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Comment by rdtsc | Hacker News Reader

> The expectation of rising real incomes was built into the American culture

Ah that's the classic propaganda line:

    "I am not poor, I am just pre-wealthy."

...So I sure don't want to vote for anything that would jeopardize my wealthy position when I get there.

The key in all of this is ability to manipulate the people into believing and voting in a particular way. US has no shortage of zombies who don't think on their won. Blame the education system, blame the system as a whole, I don' t know. As long as people don't base their votes on reality they will end up voting against their own good because they are being manipulated.

Basic health care, tax cuts for the super rich, trickle down wealth, futile wars, all this things are being delegated (via votes) from un-informed people to the politicians via a manipulative process. I see this within my own extended family, I see it on the streets, in the stores, in school and at work.

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> US has no shortage of zombies who don't think on their won.

A human being is at the most juvenile when he encounters a view contrary to his own and ascribes it to stupidity.

If only everyone was as enlightened, as educated, as brilliant as he ... then everyone would understand.

No. Grow up.

I will never be wealthy and I will still continue to vote for a fair tax system. A flat tax system. Because everyone should pay the same, regardless of status or income.

I won't always be healthy and I will still continue to vote against a socialist healthcare system. Because everyone should pay for what they use, no more and no less. Not just with healthcare, but with everything.

You don't believe what I believe? That's fine. But how dare you ascribe my beliefs to ignorance? That in itself, is ignorance distilled. The refusal to even consider anything but your own stunted views.

rdtsc's not talking about you personally, but about the median voter. Many political arguments are founded in ignorance (in contradiction of available data or in defiance of logic), and observing this fact is not equivalent to a judgment of people who happen to hold the same opinions.

Having said that... Because everyone should pay the same, regardless of status or income. [...] Because everyone should pay for what they use, no more and no less.

These are perfectly valid opinions to hold, but to express them as if they were facts is to assume the correctness of your premises. I can see why you hold those positions, but I can also think of compelling arguments for the opposite positions.

Because your views are stupid. Easy example: a homeless tramp dying of ebola.

(You can substitute a bunch of other diseases naturally occuring in the USA if you like)

You'd normally want to pack that guy into a medical isolation unit pronto. You probably won't save him but at least you'll stop other people from catching it from him.

But no! maratd vetoes this because it's not fair. The hobo should pay for his isolation unit and until he can, he should be kicked out into the streets to act as a plague vector.

Rinse and repeat for all the other issues you haven't thought about properly.

I will never be wealthy and I will still continue to vote for a fair tax system. A flat tax system. Because everyone should pay the same, regardless of status or income.

Trouble with a flat tax system is the poor can't afford the tax rates the nation's current expenditure would require. It would work O.K. if the expenditure was much lower, but I see no way to get from here to there.

Aside from that, I've come to believe that a flat tax system isn't actually fair. The less income someone has, the more taxes cut into basic living expenses (because a greater portion of that person's income is spent on basic needs). On the other hand, someone with large incomes sees no tightening of basic living expenses because they make enough that the money lost to taxes falls solidly into the "extra income" region.

I'm not very good at describing this idea yet, but I tie it back to the idea I have happened upon that (for example) a 25% raise to a person making $40k is in terms of spending power much more than a 25% raise. This is because discretionary income is much smaller than $40k. The new $10k can be considered added discretionary income (assuming the person was meeting basic needs before) thus making it in effect much larger than a 25% bump.

I am not an economist, but it sounds like you're getting at something similar to the diminishing marginal utility of money. I can't find a good source online that explains this, but the basic idea is that the more money someone has, the less each additional increment is actually worth. For example, a $10,000 raise is a lot more useful to a person that makes $50,000 a year than to one who makes $500,000 a year.

There may be a connection with progressive taxation, in the sense that if money has diminishing marginal utility, then a flat tax on money is actually regressive in terms of utility. So then a progressive tax on money is closer to being "fair" in the sense of being a flatter tax on utility.

Thanks, this ties in to what I was saying very well.

That's correct. Alfred Marshall's theories of utility are the basis of modern economic analysis. Todd Buchholz' New Ideas from Dead Economists has a great introduction to these ideas while being more accessible than the typical econ textbook.

http://www.amazon.com/New-Ideas-Dead-Economists-Introduction...

"The less income someone has, the more taxes cut into basic living expenses (because a greater portion of that person's income is spent on basic needs)."

Covered by Milton Friedman's proposal of a flat tax with a minimum standard of living deductible, e.g. 10k USD. Furthermore, those making less than that 10k would get the 'refund' as some sort of social security. Developed in his book "Capitalism and Freedom".

"I'm not very good at describing this idea yet,"

What your describing is, as far as I can tell, the concept of "marginal utility".

Oh god. Don't give them a refund, just make the first X,000 tax free. That's better than circulating the money through the hands of a bunch of bureaucrats.

I think the act of actually paying a tax is quite important, despite the bureaucratic overhead. For the same reason, I think payroll taxes and the like should be directly paid by checks (not just deducted from pay and handled by the employer). This way, a person would actually have that money and then have to commit the physical act of giving their money to the government instead of just seeing it as money not in their paycheck.

A flat tax? That's a bit too socialist for my tastes... should a man making $100k per year really be forced to pay twice as much as a man making $50k per year, just for being more productive? Wouldn't a head tax be better, since everyone would then pay equally? Plus you would not have the disincentive effect on marginal labor of your "make twice as much, pay twice as much" scheme.

Also, why should I be forced to pay for your military and your police force? Shouldn't it be my choice to consume what I want?

What if your paying the way for the other guy, who is 20 years your junior, allows him to better pay your medical bills when you get sick at age 70, and have no money to pay yourself (through no fault of your own you have lost a lot when X disaster occurred)? The swings and roundabout of the system aren't ever simple. Likewise, what about the 5 year old who needs state help, has contributed nothing, has had no chance to and has done nothing wrong. Who should pay if the parents don't?

I assume/hope scarmig is being sarcastic here? ;) But yes historically (middle-ages and before) head-based tax systems were considered fair.

Anyhow, non-progressive taxation and market-based health-care is a waste of human capital, not to mention that it leads to grossly inhumane situations.

People that don't get that should look at the stats and/or study some basic economics. For example, how does the UK spend only about half as much on healthcare, and still has a higher life-expectancy than the US?

> I will never be wealthy and I will still continue to vote for a fair tax system.

What makes you think that's fair? I didn't say what is fair or not, you brought that into the discussion. Do you think marginal utility doesn't make sense. Why is linear, percentage based, tax "fair"? Seems rather arbitrary to me.

> I won't always be healthy and I will still continue to vote against a socialist healthcare system. Because everyone should pay for what they use,

Ok except that the world where each individual is isolated and should just get what they need for themselves by paying and nothing more is a fantasy world. Exactly the kind of a situation I was talking about. Turning human lives and their health into a marketable commodity is craziness. Letting emergency services handle terminal heart patients, which would have been managed better by preventive care is insanity. Checking people's accounts before pulling the ambulance to the door is a pretty scary society, and maybe you evaluated it and decided to vote for that, I decide not to. Starting wars just to fuel the military industrial complex, is craziness. Letting old people die of hunger and neglect is craziness.

> You don't believe what I believe? That's fine. But how dare you ascribe my beliefs to ignorance?

I dare because it seems at least some of your beliefs are crazy and are hurting not only yourself in the long run but others. Maybe you'll say that you don't care about others, and it shouldn't matter what happens to them, and I say that's crazy as well.

> ... their health into a marketable commodity is craziness

> ... fuel the military industrial complex, is craziness.

> ... old people die of hunger and neglect is craziness.

> ... your beliefs are crazy

> ... and I say that's crazy as well

When you develop the maturity to actually consider another human being's view point and respond in an intelligent manner, I'll be happy to respond in kind.

Let's try a random example.

> Letting emergency services handle terminal heart patients, which would have been managed better by preventive care is insanity.

I see where you're coming from. You no doubt feel that by reducing the costs to preventative care through government subsidy, we could create a reality where the overwhelming majority of the population would be actively screened for heart disease and treat it as soon as detected, reducing overall costs.

You're wrong. Even the poorest of the poor can afford to see a physician once a year to get screened. Even if they paid out of pocket. The kind of tests you're talking about cost less than a hundred dollars.

So why don't they? They choose not to. Maybe they despise doctors, maybe it reminds them of their own mortality, maybe they feel like it could never happen to them, but they do make that choice. And it's not because of cost.

See how that works? I made an effort to understand why you said what you did, I thought about it, and then I responded without calling any of your ideas crazy, insane, ignorant, or stupid.

Now you try.

> But how dare you ascribe my beliefs to ignorance?

Because they do seem to stem from ignorance with regards to the purpose of a society. Why should I refrain from robbing you if I am sick and hungry whilst you seem to have more than you need? We have entered into a society in order to protect ourselves, which means that even the poorest in our society must have healthcare and food on the table, which again requires all of us to pay a certain amount of our money for things we might not directly need. You might not need healthcare, roads, public transportation etc. but you do need to not be killed and robbed by people who have nothing.

You speak with the confidence of a young man. If it's not too intrusive, may I ask your age and gender?

I've said for a long time the basic problem in the States isn't capitalism vs. socialism or rich vs. poor, but rather educated vs. uneducated. I think I'm not being out of line to claim that on the average an American's high-school-level education is pretty poor. People who are victims of poor education don't know history (which is rich in examples of past policy), can't think critically or reason about potential outcomes, and don't know to sometimes be healthily skeptical of things they're told.

Those kinds of people will never be able to vote in their best interests because they have no idea what their interests even are, because they're easily manipulated, and because they're incapable of reasoning critically about even the most basic policy decisions. That's how you wind up with people holding up picket signs saying "Obama=socialism" on one side and "Keep your hands off my Medicare" on the other.

The problem is basic education.

> I think I'm not being out of line to claim that on the average an American's high-school-level education is pretty poor.

The thing is that it's not really that true. Here's a typical article on Huffington Post bemoaning the American education system: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/07/23/us-students-still-l...

But if you read it carefully, the truth is that we're not getting worse. We're just not getting better as fast as others. We used to be the best. Now we're in the middle. We're not worse than we were 60 years ago. We're better. Other countries have just gotten better much faster. Which is a trend that applies to a lot in America these days.

Education IS improving. So, I think anything that tries to relate an absolute decline to "the failure of our schools" is wrong. Maybe that's not your point though.

The thing is that what you describe at the beginning of your post is actually typically human. Experiments have shown we all have cognitive biases that make us bad at "being skeptical" and "reasoning about potential outcomes" or using past examples to predict future events (even when we're well educated.) Humans are just not good at doing that stuff. We can overcome our biases but that's not really taught in school. You can read about a lot of it at http://lesswrong.com/

So I don't think it's that helpful to bundle up people who struggle with cognitive biases as "Those kinds of people" There's a chance that "our kind of people", aka people who read hacker news, are much better at being rational but it's probably because we've taught ourselves to think like computers! Because that's a big part of what being a hacker is.

I'm not saying education is better or worse than in the past, just that (in general) it's not up to the task of producing an electorate capable of voting rationally. After all, it's often people of retirement age you see holding those anti-Obamacare signs. Their basic education did happen 60-odd years ago and it clearly failed them.

"Those kinds of people will never be able to vote in their best interests"

What happened to voting in the interests of the entire population?

Nobody knows for certain what the interests of the entire population are; voting is a mechanism for groping towards identifying those interests.

But there's a big difference in thought process between "I think voting this way is best for everyone" and "I think my benefits will go up if I vote this way".

I think a person's best interest is often (not always!) the same as the general interest. Education comes in to play when a person is educated enough to be able to rationally reason that case. For example, "I have a perfectly good well on my property, but I understand that contributing to a public water supply system may benefit me in the long run, because maybe my well will go dry." Or maybe, "I have a well, but contributing to a public water system will increase commerce in the area which will directly benefit me."

Obviously that's not always going to be the case, and people can and will reason incorrectly, but the important part is that a person is capable of applying some modicum of thought instead of just "The rent is too damn high" or "Obama is a communist, hang him for treason."

Calling people names because they disagree with a progressive tax structure or mandated health insurance isn't a convincing argument for your side. There are arguments to be made for and against these policies.

In fact, it would be helpful for you to recognize that you are simply one side of a two-sided issue, each side of which believes they are obviously correct and that the other side is too uneducated to know how wrong they are.

From a rational point of view I can understand how someone with a high income is against a progressive tax structure. How someone how has millions of dollars stashed in an account votes against a socialized basic care. I don't understand why someone living on government's check, and having poor health due to a financial inability to go the doctor, is voting against it. That is the issue.

The problem I am describing is people being manipulated to vote against their own interest. Religious, fears, fake promises are all used effectively by those in power to recruit and manipulate others to do their bidding for them. That is what is scary.

"I don't understand why someone living on government's check, and having poor health due to a financial inability to go the doctor, is voting against it."

Because maybe these people actually see the immorality of taking from others by force?

"The problem I am describing is people being manipulated to vote against their own interest."

So morality has no bearing on your position? "Fuck morality and others, as long as I get mine, and then some?" Seems like your position is in direct contradiction with the values you claim to defend.

Morality has a bearing on it. Not letting die, or for that matter, enabling a minimally humane life for everyone, is as important, or more important than the dictum against (potentially unjust) taxation.

I see why in the US one might be against this, as I've lived there (working at a great IT job in central San Francisco), and have seen the poverty, and the human suffering (not to mention the smell of bums on the bus). Probably feels like there'll be no end to it, and then, in order not to feel guilty or bad, one closes ones eyes to it by believing it's their own fault; 'lazy smelly bastards!', but that doesn't change the moral reality of it.

When judging oneself, feel free to be ruthless like Ayn Rand, when judging others, please be considerate, and take into account more than economics alone.

In a way I evaded it too. Not by borking up my morality, but by voting with my feet when the opportunity presented itself. I am back in the UK now, and happy to be part of a society that treats it's weakest members well (or ok-ish at least).

I wonder what it is between the US and Europe, that we have such different notions of (social) justice. Perhaps it is because Europe has more history, that we have seen over and over that wealth is often gained (and lost) by luck, that often it accumulates over dozens of generations in the hands of the few. While the US is only now developing it's own aristocracy. I even heard a British nobleman once vehemently argue that wealth is not deserved.

So yes, being pragmatic we do allow the market to flourish, and do allow the wealthy to enjoy their wealth, but we don't confuse economics with morality, and moderate it's excesses through progressive taxation, some redistribution, and universal health-care. Human life and happiness trumps justice on the economic plane.

In other news, the UK now has the greatest divide between rich and poor in the west.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk-most-unequal-country-in...

1) That article is 18 years old 2) Relative inequality is irrelevant as a measure.

"immorality "

That is a strange moral system you have in the US. In other countries, it is morally acceptable to take from the rich and redistribute to the poor.

The reason is that in those countries, wealth and lack of wealth is thought to be a great part influenced by factor outside your control (chance). That is even backed by studies, if you are born in a poor families, you will have less opportunities than a rich kid in a rich family.

Taxing the rich to help poor people in those circumstances is not to punish hard work to reward lazyness(=immoral), it is perceived as balancing unfairness in nature.

On the other hand, there are other reason why a poor could be against taxing the rich that have nothing to do with some fluid concept like morality. It could be, for example, that they agree with the numbers and the theories presented by the party disagreeing with the taxes. After all, trickle down economic could work as described, why not, it is supported by important AND qualified people.

What is missing in US politics (and generally in politic) is a scientific approach to the proposition. The level of proof required to submit political proposition as important as tax level is much lower than what you need to convince your wife to let you buy an XBox. That is the problem, voters are provided with vague theories with nothing to back them.

How is it moral to take somebody else's propety?

Because that somebody else has agreed ?

So taxes are voluntary? Awesome.

Indeed, US/EU allows you to voluntarily pay taxes above the legal minimum corresponding to your situation. I'm happy you find that awesome.

You live here. You agree. If you don't, move to somalia or something. (somalia is tongue in cheek, obviously).

Well maybe not so tongue in cheek. You see, I have lived in US for more than a decade and noticed there is a disproportionate number of Randian type libertarians here. Mostly are just college kids who read Atlas Shrugged and now they want government to get out of their business.

This is the immaturity and fantasy world that I was referring above. For all intended purpose, a place where FDA, SEC, tax authority (IRS) don't exist and are out of people "hair" exist -- many of those places are pretty scary to live in, Somalia is one of them, other poor countries are also there. You'd think those would be a libertarian paradise, no controls, no need to pay taxes, but reality the opposite is true.

Taxes are part of the package deal. You get some things back for them. The package deal (the contract if you will) in theory is voluntary. You are free to get your ocean liner and set sail into the international waters where you don't have to pay anyone anything.

Take a look at "your" money. Notice that it says "Federal Reserve Note." That's because it's a promise created, promoted, distributed and backed by the government. In a very real sense, it's their money.

As the "property" you feel so strongly about, belongs to the government, it seems only fair that you should follow their rules in the use and disposition of it, don't you think?

I have another question, too, which is on a completely different tack. Why don't you care about the poor and weak in your society? Don't you see you're all in it together? Doesn't common fellow feeling let you see that trying to lift up the disadvantaged is a genuinely human and humane thing to do?

  | Because maybe these people actually see the
  | immorality of taking from others by force?

Based on this statement, the only form of taxes that you approve of is a 'pay whatever you want' system, right? Otherwise, all taxes is immoral, or at least any tax that is imposed on at least 1 person that feels it is too high.

  | So morality has no bearing on your position?

One of the things being described is the people that hold positions like, "Don't you dare touch my socialist programs (Social Security, Medicare, etc), but vote against Obama because he's a socialist and socialism is evil... the Bible says so!"

>I am not poor, I am just pre-wealthy.

Whose propaganda line? I've never heard anyone in favor of small government say that. There aren't people in the electorate who think they're going to wind up wealthy to swing an election.

The lack of increasing real incomes doesn't have anything to do with "tax cuts for the super rich". It's the combination of globalization and the importation of ten million poor people. If you're doing a job that can be taught to a Central or South American peasant in a few weeks you simply have no power in the labor market.

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