Gap between rich and poor rising faster in Canada

[dre]

Everyone is demonizing the "top 1%" for having all most of the wealth and not paying enough taxes. Everyone is concerned about the wealth disparity. Did you bother reading the thread?

Being concerned with wealth disparity does not mean you believe in income equality. And it doesnt mean youre anti-rich either. And it doesnt mean that you dont believe in those who excel being rewarded either.

These are all entirely dishonest strawmen.

This is a common refrain in this discussion. If someone raises the possibility that extreme concentration of wealth might not be health for ANYONE (including the wealthy), a bunch of dim-bulbs start jumping up and down, and accusing them of CLASS WARFARE!.

Edited September 16, 2011 by dre

[Zachary Young]

And you are an economist?

Well, I am loosely familiar with the history of economic thought, from Aristotle on to St Thomas Aquinas, from the Spanish Scholastics and the Brilliant Turgot, onto Smith, Ricardo, Mengar, Bohm Bawerk, Mises... that idiot Marx and that deviant Keynes. I have a general idea about the fallacy that is macro economic policy, I grasp most of the concepts involved w/ micro, demand curves and the like. I'm well aware of the economitricians fetish for numbers and graphs.... but I was never formally schooled in the subject, if that's your question.

[Zachary Young]

dre : I am glad that you have renounced the goal of income equality. Welcome to the good side!

[Zachary Young]

So, if I discuss Nazi Germany does that mean I'm not allowed to dismiss Hitler's views as insane?

[Guest Derek L]

Jacee, from Blog posts? And as far as read, not even the posts themselves, but the comments after them? They are statements of opinion, which though valid, carry no more weight then yours or mine…….

This is very quickly turning into a philosophical discussion, one wrapped around ideology, which in of itself is fine, but it should be stated as such……you have opnions, I have opnions.

When you talk about the Canadian household average it is exactly that…..an average….there are poor people, middle class, well off, and “Rich”, and the average reflects that.

Just a school classroom could determine the grade point average in any class, they’re will be super smart kids, average and challenged…..You can take it further, some children will have poor grades because they’re just plain stupid…some because they’re lazy….and some skip-out….Just as some smart ones will only have they artificially high grade because they cheated……And the average students, with an increased effort could potentially become the A students, just as some average ones with a decreased amount of effort will garner Ds and Fs…….No two people, thankfully are the same……or if you prefer:

All animals are equal but some animals are more equal than others…..

If you want all Canadians to be taxed equally, you tax them all the same rate.

[Zachary Young]

Not the same rate. No, that is not equal. That is not fair. All Canadians should be taxed the same dollar amount. I say $5 ought to cover it.

[Guest Derek L]

Not the same rate. No, that is not equal. That is not fair. All Canadians should be taxed the same dollar amount. I say $5 ought to cover it.

Proportionally it is fair………Five dollars? I thought you suggested earlier that it should be zero, so we all could live in a Mad Max style Utopian paradise………….

How much did those wretches’ at Revenue Canada force you to pay last year? (If you don’t mind of course)

[Zachary Young]

That is a VERY rude question. I do mind, thank you very much.

[Guest Derek L]

That is a VERY rude question. I do mind, thank you very much.

My wife and I paid (I checked our return) $139,499 for last year……..The reason I ask, is to qualify your statements to some extent….You see, “us rich folk” tend to pal around together, and though many that I’d consider friends agree that we should be paying less (it’s a relative term) I’ve yet to hear anyone realistically suggest paying nothing…………Are you arguing with vested interests or from a philosophical point of view? To me, your points seem juvenile and hold the same amount of merit as the dogma of a Communist.

My opinion of course…….even Freidman recognized the necessity in some form of income related taxes.

[Zachary Young]

I guess it's both. I'm not rich (no income at all currently, sadly) but would like to be some day. So that is my 'vested interest'. But it is absolutely a philosophical point of view here. I believe that it is immoral to initiate violence or coercion and I view taxation as exactly that. It is armed robbery - give us your money or we will lock you in a cage. It has all the moral authority of the highwayman.

[Guest Derek L]

I guess it's both. I'm not rich (no income at all currently, sadly) but would like to be some day. So that is my 'vested interest'. But it is absolutely a philosophical point of view here. I believe that it is immoral to initiate violence or coercion and I view taxation as exactly that. It is armed robbery - give us your money or we will lock you in a cage. It has all the moral authority of the highwayman.

As they say, advice is cheap and opinions are free……..If you want to become “successful”, buy land and come in from the fringes………Nobody truly trusts an extremely polarizing opinion……And marry a dentist

[Argus]

Tougher laws on tax "fraud"? You have to be kidding me! What a terrible idea. First of all, it isn't "fraud" to not pay taxes. No one should have to pay taxes.

Can I get your real name? I know some people in CRA's Compliance Programs who would probably like to have a look at your account.

Tax resisters are courageous individuals.

We tend to call them kooks, where I work.

Edited September 17, 2011 by Argus

[Argus]

It sickens me the way people think they can attack and steal from the rich just because they are rich. Why don't you focus on improving your life and not on ruining the lives of others?

It's not jealousy. It's seeing how the wealthy become influential, and are able to see changes made to the tax code and regulatory framework so that they get even wealthier at everyone else's expense. And it IS at others expensive. If the wealthy pay less for the services government provides then the middle class have to pay proportionately more.

[Zachary Young]

There are people who get rich at everyone else's expense. Government bureaucrats, police, politicians and corporations that deal in procurement such as the merchants of death. There is a legitimate grievance against anyone who is a net tax recipient. But if someone gets rich because he sells products that consumers want to buy you can hardly say he gets rich at anyone else's expense. His actions actually create a good deal of wealth for others.

[CitizenX]

what do you think of this video

[Zachary Young]

I don't like it. Any tax is a bad tax. I do think Banks are a huge scam. They print money by lending out 10x as much as they have on hand for deposits. This is called fractional reserve banking. If we abolished fiat currency and returned to a gold standard and outlawed the fraud that is fractional reserve banking our society would be much wealthier and we wouldn't have to deal with depressions and high unemployment and economic turmoil. But raising taxes is NOT the answer, it's never the answer. The more money government has the less money you have.

[CPCFTW]

what do you think of this video

Seems retarded. 0.5% is a huge fee for transactions. Many transactions are arbitrage trades that may only result in a 0.5% profit, but that's $5 million on a $1bil trade. This tax would make markets less efficient, and those transactions would never occur. I doubt that these exist in Japan and Europe, but it wouldn't surprise me given how poorly their economies are doing. Their debt to GDP ratios aren't exactly something we should be aspiring to.

[CPCFTW]

I don't like it. Any tax is a bad tax. I do think Banks are a huge scam. They print money by lending out 10x as much as they have on hand for deposits. This is called fractional reserve banking. If we abolished fiat currency and returned to a gold standard and outlawed the fraud that is fractional reserve banking our society would be much wealthier and we wouldn't have to deal with depressions and high unemployment and economic turmoil. But raising taxes is NOT the answer, it's never the answer. The more money government has the less money you have.

Fractional reserve banking actually makes our society much richer.

[Argus]

There are people who get rich at everyone else's expense. Government bureaucrats, police, politicians and corporations that deal in procurement such as the merchants of death. There is a legitimate grievance against anyone who is a net tax recipient. But if someone gets rich because he sells products that consumers want to buy you can hardly say he gets rich at anyone else's expense. His actions actually create a good deal of wealth for others.

How about this one then. The pharmaceutical industry in the United States lobbied (bribed) politicians to pass a low THEY wrote, which was supposedly to help elderly people pay for their prescriptions. This bill actually enriched the pharmaceutical industry by billions. It contained clauses, for example, forbidding Medicair to even try to negotiate the price of drugs with the pharmaceutical industry. They had to just take whatever price industry wanted. The senator who was in charge of getting the bill passed quit within a year to go work for the pharmaceutical industry for a million bucks a year. Meanwhile, all those pharmaceutical big-shots made a pile of money.

[CitizenX]

I don't like it. Any tax is a bad tax. I do think Banks are a huge scam. They print money by lending out 10x as much as they have on hand for deposits. This is called fractional reserve banking. If we abolished fiat currency and returned to a gold standard and outlawed the fraud that is fractional reserve banking our society would be much wealthier and we wouldn't have to deal with depressions and high unemployment and economic turmoil. But raising taxes is NOT the answer, it's never the answer. The more money government has the less money you have.

I can respect some of your opinions Zachary. I could be wrong, but from the views that I have read it sounds like your an anarchist with a strong leaning to the right. It's easy to speak philosophically without thinking about the results. Ohh to be young, keep your dreams alive.

Edited September 17, 2011 by CitizenX

[Zachary Young]

Disagree. Actually fractional reserve banking is an important factor in business cycles. Bank credit expansion fools entrepreneurs into reallocating too many resources into capital goods industries. Eventually the market self corrects and you have the bust. Depression. People out of work. It wouldn't be so bad but then government steps in to save the day and makes everything worse. It's a viscious cycle. Obviously central banks share a lot of the blame as well with their artificial manipulation of interest rates. Fractional reserve banking is fraudulent. They say they've got your money but they don't. It's also unstable - if the government didn't constantly step in to bail out the banks they would go broke.

[Zachary Young]

Argus : that sounds about par for the course. Powerful vested interests write the regulations. I think we should abolish intellectual property - it's nothing more than a government granted monopoly that keeps the price of drugs and other stuff artificially high. IF we get rid of IP drugs - especially say aids medication that the 3rd world desperately needs - would be a lot more available.

[Guest Derek L]

I don't like it. Any tax is a bad tax. I do think Banks are a huge scam. They print money by lending out 10x as much as they have on hand for deposits. This is called fractional reserve banking. If we abolished fiat currency and returned to a gold standard and outlawed the fraud that is fractional reserve banking our society would be much wealthier and we wouldn't have to deal with depressions and high unemployment and economic turmoil. But raising taxes is NOT the answer, it's never the answer. The more money government has the less money you have.

As much as I’d love to go back to a simpler time when fins on cars were the cool, smoking wasn’t really bad for you and we had the gold standard, no DeLorean is going to create enough gold to represent current currency holdings.

[CitizenX]

Seems retarded. 0.5% is a huge fee for transactions. Many transactions are arbitrage trades that may only result in a 0.5% profit, but that's $5 million on a $1bil trade. This tax would make markets less efficient, and those transactions would never occur. I doubt that these exist in Japan and Europe, but it wouldn't surprise me given how poorly their economies are doing. Their debt to GDP ratios aren't exactly something we should be aspiring to.

That was .05%

[Argus]

Argus : that sounds about par for the course. Powerful vested interests write the regulations.

And you don't think it would be a thousand times worse in a society without any kind of general elections controlling government? You talk about being able to hire security agencies and courts, but what about those people who OWN the security agencies and courts? You think you'll be able to hire a competing security agency? And how much money would you need to have to hire an agency to go after someone who had ten thousand armed security guards working for him?

I think we should abolish intellectual property

If you abolished intellectual property no one would ever write another song or book. No one would be able to profit from their own inventions, from their own hard work! You could spend ten years writing this great novel, and the next day some guy is selling it on Amazon under his name.

You champion people who work hard and make themselves rich, but without intellectual property J.K. Rowling, for example, wouldn't have been able to profit off of Harry Potter. The books would have been published by a hundred different publishers, and the movies would have been made without her getting a cent.

Edited September 17, 2011 by Argus