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Income Inequality


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6 hours ago, ZRod said:

You guys are aware that a CEO's salary typically isn't that much actual cash, right? It's usually they're total compensation in the form of stock options that make up those ungodly numbers. So, they're net worth is pretty high, but their actual earnings aren't so astronomical. It's also a minor incentive to steer the company in the right direction, all though the golden parachute clauses kind of defeat that purpose.

 

I was going to include that in my post, but ended up deleting it because compensation type really isn't the issue in either case.  Cash or not, without loopholes it's still taxable income.  The issue is that taxes are a linear function at the top and are always a linear function when you are talking about capital gains which is how wealth is made and stored, but that wealth is gained exponentially.  It simply makes sense for people after a certain level of income to focus on gaining wealth/net worth.  They don't need more cash to fund their lifestyle and wealth grows as investments with time but loses value as cash.

 

It's funny, at least to me, that republicans seem so enamored with 1950s society in their "return to greatness", but that they never mention the tax policy in place that funded that society where income tax brackets went up to basically 90%, so the burden was spread much more equitably across the board as a percentage of an individual's total income.

 

In any case, we deserve what we get when we go to the polls and vote the people in that make promises of giving us all more money without understanding the details or consequences of such policies or fall for overly simplistic arguments against things when we don't take a minute to look at who actually benefits the most from whatever they are pedaling and why their benefactors would be pushing for that. 

 

Tax policy is how we've made the inequality of our times not only possible, but the inevitable outcome.  As a society, until we can stop being short sighted when it comes to fairly basic mathematical principles our own greed will continue to be used against the majority of us for the benefit of the few.

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12 hours ago, Big Red 40 said:

i like that proposal. The people at the top can still make as much as they want , it just makes them take much better care of the people who helped them get there.

There's tons of loopholes in that plan, like the large companies will simply make all their employees contractors instead of employees or outsource all their work that would require employees. And that's before considering that the vast majority of their wealth doesn't come from a salary that can be capped.

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2 minutes ago, RedDenver said:

There's tons of loopholes in that plan, like the large companies will simply make all their employees contractors instead of employees or outsource all their work that would require employees. And that's before considering that the vast majority of their wealth doesn't come from a salary that can be capped.

I liked the general idea of it , but of course they people at the top will find ways to get around it . 

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9 hours ago, methodical said:

and poor through tax policy (because we pay a bigger percentage of our income/wealth to taxes).  We're more productive as a nation than we've ever been

Isn’t the tax code full of advantages for rich people / business owners etc too? They can hire good accountants and use creative bookkeeping, write offs , and loopholes to bring their tax liability down to nothing? 

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12 hours ago, Making Chimichangas said:

 

Then Republicans always chime in with something along the lines of: But that job isn't worth X amount.  So that begs the question: who decides what a job is worth?  Well, rich people decide what a particular job is worth.  Of course they'll always over-estimate their own worth and grossly under-estimate the worth of others.

 

A popular Republican argument is: Well, jobs and what they are paid depend on your skills and talents.  But are they?  Rachel Maddow makes 7 million a year.  Sean Hannity makes 36 million a year.  Leaving aside political differences, both people do nothing more than sit behind a desk, look into a camera, and read a teleprompter, and give their opinions.  Neither of them have any special skills, talents, or abilities.  You could literally put anyone in their place and they could do that job.  So according to Conservatives, jobs like Maddow and Hannity's should be minimum wage because anyone could do it and it takes only the ability to read.

What is preventing you from pursuing a career in the media?

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48 minutes ago, Big Red 40 said:

Isn’t the tax code full of advantages for rich people / business owners etc too? They can hire good accountants and use creative bookkeeping, write offs , and loopholes to bring their tax liability down to nothing? 

 

Of course, although if you are running a business obviously you'd be silly to not take advantage of it and it's not like society sees no benefit from things like buildings being built or equipment being purchased then depreciated or charitable giving (although some charities are questionable) and lowering someone's tax liability.  It's when you get into things like offshore money in tax havens that tax avoidance starts to be malicious to the society someone lives in, in my mind at least.

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44 minutes ago, teachercd said:

Yeah...we have that part...now some want a salary cap.

 

This is not just for you but how much is "rich"?

 

How much, per month, does everyone feel is rich?

I'm somewhat picking a number out of a hat, but "rich enough" is IMO about 100x as much money as needed for basics like food, water, shelter, healthcare, etc. (edit: I'm roughly guessing $30k/year in US), which would put that number around about $3M/year in the US.

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46 minutes ago, teachercd said:

Yeah...we have that part...now some want a salary cap.

 

This is not just for you but how much is "rich"?

 

How much, per month, does everyone feel is rich?

Zero nights sleeping outside (unless you're camping)

Zero visits to the doctor/hospital

3 meals a day

My 3 kids.

 

I'm happy with that :thumbs

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6 minutes ago, NUance said:

 

tenor.gif

Oh man...trust me...this was not my idea nor my way of thinking.  

19 minutes ago, RedDenver said:

I'm somewhat picking a number out of a hat, but "rich enough" is IMO about 100x as much money as needed for basics like food, water, shelter, healthcare, etc. (edit: I'm roughly guessing $30k/year in US), which would put that number around about $3M/year in the US.

That is kind of an interesting way to think about it.  So like, 25K a month.  I could handle that!

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53 minutes ago, teachercd said:

Yeah...we have that part...now some want a salary cap.

 

This is not just for you but how much is "rich"?

 

How much, per month, does everyone feel is rich?

 

You'd start to actually see the advantages with income beyond 500k/year after you hit the upper bracket of taxes, so I'd probably say around there.  So around 42k/month is probably actually rich on the income scale.

 

Obviously it's possible to become wealthy making far less than that and building it smartly over time, or being insanely lucky, but you aren't getting into super rich territory, ever, on even a high earner's salary.  Nor are you seeing the tax advantages before that.

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1 hour ago, NUance said:

 

tenor.gif

I've never understood this way of thinking. Does putting pictures of Hitler or Mussolini up every time capitalism is mentioned change anyone's opinions?

 

Edit to add: Dictators and authoritarians suck no matter the economic system.

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