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posted by
martyb
on Saturday January 27 2018, @12:43PM
from the I-got-mine!-And-Yours.-And-Yours.-Annnnnd-yours,-too. dept.
from the I-got-mine!-And-Yours.-And-Yours.-Annnnnd-yours,-too. dept.
The 1% grabbed 82% of all wealth created in 2017
More than $8 of every $10 of wealth created last year went to the richest 1%.
That's according to a new report from Oxfam International, which estimates that the bottom 50% of the world's population saw no increase in wealth.
Oxfam says the trend shows that the global economy is skewed in favor of the rich, rewarding wealth instead of work.
"The billionaire boom is not a sign of a thriving economy but a symptom of a failing economic system," said Winnie Byanyima, executive director of Oxfam International.
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Only 1% of World's Population Grabbed 82% of all 2017 Wealth
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(Score: 3, Interesting) by fritsd on Saturday January 27 2018, @04:01PM (7 children)
It's because the cost of living is not zero, therefore the tax function cannot be tax(income) = factor * income + 0.
The most basic form is a cutoff: if (income <= liveable income) { tax(income) = 0 } else { tax(income) = factor * (income - liveable income) }
But most civilized countries have a progressive tax with several piecewise linear functions, e.g.
tax(income) =
0 if (income <= liveable income)
factor1 * (income - liveable income) if ( liveable income <= income <= comfortable income )
factor1 * (comfortable income - liveable income) + factor2 * (income - comfortable income) if (income >= comfortable income)
factor1 is kept low: in that way, the government stimulates the people to advance their careers and that way grow the economy.
factor2 (factor3, ... ) is a progressively higher scale of income taxation because at one point you've gone beyond "i can live a comfortable lifestyle in my country even with heavy taxation" to
"i can become very rich with this job in this country even with extremely high taxation on the upper scales", when the extra income is used only as a yardstick to measure "I'm more rich/imortant than that other person because I earn more".
That doesn't benefit society, therefore it doesn't harm society or even those people themselves to be taxed heavily on the tax scales way above "comfortable income".
You can also interpret taxation in a different way in countries or supranational entities that have the "subsidiarity" principle [wikipedia.org]:
In the EU, the money earned at local level is meant to be spent at local level. If there is anything left over, it goes to fund higher-level organisations.
Sweden has the subsidiarity principle as well: A large part of my taxes go, first and foremost, to pay the unemployment benefits of the drunks and junkies in my own village/town ("Kommun") :-) .
If I earn enough, above a certain tax threshold, then what is left over gets spent by my provincial government, to pay for medical care, hospitals and road maintenance and region-wide economic development initiatives.
Healthcare is provincial (larger scale than Kommun level) because each hospital has a "catchment basin" that spans large areas and multiple Kommuns.
If there is still money left over in the scale above that, then that gets taxed and spent by Sweden's national government, on universities, defense, and other luxuries.
It is very important to observe, that only the "rich" pay for defense. So you could see it as a cause for pride, that you earn so much that you can pay for the defense of your fatherland.
Just like in feodal times, when a jarl/earl had to fight, and a hertog/duke (heer-tog) had to raise an army in times of trouble.
Whereas if you're just a basic wage slave, the government takes your money to support people in your neighbourhood that have temporarily or permanently dropped out of employment. It happens to the best of us.
The government that steals your hard-earned money, is therefore *your own* government. It is yours. That is a very important point to make. The US had a bloody revolution based on "no taxation without representation", so you probably know that much better than I.
If you don't like it, well don't immigrate to Sweden!
It also means that if it goes badly with the country's economy, like in 2008, the people come first. Defense spending comes last. They won't squander it on expensive F-35 JSF planes (I hope). Somehow, this has gone wrong in the US.
I think that the subsidiarity principle was used by Charlemagne, but I don't remember if I read that somewhere or made it up out of whole cloth.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Saturday January 27 2018, @04:17PM (6 children)
That is irrelevant. Do you believe in slavery? Because that's precisely what forcing one man to work for another man's benefit is.
Again, irrelevant. It doesn't harm a woman if you use lube and a condom when raping her but it is still morally reprehensible.
You've done a pretty good job obfuscating the fundamental issue at hand but said nothing that makes theft or slavery morally sound.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 1) by fustakrakich on Saturday January 27 2018, @04:51PM (2 children)
I remember time when people would say, *America, love it or leave it.*
Like it or not, the majority decides the form of "slavery" (chattel, wage, etc) you will live under. And people will tell me, *don't let the door hit ya on the ass.* I wouldn't say that, because I believe all the fences must be torn down, and everybody has a right to live where they want and to *follow the food*, but I am interested to see how you would fund your collective, and is it a fenced/heavily guarded community with restricted membership.
La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Saturday January 27 2018, @05:23PM (1 child)
We've actually had quite a lot of protections against that happening from the very beginning and some not small amount of blood shed to keep it from happening other times but you are largely correct.
A collective? Me? I'm not even interested in a collective of two or I would have married by now.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 1) by fustakrakich on Saturday January 27 2018, @11:11PM
A collective? Me? I'm not even interested in a collective of two or I would have married by now.
So, you live all alone in a cabin up in the mountains, sending *letters to the editor*, or a van down by the river, washing your clothes on a rock, and spearing whatever swims by?
La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
(Score: 2) by fritsd on Saturday January 27 2018, @05:39PM (2 children)
Wow.. are you really saying, that it is immoral, to be forced to do work for another man's benefit?
That's quite a radical viewpoint. It must be difficult for you to live in a society with other people, some of them putting unreasonable demands on you (or trying).
However, I respect that you'd never take a job where an asshole boss bullies you around :-). Wish I had done that a bit more often.
What is your viewpoint on military conscription: should it be dodged, because it is immoral to force you to fight for the protection of your countrymen?
And what about work in the public sector: nurses, teachers, firefighters, police officers have no choice but to work for others' benefit, even if sometimes they must "serve" absolute assholes.
What I mean is: sure, they get paid to interact with "people", but they must occasionally some days get people that they think: "It isn't worth the wage to have to deal with *these* people".
(Score: 1) by tftp on Saturday January 27 2018, @06:56PM
It's the basis of a free society. In ancient Rome it was perfectly moral.
Even if he does, I'm not forced to work for him. I do it voluntarily or I leave.
In a war morality changes. Try to proudly say in a crowd: "I'm a deserter, I do not want to protect you." See what happens.
They said an oath to help everyone. Yes, sometimes it's too hard. Those leave the profession. Nobody forces them to stay or to go.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Saturday January 27 2018, @07:07PM
Fuck yes I am. All week long and twice on Sunday. When I take a job it is for my benefit. You can tell by how I quit when value_returned is less than value_put_forth.
I'm against military conscription but not for moral reasons. I wouldn't, as a vet myself, want to share a foxhole with someone who did not want to be there. You couldn't trust them like you could a volunteer. For me that outweighs any moral argument one way or the other.
They're all paid except for volunteer firefighters. Almost none of them would be doing the job if they weren't. Actual volunteers, most of them will be doing the job because they enjoy the work, the company of their coworkers, the results of their effort, or a combination of the above. Actual altruists are mentally disturbed.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.