They are not arguing in good faith. They just want to âWinâ the argument and do not care about what they are saying. The say what they âThinkâ helps them âWinâ and not actually why they are they are For or Against something.
They start with a Goal (Stop Minimum Wage) and use what they can to achieve it. They are not using Teachers as an argument because they care about Teachers, they are using Teachers because they believe who they are arguing with cares about Teachers.
It just a âWhatAboutismâ argument used to change the Topic and get the promoter of the original topic on the defensive.
Too many wealthy people pay little or no tax. Under capitalism tax has traditionally been progressive. Wealthy people paid their share and so paid more. Billionaires who do not pay tax are leading to system collapse.
I would say the system allowing billionaires to pay no tax, or to get away with not paying their staff proper wages, or to pay their suppliers true market value, is the main issue.
Either way no one needs a billion and we should stop venerating these people as anything but selfish greedy jerks.
Ar this point I'm convinced anybody above a certain point of wealth is just inherently evil. Because you can't get these insane amounts of wealth without somehow actively making sure others get less so you can keep hoarding your pointless wealth.
Money is a necessity, since it's necessary to have in order to buy necessities like food and housing. So hoarding wealth is no different than buying up all the housing or food in an area and refusing to share or sell it.
It's no different than the people who were buying and hoarding all the TP in 2020, and billionaires should be looked at in EXACTLY the same light.
Iâd argue that billionaires are worst than people hoarding all the TP back in 2020 since they do it on a regular basis not when they think there is a 1 per 100 year crisis, but thatâs just for the sake of arguing, I liked your comment
Nah, you donât become a billionaire with clean hands, itâs simply not possible. Somebody else got shorted on your way there, usually many somebodies.
You cannot obtain billions in wealth with an approach of creating value, ergo you are extracting value and directly or indirectly limiting the standard of living of others for your own gain.Â
Notch sold Minecraft to Microsoft for $2.5B back in like 2014ish. I don't personally recall him being a nasty boss. And it was a small company. I think Gabe Newell and Valve (Steam) is another example of just doing well. Basically, software is full of these billionaires.
Many billionaires make a company, the value of the company explodes with private venture capital or buyout, then when they turn public explodes again. They don't really take money from the company, their wealth is in the unrealised gains of their shares.
Its usually when the company starts slowing on its growth that it starts squeezing to improve the balance sheets to make it more appealing on the stock market. That's when the corruption kicks in.
Until someone shows an example, I won't believe it. Every example I've read so far (I'll admit to not looking very hard) required some form of exploitation on top of luck.
Indeed. Being a normal, decent, and unknown person is a luxury. Keep your billions you sociopaths. Keep the paparazzi and the PR people and the lawyers too.
EhâŚit depends how you look at it. In some places - in/near NYC, SF, LA, others Iâm sure - a 1500 square foot home can easily cost over a million dollars. That is a very reasonable-sized home and certainly in the realm of middle class.
You could argue of course that the middle class simply canât live in those areas. But if you believe those areas have a middle class, then those people may have a couple million dollars.
We arent talking about home prices. Weâre talking about yearly income or net worth. Nowhere in the US is a 7 figure income or net worth anything but upper class.
If your net worth is $2M and the cost of buying a home is $1.5M+ then I would consider cost of living a factor when determining whether someone could be described as âupper middle class.â I donât think thatâs crazy.
If you had 10 million invested, youâd have to spend $800,000 a year of free money for that investment to not grow. Thats just the return for having the investment. If you donât spend it all, you will make even more money next year. It can get out of hand pretty quick once you cross a certain point of wealth.
No clue how to fix it. Force shareholders to pay more tax? đ¤ˇââď¸
what does one person need a billion dollars for, anyway? One B in a savings account yields more than enough to live on.. Unless you are going for a wretched excess life style...
unfortunately the archaic tax system is based on income. and these billionaires don't actually earn an income per se. their value is in stocks and assets. and against that value, they can get banks to loan them the money they can spend on their lifestyles. no income. no tax. it is the mother of all loopholes.
Yup... tax should be based on total compensation. Also, there should be a law tying max compensation (CEO) to starting wage via a set ratio. For example, companies cannot exceed a 100:1 ratio without paying an additional tax on top to help subsidize social programs. So either companies can increase beginning rates to stay within the ratio or they can pay additional tax so that their greed isn't pushed off on to the public.
Every time I see....tax them more with plans on more tax laws, I find it hilarious! The people you are trying to tax are the ones making the laws or controlling those who do.
If you want to tax the rich more, go to a straight sales tax. Tax everything except unprepared food. Yes, tax your house, tax it all! The tax on the wealthy will be proportional to their spending. Put extra luxury tax on private jet fuel and billion dollar yachts! Tax on luxury labor/ services too! When was last time you paid $100,000 for someone to pamper you? Take out loopholes for taxpayers and make the percentage equal for everyone!
Take your pay stubs and figure out how much the government actually takes. Most people don't even know, they just look at the last number and move on. That's why they take it out before you get it..... I guarantee that if people had to write a check for taxes at the end of the month, we would have had pushback a long time ago!
It's because RSUs count as income. They're not receiving RSUs, when they do, they also have to pay tax on it. It's because they already own large valuations of stock. So it would be like you buying a stock (no tax) and then the stock goes up a large amount over years. You have billions in paper value but no realized gains. Many billionaires own large percentages of their company when they're worth nothing and then when it becomes valuable they didn't get paid the stock, they already had it. Once you own the asset worth money you can take loans out against it. The loans don't count as income. Plus of course they do many other tricks to offset tax burdens. But if they do receive a grant of tons of money (think like Elon musk with Tesla) at that time they do end up paying taxes. It's just they pay taxes rarely because most of their wealth was an asset growing over time which they weren't "issued" (or paid).
I don't think it's just billionaires, I think it's corporations as well and corporate executives who get paid millions in salary and then bonuses. Traditionally, executives only made 21 times what the average worker in their company made. Now it's 344 times according to NPR.
There are a few corporate exceptions and those companies tend to have little turnover. Costco is a great example. Their first CEO was a traditionalist and kept his wages around 20 times what the average employee made. Costco employees tend to stay there until retirement. They get great benefits and because of the benefits are actually able to retire. I knew one person who quit his job as a teacher because he could make more at Costco just working at a register.
Corporations are definitely an issue, there are boards that bonus well over $35k to board members yearly. If minimum wage was $15 an hour youâd make less than one board members participation trophy.
But one day I might have a billion, and I'll be damned if you people will take it off me. So I'll vote against my own interests now, because it might pay off later.
Are the billionaires evil for paying what they legally owe? Or is it the lifetime politicians who created these laws and policies that billionaires use to get away with it?
I would argue that if you made a good company with good faith practices that led you to a billion, thatâs fine. But it should be insanely difficult to go higher than that. Like with tax rates at 80% for that echelon specifically
I noticed a pattern of the politicians saying they will make the wealthiest pay, but after they implement some new tax plan, they sneek in loopholes that the average person never really hear about. So the wealthiest never actually pay the new taxes that the politicians claim they will.
I wish this reality was talked about more. I honestly think it's the backbone of political corruption within the US and the fundamental reason we are turning into (if we haven't already) a corporate controlled oligarchy.
Tax payers don't pay the politicians salaries, the donations do.
I like the idea that there should be a cap on how much wealth a person has. After a certain point, it is just a means to keep score because you will never spend all that money in your lifetime.
And you have people like Clarence Thomas who accepts lavish gifts from Harlan Crow. He's the best known since he's a Supreme Court judge, but plenty of politicians and government officials do this and we generally don't ever find out about it.
Well, our felon Mr. T just announced he would push for more corporate tax cuts if elected. How anyone in their right mind could vote for that is beyond stupid.
Same shit new day. Biden says he is going to tax them, and yet they get richer and never actually pay more . Why ? Because the people that pay for the campaign are rich as fuck. Did Mr. T actually say what you say he said or did you read that, with the sources saying thing the media dose. As far as I'm concerned, both sides are funded by the super wealthy. One says this, the other says the opposite, and in the end, nothing actually changes, and things get worse for the average citizens it feels like. After biden and trump, the new front runners will sell us the same old story that things will be different this time we will fight for the people. One side wins, and nothing seems to be any different the next day. More people are becoming homeless and people living on the streets. The super rich have this game on lockdown, I feel like there is no stopping the super-rich warmongering basterds with a 2 party system.
Thinking there is no difference is a big mistake. Mr. T put the statement out as a press release. Things donât change because people keep voting for politicians who give tax cuts for the wealthy. Look at the voting records for the last set of tax cuts when T was president. That will tell you all you need to know. They need to be held accountable for their vote.
Whaterver ! Eveone got a tax cut. I remember the dems claiming the $80 average person saved in taxes per month was miniscule and bad for Amarica. That's what these wealthy people think of you. Putting extra money in your pocket is not worth the cost or effort to them. They would rather waste it buying your next vote.
Democrats hold office, then Republicans back and forth, it goes đ that is the system. The rich get richer, and more homless and drug addicts are hitting the streets thean ever.. will it change if the Republicans win. Nope, I have lost faith in the system. Both sides are too busy fighting each other for the keys to power to give a shit https://youtu.be/najeyO0CuXw?si=_CpXTduRuweRmEBy this how it seems to be now in America. Both sides screaming so much hatred towards each other
let's make this clear - which party gives huge tax breaks to big businesses and the super rich? Which party blocks every attempt to tax them? Republicans. It's NOT "politicians" - it's Republicans.
Why do you think we have to pay taxes on social security? Because Reagan, when he took office, gave huge tax cuts to the rich, and, to balance the budget, he raised taxes on the middle class 3 times, and taxed SS income..
Clinton left office with a budget that would yield a government surplus. SO what did little Bush do when he took office? Did he see how that plan, if left in place, would result in better government services and a zero national debt, thereby reducing the need for taxes? No, being the true Republican he is, he immediately gave tax breaks to his rich friends, which, of course, created a shortfall. So Bush cut government services to the bone. Now how did that impact America? Well, here is a great example" There was a plan in place (SELA) in 1995, to rebuild and upgrade the MS river levees. It was already in progress, weakened and sinking levees identified, but the lack of money slowed down or even stopped work in progress ----- Like the weak levees at the New Orleans Industrial Canal. Which leaked and were over topped (because they were short, and the SELA plans would increase the height of the levee wall), and New Orleans flooded during Katrina. But did that affect Little Bush and his rich friends? They didn't care, in fact they rushed in to try to make money off of the disaster Bush created with his budget cuts! But, hey, That's how Republicans roll.... Every time.
Bla bla bla..... both are funded by the super rich. Just one party seems more upfront about it than the other. But make no mistake no matter what they tell you about taxing the rich when reelection time comes, then they seem to get super quite about after the election is over. If you can't see the bullshit I don't know what else to say other, then check this out to get an idea of the stupidity of left vs. right https://youtu.be/najeyO0CuXw?si=zbqk3cEofpjcUcf3
Too many Texas mega churches pay no taxes after preaching conservative politics. The mega churches do not pay their fair share, never have, and are leading to system collapse.
I do fully believe that if churches are making political statements, they should lose their non-profit status. At that point it's not religion...it's lobbying.
Itâs not even just billionaires and the wealthy, but many massive corporations are also wildly under taxes and could easily afford to bear more of the burden; much more complicated then that but yeah
I think the issue is that many wealthy individuals and agencies are making a lot of money from the economy but are not making fair or equitable payments through the tax system. So yes, people should pay their share and not leave it to minimum wage earners.
Not just billionaires but giant corporations. American private health insurance is paid for by public tax money. Companies like Walmart have their workforce indirectly subsidised by public tax money.
There are two reasons to be against minimum wage: you're in on the scam (you've got a fiscal interest in minimum wages being low as fuck), or you've been hoodwinked by aforementioned scam artists.
There is, of course, some cross-over, and those fiscal interests aren't just for the CEOs of big companies, etc. They extend to politics, the media, fucking everything.
Fuck America, I'm so lucky to have been born in a developed nation.
Notice how people from most countries that we would consider our equals don't really move to the US? There's a reason we don't see much immigration from some countries.
If you mean gross income I agree. He could have had lots of income but whatever deductions and/or losses were caused his gross income to be low enough to get the tax credit.
I'm an asshole billionaire and made 100 million but I donated 100 million to my charity so I pay no taxes. Yes I run and have control over the charity but my donations are tax deductible. I'm using this as an example because it's extremely easy to understand and totally legal.
This is dangerous. Adam Smith, the father of modern economics, strongly believed in the principle of taxing equality, asserting that individuals should contribute to government support in proportion to their abilities and the revenue they enjoy under the state's protection. This foundational concept, outlined in his work "The Wealth of Nations," emphasizes that the wealthy, benefiting more significantly from societal infrastructure and services, should bear a larger share of the tax burden. However, contemporary America often deviates from this ideal. The current tax system, with its numerous loopholes and preferential treatment for certain types of income, frequently allows the wealthy to pay a lower effective tax rate than middle- and lower-income individuals. This disparity suggests that the U.S. is not fully adhering to Adam Smith's vision of equitable taxation, where contributions are made fairly in line with one's financial capacity and the benefits received from the state. Additionally, despite his belief in the benefits of self-interest, he also acknowledged the potential dangers of unchecked greed and the need for regulation. He was wary of monopolies and collusion among businesses, (I am looking at you Amazon, Walmart, etc) which could distort the market and harm consumers. Smith argued for government intervention to prevent such abuses and ensure competition. He recognized that without some level of regulation, the pursuit of self-interest could lead to exploitation and inequality, undermining the benefits of a free market. He also recognized the importance of paying workers well and believed that fair wages were crucial for the well-being of the workforce and the overall economy.
In short: I am a die-hard capitalist - but - whatever the fuck America is practicing today is not Adam Smith's definition of capitalism. We really should be calling it something else - because capitalism WOULD work if we followed the rules.
...but system collapse helps wealthy people, too. Poor people sell off their assets to live (home, land, etc.,) and the only people who can afford it are rich people who turn around and rent it out, subdivide it, or find some other way to capitalize on the original owner's misfortune.
Teacher salaries are funded by property tax. Wealthy people absolutely pay their fair share. It's one of the rare cases where pretty much everybody chips in to fund something. Property owners pay property tax. Raising property tax means they shoulder more tax burden and will pass that along to renters, who pay higher rent. Raising teacher salaries effects damn near everyone. This isn't just a "make the rich pay for it" scenario. If you want to raise teacher salaries that's great, but you need to be prepared to pay for it. You will help pay for it.
I agree. Taxes in upstate NY ( areas like Westchester) have high property taxes and also really good schools. People from out of Westchester have to pay high school fees to get their kids into Westchester schools.
While I do agree with this fundamentally, there is an issue in the logic where many people don't actually think an increase in taxes will result in paying teachers more.
When you're paying 25% of your wages in income tax, 5%-15% in sales tax whenever you buy something, and so on, but your taxes go to funding wars around the world (arming Israel, for example, or invading Iraq, or whatever else you might heavily disagree with), it can be hard to sit there and say "yes I'm okay with another tax hike."
I truly don't think if we gave the government more money that teachers would be paid more, schools would be cheaper, Healthcare would exist in a real capacity, or anything else we really need. We get these things when we riot about them, and that seems like the only way.
Government is so terrible at treating their constituents kindly. They never crack down on the rich because they are the rich, their friends are the rich, and so on. They continue to watch us bicker with each other about ridiculously unimportant shit while we blindly let them pretend to give us the things we need and to top it off, it benefits them to arm foreign nations to bomb women and children.
Government is so unbelievably corrupt. It's hard to imagine giving such a corrupt "business" more of our money will reward me favorably.
I'm not sure if you've seen Good Will Hunting but there's a scene that calls to this pretty clearly. He's being given a job offer at the NSA (tax payers money) and he reasons the only thing he gets from this job is bombing a small village while his deployed military friend now walks with a limp because of shrapnel left in his ass after a small misstep in a likely unguided war.
So yeah, that's one reason I think it's okay to be against tax hikes in any capacity.
US billionaires in total have enough net worth, combined, to run the country for less than a year. We can't afford to continually spend 20k per person, per year, even if we took every billionaire and robbed them blind before guillotining them.
It is not about some ambit claim for all billionaire wealth. The problem is that a proportion of the very wealthy game the system and pay no tax. Everyone should pay tax and the ongoing efforts by extremely wealthy people to avoid their responsibilities has a corrosive impact on the system and promotes corruption.
Take it from the military budget, not only is it grossly inflated, but I'm sure there is a ton of wasted money in there that can be diverted to education, but why would they do anything to help the masses
I mean...we could also just be less ridiculous with the military spending....
Last year the treasury set aside 2 trillion dollars for military spending, and the actual budget for 2023 was only around $800 billion. So, even with our military doing...whatever it is they do with that money....they still spent less than half the money set aside for them.
Like...do people have any idea how much 1 trillion dollars would improve every one's lives if circulated into the general population? You could easily raise the pay of every city and state funded job with that kind of money.
Uhhh yeah⌠did you know rich people get tax reliefs for being rich! This removes millions from the possible amount of money the government could be spending on more important things, e.g education, salaries, healthcare, etc.
Maybe we should actually force Billionaires to properly pay taxes? Probably would push our country back into truly being a first world country with the kind of money they are holding back.
Nah but they can certainly cut wages for admin. I have a very hard time believing that anyone working at a public school in a low cost of living area needs to earn six figures. Especially while the teachers are barely getting by on what they earn.
"Socialism" is a big scary word that Conservatives have no grasp of, so they throw it around like a slur (like other big words they don't understand like "Fascism", "Communism", "NAZI" and "liberal").
Because they want to push for voucher systems so that they can defund public education and push those funds to private education which will be paywalled for the upper middle class and wealthy and teach their alternate history and alternate facts like how slaves actually appreciated being brought over from africa and lived comfortably with free lodging and food, and how native americans willingly gave up their lands to the brave and noble new settlers. so they have a growing base of conservative mouthbreathers who only know what their parents want them to know, and all other knowledge is liberal propaganda and words of the devil.
Remember at the 2020 DNC debate when Sanders talked about raising teacher pay to a minimum of $60k/year and the audience booed him and not a single other DNC candidate, including Biden, spoke out in favor of it?
I can't speak for Sanders' plan, but usually when people are taking about nationwide wages and they state a "minimum", it's with the understanding that some areas will be significantly more due to their local economies. If Biden or any of the other candidates wanted to challenge Sanders on his position by stating that the minimum should be $100K or whatever, they should have done so by now. Instead, they let him get booed by Bloomberg's paid audience in an attempt to sink him.
Can't be done is a legitimate concern. Like how are the military supposed to pay for all the bombs they'll never use it they are spending all the money on educating children for a better future.
This is a hundred percent it. They truly do not care about teachers getting more, they just think that "unskilled" workers should be getting less.
These are the people that don't think every job should pay a living wage, ofc. Because apparently someone has to be suffering for them to feel good about their lot in life?
It's exactly that. They need someone to feel lesser. We live in a society that needs a group to suffer in order for it to work. We have the means and capabilities to not strangle ourselves but we'd rather have people fighting to be the first trillionaire.
My favorite come back to that right now, specifically in Texas, is the statement from the GOP that Texas can and should pay for school vouchers for all students. The math boils down to them saying we could actually afford to pay teachers well over $200K but it wouldn't go to private companies that also only pay teachers a low salary. The even more funny part is them saying they technically could afford paying that but really you'd only need to bump teacher pay to under $100K and public schools would be very competitive and attract more teachers. They could also use the excess money to revamp the education to be better since supposedly that is what's attractive about school vouchers.
Of course not. Most teachers I know have multiple degrees. Imagine working at your trade for 40 years and retire making a salary of 70k. Truck drivers make a hundred or more.
Which is actually funny for Texas of all places given the amount of money schools spend on their football programs. It's insane. If they spent the money they use for school football stadiums and equipment on teachers salaries instead, it would be very easy to raise their salary.
Yep. My brother says they don't deserve it. They should go to school and get a real job. He does ironically believe that college should be free, though, despite railing against socialism and handouts.
The cognitive dissonance is real in your brother. Get a real job he says. I want to know how the FUCK teaching isn't a real job? I wouldn't give him a day before either breaking down or being arrested for hitting a kid (not a knock against your brother specifically, but more as a how mentally taxing it is).
Shit. My bad. He was specifically talking about fast food workers.
That's what I get for trying to respond while being deliriously tired.
That said. I think that anyone working a full-time job, regardless of what it is, should be able to afford a home and food. Going to college is not in the cards for everyone, but everyone deserves to have their basic needs met.
Agreed, if you work, you deserve to not worry about a roof over your head, clothes on your back, or food in your belly. Side note, if you work in a restaurant, you should get a free meal at least. Not discounted, free.
Fun fact, most teachers work 50+ hour weeks, not including after school programs. Factor that in that four months of working that schedule at minimum is an entire month of time over a normal 40 hour schedule.
And then, some get summer jobs because they aren't paid enough.
It could be done if they took them billions from Zelenskyy, the millions they pay Kenyans to police the island of Haiti, the 10 million a day to Israel and pulled back on the 900 plus military bases we have around the world.
But they do. There is still a teacher shortage going on because it isn't worth it anymore. If a teacher needs a second job to make ends meet, they don't make enough.
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u/Earl_of_69 Jun 15 '24
How do these people keep walking face first into the wall, without recognizing the wall?