The Current Global Recession

Typical over reaction from conservatives.Tell me, do you know when your taxes are going to be raised?
As it stands, 2011.Do you know by how much?
Your tax rate will increase from 33% or 35% to 36% or 39.6% (individual vs. family filing). Does all your income get taxed at the new rate? Of course not. You're only taxed at the higher rate on income earned beyond the 200,000 or 250,000 level.And, like Joe the Plumber, do you actually make less than 200,000 (individual) or 250,000 (family)? and thus are just blowing smoke out your ass?By the way, this whole thing against taxes is really just quite ridiculous. I understand people don't like paying them. I don't like seeing roughly 17% of my paycheck vanish each week either. But you know what? Those roads I drive on? Those schools I go and went to? Those police who help keep society stable and protect my property? Those firemen who do much the same? The judicial system, which allows disputes to be settled peacefully and fairly? That military that's supposed to protect us from attack? Those are all public goods that the private sector either cannot provide or will not provide or should not provide. The government has to provide them, and the government needs money to provide its services. So I'll grumble about my taxes, but I'll pay them. And if I should ever become so successful that I'm actually taxed at the highest rate, I'll pay those too, because without government services I probably would not be so wealthy. And neither would you.

Um, overreact much?Did I say the government needed more tax revenue? I told Sarawak what his tax increase was going to be, when it would happen, and how it would work.I then railed against the attitude against paying taxes, because there are public goods that only the government can, should, and will provide. Did you know that the IRS misses about 350 billion dollars in taxes each year? Partly that's from mistakes: personally, I'm confused about how my tax obligations work thanks to stock in foreign markets. Mostly, though, its from people who game the system because they don't feel that they should pay the government for services rendered. And quite frankly, every time you drive on a road, or go to school, or buy medicine that's been approved as safe by the FDA, or any other of the numerous public goods, you are using government services. I don't know about you, but I rather like having roads, schools, agencies that, when not controlled by ideology and business interests, work to ensure the safety of my food, medicine, or any of several hundred thousand products, agencies that protect my property and person through enforceable laws.True, I think taxes should be raised, but I never said that in my previous post. Why should taxes be raised? A little something called a national debt that we do need to bring under control at some point in the future. Current tax revenues won't cut it. And then there's only paying for programs such as veteran's benefits that are consistently underfunded.Edited by kuresu, : getting names right is good

You realize you contradicted yourself? How can the government become fiscally responsible without tax revenue?Tell me, how do you balance your budget? You can either cut back, or increase your earnings. Well, the government cannot cut back right now (a spending freeze alone is folly, so imagine what cutting spending would do to the economy). The only option is to at some point in the future increase tax revenue. And quite frankly, cutting taxes from their current rates is not going to increase government revenue.You want the government to be fiscally responsible? Start paying up.

Reality disconnect? What is it with you people?How is stating that the Iraq war is not illegal (hello, UN mandates and now the SOFA?) connected with showing how Afghanistan might just not be a repeat of Vietnam? What do either of those statements really have to do with this topic, other than our expenditures related to the wars?How is being fiscally responsible disconnected from the idea that our tax revenues have to increase to pay for our national debt?You understand where are national debt comes from: largely a result of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. But even if we pull out of those wars today, we still have to pay off the debt incurred by them.How do you do that? Increase tax revenues to pay off the bond holders. How do you increase tax revenues? Shrink government expenditures, which for economic reasons right now is asinine, or raise taxes. Those tax hikes will be occurring in 2011 (unless Pelosi can get them earlier, which could be asinine, as Hoover so aptly proved).Really, do you all even try to think through what you say?Let me say it once more:
We want fiscal responsibility. That means fully paying for your programs and incurred debts. That means increasing tax revenue. Which means either cutting government spending in toto, and/or raising taxes.I'm glad you see a disconnect with reality, because I sure can't see what's so wrong with the picture above.

I realize there's another way to interpret what you were saying. Possibly more likely than what I initially thought (see above post). That is, every quote attributed to me is an individual example of my disconnect from reality, and not that they are connected in any substantive manner. To this I respond:I stand by my arguments regarding each statement. You never had the opportunity to rebut my counter-arguments in any substantive manner in the Obama expectations thread. If you start threads or find old ones regarding the two wars individually, I will defend my arguments there. As it is, there is no disconnect with reality in my arguments.As to the final two, I again stand by my arguments. I fail to see how raising taxes to pay off the national debt is a disconnect from reality. See posts above for arguments as to why we should raise taxes if we want to pay off the debt. Further, to claim that my statement about fiscal responsibility requiring tax revenues in order to pay for government services is an example of disconnecting from reality, well, I'd really like to see how you define fiscal responsibility.The bats are out tonight, that's for sure.

Isn't the definition of fiscal irresponsibility spending money you don't have?Well, they're spending money. A lot more money than usual. If you want them to be fiscally responsible, they need greater revenue. You object to raising revenue because you apparently feel that the government can spend less wastefully in order to find the revenue to pay for the increased spending.What, exactly, is the percentage of the budget that is from graft, corruption, or wasteful spending? Do you think 300 billion dollars of waste exists in the budget? 500 billion dollars? So we eliminate that wasteful spending. Guess what: our deficit this year will likely be 1.75 trillion dollars. So even if there's 500 billion dollars of waste (accounting for nearly 17% of the annual budget, and such a high level of waste does not, quite frankly, exist), there's still a 1.25 trillion dollar hole that needs to be filled. Never mind the other 11 trillion dollars in the debt, or the annual deficits each year.Now, you can argue that the deficit is the result of improper spending (TARP, ARRA, and the housing plan plus the original deficit), but now that the money's spent, wouldn't it be fiscally responsible to raise taxes to raise the revenue needed to pay for it all?That's where your contradiction comes. You want them to be fiscally responsible. The only way they can do so is to raise taxes, or as you put it, to take more of your money. But you don't want to give it to them.Life isn't fair.

Um, who's getting the tax raises? That's right, those who make 200,000 or 250,000 a year. In fact, the ARRA just lowered taxes, though not by much (400/800 dollars per year) for just about everybody.As to whether the ARRA, TARP 2.0 (whatever that plan may be), and the housing/mortgage plan will work and why we should try. Doing nothing will lead to a real catastrophe (why? a 15% reduction in GDP is not fun). The question really isn't whether these plans will or won't work. The question is how effective they will be. Can we pull a Sweden? Or will we be Japan? Quite frankly, even Japan's lost decade is preferable to what would happen if we did nothing.Welcome to the world of lemon socialism: where profits are privatized and losses are nationalized. Trouble is, if it wasn't for nationalization being a dirty word for business, we could actually get somewhere.

Yes, and as absolutely useless as you call those things, I suppose you don't realize that for the most part the systems actually work.Yes, roads are full of potholes, especially Missouri. At least, it used to be that way. Then they repaved the roads. Roads need to be continuously maintained, but even a road with potholes is better than no road. Without roads, we wouldn't have anywhere near the economy we do now.Note that its only some of the schools that are the worst: by and far most are middling, and some are actually really good public schools. But even a poor school is better than no school.I didn't realize the police were absolutely useless. I guess you've gotten a few tickets you feel are unjustified? Tell me, who's going to solve the crimes that happen? Who's going to enforce the law? There are problems with the police, but you find structural and personnel problems in any organization--even private companies.Is the judicial system a sham? Why? Because the jury didn't convict someone you thought deserved it? Or because they convicted someone you thought didn't deserve it? Or perhaps you feel that there shouldn't be a branch of government involved in determining whether what the other two are doing is actually legal and/or constitutional? Perhaps you feel that you shouldn't have recourse to a civil court when you need to sue someone for damages because of some event? Or perhaps that criminal court shouldn't exist so the state can try that person who killed your mother. Yeah, let's leave justice in the hands of the people and return to vigilantes.The power of the military does get abused, but who is going to actually protect us? You might say we have no threats, but I seem to recall the national guard being mobilized after natural disasters. Occasionally even the federal reserve. Further, suppose we are actually attacked in some manner? You know, like Pearl Harbor, or Ft. Sumter, or whenever one of our commercial shipping vessels is attacked by pirates.These public goods are not american myths. They actually, believe it or not, built this country. People talk about all this waste. And the only thing I see ever brought up are earmarks. Aside from dronestar's favored Iraq war spending, where exactly is all the unwise spending? Why can no one actually bring up anything concrete? And as I said earlier, just how much does it amount to? 5% of the budget? 10%? 2%? And for kickers, just how wasteful is private business spending? We can see what a great job the private market did: spent so unwisely they brought the economy crashing down. Haven't seen the US do that yet.ABE: If you really think that our tax dollars do no good, I suggest you check out what life is like in failed states, where there is no functioning government. You know, like Somalia. Because without tax revenue, no government could exist, and while we wouldn't be quite so bad as Somalia, we would still be in anarchy. And anarchy is very insecure: you would see the collapse of any meaningful economy as no one would have enough trust in each other to actually carry out economic activity. That's the funny thing. People rail against taxes, and how the money is spent, without realizing that without taxes we would be in anarchy, and they overestimate the actual amount of graft that happens.Edited by kuresu, : No reason given.

what's so hard to understand? This is basic economics, really. Your raving about how bad everything is with police, schools, the judiciary, and all that other stuff is just that: raving disconnected from reality.

Really? The budget, and all spending is a matter of public record.
Here's the budget for fiscal year 2009. I'm sure your library can access a paper copy of the budget if you want.Here's the omnibus spending bill.This information is available readily. All it took was a 15 second search on google. I guess it's easier to claim that the information is hidden and not even try searching for it.So, point out just how much is wasteful spending, sheer corruption, or such. It's there for you.
Did I say don't complain? Hardly. When people like Jon suggest that our tax dollars do no good, it's helpful to give them an example of anarchy. Anarchy is a very bad consequence of shutting down government, which is what would happen if the government truly did have no method of raising revenue. So the hint is not to complain, but to think through your statements. Tax dollars actually do some good. That was the point of bringing up Somalia. You can complain all you want. But you still need to pay your taxes. (For an excellent example, I suggest looking at the swedish opinion on taxes: they complain about taxes incessantly, and yet they pay them because they know they wouldn't have the government services they do have without the tax revenue). I don't know. Ask the slaves. Ask the first strikers. Quite frankly, I don't mind paying 18% of my paycheck in tax, because there is no one smacking me in the mouth every day. Yeah, the financial world screwed us all over. But you know what? Screwing them over in return is going to hurt a lot worse. I don't fancy depressions. Do you?

And that is your, and dronestar, and jon, and many other's problem lies: not wanting to do the research.How can you know what the government has made available without research? How can you know what the government has hidden without research? How exactly did Woodward and Bernstein uncover Watergate? How did we uncover any of the numerous actions I'm sure the Bush administration wanted kept quiet? Not by sitting on our duffs and saying "I'm sure the government is lying", but actually researching.So if you're going to advocate specific policies, make claims, and whatnot, be prepared to actually do the research to support your position. Otherwise, you're really no better than the YECs who are loaded with blanks.