They learn to share, like decent human beings. Or, they can learn via taxation.
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CBS, of all the major networks, tend to show a bit less bias. Uncle Walter was our icon for years, and he wouldn’t have put up with ANY of the shit going down right now.
And no, not shocking. Especially not to regular Boing Boing readers who pay attention to issues of wealth inequality and how the rich have been grifting us blind since the Reagan years.
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That you’re here on BB, means that you’re educated differently than probably 90% of the country…
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I’ve always considered CBS to be the most conservatively biased of the big three networks. Probably because their audience is older. It frustrates me when they cover something progressive, because it’s often presented as an idea or theory that’s basically improbable. Advancements are reported like the sighting of a unicorn.
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“Wealth” is usually defined as net worth. Which means that roughly a quarter of American families (and a huge percentage of people who don’t own homes) have zero wealth, since they have more debt than assets.
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Yes, but household wealth. Are they including lineage trusts, off-shore hidey-holes and all other ultra-rich ways to have wealth without it being directly tied to them?
I wouldn’t want the 0.01% to be shorted on pie.
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Yeah. One can argue about whether a CEO really earns a wage that’s some orders of magnitude more than say, what all the engineers that invent all the products that provide the company with its revenue, put together - even when, under their leadership, the company tanks. There isn’t a good argument to be made for it, but one can still argue it. But the problem is, the super-wealthy make their money via parasitic financial schemes that contribute nothing. Bill Gates becomes the perfect example, as he didn’t make his current fortune at Microsoft, it came after he retired.
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Unfortunately, all those people with no pie can’t afford to take that day off. It’s disgraceful that elections are scheduled at times when many people simply can’t vote even if they wanted to.
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Back when it was possible to have such a thing as a conservative friend, I remember being told (probably quoting somebody or other, maybe Toqueville) that democracy is doomed because as soon as the masses figure out that they can vote benefits to themselves we would bankrupt ourselves. He was half right. What he missed was that the people amassing the power to vote themselves more money would be the wealthy. More money=>more power=>more money. The guy saying "We couldn’t have a wealth tax, the American people would never go for it. really gripes my grundle. The wealthiest 1 % would never go for it, the next 9% would probably not go for it. The other 90% ought to love the prospect.
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Cool metaphore to explain this. One rather large flaw I see though is that “wealth” is not a zero sum game but that pie sure is.
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No, the pie is not, either. I could bake another pie, put nine more slices on the rich plate, split a slice between the next two, and put the crumbs on the fourth. Then I could bake another and another and another, and keep doing the same thing. How does that address inequality?
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“Even harder”? You mean something like a strongly worded letter as instead to just looking the other way like we do today? /s
But seriously, the Republicans have defunded the IRS and its enforcement division over the last couple of decades to the point where it is now their policy to ignore the wealthiest tax evaders because they don’t have the resources to go up against the one-percent’s legal challenges. I would love to see the IRS receive additional funding equal to 1% of the defense budget. That would “get some shit done” 
(showing my work - in 2019 the IRS budget was $11 billion and they generated more than $3 trillion in revenue. The 2019 defense budget was over $680 billion. Moving 1% of the annual defense budget to the IRS would increase their resources for enforcement actions by almost $7 billion dollars a year)
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The reply tweets were very predictably a trash fire, but I looked anyway. Serves me right for wasting the time.
I am very much not in favor of a wealth tax. I am very much in favor of increased income taxes for high-earning individuals.
(The Koran sets Zakat at about 2.5% of someone’s total wealth. As most countries in the west base their tax structures on the Bible’s 10% tithe, many Islamic countries structure their taxes like the Zakat.)
(Edited to add: So we can see how this works in those countries.)
Why do I prefer income taxes over wealth taxes? Because income is already liquid cash, for the most part. It’s easy to value because it is already liquid. Wealth is hard to value because some assets have not been bought or sold recently or ever; and until it is sold at arm’s length on an open market, the value is contentious.
But even worse- it contains working capital and investments. Imagine what would happen if a farmer had to pay 10% of the value of their fields and equipment each year. Imagine what would happen if a landlord had to pay 10% of the value of their real estate holdings each year. Imagine if someone who owned a small business had to pay 10% of the value of their business each year. It’s not liquid; it may not be easy to liquidate enough to pay the taxes, and it would probably raise prices for the rest of us a lot.
On the other hand, diverting income is a lot easier; it’s already liquid and has a value. We’ve tried having higher income taxes; traditionally the highest tax rates have been 2-3 times as much as they are now, and they worked fine. It resolved a lot of the issues of income inequality too, although there was also a depression that took care of some of it as well.
IMHO, having a 50% or even 75% tax on income above say $5MM a year (preferably with lower tax brackets for certain “windfall” income profiles which are non-repeatable like lawsuit wins, lottery wins, sale of buildings and other long-held assets) works a lot better than a wealth tax.
Why exclude lottery taxes? Because every Joe Sixpack out there thinks they are going to win it big some day, and they don’t want to pay more taxes on it because that’s their ticket to retirement. Remove that threat to their plans and I think they will be more likely to support such a clause.
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I’m not in favor of a wealth tax. I am, however, in favor of guillotines in the town squares. The wealthiest would then be tripping all over themselves to divest quite a bit. Is this terrorism? Sure, but I think we’re past the point of expecting anything else to work.
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Should be a national holiday with mandated decuple overtime.
Voting is that important.
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In England, at this day, if elections were open to all classes of people, the property of landed proprietors would be insecure. An agrarian law would soon take place. If these observations be just, our government ought to secure the permanent interests of the country against innovation. Landholders ought to have a share in the government, to support these invaluable interests, and to balance and check the other. They ought to be so constituted as to protect the minority of the opulent against the majority.
James Madison, Statement (1787-06-26) as quoted in Notes of the Secret Debates of the Federal Convention of 1787 by Robert Yates
Or see here:
QUESTION: Do you see much evidence of a revolutionary spirit in the America of the 1990s?
CHOMSKY: You didn’t find evidence of it in the America of the 1790s. The Revolutionary War was an important event. But it was in the first place, to a significant extent, a civil war, as most revolutionary wars are. And it was a war of independence, as opposed to a revolution against the social structure. The social structure didn’t really change significantly. There were problems right after the war was done. For example, Shay’s Rebellion and the Whiskey Rebellion and so on were challenging the social structure, and there were efforts on the part of radical farmers to take seriously the meaning of the words in the revolutionary pamphlets, but that was pretty well quieted down.
If you go back to the record of the Constitutional Convention, which took place in 1787, almost immediately after the end of the war, you see that they are already moving in another direction. James Madison – who was the main framer, and one of the Founding Fathers who was most libertarian – makes it very clear that the new constitutional system must be designed so as to ensure that the government will, in his words, “protect the minority of the opulent against the majority” and bar the way to anything like agrarian reform. The determination was made that America could not allow functioning democracy, since people would use their political power to attack the wealth of the minority of the opulent. Therefore, Madison argues, the country should be placed in the hands of the wealthier set of men, as he put it.
QUESTION: Isn’t that erection of barriers to democracy woven through the entire history of the United States?
CHOMSKY: It goes back to the writing of the Constitution. They were pretty explicit. Madison saw a “danger” in democracy that was quite real and he responded to it. In fact, the“problem” was noticed a long time earlier. It’s clear in Aristotle’s “Politics,” the sort of founding book of political theory – which is a very careful and thoughtful analysis of the notion of democracy. Aristotle recognizes that, for him, that democracy had to be a welfare state; it had to use public revenues to ensure lasting prosperity for all and to ensure equality. That goes right through the Enlightenment. Madison recognized that, if the overwhelming majority is poor, and if the democracy is a functioning one, then they’ll use their electoral power to serve their own interest rather than the common good of all. Aristotle’s solution was, “OK, eliminate poverty.” Madison faced the same problem but his solution was the opposite: “Eliminate democracy.”
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Absolute power corrupts absolutely
But absolute powerlessness does the same
Its not the poverty
Its the inequality that we live with everyday that will turn us insane
Absolute power corrupts absolutely
But absolute powerlessness does the same
Its not the poverty
Its the inequality that we live with everyday that will turn us insane
In a scheme of livin’ my life wasn’t hard
But as far as Britain goes shit I practically starved
Sleeping in a track suit, gas meter runnin’ out
Electric cut off as well, candles lightin’ up the house
Lookin’ in my momma’s eyes I see how she feels
The strain and the pain of just paying bills
It ain’t real, and thats how I grew like so many more
And it is part of who I am
I am very sure
You wanna know the rage I feel in my stomach
Knowing my mum and dad split up when I was still in her stomach
And not everything that happened I will put in sixteens
But I will tell you enough so you will know what I mean
My boy’s mother got cancer the same time as mine
His mother died, and mine survived
The shit was fucked back then
When I was like ten already had the mental strength
More than many grown men
Absolute power corrupts absolutely
But absolute powerlessness does the same
Its not the poverty
Its the inequality that we live with everyday that will turn us insane
This was a couple years after my step-dad left
Did he really know the crazy mess that he left?
Cos mum done’ recovered from the lumps in her neck
Being poor and alone just couldn’t cope with the stress
And her and my big sis fought
So much so that Nihattan left school
When she left home
I was thirteen by now
Still a little kid, innocent
Next couple years though would turn him 'to a militant
That is the result of no food in the fridge
And every other day being searched by the pigs
Fuck these patronizing teachers
Don’t want my grades ‘slip, trynna’ emasculate me
-yeah turn me 'to a bitch
And I don’t mean a woman please lemme be clear
I mean a spineless man 'cos what do they fear
Than a working class black male with a brain
When our energy is harnessed, everything changed
Look at 'Pac look at Marley look at Hendrix look at Garvey
This is the potential that is wasted on a daily basis
In this racist, classist world that we live in
Still we comin’ from nothing but we educate millions
Absolute power corrupts absolutely
But absolute powerlessness does the same
Its not the poverty
Its the inequality that we live with everyday that will turn us insane
I understand why it scares you
Its like how dare you
Overcome obstacles that we have been careful to
Place in your way every step of the way
In this so called democracy where kids get sprayed
Blacks and the Asians, Turks and the chavs
Crowded in council flats, living like ants
And who’s more confused than the poor white trash
Spouting the bullshit about they want their country back
It never was yours, you should read more
What they did to brown people they did to their own poor
Peoples memories short, so much that im seeing
Black and asian kids cussing eastern Europeans
No pot to piss in, makes competition
I fail to see how this is an effective system
Cats and dogs in America and Britain
Eat better food then most of humanity
We spend our technology only on killin’
How is this more than sophisticated savagery
Its like its said, the world is a stage
Each person’s just an actor with a part to play
Like the middle class kids, - kids of the rich
Have everything, but yet still they pissed
On coke and ketamine, strung out on heroin
I ain’t generalizing, look at the evidence
Absolute power corrupts absolutely
But absolute powerlessness does the same
Its not the poverty
Its the inequality that we live with everyday that will turn us insane
Go to Glastonbury any year
You will see, unlike carnival
It won’t be crawling with police
This is London, the kids on the very next street
Had a very different life experience than me
In my experience they can’t help but be smug
After a lifetime of what they think’s just good luck
They’re still more anxious
And more thankless
Unearned privilege weighs like an anchor
That’s why they copy what we do, tryna’ be what they not
They will grow up though and get better jobs
They will maintain the system they claim that they hated
But they can’t burn it down they got a stake in this matrix
Hip-hop is just a fad to them, you didn’t know?
But to us, this our living breathing soul
And yeah they might backpack in South America
Or even volunteer in an African village
But all said and done, push comes to shove
And shit hits the fan they’re middle class and British
That’s just how it is, most rich brown people are just as full of shit
So more concerned with they cars and jewels
Most of the worlds poor looks just like you
So more concerned with the privileged few
Most of the worlds poor looks just like you
Absolute power corrupts absolutely
But absolute powerlessness does the same
Its not the poverty
Its the inequality that we live with everyday that will turn us insane
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I thought it was “as American as apple pie”, not pumpkin pie.
I guess you take all the extra pies you baked and take them to the soup kitchen. I, however, was not trying to address inequality.
I was merely pointing out that in this experiment, there is only 1 pie and therefore is a zero sum game, so the more pie you give to the rich people, the less there is for the poor. The economy does not work like that, because it is not a zero sum game. This is not the answer to anything, much less inequality, it is just a fundamental flaw in the validity of this demonstration that I have chosen not to ignore.
