"If You’ve Got A Business — You Didn’t Build That"

[punked]

Yet they account for 1/3 of the tax revenue and provide jobs, investments, product, and services which have done far more to improve the wealth and well being of our society than the government could possibly do. I'd say at contributing is it not?

They pay less according to the tax code, but before raegan simplified the tax code, there were more loopholes than there are now.

I don't even think Obama has suggested going back to the FDR/Eisenhower tax code where the 1% pay 90% of their income in taxes. I think he has just said lets go back to the Clinton tax structure. Sooo......

[punked]

Would that be during the 1800s when the USA turned into a superpower. That time was very successful

I believe March of 1950 would be the fastest growing the US economy did which was something like 17%. Taxes were 90% on the top income earners then so....

BTW this does not change what Obama actually said and that even though few in their thread will admit it they agree with what Obama said.

Edited July 20, 2012 by punked

[blueblood]

I believe March of 1950 would be the fastest growing the US economy did which was something like 17%. Taxes were 90% on the top income earners then so....

I believe that there were enough loopholes in the tax code that nobody was paying 90% of their income in tax. If you think that all those rich people would work for 10 cents on the dollar and not raise a stink about it your dreaming. Let's bust that myth right there.

As for fastest growing USA economy that would be the 1880s

My link

In the page it explicitly states that the 1880s were the fasted period of growth.

[blueblood]

I don't even think Obama has suggested going back to the FDR/Eisenhower tax code where the 1% pay 90% of their income in taxes. I think he has just said lets go back to the Clinton tax structure. Sooo......

That's still not good enough, the world is a far richer place tha. It was 20 yrs ago, there are more options for rich Americans to do business and unfortunately they're learning that lesson the hard way.

[Shady]

In Obama's America you don't even get credit for your own personal success anymore. It's all the government's doing. The individuals that actually put the work in apparently have little to do with it. All because roads and bridges exist. It's laughable.

[blueblood]

Are they hurting for money? What's the beef? The US has a huge deficit - need to raise taxes to pay it off. That includes raising them on the middle class. There's no way you can cut enough to make up that defict. Not if you want a country left, and especially that expensive military your 1 percenters seem to feel they need.

If you want to be the big dog on the street you have to back it up. Would you work for 30 cents on the dollar? Why should he rich? What's to stop them saying screw you guys I'll take my money elsewhere? The way to pay off that huge deficit is to slash spending and provide an environment for the business class to do business in. The USA is already partly there by scaling down their military adventures. Pillaging the top 1% does nothing but engage in class warfare and sca re away investment. The big bulky portion of Americans who don't pay anything would raise far more revenue in the long run then playing robin hood

[Michael Hardner]

If you want to be the big dog on the street you have to back it up. Would you work for 30 cents on the dollar? Why should he rich? What's to stop them saying screw you guys I'll take my money elsewhere? The way to pay off that huge deficit is to slash spending and provide an environment for the business class to do business in. The USA is already partly there by scaling down their military adventures. Pillaging the top 1% does nothing but engage in class warfare and sca re away investment.

I like the way you're putting it here. Basically, there's no fairness or honour - it's just a numbers game. I agree.

The lowest classes will soon realize this too, and we'll be back to the 1930s in terms of punitive taxes on the wealthy. They can always move if they don't like it - provided they pay the heavy tax for offshoring money...

[blueblood]

I like the way you're putting it here. Basically, there's no fairness or honour - it's just a numbers game. I agree.

The lowest classes will soon realize this too, and we'll be back to the 1930s in terms of punitive taxes on the wealthy. They can always move if they don't like it - provided they pay the heavy tax for offshoring money...

And what would happen if they said screw you guys I'm moving to bermuda, Dubai, Luxembourg, Malaysia, etc. No future tax money. Who's to say they'll pay it, they'll have their high price lawyers set to stun and it would be akin to a bankruptcy negotiation to creditors.

The main worry is if you put punitive taxes on the wealthy, what's to stop them from punishing everyone else. What's wrong with somebody becoming rich? Is it a problem when person a makes x money and person b makes x+y money? Both are still making money. I think a bigger problem is govt trying to fix economic corrections by printing money and essentially screwing person a over because his money is worthless and since person b has more is a bit more flexibility.

Edited July 20, 2012 by blueblood

[Canuckistani]

And what would happen if they said screw you guys I'm moving to bermuda, Dubai, Luxembourg, Malaysia, etc.

Good luck doing business in Bermuda. The IRS is already getting tough with tax evaders.

[blueblood]

Good luck doing business in Bermuda. The IRS is already getting tough with tax evaders.

And china, brazil, mexico, Malaysia, thailand, Vietnam, Argentina, chile, australia, etc. Are benefitting from the increased cost of business in the USA. Just set the lawyer to stun and the IRS will take a settlement.

[punked]

I just want to point out there is absolutely no proof that when taxes are raised slightly that any significant number of people go full on John Gault. Just saying.

[blueblood]

I just want to point out there is absolutely no proof that when taxes are raised slightly that any significant number of people go full on John Gault. Just saying.

Ah but in a way they are, why is so much money being invested overseas in emerging markets rather than in the USA?

When the cost of business gets too high, business looks elsewhere to operate. Money follows the least path of resistance.

[punked]

Ah but in a way they are, why is so much money being invested overseas in emerging markets rather than in the USA?

When the cost of business gets too high, business looks elsewhere to operate. Money follows the least path of resistance.

Taxes a very small piece of that pie and you know it. Most of it has to do with high labour costs and if Mitt Romney wants to run on every American needs to take a 50% pay cut maybe he could do something about that money going to over seas market. My bet is he wouldn't win that election nor should he. Maybe the American empire is falling but its middle class should not let it happen with out a fight or with out trying a different way.

[Shady]

I wonder if Obama will take some credit for the Colorado shooter. After all, he used a government road to get to the movie theatre.

[kimmy]

If Obama is to be criticized for anything here, it ought to be plagiarism. What he said is more or less a cut-and-paste of something Elizabeth Warren said last September.

As for the merits of the statement, it's bang on.

If you got rich in North America, you owe some thanks to the terrific environment that has been provided for you to operate in-- and that includes everything from roads and infrastructure to an educated work-force to consumers who can afford to buy your products. If "the right" really had a case, they wouldn't be trying to pass off this 12-second snippet as representing Obama's views. You'd have thought people might have learned something after that Shirley Sherrod fiasco, but apparently not.

-k

[cybercoma]

In Obama's America you don't even get credit for your own personal success anymore. It's all the government's doing. The individuals that actually put the work in apparently have little to do with it. All because roads and bridges exist. It's laughable.

Who is "the government"?

[Canuckistani]

If Obama is to be criticized for anything here, it ought to be plagiarism. What he said is more or less a cut-and-paste of something Elizabeth Warren said last September.

As for the merits of the statement, it's bang on.

If you got rich in North America, you owe some thanks to the terrific environment that has been provided for you to operate in-- and that includes everything from roads and infrastructure to an educated work-force to consumers who can afford to buy your products. If "the right" really had a case, they wouldn't be trying to pass off this 12-second snippet as representing Obama's views. You'd have thought people might have learned something after that Shirley Sherrod fiasco, but apparently not.

-k

look at the comment just above yours

[Shady]

As for the merits of the statement, it's bang on.

If you got rich in North America, you owe some thanks to the terrific environment that has been provided for you to operate in-- and that includes everything from roads and infrastructure to an educated work-force to consumers who can afford to buy your products.

The merits of his statement are ridiculous. People that create, work hard, and make their businesses successful deserve the majority of the credit. Besides, it's those people that pay the majority of taxes for said roads, education, etc. In Obama's America, you don't even own your own success. You have to give praise to the government.

[cybercoma]

The merits of his statement are ridiculous. People that create, work hard, and make their businesses successful deserve the majority of the credit. Besides, it's those people that pay the majority of taxes for said roads, education, etc. In Obama's America, you don't even own your own success. You have to give praise to the government.

You think those people that create and work hard would be able to make their businesses successful if they were forced to do so in North Korea, Somalia, or Afghanistan?

Good thing you temper your criticism by saying "the majority of the credit" because you would look foolish saying "all."

[Canuckistani]

The merits of his statement are ridiculous. People that create, work hard, and make their businesses successful deserve the majority of the credit. Besides, it's those people that pay the majority of taxes for said roads, education, etc. In Obama's America, you don't even own your own success. You have to give praise to the government.

they deserve the majority of the profits and they get the majority of the profits. But Obama's comments are a good reminder that nobody does it alone. I would suggest before the rich start giving praise to the govt, they could just try bitching a little less about how hard done by they are.

[August1991]

The last 10 years have seen the biggest reduction in global poverty that the world has ever seen:

http://yaleglobal.yale.edu/content/little-notice-globalization-reduced-poverty

The fact is the people in developed countries lived privileged life for the last 50 years because they alone had access to modern technology and the productivity improvements that go with it. This is no longer true. The developed world is going to have to share that wealth with the rest of the world and the way this sharing will take place will be in reduced incomes for people in the developed world.

I both agree, and disagree.

First, the incomes of poor families in rich western countries have increased in the past few decades, they just have not increased (apparently) as much as rich families. IOW, while poor (Western) families are generally better off, rich (Western) families have gained (apparently) more and so the divide (in the West) is greater.

Second, hundreds of millions of people, billions in fact around the world, are now better off than thirty years ago. In China, India, elsewhere in Asia and even Africa, people/families live better lives. The word "famine" has become another word like "smallpox"; once scourge, now a footnote.

Third, and my key point, if your neighbour finds a better/faster way to drive to work in the morning, how does that harm you? If someone in China discovers a better way to accomplish his daily tasks, is that good or bad for someone in the West?

-----

TimG, if people in China find a better way to do things, their discovery does not mean less for us. Life, the universe, is not a zero sum game.

Edited July 21, 2012 by August1991

[August1991]

If you got rich in North America, you owe some thanks to the terrific environment that has been provided for you to operate in-- and that includes everything from roads and infrastructure to an educated work-force to consumers who can afford to buy your products.

But Kimmy, what made this "terrific environment that has been provided to you" (as you put it)?

The US federal government? The White House?

Kimmy, you know as well as I do (if Obama does not) that what makes America great is the absence of government. Individual Americans made and make America.

Sure, Americans are all in this together, but Americans make their society their own way. For starters, it's a federal State with a Tenth amendment. America is about limiting cartels, ensuring centralized power does not hold sway.

Or Gary Cooper riding into town.

[As to Canada (since you refer to North America), I'll simply note that we were fortunate to live aside such an experiment while, in the same breath, reminding Americans that they have been fortunate to have us as neighbours.]

If Obama is to be criticized for anything here, it ought to be plagiarism. What he said is more or less a cut-and-paste of something Elizabeth Warren said last September.

I can't vouch for the veracity of the Elizabeth Warren quote, but if I were Obama I would hardly want her as a source. First, she lies. Second, on such a fundamental point, surely Obama could have a more original source. Edited July 21, 2012 by August1991

[blueblood]

Taxes a very small piece of that pie and you know it. Most of it has to do with high labour costs and if Mitt Romney wants to run on every American needs to take a 50% pay cut maybe he could do something about that money going to over seas market. My bet is he wouldn't win that election nor should he. Maybe the American empire is falling but its middle class should not let it happen with out a fight or with out trying a different way.

Except it's not a small piece of the pie, it's a sizable piece, the same as high labour costs and excessive regulations. The American empire isn't falling, it's echoing what happened to England around a hundred years ago. Get ready for stagnation. Unfortunately the Americans have to decide if the path they are on is working for them, I'd say no. Simplifying the tax code slashing regulations and have a set in stone govt policy about the economy would be a great start.

The way of big govt from both republicans and democrats hasn't worked. I think unfortunately the middle class of the USA is going to have to wait until the BRIC countries get their middle class going and buying their own products. That takes time.

[bush_cheney2004]

.... Unfortunately the Americans have to decide if the path they are on is working for them, I'd say no. Simplifying the tax code slashing regulations and have a set in stone govt policy about the economy would be a great start.

That's a tough sell, because America's rise to economic dominance parallels the growth in such regulation and tax code complexity/policy objectives.

The way of big govt from both republicans and democrats hasn't worked. I think unfortunately the middle class of the USA is going to have to wait until the BRIC countries get their middle class going and buying their own products. That takes time.

"Has not worked" is relative...clearly it has worked for a very long time.

[blueblood]

That's a tough sell, because America's rise to economic dominance parallels the growth in such regulation and tax code complexity/policy objectives.

"Has not worked" is relative...clearly it has worked for a very long time.

So has china and all the BRIC countries growth. Too much regulation and tricky tax code plus high labour equals bye bye money. It's a thing a lot of north Americans are ignorant of.

What worked for an extremely longer time was limited govt, competitive wages, and few regulations during the 17 and 1800s when the USA began to leave the UK in the dust. The innovations that happened today were built on that foundation.