I might be off, but it sounds to me like you have never had the experience of being poor. I actually grew up pretty well off, but my mom kicked my ass out soon after I turned 18. She gave me some warning and I had a little time to plan, but it was still a rude awakening. Looking back, I consider my couple of years in poverty a privilege.
Adjusted for inflation, $8k a decade ago is %10.5K today; almost what one would make working full time for federal minimum wage. I managed without subsidies. The GP mentioned making use of them.
As for school, it's not true you can't go when living in poverty. Government subsidies make college virtually free for those with little to no means. Upward mobility is still very possible for those who care to make the effort. IMO, the only major shortcoming of this country is the lack of free health care.
Vacation/Travel? Have some imagination! When I was dirt poor, I and four of my friends saved up over a couple of months, piled into an 85' Nissan half-ton with a camper shell, and drove 1200 miles to Canada for one of the most awesome road trips ever. We crashed on peoples' floors, camped out near hot springs and huge raging rivers, and chopped down our own firewood with the help of an oil field worker from Quebec who barely spoke English.
I agree with you that living in absolute poverty for an entire life would suck, but I think you place way to much emphasis on money when it comes to happiness. A good portion of people, even with a good work ethic, will never be able to make 75K a year due to limited intellect, but many people like this still manage to be happy.
I think the relationships in ones life has a lot more to do with happiness than income. During my road trip in Canada, the fond memories I have remember were of the interactions with the people around me - not the money, or lack thereof in our wallets.
90% rate only applies to income over extreme amounts - like 3 million. Only the top 0.0001% were ever touched by those tax rates. A doctor -even a highly paid specialist - would never sniff the 90% bracket.
I don't understand why you think the GP's post is a joke. The median individual income in this country is around 34k, which in urban areas can be barely enough to get by without public subsidies. Federal minimum wage, which is $7.25 an hour, is not even near a living wage in urban areas, and is barely a living wage in cheaper, rural areas of the country.
A decade ago I lived on 8K a year. I did it by having two roommates and living in an area with a low cost of living. In an urban area I would have needed Section 8 subsidies (that's your answer to your question about how the GP pays rent) and food stamps to survive.
If you don't have any children, or a spouse, $75,000 is about right. If you have children, a wife, and a big family, $75,000 is a drop in the bucket and you'd probably need twice that much to provide for children and take care of parents or grand parents into old age.
In urban areas I think that number sounds about right, but in many parts of the country 75K a year is middle to up upper-middle class due to the very low cost of living.
Woosh! I was intentionally playing into the stereotype that all news organizations other than Fox are evil lefties that have no viewers.
I'm usually pretty good at picking up on sarcasm - even on the net. Congratulations.
Secondly, just because liberals view those organizations as pandering to the right, it suddenly makes it so?
I didn't say that. My point was that it was all a matter of perspective. The same media viewed by conservatives as liberal is viewed by liberals as conservative.
As far as tax cuts go, you might remember that we transitioned from stagflation to a growing economy during Reagan's time in office which continued through to the end of Clinton's second term (aside from the 90-91 recession).
Where do you get your history? Conservapedia? The Reagan tax cuts (or more aptly, tax-burden shift) had nothing to do with ending stagflation.
Fed chairman Paul Volcker ended stagflation by raising interest rates sharply, and sparking the terrible recession (deemed necessary) that happened a year into Reagan's first term.
Reagan's tax cut and subsequent tax increases (to keep the country from going broke due to his initial tax cut) did nothing but shift a portion of the tax burden from the wealthy to the middle class and explode the debt which had been shrinking steadily every year since the end of WWII.
Yeah but that was in the early 1800's. Do you think Mendel would be a creationist today given the fact that the Catholic church accepts the theory of evolution?
national debt that is almost the size of annual GDP
That debt and deficit problem we face now has been 30 years in the making. It was started by Reagan's tax cuts on the wealth in 1981. You'll have to excuse me if I dismiss your sudden concern as feigned.
Where the fuck were you deficit chicken-hawks during Reagan, Bush, and Bush II were in office?
So you're willing to generalize to an entire group of people based on three data points?
I think you need re-read my post. I just said that I DON'T view the tea party's motivation as being race, even though every tea partier I know is in fact racist.
Absolutely. Another factor is experience and empathy - My father grew up and has lived in a 99% non-black area near the Canadian border in the midwest. His experience is different so he can't relate.
Exactly. My wife is half Mexican (the dark variety) and half Italian. She has the experience of being rejected by both groups when she was young, i.e., to the Mexicans she was white and to the whites she was Mexican.
Being whitey McWhiterson myself, this is a phenomenon I was completely unaware of until I met and got to know her.
The experience of being placed in a box her entire life shaped her world view.
But again, a group of mostly white people is not racist because it's a group of mostly white people, and though you call it a generalization, I stand by my first statement that people who claim otherwise are racist themselves.
People are not labeling the tea party racist because it's made of 98% white people. They are labeling it racist because of the overtly racist signs and comments captured in the media coverage of the tea party events. This may be not be fair representation of the group, but that's the way it is.
My wife views the tea party as racist. We disagree, but the idea that that makes her a racist is laughable to me.
Frankly, I call anyone who says otherwise a racist themselves.
You are generalizing about people who generalize.
I only know three, but every "tea partier" I personally know is an older white person who harbors what I would call..."ethnic animosity".
Certain groups are terrified of what the Tea Party stands for, and they've played the race card in order to try and stop it.
The playing of the race card is nothing more than a misunderstanding of the core motivation of the Tea Party movement. The Tea Party is the John Birch society all over again. The primary motivation is not race, but economics. It's a bunch of people who see the shifting economic social climate as a threat to the status quo which has benefited them greatly. The issue of racism comes out of simple demographics. Most of the tea partiers are mostly older white people, and a higher percentage of older white people harbor racial animosity. Hell, even my Dad who is a dyed-in-the-wool progressive and participated in civil rights marches in the 1960's has expressed sentiments that can come across as "racist". It's doesn't mean he's racist. He's just an old white dude who suffers from the same fears as other older white people.
No, in this particular thread that was exactly the point.
No, it was not. The claim that "$250,000 isn't rich" was brought up as a Red Herring. It deflects attention from the original argument that the lower income taxes on the top 2% do nothing to help working class people.
If you say so. Good luck with your magic number. I'm sure there won't be any unintended consequences or anything.
See 1993 when the Democrats forced through a tax increase, while Republicans wailed about the dire consequences that is would have for the economy.
If would like to read the actual quotes by Republicans saying that the recession of 1991-92 would return due to the Clinton tax hikes, here you go.
How about skipping the logical extremes and electing someone who thinks existing government institutions can be run more efficiently?
Someone with the mindset that government is always bad will never improve anything once elected. Instead they will only work to fulfill their own prophecy.
Regarding, "freedom", the government also protects rights, which contrary to popular belief, are not "god given".
Our economy is consumer driven. Given the fact that lack of consumer demand is the major problem slowing our economy now, raising taxes on the top 2.5% of income earners by a few percent will not significantly affect overall consumer demand.
Slashdot Mirror
The mean and median salary in the US is around $45k a year
That sounds more like the median household income. The median personal income is 32k for all workers; 39K if you count only those working full time.
I might be off, but it sounds to me like you have never had the experience of being poor. I actually grew up pretty well off, but my mom kicked my ass out soon after I turned 18. She gave me some warning and I had a little time to plan, but it was still a rude awakening. Looking back, I consider my couple of years in poverty a privilege.
Adjusted for inflation, $8k a decade ago is %10.5K today; almost what one would make working full time for federal minimum wage. I managed without subsidies. The GP mentioned making use of them.
As for school, it's not true you can't go when living in poverty. Government subsidies make college virtually free for those with little to no means. Upward mobility is still very possible for those who care to make the effort. IMO, the only major shortcoming of this country is the lack of free health care.
Vacation/Travel? Have some imagination! When I was dirt poor, I and four of my friends saved up over a couple of months, piled into an 85' Nissan half-ton with a camper shell, and drove 1200 miles to Canada for one of the most awesome road trips ever. We crashed on peoples' floors, camped out near hot springs and huge raging rivers, and chopped down our own firewood with the help of an oil field worker from Quebec who barely spoke English.
I agree with you that living in absolute poverty for an entire life would suck, but I think you place way to much emphasis on money when it comes to happiness. A good portion of people, even with a good work ethic, will never be able to make 75K a year due to limited intellect, but many people like this still manage to be happy.
I think the relationships in ones life has a lot more to do with happiness than income. During my road trip in Canada, the fond memories I have remember were of the interactions with the people around me - not the money, or lack thereof in our wallets.
90% rate only applies to income over extreme amounts - like 3 million. Only the top 0.0001% were ever touched by those tax rates. A doctor -even a highly paid specialist - would never sniff the 90% bracket.
You apparently don't realize that the wealthiest 1% of income earners pay a larger share of Federal revenues today than the same group did in the 50s.
And you apparently don't realize why that is.
I don't understand why you think the GP's post is a joke. The median individual income in this country is around 34k, which in urban areas can be barely enough to get by without public subsidies. Federal minimum wage, which is $7.25 an hour, is not even near a living wage in urban areas, and is barely a living wage in cheaper, rural areas of the country.
A decade ago I lived on 8K a year. I did it by having two roommates and living in an area with a low cost of living. In an urban area I would have needed Section 8 subsidies (that's your answer to your question about how the GP pays rent) and food stamps to survive.
If you don't have any children, or a spouse, $75,000 is about right. If you have children, a wife, and a big family, $75,000 is a drop in the bucket and you'd probably need twice that much to provide for children and take care of parents or grand parents into old age.
In urban areas I think that number sounds about right, but in many parts of the country 75K a year is middle to up upper-middle class due to the very low cost of living.
Woosh! I was intentionally playing into the stereotype that all news organizations other than Fox are evil lefties that have no viewers.
I'm usually pretty good at picking up on sarcasm - even on the net. Congratulations.
Secondly, just because liberals view those organizations as pandering to the right, it suddenly makes it so?
I didn't say that. My point was that it was all a matter of perspective. The same media viewed by conservatives as liberal is viewed by liberals as conservative.
Looks like YOU typecasted YOURSELF.
As what? A centrist?
As far as tax cuts go, you might remember that we transitioned from stagflation to a growing economy during Reagan's time in office which continued through to the end of Clinton's second term (aside from the 90-91 recession).
Where do you get your history? Conservapedia? The Reagan tax cuts (or more aptly, tax-burden shift) had nothing to do with ending stagflation.
Fed chairman Paul Volcker ended stagflation by raising interest rates sharply, and sparking the terrible recession (deemed necessary) that happened a year into Reagan's first term.
Reagan's tax cut and subsequent tax increases (to keep the country from going broke due to his initial tax cut) did nothing but shift a portion of the tax burden from the wealthy to the middle class and explode the debt which had been shrinking steadily every year since the end of WWII.
MSNBC fills a niche. What wrong with that?
As for the others you mentioned, Liberals view them as panderers to the right. You only typecast yourself by lumping them in with MSNBC.
A person who was never conscious...
..was never alive to begin with.
Yeah but that was in the early 1800's. Do you think Mendel would be a creationist today given the fact that the Catholic church accepts the theory of evolution?
. I just saw the lame first paragraph and blew off the rest.
Fuck you too.
What's the problem with people defending their economic status?
It's not a problem per se, but people tend not to take the long view when it comes to economic policy.
Why are some people required to sacrifice their economic well being when other people are not?
See: progressive taxation. McCain's "hero", Teddy Roosevelt was one of the early proponents of progressive taxation in the U.S. We had a stable middle class and wages until 1981 when Reagan decimated the top tax brackets.
national debt that is almost the size of annual GDP
That debt and deficit problem we face now has been 30 years in the making. It was started by Reagan's tax cuts on the wealth in 1981. You'll have to excuse me if I dismiss your sudden concern as feigned.
Where the fuck were you deficit chicken-hawks during Reagan, Bush, and Bush II were in office?
So you're willing to generalize to an entire group of people based on three data points?
I think you need re-read my post. I just said that I DON'T view the tea party's motivation as being race, even though every tea partier I know is in fact racist.
Absolutely. Another factor is experience and empathy - My father grew up and has lived in a 99% non-black area near the Canadian border in the midwest. His experience is different so he can't relate.
Exactly. My wife is half Mexican (the dark variety) and half Italian. She has the experience of being rejected by both groups when she was young, i.e., to the Mexicans she was white and to the whites she was Mexican.
Being whitey McWhiterson myself, this is a phenomenon I was completely unaware of until I met and got to know her.
The experience of being placed in a box her entire life shaped her world view.
But again, a group of mostly white people is not racist because it's a group of mostly white people, and though you call it a generalization, I stand by my first statement that people who claim otherwise are racist themselves.
People are not labeling the tea party racist because it's made of 98% white people. They are labeling it racist because of the overtly racist signs and comments captured in the media coverage of the tea party events. This may be not be fair representation of the group, but that's the way it is.
My wife views the tea party as racist. We disagree, but the idea that that makes her a racist is laughable to me.
Frankly, I call anyone who says otherwise a racist themselves.
You are generalizing about people who generalize.
I only know three, but every "tea partier" I personally know is an older white person who harbors what I would call..."ethnic animosity".
Certain groups are terrified of what the Tea Party stands for, and they've played the race card in order to try and stop it.
The playing of the race card is nothing more than a misunderstanding of the core motivation of the Tea Party movement. The Tea Party is the John Birch society all over again. The primary motivation is not race, but economics. It's a bunch of people who see the shifting economic social climate as a threat to the status quo which has benefited them greatly. The issue of racism comes out of simple demographics. Most of the tea partiers are mostly older white people, and a higher percentage of older white people harbor racial animosity. Hell, even my Dad who is a dyed-in-the-wool progressive and participated in civil rights marches in the 1960's has expressed sentiments that can come across as "racist". It's doesn't mean he's racist. He's just an old white dude who suffers from the same fears as other older white people.
This is why I support compulsory voting. If we can be made to serve on juries in the U.S. I don't see any reason why we can't be made to vote.
ideology....I kicked the habit of that mind poison years ago.
Based on your economic views, you certainly didn't.
The quotes are in the congressional record.
Your writing almost as bad as Rand's.
In political rhetoric "rich" is someone who has more money than you do.
Then it's settled!
98.5% of households in the nation agree: 250K a year is rich!
With businesses, profit gets taxed. Not revenue.
No, in this particular thread that was exactly the point.
No, it was not. The claim that "$250,000 isn't rich" was brought up as a Red Herring. It deflects attention from the original argument that the lower income taxes on the top 2% do nothing to help working class people.
If you say so. Good luck with your magic number. I'm sure there won't be any unintended consequences or anything.
See 1993 when the Democrats forced through a tax increase, while Republicans wailed about the dire consequences that is would have for the economy.
If would like to read the actual quotes by Republicans saying that the recession of 1991-92 would return due to the Clinton tax hikes, here you go.
How about skipping the logical extremes and electing someone who thinks existing government institutions can be run more efficiently?
Someone with the mindset that government is always bad will never improve anything once elected. Instead they will only work to fulfill their own prophecy.
Regarding, "freedom", the government also protects rights, which contrary to popular belief, are not "god given".
How one wants to define rich is not the point.
Our economy is consumer driven. Given the fact that lack of consumer demand is the major problem slowing our economy now, raising taxes on the top 2.5% of income earners by a few percent will not significantly affect overall consumer demand.
Electing a politician who says 'government is the problem' is akin to hiring a PETA member to manage your slaughterhouse.