Atheist goes Political, vol. 2: Trickle-Down Economics

[AussieGriffin]

I'd do it shorter than that, yet this was worthy of being in my economics made easy series.

A.G.

[Squiglypig]

@ReignbowSmite Yeah, because you can't really blame anyone other than the company if anything happens to you and then even if something happens it might not be covered by a clause in your employment contract that ensures that you, for instance, can't have your broken leg covered by their insurance.

If the government has free medicare then it's all covered if you're a US citizen. No "Oh well you can't because of constitutional clause ##".

[drkangl21]

Very well said!

[lazyperfectionist1]

@drkangl21 Thank you.

[jffryh]

"trickle-down" is a straw man. Its a term "liberals" use to bash republicans with. Republicans campain 4 smaller govt & "across the board" tax cuts. Democrats campain for "middle class" tax cuts & programs to give extra help to "working" families. Whoever wins elections, we always end up with exponential growth of debt & acceleration towards the cliff wall. Dec 2016 tipping point of no return. All life will fry within few centuries as no one is willing to immediatly end fossil fuel industry.

[Squiglypig]

@jffryh "Trickle down" is a reality.

By "Across the board" you're talking mostly about the wealthiest 12% of the US citizens who control over 50% of the country's assets, right?

The "Trickle down" theory (NOT a scientific theory mind you!) is what Lazyperfectionist1 described it as in this video.

It's (more or less) the hopes that the rich will spend more money on jobs if they get to keep more of the money they earn, which hasn't really been shown to happen since it was introduced by Reagan.

[DarthSutekh]

@Squiglypig Reagan didn't introduce it he just renamed it, it was the prevalent economic policy just before and during a a good percentage of the Great Depression. Which ended when Roosevelt brow beat congress to ignore the lobbists and put thousands to work in base wage jobs and established the minimum wage. Lo and behold having money in the hands of the bottom majority rather than the top 20 wealthy dragged us out of that hole.

[Squiglypig]

@DarthSutekh And look where we are now.

History repeats itself because people don't learn.

[jffryh]

@Squiglypig If up to me, I might replace income tax with sales tax, sin taxes, luxury taxes. I would tax fossil fuel industry out of existence. "trickle down" is term used only by leftists to deride rightists, I guess refering to "supply side", which rightists might seriously support. Truth: question of whether supply or demand is more important is like asking which blade of a pair of scissors is more responsible 4 cutting the paper. Every good bought & sold is supplied and demanded equally.

[Squiglypig]

@jffryh SHOULD be supplied and demanded equally.

I'll use the opening of the PS3 as an example.

Sony purposefully didn't create a lot of PS3s because they figured that they could sell the fewer ones at a larger profit, which they could if everyone bought one, which they didn't. But the demand was way too high and the price was too steep, so that was a failure.

What happened in the 1930s was the direct opposite. Everyone had something to sell, but it wasn't sold.

Both examples are failures.

[jffryh]

when wealthy people spend money on goods they are employing the producers of goods. when wealthy people save their money in a bank, the bank lends out the money to others who will spend it on goods & services, which employs producers of goods & services. If govt demands that all people have equal $, then people will have less reason to work hard as they will get the same $ no matter what they do, & fewer goods will be produced. Less production means conserved environment, so horray4socialism

[Squiglypig]

@jffryh You are confusing socialism with communism.

He talked about misunderstood words in the last video, this is one of those words.

People in the US have a tendency to equate socialism with communism, while it's in fact a VERY different economic policy.

Denmark has a mixture of a free market + state controlled economic model. It has mostly socialist policies such as free health care (GASP!), free education (DOUBLE GASP!!) and is still one of the wealthier countries in Europe.

[jffryh]

@Squiglypig I view socialism as state controlled economy coupled with democracy/free elections/voting, and communism as state controlled economy without democracy. The most totalitarian state might find it immpossible to entirely eliminate free choice from markets. Theres continuums of possible levels and sorts of state control. I divide the world between public goods & private goods. Private goods R those 4which public welfare is maximized when state keeps hands off. public goods R those ...

[jffryh]

@Squiglypig Public goods R those 4which state involvement is needed 4 maximum public welfare. to provide public goods, state must take from private economy. state should take revenue in which ever way does minimum harm to private economy per given level of revenue, &spend it on most important public goods. as state grows from 0 to 100, you get diminishing marginal returns from state. state should stop at level where marginal benefit from state == marginal cost to private economy.

[jffryh]

@Squiglypig excludability is part of what makes something a private good. health care is private good because time I spend talking to my doctor is time the doctor cannot spend with someone else. health care is public good because if person A feels happy because of person B's good health, so does person C.

Smarter people may know better than me what tax structure does least harm. "tax the rich" is surely too simplistic. what we have now is surely overly complex. if up to me, I would ...

[Squiglypig]

@jffryh But that doesn't mean that the C.E.O of Mærsk gets the same wage as someone at the cash register.

Denmark also does not give free money to people who don't do anything other than sit on their flat bottoms (a typical straw-man of people who don't understand the system).

You CAN sit around and do nothing, but then your money WILL be cut off.

[ironearth701]

They are creating jobs... in China!

[thethingthatwants]

What upsets me most about the Conservative party is how many things I feel that “should” make me one of them. I am one who loosely belies in “Less government involvement” but somehow this means something completely different; for instance, I am pro choice because it is a personal choice that the individual makes, it is not a choice the government should make for us! How is helping the wealthy “less involvement”? I think the Conservative motto is now “Less (of your) government (but more of mine)”

[lazyperfectionist1]

@thethingthatwants I'm probably going to get into that down the road.