Where are the hardcore capitalists at?

[TheBeast]

Due to this, real simple math must reign supreme--the only source of income for a government is taxes. As much as we all hate higher taxes, we have to balance the budget and get rid of the deficit. We need to BOTH cut government spending where it's not needed, and raise taxes, two highly unpopular things...but the right things to do. Now--how to approach those two concepts is what gets fought about all the time, but when you look at the facts...that is what we need to do.

That is Keynsian economics that not only in the real world but on paper is a failure.

Keynes says GDP=C+I+G+NX So he assumes that if you increase increase any variable in the equation, the GDP will increase accordingly. This is what his entire theory is based on. However, he consistently forgets that simply moving the wealth around is not creating wealth, but rather just allocating it differently. I’ll show some examples of this fallacy.
If you raise taxes on businesses they are not going to just pay it go on they are going to decrease expenses by laying off/firing workers so they can keep their earnings the same. Thus with less people paying in because of not drawing a paycheck net revenues goes down. Now if you lower those taxes and give them incentive to hire more workers and still be able to keep the same amount in their own pocket you will have more people paying in and an increase in net revenues. There has never been one person in the history of ever gone into business just so they could hire people and give them jobs. You go into business to make money and have more for yourself period, then you hire on others after you have that. Unless this admin keeps the Bush tax cuts (or something similar) in place that are set to expire at the end of the year unemployment and layoffs are going to go jump tremendously. http://lilburtonboy7489.wordpress.co...ian-economics/


If you raise taxes on businesses they are not going to just pay it go on they are going to decrease expenses by laying off/firing workers so they can keep their earnings the same. Thus with less people paying in because of not drawing a paycheck net revenues goes down. Now if you lower those taxes and give them incentive to hire more workers and still be able to keep the same amount in their own pocket you will have more people paying in and an increase in net revenues. There has never been one person in the history of ever gone into business just so they could hire people and give them jobs. You go into business to make money and have more for yourself period, then you hire on others after you have that. Yes I know this is a description of supply side economics but it has proven to work when implemented, whereas Keynsian has failed every time it has been implemented.

[R13]

Obviously we know this is bullshit, failed every time it's been tried? LMAO It's one of the major causes of the "Golden Age of Capitalism", it helped bring us out of a damn depression. It's worked all over the world, it's undeniable. We see what happens when we use trickle-down and deregulation , we get into the mess we're in now. We get disaster in the economy, healthcare and the environment when deregulation happens.

[CoeburnCane]

Now if you lower those taxes and give them incentive to hire more workers and still be able to keep the same amount in their own pocket you will have more people paying in and an increase in net revenues.

See, this is where supply-side Reaganomics effs up majorly, in comparison to Keynesian thought...The supply-siders assume that because they give a company more tax breaks and incentives to do something good, that they will indeed use the saved money to do great things like create jobs and give raises instead of pocketing it in increased revenues while they grow nothing else but their own bank accounts--which will be used to pad their backside and nothing else.

Greed is the variable that supply-side economics doesn't account for. If you give a CEO more money or a way to make more money, it's been shown in the past decade that lust for profits will overcome growing a business, producing jobs, and increasing wages. TRICKLE DOWN ECONOMICS DOES NOT WORK. It will not work in this day and time. It's not working now. Greed is to blame for that. A CEO does not care if the guy on the assembly line is struggling b/c he's underpaid and overworked, and 99.9 times out of 100 will not do anything about it if you give him extra money.

We've replaced the billionaires of yesteryear like Andrew Carnegie and John Rockefeller who indeed used what money they could for the greater good by setting up charities and spilling money into education, arts, and grants for new ideas. I think the earth's foundations would rock and crumble if Michael Bloomberg or Rupert Murdoch did the same thing today, they create jobs and spend their money--sure, but it's all in the support of a political agenda instead of making things better for the country as a whole.

Today's moneybags aren't the same as the ones in the past. They have next to no thought of making this country better. It's about the bottom line and only the bottom line to them anymore. There's simply more to life and a successful country than the bottom line. Deregulation has fed this greed, and that's evident just about everywhere you look.

As an example--why are Wall Street bankers/investors still getting paid ludicrous salaries and incentives when we know how crooked the industry's become? You can't tell me that a Wall Street banker making well into six figures/nearly seven figures couldn't afford an extra 5-10% in taxes and still be just fine, esp. when compared to the quality of life of the middle/lower class in this country. Their quality of life will not go down noticeably, and it will in turn help with our deficit issues and pull our economy out of a hole. We're talking about guys that still get paid for their services even if they lose a suburban family's nest egg b/c they were dumb enough to invest with someone who didn't have their best interests in mind. These aren't honest working stiffs, these are greedy assholes who get Italian suits custom made and buy them like we do underwear from Wal Mart. Their toughest choice is to decide which 5* restaurant to get reservations for, when people in the lower classes are wondering how they'll keep their job, put their kids thru school, how they'll pay their bills...etc...

If the multi-millionaires aren't going to be philanthropic as their predecessors were, and use their money to make the country better of their own volition, then increased taxation is the only solution. It's then up to us in the middle class to make sure the taxes are spent in a smart way by voting for people who will clean up the mess given the opportunity. I'm not saying take all their money that they work hard for as has been said as a scare tactic by conservative economists & politicians, I'm saying when we see a vast amount of people struggling to get by when we could help so many more by an extra few percentage points on the tax rate for that richest bracket could rake in enough money to fix it, then we should do it.

I always hear people bitching about spending money in poor countries abroad and not taking care of our people here at home first, and then they disagree with my views above. To those people I simply say--put your money where your mouth is.

[TheBeast]

Ok I will give you that having the ability to hire more and do more good is no guarantee that they will do it, but I will GUARANTEE that not giving them that ability by implementing the Keynsian theory will lead to more layoffs and a worse economy.

This country doesn't run on just the big businesses like GM, Ford, big banks, Wall Street, and Alpha Natural Resources. The largest employer is small business and this is where the Keynsian theory fails and supply-side works. Small business owners do use their incentives and tax breaks to expand their business and hire more workers. You give these small businesses the ability to do this with tax breaks and you have 100,000 small businesses expanding and hiring 100,000+ new employess, whereas all these big businesses that you hate even if they do take these incentives and make more jobs it would only be 400-500 each and nowhere near the numbers small businesses would do.

it helped bring us out of a damn depression

Have you ever heard of a little thing called World War 2, that is what brought us out of the depression. There was such a demand for military equipment that factories and industry had to expand and hire to meet the demand and thus through capitalism the country was brought out of the depression. Again even with this demand these companies would not have done this expansion without knowing they were going to make a nice profit doing it.

[CoeburnCane]

This country doesn't run on just the big businesses like GM, Ford, big banks, Wall Street, and Alpha Natural Resources. The largest employer is small business and this is where the Keynsian theory fails and supply-side works. Small business owners do use their incentives and tax breaks to expand their business and hire more workers. You give these small businesses the ability to do this with tax breaks and you have 100,000 small businesses expanding and hiring 100,000+ new employess, whereas all these big businesses that you hate even if they do take these incentives and make more jobs it would only be 400-500 each and nowhere near the numbers small businesses would do.

I agree w/that. However, the issue is there are 2 different sets of tax books for multi-national corporations and small businesses. When someone like me wants to raise taxes, I don't want to do it on small businesses, I want it increased for large corporations who take advantage of the tax laws here in the US and don't pay in their fair share. Why should a large corp like IBM pay the same tax rate as a smaller business like Southwest Trailer? They shouldn't, and they don't, but still comparatively--IBM doesn't pay as much of their profit margin as Southwest does. If they did--imagine the economic impact that could have on the US economy...get my drift?

I'm not saying go 1000% Keynesian, I don't want 1000% supply-side either. The best economy is one that deals with things on a situation-by-situation basis, which would end up being a hybrid between the two schools of thought. Tax-wise, you need to raise it on the highest incomes in the country. If you raise it across the board, you're doing nothing but cutting off your nose to spite your face because the economy will become stagnant. I nor Dems are calling for that, last I checked.

All I know is that if they raised taxes for those who are more than comfortable and thriving in order to help us all have a better standard of living across the country, then I'd be happy. BUT--there's too much lobbying that goes on for that to occur...which is a whole 'nother set of issues.

[pvfan]

Based on pure economics you are a fool if you vote Republican and make under 100K. There isn't anything anybody could show me to convince me otherwise either. I've studied it enough to make up my mind and until major changes are made in Republican views of business they will have a hard time getting my vote at the national level.

[R13]

Have you ever heard of a little thing called World War 2, that is what brought us out of the depression. There was such a demand for military equipment that factories and industry had to expand and hire to meet the demand and thus through capitalism the country was brought out of the depression. Again even with this demand these companies would not have done this expansion without knowing they were going to make a nice profit doing it.

Go do a little reading on the "golden years of capitalism", then look at the reasons why it happened, started being used towards the end of the depression, during the war and decades after Of course WW2 was the main reason, keynesian economics helped and is the main reason for all of the expansion decades after.

[R0cketer]

This is an interesting discussion. Counts scared me too with his tongue-in-cheek comment earlier.

I'm not an economics or accounting major, nor was I, but I do remember enough to be dangerous.

Problem is, not enough people do understand that quick fixes, while they sound good, are just that a quick fix. Not any form of long term solution, and most of the time, they make the situation worse, it just delays that. Get this shiny credit card with 2% interest for a year, but after that the interest rate goes to 25% or something. The person uses the card, there isn't much interest and they become acclimated to it and used to it, right when the rate goes through the roof.

To get things better, I think Cane said it, we have to deal with increased taxes for a bit. Nobody likes taxes, that much is obvious, and it would be great to come up with a completely fair tax that everybody was subject to, but considering that most of the time your law makers would be punished by that type of taxing, hard to get that passed.

It's kind of a game, when ever there is any tax increase that affects businesses, especially big business, we hear how it will cost them, they will have to lose employeees, etc, then you see their profit sheets for the year. I realize that the point of having a business is to make money but the point of a person working is to making a living as well, not an existance. By allowing the big businesses to pass the buck downward, we force more people to a situation of poverty, or where they are actually better off not working and living off of those who do work. Don't think so? Look around near the first of the month. I don't know about you but I see people in Walmart, or grocery stores, buying a lot more, better stuff than I can buy, driving newer vehicles than me and generally due to me and others. It is hard to accept that, because most of us have a better work ethic than that, but are we necessarily smarter? It sucks and the problem is, the solution is not a Dem or Republican thing, but both. To run for any office anymore, they have to have power, they have to have money backing them and most of the time, have the money themselves. Look at the wealth of nearly all of your congress, Presidents, on down the line, you don't see them hurting, living in poverty, when the salary that they earn from their positions isn't that high all things considered. Kickbacks are the bane of our existence and that is both sides of the fence. George Bush gets good money doing speaking deals now from companies and countries as does Bill Clinton, both of which made laws, restrictions, taxes that benefitted them.

That all being said, forget fixing the country, when you can't get something like Wise County or Dickenson County to fix things. Those are small pockets that suffer generally from the same issues. Most of the money is in a very small amount of peoples hands, they don't want to sacrifice it, they'll do anything and everything to not take the hit, politics is king and the rule. No matter what is said or done, at the end of the day, you can convince nearly every person that the decision is political, even if something isn't. So even if those in charge are not doing things in a political nature, due to the talking mouths, everybody thinks it is and immediately tries to figure out which side wants it, if its the side they support, the same 5 people show up to support it, if its the other, the same 10 show up against. School consolidation is not about the school, its not about the money, or anything else now, it's been going on too long, so anything that is said, is political, at least to most people. And the bad part is, there are still too many that can't see anything but from their respective party glasses.

There is no quick fix for any economic issues. Blame can go all around and there is more than enough to put on Clinton, Bush, Congress, both Democratic and Republican controlled. The inability to work together costs it. Both sides need to give a bit, but not give so much that anything you do loses its effectiveness.

[centennialdawg]

Nice try, it could just be when you know, that pesky recession started in December of 2007. Hardly the dems fault.

I don't fault the recession on any one political party. Instead, I fault everybody in part because, even though all the signs were present, everyone but a select few, ignored them, politicians and the general puble alike. The plain truth is, we all got greedy and it cost us all.