A Voice From the 1%

51 points by Paul_Morgan 14 years ago | 9 comments

Yoms 14 years ago |

How did this get on here? The guy obviously has religiously political views.

I'm not sure what industry he's in, but in many industries it takes money to increase customer demand. And his absolute statement of "Hiring has no correlation at all to profits or to income - none." What? Again maybe in his industry...

If he has so much money left over, why not set up or donate to a charity that helps mining workers in Appalachia? Or invest it in a business?

If you want to make an argument for higher taxes, this is not the way to do it. This is political drivel, and not worthy of HN.

dfxm12 14 years ago |

Writing a piece on the daily kos is one thing, but if this guy feels this strongly about it, why doesn't he do something substantial about it? All the 99% can do is have a sit out to raise awareness, and that's what they're doing (and then some). It takes money, lobbying and connections to fix this problem. The author seems to have some of that, at least.

mattmanser 14 years ago | |

It takes money, lobbying and connections to fix this problem.

No, that is the problem right there. The more this mess is unfolding in your country the more it's becoming apparent that American democracy is now bought rather than voted for.

temphn 14 years ago |

Here is the link to donate to the Treasury: http://www.treasurydirect.gov/govt/reports/pd/gift/gift.htm

Group A wants to raise their own taxes, and a (much larger) Group B does not want their taxes raised. Fantastic, the Treasury's donation program allows both preferences to be satisfied without acrimony.

JoachimSchipper 14 years ago | |

If I donate $10 to the treasury, I get -$10 and the treasury gets +$10. If I can pass a $10 tax, I get -$10 and the treasury gets +$3 000 000.

It's entirely reasonable to value one dollar in the treasury somewhere between one dollar in my wallet and 1/300 000 of a dollar in my wallet.

[Note: I'm not an American.]

temphn 14 years ago | | |

The thing is that people generally feel that taking someone else's money from their pocket at gunpoint is a bad thing. But when a third party, the IRS, does this at their behest then people think it is a good thing.

No one would pay taxes if the IRS did not have weapons. It is a strange agency for a pacifist to embrace.

I think people really don't give much thought to what the IRS actually is and what it does.

randallsquared 14 years ago | |

Yeah, I think it's obvious that Group A cares about raising Group B's taxes, rather than having an altruistic desire to donate their own money and somehow being unable to figure out how.

wccrawford 14 years ago |

"we wouldn't have noticed a 3.5% tax increase."

... Yes, you would. I hear the reasons state, and they're bunk. When you're outside the 5% margin at the end of the year, are you going to say, "Oh, I screwed up" or "It was that 3.5% tax increase!" I know which you'll pick.

Rich people generally don't get rich by throwing money away. They aren't going to vote for higher taxes because that takes money directly from their pockets.

And if those taxes get passed, they'll find a way around them, like moving to another country, or at least moving their operations there. It's already happening, and we don't need to make it any worse.

I'm not 'defending the rich', I'm defending our country. I don't want to see the 1% leave. It will not be pretty.

I'm not even close to being in the 1%, but I live comfortably. I actually rather resent being included in their 99% statistic. I haven't been tricked into owing a bank more than I earn in a year. I haven't had a problem finding a job because I picked a career (and skillset) with a future. Anyone that doesn't pick a skill and work towards it, then complains that there are no skill-less jobs left... Well, I'm having trouble having sympathy. I worked my ass off to get better at what I do.

rauljara 14 years ago | |

Your assertion that the rich would leave the country is not backed up by historical data. Between 1944 and 1960, the tax rate on the top income bracket was over 90% (it maxed out at 94% in '44). Yet the nation did not lose all it's rich people.

13rules 14 years ago | | |

The world is quite different today than in 1944-60. A lot easier to operate from a foreign country, yet maintain communication with others in the US and travel easily back and forth.

This is a bigger problem on the corporate scale because companies can (and have) move overseas and base their operations in countries where they have huge tax and other advantages.