Flint,

I tend to favor economic policies that focus on efficiency over equality, which is usually to not intervene except in cases where market failures or negative externalities are involved. However, I believe there is one equality the government should guarantee. That is equality of opportunity, and I am going to fight tooth and nail for it. Unfortunately, your position on education means you don't care about equal opportunity. It is also an imprudent policy, because affordable education and retraining is essential for the needs of our volatile economy.

As long as it possible to get rich.
If education is so expensive the lower and middle classes can't afford it, and therefor can't get a good job, can't make a decent amount of money, and can't send their children to a good school, you have a loop. At that point it is starting to look like a feudal system.

> Einstein wrote:

> The top 1% pays how much of the taxes?

Your clearly making a mistake on all of your stuff. Rethink it again.

Are you saying, Flint, that the poor and middle class doesn't pay most of the taxes?

> Einstein wrote:

> I am saying everyone pays except 48% get so much back they did not lose out...

But the rich pay far more per person than any poor person does, and by a greater percentage of their income also.

But the poor pay far more per capita, and you do not tend to factor in the indirect costs of running the system incurred by the poor and middle class, which are in effect just another tax, which disproportionately affect them more than it does the rich: interest on loans and mortgages, general inflation (for which the rich have much more protection), inflation of goods and services due to corporations 'passing down' the cost of production, of corporate taxes, licensing fees, etc.; sales taxes on essential goods and services; the medical costs and cost of lost wages due to poorer health associated with people under financial strain (due to being underpaid, they are over-stressed, over-worked and more prone to illness); and the costs of environmental degradation due to being poor pollution; the costs of education and lost wages during periods of education.  These are DISPROPORTIONATE taxes on the poor and indebted middle class.

The rich, on the other hand, are able to factor all of these costs into their profit margins, passing down most of the overall costs to the consumer.  The poor and middle class don't have this luxury.

It's very simple.  Consider it as such: wealth accumulation = profit off the system.  The costs of running the system should be incurred by those who profit from it, not passed down to those who do not.

Yet, the system is designed the reverse: those who profit from it the least (and even those who do not profit from it at all) are paying the most for it.  This is morally reprehensible.

Get rid of the money, This whole money system is unfair.

Some kid (justin bieber for example)  doesn't have to work anymore if he wishes. A normal person has to work his butt off everyday again and again and never get to a wealth status a 17 year old kids has.  Its unfair and this is just 1 error in this whole system that is called Money.

Also when we go out into space money surve no purpose once we meet aliens.

Money makes humans greedy.

Your calculations are off but and i dont words suchs as "capitalism" but yea i get your point.

Just because this is how we do things doesn't make it right. The money system is corrupted from start to end.

Getting rid of the money is easier said than done and it will have to change humanity as a whole on how we do things. Pretty sure it doesn't work out to well for us untill we get World War 3 on our heads and only have a few mill people alive to start a new civilization

feudal system? because we make it hard for craftsmen or service people to start their own company hiring other craftsmen or service people to do chores over a wider area, taking on more work than one person, we make it cost more for fuel to move around to a wider client base,we say ' if you're going to hire anybody you owe them health insurance, you owe them 4x more an hour than 30 years ago, you owe them more time off, you owe them paid maternity leave

then if you just want to work for somebody else we say "if you earn $30k a year working you take home less money than somebody who has no job but has kids, because food stamps and tax credits and housing will make up the differnece and then some. but that's ok because your employer compensates you with paid time off and health insurance so your quality of life is better even if you don't have cash in the bank. oh yeah rising food and fuel prices aren't inflation, enjoy the boom"

then we raise taxes on the people who can afford to start businesses in spite of that

then we say "oh shit we have 60% participation in the workforce and 8% unemployed people actively looking, and there's no income mobility anymore, sounds like we need more socialism because it looks feudal"

Key,

No, it's because of the minimum wage and labor laws. Ban the minimum wage, and employment will increase. Ban labor laws, and people will start working harder trying to compete. They will realize that staying in work depends on being competitive.

> Justinian I wrote:

> Key,

No, it's because of the minimum wage and labor laws. Ban the minimum wage, and employment will increase. Ban labor laws, and people will start working harder trying to compete. They will realize that staying in work depends on being competitive.

Whats the goal #1? Improving economy? No. #1 is improving life standard, everyone deserves a standard. I agree minimum wages shouldnt be too high, but they are necessary. Labor laws.. banned? Seriously.. I mean we are trying to improve our way of life, try to make everything easier for ourselfs. Maybe those labor laws need some second tought (Im no specialist since Im not American and I dont know too much about American policitics either), but they certainly need to be there. Without them every non-management employee will just sacrifice their own lifes to be able to feed their children and maybe on long term life standard will be so high everything comes into place again. But ban them is no option. Like you said "work harder". There are people who should work harder, agreed. Does everyone need to? You want more stress? Less free time? You're not even thinking this through. This is not a game in which you only have to try to optimalize your economy.

Like I said.. They might need working on but thats not up to me. And yes indeed Wornstrum.. Quality of life > Best economy. Some people just confuse the one with the other, which in ic words would be "a nubie mistake".. one i'd make and Mizzle would do on purpose.. only to flatter his rep as ubern00blet. Anyways Europe are whiners to about retirement age.. but if 30% protests it seems alot, but that does mean 70% agrees.. dont forget 1% of 100 million is still 1 million people protesting

Remember, though, that "Quality of life" is a function of economic health, in that it requires the resources of an effective economy in order to be effective.

For example, let's say that a no-government interference economy produced a per capita income of $30,000, although inequality did exist.  If the government set a goal of maximizing every individual's quality of life by ensuring every individual had a $30,000 income, the overall productivity would see some reduction as a result of taxation, bureaucracy, incentives to work, etc.  So the government may be able to achieve "equality," but at a lower income due to lower economic activity, so individuals would only receive maybe $15,000 per year or less.

So you can't say that one priority trumps the other priority because both priorities go hand in hand.  Generally, an increase in overall economic development is a net increase in individual quality of life, albeit not at equal levels (case in point: if I asked you whether you would rather be a poor person living in the United States or a poor person living in Uganda, you would probably rather be poor in the US, if only because minor social programs such as food stamps, plus the existence of charitable organizations, increases your expected income as a poor person here).  At the same time, though, a complete disregard for quality of life would doom the economy (remember, capitalists still need consumers to buy their products, so if 90% of consumers are too impoverished to purchase products, domestic economic growth does not actually occur).  The key is to find a balance between the two.