An old trick politicians play

This has no reply to the above post, all pretty interesting ideas. I was actually going to start another thread but maybe here is just find and my reason for posting is: CONGRATULATIONS TO RABBLEWATCH!!! He may think I'm being disingenuous and condescending, but not at all. This is the first Rabblewatch comment which I've come across (though I don't read all) that actually had thought provoking comments, no ninth grade foul language, no condescending insults to those who disagree and no vehemence against anyone. It's always good to see constructive useful comments on here that are designed to provoke thought, not retaliation. Good show, and feel free to 'let loose' if you had to hold back in the previous post.

[QUOTE BY= Marcarc] This has no reply to the above post, all pretty interesting ideas. I was actually going to start another thread but maybe here is just find and my reason for posting is: CONGRATULATIONS TO RABBLEWATCH!!! He may think I'm being disingenuous and condescending, but not at all. This is the first Rabblewatch comment which I've come across (though I don't read all) that actually had thought provoking comments, no ninth grade foul language, no condescending insults to those who disagree and no vehemence against anyone. It's always good to see constructive useful comments on here that are designed to provoke thought, not retaliation. Good show, and feel free to 'let loose' if you had to hold back in the previous post. [/QUOTE] stop kissing my ass. i'm not queer.

[QUOTE BY= Marcarc]Good show, and feel free to 'let loose' if you had to hold back in the previous post. [/QUOTE] Got it in 1. [QUOTE BY= Rabblewatch] Still though, if I had it my way...I'd scrap ALL INCOME TAXES, and place a simple 17-20 percent 'G.S.T' consumption tax.[/QUOTE] Sounds a lot like the 'import tax' that was charged on anything coming into the country which used to pay for the operation of the government, before income tax.

awww, but you're soooo sexy, and have SUCH a big mouth <img align=absmiddle src='images/smilies/wink.gif' alt='Wink'> essentially that's what we have with gas and alcohol taxes. How well it would work is worth exploring, I don't know whether ANY country does such a thing. Some day in the future I'll try to pry my lips from rabble's scrumptuous ass and try to find out.

It seems that which tax you would prefer to have lowered depends on where you stand on the income scale and your buying habits. Since food and lodging are not subject to GST most of the income of those families who do not make enough to pay income tax will see little affect because they have little discretionary income. The bottom 20 per cent of Canadian families make an average of only $12,600. Once food and lodging is taken from that there is little left. They would not really benefit from either tax reduction. The working poor or the next 20 per cent who make an average of $28,000 would see some advantage from the Martin plan because an increase in the personal exemption would see some of them no longer have to pay any income tax. Since they still have little discretionary income the GST cut would not benefit them very much. Those with some taxable income would see a 1 per cent decrease in income tax. The biggest advantage for the Liberal plan would be for the working poor and the next class the real "middle class" who make an average of $46,000. The biggest advantage for the Conservative plan would be for those with large amounts of discretionary income. That starts around the $46,000 level. Someone spending $20,000 on taxable items would save $200. The GST reduction helps purchasing power of the big spenders with large discretionary incomes. (Income figures based on 2003 figures by Statistics Canada) If you were in the middle income group (do not equate this is what politicians refer to as the "middle class" unless they specifically define it. Since their is no aristocratic class in North American some define the "middle class" as those in the top 50 per cent of the population. It appears that this is the group the Conservatives refer to when talking about the "middle class.") Paul Martin's previous tax cuts did help the "middle class." His tax cuts for low income earners were a myth because he simply transferred anything gained from his income tax to an increase in pension deductions which meant that the working poor saw little or no benefit. Martin's conversion to helping the working poor rings a bit hollow although the tax cuts he proposes would be more beneficial to them than the Harper proposals.

[QUOTE BY= Marcarc] awww, but you're soooo sexy, and have SUCH a big mouth essentially that's what we have with gas and alcohol taxes. How well it would work is worth exploring, I don't know whether ANY country does such a thing. Some day in the future I'll try to pry my lips from rabble's scrumptuous ass and try to find out. [/QUOTE] Actually, I don't mind your lips on my asscheeks. It's when you get too eager and move towards the 'main course' I need that area for other things (like after eating too many burritos)

The best type of tax is the 'Consumption Tax' proposed by Republican Congressmen Tom Delay. Basically, nobody would pay any income taxes. ZERO. So if you make $1000, you GET $1000. And if you want, you can put that $1000 cheque into your bank account and allow it to accrue interest TAX FREE FOREVER. So if someone makes $30,000 a year, they'll get $30,000 of spending power instead of $17-15,000 (after all taxes have been paid for) Canada alone, we spend about 45% of every dollar we earn on taxes. that means you get about $0.45-55 cents of spending power on each dollar you make. A Consumption tax would only hit you ONCE you spent that $1.00 So if you wanted to buy a DVD for $19.99, it would cost you $23 - 24 depending on the 20-22 percent Consumption tax. The key here is...the more money people immediately have, the more they'll immediately SPEND. The more JOBS this creates and the QUICKER prosperity will occur. The reason why the Liberals never wanted to axe the G.S.T. is that it is one of the easiest taxes to collect (businesses are always mailing G.S.T. to the government). Also, the moment you eliminate the Income Tax, you IMMEDIATELY bring the Lower Class to the Middle Class. With a sudden amount of extra disposable income, people would go nuts! Imagine as parents suddenly having an extra $10-20,000 per year? That alone could help pay for tuition for their children in one year rather than saving tuition over several. Houses could be bought faster. Cars too. All the amenities to make our lives easier. If you want to buy an XBOX 360, people would have more money to do so. Charities too could benefit, and also still be able to offer 'No Consumption tax'. And the Government would still rake in countless billions in a 'Consumption Tax'. Filing for taxes every year would literally be the size of a post-card and not the hours/days spent currently filing. Here's a good website: http://www.fairtax.org/ [QUOTE BY= Innes] It seems that which tax you would prefer to have lowered depends on where you stand on the income scale and your buying habits. Since food and lodging are not subject to GST most of the income of those families who do not make enough to pay income tax will see little affect because they have little discretionary income. The bottom 20 per cent of Canadian families make an average of only $12,600. Once food and lodging is taken from that there is little left. They would not really benefit from either tax reduction. The working poor or the next 20 per cent who make an average of $28,000 would see some advantage from the Martin plan because an increase in the personal exemption would see some of them no longer have to pay any income tax. Since they still have little discretionary income the GST cut would not benefit them very much. Those with some taxable income would see a 1 per cent decrease in income tax. The biggest advantage for the Liberal plan would be for the working poor and the next class the real "middle class" who make an average of $46,000. The biggest advantage for the Conservative plan would be for those with large amounts of discretionary income. That starts around the $46,000 level. Someone spending $20,000 on taxable items would save $200. The GST reduction helps purchasing power of the big spenders with large discretionary incomes. (Income figures based on 2003 figures by Statistics Canada) If you were in the middle income group (do not equate this is what politicians refer to as the "middle class" unless they specifically define it. Since their is no aristocratic class in North American some define the "middle class" as those in the top 50 per cent of the population. It appears that this is the group the Conservatives refer to when talking about the "middle class.") Paul Martin's previous tax cuts did help the "middle class." His tax cuts for low income earners were a myth because he simply transferred anything gained from his income tax to an increase in pension deductions which meant that the working poor saw little or no benefit. Martin's conversion to helping the working poor rings a bit hollow although the tax cuts he proposes would be more beneficial to them than the Harper proposals. [/QUOTE]

[QUOTE]So if you make $1000, you GET $1000. And if you want, you can put that $1000 cheque into your bank account and allow it to accrue interest TAX FREE FOREVER.[/QUOTE] That would be fine if you did not have to eat or have a place to live or clothes to wear. You could only do that if it was discretionary income that you did not need for anything else. Again consumption taxes bear far more heavily on those with lower incomes. In your example, your consumption tax is 20 per cent. I have to assume that is only the federal share of the tax. There is no personal exemption. Let us estimate the cost of living as $11,200 which is lodging at $6,000 and food and other necessities at $5,200 per year. You would have to pay $2,240 in taxes for a total of $13,400. A person with an income of $12,600 would find it difficult to survive. They would have less to live on. Those people would be able to consume less. Tom DeLay, like most wealthy Republicans, don't really have to worry about having a place to live or food to eat. They look at the world from the point of view of those who are in their own economic class: those that have incomes over $100,000. For those people the system acts like a "flat tax" because their $20,000 in taxes leaves them lots of discretionary income to invest or to spend. The system increases inequality. While the rich can consume more the poor can consume less: one offsets the other so it does not create more jobs. In fact, when inequality becomes too great we get a recession. Since investment leads to more production eventually there are not enough consumers that can afford to purchase. The economy eventually will correct but at enormous cost to society. If we look at an issue from the point of view of a theory it can look quite simple. When we have to look at it from a practical point of view we begin to see the problems. Many politicians see it in their self-interest to only tell us part of the story and if we don't dig deep enough we can be fooled. I have been fooled many times by political "double speak" and each time I learn important lessons. For example, when the Conservatives came out with the brochure that stated they would maintain all the Liberal tax cuts I took that at face value. We now know that what they really meant was that they would not tamper with the taxes for last year (which they could not legally change anyway) but would eliminate those cuts for the future. Harper fooled me. You can't take anything they say at face value and must search for the hidden meanings. During the PC leadership campaign Peter MacKay said: "I am not the merger candidate." In hindsight I now know he was actually saying was that Craig Chandler was the merger candidate not that he would not merge the PC Party with the CA.

[QUOTE BY= Innes] [QUOTE]So if you make $1000, you GET $1000. And if you want, you can put that $1000 cheque into your bank account and allow it to accrue interest TAX FREE FOREVER.[/QUOTE] That would be fine if you did not have to eat or have a place to live or clothes to wear. You could only do that if it was discretionary income that you did not need for anything else. Again consumption taxes bear far more heavily on those with lower incomes. In your example, your consumption tax is 20 per cent. I have to assume that is only the federal share of the tax. There is no personal exemption. Let us estimate the cost of living as $11,200 which is lodging at $6,000 and food and other necessities at $5,200 per year. You would have to pay $2,240 in taxes for a total of $13,400. A person with an income of $12,600 would find it difficult to survive. They would have less to live on. Those people would be able to consume less. Tom DeLay, like most wealthy Republicans, [/QUOTE] This is where you lose me. Like as if Democrats/Liberals are poor/destitute. Also, Delay made it clear, that for the very poor, they'd basically get all their money back in the form of rebates. Currently here in Canada we have our quarterly 'G.S.T. cheque' for the uber poor. Same for the consumption tax. So what's your point? Also, what's with this chronic obsession with the poor? Shouldn't it be their vested interest in getting a better/higher paying job? I remember making $3.90 scrubbing dishes when I was a kid. I worked 24 hours a week part-time and thus made $93.6 weekly to a tune of $187.2 every two weeks. $150+ after taxes of course... Am I still there scrubbing dishes all these years later? Of course not. I got myself a career and thus don't have to deal with this crap of destitution.

The deal with the poor is that some people actually care about them, but are quite used to those who don't. We certainly haven't had a government in Canada who was worried about them. Careers are wonderful if you can find them, but aren't available equally everywhere. It's really a moot point though, no party has ever mentioned such an idea and the government is too addicted to income taxes. All sorts of taxes will 'work', but all taxes also have an effect. We don't actually KNOW how much of a spending spree people will go on, a good lot of people have all the 'junk' that they want or need, so whether they'd actually run out and buy more junk is an extremely hypothetical situation. Personally, I could take all that wealth and put it in a cayman island account and save it for a rainy day, or save it up and invest it elsewhere. The people who buy the most 'stuff' would be young people and old people, old people pay very little tax on RSP's they are cashing in and social security, and with the high cost of 'stuff' they'd be quickly bankrupt. As will all tax systems though, if that's a huge issue there are ways of dealing with it. The question is really if it amounts to the same thing, why bother changing it at all? The wealthiest canadians aren't going to support it, because they've had the most disproportionate tax decreases-all without the GST increases, so they have it made in the shade.

[QUOTE BY= Marcarc] The deal with the poor is that some people actually care about them, but are quite used to those who don't. [/QUOTE] I too was "poor" for many years. I found that by caring for *MYSELF* I was able to get a helluva lot done. Like sacrificing wasting my money at the bar or other trivial amenities. Even the poorest of the poor can always save a certain amount of capital, or even get a basic loan to help them purchase equipment/go to school to get a better chance in life. History is full of countless stories of people who started from nothing and made it big. I don't see why my taxes have to go to help someone else maintain the status quo. I don't get it either...our government is spending MILLIONS telling us how STUPID it is to SMOKE CIGARETTES. Why not also run ads telling people how STUPID it is for them to try and get married/have kids on a minimum wage salary? Our healthcare experts are all too quick to give parents shit over 'second hand smoke'. Why not also give the poor shit over the quality of life they would give for their children? The poor historically don't eat well, and basically that's why they have the worst diets. Why not give them crap for that? I mean, that's if you "care"

Because some people's idea of 'care' isn't thinking that they are lord god almighty and sit in judgement of everybody and complain why everybody isn't like them. We KNOW that the above remarks aren't true, Canada is quickly catching up to the US where the poor are the working poor. Some people like to believe the old stereotypes that the poor are lazy, drug addicted, sponges that just aren't 'thrifty' enough. Forgetting of course that if you WERE poor ten or twenty years ago you had far more government supports and price regulations. In Ontario, thanks to getting rid of rent ceilings the vast majority of a persons income goes straight to the landlord. If you are dumb enough to believe the above then that's your business, but don't expect everyone to be like you. Most of all people care about the poor because usually they are a lot nicer than the judgemental pricks in the middle class.

[QUOTE BY= Marcarc] In Ontario, thanks to getting rid of rent ceilings the vast majority of a persons income goes straight to the landlord.[/QUOTE] Landlords got seriously screwed over by the NDP in the early 90's. Lesson learned: Apartments are always up for grabs over any political party in the future. Solution: CONDOMINIUMS! Policies cannot affect private home ownership such as 'rent control', hence that's why you're seeing Condos pop up faster than weeds in Toronto. Why is that? Answer: Landlords aren't stupid and they don't want to get shafted again by the public sector. That's why so many apartments are basically falling apart/disrepair...there seriously is NO INCENTIVE for owners of apartments to invest ONE NICKEL into it. Why? Simple: FEAR OF FUTURE RENT CONTROL. Unless of course you're willing to shred the 'Charter of Human Rights and Freedoms' and basically railroad the government into the private sector. Why do you think Howard Stern left public radio? He got sick of douche-bag politicians telling him what to do. Why are t.v. shows like 'The Sopranos' so popular? Simple: Because it's PRIVATE and they (creators) don't have to deal with the FCC. Apartments are facing the same fate...too much government control, pushes landlords to go private. Politicians never seem to understand this...but they sure as hell love watching HBO. [QUOTE BY= Marcarc] Most of all people care about the poor because usually they are a lot nicer than the judgemental pricks in the middle class. [/QUOTE] So your idea then, is to make sure that the POOR REMAIN POOR? So that they'll 'play nice'? What if someone is sick of being poor and wants to make more than minimum wage? Does that suddenly make them into 'pricks' in which government should PENALIZE them EVERY STEP OF THE WAY with PROGRESSIVE TAXATION? The current system we have, is DESIGNED TO KEEP PEOPLE POOR. So yeah, go ahead and pat the poor on the head and say 'there, there...you're a nice little street urchin." I frankly think you're an arrogant piece of trash for drawing such parallel's to begin with, and it only shows what contempt you have for people who are trying to do something with their lives. You're pathetic.