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America Is A Welfare Nation Now

Standard memberFishHead111
Debates 17 Oct '15 15:57
  1. F
    Standard memberFishHead111
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    17 Oct '15 15:57
    Disturbing statistics, not the same country I grew up in, and the trend is just getting worse.

    http://www.amren.com/features/2015/10/welfare-whos-on-it-whos-not/
  2. Standard memberAThousandYoung
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    17 Oct '15 16:32
    Originally posted by FishHead111
    Disturbing statistics, not the same country I grew up in, and the trend is just getting worse.

    http://www.amren.com/features/2015/10/welfare-whos-on-it-whos-not/
    The country you grew up in had enormous taxes relative to today.
  3. F
    Standard memberFishHead111
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    17 Oct '15 16:38
    Originally posted by AThousandYoung
    The country you grew up in had enormous taxes relative to today.
    Really?
    So how are we paying for all the welfare today if taxes are so much lower ?
    Got a reference for that claim?
  4. Standard memberAThousandYoung
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    17 Oct '15 16:43
    Originally posted by FishHead111
    Really?
    So how are we paying for all the welfare today if taxes are so much lower ?
    Got a reference for that claim?
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taxation_history_of_the_United_States

    Following World War II tax increases, top marginal individual tax rates stayed near or above 90%, and the effective tax rate at 70% for the highest incomes (few paid the top rate), until 1964 when the top marginal tax rate was lowered to 70%. Kennedy explicitly called for a top rate of 65 percent, but added that it should be set at 70 percent if certain deductions weren't phased out at the top of the income scale.[24][25][26] The top marginal tax rate was lowered to 50% in 1982 and eventually to 28% in 1988. It slowly increased to 39.6% in 2000, then was reduced to 35% for the period 2003 through 2012.[23] Corporate tax rates were lowered from 48% to 46% in 1981 (PL 97-34), then to 34% in 1986 (PL 99-514), and increased to 35% in 1993.
  5. K
    Standard memberKazetNagorra
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    17 Oct '15 16:43
    Originally posted by FishHead111
    Really?
    So how are we paying for all the welfare today if taxes are so much lower ?
    Got a reference for that claim?
    It's because most people who get "some form of welfare" get a small tax credit (e.g. in the form of food stamps).

    Here's a nice graph:
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taxation_history_of_the_United_States#Development_of_the_modern_income_tax
  6. Standard memberAThousandYoung
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    17 Oct '15 16:461 edit
    We are running a deficit. In other words. where the USA used to be able to pay our bills, now the government has to borrow money. It is a deliberate strategy by the Republican party to destroy the economy. It's known as the "two Santas".

    https://www.quora.com/Two-Santa-Clause-Theory

    The two santa clause theory was proposed in 1976 by Jude Wanniski. The summary is this: Democrats were winning government positions by always promising to spend on social benefits. The Republicans would lose by proposing to limit this spending, effectively turning themselves into the enemy of Santa Clause. The two Santa Clause theory was that the republicans needed to be Santa as well to win elected positions. They still wanted fiscal conservatism, but somehow needed to be Santa. The solution to this was to sell the public on the "gift" of lowering taxes.

    This has set up a big game of chicken. Democrats promise spending, but get blocked on tax raises to fund it. Republicans promise tax cuts, but get blocked on spending cuts.

    In theory, the Republicans would hope that the Democrats would blink first, curtail spending and then lose their own Santa Clause status.
  7. F
    Standard memberFishHead111
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    17 Oct '15 16:49
    Originally posted by KazetNagorra
    It's because most people who get "some form of welfare" get a small tax credit (e.g. in the form of food stamps).

    Here's a nice graph:
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taxation_history_of_the_United_States#Development_of_the_modern_income_tax
    So it's paid for by giving "tax credits" ?
    We pay less taxes but we give out a chit load more money to a lot of people for doing nothing.
    OK...got it. It's all magic.
  8. Standard memberAThousandYoung
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    17 Oct '15 16:50
    Originally posted by FishHead111
    So it's paid for by giving "tax credits" ?
    We pay less taxes but we give out a chit load more money to a lot of people for doing nothing.
    OK...got it. It's all magic.
    Loans.
  9. F
    Standard memberFishHead111
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    17 Oct '15 16:57
    Originally posted by AThousandYoung
    Loans.
    OK even if true about taxes, etc....what's that got to do with the huge increase in people living off the government?
    It can't be sustained for long without some kind of reckoning.
    Or can it?
  10. Standard memberAThousandYoung
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    17 Oct '15 17:02
    Originally posted by FishHead111
    OK even if true about taxes, etc....what's that got to do with the huge increase in people living off the government?
    It can't be sustained for long without some kind of reckoning.
    Or can it?
    The increase is an illusion. For example, back in the day there were hospitals for the hopelessly insane. Those people are now on the streets. Over the years the Right has cut funding to all kinds of programs that used to allow people to "live off the government". For example, "government jobs". You know how much the Right hates such jobs.
  11. Standard memberAThousandYoung
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    17 Oct '15 17:044 edits
    Los Angeles used to have Red Cars.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southern_California_freeways#Origins

    Judge Doom's plot from Roger Rabbit

    YouTube

    "Toontown" is now known as Highland Park, a lower middle class Chicano neighborhood parallel to the 110 freeway, currently being gentrified by hipsters.

    The local gang is called the Avenues.

    Los Avenues Assassins Clique rap "Dipping Down the Avenues"

    YouTube
  12. b
    Standard memberbill718
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    17 Oct '15 17:372 edits
    Originally posted by FishHead111
    Disturbing statistics, not the same country I grew up in, and the trend is just getting worse.

    http://www.amren.com/features/2015/10/welfare-whos-on-it-whos-not/
    That's only a small part of the welfare story little FishHead. What you showed us is small potatoes compared to the tax money our country is shelling out to the Fortune 500 as subsidies and other corporate welfare goodies (nearly twice that of social welfare!) So...if you want to tell your tale about welfare, then tell the WHOLE tale, not just the little part YOU want people to see!

    Oops...another little inconvenient truth slips out. 😏

    http://www.forbes.com/sites/taxanalysts/2014/03/14/where-is-the-outrage-over-corporate-welfare/

    http://thinkbynumbers.org/government-spending/corporate-welfare/corporate-welfare-statistics-vs-social-welfare-statistics/
  13. K
    Standard memberKazetNagorra
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    17 Oct '15 17:41
    Originally posted by FishHead111
    So it's paid for by giving "tax credits" ?
    We pay less taxes but we give out a chit load more money to a lot of people for doing nothing.
    OK...got it. It's all magic.
    The United States is, relative to most other Western nations, a society where social welfare is poor and income equality low. Your bizarre denial of this reality reeks of a rather desperate need to put other people down.
  14. b
    Standard memberbill718
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    17 Oct '15 17:44
    Originally posted by KazetNagorra
    The United States is, relative to most other Western nations, a society where social welfare is poor and income equality low. Your bizarre denial of this reality reeks of a rather desperate need to put other people down.
    Thank You. I agree 100% 🙂
  15. F
    Standard memberFishHead111
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    17 Oct '15 19:273 edits
    Originally posted by AThousandYoung
    Los Angeles used to have Red Cars.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southern_California_freeways#Origins

    Judge Doom's plot from Roger Rabbit

    [youtube]OquSczOMkO4[/youtube]

    "Toontown" is now known as Highland Park, a lower middle class Chicano neighborhood parallel to the 110 freeway, currently being gentrified by hipsters.

    The local gang i ...[text shortened]...

    Los Avenues Assassins Clique rap "Dipping Down the Avenues"

    [youtube]mScqCEIzDJc[/youtube]
    Yes when I was very young I saw the last of the Red Cars were still operating in downtown Los Angeles, my dad pointed it out to me. Hawthorne Blvd had the overhead wires and tracks going down the middle of the street, it was a big construction job pulling them out from Inglewood down to the foothills of Palos Verdes.
    Back then I used to go play on the the Watts Towers and my parents would go to Highland Park, Silver Lake district, etc, with no fears. Los Angeles was a clean, safe, wholesome place to raise a family, like something out of an Ozzie and Harriet episode.
    For that matter, so was all of California.
    Not so today.
    Same can be said for much of America.

    I think most Europeans are going to feel the same way pretty soon.
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