Should we allow the rich to get richer?

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No I do not take deductions and do not own a house, I do report my student loan interest though. The real class warfare going on here is against anyone who isn't the "elite". They deserve to pay less because they make more, while the average people have to pay a higher percentage? Quit drinking that pubaide, its melting your brain.
 


Earned income tax rates are the lowest they've been in awhile and you want to lower them even more? What would this accomplish? I think 20% is closer to fair on capital gains tax because the average person can't throw around millions of dollars to make millions more dollars.
 


I do claim the initial deduction but other then that I don't have anything else that I can claim, besides student loan interest and then this year I purchased a vehicle so I will claim the sales tax. I rent a house with roommates, would like to own a house but would probably start with an apartment first (this housing market here is rebounding like crazy, parents just sold their house for 300k). I could probably get more deductions if I had someone do my taxes for me but I usually do them myself.

We have one of the lowest income rates in the world and then you spout of freedom and liberty? You do know that freedom and liberty and contradictory right? Maybe give me some real reasoning instead of propaganda?
 


Turbotax did give me the highest return but it was still meagre. I hit the next bracket up this year and it killed my return.

A person's freedom can overshadow someone's liberty and vice versa. There is a constant give and take between the two. To have more freedom someone must give up more liberty.
 


Ok, take Bain Capital. A failing company that was going to go bankrupt and everyone lose their jobs. He turned around a failing company, made it profitable and sold it off for continued success. Yes, people lost their jobs. Oddly enough, by cutting those jobs and changing the practices of the company, it became successful. It is without question or doubt that company had over hired and had a poor business model.

He did that and saved a lot of jobs. He earned his money there.
 


The freedom to own slaves vs the liberty of the slaves.
The freedom to take your neighbors land vs his liberty to shoot your face off.
The freedom to own a monopoly vs the liberty of other citizens to participate in the market.

I view liberty as equality, but some people consider liberty and freedom the same thing.
 


So cutting someones benefits and costing the government a huge sum of money is worth is to make a buck? By the way the companies that he took on were not all successful. Private equity is a scam for the rich to get richer with significantly mitigated risk for themselves and incredible risk for the people that work in said companies. Read some of the stuff about the lives he destroyed by pushing companies to the brink.
 



Does this make a good leader though?
 


Great job evading my question.

Secondly, capital gains tax may have different rates, I do not know the exact specific rates for the U.S at this time. However, just because you pay a higher capital gains percentage tax means nothing...its miniscule compared to the total amounts of other taxes Rich Pay. Secondly, corporations are mainly the ones abusing loopholes. Rich people themselves with their own money pay tax just like anybody else. If you stop nit-picking on very specific types of taxes and factor into account all taxes that a person pays in the United States, the Rich pay a much higher percentage, not just a higher amount. So mathematically they pay exponentially more amounts of taxes than somebody who is let say, middle-class or lower.
 


Sure, he made money. But what he did was put a company on the right path to be successful as opposed to bankrupt and people without anything at all. This is the same comparison that the gov't is in right now. Stuff needs to be cut. We have more than what we can afford.. and we must give some of it up in order to continue to be successful, otherwise we fail.

So benefits were cut. Have you followed up on Bain to see how the benefits are now? How the company is doing? How are the benefits today? Short term sacrifice. Without the company, no one has a job or benefits. The company is made up of the employees. It is in the best interest of the employees that their company remains profitable. This is what was done. Yes, some people lost their jobs and I'm sure they're gainfully employed elsewhere in other positions. Everyone experiences a set back, I have myself, and I am better from it.

I can read a ton of stories about lives saved from his actions. You're a half empty kind of guy.
 

This is where you claim they arent paying enough taxes, after its already been taxed, to be yet taxed again, at a lower rate so it gives incentives for investments.
So, add the first tax, add the entire amount, both earned and invested, and Im betting youll find their taxes quite high, compared to monies in overall
 


K how do you view equality vs freedom?
 
Look, if we dont support companies, because we are jealous of thir current rights on deductions/loopholes, several things happen.
Those companies go out of work/bankrupt
They have to charge more for their product (compare the traditional efficiency of private companies and those of government, yet we would expect them to do more, as the government flails away in its ineptness) to maintain their value and profitability.
No one is looking at the governments mismanagement here.
Their waste.

Why do we expect much much more from a company than of our governement?
Shouldnt it be the other way around?
Someone once said, the constitution limits what the government can do for you.
Another person said, ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country.

My first quote, this person says hes like the person in my second quote, when in reality, its the exact opposite.
 


I am not talking about Bain, I am talking about the ventures they involved themselves in using private equity tactics. By the way did you ever read about how completely ****ed higher education is in Massachusetts because of Romney? (kind of off the topic but were talking about Romney now it seems). He made such deep cuts into education that they still have not recovered.
 


He made hard decisions. The company still exists, did not go bankrupt, many other companies are doing well. Some did go bankrupt, but that's business. Anyone can focus in on the individual issues but through his leadership he was able to focus on the big picture, make the necessary changes to make the company succeed. Those employees are better off. The company exists. I'm sure someone could easily write a book at how many people are better off because of the company remaining. He could have stayed at the company, but it appears his expertise is making the difficult decisions to make a company successful. One those policies are in place, his job is done and he can move on to assist elsewhere. Almost sounds like a presidential position? 4 years or 8 years and then you're done and moving on after making those tough decisions. I believe that's what this country needs today.

As far as the ones whose 'lives were destroyed' I would argue at a high level they didn't do a very good job of securing their lives. Were they living outside of their means? Did their skillset not stay updated? There is a reason those people were let go and that is always a hard decision to make. I have been laid off in a city where jobs were hard to come by, even harder for well paying jobs. My life wasn't destroyed, I made it much better. I had my savings, my skillset, etc, to make sure that if the company wasn't around, I would still be viable.
What if the company continued the current course without change, those laid off people's lives would have still been destroyed along with a bunch of other people. In the end, the decision was tough, the company is still around and employing people. When faced with being successful or going bankrupt, which do you choose when people's lives depend on you?
 


I know which is why I am switching the discussion over to equality vs freedom. Which do you think is more important and why? Would you rather have the freedom to own everything or the equality for everyone to live decent lives?
 


You reasoning makes logical sense but does the ends justify the means? I think the company that he did bankrupt were entirely his/bain's fault. He took business's that were doing very well, set unrealistic revenue goals, took out an incredible amount of debt and then bailed once the company had made them some money and it was apparent they were not going to be successful much longer. Maybe destroying people's lives is an overstatement, I am sure they were eventually able to recover. However was their struggle with job relocation and the stress it brought on their families worth it so Bain could make a quick few mil?
 


The United States was never meant to be about equality. It was about freedom. Everybody has equal rights, however your lifestyle is your choice. Your education, talent, and effort is proportional to your money.

If you want equality go to socialist europe or communist NK or China.
 

Ron Paul? 😗

Yes. This election has turned into a 'vote for the pile that stinks the less'-Jack Cafferty.

Some individuals think that through equality, everyone can be free. The slaves, for example, were never free until they had equal rights as the white folk did. This is the clause of the case.

I have to agree with OMG here. There is no logical connection between liberty,( libre-'freedom,) and equality. I have the freedom to vote, however, everyone has equal opportunity (equality) to vote. See the difference.
 
I don't see how you can have equal opportunity without equality throughout society. You can already see how a lack of equality is powering the gap between the upper class and everyone else. Starting out with freedom is great but I think you need some level of equality within a society to truly prosper.
 


Which specific company are you referring to? Most of it was venture capital, providing money to a company with expectations of a return. They also footed the loss if it went under in most cases. They assumed the risk and were paid back first, regardless of under funding a pension or anything like that.

Creditors will almost always get their money first since that's where the money came from.

Such is life in losing a job and having to relocate. You are not entitled to anything. It isn't like they bought a company and 3 months later it went under. They had bought one failing company, tried making it profitable, the people went on strike, a year later it was closed down (Not-profitable) and then their other factor was closed a year or two later. Again, maintaining something that is not making a profit is not feasible.

How many people can thanks Bain Corp for their continued success in life thanks to Staples alone? You are trying to blame Bain Corp (Romney) for mistakes that the previous owners had made. If you hired 100 workers for a job that required 75, then you sold out because you were failing and pocketed money and left it up to another company (Bain) to cut the staff and make the company profitable, who is to really blame?

About 7-8 years ago, the very large corporation I worked for had bought a small father & son multi-million dollar factory. They employed around 800 workers, made millions in revenue but were losing money each year. The owners sold out to the tune of $42 million and walked away and let our company take it over. I spent 9 weeks out there implementing our IT equipment, training the users, etc. They were so far behind that we had to let go most of the office staff. They didn't want to change their ways.. they were still using paper/pencil in a factory production environment. We put in computers and wireless scanners to speed up the process and create efficiency. The people were going to keep their jobs if they would retrain. They didn't. Within 1 year of acquiring that company, there wasn't a single original employee left. They weren't able to go out and find the jobs paying the same, they didn't have the skillset.. I kept in touch with one guy about my age (owner's son) who didn't have to work because of all the money. He wasn't happy we let them all go, but they were the reason his family business was failing. 2 years in the production line increased from 22% efficiency to 64% efficiency. On average, we were losing $500k a week in production because of inefficiency. We were trying to achieve 84% production capacity for a world class standard. It took 3 years until that location became profitable and when it did, they were pulling in 18-20% profits a year after taking massive losses, plus the initial $42 million investment.

I have experience in going into failing businesses, identifying required change, and implementing solutions via IT and LEAN/Sigma Six solutions. The employees were making the company fail. They're all out of jobs but when I left the company they had over 500 quality people employed and were still making a profit. Employees were paid better and all.

Yep, I assisted in ruining 200+ people's lives; people who didn't want to be successful. I sleep well still. I see it as I assisted in over 500 people having better lives and making the location successful.. and that doesn't even count moving up the chain through the company because of the success at the ground level, or the families of those hard workers, or the consumers who purchased a higher quality product than the previous low quality product. Edit - Also, the products were CHEAPER because of increased efficiency and having a lower overhead. The giant evil corporation I worked for did some really great things for a lot of people. I'm proud to say I was part of that.

Just because someone is employed, doesn't mean they're the right person for the job, or capable of doing the assigned job.
 


I am talking about how having more freedoms makes any society less equal. You keep talking about how you want your freedoms back when the income gap is growing immensely. Our middle class is stagnant, economic and societal advancement is less prevalent than ever. Some individuals are just dumb but most are intelligent in some regard, enough that when given a chance they can contribute to society.
 
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