Americans Must Be Socialists

[mainejeff]

Very few people are against not having to work for something, getting things for free, and getting things as soon as they want those things. That answers to a survey corroborate that is not necessarily surprising.

And the spoiled Millenials are beginning to enter the political realm. Hopefully I am gone before all this horse dung comes to pass.


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Hopefully.

[UNI88]

I've said this before, anyone who thinks people making $200k+ a year are going to be able to carry all the load is kidding themselves. People with mid to high 5-figure incomes will have to pay more taxes...

If such a plan were to move forward, individuals wouldn't be the only ones taxed.

Corporations would incur higher marginal taxes as well.

And corporations will follow the path that Accenture, Aon and others have taken and move overseas to avoid those taxes. We have to compete for corporations and the tax dollars and jobs they bring. That means that we shouldn't be chasing them away with higher taxes. We need a more efficient government that is focused on doing a smaller number of things well rather than a government that employs a massive and expensive Byzantine bureaucracy that tries to do everything.

Trip you like to bitch about how the Boomers have spent their children and grandchildren's money making their lives easier (or something along those lines), how is what Bernie or AOC propose going to be any different and not bankrupt the future?

[Ivytalk]

If such a plan were to move forward, individuals wouldn't be the only ones taxed.

Corporations would incur higher marginal taxes as well.

And corporations will follow the path that Accenture, Aon and others have taken and move overseas to avoid those taxes. We have to compete for corporations and the tax dollars and jobs they bring. That means that we shouldn't be chasing them away with higher taxes. We need a more efficient government that is focused on doing a smaller number of things well rather than a government that employs a massive and expensive Byzantine bureaucracy that tries to do everything.

Trip you like to bitch about how the Boomers have spent their children and grandchildren's money making their lives easier (or something along those lines), how is what Bernie or AOC propose going to be any different and not bankrupt the future?

Because the Boomers will pay for it all! Oh, wait...

[JohnStOnge]

Social Security - Our own money, not socialism
Medicare - Our own money, not socialism

You know that has never been the case. You know that both Social Security and Medicare are and always have been a transfer from the young to the old. It's never been a situation in which you send your money in and it's held for you when you get old. You send it in and it's used to take care of the people who are old now. Then when you get old the young do the same thing for you.

[AZGrizFan]

Social Security - Our own money, not socialism
Medicare - Our own money, not socialism

You know that has never been the case. You know that both Social Security and Medicare are and always have been a transfer from the young to the old. It's never been a situation in which you send your money in and it's held for you when you get old. You send it in and it's used to take care of the people who are old now. Then when you get old the young do the same thing for you.

Thanks, Nostradumbass. No shit. But it’s OUR money. That WE send in, then get paid back when we retire. So it’s in no way, shape or form “socialism”. It’s a Ponzi scheme...most certainly...but it’s not socialism.

[kalm]

People might want all those things, but ask them to open their wallets to fund them and I think you'll find a large number of people unwilling to do so. I like bridges, highways, etc. and I'm willing to fund them since I'm a user of them. Free college? Nice idea, but I have no kids and also no interest in funding it. Until the Sanders and Occasional Cortices of the world can figure out the math on making this possible without bankrupting every citizen then I'm out.
Socialism stifles innovation and incentive to do any better than the status quo because there's no incremental benefit for additional effort.

1) Does "free" college and medicare for all in an otherwise mostly capitalist system = socialism? Or are we simply talking a matter of what we choose to fund in a "free" market mixed economy? If I take out college loans isn't college "free" at least until I have to start paying back the loans...at interest? If government provides 'free education" isn't it still "free" until I make enough to help fund it for myself and future students through taxes? And in that case without the profit motive of interest?

2) Has the government not received a significant ROI for funding education like the GI Bill? There's story after story of troops coming home from war, getting a "free education" (sometimes the first college graduate in their family's history) and going on to found companies, technology, innovations that represent $ trillions in GDP to the economy. It's like investing in human infrastructure.

3) We already get to pick and choose what government spends our money on through elections. You don't have kids and I don't have federally subsidized CRP land. We both help fund support of each because it's theoretically good for the country as whole.

[AZGrizFan]

Free college is an extension of free elementary and high school. Funded through a tax of some sort. I’m not horribly opposed to it, but feel that colleges will take advantage of the formulary (much like they have with government GSL’s) and the costs will skyrocket AGAIN....

[kalm]

https://apnews.com/4516833e7fb644c9aa8bcc11048b2169

WASHINGTON (AP) — Americans like the idea of “Medicare-for-all,” but support flips to disapproval if it would result in higher taxes or longer waits for care.

Support increased when people were told “Medicare-for-all” would guarantee health insurance as a right (71 percent) and eliminate premiums and reduce out-of-pocket costs (67 percent).

But if they were told that a government-run system could lead to delays in getting care or higher taxes, support plunged to 26 percent and 37 percent, respectively. Support fell to 32 percent if it would threaten the current Medicare program.

I've said this before, anyone who thinks people making $200k+ a year are going to be able to carry all the load is kidding themselves. People with mid to high 5-figure incomes will have to pay more taxes. If you doubt that you can look at how little of the deficit was closed when Obama let the GWB tax cuts expire (which were basically tax cuts for the rich, right?). Of course any future donk administration and congress could do what the Obama admin did with Obamacare and just lie about what it's going to cost people.

People also need to realize the bureaucracy is going to decide if they're worth it to get certain treatments and procedures. The alternative is letting hospitals milk the crap out of medicare like they do now. All this stuff sounds great to people until you get to the fine print.

Raising taxes on the wealthy won't be enough. AOC's point was that in the 1950's and 60's we had significantly higher marginal rates and still didn't kill growth. The only debate is whether we would have grown significantly more with lower personal tax rates. During that era your first few million (more than you or your heirs would ever need to live off of) were taxed much higher before the top marginal rate kicked in at which point you might be more incentivised to reinvest those higher taxed dollars in your company. If not, they were used to pay off war debts and help rebuild Europe and Japan (which was rather nice of us).

But we also taxed corporations about 30 points higher.

Those two hits alone have blown a continuous blow in our budget since they've been reduced. The solution? Spend less because you tax less. Nobody from those living on SS to military contractors want that.

If the deficit worries you, raise taxes on corporations and the wealthy and cut spending.

- Captain Obvious

[kalm]

Free college is an extension of free elementary and high school. Funded through a tax of some sort. I’m not horribly opposed to it, but feel that colleges will take advantage of the formulary (much like they have with government GSL’s) and the costs will skyrocket AGAIN....

Agreed and Ganny has made some great points along this line as well.

[dbackjon]

People might want all those things, but ask them to open their wallets to fund them and I think you'll find a large number of people unwilling to do so. I like bridges, highways, etc. and I'm willing to fund them since I'm a user of them. Free college? Nice idea, but I have no kids and also no interest in funding it. Until the Sanders and Occasional Cortices of the world can figure out the math on making this possible without bankrupting every citizen then I'm out.
Socialism stifles innovation and incentive to do any better than the status quo because there's no incremental benefit for additional effort.

Yeah but we don’t HAVE to open our wallets... we can just borrow the money and there will be no pain for us right now


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So the Republican Plan

[CID1990]

Yeah but we don’t HAVE to open our wallets... we can just borrow the money and there will be no pain for us right now


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So the Republican Plan

What’s YOUR debt neutral plan for healthcare for all, free college for all, and heck... guaranteed basic income?

Since we’ve been spending money we don’t have since about 1965 I’d say its a very bipartisan plan


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[css75]

You know that has never been the case. You know that both Social Security and Medicare are and always have been a transfer from the young to the old. It's never been a situation in which you send your money in and it's held for you when you get old. You send it in and it's used to take care of the people who are old now. Then when you get old the young do the same thing for you.

Thanks, Nostradumbass. No ****. But it’s OUR money. That WE send in, then get paid back when we retire. So it’s in no way, shape or form “socialism”. It’s a Ponzi scheme...most certainly...but it’s not socialism.

Ponzu scheme combined with a pyramid scheme, problem is the bottom can’t get bigger on the pyramid.


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[kalm]

Thanks, Nostradumbass. No ****. But it’s OUR money. That WE send in, then get paid back when we retire. So it’s in no way, shape or form “socialism”. It’s a Ponzi scheme...most certainly...but it’s not socialism.

Ponzu scheme combined with a pyramid scheme, problem is the bottom can’t get bigger on the pyramid.


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Mmmmm...I love ponzu sauce!

[CID1990]

Here’s an interesting article:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the ... 68f95738bf

I think someone else is also tired of the old school socialist class struggle tropes. I think this is one reason what’s her name gets a lot of flack from the right and even some from the left... she sounds too much like the same old (which has been proven over and over to be a dead end)

[Ibanez]

You know that has never been the case. You know that both Social Security and Medicare are and always have been a transfer from the young to the old. It's never been a situation in which you send your money in and it's held for you when you get old. You send it in and it's used to take care of the people who are old now. Then when you get old the young do the same thing for you.

Thanks, Nostradumbass. No shit. But it’s OUR money. That WE send in, then get paid back when we retire. So it’s in no way, shape or form “socialism”. It’s a Ponzi scheme...most certainly...but it’s not socialism.

I was going to post just that. It's a failing Ponzi scheme.

[kalm]

Here’s an interesting article:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the ... 68f95738bf

I think someone else is also tired of the old school socialist class struggle tropes. I think this is one reason what’s her name gets a lot of flack from the right and even some from the left... she sounds too much like the same old (which has been proven over and over to be a dead end)

WaPo is behind a paywall now too? Who do they think they are...the WSJ?


Gawdammn capitalists. .

[CAA Flagship]

Here’s an interesting article:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the ... 68f95738bf

I think someone else is also tired of the old school socialist class struggle tropes. I think this is one reason what’s her name gets a lot of flack from the right and even some from the left... she sounds too much like the same old (which has been proven over and over to be a dead end)

WaPo is behind a paywall now too? Who do they think they are...the WSJ?


Gawdammn capitalists. .

Someone has to pay journalism majors.

[kalm]

WaPo is behind a paywall now too? Who do they think they are...the WSJ?


Gawdammn capitalists. .

Someone has to pay journalism majors.

We actually could use more of them.

[houndawg]

People want free stuff. Shocker.

Social Security - Our own money, not socialism
Medicare - Our own money, not socialism
legalize marijuana = government out of our lives not MORE government

That’s a shitty meme.

Thank a socialist every time you recite the Pledge of Allegiance.

[Gil Dobie]

Venezuela for sure, are socialist, they are American's.

[kalm]

Venezuela for sure, are socialist, they are American's.

Canada and Costa Rica too.

[Gil Dobie]

Venezuela for sure, are socialist, they are American's.

Canada and Costa Rica too.

Yes, they are American's too. My buddies in Canada always referred to us a Yanks, or your from the States.

[kalm]

Canada and Costa Rica too.

Yes, they are American's too. My buddies in Canada always referred to us a Yanks, or your from the States.

My canadian relatives were the same. Funny...they never referred to us as "you capitalists".

[Ivytalk]

Someone has to pay journalism majors.

We actually could use more of them.

To do what? Pick vegetables?

[CID1990]

What “Medicare for All” really means-

http://reason.com/blog/2019/01/30/kamal ... icare-fail


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