Wealth Distribution in the USA

You wouldn't like the results.If you want more of something, subsidize it. It you want less of something, tax it.Forcibly taxing enough money from the "rich" to even everyone out would cause the "rich" to stop working as hard. What's the point or working, if your hard-earned money is just going to be taxen away?And those who are getting free money, what is their incentive to work at all?The result would come to resemble a third-world country in short order.But the hard-core socialists keep trying to repeal the laws of human nature, and never learn from their mistakes. Here is a good summary:

Socialist governments traditionally do make a financial mess. They always run out of other people's money.

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Margaret Thatcher

Sure it is. You just try ducking taxes and see what happens. Force is the ultimate "argument" that the government has for enforcing its edicts. For who? I agree that for many workers there are a lot of other motivators for increasing productivity.But for those who are wealthy? Try taking 90% of their earnings and see how motivated they become! Their primary motivation will be to duck those taxes somehow!

Bullshit. More bullshit. (See below.)

The America of my time line is a laboratory example of what can happen to democracies, what has eventually happened to all perfect democracies throughout all histories. A perfect democracy, a ‘warm body’ democracy in which every adult may vote and all votes count equally, has no internal feedback for self-correction. It depends solely on the wisdom and self-restraint of citizens which is opposed by the folly and lack of self-restraint of other citizens. What is supposed to happen in a democracy is that each sovereign citizen will always vote in the public interest for the safety and welfare of all. But what does happen is that he votes his own self-interest as he sees it which for the majority translates as "Bread and Circuses."

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"Bread and Circuses" is the cancer of democracy, the fatal disease for which there is no cure. Democracy often works beautifully at first. But once a state extends the franchise to every warm body, be he producer or parasite, that day marks the beginning of the end of the state. For when the plebs discover that they can vote themselves bread and circuses without limit and that the productive members of the body politic cannot stop them, they will do so, until the state bleeds to death, or in its weakened condition the state succumbs to an invaderthe barbarians enter Rome.

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― Robert A. Heinlein

And when this happens, what do you think the productive members of society do? They're certainly not going to spend all their efforts to support the parasites. And why should they?Socialists spend so much time demonizing those productive folks who have earned a lot of money through their efforts, but they seldom realize they would be doomed without them. Socialists have to have someone to extort money from! (See also the parable about the goose and the golden egg.)

If the lefties keep it up, you may get your wish.

According to new IRS data, the 1.35 million taxpayers that represent the highest-earning one percent of the Americans who filed federal income tax returns in 2010 earned 18.9% of the total gross income and paid 37.4% of all federal income taxes paid in that year.

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Link

You want to try to get by without that 37.4% of all federal income taxes? The folks no longer getting their Obamaphones and free government cheese would riot!I know this is contrary to socialist thinking, but have you ever considered that we need more rich folks, not fewer? And that we should be encouraging them to earn more, not demonizing them?Now wouldn't that make more sense?

Nice try, but you should take this topic seriously.True wealth is earned, not "acquired." Crony capitalism is a plague that should be eliminated, while any honestly earned money should be honored.

More bullshit.Do you think paupers make anyone better off? Are socialists trying to expropriate money from paupers? How many paupers start businesses and hire people? Paupers are a drain on society, not an asset. Those with money can create jobs and spread money around. Those who work for their money and create wealth are an asset, not a class to be demonized.You destroy that class of people and you think anyone will be better off? What a joke! Different issue entirely. Socialists have been trying to expropriate every loose dime that they can, but what happens when they run out of people to loot?Socialists should realize that they need a lot more wealthy people to support their nefarious schemes, not fewer. When everyone is reduced to pauperism who will the socialists have left to loot? Their whole sorry scheme will collapse around their ears.But still they and their sycophants continue to decry those who have earned their money by hard and honest work. What a joke!

Equitable for whom?Certainly not for those who actually create wealth!"From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs" is straight out of Karl Marx, and that sentiment has been shown to belong in the trash bin of history, one of the stupidest ideas ever conceived in the fevered mind of a ne'er-do-well.Those who believe this nonsense are generally the non-productive, or "intellectuals" of a similar stripe. They are always willing to "share the wealth" but rarely do they actually create wealth themselves.Personally I have nothing that could be called wealth, but yet there are always those willing to "share" it, starting with the government and their dependents, of which there are an ever-increasing number.

You're right, the current system is not equitable for those who actually create wealth. Because your such a peach of a fellow I'm going to give you a trophy indicating you won the Indy 500 next week.But if you're honest, it will be of no value to you as you didn't actually win that race.The same is true of redistributed wealth--you didn't earn it so it has far less value than money you actually earned through your own efforts. It is nothing to be proud of.So no, I am not in favor of redistribution even if I were to be the beneficiary.

The factory worker earns his pay. The local company he works most likely earns a profit as well, as do the suppliers of the materials used in the shoes.The shipping company that transports the shoes most likely earns a profit as well, as does the longshoremen who unload the boats and the truckers and the trucking companies who carry the shoes around the country. Finally the store that sells the shoes earns a nice markup, as does the company that commissioned the shoes to be made in the first place.And governments around the globe are siphoning off their cut at each step of the process.The principal point is that, except for the governmental involvement, at each level some value (i.e., wealth) is created by voluntary interactions between people or companies selling their labor, materials, or services.Why do lefties have such a problem with that?

So you're against profit? Why don't you just leave and find a place where you're going to be happier? Might I suggest North Korea? I suspect the populace there has no benefit from profit at any level. And might have to find some productive line of work that would actually benefit the economy?Aren't you aware that for every government employee there are several taxpayers supporting their salaries and benefits--and that by definition government is a drain on the economy rather than a benefit? I'll make it very clear for you: more productive workers will benefit everyone, while more government parasites are a drain on the economy.If this were not the case the communist countries (workers' paradises) would have had flourishing economies rather than going bust.

The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people's money.

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Margaret Thatcher

And how does one make a profit that does not return to the economy?

Scrooge McDuck is a fictional character that doesn't reflect anything about the real world.In the real world profits are invested in banks, stocks, bonds, businesses or additional business merchandise, plant expansion, dividends to millions of shareholders, donations to charity, and many other similar places.Those profits that go into tax shelters are the result of socialists and their nasty tax schemes that are designed to tax the productive and spread the proceeds among the non-productive. The golden goose parable comes to mind.

And you offer nothing but redistributionist socialist dogma that has failed worldwide.What good is it when everybody is poor?Your socialist system relies on the profit and wealth created by others to exist, so you should be less critical of those who do create the wealth and profit that you (general, not personal) rely on so heavily.

Right, and you say you don't kowtow to socialist dogma?Your obvious hatred for a "monied" class speaks volumes.

Why Government Spending Does Nothing for Jobs

While most economists and policy makers are focusing on the International Monetary Fund’s epiphany on the perils of austerity, some researchers at the IMF have offered another take on the fiscal-policy debate. They found that less is more, even when it comes to the size and scope of government.

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More.

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Bloomberg - Are you a robot?