NationStates Jolt Archive

Class discrimination... Everyone is so concered with equality in this country.. but at the first hint of economic hardship people blame the worlds problems on the rich and discriminate against them (for example the tax cuts) ... tax are paid proportionally, which is why the top 8% of the countries richest pays 80% of the annual tax revenues. The tax cut was in turn a proportional tax cut keeping the percentages within each tax bracket proportional to the income. Why do we punish the successful people in this country, or assume misdoings on their part when they have simply taken advanatge of the opprounties this country offers. We are suppose to be people who look for equality under the law, yet there are those (mostly democrats) who want to force the successful people in this country give hand outs to those unable to or unwilling to take advanatge of those same opprotunities. people are not born equal.. but that is not the promis of america... america is here to offer equal opprounity... Isn't america now trying to engage in clear class discrimination ?

You're right. Rich people are saddled with so much oppression while the lucky ducks who are poor get everything!

wow, in all this quagmire of lefty garbage, i find salvation.

i could show all the things i concur with here, but that would be repeating what you said.

You're right. Rich people are saddled with so much oppression while the lucky ducks who are poor get everything!

my question isn't weather or not the poor people have it bad.. but rather, is it right to punish success because other people couldn't make it ? and isn't this punishment essentially discrimination

When the unemployment rate gets very low, raising the spectre of upward pressure on wages, the Federal Reserve steps in to raise the prime rate and cool the economy down to help avert inflation (the last time this happened was during the Clinton administration). Does no one call that class discrimination--the government acting to keep workers' wages from rising?

Of course not.

But should anyone suggest that those whose wages are essentially controlled, as a group, by the Federal Reserve should pay a lower tax rate than those who make more, the right-wing nutcases pour out of the woodwork and start ranting about "class warfare."

my question isn't weather or not the poor people have it bad.. but rather, is it right to punish success because other people couldn't make it ? and isn't this punishment essentially discrimination

Does your definition of success include being born into a rich family? Just wondering.

Does your definition of success include being born into a rich family? Just wondering.

seeing how the american dream is essentially providing for your faimily.. yes. being born into a rich faimly is the fruit of success. Very Very few people are simply born into fabiously weathly faimilyes never work a day in ther life and make no contrinbutions to society. Like i said... people aren't born equal, but everyone is given the same opprotunity to succeed.

Awww poor rich people. Why do they even bother?

I guess the recent corporate fraud, stock firms misrepresenting value, savings and loan, etc. etc. was because the wealthy are getting taxed to death right?

seeing how the american dream is essentially providing for your faimily.. yes. being born into a rich faimly is the fruit of success. Very Very few people are simply born into fabiously weathly faimilyes never work a day in ther life and make no contrinbutions to society. Like i said... people aren't born equal, but everyone is given the same opprotunity to succeed.

Born into a wealthy family is a success? Sounds like luck to me.

I went to school with the successful children. You had decent types but then you had many that had a superiority tude.

Many did contribute. They gave money to the drug trade.

I'm just going to flat out say it: Why the hell should I care about the rich? Even if the taxes are unfair, which I don't think they are, why should I care about them. When you're talking about the richest 8% of the country any sympathy I have for their tax rates goes to exactly nil. They are going to do just fine no matter how much they are taxed, if that money can feed someone who can't afford to eat it doesn't bother me at all. All these grand oppurtunities that the poor are unwilling to take advantage of are a pipe dream. The people who do make it out of poverty are one in a million, there isn't some magic "If you work hard enough all your dreams will come true" scenario that everyone can take avantage of.

Like i said... people aren't born equal, but everyone is given the same opprotunity to succeed.
Really now? So your telling me that the kid in an inner city Philadelphia middle school has the same opputunities to suceed as the rich kid in an exclusive prep school? Despite the fact the the Philly kid has barely been taught to read, has parents addicted to drugs, and has to be more concerned about not getting killed than passing his math test? Yeah that seems like the both have the same oppurtunity.

Here is a free tip, go out an see the real world before coming and lecturing people on the plight of the idle rich.

I'm just going to flat out say it: Why the hell should I care about the rich? Even if the taxes are unfair, which I don't think they are, why should I care about them. When you're talking about the richest 8% of the country any sympathy I have for their tax rates goes to exactly nil. They are going to do just fine no matter how much they are taxed, if that money can feed someone who can't afford to eat it doesn't bother me at all. All these grand oppurtunities that the poor are unwilling to take advantage of are a pipe dream. The people who do make it out of poverty are one in a million, there isn't some magic "If you work hard enough all your dreams will come true" scenario that everyone can take avantage of.

I happen to disagree with that.. If you know what you want.. anyone can succeed in this country.. thats what equality of opprountiy is.. people have to be doing something seroiusly wrong if they go through their entire life without ever having a single opprotunity for some kind of success or to atleast benifit themselves. and what about Condalisa Rice and Powel.. just so happen to have 2, 1 in a million people who are black no less come together in one administration to become some of the most successful people in the world ?

The fact of the matter is there is no shortage of examples showing the opprotunities even the most impoverished has benifited from.. sure not everyone ends up as bill gates... but moving up in socio economic status is a great acheivement in of itself. We only encourage medocracy if we push those who have succeeded in life.. it is their stories of success which continue to generate more opprotunities for those less fortunate.

Bring on taxes for the rich. There are people and institutions who need that money more than they do.

Bring on taxes for the rich. There are people and institutions who need that money more than they do.

maybe the poor people like mexicans should stop trying to get into our country then.. and start moving to communist countries like china or cuba.. where they are garanteed basic services . If your so poor in america why not get out as fast as you can ? Mexicans can do it as it they come over here.. despite all of our attempts to deter that

(this is not to say everyone poor is mexican, but to suggest if ur not making it in america why not move else where)

Stuff
Yeah yeah....
Thats all well and good, but you theories reek of inexperience and uniformed idealism. There is no magic road to the top that you can take if you work hard enough. Sometimes there is nothing you can do to change your situation. You just can't do it on your own, and you need help. If you're stuck in a gutter somewhere there's not a hell of alot you can do to feed yourself, let alone climb the corporate ladder. Somehow I think providing living wages to people who just need to stay afloat is a much more worthy cause than expanding a CEO's stock portfolio. Whats less fair; taking money from people who have more than they could ever spend, or refusing to give food to someone starving to death. I hate to draw religion into this debate (honestly) but Jesus agrees with me.

The fact of the matter is there is no shortage of examples showing the opprotunities even the most impoverished has benifited from.. sure not everyone ends up as bill gates... but moving up in socio economic status is a great acheivement in of itself. We only encourage medocracy if we push those who have succeeded in life.. it is their stories of success which continue to generate more opprotunities for those less fortunate.

Assistence programs don't encourage mediocraty. We were at the poverty level after my old man split. This was a time when society kind of looked at divorsed women with a little disdain.

She bought into the Conservative crap of the women being the happy housemaker. It rewarded her with no skills and 2 children to take care off.

She did assistence for a couple years so she would attend school, keep us in a decent home, and fed.

The end result of the average american squandering their taxes. A woman who went on to be an RN and has over 40000 births in her career. I am currently a Wan Engineer for a multi-national. My sister does costume design on Broadway.

Could we have done it without? I don't know. But it was easier for us.

maybe the poor people like mexicans should stop trying to get into our country then.. and start moving to communist countries like china or cuba.. where they are garanteed basic services . If your so poor in america why not get out as fast as you can ? Mexicans can do it as it they come over here.. despite all of our attempts to deter that

(this is not to say everyone poor is mexican, but to suggest if ur not making it in america why not move else where)
You just don't get it do you?
Poor Mexicans are coming to this country because Mexico sucks. Its a poor and insanely corrupt country. They are coming to America because its better here. Compared to back in Mexico they are making it here. They don't want to go to communist countries because:
A) How would they afford to get there?
B) Communism doesn't work.

Assistence programs don't encourage mediocraty. We were at the poverty level after my old man split. This was a time when society kind of looked at divorsed women with a little disdain.

She bought into the Conservative crap of the women being the happy housemaker. It rewarded her with no skills and 2 children to take care off.

She did assistence for a couple years so she would attend school, keep us in a decent home, and fed.

The end result of the average american squandering their taxes. A woman who went on to be an RN and has over 40000 births in her career. I am currently a Wan Engineer for a multi-national. My sister does costume design on Broadway.

Could we have done it without? I don't know. But it was easier for us.

exactly, im not saying all assiatance programs arn't needed.. because some definatly are.. and your mother would be a case in which she actually tried to better herself and used the system to create opprotunity for herself and you. But how many people surivie souly on welfare or other government hand outs, or live on the brink of povertly simply because they dont wish to better themselves.. is class discrimination the answer ?

I suggest instead of telling poor people how poor they are.. we should be educating them on the opprotunities open to them and trying to get them to better themselves instead of trying to get them more handouts. The focus in this country is clearly on the hand outs rather then the education and that is the real travesty

exactly, im not saying all assiatance programs arn't needed.. because some definatly are.. and your mother would be a case in which she actually tried to better herself and used the system to create opprotunity for herself and you. But how many people surivie souly on welfare or other government hand outs, or live on the brink of povertly simply because they dont wish to better themselves.. is class discrimination the answer ?

I suggest instead of telling poor people how poor they are.. we should be educating them on the opprotunities open to them and trying to get them to better themselves instead of trying to get them more handouts. The focus in this country is clearly on the hand outs rather then the education and that is the real travesty
And how do you intend to do this without taxing the rich?

You just don't get it do you?
Poor Mexicans are coming to this country because Mexico sucks. Its a poor and insanely corrupt country. They are coming to America because its better here. Compared to back in Mexico they are making it here. They don't want to go to communist countries because:
A) How would they afford to get there?
B) Communism doesn't work.

thats what your essentially suggetsing though.. when you say take the money from the rich to the poor.. that is communism.. the whole point of capitalism, and the whole point people flock to come into this country is that there is no limit on the possible success you can attain!

and how would they afford to get there ? poor people all accross the globe manage to move either here or to Europe to give better opprotunity to their families.. and they are in far more impoverished conditions then those people here.. when there is a will.. there is always a way

And how do you intend to do this without taxing the rich?

im not saying dont tax them.. but we shouldn't be trying to unproprtionally tax them.. like what democrats where crying for.. to repeal only tax cuts from the rich.. that is clearly class discrimination .. why not only tax the rich ? why not just take all the extra money they make above those levels of middle class and give them to the poor.. because these are against the fundamentals of capitalism and the freedom we are suppose to be supporting

maybe the poor people like mexicans should stop trying to get into our country then.. and start moving to communist countries like china or cuba.. where they are garanteed basic services . If your so poor in america why not get out as fast as you can ? Mexicans can do it as it they come over here.. despite all of our attempts to deter that

I don't know how u got those dirty mexicans involved in this. Perhaps you just think that every opinion on economics is an abstraction of one's own economic self-interest. Which in that case makes you a REAL moron.

And if you disagreed with me in my previous statement, you should really look at reality. Someone with six cars really ought to have five or four of them resold into cash and used to alleviate child poverty. Because honestly, what makes the greatest difference in people's lives: having a different ride to work to make you seem so important, or having food to eat every day and having shelter every night? The latter is certainly more worthwhile, though very few rich people will trade in their cars for that (much less admit that they care more about their own materialistic egos than the poor).

thats what your essentially suggetsing though.. when you say take the money from the rich to the poor.. that is communism.. the whole point of capitalism, and the whole point people flock to come into this country is that there is no limit on the possible success you can attain!

and how would they afford to get there ? poor people all accross the globe manage to move either here or to Europe to give better opprotunity to their families.. and they are in far more impoverished conditions then those people here.. when there is a will.. there is always a way
Well yeah way to give incredibly oversimplified answer to some of the toughest economic questions in the world.

Taking from the rich and giving to the poor is not communism, there is a little (Read: ALOT) more to it than that. Robin Hood wasn't a soviet last time I checked.
Where there is a will there isn't always a way. Thats a naive and downright foolish thing to say. Sometimes you are screwed.
People from Mexico get to America by crossing the Rio Grande, its a bit harder to get from Mexico to China that way.

im not saying dont tax them.. but we shouldn't be trying to unproprtionally tax them.. like what democrats where crying for.. to repeal only tax cuts from the rich.. that is clearly class discrimination .. why not only tax the rich ? why not just take all the extra money they make above those levels of middle class and give them to the poor.. because these are against the fundamentals of capitalism and the freedom we are suppose to be supporting
I'm not sure you understood the repealing of tax cuts.

The tax cuts were intended to stimulate the economy, Bush said so and that makes sense in theory. Giving tax cuts to people who don't have any extra money means they can now spend more without worrying. Giving extra money to people who already have plenty of cash isn't going to encourage them to spend anymore. They could have done so before, why would they do it now? Therefore by giving more to the poor, more money would be reinvested in the economy. They also wanted to repeal the tax cuts because we are in massive crippling debt and the money given to the richest 20% accounted for about 50% of the total money spent on tax refunds.

I don't know how u got those dirty mexicans involved in this. Perhaps you just think that every opinion on economics is an abstraction of one's own economic self-interest. Which in that case makes you a REAL moron.

And if you disagreed with me in my previous statement, you should really look at reality. Someone with six cars really ought to have five or four of them resold into cash and used to alleviate child poverty. Because honestly, what makes the greatest difference in people's lives: having a different ride to work to make you seem so important, or having food to eat every day and having shelter every night? The latter is certainly more worthwhile, though very few rich people will trade in their cars for that (much less admit that they care more about their own materialistic egos than the poor).

what about the average person.. why have 2 cars when u only need 1, why have the lcd screen when the crt will do.. or the 32' plasma when the 13 inch is fine ... or the mp3 player when u dont really need any player.. or the fansy cloths when u can go 1 or 2 years without changing them..

why focus on the rich when the majority of the country is middle class.. why dont we give up the little things so those poor people can eat.. ? its easy to blame the neighbor instead of taking responsibilty yourself

I'm not sure you understood the repealing of tax cuts.

The tax cuts were intended to stimulate the economy, Bush said so and that makes sense in theory. Giving tax cuts to people who don't have any extra money means they can now spend more without worrying. Giving extra money to people who already have plenty of cash isn't going to encourage them to spend anymore. They could have done so before, why would they do it now? Therefore by giving more to the poor, more money would be reinvested in the economy. They also wanted to repeal the tax cuts because we are in massive crippling debt and the money given to the richest 20% accounted for about 50% of the total money spent on tax refunds.

i do u nderstand it .. i understand democrats only intended to repeal taxes for the top 5% or those people making over 200k. and of course they made up 50% of the total money refunded seeing how they account for more then 80% of the taxes collected. But the fact that some people should then recieve a tax cut while others do not is clearly discriminatory. It is to say only those making over 200k should be taxed and all others not.

what about the average person.. why have 2 cars when u only need 1, why have the lcd screen when the crt will do.. or the 32' plasma when the 13 inch is fine ... or the mp3 player when u dont really need any player.. or the fansy cloths when u can go 1 or 2 years without changing them..

why focus on the rich when the majority of the country is middle class.. why dont we give up the little things so those poor people can eat.. ? its easy to blame the neighbor instead of taking responsibilty yourself
Because we're not talking about a 32' plasma TV. We're talking about gold plated toliets, $5 million birthday parties, half a million dollar cars, and half acre mansions. There is much more money here than you think.

i do u nderstand it .. i understand democrats only intended to repeal taxes for the top 5% or those people making over 200k. and of course they made up 50% of the total money refunded seeing how they account for more then 80% of the taxes collected. But the fact that some people should then recieve a tax cut while others do not is clearly discriminatory. It is to say only those making over 200k should be taxed and all others not.
So what? Whats more in the interest of a capitalist society: A strong economy or money given to rich people?

Because we're not talking about a 32' plasma TV. We're talking about gold plated toliets, $5 million birthday parties, half a million dollar cars, and half acre mansions. There is much more money here than you think.

I think the average american simply wants to see the worlds problems solved as long as it does not dramatically effect their own comfort.. if middle class americans were so concerned about the poverty of others, they wouldn't waste their time trying to force the rich people to give up alittle more money, they would be making sacrifices in their own lives to help the poor.. top 1%.. i think the other 72% of the country (given about 17% of the nation lives below the poverty line) could equal or exceed the amounts of money drawn from this small 1% if real sacrifice and dedication was at hand.

im not saying dont tax them.. but we shouldn't be trying to unproprtionally tax them.. like what democrats where crying for.. to repeal only tax cuts from the rich.. that is clearly class discrimination .. why not only tax the rich ? why not just take all the extra money they make above those levels of middle class and give them to the poor.. because these are against the fundamentals of capitalism and the freedom we are suppose to be supporting

You are not being realisic in any of your ideas.
If I take your theory of what communism is, then all social programs are communism. Pure communism doesn't work because it's against human nature. Pure capitalism leaves a huge rich/poor divide. The lower 90% ends up as slaves to the other 10%.
If the rich and poor are taxed at the same flat rate, say 20%, it takes more from the poor, because a larger percent of their income goes towards neccessities. If 50% of your income goes towards rent, and 25% towards groceries, then you basically have noyhing left after taxes.
Even accounting for nicer shelter and better food, the wealthy spend a much smaller percentage on neccessities. Let's say after 20% tax you pay 10% for shelter and 2% on food. You stll have 68% left, compared with the poors 5% left. Increasing the tax on the wealthy is not going to put them on the same finacial footing as the poor. Few people suggest we do that.
But evening things up so the rich can only afford seven cars instead of eight is hardly communism.