increase for couples making over $250K or singles over $200K. So that’s what’s relevant in interpreting his speech. Meh, 250K is OK too. We’re talking about 4.6% increase in marginal income. For someone making $300K, the extra taxes is ~2K. > [@](#): > > Like Obama’s argument, yours is also one that could be repeated again and again. A few thousand dollars more won’t change their lifestyle. At that point a few thousand more also won’t change their lifestyle. And so on and so on. I don’t think that’s a proper way to look at it. Thats silly. Saying that folks making 300K would not notice a change in their lifestyle if we increased their taxes a couple of thousand bucks doesn’t mean they wouldn’t notice if I did that a hundred times. > [@](#): > > No, it doesn’t. Both because these do not amount to taking money from poor people to give to rich people, and because no children are going to starve as a result of any of these cuts. Wait. What!!?? I said " it is a good idea to take one dollar from the richest in society (by force if necessary) and give it to a starving child" Where do I say anything about taking money from poor people to give to the rich? I said that we should be taking money from the rich to feed starving children (and I guess I should have said hungry children). > [@](#): > > When I was more familiar with WIC than I am now, the subsidies were ridiculously generous, and people who were lucky enough to qualify for WIC would share their bounty with friends and relatives who were deemed too rich to qualify for the program, but this info dates to the 90s. And I don’t know about Food Stamps. But in any event, no children are starving or going to starve. [http://www.fns.usda.gov/wic/about-wic-wic-glance](http://www.fns.usda.gov/wic/about-wic-wic-glance) OK, I should have said hungry kids. ---
**Author:** ![MaxTheVool](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9fc29f/32.png) [@MaxTheVool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MaxTheVool)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2014, 1:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/magellan01-epitome-of-racist-republican/683975/587 "2014-03-30T13:05:54Z")
> [@Fotheringay-Phipps](#): > > But once you add the specific value of “a few thousand more”, then it will continue to be true that “a few thousand (additional) more will not hurt them”. So if you’re consistent with that approach, the sky is the limit. The problem with your argument is that it could be used to rebut nearly any argument anyone ever makes to do anything with respect to taxes, up OR down. Generally speaking, the tax rate will be, say, 33%. And some number of Republicans will be arguing to lower it. And some number of Democrats will be arguing to raise it. Thing is, those arguments (at least the populist ones made to the general public) are almost never of the form “hey, here’s a bunch of math that explains why 33% is not the ideal tax rate, 35% (or 31%) is”. Rather, they’re almost always slightly vague rhetoric about “if we give more to the job creators, they’ll work harder and create more jobs” or “it’s only fair to ask those wealthiest among us to give back”, etc. All of those arguments, to the extent that they are actual logical arguments as opposed to pure windbaggery (not that it’s necessarily terrible to have pure windbaggery in political speeches) can clearly then be applied forever, because nothing in them ever only applies when the rate is currently 33%. So take any argument that Mitt Romney made during the 2012 election about lowering taxes, repeat it forever, and you’ll end up with a tax rate around 0.001%. Take any argument for raising taxes that anyone has ever made, repeat it forever, and you’ll end up with a tax rate \> 99%. So I find your objection spurious. ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2014, 5:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/magellan01-epitome-of-racist-republican/683975/588 "2014-03-30T17:14:16Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > This is the [Sorites Paradox](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sorites_paradox), and it crops up in many different areas of social policy. The answer is that sometimes we draw a line without having a clear first principle for doing so (say, putting the drinking age at 18), understanding that at some point we may change that line. > > Tax rates are no different. What works right now may not work later. That’s ducky. I’m not sure you grasp the full extent of American right-wing stupidity. Lower the drinking age to 18? Soon we’ll be encouraging babies to drink liquor. Increase minimum wage from $10 to $11 per hour? Why not $10,000 per hour? Extend the right to abortion to the 2nd trimester? Soon women will be able to kill their children through age 21. Increase a tax rate from 30% to 31%? It won’t stop there; soon the rate will be 100% or more. Allow gays to marry? Soon we’ll be forcing people to marry farm animals. The mystery is why Dopers engage these blithering dolts. I’ve got some of the stupidest set to Ignore, and thank Dopers who Quote their more amusing blither so I can laugh too. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2014, 6:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/magellan01-epitome-of-racist-republican/683975/589 "2014-03-30T18:07:42Z")
Well, the American right wing didn’t invent the slippery slope fallacy, nor do they have a monopoly on it. It just happens to go over reasonably well with people who are already motivated by fears that terrorists/gays/atheists/immigrants are coming for their children/marriages/churches/jobs. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2014, 10:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/magellan01-epitome-of-racist-republican/683975/590 "2014-03-30T22:37:24Z")
I think F-P is more of a Libertarian True Believer. The Libs I’ve known tend to pride themselves on arguments from first principles and to deride us Muddlers. Since reading _The Crooked Timber of Humanity_ my senior year in college, I’ve switched from being some sort of communist anarchist (also arguing from first principles, albeit different ones from Lib F-Ps) to being a committed Muddler. Slippery Slope, and the Heap Paradox, are much more convincing to ideologues of any stripe than they are to us Muddlers, since Muddlers live comfortably on the slope of the heap. ---
**Author:** ![Kobal2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kobal2/32/20_2.png) [@Kobal2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kobal2)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2014, 11:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/magellan01-epitome-of-racist-republican/683975/591 "2014-03-30T23:56:48Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > Well, the American right wing didn’t invent the slippery slope fallacy, nor do they have a monopoly on it. It just happens to go over reasonably well with people who are already motivated by fears that terrorists/gays/atheists/immigrants are coming for their children/marriages/churches/jobs. The slippery slope is, ultimately, a conservative/reactionary argument. “Don’t change anything because if anything changes even a tiny bit everything will explode and catch AIDS !”. Since outside of trying to revert to an imaginary moral golden age the right wings of the world tend to camp on their positions that everything is FINE (‘xcept for that Obama guy, what a jerk), they’re the ones who get to rely more regularly on that trusty ol’ slope. Progressives, by and large, tend to rely more on excluded middles. “What we have is crap, your proposed solution is crappier or non-existent, therefore my solution is good”. ---
**Author:** ![Fotheringay-Phipps](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/d9b06d/32.png) [@Fotheringay-Phipps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fotheringay-Phipps)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2014, 1:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/magellan01-epitome-of-racist-republican/683975/592 "2014-03-31T13:37:29Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > The point is that, even though every increment is minor and not itself significant, we as humans have no problem putting our foot down when we decide it’s too much. > > If someone suggests raising NC sales taxes from 6.25% to 7.25%, it’s true that that’s only 1% more, and that 1% isn’t that significant. However, I’m not going to evaluate the difference, I’m going to evaluate the 7.25%. Do I think that’s too much? If they raise it to 8.25% will that be too much? 9.25%? 20.25%? > > The paradox doesn’t stop me from making a judgment. I decide where I personally draw the line, and sure, that place may be somewhat arbitrary, but that’s necessary. > > Objecting to a 1% raise in sales tax because raising it by 1% each time will eventually lead us to a 99.25% sales tax ignores the thousands-year-old solution to this paradox. But I don’t disagree with any of this. In this argument, the one who is saying the equivalent of " that’s only 1% more, and that 1% isn’t that significant" is not me, it’s Damuri Ajashi et al. I’m agreeing with you (I think) that this is not a valid argument. > [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > Well, that’s fair since I was being polite … The first is truer than the second. > [@Damuri\_Ajashi](#): > > Yeah, so to repeat, you’re saying that there is no practical way that they could ACTUAlLY use this argument ad infinitum but in theory, there is no internal mechanism that would prevent this argument from being used over and over again ad infinitum, despite the fact that it wouldn’t WORK over and over again, ad infinitum. That’s true. As a practical matter, the concern is not that someone will raise taxes ad infinitum. It’s that they’ll continue to raise it again and again, beyond what’s currently being proposed. > [@](#): > > We have a lot less of THAT too. > > Its STILL pretty flat even including all that. > > Are you confusing the progressivity of the tax SYSTEM to the progressivity of who is actually paying the taxes? Because the richest are paying a larger and larger share of income taxes, largely because they are commanding an even more disproportionate share of income. Truth is I’m not quite sure how progressive the tax rates specifically are, and you could be right. I was just noting that the facts you pointed to didn’t seem to establish your claim. [Though I doubt very highly if it’s true when you consider EIC etc. and social programs.] > [@](#): > > I’m not inserting anything into his words. I am ACCCUSING him of straw manning. We call each other on that sort of straw manning every day on this board. His arguments don’t aren’t really valid outside of that context. His statement isn’t an argument for increasing taxes, his statement is an argument for the existence of taxes. > > I am in not saying he meant to address the "taxes are theft’ crowd. I am saying that his statement really only makes sense if he was addressing a “taxes are theft crowd” so using that sort of argument is a logical fallacy because only a teeny tiny (but very vocal and influential) sliver of the Republican party thinks that all taxes are theft. > > Its not my interpretation and I don’t think that is the message he was trying to get across. I think he was using an argument for the existence of taxes to support increasing already existing taxes. OK, I don’t disagree with this. > [@](#): > > Thats silly. Saying that folks making 300K would not notice a change in their lifestyle if we increased their taxes a couple of thousand bucks doesn’t mean they wouldn’t notice if I did that a hundred times. But I’m not saying that. I’m saying if you considered each raise in isolation (as you’re doing WRT this particular raise) then they wouldn’t notice each one. So the process would work. > [@](#): > > Wait. What!!?? I said " it is a good idea to take one dollar from the richest in society (by force if necessary) and give it to a starving child" Where do I say anything about taking money from poor people to give to the rich? I said that we should be taking money from the rich to feed starving children The opposite of taking from the rich to give to starving children is taking from starving children and giving to the rich. I assume I misunderstood you in that regard. You do see this type of attitude all the time in contemporary political discourse, in which tax cuts are considered giving things to people. (Obama - a past master of political doublespeak - took it to a new level in referring to tax increases as spending cuts, as in “cutting spending in the tax code”, but the general attitude is all over.) > [@MaxTheVool](#): > > The problem with your argument is that it could be used to rebut nearly any argument anyone ever makes to do anything with respect to taxes, up OR down. > > Generally speaking, the tax rate will be, say, 33%. And some number of Republicans will be arguing to lower it. And some number of Democrats will be arguing to raise it. Thing is, those arguments (at least the populist ones made to the general public) are almost never of the form “hey, here’s a bunch of math that explains why 33% is not the ideal tax rate, 35% (or 31%) is”. Rather, they’re almost always slightly vague rhetoric about “if we give more to the job creators, they’ll work harder and create more jobs” or “it’s only fair to ask those wealthiest among us to give back”, etc. > > All of those arguments, to the extent that they are actual logical arguments as opposed to pure windbaggery (not that it’s necessarily terrible to have pure windbaggery in political speeches) can clearly then be applied forever, because nothing in them ever only applies when the rate is currently 33%. So take any argument that Mitt Romney made during the 2012 election about lowering taxes, repeat it forever, and you’ll end up with a tax rate around 0.001%. Take any argument for raising taxes that anyone has ever made, repeat it forever, and you’ll end up with a tax rate \> 99%. As a general rule, that’s not far off. People who are in favor of specific tax raises based on these types of arguments are likely to continue to favor additional tax increases once these are accomplished, and vice versa. What I’m saying is not a “rebuttal” of any argument, but a reason to be very wary of people who vaguely use arguments like “fair share” (or “job creators”, on the other side) because there’s no end to these arguments and these people - on either side - are likely to just come back for more later. But there are sometimes tax increase advocates who are not talking about fair share etc., but simply say something like “hey, we think everyone is paying too much taxes as it is, but unfortunately right now we are facing a huge budget shortfall totaling $XB so we need to take this unpleasant step”. Personally I tend to be skeptical of this too, because when you make up the shortfall you can always institute wonderful new programs which create new shortfalls, but this argument is not in itself a self-perpetuating one and sometimes its advocates are sincere about it. ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2014, 6:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/magellan01-epitome-of-racist-republican/683975/593 "2014-03-31T18:35:25Z")
> [@Fotheringay-Phipps](#): > > Truth is I’m not quite sure how progressive the tax rates specifically are, and you could be right. I was just noting that the facts you pointed to didn’t seem to establish your claim. > > [Though I doubt very highly if it’s true when you consider EIC etc. and social programs.] So are you treating social security benefits (or anything you get from the government as a negative tax)? I think we may be straying from the commonly understodd concept of taxes. I’ve heard of tax expenditures where people treat tax breaks like spending, i have never heard the opposite where you treat spending like tax breaks. The EITC STILl doesn’t bring us close to the days when tax rateswent up to 90%+, almost nothing would. > [@](#): > > But I’m not saying that. I’m saying if you considered each raise in isolation (as you’re doing WRT this particular raise) then they wouldn’t notice each one. So the process would work. You’re saying that its like boiling a frog, right? I don’t think thats the case at all. I think we would notice. > [@](#): > > The opposite of taking from the rich to give to starving children is taking from starving children and giving to the rich. > > I assume I misunderstood you in that regard. You do see this type of attitude all the time in contemporary political discourse, in which tax cuts are considered giving things to people. (Obama - a past master of political doublespeak - took it to a new level in referring to tax increases as spending cuts, as in “cutting spending in the tax code”, but the general attitude is all over.) OK, I think I get what you’re saying. People like the “other 98%” try to portray the failure to tax the rich as stealing from the poor. But they’re idiots. The argument is that we are denying the needy in order to spare the rich from taxes. And it is a sin to deny a child food for the sake of sparing the rich from marginally higher taxes. That doesn’t mean I would use the same argument to provide that child with a pony. ---
**Author:** ![Fotheringay-Phipps](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/d9b06d/32.png) [@Fotheringay-Phipps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fotheringay-Phipps)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2014, 7:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/magellan01-epitome-of-racist-republican/683975/594 "2014-03-31T19:19:53Z")
> [@Damuri\_Ajashi](#): > > So are you treating social security benefits (or anything you get from the government as a negative tax)? I think we may be straying from the commonly understodd concept of taxes. > > I’ve heard of tax expenditures where people treat tax breaks like spending, i have never heard the opposite where you treat spending like tax breaks. I think that depends on the context. IIRC that was a point of contention between Obama and the Republicans, in that the Republicans insisted that you could only call something a “tax cut” if you were lessening the level of taxes that someone paid, while Obama preferred to call having people pay negative tax rates a “tax cut” as long as it was processed by the IRS via tax filing. I inclined to the Republican view on that, because in that context, the notion of tax cuts implies a lessening of the burden on those who were paying the government’s bills, not a bigger handout to those who were not. But for our purposes here, we are just discussing income disparities and redistribution schemes. I don’t see any reason to focus solely on taxes. Any government redistribution has the same effect, for that purpose. [I don’t know about social security specifically. Ostensibly social security is just return on money you’ve been paying into the system and is not a form of income redistribution. There are those who disagree with this - generally those who want to make SS benefits income-based - but that’s beyond the scope of this discussion.] > [@](#): > > The EITC STILl doesn’t bring us close to the days when tax rateswent up to 90%+, almost nothing would. I don’t think anything these days is at 90%. But the question is what was excluded in those days, and also what percentage of the population was impacted by the 90%. (I don’t know.) > [@](#): > > You’re saying that its like boiling a frog, right? I don’t think thats the case at all. I think we would notice. Well the frog notices too. But the frog doesn’t notice “hey, it’s hotter here than it was a few minutes ago”. It notices “hey, it’s PRETTY DARN HOT IN HERE!!” So too, I don’t think what’s significant in raising taxes is whether the new level is noticeably higher than the old level. What’s important is how high it is on an absolute basis. ---
**Author:** ![Fotheringay-Phipps](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/d9b06d/32.png) [@Fotheringay-Phipps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fotheringay-Phipps)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2014, 7:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/magellan01-epitome-of-racist-republican/683975/595 "2014-03-31T19:32:59Z")
> [@Fotheringay-Phipps](#): > > I don’t think anything these days is at 90%. But the question is what was excluded in those days, and also what percentage of the population was impacted by the 90%. (I don’t know.) FWIW, I found this on [Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taxation_history_of_the_United_States#Tax_rate_reductions): > [@](#): > > Timothy Noah, senior editor of the New Republic, argues that while Ronald Reagan made massive reductions in the nominal marginal income tax rates with his Tax Reform Act of 1986, this reform did not make a similarly massive reduction in the effective tax rate on the higher marginal incomes. Noah writes in his ten part series entitled “The Great Divergence,” that in 1979, the effective tax rate on the top 0.01 percent of taxpayers was 42.9 percent, according to the Congressional Budget Office, but that by Reagan’s last year in office it was 32.2%. This effective rate on high incomes held steadily until the first few years of the Clinton presidency when it increased to a peak high of 41%. However, it fell back down to the low 30s by his second term in the White House. This percentage reduction in the effective marginal income tax rate for the wealthiest Americans, 9%, is not a very large decrease in their tax burden, according to Noah, especially in comparison to the 20% drop in nominal rates from 1980 to 1981 and the 15% drop in nominal rates from 1986 to 1987. In addition to this small reduction on the income taxes of the wealthiest taxpayers in America, Noah discovered that the effective income tax burden for the bottom 20% of wage earners was 8% in 1979 and dropped to 6.4% under the Clinton Administration. This effective rate further dropped under the George W. Bush Administration. Under Bush, the rate decreased from 6.4% to 4.3%. Reductions in the effective income tax burden on the poor coinciding with modest reductions in the effective income tax rate on the wealthiest 0.01% of tax payers could not have been the driving cause of increased income inequality that began in the 1980s.[27] These figures also correspond to an analysis of effective tax rates from 1979-2005 by the Congressional Budget Office.[28] I can’t vouch for any of this and it’s quite possible that there are valid counter-arguments, but my point is just that it’s a complex matter and you can’t settle it merely by quoting the nominal marginal rates. ---
**Author:** ![Fotheringay-Phipps](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/d9b06d/32.png) [@Fotheringay-Phipps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fotheringay-Phipps)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2014, 7:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/magellan01-epitome-of-racist-republican/683975/596 "2014-03-31T19:45:26Z")
And from [CNN](http://www.cnn.com/2013/02/08/opinion/mccaffery-marginal-tax-rates/) > [@](#): > > As a result, some of the working poor face extremely high rates on their next dollar earned. Tax scholars and economists have long known this. Dan Shaviro of NYU published a study in 1999 showing marginal tax rates above 100% on the working poor; specifically, he illustrated that a single parent earning $10,000 would lose over $2,500, after taxes, by earning another $15,000, pushing her income to $25,000. > > Last year, a study from the Congressional Budget Office shows how a single parent making $18,000 now faces a marginal tax rate of 88% in 2013, down from 95% in 2012. The CBO report is 45 pages long, with complex details. Adding in all the taxes along with a host of other things that have strange acronyms like SNAP and TANF, and the result is that it is possible to face marginal tax rates approaching 90%. This includes the impact of social programs, as described. [I did not read the original CBO study, so I don’t know whether it includes the impact of ACA subsidies, which are highly progressive in their own right.] ---
**Author:** ![MaxTheVool](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9fc29f/32.png) [@MaxTheVool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MaxTheVool)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2014, 10:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/magellan01-epitome-of-racist-republican/683975/597 "2014-03-31T22:39:49Z")
[QUOTE=Fotheringay-Phipps] As a general rule, that’s not far off. People who are in favor of specific tax raises based on these types of arguments are likely to continue to favor additional tax increases once these are accomplished, and vice versa. [/QUOTE] I have a couple of responses to that: (1) This particular discussion was, I believe, in the context of arguing about “letting the Bush tax cuts expire”. That makes it far more likely than normal to think that Obama and the Democrats would have both the desire and the political capital to “raise taxes” (or let tax cuts expire) a certain predefined amount, but not then just keep going forever (2) Suppose that you think that taxes are currently too low. Say they’re at 30% right now, and the government clearly needs more money, and you think that 33% is a reasonable rate. You have a choice between two parties. One wants to lower taxes further because, I dunno, lower taxes. The other wants to raise taxes. They CLAIM they want to raise taxes to 33%. But you suspect from their rhetoric that they might then keep raising taxes. Which party would you vote for (all other things being equal)? (3) I also reject your premise that there is something particularly sinister about Obama’s rhetoric that makes it likely that he would have the desire to continue raising taxes forever (not to mention that clearly he wouldn’t have the ABILITY to do so). Do you think Obama’s political philosophy is substantially different from, say, Bill Clinton’s? Did Bill Clinton raise taxes forever? ---
**Author:** ![Fotheringay-Phipps](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/d9b06d/32.png) [@Fotheringay-Phipps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fotheringay-Phipps)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2014, 11:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/magellan01-epitome-of-racist-republican/683975/598 "2014-03-31T23:05:19Z")
> [@MaxTheVool](#): > > I have a couple of responses to that: > (1) This particular discussion was, I believe, in the context of arguing about “letting the Bush tax cuts expire”. That makes it far more likely than normal to think that Obama and the Democrats would have both the desire and the political capital to “raise taxes” (or let tax cuts expire) a certain predefined amount, but not then just keep going forever I disagree that this is the context of the discussion. The context of this discussion is Obama’s rationale for raising taxes, i.e. “you didn’t build that (infrastructure)”, and what this says about his mindset when it comes to raising taxes. Taxes are a perennial issue in American politics and legislation, and it’s also a big issue for a lot of people. It would reasonably be expected to come up every year at budget time, and a lot of times in between. If someone takes the attitude that “you owe us” more tax money, there is a good reason to think that this guy will generally tend to be on the side of raising taxes on most or all of these occasions. For someone to whom taxes are a big issue, this is good reason to refrain from voting for this guy. [To be honest, I think a lot of people disagreeing with me here would take the same position if it was an issue that they cared about. If someone was pushing a proposal on an issue that they cared about - say abortion, freedom of speech, whatever - and that particular proposal was not in itself a huge deal but indicated that this guy’s general sympathies were very opposed to their own - and if this indication was backed up by actual rhetoric from the candidate himself - I think most or all these people would take the same position and would not be harping about slippery slope fallacies and insisting that we consider only the specific proposal on the table right now.] > [@](#): > > (2) Suppose that you think that taxes are currently too low. Say they’re at 30% right now, and the government clearly needs more money, and you think that 33% is a reasonable rate. You have a choice between two parties. One wants to lower taxes further because, I dunno, lower taxes. The other wants to raise taxes. They CLAIM they want to raise taxes to 33%. But you suspect from their rhetoric that they might then keep raising taxes. Which party would you vote for (all other things being equal)? I addressed this earlier (post #567, last paragraph). > [@](#): > > (3) I also reject your premise that there is something particularly sinister about Obama’s rhetoric that makes it likely that he would have the desire to continue raising taxes forever (not to mention that clearly he wouldn’t have the ABILITY to do so). Do you think Obama’s political philosophy is substantially different from, say, Bill Clinton’s? Did Bill Clinton raise taxes forever? I don’t know. Certainly Clinton started off as more of a centrist than Obama (though possibly this was based more on their respective offices and homestates than on their sympathies). And it’s hard to know what Clinton would have done had he not been constrained by a Republican congress (something which also applies to Obama). But I don’t know. What I do know is that this specific quote by Obama indicated an expansive sense of government entitlement to private property, and as such was fair game. I would have much preferred had his critics been more honest in their use of it, but even as correctly understood the attitude was effectively the same, as above. ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2014, 12:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/magellan01-epitome-of-racist-republican/683975/599 "2014-04-01T00:28:06Z")
> [@Fotheringay-Phipps](#): > > [I don’t know about social security specifically. Ostensibly social security is just return on money you’ve been paying into the system and is not a form of income redistribution. There are those who disagree with this - generally those who want to make SS benefits income-based - but that’s beyond the scope of this discussion.] Social security is fairly progressive. The tax is regressive but the payout is far more progressive than the tax is regreesive. It would make sense to elimiante the cap on social security taxes and apply it to all wages (including deferred and contingent wages). In the contexts of Obama’s “you didn’t build it comment” I think its fairly safe to say that it wasn’t going to grease teh skids of a slippery slope and thats really all we’re arguing about isn’t it? It doesn’t provide some clear window into his mind or anything. it was just a straw man argument that meant to make the Republican opposition seem unreasonable. ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2014, 8:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/magellan01-epitome-of-racist-republican/683975/600 "2014-04-01T08:48:13Z")
SocSec benefits end at death ( :smack: ) which adds a regressive factor since the rich tend to have longer life expectancies. But I think means-testing would be a bad detour into bureaucracy and other problems. Note that the rich (those with enough investment income to pay income tax) already have to pay income tax on some of their social security benefits. I’d like to see the first $12,000 of income exempted from SocSec tax (but not the benefit accrual) with the revenue source replaced with a carbon tax. This would raise the _effective_ minimum wage with no cost to employer, thus encouraging employment. U.S. employers who outsource to other countries do not pay pensions or healthcare for the outsourcing workers. It’s a shame that America has developed a fallacious dogma that employers should be responsible for their American employees’ health care and SocSec: this leads to to undesired incentives. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/magellan01-epitome-of-racist-republican/683975.md?page=29) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/magellan01-epitome-of-racist-republican/683975.md?page=31)