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EdwardT
Trad climber
Retired
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Jan 23, 2019 - 06:48am PT
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Meanwhile the poorest are becoming increasingly worse off, and the wealth of the middle class has dwindled as well.
Global poverty has steadily declined for the last 35 years.
Global poverty has fallen to a record low. The World Bank says 10 percent of the world’s population lived on less than $1.90 a day in 2015, down from 11.2 percent in 2013. That means 735.9 million people lived below the poverty threshold in 2015, down from 804.2 million.
Poverty dropped everywhere but the Middle East and North Africa, where conflicts in Syria and Yemen pushed the poverty rate up to 5 percent in 2015 from 2.6 percent in 2013.
The poverty rate was 41.1 percent in Sub-Saharan Africa, 12.4 percent in South Asia, 4.1 percent in Latin America and the Caribbean, 2.3 percent in East Asia and the Pacific and 1.5 percent in Europe and Central Asia.
Regarding the middle class. Ours is declining. But it's more than offset in the emerging economies..
And then there's the wealthy. If you make $32,400 per year, you're in the top one percent of earners.
Do you feel wealthy?
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BASE104
Social climber
An Oil Field
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Jan 23, 2019 - 07:37am PT
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In my occupation as an exploration geologist, owning my own company as generally a one man shop, I enjoy certain things. One of them is seeing up to 3 million dollars of work going on as I watch a well getting drilled. That happens even if it is a dry hole. It puts a ton of guys to work based on an idea that occurred to me as I mapped away.
If I am successful, the partners and mineral owners can make money for decades. It isn’t easy. I worked and learned for 4 years before I drilled and hit my first well. It still produces.
That is like creating wealth out of thin air.
Many super wealthy people inherited their money. They simply won the vaginal lottery. There are a ton of such people in my industry. Consider the Walton or Koch family. It is much easier to make money when you begin the game at the top of the ladder.
If you think that wealth inequality of this scale is bad or unfair, the only answer is a radical estate tax.
We do not share equal opportunity. Anyone who says that is lying.
It is like playing a permanent game of monopoly. No one needs more than a few million dollars.
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clockclimb
Trad climber
Orem, Utah
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Jan 23, 2019 - 08:41am PT
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This thread has fascinating input from all sides. I usually skip out early on political threads since they usually devolve into personal attacks.
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stevep
Boulder climber
Salt Lake, UT
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Jan 23, 2019 - 08:45am PT
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The top 1% and particularly the top .1% have done much better than everyone else in the US in recent decades.
CEO pay has increased as a multiple of average worker pay over the same time.
I'm sure that those of you who own your own businesses have worked very hard to get to where you are. And you deserve to reap the rewards of that.
But you're smoking some newly legal weed if you think that all that growth in the wealth of the top .1% and the CEOs is due to all of those people working that much harder.
A lot more is due to the system being rigged for them. The traditional argument on the conservative side has been that if we make those folks more wealthy by cutting their taxes, then the benefits would trickle down to everyone else. But that isn't happening, or at least it's not trickling down to the US(maybe you could argue it is to China and India).
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Reilly
Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
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Jan 23, 2019 - 08:47am PT
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If you make $32,400 per year, you're in the top one percent of earners. Do you feel wealthy?
I would if I made that in Swaziland.
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Burnin' Oil
Trad climber
CA
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Jan 23, 2019 - 12:04pm PT
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Thank you NutAgain and MB1 for your thoughtful posts.
Is there a correlation between the wealth of the 26 people and the poverty of the poorest half of the population? If those 26 had less, or even nothing, would the poorest half have more?
I do not understand the desire to take from others. Why is there an impulse to "tax" those who are perceived by some to have "too much?" Would taking all of Bezos's wealth improve the lot of the poor? If the Gates Foundation shut down and gave its assets to the government, what would the net effect on the poor be?
The issue (at least for me) is not whether we should help those less fortunate,but what is the most efficient way to do so? The US government is inefficient and incompetent in so many respects I don't see confiscating wealth as an effective tool.
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Splater
climber
Grey Matter
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Jan 23, 2019 - 12:43pm PT
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"I don't see confiscating wealth as an effective tool."
Why is it more effective that Warren Buffet's employees are in a far higher total tax bracket than he is?
Why is it more effective that hedge fund billionaires are able to pay tax on commissions that is treated as a long term capital gain?
Why are real estate profits not taxed if they are sheltered in a swap?
Why does Social Security tax not apply to all income?
Why was donny trump allowed to write off $900 million in fake losses in one year alone? Why was he allowed to continue claiming fake losses for years?
Why is it better to tax working citizens to pay for government than to tax heirs like the Waltons?
Why is Dick Cheney rich?
Why is it better to pay for tax cuts for the rich by increasing the federal deficit?
Why was quantitative easing used to shore up the rich by paying them far more for debt assets than the commercial market value?
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Burnin' Oil
Trad climber
CA
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Jan 23, 2019 - 01:30pm PT
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DMT, from whom did Bezos or Gates take?
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Lituya
Mountain climber
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Jan 23, 2019 - 02:58pm PT
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The level of economic illiteracy here is disappointing. Apparently the UC system is achieving its mission.
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Burnin' Oil
Trad climber
CA
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Jan 23, 2019 - 03:24pm PT
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Thanks, DMT. I see things a bit differently, particularly regarding the estate tax. I am still noodling through how confiscatory taxing of the rich will help the poor. Perhaps indirectly but certainly not efficiently.
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HermitMaster
Social climber
my abode
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Jan 23, 2019 - 03:29pm PT
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madbolter1
Big Wall climber
Denver, CO
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Jan 23, 2019 - 04:56pm PT
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we could adequately feed cloth shelter educate and doctor EVERYONE and we will STILL have poor among us
If you admit that point, then you're DONE. See, the POINT is that you'll ALWAYS have a class that is "below the bar," no matter where you set the bar.
And Christ was NOT advocating: "STEAL from the middle-class and the 'wealthy,' so that by force of arms you 'redistribute' on a completely arbitrary basis to the class that will NEVER have enough to be 'equal.'"
Christ was advocating that we all, INDIVIDUALLY, identify the WORTHY poor and do what we feel impressed to do INDIVIDUALLY to help such people. See, morality is INDIVIDUAL and by CHOICE, not forced! That's by definition. So, you have exactly ZERO "moral" argument to make to justify the welfare state.
Moreover, the "poor" in this nation are better off than the VASTTTTT majority of people who have EVER lived on this planet, and that includes now.
No matter where we set the bar, you will ALWAYS be making the same, lame argument, and no matter how HIGH you elevate "the poor," they will STILL be below the curve. And the VAST majority of them will always do better if they work hard rather than to settle into the "why bother" mindset.
My trucker friend, Will, was doing GREAT with his (about) 100 IQ. He found his niche, and he WORKED it with excellence. And his excellence was well-rewarded. That's how it WORKS in the USA, and even better today than in the 60's and 70's. Almost everybody could be where the middle class is today, with very, very few exceptions.
And you don't make national policy over a few exceptions. That, particularly, is the role of the states or even cities.
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madbolter1
Big Wall climber
Denver, CO
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Jan 23, 2019 - 05:39pm PT
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I said that Christ was prescient on this point, and, thus far, totally accurate in his prediction about the poor. You effectively agree with the point, and that's because by definition "the poor" are those below whatever arbitrary bar you set.
Moreover, your graphic (thanks for that!) is NOT a deception. It is precisely accurate, and it's been demonstrated to be accurate wherever socialism has been tried.
But this talk of individuals is missing the OP. The OP is about a fairly narrow range of "redistribution of wealth," namely: Beyond some arbitrary level of wealth/income, "we" (some mob of us) are (somehow) "justified" to just "take" (read: steal) some (arbitrary) amount of wealth/income, so that "the poor" (always and necessarily defined in some arbitrary way) can "benefit" (yet, while still remaining "poor") from what they "fairly" (whatever that means) "ought" (whatever that means) to have.
So, let's stay focused on the above paragraph and see if we can (or can't) define some of those free-floating terms.
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Fritz
Social climber
Choss Creek, ID
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Jan 23, 2019 - 06:17pm PT
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Wow! So much sympathy for those poor, poor, rich people & the big income taxes they pay.
It makes me feel bad, sad, & guilty as hell, that I'd enjoy seeing the rich taxed at a higher % rate than present.
But that aside, think how the American rich suffered from 1950 - 1963, when the top income tax bracket was 91%.
And from 1965 to 1981, when the top income tax bracket was 70% to 77%!
Most of the top earners must have quit working during those dark tax years, or moved to other lower-tax countries.
One question?
How did America pay down much of the huge public debt from WWII, fight the Cold War & Vietnam, build the Interstate Highway System, & enjoy what I remember as the good-times of the 1950's & 60's, despite various recessions along the way?
Really! How did they manage that with such onerous high tax rates?
And of course, the financial stimulus given by the multiple income tax reductions since 1981, seem to have been very successful in growing America’s budget deficit.
Right?
But think of how much more disposable income the rich now have, to give to charity.
If they want.
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rottingjohnny
Sport climber
Sands Motel , Las Vegas
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Jan 23, 2019 - 06:35pm PT
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I know a lot of younger people working 2 to 3 jobs and working 7 days a week for large corporations and barely scratching out an existence....This is Ronny Raygun's wet dream come to fruition...Shame on you apologist for predatory capitalism....May you rot in the cesspool of greed you've created...
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madbolter1
Big Wall climber
Denver, CO
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Jan 23, 2019 - 06:36pm PT
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Ah, so much venom from the left. So many generalizations.
But none of it amounts to a principled account of "what" you're really seeking to accomplish with your theft.
I'll ask a question that I already know will only be answered in vague generalities, coupled, of course, with all sorts of vague epithets about anybody disagreeing being a "selfish bastard" and some such. But, for entertainment purposes, here it is....
EXACTLY what counts as a "win" for your perspective? Another way to ask it is: EXACTLY when has your perspective "succeeded"?
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rottingjohnny
Sport climber
Sands Motel , Las Vegas
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Jan 23, 2019 - 07:00pm PT
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FYI...your money owns you not the other way around and theft works both ways...Not necessarily directed at you...
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rottingjohnny
Sport climber
Sands Motel , Las Vegas
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Jan 23, 2019 - 07:34pm PT
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Brennan....I owe you another drink...
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Fritz
Social climber
Choss Creek, ID
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Jan 23, 2019 - 07:39pm PT
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MB1? Per your question about what those who want higher taxes on the rich, wish to achieve.
I'd like to take all those lowered taxes that supposedly provide the rich with "Financial Stimulas," & raise the top tax bracket to around 50%, to start paying down our National Debt.
Since you ignored my question in my last post, let me share it again:
Wow! So much sympathy for those poor, poor, rich people & the big income taxes they pay.
It makes me feel bad, sad, & guilty as hell, that I'd enjoy seeing the rich taxed at a higher % rate than present.
But that aside, think how the American rich suffered from 1950 - 1963, when the top income tax bracket was 91%.
And from 1965 to 1981, when the top income tax bracket was 70% to 77%!
Most of the top earners must have quit working during those dark tax years, or moved to other lower-tax countries.
One question?
How did America pay down much of the huge public debt from WWII, fight the Cold War & Vietnam, build the Interstate Highway System, & enjoy what I remember as the good-times of the 1950's & 60's, despite various recessions along the way?
Really! How did they manage that with such onerous high tax rates?
And of course, the financial stimulus given by the multiple income tax reductions since 1981, seem to have been very successful in growing America’s budget deficit.
Right?
But think of how much more disposable income the rich now have, to give to charity.
If they want.
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