I guess this is as close as we’re going to get to an admission from you that you have no evidence to back up your “facts”.
What a load of claptrap. This presumes Rutan’s sole motivation to design groundbreaking aircraft was the acquisition of wealth, and if his fortune was diminished by any increase in taxes, he would lose the will to pursue his dream. Hogwash.
That’s not even close to what I said. Read for content, please. I said that even if he continued to work hard, he won’t be able to do as much good because he won’t have as much in the way of financial resources.
So what? Government can do things that are beyond the capabilities of the private sector. That requires taxes. We as a society, through our elected representives, have decided that whatever good the individual must forego is more than offest by the good created by the government. Color me surprised that you disagree.
And what of those who do it for sheer greed? Are there none of those, or all of these people altruists in drag?
Fear itself: Right. So you’re taking money away from the smartest, most creative, hardest working people in the country, and give it to a bunch of government functionaries who will in turn give it out to their donors. That’s exactly what it hurts productivity and economic growth. It diverts capital away from those best able to use it, and gives it to those who have demonstrated no such thing.
elucidator: It doesn’t matter if they do it for sheer greed. That’s the beauty of capitalism - the more greedy you are, the more needs of others you need to satisfy to placate your greed. It’s called the invisible hand.
So, how about a “deserving” test, where people who actually made their money get a break, and people who inherited it and sit on their butts clipping coupons pay more? But it seems you’re against the inheritance tax.
I’m not aware that Rutan is rich, not that he doesn’t deserve to be. He has people supporting his work, but that’s different. He’s not making a fortune on what he’s doing at the moment.
It is easy to be rich and stay rich if you start with money and connections to power. Look at George Bush. He’d be working at WalMart if his father’s powerful friends hadn’t bailed him out of his losing investments.
Sam, can you name a single government program at any level (federal, state, municipal) that works by giving government functionaries access to taxpayer funds so they can “give it out to their donors” Last time I looked elected or appointed officials who were caught doing this kind of thing ended up in jail.
No, this is based on the assumption that the government should grab your money unless you can prove you deserve it. That’s wrong - everybody should be able to keep their money (once taxes are at the point of funding all necessary and Constitutional functions of government).
The only role government should play once that point is reached to provide the rule of law. If you earned or inherited money legally, the role of government in determining if you deserved it or not is done.
Taxes should be designed to have minimal impact on the market. You can tax rich people at higher rates because this will have less impact on their lives, but not because they don’t “deserve” their money. That’s class envy, which often ends up cutting off your nose to spite your face.
Besides, think about it. I have this business, or family farm, that I can build up and leave to my children. Or I can work equally hard, knowing that the government will grab it and parcel it out to strangers. Which do you think is more likely?
Regards,
Shodan
Neither. Your analogy is as extreme as your position. And you forgot to mention jackboots.
Your argument is with Sam. He’s the one saying that we shouldn’t tax the wealthy more because they are so productive. I was trying to demonstrate that not all rich people are equally deserving, so his metric of merit based on money is bogus.
I basically agree with the rest of your post. Deservingness should have nothing to do with it, and taxes should be designed to cause a roughly equal amount of pain to everyone paying. The morality of what we spend it on, how much it should be, and social policy implemented through tax policies makes it more complicated, but equality of pain is the underlying principle.
This is a valid argument. I agree with the principle that the people are more entitled to keep their money than the government is to take it. But except for a few extreme libertarians this is a moot argument. Pretty much everyone agrees that the government should exist at some level and requires revenue to exist. So the argument is not over whether taxes should exist but over who should pay them.
And this is where we go from the above. I don’t think we should tax the wealthy at a higher rates to punish them. I think we should tax them at higher rates because it produces the most revenue for the least impact on society as a whole.
Suppose the government was going to step in and grab everything I owned when I died (that’s not actually a realistic description of any proposed inheritance tax but let’s go with it). What would my response be? Be greatly annoyed about the fact that I wouldn’t be able to leave my heirs anything but go ahead and build up my business anyway so I can live in comfort and my children can as well during my lifetime? Or decide that I’m going to refuse to be wealthy despite my ability to do so in order to spite the government? As you asked, which do you think is more likely?
When Bush became prez he had a huge money surplus . He passed a tax bill to give a huge proportion of it to the wealthy . They are his peeps. They got more of what they did not need.
Agreed, gonzomax! But that was a tax-cut right?
It’s true enough that the way contracts have been handed to Halliburton et al in Iraq war/reconstruction (and the way that execution has not been properly supervised by government overseers) is not quite criminal (some might say) but is nonetheless representative of donor payola of this sort.
However, my question to sam stands in either case. Tax cuts for the rich are indeed regressive paybacks to wealthy donors but that’s not what’s being disputed here.
And although my own example (Iraq) may not be narrowly within the bounds of the law certainly it’s not the kind of domestic redistributive program that I think sam has in mind.
Quoted for Truth.
I forgot this. Please give a cite on the number of family farms or small businesses lost to the inheritance tax. During the debate on this, the Republicans were repeatedly challenged to back up this fantasy, and maybe came up with a grand total of one farm lost (if that.) You might as well oppose the inheritance tax because without the money eaten up by taxes zombies will eat the brain of the deceased.
If you want to oppose it out of a belief that someone has an absolute right to leave everything to his or hers heirs, fine. I disagree, but the point is arguable. But enough with the family farm fairy tale already.
Actually, his argument was against the notion that government should have the money in preference to private citizens. Your counter-suggestion was that the government should confiscate inherited wealth because of a presumption that the heirs didn’t deserve it.
Good - then we agree that confiscatory, or close to it, inheritance tax, or any tax based on some notion of distribution of wealth based on “fairness” or deserts, is bogus.
Regards,
Shodan
Agreed.
The problem is that many people tend to equate value with reward. This is incorrect.
For example…teachers. Everyone talks about how important teachers are. When I was a teacher, I heard this all the time. At the same time, no increase in income was forthcoming and, in fact, for me it even declined over time as my salary didn’t keep up with inflation.
Was what I did important? Sure…I believe it was to this day.
Was I underpaid? At the time I would have screamed “YES”. Now, I’m not so sure.
My thinking on this (which I did much of as I contemplated leavign teaching many moons ago) was that the importance of a job had little to do with it’s compensation.
Reasoning:
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A job that has high demand for it but low supply will pay more. Low supply can come from work that is hard to learn and/or difficult and/or not fun to do considered from the viewpoint of society at large.
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How much immediate impact, positive or negative, you can have on depending on how good a job you do.
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Does your work affect many or few (1)?
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How much more of an impact will you have if you are just a ‘little bit’ better at what you do?
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How much time and effort it would take to get a replacement for you if you just quit and walked out.
===
So…examine amazing teacher versus hot-shot defense lawyer…
Teachers…many of them around. Lawyers…many around but is harder to achieve.
A bad teacher teaches little Johnny. Because of this, 10 years later he isn’t a doctor. Who would know? A bad lawyer defends Joe…because he had a bad lawyer, Joe has to spend 35 years in jail.
A teacher teaches to many. A lawyer defends a few. If your work helps many…you will be paid less because you had a little affect on many…the lawyer will be paid more because those few’s future is affected very much by his performance.
A teacher cracks up and walks out of the classroom. Time to get replacement? Seconds.
A lawyer cracks up and walks out of a case…it will take much time to get a replacement.
AAmazing teacher becomes a little bit better than he was before. Noticeable impact? Little. Hot-shot defense lawyer? Could be quite a bit…so someone a little bit better could command much more money. (think sports)
Using the above, the worst career you could be in moneywise is one that is easy to get credentials for…that benefits many…where mistakes are not easily seen…hard to judge differing levels of ability and where it takes little time to find a replacement.
Best moneywise? Difficult to get credentials…benefits few…mistakes easily seen…easy to see different levels of abiity…and takes much time to find a replacement.
The above isn’t completely thought out…but is what ran through my mind as I considered leaving teaching. I decided to do so even though I loved teaching and thought I was doing good…because I needed to support a family. This thinking was my ‘making peace’ with it. I figured society was designed so that guys needing to raise a family couldn’t teach…and so I shouldn’t feel bad about not doing it.
Sam said
Since he objected to diverting money from those best able to use it, I was wondering if he was okay from diverting it from those not best able to use it - in other words, the idle rich. Which was not saying that all rich are idle, just that some of them are. Sorry if the point was a bit subtle.
Clearly trying to distinguish who can best use the money is absurd - which I had hoped was obvious.
Right, fairness has nothing to do with it. But the deceased by definition is not hurt by the tax, and the heirs just receive less, so while their benefit may be reduced, they are certainly not hurt relative to their previous position - especially due to the large deductible, which means that most of those who might really suffer from not getting an inheritance get 100% (less probate.)
I agree that those depending on the family farm would get hurt if it had to be sold for taxes, but in reality everyone seems to be able to pass businesses on using the current law without any issues. Why deprive all of us of all this revenue due to one or two stupid families? If we don’t have the revenue, either the deficit goes up or other taxes increase. If we were going to cut spending, we’d do it no matter what the inheritance tax is, given the deficit.
Yes, if you donate $1,000 to charity you are being philanthropic. St Teresa isn’t donating money, she’s investing in tax free bonds to reduce her tax rate down to 12%. That’s more than 1/2 what the average person pays. Maybe my next job I’ll be able to talk my employer into paying me in nothing but tax-free bonds so I don’t have to pay any taxes. I’ll be twice as philanthropic as St Teresa.