Board 8 > Leftists demand a "living wage," just, you know, don't expect it from them...

(+) Yeah! (+)

http://www.allamericanblogger.com/17924/why-isnt-the-working-families-party-paying-its-employees-a-living-wage/

You can also access the link from DWMF if you'd prefer!

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SmartMuffin - Because anything less would be uncivilized
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Unfortunately I neglected to bookmark DWMF, so could you please repost the link?

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Bookmark? It should be your homepage!

http://dudewheresmyfreedom.wordpress.com/

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SmartMuffin - Because anything less would be uncivilized
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Just curious, what is their definition of a "Living wage?"

It is very easy possible to live decently on $10/hour most places if you work full time.

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Thanks. Oh and btw

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[This message was deleted at the request of the original poster]

LOL @ that list of demands

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IMO, it's time to start giving universal welfare to all unemployed people. We're not going to call it a living wage, because that's a stupid idea. We need to make it clear to the greedy middle class that they are worthless. What better way to do that than by giving away money to the poor just because we can. And we can, because we can do it for less than the cost of Obama's latest stimulus plan. The poor aren't nearly as greedy as the middle class.

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90s games > 00s games

I can't tell if that last post is sarcastic or not.

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SmartMuffin - Because anything less would be uncivilized
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It's half and half. The middle class really is the greediest class.

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90s games > 00s games

Oh yeah? How so?

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90s games > 00s games

He's not completely wrong. I wouldn't say greediest, but there's a large portion of the Middle Class who are very much "f*** you, got mine", simply because they think it's entirely their hard work that got them to where they are, and think that their "hard work" will continue to propel them into super mega rich-ness, even though barring some major technological breakthru (think Bill Gates), that simply won't happen.

The greediest are still easily the highest possible class, who, for the most part, stockpile billions of dollars simply to have billions of dollars, and (again, for the most part) only donate to charity simply because they are able to without the money that they donate, because it's such a small percentage, and because they would look terrible if they had all that money and didn't. Charitable, but not because of any desire to feel charitable.

Honestly, if people who make over a billion dollars (however small a percentage this is) were taxed say, 80%, the ones that complained would be outed as the most greedy, because being "forced" to live off of a "meager" $200,000,000 earns you as much pity as Charlie Manson.

It must be nice to be all high and mighty and somehow know why other people do things.

I wish I was psychic like you guys!

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SmartMuffin - Because anything less would be uncivilized
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Greed = wanting money you think you deserve that you don't have. Rich capitalists are usually pretty aware they don't "deserve" their wealth.

Basically the whole concept of greed and deservingness is stupid, and the middle class buys into it to make themselves feel better about themselves.

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90s games > 00s games

Honestly, if people who make over a billion dollars (however small a percentage this is) were taxed say, 80%, the ones that complained would be outed as the most greedy, because being "forced" to live off of a "meager" $200,000,000 earns you as much pity as Charlie Manson.

There are probably years (like 2008 perhaps) when there are zero people in the entire country who made 1 billion. In a typical year I doubt it's more than 10-20. But if you put in an 80% tax, it would go to zero every year. If you have $40 billion like Warren Buffet, you're not going to make an investment that earns you only 800 million when it goes up 10%, but still loses the full 4 billion when it goes down 10%. That's a terrible investment.

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90s games > 00s games

Well, you can deduct capital losses from capital gains, so it doesn't work exactly that way, but yeah.

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SmartMuffin - Because anything less would be uncivilized
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But the government is never going to pay you for your losses. If you're currently sitting at zero capital loss carryover and you do intend to make more than you lose in future, it's a terrible bet.

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90s games > 00s games

So, in other DWMF news, I got my first referral from a search engine today.

I'm the first result on the second page for "secret panel can authorize"

Paramore Twitter Boobs here I come!

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SmartMuffin - Because anything less would be uncivilized
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red sox 777 posted...
There are probably years (like 2008 perhaps) when there are zero people in the entire country who made 1 billion. In a typical year I doubt it's more than 10-20. But if you put in an 80% tax, it would go to zero every year. If you have $40 billion like Warren Buffet, you're not going to make an investment that earns you only 800 million when it goes up 10%, but still loses the full 4 billion when it goes down 10%. That's a terrible investment.

You could lower the number to say, $10 million, and it would still elicit the same response, living off of a "mere" $2 million is no less un-horrifying. And of course, if a tax was that high, and you decided that an investment with that small a gain wasn't worth it, the only other option would be to make $0 in a year by not investing at all. If the tax were applied to all investments, your options would still be invest or don't, and the results would still be the same, but with the tax raise, you'd simply be making less as an end result, but so would everyone else. It would be terrible compared to now, sure, but it would A: encourage people to make better investments, and B: help the economy of the country you live in, which may benefit these people in ways that they don't know.

It's not as if this hasn't been attempted before. If you look at tax rates from the 1950s or 1960s, you'll be shocked at how high they are, and that's a good 10-20 years after the war ended. You'd be hard pressed to argue that, in economic terms, that quality of life is significantly better now than it was then. Education certainly was much better then, as was discrepancy between highest and lowest classes.

You could lower the number to say, $10 million, and it would still elicit the same response, living off of a "mere" $2 million is no less un-horrifying. And of course, if a tax was that high, and you decided that an investment with that small a gain wasn't worth it, the only other option would be to make $0 in a year by not investing at all. If the tax were applied to all investments, your options would still be invest or don't, and the results would still be the same, but with the tax raise, you'd simply be making less as an end result, but so would everyone else. It would be terrible compared to now, sure, but it would A: encourage people to make better investments, and B: help the economy of the country you live in, which may benefit these people in ways that they don't know.

Oh you can live very very comfortably and extravagantly even. But you're not going to be helping our your country, because you won't be investing your money back into the economy. When Warren Buffet invests a billion dollars, that's a billion dollars that goes back out into the economy to be used to grow businesses. If he and others just hoard the wealth, that's bad for the country.

It's not as if this hasn't been attempted before. If you look at tax rates from the 1950s or 1960s, you'll be shocked at how high they are, and that's a good 10-20 years after the war ended. You'd be hard pressed to argue that, in economic terms, that quality of life is significantly better now than it was then. Education certainly was much better then, as was discrepancy between highest and lowest classes.

You can do this with income taxes, but not with capital gains. It's true that we can have much higher income taxes, and I favor that (along with higher limits to get into the higher tax brackets). If it were up to me, I'd raise taxes on income above 1 million, and then have another higher bracket above perhaps 3 million, and again above 10 million. 50% marginal tax rate starting at income of 10 million is fine by me.

Raising taxes on income isn't going to make people stop working for the most part, because they don't lose anything by working. And to the extent that they work less, it doesn't hurt the economy too much because their work really isn't worth that much to the economy. Raising taxes on capital gains makes investments untenable.

The difference is that your investments are going to have negative expected value. Normally you might have, say, a 75% chance of making 10%, a 25% chance of losing 10%. So, the expected value of your gain is 5% in this case, before taxes. Now let's implement that 80% tax. Now you have a 75% chance of winning 2% and a 25% chance of losing 10%. Your new expectation is.....-1%. So you are better off building swimming pools and stuffing them with money instead of water.

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90s games > 00s games

Just to add some actual facts to this topic, the middle class IS the least charitable set of the population.

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SubDeity wants to vote for Calvin Coolidge. [Evil Republican]
Play Der Langrisser.

Why is some random jackass who says $20/hr should be minimum wage representative of all of the movement again

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We can probably raise the long term capital gains rate though, as Warren Buffet suggests, just not anywhere near 80%. 30% might be okay. Though such a tax structure would impact 90% of investors more than Warren Buffet. His investment strategy is "buy and hold forever." Well if you hold forever, you're never going to pay taxes! The current tax structure as it is grossly favors long term investments over shorter ones- this is not just because of the different tax rates, but is true even with the same tax rate.

Example: Investor A buys a stock that rises 1000-fold in 10 years. He pays 15% tax when he sells, for an ending total of 850 times his initial investment. Investor B buys and sells once a year for 10 years, doubling his money each time. 2^10 = 1024. But he has to pay the tax each year, not just at the end, so his actual final total will be 1.85^10 times his initial investment. That comes out to around 470, only a little more than half of 850. With a 30% tax rate, this becomes 700 and about 200, less than a third. So you see how raising capital gains taxes will hurt Warren Buffet less than the vast majority of people.

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90s games > 00s games

I mean jesus. It's a random jackass on a FORUM. That would be like assuming that you speak for all gamers.

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I ****ing love to cuddle.
I'm being oppressed!

Why is some random jackass who says $20/hr should be minimum wage representative of all of the movement again

Living wage people are a real movement.

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SubDeity wants to vote for Calvin Coolidge. [Evil Republican]
Play Der Langrisser.

CeraSeptem posted...
Why is some random jackass who says $20/hr should be minimum wage representative of all of the movement again

Fun Fact: When you adjust for inflation, minimum wage was worth more before 1980 than it is today ).

$20 might be a bit steep, but $10 would be a great point to be at. (I know where I am, it's $7.50, which I believe is a little higher than the national rate, and in some places, it's a lot higher)

red sox 777 posted...
We can probably raise the long term capital gains rate though, as Warren Buffet suggests, just not anywhere near 80%. 30% might be okay. Though such a tax structure would impact 90% of investors more than Warren Buffet. His investment strategy is "buy and hold forever." Well if you hold forever, you're never going to pay taxes! The current tax structure as it is grossly favors long term investments over shorter ones- this is not just because of the different tax rates, but is true even with the same tax rate.

Example: Investor A buys a stock that rises 1000-fold in 10 years. He pays 15% tax when he sells, for an ending total of 850 times his initial investment. Investor B buys and sells once a year for 10 years, doubling his money each time. 2^10 = 1024. But he has to pay the tax each year, not just at the end, so his actual final total will be 1.85^10 times his initial investment. That comes out to around 470, only a little more than half of 850. With a 30% tax rate, this becomes 700 and about 200, less than a third. So you see how raising capital gains taxes will hurt Warren Buffet less than the vast majority of people.

Yeah, when I was talking about 80% rates, I meant income. I feel hella dumb thinking that people like Warren Buffett are affected by income tax.

I really wish I knew more about economics, my HS class left me woefully underprepared for debates like these.

$650 for 40 hours of work is considered a living wage in New York for a single adult.
$350 for 30 hours of work is also considered a living wage in New York for a single adult. Barely.


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Love is better than anger. Hope is better than fear. Optimism is better than despair. So let us be loving, hopeful and optimistic. And we’ll change the world.

Wow, $1400 in a month for NY? That's gotta be pretty tight living.

TBQH, if you're willing to have a roommate, not have kids, and not live in a huge, expensive city, minimum wage isn't all that bad. You just can't live above your means. Granted, if you're getting less than 30 hours a week, problems do start popping up.

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Exactly what a living wage is is irrelevant to this article. What matters is that (according to the article) the party claims that a living wage is $20 per hour but are paying their employees less than that.

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Exactly what a living wage is is irrelevant to this article. What matters is that (according to the article) the party claims that a living wage is $20 per hour but are paying their employees less than that.

The party isn't claiming that.

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I ****ing love to cuddle.
I'm being oppressed!

Why is some random jackass who says $20/hr should be minimum wage representative of all of the movement again

I believe "living wage" was literally the FIRST of the demands these protestors actually came up with.

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SmartMuffin - Because anything less would be uncivilized
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"living wage" and "$20/hr" are different things.

You understand that right

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I ****ing love to cuddle.
I'm being oppressed!

I think the problem a lot of rich people have with higher taxes is that they view taxes as a poor investment. They don't have any control over where their tax money goes, and feel that it's going into $16 muffins or Solyndra or whatever bulls*** the government thinks of next.

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My Japanese alter-ego.
Hey all this is Bartz btw.

A problem with increasing minimum wage is that prices for things start increasing and thus a "living wage" would just become higher. Only way to stop that is if the government puts a cap on things which is just crazy IMO.

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Another problem with raising the minimum wage is that it quite directly raises unemployment.

Fun fact: The initial impetus for the minimum wage was to keep companies from hiring black workers, who were willing to work for less!

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SubDeity wants to vote for Calvin Coolidge. [Evil Republican]
Play Der Langrisser.

red sox 777 posted...
The current tax structure as it is grossly favors long term investments over shorter ones- this is not just because of the different tax rates, but is true even with the same tax rate.

Example: Investor A buys a stock that rises 1000-fold in 10 years. He pays 15% tax when he sells, for an ending total of 850 times his initial investment. Investor B buys and sells once a year for 10 years, doubling his money each time. 2^10 = 1024. But he has to pay the tax each year, not just at the end, so his actual final total will be 1.85^10 times his initial investment. That comes out to around 470, only a little more than half of 850. With a 30% tax rate, this becomes 700 and about 200, less than a third. So you see how raising capital gains taxes will hurt Warren Buffet less than the vast majority of people.

Are you serious? The firms making hundreds of millions of dollars a year are the ones that make thousands upon thousands of trades a day. Seriously, just read the wikipedia article on high frequency trading, and how it's come to completely dominate the US stock market. These aren't Warren Buffet types who are actually putting money into companies and helping them grow, most of these firms start and end the day with zero dollars in stocks.

And before someone mentions that the wikipedia article cites papers saying that in stable markets HFT firms are beneficial for improving market liquidity, lowering the price of trading, etc., guess what? This aint a stable market.

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SmartMuffin posted...
It must be nice to be all high and mighty and somehow know why other people do things.

I wish I was psychic like you guys!

No you don't. It's a f***ing curse, not a gift.

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Are you serious? The firms making hundreds of millions of dollars a year are the ones that make thousands upon thousands of trades a day. Seriously, just read the wikipedia article on high frequency trading, and how it's come to completely dominate the US stock market. These aren't Warren Buffet types who are actually putting money into companies and helping them grow, most of these firms start and end the day with zero dollars in stocks.

Of course I'm serious, it's simple math. Hi-frequency trading is hurt far more than long run trading by our current tax system.

It doesn't mean that hi-frequency trading will be less profitable, because it ought to be intrinsically more profitable. If you're trading thousands of times a day, your expected gain on each trade can be 1/1000 of a percent and you'll be making money at an insanely fast rate.

Are you saying that we can eliminate hi-frequency trading without hurting the economy? I guess that's possible, but I wasn't really talking about hi-fi trading in the first place.....more like buying and selling every few months, or even a couple of years. That kind of trading is definitely good for the economy, and would be completely crippled with a, say, 50% tax rate.

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90s games > 00s games