Socialism for the Rich and Capitalism for the Poor !

[jenny205]

Imagine you live in a society where taxes are admittedly a little high, but all the main services are provided for free: health care, education, pension, unemployment benefits, and you will even receive some little extra if you are extremely poor or if you have children. And then there is another society where taxes are quite low. However, you do not get everything for “free” – you have to pay for each and every service yourself. Which of the two societies should be preferred? And is it true, as often asserted, that the poor would be worse off in the second society? Is it true that only the rich would benefit and that the poor were harmed by these policies?

No, it is not true. For many decades, the myth that in a capitalist country the rich become richer while the poor become poorer has been spreading all over the world – despite the fact that a quick glance over the facts would show that the economically freer the country, the less poor it is. It actually is no news that countries that have more economic freedom are richer and its citizens live better than those states which isolate themselves from the world, tax high, and regulate heavily. According to the Heritage Foundation’s Index of Economic Freedom, the five countries with the most economic freedom are in fact Hong Kong, Singapore, New Zealand, Switzerland, and Australia, while the bottom five are (of course known as being paradises incarnate) Yemen, North Korea, Venezuela, Cuba, and the Republic of Congo. An easy way to figure out where it is better to live no matter the social class is to see where people move to: Are people moving to North Korea, or to Australia? Exactly.

Usually countries with a small government, low taxes and free markets make both poor and rich people richer. Sure enough, as Kuznets emphasized, when some countries begin to develop, there will be a wealth gap between the rich and the poor – but usually after a bit, the gap will shrink again. In pro-market countries everybody will be better off.

 

[virtusa]

Imagine you live in a society where taxes are admittedly a little high, but all the main services are provided for free: health care, education, pension, unemployment benefits, and you will even receive some little extra if you are extremely poor or if you have children. And then there is another society where taxes are quite low. However, you do not get everything for “free” – you have to pay for each and every service yourself. Which of the two societies should be preferred? And is it true, as often asserted, that the poor would be worse off in the second society? Is it true that only the rich would benefit and that the poor were harmed by these policies?

No, it is not true. For many decades, the myth that in a capitalist country the rich become richer while the poor become poorer has been spreading all over the world – despite the fact that a quick glance over the facts would show that the economically freer the country, the less poor it is. It actually is no news that countries that have more economic freedom are richer and its citizens live better than those states which isolate themselves from the world, tax high, and regulate heavily. According to the Heritage Foundation’s Index of Economic Freedom, the five countries with the most economic freedom are in fact Hong Kong, Singapore, New Zealand, Switzerland, and Australia, while the bottom five are (of course known as being paradises incarnate) Yemen, North Korea, Venezuela, Cuba, and the Republic of Congo. An easy way to figure out where it is better to live no matter the social class is to see where people move to: Are people moving to North Korea, or to Australia? Exactly.

Usually countries with a small government, low taxes and free markets make both poor and rich people richer. Sure enough, as Kuznets emphasized, when some countries begin to develop, there will be a wealth gap between the rich and the poor – but usually after a bit, the gap will shrink again. In pro-market countries everybody will be better off.

https://www.usnews.com/news/best-countries/rankings/quality-of-life

QUALITY of life.
In the top 6 of the world, there are ALL 4 Scandinavian countries. In these countries taxes are high. But the redistribution of these taxes are beneficial for all citizens.
The Norwegian pension fund has now already enough money to pay the pensions of the next three generations.

 

[themickey]

 

[TheDawn]

Imagine you live in a society where taxes are admittedly a little high, but all the main services are provided for free: health care, education, pension, unemployment benefits, and you will even receive some little extra if you are extremely poor or if you have children. And then there is another society where taxes are quite low. However, you do not get everything for “free” – you have to pay for each and every service yourself. Which of the two societies should be preferred? And is it true, as often asserted, that the poor would be worse off in the second society? Is it true that only the rich would benefit and that the poor were harmed by these policies?

No, it is not true. For many decades, the myth that in a capitalist country the rich become richer while the poor become poorer has been spreading all over the world – despite the fact that a quick glance over the facts would show that the economically freer the country, the less poor it is. It actually is no news that countries that have more economic freedom are richer and its citizens live better than those states which isolate themselves from the world, tax high, and regulate heavily. According to the Heritage Foundation’s Index of Economic Freedom, the five countries with the most economic freedom are in fact Hong Kong, Singapore, New Zealand, Switzerland, and Australia, while the bottom five are (of course known as being paradises incarnate) Yemen, North Korea, Venezuela, Cuba, and the Republic of Congo. An easy way to figure out where it is better to live no matter the social class is to see where people move to: Are people moving to North Korea, or to Australia? Exactly.

Usually countries with a small government, low taxes and free markets make both poor and rich people richer. Sure enough, as Kuznets emphasized, when some countries begin to develop, there will be a wealth gap between the rich and the poor – but usually after a bit, the gap will shrink again. In pro-market countries everybody will be better off.

It all depends on who can use the money more efficiently and effectively to get the services it needs. The money, whether it's used by the government or the individuals to pay for needed services is the same money. If the money is used more effectively and efficiently by the government to pay for services for all after it is collected from the people, then people will be better off in a country with high taxes where they remit the money to the government in taxes and for the government to spend it on infrastructure and people actually get more from the government in terms of the services that they are getting but on the other hand if the individuals are able to spend more wisely and effectively to get the services that they need then it's better that the individuals retain the money for themselves instead of remitting to the government in the form of taxes and spend it on themselves to get the services that they need and in this case, people will be better off in a low tax country.

 

[TheDawn]

https://www.usnews.com/news/best-countries/rankings/quality-of-life

QUALITY of life.
In the top 6 of the world, there are ALL 4 Scandinavian countries. In these countries taxes are high. But the redistribution of these taxes are beneficial for all citizens.
The Norwegian pension fund has now already enough money to pay the pensions of the next three generations.
View attachment 309110

Jesus Canada makes the most amount of money among all of the six countries $1.99 trillion and yet has the lowest GDP per capita. Poor (no pun intended) Canada!

 

[TheDawn]

You need to live outside the US for a while, just to recognize that your bubble is just that, a bubble.

And you need to learn English or simply read to better understand what I wrote. LOL

 

[vanzandt]

. This isn’t about nuitrition. no one has argued the fact that you can’t buy organic yogurt under SNAP..

Yeah but you can buy Frito's, candy bars, Pepsi, even friggin' Red Bull.
Why is that? It's bs imo.

Many of the people that use this stuff have no decent access to decent grocery stores, so they feed their kids oftentimes out of the local bodega/gas station. Times have changed however. We have the ability to get an AMZN package in 4 hours, they can do that with beans, rice, eggs, bread and milk. And flour. Learn to cook or starve.
(Of course then we'll be expected to also hand out electric stoves and pbe free cookware)

Oh yeah... and then there's always the inevitable 2 process checkout where after they buy their poor kids the above junk food, out comes the cash to buy the blunt wraps, cigarettes, tall boys, lottery tickets.. whatever.

The whole system needs redone. It's bs.

 

[Cuddles]

Dems should just propose an amendment of 1 for 1 dollar match cut on defense and call the GOP's bluff as this bill disappears from the spotlight.

 

[M.W.]

I can't disagree more. Humans operate a lot based on hope. When you take opportunities for a decent life away is when a sizable portion of society drops out and gives up. I am not postulating for everyone to be equally well off but what we are currently seeing is an entire young generation losing hope to ever meaningfully participate in a middle class life style. When hope is lost humans make all sorts of poor choices that usually accelerate the descent.

The current system is hugely rigged in favor of those who were born with means and hardly leaves any opportunities to climb up for those who start with little or nothing. In the past those could through hard work still attain a decent life style. As society we should never worry about the very few exceptional people, those always make it no matter what. What we need to concern ourselves with are the masses that don't have exceptional skills or drive. What's in it for them? At the moment not a whole lot. And I say this out of selfish motivations. Supporting the downtrodden costs the entire economy a lot more than reinventing the system that gives everyone a fairer shot at getting somewhere in life.

That's wishful thinking. There's no study demonstrating that economic equality leads to "happiness". Quite the opposite, I think it leads to petty infighting of the worst kind, with everyone checking on everyone else to ensure they are not more equal than the other. I've seen this behavior often enough living for a time in so called equalitarian systems like China or Singapore.
I think humans subscribe to competitive advantages and, if economic reward is removed, we spontaneously seek to find it in other ways, like by working the least to get the same. I think it's a common response in Europe and North America for people who drop out of the working economy for whatever reason (no judgement) to figure out the system to maximize benefits without having to work. Take this to a generational level and you now have a permanent underclass of people who are raised knowing how to maximize benefits without having to spend hours a day at a job. In Europe it's an epidemic dysfunction thanks to generous safety nets, where one can game the system and live correctly without legally working. It is done in the US as well, but the living conditions of these groups is much worse.

 

[VicBee]

I can't disagree more. Humans operate a lot based on hope. When you take opportunities for a decent life away is when a sizable portion of society drops out and gives up. I am not postulating for everyone to be equally well off but what we are currently seeing is an entire young generation losing hope to ever meaningfully participate in a middle class life style. When hope is lost humans make all sorts of poor choices that usually accelerate the descent.

The current system is hugely rigged in favor of those who were born with means and hardly leaves any opportunities to climb up for those who start with little or nothing. In the past those could through hard work still attain a decent life style. As society we should never worry about the very few exceptional people, those always make it no matter what. What we need to concern ourselves with are the masses that don't have exceptional skills or drive. What's in it for them? At the moment not a whole lot. And I say this out of selfish motivations. Supporting the downtrodden costs the entire economy a lot more than reinventing the system that gives everyone a fairer shot at getting somewhere in life.

Hope is too ephemeral a word for me. Hope is for those who have little control over their situation. Hope that the weather will be good, hope that I can make it to school without getting shot, hope that I'm going to make a living trading this year... Hope is what better off people project on those who have very little. It's a righteous feeling that elicits strong emotions, not always good. Hope can be both aspirational and practical.
America has a crisis high number of vagrants living on the streets of cities all over the country, well over half a million souls getting by on substance abuse and assistance. Many millions, if not billion dollars, has been spent to study, address and resolve this crisis. An entire economy has been created around these, from non profit and for profit, food, shelter, medical, drug and violence prevention, all this taxpayer funded support and yet the number of vagrants continue to grow. I know, good conscience wants us to use the word homeless, as if that was their only problem. Anyone willing to walk around these camps can attest to the hopelessness of the task at hand.

Hard work. This is the most common reason given by the typical American to succeed or fail in America. Work hard and you win. You fail because you don't work hard enough.
The irony is that no one defines what hard work is. Picking back breaking strawberries for 12 hour days in 100 degrees heat with hot water and a tarp for shade 100 yards away is hard work but, somehow I don't think any of these poor souls will make it to the middle class. But they aren't vagrants or a taxpayers burden; only fodder for politicians on both sides of the political spectrum.
What's hard work then? Finishing high school? It's well known that college is viewed by many as a waste of time, costly and irrelevant if it's not a practical degree to increase ones opportunity to be paid more. If so, then that was hard work. Intellectual pursuit is shit.
Is becoming a doctor or a lawyer hard work? Does it matter if it was accomplished by a middle class person or a working class person? Americans recognize hard work based on result, not based on the work itself or the challenges of even getting to do the hard work. We glorify #1 and forget who all the others behind are... could as well all be losers. It's depressing and hopeless.