Who says we are not a socialist country?

[nitro]

Quote from Pabst:
...The Social Security "tax" under FDR was 1% until 1942 with a cap after $3,000 of income. ...

Be careful - are you taking inflation into effect? Also, back then the economies of the world weren't as intermingled as they are today, so it is very difficult to compare taxation back then to today as FX was almost non-existant.

Finally, the current tax rate probably takes into account the fact that more and more people are buying goods on the Internet, which don't get taxed.

It is really dangerous to take numbers out of the air to draw conclusions without normalizing them, and even then it is very dangerous.

We ask a mathematician what 1+1 =? He says 2. We ask a physicist and he says it depends on the coordinate system and the units used. We ask an economist and he says, what do you want it to be?

nitro

 

[Pabst]

Are you on DRUGS? WTF does inflation have to do with a PERCENTAGE increasing from 1 to 15? And WTF do E-Commerce sales on the internet have to do with the increased rate of SOCIAL SECURITY taxation?

Quote from nitro:

Be careful - are you taking inflation into effect? Also, back then the economies of the world weren't as intermingled as they are today, so it is very difficult to compare taxation back then to today as FX was almost non-existant.

Finally, the current tax rate probably takes into account the fact that more and more people are buying goods on the Internet, which don't get taxed.

It is really dangerous to take numbers out of the air to draw conclusions without normalizing them, and even then it is very dangerous.

We ask a mathematician what 1+2 =? He says 2. We ask a physicist and he says it depends on the coordinate system and the units used. We ask an economist and he says, what do you want it to be?

nitro

 

[nitro]

Quote from Pabst:

Are you on DRUGS?

no drugs.

WTF does inflation have to do with a PERCENTAGE increasing from 1 to 15?

I suggest you study the idea of utility of money. You assume that percentage is a linear function of only wages. That is 100% false.

And WTF do E-Commerce sales on the internet have to do with the increased rate of SOCIAL SECURITY taxation?

Everything. If you can get goods and services by paying less taxes [or zero in the internet case] for them, that means that the money you have earned has a greater potential energy stored in it's savings, than someone who had to pay for the same goods before the Internet. In fact, the internet is a perfect example and proves that without understanding the relationship that money has to the real cost of goods in a given epoch, it is really dangerous to simply compare numbers from two time periods.

Basically, the real tax rate is a tensor or a spinor - you think it is a scalar.

I am surprised you did not ask about FX and taxes, because that is even more complex and less obvious than the other two assertions I made.

nitro

 

[Pabst]

Nitro: Internet sales were virtually non-existant prior to 1995. Agreed? Yet the SOCIAL SECURITY TAX RATE had ALREADY increased 15 fold from 1936. You're confusing apples to oranges.

 

[ZZZzzzzzzz]

It is my guess, that taxes themselves are not the real issue here, but rather what the tax revenue goes to.

I suspect our resident flag waving Patriots, who would shelter their money off shore to dodge their civic responsibility as citizens do so evade taxes out of greed, rather than principle.

Many in the right wing have philosophical issues to where tax revenue goes...other are just flat out greedy, and don't want to part with a dime if they cannot see an immediate gratification personally. They live in a fantasy world that is constructed out of the incorrect notion that all that we have in our country is a collective process, not the sum of only the amount one can bring home before taxation.

If the taxes were needed to fund a genuinely necessary war effort (not a farce like Iraq) would the same traitors...err traders be screaming about the tax rate? Or would they gladly be paying for that which they think is worthy of being taxed for?

This effort to dodge paying taxes by those who can afford the fees and expense to do so, are not patriotic, nor are they practice a form of civil disobedience. It is like someone who doesn't like a particular party in power, but rather than living in a democracy that means all that goes with it, they act in a most selfish and independent manner, having no concern for the overall welfare of our society, for the common good.

They are simply greedy, which of course fits perfectly with the so many in the right wing, as we all know that greed is the root of all evil.....

 

[nitro]

Quote from Pabst:

Nitro: Internet sales were virtually non-existant prior to 1995. Agreed? Yet the SOCIAL SECURITY TAX RATE had ALREADY increased 15 fold from 1936. You're confusing apples to oranges.

Pabst,

But 15 fold compared to what? Compared to a time when if you had all the money in the world, it made no difference because there was nothing to buy? Or on the other end of the scale, if you made $1 a day, being taxed 15% didn't make you any poorer?

What I am trying to say is that using a percentage blindly like you are here is a dangerous game, not only mathematically for reasons I have already given, but for practical reasons that have to do with the utility of money and the real costs of goods.

Let me give you an example. The price of oil has gone up. So people that look only at the price of oil will say we are poorer if they use that number in isolation. But when you take the whole picture into effect, the cost of oil is less clear. For example, I truly belive that one of the reasons the price of oil is so high is that we buy more product from the Internet because they are not taxed. But those products have to be shipped to you, and that takes oil. That is why you see the transports on fire each and every day in the markets. So while we are getting products cheaply through the internet, the markets adjust (the invisible hand at work) by compensating somewhere else. Do you see how if I just took the price of oil in isolation it would give a false representation of my real costs to live? The best measure of living costs is not taxes, but the value of the dollar and the effects that inflation and deflation have on it. It is the only measure that comes close to being able to compare generations.

In Europe they get taxed in some countries at 50-70%, yet they get free health care and free first rate education. Do you see how bad this mumber is to use without context?

Taken together, the equation is non-linear and it is more complicated than simply taking a percentage of one nubmer and regressing back 70 years.

nitro

 

[ZZZzzzzzzz]

Okay.

Which is better all for society, collectively as a whole?

Going back to 1% and the standard of living for most of the people in this country at that time, i.e. the depression....or having a 15% rate and having an elevated living standard for the majority of people in this country?

The reason that there has not been a tax revolt, is that because the majority of people in this country, with all the taxes, still have it better that most societies, and certainly much better than in the 30's....

Quote from nitro:

Pabst,

But 15 fold compared to what? Compared to a time when if you had all the money in the world, it made no difference because there was nothing to buy? Or on the other end of the scale, if you made $1 a day, being taxed 15% didn't make you any poorer?

What I am trying to say is that using a percentage blindly like you are here is a dangerous game, not only mathematically for reasons I have already given, but for practical reasons that have to do with the utility of money and the real costs of goods.

Let me give you an example. The price of oil has gone up. So people that look only at the price of oil will say we are poorer if they use that number in isolation. But when you take the whole picture into effect, the cost of oil is less clear. For example, I truly belive that one of the reasons the price of oil is so high is that we buy more product from the Internet because they are not taxed. That is why you see the transports on fire each and every day in the markets. So while we are getting products cheaply through the internet, the market adjust (the invisible hand at work) by compensating somewhere else. Do you see how if I just took the price of oil in isolation it would give a false representation of my real costs to live?

Taken together, the equation is non-linear and it is more complicated than simply taking a percentage of one nubmer and regressing back 70 years.

nitro

 

[nitro]

That is an experiment that is being run right now in some parts of the world. This country's tax rate is low, but we pay through the nose for everything. Europes tax rate is huge by comparison, but they get great education, good health care, great roads, etc etc from the taxed money.

I have no idea which is better because they both look the same to me, although I think that Europes answer smooths out the variation between the poor and the rich better than our system does.

nitro

Quote from ZZZzzzzzzz:

Okay.

Which is better all for society, collectively as a whole?

Going back to 1% and the standard of living for most of the people in this country at that time, i.e. the depression....or having a 15% rate and having an elevated living standard for the majority of people in this country?

The reason that there has not been a tax revolt, is that because the majority of people in this country, with all the taxes, still have it better that most societies, and certainly much better than in the 30's....

 

[ZZZzzzzzzz]

Europeans are more relaxed in general from my experience, at least about retirement and health care.

They are not on the same treadmill that Americans, chasing constant consumerism....and trying to keep up with the Jones's...

Quote from nitro:

That is an experiment that is being run right now in some parts of the world. This country's tax rate is low, but we pay through the nose for everything. Europes tax rate is huge by comparison, but they get great education, good health care, great roads, etc etc from the taxed money.

I have no idea which is better because they both look the same to me, although I think that Europes answer smooths out the variation between the poor and the rich better than our system does.

nitro

 

[Johnny Walker]

Quote from ZZZzzzzzzz:

Europeans are more relaxed in general from my experience, at least about retirement and health care.

They are not on the same treadmill that Americans, chasing constant consumerism....and trying to keep up with the Jones's...

Too bad Euros need worry about there underclass immigrant labour rising up and killing them at any time. Plus I would be significant amount of money that there standard of living will got to shit in the next 30 years because of aging demographic issues, lazy workforce, and state policies that stifle wealth creation.