Vale Gough Whitlam
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Mugwump
Joined: 28 Jul 2007
Location: Between London and Melbourne
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| Pies4shaw wrote: | | On the other hand, I've paid the top marginal rate for about 30 years and, in my view, it should be much higher. |
Actually, if i'd earned top tax rate for thirty years they could probably tax the lot, for all I'd care, too. But many of those who get there, get there for rather fewer years and acquire a lot of grey hair in the process.
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Two more flags before I die!
Last edited by Mugwump on Thu Oct 30, 2014 8:21 am; edited 1 time in total |
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think positive 
Side By Side
Joined: 30 Jun 2005
Location: somewhere
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| Pies4shaw wrote: | | On the other hand, I've paid the top marginal rate for about 30 years and, in my view, it should be much higher. |
Well I don't think anyone will complain if you donate the surplus you don't think your entitled too!
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You cant fix stupid, turns out you cant quarantine it either! |
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think positive
Side By Side
Joined: 30 Jun 2005
Location: somewhere
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| Mugwump wrote: | ^ David, taxes at the top marginal rate are ca 50%. I'm not sure how much more you'd like to raise them, but until you've actually built a business yourself, amd learned how hard it is to take that risk, make it work, keep it afloat on changing seas, meet a payroll.... Or until you've actually climbed the greasy workplace pole for enough years with enough distinction to pay that 50% tax rate, i'd be a little sceptical about the justice of taking it away from those that do.
The problem with the Left, I think, is the assumption that the people who earn good money somehow achieved it effortlessly and don't deserve it. In my experience, that is true of some (most real estate agents, lots of financial services and the general cartel called the medical profession spring to mind), but it's not true of many. I don't like what CEOs are paid, but I've seen the business world up close for long enough to know that very few people can do that job in a large company. A lot think they can, but funnily enough, that envious conviction is mostly proportional to the degree of ignorance about, and unsuitability for, the relentless pressures, self-control and skills that such a job entails.
As Margaret Thatcher (boo, hiss) once said - the trouble with socialists is that they always run out of other peoples' money.... |
That's a top post.
And I like your description of "the general cartel called the medical profession". Aside form, obviously the underpaid section of nurses and ambos, I agree totally. It's insidious. If they really wanted to defeat some of the most awful diseases and threats society faces right now, they would work together and just do it. It's mind boggling to me that we can chose a generic brand. Huh? Should there be a prettier packaged antibiotic? Is it added taste, added colour or do the cheap ones use sawdust as fillers? Having had the unfortunate luck to see a couple of the major threats from the wrong side, (not me, close relos) I'm pretty disenchanted. Is the battle for the next big drug about making the most money or actually getting a cure? When your so desperate for answers, you'll try anything, and it's oh so easy to be conned into spending lots of money to find it. That's the first thing, more important than anything else, we need to fix.just care about getting people healthy.
But that leads to the justice department. And drugs. The money made from narcotics. The damage done to addicts. But while tobacco and alcohol are still legal, it's hard to stop the rest. I won't get into the war on crime. I'm pretty hard line there! Do no harm to others, that's the number one commandment for me. And that includes the animal kingdom too. Anything that feels.
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You cant fix stupid, turns out you cant quarantine it either! |
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pietillidie
Joined: 07 Jan 2005
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| Mugwump wrote: | | The problem with the Left, I think, is the assumption that the people who earn good money somehow achieved it effortlessly and don't deserve it. In my experience, that is true of some (most real estate agents, lots of financial services and the general cartel called the medical profession spring to mind), but it's not true of many. I don't like what CEOs are paid, but I've seen the business world up close for long enough to know that very few people can do that job in a large company. A lot think they can, but funnily enough, that envious conviction is mostly proportional to the degree of ignorance about, and unsuitability for, the relentless pressures, self-control and skills that such a job entails. |
I mostly agree with that, but with quite a different emphasis. My biggest criticism of the far left has always been that it can't be taken seriously until it enters business, the basic task of tilling the field in modern society.
However, in my experience there are plenty of very successful business leaders who are centre-left or solidly left at heart. Far, far more highly talented people than advertise the fact for fear of the mafia-like bullying of Looney Big Wealth and their minions. Someone with excess, idle wealth and sufficient motivation can destroy everything another serious, productive businessperson has created in five minutes—without a hint of productive, competitive business involved.
As such, the right and Libertarians are every bit as null and void until they grow the knackers to deal with the pervasive, anti-competitive and permanently menacing reach of massive, idle wealth. Until they do that instead of winning elections by sacrificing the powerless and minorities, they're a fraudulent, despicable joke.
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In the end the rain comes down, washes clean the streets of a blue sky town.
Help Nick's: http://www.magpies.net/nick/bb/fundraising.htm |
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David
I dare you to try
Joined: 27 Jul 2003
Location: Andromeda
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| Mugwump wrote: | ^ David, taxes at the top marginal rate are ca 50%. I'm not sure how much more you'd like to raise them, but until you've actually built a business yourself, amd learned how hard it is to take that risk, make it work, keep it afloat on changing seas, meet a payroll.... Or until you've actually climbed the greasy workplace pole for enough years with enough distinction to pay that 50% tax rate, i'd be a little sceptical about the justice of taking it away from those that do.
The problem with the Left, I think, is the assumption that the people who earn good money somehow achieved it effortlessly and don't deserve it. In my experience, that is true of some (most real estate agents, lots of financial services and the general cartel called the medical profession spring to mind), but it's not true of many. I don't like what CEOs are paid, but I've seen the business world up close for long enough to know that very few people can do that job in a large company. A lot think they can, but funnily enough, that envious conviction is mostly proportional to the degree of ignorance about, and unsuitability for, the relentless pressures, self-control and skills that such a job entails.
As Margaret Thatcher (boo, hiss) once said - the trouble with socialists is that they always run out of other peoples' money.... |
I reckon some of the bigger earners in our society could be taxed 75% plus and still enjoy a ridiculously comfortable lifestyle. Thatcher's quote is about a system that doesn't provide any incentives and thus has little to no productivity. Nobody's suggesting that.
_________________
All watched over by machines of loving grace |
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think positive
Side By Side
Joined: 30 Jun 2005
Location: somewhere
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| David wrote: | | Mugwump wrote: | ^ David, taxes at the top marginal rate are ca 50%. I'm not sure how much more you'd like to raise them, but until you've actually built a business yourself, amd learned how hard it is to take that risk, make it work, keep it afloat on changing seas, meet a payroll.... Or until you've actually climbed the greasy workplace pole for enough years with enough distinction to pay that 50% tax rate, i'd be a little sceptical about the justice of taking it away from those that do.
The problem with the Left, I think, is the assumption that the people who earn good money somehow achieved it effortlessly and don't deserve it. In my experience, that is true of some (most real estate agents, lots of financial services and the general cartel called the medical profession spring to mind), but it's not true of many. I don't like what CEOs are paid, but I've seen the business world up close for long enough to know that very few people can do that job in a large company. A lot think they can, but funnily enough, that envious conviction is mostly proportional to the degree of ignorance about, and unsuitability for, the relentless pressures, self-control and skills that such a job entails.
As Margaret Thatcher (boo, hiss) once said - the trouble with socialists is that they always run out of other peoples' money.... |
I reckon some of the bigger earners in our society could be taxed 75% plus and still enjoy a ridiculously comfortable lifestyle. Thatcher's quote is about a system that doesn't provide any incentives and thus has little to no productivity. Nobody's suggesting that. |
Hahahaha so why work your butt off for 25%? Your asking for offshore investment and tax havens, and I don't bloody blame em one bit!
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You cant fix stupid, turns out you cant quarantine it either! |
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HAL
Please don't shout at me - I can't help it.
Joined: 17 Mar 2003
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| Impressive. |
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David
I dare you to try
Joined: 27 Jul 2003
Location: Andromeda
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Once again, they can only operate on the playing field they've been given, but cheats and law-breakers should face the consequences.
Using offshore tax havens should of course be illegal. Those who do should be treated as common thieves, because that's what they are at the end of the day.
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All watched over by machines of loving grace |
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Wokko 
Come and take it.
Joined: 04 Oct 2005
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| David wrote: | Once again, they can only operate on the playing field they've been given, but cheats and law-breakers should face the consequences.
Using offshore tax havens should of course be illegal. Those who do should be treated as common thieves, because that's what they are at the end of the day. |
The only thief is the State trying to take 75% of someone's earnings that they worked for to give to someone else who didn't. How exactly do you make it a crime to emigrate? Sounds like the Soviet Union to me. |
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think positive
Side By Side
Joined: 30 Jun 2005
Location: somewhere
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| Wokko wrote: | | David wrote: | Once again, they can only operate on the playing field they've been given, but cheats and law-breakers should face the consequences.
Using offshore tax havens should of course be illegal. Those who do should be treated as common thieves, because that's what they are at the end of the day. |
The only thief is the State trying to take 75% of someone's earnings that they worked for to give to someone else who didn't. How exactly do you make it a crime to emigrate? Sounds like the Soviet Union to me. |
Clap clap clap
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You cant fix stupid, turns out you cant quarantine it either! |
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HAL
Please don't shout at me - I can't help it.
Joined: 17 Mar 2003
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| How long have you been using offshore tax havens should be illegal ? |
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Mugwump
Joined: 28 Jul 2007
Location: Between London and Melbourne
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| David wrote: | Once again, they can only operate on the playing field they've been given, but cheats and law-breakers should face the consequences.
Using offshore tax havens should of course be illegal. Those who do should be treated as common thieves, because that's what they are at the end of the day. |
Oh, Lord. Firstly, your thinking is rather out of date in a globalised world. Hiding money away in Lichtenstein or Switzerland is not necessary, when you can live in vibrant and/or interesting countries ranging from New Zealand to Singapore to the US, Uk or Dubai or even the Netherlands - all of which will welcome you with advantaged rates and citizenship if you have enough capital - and pay rates that are more like 0%- 30%. When you leave Australia, you take your wealth, the jobs that go with it, and the entire tax base than the Treasury would have received before it got too greedy. Britain tried this in the sixties and Seventies, and by 1976 it was shambling to the IMF for a bail out.
France tried it recently, and it's enjoying unemployment at 12%.
Secondly, you have introduced a state where someone who has already given you perhaps 40% in every dollar is suddenly a thief because they try to keep more than 25% of the value of their incremental labour. I would welcome that kind of common thief in my house.
Thirdly, you have set the state up as an oppressor, somehow justified in forcibly appropriating 75% (hey, why not 90%?) of each extra working week past a certain point, simply because the state can amd a majority want things that they do not propose to pay for with their own momey. That is indeed, to quote a famous book, the Road to Serfdom, and a condition that no nation of proud and free people should tolerate.
This is the basic problem with "deep Socialism". It starts with benign - perhaps even the best - intentions, and it ends with the police state, barriers to migration, lower overall wealth and happiness, and Commissars in the vast state who access others creativity and work to spend as they see best. One of history's little jokes, I guess.
_________________
Two more flags before I die!
Last edited by Mugwump on Thu Oct 30, 2014 6:53 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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stui magpie 
Prepare for the worst, hope for the best.
Joined: 03 May 2005
Location: In flagrante delicto
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| David wrote: | | Mugwump wrote: | ^ David, taxes at the top marginal rate are ca 50%. I'm not sure how much more you'd like to raise them, but until you've actually built a business yourself, amd learned how hard it is to take that risk, make it work, keep it afloat on changing seas, meet a payroll.... Or until you've actually climbed the greasy workplace pole for enough years with enough distinction to pay that 50% tax rate, i'd be a little sceptical about the justice of taking it away from those that do.
The problem with the Left, I think, is the assumption that the people who earn good money somehow achieved it effortlessly and don't deserve it. In my experience, that is true of some (most real estate agents, lots of financial services and the general cartel called the medical profession spring to mind), but it's not true of many. I don't like what CEOs are paid, but I've seen the business world up close for long enough to know that very few people can do that job in a large company. A lot think they can, but funnily enough, that envious conviction is mostly proportional to the degree of ignorance about, and unsuitability for, the relentless pressures, self-control and skills that such a job entails.
As Margaret Thatcher (boo, hiss) once said - the trouble with socialists is that they always run out of other peoples' money.... |
I reckon some of the bigger earners in our society could be taxed 75% plus and still enjoy a ridiculously comfortable lifestyle. Thatcher's quote is about a system that doesn't provide any incentives and thus has little to no productivity. Nobody's suggesting that. |
You're suggesting taxing people at 75% and you don't think that's not providing an incentive an actually providing a massive disincentive? WOW.  What colour is the sky on your planet?
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Every dead body on Mt Everest was once a highly motivated person, so maybe just calm the **** down. |
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David
I dare you to try
Joined: 27 Jul 2003
Location: Andromeda
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Mugwump, I agree that the existence of wildly disparate national taxation systems makes it very hard to institute a progressive tax without simply losing the greedier multimillionaires and their businesses. That doesn't mean that steep progressive tax systems are an inherently bad thing, however; it just means that these changes perhaps need to occur slowly so as not to scare people away. Tough, of course, when most countries (like ours) constantly oscillate between reformist and reactionary governments.
Stui, the maths seems simple to me: let's say you pay 60% tax on x amount of income, but you pay 70% if you earn twice as much. Are you seriously suggesting there's no financial incentive to get to the higher tax bracket? Even if your sole concern in life was money, it'd be a no-brainer. Beyond the psychological discomfort of "the government's taking more than half of my money", it's effectively the same principle as any progressive tax system like Australia's: whatever happens, more productivity leads to a substantially higher net income. Who loses, exactly?
What rate is too high? Well, let's put it this way: if you've run out of imaginable ways to spend your money, you can probably afford to pay a bit more in tax. I have absolutely no doubt that Gina Rinehart could pay 90%+ tax and not experience any drop in quality of life whatsoever.
In principle, it seems like sensible policy to me. Of course, if traitors like Gerard Depardieu want to scurry off to Russia and pay a pittance in tax, then there's not much a government can do about it. But let's get this straight: you want to move your business to Liechtenstein, you do your business in Liechtenstein. The way most off-shore tax havens are used is an obvious rort of the system, and I can't believe any of you would endorse such practices.
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All watched over by machines of loving grace |
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think positive
Side By Side
Joined: 30 Jun 2005
Location: somewhere
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Wait til they taking a fair chunk of your hard earned, then we will see what you think. As for Gina, bloody good on her! How about you stick someone else's name in for a change? Or is it a female thing! It's ok in a man, not a woman?
Right now you get assistance. Wait til your watching your taxes get spent in ways you don't like. The. You can talk.
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You cant fix stupid, turns out you cant quarantine it either! |
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