Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez

[skepticalbip]

...the creation of wealth must be encouraged or, at a minimum, allowed or the available funds for the government dries up.

The classic central fallacy of trickle-down nonsense.
The people paying most of the taxes are NOT the wealthy.

And what is the source of income that is taxed for those who are paying the taxes? Businesses maybe?

 

[skepticalbip]

Thus illustrating why utopian ideals fail when there are attempts to implement them....

Since UHC exists in a number of countries, it is hard to argue that it is a utopian ideal. Moreover, I think Pyramid's position is that there is sufficient wealth to implement UHC without depleting the national wealth to an unsustainable or undesirable level.

If UHC was the only program that would consume federal funding then I would agree. I hear a hell of a lot more free stuff being proposed plus a guaranteed minimum income. One free program is easy to finance but the totality becomes overwhelming.

 

[PyramidHead]

The math isn't that complicated. If the programs advocated to achieve those lofty goals require financing that exceeds the available resources then any activation of those programs are insured of failing.

I figured it was something like a resource calculation, which is disappointing because it's totally false, and a perfect example of the point AOC was trying to convey. Here is why.

The resources to provide basic health care, housing, food, clothing, and education to everyone in America (or, indeed, the entire world) are already available many times over. What prevents these resources from being transferred to people on the basis of who needs them is a system that prioritizes transferring them to those with the most money, and doesn't bat an eye at wasting obscene quantities in the name of accumulating more wealth.

Separating the goal of universal health care (which is indeed lofty) from the reality of its implementation, then, is not a matter of mathematics at all, because the numerator is many orders of magnitude higher than the denominator in all senses, and has been since the industrial revolution.

It comes down to how we choose to produce and distribute the fundamental necessities of human life, and who we deem as worthy recipients of the surplus we are easily capable of producing, all of which can be neatly encapsulated by the word 'morality'.

Thus illustrating why utopian ideals fail when there are attempts to implement them. Wealth is not a fixed commodity to be distributed. Wealth is a commodity that is created daily and consumed daily. For any system to work, the creation of wealth must be encouraged or, at a minimum, allowed or the available funds for the government dries up. Over taxation decreases wealth creation because companies can move to where there are lower costs of operation (taxes) or they can just close down because the minimal reward does justify the effort. For comparison, there are plenty of fish in the sea but they must be allowed to continue to multiply for that to remain so. If too many are taken to feed the population then they vanish and no one eats fish.

Wealth creation is not something that companies do by lowering their costs. It's something workers do by producing the things that people want and need for themselves as humans in society. And as each person can produce far more than they can consume in a day, surely wealth is not created and consumed daily in equal measure, even if it's not a "fixed commodity". Your idea of wealth coming from the operations of profit-seeking corporations who, as a side effect, happen to make adequate profits by selling us commodities at the highest price we are willing to pay, is not a mathematical theorem but a moral one, thus once again demonstrating the representative's point.

 

[PyramidHead]

...the creation of wealth must be encouraged or, at a minimum, allowed or the available funds for the government dries up.

The classic central fallacy of trickle-down nonsense.
The people paying most of the taxes are NOT the wealthy.

And what is the source of income that is taxed for those who are paying the taxes? Businesses maybe?

The source is the people who make the things or provide the services that the company owners sell at a higher price than what they paid the workers, subsequently pocketing the difference. And unlike the owners of capital, these people are not enticed positively to continue producing wealth via receiving greater shares of this difference, but negatively by receiving ever shrinking shares of it, so they have to continually sell their work in order to survive.

 

[skepticalbip]

And what is the source of income that is taxed for those who are paying the taxes? Businesses maybe?

The source is the people who make the things or provide the services that the company owners sell at a higher price than what they paid the workers, subsequently pocketing the difference. And unlike the owners of capital, these people are not enticed positively to continue producing wealth via receiving greater shares of this difference, but negatively by receiving ever shrinking shares of it, so they have to continually sell their work in order to survive.

??? Automobiles are not made and steel is not refined in people's back yard.

 

[Elixir]

...the creation of wealth must be encouraged or, at a minimum, allowed or the available funds for the government dries up.

The classic central fallacy of trickle-down nonsense.
The people paying most of the taxes are NOT the wealthy.

And what is the source of income that is taxed for those who are paying the taxes? Businesses maybe?

Nope. WORK.
Why try to prop up trickle-down idiocy, when there are so many real-life examples that demonstrate unequivocally that IT DOESN'T WORK.

 

[skepticalbip]

And what is the source of income that is taxed for those who are paying the taxes? Businesses maybe?

Nope. WORK.
Why try to prop up trickle-down idiocy, when there are so many real-life examples that demonstrate unequivocally that IT DOESN'T WORK.

Work?? Dude I can work my butt off digging holes in my backyard but it will not provide me with an income. I only get income from a business and only when I provide a service.

 

[Don2 (Don1 Revised)]

And what is the source of income that is taxed for those who are paying the taxes? Businesses maybe?

Nope. WORK.
Why try to prop up trickle-down idiocy, when there are so many real-life examples that demonstrate unequivocally that IT DOESN'T WORK.

Work?? Dude I can work my butt off digging holes in my backyard but it will not provide me with an income. I only get income from a business and only when I provide a service.

How about the hole you dug for yourself thinking AOC said something she didn't actually say? Does that require a business, a city government, or just a guy on the Internet?

 

[Horatio Parker]

Thus illustrating why utopian ideals fail when there are attempts to implement them....

Since UHC exists in a number of countries, it is hard to argue that it is a utopian ideal. Moreover, I think Pyramid's position is that there is sufficient wealth to implement UHC without depleting the national wealth to an unsustainable or undesirable level.

If UHC was the only program that would consume federal funding then I would agree. I hear a hell of a lot more free stuff being proposed plus a guaranteed minimum income. One free program is easy to finance but the totality becomes overwhelming.

Consider real resources instead of nominal. If the real resources exist i.e. sufficient medical infrastructure, then any financial barrier is discretionary, self-imposed, IOW political.

 

[Elixir]

And what is the source of income that is taxed for those who are paying the taxes? Businesses maybe?

Nope. WORK.
Why try to prop up trickle-down idiocy, when there are so many real-life examples that demonstrate unequivocally that IT DOESN'T WORK.

Work?? Dude I can work my butt off digging holes in my backyard but it will not provide me with an income.

Then come dig holes in MY back yard. I'll pay you 2x minimum wage, and you can pay income tax on it.
THAT is where revenue comes from. WORK.
If you work providing a service and a hiring manager at a business wants to pay you for it, it's still your WORK that provides revenue to the government. Just less of it, since the hiring manager, the CEO, shareholders and other non-productive and marginally productive middle-men at the "top" take big pieces of your product before you get any of it. That's why digging holes usually pays minimum wage, and I can readily afford to pay you twice that, and the government gets twice the revenue (if you're honest - or if you hit the 1099 minimum digging holes in my back yard.).

 

[skepticalbip]

Work?? Dude I can work my butt off digging holes in my backyard but it will not provide me with an income.

Then come dig holes in MY back yard. I'll pay you 2x minimum wage, and you can pay income tax on it.
THAT is where revenue comes from. WORK.

That is rather silly. Do you really believe that offering someone a job digging holes in your backyard at 2X minimum wage for a couple days is something anyone with a full time job at a company at maybe 4 or 5 times minimum wage plus retirement plan and insurance plan is something they would consider appealing. Besides, someone working at 2x minimum wage pays no income tax (even if you hired them as a full time job) because of the tax bracket they would be in. Talk about depriving the government tax revenue to fund social programs, this would certainly do it if all 'workers' decided this was a good idea.

Or are you suggesting that I start a business digging holes? Nah, you couldn't, businesses are evil.

 

[Elixir]

Do you really believe that offering someone a job digging holes in your backyard at 2X minimum wage for a couple days is something anyone with a full time job at a company at maybe 4 or 5 times minimum wage plus retirement plan and insurance plan is something they would consider appealing

That's all that digging holes is worth. And who said anything about "a couple days"? I could keep you busy for years.
But that's beside the point - do the math; people at 2-4x minimum wage pay MOST of the fed's income. Rich people pay almost nothing (in general).
I'm not opposed to businesses - sold a startup last year that I and two partners had grown from zero into a $10m+ concern over 11 years (by doing WORK). To a VC group no less. And the difference is becoming apparent; the money that used to back into the business (taxed as income) now goes to the VC group that has write-offs up the wazoo, mainly supporting the group's principals' lifestyles. The fed gets none of it. The people we were paying $25-50k/yr are replaced with $7.75/hr laborers and $30k/yr "managers". Those laborers and managers pay more tax than the group that now owns the business.

Trickle-down is BULLSHIT.

 

[skepticalbip]

Do you really believe that offering someone a job digging holes in your backyard at 2X minimum wage for a couple days is something anyone with a full time job at a company at maybe 4 or 5 times minimum wage plus retirement plan and insurance plan is something they would consider appealing

That's all that digging holes is worth. And who said anything about "a couple days"? I could keep you busy for years.
But that's beside the point - do the math; people at 2-4x minimum wage pay MOST of the fed's income. Rich people pay almost nothing (in general).
I'm not opposed to businesses - sold a startup last year that I and two partners had grown from zero into a $10m+ concern over 11 years (by doing WORK). To a VC group no less. And the difference is becoming apparent; the money that used to back into the business (taxed as income) now goes to the VC group that has write-offs up the wazoo, mainly supporting the group's principals' lifestyles. The fed gets none of it. The people we were paying $25-50k/yr are replaced with $7.75/hr laborers and $30k/yr "managers". Those laborers and managers pay more tax than the group that now owns the business.

Trickle-down is BULLSHIT.

You need to write a real nasty letter to the government demanding they correct the data they present.

https://taxfoundation.org/summary-federal-income-tax-data-2017/


High-Income Americans Paid Majority of Federal Income Taxes

In 2015, the bottom 50 percent of taxpayers (those with AGI below $39,275) earned 11.28 percent of total AGI. This group of taxpayers paid approximately $41 billion in taxes, or 2.83 percent of all income taxes in 2015.

In contrast, the top 1 percent of all taxpayers (taxpayers with AGI of $480,930 and above), earned 20.65 percent of all AGI in 2015, but paid 39.04 percent of all federal income taxes.

In 2015, the top 1 percent of taxpayers accounted for more income taxes paid than the bottom 90 percent combined. The top 1 percent of taxpayers paid $568 billion, or 39.04 percent of all income taxes, while the bottom 90 percent paid $428 billion, or 29.41 percent of all income taxes.

 

[Elixir]

You need to write a real nasty letter to the government demanding they correct the data they present.

https://taxfoundation.org/summary-federal-income-tax-data-2017/


High-Income Americans Paid Majority of Federal Income Taxes

In 2015, the bottom 50 percent of taxpayers (those with AGI below $39,275) earned 11.28 percent of total AGI. This group of taxpayers paid approximately $41 billion in taxes, or 2.83 percent of all income taxes in 2015.

In contrast, the top 1 percent of all taxpayers (taxpayers with AGI of $480,930 and above), earned 20.65 percent of all AGI in 2015, but paid 39.04 percent of all federal income taxes.

In 2015, the top 1 percent of taxpayers accounted for more income taxes paid than the bottom 90 percent combined. The top 1 percent of taxpayers paid $568 billion, or 39.04 percent of all income taxes, while the bottom 90 percent paid $428 billion, or 29.41 percent of all income taxes.

My bad, but - Look at 2018... I might still be wrong, but Trump's tax giveaway changed the picture a lot from 2015.
Anyhow, median for 2017 was something like $33k, and top 1% started at around $480k (Which surprised me quite a bit)

Regardless, virtually NOBODY is going to get to the top 1% without either a big inheritance, a ton of luck or ... a lot of other people's WORK.

And the top 0.01% ($35m) ? And the top 0.001% (152m) ? It's almost ALL other people's WORK.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

and have had for over 200 years (longer in, eg, Britain), yet the sky hasn't fallen. On the six or so occasions you reversed that trend by running surpluses, the result was depressions. That's because govt "debt" denominated in the currency which that govt issues is nothing like household debt - and arguably isn't really "debt" at all except in an abstract accounting sense

But paying for it by borrowing comes with it's own cost--an ever-increasing percent of the budget going to pay the interest on that borrowing. Not to mention eventually people won't loan you money anymore. To continue to live on debt is either to bring catastrophe or big inflation to chew the debt down to a manageable size.

Of course running a surplus caused a recession (not a depression)--a sudden cut in government spending will do that. You need to steer with a very gentle hand and you should aim for a balanced budget or a slight surplus to reduce the size of the debt.

A sovereign currency issuing govt does not need to balance its budget, it needs to balance the economy.

Only because it can avert catastrophe by means of a hidden tax--inflation. Better not to get in the situation in the first place, though.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

I think she's right, even out of context. I mean, would you rather get an A- on a test or murder your neighbor?

That's how a sane person would interpret the dichotomy she was presenting. However, Loren is worried that she is willing to bend or ignore facts to suit her preferred moral position, which would be bad of course, but she hasn't shown any indication of that so far. If anything, she usually wipes the floor with her detractors in terms of understanding the facts.

I also see things like her green new deal that is asking for technology that we don't have (suitable storage) and thus certainly can't deploy in the specified timeframe.

I also see her calling for tax rates that never really existed in the past and thus we have no yardstick to see how they would fare.

The pentagon one doesn't look to me like an outlier oops.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

And that has been the problem with utopians and the reason the 'utopias' they try to establish has resulted in failure and the suffering of those involved. It would certainly be a moral victory if everyone had everything they wanted and needed provided by some benevolent caretaker. Unfortunately, there is no economic mathematical support for such ventures even though the 'caretaker' confiscates more and more of what is available.

Not sure what this has to do with the thread topic or anything I said, but sure, I can agree with all that.

It illustrates that someone who advocates doing 'the moral thing' (and worse yet implementing it) in spite of the math informing them that it will fail is causing suffering. Holding some lofty goal is admirable but recognizing and accepting reality is more important. Math is reality.

At least someone gets it! This is exactly my problem with her--she's more interested in lofty objectives than whether those objectives can actually be attained.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

It illustrates that someone who advocates doing 'the moral thing' (and worse yet implementing it) in spite of the math informing them that it will fail is causing suffering. Holding some lofty goal is admirable but recognizing and accepting reality is more important. Math is reality.

Okay, but I'm still not getting the relevance here. Could you try expressing your moral point about causing suffering in the language of linear algebra?

Whether you succeed or fail you expend effort. If you fail that effort was expended for little if any gain--people would be better off if that effort had been expended on something productive. She's advocating spending vast sums on hopeless stuff--which will reduce our standard of living for almost no benefit.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

The math isn't that complicated. If the programs advocated to achieve those lofty goals require financing that exceeds the available resources then any activation of those programs are insured of failing.

I figured it was something like a resource calculation, which is disappointing because it's totally false, and a perfect example of the point AOC was trying to convey. Here is why.

Once again, the leftist idea of an infinite pool of money to fund your pet projects.

The resources to provide basic health care, housing, food, clothing, and education to everyone in America (or, indeed, the entire world) are already available many times over. What prevents these resources from being transferred to people on the basis of who needs them is a system that prioritizes transferring them to those with the most money, and doesn't bat an eye at wasting obscene quantities in the name of accumulating more wealth.

La-la land.

Separating the goal of universal health care (which is indeed lofty) from the reality of its implementation, then, is not a matter of mathematics at all, because the numerator is many orders of magnitude higher than the denominator in all senses, and has been since the industrial revolution.

UHC is one of her more sensible proposals. We certainly can do it, the problem is that UHC puts the regulators and the doers under the same roof and history shows us that always leads to an erosion of the regulation.

Now, if we want a UHC system take the ACA and push the standards up and then give everyone a government subsidy equal to the cheapest plan they can buy. The non-payment penalty is to assign them to that cheapest plan.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Wealth creation is not something that companies do by lowering their costs. It's something workers do by producing the things that people want and need for themselves as humans in society. And as each person can produce far more than they can consume in a day, surely wealth is not created and consumed daily in equal measure, even if it's not a "fixed commodity". Your idea of wealth coming from the operations of profit-seeking corporations who, as a side effect, happen to make adequate profits by selling us commodities at the highest price we are willing to pay, is not a mathematical theorem but a moral one, thus once again demonstrating the representative's point.

You have quite a fantasy about how much is actually produced. The GDP of the US is under $60k per person--and some of that has to go into the tools/resources used by those workers, not all of it can appear as income.