Taxes on the Rich !~

[Tormund Ukrainesbane]

Err, virtually all of them? From ancient Sumeria to Egypt to China, I can't recall any early agricultural civilizations in which the ownership of land aren't concentrated in the hands of the state and/or its apparatus and ruling class.

Precisely. Someone owned the land. Someone was universally recognized in that society as having a property right to it. Whether it be the king, pharoh, a lord, a satrap, a freeman, or whatever. It was not held in common, or believed to belong to "no one", it was owned, and passed through sale, inheritance, or bequeathment to others who also owned it.

[Guest Raidne]

FLOW - No, the biggest difference being alienability. We're not serfs.

[Former Lord of Winterfell]

FLOW - No, the biggest difference being alienability. We're not serfs.

Yeah, well, opinions apparently vary on that.

[Iskaral Pust]

Err, virtually all of them? From ancient Sumeria to Egypt to China, I can't recall any early agricultural civilizations in which the ownership of land aren't concentrated in the hands of the state and/or its apparatus and ruling class.

The aristocracy owned the land and benefited from the wealth generated. I think you are proving his point. There would have been no development if no-one could assert ownership to any of the land.

There have been some limited examples of agricultural development on commonly-held land, but usually only in small villages where social accountability can be maintained. Once the society gets larger, it's harder to enforce responsible sharing of the commons and individual ownership takes over. That doesn't mean everyone owns the land, just that someone owns the lantd.

[Swordfish]

You can blame the lap dogs if you like, I prefer to point my ire at the people pulling the strings.

No one making 250k is pulling anyones strings.

You have a distorted sense of what 250k can buy, and what the typical person making that wage does with their disposable income.

i won't even bother going into which one of the two is obligated to look out for us and which one isn't, because you're kind of on a roll, and i don't want to interrupt the TRAIN OF (self)RIGHTEOUS INDIGNATION.

*sniffle*

[The Progressive]

The aristocracy owned the land and benefited from the wealth generated. I think you are proving his point. There would have been no development if no-one could assert ownership to any of the land.

There have been some limited examples of agricultural development on commonly-held land, but usually only in small villages where social accountability can be maintained. Once the society gets larger, it's harder to enforce responsible sharing of the commons and individual ownership takes over. That doesn't mean everyone owns the land, just that someone owns the lantd.

There are two arguments being made here. The first is that the social development of private ownership is solely responsible for the transformation of society from a hunter-gatherer to an agricultural one. This statement is flatly false given that such a transformation is reliant upon a variety of factors (the domestication of animals and cultivation of plants, the division of labor, the development of permanent settlements and irrigation, ect.), all of which played just as important roles, if not more, than the privatization of ownership.

The second argument is that the privatization of properties in societies that are transitioning into agricultural civilizations are similar to the private ownership of property today. Yes, it is true that somebody (usually a king or a collective of aristocrats) staked ownership to the properties in the latter. This simplistic view, however, fail to adaquately capture the complexity (legal/historical/cultural/proportional) of the differences between the two.

[Rhom]

It's probably Federal, State, and Local taxes, and also Social Security and Medicare taxes. Plus, if Rhom is self-employed (and I believe he is), he would pay both halves of the employment taxes.

Correct.

I'm familiar with the different taxes, it's the actual number that's relevant here. And we haven't even include the numerous deductions that the self-employed could claim yet.

I had to do a little digging to find my payroll summary from that check. There's a gross amount of $4,000. From that was set aside $1,400 in federal withholding, $58 for Medicare employee, $248 for Social Security Employee, $240 for Kentucky withholding, and $54 for city taxes. That totalled $2,000 off the top. My company (which is me also) kicked in another $32 for federal unemployment, $58 for Medicare Company, $248 for Social Security Company, and $128 for Kentucky Unemployment. For a total "employer" tax and contribution of $466.

My withholding is much higher this year than last because last year was my first real profitable year as a business. (Lost in year one, broke even year 2, slight profit year 3.) I ended up paying about $18,000 in taxes between federal and state when it was all figured up. (Yes, I could have sat on it for another month or so and paid in April... but I'd rather just have it done with and behind me.)

Are there potentially more tax advantages out there for me? Probably. I'm exploring options of some retirement savings that might be pre-tax dollars from the business rather than post-tax from my personal income. There's a few other things that can probably be done to help me some, but the numbers don't lie... Once my office bills have been paid for, what's left over can go towards my pocket, but the government takes an inordinately large chunk of that.

I also lost out on my ability to write off the interest from my student loan debt this year because I made too much money. :dunno: I try to keep my overhead low and I don't carry a large debt ratio on my equipment. I have one full time and one part time employee other than myself. They carry the patient load quite well and I have no need to hire, so I won't be able to take advantage of tax credits for hiring the unemployed, etc.

[Tormund Ukrainesbane]

There are two arguments being made here. The first is that the social development of private ownership is solely responsible for the transformation of society from a hunter-gatherer to an agricultural one. This statement is flatly false given that such a transformation is reliant upon a variety of factors (the domestication of animals and cultivation of plants, the division of labor, the development of permanent settlements and irrigation, ect.), all of which played just as important roles, if not more, than the privatization of ownership.

This argument was not made. My argument was simply that the concept of ownership was necessary to advance beyond hunter-gatherer society. I never said that it was "soley responsible".

The second argument is that the privatization of properties in societies that are transitioning into agricultural civilizations are similar to the private ownership of property today. Yes, it is true that somebody (usually a king or a collective of aristocrats) staked ownership to the properties in the latter. This simplistic view, however, fail to adaquately capture the complexity (legal/historical/cultural/proportional) of the differences between the two.

I haven't made this argument either.

[Stego]

If we're talking "reason" here, what reason is there that a piece of the natural world (land in this case) should belong to you and/or your descendants in perpetuity just because you swat on it for a certain amount of time?

That's higher truth, Lev. I agree with you wholeheartedly. But the Capitalism Dogmatics aren't ready for chapter 41 yet.

[Iskaral Pust]

There are two arguments being made here. The first is that the social development of private ownership is solely responsible for the transformation of society from a hunter-gatherer to an agricultural one. This statement is flatly false given that such a transformation is reliant upon a variety of factors (the domestication of animals and cultivation of plants, the division of labor, the development of permanent settlements and irrigation, ect.), all of which played just as important roles, if not more, than the privatization of ownership.

The second argument is that the privatization of properties in societies that are transitioning into agricultural civilizations are similar to the private ownership of property today. Yes, it is true that somebody (usually a king or a collective of aristocrats) staked ownership to the properties in the latter. This simplistic view, however, fail to adaquately capture the complexity (legal/historical/cultural/proportional) of the differences between the two.

I wasn't arguing Tormund's point for him, just that your counter-example of the early aristocracy does not work.

I didn't try to simplify all human development as you are making out. But Tormund has a point that personal wealth/ownership has been a common across nearly all developed societies, which does not make it the sole driver. There are vanishingly few societies that were able to develop to any size with communal resources. As the group increases in size, social policing of communal resources weakens and selfish incentive increases. Individual ownership becomes necessary for large, complex social groups, and those are the driver of technological advances in recent millenia.

You should check out Jared Diamond's chapter on exploiting the commons in Collapse.

[The Progressive]

This argument was not made. My argument was simply that the concept of ownership was necessary to advance beyond hunter-gatherer society. I never said that it was "soley responsible".

Because it's the only way to progress beyond hunter-gatherer society.

My apologize; I think I must have misinterpreted that as "solely responsible".

[Stego]

No one making 250k is pulling anyones strings.

Someone else brought that figure into the discussion. Not me. I simply wanted to cap any and all incomes at 500k ann with a vicious tax on any figures over that. I don't want to remove the comfortable class... I could not give a shit, really, about the Audi driving pretentious born-with-it-alls... they are merely cogs in the machine. I want to remove the Rockefeller's and Rothschild's. I want to remove wealth.

At least that would be step one.

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

Stego,

Someone else brought that figure into the discussion. Not me. I simply wanted to cap any and all incomes at 500k ann with a vicious tax on any figures over that. I don't want to remove the comfortable class... I could not give a shit, really, about the Audi driving pretentious born-with-it-alls... they are merely cogs in the machine. I want to remove the Rockefeller's and Rothschild's. I want to remove wealth.

At least that would be step one.

I was about to ask how you deal with people sitting living of trust funds but I suppose the end to "usery" would end people sitting around living off the incomes (under $500,000.00) generated by their trust funds?

[Tormund Ukrainesbane]

My apologize; I think I must have misinterpreted that as "solely responsible".

No, it's my bad, it was insufficiently clear. Let me rephrase, "Without a concept of individual ownership, society can not progress beyond the hunter-gatherer stage."

[litechick]

Btw Lev, you said that if the resources were available the problem wouldn't exist and I was pointing out the falseness of that.

[Swordfish]

Someone else brought that figure into the discussion. Not me. I simply wanted to cap any and all incomes at 500k ann with a vicious tax on any figures over that. I don't want to remove the comfortable class... I could not give a shit, really, about the Audi driving pretentious born-with-it-alls... they are merely cogs in the machine. I want to remove the Rockefeller's and Rothschild's. I want to remove wealth.

At least that would be step one.

Ahh.... So your response to me had nothing to do with what was being discussed by me at the time.

Gotcha.

*makes wind, peruses a pottery barn catalog*

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

Stego,

Do you believe in property ownership at all anymore? If you do how do you determine what is okay to own and what is not okay to own? In other words you've capped annual income, would you cap how much people can accumulate to themselves by saving?

[Stego]

Do you believe in property ownership at all anymore?

I'm not sure. That's a question well worth a walk or two in the woods to consider.

I certainly like owning things like books, but I often feel guilty that I don't share them with others enough. I'm not sure if my 'enjoyment' of ownership is real or a response I've been trained to have.

So I go back to.... I don't know.

As for limiting what people have.... yeah. Limit that shit. And in my magical world I would also remove all inheritance. There's no need for it!

In my magical world, people who need health care would get health care. They would not take their family to Canada for free health care and then run for Vice President of the United States as a hypocrite blowhard moron Republican.

[Stego]

Ahh.... So your response to me had nothing to do with what was being discussed by me at the time.

Gotcha.

*makes wind, peruses a pottery barn catalog*

You are entitled to read the thread before commenting, Swordfish.

It may go against your principles, but it certainly saves you form looking like your usual self.

[TerraPrime]

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