Originally Posted By DDMAN26 I saw that Kanye West showed up to lend support to the protesters. I can't think of a better person to lend a voice against excess and greed than a rapper.
Originally Posted By mawnck >>I can't think of a better person to lend a voice against excess and greed than a rapper.<< You're still refusing to see the point of all this. Not that it's going to matter.
Originally Posted By DDMAN26 I will judge someone like Kanye West who's there to benefit one person. Kanye West.
Originally Posted By DDMAN26 Who else should support them? Hey maybe members of the Knicks and Nets could come down. I mean they're not going to have a season because of greed between the owners and players. I'm fine with the regular citizens protesting what Wall Street and both parties, yeah both parties, have gotten away with. But I just think rich celebrities coming down there and acting like they are part of the people and understand what they're going through is a farce. That's my two cents.
Originally Posted By Dabob2 <even though I think they need to remove the 'class warfare' part of this> Favoring a return to the 90's tax rates and accountability for people who (genteelly) stole money, which is all most people are asking for, is not class warfare.
Originally Posted By vbdad55 I won't out all rappers in one box- whether they should be or not-- but I already stated that Kanye has a mansion - 5 minutes from my home. It's back in a secluded ( but not gated) area and value has to be $5M +. You can never drive by without fleets of Hummers and Bentleys parked in full view in the front of the house... So you're telling me Kanye doesn't fit the bill of what at least some of the protesters are talking about as they keep repeating over and over 1% of the people control 50% of the money in the country ? sorry, I don't think DAR wrong on this one. but interested to hear how Kanye fits into the other 99%...
Originally Posted By vbdad55 <Favoring a return to the 90's tax rates and accountability for people who (genteelly) stole money, which is all most people are asking for, is not class warfare< sorry - they are blanketing ALL people on wall street- ( wall street vs main street) everyone there didn't steal. And when they get into the 1% with 50% of the money- what else would you call that ? Who gave the banks all that money ? Not fellow wall streeters, that was the Congress. Maybe they need to be more specific. Plenty of top people who did steal need to be in jail, there needs to be more accountability for decisions that hurt the overall economy ( off shoring) - etc. totally agree. but when one targets soley on median income- guess what I view that as class warfare - and is a very slippery slope as to where that cut off occurs.
Originally Posted By mawnck >>The way to understand all of this is to realize that it’s part of a broader syndrome, in which wealthy Americans who benefit hugely from a system rigged in their favor react with hysteria to anyone who points out just how rigged the system is.<< <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/10/opinion/panic-of-the-plutocrats.html?_r=2" target="_blank">http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10...tml?_r=2</a>
Originally Posted By vbdad55 I don't disagree that the system is somewhat rigged for the weathiest - but where does one draw that line. SOmeone making $100K in Omaha is pretty darn well off- live in Chicago /NY etc and it's nowhere near that. I am more concerned about the 'working poor' and 'middle class' ( what's left of it ) - and how this all affects them The tax burden today falls into those areas from a % standpoint.
Originally Posted By queenbee <a href="http://sociology.ucsc.edu/whorulesamerica/power/wealth.html" target="_blank">http://sociology.ucsc.edu/whor...lth.html</a> <a href="http://sociology.ucsc.edu/whorulesamerica/power/investment_manager.html" target="_blank">http://sociology.ucsc.edu/whor...ger.html</a> <<Until recently, most studies just broke out the top 1% as a group. Data on net worth distributions within the top 1% indicate that one enters the top 0.5% with about $1.8M, the top 0.25% with $3.1M, the top 0.10% with $5.5M and the top 0.01% with $24.4M. Wealth distribution is highly skewed towards the top 0.01%, increasing the overall average for this group. The net worth for those in the lower half of the top 1% is usually achieved after decades of education, hard work, saving and investing as a professional or small business person. While an after-tax income of $175k to $250k and net worth in the $1.2M to $1.8M range may seem like a lot of money to most Americans, it doesn't really buy freedom from financial worry or access to the true corridors of power and money. That doesn't become frequent until we reach the top 0.1%.>> Here are a few articles on how the top 1% breaks down. My guess is, it's makes a better slogan to say 99% or 1% rather than .05% or 99.5%, but the sentiment is the same. Too few people control too many of the avaiable resources.
Originally Posted By Dabob2 <<Favoring a return to the 90's tax rates and accountability for people who (genteelly) stole money, which is all most people are asking for, is not class warfare<> <sorry - they are blanketing ALL people on wall street- ( wall street vs main street) everyone there didn't steal.> 1). No, they're not. "Wall Street" is for them shorthand for the financial titans whose shenanigans put us in the mess we're in, not the hot dog vendor on that street, the cleaning woman who cleans those offices, or even the run of the mill trader. 2). If the run of the mill trader is a millionaire (for, let's face it, working not a whole lot harder, if at all, than the hot dog vendor), then yes they think he should pay the same tax rates he paid in the 90's. Oooooooooooh, radical! As I remember, he did just fine in the 90's, the economy did just fine in the 90's, AND we weren't swimming in red ink. <And when they get into the 1% with 50% of the money- what else would you call that ?> I'd call it pointing out the facts. As Paul Krugman put it (very well) in mawnck's link: "This special treatment can’t bear close scrutiny — and therefore, as they see it, there must be no close scrutiny. " It wasn't always thus. Look at the stats. The share that the upper 1% controls has risen tremendously in the last 30 years, and particularly in the last 10. Why should it be so? Did the wealthy really suffer when they got a great deal of the national wealth, but not quite so much as today? Were they really hurting in the 90's? Of course not. It's particularly galling precisely because so many people are hurting now. The middle class has seen their wages stagnate (and then fall with the downturn), yet the wealthiest are not sharing that pain. In fact, their share of the pie has risen. And many of them seem to see it as some sort of birthright. And their apologists in the media/pundit world call any suggestion to simply go back to the somewhat more fair rules of the 90's as "class warfare." Give me a break. <Who gave the banks all that money ? Not fellow wall streeters, that was the Congress.> Separate question. But not unrelated. Further adding to the anger is the fact that the banks were bailed out (by Congress, but ultimately BY THE TAXPAYERS), and then a). the banks didn't free up much of that money, which was ostensibly the reason to give it to them; b). they continue to give their top execs multi-million dollar bonuses (while other people deal with unemployment) as though they were doing a great job instead of the horrendous job they actually did; c). no one guilty of fraud or peddling junk they KNEW was junk and knew had to crash some day has been prosecuted. These people are responsible for the mess millions of Americans find themselves in... yet not only are they not in jail, they're getting multi-million dollar bonuses. That just ain't right. People guilty of fraud need to be prosecuted. Honest people who make millions need to give slightly more in taxes, like they did in the 90's. Because if they don't, there are only two possible consequences; a). the deficits continue to soar, or b). someone else (i.e. the middle class) makes up for that lost revenue. It's not class warfare to point that out, it's basic common sense.
Originally Posted By vbdad55 <And when they get into the 1% with 50% of the money- what else would you call that ?> I'd call it pointing out the facts --- then just 'pointing out the facts is that 47% of the people in this country pay no federal tax - guess what that bothers me as well. But again just pointing out the facts does not tell the whole story people can't like one set of facts and not another - if they are both true.
Originally Posted By vbdad55 <It's not class warfare to point that out, it's basic common sense.< it is when blanket statements are made- like they are in this protest, that does not account for people who worked their arses off to make what they did-- and there are some of those in there. There are plenty of honest people among the crooks...
Originally Posted By Dabob2 No, that's too easy. You have to look into the "why." 47% don't pay federal income taxes... why? Because they're too poor to. They do pay payroll taxes, state income taxes, sales taxes, excise taxes, property taxes (even if they rent, as the landlord figures it in)... but they don't make enough to pay federal income taxes, and federal income taxes only. Setting aside for the moment of "why do so many Americans make so little?" (which is really the better question), we then have to ask "why do they pay none, when they do make some money?" The answer is mostly the Earned Income Tax Credit, which was started by none other than St. Reagan as a way of helping the poor be not quite so poor. Of course, you'll never hear any of the people who complain about the 47% mention this. It helps, but... if you're poor enough to not pay federal income taxes, you're still poor. And now we look to the "why" of the other side. Why should the top 1% control 50% of the wealth? And how is it that they control so much when they didn't used to? WHY has their share risen in the last 10 years? Like it or not, vbdad, the "why's" of both of those questions ARE being asked by the Occupy people... and rightly so.
Originally Posted By Dabob2 <It's not class warfare to point that out, it's basic common sense.< <it is when blanket statements are made- like they are in this protest, that does not account for people who worked their arses off to make what they did-- and there are some of those in there. There are plenty of honest people among the crooks...> I said there were, and you're missing the point(s). The main points are these: 1). There ARE crooks but they're not being held accountable, and there's nothing to keep them from doing it again; 2). There are honest people but they could easily pay the tax rates they did in the 90's and be just fine, thank you. If they don't provide that extra revenue, it's either going to come from the middle class or the debt increases.
Originally Posted By DDMAN26 <<There are plenty of honest people among the crooks...>> Yep, they're there, it might be like finding Waldo but they're there. And I say establish a flat tax for everyone. That is the most fair way to do it.
Originally Posted By DDMAN26 <<1). There ARE crooks but they're not being held accountable, and there's nothing to keep them from doing it again;>> Well you'd have to do a clean sweep of Washington.
Originally Posted By Dabob2 I was talking about the financial crooks. They weren't prosecuted for what they did, and the financial reforms that passed were so watered down that there's really nothing in place to keep them from doing it all again. We didn't even impose the wall between commercial and investment banks that stood for decades and did exactly what it was designed to do.
Originally Posted By plpeters70 <<And I say establish a flat tax for everyone. That is the most fair way to do it.>> A flat tax may sound fair, but it would really hurt those at the bottom far more than it would hurt those at the top. Asking someone who only makes $30,000 a year to pay the same rate as someone who makes $1,000,000 isn't really what I would call fair.
