Nope. We spend way too much. WAY, WAY too much already. Adding trillions more with all of his proposals would be disastrous.

The government should be cut dramatically, not the other way around.

The United States is basically just playing monopoly right now. The money is fake and we don't need to make it even worse by printing more fake money to make luxuries into "rights" or needs for everyone.

Carcus wrote:Nope. We spend way too much. WAY, WAY too much already. Adding trillions more with all of his proposals would be disastrous.

The government should be cut dramatically, not the other way around.

The United States is basically just playing monopoly right now. The money is fake and we don't need to make it even worse by printing more fake money to make luxuries into "rights" or needs for everyone.

I agree. Lets re-organize and cut out all of the BS that has piled up and see if we can't get more out of the 4 trillion we are already spending, reign in health care costs, stop wasting money on the war on terror, the war on drugs, and then we can talk about raising taxes.

Carcus wrote:Nope. We spend way too much. WAY, WAY too much already. Adding trillions more with all of his proposals would be disastrous.

The government should be cut dramatically, not the other way around.

The United States is basically just playing monopoly right now. The money is fake and we don't need to make it even worse by printing more fake money to make luxuries into "rights" or needs for everyone.

Totally disagree. Healthcare is not a luxury. No where else in the first world is it considered as such. Plus we spend more for healthcare. Re-building infrastructure is not a luxury. It is absolutely necessary. Now cutting the defense budget and ending the stupidity that is the war on drugs would be nice.

When someone makes broad statements like government should be cut I have to question what they mean exactly. Cut where? You want Social Security cut? Social security is a huge chunk of the federal budget but good luck selling that cut. Food stamps? Food stamps make up a tiny fraction of spending in the federal budget. Cutting them does nothing but harm people who really need them, with no real gain.
You want to go back to the late 19th century when we truly left the non-wealthy to fend for themselves? Higher taxes on the wealthy and on capital gains worked for so long in this country, why the hesitation to go back to what worked for nearly 100 years? There is a saying that I see conservatives bandy about from time to time. Something like: "you can't tax your way into prosperity." It's yet another false statement that sounds cute, but the numbers say otherwise. We absolutely taxed this nation into prosperity from Teddy Roosevelt's era, until the 1920s when a return to Laissez-Faire practices led to the Depression, which we also taxed and spent our way out of. Our fiscal policy right now is a mess and it's still a George W. Bush problem that unfortunately Obama has refused or been unable to combat.

I know that someone like Elizabeth Warren or Sanders will try and change this. Hillary? I have my doubts. Any GOP candidate? I expect we will be at war with Iran within two years should any GOP fanatic make their way into office. Now there's something we can't afford.

ratonmono wrote:Under Eisenhower long term capital gains was 25% and taxes on incomes over 400,000 was 91% (holdover from WW2). We were doing just fine then.

Here is where you lost me. In my mind, if your solution involves taking away anything more than 50% of something someone has legally earned in taxes, your tax plan is a failure and you need to try again. We need a tax code that incents everyone to earn more, not just the lower and middle classes. Leaving the "super-rich" with 10% of what they earn over $2,500,000 (a ballpark estimate of the current value of $400,000 from the Eisenhower era) is going to destroy any attempt at job creation. Like it or not, people who make this kind of jack by and large worked really hard to get where they are in this economy, and they are the ones creating jobs. Instead of sticking it to the people who make this kind of money in some sort of wealth redistribution, how about we try making it easier for companies to operate in the US than it is to move jobs overseas?

You are lost for two reasons- both due to lack of knowledge.

First this very system gave us the greatest middle class the world has ever seem. Trickle down has destroyed it.
Compare America from 1948-1980 to America from 1980- now.....I will wait.

Second the government only takes the 91 percent you don't give to charity or INVEST BACK INTO YOUR BUSINESS. Without the threat of dire taxation on any annual income above 2.5 million...think about earning that EVERY SINGLE YEAR........the plutocrats just buy Rembrandts for their guest bathroom or sit on trillions in wealth. That is the biggest lie of Trickle Down failure bullshit. There is no motivation to create a fucking job- much less job(s).
Please.

I just want to point out that today taxing 91% of a $400k income seems ridiculous, because it is. $400k in the 50's equates to about $3.9M today. Something to keep in mind when looking at those numbers.

I'm not for a tax structure that extreme, especially in the long term. If the government was smart (and this goes to both Democrats and Republicans) they'd be willing to sacrifice a bit more now in deficit to get things in order that will save us a lot of cash in the long run.

Two of these are healthcare and education. Now I don't agree totally with Sanders exactly on how he wants to do things, but his end goal is pretty much spot on. Let me preface this by adding I'm one of the biggest 2nd Amendment supporters out there (I shoot almost every weekend and grew up hunting), but don't we think its a little bit ridiculous that our government guarantees us the right to bear arms but doesn't guarantee us the right to be healthy and the right to get an education that can land you a decent job? I think it is.

I also have a masters degree (and currently working towards a PhD) in Public Health, so healthcare is kind of my area, and the healthcare system in the US is so fucked compared to other countries its unbelievable. First of all, getting healthcare is essentially based on if you have enough money to afford it (or afford insurance). Which is just stupid, and morally irrelevant. No other first world country does that. Secondly, before Obamacare (which doesn't do enough of this IMO) there was no focus on preventative care/medicine. The procedure for health care in the US is "get sick, go to the doctor, get it taken care of" which is literally the most expensive way to do healthcare, and it shows up on our budget. We spend WAY more on healthcare per person compared to other nations that guarantee everyone in their country full healthcare coverage. Thats absolutely ridiculous. On top of that, despite the fact we spend more money, we have worse outcomes-we are low in the rankings of developed nations on infant mortality rate and life expectancy.

The solution is simple. You institute a single payer healthcare system that is focused on prevention first. It will be expensive, but it will eventually lead to a healthy nation overall once its instituted, and thus much less spending on healthcare in the long run (this isn't made up-its been demonstrated in plenty of other places). This next part will sound extremely "big government" to me, but also IMO people who do things that are proven to be extremely unhealthy (smoke, refuse vaccinations, etc) should have to pay additional taxes to help recoup the eventual costs that they will burden the healthcare system with.

With education, it follows a similar route. It will be expensive at first no doubt-but once we have a more educated middle class it pays for itself in the long run.

I just want to finish this by saying I grew up as a conservative and I still consider myself conservative on many issues--but with these two, when you look at history and the rest of the world, its hard to not agree with the left.

MissouriMook wrote:

ratonmono wrote:Under Eisenhower long term capital gains was 25% and taxes on incomes over 400,000 was 91% (holdover from WW2). We were doing just fine then.

Here is where you lost me. In my mind, if your solution involves taking away anything more than 50% of something someone has legally earned in taxes, your tax plan is a failure and you need to try again. We need a tax code that incents everyone to earn more, not just the lower and middle classes. Leaving the "super-rich" with 10% of what they earn over $2,500,000 (a ballpark estimate of the current value of $400,000 from the Eisenhower era) is going to destroy any attempt at job creation. Like it or not, people who make this kind of jack by and large worked really hard to get where they are in this economy, and they are the ones creating jobs. Instead of sticking it to the people who make this kind of money in some sort of wealth redistribution, how about we try making it easier for companies to operate in the US than it is to move jobs overseas?

I get that 91% is too high and noted that it was a war/depression holdover. 91% worked in that era because of the boom right after the war/coming out of the depression. The only problem with making it easier for companies to operate here is that we have done exactly that under W. Bush by dropping capital gains taxes to 15% and taxing high incomes as low as 35%. Problem is even with these incentives to stay here (the tax rates simply can't go any lower if we want to function) is that big companies still ship jobs overseas to third world shit holes that will give them better rates because those nations don't care about their people and/or are so poor that getting those US companies over there is a huge incentive for them.

It's not an easy solution. I don't want to make it seem like it is. I understand that people making large incomes have likely earned it. People in the early-mid 20th century earned their large incomes too, and some understood that the burden/responsibility of funding this nation's social programs falls upon them. It would be great if every billionaire were like Magic Johnson, but so many are like Stan Kroenke. You can't count on the wealthy's sense of charity to run the country, so in,lieu of this we have to levy taxes. Proportionate taxes, that increase dramatically with income.

As far as keeping companies here? That's a whole other issue, and again no easy answers there at all.