Taxes[Wall of grammatically incorrect text]

[prole]

TSA screeners'll be all like, "Dude, where's your junk?"

[murraysovereign]

So do they pay sales tax at the register or not? Don't dick around with a rebate, "put money in people's pockets". As far as the rich paying taxes "on behalf" of the poor, Off had it right: the rich are the prime beneficiaries of the social arrangements that made them that way. They should be paying and more.

 

Up here, yes, they pay the tax at the till. But they receive a tax credit from Ottawa every three months, so they're not out of pocket over the year. If that isn't good enough for you, I'm sure you could establish some sort of exemption card they could present to the cashier, although in my experience the difficulty and expense of trying to administer such exemptions at the point of purchase is considerable, not to mention the potential for abuse/fraud at various levels. The tax rebate payments work pretty well up here - it's the one aspect of our taxation system that no-one seems to have any objection to. You can use the rebate any way you want - put it toward the rent, blow it at the track, spend it on groceries, buy shoes for the kids, get drunk, or put it aside in a college fund. What's wrong with that?

[KaskadskyjKozak]

TSA screeners'll be all like, "Dude, where's your junk?"

 

I ask myself that everytime I think about climbing.

[Fairweather]

TSA screeners'll be all like, "Dude, where's your junk?"

 

The future according to Obama.

[prole]

Rush Limbaugh's fixation on the national testicles, I presume?

[Hugh Conway]

Rush Limbaugh's fixation on the national testicles, I presume?

 

no, their predelection for servicing Rush's testicles

[Fairweather]

Your indignation would be reaching new heights--if only GW were still around to blame. You libtards are a pathetic lot.

[mattp]

Your indignation would be reaching new heights--if only GW were still around to blame. You libtards are a pathetic lot.

 

I'm not following this discussion, but it is pretty interesting to see Obama blamed for the state of our economy, our troubles abroad, and the horror that is TARP.

[Fairweather]

Your indignation would be reaching new heights--if only GW were still around to blame. You libtards are a pathetic lot.

 

I'm not following this discussion, but it is pretty interesting to see Obama blamed for the state of our economy, our troubles abroad, and the horror that is TARP.

 

TSA molestations ordered by Obama.

[ivan]

TSA molestations ordered by Obama.

if i was the first black dude in charge of the cops i'd probably feel like turnign every honky's tsa expereince into the equivalent of a south central traffic stop too

 

i don't much care about the tsa - i fly maybe once a year - anyone who supports the patriot act can clearly shut the fuck up about a virtual strip search at any rate

[prole]

Your indignation would be reaching new heights--if only GW were still around to blame. You libtards are a pathetic lot.

 

I'm not following this discussion, but it is pretty interesting to see Obama blamed for the state of our economy...

 

Isn't it?

 

Corporate Profits Were the Highest on Record Last Quarter

NYT 11/23/10

 

The nation’s workers may be struggling, but American companies just had their best quarter ever.

 

American businesses earned profits at an annual rate of $1.66 trillion in the third quarter, according to a Commerce Department report released Tuesday. That is the highest figure recorded since the government began keeping track over 60 years ago, at least in nominal or non-inflation-adjusted terms.

 

Corporate profits have been going gangbusters for a while. Since their cyclical low in the fourth quarter of 2008, profits have grown for seven consecutive quarters, at some of the fastest rates in history.

 

This breakneck pace can be partly attributed to strong productivity growth — which means companies have been able to make more with less — as well as the fact that some of the profits of American companies come from abroad. Economic conditions in the United States may still be sluggish, but many emerging markets like India and China are expanding rapidly.

 

Tuesday’s Commerce Department report also showed that the nation’s output grew at a slightly faster pace than originally estimated last quarter. Its growth rate, of 2.5 percent a year in inflation-adjusted terms, is higher than the initial estimate of 2 percent. The economy grew at 1.7 percent annual rate in the second quarter.

 

Still, most economists say the current growth rate is far too slow to recover the considerable ground lost during the recession.

 

“The economy is not growing fast enough to reduce significantly the unemployment rate or to prevent a slide into deflation,” Paul Dales, a United States economist for Capital Economics, wrote in a note to clients. “This is unlikely to change in 2011 or 2012.”

 

The increase in output in the third quarter was driven primarily by stronger consumer spending. Wages and salaries also rose in the third quarter, which might help bolster holiday spending in the final months of 2010.

 

Private inventory investment, nonresidential fixed investment, exports and federal government also contributed to higher output. These sources of growth were partially offset by a rise in imports, which are subtracted from the total output numbers the government calculates, and a decline in housing and other residential fixed investments.

 

How's everyone enjoying their productivity gains?

[Lucky Larry]

yep, highest corporate profits ever; surprise. dam labor cutting into profits. hi ho, hi ho, it's off to China we go, where we can get away from the f'in greedy American blue collar bastards, and throw away the chinks when their quotas drop. make more with less. long live free trade and democracy. cough, cough, sputter. btw, sounds like the Euro is in deep shit. just another great idea by those in power: the Euro dollar. so much for the US build up of Europe and their model socialistic systems after WW II. They were the envy of many a blue collar worker: benefits, health care, retirement pensions, above existence wages, unions, fat vacations, sick leave etc. Apparently the capitalists couldn't stomach gentler and kinder nations in the world that actually took care of people instead of throwing them onto the dung heap. Of course, when has a capitalist/fascist ever cared about the worker? Only when they were forced to. Get a job lazy fuck.

[prole]

But didn't you know, oldlarry, a rising tide lifts all...oh, wait...FUCK!

[billcoe]

It's no a rising tide. Tides going out Prole.

 

The fucks who are resorting to being personally offensive to try and make a point: if you have to turn away from making a point to spit invectives at others: YOU AIN'T GOT A FUCKING POINT. Or you don't have the brains to make one.

 

Murrays, Fairweather and anyone who supports the national sales tax to replace an income tax. Look dudes, the woman with 3 kids buying each of the little fucks $20 pairs of shoes is faced with a MANDATORY tax on those shoes which, as a PERCENTAGE of the disposable she has, is significantly higher than the guy who is buying the $1500 Bruno Magli (think OJ here) shoes. Furthermore, for the rich guy, its a voluntary tax. He can pay the same as the poor woman, and frequently will. It's his choice. The poor woman with 4 kids has NO FUCKING choice. Her only hope is that the government will FINALLY GET THEIR FUCKING EXPENSES AND OUT OF CONTROL SPENDING back to reasonable levels so that they might shake her down for less. But shake her down they will because the kids still need shoes.

 

While for the rich man, it remains voluntary if he wants to pay a rich mans tax or a poor persons tax: totally his choice. He can, IF HE WISHES, pay the same shoes as a poor person. She has NO choice. In fact, more importantly, look at the percentage of their net worth which a poor person WHO HAS NO EXCESS DISPOSABLE INCOME will pay tax on for a fucked up beater POS Taurus that barely runs. Compare it to the net worth of a rich person, who will still bank $600,000 more this year than he is spending and doesn't give a rats ass that the tax on a $100,000 Mercedes is.

 

I'm a rich enough man myself who will be laughing all the way to the bank at the suckers getting hit by it. Regardless of my personal game, it's still an unfair and morally bankrupt thing to do and very very wrong to do that to desperate people. You can say that the percentage a poor woman is paying for shoes for her children is less than a rich dude and you may think it is fair, yet when the percentage of their net worth is both mandatory and significant for the poor person vs somewhat voluntary and insignificant to the point of absurdity for the rich guy. Despite the cries that 47% of the citizens will even not pay income tax, it is still fair. And if we could get the tide to rise, more of the folks on the bottom will we paying, so that the 47% figure will decrease. So a rising tide will lift all boats Prole.

 

Let me phrase this in real terms. A rich man paying $10,000 (10% tax) on a $100,000 car is often paying an insignificant price compared to the devastation and pain a poor person feels paying $30 on the price of a $300.00 vehicle. For the poor person, $30 might mean just being able to eat as a 25 lb bag of beans and rice is much less than that together. So for a rich man, $10,000 tax on a car might mean that he only puts an extra $590,000.00 into his bank account that year on top of the mega millions he has piled in there making him big bank on the interest alone each year, while for the poor person, they might be able to buy some fucking butter or other "extravagance" for their family. They have NO extra income. It all MUST go out just to survive. $30 is crippling and painful to them. Really. Not to me. Not to you. But to them it is.

 

Hope that makes sense to you folks. I'm sure you are good people, but we MUST get our government expenditures down for both the poor and the rich. The rich will feel the poor's pain at some point I do not doubt. We're in this together, either that or the pain which will follow for our country will be bad news for everyone.

 

Regards to all:

 

Bill

[AlpineK]

Things might be fair if each customer brought in last years tax return and last months bank statement to the store when shopping for shoes.

 

After the clerk reviews the statements and performs a TSA style exam they tell the customer which isle they can purchase shoes out of.

 

Sir get out of the $40 isle. If I see you there again I'm calling security.

[Lucky Larry]

dig this : the whole f'in game is rigged for, and by, those in power. get it.

I'm not talking bout joe smoe busting his balls small business owner, or even what appears to be a rich smoe. no, it's the uber smoe in the top 2% with most of the wealth and power.

Gates dad even voted to increase rich man's tax--he gets it: tide lifting all. this whole f'in depression was caused by the rip off bastards controlling all parties in the government.

Our government? Shit, the citizens don't control the government--they fucking control us. Fucking fascists.

[murraysovereign]

OK, one more time:

 

As long as it's designed with adequate protection for the lowest income-earners by way of rebates or something of that sort, I'm all for it.

 

Under the system that's used here, people at the lowest end of the income scale actually receive more in rebates than they spend in sales taxes. They actually benefit from it. Not only are they not paying income tax, and not paying any sales tax, but they're also receiving a slight increase in their income thanks to the rebate schedule. So they can go ahead and buy shoes for the kids with the sales tax credit $$ they receive from the government, or they can use that money to buy groceries (which aren't taxed, by the way). As far as cars go, you can exempt vehicles from the sales tax if they're more than, say, five years old. Hell, if you want to, you can make flights to France tax-exempt, so Mom can still take her kids to Provence for the summer. And country-club memberships could be tax-exempt, too, so they don't have to miss the spring Cotillion. It's not difficult to identify areas of particular importance to low-income families and provide relief through targeted exemptions. Those exemptions, coupled with the tax credit rebates, can be used not only to negate the impact of the sales tax, but to provide additional financial support to those families.

 

So, to recap:

As long as it's designed with adequate protection for the lowest income-earners by way of rebates or something of that sort, I'm all for it.

As long as it's designed with adequate protection for the lowest income-earners by way of rebates or something of that sort, I'm all for it.

As long as it's designed with adequate protection for the lowest income-earners by way of rebates or something of that sort, I'm all for it.

 

[billcoe]

LOL, got it Murray! Thanks, and your earlier point on the benefit of taxing consumption to encourage savings and investment is well said as well sir.

[Fairweather]

The poor woman with 4 kids has NO FUCKING choice.

 

Sure she...

 

...nevermind.

[billcoe]

Husband died. Cancer. She won't accept food stamps or welfare. In fact she kicked the welfare people off her porch once when they showed up explaining such. They felt that programs like that were made with people like her in mind. She gets a small amount of Social Security each month which varies for each kid, the youngest is almost a negative number though, which isn't viewed as a hand out, but in fact the money he had taken from him while working now coming back.

[prole]

Husband died. Cancer. She won't accept food stamps or welfare. In fact she kicked the welfare people off her porch once when they showed up explaining such...

 

Power to the People!!

[tvashtarkatena]

What is it about the grossly skewed concentration of wealth that our 40 year march to modern conservatism has given us - one that has immeasurably destabilized our culture and threatened the security of everyone that conservitards don't understand? To interpret a desire to correct this obvious dysfunctional and dangerous state as being anti-business, anti reward-for-effort or anti-work ethic is frankly sociopathic. It's spokespeople here also seem to share a characteristic delight in human misery and/or punishment - torture, war, execution, draconian criminal punishment, denial of even menial social benefits - but never anything on the human kindness end of things. Like their media darlings, these cyberpundits create strawmen, the liar's friend, as targets for this emotional self-stroking.

 

And this is the problem with the Teabaggers - their philosophical foundation is sociopathy. This shouldn't come as a surprise, given that their primary funder is a sociopath - as are their media darlings Sarah Palin and Christine O'Donnell, by all indications. half the FOX team probably fall into this category.

[billcoe]

LOL, we should talk slow for the clueless idiots like Pat who don't understand a damn thing but let their lips flap anyway.

[KaskadskyjKozak]

... never anything on the human kindness end of things...

And this is the problem with the Teabaggers - their philosophical foundation is sociopathy.

 

coming from YOU that means so much.

[jordansahls]

"And that," put in the Director sententiously, "that is the secret of happiness and virtue-liking what you've got to do. All conditioning aims at that: making people like their inescapable social destiny."

 

- Aldous Huxley, Brave New World