The New American Politics thread

[HockeyIlliterate]

Originally Posted by MattyC

I say, why live in a democracy if you're not going to adhere to the one basic principle of the thing, that will of the majority should guide the society?

I think that I understand your comments, but in regard to the quoted portion, if you truly believe that the "will of the majority should guide the society," then I suppose, at least in the U.S., slavery (or at least segregation) would still likely be allowed, women might just now be getting the right to vote, and homosexual marriage would still likely be illegal.

Which is why I think that, in regard to some matters, the "will of the majority" is not how things should be decided. And tax policy is probably one of those matters.

[Flash Walken]

Originally Posted by MattyC

Good data, thanks.

Dangerous to whom?

Establishment politicians.

[Coach]

Originally Posted by HockeyIlliterate

I think that I understand your comments, but in regard to the quoted portion, if you truly believe that the "will of the majority should guide the society," then I suppose, at least in the U.S., slavery (or at least segregation) would still likely be allowed, women might just now be getting the right to vote, and homosexual marriage would still likely be illegal.

Which is why I think that, in regard to some matters, the "will of the majority" is not how things should be decided. And tax policy is probably one of those matters.

Well, firstly I'm not sure I agree that those things would have happened slower. In a case of things like slavery, it's not an accident that the people fighting for slavery were also the ones who stood to gain huge profits from it.

Either way, I see your point, in regards to something like tax policy, again you have to assume that the people drawing up the laws and influencing them are not the ones that stand to gain from skewing them disproportionately to their own liking. IMO this is just straight up not the case. The enormously wealthy have a much greater ability to influence the taxation policy (and any policy really) of a nation, and it's not an accident that it's currently built to benefit them the most.

[HockeyIlliterate]

Originally Posted by MattyC

The enormously wealthy have a much greater ability to influence the taxation policy (and any policy really) of a nation, . . .

That is probably true.

Originally Posted by MattyC

. . . and it's not an accident that it's currently built to benefit them the most.

I don't know if that is true.

Somewhere around 40 to 45 percent of American households simply do not pay (because they do not owe) any federal income tax. Surely they are benefitting quite handsomely from the current tax code, and they are, in this respect, benefiting much more than I am.

The lower-earning class benefits "more" than others under the current tax code as well. The earned income tax credit, for example, is no use to the "enormously wealthy." The deduction for mortgage interest is limited, which somewhat equalizes the benefit amongst the classes. The deduction for student loan interest is of absolutely no benefit to even the "barely" wealthy. And so on.

Sure, the wealthy have their tax benefits, and they probably have more opportunities to find and use tax dodges than others do. But I just don't know if it is accurate to say that they benefit the "most."

[As an aside, I appreciate the respectful discussion that we've had on this matter.]

[Coach]

Originally Posted by HockeyIlliterate

Somewhere around 40 to 45 percent of American households simply do not pay (because they do not owe) any federal income tax. Surely they are benefitting quite handsomely from the current tax code, and they are, in this respect, benefiting much more than I am.

The lower-earning class benefits "more" than others under the current tax code as well. The earned income tax credit, for example, is no use to the "enormously wealthy." The deduction for mortgage interest is limited, which somewhat equalizes the benefit amongst the classes. The deduction for student loan interest is of absolutely no benefit to even the "barely" wealthy. And so on.

Sure, the wealthy have their tax benefits, and they probably have more opportunities to find and use tax dodges than others do. But I just don't know if it is accurate to say that they benefit the "most."

[As an aside, I appreciate the respectful discussion that we've had on this matter.]

I worded that poorly I think. Obviously the wealthy have higher percentage tax rates than other people do. What I mean is that, just because they pay a more percentage tax (and those that are in low income brackets pay little to no) does not mean that the society overall wouldn't benefit greatly from them being taxed more heavily. I don't consider it punitive to anyone that is still left with millions if not billions of dollars in yearly income.

A problem for me is taxing people bringing in billions the same as people making $300K/year. Even though those people in the $300K+ bracket are still incredibly well off, those are not the people I'm talking about really. Taxing people making millions, hundreds of millions, and up to billions PER YEAR, the same as you do for people making 1/2 mil/year is huge lost tax revenue.

This is putting aside the things you mentioned, like opportunities to pay for people to expose tax loopholes and what not. Warren Buffett, who increased his total wealth by a factor of $9 f***ing billion dollars last year, is well cited as paying less individual income tax than his secretary. That is rigoddamndiculous. And he's the first one to tell you that. 9 billion dollars. I don't care who you are, what you own, or what you do on a daily basis, NO ONE, absolutely no one "earns" that much. No one works that proportionally harder than anyone else.

[I also enjoy these discussions. I may get a bit overzealous at times, but it is directed at the people who seem fine with this level of greed. Thanks for engaging it. I usually find out some interesting info when digging into these numbers, whether it helps my point or not.]

[peter12]

Originally Posted by MattyC

I worded that poorly I think. Obviously the wealthy have higher percentage tax rates than other people do. What I mean is that, just because they pay a more percentage tax (and those that are in low income brackets pay little to no) does not mean that the society overall wouldn't benefit greatly from them being taxed more heavily. I don't consider it punitive to anyone that is still left with millions if not billions of dollars in yearly income.

A problem for me is taxing people bringing in billions the same as people making $300K/year. Even though those people in the $300K+ bracket are still incredibly well off, those are not the people I'm talking about really. Taxing people making millions, hundreds of millions, and up to billions PER YEAR, the same as you do for people making 1/2 mil/year is huge lost tax revenue.

This is putting aside the things you mentioned, like opportunities to pay for people to expose tax loopholes and what not. Warren Buffett, who increased his total wealth by a factor of $9 f***ing billion dollars last year, is well cited as paying less individual income tax than his secretary. That is rigoddamndiculous. And he's the first one to tell you that. 9 billion dollars. I don't care who you are, what you own, or what you do on a daily basis, NO ONE, absolutely no one "earns" that much. No one works that proportionally harder than anyone else.

[I also enjoy these discussions. I may get a bit overzealous at times, but it is directed at the people who seem fine with this level of greed. Thanks for engaging it. I usually find out some interesting info when digging into these numbers, whether it helps my point or not.]

As a percentage, maybe, but not as an absolute number.

[Coach]

Originally Posted by peter12

As a percentage, maybe, but not as an absolute number.

That's kind of my point. Even if that number is substantially larger than the secretary's, it's absolute peanuts compared to his overall wealth. Where as the tax paid by the secretary actually has real implications on her life.

You're never going to convince me that it's ok for one single person to have that much money personally. I would say that no one should be able to hold more than $1B in any way shape or form. You can't tell me that someone with $60B lives a different life than someone with $1B. Both are ludicrous amounts of money. At a certain point, it just doesn't matter any more, but it matters for the people on the other end of the spectrum in a huge way.

[tjinaz]

You're never going to convince me that it's ok for one single person to have that much money personally. I would say that no one should be able to hold more than $1B in any way shape or form. You can't tell me that someone with $60B lives a different life than someone with $1B. Both are ludicrous amounts of money. At a certain point, it just doesn't matter any more, but it matters for the people on the other end of the spectrum in a huge way.

You clearly made the right decision to leave the US and go to Canada. Glad you found a place you belong.

[Coach]

Originally Posted by tjinaz

You clearly made the right decision to leave the US and go to Canada. Glad you found a place you belong.

It's a global problem. Canada's not much better, just has less people.

And my parents, who are born and raised Canadians, moved us here. Didn't have a choice in the matter. I am however very happy to be here vs there.

Maybe you could add to the discussion by justifying how someone, anyone, works 20,000-200,000 times harder than anyone else.

[Vulcan]

Originally Posted by HockeyIlliterate

I think that I understand your comments, but in regard to the quoted portion, if you truly believe that the "will of the majority should guide the society," then I suppose, at least in the U.S., slavery (or at least segregation) would still likely be allowed, women might just now be getting the right to vote, and homosexual marriage would still likely be illegal.

Which is why I think that, in regard to some matters, the "will of the majority" is not how things should be decided. And tax policy is probably one of those matters.

Than it should be decided by the will of the minority? Lets be straight about this, in the US it isn't the legislative bodies who are running the show, it's the big money contributors who have their self interest at heart.

While I agree not all policies should be controlled by "the will of the majority" (IIRC the majority in Canada wanted to retain the death penalty but our MPs voted to abolish it) this isn't an ideologue problem where it's one choice or the other, it's a situation that needs checks and balances as situations arise. Right now the taxation policy in the US seems to favour the rich with too many loopholes, as the trickle down policy is a bunch of rubbish.

You don't agree but the only people I can see agreeing with your position are the ones who profit from the current situation or those in their pay. Any others are being foolish.

[CorsiHockeyLeague]

On my facebook feed... I laughed.

[HockeyIlliterate]

Originally Posted by MattyC

What I mean is that, just because they pay a more percentage tax (and those that are in low income brackets pay little to no) does not mean that the society overall wouldn't benefit greatly from them being taxed more heavily.

Okay, but what does "more heavily" mean?

And how do you determine who, and under what circumstances, someone should be taxed "more heavily"?

If we are all in this together, why shouldn't everyone be taxed in the same proportion? In this regard, Sanders does have a proposal that I like quite a bit: as I understand it, he wants Family Leave to be paid for by a flat 0.2% tax on everyone, reasoning that everyone will benefit from the law.

Or should those who receive greater governmental benefits be taxed "more heavily" than those who receive fewer governmental benefits (in which case, perhaps the higher-earners should actually pay less tax, proportionally, than lower-earners)?

The problem, as I see it, is that I worked very hard to obtain an education that allowed me to get a good paying job, and all the government sees is a "rich" person who needs to pay his "fair share" to, among other things, support those in society who don't pay any federal income taxes now and who seem not to be terribly interested in advancing their lot in life. To say that I need to pay more federal income taxes is ridiculous; my federal income tax bill is already tens of thousands dollars more than my annual living costs are. Which is to say, it costs me more to support the federal government than it does to support my own family.

And it isn't just me. There are many Americans who have worked hard and tried to advance themselves, and one "reward" for doing so is simply more taxes to be paid. And I think it is going to be very difficult to convince these people that they should pay even more in federal income taxes to benefit those who either don't pay anything already or to pay for additional government programs (however well-intentioned they may be) that simply are not cost-sustainable.

Originally Posted by MattyC

A problem for me is taxing people bringing in billions the same as people making $300K/year.

Well, when you get to billions of dollars of income each year, you likely aren't in the wage-earning class anymore, but rather in the capital class.

Which is why I argue for a federal tax code that is not based on income, but rather on wealth, since income can be "lumpy" and income is not, in my view, a good measure of whether someone is "rich" or "wealthy" or not.

Of course, how you measure "wealth" can be problematic too, but it might do a better job of truly taxing the wealthy as opposed to just the high-earners.

Originally Posted by MattyC

Warren Buffett, who increased his total wealth by a factor of $9 f***ing billion dollars last year, is well cited as paying less individual income tax than his secretary. That is rigoddamndiculous. And he's the first one to tell you that.

Yes, I suppose he is, but I don't think that he has made any donations to the US Treasury to rectify the disparity either.

In fact, isn't he trying to give away a lot of his wealth, and in so doing, depriving the federal government of tax revenue that it might otherwise receive?

[Hemi-Cuda]

Sanders up big in New Hampshire, and pulls ahead of Hillary in Iowa

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/nh-poll-...r-voting-bloc/

http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/berni...ry?id=36240514

[driveway]

The Republican Party, in a continued effort to not merely be the party of old white people, announced their "#SNAPoftheUnion" Social Media event this evening where they would give SnapChat users the opportunity to see "an exclusive behind-the-scenes look at President Obama’s final State of the Union address."

The leading .gif for the event was this:


This happens to be an image of Louis Virtel, a comedian and avid tweeter who once competed on Jeopardy! and celebrated getting a Daily Double with the above "Oh Snap!" gesture.

Virtel responded to the House GOP using his image in an essay on hitfix.com

Nothing about representing myself on Jeopardy! with excitement, self-possession, and pride has anything to do with the GOP’s ideals, and it is borderline traumatizing to see my image associated with their horrifying, regressive shambles of a party.
...
So instead of "dragging" the GOP for being a gross, harmful creepshow that continues to endanger the lives of LGBT Americans, I will solemnly say this: The fact that the GOP can’t detect gay pride in arguably the gayest "Jeopardy!" moment of all time is proof of their brutal ignorance. There is nothing sassy or cute about the GOP invoking my image to prove they're hip with the kids, who almost unanimously think they're a joke anyway. The GOP’s aggressive, antigay hysteria fills me with contempt, and this is just another laughably moronic mistake to consider alongside their regressive legacy.

Oh snap.

[tjinaz]

Than it should be decided by the will of the minority? Lets be straight about this, in the FREE WORLD it isn't the legislative bodies who are running the show, it's the big money contributors who have their self interest at heart.

Fixed your post.

Find me a politician anywhere that left office of their own accord poorer than when they started and did it for "the good of the people". Lobbies will always be there with money and politicians will be there with their hands out.

Politics is a business and has been since Roman times.

Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely.
Lord Acton

[troutman]

Obama tapped Biden to lead a mission to find a cure for Cancer.

It is as bold as Kennedy's challenge to go to the moon.

http://www.cnbc.com/2016/01/12/while...r-mission.html

"Last year, Vice President Biden said that with a new moonshot, America can cure cancer," Obama said. "Tonight, I'm announcing a new national effort to get it done. And because he's gone to the mat for all of us, on so many issues over the past forty years, I'm putting Joe in charge of Mission Control."

[peter12]

Originally Posted by troutman

Obama tapped Biden to lead a mission to find a cure for Cancer.

It is as bold as Kennedy's challenge to go to the moon.

http://www.cnbc.com/2016/01/12/while...r-mission.html

"Last year, Vice President Biden said that with a new moonshot, America can cure cancer," Obama said. "Tonight, I'm announcing a new national effort to get it done. And because he's gone to the mat for all of us, on so many issues over the past forty years, I'm putting Joe in charge of Mission Control."

Barack Obama: Carrying on Richard Nixon's Legacy.

http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/...-been-a-bust/#

[Coach]

Originally Posted by HockeyIlliterate

Okay, but what does "more heavily" mean?

And how do you determine who, and under what circumstances, someone should be taxed "more heavily"?

If you're wanting a breakdown by income bracket, I don't really have the time or care to go through the math involved in that haha. What I would say is that, taxing someone to the point that they can be left with an identical lifestyle as if they weren't taxed at all, seems pretty logical to me. How that can be determined is pretty difficult and very abstract because not everyone making the same money lives identical lifestyles. Really the excess of North American society needs a significant drop. This is all idealism for sure, but that doesn't mean it's something we should strive for. Does a person making $1m/year have a remarkably different lifestyle than someone making $10m? Maybe to the point that they might have a bigger house or yacht (both of which are likely far beyond what they actually need), but it's likely not significantly different. I acknowledge that my views on this are pretty radical.

As far as flat tax, looking at who benefits from what, it's just not a feasible solution. To agree with that, you also have to agree that there is a point where people just don't need that much money and should be returning a significant portion to the society. A 10% tax on everyone does not capture this. Someone making $50K who is now at $45K net because of a flat tax, is actually hindered by that. Tax shouldn't be a burden in that way. That extra $5K, which is absolute peanuts in the grand scheme, is a huge loss to someone of that income level. Someone who banked $1m pays $100K in tax. Obviously not a nice number to write over the government, but your still left with $900K in yearly earnings. Is your life different because of that tax? No. It could be argued you could bring that person down to $400-$500K and they still wouldn't feel any ill-effects on their lively hood. A person with $1b/year would pay $100m in tax. Obviously that is a huge number. But it's a number that could build schools and pay for significant infrastructure upgrades, and they are still left with $900m freaking dollars in YEARLY income. If you left a person with $100m in that year, would their life be changed in any significant way?

If we are all in this together, why shouldn't everyone be taxed in the same proportion?

The problem, as I see it, is that I worked very hard to obtain an education that allowed me to get a good paying job, and all the government sees is a "rich" person who needs to pay his "fair share" to, among other things, support those in society who don't pay any federal income taxes now and who seem not to be terribly interested in advancing their lot in life. To say that I need to pay more federal income taxes is ridiculous; my federal income tax bill is already tens of thousands dollars more than my annual living costs are. Which is to say, it costs me more to support the federal government than it does to support my own family.

And it isn't just me. There are many Americans who have worked hard and tried to advance themselves, and one "reward" for doing so is simply more taxes to be paid. And I think it is going to be very difficult to convince these people that they should pay even more in federal income taxes to benefit those who either don't pay anything already or to pay for additional government programs (however well-intentioned they may be) that simply are not cost-sustainable.

I understand this logic to a point, but it's a common point that kind of ticks me off. For every person like you, who worked hard to get through school (lets say law, as I don't know what you do), there is someone who, by all objective accounts, worked just as hard to get a PhD in whatever (lets say, Social Work or Economic Development) but are making far less money because the MARKET determines the majority of your salary, not necessarily how hard you worked to get there. They are paying off the same loans, did the same amount of work (time wise), want to have the same type of family, but because their interest isn't in something lucrative, our society is punishing them by not valuing their field. To say that people like this aren't "terribly interested in advancing their lot" is a pretty ignorant statement to make from the high horse of a well-paid field.

The overall point is that our society, and the resources we deem to be important and income generating, are what pay the majority of your salary, not how hard you worked in school. The different between what you make and what other lawyers make is what you can attribute to your hard work/acumen, not what you make vs a social worker, or even a janitor. Your salary is not necessarily a measure of how hard you work/worked.

Onto the janitor, our society does not provide much in the means of allowing that person to escape that cycle. made some mistakes while younger? Most likely. But now a few years later, they can't just cut and run and go to law school, even if they have the intellectual capacity and the work ethic to do so, they don't have the financial means to put themselves through that type of program. Even worse so if they have a family to support. How come we force this person (or anyone) to go into extreme debt to try and better themselves? Don't you think that is a massive deterrent to do so? Who's to say what these people could do if provided the proper means to educate themselves and explore their talents? What if your education was free? Would you have still pursued what you did, or was it just because it was a money making field? Would your impact on society be greater if you could explore anything you wanted? People would still want to be lawyers and engineers because that's what interests them, and there would be people who enter those programs who otherwise couldn't. Would there be people that take advantage of something like this and be lifetime students? Probably, there will always be people like that regardless. But you can't base policy around the people who may leech off of it. If we did that we wouldn't have the healthcare system we do. AND IMO, the people who make exuberant amounts of money and dodge what they realistically owe back to society through loopholes, personal corporations, and other tax benefits that aren't available to others, are just as much of leeches on the system as people at the other end of the spectrum. But the difference is those people's lost revenue is significant enough that it can actually affect real social problems (lack of proper education for children, poverty, opportunities for people growing up in difficult situations).

A conversation I had with my dad (who is quite wealthy, but not excessively so) over Xmas went like this after discussing similar issues:

Me: Think about it like this Dad, what if, for every $1000 extra you made on top of what you actually need/use, stops a kids from having a proper education, or even a meal on the table?

Dad: Well that wouldn't make me feel good at all.

Me: Well that IS what's happening. Now imagine that $1000 was a number in the billions. Think about the good that could be done with those resources that will other wise sit in bank accounts earning interest at such obscene levels that one monthly dividend off one stock is equal to a very good yearly salary for most people.

Which is why I argue for a federal tax code that is not based on income, but rather on wealth, since income can be "lumpy" and income is not, in my view, a good measure of whether someone is "rich" or "wealthy" or not.

I do agree with this, as someone like yourself might put themselves through school and get a high paying job, and now you're paying a lot of tax, but don't actually have a lot of money in the bank. Maybe it should be based on your income from the last 5 years or something.

Yes, I suppose he is, but I don't think that he has made any donations to the US Treasury to rectify the disparity either.

In fact, isn't he trying to give away a lot of his wealth, and in so doing, depriving the federal government of tax revenue that it might otherwise receive?

Yes he is, but personally, as long as those donations are going to things that most would consider important (children's school charities, healthcare research etc..), because he doesn't beleive the government allocates his tax dollars properly to those things, I'm OK with it. The other argument is that, if people like him DID pay a significant portion of their money in tax, you might not need those types of charities. A bit of a chicken or the egg problem there.

I acknowledge that government has a lot of inefficiencies that could be allocated more effectively, but the government is built by us as a tool for us. If people have problems with how things are run, that's our fault collectively and on us to change it. But how does putting trust in corporations legally bound to drive up profits, and the people who run them, make any more sense? And I also think it's important to acknowledge that a lot of the problems with government exist because of the incredibly wealthy's influence on policies.

[wittynickname]

My question, with regards to the janitors and fast food workers and other "low wage" jobs where people have "no desire to improve their lot in life."

1) Have you ever done these jobs? Do you have any idea the incredible amount of hard work that those jobs involve? Do you grasp how people such as yourself make life miserable for people who are working those jobs?
2) Do you like to have clean buildings and public places to go? Do you like to eat in restaurants and go to movies? If those people with "no desire to improve their lot in life" suddenly got high-paying executive jobs, you would have no one to clean up after you, you would have no one to serve your food or wash the dishes afterward. You would have no one to drive your Uber or taxi.

Your life is made better by those low wage workers, your way of life depends on their doing menial work that you have no desire to do. That work is just as necessary--if not more so--than the work of pencil pushers in cubicles all over North America and the globe. Just because you devalue their work does not mean that it is not incredibly taxing and tiring.

And finally:
3) Do you support raising the minimum wage? Limiting how high CEO/Executive compensation can be placed? Limiting how much bonus money executives can earn?

Because if you don't want your taxes going to those who "have no desire to improve their lot in life," an easy way to get those people out of poverty and off of public assistance is to ensure that they are making fair wages for the work they do. There are people working 50-60 hours a week for peanuts, just to survive. Are those people lazy? Don't they deserve the dignity of the ability to own a home, feed their children?

The view is incredibly elitist and appalling, and until you're willing to cook all your own meals and clean all of your own buildings, grow your own food, work on your own car--those jobs are essential to the North American way of life, and people need to start respecting others as human beings.

[HockeyIlliterate]

Originally Posted by MattyC

What I would say is that, taxing someone to the point that they can be left with an identical lifestyle as if they weren't taxed at all, seems pretty logical to me. How that can be determined is pretty difficult and very abstract because not everyone making the same money lives identical lifestyles.

I'm not entirely sure what you mean by this, but are you suggesting that, from a tax perspective, everyone should be treated as being equal in terms of the results obtained from one's efforts?

Originally Posted by MattyC

As far as flat tax, looking at who benefits from what, it's just not a feasible solution. To agree with that, you also have to agree that there is a point where people just don't need that much money and should be returning a significant portion to the society.

But isn't this exactly what you are arguing for when you stated that government should tax someone "to the point that they can be left with an identical lifestyle as if they weren't taxed at all"?

Maybe I'm missing something, but it seems to me that implicit in your statement is either:

1) People simply don't need all of the money that they earn, regardless of how much they earn; or

2) Only the high-earning people don't need all of the money that they earn.

In any event, I am particularly leery of suggesting what any person may "need," and I think that thinking of tax policy in terms of what someone may or may not "need" conflicts, to some extent, with your discussion regarding the market setting one's income. Apparently, the market believes that someone doing X is worth Y, and maybe that person went into X simply to earn Y because X believes that it needs Y. Why should the government believe that it knows better than either X or the market and say "oh, no, you don't really need Y, you only need Y-[tax amount "T"]"?

Of course, I suppose this gets into a deeper issue of whether society should be allowed to say that X doesn't need T, but that other people (including the government) should be allowed to use T for their own benefit. Who really determines what the government and the rest of society needs?

Originally Posted by MattyC

A 10% tax on everyone does not capture this. Someone making $50K who is now at $45K net because of a flat tax, is actually hindered by that. Tax shouldn't be a burden in that way.

If you are saying that income tax shouldn't burden anyone, them I'm in reasonable agreement with you.

If, however, you are saying that income tax shouldn't burden certain selected people in society, and that one method of selecting the chosen unburdened ones is based on the amount of wages that they earn, then I disagree.

I simply believe that taxes should burden everyone equally. Either everyone in society benefits from government, or they don't. And if they do, then everyone should share in the costs of government; and if they don't, then those who don't benefit shouldn't have to pay anything.

Originally Posted by MattyC

Is your life different because of that tax? No. It could be argued you could bring that person down to $400-$500K and they still wouldn't feel any ill-effects on their lively hood.

Of course they would. Why would they work in a job that pays, say, $1M a year if they are only going to see--and be able to spend as they see fit---half of it? At what point do you think they would say "gee, I seem to be working for the government now...." and adjust their worklife accordingly?

Originally Posted by MattyC

. . . but because their interest isn't in something lucrative, our society is punishing them by not valuing their field.

Or, perhaps, they are being rewarded---through paying less income tax---for going into a field that is lower paying.

That said, plenty of people go into certain career fields for the money, not because they have any burning passion for the work.

Originally Posted by MattyC

Your salary is not necessarily a measure of how hard you work/worked.

True, but then why should it be used as a measure of what I owe someone else (indirectly through the government's imposition of income taxes)?

Originally Posted by MattyC

Onto the janitor, our society does not provide much in the means of allowing that person to escape that cycle. made some mistakes while younger? Most likely. But now a few years later, they can't just cut and run and go to law school, even if they have the intellectual capacity and the work ethic to do so, they don't have the financial means to put themselves through that type of program. Even worse so if they have a family to support.

I simply disagree. Student loans are essentially guaranteed (up to a point) by the federal government and are available to anyone who (in the eyes of the government) truly needs them. The possibility to improve one's education and escape the cycle of poverty is open to just about anyone who is reasonably intelligent and who is willing to put forth the effort to do so.

Originally Posted by MattyC

How come we force this person (or anyone) to go into extreme debt to try and better themselves?

I don't think the debt that would be undertaken would need to be "extreme," but I'll play along with the hypothetical and respond by noting that an intelligent person who is in a low-paying job and who has a family to support likely would receive scholarships that would result in a free (or nearly free) college education.

Originally Posted by MattyC

What if your education was free?

Honestly, if I would have been given a free college education, I probably wouldn't have applied myself as hard as I did and would have likely wasted the opportunity. But that's just me.

Originally Posted by MattyC

And I also think it's important to acknowledge that a lot of the problems with government exist because of the incredibly wealthy's influence on policies.

I don't necessarily dispute this.

But, at the same time, some of government's problems exist because politicians want to get re-elected, and promising "free" things to people who won't have to pay for them generally helps achieve that goal.

Originally Posted by wittynickname

1) Have you ever done these jobs? Do you have any idea the incredible amount of hard work that those jobs involve? Do you grasp how people such as yourself make life miserable for people who are working those jobs?

I have never been a janitor or a fast food worker. The first few jobs that I had, however, were very low paying, involved a good deal of hard work, and would generally be considered menial.

Originally Posted by wittynickname

2) Do you like to have clean buildings and public places to go?

Yes, I guess.

Originally Posted by wittynickname

Do you like to eat in restaurants and go to movies?

No, I don't.

Originally Posted by wittynickname

If those people with "no desire to improve their lot in life" suddenly got high-paying executive jobs, you would have no one to clean up after you, you would have no one to serve your food or wash the dishes afterward. You would have no one to drive your Uber or taxi.

No, those jobs would still exist, but the wages paid for the jobs would ostensibly increase (given supply and demand and all of that), and the pool of interested workers would expand in a corresponding fashion.

Originally Posted by wittynickname

3) Do you support raising the minimum wage? Limiting how high CEO/Executive compensation can be placed? Limiting how much bonus money executives can earn?

No, no, and no (at least not through government directive or intervention).

Originally Posted by wittynickname

Don't they deserve the dignity of the ability to own a home, feed their children?

No, not every one "deserves" to own a home, and not everyone "deserves" to have children.

Owning a home and having children are personal choices, and they should--in my view--only be undertaken when the adult has enough resources to fully handle and support the undertaking for the life of the item being undertaken.

Originally Posted by wittynickname

. . . and until you're willing to cook all your own meals and clean all of your own buildings, grow your own food, work on your own car--those jobs are essential to the North American way of life, and people need to start respecting others as human beings.

So how much more in federal income taxes should I pay to sufficiently evidence that I respect others as human beings?