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Post by Orac on May 24, 2024 10:21:50 GMT
I think your idea would create a huge hole on public services. But for me this is less about politics and more about civilisation. Over the centuries history has taught us that society falls apart if the wealth divide gets too large. It has little to do with real poverty and much to do with comparative poverty. As people see the gap grow they become disenfranchised and turn to crime and a black economy. Historically this lead to increasingly severe penalties to try and discourage crime which leads to more public sympathy for the criminal and further breakdown of society. Eventually the rich realise that their own lives are worse because of this and it gets addressed in a seemingly never ending (never learned cycle) The idea of personal responsibility seems an ideal, but does not allow for human frailty. So we need tax and it needs to be at a level that provides a similar enough service to every citizen. Back to our conversation: How do we achieve that tax level when more and more of the money goes to less and less people. That it does not get spent back into society as hoped, but gets locked up and wasted. Another lady I know has an 800k yacht moored in Menorca, she hasn't used it more than 3 times in the last 5 years. Such is the amount of spare capital the people I speak of have that this doesn't matter. And that's not touching the millions of ordinary citizens cuffed that their home is worth 20 times what they paid for it and don't care that this means young people cannot afford a home at all. I agree with just about all of that but tax is a very ineffective as a direct way of correcting wealth inequalities. Another phantom. The inequalities themselves aren't the problem. The problem is the rich's ability to purchase an abusive power over the poor that can't be competed away
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Steve
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Post by Steve on May 24, 2024 10:33:06 GMT
I agree with just about all of that but tax is a very ineffective as a direct way of correcting wealth inequalities. Another phantom. The inequalities themselves aren't the problem. The problem is the rich's ability to purchase an abusive power over the poor that can't be competed away Nope You want people to obediently pay taxes while living a lifestylefar far removed from the squillionaires whose lives are thrust into their faces everyday then expect many to refuse not just to pay but also to obey the laws we all rely on to have a decent society. We're not in French Revolution levels of wealth inequality societal stress just yet but every year we nudge a little closer.
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Post by Orac on May 24, 2024 10:35:57 GMT
Another phantom. The inequalities themselves aren't the problem. The problem is the rich's ability to purchase an abusive power over the poor that can't be competed away Nope You want people to obediently pay taxes while living a lifestylefar far removed from the squillionaires whose lives are thrust into their faces everyday then expect many to refuse not just to pay but also to obey the laws we all rely on to have a decent society. We're not in French Revolution levels of wealth inequality societal stress just yet but every year we nudge a little closer. It wasn't inequality that caused the French revolution, it was oppression and unfairness
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Post by Steve on May 24, 2024 10:40:53 GMT
Aka inequality
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Post by Orac on May 24, 2024 10:48:46 GMT
I guess the two are synonymous if you are a communist
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Post by Steve on May 24, 2024 10:59:06 GMT
And if you're an objective viewer of events As this shows www.rmg.co.uk/stories/topics/french-revolution'In the late 18th century France was on the brink of bankruptcy due to its involvement in the American Revolution and King Louis XVI’s extravagant spending. This led to a people’s revolt against the inequalities of French society, the corruption of royal officials, and despair owing to widespread economic hardship.'
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Post by Orac on May 24, 2024 11:09:06 GMT
And if you're an objective viewer of events As this shows www.rmg.co.uk/stories/topics/french-revolution'In the late 18th century France was on the brink of bankruptcy due to its involvement in the American Revolution and King Louis XVI’s extravagant spending. This led to a people’s revolt against the inequalities of French society, the corruption of royal officials, and despair owing to widespread economic hardship.'Instead of just copying things, why not engage in some thought? Napoleon wasn't 'equal' was he? The root cause of the french revolution was most likely leadership incompetence.- the unnecessary abuse and cruelty were dimensions of that incompetence.
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Post by Zany on May 24, 2024 11:39:48 GMT
I think your idea would create a huge hole on public services. No. That impression is just a phantom caused by your naturalisation to a badly dysfunctional economy. Because landowners have an abusive power and that power is competed over, the whole economy becomes dysfunctional. Rather than competing to provide more, most players (and their resources) are competing to take more via monopoly power. The impoverishment caused then gives the state a reason to intervene - but rather than intervene by taxing the process that causes damage, they decide to tax the productive.- ie the very process that might be providing some relief from impoverishment. So , now the worker (the producer) is in two holes at once - on one side he has real estate working against him and , on the other he has the public sector taxing him to provide relief from the effects of the former. This is a really interesting concept, I like it. So we make owning land expensive (Tax wise) and this forces owners to make better use of it or get rid of it. However it doesn't solve the problem of the people who make their money from other things not being taxed properly. It stops them buying so much land in the UK. but not the empty houses all across the planet they bought on a whim. As I've got better off I have found it increasingly puzzling why the lady with an £800,000 yacht that she doesn't use and is steadily depreciating, objects to the idea of paying another 20k a year in tax for the country she does use to be better. But if I raised such an idea among these folk I would be lampooned as an idiot leftie.
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Post by Zany on May 24, 2024 11:53:30 GMT
I think your idea would create a huge hole on public services. But for me this is less about politics and more about civilisation. Over the centuries history has taught us that society falls apart if the wealth divide gets too large. It has little to do with real poverty and much to do with comparative poverty. As people see the gap grow they become disenfranchised and turn to crime and a black economy. Historically this lead to increasingly severe penalties to try and discourage crime which leads to more public sympathy for the criminal and further breakdown of society. Eventually the rich realise that their own lives are worse because of this and it gets addressed in a seemingly never ending (never learned cycle) The idea of personal responsibility seems an ideal, but does not allow for human frailty. So we need tax and it needs to be at a level that provides a similar enough service to every citizen. Back to our conversation: How do we achieve that tax level when more and more of the money goes to less and less people. That it does not get spent back into society as hoped, but gets locked up and wasted. Another lady I know has an 800k yacht moored in Menorca, she hasn't used it more than 3 times in the last 5 years. Such is the amount of spare capital the people I speak of have that this doesn't matter. And that's not touching the millions of ordinary citizens cuffed that their home is worth 20 times what they paid for it and don't care that this means young people cannot afford a home at all. I agree with just about all of that but tax is a very ineffective as a direct way of correcting wealth inequalities. What we need to do is use tax to incentivise those who create meaningful jobs (and thereby more money) for the many and disincentivise those who create more wealth for the few. One suggestion I have is to raise the level of VAT but allow companies to claim VAT against wages. This would go a long way towards making employee intensive production more equal with low employee production. At the moment a diamond importer makes far more money and pays less VAT than someone running a nursery. Its a weird scenario where if the work (Mining diamonds) is included in the purchase price you can claim VAT on the whole price you paid, but if you sell the labour separately you can't. Agreed. but in the end its all income of some sort. If I buy 4 miles of land and sit on it for a decade my wealth sky rockets but my income remains the same. The big problem I see is a growing number of people with so much wealth they no longer even bother to invest to get best returns. Land as you say is a big part of this.
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Post by Steve on May 24, 2024 20:39:24 GMT
And if you're an objective viewer of events As this shows www.rmg.co.uk/stories/topics/french-revolution'In the late 18th century France was on the brink of bankruptcy due to its involvement in the American Revolution and King Louis XVI’s extravagant spending. This led to a people’s revolt against the inequalities of French society, the corruption of royal officials, and despair owing to widespread economic hardship.'Instead of just copying things, why not engage in some thought? Napoleon wasn't 'equal' was he? The root cause of the french revolution was most likely leadership incompetence.- the unnecessary abuse and cruelty were dimensions of that incompetence. Oh you do like your silly jibes don't you. Well if that's your style: Intelligent observers would have seen I was quoting an independent source to back what I'd already said: long standing and deep social inequality was the prime cause of the French Revolution in the 1780s. Those that actually were awake in their school hostory lessons would know the rise of Napoleon was LONG AFTER the French revolution. He was neither a protagonist in it or brought to power by it. He seized power after the failure of the First Republic in the mid 1790s.
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Post by Zany on May 24, 2024 20:59:28 GMT
Instead of just copying things, why not engage in some thought? Napoleon wasn't 'equal' was he? The root cause of the french revolution was most likely leadership incompetence.- the unnecessary abuse and cruelty were dimensions of that incompetence. Oh you do like your silly jibes don't you. Well if that's your style: Intelligent observers would have seen I was quoting an independent source to back what I'd already said: long standing and deep social inequality was the prime cause of the French Revolution in the 1780s. Those that actually were awake in their school hostory lessons would know the rise of Napoleon was LONG AFTER the French revolution. He was neither a protagonist in it or brought to power by it. He seized power after the failure of the First Republic in the mid 1790s. Yep. Seconded.
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Post by Orac on May 25, 2024 7:51:37 GMT
Instead of just copying things, why not engage in some thought? Napoleon wasn't 'equal' was he? The root cause of the french revolution was most likely leadership incompetence.- the unnecessary abuse and cruelty were dimensions of that incompetence. Oh you do like your silly jibes don't you. Well if that's your style: Intelligent observers would have seen I was quoting an independent source to back what I'd already said: long standing and deep social inequality was the prime cause of the French Revolution in the 1780s. Those that actually were awake in their school hostory lessons would know the rise of Napoleon was LONG AFTER the French revolution. He was neither a protagonist in it or brought to power by it. He seized power after the failure of the First Republic in the mid 1790s. The point i'm making about Napoleon is that the french revolution clearly did not move France into a system of anti-inequality.. If inequality itself was really a big problem, why wasn't Napoleon's inequality also a problem? The french revolution was a series events that lasted over the last decade of 18th century - a few years later Napoleon was emperor. What you have there is an interpretation of history and , in my view, a very lazy, biased one. Militants at the time may have shouted and wrote about inequality, but that doesn't mean the French Revolution happened because of the inequality. Anyone using this nonsense interpretation of history is going to have a hard time explaining the fact of all the stable systems that involve inequality - or the fact that only stable content ones have been the ones involving inequality (in the sense you mean it) My point about inequality being synonymous with injustice IF you are a communist, still stands btw.
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Post by Zany on May 25, 2024 8:27:02 GMT
Oh you do like your silly jibes don't you. Well if that's your style: Intelligent observers would have seen I was quoting an independent source to back what I'd already said: long standing and deep social inequality was the prime cause of the French Revolution in the 1780s. Those that actually were awake in their school hostory lessons would know the rise of Napoleon was LONG AFTER the French revolution. He was neither a protagonist in it or brought to power by it. He seized power after the failure of the First Republic in the mid 1790s. The point i'm making about Napoleon is that the french revolution clearly did not move France into a system of anti-inequality.. If inequality itself was really a big problem, why wasn't Napoleon's inequality also a problem? The french revolution was a series events that lasted over the last decade of 18th century - a few years later Napoleon was emperor. What you have there is an interpretation of history and , in my view, a very lazy, biased one. Militants at the time may have shouted and wrote about inequality, but that doesn't mean the French Revolution happened because of the inequality. Anyone using this nonsense interpretation of history is going to have a hard time explaining the fact of all the stable systems that involve inequality - or the fact that only stable content ones have been the ones involving inequality (in the sense you mean it) My point about inequality being synonymous with injustice IF you are a communist, still stands btw. Napoleon was a very popular leader in France. He bought in a lot of fair laws and equality of law for that time. He was beaten not by his own people who fought to the death for him. He was beaten by armies raised by the Monarchy of countries around Europe because they feared his methods appealing to their own populace. Inequality is not just about wealth. We had a thing called Outlaws. Which literally meant outside the law. Anyone could kill an outlaw with impunity, and guess who decided who was an outlaw. The French revolution most certainly did happen because of inequality. Napoleon happened because those who got rid of the Monarchy had no idea how to run a country.
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Post by Orac on May 25, 2024 9:13:44 GMT
The point i'm making about Napoleon is that the french revolution clearly did not move France into a system of anti-inequality.. If inequality itself was really a big problem, why wasn't Napoleon's inequality also a problem? The french revolution was a series events that lasted over the last decade of 18th century - a few years later Napoleon was emperor. What you have there is an interpretation of history and , in my view, a very lazy, biased one. Militants at the time may have shouted and wrote about inequality, but that doesn't mean the French Revolution happened because of the inequality. Anyone using this nonsense interpretation of history is going to have a hard time explaining the fact of all the stable systems that involve inequality - or the fact that only stable content ones have been the ones involving inequality (in the sense you mean it) My point about inequality being synonymous with injustice IF you are a communist, still stands btw. The French revolution most certainly did happen because of inequality. Napoleon happened because those who got rid of the Monarchy had no idea how to run a country. But here, you are engaging in an accidental straw man of my position. I'm not saying the inequality is always fair. What is clear is that popular sentiment in France was not that interested in making everyone equal (in the modern sense) If you look at what happened the the wake of the revolution, it's clear that leadership competence was the principle gripe. Napoleon was competent and gave France victories, the aristos were self absorbed perverts who lost territories and engaged in petty tyranny.
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Post by Steve on May 25, 2024 9:19:46 GMT
Oh you do like your silly jibes don't you. Well if that's your style: Intelligent observers would have seen I was quoting an independent source to back what I'd already said: long standing and deep social inequality was the prime cause of the French Revolution in the 1780s. Those that actually were awake in their school hostory lessons would know the rise of Napoleon was LONG AFTER the French revolution. He was neither a protagonist in it or brought to power by it. He seized power after the failure of the First Republic in the mid 1790s. The point i'm making about Napoleon is that the french revolution clearly did not move France into a system of anti-inequality.. If inequality itself was really a big problem, why wasn't Napoleon's inequality also a problem? The french revolution was a series events that lasted over the last decade of 18th century - a few years later Napoleon was emperor. What you have there is an interpretation of history and , in my view, a very lazy, biased one. Militants at the time may have shouted and wrote about inequality, but that doesn't mean the French Revolution happened because of the inequality. Anyone using this nonsense interpretation of history is going to have a hard time explaining the fact of all the stable systems that involve inequality - or the fact that only stable content ones have been the ones involving inequality (in the sense you mean it) My point about inequality being synonymous with injustice IF you are a communist, still stands btw. ^ The point made was we are NOT yet in French Revolution levels of inequality but it you allow inequality to become too severe then you risk a modern day such. Maybe you should look at 2011 too because if you want to pretend they were nothing to do with economic deprived areas you'd be double
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