Richest Counties All In High-Tax States!

stevejhx... This is your America.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4S634oKxUzI&feature=related

If this non-sequitur is the best that julia can do, shall we just declare steve the winner of this exchange and move on to the next thread?

For the chess players on the board, this one would be notated 1. e4 1-0

steve brings up this dumb point all the time to try to support his claim that high taxes are better for wealth creation. This argument has been countered and debunked soundly. But steve likes making losing arguments over and over again.

"This argument has been countered and debunked soundly"

By who? Please point it out.

Ppl are ok with taxes that support the quality of their communities.

Not LICCdope. He doesn't like taxes, because he wants the world to look like Long Island City.

Yuck.

Steve, you are wrong.

... it's "by whom?"

Wrong, AH - it's "By who" because "who" is the subject: "who has". "By who was it done?" "Who" is the subject of "was". It is the passive voice of "Who did it?" = "who was it done by?"

"Whom was it done by?" makes no sense - there is no subject. "It was done by whom?" likewise makes no sense - it has no subject.

"By whom was I standing?", however, is correct, because there the subject of "was" is "I".

what is the argument here? That higher taxes promote wealth or that areas where people make more money have higher taxes and put up with it?

Okeh, then you're right ... but LICcomm still won't admit that you are, because it would mean facing up to the next step: that high-tax nations are wealthy nations, and low-tax nations are third world.

In Econmoics 101 its Wealth ( Net Assets ) defines someone who is "rich", not income. In order to justify high income taxes, the definition has been twisted from Wealth to Income, so we can rail against the "rich" when in fact high income is not the same thing. Someone who happens to make a high income this year (> $250K) is now "rich", while the sample set of those in the high income group is constantly changing, while the sample set of those who have lots of Wealth is much less volatile.

People who truly are "Rich" (Net Worth > 10 Million) care a lot less about high income taxes because the "richer" you are the lower your earned income is relative to net worth. Rich people accumulate their wealth through capital appreciation which is taxed at the lower Capital Gains Rate, not income.

People born into the lower wealth clases and work their butts off, get their initial wealth accumulation through income as they have no assets which will appreciate. So a first year Doctor who makes 300K (if they even make that any more) and is saddled with 300K in debt, actually has a negative net worth, but will be taxed at a higher rate than Warren Buffet who makes his money though Capital Gains (he pays himself $1).

So the higher you make income taxes the less class transition there will be. Put the "Income Tax Rate" at 90% and someone who already has Eff You Money will not care as much as someone who comes from the lower middle class who is trying to accumulate wealth.

But go ahead confuse the two. Those that will be affected the most by a higher income tax policy (as it relates to accumulating wealth) will be people in their late 20's and 30's who are attempting to earn income to accumlate wealth. While all those who have alreadly have thier money, who are running around the expensive neighborhoods of Manhattan Could care less! This will be especially true for Manhattanites in their late 40's and older who bought their Apartments over a decade ago. They are impervious to any new tax policy relating to income!

stevejhx, Let us agree to eliminate the federal income tax(it is unconstitutional anyway) and let the states tax. That way the libs in ny and cal can have a welfare state and the citizens of those states can pay for it.

jrrtax... You are absolutely right.

Stop talking intelligently, steve can't understand . . .

The wealthiest AND those with the highest incomes tend to live in high-tax areas. I am not saying one causes the other. But the whole she-bang above is silly, because NO MATTER HOW YOU MEASURE "rich", the outcome is the same.

A successful young entrepreneur in Washington State with a business that employs a fair number of people, but whose business could be moved anywhere said of the Gates family's perspective on adding an income tax in Washington State that of course they are pro-tax, they already made their money. Interestingly this entrepreneur had moved his business to Washington from Oregon to avoid Oregon's tax.

Julialg -- The federal income tax is unconstitutional? According to whom/who? (Sorry Steve and AH.) And, if it is, why hasn't the conservative majority on the SCT overturned it? I guess you also have problems with Brown v. Board of Education and other "overextensions" of federal power.

Even libertarians who want to abolish taxes acknowledge that the federal income tax is constitutional:

http://www.thefreemanonline.org/columns/peripatetics-is-the-income-tax-unconstitutional/

Try some other argument.

On grammar: "by whom" is definitely correct. The word "by" is a preposition, and "whom" is the object of that preposition. "By whom was it done? would also be correct. "Whom was it done by?" is also technically correct but clumsy, because you're ending the sentence with a preposition.

"Who did it?" would be a completely different sentence with its own grammar, requiring the subjective case rather than the objective case.

On taxes: I'd be interested in an actual discussion of the causal relationship here. Do wealthy communities have a tendency to increase their own taxes? Or do government services facilitated by high taxes facilitate growth in wealth and living standards? The discussion on this thread is very meta, and no one is addressing the actual substantive point as to which is the chicken and which is the egg. Someone please enlighten me.

On the USSC: They are still to the left of the median on America's political spectrum, even if they are to the right of previous courts over the past few decades. Again, very meta, and not relevant to much of anything.

God bless Ron Paul..(even though I'm an atheist)
Congressman Ron Paul Speaks Out!

The Federal income tax is UNCONSTITUTIONAL

Speech by: The Honorable Congressman Ron Paul (2002)

"When I say cut taxes, I don't mean fiddle with the code. I mean abolish the income tax and the IRS, and replace them with nothing." -Ron Paul

"The other day, I made a huge "gaffe" on national TV: I told the truth about the crimes of the U.S. government. As you can imagine, the ceiling fell in, and a couple of walls too. Congressmen are supposed to support the government, I was told. Oh, it's okay to criticize around the edges, but there are certain subjects a member of the House of Representatives is not supposed to bring up. But I touched the real "third-rail" of American politics, and the sparks sure flew.

I was interviewed on C-SPAN's morning "Washington Journal," and I used the opportunity, as I do all such media appearances, to point out how many of our liberties have been stolen by the federal government. We must take them back. The Constitution, after all, has a very limited role for Washington, D.C. If we stuck to the Constitution as written, we would have: no federal meddling in our schools; no Federal Reserve; no U.S. membership in the UN; no gun control; and no foreign aid. We would have no welfare for big corporations, or the "poor"; no American troops in 100 foreign countries; no Nafta, Gatt, or "fast-track"; no arrogant federal judges usurping states rights; no attacks on private property; and no income tax. We could get rid of most of the cabinet departments, most of the agencies, and most of the budget. The government would be small, frugal, and limited. That system is called liberty. It's what the Founding Fathers gave us.

Under liberty, we built the greatest, freest, most prosperous, most decent country on earth. It's no coincidence that the monstrous growth of the federal government has been accompanied by a sickening decline in living standards and moral standards. The feds want us to be hamsters on a treadmill--working hard, all day long, to pay high taxes, but otherwise entirely docile and controlled. The huge, expensive, and out-of-control leviathan that we call the federal government wants to run every single aspect of our lives. Well, I'm sorry, but that's not America. It's not what the Founders gave us. It's not the country you believe in. It's not the country I believe in.

So, on that TV interview, I emphasized not only the attacks on our property, but also the decline of our civil liberties, at the hands of the federal police. There are not supposed to be any federal police, according to the Constitution. Then I really went over the line. I talked about the Waco massacre. Bill Clinton and Janet Reno claim those 81 church members, including 19 children, burned down their own church and killed themselves, and good riddance. So they put few survivors on trial, and threw them in prison for 40 years. We're not supposed to remember that the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms--talk about an unconstitutional agency--rather than arrest David Koresh on his regular morning jog, called in the TV stations for big publicity bonanza, and sent a swat team in black masks and black uniforms to break down his front door, guns blazing. They also sent in a helicopter gunship, to shoot at the roof of a church full of innocents. The Branch Davidians resisted, and after a heartless siege of almost two months, and after cutting off food, water, and electricity, and playing horrible rock and roll through huge speakers 24 hours a day, the feds sent in the tanks to crush the walls of the church, and inject poisonous CS gas. Now, CS gas is banned under the Paris Convention on Chemical Warfare. The U.S. could not use it in a war. But it could and did use it against American civilians. After the tanks did their work on the church, the place burst into flame, and all 81 people--men, women, children, and babies - were incinerated in a screaming horror. Did some feds set the fire? Did the flammable CS gas ignite, since without electricity, the parishioners were using lanterns? Did a tank knock over a lantern, striking one of the bales of hay being used against the thin walls as a "defense" against bullets? Or did the Davidians, as Clinton and Reno claim, kill themselves?

A new documentary- -Waco: The Rules of Engagement- may show, through FLIR infrared photography, FBI snipers killing the Davidians by shooting through the back of the church, where no media cameras were allowed. This film won a prize at the famed Sundance Film Festival. It was made by people who took the government's side, until they investigated. Whatever the truth, there's no question that an irresponsible federal government has innocent blood on its hands, and not only from Waco. And the refusal of corrupt and perverse liberals to admit it means nothing.

In my interview, in answer to a caller's question, I pointed out that Waco, and the federal murders at Ruby Ridge- especially the FBI sniper's shot that blasted apart the head of a young mother holding her baby- caused many Americans to live in fear of federal power. Then I uttered the sentiment that caused the media hysteria: I said that a lot of Americans fear that they too might be attacked by federal swat teams for exercising their constitutional rights, or merely for wanting to be left alone. Whoa! You've never seen anything like it. For days, in an all-out assault, I was attacked by Democrats, unions, big business, establishment Republicans, and- of course- the media, in Washington and my home state of Texas. Newspapers foamed at the mouth, calling me a "right-wing extremist." (Say, isn't that what George III called Thomas Jefferson?) I was even blamed for the Oklahoma City bombing! And by the way, I don't believe we've gotten the full truth on that either. All my many opponents were outraged that a Congressman would criticize big government. "If you don't like Washington, resign!" said a typical big-city newspaper editorial. But the media, as usual, were all wet. (Do they ever get anything right?) The average Congressman may go to Washington to wallow in power, and line his pockets with a big lobbying job for a special interest (so he can keep ripping-off the taxpayers). But that's not why I'm in Congress. It's not why I left my medical practice as a physician. It's not why I put up with all the abuse. It's not why I refuse a plush Congressional pension. I'm in this fight for a reason. I want to hand on to my children and grandchildren, and to you and your family, a great and free America, an America true to her Constitution, an America worthy of her history. I will not let the crooks and clowns and criminals have their way.

I'm in Congress to represent the ideas of liberty, the ideas that you and I share, for the people of my district, for the people of Texas, for the people of America. That's why I'm working to stop federal abuses, and to cut the government: its taxes, its bureaucrats, its paramilitary police, its spending, its meddling overseas, and every single unconstitutional action it takes. And not with a pair of nail scissors, but with a hammer and chisel. Won't you help me do this work? Not much of the federal leviathan would be left, if I had my way. But you'd be able to keep the money you earn, your privacy would be secure, your dollar would be sound, your local school would be tops, and your kids wouldn't be sent off to some useless or vicious foreign war to fight for the UN. But Jefferson and the other Founders would recognize our government, and our descendants would bless us. By the way, when I say cut taxes, I don't mean fiddle with the code. I mean abolish the income tax and the IRS, and replace them with nothing.

Recently, I asked a famous Republican committee chairman- who's always talking about getting rid of IRS- why he engineered a secret $580 million raise for the tax collectors. "They need it for their computers," this guy told me. So the IRS can't extract enough from us as it is! The National Taxpayers Union says I have the highest pro-taxpayer rating in Congressional history, that I am the top "Taxpayer's Best Friend." You know I won't play the Capitol Hill games with the Capitol Hill gang, denouncing the IRS while giving the Gestapo more of your money. Or figuring out some other federal tax for them to squeeze out of you. I also want to abolish the Federal Reserve, and send Alan Greenspan out to get a job. The value of our dollar and the level of our interest rates are not supposed to be manipulated by a few members of the power elite meeting secretly in a marble palace. The Federal Reserve is unconstitutional, pure and simple. The only Constitutional money is gold and silver, not notes redeemable in them. Not fed funny money. Without the Federal Reserve, our money could not be inflated at the behest of big government or big banks. Your income and savings would not lose their value. Just as important, we wouldn't have this endless string of booms and busts, recessions and depressions, with each bust getting worse. They aren't natural to the free market; they're caused by the schemers at the Fed. President Andrew Jackson called the 19th-century Fed "The Monster" because it was a vehicle for inflation and all sorts of special-interest corruption. Let me tell you, things haven't changed a bit.

I also work to save our schools from D.C. interference. Thanks to the feds, new curriculums not only smear the Founders as "racist, slave-owning elitists," they seek to dumb down our students so they will all be equal. "Look-say" reading and the abolition of phonics has the same purpose, and so does the new "fuzzy" math, in which there are no right and no wrong answers. That must be what they use in the U.S. Treasury! It's certainly what they use in the U.S. Congress. But ever since the beginning of federal aid to education and accelerating with the establishment of the rotten Department of Education, SAT scores have been dropping. Schools, with few exceptions, are getting worse every year. To save our kids, we must get the sticky fingers of the feds off our local schools, and let parents rule. That's what the Constitution says, and the Bible too.

And then there's my least favorite topic, the UN. World government is obviously unconstitutional. It undermines our country's sovereignty in the worst way possible. That's why I want us out of the UN, and the UN itself taking a hike. After all, the UN is socialist and corrupt (many votes can be bought with a "blonde and a case of scotch," one UN ambassador once said). It costs many billions, and it puts our soldiers in UN uniforms under foreign commanders, and sends them off to unconstitutional, undeclared wars. When Michael New, one of the finest young men I've ever met, objected to wearing UN blue, he was kicked out of the American Army. What an outrage! Not one dime for the UN, and not one American soldier! Not in Haiti, not in Bosnia, not in Somalia, not in Rwanda. I know its radical, but how about devoting American military efforts to defending America, and only America? Such ideas, said one newspaper reporter, make me a maverick who will never go far because he won't go along to get along. Darn right! What does "go far" mean? Get a big government job? To heck with that. And I won't sell my vote for pork either.

When I walked through the U.S. Capitol this morning, I got angry. The building is filled with statues and painting of Jefferson, Madison, and the other Founders. Those great men sacrificed everything to give us a free country, and a Constitution to keep it that way. When I was first elected, I placed my hand on the Bible and swore an oath to uphold the Constitution. That's exactly what I'm fighting for. But such ideas drive the liberals crazy. That's why I badly need your help. I've been targeted nationally for defeat. The Democrats, the AFL-CIO, the teachers union, big business PACs, the trial lawyers, the big bankers, the foreign-aid lobbyists, the big media, and the establishment Republicans want to dance on my political grave. The Fed, the Education Department, and the UN are anxious to join in. They can't stand even one person telling the truth. And they're terrified when that truth gains the people's support. Right now, four well-funded Democrats are competing to try to beat me, and a Republican is rumored to have been offered money at a secret meeting in Mexico(!) if he would try to knock me off in a primary.……

Join this fight for the Constitution, and stop those who want to rip it up, and throw it in the Potomac.

Together, we can join the Founders' fight. Together, we can make history. "

Sincerely, Ron Paul

Dr. Ron Paul is a Republican member of Congress from Texas.
Ron Paul Archives (You would be wise to read many of these articles)

Visit Dr. Ron Paul's Website

The grammar stuff is pedantry up with which I shall not put (apologies to Winston Churchill).

Where, exactly, in that rambling diatribe is there any argument -- let alone a cogent argument -- that Congress lacks the power to impose the federal income tax? No such argument exists. If you want to argue against the wisdom of the federal tax, go right ahead (something other than the insane Ron Paul, please), but leave the crackpot theories on constitutionality at home. They just don't work.

sorry, but income tax is perfectly constitutional, because they changed the constitution to make it such.

I would certainly support, however, eliminating all tax deductions, lowering rates in general, extending social security / medicare to cover all earned income and reducing the rates payable, eliminating the double-taxation of corporate dividends, and taxing capital gains at a flat rate regardless of whether it's long- or short-term. And lower the rates further by supplementing income tax with a federal sales tax, to broaden the tax base.

Generally I'm against taxation of assets - property taxes, etc. - as they are incurred regardless of one's ability to pay, and they lead to nasty situations like they have in Florida, where if you just move in you have to pay a significantly higher rate than someone who has lived there for a long time, or in the case of NYC, where a single-family brownstone will pay $5,000 in property tax, 1/10 of what a condominium worth the same amount would cost.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JZl6202HJGQ

Okay, I watched those two babbling idiots for 8 minutes and I really want that time back. (CNBC should have its license revoked for putting on such crap; it was worse than a half hour of Jim Cramer.) All Ron Paul said is that the income tax is unconstitutional because the 16th amendment wasn't passed properly. Huh? He offers no absolutely no evidence in support of his bald assertion and none exists. No court has ever accepted such a ludicrous theory. Give it up and focus on the policy-based arguments; I disagree with those, too, but at least they have some basis. The "income tax is unconstitutional" argument is a specious waste of time.

You clicked on a julialg link? Are you new?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JfdRpyfEmBE

midtowner okay, but watch this it's genius and he won a Nobel when it actually stood for something.

Yes, but now I know better. Friends don't let friends (or other posters) watch julialg videos?

alanhart
10 minutes ago
ignore this person
report abuse

You clicked on a julialg link? Are you new?"

Some were hoping after 11/2/10 you would drink the hemlock....

Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice ....

Ron Paul is HILARIOUS! Along with Junior, now senator from somewhere dumb. One of his claims is that the government can't print paper money, only coins, because the constitution says "To coin Money, regulate the Value thereof," and coins are not paper.

HAHAHAHA!

He even tried to bait Ben Bernake on that one once, but Big Ben just smiled and moved on to the next question.

What julialg means by "when the Nobel prize actually stood for something" s/he means, before Al Gore & Barack Obama won it.

Isn't that right, julialg?

"What julialg means by "when the Nobel prize actually stood for something" s/he means, before Al Gore & Barack Obama won it."

agreed, also ,before arafat won for putting bombs on school buses and krugman for an economic theory of 2+2=5.

What again did obama win for doing?

Does anyone else think julialg writes like Yoda tlaks? "What again did obama win for doing?" Answer to that question not wanted because rhetorical.

Sorry, "Yoda talks."

Krugman won for coming up with a theory why the economies of certain countries all resemble each other when they are so geographically, culturally, and ethnically different. Quite compelling stuff.

This is the problem with people from the other side - on my side, we recognize when someone we may not like or whose position we don't like does something noteworthy; on the other side, it's black and white thinking, typical of primitive psyches.

That's why talk radio is RIGHT, and progressive talk radio never took off: we're not good at demonizing.

But krugman is such a political hack. He demonizes and belittles his opponents. We recognize when someone we may not like or whose position we don't like does something noteworthy (Keynes), for example. But kurgman or obama. they are pathetically small and disappointing.

But all you do is post the same stupid you tubes.

Oh cc, did you see this?
www.youtube.com/watch?v=9WlqW6UCeaY

Are you trying to make a point? Other than that everyone but you and uncle miltie sucks?

"they are pathetically small and disappointing."

I'd say that about your video.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JfdRpyfEmBE

steve really, this is small?

Are they disappointing because they are small? Really, julialg, you should keep your desires to yourself.

Friedman made his contributions, which work at the extreme of economic systems: cutting taxes does work to increase productivity when they are extremely high, and cutting regulation does work well when regulation is excessive. Friedman took Keynesian economics to a further level, built upon it in ways that could not be conceived of by Keynes himself, much like after Freud, others built upon and improved basic psychology theories.

However, I disagree with the attempt made by some today that would seek to apply Friedman's free market theories beyond their own theoretical framework and inherent limitations. Absolutely free markets work no better than absolutely controlled markets. Decreasing taxes does not always increase tax revenues. It is a balance that must be struck, and exactly where to strike the balance is something that reasonable men and women can disagree on, and compromise over.

There is no such thing as a free lunch - I think Milton himself came up with that saying, and it's true. Cut taxes, cut taxes, cut taxes can be more destructive than productive. Take Gov. Christie's cutting the trans-Hudson tunnel for "austerity" reasons: that is a stupid, stupid move, because only the government can provide that type of infrastructure, which is necessary for economies to grow. Far better it would be to restructure the state government and get rid of unnecessary and redundant layers than to cut basic infrastructure spending.

In New York City we saw what happened when infrastructure spending was cut: cut back to the 1970's, with collapsing highways, unusable subways, and graft and theft everywhere. Taxes are a necessity, even though no one likes them. The most efficient way to tax is to tax on transactions. Income is a transaction.

Here is where I agree with the supply-siders: fix the supply side of government by reorganizing it and making it efficient. Eviscerating it will do more harm than good. Stop being chickens, stand up to the public-service unions and get rid of waste and mismanagement. It can clearly be done from the supply side, and - like it or not - there are some things that the government supplies more efficiently than private enterprise: public transportation, public eduction, public safety, public health. Rather than try to destroy them - the current policy - make sensible solutions to resolve the problems they have.

People will listen.

You'll note that Republicans did just that with welfare reform & Clinton: the Republicans were right. They're also right on insisting that teachers be evaluated on results, not some pie-in-the-sky "everybody's excellent" rating.

Republicans were right on that, Democrats were right on Social Security, and privatizing social security will not work: never has, never will, and the few places they tried it they've had to go back on it (Chile).

So - fix it. Increase the tax base, reduce the rates, change the indexing formulas, raise the retirement age. You'll find broad support for that sort of policy.

Ditto healthcare reform: Democrats are right on that, too. The only efficient way to allocate healthcare is by need, not by income, and health insurance companies - originally created as nonprofit mutuals - do not work well as for-profit institutions because they do not distribute risk, but rather maximize profit. So rather than fighting to keep insurance companies' antitrust exemptions and to prevent the government from negotiating bulk discounts for bulk purchases, let the insurance companies compete against the government. FedEx and UPS provide excellent service precisely because they have to compete against the government Post Office - none to elegant, but very good at what it does.

You'd get a lot further if you acted like Democrats, who stole the Republicans' best ideas and called them their own, than acting like ideologues for whom everything is either black or white.

stevejhc... I like you, we just disagree.

steve advocates Keynesian theories that have failed every time they have been tried. steve and failure go hand in hand.

I can disagree with someone I can compromise with - but it takes two to compromise. There is no empirical support for much of what you say; were there, I'd probably support it. If the gold standard worked, I'd say go for it.

But it doesn't.

Before you make claims or support a policy, think through the consequences, and look at why things are the way they are: Medicare is here for a reason, Social Security is here for a reason. Maybe individually some people would be better off if they didn't exist, but as a whole we would not be. Not being so leads to Latin American-type economic and social problems, which can only be contained (and then only temporarily) through violent repression. Flexibility is why the US didn't wind up like post-WWII England, or the Soviet Union, or China. A market economy with some what you would call "socialist" safety-nets, deftly regulated, is the way we have advanced. We didn't advance through slavery or the gold standard.

"steve and failure go hand in hand."

Oh, LICCdope, really! You're the one who lives in Long Island City, I live in Manhattan. Let us not discuss "failure," then, shall we? It's for your own good.

julia...

i despise you.

columbiacounty
about 4 hours ago
stop ignoring this person
report abuse julia...

i despise you." I consider this a job well done.

I guess all things considered, "New Jersey Housewife who listens to right-wing hate-radio 24/7" IS a job ... albeit a freeloader's job because she pays no taxes, yet derives endless benefits and services from the taxpayer-supported government. Sad.

julia--

where are you? this is where you insert glenn's stuff, and the hannity soundbites

Now steve the clown is trying straw man arguments. Who is calling for ending Social Security or Medicare? No one, except the bizarro voices in steve's head.

According to steve, wanting to reform these programs to make them cost-effective equals ending their existence.

steve and failure are now synonomous.

I think julia has abandoned the thread, because in the words of last President, it is "mission accomplished." She wanted to be hated and she has achieved it. Lofty goal, indeed.

"wanting to reform these programs to make them cost-effective equals ending their existence."

So how, exactly, do you want to "reform" them, LICCdope? Deets, pleeze (for a change).

Steve the OP has confused correlation with causation, a pretty elementary mistake.

More important, look at income *growth* in high vs. low tax states. The low tax states generally add a lot more jobs.

steve either has a horrible memory or can't read well. I've posted suggestions on reform in other threads.

steve makes lots of elementary mistakes. That wouldn't be so bad if he also wasn't so arrogant in his ignorance.

pot, kettle...

"the OP has confused correlation with causation"

Not at all - it doesn't claim either. I wouldn't claim that high taxes "cause" high incomes, but it's been well proved throughout the world that high incomes cause high taxation.

"The low tax states generally add a lot more jobs."

Show me the empirics of that, because it's not true as far as I know. What is true is that if you're in a low-population state it's easier to add a greater percentage of jobs, because you start with a lower number.

"I've posted suggestions on reform in other threads."

Point us to them, LICCdope, b/c they don't exist.

"steve makes lots of elementary mistakes"

You mean like investing my life savings in an alcove studio in Long Island City?

Methinks not.

It seems that the majority of the richest counties surround Washington DC. Moral: working for Uncle Sam makes people rich.

Specifically, selling to the military and CIA makes people rich. Hi McLean!

Or - the government hires a lot of well-educated people.

Which is why we have to do away with it - let's cut taxes, cut education spending, cut social security, cut medicare, cut everything, return to a Jeffersonian Rural Utopia that never really existed. Eradicate pointy-headed east-coast elitists.

lobbyists are well-paid

Because they're pointy-headed east-coast elitists.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2bzU77zGDlI

Clearly we could never get rid of Social Security or Medicare, but it would be nice to have some level of opt-out from Social Security at least. I am thinking it would be nice if I could keep half my Social Security payroll tax, and in return surrender all of my future right to Social Security benefits.

That would at least allow me to keep some money out of a system that I feel does not perform well and serves as a cookie jar for Congress, but at the same time the system would save on future benefits it would otherwise owe me.

On balance I think my proposal would bring the system closer to solvency while still giving people a measure of more personal autonomy. Win-win.

For alanhart stevjhx wbottom aboutreadyhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bx-LpRSbbeA&feature=rec-LGOUT-exp_stronger_r2-2r-37-HM

Ayn Rand - boring novelist, whose fascist theories even Alan Greenspan wound up having to denounce.

Post87deflation, all you're saying is that you want to be a premium member of the risk-pool for safety-net alternatives to Social Security (i.e. welfare) in old age.

You and the others who are too short-sighted to plan (with contingency plan) for your Sunset Years.

And that's exactly why Social Security was implemented in the first place.

Ayn Rand was hardly a fascist. Libertarians are fairly opposed to strong centralized governments. Hitler, Franco, and Mussolini would HARDLY be fans of Atlas Shrugged. She was an atheist, free-sex, radically libertarian anti-communist, anti-leftist, anti-statist, and many other things. I think her vision of the world is unrealistically simplistic and ignores the very real limitations of the market. But a fascist she was not. Please.

Alan: I guess that's possible. We could always limit the opt-out to people who fund the maximum under a 401k or IRA plan, thus reducing the moral hazard you describe.

How do welfare payments compare to social security payments anyway? Less, I would imagine? So the system would still save money, even if every opt-out were such a dead-beat as you describe.

Back to the original issue:

It's unquestionable that wealthy people (those with significant assets) and high-income people are both highly concentrated in high tax states. It is not that they want high taxes: rich people want to avoid taxes as much as anyone else, and probably more than others, because they are usually more focused on money--anyone know the joke about stealing goats? Don't take goats from the guy with a lot of goats.

The point is that despite their efforts to avoid taxes by, say, moving from New York to Connecticut, rich people enjoy the quality of life that only high taxes can provide. I think about my own life. Would I rather pay lower taxes and be able to afford a bigger apartment? I guess. But my apartment is plenty big. What I would really like would be a 2nd Avenue Subway to relieve congestion on my way to work. How am I going to get that? Higher taxes. I'd like a rail link to LaGuardia Airport. I'd like more trees planted along the streets to make the air cleaner. I'd an additional elementary school to relieve crowding at PS41 and PS3.

Now, I could relocate to a state with no mass transit, terrible schools, low construction standards/regulation, high crime, and no pollution controls. I could probably build myself a thirty thousand square foot house on five thouand acres of land with indoor and outdoor swimming pools and tenis courts. but as a private citizen i can't make the schools good, the streets safe, or the air clean.

happyrenter: "...as a private citizen i can't make the schools good, the streets safe, or the air clean."

I disagree.

By the way, the correlation also holds between rich people and high tax countries--and yes, I am excluding tiny countries that operate as corrupt tax havens.

so you think i can make the streets safe? should i become a vigilante?

"I disagree" is not an argument.

renter, your premises are flawed. For all of NY's high taxes, you still don't have that 2nd Avenue subway, rail link to LaGuardia, etc. For all of NY's high taxes, you have high levels of crime 20 years ago. You equate lower taxes with no mass transit, terrible schools, etc., and that is incorrect.

There goes LICCdope again, in whose bizarro world taxes actually don't buy things. In his bizarro world, because there is no 2nd Avenue subway, there is no mass transit.

Yet he himself chooses to live in a place with high taxes. I say MOVE, LICCdope, set up a hut and a hammock in the Mississippi bayou, and live your low-tax dream.

When you come back with malaria, which is chronic and incurable, let us know and we'll welcome you back with open arms.

Or not.

steve's obsession with the person who has exposed the idiocy of his arguments and his lack of understanding of basic concepts for the last two years continues . . .

I know this must be tough on you steve. You used to think you were intelligent, and now everyone can come on these discussions and see you are clueless, but maybe you should stop being so arrogant and nasty and see how that works.

happyrenter, "I disagree" is the first step.

The first step to making the street safer, schools better, and air cleaner is to not believe that you have no control over that.

We can make the streets safer by paying attention, "see something, say something." It doesn't just apply to the subways. You can work with your kids and teachers to make the school better. Both students and teachers need encouragement from the parents. As individuals, you can vote for the people who will action on the issues you care about. You can purchase products and services from companies that support your cause.

Oh yes, LICCdope - basic concepts! Like, "Location, location, location!"

HAHAHAHA!

Well I do think LICComment has a point (albeit expressed with unnecessary antagonism) about the relationship between taxes and services. It is unfortunately not always a direct relationship, and the history of mass transit in NYC is a good example.

Few people are aware that NYC used to have a better mass transit system, with more lines, more service, and cleaner stations and trains. This was back when there were 3 competing transit companies and less government involvement. (Not zero government involvement, mind you, but less than today.)

Somewhere in the late '30s some government bureaucrats decided that it was wrong for the people of NYC to rely on profit-making enterprises for a service so vital as transportation, so they drove the private players out of business with oppressive new price controls and then combined their assets into a single system. Now we are dependent on a monopolistic government bureaucracy for our transit services, and gradually over decades that monopolistic government bureaucracy has been providing us less and less quality transportation services for more and more money.

This is in contrast to other more functional transit systems (such as in Tokyo, Osaka, Singapore, Bangkok, etc.) where you still have multiple competing profit-seeking transit companies and much, much better and more comprehensive systems. I'm not saying the government has no role - it certainly has one. But at a certain point the government becomes so powerful that it does more harm than good.

And so, happyrenter, I share LICC's skepticism that paying more taxes would get you that 2nd Avenue subway line. We'd do much better if we could re-privatize the system, and then maybe help fund the new line's completion with a city-guaranteed bond issuance. And if we were to do that, you'd end up with less of your tax money going to the MTA, not more.

"This was back when there were 3 competing transit companies and less government involvement."

Nope - first, it was in the 1940 that the government bought the money-losing systems, that didn't allow for connections and required massive subsidies. It's disingenuous to compare the NYC subway with, say, the Singapore subway, the former having been opened in 1904, the latter in 1987. It was precisely the government involvement that you deplore that make the other systems "more comprehensive" and "better" - NY was built by private companies for their own profit in mind, not the benefit to the companies.

I don't know where you get the idea that the Singapore subway is a "profit-seeking transit company," because it was built and planned, and is operated by, the government. I lived there when they were building it. It opened in 1987, making it the second oldest subway in Asia. You can't compare that with the New York City subway, work on which started in the 1890's. You also can't compare it to systems that aren't opened 24-hours a day (none other is), whose closure at night makes maintenance and upgrades much easier.

Compare it to the London system - New York's is far better, and London's closes at midnight.

Re Singapore: Planned and funded, I'll agree with. Operated, I won't. The operators are SMRT Corporation and SBS Transit, two competing for-profit companies. See? Government involvement, but less than NYC. Result? Better system than NYC.

Re NYC: Yes, the government bought the private transit companies in 1940, after having spent the late '30s wearing them down with new regulations including price controls. Of course today, on an inflation-adjusted basis, user fees are almost double what they were the last time the system was mostly private and all profitable. And that doesn't count all the tax subsidies.

Re London: Since both London and NYC have systems run by monopolistic government bureaucracies, this is not a terribly useful comparison. Fine, some governments are even worse than ours. Probably the best run monopolistic government subway is the Paris Metro, which is still crappy compared to competitive systems in Osaka, etc.

taxes yadda yadda

7/10 of these are in dc. does that not bother anyone else?