Rush Limbaugh - Progressive Income Tax is Immoral

[mdt2189]

Competition ends as soon as someone loses the game.

[ifuckingfarted]

I Farted!!!

[wentafew]

How come his discussion didn't include tax breaks. Tax breaks are progressive. The wealthiest get the most and the poor the least. We'll have to take away all those write offs. No more writing off those Cheeseburgers fatty.

[wentafew]

Your sitting on the lowest taxes in years you fat fuck. Progressive taxes are necessary due to cost of living. If you taxed someone making 20,000 a year 35% they probably wouldn't be able to live. You tax someone making 1 million a year 35% and they will live quite comfortably in a gated community separated and ignorant from the realities of the world. What are you doing with your millions to create jobs fat fuck? Your audience is dying, because they are all over 70. Go take a Vic fatty.

[Chaaarge]

I could list several examples of corporatism in the american market rather than free market capitalism, and in all cases, it has been bad for the people, not good. And america didn't even have an federal income tax back in the day. Yes, I know the civil war was an exception. BUt most was payed for by tariffs. And even in 1930 when there was a federal income tax, the income tax was around 6-21% for the average person. So even if it was progressive, it didn't matter because taxes were so low.

[djlazlow1]

Why do people talk about taxes like if the government took half their money and handed it out to lazy poor people. The truth is that DIRECT welfare (food stamps and cash) account for around 2-3% of the Federal Budget. The MAJORITY of the taxes collected are used for other things that BENEFIT everyone, but specially the rich. Are rich people, with very luxurious lifestyles, seriously crying because 2% of the taxes they pay go to help some poor mother and her children not starve? Wow....

[Chaaarge]

@djlazlow1 they don't go to things that benefit everyone, they go to wars and entitlement programs. and most things run by government are not being run with a good cost to benefit ratio. Healthcare would be much better handled by the free market, and organizations like the FDA are doing a very poor job. A lot of taxes also go to keeping non violent people, who bought some drugs and hookers, in jail. So the government doesn't just take taxes, they waste them

[djlazlow1]

@Chaaarge The fact that government is a wasteful spender is another topic. I do agree with you that spending tax dollars on wars of aggression doesn't benefit the majority of Americans. But why doesn't anyone talk about holding government accountable and improve its efficiency instead of just assuming it would be better off to be left to the free market? Besides, the market has never been and never will be free. It's manipulated like a puppet to serve a select few. Lets be realistic.

[Chaaarge]

@djlazlow1 Actually, the market used to be relatively free before big corporations were given special priviliges by government. Just look at the American medical association. They were given the privilige to put sanctions on doctors, pretty much as they wished. This ruined competition in the health care industry, drove up prices etc... History does show that in a lot of cases, it is much better to just leave things to the market, because using government as a middle man drives up total cost.

[djlazlow1]

@Chaaarge I'm pretty sure the government didn't give corporations any special privileges, THEY FOUGHT FOR THEM. But yeah, maybe we should go back, to the post-WWII days. You know, when the tax system was actually progressive. When the regulations on the financial sector imposed by FDR's New Deal where in place to protect citizens. Today all we have is privatized profits and socialized losses. I think we should carefully examine what to leave and what not to leave to the free market. *Ramble*

[wentafew]

@Chaaarge LOL, ya Healthcare better managed by the Free Market. Apparently you have not used or paid for your Healthcare lately.

[Chaaarge]

@wentafew Are you trying to say that america has free market health care? It doesn't. The US government has ruined competition within the healthcare industry. In a free market resources are allocated based on supply and demand. Therefore, if you are a rational human being, capable of making rational decisions you should be for free market health care because the free market presumes that you are making decisions for yourself. Socialised medicine is also immoral, but that's another story.

[wentafew]

@Chaaarge You over simplify the issue so bad it's not even funny. What happens in a Free Market when 1 entity owns or controls all of 1 resource? Where is the competition? What happens to the environment in a free market where profits come before the destruction of vast ecosystems? Banks and credit institutions were deregulated to lower and extend credit to more people. The competition is getting ever smaller. What began highly diversified is now 10% owning it all. Competition is an illusion.

[Chaaarge]

@wentafew 1/2 monopolies are an illusion in a free market. If you're producing something, and you try to corner the market (provided there is no force involved, or fraud) you will go broke, because as long as you invite competition, a better businessman will make you go bankrupt. What you demonstrate with the banks is first of all fraud, which still isn't allowed in a free market (because there has to be a reserve rule, you can't loan out money you don't have).

[wentafew]

@Chaaarge That's the whole point Free Markets don't invite competition. Why do you think they monopolize? So, they don't have to compete and can control prices. You think people in a Free Market want to compete?!?!!? You are looking from a consumer perspective.

Your theory works with non necessity material good, but it fails miserably against necessities. Food, Water, Energy, Health, Housing, Police Protection, Education, Etc. You are being way to idealistic.

[Chaaarge]

@wentafew please tell me why this wouldn't work: hospital x provides health services at price y. those prices are really expensive, so another hospital opens up and lowers their prices to something people can afford. the new hospital will get the costumers and the only way hospital x can win in the competition is if they further lower prices or increase quallity. Eventually you'll get to a point which is the market price, which is a price that is proportionate to quallity.

[wentafew]

@Chaaarge Fallacy of over simplification. Problem is more complicated with more inputs. That looks good on paper, but it's not reality.

[Chaaarge]

@wentafew and a free market without government intervention(except for fraud) does invite competition. Look at every single monopoly and you'll see that it came about because of government in one way or another. It was either special tax cuts given to some over others, the government actually creating a law that prohibits others to trade in a certain area (like the swedish alcohol monopoly) or allowing organizations like AMA to put sanctions on doctors

[wentafew]

@Chaaarge Businesses will still strive for the same goal. Do you have any truly free market to compare to, they have always been governed. You're comparing to some fairytale world that doesn't exist.

Again you take the consumers perspective. Take the businessman's perspective. He doesn't want to compete, and will strive to do anything to not compete to maximize his profits. Hell maybe he'll even set a backroom deal to price regulate with 2 competitors so all 3 come out ahead.

[Chaaarge]

@wentafew I agree that the lobbying is a problem in the free market, and we must strive to get rid of it. And yes, I am an idealist, because a free market is in my opinion the only moral system possible. What we should do is get as close to that system as possible. If you want an example, take hong kong. They've been more and more successful since implementing free market ideas.There are also many small examples throughout the world that show deregulation works, and how big government fails

[wentafew]

@Chaaarge Hong Kong China is not a good example to me. China is a good example of how a Free Market does not take into account things like, human welfare --and no I am not meaning checks from the government. Human labor is nothing more than a piece of capital, and with the surplus of capital they have, they have no reason to treat their lower working class kindly or fairly. They work long hours for ridiculous wages in horrible conditions. We (the US) are exacerbating the problem.

[Chaaarge]

@wentafew but those backroom deals will only work if they do it with the government. There have been many companies trying to do price controls without government help, and the result has always been that they went broke. Monopolies simply won't happen in those industries that are not run by government

[wentafew]

@Chaaarge Why would it only work if they do it with the Government? Let's say, 2 competing soda companies decide that they are tired of competing with one another and driving each others prices to the point of no profit. Because that's what would theoretically ultimately happen. They would both continue to lower their price until they reach a point which they could go no lower. So instead they say, "Hey if you don't charge less than this. I won't charge less than this, and we both win"

[Chaaarge]

@wentafew then there are two companies charging the same price, nothing wrong with that. other people can still open up soda companies, and maybe create a better soda, or cheaper soda. if the soda is so cheap and good that nobody can compete with them, then what's the problem? we got cheap and good soda. If you are reffering to "cornering the market", then that has already been attempted (the wheat and cotton industry is an example), and the result was that they went broke.

[wentafew]

@Chaaarge Yup, it's just that simple.

[Chaaarge]

@wentafew 2/2 now, if a company actually does produce something which is so superior to what others produce that it in a way does become a monopoly, then I say, more power to them! They are producing something of value that people want to buy, so as long as people are willing to pay for it, they should be allowed to charge the prices they charge. if those prices are too high, then people won't buy the product anyway, and they would go broke