Capitalism is all about using greed as the primary motivating factor behind the economy. "Unbridled", of course not... unless you're against regulation (i.e. republicans)... then it is all about unbridled greed.
Communism on the other hand, is all about working for the betterment of your neighbors, for the good of the whole, for the satisfaction of doing a good job and you see where that gets you? Capitalism is all about individual greed. If you use it right, if you harness it and bound it with fair competition, the greed motivation works is much than all that group love you get from communism. This is the way of things. This is what the 20th century taught us.
But don't for one tiny iota of a second think that capitalism isn't all about greed, because it is.
If there is any bias, it is the bias of expectation as opposed to the bias of conclusion. The idea that ANY SINGLE ONE of these physicists would say "hm... reality doesn't match up with general relativity so I'll just fudge the numbers because I *want* GR to be true" is insane. I would be that the thinking went more like this:
1. Bah... results are slightly wrong, what'd I screw up? 2. Hm.. results must be wrong by the margin of error of the equipment.... no no... that's not it 3. Ok... double checked all equipment and the speed reading is still off.... 4. confirmed calibration on all instruments, re-calibrated, re-measured,... WTF am I doing wrong? 5. Ok, I the 5 smartest people I know double check all equipment, results, calculations, methods, etc. 6. HOLY FUCKEN MOTHER OF GOD CAN THIS REALLY BE TRUE!?? 7. Let's show what we found... be cautious... and have have other people repeat the experiment because after all, incredible claims require significant evidence.
What I'm trying to point out here, is that a result like this is any one of these scientist's wet dream. They all would love to "break" the current scientific understanding because that allows them to discover something new. To throw out the word "bias" is misusing it from the typical context. In more typical language it implies that the desire of the scientist drives the result. In this case, the desire of the scientist is for neutrinos to be FTL because that would reap them lots of scientific prestige and then the physics groupies would be all over them.
What are you smoking? Theoretical limitations aren't too far away. There are lots of games that we can yet play to increase performance, but miles of runway we don't have.
And yes, I remember a headline "Can we break the 1 micron barrier?" and I marvel that we're at 22nm lithography and shrinking.
I call bullshit. List the stores and I'll call them myself. Even back in the day, MS never "contractually forbid" selling other operating systems, they just charged their license fee based upon each and every computer sold. So in effect the company was paying for a windows operating system even if they never installed it on the machine.
Well, unless they lose money. It does happen. Under the current regime, you can carry forward capital losses from year to year but can use them to offset only $3000/year of regular income (though you can use them in toto against any capital gains). Getting rid of the special taxation status of capital gains would encourage enormously risk-averse investing - and we want more money at risk, because those risky new projects are the ones we want to encourage.
Nah... that doesn't quite pass the smell test. Capital gains are taxed at 15%... income at 28%. So the argument is that the risk of making this investment is oh so worth it when your take home is 85% of the profits... but "run away scary" when you get to keep *only* 72% of the profits. The numbers just aren't there to support the adjectives you used.
So from an investment standpoint, a minor hit... from a tax standpoint... it's double the money coming in from some MAJOR streams of income. That's a big difference.
WTF... I must have just run into the fox news talking point section. Which way to the door out of bullshit land?
This is one of the stupidest lines of spoon fed nonsense to come out of the whole Warren Buffett episode. He can't argue that the system should be changed without putting up the money himself? And to what end? Nobody wants to pay taxes but adults realize that it goes toward running our country. I personally think my tax rate should be increased... you know why? not because I want to pay more money, but because I want our country to balance it's budget. But if I volunteered to paid more in taxes, I wouldn't have the money (which I don't want to lose) AND the federal government wouldn't balance it's budget (which I also want). However I still think Obama shouldn't have renewed the bush tax cuts for anyone.
So why the fuck can't Warren Buffett argue that the tax rate on the rich should be increased while not giving away his money to the government? It is perfectly reasonable and logical to argue that he doesn't pay enough in taxes and argue the system should be changed for the benefit of the country! Because if it was changed for all, it might actually make a difference to the country.
Attacking Warren Buffett just shows how fucking nuts the right is. A guy who made his billions from scratch and is giving almost all of it away before he dies.... but watch out, he's arguing that the rich should pay at least the same percentage as middle class folks so fox says he's eeeeeevil and that "he's a socialist too!!!!1111!!11"
yeah... but I don't agree with your first statement. How does it encourage investment? If you invest and make money you get taxed on the profit. The key phrase being "you make money". You only pay taxes on the money you make. We're not talking corporate tax rates. We're talking individual profit rates. The person who is going to invest is going to put their money where it has the greatest returns. That means: cash interest earning bank account bonds stocks (generally speaking; ignoring risk levels). Changing how much tax you have to pay won't change where you put your money because you're still looking for the highest rate of return.
Give me some examples where your statement is true and compare against what happens if the tax rate is lower or not. Show me situations where the lower cap gain tax rate will actually effect behavior. People will invest where it will earn them money.
Also, keep in mind that if you don't place the tax burden here, you shift it somewhere else. They've moved the tax burden from capital gains to income so if we increase cap gains we can decrease income tax. At the moment it doesn't feel like that because we're so far in the hole, we're not looking at shifting, we're only looking at shoveling money back into the hole. Frankly I make much more money on income than on stocks so I have no problem switching over to the same tax rate for both. I don't see why they should be taxed differently in the first place.
Savings where the *earnings* on those savings are taxed as income will still make more money than cash.
Ok... so you that's exactly where I started. It doesn't make sense to tax it as an income class that's taxed lower than standard income. If you want to help out new businesses, add something that helps new businesses specifically. Rewarding people who have all their money in stocks with a lower tax rate just appears to be a form of coddling the rich.
So I agree with your premise. Raise or get rid of capital gains tax. And by "get rid of" I mean, treat it as normal income.
In addition you have to consdier that the companies that the rich use to get rich, use the resources of the country at a far higher rate than a normal person. They make their money using tax payer funded roads, infrastructure, laws, legal system, etc. This is not all about the rich, this is about their money. You also have to factor in all the programs that support economy, public peace, and maintaining our standing overseas (i.e. military and diplomacy).
So a rich person may sit in their mansion and never travel on a public road, but their money has US tax payer fingerprints all over it. That's why it should be taxed on par or greater than the money from people who actually work for a living.
Help me out here: How do capital gains drive investment? As I see it, this is primarily taxes on property. Not much value add there. I know this is the argument that has been used, but I can't come up with even a token argument where this is true.
"If a person pays SOMETHING, they are more likely willing to make responsible voting choices if they know that asking/getting MORE stuff from the fed will mean they will pay MORE in taxes. It's far too easy for someone who pays NOTHING to ask for more."
This is a stupid talking point. So let's take your Yahoo article example. A family of 4 making 50,000. They still pay taxes, social security for example, just not Federal Income tax. So lets say they pay $10 in federal income tax. Is that enough? Does that change their attitude? No? How about $20? Do you want them to all pay NO LESS THAN $100 per household in order to qualify as feel invested? "But NOW they feel invested in the system!"
This is totally stupid as it won't change anyone's opinion as to what should happen with the federal budget. And frankly, lets not pretend that the poor drive any political decision these days. A politician pandering to the poor? Laughable. Seriously, whens the last time you actually heard that? Name the issue... and it can't just be a talking point, they actually have to do something on the issue. Pass a bill, create a law. (Elderly don't count, they drive votes.) Even the middle class doesn't really count anymore.
Here we are debating if the rich should pay another percentage point or two in their taxes. Back in the 1950's the top tax rate used to be 90%. Yet the idea of even talking about that is ridiculous, but "let um die!" is ok for people without insurance and defunding social security, no problem.
Class warfare has been going on a long time. If you really want to talk about fair, lets talk about getting rid of the term "capital gains" and instead just call it income and tax that appropriately.
... you know that in an "automated machining center" the lathe/mill/whatever are STILL run by humans, right?
In industry, efficiency is measured by (how much you get done)/(cost). The GP is correct that humans will be hired when they're cheaper than robots. This is the way industry works right now. However, his implication that cheap energy going away will kill robotics is stupid. Renewable energy is only about double the cost or less than coal/nuclear energy. If you removed all coal, people would just switch to solar/wind, etc. At double the cost for energy, nothing would significantly change. Robots aren't expensive because of the electricity they use, but rather their engineering time and cost of manufactured parts.
Robot design is not a math problem, it is an engineering problem. Engineering is about the best use of resources and solving problems the most efficient way. Some of these problems can be programmed into a computer to assist with the design, while most can't (things like marketing). It also involves a level of creativity to do stuff like this, and while computers will get there some day, they aren't even close right now.
Are you talking about Wall Street bankers? CEOs? Sports stars? OMG, you mean they're selfish beings? Oh no.
You could argue that we the people are so pathetically lame that it takes a habitual liar to satisfy us and get elected. Or that we have such a short attention span that they can do whatever they as long as they mouth platitudes "America is great", "we are exceptional", "other people hate us because of our freedoms".
The reality is that we've let the system become corrupt. Politicians need money to run for office (because the person with the most money wins 4 out of 5 times). Annnnd, the people who give the politicians the money get to tell them what to do. Are you giving the politicians the money? no? Are they listening to you? Hm... thought not.
They aren't sociopaths, they just don't care about you.
You know... the funny thing is that this statement is much more true for magnets than it is for tides. Magnetism, like gravity, is a fundamental force that we can't explain. It just is. It is just one of the rules of the universe and we haven't been able penetrate other than to measure and bound it's behavior with mathematical equations.
You aren't kidding. Think about it.. For every watt of power computers use, computers turn that watt into heat and then they have to run an AC to remove the heat from your building, thus doubling your electricity bill. Half your electricity goes toward heating (and processing) and the other half goes toward cooling.
This is why there are been experiments in just sucking in outside air for natural cooling instead of keeping it a closed system. (See "free cooling") The easier it is to cool your data center, the less power you will use.
"Yeah see, the magnets... they pull each other closer... they push each other away... It always goes on. you can't explain that. you can't explain it."
I tend to agree. Once we got to the moon... there totally is a feeling of "um.. ok, now what?" that you see in the history of the Apollo programs. So we're there and we start making up crap excuses and hollow objectives to justify why we're there.
Ok, so that's stupid, but I believe in the final objective of putting people up in space in a long term and sustainable fashion. In the end, this does mean you have to have a viable economy or other reason for being there, but in the short therm you want to keep making continuous steps toward that objective. If we don't we'll never get there and it'll always remain economically unachievable because we will won't be any closer to our goal than we are now.
From my perspective we have made steps toward the goal of putting people in space by building the space station. Getting people farther and farther away from this planet isn't the objective. Shooting a guy off to mars for example, is just a short term pissing contest. People living in space is the objective (at least as I see it). Building viable space stations is a necessary part of living in space so on that regard we're approaching things pretty well with the ISS.
The goal should be first to do things that are self sustaining and everything else will come back from that.
Face it... when most people buy most technology, weather it's TVs, cars, or MP3 players, we all want that "cool new technology" feeling. Apple doesn't have anything unique here except they do focus on looks and functionality a little more than other companies. I'm about as anti-apple as you can get, but I hate this argument. It's been repeated to death and just doesn't ring true for apple owners any more than the rest of us.
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Capitalism is all about using greed as the primary motivating factor behind the economy. "Unbridled", of course not... unless you're against regulation (i.e. republicans) ... then it is all about unbridled greed.
Communism on the other hand, is all about working for the betterment of your neighbors, for the good of the whole, for the satisfaction of doing a good job and you see where that gets you? Capitalism is all about individual greed. If you use it right, if you harness it and bound it with fair competition, the greed motivation works is much than all that group love you get from communism. This is the way of things. This is what the 20th century taught us.
But don't for one tiny iota of a second think that capitalism isn't all about greed, because it is.
d
Archangel Michael... giving "the man" a reach-around.
Ok... spell it out for me. Tell me what they should say when a reporter sticks a camera in their face.
Samsung is being treating everyone who ISN'T suing them in the same non-discriminatory manner.
d
If there is any bias, it is the bias of expectation as opposed to the bias of conclusion. The idea that ANY SINGLE ONE of these physicists would say "hm... reality doesn't match up with general relativity so I'll just fudge the numbers because I *want* GR to be true" is insane. I would be that the thinking went more like this:
1. Bah... results are slightly wrong, what'd I screw up? ... WTF am I doing wrong?
2. Hm.. results must be wrong by the margin of error of the equipment.... no no... that's not it
3. Ok... double checked all equipment and the speed reading is still off....
4. confirmed calibration on all instruments, re-calibrated, re-measured,
5. Ok, I the 5 smartest people I know double check all equipment, results, calculations, methods, etc.
6. HOLY FUCKEN MOTHER OF GOD CAN THIS REALLY BE TRUE!??
7. Let's show what we found... be cautious... and have have other people repeat the experiment because after all, incredible claims require significant evidence.
What I'm trying to point out here, is that a result like this is any one of these scientist's wet dream. They all would love to "break" the current scientific understanding because that allows them to discover something new. To throw out the word "bias" is misusing it from the typical context. In more typical language it implies that the desire of the scientist drives the result. In this case, the desire of the scientist is for neutrinos to be FTL because that would reap them lots of scientific prestige and then the physics groupies would be all over them.
d
What are you smoking? Theoretical limitations aren't too far away. There are lots of games that we can yet play to increase performance, but miles of runway we don't have.
And yes, I remember a headline "Can we break the 1 micron barrier?" and I marvel that we're at 22nm lithography and shrinking.
d
I call bullshit. List the stores and I'll call them myself. Even back in the day, MS never "contractually forbid" selling other operating systems, they just charged their license fee based upon each and every computer sold. So in effect the company was paying for a windows operating system even if they never installed it on the machine.
d
Well, unless they lose money. It does happen. Under the current regime, you can carry forward capital losses from year to year but can use them to offset only $3000/year of regular income (though you can use them in toto against any capital gains). Getting rid of the special taxation status of capital gains would encourage enormously risk-averse investing - and we want more money at risk, because those risky new projects are the ones we want to encourage.
Nah... that doesn't quite pass the smell test. Capital gains are taxed at 15%... income at 28%. So the argument is that the risk of making this investment is oh so worth it when your take home is 85% of the profits... but "run away scary" when you get to keep *only* 72% of the profits. The numbers just aren't there to support the adjectives you used.
So from an investment standpoint, a minor hit... from a tax standpoint... it's double the money coming in from some MAJOR streams of income. That's a big difference.
d
WTF... I must have just run into the fox news talking point section. Which way to the door out of bullshit land?
This is one of the stupidest lines of spoon fed nonsense to come out of the whole Warren Buffett episode. He can't argue that the system should be changed without putting up the money himself? And to what end? Nobody wants to pay taxes but adults realize that it goes toward running our country. I personally think my tax rate should be increased... you know why? not because I want to pay more money, but because I want our country to balance it's budget. But if I volunteered to paid more in taxes, I wouldn't have the money (which I don't want to lose) AND the federal government wouldn't balance it's budget (which I also want). However I still think Obama shouldn't have renewed the bush tax cuts for anyone.
So why the fuck can't Warren Buffett argue that the tax rate on the rich should be increased while not giving away his money to the government? It is perfectly reasonable and logical to argue that he doesn't pay enough in taxes and argue the system should be changed for the benefit of the country! Because if it was changed for all, it might actually make a difference to the country.
Attacking Warren Buffett just shows how fucking nuts the right is. A guy who made his billions from scratch and is giving almost all of it away before he dies.... but watch out, he's arguing that the rich should pay at least the same percentage as middle class folks so fox says he's eeeeeevil and that "he's a socialist too!!!!1111!!11"
d
yeah... but I don't agree with your first statement. How does it encourage investment? If you invest and make money you get taxed on the profit. The key phrase being "you make money". You only pay taxes on the money you make. We're not talking corporate tax rates. We're talking individual profit rates. The person who is going to invest is going to put their money where it has the greatest returns. That means: cash interest earning bank account bonds stocks (generally speaking; ignoring risk levels). Changing how much tax you have to pay won't change where you put your money because you're still looking for the highest rate of return.
Give me some examples where your statement is true and compare against what happens if the tax rate is lower or not. Show me situations where the lower cap gain tax rate will actually effect behavior. People will invest where it will earn them money.
Also, keep in mind that if you don't place the tax burden here, you shift it somewhere else. They've moved the tax burden from capital gains to income so if we increase cap gains we can decrease income tax. At the moment it doesn't feel like that because we're so far in the hole, we're not looking at shifting, we're only looking at shoveling money back into the hole. Frankly I make much more money on income than on stocks so I have no problem switching over to the same tax rate for both. I don't see why they should be taxed differently in the first place.
Savings where the *earnings* on those savings are taxed as income will still make more money than cash.
d
Ok... so you that's exactly where I started. It doesn't make sense to tax it as an income class that's taxed lower than standard income. If you want to help out new businesses, add something that helps new businesses specifically. Rewarding people who have all their money in stocks with a lower tax rate just appears to be a form of coddling the rich.
So I agree with your premise. Raise or get rid of capital gains tax. And by "get rid of" I mean, treat it as normal income.
d
In addition you have to consdier that the companies that the rich use to get rich, use the resources of the country at a far higher rate than a normal person. They make their money using tax payer funded roads, infrastructure, laws, legal system, etc. This is not all about the rich, this is about their money. You also have to factor in all the programs that support economy, public peace, and maintaining our standing overseas (i.e. military and diplomacy).
So a rich person may sit in their mansion and never travel on a public road, but their money has US tax payer fingerprints all over it. That's why it should be taxed on par or greater than the money from people who actually work for a living.
d
Help me out here: How do capital gains drive investment? As I see it, this is primarily taxes on property. Not much value add there. I know this is the argument that has been used, but I can't come up with even a token argument where this is true.
d
"If a person pays SOMETHING, they are more likely willing to make responsible voting choices if they know that asking/getting MORE stuff from the fed will mean they will pay MORE in taxes. It's far too easy for someone who pays NOTHING to ask for more."
This is a stupid talking point. So let's take your Yahoo article example. A family of 4 making 50,000. They still pay taxes, social security for example, just not Federal Income tax. So lets say they pay $10 in federal income tax. Is that enough? Does that change their attitude? No? How about $20? Do you want them to all pay NO LESS THAN $100 per household in order to qualify as feel invested? "But NOW they feel invested in the system!"
This is totally stupid as it won't change anyone's opinion as to what should happen with the federal budget. And frankly, lets not pretend that the poor drive any political decision these days. A politician pandering to the poor? Laughable. Seriously, whens the last time you actually heard that? Name the issue... and it can't just be a talking point, they actually have to do something on the issue. Pass a bill, create a law. (Elderly don't count, they drive votes.) Even the middle class doesn't really count anymore.
Here we are debating if the rich should pay another percentage point or two in their taxes. Back in the 1950's the top tax rate used to be 90%. Yet the idea of even talking about that is ridiculous, but "let um die!" is ok for people without insurance and defunding social security, no problem.
Class warfare has been going on a long time. If you really want to talk about fair, lets talk about getting rid of the term "capital gains" and instead just call it income and tax that appropriately.
d
... you know that in an "automated machining center" the lathe/mill/whatever are STILL run by humans, right?
In industry, efficiency is measured by (how much you get done)/(cost). The GP is correct that humans will be hired when they're cheaper than robots. This is the way industry works right now. However, his implication that cheap energy going away will kill robotics is stupid. Renewable energy is only about double the cost or less than coal/nuclear energy. If you removed all coal, people would just switch to solar/wind, etc. At double the cost for energy, nothing would significantly change. Robots aren't expensive because of the electricity they use, but rather their engineering time and cost of manufactured parts.
d
Robot design is not a math problem, it is an engineering problem. Engineering is about the best use of resources and solving problems the most efficient way. Some of these problems can be programmed into a computer to assist with the design, while most can't (things like marketing). It also involves a level of creativity to do stuff like this, and while computers will get there some day, they aren't even close right now.
d
Are you talking about Wall Street bankers? CEOs? Sports stars? OMG, you mean they're selfish beings? Oh no.
You could argue that we the people are so pathetically lame that it takes a habitual liar to satisfy us and get elected. Or that we have such a short attention span that they can do whatever they as long as they mouth platitudes "America is great", "we are exceptional", "other people hate us because of our freedoms".
The reality is that we've let the system become corrupt. Politicians need money to run for office (because the person with the most money wins 4 out of 5 times). Annnnd, the people who give the politicians the money get to tell them what to do. Are you giving the politicians the money? no? Are they listening to you? Hm... thought not.
They aren't sociopaths, they just don't care about you.
d
You know... the funny thing is that this statement is much more true for magnets than it is for tides. Magnetism, like gravity, is a fundamental force that we can't explain. It just is. It is just one of the rules of the universe and we haven't been able penetrate other than to measure and bound it's behavior with mathematical equations.
d
You aren't kidding. Think about it.. For every watt of power computers use, computers turn that watt into heat and then they have to run an AC to remove the heat from your building, thus doubling your electricity bill. Half your electricity goes toward heating (and processing) and the other half goes toward cooling.
This is why there are been experiments in just sucking in outside air for natural cooling instead of keeping it a closed system. (See "free cooling") The easier it is to cool your data center, the less power you will use.
d
Ok... who couldn't read this article with out thinking of Dilbert and these guys: http://tim.2wgroup.com/blog/images/elbonian_computer.gif
d
"Yeah see, the magnets... they pull each other closer... they push each other away... It always goes on. you can't explain that. you can't explain it."
On the holodeck, everyone has awesome land, fantastic art, and hot chicks.
d
Mod parent up. This is one of the biggest reasons the rich pay lower tax as a percentage of earnings that us normal folks.
d
I tend to agree. Once we got to the moon... there totally is a feeling of "um.. ok, now what?" that you see in the history of the Apollo programs. So we're there and we start making up crap excuses and hollow objectives to justify why we're there.
Ok, so that's stupid, but I believe in the final objective of putting people up in space in a long term and sustainable fashion. In the end, this does mean you have to have a viable economy or other reason for being there, but in the short therm you want to keep making continuous steps toward that objective. If we don't we'll never get there and it'll always remain economically unachievable because we will won't be any closer to our goal than we are now.
From my perspective we have made steps toward the goal of putting people in space by building the space station. Getting people farther and farther away from this planet isn't the objective. Shooting a guy off to mars for example, is just a short term pissing contest. People living in space is the objective (at least as I see it). Building viable space stations is a necessary part of living in space so on that regard we're approaching things pretty well with the ISS.
The goal should be first to do things that are self sustaining and everything else will come back from that.
d
Face it... when most people buy most technology, weather it's TVs, cars, or MP3 players, we all want that "cool new technology" feeling. Apple doesn't have anything unique here except they do focus on looks and functionality a little more than other companies. I'm about as anti-apple as you can get, but I hate this argument. It's been repeated to death and just doesn't ring true for apple owners any more than the rest of us.
d