Meet the rich (they are stupid and heartless)

[Pawn Power]

Meet the rich

The gap between rich and poor is wider than ever. But that doesn't seem to bother Britain's wealthiest earners. In an extract from their new book, Polly Toynbee and David Walker describe the jaw-dropping arrogance they encountered when they asked some of the fat cats to justify their lives of luxury

http://www.guardian.co.uk/money/2008/aug/04/workandcareers.executivesalaries


Here is a great article on the "positions" of the super wealth.

[politics student]

Tax consultants Grant Thornton estimated that in 2006 at least 32 of the UK's 54 billionaires paid no income tax at all.

Fucking disgusting!

I knew most found ways to avoid most tax but all of it. :cursing:

Ok just finished reading all of it, most of the responses I expected and what they expected the average income to be was not surprising from people so disconnected from society.

[Bud Struggle]

I take it that the Guardian is the "Daily Mail" of the Left. :lol:

[Joe Hill's Ghost]

I take it that the Guardian is the "Daily Mail" of the Left. :lol:

The Guardian isn't very left wing in the first place. It was started by a Liberal party dude.

[politics student]

I take it that the Guardian is the "Daily Mail" of the Left. :lol:

No the Guardian will print anything to piss some people off.

Its all about creating debate.

Saying that they have published some great radical feminist articles in the past. :cool:

[Schrödinger's Cat]

I read an article that had similar findings for the States: thousands of people making more than a million dollars were paying absolutely no income tax, and their investments were getting the good ol' 15% chop off block, even for upwards of $20 million.

It's moments like these I remember the wisdom of the good Dr. King: What this country needs is a radical redistribution of economic power. [different snip] When machines and computers, profit motives and property rights are considered more important than people, the giant triplets of racism, materialism, and militarism are incapable of being conquered.

[forward]

liberal party seems leftist to me

[Schrödinger's Cat]

Says an advocate for killing drug users. I think all of reality is "left" to you.

[politics student]

I read an article that had similar findings for the States: thousands of people making more than a million dollars were paying absolutely no income tax, and their investments were getting the good ol' 15% chop off block, even for upwards of $20 million.

It's moments like these I remember the wisdom of the good Dr. King: What this country needs is a radical redistribution of economic power. [different snip] When machines and computers, profit motives and property rights are considered more important than people, the giant triplets of racism, materialism, and militarism are incapable of being conquered.

What was the article called? Who published it?

Rather interested to look it up, I may have read it in the past it rings a bell.

[Bud Struggle]

The Guardian isn't very left wing in the first place. It was started by a Liberal party dude.

I once quoted something from the Daily Mail--and got some MAJOR negative reaction. I'm not British and for the most part papers in the USA--are all the same.

Anyway to the story. Yea, those folks are a bit nasty and arrogant, I full agree--some of these people happen to be in a business of "money"--merchant banking. They dela in billions and if they take a few pennies commission--those few pennies are millions. No different than a butcher taking home a good steak after a days work.

I saw a lot of the life when I lived in NYC--you make a lot, but you spend a lot. So making $250,000 a year (100,000 lbs ;)) doesn't go all that far.

Most people that have good jobs are decent people that got lucky or were smart--they have fancier things than poor people, but their lives are not that much different.

These authors are a bit sensationalist--actually I'm farmiliar with that Toynbee woman--her cousin owns Castle Howard, the place where they keep filming those Brideshead Revisited movies.

[Schrödinger's Cat]

What was the article called? Who published it?

Rather interested to look it up, I may have read it in the past it rings a bell.

I'm trying to look for it. In the meantime I found a good blogger (with citations) who shows how capitalists get around taxation and put the burden on workers of all income groups. Warren Buffet only had to pay about 22% of his income in taxes for 2006. About three-fourths of the country payed more (percentage) in taxes than the second richest man in America.

http://philosophers-stone.typepad.com/my_weblog/2006/11/how_the_rich_do.html

Edit- Found the article. Apparently it's people making more than $200,000 per year, not millionaires.
http://www.usatoday.com/money/perfi/taxes/2008-06-11-taxes_N.htm?csp=34


Death is inevitable, but federal income taxes aren't for an increased number of high-income earners.

New IRS statistics show 7,389 federal tax returns with $200,000 or more in adjusted gross income reported no federal income taxes in 2005. That's a 161% jump from the 2,833 comparable returns filed in 2004.

[Pirate turtle the 11th]

I once quoted something from the Daily Mail--and got some MAJOR negative reaction. I'm not British and for the most part papers in the USA--are all the same.


The daily mail is known as "gutter press" alongside the daily express it targets middle class people who like to complain about the immigrants and eroding of family values. Go look at the posts on uk debate started by them and you will see what i mean. I once heard a dude who wrote for the daily mail say "the perfect daily mail story will leave you hating somone or something" and thats how the daily mail works.


The Gaurdain is mostly librel stuff which sells on the impression it is open minded and takes everything into account (although sometimes it does not). Although the bleeding hearty stuff annoys me its quite a good source.

[Socialist18]

Rich capitalist people suck, the working class is where the real people are.:D

[Decolonize The Left]

Anyway to the story. Yea, those folks are a bit nasty and arrogant, I full agree--some of these people happen to be in a business of "money"--merchant banking. They dela in billions and if they take a few pennies commission--those few pennies are millions. No different than a butcher taking home a good steak after a days work.

And just how many steaks can a couple million dollars buy? Your analogy is so incoherent it's shocking.

- August

[Bud Struggle]

And just how many steaks can a couple million dollars buy? Your analogy is so incoherent it's shocking.

- August

Some people deal in money and take home money at the end of the day. Some people deal in beef and take home steaks at the end of the day--what's so hard to understand?

Hey, I deal in real estate--do you think I bought my house or did my business--and I just lease it? One of the perks of owning the "means of production" is that you own everything the means of production owns.

The rich may be heartless--but they sure aren't stupid. :D

[Decolonize The Left]

Some people deal in money and take home money at the end of the day. Some people deal in beef and take home steaks at the end of the day--what's so hard to understand?

Hey, I deal in real estate--do you think I bought my house or did my business--and I just lease it? One of the perks of owning the "means of production" is that you own everything the means of production owns.

The rich may be heartless--but they sure aren't stupid. :D

The rich might not be, but your argument certainly is. You may be correct in the simplistic sense - each take home 'something.' But in actuality these are so far differentiated that your analogy insults butchers.

A banker who takes home two million dollars can buy, let's say, one million steaks. The butcher who works all day can take home... one. OR, let's give you even more benefit of the doubt - the butcher takes home one steak each day. The butcher now has accumulated a whopping 365 steaks, as opposed to the banker who has one million. But hey, they're the same aren't they... no difference here.

In fact, if you ignore material differences, quantitative differences, and the well-being of the majority of individuals, capitalism looks quite fair. :rolleyes:

- August

[Publius]

Fucking disgusting!

I knew most found ways to avoid most tax but all of it. :cursing:

To be fair, being a "billionaire" need only mean that you own that much in stock.

These people probably don't make any "income", and as such cannot, in principle, be taxed on their income.

Now the question is, should people be taxed on their stock holdings? Only when they liquify them, though.

A person can be "worth a billion dollars" and not have anything directly in his or her name until they sell that stock. I think that when they sell the stock they should be taxed, as well as be taxed on money they make from derivatives.



Ok just finished reading all of it, most of the responses I expected and what they expected the average income to be was not surprising from people so disconnected from society.

It's worse than this, I assure you.

I just finished reading Melvin Konner's The Tangled Wing (a FANTASTIC book, by the way) and in it he recounts this anecdote:

"A statement by a twelve-year-old girl about one of her familys servants is typical:

'We had one maid, and she said we spent more time with the animals than she does with her children. I felt sad when she told me that. She has no understanding of what an animal needs. She was the one who was always telling me I was beautiful, and so I didn't need any lotion on my skin. I wanted to give her the lotion. She needs it. Her skin is in terrible shape. It's so dried and cracked. My mother says you can be poor and still know how to take care of yourself. If our maid stopped buying a lot of candy and potato chips, she could afford to get herself som skin lotion. And she wouldn't be so fat!'

We're raising an entire generation of these things. Watch MTV Cribs sometime. Same people.

Also, there's an excellent quote in here from Bill Gates, of all people:

From: http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9F06E7D91F30F930A35752C1A9669C8B 63



As the ''Creating Digital Dividends'' conference drew to a close in Seattle recently, the final speaker arrived and started asking skeptical questions. The premise was that ''market drivers'' could be used ''to bring the benefits of connectivity and participation in the e-economy to all of the world's six billion people,'' according to conference materials, but the speaker would have little of it.



''I mean, do people have a clear view of what it means to live on $1 a day?'' the speaker, William H. Gates, asked. ''There's no electricity in that house. None.''



When a moderator brought up solar power, Mr. Gates shot back, ''No! You can't afford a solar power system for less than $1 a day.'' And, ''You're just buying food, you're trying to stay alive.''


This is the attitude of the rich.


It's funny, in a way. I don't even like Gates, or especially Microsoft, but I definitely respect him for what he's doing philanthropically.

He actually seems to understand what's going on:





It is a theme to which Mr. Gates, the world's richest man, returns in an interview at his office here at the Microsoft Corporation, the giant software maker he founded. Pacing the room, waving his hands, he conjures up an image of an African village that receives a computer.



''The mothers are going to walk right up to that computer and say, My children are dying, what can you do?'' Mr. Gates says. ''They're not going to sit there and like, browse eBay or something. What they want is for their children to live. They don't want their children's growth to be stunted. Do you really have to put in computers to figure that out?''


That's a striking image, and a terrifically sad one.

[Schrödinger's Cat]

To be fair, being a "billionaire" need only mean that you own that much in stock.

These people probably don't make any "income", and as such cannot, in principle, be taxed on their income.

Now the question is, should people be taxed on their stock holdings? Only when they liquify them, though.

A person can be "worth a billion dollars" and not have anything directly in his or her name until they sell that stock. I think that when they sell the stock they should be taxed, as well as be taxed on money they make from derivatives.
How do you think the economy would respond to investments being lumped in with income even when liquefied? Currently (long-term) investments are taxed at 15%, which is close to what the bottom income-earners fork over. Enacting a progressive tax for investments would be pretty rough waters (not taking into consideration the fight these people would put up), and even wealth that is not liquefied still counts as unjust acquisition of money. Holdings still act as an influence.

The best way to target capitalist wealth is to cut the state out from beneath them. No incorporation. No corporate personhood. No subsidization. No tax loopholes. No exclusive rights to property (unless, at the bare minimum, a LVT is payed off).

Bill Gates and Warren Buffet make some plainly obvious inferences, which is kind of sad in itself since we have blowhards on television championing Objectivist morality: reciprocate what I might give you... maybe. Once you attack homosexuals.

Still, neither can don the white cloak just yet. Buffet squeezes through any tax loophole he can find, and Gates uses his foundation for business purposes. On a related note, these charities only account for about 5% of all annual donations. That's pretty startling, seeing how the top 1% owns 40% of the country's wealth, and about half that in income. The most generous group of people can be found in the "upper middle class."

[Bud Struggle]

In fact, if you ignore material differences, quantitative differences, and the well-being of the majority of individuals, capitalism looks quite fair. :rolleyes:

- August

It doesn't matter in the least how much people take home--if the guy earns it, he earns it. Who are you or who is anyone else to say otherwise? If someone deals in billions of dollars and if he takes home 1% that could be quite a lot, if he deals in cows he may thake home 1% of the cow--there's no big social message here, some people by virtue of what they do make more than others. They don't take a bigger % or they don't do anything illegal--they just work in a different medium that affords more income.

There's nothing wrong with that, they are no laws against it. You may not LIKE it, but lots of people don't like lots of things--it doesn't make it wrong, it just means that you don't like it.

Which of course, is just fine.

[Publius]

How do you think the economy would respond to investments being lumped in with income even when liquefied?

I don't know.

Only when liquified.

Only when the investments become "income" would I tax them. In other words, they would only be taxed when used for personal purposes, however defined.

Businesses like holding companies could buy and sell stock while avoiding personal rates, for example, but some individual who owns masses of stock and sells it and then lives off the proceeds would have to pay.



Currently (long-term) investments are taxed at 15%, which is close to what the bottom income-earners fork over. Enacting a progressive tax for investments would be pretty rough waters (not taking into consideration the fight these people would put up), and even wealth that is not liquefied still counts as unjust acquisition of money. Holdings still act as an influence.

Yes, but the point is, more than anything, to create money for the public coffers, which can then be put to good use.

They would put up a fight, but fuck them.

Another big deal would be Inheritance Taxes. They should be high as fuck. Also, maybe some sort of sales tax on the rich.

Say if you make x amount of money, you're now subject to a certain tax on luxury purchases. That would amount to the same thing.



The best way to target capitalist wealth is to cut the state out from beneath them. No incorporation. No corporate personhood. No subsidization. No tax loopholes. No exclusive rights to property (unless, at the bare minimum, a LVT is payed off).

The problem is that cuts quite a bit else out as well.

Incorporation isn't all bad, for example. It often helps small businesses as well. "No tax loopholes" is an awful nice idea, but the point of a loophole is that it defies the rules. Any rule can, in principle, be defied, it seems.



Bill Gates and Warren Buffet make some plainly obvious inferences, which is kind of sad in itself since we have blowhards on television championing Objectivist morality: reciprocate what I might give you... maybe. Once you attack homosexuals.

Still, neither can don the white cloak just yet. Buffet squeezes through any tax loophole he can find, and Gates uses his foundation for business purposes. On a related note, these charities only account for about 5% of all annual donations. That's pretty startling, seeing how the top 1% owns 40% of the country's wealth, and about half that in income. The most generous group of people can be found in the "upper middle class."


This is true.

[Lost In Translation]

Alright, back to the OP: I'm really not that surprised at the arrogance of the rich. They always justify it as saying 'I worked hard, he didn't. That's why I got the dough and drive mercedes, and he's living on welfare'. These people don't have second thoughts about these issues. It's really provocative, imo, and sometimes, i just want to beat the crap out of them.

[Bud Struggle]

Alright, back to the OP: I'm really not that surprised at the arrogance of the rich. They always justify it as saying 'I worked hard, he didn't. That's why I got the dough and drive mercedes, and he's living on welfare'. These people don't have second thoughts about these issues. It's really provocative, imo, and sometimes, i just want to beat the crap out of them.

Nope. The rich are people just like the poor. Some rich are idiotic snobs and some poor are idiotic snobs. Some rich are nice good peoiple some poor are nice good people. That's it.

On the of the Marxian fallacies is that people that make different sums of money are some how intrinsicly "different" from one another. they want different things, they think different thoughts.

Nothing could be further from the truth. People are people no matter how much money the make or don't make.

What the OP posted was just some inflamitory article where they talked to a bunch of snots and got a bunch of snotty answers--they put it in a book so it would sell. All fine and good but it's a piece of propaganda as much as a book about poor people being shiftless and lazy might be a piece of propaganda.

Listen: everyone on earth is in the same "class" the human class. Some people have more money, some have less--but making thinking some coins in one's pocket makes people different from one another is just nonsense.

I was poor and i was rich, I know lots of poor people and I know lots of rich people--and they are all the same--they are people.

[Schrödinger's Cat]

different sums of money

I don't think you're using the term Marxian correctly. It's not interchangable with Marxist.

Regardless of that little tidbit, Marxism is impartial to the sum of money one acquires. Doctors and factory workers are of the same class. We are responsive to the way people acquire money, which is to say - we believe that capitalists are thieves.


Listen: everyone on earth is in the same "class" the human class. Some people have more money, some have less--but making thinking some coins in one's pocket makes people different from one another is just nonsense.



Hey, aristocrats and landed gentry made that same exact statement. Fuggetaboutit! Just let us pick every bone out of your pocket for our pleasures on the claim of private property! Clearly you can see I deserve this little plot of land because I - uh - defecated in it. Oh, and I took your wood and built a house here.

[Bud Struggle]

I don't think you're using the term Marxian correctly. It's not interchangable with Marxist.

I'm sure--I don't know why I didn't write Marxist.


Regardless of that little tidbit, Marxism is impartial to the sum of money one acquires. Doctors and factory workers are of the same class. We are responsive to the way people acquire money, which is to say - we believe that capitalists are thieves. I have my issues ther, of course.




Hey, aristocrats and landed gentry made that same exact statement. Fuggetaboutit! Just let us pick every bone out of your pocket for our pleasures on the claim of private property! Clearly you can see I deserve this little plot of land because I - uh - defecated in it. Oh, and I took your wood and built a house here.

Now that's an interesting point. My neighbours on our yearly vacation to Itlay are mostly British aristocracy--they summer in Italy and let our their big houses as museums for turists in Britain and then take them back over again on October 1.

And I'll admit the British lords are different. They really think they are better than everyone else. There is a lot of pomposity there. One time we were all out to dinner and for some reason someone stopped by and we introduced ourselves and everyone had a fancy title so kidding around I said I was the "Honorable" TomK. The whole freakin' party STOPPED and it was EXPLAINED to me EXACTLY what an "honorable" was and why I am NOT an honorable.

Pain in the ass people--I'd be more thn happy to help you guys shoot them when the Revolution comes. :)

[Labor Shall Rule]

The individual 'capitalist' is not the problem—Warren Buffet might be able to talk football and keep up great conversation, but the intricacies of the market necessitated corporate structural reorganizing with the aim of a greater return on investment during his holding of Berkshire-Hathaway, so he (most likely) wrecked far more lives than he helped with his charity.

As so, they are only the class enemy.

[Kwisatz Haderach]

It doesn't matter in the least how much people take home--if the guy earns it, he earns it.
What is "earning?" Clearly some ways of obtaining money are justified, and others aren't. It does matter how people make their money - for example you wouldn't like it if I made my money by robbing your house.

So no, you can't say that it doesn't matter how people make their money, unless you're willing to accept theft, robbery, extortion and so on.

We simply happen to believe that capitalist profits are as bad as theft, robbery, or extortion.


There's nothing wrong with that, they are no laws against it. You may not LIKE it, but lots of people don't like lots of things--it doesn't make it wrong, it just means that you don't like it.
Wait, so now the law is the measure of all morality? Whatever is legal is moral, and whatever is illegal is immoral?

That's dangerous and absurd territory you're going into. It's basically Might Makes Right - whoever has the power to write laws is always right and moral. If whatever is legal cannot be wrong, then what happens if someone passes a law saying that you should be killed for sport? Is that not wrong then?

[Demogorgon]

I once quoted something from the Daily Mail--and got some MAJOR negative reaction. I'm not British and for the most part papers in the USA--are all the same.

Th Guardian is a quality newspaper with fairly high journalistic standards. The Daily Mail is a tabloid rag.

It is like comparing the New York Times with the New York Post.

[Bud Struggle]

What is "earning?" Clearly some ways of obtaining money are justified, and others aren't. It does matter how people make their money - for example you wouldn't like it if I made my money by robbing your house.

Agreed.


So no, you can't say that it doesn't matter how people make their money, unless you're willing to accept theft, robbery, extortion and so on. Agreed, too.


We simply happen to believe that capitalist profits are as bad as theft, robbery, or extortion. Here we don't agree. Your belief that Capitalist profits are bad is something not agreed on by a concensus of humanity. It's a minority opinion and as long as it remains such--it holds no real moral weight.



Wait, so now the law is the measure of all morality? Whatever is legal is moral, and whatever is illegal is immoral? He else would you define it? In Nazi Germany it was "moral" to persecute Jews. No one was put into prison for doing bad things to Jews. How else could one define one's moral philosophy than by the judging it by the society in which one lives?


That's dangerous and absurd territory you're going into. It's basically Might Makes Right - whoever has the power to write laws is always right and moral. If whatever is legal cannot be wrong, then what happens if someone passes a law saying that you should be killed for sport? Is that not wrong then? If one postits the nonexistance of a supreme law giver--than where else can on determine a font of all morality. Any morality devised by man is surely "flawed" as the example of what happened to Jews in Nazi Germany. NOW we say we were wrong to gas Jews but at the time the moral compass of an entire civilized society said such behavior was not a bad thing.

Society changed it's mind about the Jews nothing more. Without a supreme arbiter of good and evil--there can be no real morality--there are only the customs and laws of the society in which one lives. The world today says that Capitalist profiteers are good and that the correct moral stance. In 1960 there were Communist countries that said capitalist profiteers were bad--and in those countries, that was the correct moral stance.

But in the end all we have ultimately is our own personal code of behavior to go by. There are no other rules other than customs and traditions.