French President Francois Hollande has called for a 75 percent income tax on top earners in France t - Polidicks

[QUOTE=Doctor Zedacon;36935397]No, not everyone. Just an incredible vast majority of them. Hardwork is not a factor. Period. There are plenty of factors, all of which beyond the control of the individual, that go in to an individual's success. Race, family, political standing, location. Things that are completely out of the control of the individual. And luck alone is an overwhelming factor. But hardwork? It basically does not exist in the equation. Its of such little importance as to be not worth mentioning.[/QUOTE] How is hard work not a factor? For some people, maybe it isn't a factor. But for plenty of others, they actually have to work to get to where they are. CEOs and CFOs who start off at the bottom and work their way to the top, would you say they did no hard work to get to where they are? Can I start off as a staff accountant one day and then magically become CEO the next just because hard work isn't necessary?

[QUOTE=Disotrtion;36935494]My anecdote overrides your statistics.[/QUOTE] (except not really [url]http://taxprof.typepad.com/files/crs-1.pdf[/url])

[QUOTE=Ezhik;36932634]if they earned their money, they shouldn't have to give most of it just because they worked harder to get it.[/QUOTE] tax brackets shouldn't be difficult to wrap your heads around, nor should the reasoning behind them. it's not about "punishing the rich for working hard", its a situation in which a country needs finances and taxes need to be raised on somebody to provide that revenue. in the end, taxing the rich has the least impact on their quality of living and provides an enormous amount of revenue. while principally i might not think tax brackets are "fair", in the end they're a necessary evil because when you need to raise taxes, it's better to tax those that can afford it, rather than those already struggling to survive.

[QUOTE=DainBramageStudios;36935530]refresh the page, I added more[/QUOTE] yo I don't have any trust for an artificial metric of "personality" to not be tainted by the very sociocultural attitudes of wealth and merit that you yourself are defending right now [editline]25th July 2012[/editline] [QUOTE=Kopimi;36935592]tax brackets shouldn't be difficult to wrap your heads around, nor should the reasoning behind them. it's not about "punishing the rich for working hard", its a situation in which a country needs finances and taxes need to be raised on somebody to provide that revenue. in the end, taxing the rich has the least impact on their quality of living and provides an enormous amount of revenue. while principally i might not think tax brackets are "fair", in the end they're a necessary evil because when you need to raise taxes, it's better to tax those that can afford it, rather than those already struggling to survive.[/QUOTE] all of this bloviation about taxing the rich not being fair is, regardless of whether or not it's justified, very, very naive. we have to fucking tax somebody seeing as how trickle-down economics is a myth so let's tax the people who actually have some money

[QUOTE=SigmaLambda;36935560](except not really [url]http://taxprof.typepad.com/files/crs-1.pdf[/url])[/QUOTE] uh that's about income disparity not business life-expectancies??

[QUOTE=Kopimi;36935592]tax brackets shouldn't be difficult to wrap your heads around, nor should the reasoning behind them. it's not about "punishing the rich for working hard", its a situation in which a country needs finances and taxes need to be raised on somebody to provide that revenue. in the end, taxing the rich has the least impact on their quality of living and provides an enormous amount of revenue. while principally i might not think tax brackets are "fair", in the end they're a necessary evil because when you need to raise taxes, it's better to tax those that can afford it, rather than those already struggling to survive.[/QUOTE] Well, I just thought that it was 75% on everything at that point, not just on money past 1.2 mil. I guess this is more reasonable.

[QUOTE=SigmaLambda;36935607]yo I don't have any trust for an artificial metric of "personality" to not be tainted by the very sociocultural attitudes of wealth and merit that you yourself are defending right now[/QUOTE] it's a rigorous test used in psychology which superseded the flawed MBTI test. there are problems with it, yes, but provincialism is not one of them. burden of proof is on you to show that it's false, you can't just dismiss it out of hand because it disagrees with your worldview. you're treading dangerously close to scientific denialism at this point.

[QUOTE=SigmaLambda;36935560](except not really [url]http://taxprof.typepad.com/files/crs-1.pdf[/url])[/QUOTE] "Now read 22 pages of a unrelated pdf while I try to find something relevant." [editline]25th July 2012[/editline] [QUOTE=Kopimi;36935592]tax brackets shouldn't be difficult to wrap your heads around, nor should the reasoning behind them. it's not about "punishing the rich for working hard", its a situation in which a country needs finances and taxes need to be raised on somebody to provide that revenue. in the end, taxing the rich has the least impact on their quality of living and provides an enormous amount of revenue. while principally i might not think tax brackets are "fair", in the end they're a necessary evil because when you need to raise taxes, it's better to tax those that can afford it, rather than those already struggling to survive.[/QUOTE] Ezhik posted that before someone brought up that France has tax brackets, and explained the situation to us.

[QUOTE=DainBramageStudios;36935687]it's a rigorous test used in psychology which superseded the flawed MBTI test burden of proof is on you to show that it's false, you can't just dismiss it out of hand because it disagrees with your worldview. you're treading dangerously close to scientific denialism at this point.[/QUOTE] It's just social critique based on a history of "scientific" tests being biased on social attitudes which ultimately exclude certain groups of people or uphold socially supported preconceptions about The Way Things Are And Should Be [QUOTE=DainBramageStudios;36935659]uh that's about income disparity not business life-expectancies??[/QUOTE] with a specific bent on economic mobility. it states that income disparity has grown (more of us are in the lower class than every before) and that the lower class has less economic mobility than before, ergo your "anyone can make it with hard work" attitude is not particularly supported unless you're about to make some unethical proclamation that would support your continued belief like "well maybe the average person is just lazier/stupider/less deserving of wealth than they were 20 years ago"

[QUOTE=SigmaLambda;36935796]It's just social critique based on a history of "scientific" tests being biased on social attitudes which ultimately exclude certain groups of people or uphold socially supported preconceptions about The Way Things Are And Should Be[/QUOTE] [quote]As an imposed etic measure,[60] the Big Five have been replicated in a variety of different languages and cultures, such as German,[61] Chinese,[62] Indian,[63] etc.[64] For example, Thompson has demonstrated the Big Five structure across several cultures using an international English language scale.[32] Support has been less good for the Big Five as an emic measure in Asian countries. Cheung, van de Vijver, and Leong (2011) suggest that the Openness factor is particularly unsupported and that a different fifth factor is sometimes identified. Recent work has found relationships between Geert Hofstede’s cultural factors, Individualism, Power Distance, Masculinity, and Uncertainty Avoidance, with the average Big Five scores in a country.[65] For instance, the degree to which a country values individualism correlates with its average Extraversion, while people living in cultures which are accepting of large inequalities in their power structures tend to score somewhat higher on Conscientiousness. The reasons for these differences are as yet unknown; this is an active area of research.[/quote] wow the white people are oppressing meeee minor differences. that's all. [editline]26th July 2012[/editline] [QUOTE=SigmaLambda;36935796]with a specific bent on economic mobility. it states that income disparity has grown (more of us are in the lower class than every before) and that the lower class has less economic mobility than before, ergo your "anyone can make it with hard work" attitude is not particularly supported unless you're about to make some unethical proclamation that would support your continued belief like "well maybe the average person is just lazier/stupider/less deserving of wealth than they were 20 years ago"[/QUOTE] this debate has only ever been around entrepreneurs, not people attempting to make it big in pre-existing companies

[QUOTE=DainBramageStudios;36935846]wow the white people are oppressing meeee[/QUOTE] hmm that passage you quoted seems to imply that attitudes towards the relationship between success personality are socio-cultural ones as opposed to some platonic ideal of "hard work" as an objective, measurable aether-substance of some sort...

[QUOTE=SigmaLambda;36935885]hmm that passage you quoted seems to imply that attitudes towards the relationship between success personality are socio-cultural ones as opposed to some platonic ideal of "hard work" as an objective, measurable aether-substance of some sort...[/QUOTE] yes, the word "openness" means "hard work" [B]LEARN TO READ.[/B]

[QUOTE=DainBramageStudios;36935846] this debate has only ever been around entrepreneurs, not people attempting to make it big in pre-existing companies[/QUOTE] no this debate is about horses because, I, just like you, can apparently redefine the debate at a moment's notice neigh

Reminds me of when the the Beatles were getting 95% taxed and then they made the song Taxman. [media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZqK97av7I3s[/media]

[QUOTE=thisispain;36934838]war is one of the united states' greatest business ventures so i would disagree there. it's all about the cost. sure entrepreneurship might create wealth, but it's the cost i care about.[/QUOTE] Indeed; it's not just metal and money and petroleum that're being spent in war, it's more than just a material and economic cost that war guzzles up. War consumes lives; many John Does and Tommy Atkins' don't make it home from the deserts, many insurgents don't live to fight another day, and for the families of those who sling lead on the battlefield, the fear of loss is ever-present. Every day, war is likely to claim at least one life; a parent, a sibling, a child, a friend; on one side or the other, death is almost certain, and bereavement comes swiftly on the night winds, bringing fear, pain, and sometimes anger, to those close to the deceased. Even if the soldiers are well-trained and careful, some day their luck may run out; some day they might take a bullet where it counts, or their concentration may waver and a footfall triggers a mine, or they might just be in the wrong house when the drones arm their missiles. Life is a fragile thing, so easily shattered, and to the best of our knowledge nothing awaits afterward, no pearly gates or firey pits, no cycle of restoration; the precious data of the soul is lost when the body can no longer sustain it, leaving naught but a cold mannequin of meat and bone in fortified cloth, grasping a gun in it's cold lifeless hands. Though they say one can't really put a price on a life, i'd say that it's expensive when it's gone; expensive in a way that transcends the abstract arbitrarium of money. It's costly in emotions, in experiences, in time; all that nurturing care, all that education, all those connections, all the battles fought and survived, all the horrors endured and victories embraced; they all amount to nothing when the systems of the warrior encounter a critical failure and cannot recover, the symphony and the writings are tragically disrupted, the blank pages in the half-filled journal crumble to dust like a sandcastle during high tide, and all that is left is what they did, and the memories of those who knew them; the husband who had three kids with her, the friends who drank with her in the Windsor, the sergeant who saw her become a fine warrior, even the insurgent who sought vengeance after she shot his dear brother. What i'm getting at is that so long as death is the end, and the soul is lost when the body fails, the price of war is too much to pay; no amount of green notes can pay for the damage done to the warrior and their loved ones, no number of gold coins can restore that which can never be restored. If the future brought with it the power to preserve the soul, the technology to allow mind to survive independently of body and pour itself into an empty vessel when their old form fails, then the cost of war would probably become less complicated; death would be merely a temporary setback as opposed to a horrid and unfair conclusion to a story of so many pages, people wouldn't be as bereaved if they knew their close friend/family wasn't at risk of being lost forever, and as for conflict, combatants would have less inhibitions regarding life-threatening situations, since being pumped full of lead or being blown apart would mean they'd merely be inconvenienced, merely having to wait for the white-coats to prep a body for inhabitation, which'd take either a short while if there's a body available, or months of waiting around as a Specter until the tubes squeeze out a new Vessel. Nonetheless, such a miraculous technology hasn't been developed yet, and probably never will be, so in the end war is never worth the cost, no matter the size of your military budget. Even if some sort of Project Gestalt rears its head one day and brings a solution to the problem of death, war in the present day is just too expensive in terms of the stories and songs that're lost to the bullet and the bomb, and the aftermath of lives cut so brutally short. Also, in regards to the rich paying more, it's kind of general empathy and making use of their resources by using them to help those who need said resources, be they essentials for sustaining the body, or luxuries for sustaining one's sanity and morale; that way there are actually things around to be used as a reward for doing your part, appealing to the idea of good pay for good work. One cannot simply take and take; they must give in order to maintain balance and stability, both economical and personal. They say too much of anything is a bad thing, though to quote the Petshop Boys, "too much of anything is never enough"; some people want to have plenty of stuff so that they don't worry, but if you can't worry, what's the point in living? You can't have the up without the down, can't have the high without the low, can't have ying without yang, otherwise you become imbalanced inside. To truly live, you need the negatives to make you appreciate the positives, and if you're too high on the positives, you need to be dragged down by lows to prevent becoming desensitized and seeking even greater highs that could potentially be harmful. Example; candy tastes good, and it can taste great if you haven't had it for a while, but have it too often and it becomes meh, and you'll end up wanting to seek bigger sources of sugar to fix your craving, which is a slippery slope that can end up harming you and potentially others.

[QUOTE=SigmaLambda;36935913]no this debate is about horses because, I, just like you, can apparently redefine the debate at a moment's notice neigh[/QUOTE] Except he's not redefining the debate at all. I mean, just scroll up to the top of the page.

[QUOTE=SigmaLambda;36935913]no this debate is about horses because, I, just like you, can apparently redefine the debate at a moment's notice neigh[/QUOTE] [media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3g-0G8OrAtc[/media] well first of all we had a disagreement over whether or not the economy was zerosum, which you avoided. then I said this: [quote]and entrepreneurs apparently don't exist[/quote] then this [quote]but what about the people that did[/quote] then this [quote]they fucked up and I don't care one way or the other[/quote] then a few things about tax brackets which weren't in response to you then this [quote]a) gaming the system is hard work b) being born rich doesn't necessarily make you stay rich. you can still fuck up and lose it all c) you're willfully ignorant of people starting businesses and becoming wealthy from poorer backgrounds.[/quote] [quote][url=http://www.sba.gov/sites/default/files/Business-Survival.pdf]oh really?[/url][/quote] [quote]nope, see Landy et al., 1994, pp. 271, 273, Organ 1994 also here's the abstract from Ciavarella et al, 2003: [quote]This study examines the relationship of the entrepreneur's personality to long-term venture survival. We measure survival in two ways: (1) the likelihood the venture will survive for at least 8 years and (2) the overall life span of the venture. The “Big Five” personality attributes—extraversion, emotional stability, agreeableness, conscientiousness, and openness to experience provide the measures of the entrepreneur's personality. As hypothesized, the entrepreneur's conscientiousness was positively related to long-term venture survival. Contrary to expectations, we found a negative relationship between the entrepreneur's openness and long-term venture survival. Extraversion, emotional stability, and agreeableness were unrelated to long-term venture survival.[/quote][/quote] [quote]uh that's about income disparity not business life-expectancies??[/quote] then we started talking about psychology testing (which you don't actually know shit about) so yeah, this debate has been mostly about entrepreneurship. Sigma, throughout this debate you've just been reflexively flinging shit at scientific studies because they don't conform to whatever political ideology you subscribe to. What does that remind you of?

Is this a graduated tax in the sense that for every dollar over 1.2 million, you are taxed 75%, or is it, after 1.2 million dollars, you are taxed 75% of your total income.

[QUOTE=ironman17;36935944]If the future brought with it the power to preserve the soul[/QUOTE] Yeah but the soul doesn't exist for one thing.

[QUOTE=DainBramageStudios;36935980] Sigma, throughout this debate you've just been reflexively flinging shit at scientific studies because they don't conform to whatever political ideology you subscribe to. What does that remind you of?[/QUOTE] whinny, nicker

[QUOTE=DainBramageStudios;36935980][media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3g-0G8OrAtc[/media] well first of all we had a disagreement over whether or not the economy was zerosum, which you avoided. then I said this: then this then this then a few things about tax brackets which weren't in response to you then this then we started talking about psychology testing (which you don't actually know shit about) so yeah, this debate has been mostly about entrepreneurship. Sigma, throughout this debate you've just been reflexively flinging shit at scientific studies because they don't conform to whatever political ideology you subscribe to. What does that remind you of?[/QUOTE] should have skipped everything below the video and just ended the post on a good note you're just desperately trying to justify changing subjects and avoiding valid points because they don't fit into your small sub-debate you feel you're winning (you aren't)

[QUOTE=Luuper;36936056]Is this a graduated tax in the sense that for every dollar over 1.2 million, you are taxed 75%, or is it, after 1.2 million dollars, you are taxed 75% of your total income.[/QUOTE] The former. If I earn $1,000,001 then the first million is taxed at the lower rate, and the extra dollar is taxed at 75% [editline]26th July 2012[/editline] [QUOTE=Kopimi;36936070]should have skipped everything below the video and just ended the post on a good note you're just desperately trying to justify changing subjects and avoiding valid points because they don't fit into your small sub-debate you feel you're winning (you aren't)[/QUOTE] what valid points

[QUOTE=Kopimi;36936070]should have skipped everything below the video and just ended the post on a good note you're just desperately trying to justify changing subjects and avoiding valid points because they don't fit into your small sub-debate you feel you're winning (you aren't)[/QUOTE] [QUOTE] these are rare exceptions to the rule, dogg. the majority of new businesses fail within the first year. only the really fucking lucky manage to get anywhere[/QUOTE] your ignoring this and its making you look like an idiot.

[QUOTE=DainBramageStudios;36936076] what valid points[/QUOTE] It's totally valid because the argument about the success rates of small businesses is totally tangential to the original argument about the relationship between wealth and merit. Regardless of how often small businesses succeed; having a small business that doesn't fail doesn't mean that you're going to be rich, and most people don't have the cash to start up a small business in the first place; which makes this argument moot. The former condition is a premise that you accepted and conflated with "becoming rich" without argument and the second one predicates heavily on ~~~privilege~~~ now where's my feedbag I wanna eat a oat

[QUOTE=SigmaLambda;36936148]It's totally valid because the argument about the success rates of small businesses is totally tangential to the original argument about the relationship between wealth and merit. Regardless of how often small businesses succeed; having a small business that doesn't fail doesn't mean that you're going to be rich, and most people don't have the cash to start up a small business in the first place; which makes this argument moot. The former condition is a premise that you accepted and conflated with "becoming rich" without argument and the second one predicates heavily on ~~~privilege~~~ now where's my feedbag I wanna eat a oat[/QUOTE] wow you could have prevented this all 2 pages ago by saying that all at the beginning you know for a moment I thought you believed that economics was zero sum, that hard work has no correlation at all for business success, that the only way to get rich is to be lucky or be born into a rich family, and that the big 5 personality test is some kind of western conspiracy to keep other cultures down how silly of me

[QUOTE=Sobotnik;36936063]Yeah but the soul doesn't exist for one thing.[/QUOTE] Hmmm, thing is, I meant the soul as in the sum of our personalities, our experiences, our emotions, our ideas, what makes us unique and individual, though again I failed to explicitly state that's what I meant by soul. I used the wrong word there, probably better to use the term 'consciousness', since usually when I refer to the soul, I either mean the metaphysical construct that stores the self, or i'm referring to one's "humanity", like their sense of empathy and "goodness"; the latter term I use when denouncing publishers like Activision and EA, since from my perspective big corporations like those don't tend to have a "soul" so to speak, being that they seem to only think of money and don't seem to empathize or apologize; they seem faceless and inhuman. Publishers and empathy aside, what mankind may one day need would be a technology that could convert the central nervous system into some sort of durable ghost-like cloud capable of existing independently of a traditional shell, storing the human consciousness in a form that could easily inhabit a functional vessel of some sort, be it a blank-minded clone or a robotic platform. If humanity were dying out, be it due to a resource deficit, an incurable plague, or even simply due to a nuclear holocaust, we'd probably need to separate our consciousnesses from our old bodies, prepare replacement vessels for future inhabitation, wait until the Earth is habitable again, then awaken in our new bodies and begin life anew. I think that was the backstory of the game Nier, only the vessels became independent and destroyed the human spirits that they feared to be demons.

[QUOTE=ironman17;36936267]I should honestly write a book themed around that.[/QUOTE] atlas shrugged v2 - the pagecount strikes back

I've heard of Atlas Shrugged; apparently it's about the collapse of society as all the innovators go on strike due to increasing taxes, in an attempt to demonstrate that a world without the freedom to create is doomed. Sounds like a cool book, something to consider reading one day.

[QUOTE=ironman17;36936542]I've heard of Atlas Shrugged; apparently it's about the collapse of society as all the innovators go on strike due to increasing taxes, in an attempt to demonstrate that a world without the freedom to create is doomed. Sounds like a cool book, something to consider reading one day.[/QUOTE] I tried to read it but gave up a little bit in.

I can probably understand that; was it the book itself that put you off, or were there were other things tempting you at the time?