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If you bring up UBI, or other reforms, you'll inevitably get someone who brings up: "voting yourself someone else's money".
You could convince me, except that things have gotten to an absurd state.
I look at some graphs of wealth inequality and it is unimaginably shocking. I never dreamed it could be this bad. More than 50% of the US wealth is owned by 5% of the people. [1] 35% is owned by only 1% of the population.
This image from this article also tells the story.
I'm not going to argue how accurate those numbers are. Rather, I will extrapolate the trend.
Let's continue the current trend to its logical absurd conclusion. The entire planet is owned by one single person. You (and everyone else) are one of the wage slaves in the bottom 99.99999999 % of the population (at least 8 decimal places). [7.5 billion people, minus that one person who owns everything, then divided by 7.5 billion people.]
Naturally, we should respect property ownership. Somehow this one person deserves and "earned" the wealth of the entire planet through his hard and diligent efforts and deserves to own everything and everyone. It is absurd on its face.
At this logical endpoint, it clearly seems that the rest of the planet should seize the wealth of the one person.
Wealth transfer has already happened. And is still happening. Republicans are just fine with this as long as it is all trickling upward.
Yes, "voting yourself someone else's money" involves taking away some of the absurd amounts of wealth hoarded up by a few. Amounts of individual wealth that one person couldn't spend in a lifetime; then leaves to others, who themselves can't spend it in their lifetime.
Not as a proposal, but just to make a point, hypothetically, if all of these people who exceed this threshold had their net worth capped at $100 Million, they would still be just fine. Yes, really! They would still live in fabulous homes, drive fabulous cars, and eat whatever they wanted, travel wherever and whenever they wanted -- for the rest of their natural lives.
In case my "one man owns the world" didn't get the idea across, I'll be more blunt. Any time too few people have owned way, way too much, and too many had nothing, there is always an uprising. I'm not proposing an uprising. I'm merely warning it is inevitable. Hopefully not in my lifetime. Maybe it would be better to solve this peacefully where the wealthiest, while heavily taxed, still end up, after taxes, fabulously wealthy beyond the dreams of most everyone else. I'm not proposing reducing all the rich people's wealth to some cap. Just that they should pay their fair share. Why are they the ones who get the tax cuts?
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Friday October 30 2020, @09:30PM (7 children)
No, you are not, because your policies (thank Goddess!) have *not* been implemented at the national level. A bunch of them might be fairly soon though; you gibbertarian assholes might just be about to get exactly what you *think* you want, and part of the reason I want to get across the Canadian border is to have a stable vantage point from which to point and laugh at you.
Don't you sell hotdogs at Yellowstone or something? You can kiss that job goodbye if the current trends in removing parks protections continue. And aren't you not all that far off from retirement, maybe 10-12 years? You're proper fucked without Social Security, Medicare, and all that other socialist commie pinko gubbamint over-reach.
Personally, I hope you *do* get everything you think you want. Good and hard. With a spike on the end and covered in minced habanero peppers. Spending your twilight years under a bridge begging for food may just be the hands-on lesson you need to get wise about the way the economy works.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday October 30 2020, @10:37PM (6 children)
The only policies I have advocated here are for individuals to save money and to not transfer wealth from people who employ people and create valuable infrastructure to people who merely spend money.
Why would my job go away? Libertarians don't do tourism? I'm properly fucked with Social Security, Medicare, and other socialist commie pink gubbamint over-reach. For example, I'm already expecting to work deeply into my would-be retirement and not expecting much to come of those programs precisely because I think the wheels will come off of them by then, with or without my help, due to the terrible design and economic fundamentals of these programs. And that self-destruction will cause follow-on damage to basic government services like emergency services, defense, roads, etc.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Friday October 30 2020, @11:48PM (5 children)
All the more reason, Mr. Hallow, to support policies common to the Nordic nations.
If those were your real concerns, you would be all on board with strong, sustainable social safety nets. The fact that you're not, even when you know and acknowledge that it's your ass in the fire as well as everyone else's, tells me your motivation isn't actually fiscal responsibility any more than the average "pro-lifer's" motivation is actually stopping abortion, simpliciter.
You want people you deem unworthy to suffer, and are willing to put up with myriad and sundry stupidities, waste, and needless harm, even to yourself, to make sure that this is what happens. You're so full of shit I could use you to blow up Beirut AGAIN just by dropping you off a plane with a small C4 charge up your ass.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday October 31 2020, @01:16AM (4 children)
And if those were your real concerns, you'd have said something about our governments' spending more than they receive. "Sustainable" is an important word here.
You behave like you have a solution that results in less suffering. My take is that you've already gotten a large part of what you thought you wanted. And it has resulted in more rather than less suffering.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Saturday October 31 2020, @02:27PM (3 children)
Good grief, what? I haven't gotten anything CLOSE to what I wanted over my entire lifetime aside from the marriage equality ruling. Damn near everything else--remember, I was born in 1988!--has been an accelerating plunge into a right-wing political hellscape. What the fuck was that? Was that some kind of failed attempt at a "no U!"
And don't fucking pretend to be concerned about deficit now of all times. Trump has run up a gigantic deficit, mostly with his corrupt tax breaks for the already ultra-wealthy. You don't give a shit about the deficit unless it's people you disagree with in charge, just like every other Republican asshole out there. And yes, I count Obama and Clinton (both of them!) as Republicans, I don't give a damn if they have a (D) after their names, their policies are Republican through and through,
If you want to do something about the deficit, let's do what the last Republican with a shred of honor or competence, that being Dwight Eisenhower, did with the tax brackets :) THAT is how you Make America Great Again (TM).
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday October 31 2020, @04:02PM (2 children)
Unintended consequences are a bitch, amirite?
As you said earlier, "Good and hard."
Since I'm concerned about the deficit now (not pretending, you fucking idiot), I guess that means Trump is someone in charge I don't agree with, huh? News flash Buttercup, I never did.
I can't help but note that there's been only one year since when the US came close to no budget deficit in the 1999-2000 fiscal year. We know how this will play out, if we allow the government to take more. They'll just spend more.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Saturday October 31 2020, @06:00PM (1 child)
You know how some people are calling you a dogmatic, unthinking asshole? Stuff like this is why.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: -1, Troll) by khallow on Saturday October 31 2020, @07:41PM