She is saying that essence can precede existence, if the object in question is constructed and conceived according to a pre-determined set of characteristics.
There must be a certain freedom in just making shit up. Did you know that the CEO of Walmart got a $137M bonus last year? That’s enough to give every worker a $10,000 raise and pay 100% of their medical insurance. I’m not very good at math though, so I may be off a bit. My point stands however.
So how about that NYT write-up from Warren Buffet . . .
What more is there to say?
In what way can this philosophy not be justified?
I agree it can never be achieved and neither can complete fairness but it gives you a method of approaching fairness that doesn’t amount to “WAAHH I’m going to Harvard Law or Stanford MBA and progressive taxation seems SOOOO unfair”
You’re doing a very poor job of thining, even animals can act selfishly. Progressive taxation is not about sour grapes and only an idiot or the ignorant would think it is.
It is especially galling these days considering how flat our system is. There are 5 income tax brackets and 4 of them are between 28% and 35%, how much flatter do you need it to be to make life seem fair to you?
I think a couple of people pointed out your error and then when you doubled down, people started dogpiling.
I quoted the relevant part. Well at least you are admitting that you were focusing on (and effectively blaming taxes).
Then its not a fucking bailout. A bailout is when we jump in and save peopel BEFORE bankruptcy. Letting people go bankrupt is not ANYONES idea of a bailout.
They don’t charge interest rates based on default rates, they charge interest rates primarily based on the usury laws (the highest rate they can charge without going to jail) and second on the creditworthiness of the borrower. A high default rate affects their profits but I don’t think I have ever had my rates increased because of an increased default rate.
Credit card companies are not insurance companies, they do not spread their losses to all policyholders through increased premiums.
It has everything to do with what you said. Your point seems to be that borrowers should be the gatekeepers to the credit market instead of the lenders. WTF?!?!
OK so you don’t remember but you are happy to keep insisting taht your vague recollections are the sound basis for your opinions?
Why the hell would I agree to pay more to credit card companies for lending money to bad credits? Why would you? Credit Card Companies absorb default losses to their bottom line.
Because legal fees and shit like that get a preference in bankruptcy. They get paid before almost everyone else. And some of them are non-profits.
It is the essense of what you said. All the other stuff adds gloss but it doesn’t change your point.
Yeah, she’s saying taht she was just spouting off some notions based on how she feels and impressions she has been getting from folks to conclude that taxes are the reason she doesn’t notice a 20K drop in income and that the bakruptcy code is a bailout.
I understand her feeling thsi way but when confronted with facts, she doesn’t reclibrate her position, she looks for ways to make her original position correct.
<looks around> Yep, we are in the pit. Hey, jerkface, your reading comprehension should be checked. We get DEDUCTIONS for him (and quite large ones) that I can’t get at our current combined income. 300 bucks a months. Since we would only need about 1200, I consider it significant.
And it doesn’t have anything to do with marginal tax rate (since I would be in the same bracket) but you can get a large amount back here in canada if your income is smaller.
I think I might have figured out why you might not have noticed the 20K drop in income too much.
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=14132682&postcount=72
I got the impression your husband was making more in the order of 50K/year not 100K+/year.
It sounds like youa re saying that there are some decudtions taht “phase out” because of your husband’s income such that you are actually subject to a greater than 100% marginal tax rate at some point in the Canadian tax system. I’m not all taht familiar with Canada’s tax system. Can you provide a cite to this rather unusual phenomenon?
Cite.
Buffet is kind of rich and says in this article that the rich are not paying their share. They have power and connections enough to get laws passed that let them out of paying their share. The rich are not suffering in the economy . They are piling up dough.
He also says a higher tax rate does not low down investment in businesses. A good investment is a good investment. When taxes were higher, there were more jobs and a thriving job market.
Jesus. His taxes WILL BECOME ZERO. As a result of him not working, my taxes WILL BE REDUCED. Ergo, WE EARN THE REDUCTION. So, 31% of anything that is now a deduction I would get to keep.
Linky to tax code: http://www.cra-arc.gc.ca/tx/ndvdls/tpcs/ncm-tx/rtrn/cmpltng/ddctns/lns300-350/303/menu-eng.html
BTW, the deduction for a spouse is 10382.
And that’s just the tip. There are deductions for heating if you are under a certain amount. You can claim your mortgage or rent if you are under a certain amount.
Note: these just reduce the income that you are taxed on so you only get back the taxes that you have already paid in excess of this as they are normally calculated.
Link to our basic tax form in ontario: http://www.cra-arc.gc.ca/E/pbg/tf/5000-s1/README.html
And you’re right that this has shit to do with marginal tax rate but with DEDUCTIONS you can see a significant difference in your taxes if your income is lower.
OK, like I said, I’m not that familiar with teh candaian tax system but it sounds like youar e saying that under the Canadian tax system you can actually end up with less money as a couple by earning X + Y (where X is one person’s income and Y is another person’s cinoem) and end up with more money earning just X?
Your links don’t exactly walk your through it but it looks like everyone gets a $10K non-refundable tax credit for their own tax return. If your spouse works and makes at least 10K, they get their OWN $10K tax credit. If they don’t work (or make less than 10K) then they no longer get a 10K tax credit but now YOU get their 10K tax credit.
Is that the way it works? Cuz it looks like you are simply taking your spouse’s tax credit and putting it on your tax return (not really sure taht tax credit in Canada means what it means in the USA).
In any event, if the Canadian tax system actually works the way you describe, I feel a lot better about our tax system.
No. You cannot take a couple making X + Y, remove Y and still be making more than X + Y. You can however be making more than X + Y - Y. (Assumes that values are in after tax income.) So, at the very least (again assuming after tax income) you are making X + 10k*marginal tax rate.
What I was responding to was whether the change in taxes when your spouse quit their job could be SIGNIFICANT. It can be and yes, the credits will now apply to the bigger income instead of the small (making for a small gain there) and you will qualify for deductions that you did not qualify for before.
To sum up:
Marginal tax rate changes will affect near nothing.
Overall tax changes when losing an income can be a significant factor.
Curlcoat is clearly not aware how money works or math for that matter.
No one who tried to point out my “error” would seem to admit that I had said what I’d said. Some refused to see that I’d said I’d made some adjustments in my OP, others refused to see that any dollar amounts I posted had to be guesses. All of them refused to view the OP in the way it was presented - no matter what the actual dollar amount is that we no longer have, it isn’t making much of an impression on our lifestyle. That is all the OP was - to point out that if taxes start taking an even bigger bite out of the incomes of folks above a certain level, lower middle class say, more may decide to opt out of the American dream of making as much money as possible because it simply isn’t worth all the extra work/commute/sleep loss/whatever to make another $10K or whatever.
Why would that be the only relevant part? Because that is the part everyone decided to focus on?
As for “blame”, yeah I didn’t make $20K worth of adjustments in our spending and everything else remained the same, so…
Being allowed to keep your major possessions and write off a bunch of your debt after living well beyond your means for years isn’t a bailout? Have they not been bailed out of their responsibility to their various creditors?
If you don’t want to use that word bailout, what one do you prefer?
I rather doubt they would tell you. The rest of your paragraph here doesn’t seem to jive with the fact that different credit card suppliers have different interest rates, even for the same person. For example, I dumped our Sears Mastercards when their interest rates shot up and a VISA from somewhere I can’t remember now for the same reason, but our other VISA is still low.
They’ve got to recoup their losses some how.
I haven’t said anything like that. What I am saying is that one cannot lay all of the blame on the lenders. They just passed a law that said that all lenders had to have a blurb in each bill about if you only pay the minimum amount, it will take you X years to pay this off - Christ, when did that drop out of common knowledge? Or did it? Are people just acting stupid about credit because there is less of a penalty for going under?
No, what I don’t remember is some specific detail. Sheesh.
Why would CC cos be the only business to just absorb losses without passing it on to their customers? And it’s not like they ask you if it’s OK - you don’t get to agree to it, other than refusing to have certain cards. Which reminds me of something - there are card companies out there who will give credit to poor risks at a high interest rate - don’t you think this is something that all CC companies would be doing at some level? Not giving the cards to deadbeats, but setting their interest rate to cover projected losses.
Ah. Well, the ones I’m referencing aren’t non-profits, and if there is no money to be had, even the legal fees aren’t going to get paid.
That seems kinda dumb BTW - why do they get to jump to the head of the line?
Where did you get that idea? From that one post about that one short term job? Yeah no shit if he had been only making $50K we would really notice the lack of $20K. OTOH, I’m cheap as hell and would notice a significant lack no matter how much he makes. On yet another hand, we are taxed to hell here and there isn’t as much distance between $50K & $100K as it appears.
It may also be that our lifestyle is so alien to the average person in this country these days that it just doesn’t compute. When I say that other than a few adjustments, nothing in our lives changed I mean that literally. We have extremely few ongoing bills and live well below our means. Very little goes on credit cards, not even gas and even things like car repairs I almost always write a check for. Shoot, I was going to buy a new-ish car last winter and was going to pay cash for that! So, it could be that there are so few folks out there living like this that any perceptions I have about the affect of the loss of my working ability are completely alien. I don’t know.
Define rich. Is that the same rich that Buffet is referring to? Are we talking $25 billion+ rich or $250,000 per year rich?
As far as your last line, you may want to educate yourself as to the difference between correlation and causation.
If you could be bothered to click the link, Buffet gets specific.
Well, I’m convinced by this utterly novel observation that has never ever been made by anyone else ever. No taxes for anyone!
MAGELLAN has no interest in listening to facts. He merely spurts out conservative propaganda and pats himself on the back for another job well done.
Well then, between him, curly, and SA, this thread is fucking Grand Central Station for that type of people!
What with the who now?
Claim your mortgage?
I know that there is an Ontario property and tax credit for Ontario provincial tax only… but that only covers energy costs for low income folks and a break on property tax.
Cite on the ability to claim your mortgage in Canada?