Why the idea that fiscal conservatives hate poor people?

[2sense]

@Grumman

I’m sorry, but you have no idea what you’re talking about. You don’t need a monarch to decide how much you spent to provide a particular service to a particular person when you can just look at the receipts, so to speak. If it costs $100,000,000 per year to maintain the roads you don’t just arbitrarily decide how much each person has to pay, you find something that has a strong correlation to the wear and tear caused (like petrol usage) and pass a tax that reflects that cost.

My point is that there is nothing magical about your opinion. You are entitled to one but it isn’t authoritative. Just because you believe it fairest to tax road usage to pay for roads doesn’t make it so. Just because you believe the progressive taxation doesn’t reflect what individuals should owe doesn’t mean the government doesn’t give a damn about making people pay what they owe.

The politicians decide by fiat how much money they expect you to pay them, and this is automatically a legitimate decision, because they’re the government.

Pretty much. We don’t have a monarchy, we have a republic. Nation of laws and not a nation of men, that sort of thing. When laws are properly enacted then yeah, that makes 'em legitimate according to our theory of government. We are represented, after all, in accordance with our theory.

@Stratocaster

Is there a cite that explains this conclusion? Hacker notes the assertion that it’s not apples-to-oranges, but then doesn’t seem to specifically counter it–i.e., something like, “…but when we account for payroll taxes…” I couldn’t find a cite, and Hacker just seems to hand wave away the point. And I couldn’t find the CBO study he references, though it may have been under my nose. Those reports are thick.

Not sure if you misunderstood the quote or if I’m misunderstanding what you are saying. He says Medicare vs Medicare Advantage are “Apples to Apples” because they serve the same kinds of people under the same kind of rules.

When I started this reply I was going to say it wasn’t hard to find a cite that Medicare costs less to administer than private insurance. I’ve been out of the debate game for a few years. Back then I didn’t have trouble finding stuff. Now that healthcare is on the national agenda all I can find on Google is pages claiming that this isn’t so. There are references to government documents as sources of comparisons but even when I find stuff like the National Health Expenditures Accounts I can’t dig the info out of the reports they have online.:dubious:

[sinjin]

@Starving_Artist

I saw the movie Avatar today (for the second time, woo-hoo), and for a movie with such allegedly leftie sentiments, it contained a very telling line which in my opinion goes a long way toward explaining why liberals love to call conservatives selfish (or greedy or evil or that we want to see sick people dying in the streets or any of the myriad other condemnations liberals so love to hurl at conservatives). To wit:

But the bolded part above is exactly what **Rand **says he wants:

Rand Rover

Originally Posted by **AboutAsWeirdAsYouCanGet **
If the " get rid of stuff helping the poor" people were in charge, I’d be out on the street like those deaf beggers of old.

And this gets us right back to why liberals think the fiscal conservatives are selfish. You think it is OK to use violence as long as you benefit. You are selfish, not me.

[Starving_Artist]

Look, what it boils down to is this: liberals are insisting that the government take money away from people who earn it and spend it either on themselves or on people they feel sorry for.

Conservatives aren’t trying to take money from anybody. They just want everybody to take care of themselves.
But conservatives have much of what liberals want, which is earned income, and so they demonize conservatives in order to justify taking money from them.
People have no more right to health care than they do to homes, automobiles, clothes, hot tubs or spending money. But liberals, especially during the last couple of decades, have decided that everyone “deserves” health care, that it’s a “right”, and they label anyone who objects as greedy, evil, selfish, etc. (And they do the same with anyone who objects to any of their other government income redistribution schemes as well.)

Again, it isn’t conservatives who are trying to take things from liberals, it is liberals who are trying to take things from conservatives. And then they call conservatives the selfish ones.

As the line I quoted says – if somebody has something you want, you make them your enemy to justify taking it from them. This is exactly what the liberal communty has been doing since the days of Roosevelt, if not before.

If you want to help somebody, great, help them. But don’t call me an asshole because I happen to think your solution causes more harm than good.

But of course you will anyway.

Now, having said that, I have no problem with programs that help the truly down and out, and I especially have no problem with programs to help individuals who are seriously handicapped and their families as well. I also think charitable giving is a great thing.

What I don’t think is a great thing is having the government exert increasing control over our lives, nor is it a good thing to turn American society into serfs working to feed the government trough, and dependent upon it to care for their needs.

[Digital_Stimulus]

@2sense

When I started this reply I was going to say it wasn’t hard to find a cite that Medicare costs less to administer than private insurance.

I suspect that you’re likely looking for this New England Journal of Medicine article (from 2003, so a bit dated). It contains some of the more well-worn statistics, including:

In 1999 U.S. private insurers…average overhead (11.7 percent) exceeded that of Medicare (3.6 percent) and Medicaid (6.8 percent).

After exclusions, administration accounted for 31.0 percent of health care expenditures in the United States, as compared with 16.7 percent of health care expenditures in Canada.

[Dick_Dastardly]

@Starving_Artist

Look, what it boils down to is this: liberals are insisting that the government take money away from people who earn it and spend it either on themselves or on people they feel sorry for.

Conservatives aren’t trying to take money from anybody. They just want everybody to take care of themselves.
But conservatives have much of what liberals want, which is earned income, and so they demonize conservatives in order to justify taking money from them.
People have no more right to health care than they do to homes, automobiles, clothes, hot tubs or spending money. But liberals, especially during the last couple of decades, have decided that everyone “deserves” health care, that it’s a “right”, and they label anyone who objects as greedy, evil, selfish, etc. (And they do the same with anyone who objects to any of their other government income redistribution schemes as well.)

Again, it isn’t conservatives who are trying to take things from liberals, it is liberals who are trying to take things from conservatives. And then they call conservatives the selfish ones.

As the line I quoted says – if somebody has something you want, you make them your enemy to justify taking it from them. This is exactly what the liberal communty has been doing since the days of Roosevelt, if not before.

If you want to help somebody, great, help them. But don’t call me an asshole because I happen to think your solution causes more harm than good.

But of course you will anyway.

Now, having said that, I have no problem with programs that help the truly down and out, and I especially have no problem with programs to help individuals who are seriously handicapped and their families as well. I also think charitable giving is a great thing.

What I don’t think is a great thing is having the government exert increasing control over our lives, nor is it a good thing to turn American society into serfs working to feed the government trough, and dependent upon it to care for their needs.

What about all those limousine liberals? There seem to be an awful lot of rich people out there who want to pay higher taxes, who donate millions of dollars to politicians so they’ll get elected and tax them more. And all those rich states that vote Democrat, while all the poor states that already get a federal transfer of money from the rich ones vote GOP. So clearly it isn’t as simple as you make it out to be.

[Hentor_the_Barbarian]

If we could enact one set of policies that specifically benefit one group at the expense of others, or enact another set of policies that benefit everyone, wouldn’t it be fair to say that it was not only selfish, but cruel to favor the former instead of the latter?

Yet, if we look over history, when Democrats are in office, people at all income levels do better than when Republicans are in office. Even the very, very wealthy do equally well when Democrats and Republicans are in office.

So yeah, it’s pretty selfish and cruel to support policies that pretty much just have the effect of making sure some people suffer.

The fact is, if you are voting on the basis of fiscal outcomes, you should be voting for Democrats.

[Rand_Rover]

@Digital_Stimulus

I suspect that you’re likely looking for this New England Journal of Medicine article (from 2003, so a bit dated). It contains some of the more well-worn statistics, including:

These numbers have been the subject of some criticism. One of the easiest ways to see how they can go awry is as follows: if a private insurer spends $1 to save $3 in the future, then that gets recorded in these numbers as a current dollar of administration. Medicare may not spend that dollar because it doesn’t have the same motivation to save money. So, the long-term result may be less administrative costs for private insurers, but the shortIterm result is just the opposite.

[Polycarp]

@Starving_Artist

Look, what it boils down to is this: liberals are insisting that the government take money away from people who earn it and spend it either on themselves or on people they feel sorry for.

Conservatives aren’t trying to take money from anybody. They just want everybody to take care of themselves.
But conservatives have much of what liberals want, which is earned income, and so they demonize conservatives in order to justify taking money from them.
People have no more right to health care than they do to homes, automobiles, clothes, hot tubs or spending money. But liberals, especially during the last couple of decades, have decided that everyone “deserves” health care, that it’s a “right”, and they label anyone who objects as greedy, evil, selfish, etc. (And they do the same with anyone who objects to any of their other government income redistribution schemes as well.)

Again, it isn’t conservatives who are trying to take things from liberals, it is liberals who are trying to take things from conservatives. And then they call conservatives the selfish ones.

As the line I quoted says – if somebody has something you want, you make them your enemy to justify taking it from them. This is exactly what the liberal communty has been doing since the days of Roosevelt, if not before.

If you want to help somebody, great, help them. But don’t call me an asshole because I happen to think your solution causes more harm than good.

But of course you will anyway.

Now, having said that, I have no problem with programs that help the truly down and out, and I especially have no problem with programs to help individuals who are seriously handicapped and their families as well. I also think charitable giving is a great thing.

What I don’t think is a great thing is having the government exert increasing control over our lives, nor is it a good thing to turn American society into serfs working to feed the government trough, and dependent upon it to care for their needs.

I think you may have mistaken the warehouse maintenance store for the art shop when you bought your brush here.

Fiscal conservatives are not trying to take money from anyone, as you say – and, annoyingly smug as Rand Rover often comes across, he presumably qualifies as what he terms himself in the OP. Magiver is another Doper with apparent fiscal-conservative motives.

There are, however, conservatives whose attitudes are that government should spend money to benefit big business (cf. the trickle-down theory) and those who feel that massive expenditures on the armed services (ships, planes, tanks, etc., not salaries) are justifiable while expedigures to support the poor are not.

Likewise, there are people on the “Liberal” side of things who believe in fiscal prudence while strongly supporting activities for social justice. A lot of HUD grants were focused on loans to low-income homeowners and landlords renting to low-income people for “filling in money pits” with the idea that the repayments would set up a self-perpetuating program, ultimately costing the government less. E.g., don’t help someone heat a poorly-insulated home with a low-efficiency furnace year after year; invest the money in insulating the building, caulking windows, installing a new higher-efficiency heating plant, with a decades-long payback the landlord or homeowner can afford. Yeah, you could say to let 'em suffer instead of doing either – but the majority of Americans, even a lot of those considering themselves conservative, would not agree.

[Revenant_Threshold]

@Starving_Artist

Again, it isn’t conservatives who are trying to take things from liberals, it is liberals who are trying to take things from conservatives. And then they call conservatives the selfish ones.

Hang on a mo, that doesn’t really work. I mean, you’ve characterised conservatives as the ones with the money and liberals as the ones without (or, at least, with less) but I don’t believe that’s true across the board. And even then, so far as I can tell, there tend not be pieces of legislation or calls for taxes or whatever solely to pay for liberal causes - it’s not as though no money is going to conservatives.

I agree with you that it does not make sense to call conservatives generally selfish. But I think you’ve fallen into the trap of wanting a clever reversal, because honestly to turn it around requires *way *too many assumptions and generalisations.

[septimus]

@Dick_Dastardly

What about all those limousine liberals? There seem to be an awful lot of rich people out there who want to pay higher taxes, who donate millions of dollars to politicians so they’ll get elected and tax them more…

Right-wingers will deny this! When intelligent liberal-minded self-made billionaires like Buffett or Soros advocate liberal politics, right-wingers insist it’s all about enhancing certain investments. (Even Gore supposedly isn’t sincere about climate change: he espouses it to boost his alternate energy investments.)

Moreover, according to the right-wing politics espoused in this forum, it is charity, not taxes, that is the pathway to feeding and educating the poor, yet when tax returns are made public, it is “left-wingers” who give much more.

[Digital_Stimulus]

@Rand_Rover

These numbers have been the subject of some criticism.

Well of course they have. Whether the numbers are legitimate or not, I have no doubt that the industry would find some way to criticize anything that casts them in a negative light. (I should note that I was simply supplying a cite that I’ve come across repeatedly – I’m neither vouching for nor criticizing the study itself, particularly as I’ve not read it thoroughly.)

One of the easiest ways to see how they can go awry is as follows: if a private insurer spends $1 to save $3 in the future, then that gets recorded in these numbers as a current dollar of administration. Medicare may not spend that dollar because it doesn’t have the same motivation to save money. So, the long-term result may be less administrative costs for private insurers, but the shortIterm result is just the opposite.

Of course, capturing the same metrics over some span of years would easily resolve that objection. Assuming the report only treats a single year (again, I’ve not read it to any depth), do you happen to know if such numbers are available?

[Euphonious_Polemic]

@Polycarp

I think you may have mistaken the warehouse maintenance store for the art shop when you bought your brush here.

Thank you Polycarp, for saying what I was thinking, although in a much more polite form.

I mean, whenSA, says “liberals want to spend money on themselves or on people they feel sorry for.”

This is a joke, right? An example for textbooks about a strawman argument? He can’t actually believe this, can he?

He really can’t conceive of anyone thinking that government resources (yes tax dollars), might be usefully spent on helping someone rise out of poverty and become a useful productive member of society rather than a drain… He can’t imagine this, can he? No, it’s all about “giving” money to those we “feel sorry for”. The concept is idiotic on its face.

I feel sorry for him if he genuinely thinks that others operate this way.

Fiscal conservatives may not hate people -but some are indifferent towards them.

I guess we could start a thread “Why the idea that liberals want to steal your money and give it to people they feel sorry for?”

[BrainGlutton]

Here’s a quite recent and pretty striking illustration of RW hatred of, or at least dismissive contempt for, poor people.

[Rand_Rover]

You have at least the following two problems Brainglutton:

1. This thread is about “fiscal conservatives,” not everyone who is “RW.”

2. You have posted a link to a post written by one anonymous person. This person does not represent the views of anyone but him/herself.

[Starving_Artist]

@Euphonious_Polemic

Thank you Polycarp, for saying what I was thinking, although in a much more polite form.

I mean, whenSA, says “liberals want to spend money on themselves or on people they feel sorry for.”

This is a joke, right?

I don’t have time tonight to go into this as much as the subject requires, but for now just consider the arguments and attitudes of the left concerning UHC, the reasons for its establishment, and toward its conservative opposition, and you’ll see most of the arguments and attitudes I described upthead very clearly at work.

[BrainGlutton]

@Rand_Rover

You have at least the following two problems Brainglutton:

1. This thread is about “fiscal conservatives,” not everyone who is “RW.”

2. You have posted a link to a post written by one anonymous person. This person does not represent the views of anyone but him/herself.

Then, you will go on record as expressing disagreement with Tim R. Mortiss?

[Grumman]

@2sense

My point is that there is nothing magical about your opinion. You are entitled to one but it isn’t authoritative. Just because you believe it fairest to tax road usage to pay for roads doesn’t make it so. Just because you believe the progressive taxation doesn’t reflect what individuals should owe doesn’t mean the government doesn’t give a damn about making people pay what they owe.

Of course it’s nothing magical, it’s a simple statement of fact: if your usage costs the government $350 per year in materials, labour and overhead, $350 is a fair price for the government to charge you for your usage.

It’s called job costing. Look it up.

[2sense]

Your opinions are not facts.

[AboutAsWeirdAsYouCanGet]

And before government got involved charities were responsible for the care of the poor, and lots of them died. Any you guys say tsk tsk and start threads about how odd it is that anyone thinks conservatives hate the poor.

You want to see a government that works the way fiscal conservatives want? Look at Haiti, look at India. Heck look at Oliver Twist and our own history before WW II.
Fiscal conservatives think that the ONLY class that government should serve are the middle and upper classes. Nothing for the poor. After all, they’re a drain on society.
Were you aware that the government HELPED create the middle class? gasp
I don’t get where fiscal conservatives get this idea of big bad gubvermit as teh evil.
You know if you invested in a lot of schools or towns that are down at the heels, a lot of people would rise up and become independant of the government teat.
gasp IMAGINE THAT!

[noxxer]

note, i only read the first page of the thread, so please forgive if this has been brought up before.

as previously stated, the less fortunate among us do tend to resent the more fortunate who choose not to give back. I for example make around 25k per year, gross. 30% ($7500) of that goes to taxes and social security etc. however when you make over 373,651 (assuming equal soc. sec contributions as income tax rate) you put in 74k (leaving just under 300k) I can just barely afford to pay for rent on an apt, due to not being able to conjure 5k+ in deposit (more than 4 months gross pay) where someone making 373,651 makes 25,000 per month after taxes.

I am being squeezed by my bills to the point where i choose gas or food some days. the people who make more are having to choose which house to sell. that is the reason i personally don’t like to hear about cutting programs to help the poor. i could EASILY get behind by 2 months and be out of my apt and homeless, needing those very services that were cut.

Part of what ameliorates this is estate taxes, however there are so many loopholes that are used that it makes it less than it was intended for.