Define Middle Class

One way to solve this issue again is to change our culture in the U.S. if we valued education and learning more culturally, then colleges best selling point would be to demonstrate they are the best learning center, or the best bang for your buck learning center. It's a hybrid education is important, percent of kids who are getting X paying jobs after colleges is important to the parents. But people are picking colleges for a lot of other reason (their sports team, various other events/activities the college has) If having a notable sports team didn't generate the added enrollment, and ticket sale/exposure from home games, and doing well. Things would be different.

It's always been my belief that it's on reality 80% student and 20% teacher. If you have a teacher, even if they're not the best, that puts you on the right track, looking at the right things, thinking about things appropriately the rest is up to you. You can have a great teacher that makes things a world better, ultimately even with a teacher that just puts you on the right track, if you put in the work you will learn the material.

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Originally Posted by Ziggy Stardust

Hey Lewk, you voiced my thought when I read that post.

How often do I get to say that in this kind of thread? :)
By Proxy, meaning even though I myself wouldn't profit from it, the reason boils down to that I am envious of A's money and rather see it going to B than it remaining in A's possession? May I enquire what you have to support this assessment? Because you offered only the conclusion in a form of a statement and an explanation what you meant by that statement, not the argumentation that led you to that conclusion.

Could you also include in that argumentation the debunking of my personal reason why I believe a higher percentage for richer people is justified in my opinion since they also have a larger percentage of their income which they don't need for basic necessities. Mind you, I want you to debunk that this is my reason instead of envy. I'm not interested in you debunking whether that reasoning is valid, since that would be meaningless if that isn't my motivation in the first place.

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Sorry for the long delay in response (not that you were probablly really looking for it :) ) as I usually only get to peruse the boards a couple of days a week.
Obviously the envy principle can not apply to all. There are some that have a genuine belief that it is 'fair' to tax at a higher rate, as those at the higher rate can afford to miss it. If you, Ziggy, feel this way, then I believe you. If others say that, then I would also have to belive them, unless they say other things that would lead me to another path. When earthJoker kept pushing the the Rich should just consider themselves lucky, that leads to think that it is partially (at least) envy. But I could be wrong.

Can you say with a straight face that no one lets wealth envy lead in how they view taxation?

But I have had heated discussions with friends of mine that come right out and say that these rich people don't deserve their money, and that taxing them is to make them feel the pain the rest of us do. Also this mentality is pushed by our politicians. (Of course the inverse is pushed by the other side of the asile.)

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Originally Posted by Veldan Rath

Can you say with a straight face that no one lets wealth envy lead in how they view taxation?

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No one, eh? What a silly question. Anyway, that statement is rather different than envy being at the heart of wealth distribution. Do you have examples of politicians pushing the rich are lucky so tax em to hell narrative? I can't check your conversations with your friends, but I can check that to form an opinion.

And the rich should consider themselves lucky to be where they are. even if they worked hard for it. I consider myself lucky to have found an escape out of my destined management career path when I found the unlikely job of programming gambling machines and a company willing to hire me while I had no IT experience. What does the impression the rich got lucky have to do with envy?

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Originally Posted by Ziggy Stardust

No one, eh? What a silly question. Anyway, that statement is rather different than envy being at the heart of wealth distribution.

Which I feel is still bull. And the rich should consider themselves lucky to be where they are. even if they worked hard for it. I consider myself lucky to have found an escape out of my destined management career path when I found the unlikely job of programming gambling machines and a company willing to hire me while I had no IT experience. What does the impression the rich got lucky have to do with envy?

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Cause if you reduce the way one has/earns something to luck (or some people want ot call it theft), you can eaisly justify taking it away from them. It's kinda like how more 'advanced' civilizations rationalized taking advantaged of those less so: 'They are only savages, barley more than animals'

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Originally Posted by Veldan Rath

Cause if you reduce the way one has/earns something to luck (or some people want ot call it theft), you can eaisly justify taking it away from them. It's kinda like how more 'advanced' civilizations rationalized taking advantaged of those less so: 'They are only savages, barley more than animals'

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What an odd way of thinking. And there are politicians pushing that story?

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Originally Posted by Ziggy Stardust

What an odd way of thinking. And there are politicians pushing that story?

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The rich are thieves or the savages are merely a bit more than animals? :D

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Originally Posted by GGT

The monthly prebate check is calculated by multiplying the annual poverty level spending published each year by the Department of Health and Human Services times the FairTax rate and dividing by twelve. Poverty level spending represents what it costs families of varying household size and composition to buy their necessities.

Still need to define Poverty Level. Didn't we already establish (in another thread) that those formulas haven't been updated in decades?

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If that is the case then we need to review that as well.

"The rich are lucky, so it's ok to tax them more." That savages mentality I've seen often enough and is still recent.

But I'm already losing interest, so ... ;) Have a Civ game waiting for me. 1600, me industrial era, Siam future era :eek:. Him on another continent and me sucking up big time so he'll leave me be as a sort of savage pet.

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Cause if you reduce the way one has/earns something to luck (or some people want ot call it theft), you can eaisly justify taking it away from them.

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The connection you need to be making here. Is that if someone got something by chance, not by hard work, or some other action. Then really anyone could have gotten, but they just so happen to get it. They really don't deserve it anymore than the next person, they just happen to get it. So if you found 20 dollars tomorrow, just by chance, technically you could keep it, and if you gave it away you would be losing 20 dollars; however, one might tell themselves it's merely random that i got it, I don't deserve to have ownership of the money, I have no entitlement to it. If I lose it, I didn't relaly own it anyway.

There is some legitimacy to that, in regards that you do have minimal entitlement, you are the best "owner" of it at the moment, but your rights to the money are tenuous.

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Originally Posted by Lebanese Dragon

The connection you need to be making here. Is that if someone got something by chance, not by hard work, or some other action. Then really anyone could have gotten they just so happen to get it. They really don't deserve it anymore than the next person they just happen to get it. So if you found 20 dollars tomorrow, just by chance, technically you could keep it, and if you gave it away you would be losing 20 dollars; however, one might tell themselves it's merely randomly that i got it, I don't deserve to have ownership of the money, I have no entitlement to it.

There is some legitimacy to that, in regards that you do have minimal entitlement, you are the best "owner" of it at the moment, but your rights to the money are tenuous.

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I'm not sure if you are agreeing with me or not...:)

Definition of middle class is people willing to pay for things we rich people don't feel the obligation to pay for.

Did I mention our unwillingness to pay for things that benefit us will bite us in the ass? Yes, I forgot to mention that...because I was too busy with my money.

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I'm not sure if you are agreeing with me or not..

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I'm in agreance with you. One way to justify taking something from someone is to make an argument that they don't deserve it. One way you wouldn't deserve what you have is if you got it by chance. This is why people generally care less if they lose something they found by chance, this idea of how much rightful ownership they have of it.

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If people want to have an inkling of how reality plays out, the wealthy play off the ignorance of the poor. Who are ignorant due to worse learning conditions/opportunity as they grow up. They get the poor people to vote against themselves with catchy and straightforward slogans. I like the idea of being for the country, but unless you have a leadership you can faithfully trust, then people should vote in their best interest. The poor have the numbers to get what they want, they just have to have the knowledge, and motivation.

Some poor people are lazy, tax avoiding fools... most are not. Most realize the amount of work at McDonalds, even after taking out taxes, makes for a better, longer, more fulfilling life, stress free life. Than having to worry if you'll eat, hopping around trying to find places to sleep, relying on donation centers for sweatshirts and items, and walking around collecting cans. Do you think a poor person would choose to spend 5 hours collecting cans? Don't you think they'd make way more money (even after taxes) working for 5 hours at a entry level job.

I think the people that are like that either have mental disabilities, or are ignorant of their options and there is a disconnect between lines of employment and these people who are capable and would benefit the most from working there.

I'd like to see a Charity designed to deal with this problem, adn pool together all other charities that deal with the poor, all of their resources into one combined charity. Instead of charities overlapping in what they do, and having to each pay for the own set up to do things, have a complete program. Basic Education, Food, dress up clothing and transportation. They learn how to use the bus route get set up by the state with a year long pass, get clothing for their interviews, are trained and taught abuot the job they're applying for before they apply. So they know terms the gist of how it's set up. They gradually go through this program designed to ween them off goverment support and back into society in some form. On top of that, they'll promote talking and community building between all the poor people in the program to build those networking skills, and information sharing etc... etc... But I digress..