" it is very dangerous to mess around with the costs of necessities"
Our government, at various levels, does this already.
Environmental regulations can increase costs.
Minimum wage laws can do this.
Banking regulations similarly.
There are other specific examples, no need to cite them. It's a cost/benefit tradeoff, allegedly.
I'm not saying regulation isn't useful, or that it should be abandoned, but your complaint that it is 'dangerous to mess around with the costs of necessities' is real and genuinely true, but it's already the case.
You're well on your way to forcing an ideal if you want to avoid impacting on costs on 'necessities'. Right after you settle on defining 'necessities'...
It is not, in fact, that easy, I an I am well aware of that, despite the simplistic interpretation of my comments.
I'm so sick of idiots like you pointing this out like you think you're some kind of economic guru. Despite your assertion that we should tax as closely as possible to the actual use, it is inevitable that we, consumers, pay. Get over it.
And, to be even more annoying, we, individual taxpayers, consumers, WILL PAY. Gladly. Because we want nice things.
HOLY CRAP, just how self-righteous can you get? Seriously, read up. It's simple. You just don't like the perception of injustice you found. Poor thing. You must be outraged fairly regularly, huh?
"Jobs are created exclusively by consumer spending"
You think the rich don't create jobs, for instance by consuming goods and services, like housekeeping, landscaping, etc? Of course you know that. Stop being obtuse.
"the wealthiest tend to save more than the poorest, and thus the money they get doesn't go into creating more labor demand"
Well, what does it go into? Capital?
"A Universal Dividend, for example, ends up giving a NEGATIVE 100% tax rate at $6,000 in the United States"
This is so close to the Broken Window fallacy I'm not sure how to best ignore it. But this is an idea expressed by government growth - government employees provide a real-world example. Can we track the economic impact of government growth using government employment as a metric? If so, what have been the results? For the Universal Dividend, or Base Income, is essentially government employment, if only partial, for the recipients.
"The problem comes when they buy a lot of stocks and bonds instead of putting money into anything involving consumption"
Well, then perhaps we need to be discussing the function of the capital markets?
"Even growing a business, while useful to the economy (this is how technical progress is made), doesn't necessarily create jobs, but rather re-allocates them"
Are you assuming this is a zero-sum game? growth isn't real? You may be right, but if so then that's a real problem, eh?
"a few temporary jobs are available (funded by seed capital), and then the business becomes self-sustaining"
Or, more appropriately, replenishes or grows available capital, right?
This is why blockchain 'currencies' ought to work more like currency, and less like payment systems. Cash isn't subject to third-party chargeback. Bitcoin could do this, but the required blockchain tech would defeat most of the advantages.
"During a major emergency, they don't care.... they're not deploying resources to swap backup batteries on your individual service."
The ice storm in the Northeast US in 1998 proved that wrong.
First, it caused so much damage to the electrical systems that I was without power for 11 days. My sister was without power for 19 days.
It happened that the damage done was primarily borne by the electrical lines, the cable and telephone lines partly spared, though many poles were down taking everything. BUT I had telephone service, it happened that many subscribers had telephone service for most of this time, just how the wires fell.
If it weren't for the ingenuity of the Nynex team, there would have been no service in 48 hours as the SLICs and other equipment batteries failed. They arranged for:
- spare batteries, mostly from Massachusetts. Upstate New York, etc, having their own problems. - spare charging stations, because the Nynex team leader had gone through a similar event in Cape Cod the year before or so. - generators to run the charging stations. - fuel from the National Guard to run those generators. - extra trucks, techs, and fuel for those trucks to swap out batteries all over heck and then some.
Modern copper requires power. And it's vital. In NYC I would expect a power outage for more than 2 days to present huge problems, and landline services could be a big help, since many cell towers might be running low on fuel for generators in 48 hours. And how many of those use either fiber or copper or backhaul? Power is needed everywhere. Batteries are short lived.
When they include more spring-sourced waters, like Poland Spring, I'll be interested. No, I don't buy those exclusively, but surprise, I can name at least two cities in the US that receive spring-sourced water from their public utilities, and it is in fact better than most bottled water, right out of the tap. And I miss that water.
When you plug in your EV to charge, is there some hitherto unknown technological impediment to collecting a little data via the same connector? Even a powerline network would do this.
And you can be sure the manufacturers will implement this, logically to diagnose and require service when they want you to, and secondarily to be part of the loop. As EVs take over, the GM lesson with the EV-1 will be learned all over. EVs require a LOT less maintenance, at least until they devise much higher capacity, and therefore, more complex and shorter lived, energy storage schemes. Which will require more maintenance.
This argument can be used for virtually any service government could provide. For instance, healthcare, which the government does not and should not provide in the US, but somehow has managed to compel us to purchase in advance, just in case.
Though that is going away, slowly, since it didn't really work out well. Like so many services the government enables the private sector to deliver in an essentially compulsory manner, like college student loans...
So, you're essentially asking me to believe that a millionaire, with an income approaching 5-10 times mine, either directly causes 2-4 times the road wear I do, or what?
I doubt the 1%ers ram the roads that much more than I do, and their service providers those housekeepers, landscapers, accountants, managers, etc, all collectively do, but these also pay taxes.
You want the 1%ers (by income*) to be USING their income to either live better than us or invest so that we can live better than we are. Job creation, business capitalization, those sort of investments. Using their income for services employs several directly, yes, even the private school instructors and the travel and lodging industry.
* If you know where you are sleeping tonight, know that you will eat tomorrow, have no direct threat to your physical existence waiting for you, are certain you will earn enough money to pay for food, housing, clothing, and that of your family, you are in the top 5% globally. If you have money left over to buy a TV and watch cable, you're probably in the top 1%. Now would be a good time to stop whining about how others are not paying their 'fair share'. Give just a little, maybe 1% if your income, and see the world change. If you care. Or not, because charity is not demanded of us. It's just the right thing to do.
Reliable odometer readings are increasingly being baked into the software. While many states no longer track mileage for title purposes on cars >10 years old, this is a simple change, and then registering your car would just include a mileage statement and fees based on miles driven.
This could also be a quarterly assessment, with appropriate penalties for misstating the mileage during the year, collected annually, via inspection. An OBDII read might do this.
And you need penalties, because, you know, taxes = men with guns.
Collecting the penalties upon transfer is another way. A less well coupled means of collecting the funds to be used for maintenance, but that's not so new, as many principalities in the US don't use road taxes reliably anyways.
If you're waiting a week for your credit card transactions to clear, you are doing it very wrong, and need not, unless you are trading off time for cost. And even then you can do better easily.
Mostly you will, in the US, find that overnight is as fast as credit card transactions will clear, though the tech is easily within reach to settle in an hour, with commensurate higher costs, for some merchants. It just isn't deployed.
Oh, and while I'm ranting, the radio ads hear for refi offers that includes, among other reasons you might want to 'cash out' on your home's equity, 'cash in on the Bitcoin slump'.
So an article about an ICO might be shown, but an 'ad' for the ICO not?
Really. This is stupid. Can Google please stop censoring the Internet, or offer a reasonable explanation why ICO ads aren't allowed? Like SEC violations?
As if Kickstarter hasn't actually been used for what, in every so slightly different form, would be an improper public offering.
Prove that. The ACLU is arguing about this now, and that is the point of the FOIA requests, because as I pointed out two-thirds of Americans, by residence, can be part of the buffer zone, and the TSA is searching devices belonging to passengers on entirely domestic travel, and yet does not explain why.
Prove your claim. TSA may well be conducting these searches claiming they are permitted in Title 8, but until they show why we should not assume anything. TSA may well assert they are justified as if they are Customs.
Slashdot Mirror
Please, I'm burdened enough.
What am I missing here? One does not go with the other.
Oh, you just want to plug the wireless gadget into USB-C.
Oh, God. They probably sell them in Shenzhen and the Akihabara, the size of a gumstick and in white or Hello Kitty. For $8USD.
The Net interprets censorship as damage and routes around it.
- John Gilmore, 1993.
Much wisdom from the key developers of the early Internet has been lost or ignored, to our detriment.
" it is very dangerous to mess around with the costs of necessities"
Our government, at various levels, does this already.
Environmental regulations can increase costs.
Minimum wage laws can do this.
Banking regulations similarly.
There are other specific examples, no need to cite them. It's a cost/benefit tradeoff, allegedly.
I'm not saying regulation isn't useful, or that it should be abandoned, but your complaint that it is 'dangerous to mess around with the costs of necessities' is real and genuinely true, but it's already the case.
You're well on your way to forcing an ideal if you want to avoid impacting on costs on 'necessities'. Right after you settle on defining 'necessities'...
It is not, in fact, that easy, I an I am well aware of that, despite the simplistic interpretation of my comments.
I'm so sick of idiots like you pointing this out like you think you're some kind of economic guru. Despite your assertion that we should tax as closely as possible to the actual use, it is inevitable that we, consumers, pay. Get over it.
And, to be even more annoying, we, individual taxpayers, consumers, WILL PAY. Gladly. Because we want nice things.
HOLY CRAP, just how self-righteous can you get? Seriously, read up. It's simple. You just don't like the perception of injustice you found. Poor thing. You must be outraged fairly regularly, huh?
"Jobs are created exclusively by consumer spending"
You think the rich don't create jobs, for instance by consuming goods and services, like housekeeping, landscaping, etc? Of course you know that. Stop being obtuse.
"the wealthiest tend to save more than the poorest, and thus the money they get doesn't go into creating more labor demand"
Well, what does it go into? Capital?
"A Universal Dividend, for example, ends up giving a NEGATIVE 100% tax rate at $6,000 in the United States"
This is so close to the Broken Window fallacy I'm not sure how to best ignore it. But this is an idea expressed by government growth - government employees provide a real-world example. Can we track the economic impact of government growth using government employment as a metric? If so, what have been the results? For the Universal Dividend, or Base Income, is essentially government employment, if only partial, for the recipients.
"The problem comes when they buy a lot of stocks and bonds instead of putting money into anything involving consumption"
Well, then perhaps we need to be discussing the function of the capital markets?
"Even growing a business, while useful to the economy (this is how technical progress is made), doesn't necessarily create jobs, but rather re-allocates them"
Are you assuming this is a zero-sum game? growth isn't real? You may be right, but if so then that's a real problem, eh?
"a few temporary jobs are available (funded by seed capital), and then the business becomes self-sustaining"
Or, more appropriately, replenishes or grows available capital, right?
True cost is what you will pay. Period. It changes, sometimes rapidly, and not always for reasons you can readily discern.
This is most visible at the gas station or grocery store.
This is why blockchain 'currencies' ought to work more like currency, and less like payment systems. Cash isn't subject to third-party chargeback. Bitcoin could do this, but the required blockchain tech would defeat most of the advantages.
I can get that in Gilbert, Arizona, right now. vDSL, 40/4, concurrent video service. And the new modem/gateway actually works.
And the tech will get right to it. Right after all the other alarms, the COE alarms, etc, during an event.
"During a major emergency, they don't care.... they're not deploying resources to swap backup batteries on your individual service."
The ice storm in the Northeast US in 1998 proved that wrong.
First, it caused so much damage to the electrical systems that I was without power for 11 days. My sister was without power for 19 days.
It happened that the damage done was primarily borne by the electrical lines, the cable and telephone lines partly spared, though many poles were down taking everything. BUT I had telephone service, it happened that many subscribers had telephone service for most of this time, just how the wires fell.
If it weren't for the ingenuity of the Nynex team, there would have been no service in 48 hours as the SLICs and other equipment batteries failed. They arranged for:
- spare batteries, mostly from Massachusetts. Upstate New York, etc, having their own problems.
- spare charging stations, because the Nynex team leader had gone through a similar event in Cape Cod the year before or so.
- generators to run the charging stations.
- fuel from the National Guard to run those generators.
- extra trucks, techs, and fuel for those trucks to swap out batteries all over heck and then some.
Modern copper requires power. And it's vital. In NYC I would expect a power outage for more than 2 days to present huge problems, and landline services could be a big help, since many cell towers might be running low on fuel for generators in 48 hours. And how many of those use either fiber or copper or backhaul? Power is needed everywhere. Batteries are short lived.
When they include more spring-sourced waters, like Poland Spring, I'll be interested. No, I don't buy those exclusively, but surprise, I can name at least two cities in the US that receive spring-sourced water from their public utilities, and it is in fact better than most bottled water, right out of the tap. And I miss that water.
The exceptions, like TVA, prove the rule.
When you plug in your EV to charge, is there some hitherto unknown technological impediment to collecting a little data via the same connector? Even a powerline network would do this.
And you can be sure the manufacturers will implement this, logically to diagnose and require service when they want you to, and secondarily to be part of the loop. As EVs take over, the GM lesson with the EV-1 will be learned all over. EVs require a LOT less maintenance, at least until they devise much higher capacity, and therefore, more complex and shorter lived, energy storage schemes. Which will require more maintenance.
Raising road taxes on trucking raises the cost of goods they carry.
Really simple, just remember - as the individual taxpayer, you pay for it all. Eventually.
This argument can be used for virtually any service government could provide. For instance, healthcare, which the government does not and should not provide in the US, but somehow has managed to compel us to purchase in advance, just in case.
Though that is going away, slowly, since it didn't really work out well. Like so many services the government enables the private sector to deliver in an essentially compulsory manner, like college student loans...
So, you're essentially asking me to believe that a millionaire, with an income approaching 5-10 times mine, either directly causes 2-4 times the road wear I do, or what?
I doubt the 1%ers ram the roads that much more than I do, and their service providers those housekeepers, landscapers, accountants, managers, etc, all collectively do, but these also pay taxes.
You want the 1%ers (by income*) to be USING their income to either live better than us or invest so that we can live better than we are. Job creation, business capitalization, those sort of investments. Using their income for services employs several directly, yes, even the private school instructors and the travel and lodging industry.
* If you know where you are sleeping tonight, know that you will eat tomorrow, have no direct threat to your physical existence waiting for you, are certain you will earn enough money to pay for food, housing, clothing, and that of your family, you are in the top 5% globally. If you have money left over to buy a TV and watch cable, you're probably in the top 1%. Now would be a good time to stop whining about how others are not paying their 'fair share'. Give just a little, maybe 1% if your income, and see the world change. If you care. Or not, because charity is not demanded of us. It's just the right thing to do.
Reliable odometer readings are increasingly being baked into the software. While many states no longer track mileage for title purposes on cars >10 years old, this is a simple change, and then registering your car would just include a mileage statement and fees based on miles driven.
This could also be a quarterly assessment, with appropriate penalties for misstating the mileage during the year, collected annually, via inspection. An OBDII read might do this.
And you need penalties, because, you know, taxes = men with guns.
Collecting the penalties upon transfer is another way. A less well coupled means of collecting the funds to be used for maintenance, but that's not so new, as many principalities in the US don't use road taxes reliably anyways.
If you're waiting a week for your credit card transactions to clear, you are doing it very wrong, and need not, unless you are trading off time for cost. And even then you can do better easily.
Mostly you will, in the US, find that overnight is as fast as credit card transactions will clear, though the tech is easily within reach to settle in an hour, with commensurate higher costs, for some merchants. It just isn't deployed.
They can't get those patches from TV, snowflake.
Curating. Like they're curating ads for AR-15 anything.
Oh, and while I'm ranting, the radio ads hear for refi offers that includes, among other reasons you might want to 'cash out' on your home's equity, 'cash in on the Bitcoin slump'.
This is nearly criminal. Nearly.
So an article about an ICO might be shown, but an 'ad' for the ICO not?
Really. This is stupid. Can Google please stop censoring the Internet, or offer a reasonable explanation why ICO ads aren't allowed? Like SEC violations?
As if Kickstarter hasn't actually been used for what, in every so slightly different form, would be an improper public offering.
They got servers...
Prove that. The ACLU is arguing about this now, and that is the point of the FOIA requests, because as I pointed out two-thirds of Americans, by residence, can be part of the buffer zone, and the TSA is searching devices belonging to passengers on entirely domestic travel, and yet does not explain why.
Prove your claim. TSA may well be conducting these searches claiming they are permitted in Title 8, but until they show why we should not assume anything. TSA may well assert they are justified as if they are Customs.