Brace yourselves, humans. About to Devil's advocate the heck out of everything.
so you're basically saying that money should be taken from the rich and given to the poor, when 9/10 times the rich are rich because they tried and/or earned it SOMEHOW and the poor are poor because they didn't earn it.
90% of the time, really? Inheritance is absolutely a thing, and poor people tend to live in poor areas with ******** education systems which limit opportunities for advancement. Poor people aren't lazy; they're poor because the system is inherently (albeit unintentionally) biased against poor pepole.
that's how capitalism works - wealth redistribution is, in effect, socialism, which leads to communism, which doesn't work.
Capitalism isn't exactly a fine system of economics. See: child labor, environmental crises, mega-corporations, and other assorted fun side-effects of capitalism.
And would you remind me of the last stateless society to dramatically fall to its inevitable doom? Because, as I recall, the Soviet Union
did have a government. And money. And classes. Other than those three central tenets of Marxism, I guess it was pretty close.
Not that communism
would work, but to so affirmly argue that it
doesn't work is a bit extreme, considering that we haven't seen it done on a large scale ever. Models are good for nothing.
This is just my opinion. I am a strong capitalist, which means that I believe that the hard working people should get the money. While not seeming completely fair, wealth inequality actually provides incentive and motivation for one to get a good job.
This would suggest that competition would push inequality down in the long run. Poor people hate being poor, so they'll work themselves out of poverty. Look at the stats, and the Gini coefficient in the United States has been steadily rising. Go figure.
Think about it, if every job in America got paid the same, we wouldn't have as many doctors lawyers etc as we needed! No one would be motivated to get a good job. If you want more money, well, you're going to have to work hard to get there, and I don't mean by patty flipping. I mean medical school, law school, etc. I would hate to see America become a socialistic country.
Being a doctor is not an unpleasant career. You spend your entire life healing people. Why should this be incentivized purely by money? And I'd much rather work in a law office than in a coal mine.
Do you believe in socialism/Marxism?
This is not the straw-man you were looking for.
You're basically contradicting yourself.
No, he's not. Anarcho-capitalism isn't the only form of capitalism. You can have wealth redistrubition and regulation without being a socialist or a communist. The heart of capitalism is a marketplace consisting largely of private actors. Socialism is characterized government ownership of large industry, and communism is
by definition a society with no private ownership of the means of production.
When you look at the fact that a lot of the 1% (at least the most well known, and many of the non-so-well-known ones) put huge chunks of their money towards charity, I think it kinda makes it good that they get lots of money - think of your family, mine maybe gives 1, maybe 2% of their annual income to charities each year. These people give 50% or more sometimes.
Fortunately, many billionaires throw millions at political campaigns to ensure that their industries remain underregulated and undertaxed. How very democratic of them.
Here's an idea for those people: how about
working hard instead of dodging anti-fracking policies or whatever it is they don't want to happen?
That only provides a negative incentive to work hard to try to make a great life for yourself. If you worked hard to be in the top 1% and had to pay 50% (ex.) taxes, why would you have any incentive to work for a high paying job (such as some surgeons, other specialists, and many other hard, lots of school jobs).
If you provide a, basically, punishment for getting a higher paying job, then people won't want the jobs. Let the welfare stick to who it should be with: individuals and charity. The government has no business providing entitlements to people - as we've seen in the past 50+ years they, quite frankly, suck at it.
Doesn't this whole argument contradict the law of diminishing returns? Honestly, I wouldn't have much of a difference in my life if I had $5 million or $1 billion. Either would provide anything I could realistically want in my life. There is no incentive to make the extra $995 million
regardless of how much the government taxes it.
Right now the top 1% pay about 75% of the taxes in this country. Most of the people here are not old enough to remember the 90's but there was a tax plan that was passed by Congress to get "Even" with the rich. The US placed high taxes yachts, furs, jewlery and other luxuray items. Did this hurt the rich? Nope, not one bit because they went to the Bahamas or Bermuda and bought their boats there and had them docked there. Who got hurt? The people in th US that made and serviced the yachts, made and sold high end jewlery and furs, etc.
Luckily for the 1%, they make way more than 75% of the money.
And I seriously doubt they pay anywhere near 75% of the nation's taxes. Considering the loopholes available at that level and the payroll tax cutoffs, no way.
Socialism isn't good. It will never work. Sorry. Countries who have implemented socialism are doing very poorly.
Firstly, there are barely any pure socialist countries on this Earth. Closest one is China which has been going through one of the most incredible economic booms in the history of humanity. Norway also rocks a government controlled oil industry, which has amassed a
trillion dollar trust fund for its people. Coincidentally, Scandinavia in general is among the happiest regions on Earth. I'm sure that's just because of the joyous cold weather they have.
Also, it is a proven statistic that most people who receive welfare money are not using it for its purpose. I, nor Fox News, has any problem with helping people out who are actually wanting to get a job. The problem with welfare is it becomes a lifestyle. Ones primary income should NOT become welfare. When people receiving welfare are buying, lobster, cigarettes, iPhones, and any other luxury good that isn't needed for survival, then it becomes a problem. These people are the mooches. And yes. It's perfectly ok to call people who take advantage of the welfare system mooches. I'm not saying that everyone who gets food stamps is trying to take advantage of the system. Food stamps should only be given when absolutely necessary, to help people get back on their feet, NOT to be paying peoples iphone and cable bills.
I keep hearing about these people but I've never once seen them. Maybe because they're fringe cases blown up by the media who cost the government next to nothing relative to the actual benefits of having a social safety net, but hey.
It's about freedom. It's about the government not telling you what todo with YOUR money. Honestly, let people do what they want with their money.
Devil's advocate Marxist* argument: are you truly free if you can only make money by getting an unaffordable education, and then at the approval of an employer?
* = I'm not an actual Marxist, but this is a compelling argument.
