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[Bauglir]

How does the GOP platform of tax hikes on the poor and middle class and tax cuts on the wealthy pander to the poor?

Because they call it tax cuts, with no further qualifications.

EDIT: Also, any tax hikes are called "paying a fair share", and appeals are made to a sense of justice to make the subjects of the hikes feel like they're serving their country and living up to their obligations.

[Deadmeat1471]

Conservatism is the greatest manifestation of hubris ever displayed.

The idea that, 'I work hard, fuck everyone else, if theyre poor they must be lazy else they'd be rich like me' is unfathomably ignorant, immoral and unfair.

There is no corrolation between hard work and wealth, in fact in many cases the opposite is true. Especially in a rich/poor comparitive nature.
Opportunity is directly linked to the general prosperity of the world, and even in the greatest boom years billions of talented, honorable, hard working individuals are abandoned at the lowest rungs of society. The market will never have a 1:1 ratio of hard work and talent, to good well paid jobs.
Capitalism is a tiered society, and there is no way to get around that. There will always be the poor, and talent wasted in the poor. During recessions this is just exacerbated, it isn't unique to it.

[Urist Imiknorris]

Fuck you, got mine.

[Montague]

Conservatism is the greatest manifestation of hubris ever displayed.

The idea that, 'I work hard, fuck everyone else, if theyre poor they must be lazy else they'd be rich like me' is unfathomably ignorant, immoral and unfair.

There is no correlation between hard work and wealth, in fact in many cases the opposite is true. Especially in a comparative nature.

Can you explain how or why of this is true?

[Deadmeat1471]

Conservatism is the greatest manifestation of hubris ever displayed.

The idea that, 'I work hard, fuck everyone else, if theyre poor they must be lazy else they'd be rich like me' is unfathomably ignorant, immoral and unfair.

There is no correlation between hard work and wealth, in fact in many cases the opposite is true. Especially in a comparative nature.

Can you explain how or why of this is true?

I believe I did. There is no corrolation between how hard people work, and the rewards they get.

Factory worker, breaking his back 50 hours a week, paid minimum wage. This man gets paid not by the effort he personally puts into his job, or into life, but purely upon a miniscule portion of the monetary value of his labor.

[Nadaka]

Conservatism is the greatest manifestation of hubris ever displayed.

The idea that, 'I work hard, fuck everyone else, if theyre poor they must be lazy else they'd be rich like me' is unfathomably ignorant, immoral and unfair.

There is no correlation between hard work and wealth, in fact in many cases the opposite is true. Especially in a comparative nature.

Can you explain how or why of this is true?

The most wealthy people expand their wealth not through the product of their labor, but the rents of their property and interests of their investments.

[Deadmeat1471]

Conservatism is the greatest manifestation of hubris ever displayed.

The idea that, 'I work hard, fuck everyone else, if theyre poor they must be lazy else they'd be rich like me' is unfathomably ignorant, immoral and unfair.

There is no correlation between hard work and wealth, in fact in many cases the opposite is true. Especially in a comparative nature.

Can you explain how or why of this is true?

The most wealthy people expand their wealth not through the product of their labor, but the rents of their property and interests of their investments.

Exactly, they make money from money. Like parasites they produce nothing of their own. While honest men earn minimum wage by honest labor.

I call this, immoral, unfair and unjust. Conservatives support the parasites above the workers who produce the goods which make our nations great.

[Bauglir]

There is no correlation between hard work and wealth,

I should mention that there's a (very) weak correlation. You can fuck up your way into failure no matter where you start (although, to be sure, at the top wealth levels in this country you'd have to basically be trying). You just can't work your way into success without luck being at least as big a factor.

[Montague]

Conservatism is the greatest manifestation of hubris ever displayed.

The idea that, 'I work hard, fuck everyone else, if theyre poor they must be lazy else they'd be rich like me' is unfathomably ignorant, immoral and unfair.

There is no correlation between hard work and wealth, in fact in many cases the opposite is true. Especially in a comparative nature.

Can you explain how or why of this is true?

The most wealthy people expand their wealth not through the product of their labor, but the rents of their property and interests of their investments.

Exactly, they make money from money. Like parasites they produce nothing of their own. While honest men earn minimum wage by honest labor.

I call this, immoral, unfair and unjust. Conservatives support the parasites above the workers who produce the goods which make our nations great.

The super-ultra-wealthy make most of their money, by investing other money, sure. They also make most of their money from exploiting other super-wealthy people.

Most rich people get their income through work like anybody else. CEO's and the such are basically hired employees and are paid so much because people able to do the job well are in extremely high demand.

People get paid according to market principles. A job that almost anybody is able and willing to do isn't going to pay much. A job that few people can ably do and jobs that nobody wants to do, pay very well. The latter implies a certain degree of merit, talent, work ethic, personal responsibility and competence required to do it, so it pays better.

[Darvi]

You're kidding right?

[Deadmeat1471]

Conservatism is the greatest manifestation of hubris ever displayed.

The idea that, 'I work hard, fuck everyone else, if theyre poor they must be lazy else they'd be rich like me' is unfathomably ignorant, immoral and unfair.

There is no correlation between hard work and wealth, in fact in many cases the opposite is true. Especially in a comparative nature.

Can you explain how or why of this is true?

The most wealthy people expand their wealth not through the product of their labor, but the rents of their property and interests of their investments.

Exactly, they make money from money. Like parasites they produce nothing of their own. While honest men earn minimum wage by honest labor.

I call this, immoral, unfair and unjust. Conservatives support the parasites above the workers who produce the goods which make our nations great.

People get paid according to market principles. A job that almost anybody is able and willing to do isn't going to pay much. A job that few people can ably do and jobs that nobody wants to do, pay very well. The latter implies a certain degree of merit, talent, work ethic, personal responsibility and competence required to do it, so it pays better.

Tell that to our crushed economy in which a lack of expressed talent, a poor work ethic, little personal responsibility and massive golden parachutes ruined the lives of millions of people.

*This happens in recession and boom alike.

[Bauglir]

Most rich people get their income through work like anybody else. CEO's and the such are basically hired employees and are paid so much because people able to do the job well are in extremely high demand.

People get paid according to market principles. A job that almost anybody is able and willing to do isn't going to pay much. A job that few people can ably do and jobs that nobody wants to do, pay very well. The latter implies a certain degree of merit, talent, work ethic, personal responsibility and competence required to do it, so it pays better.

I'd buy that if you didn't get a severance package for fucking up so badly the company decides that paying you $10,000,000 to quit is cheaper than letting you run things anymore (who was that HP guy, again?). I grant that I would not do well as a CEO - I do not have the charisma that you need to be the public face of a company whenever shit happens, and I don't have the business training to actually do the job. But that latter, at least, I could potentially fix, and possibly the former given enough work.

What I do not grant is that top executive pay is determined by market principles from the company's perspective. Executives are human - they make their decisions based on what's good for them, in the majority of cases. Each and every one of them knows that having safety nets like that as established principle is good for them, and perpetuating that is in turn what they should do. Same reason you got European monarchs that warred with France for generations fighting to undo the French Revolution. Same reason you get a Congress that refuses to improve the voting system. For that matter, the number of people who want to be and have the ability to be CEOs is, I'd wager, far higher than the number of people who are.

Now, if your definition of "can" includes the enormous slew of environmental factors in a person's life that determine whether or not CEO or Janitor is a more appropriate career aspiration, that's at least logically consistent, but it's also what we're complaining about since that shouldn't be allowed to generate such a huge disparity.

[kaijyuu]

I used to have a nice Andrew Carnegie quote about this. Don't have it on hand so I'll just paraphrase what happened: He got the opportunity to invest some money for the first time, and did so through borrowing. When he got his return, that completely paid off his debt and then some, he said "Eureka! Here lies the goose that lays the golden eggs. It was the first dollar I earned not by the sweat of my own brow."

Latter part's important.


As long as you need money to make money, wealth will never have more than a tentative correlation to hard work and/or aptitude. The hard workers are making minimum wage. The geniuses are in R&D on salary.

[NinjaBoot]

How does the GOP platform of tax hikes on the poor and middle class and tax cuts on the wealthy pander to the poor?

I never said anything connecting the GOP to vote pandering to the poor. 

I stated that Politicians (on both sides) do this. 

For me personally, being Canadian, I have a somewhat vested interest in seeing our closet ally and biggest trading partner get its shit together. 

$15 Trillion in debt and spiraling out of control. 

The whole issue has never been with taxation.  While I do agree that the 46% of Americans who pay no taxes, should pay SOME taxes (everybody has to have skin in the game, duly so if they have the right to vote), the whole problem has been with the spending.

[lemon10]

No, 46% don't pay federal income tax.
They still pay the other taxes.

And you are wrong, the whole problem hasn't been spending, the US needs both to get more revenue (aka taxes) and to cut spending, the US simply can't cut its way out of this problem (short of completely gutting a ton of stuff).
Bush cutting taxes and them getting extended by the republicans (and obama OK'ing it), has been one of the most damaging things to the budget.