Too Reliant On The Few?

[Arkolon]

When your income is enhanced by the state to the point where you can work a $5/hour job to make $21.5k a year, whether or not bankers' bonuses are raised by 20% or 200% harms you none.


The reason that some guy in Beverly Hills has five Ferraris isn't the reason I don't have five Ferraris. Like TLT said, there is no pie. The rich aren't rich because the poor are poor. The rich are rich because they are rich, full stop, and the poor likewise.

Do you live in a post scarcity society?

Things actually have value, so no, I do not live in a post-scarcity society, but thanks for asking. I definitely needed a casual reminder.

[Rebellious Fishermen]

I don't know about the exact math, but I think the rich should pay as much tax as necessary to completely eliminate poverty, homelessness, and lack of access to basic human rights like healthcare.

The ideal tax system is whenever this goal is reached.

Yes, penalize the rich for being successful and create incentives for laziness. Excellent idea.

Not only that, but it doesn't work. The rich will either leave the country entirely, move their businesses, or find ways to store their money so it can't be taxed. It's quite harmful to the economy.

[Arkolon]

What, why? For what reason?

To raise more revenues and reduce inequality. Taxes should be lower on capital gains at first, but then for very high capital gains, there's no point of keeping them low, as it just creates inequality and an unequal balance between those who earn money from labor and those who earn money from investment income.

Why do you still look at income inequality when basic income is guaranteed? For what reason? If there was little to no poverty but a Gini of 0.6 I wouldn't give a damn at all, because everyone would at least live comfortably. "Taxing for equality" sounds like neoprog rhetoric for taxation just for the sake of taxation.

[Arkolon]

I really don't see what the problem is? How is taxing rich people, who, no doubt, can afford the tax, a great evil?

It isn't so much just taxing rich people. Of course we should tax rich people. It's taxing rich people at rates that are so much higher than the rest of society, injecting an unhealthy dose of budget volatility which swerves debt increase depending on current economic fluctuation. It creates budget dependency on rich people. I know you mustn't like the sound of it, but taxing the rich people more to the point that most of your income tax income is reliant on those rich people incentivises the government to kiss the asses of that 1%. It fuels inequality by giving the government itself a bigger interest in keeping the rich richer than they currently are.

[Arkolon]

Snip

So, NSG, what do you make of this? How progressive is the ideal income tax system? How much should the 1% pay more than the other 99%? Should they even pay more at all? And how about your opinion on Britain’s job-rich, tax-poor recovery? Corporate tax is the subject of a different debate, however, and we are going to concentrate more on how too much progressivity in income tax makes for terrible fiscal policy, and how the best tax policy is that which is levied more or less equally all around the economy. Not necessarily flat, no, but of one or two, say, tax brackets at the most, I say.

One source, and I couldn't quite find the second one, but there are less numbers for that one.

While I know almost nothing about how economies work and I dislike interfering in people's lives when I have no basis for relating with them, as in the wealthy. I prefer systems the work on a "moderation in all things approach" with finite ends. As in we use unemployment and welfare benefits to limit how poor someone can get. So why do we not limit how wealthy someone can get?

I see no reason why taxation shouldn't be 100% at a certain point of wealth.

Because these arbitrary "certain points in wealth" are fixated at certain numbers and are not inflation-adjusted, and even if they were they would be susceptible to fiscal drag or reverse fiscal drag. When wage growth outpaces inflation, poorer people are put into richer tax bracket, even if they feel no richer. This problem is magnified even further when the tax system is too progressive, ie there are too many tax brackets that have rates that vary incredibly. Conversely, reverse fiscal drag is when inflation outpaces wage growth, putting richer people into poorer tax brackets, essentially making them paying less than you would like them to.

If the economy ticks along nicely, the threshold at which you set your 100% tax would end up making middle class people poorer than they ever have been. Also, not to mention that this would make the 1% flee the country even faster than they currently are-- and when your whole budget is 25% reliant on that 1%, them leaving is going to be quite the issue.

[Republic of Coldwater]

I don't understand a need for an income tax. A good move would be to the FairTax (prob with something lower such as 15% instead of 23%), it would fund the federal government more, increase the spending in the market and thus pump more money into the economy, and the FairTax is apparently progressive as it gives people a rebate to buy food, water and shelter. To learn more:
http://fairtax.org

(I don't feel like explaining the entire plan, but I suppose it would be a good idea for America)

[Arkolon]

A flat tax is a regressive tax because those with less need more of their income. Further, a flat tax is not economically beneficial.

Did the rest of your post get cut off, or something?

But I have to disagree, in any case.

[Arkolon]

We just need to get the US Gini Coefficient at least below .29 and the relative poverty rate below 10%.

You can do both by making everyone equally poorer. Note that poverty is usually measured as those who earn less than 60% the average wage, and when after-tax Gini is incredibly low, after-tax income is equally just as low. Alternatively, you could focus on one of the two goals instead: does it matter to you more that everyone earns comparably more equally, or allowing the poor to be able to at least live comfortably? If the former, it would be destructive for the most obvious of reasons-- it is, literally, taxing for the sake of taxation. If the latter, which I find has much more soundness bound to it, income inequality simply does not matter. It is a useless metric to go by when income is guaranteed. It is a make-belief problem.

[Arkolon]

There is no basic human right to anything. There are negative, or liberty, rights, (rights to the freedom from), and these are basic human rights. There is no inherent human right to healthcare, the same way there is no inherent human right to using free massages or helpdesk use. Healthcare is a service, not a right.

Healthcare is objectively a right, not a service, under the law, no matter what your opinion is.

Did you seriously just go "but it's the law" on me? You.. do know what rights are, right? You.. know a bit about what you're talking about, right? Reassure me here. A right is not granted by the law. A right cannot be granted by the law. A right is not granted by anyone. That's what makes it a right. If a right is granted, then it can be taken away just as easily. If it can be taken away, then it is not a right, but just a legal privilege. You have no right to healthcare. No one has any right to anything. No right can oblige action. If it obliges action, then it is a legal privilege, hence not a right. Take this "human right to abortion" nonsense. If you're stranded on a desert island with one other person and you want to get an abortion (but the person you're stranded with is not a gynecologist), is that person violating your rights? Are you going to whip out your piece of paper, written by other humans, and tell that person that what he is not doing to you is an intrinsic and objective offense to you? Answer me honestly, because at this point I'm not sure what to expect from you anymore.

Honestly, I see this UN writing of human "rights", ie a long list of legal privileges for the most part, as the only objective rights humanity has ever had, ever, as valid as those who wrote the Bible claiming that the Bible is the only source of scientific information as well as the single most credible source humanity has ever had, ever. The fact that you're part of that clique of Internet liberals just outlines what this is, exactly: hypocrisy. You deny that what Yahweh supposedly wrote six-thousand years ago, or whatever, is true, but suddenly whatever a couple of law postgraduates wrote under a hundred years ago is objectively true no matter where you are just because you're a human?

Rights are not legal privileges, and legal privileges are far, far from being even remotely close to rights.

Rights are those things, which already exist and belong to each individual in equal measure. They are unalienable. That is, they cannot be transferred, taken, or given away. They can be violated; but they cannot be provided because they already exist. Further, if one assumes that rights may be given by the state (or granted by law), then that is also to assume that they may be taken away by the state. In which case, they were never rights at all but were at most, legal privileges. No state needs to exist to give me permission to live. I live already. My right to live was not granted to me by law, nor can the law justly deny me the right to live. (Samantha Lindsay, ''What is Just Law'')

[Chestaan]

Do you live in a post scarcity society?

Things actually have value, so no, I do not live in a post-scarcity society, but thanks for asking. I definitely needed a casual reminder.

So if resources are scarce how can the income/wealth of another not affect you? Money is only of value to us because we can purchase goods and services with it.

[The Liberated Territories]

On my phone so can't type up an essay, but regarding the flat tax it has been tremendously beneficial to the Russian economy and was a major factor in helping develop modern Russia out of the SU.

[Olivaero]

Healthcare is objectively a right, not a service, under the law, no matter what your opinion is.

Did you seriously just go "but it's the law" on me? You.. do know what rights are, right? You.. know a bit about what you're talking about, right? Reassure me here. A right is not granted by the law. A right cannot be granted by the law. A right is not granted by anyone. That's what makes it a right. If a right is granted, then it can be taken away just as easily. If it can be taken away, then it is not a right, but just a legal privilege. You have no right to healthcare. No one has any right to anything. No right can oblige action. If it obliges action, then it is a legal privilege, hence not a right. Take this "human right to abortion" nonsense. If you're stranded on a desert island with one other person and you want to get an abortion (but the person you're stranded with is not a gynecologist), is that person violating your rights? Are you going to whip out your piece of paper, written by other humans, and tell that person that what he is not doing to you is an intrinsic and objective offense to you? Answer me honestly, because at this point I'm not sure what to expect from you anymore.

Honestly, I see this UN writing of human "rights", ie a long list of legal privileges for the most part, as the only objective rights humanity has ever had, ever, as valid as those who wrote the Bible claiming that the Bible is the only source of scientific information as well as the single most credible source humanity has ever had, ever. The fact that you're part of that clique of Internet liberals just outlines what this is, exactly: hypocrisy. You deny that what Yahweh supposedly wrote six-thousand years ago, or whatever, is true, but suddenly whatever a couple of law postgraduates wrote under a hundred years ago is objectively true no matter where you are just because you're a human?

Rights are not legal privileges, and legal privileges are far, far from being even remotely close to rights.

Rights are those things, which already exist and belong to each individual in equal measure. They are unalienable. That is, they cannot be transferred, taken, or given away. They can be violated; but they cannot be provided because they already exist. Further, if one assumes that rights may be given by the state (or granted by law), then that is also to assume that they may be taken away by the state. In which case, they were never rights at all but were at most, legal privileges. No state needs to exist to give me permission to live. I live already. My right to live was not granted to me by law, nor can the law justly deny me the right to live. (Samantha Lindsay, ''What is Just Law'')

Do you consider property an unalienable right?

[Arkolon]

Did you seriously just go "but it's the law" on me? You.. do know what rights are, right? You.. know a bit about what you're talking about, right? Reassure me here. A right is not granted by the law. A right cannot be granted by the law. A right is not granted by anyone. That's what makes it a right. If a right is granted, then it can be taken away just as easily. If it can be taken away, then it is not a right, but just a legal privilege. You have no right to healthcare. No one has any right to anything. No right can oblige action. If it obliges action, then it is a legal privilege, hence not a right. Take this "human right to abortion" nonsense. If you're stranded on a desert island with one other person and you want to get an abortion (but the person you're stranded with is not a gynecologist), is that person violating your rights? Are you going to whip out your piece of paper, written by other humans, and tell that person that what he is not doing to you is an intrinsic and objective offense to you? Answer me honestly, because at this point I'm not sure what to expect from you anymore.

Honestly, I see this UN writing of human "rights", ie a long list of legal privileges for the most part, as the only objective rights humanity has ever had, ever, as valid as those who wrote the Bible claiming that the Bible is the only source of scientific information as well as the single most credible source humanity has ever had, ever. The fact that you're part of that clique of Internet liberals just outlines what this is, exactly: hypocrisy. You deny that what Yahweh supposedly wrote six-thousand years ago, or whatever, is true, but suddenly whatever a couple of law postgraduates wrote under a hundred years ago is objectively true no matter where you are just because you're a human?

Rights are not legal privileges, and legal privileges are far, far from being even remotely close to rights.

Rights are those things, which already exist and belong to each individual in equal measure. They are unalienable. That is, they cannot be transferred, taken, or given away. They can be violated; but they cannot be provided because they already exist. Further, if one assumes that rights may be given by the state (or granted by law), then that is also to assume that they may be taken away by the state. In which case, they were never rights at all but were at most, legal privileges. No state needs to exist to give me permission to live. I live already. My right to live was not granted to me by law, nor can the law justly deny me the right to live. (Samantha Lindsay, ''What is Just Law'')

Do you consider property an unalienable right?

No. The state of nature was a negative commons.

[The Liberated Territories]

Things actually have value, so no, I do not live in a post-scarcity society, but thanks for asking. I definitely needed a casual reminder.

So if resources are scarce how can the income/wealth of another not affect you? Money is only of value to us because we can purchase goods and services with it.

Again, there is no pie. Value is something not static, and wealth can be created. What is worthless to me may be worth a lot to someone else, and vice versa...

[Chestaan]

So if resources are scarce how can the income/wealth of another not affect you? Money is only of value to us because we can purchase goods and services with it.

Again, there is no pie. Value is something not static, and wealth can be created. What is worthless to me may be worth a lot to someone else, and vice versa...

You can say it as much as you want, its still not true. A person's access to resources affects the access of the rest of us. Your point might be correct if world gdp were to rise by a few hundred percent a year.

[Olivaero]

Do you consider property an unalienable right?

No. The state of nature was a negative commons.

The State of nature is not important to us in the present. We have long progressed past the state of nature we defy it on a daily basis when we keep people alive or communicate 1000's of miles a part so I have no idea why your concerned with what the state of nature is and why rights are only dependent upon being available to humans in a "state of nature".

Rights as a legal concept are much more useful to us if the definition is legal privileges that apply to all humans within a governed area or even Legal privileges that we think should apply to all humans no matter which governed area they lie in. The state of nature is something we left a long time ago, our society needs to deal with issues that would never of been a problem to humans within the state of nature. So why define words around a the State of Nature?

[Arkolon]

Again, there is no pie. Value is something not static, and wealth can be created. What is worthless to me may be worth a lot to someone else, and vice versa...

You can say it as much as you want, its still not true. A person's access to resources affects the access of the rest of us. Your point might be correct if world gdp were to rise by a few hundred percent a year.

Income is not synonymous to the "resources" you are talking about. The reason my neighbour makes $10,000 more than me isn't the reason I make $10,000 less. Income isn't a fixed pie. Wealth isn't a fixed pie. Scarce resources that are non-renewable and deplete entirely once consumed, perhaps.

[Atlanticatia]

We just need to get the US Gini Coefficient at least below .29 and the relative poverty rate below 10%.

You can do both by making everyone equally poorer. Note that poverty is usually measured as those who earn less than 60% the average wage, and when after-tax Gini is incredibly low, after-tax income is equally just as low. Alternatively, you could focus on one of the two goals instead: does it matter to you more that everyone earns comparably more equally, or allowing the poor to be able to at least live comfortably? If the former, it would be destructive for the most obvious of reasons-- it is, literally, taxing for the sake of taxation. If the latter, which I find has much more soundness bound to it, income inequality simply does not matter. It is a useless metric to go by when income is guaranteed. It is a make-belief problem.

The standard relative poverty measure is 60% of the median income - not average income. This is important because it measures how far from the 'middle' someone is - while the average can be distorted by a lot of wealth or a lot of poverty. The US uses an absolute measure of poverty, so we could also say that we want to get that measure below 5% or 0%. Both are important.
Relative poverty is a measure of how relatively poor someone is. It's not necessarily showing how many people are living in deprivation, but how many people aren't in the 'middle class' - how large gaps are between income classes. While, yes, if the absolute poverty rate was 0%, that'd mean the poor are all able to subsist, but the gap between the wealthy and those poor is important to look at, too. Income inequality and social mobility are related...it's easier to move up in society when the gap is smaller. Not having stark class divisions is important. Rather than having a huge amount of rich people, and huge amount of people at the bottom - even if those people at the bottom aren't living in poverty it's better to have a very large 'middle class', with less extremes at either ends. Income inequality is also related to social ills. Having too many people who are relatively worse off than the rest, and who are relatively better off than the rest leads to social exclusion and antisocial behavior.
To reduce that gap, yes, many peoples' cash disposable incomes will decrease, while some peoples' will increase. However, this isn't the only thing that is important - a cradle to grave welfare state guarantees things like health care, all levels of education, childcare, social insurance, etc for all people. Some people may be individually worse off as far as their disposable income goes (due to taxation) and some may be individually better off (due to cash transfers and such), but collectively, society will be better off.

[Arkolon]

No. The state of nature was a negative commons.

The State of nature is not important to us in the present. We have long progressed past the state of nature we defy it on a daily basis when we keep people alive or communicate 1000's of miles a part so I have no idea why your concerned with what the state of nature is and why rights are only dependent upon being available to humans in a "state of nature".

Did you not give yourself enough time to google "state of nature", or something? The state of nature, and more specifically the Lockean state of nature, has absolutely nothing to do with biological nature and a Garden-of-Eden-type civilisation. It is a thought experiment that dates from the humanist era that attempts to justify societies, philosophies, religions, ideas, principles, and the like from the ground-up instead of a "just because" basis to fall back on. I'm not suggesting that we turn back to the state of nature, nor am I even suggesting that the Lockean state of nature ever really materialised. I am suggesting that, using the thought experiment, land (and all unclaimed resources for that matter) is a negative commons as opposed to the Pufendorfian positive commons.

Rights as a legal concept are much more useful to us if the definition is legal privileges that apply to all humans within a governed area or even Legal privileges that we think should apply to all humans no matter which governed area they lie in. The state of nature is something we left a long time ago, our society needs to deal with issues that would never of been a problem to humans within the state of nature. So why define words around a the State of Nature?

x2

[Murkwood]

I don't know about the exact math, but I think the rich should pay as much tax as necessary to completely eliminate poverty, homelessness, and lack of access to basic human rights like healthcare.

The ideal tax system is whenever this goal is reached.

Governments can't do that with the billions of dollars they already have! How can an extra billion or two from the rich help?

[Chestaan]

You can say it as much as you want, its still not true. A person's access to resources affects the access of the rest of us. Your point might be correct if world gdp were to rise by a few hundred percent a year.

Income is not synonymous to the "resources" you are talking about. The reason my neighbour makes $10,000 more than me isn't the reason I make $10,000 less. Income isn't a fixed pie. Wealth isn't a fixed pie. Scarce resources that are non-renewable and deplete entirely once consumed, perhaps.

Here's an example: If we assume that only a certain amount of steel can be produced in a year (that amount can grow from one year to the next but not infinitely) and also that there are several ways steel can be used. One use could be to produce, say, cutlery while another use is in the production of sports cars
The more demand there is for sports cars the more steel will be used in its production. Hence there will be less steel to use in cutlery. Less supply of cutlery means higher prices. The demand for steel affects the price of cutlery and vice versa. So if a wealthy member of society purchases a sports car then they are directly affecting the rest of us who demand other products that require steel.

You are essentially ignoring that fact that time matters. In the short term all goods act as if they are non-renewable resources. This has to be the case, otherwise they wouldn't have a price.

Also to your point about a fixed pie. I am not saying that the pie is fixed, just that its growth is restricted from one year to another.

[Arkolon]

Income is not synonymous to the "resources" you are talking about. The reason my neighbour makes $10,000 more than me isn't the reason I make $10,000 less. Income isn't a fixed pie. Wealth isn't a fixed pie. Scarce resources that are non-renewable and deplete entirely once consumed, perhaps.

Here's an example: If we assume that only a certain amount of steel can be produced in a year (that amount can grow from one year to the next but not infinitely) and also that there are several ways steel can be used. One use could be to produce, say, cutlery while another use is in the production of sports cars
The more demand there is for sports cars the more steel will be used in its production. Hence there will be less steel to use in cutlery. Less supply of cutlery means higher prices. The demand for steel affects the price of cutlery and vice versa. So if a wealthy member of society purchases a sports car then they are directly affecting the rest of us who demand other products that require steel.

You are essentially ignoring that fact that time matters. In the short term all goods act as if they are non-renewable resources. This has to be the case, otherwise they wouldn't have a price.

I accepted that resources are finite and scarce, and as such do have a "pie" (albeit a very, very big one). We were talking about income, though, and you didn't address that point at all.

[Chestaan]

Here's an example: If we assume that only a certain amount of steel can be produced in a year (that amount can grow from one year to the next but not infinitely) and also that there are several ways steel can be used. One use could be to produce, say, cutlery while another use is in the production of sports cars
The more demand there is for sports cars the more steel will be used in its production. Hence there will be less steel to use in cutlery. Less supply of cutlery means higher prices. The demand for steel affects the price of cutlery and vice versa. So if a wealthy member of society purchases a sports car then they are directly affecting the rest of us who demand other products that require steel.

You are essentially ignoring that fact that time matters. In the short term all goods act as if they are non-renewable resources. This has to be the case, otherwise they wouldn't have a price.

I accepted that resources are finite and scarce, and as such do have a "pie" (albeit a very, very big one). We were talking about income, though, and you didn't address that point at all.

Income is a representation of how much scarce resources you are entitled to on a yearly basis.

Lets make a simple model, two people exist in our world and only a certain amount of some good, lets say cola because I can't think of anything else. All resources in this world are used to produce cola. Person A has an income ten times greater than person B, hence person A receives 10 times the units of cola that Person B does. If we produce 110 units of cola then person A will get 100 while get 10. Now next year we might produce 220 units, but that still leave A with 200 and B with 20. Growth may change B's situation positively but A's income still affects how many units B can access.

[Arkolon]

I accepted that resources are finite and scarce, and as such do have a "pie" (albeit a very, very big one). We were talking about income, though, and you didn't address that point at all.

Income is a representation of how much scarce resources you are entitled to on a yearly basis.

Lets make a simple model, two people exist in our world and only a certain amount of some good, lets say cola because I can't think of anything else. All resources in this world are used to produce cola. Person A has an income ten times greater than person B, hence person A receives 10 times the units of cola that Person B does. If we produce 110 units of cola then person A will get 100 while get 10. Now next year we might produce 220 units, but that still leave A with 200 and B with 20. Growth may change B's situation positively but A's income still affects how many units B can access.

I'm sorry, but income just doesn't work like that. It is very different to steel, cola, or other resources because money growth is permanent. That is how central banks work. They need to keep loaning out money to keep the economy ticking. Money is constantly being created. Steel, or cola, aren't printed out in the same way. Their growth isn't permanently continuous. You're also assuming that Person A will always, always, have an income 10 times greater than Person B, which is a get-out-of-the-awkward-situation-where-I'm-wrong-free card implanted into your system that makes the system intrinsically unfair, forgetting about time and income change over time, and skews your analogy up as to paint nothing but what you want to see.

[Chestaan]

Income is a representation of how much scarce resources you are entitled to on a yearly basis.

Lets make a simple model, two people exist in our world and only a certain amount of some good, lets say cola because I can't think of anything else. All resources in this world are used to produce cola. Person A has an income ten times greater than person B, hence person A receives 10 times the units of cola that Person B does. If we produce 110 units of cola then person A will get 100 while get 10. Now next year we might produce 220 units, but that still leave A with 200 and B with 20. Growth may change B's situation positively but A's income still affects how many units B can access.

I'm sorry, but income just doesn't work like that. It is very different to steel, cola, or other resources because money growth is permanent. That is how central banks work. They need to keep loaning out money to keep the economy ticking. Money is constantly being created. Steel, or cola, aren't printed out in the same way. Their growth isn't permanently continuous. You're also assuming that Person A will always, always, have an income 10 times greater than Person B, which is a get-out-of-the-awkward-situation-where-I'm-wrong-free card implanted into your system that makes the system intrinsically unfair, forgetting about time and income change over time, and skews your analogy up as to paint nothing but what you want to see.

Why do people prefer higher incomes to smaller ones?

Secondly, are you trying to state that A's percentage of income is likely to get smaller over time?? Because the real world evidence tends to suggest that economic growth benefits the wealthier in a proportionally greater manner. But we don't even need to talk about changes over time, all I'm saying is that income affects resources directly. I could just as easily said that A and B had identical incomes and still proved my point that the income of one affects the rest of society.