the Trump show

@averagejoe1 said
Actually, google ‘17 States fund abortions.’
As to human society, simply put, each person in a ‘region’ has his own talent, if you will. Carpenter, bricklayer, potato grower, maker of bricks, computer maker, clothes maker, doctor, computer technician and so on. Boat builder. Car maker. Do they not have to all form a society (a community rather than isolation) in orde ...[text shortened]... ng to now change all of that, how about everybody getting a check from the government help me Rhonda

UMM, wrong. Human societies formed long before there was such a massive diversity of labor. They formed for the mutual protection of all not so some elite could hold virtual life or death power over the rest by economic or political means.

You seem to be laboring under the misconception that our present type of society i.e. a capitalist one based on private property is the only possible one. In fact, such societies are fairly recent aberrations.

The fact that these types of societies have allocated the vast majority of property to a relative few is the only reason that others must sell their labor to those owners to live. Given that society has made it possible for those relative few to have such overwhelming economic power it seems only reasonable to expect them to give back some of that benefit to fund societal needs. That is what progressive taxation and anti-poverty programs are all about.

@averagejoe1 said
You say that ‘the rich do profit from the poor’. I paid our yard man to rake my yard today ...how did i profit from him? He profited from me when I paid him to rake my yard!your comment makes no sense. Help me Rhonda.
As to the flat tax, we are not under that system, so it is not Germaine to this discussion. I do support it, of bourse. But TODAY I am asked to pay, ...[text shortened]... orrow, and it drops 50%, should the government pay me for my loss, for my having made a bad choice ?

He’s gotta pay the landlord who is a rich person. Poor people are also sent to prison more often and the prisons are for profit institutions. Etc.

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2016/jun/28/profit-from-poverty-daniel-hatcher-the-poverty-industry

@no1marauder. Then I would put questio to you, are you saying capitalism is not the way to go? Then, what way?

@averagejoe1 said
You say that ‘the rich do profit from the poor’. I paid our yard man to rake my yard today ...how did i profit from him?

1.
If the rich do not profit from the poor who do they profit from?

2.
If your yard man overcharged you then he profited.
If you underpaid him then you profited.
If it was a fair exchange then you both profited.

PS. What makes you think your yardman is poor and you are rich?

@averagejoe1 said
Thanks for your reasoned reply. The value of the apt is the same to bill as it is to joe. Each has the exact same use of the premises. So it would follow that each pays for 1/2 rent. To reason otherwise would be tantamount to telling a rich guy to pay $40k for a car that a lesser-monied person pays $25k for. So the issue here is not about the apt, it is about 2 people in ...[text shortened]... me do not everyone is different. There is no way to redistribute wealth and remain a healthy nation.

But you just said you support a flat tax, where someone with a higher income pays more taxes. Do you think this is just or not, and if so, what is the point of the analogy?

As a side question, what makes you think productivity is proportional to income? There are high-income jobs with negative productivity.

A human Society lives on an island. Say coconuts are the currency, I work hard picking and Saving them while Ralph flies a kite (till he gets hungry). Which of us is the richer? Hate me cause I am rich. Lucky for him I am rich, so he can work for me, like the yard raker. Soon he says, dang, I think I will start a raking company, hire people, grow, be rich myself. This is as short an analogy as I can come up with. Hereinabove, someone said something like ‘just get rich guy’s coconuts’. Do not socialists understand that Richie will just stop producing?
No sense hashing the myriad of tax plans, it can never be totally fair or flat. Life is not fair. Actually, come to think of it, the kite flyer best be glad it is not fair, or there’d be no guy to give him a job.

@averagejoe1 said
A human Society lives on an island. Say coconuts are the currency, I work hard picking and Saving them while Ralph flies a kite (till he gets hungry). Which of us is the richer? Hate me cause I am rich. Lucky for him I am rich, so he can work for me, like the yard raker. Soon he says, dang, I think I will start a raking company, hire people, grow, be rich myself. This is ...[text shortened]... to think of it, the kite flyer best be glad it is not fair, or there’d be no guy to give him a job.

Never mind if you think it will be implemented - if you were in charge of designing a tax system, how would you do it (in broad strokes of course), why, and what is the connection to your apartment and coconut stories?

Apt and coconut is to try to simply highlight to folks, who desire govt control and distribution of wealth, that these concepts can’t work. How can a member of the society think that he is entitled to the product of another person? And I would ask that member, At what point in the life of the other person does that other person incur a debt to the member/taker ? How can a society sustain itself if the risk-taker is in effect prohibited from enjoying the fruits of his labor by having these fruits forcibly distributed around to the kite flyers? He would just close his company and 450 people lose their jobs.
I figurehe is justified to make $300 an hour while his employees make $30 an hour.. He took the risk while his employees were working at McDonalds, who have now moved up in their lives and probably become his managers, ....and later?? Start their own companies.
I love this country. But alas, Bernie et al will change it to Venezuals.

@averagejoe1 said
Apt and coconut is to try to simply highlight to folks, who desire govt control and distribution of wealth, that these concepts can’t work. How can a member of the society think that he is entitled to the product of another person? And I would ask that member, At what point in the life of the other person does that other person incur a debt to the member/taker ? How ca ...[text shortened]... eir own companies.
I love this country. But alas, Bernie et al will change it to Venezuals.

If you were in charge of designing a tax system, how would you do it?

@averagejoe1 said
A human Society lives on an island. Say coconuts are the currency, I work hard picking and Saving them while Ralph flies a kite (till he gets hungry). Which of us is the richer? Hate me cause I am rich. Lucky for him I am rich, so he can work for me, like the yard raker. Soon he says, dang, I think I will start a raking company, hire people, grow, be rich myself. This is ...[text shortened]... to think of it, the kite flyer best be glad it is not fair, or there’d be no guy to give him a job.

You are describing a merit based society which is not at odds with socialism.

How about this story...
A human Society lives on an island. Say coconuts are the currency.
One man owns all the coconut trees.
He pays men to harvest the coconuts (they get 10%, he keeps 90% )
Every year the tree owner gets richer and richer yet he does nothing.
The workers get poorer and poorer each year since the rich
man can outbid anyone and buy whatever he wants.
(Inflating any commodity price)
Richie eventually buys all the land on the island.
He gets richer from rent.
(Effectively taking back his workers wages.)
Still he does nothing but gets richer and richer.

That is capitalism.
Money earning money. The rich getting richer from the poor.

@averagejoe1 said
A human Society lives on an island. Say coconuts are the currency, I work hard picking and Saving them while Ralph flies a kite (till he gets hungry). Which of us is the richer? Hate me cause I am rich. Lucky for him I am rich, so he can work for me, like the yard raker. Soon he says, dang, I think I will start a raking company, hire people, grow, be rich myself. This is ...[text shortened]... to think of it, the kite flyer best be glad it is not fair, or there’d be no guy to give him a job.

Hoarding scarce goods is not “producing”.

@averagejoe1 said
This best most charitable generous country in the world has disabled persons covered. Programs everywhere.That is a total different issue (see plethora of ‘issues avoided’ above).
Obviously I refer to people who work hard susidizing those who don’t , or won’t. If 500 people live on an island and one guy collects and saves coconuts all day while another plays guitar on th ...[text shortened]... are key here) , does the guitar player have any rights to any of the coconuts in the gatherer’s hut?

Nobody has an issue with people who work hard.
Self-made millionaires and billionaires tend to be philanthropists
and many are left leaning. They have normally worked hard for
their money and enriched society with their efforts. (Think Bill Gates)
However there is an elite of people with money who do nothing and have
always done nothing. They generate income through having money.

@wolfgang59 said
Nobody has an issue with people who work hard.
Self-made millionaires and billionaires tend to be philanthropists
and many are left leaning. They have normally worked hard for
their money and enriched society with their efforts. (Think Bill Gates)
However there is an elite of people with money who do nothing and have
always done nothing. They generate income through having money.

Did you miss or leave out the (think Donald Trump) at the end?

🙂

Hoarding the coconuts is not producing? Picking them is being productive, which is the issue. Working, or not working. All I’m saying is that hangers-on in our society should produce or get out of the way. And at the end of the day, I am sweating, sitting on a pile of coconuts that I’ll use at the local college to educate my kids. What would you have me do with the coconuts that I have harvested? Really what would you have me do with them. Certainly you would not have me give them to you. Can you imagine taking them after I’ve worked for them? We would all be amazed at the people in the society who would think nothing of that. Creepy indeed

Now this is interesting. Think Donald Trump,,? I assume this is an aspersion? That you are saying you have a problem or that you should weigh in on or comment about how much money he, or your neighbor, or Mr Robinson in Idaho makes?? To me that is the stuff of a total different thread. The idea that anyone person should have any business in noting the amount of money that another person makes. I find that Unfathomable