Basic income as a human right

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e: ^^ could you use some whitespace in your posts? it's really hard to read them if it's one big box o text

it's not the matter of who earns what, it's more the fact that the top 1 % doesn't pay any meaningful amount in taxes thanks to tax shelters overseas.

it doesn't matter to the right wingers because they all see themselves as being rich one day so they think they will have "earned" the right to coast while everybody else beneath them carried the tax burden.

This is how things work regarding who gets the money versus who does the work & pays taxes versus who's made to war-fare...

we have met the enemy, and he is us.

They say that socialism is the idea that if you work hard in school and get good grades, and someone else gets bad grades, some of your GPA should be taken and given to them.

Capitalism is the idea that if you go to school, listen to your teachers, work with your tutors, and listen to your parents, you earned your grade. If someone else went to a worse school, spent all class worrying about bullies, didn't do their homework because they don't have access to a computer, and didn't study because they were trying to calm their drunk father down.. they should have just worked harder.

What if all those unemployed people don't work? Surely the economy would collapse from our dire labor shortage

Here in the UK we seem to have a fair balance. We do have unemployment benefit and people have to prove they are looking for work. The benefit is not really enough to make unemployment seem attractive. The system is abused, but the abusers have to know there are fraud squads hunting them. I have experienced unemployment, often having to take temporary work lifting boxes in warehouses. I got too old for that. I went to sign on one week and got asked how my job hunting was going. I said it wasn't that easy to get a job at 61 years of age. The good lady smiled, absolutely delighted to get another person off unemployment. The Job Centre retired me off and I became better off. That's when I became a painter who could get by making enough to pay costs. I had been a self employed graphic designer. It was not an easy life.

I'm pretty far from a right winger, but I do think that when people earn something they should keep it. I also think that if there are tax shelters then everybody should be able to benefit from them even the super rich. I don't think it's fair to say they can't. It would also be unfair to people who use those tax shelters so they can have a decent retirement etc if you did away with them.

I'll never be rich, or even comfortable really, but I still don't think it's fair to put a cap on what others can have. I also think that if somebody finds a loophole, then more power to them. I'm more pro "sneaky tricks to get out of paying something" than I am pro "rich people", so I respect the sneaky tricks and think that whoever has found a legal way to do something should be allowed to do it.

Also, as for income tax, I don't really pay any. We get ours back when we file. We get everything that has been taken out, back. Is it wrong for us to get ours back and end up not paying any because we are literally at the poverty line? And what about inheritance tax? My husband will inherit some money and property when my MIL goes, and no it won't make us rich but we might be able to live once he retires though, but supposedly it's been set up so we don't have to pay a big tax on it when we get it. Do you think that is wrong?

I don't think dynasties should be considered a desirable American value. money trapped in family lineages only makes for a more entrenched aristocracy, so I do believe in inheritance taxes above a certain amount, like a few million dollar as is the current regulation. I don't begrudge anybody their tax returns on what they filed. I do begrudge the .1 percent for avoiding their fair share of taxation with sneaky overseas schemes. IOW I believe the wealthy should pay at least the same percentage of their total income as what us worker bees have to do, even warren buffet agrees with this, as he described how he pays a far lower percentage of his income in taxes than his secretary.

Money or lack of it doesn't cause bullying or drunk fathers. I've known just as many rich drunks as poor ones you know. While I do know that schools in better areas are better and you have more of a chance of doing well there and getting into a good college, I also know that people from bad areas also get into college and do well. Not all poor households are chaotic you know, and there are just as many richer ones that are as well, it just doesn't look the same and may not be as loud. I do think that schools should be funded more evenly, with all schools getting just as much money, however having moved somewhere for better schools myself, I'd be pissed off if I moved out here for the schools then found out that they were just the same. Also, it's not always just the money that makes the schools bad. Avondale school where I sent my oldest for a couple years in Bham was terrible. It was bad because of howthe kids behaved and the fact that the teachers couldn't get a handle on them or make them mind and all the violence in the playground, etc. My oldest kid was hit in the back with a chain in second grade and it left a scar. So we sent them to private school after that. We also lived in a good area, Forest Park and not Avondale but living in a good area doesn't mean that the public schools are better.

Are you against private schools? Do you think there should be free computers? I could get on board with free laptops for students because that is needed now, but I'm still very much for being able to buy something better than what you are given whether it's schools, healthcare, etc. I might not be able to buy something better myself, but I'd like to have that option.

I'm against the mandated "everybody has the same and nobody has anything better" idea. Why not move to a country that has all that rather than try to change a country that was built with the idea of working for what you get?

I wouldn't call it a dynasty, and I'm not at all against an aristocracy even though I'd never be part of it or even socialize with those people if we had something like that here, I'm "not their kind, dear". If someone earns the money (or inherits it) it belongs to them and they can leave it to their kids, some cat place, or their church if they want to. It's up to them. I don't really see a reason to be against something being passed down in a family except out of jealousy.

While in my MIL's case there is a couple million in assets and the properties are worth more than that but it's not like we will be set for life when we get it. There are three kids for it to be split up among and also grandkids, charities, the Southern Baptist Association, it's still going to get taxed some, etc. We will get less than a million, plus our house. AFAIK the lake house will go to the grandsons with my oldest son being the one to live there and take care of it and they will all have the option to buy the others out. My FIL taught my oldest son about taking care of the place for that very reason. The place in Greece may have already been sold for all I know, it's never been used since I met my husband so who knows. I'd love to go there though, but I can't afford to go to Gulf Shores for a weekend, let alone a vacation to Greece. Of course my MIL might have changed that in his will too, the same way she went and did away with my kids trusts the very week after he died. She wanted to sit on every penny she has until she dies, so she's doing that. Whatever, it's hers. If she wants to still live like she's in the Great Depression, let her.

If it were up to you, exactly how much money would people be able to have? Would anybody be paid more than somebody else?

Without goals and chances for something better, what would people have to work toward?

because the "love it or leave it" crowd conveniently ignores the fact that for most of us, packing up and moving overseas is not affordable nor practical. it belongs in the "let the starving peasants eat cake" category of dismissing folks with legitimate grievances regarding the direction of the ship of state, as mere malcontents.

I know that people can't just move, however I also don't see why they want to change our entire country and society just to accommodate what they want. The majority of Americans don't want socialism, we want capitalism and that is what we have.

How would your idea society be set up? How much money would people earn and what would it be based on? What about criminals or people who just don't want to work? What would be the limit to how much you could earn? Would everybody go to college and get white collar jobs? Who would pick up the garbage? Etc. I'm seriously curious.

(BTW, you do know that even though I'm arguing with you about this and very much against your opinion on this that I do like you very much, right? I'm not being mean to you by any means, so please don't take it like that. )

the problem with permitting aristocracy to take root in America, is that we get an accumulation of undemocratically moderated power in a few hands, and distortion to our national policies to disproportionately benefit those same few hands, which is an anti-democratic end. George Carlin {RIP} had a lot to say about that. money=power, power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely [lord acton]. unlimited money = unlimited power. I don't believe any private citizen or corporation should have the virtually unrestrained [by ethics or law] powers that folks like the Koch brothers or large multinational corporations do, over americans and American gov't policy. I believe this has led to a uniquely American form of quasi-fascism. and folks lucky enough to have "goals/chances for something better" [IOW the cognitive elite unencumbered by mental/physical addlements] more often than not leave folks like the bulk of posters on this forum, in the dust of irrelevancy. I find it distressing that so many working class folks who lucked and plucked into middle-class status seem to forget where they came from. in third way cultures [northern Europe] there is more upward mobility than in present-day America! it is possible to have a social safety net AND vigorous capitalist practice, capitalism can have a human face. but in America we seem to prefer it to resemble harlequin.

I understand you are a good egg I appreciate your kindness I want America to be more humane in its public policy, less foreign adventurism, less sticking our noses in other nations' affairs. Eisenhower-era levels of taxation on the upper class [50%] caused them no real discomfort, they were still wealthy. I'm not talking about doing away with America but I am talking about filing away the rough edges so that we are a "kinder and gentler" place to live for the bulk of the populace [not just the rich], and to halt the inexorable descent into banana republic status that we are on. universal health and dental care would be a big first step. universal college/technical education also, as is the case in Europe. there would be no income limits but folks like warren buffet would pay at least the same percentage of taxes as the help does. we would not be having to jail so many people [more than any other nation on earth] because we would be spending the money instead on our children when they are able to be helped to grow into effective adults. there would be a net reduction in welfare expenditures for that reason, because we invested in the children unlike now where we just leave things to chance. people would still get jobs picking up the trash as before, and they would get paid what they do now, but the owners of the various waste disposal firms [and any corporation] would not have the tax loopholes they do, and they would pay income tax a bit closer to what they would in Canada for example [40%]. I want more comforting the afflicted and afflicting the comfortable [mother jones] than what we have which seems to be punishing the already punished and rewarding the already rewarded. a basic universal income [received only in the absence of gainful employment, replacing all cash dole/welfare programs/social security and unemployment compensation] would be the main platform of our social safety net. the beauty of all this is that we would not be spending as much money as we are now on things like our dysfunctional justice system. what you seem to be fine with, is at best, things as they are, and at worst, neo-feudalism with an entrenched aristocracy, letting the unfortunates just rot. I cannot accept that as Americans we should descend to that level with smiles on our faces. I want a better America, than that. I want an America where as a citizen I would not be allowed to just starve to death or freeze to death. American citizens deserve far better than that. we deserve at least what the average Commonwealth citizen enjoys.

I understand what you're saying and agree somewhat but not at all completely. I don't think that just because someone is rich that they have as much power as you think they do. Others may suck up to them so they can get some of their money but they certainly can't go around forcing laws to be passed, etc. An aristocracy will certainly have more social power than the rest but we still have elections and votes and the majority will still win out I think.

I also think it's very unfair to say that we should limit one person's ability to accumulate what they want because of someone else's disability. That sounds horrible when I say it but I don't mean it that way at all. We do have safety nets and nobdoy should have to do completely without because they can't work for physical or mental reasons, but I also don't think it's fair to say that we should limit what others have who are able to work so that those who can't can have nicer things. In other words, I'm perfectly ok with having levels of things that are only available to those who can buy them even though I'm one of those who will not be able to buy them. IOW, just because the Jonses eat steak and lobster every night doesn't mean that it's wrong that the Smiths can only afford hamburger helper and fish sticks. We shouldn't take away from the Jonses to give the Smiths steak once a week but we should tax the Jonses and the Smiths so the Williams get a meal every night and don't have to eat cat food. Make sure everybody has at least a bologna sandwich and some chips, but for goodness sakes if somebody else can afford hamburger helper or steak or whatever, then let them have it. Don't take it away because somebody else has no way of ever getting anything better.

I have a house bigger than what we need now that most of the kids are out of it. Would it be fair to take it away from us and give it to a large family that can only afford a one bedroom apartment? Should I feel bad for having a decent size house for fewer people when some people are crammed into small and crappy places, because I don't at all? It seems that according to your philosophy of this that I shouldn't have my house now and I should feel bad about it. It also seems like that in your philosophy that my husband who does hard physical work every day should only be able to keep enough for us to survive on and the rest should be taken and given to somebody who cannot physically do the work. I have no problem with taxes going to make sure people have food and shelter and medical care. We already have that. It seems that you think that we should take more in taxes to make sure that people have nicer things than they do. If we are going to do that then I want an increase in my food stamps lol. We get about $460 a month to feed everybody here and I could cook us some much better meals if we were to get more. I might even be able to eat the same stuff my neighbor the doctor and his wife and kid eat. After all, isn't that fair? (however, we do eat pretty well but that is only because I'm a housewife with time to cook from scratch and also my oldest daughter who lives with us is just finishing up culinary school so we have an "in house chef" just like the really rich folks - except she cooks here for practice and because she enjoys it and not for pay and certainly not every night like the rich folks)

I never said YOU should not be able to live as you wish, I am merely saying folks on the top should pay at least the same tax rate as the rest of us.