What I mean is that no matter what the tax rate, the actual revenue remains a consistent percentage rate
I don't know where you get your information, but this is demonstrably wrong. I can point to countries with twice our tax rate (and twice our revenue by GDP). I can point to places where federal revenue took a hit or got a bump because of a tax decrease or increase.
I completely agree that taxes impact economic growth, but the suggestion that this relationship is 1:1 is easily falsifiable.
I agree, but debt is also an enemy of economic growth - and morally reprehensible since you are improving your own standard of living at the expense of future generations.
I don't know what you mean by "don't work". If you want to raise revenue, then raising taxes certainly works. Of course it will have an impact on economic growth, but you can absolutely raise revenue with higher taxes.
I think it's because people have stopped paying attention to him. He makes the news for being funny at the correspondents' dinner rather than for fighting with congress.
0.5% will not make a significant difference to the German economy. That's basically sacrificing one year's growth, and only because it's a slow year. In reality, Germany would never be expected to pick up the entire $14 billion, so they wouldn't even notice. I don't think more spending is even necessary to counter Russia - they just need to centralize their defense a bit more. The EU as a whole already outspends Russia.
None of those "major industrialised nations" can [telegraph.co.uk] afford [yahoo.com] to defend themselves [mirror.co.uk] from the likes of Russia without our help.
That's silly. Germany can, all by itself, match Russia's military spending by adding around $14 billion/year. That's about 0.5% of their GDP. Europe absolutely can defend themselves if we bow out.
this study says basically that modern cars let out less fuel fumes in 50000 km than the volume differential between new and used braking pads and tires.
No, the study says that modern GASOLINE cars let out fewer PARTICULATES than the volume differential between new and used braking pads, tires, and road surface. This is reasonable, since there isn't very much particulate emissions from a modern gasoline engine.
I'm not vilifying them. In fact, I share their goal of reduced spending. I'm pointing out that their tactic has been mostly ineffective. All one has to do is look at the rise in the national debt to realize this. I would rather have a compromise that resulted in lower spending, higher taxes, and a smaller debt than some restraint on spending increases, no tax hike, and a huge and growing debt. Had they compromised on taxes, they would have gotten spending concessions out of the Democrats - even on entitlements.
Conservatives at this time seem to oppose all public-sector spending, demanding privatization or nothing.
I'm not sure what you mean. The mainstream Republican party has recently expanded Medicare and seems to be a staunch defender of Social Security. Privatization is not that accurate - they don't propose selling off roads and bridges to a private enterprise. In the most extreme cases, they propose bidding out the maintenance of a highway or long-term leases. This contractor vs. employee difference is minor and mostly related to how unions tend to support one side rather than the other.
When you yoke those things to an agenda that demands simple and demonstrable business-based ROI, you realize it's not possible.
You threw an awful lot of things together into one pile. Some problems benefit from more efficiency, some benefit more from stability. Road construction probably benefits more from efficiency. Air traffic control, not so much. I see "liberals" and "conservatives" arguing about how much to involve contractors vs employees, about the amount of grant money spent - but you never hear any mainstream "liberals" call for nationalization of an industry, nor do you hear mainstream "conservatives" call for the selling off of public infrastructure. Even in education, "conservatives" want free public education funded by vouchers while "liberals" want free publiic education run by employees. Neither side is calling for an end to free public education. For the most part, their positions are very similar, but just different enough to fire up union membership.
Unfortunately, Tea Party members take their tax pledge too seriously and so are unable to compromise. I'd rather see a healthy balance sheet than politicians take a quixotic stand. When it becomes absolutely clear that you aren't going to get spending cuts without tax increases, something is better than nothing. Ironically, the "disastrous" sequester turned out to be a pretty good compromise. Not as good as could have been negotiated with some flexibility on taxes, but still better than nothing.
Yes, well economic growth, population growth, and inflation conspire to raise tax revenue - but it is not keeping up with spending. I would prefer that spending was cut, but absent that I simply have to insist on balancing the books for recurring costs. Infrastructure borrowing is defensible, but not borrowing to pay salaries and benefits. And borrowing money and then handing it out to the populace is simply insane.
Nothing is static, including language. In political science, terms such as "conservative", "liberal", etc. are not buckets, but points on a spectrum. In the classic polysci "wheel" of political beliefs, the Republican and Democrat positions are remarkably close in almost all respects except social policy. And even there, the differences are not all that far apart. The mainstream position of both parties has been trending towards larger government with larger social programs. Free trade has been a cornerstone of both parties' economic policy since the 90s. The handoff in economic policy amidst a crisis between Bush and Obama was remarkably smooth and consistent. Both parties have had activist foreign policy since WW2. Both sides supported the Patriot Act and domestic spying. Deregulation of financial markets, etc, etc.
It's become more and more of a team sport, "red" vs "blue" and a lot less interesting if you really care about issues besides those that have become "wedge" issues: gay rights, abortion, um.... is there anything else that defines the parties? As important as these things are, they are ultimately social issues driven by the populace, and the government has little long-term influence - in other words, politicians either ride the popular wave or perish. So for things where the government actually has a large impact - defense, trade, civil liberties, taxes, foreign policy, social programs... the parties are largely homogeneous.
This is an example of your city making a decision to create a local monopoly. My city still has a website where all the news is posted, and their Facebook feed simply posts links to this website.
No, we don't want Facebook and Twitter to be the de-facto monopoly for government communications - I think you could probably get this policy changed if you raise enough hell (depending on how big your city is).
Okay, so now that you've accused me of not paying attention, lack of critical thinking, and not listening, would you like to try to prove your assertion that Facebook has a monopoly over something? As far as I can tell, they only have a monopoly over Facebook. Which is to say, no monopoly.
How in the world can you say that Facebook has a monopoly? Just close your account and stop using it - no "service" that it provides cannot be gotten elsewhere. "Events" can be sent with Evite, messages with dozens of different competitors. I have many friends who are not on Facebook and they get along just fine. The only "monopoly" they hold is over the content on their own website, and that's true of all other websites as well.
Conservative does not mean libertarian. There was a time when embracing some libertarian ideas seemed like a good way to pursue a conservative agenda, but that is no longer the case: (1) Since older people are disproportionately conservative, they need to keep this base happy by keeping benefits to the elderly flowing. Not a "small government" principle at all. Yet until Obama, George Bush had the record for largest expansion of Medicare ever. (2) Since society started to move to embrace social movements unpopular among conservatives, they had to use the federal government to try and stomp this out - see the "defense of marriage act" as one example. (3) It's hardly a new phenomenon, but the Republicans and Democrats have both competed vigorously for the support for the richest people in the US. This has led to lower taxes without corresponding cuts in spending. So we no longer borrow for infrastructure spending, but we need loans simply to cover day-to-day operations. It's not hurting us right now, but eventually rates will go up and we'll feel that debt burden. Or rather, our children will.
The sad fact is that neither party in the US stands for responsible or sustainable fiscal policy anymore. And arguably, "conservatives" even less so given their inability to compromise on taxes or on entitlement programs.
In addition, a plane would have to be made stronger to support landing at full-takeoff weight. Current planes cannot land safely when fully loaded with fuel.
My favorite feature is the tendency of the Office built-in gee-wiz integration to just sort of fail silently sometimes. Everything opens up fine. Hitting save seems to save it. Close it and there is no problem. Then go back to sharepoint and where are your changes? If you are lucky maybe still somewhere in your %TEMP% folder. Fun, fun.
Well, now you've sent me on a Wikipedia journey to finish out the night:)
I like this bit: "They concluded that the men whose graves had been found on Beechey Island most likely died of pneumonia and perhaps tuberculosis and that lead poisoning may have worsened their health, owing to badly soldered cans held in the ships' food stores. However, it was later suggested that the source of this lead may not have been tinned food, but the distilled water systems fitted to the expedition’s ships."
Either way, they were dealing with what they thought to be some pretty decent technology at the time...
Slashdot Mirror
What I mean is that no matter what the tax rate, the actual revenue remains a consistent percentage rate
I don't know where you get your information, but this is demonstrably wrong. I can point to countries with twice our tax rate (and twice our revenue by GDP). I can point to places where federal revenue took a hit or got a bump because of a tax decrease or increase.
I completely agree that taxes impact economic growth, but the suggestion that this relationship is 1:1 is easily falsifiable.
I agree, but debt is also an enemy of economic growth - and morally reprehensible since you are improving your own standard of living at the expense of future generations.
I don't know what you mean by "don't work". If you want to raise revenue, then raising taxes certainly works. Of course it will have an impact on economic growth, but you can absolutely raise revenue with higher taxes.
I think it's because people have stopped paying attention to him. He makes the news for being funny at the correspondents' dinner rather than for fighting with congress.
0.5% will not make a significant difference to the German economy. That's basically sacrificing one year's growth, and only because it's a slow year. In reality, Germany would never be expected to pick up the entire $14 billion, so they wouldn't even notice. I don't think more spending is even necessary to counter Russia - they just need to centralize their defense a bit more. The EU as a whole already outspends Russia.
Some people will say to glue tinfoil to the inside of your hat. That won't do it, you need it directly under the scalp.
None of those "major industrialised nations" can [telegraph.co.uk] afford [yahoo.com] to defend themselves [mirror.co.uk] from the likes of Russia without our help.
That's silly. Germany can, all by itself, match Russia's military spending by adding around $14 billion/year. That's about 0.5% of their GDP. Europe absolutely can defend themselves if we bow out.
this study says basically that modern cars let out less fuel fumes in 50000 km than the volume differential between new and used braking pads and tires.
No, the study says that modern GASOLINE cars let out fewer PARTICULATES than the volume differential between new and used braking pads, tires, and road surface. This is reasonable, since there isn't very much particulate emissions from a modern gasoline engine.
It was a nice speed bump, that's all. I completely agree that both parties are responsible for our fiscal situation.
I'm not vilifying them. In fact, I share their goal of reduced spending. I'm pointing out that their tactic has been mostly ineffective. All one has to do is look at the rise in the national debt to realize this. I would rather have a compromise that resulted in lower spending, higher taxes, and a smaller debt than some restraint on spending increases, no tax hike, and a huge and growing debt. Had they compromised on taxes, they would have gotten spending concessions out of the Democrats - even on entitlements.
Don't tell your scientific studies about this Wikipedia article, then.
Conservatives at this time seem to oppose all public-sector spending, demanding privatization or nothing.
I'm not sure what you mean. The mainstream Republican party has recently expanded Medicare and seems to be a staunch defender of Social Security. Privatization is not that accurate - they don't propose selling off roads and bridges to a private enterprise. In the most extreme cases, they propose bidding out the maintenance of a highway or long-term leases. This contractor vs. employee difference is minor and mostly related to how unions tend to support one side rather than the other.
When you yoke those things to an agenda that demands simple and demonstrable business-based ROI, you realize it's not possible.
You threw an awful lot of things together into one pile. Some problems benefit from more efficiency, some benefit more from stability. Road construction probably benefits more from efficiency. Air traffic control, not so much. I see "liberals" and "conservatives" arguing about how much to involve contractors vs employees, about the amount of grant money spent - but you never hear any mainstream "liberals" call for nationalization of an industry, nor do you hear mainstream "conservatives" call for the selling off of public infrastructure. Even in education, "conservatives" want free public education funded by vouchers while "liberals" want free publiic education run by employees. Neither side is calling for an end to free public education. For the most part, their positions are very similar, but just different enough to fire up union membership.
Unfortunately, Tea Party members take their tax pledge too seriously and so are unable to compromise. I'd rather see a healthy balance sheet than politicians take a quixotic stand. When it becomes absolutely clear that you aren't going to get spending cuts without tax increases, something is better than nothing. Ironically, the "disastrous" sequester turned out to be a pretty good compromise. Not as good as could have been negotiated with some flexibility on taxes, but still better than nothing.
Yes, well economic growth, population growth, and inflation conspire to raise tax revenue - but it is not keeping up with spending. I would prefer that spending was cut, but absent that I simply have to insist on balancing the books for recurring costs. Infrastructure borrowing is defensible, but not borrowing to pay salaries and benefits. And borrowing money and then handing it out to the populace is simply insane.
Nothing is static, including language. In political science, terms such as "conservative", "liberal", etc. are not buckets, but points on a spectrum. In the classic polysci "wheel" of political beliefs, the Republican and Democrat positions are remarkably close in almost all respects except social policy. And even there, the differences are not all that far apart. The mainstream position of both parties has been trending towards larger government with larger social programs. Free trade has been a cornerstone of both parties' economic policy since the 90s. The handoff in economic policy amidst a crisis between Bush and Obama was remarkably smooth and consistent. Both parties have had activist foreign policy since WW2. Both sides supported the Patriot Act and domestic spying. Deregulation of financial markets, etc, etc.
It's become more and more of a team sport, "red" vs "blue" and a lot less interesting if you really care about issues besides those that have become "wedge" issues: gay rights, abortion, um.... is there anything else that defines the parties? As important as these things are, they are ultimately social issues driven by the populace, and the government has little long-term influence - in other words, politicians either ride the popular wave or perish. So for things where the government actually has a large impact - defense, trade, civil liberties, taxes, foreign policy, social programs... the parties are largely homogeneous.
This is an example of your city making a decision to create a local monopoly. My city still has a website where all the news is posted, and their Facebook feed simply posts links to this website.
No, we don't want Facebook and Twitter to be the de-facto monopoly for government communications - I think you could probably get this policy changed if you raise enough hell (depending on how big your city is).
Okay, so now that you've accused me of not paying attention, lack of critical thinking, and not listening, would you like to try to prove your assertion that Facebook has a monopoly over something? As far as I can tell, they only have a monopoly over Facebook. Which is to say, no monopoly.
How in the world can you say that Facebook has a monopoly? Just close your account and stop using it - no "service" that it provides cannot be gotten elsewhere. "Events" can be sent with Evite, messages with dozens of different competitors. I have many friends who are not on Facebook and they get along just fine. The only "monopoly" they hold is over the content on their own website, and that's true of all other websites as well.
Conservative does not mean libertarian. There was a time when embracing some libertarian ideas seemed like a good way to pursue a conservative agenda, but that is no longer the case: (1) Since older people are disproportionately conservative, they need to keep this base happy by keeping benefits to the elderly flowing. Not a "small government" principle at all. Yet until Obama, George Bush had the record for largest expansion of Medicare ever. (2) Since society started to move to embrace social movements unpopular among conservatives, they had to use the federal government to try and stomp this out - see the "defense of marriage act" as one example. (3) It's hardly a new phenomenon, but the Republicans and Democrats have both competed vigorously for the support for the richest people in the US. This has led to lower taxes without corresponding cuts in spending. So we no longer borrow for infrastructure spending, but we need loans simply to cover day-to-day operations. It's not hurting us right now, but eventually rates will go up and we'll feel that debt burden. Or rather, our children will.
The sad fact is that neither party in the US stands for responsible or sustainable fiscal policy anymore. And arguably, "conservatives" even less so given their inability to compromise on taxes or on entitlement programs.
To be fair, if the study had concluded that cell phones were no more damaging than sunlight, I'd be terrified of putting it next to my head :)
Yes, perhaps I should not have written "safely". They might return with all hands safe and sound, but the aircraft may be damaged.
In addition, a plane would have to be made stronger to support landing at full-takeoff weight. Current planes cannot land safely when fully loaded with fuel.
And why does a sith master need armor?
My favorite feature is the tendency of the Office built-in gee-wiz integration to just sort of fail silently sometimes. Everything opens up fine. Hitting save seems to save it. Close it and there is no problem. Then go back to sharepoint and where are your changes? If you are lucky maybe still somewhere in your %TEMP% folder. Fun, fun.
Well, now you've sent me on a Wikipedia journey to finish out the night :)
I like this bit:
"They concluded that the men whose graves had been found on Beechey Island most likely died of pneumonia and perhaps tuberculosis and that lead poisoning may have worsened their health, owing to badly soldered cans held in the ships' food stores. However, it was later suggested that the source of this lead may not have been tinned food, but the distilled water systems fitted to the expedition’s ships."
Either way, they were dealing with what they thought to be some pretty decent technology at the time...