Children tend to have a hard time distinguishing fantasy from reality. Usually they mistake unreal things for real but occasionally they mistake real things for unreal.
Then I guess today's children are getting more stupid with every generation somehow.
I grew up in the days of cartoons every afternoon and Saturday all morning....in the days of NON- censored Loony Tunes.....I knew full well at the youngest age I have memories that cartoon violence was different than reality.
I knew that the anvil that hit Wily Coyote was not real and would kill a real person or animal.
Hell, I remember one old Bugs Bunny cartoon....where he saw Elmer asleep against a tree...and Bugs whipped out a bottle of sleeping pills, labeled "Take Deeze and Dose"....gulped them down and fell asleep there too so he could enter Elmers dream and mess with him there.
I saw this same cartoon not long back...and that part with the sleeping pills? It was fucking edited OUT?!?!
Seriously? We can't let kids see that anymore? The snowflakes are now too sensitive, and can't know cartoon from reality?
I try to take every deduction, every investment, every loophole I can that is legally available to me.
I would expect no less from any other person or company.
Hell, if the US would drop the corporate rate to something even nearly that low, I'll bet Apple and others would bring much of that money home.
But if all of this is legal and it appears to be....then so what?
Paying taxes is not a moral choice, it is a part of doing business.
If you don't like companies or people using the current rules....make some changes, but until then, quit bitching about it.
If YOU want to pay more tax than you legally have to...there is a nice section on the form where you can voluntarily pay additional over and above what you owe.
No matter where you go, there will be new culture and new language when you do something new.
It was much easier only a few decades ago in the US, where the culture was largely homogenous, and you could easily speak the common tongue in a manner that was readily understandable.
You didn't have to learn to try to decipher strange strained accents and pronunciations and a different culture all even before you started learning the subject you are taking the class for.
Before the foreign invasion, it was much easier for a US student to learn in a US school.
Too many HOAs would object. Too many neighborhoods with HOAs also now have grouped mailboxes at the end of the block instead of individual mailboxes on each residence too.
Man, I thank God I don't live in a fscking HOA area.....I can't believe people willingly sign on to buy a house and land, and yet have no or virtually no rights to do and decorate as they please with such a large purchase.
I like it in New Orleans. I like to see the occasional purple house...gives the neighborhoods character.
I'm actually kinda surprised Amazon didn't see this one coming?
I mean, they're not generally stupid.....Do all the people at Amazon working on this "solution" freely admit strangers into their homes when they are away?
30 years ago, Wal-Mart pushed all the small shops out of the small towns; now, Wal-Mart is pulling up roots in those same small towns, leaving the residents with no retail grocery options.
What happens to the bears (consumers) when all the fish have devoured one another, and the lake stands empty?
I dunno....maybe the mom and pop stores come back?
In business like anything else, if there is a void, it will be filled.
So the premise of this post is that the US students couldn't understand the foreign accents but somehow all of the foreign students (for whom English was a second language) could magically understand it since students from Beijing have a magical ability to understand English spoken with an Indian accent or something like that?
No, the point is, that the foreign students can understand the foreign instructors better than US students can....and it creates a vicious circle.
Actually, this language problem like *IS* a large part of the problem of getting US STEM under graduates in the first place, much less them going on to graduate degrees.
With so many foreigners in the hard sciences, and the graduate students in charge of classes and labs, it makes it very difficult for US students to learn because they often can NOT understand what the grad students are saying!!
This was a problem even way back in my college days. I had grad lab students and even a couple of professors trying to teach me that had accents so thick that I couldn't understand a fucking word they said.
Its bad enough when you're on the phone with tech support and can't understand them, but when you are in a class trying to learn some very difficult subjects (this really killed me in physics) and you spend most of your time just trying to translate what they are saying into Engrish, it is hard to learn the concepts.
I know it frustrated me in so many ways. It is even worse today in schools due to the situation mentioned in the article where the overwhelming majority of grad students and instructors in US colleges are foreign.
It's a vicious circle.
I won't even go into the cultural differences that often make things even more difficult.
If you are paying yourself a "reasonable salary" to reduce your income taxes- you are also reducing your social security taxes and thus your social security benefits.
Well, I"d rather take the extra money, invest it to make up for what SS may not pay me....
Yeah, fuck them. All of the up-side to being an academic disappeared more than a decade ago. If they think salary is the *only* thing they're not winning at, they've got their collective heads up their asses.
When the amount of money is 5x the amount the universities can pay...at that point, it IS pretty much all about salary.
Don't misunderstand. I've never really ever been out of the SS program.
Even now , with the S-Corp scenario I described earlier...I still pay SS...I just don't pay SS and medicare on everything I bill....as opposed to paying % of SS and medicare on everything a regular W2 employee pays, or even a LLC pays...
The money you save on taxes *will* reduce your social security payments later in life.
Good Point.
But, in my case, it took a good number of years working w2 before I could make the jump to 1099....so, I have a decent SS number when I hit retirement.
And as others have pointed out, SS may not be here for many of us. I'm at the age where I will likely just "sqeek" by and be able to get my full amount for my full lifetime, but for younger folks, man..I dunno if I'd try to depend on it for anything less than just a small supplement to your own retirement savings.
I think you miss the elephant in the room as to why one does S-Corp or LLC. To prevent someone sueing you into oblivion.
Well, while that is an excellent reason to, it isn't the only one.
I did S-Corp, to save paying tax $$$.
I have S-Corp, and am sole employee.
Let's say, for example, I bill $100K a year that the corp brings in.
I pay myself $40K as a "reasonable salary"...that the IRS accepts.
Now, over the year, I pay SS and medicare (employment taxes), and state and federal tax on that $40K.
At the end of the year, from that remaining $60K, I take all my deductions from that (buying equipment, business expenses, etc)...and lets say I have $45K left over after expenses.
That $45K amount "falls through" to my personal account, and I ONLY pay state and federal taxes on that amount, I do not pay employment taxes on that amount and therefore, save that money.
I think with LLC, you have to employment taxes on your full bill income.
Also, a S-Copr and LLC, keep you from the double taxation situation that regular corporations have to pay, so, both of them are good that way if you are a small business of 1 or more people.
That's too bad. I was looking forward to the future with a 4 hour work week, and robots doing all the actual work, sitting on the beach being served pina coladas by a robot.
Err...this robot thing can go too far!!
I'd rather be served drinks at the beach by a cute bartender with nice tits straining against her bikini top.
eventually technology will provide close to free food and shelter through automated farming and construction, and so the basic needs of people will be so cheap they can and will be free to anyone not suited for work...
You know...if our society comes down to this and actually dependent upon this tech providing all....we're all pretty much fucked when something as natural and unpredictable as a solar flare knocks out the power grid for any good length of time.
That's not even counting terrorist hackers fscking up the infrastructure.
You think it looks bleak on The Walking Dead...let the US go without power grid for a month or so across the country and we'll see some pretty nastiness come out in people when they have to do more to survive than just drive down the block to the grocery store.
The reality is, if companies want to move to the gig economy, they should fully accept and understand that the people they hire for small jobs will never give a fuck about them.
If you expect such people to vigorously look out for your interests you're going to be disappointed. The more employers don't give a fuck about us, the less we give a fuck about them.
You seem to act like this is something "new"??
I've been in the workforce for a few decades now, and the W2 job by a company that gave loyalty to its employees was long gone before I started working.
There has been nothing like company loyalty to employees for ages now, with VERY very few exceptions.
Perhaps some employees have been loyal on the mistaken notion that loyalty would be returned to me...but it really hasn't been the case. All employees have been expendable for a long time now.
That's why as soon as I could, I got into contracting.
I figure if you have as much loyalty from your employer as a contractor, have the job security of a contractor...
Then you might as well get the BILL RATE of a contractor, you know?
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That still doesn't make paying taxes have anything to do with morality.
It is a legal obligation, nothing more.
How about you give little Johnny or little Suzie a fscking BOOK to read?
That's a win on SOOO many fronts....it's what my folks did and sure helped me develop.
Q. How do you unload a truck full of dead babies?
A. Use a pitchfork...
Then I guess today's children are getting more stupid with every generation somehow.
I grew up in the days of cartoons every afternoon and Saturday all morning....in the days of NON- censored Loony Tunes.....I knew full well at the youngest age I have memories that cartoon violence was different than reality.
I knew that the anvil that hit Wily Coyote was not real and would kill a real person or animal.
Hell, I remember one old Bugs Bunny cartoon....where he saw Elmer asleep against a tree...and Bugs whipped out a bottle of sleeping pills, labeled "Take Deeze and Dose"....gulped them down and fell asleep there too so he could enter Elmers dream and mess with him there.
I saw this same cartoon not long back...and that part with the sleeping pills? It was fucking edited OUT?!?!
Seriously? We can't let kids see that anymore? The snowflakes are now too sensitive, and can't know cartoon from reality?
Ugh....
Paying taxes is neither moral or immoral....it is just something you have to do to help fund government.
You are only obligated to pay what you legally owe.
This is not an action that has morality anywhere in the equation.
I try to take every deduction, every investment, every loophole I can that is legally available to me.
I would expect no less from any other person or company.
Hell, if the US would drop the corporate rate to something even nearly that low, I'll bet Apple and others would bring much of that money home.
But if all of this is legal and it appears to be....then so what?
Paying taxes is not a moral choice, it is a part of doing business.
If you don't like companies or people using the current rules....make some changes, but until then, quit bitching about it.
If YOU want to pay more tax than you legally have to...there is a nice section on the form where you can voluntarily pay additional over and above what you owe.
Well, in STEM, its basically Indian or some sort of Oriental.....so, those kinds have a pretty decent chance of getting one they can understand.
The regular US students are fscked either way....
It was much easier only a few decades ago in the US, where the culture was largely homogenous, and you could easily speak the common tongue in a manner that was readily understandable.
You didn't have to learn to try to decipher strange strained accents and pronunciations and a different culture all even before you started learning the subject you are taking the class for.
Before the foreign invasion, it was much easier for a US student to learn in a US school.
Well, the ghetto poor and dangerous neighborhoods aren't every gonna attract real businesses, so that's kind of a moot point.
They ran off mom and pop shops long ago without Walmart help....
I"m talking about regular small towns and the like with middle class folks, etc.
The "hood" has its own set of problems that that community itself needs to sort out.
Man, I thank God I don't live in a fscking HOA area.....I can't believe people willingly sign on to buy a house and land, and yet have no or virtually no rights to do and decorate as they please with such a large purchase.
I like it in New Orleans. I like to see the occasional purple house...gives the neighborhoods character.
I mean, they're not generally stupid.....Do all the people at Amazon working on this "solution" freely admit strangers into their homes when they are away?
I dunno....maybe the mom and pop stores come back?
In business like anything else, if there is a void, it will be filled.
No, the point is, that the foreign students can understand the foreign instructors better than US students can....and it creates a vicious circle.
Are you seriously comparing him to someone or some entity that uses the laws as written to try to save their money from the tax man....?
I suppose on your annual forms, you don't take all the deductions available to you? You volunteer to pay more tax than required?
There is a place on the forms to do that you know.....
With so many foreigners in the hard sciences, and the graduate students in charge of classes and labs, it makes it very difficult for US students to learn because they often can NOT understand what the grad students are saying!!
This was a problem even way back in my college days. I had grad lab students and even a couple of professors trying to teach me that had accents so thick that I couldn't understand a fucking word they said.
Its bad enough when you're on the phone with tech support and can't understand them, but when you are in a class trying to learn some very difficult subjects (this really killed me in physics) and you spend most of your time just trying to translate what they are saying into Engrish, it is hard to learn the concepts.
I know it frustrated me in so many ways. It is even worse today in schools due to the situation mentioned in the article where the overwhelming majority of grad students and instructors in US colleges are foreign.
It's a vicious circle.
I won't even go into the cultural differences that often make things even more difficult.
Well, I"d rather take the extra money, invest it to make up for what SS may not pay me....
And...also to ban guns.
When the amount of money is 5x the amount the universities can pay...at that point, it IS pretty much all about salary.
Even now , with the S-Corp scenario I described earlier...I still pay SS...I just don't pay SS and medicare on everything I bill....as opposed to paying % of SS and medicare on everything a regular W2 employee pays, or even a LLC pays...
Good Point.
But, in my case, it took a good number of years working w2 before I could make the jump to 1099....so, I have a decent SS number when I hit retirement.
And as others have pointed out, SS may not be here for many of us. I'm at the age where I will likely just "sqeek" by and be able to get my full amount for my full lifetime, but for younger folks, man..I dunno if I'd try to depend on it for anything less than just a small supplement to your own retirement savings.
Well, while that is an excellent reason to, it isn't the only one.
I did S-Corp, to save paying tax $$$.
I have S-Corp, and am sole employee.
Let's say, for example, I bill $100K a year that the corp brings in.
I pay myself $40K as a "reasonable salary"...that the IRS accepts.
Now, over the year, I pay SS and medicare (employment taxes), and state and federal tax on that $40K.
At the end of the year, from that remaining $60K, I take all my deductions from that (buying equipment, business expenses, etc)...and lets say I have $45K left over after expenses.
That $45K amount "falls through" to my personal account, and I ONLY pay state and federal taxes on that amount, I do not pay employment taxes on that amount and therefore, save that money.
I think with LLC, you have to employment taxes on your full bill income.
Also, a S-Copr and LLC, keep you from the double taxation situation that regular corporations have to pay, so, both of them are good that way if you are a small business of 1 or more people.
HTH
I think this is gonna have unintended backlash consequences for women in the job force across ALL industries.
Err...this robot thing can go too far!!
I'd rather be served drinks at the beach by a cute bartender with nice tits straining against her bikini top.
You know...if our society comes down to this and actually dependent upon this tech providing all....we're all pretty much fucked when something as natural and unpredictable as a solar flare knocks out the power grid for any good length of time.
That's not even counting terrorist hackers fscking up the infrastructure.
You think it looks bleak on The Walking Dead...let the US go without power grid for a month or so across the country and we'll see some pretty nastiness come out in people when they have to do more to survive than just drive down the block to the grocery store.
You seem to act like this is something "new"??
I've been in the workforce for a few decades now, and the W2 job by a company that gave loyalty to its employees was long gone before I started working.
There has been nothing like company loyalty to employees for ages now, with VERY very few exceptions.
Perhaps some employees have been loyal on the mistaken notion that loyalty would be returned to me...but it really hasn't been the case. All employees have been expendable for a long time now.
That's why as soon as I could, I got into contracting.
I figure if you have as much loyalty from your employer as a contractor, have the job security of a contractor ...
Then you might as well get the BILL RATE of a contractor, you know?