Yeah, and when your taxes actually provide meaningful services that result in you not having to otherwise spend money that people in other countries such as the US have to expend, you can end up ahead financially even while paying more taxes.
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The source material being referred to makes the claim that the US has more progressive taxation system largely because those with âmiddle incomeâ pay less in taxes than they do elsewhere, and thus, although the wealthy would be paying the lionâs share of taxes just because of income inequality, theyâre shouldering disproportionately more of the tax burden than in other countries. Even if true, this seems problematic however, because the equivalent salaries for certain jobs in most of the first world are smaller than they are in the US, and even with those lower salaries, because of the services provided by taxes, they have equivalent or better quality of life, financially, than their US counterparts. So the income distribution is different, as is the value of that income, making the idea of âmiddle incomeâ not so comparable.
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Itâs certainly entertaining. I want it to be full of fnord, letâs say.
The extractive structures you are talking about are our political system - the government and their cronies. There is no separation or distinction. Thatâs how we got to where we are. We have the corporate structure we have because thatâs how the government designed it when creating the legal entities that are corporations. In fact, the very design of government is precisely the same - a few people on top, everyone else on the bottom.
Capitalism - the accumulation of capital to fund enterprises - is perfectly compatible with co-operatives and group ownership. In fact, you can watch it work directly via Internet innovations like Kickstarter. But that is largely not the system we have today, which is better defined as cronyism or partial fascism. It has nothing to with capital structure, and everything to do with the use of regulations and tax manipulation to secure market positions for favored cronies.
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But there is no inherent requirement for well-regulated capitalism to only benefit the cronies. I find this stance to be cynical and/or a useful talking point for people who really desire the current system, because it makes it seem like weâd all be better off with fewer regulations in general. Which is obviously bullshit, to those of us with any clue.
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When the regulations are written by and for the government and their cronies, what else would you expect? There may be other theoretical options, but public choice mechanics virtually ensure that it works out in favor of those in power. You are essentially hoping that the people writing the rules wonât write them to benefit themselves - a dubious proposition at best.
Whether or not weâd all be better off with fewer regulations is another argument - the fact is that the current regulations are a big part of the inequality problem weâre talking about. Itâs quite possible that you are correct - the regulations both a) make everyone better off, and b) increase inequality (though I, of course, would disagree).
I believe that regulations as they are currently codified are very much contributing toward inequality and croney capitalism. I donât tend to agree that all regulations by the government of various parts of the market have to have this impact. I do acknowledge that it may literally take a pretty big step in human evolution for us to be a species that can make an advanced society work in a decent way.
Thank Kimmo, interesting. I donât know enough about open source coding to know the following, would love it if someone could enlighten me:
How does the community working on a project reject or approve a personâs proposed changes to the source?
Also, the idea of code getting forked â I guess this is when multiple groups canât just come to an agreement? This too is an inherent part of open source coding, right? How would you âforkâ a set of laws we have to live under? This would seem to come back to the idea that weâd been discussing earlier of allowing people to form non-geographicly-bound âvirtual nation states.â
Inequality in each U.S. state does not seem to have much correlation with state policies. See this map
There is the fact that you can easily identify the Mason Dixon line in it.
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Compare the middle class in the U.S. to the middle class in Scandinavia. The: âweâve got it better than Africansâ argument is pretty cliched and tired.
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Came to say the same. Theyâre preparing for it.
It appears to correlate strongly with âdistance from Canadaâ (excepting Utah = Canada and New York = Guatemala).
non-geographicly-bound âvirtual nation states.â
You might be talking about a free market in legal systems, i.e. the ultimate in privatisation. Itâs discussed at length here:
http://www.daviddfriedman.com/The_Machinery_of_Freedom_.pdf
I think itâs unworkable because we are instinctively in favour of a fairly stable territorial monopoly over the use of violence to control one other. Also itâs exactly how every nation state with a unified legal system and army got started: as a region of the earth with no nation state and no unified legal system or army. And look how they all ended up. It strongly suggests that this is a very reliably confirmed product of human nature.
Keep in mind that three of the states which seem to buck the expected trend have a very special situation: the three largest cities in the country, in states which are otherwise largely rural. (New York, Illinois, and California)
Thatâs 3.57 billion people who need to stop sitting on their couches in front of their TV sets eating bonbons.
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That is quite a flock of lucky duckiesâŚ
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I donât see how a riot would impress someone with that kind of resources. Let alone a music video vaguely referring to a riot.
Or you could just fork laws regionally and allow people to choose the standards theyâd like to hold themselves to (which would match the expectations of those around them). You just have to make it easy to move from place to place.
I.e. governance of choice instead of a birth-circumstance lottery.
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