If it works so well why isn't the U.S. (one of the most capitalist countries in the world, although not a pure capitalist system) higher in standard of living rankings. Its the more socialist countries that have a higher standard of living.
Countries 1 through 7 are all countries with TINY, homogenous populations. Indeed, only Japan, France, and the USA have sizeable populations. Countries with tiny, homogenous populations do better with socialism. It's their culture that makes the higher degree of socialism work, not socialism itself.
I love the examples set by the Scandinavian countries. They demonstrate my point that if you want to do something "better" than market capitalism we see in this country, the very first thing you have to do is control your population. Reference China... Now, those countries don't actively have programs controlling population, but you'll see their populations are fractions of the US, whereas their GDP-to-population ratios are (I'm assuming without direct numbers crunching) better.
It's something the US is going to have to address, IMO. It's something the world is going to have to address so that we can control our environmental impact. I don't hear anyone in this country advocating government guidelines for population control.
If I've ever represented myself as believing in unrestrained capitalism, it was an error. Capitalism does require oversight. Oversight too easily turns in to what I call "class warfare."
I'm odd, you know. I just think things the government does should be fair regardless of race, religion, sexual orientation, and how much freakin money you make. Now, I'm for means testing of Social Security and Medicare, etc., but I have a big problem with tax rates for people who are "rich".
(And for the record, my own income is within a fraction of a percent of the national median, I'm not rich, and no one in my family is).
It bothers me that the top 1 percent of wage-income earners pay 39.4% of the income tax (between 85 and 05, numbers from Congressional OMB) while only generating 21.2 percent of total wage-income. That strikes me as unfair, and I'm not in that group! That's discriminatory. Against people who make "more" than some arbitrary line.
I'm personally for consumption taxes and flat taxes. I'm against the government being able to tax people (in any fashion, single or combined taxation) more than 33 percent. I just think it's BS that the government can take more than 1 out of 3 dollars you make, no matter how much you make!
I believe that people outside of government always work harder to resolve issues they care about than a government can with a mandate from the people that it's supposed to care.
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Remember the dollar value to human life. Mine is priceless. Yours is negotiable. - unknown
[quote=heliodorus04;85983]Countries 1 through 7 are all countries with TINY, homogenous populations. Indeed, only Japan, France, and the USA have sizeable populations. Countries with tiny, homogenous populations do better with socialism. It's their culture that makes the higher degree of socialism work, not socialism itself.quote]
Can you substantiate this assertion. You state a cause and effect relationship but do not back it up with any facts.
As far as homogenous populations it could be argued that the countries at the top are heterogenous. The canadians have Quebec, the Australians the aborigines. Or you could argue the the US is homogenous given that a majority still falls in the middle class. Would be helpful if you were a little more objective with your terms. Surprising coming from someone who pointed out the biased writing in some of the articles submitted by Marco.
As far as the rest of your rant about the poor "rich" being unfairly taxed in our country. Look at all the benefits corporations receive and the wealthy recieve as far as tax breaks. Corporations get tax incentives from the government not to mention preferential treatment in many cases. Not to mention how small business owners are very tax advantaged over the people who only make an earned income.
But really why shouldn't we tax the rich at a higher rate. They are after all "rich". What wrong with spreading resoures out in an equitable if not even way? Where's the compassion?
Canada is the only country on that list that's as heterogenous as the US. France is also close, in terms of immigration, but not from nearly as diverse a range of areas as the US. I'll look up some comparisons to GDP and population later, and I can prove declining birth rates in most of the aforementioned countries. I'm not trying to sneak anything under the radar.
As far as taxation:
I don't have any real objections to differing tax brackets and tax rates. In principle I do, but in practice, it tends to solve a big country's problems (like mine). Like I said, my real issue is when taxation reaches a point that I'm philosophically horrified, and that point for me is 33 percent (combined, total taxation).
I agree there's too much corporate welfare in this country, and lobbying has too much influence. The problem I see with "fixing" lobbying is that in this country every individual or group has a right to petition the government, per free speech. So I don't see how you fix the influence without violating the right to free speech, so I say - leave it alone. The law of unintended consequences with limiting lobbyists means too much can go wrong. You can see that McCain-Feingold really didn't change anything.
Instead, why are we giving any corporations subsidies? If businesses can't make it on their own, let them sink. That's the flip side to market based capitalism. Sink or swim on your product and your effeciency.
So as with private citizens, corporations should be taxed in some uniform manner, with no exceptions and exemptions*
*some exemptions need to be made for critical industries, for example like emerging energy technologies.
But remember, all lobbying begins as one industry's petition of the government that its sector is critical to the economy. And all corporations and special interest groups are made up of people trying to make a living, most of them decent people with decent intentions.
Whether it's corn producers or transistor manufacturers or Florida orange juice producers - each of these companies represents a group of individuals who believe they have a legitimate right to petition for government assistance. It's time we do away with the vast majority of corporate welfare in this country, which, if regimented properly (that is to say, hard coded into budgetary law), i feel could also solve the lobbying issue.
Flat taxation (even if it's bracketed based on incomes, etc.) for corporations and individuals increases the transparency of government, and a government that is transparent has a difficult time lying.
So to create our utopia, let's start with fixing taxation for individuals and corporations, and also do something about population growth. Then, I feel, the other things will be a lot easier to work out. Simplify, eliminate all exemptions, eliminate subsidies. I don't think we take power out of the special interests by changing a borked tax code. You change the tax code, you can start with a clean slate that can fix more problems than trying to dink with the broken system we currently have.
We also need a constitutional amendment for the line-item veto, so presidents really can single-handedly take on pork. I don't hear any candidate tackling that issue. Line item veto would be the bomb.
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Remember the dollar value to human life. Mine is priceless. Yours is negotiable. - unknown
I agree to some extent that the crap on TV is our own fault. But that is not entirely accurate. Ever see those BASF commercials? "We don't make blank, we make blank better." Now why would BASF, a company that doesn't sell anything, advertise? Could it be so it can threaten to withdrawl advertising dollars if it doesn't like the programing? I think I got that from the documentary "The Corporation".
-d
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Could it be that intense partisanship unhinges us all, leading us to being with the conclusion we prefer, and then to reason backward to reach it? -William Falk
So ultimately, the finger of blame for our terrible government falls onto the people, not the corporations, nor the MSM, nor the politicians. The lack of outrage by the voting public (less than half those eligible TO vote) is tacit approval for the way our government does "work".
Ultimately, the electorate doesn't want to be bothered with being informed. Even on basic, no cable television, most people can pick up PBS and watch McNeil-Lehrer newshour. Most people can watch 60 minutes. If people spent that 6 hours a week taping and watching those two programs, I assert our country and the world would work a whole lot better.
But people don't.
I gotta agree with helio. Especially watching these debates. It seems like all the candidates are just trying to buy off the uninformed electorate rather than being straight with them about the mess we're in. It sounds like a high school class president election. "Vote for me and I'll give you free lunch". And on the issue of taxes: "All you poor people vote for me and I'll make the rich people pay for your lunch."
That only works on an uninformed electorate that doesn't realize we're already bankrupt and doesn't realize exactly what lowering the interest rate or giving a tax rebate does. As long as they get a free lunch, all's good.
If it works so well why isn't the U.S. (one of the most capitalist countries in the world, although not a pure capitalist system) higher in standard of living rankings. Its the more socialist countries that have a higher standard of living.
A small society of like minded people can more easily make socialism work. A huge society of widely different cultures, faiths, values, work ethics, etc. could never make socialism work the way that Sweden does. Unless they kill off the dissenters like the USSR did.
Also their standard of living is elevated because there are capitalist countries in the world like the USA and Japan. If every country was like Sweden where everything's taken care of for you and there's not much incentive to inovate because you're not going to be allowed to profit off of it anyway, we would still be listening 8 track tapes, watching UHF TV and driving SAABs.
A small society of like minded people can more easily make socialism work. A huge society of widely different cultures, faiths, values, work ethics, etc. could never make socialism work the way that Sweden does. Unless they kill off the dissenters like the USSR did.
And at this point- the dissenters we'd have to kill off would be the top 2%. We can live with that.
Also their standard of living is elevated because there are capitalist countries in the world like the USA and Japan. If every country was like Sweden where everything's taken care of for you and there's not much incentive to inovate because you're not going to be allowed to profit off of it anyway, we would still be listening 8 track tapes, watching UHF TV and driving SAABs.
You need to check your facts on how socialism works in other countries. The Swedes are not communists. Basically they pay higher taxes overall to make sure all people have access to things like health care, retirement benefits, and education (sounds awful, huh). Their economic system is still basically capitalist.
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