It is completely futile to discuss this if you keep going back to that ridiculous extrapolation. Or should I say, these ridiculous extrapolations, as, indeed, your entire post is full of them; example: " You say that other people should work uncomplainingly for the benefit of others." Ridiculous.
I actually think we could go significantly higher than that. I guess I would point to the econmic growth and acticvity during the 50’s when top marginal tax rates topped 90%. This probably helped keep CEO compensation at around 50 times the compensation of the front line worker. CEOs somehow managed to still do a pretty good job even though their pay wasn’t 400 to 500 times the salary of front line workers the way it was until right before the recession,and actually quite a bit into it).
It doesn’t matter who is paying for it, noone wants to waste resources, its opportunity cost for everyone. If I gave a billion dollars to be spent for the benefit of the members of this board you probably want different things but none of you would want to waste money.
With tahtsaid, I think it hurts your sense of ownership in the country if you don’t have to contribute and at least try to pull your weight.
Small businessmen are pretty close to being on a consumption tax. They don’t get taxed until and unless they actually need to pull the money out of their business.
What’s ridiculous is that you keep using inconsistent logic throughout all your posts.
I do notice one constant pattern to your thoughts: you consistently try to handwave away your hypocrisy.
On the other hand, I freely admit that I and billions of others have acted in a self-interested manner similar to the doctor not seeing patients. Since you do not acknowledge this view, you must be the rare saint. It must be lonely from your pedestal.
Oh bullshit.
**Shodan **said that if doctors are taxed more, then they will have to see fewer patients and more tax lawyers. I said that’s a shitty thing for them to do. Now I want to strangle African dirt farmers or some shit.
I’m done defending myself against ulterior motives and torured extrapolations that only exist in your’s and **Shodan’s **heads.
Maybe this thread would be cleaner if someone would define “soak the rich” or perhaps tell us WHICH historical tax system (not just rates - the the entire code with its deductions, shelters, trusts, and luncheon write-offs) they would go back to.
When income taxes were a bit higher in the 80s, you could write off an entire lunch (with booze) as a business expense. So you had a lot of nice lunches for the staff, for clients, for partners, for meetings, for the mistress, etc. That helped compensate for the higher tax rate - you could have a nice steak and 3 martini lunch using pre-tax income. The company could also pick up your country club dues, provide a nice car, etc. at it was all tax advantaged. When we cut the rates, we also cut a lot of those deductions. From a standard of living perspective, it might have been close to even.
One MORE slight request. Salary is the money you get with every normal paycheck. Bonus is what you get based on the achievement of certain goals. Stock compensation comes as restricted stock or options with vesting restrictions. Calling all of that salary is incorrect.
Joe Frickin Friday stated that the CEO of Ford has a salary of $20mm per year. Here is the correct information:
2007:
Salary: $2,000,000. This is interesting, since Ford can only write off the first $1,000,000.
Bonus: $4,006,154.
Stock Awards: $3,718,581. This appears to be based on the vesting of prior year grants.
Option Awards: $7,511,634. See above. I would need to read the 10k footnotes to properly analyze.
Non-equity incentive plan: 2,993,846. Long-term incentive plan payout - think multi year bonus program.
Perqs: 1,440,459. Ford guys get a free car to drive (and swap them out a few times per year.).
Total: $ 21,670,674 in all compensation. A nice chunk of change, but that is not “salary.”
It happens in every branch of local government that is legally prohibited from running deficits. Even the California state government has a contingency fund, which ran out in our torrential downpour. One of the defeated propositions mandated a certain percentage of revenues go into it. This is yet another example of right wingers criticizing something they seem to know nothing about.
If **Shodan ** is so concerned about doctors seeing the maximum number of patients, he should be for banning golf courses also. Makes about as much sense as what he is saying.
Point being, how much do you think a doctor should work for? What constitutes a “big pile of money” to you? If someone chooses to go into medicine (or law, or finance or a thousand other professions) primarily to make money, why do you presume that makes them to be morally contemptible? Intelligent and capable people generally go into professions that pay well. I’d rather have a doctor who’s well-paid and competent to an incompetent doctor with noble intentions.
We can’t say this often enough. It seems conservatives think the people who run businesses are stupid. They are sitting there with factories running at 50% capacity, and having trouble finding enough for their employees to do even after a 20% layoff, and the conservatives think that the first thing they will do if you give them more money is hire people (to do what?) and add capacity (to make what?) They read their books and articles and can parrot technical economic terms, but they actually understand nothing.
No, but this conservative thinks (and is supported by economic theory) that if you raise the cost of doing business through taxes, you shift the supply curve until it is at a higher price (P) intersection with demand. The supplier will insist on a higher price for the same quantity, to ensure that the ROI is still worth it to the supplier.
If you cut taxes, then the supplier can drop the price, shift the supply line higher, and reap the rewards as well. This will also result in more jobs as capacity is filled.
I am dropping $27k to install solar panels on my roof. I am doing this thanks to $7k or so in tax credits from the state of California, plus the deductions I will get from the Feds. After April 15th, my out-of-pocket will be below $14k or so. This gets me a 10 year ROI on my investment. Those tax credits from the State and the Feds have made my investment in solar panels worthwhile. There are now new jobs being created, because the tax credits have stimulated demand by dropping P (Price), creating more Demand, and the manufacturers and installers are scrambling to provide the Supply.
Might want to actually read the thread before commenting. Jack Batty is the one who believes doctors are morally obligated to treat patients during every waking hour.
Regards
Shodan
Yes. And I also believe they should provide free blow jobs with every check-up. Or was that something you were going to attribute to me next hour. Sorry for jumping the gun.
Well, hell why don’t we just eliminate company taxes. It is not like they use a lot of services or anything. Just think how low they could drop prices then.
Only they wouldn’t. They would just make more for themselves. Corporations are in a battle to eliminate competition. That is the danger when we keep allowing mergers. They do not get bigger and more efficient. They get more powerful and can impact legislation and can control larger parts of the market.
In Maine Wellpoint controls 71 % of the health care market. Maine has very high prices.
Jack Batty, when you state:
That implies that **YOU **are judging how doctors spend their time. You are stating that it is shitty that a doctor would weigh the time spent on earning money and would choose to maximize the return on his investment by spending less time in the practice of medicine and more time in the management of his business of practicing medicine.
So it appears to some readers that you think that Doctors are shitty for making that type of determination.
Would you care to restate your position a bit clearer, to ensure that all can understand?
Let me help frame the issue with a random outline of a physician’s work day (real docs are welcome to adjust this - I base this on a few clients of mine):
8 hours sleeping
3 hours eating
2 hours commuting
6 hours practicing medicine
2 hours management of the business of practicing medicine
1 hour continuing education (journals, etc.)
2 hours downtime
Now, if you crank up the taxes, the doctor might consider reducing the 6 hours, and putting more time into the 2 hours of management to even out the income stream. That is a natural result, and is what we would see in any well-run small business. With doctors, we can make a value judgment, but they do still have a business to run.
You could drop all corporate taxes, and put them all onto individuals instead. Corporate taxes are just an efficient means of collecting revenue.
Your comments on mergers is a different discussion from corporate and individual tax rates, however.
Don’t aske me. **Shodan’s **the one who thinks doctors shouldn’t have to see patients at all because it takes to much time away from jerking off their tax lawyers.
See. I can do it too.
It was responsive to a post.
You responded to my post, and I had nothing to say in this thread about mergers.
I did point out that taxes raise the cost of doing business. That cost helps determine the Supply curve. When you raise tax rates on providers, Supply shifts. This is a simple equation. It is NOT an argument for no taxes - it simply points out that there is cause-and-effect in the marketplace and raising taxes WILL have an effect on how businesses and people act.
**You **said it was shitty for a doctor to spend time with a tax attorney. **You **made the value call - you can defend it.
**Shodan **simply pointed out what a rational doctor/businessman would do. If the doctor sees zero patients, then he has no income to even need a tax attorney. Somewhere the doctor makes a balance between number of hours spent with patients and number of hours spent on making sure that he earns money from seeing those patients.