Sales tax is the way I want to pay taxes... I don't mind if it's like 25-30% either... but only if they'd repeal those pesky income and property taxes.
You really want to have to mark up everything by 30% every time you purchase something from the store?
On the other hand, the poorer person may spend most of their money on food and items which may not be taxed while the wealthier will be taxed on non-essential purchases.
The wealthier person will likely purchase securities which would not fall under a sales tax.
It is basically giving the wealthy and IRA for all their money where they can make investments and not worry about paying taxes until they decide to purchase their goods, if ever. It would result in a large short fall in revenue for the US government while making those who live paycheck to paycheck have the greatest tax burden.
Dot com is the gold standard for the Internet. Any porn website with a.xxx domain will be associated with spam and viruses just like all these other gimmicky TLDs
You can't throw people in jail if they committed no crime. Both bankers and homeowners who caused this mess only crime was making a poor financial decision.
Even if you throw people in jail, it won't prevent the next crisis in 20 years because human greed will always get the best of them. A new group of idiots start making money and think that they know what they are doing and get over confident. It would create another boom and bust cycle.
Some people who caused the problems will get bailed out, but it is part of the costs of stimulating the economy. If it results in more jobs, then it will be a net win. You can also stimulate the economy by taxing the banking system and using the money on other parts of the economy.
Nationalizing the financial system is not a realistic solution and doesn't solve the problem. Corporations will asks for special favors from the government who has little incentive to minimize risks. Voters will want cheap loans and the government will give them to people who don't deserve it.
Even in the recession we are experiencing, people go to work, pay taxes, buy homes and cars. Allowing the system to collapse will halt this economic activity and just make the economy longer to recover.
There are many pragmatic solutions that the government can pursue to help stabilize the banking system and stimulate the economy. Instead of nationalizing the banks or allowing them to fail, you can just create more regulation and oversight to prevent banks from taking excess risks in the future.
The securities weren't complete crap, they were just overvalued. Banks who over leveraged themselves too much with these bad securities were the ones who were going to fail. Banks who took a more conservative risked were able to absorb the losses of these securities.
The problem is that when a large over leveraged institution goes bankrupted and is forced to sell the assets all at once, the prices will temporarily fall below their true value in the market because there are not enough immediate buyers. This will temporarily drive down the value of the assets of the less risky banks which could cause them to default even if they are financially sound in the long term. It was a market failure so the government stepped in to intervene
The securities were overvalued, but they are far from worthless.
When Lehman Brothers was bankrupted, it was forced to sell all its assets which resulted in a short term drop in valuation because there wasn't enough liquidity in the market to buy them all. It resulted in the value of similar securities held by other institutions to drop which could force them to default, forcing a sell off which would bring other banks who down in the process. The government had to step in to stop the fire sale so that assets can trade at closer to their real value. The US government recovered the majority of the money it invested, so these assets are far from worthless.
This idea that businesses and banks will be the only ones that suffer, while the average American will be fine is completely wrong. Americans are employed by corporations who rely on the banks to run their day to day business. If the banks fail, many of these corporations will fail, which will cause people to lose their jobs in great numbers.
It's not just individuals. Corporations can lose their savings and cant get loans to cover costs, which would force them out of business. It would have resulted in a far greater job loss than which have already occurred. Job losses mean less consumers in the economy which will affect more businesses. It is a vicious cycle.
One of the requirements in a capitalistic economy is a sound banking system. Entities need to be able to safely store their wealth and take out loans to cover their cash flow needs. When these institutions fail, it is the government's responsibility to fix the problem if it expects a functioning economy.
Bailing out Lehman brothers would allow the market for mortgage backed securities to remain liquid and not cause other banks to fail as a result. I don't have a time machine, so of course I can't have iron clad proof on how results will be different, but I can assume it wouldn't make things worst.
The point is that having the majority of major banks fail would be catastrophic for the economy. Imagine if Americans suddenly lose all their savings accounts as a result and can't get a loan for anything.
I think everyone knew that even Capitalism has its down sides, we just agreed that they were acceptable.
You don't have to accept the downsides of capitalism. All developed countries have mixed economies which allow the government to intervene to correct the problems with capitalism, while still enjoying the benefits of free markets.
Those examples are a little extreme. Micro transactions can just be the equivalent of paying for an expensive set of golf clubs to improve your game. It could allow you to hit the ball longer and more accurate giving you an advantage, but the game still relies mostly on the skill of the player.
Perfect competition is just one type of market in a free market economy. Many industries naturally have imperfect competition under free markets. Economies of scale and networking effects can create barriers of entry making it harder for new competition to emerge.
If you really think you can build better cars for cheaper, you can go to Wall Street and convince people to give you the capital needed to do so. There are less barriers to entry in game development, so it shouldn't be an issue there.
Once we start changing the climate in anyway, no matter how slightly, there will be a lawsuit for every snowstorm injury, rainstorm injury, wind storm injury, cold injury, heat injury,...and the suits will be agianst the researchers, the organizations, the universities, and anyone else connected with this Really Bad Idea.
IANAL but I am pretty sure weather events are considered acts of God so there are no grounds to sue. Maybe if you can prove that the geoengineering directly caused the weather event you could, but that would be nearly impossible to do. It is like linking a butterfly to causing a hurricane.
The problem with the Kyoto Protocol was that it required nations to use less energy which would hurt energy companies profits. It will also put one country at a disadvantage because other nations will ignore the Kyoto Proctocol and have the advantage higher energy usage. There is no economic incentive for an individual nation to follow the Kyoto Protocol.
With geoengineering, we can theoretically burn all the cheap fossil fuels we want and not have to worry about the effects of global warming. Everyone wins.
Some technologies are obviously risky but how is removing CO2 from the atmosphere going to create major unintended consequences? We know how the effects of less CO2 because we experienced in the recent past.
Compare this to our current geoengineering project of raising the CO2 levels in the atmosphere where we have no idea what the consequences are.
Most users don't spend time navigating file menus is because they are complex to use. It results in the average user not knowing about useful features that can make them more productive with their work.
The ribbon uses the same amount of real estate as the menu in Office anyways, so I don't buy the argument that it gets in the way. The only thing that slows you down is learning the new system.
Ok, look at the image where they annotate various buttons with the frequency of use (10th image down). I thought this was a joke. If MS has such detailed usage statistics, why wouldn't they order or size the buttons according to frequency of use. Why is 'New Folder' (1%) the same size as 'Paste' (19%) and twice the size of 'Cut' (7%).
Probably because most people don't know about the new folder button. One of the advantages of the ribbon is it makes important features more discoverable by the average user.
GIMP's UI is awkward because it differs from almost every program out there, not just Photoshop. It is harder to learn even for non Photoshop users.
Making software user friendly benefits experts not just the average user. People want to spend time actually manipulating images instead of figuring out a wonky new interface.
I don't doubt they will make it harder to pirate and annoy users, but there is no way that Microsoft will require an Internet connection to load the OS. Microsoft might be stupid, but they aren't that stupid. This is just speculation based off one patent and FUD.
It made no assumption that it was the only barrier or that IE9 was the best in every security measure. It says that it is the most common form of malware out there.
Have you seen the average Internet user? They have a hard time determining if a download is from a reputable source or not.
If you are smart enough to be able to determine if a download is safe, then other browsers could be more secure for your needs. However, for the average user, having a whitelist/blacklist is very valuable informing how to safely browse the Internet.
The study analyzed the correct criteria for social engineering attacks because they exploit the weaknesses in the users instead of the weaknesses of the browser. You can assume that users are equally as vulnerable if the malicious website is rendered the same on all browsers. If there is a download free wallpapers button, a web browser is not going to prevent a user from clicking on it.
Assuming that IE9 just blocks every website is absurd. If that was the case, it would be mentioned in the article. It would be interesting to get these statistics, but you can't really make judgments when you have no information.
Slashdot Mirror
Sales tax is the way I want to pay taxes... I don't mind if it's like 25-30% either... but only if they'd repeal those pesky income and property taxes.
You really want to have to mark up everything by 30% every time you purchase something from the store?
On the other hand, the poorer person may spend most of their money on food and items which may not be taxed while the wealthier will be taxed on non-essential purchases.
The wealthier person will likely purchase securities which would not fall under a sales tax.
It is basically giving the wealthy and IRA for all their money where they can make investments and not worry about paying taxes until they decide to purchase their goods, if ever. It would result in a large short fall in revenue for the US government while making those who live paycheck to paycheck have the greatest tax burden.
Why would any website go with .XXX over .COM?
Dot com is the gold standard for the Internet. Any porn website with a .xxx domain will be associated with spam and viruses just like all these other gimmicky TLDs
You can't throw people in jail if they committed no crime. Both bankers and homeowners who caused this mess only crime was making a poor financial decision.
Even if you throw people in jail, it won't prevent the next crisis in 20 years because human greed will always get the best of them. A new group of idiots start making money and think that they know what they are doing and get over confident. It would create another boom and bust cycle.
Some people who caused the problems will get bailed out, but it is part of the costs of stimulating the economy. If it results in more jobs, then it will be a net win. You can also stimulate the economy by taxing the banking system and using the money on other parts of the economy.
Nationalizing the financial system is not a realistic solution and doesn't solve the problem. Corporations will asks for special favors from the government who has little incentive to minimize risks. Voters will want cheap loans and the government will give them to people who don't deserve it.
The collapse of the US economy is not inevitable.
Even in the recession we are experiencing, people go to work, pay taxes, buy homes and cars. Allowing the system to collapse will halt this economic activity and just make the economy longer to recover.
There are many pragmatic solutions that the government can pursue to help stabilize the banking system and stimulate the economy. Instead of nationalizing the banks or allowing them to fail, you can just create more regulation and oversight to prevent banks from taking excess risks in the future.
The securities weren't complete crap, they were just overvalued. Banks who over leveraged themselves too much with these bad securities were the ones who were going to fail. Banks who took a more conservative risked were able to absorb the losses of these securities.
The problem is that when a large over leveraged institution goes bankrupted and is forced to sell the assets all at once, the prices will temporarily fall below their true value in the market because there are not enough immediate buyers. This will temporarily drive down the value of the assets of the less risky banks which could cause them to default even if they are financially sound in the long term. It was a market failure so the government stepped in to intervene
The securities were overvalued, but they are far from worthless.
When Lehman Brothers was bankrupted, it was forced to sell all its assets which resulted in a short term drop in valuation because there wasn't enough liquidity in the market to buy them all. It resulted in the value of similar securities held by other institutions to drop which could force them to default, forcing a sell off which would bring other banks who down in the process. The government had to step in to stop the fire sale so that assets can trade at closer to their real value. The US government recovered the majority of the money it invested, so these assets are far from worthless.
This idea that businesses and banks will be the only ones that suffer, while the average American will be fine is completely wrong. Americans are employed by corporations who rely on the banks to run their day to day business. If the banks fail, many of these corporations will fail, which will cause people to lose their jobs in great numbers.
It's not just individuals. Corporations can lose their savings and cant get loans to cover costs, which would force them out of business. It would have resulted in a far greater job loss than which have already occurred. Job losses mean less consumers in the economy which will affect more businesses. It is a vicious cycle.
One of the requirements in a capitalistic economy is a sound banking system. Entities need to be able to safely store their wealth and take out loans to cover their cash flow needs. When these institutions fail, it is the government's responsibility to fix the problem if it expects a functioning economy.
Bailing out Lehman brothers would allow the market for mortgage backed securities to remain liquid and not cause other banks to fail as a result. I don't have a time machine, so of course I can't have iron clad proof on how results will be different, but I can assume it wouldn't make things worst.
The point is that having the majority of major banks fail would be catastrophic for the economy. Imagine if Americans suddenly lose all their savings accounts as a result and can't get a loan for anything.
I think everyone knew that even Capitalism has its down sides, we just agreed that they were acceptable.
You don't have to accept the downsides of capitalism. All developed countries have mixed economies which allow the government to intervene to correct the problems with capitalism, while still enjoying the benefits of free markets.
Lehman Brothers was allowed to fail which resulted in making the financial crisis much worst. It was a test of pure capitalism that failed.
Those examples are a little extreme. Micro transactions can just be the equivalent of paying for an expensive set of golf clubs to improve your game. It could allow you to hit the ball longer and more accurate giving you an advantage, but the game still relies mostly on the skill of the player.
Perfect competition is just one type of market in a free market economy. Many industries naturally have imperfect competition under free markets. Economies of scale and networking effects can create barriers of entry making it harder for new competition to emerge.
If you really think you can build better cars for cheaper, you can go to Wall Street and convince people to give you the capital needed to do so. There are less barriers to entry in game development, so it shouldn't be an issue there.
Once we start changing the climate in anyway, no matter how slightly, there will be a lawsuit for every snowstorm injury, rainstorm injury, wind storm injury, cold injury, heat injury,...and the suits will be agianst the researchers, the organizations, the universities, and anyone else connected with this Really Bad Idea.
IANAL but I am pretty sure weather events are considered acts of God so there are no grounds to sue. Maybe if you can prove that the geoengineering directly caused the weather event you could, but that would be nearly impossible to do. It is like linking a butterfly to causing a hurricane.
Corporations can profit off geoengineering.
The problem with the Kyoto Protocol was that it required nations to use less energy which would hurt energy companies profits. It will also put one country at a disadvantage because other nations will ignore the Kyoto Proctocol and have the advantage higher energy usage. There is no economic incentive for an individual nation to follow the Kyoto Protocol.
With geoengineering, we can theoretically burn all the cheap fossil fuels we want and not have to worry about the effects of global warming. Everyone wins.
Some technologies are obviously risky but how is removing CO2 from the atmosphere going to create major unintended consequences? We know how the effects of less CO2 because we experienced in the recent past.
Compare this to our current geoengineering project of raising the CO2 levels in the atmosphere where we have no idea what the consequences are.
Most users don't spend time navigating file menus is because they are complex to use. It results in the average user not knowing about useful features that can make them more productive with their work.
The ribbon uses the same amount of real estate as the menu in Office anyways, so I don't buy the argument that it gets in the way. The only thing that slows you down is learning the new system.
Ribbons are more efficient than navigating complex drop down file menus.
Ok, look at the image where they annotate various buttons with the frequency of use (10th image down). I thought this was a joke. If MS has such detailed usage statistics, why wouldn't they order or size the buttons according to frequency of use. Why is 'New Folder' (1%) the same size as 'Paste' (19%) and twice the size of 'Cut' (7%).
Probably because most people don't know about the new folder button. One of the advantages of the ribbon is it makes important features more discoverable by the average user.
GIMP's UI is awkward because it differs from almost every program out there, not just Photoshop. It is harder to learn even for non Photoshop users.
Making software user friendly benefits experts not just the average user. People want to spend time actually manipulating images instead of figuring out a wonky new interface.
I don't doubt they will make it harder to pirate and annoy users, but there is no way that Microsoft will require an Internet connection to load the OS. Microsoft might be stupid, but they aren't that stupid. This is just speculation based off one patent and FUD.
People can still pirate Windows 7 and XP so it won't have a significant factor in the market share.
Couldn't they just enable the protection when there is an Internet connection?
The market for computers that don't connect to the Internet is small enough that it probably isn't a big factor in piracy.
It made no assumption that it was the only barrier or that IE9 was the best in every security measure. It says that it is the most common form of malware out there.
Have you seen the average Internet user? They have a hard time determining if a download is from a reputable source or not.
If you are smart enough to be able to determine if a download is safe, then other browsers could be more secure for your needs. However, for the average user, having a whitelist/blacklist is very valuable informing how to safely browse the Internet.
The study analyzed the correct criteria for social engineering attacks because they exploit the weaknesses in the users instead of the weaknesses of the browser. You can assume that users are equally as vulnerable if the malicious website is rendered the same on all browsers. If there is a download free wallpapers button, a web browser is not going to prevent a user from clicking on it.
Assuming that IE9 just blocks every website is absurd. If that was the case, it would be mentioned in the article. It would be interesting to get these statistics, but you can't really make judgments when you have no information.