2043 billionaires in the US with average income $200m/year x 0.02 (2% tax)= wait for it...
$8.2 billion - not enough to provide shit
This is not difficult math. Warren is full of crap and so is Bernie when he says these things. I have no problem with Democrats wanting to provide extra services, but I call bullshit that a 2% tax on billionaires is going to pay for it. There simply are not enough of them for their income to pay for any of these progressive policies. Tell me the fucking truth and let me decide, Elizabeth. At least Bernie admits that everybody is going to have to pony up...
Maybe I'm misunderstanding it, but I believe it's a 2 cent wealth tax. Not income tax. So they arent taxing the income of those billionaires. They're taxing their wealth. Also, it's not just on Billionaires, but also on Millionaires. The Billionaires have a wealth tax that's higher, like 5 cents or so.
I understand that you dont like feeling lied to, but there's always a chance that you're just misunderstanding the proposal.
Edit - and the income tax on this would also stand up. Also the corporate tax would be raised again (Reversing the Trump tax cut that was mostly focused on enriching corporations).
I saw an article the other week that the reason Bloomberg is in the race and spending insane amounts of money is because he will lose WAY more under Warren and Sanders. Bloomberg owns something like 88% of his company, and it made something like 60 billion dollars last year (For some reason, the figure `3 billion is sticking in my head, but I dont remember specifically what number he'd pay). When all the tax plans are added up, Bloomberg will end up paying well over a billion a year (Still making 60ish billion, so it's hard to feel bad for him). So far, he's spent like 350 million in ads. It's practically a no-brainer to spend his money trying to buy the presidency rather than let Sanders or Warren become president.
I saw an article the other week that the reason Bloomberg is in the race and spending insane amounts of money is because he will lose WAY more under Warren and Sanders. Bloomberg owns something like 88% of his company, and it made something like 60 billion dollars last year (For some reason, the figure `3 billion is sticking in my head, but I dont remember specifically what number he'd pay). When all the tax plans are added up, Bloomberg will end up paying well over a billion a year (Still making 60ish billion, so it's hard to feel bad for him). So far, he's spent like 350 million in ads. It's practically a no-brainer to spend his money trying to buy the presidency rather than let Sanders or Warren become president.
Honestly that's what Trump did. He ran as an outsider and if he lost like he thought he would he planned to bitch about being cheated and hey you come buy a Trump condo. So if he lost he would have had a new grievance marketing angle and if he won well we're seeing that.
He won, and his main accomplishment was cutting his own taxes. He cut the top rates (his rates) by a hell of a lot, he gave us a slight cut, and halved the corporate tax rate. Tax cuts for him and his buddies was the most important thing for him, because he's rich.
Another thing he did was double the estate tax exemption, which of course only applies to people with estates like him. The exemptions are doubled to $22.36 million dollars.
Anyway, Bloomberg who is objectively much richer is trying to do the same thing as Trump - buy the Presidency. We truly don't need another racist New York Billionaire president very badly.
Heard of a country in the heart of South Asia that was once a place which European imperialists used to drool upon? A piece of chocolate cake they fought maniacally upon like ill-tempered kindergarten toddlers? So fascinated they were by it that Granny Victoria proclaimed herself Empress of no other colony, but it. India.
Ahh, such fond memories... of oppression, of torture, of a wonderfully systematic drainage of our wealth and economy. So romantic, isn't it? Oh wait, them British imperialists also gifted us something! You want to know? What, you think it's modern education? Ha ha, no!
1905. Lord Curzon divided Bengal, the heartland of our freedom struggle. My Bengal. Our Bengal. On what basis, you ask? Into an Eastern part in which there lived a somewhat larger Muslim population, and a Western part in which there was a larger Hindu population. But that was only the beginning. After they had bled our resources dry, they decided it was time to leave us in shambles, but not before etching another couple of bloodied borderlines on the map of our country. The Partition of India happened, on the same basis, religion.
What was for the British just one of their many loathsome strategies to divide our movement and struggle for Independence, ended up hurting us very badly. We got our Independence in 1947, but India was divided. Not just into today's India, Pakistan and Bangladesh, but into a more eerily haunting segregation of Hindus and Muslims, who didn't really know WHY they should hate each other, except the fact that their British overlords taught them so, and who ingrained that thing into their very brains, through propaganda... and whiplashes... and gunshots. That was their "gift" of communal hatred and intolerance for us.
But our founding fathers fought. They fought hard to unite our people. And they put it in the Preamble of our Constitution (the longest one in the world), the words, clearly in bold letters: "SECULAR" and "DEMOCRATIC". We came a long way since then. We did our best to heal the wounds, the marks of those whiplashes and police batons, and be a united people once again.
Ahh, but what would politicians not do to come and stay in power? Came in Narendra Modi (that goddamn psychopath who's our Prime Minister right now), who first rose to power after the 2002 Gujarat Riots, which, by the way, was organised and orchestrated by him and his fellow psychopaths, in an attempt to instigate communal hatred and violence, and they were very successful, so successful that Modi stayed in power in Gujarat as the unquestioned Chief Minister right upto 2014, when he became the PM of India. He turned the BJP (Bharatiya Janata Party) into an aggressive Hindu Nationalist party, and based his campaigns on communal intolerance and hatred, exactly the same way Hitler did back in the 1930s. Hitler said: "Jews bad." Modi says: "Muslims bad."
12 December, 2019. The BJP majority Union Government passes the Citizenship Amendment Act. An Act which sounds like a harmless attempt to give "non-Muslim" refugees from neighbouring countries asylum in India. The truth is far from that. They coupled the CAA with the NRC (National Register of Citizens), which is supposed to be a process to determine who is a rightful citizen and who is an "illegal" migrant, but the fact is that, they kept the NRC procedure vague and unclear and did not define who is an "illegal migrant"! So, it can be ANYBODY they want! Just anybody that they want. And you guess what? "Muslims bad!" So? "Muslims are illegal migrants!" And Hindus and other religions are practically immune to the "illegal migrant" sticker, because, well, the CAA gives "asylum" to all "non-Muslim" immigrants!
This beats the very spirit of our Indian Constitution that our founding fathers had so painstakingly made to ensure freedom, liberty and justice to all. Any legislation that treats one religion differently than others is completely against our Constitution! But, who cares? When you want to create a Reign of Terror based on falsehood and hatred, it's not that hard. Police brutality, buying the media for yourself, and all kinds of underhanded tactics has been used by the Modi government, and the country is in a state of deep turmoil. They also keep rigging the elections, manipulating results, threatening voters so that they would not vote, and doing everything they can to suppress our Democratic Rights. Do people die in America on Election Day because of violent assaults? No, right? Well, here in India, they do. Lots of them. Every time.
But we, the people, are fighting. We are fighting against this corrupt Fascist (or should I rather plainly say "Nazist") government. If you want to read and know about the incidences of police violence and the whole lot of atrocities by the government on intellectuals and students who question and protest against this aggressive Hindu Nationalist bullshit, go to the r/india subreddit. It's by far the best non-censored source of information available regarding the situation out here.
I belong to a Hindu family (though I personally am an Agnostic Atheist), but Hinduism doesn't teach us to hate other religions and kill people, neither does Islam. I hate Modi's Hindu Nationalist bullshit. He and his goons are besmirching all the philosophies that Hinduism stands for! (If you want to know some of the philosophies, read the subtitles in this music video.) It's dirty politicians like him that turn religion into instruments of violence and terror, and use it to instigate communal hatred and intolerance, all based on false propaganda. They make it appear as if Muslims are the ones who do all the crimes and are responsible for all the problems in the society, exactly the way Hitler did with Jews back in his time.
Modi has built concentration camps too! He just calls them "Detention Centres". He and Amit Shah (his right hand man, in office as Home Minister of India, actually is more than that; also Shah not to be confused as a Muslim surname, it's a Hindu one, and he's another aggressive Hindu Nationalist), these two are the ones who are the masterminds behind all of this.
They are running an authoritarian Fascist regime and are turning our vibrant democracy, the world's largest one, into a police state. Things are bad here. Our capital Delhi is plunged in communal riots, and things are really bad there. It was instigated by those aggressive Hindu Nationalist goons, who did it right in the aftermath of Trump's visit to India, so as to make it appear that Muslims are causing violence and vandalism, while it was those Hindu Nationalist mobs who burned down at least two mosques in Northeastern Delhi and attacked and killed Muslim children.
In preparation for Trump's visit, Modi also built a massive wall to hide the slums in Gujarat, so as to create a false image of wealth and modernisation. It also triggers me so hard that Modi's spending so much money on Trump's worthless arse in order to appease that absolute psychopathic criminal, so that he would not talk about the annexation of Kashmir by India (YES, IT WAS AN ANNEXATION!) as well as ignore this whole turmoil and crisis created by the CAA-NRC. They both are like: "You suck my nuts, I suck yours." Simply amazing, isn't it?
I hate Fascists so much, I do. I can't help it. Because I, a normal person on Earth, am affected adversely by these people. My family is, my friends are, my society and my country, and other countries too, everyone is affected adversely.
By the way, my American friends, I request you, please get yourselves a better President this time. As someone who, not being an American, is STILL affected by Trump's bullshit (IN ADDITION to Modi's bullshit), I hold the American people responsible for being irresponsible in choosing a sane President. Please don't repeat your mistakes. Thank you.
I mean, this is getting almost no attention here. These religious hate crimes and beatings of Muslims in streets are taking place while Trump is in the country visiting, and he hasn't said a single word about it. And our media might as well have a total blackout of it. The fact is, 99% of Americans have no idea this is happening, and even if they did, maybe a small fraction would care. The only thing anyone in America knows is that Modi filled a stadium for Trump, and that Ivanka is tweeting pictures from the Taj Mahal. Again, in previous Administrations, not matter how bad they were, it would be inconceivable that such a thing would be taking place during an official state visit and simply be......ignored.
And, for the record, this is why Tulsi Gabbard was persona non grata to alot of people paying attention. Because she is tied at the hip with Modi more than any other politician. It's not the least bit surprising that Trump and Modi are collaborating in an elaborate con-job for the world media. They're two peas in a pod.
Heard of a country in the heart of South Asia that was once a place which European imperialists used to drool upon? A piece of chocolate cake they fought maniacally upon like ill-tempered kindergarten toddlers? So fascinated they were by it that Granny Victoria proclaimed herself Empress of no other colony, but it. India.
Ahh, such fond memories... of oppression, of torture, of a wonderfully systematic drainage of our wealth and economy. So romantic, isn't it? Oh wait, them British imperialists also gifted us something! You want to know? What, you think it's modern education? Ha ha, no!
1905. Lord Curzon divided Bengal, the heartland of our freedom struggle. My Bengal. Our Bengal. On what basis, you ask? Into an Eastern part in which there lived a somewhat larger Muslim population, and a Western part in which there was a larger Hindu population. But that was only the beginning. After they had bled our resources dry, they decided it was time to leave us in shambles, but not before etching another couple of bloodied borderlines on the map of our country. The Partition of India happened, on the same basis, religion.
What was for the British just one of their many loathsome strategies to divide our movement and struggle for Independence, ended up hurting us very badly. We got our Independence in 1947, but India was divided. Not just into today's India, Pakistan and Bangladesh, but into a more eerily haunting segregation of Hindus and Muslims, who didn't really know WHY they should hate each other, except the fact that their British overlords taught them so, and who ingrained that thing into their very brains, through propaganda... and whiplashes... and gunshots. That was their "gift" of communal hatred and intolerance for us.
But our founding fathers fought. They fought hard to unite our people. And they put it in the Preamble of our Constitution (the longest one in the world), the words, clearly in bold letters: "SECULAR" and "DEMOCRATIC". We came a long way since then. We did our best to heal the wounds, the marks of those whiplashes and police batons, and be a united people once again.
@Rik_Kirtaniya I agree with your main point that Modi's approach to Hindu nationalism is pretty terrible. I also agree that the British have a lot to answer for in the way they ran India. However, I don't think it's realistic to suggest that British rule was the sole cause of religious conflict. There had been a history of religious violence in India for many hundreds of years before the British arrived. You can make a plausible argument that this was made worse by the British as a result of encouraging political groupings to form around religions. However, you can also make a case for saying it was inevitable that, once political groupings were allowed, they would form around existing strong community identities.
I think that history shows that often the colonial powers used a situation which already existed and worsened it to help their interest. It is clear in India, and I refer to all the books of Darlymple on the subject. In Africa, it was too typical. I think about Rwanda that I know well, and on the role of Belgium and France in widening the rift between communities by exporting there the racist Weltanschauung of 19th Century Europe. But the European culpability does not exonerate local cultures of their own faults.
India is a very complex subject and nowadays Modi's populist fascism is really worrying. But it has its parallel in a lot of other countries around the world - we seem to be living in an era of nationalism awakening, and all the old universal values are depreciated. There may be some good reasons for that, and one is that the fact that these same universal values were used by European colonialist to dominate other people around the world. I read recently a nice polmical book from Pankaj Mishra on this subject, "Age of Anger" I do not agree with all he said, but there are interesting perks in his book.
When I read Amartya Sen book on The Argumentative Indian a couple of years ago (he already talked about Modi, who was as just a fanatical regional politician), I was startled to discover India's fascinating history of religious tolerance (I mean, at school, I learned about the fanatics, the massacres, etc) particularly during the Moghol era, and the reign of Ackbar (not "It's a trap" ...). I already knew the old story of Ashoka, but not of Ackbar and his open tolerant politics towards all religions, and his even strange tentative to create some kind of new syncretism. Unfortunaltely, it did not last long, but this is a milestone in the complex and difficult story of attaining to a balance between different religions.
2043 billionaires in the US with average income $200m/year x 0.02 (2% tax)= wait for it...
$8.2 billion - not enough to provide shit
This is not difficult math. Warren is full of crap and so is Bernie when he says these things. I have no problem with Democrats wanting to provide extra services, but I call bullshit that a 2% tax on billionaires is going to pay for it. There simply are not enough of them for their income to pay for any of these progressive policies. Tell me the fucking truth and let me decide, Elizabeth. At least Bernie admits that everybody is going to have to pony up...
Maybe I'm misunderstanding it, but I believe it's a 2 cent wealth tax. Not income tax. So they arent taxing the income of those billionaires. They're taxing their wealth. Also, it's not just on Billionaires, but also on Millionaires. The Billionaires have a wealth tax that's higher, like 5 cents or so.
I understand that you dont like feeling lied to, but there's always a chance that you're just misunderstanding the proposal.
Edit - and the income tax on this would also stand up. Also the corporate tax would be raised again (Reversing the Trump tax cut that was mostly focused on enriching corporations).
I saw an article the other week that the reason Bloomberg is in the race and spending insane amounts of money is because he will lose WAY more under Warren and Sanders. Bloomberg owns something like 88% of his company, and it made something like 60 billion dollars last year (For some reason, the figure `3 billion is sticking in my head, but I dont remember specifically what number he'd pay). When all the tax plans are added up, Bloomberg will end up paying well over a billion a year (Still making 60ish billion, so it's hard to feel bad for him). So far, he's spent like 350 million in ads. It's practically a no-brainer to spend his money trying to buy the presidency rather than let Sanders or Warren become president.
Ok then, if by chance my total wealth gets over a million dollars then some IRS agent is going to send me a bill for $20k? If that's really what Warren is talking about then screw her. That's theft, not taxes. Where does it stop? 2%? 5%? 10%? It's whatever some president says it is? Count me out...
Is it really that hard to read her proposal? For what it is worth, you will still call this theft, but the 2% wealth tax would kick in above 50 millions, e.g. you would get the $20k bill in your example if you own $51 millions.
I am not a fan of wealth tax either. I already paid taxes on it through income tax. Government shouldn’t be double dipping more than they are (let’s not forget, when I spend the money I get hit with sales tax).
However, if we’re talking about taxing money I get from investments, or bank saving programs, then sure, tax that because it is a form of income. Anything that increases a persons wealth should be taxed if labour is taxed.
But once again, the one thing Trump has shown is that if there is enough money for pet projects like a Space Force and a vanity wall then there is enough money for Medicare for All or other social programs. Remember Mexico will pay for it.
However, I don't think it's realistic to suggest that British rule was the sole cause of religious conflict.
Of course they are not the sole reason, but they played a HUGE role. And they did it on purpose. The British Raj did a lot of nasty things to ENSURE that it happened.
Persecution by a certain king or emperor of his opposite religion and deaths during an invasion were mostly what happened before (it's not that I don't condemn them). However, with the British Raj, came a whole new brand of religious violence and in a scale that was not seen before. COMMUNAL RIOTS. Now, common people of either religion (not kings and rulers) who have been brainwashed by the British Raj came out armed and fought each other in the lanes of the suburbs and villages. It keeps on happening even today, with the difference being that the brainwashers are now these corrupt politicians. It just happened yesterday in Delhi as well, and is not fully in control yet.
You can make a plausible argument that this was made worse by the British as a result of encouraging political groupings to form around religions.
Not just encouraging, but also ensuring. They did everything they could to make it happen. They even bribed and patronized corrupt and influential people in either communities to spread intolerance and hatred against the other community. Gandhi did a LOT to stop that from happening, but he couldn't prevent the Partition of India despite all his efforts.
However, you can also make a case for saying it was inevitable that, once political groupings were allowed, they would form around existing strong community identities.
Well, the way in which history took course doesn't mean that it was inevitable. In fact, we were dragged down this path of history by the rulers in power, and I blame the British Raj the most. As @Rigel mentioned, we did have other rulers who did a lot to ensure communal tolerance, unity and peace, and those are not values and notions that were alien to the Indian culture and the Indian way of life. We have a phrase here from our old Sanskrit Upanishads, "Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam", which means in English, "the world is one family". It is values like these that Hinduism taught us, not this hate-mongering bullshit that Modi and Shah and others in the BJP/RSS/Hindu Mahasabha Alliance preach. Whatever this is, this is NOT Hinduism. If you see the music video I linked earlier, it would be even more clear.
Religions are philosophies, but when they are not understood by the common people, but rather left in the hands of the corrupt preachers for them to interpret as they find profitable, and then brainwash the common people by instigating some kind of vague communal identity, that's when the problem arises. This is a generalization for all religions. They are philosophies and should be treated as such, and not some medal or badge that one hangs over one's apparel. That is the problem.
In France there is a wealth tax - above more than one million euros wealth you need to pay it. Or this used to be because Macron cancelled it. Because of this you had a lot of very rich people moving to Belgium for example - there the income tax is higher but the wealth tax is almost nonexistent.
I think in a lot of European country it is a bit the same. Corbyn in the UK planned to have such a tax installed (according to my family there - and they were not very happy about it, even if they have always voted Labour).
I am not a fan of wealth tax either. I already paid taxes on it through income tax. Government shouldn’t be double dipping more than they are (let’s not forget, when I spend the money I get hit with sales tax).
However, if we’re talking about taxing money I get from investments, or bank saving programs, then sure, tax that because it is a form of income. Anything that increases a persons wealth should be taxed if labour is taxed.
This is one of the significant problems with income tax. At most people's level, defining income is normally pretty easy, but that's not the case when you're a billionaire. There are plenty of ways that you can increase your wealth that are not counted as income for the purpose of tax. Hence when you look at rates of tax paid, it's not just that very wealthy people pay a lower share of their declared income, they also have potentially much lower proportions of their increasing wealth counted as income in the first place.
2043 billionaires in the US with average income $200m/year x 0.02 (2% tax)= wait for it...
$8.2 billion - not enough to provide shit
This is not difficult math. Warren is full of crap and so is Bernie when he says these things. I have no problem with Democrats wanting to provide extra services, but I call bullshit that a 2% tax on billionaires is going to pay for it. There simply are not enough of them for their income to pay for any of these progressive policies. Tell me the fucking truth and let me decide, Elizabeth. At least Bernie admits that everybody is going to have to pony up...
Maybe I'm misunderstanding it, but I believe it's a 2 cent wealth tax. Not income tax. So they arent taxing the income of those billionaires. They're taxing their wealth. Also, it's not just on Billionaires, but also on Millionaires. The Billionaires have a wealth tax that's higher, like 5 cents or so.
I understand that you dont like feeling lied to, but there's always a chance that you're just misunderstanding the proposal.
Edit - and the income tax on this would also stand up. Also the corporate tax would be raised again (Reversing the Trump tax cut that was mostly focused on enriching corporations).
I saw an article the other week that the reason Bloomberg is in the race and spending insane amounts of money is because he will lose WAY more under Warren and Sanders. Bloomberg owns something like 88% of his company, and it made something like 60 billion dollars last year (For some reason, the figure `3 billion is sticking in my head, but I dont remember specifically what number he'd pay). When all the tax plans are added up, Bloomberg will end up paying well over a billion a year (Still making 60ish billion, so it's hard to feel bad for him). So far, he's spent like 350 million in ads. It's practically a no-brainer to spend his money trying to buy the presidency rather than let Sanders or Warren become president.
Ok then, if by chance my total wealth gets over a million dollars then some IRS agent is going to send me a bill for $20k? If that's really what Warren is talking about then screw her. That's theft, not taxes. Where does it stop? 2%? 5%? 10%? It's whatever some president says it is? Count me out...
They aren't paying the full income tax they should though. Not to mention they more tax breaks than everyone else, along with paying less taxes proportionally. If trying to get them to pay what they actually owe is theft, than so is every single tax anyone pays ever.
I am not a fan of wealth tax either. I already paid taxes on it through income tax. Government shouldn’t be double dipping more than they are (let’s not forget, when I spend the money I get hit with sales tax).
However, if we’re talking about taxing money I get from investments, or bank saving programs, then sure, tax that because it is a form of income. Anything that increases a persons wealth should be taxed if labour is taxed.
This is one of the significant problems with income tax. At most people's level, defining income is normally pretty easy, but that's not the case when you're a billionaire. There are plenty of ways that you can increase your wealth that are not counted as income for the purpose of tax. Hence when you look at rates of tax paid, it's not just that very wealthy people pay a lower share of their declared income, they also have potentially much lower proportions of their increasing wealth counted as income in the first place.
But that’s part of the point.
If I can proclaim in one year I had 1 billion dollars, and then the next year I had 3 billion dollars, my ‘income’ would be 2 billion.
It doesn’t matter if I purchased something with some of the money because whatever I purchase should have already be taxed with the purchase. Key word is should. A good chunk of the time it isn’t.
If some shmuck is getting money taken away from him because he is flipping burgers (al la income tax), then I don’t see why a person can’t pay 2 cents on the dollar when the banks calculate compound interest in savings accounts.
Wait just a minute here--all this talk of taxation so that the government can fund the programs you want them to fund.... Do you (not any specific "you", just a generic "you") really think that is how taxes still work? That the government doesn't have the money to pay for things unless it taxes people for it?
That is not how taxes have worked for almost my entire life, at least at the Federal level. Why do people still think that this is how taxes work?
If the government needs $10 billion to pay for something it can just issue the money for it, call it valid, and pay for it; they don't need your tax revenue to do that. The *reason* for Federal taxes now is so that the government can restrict the money supply as a check against currency devaluation and inflation which occur when the government issues new money.
Just for the sake of discussion, let us presume that Sanders wins the White House, the Democrats retain the House, and Republicans retain the Senate. Can Bernie implement new taxes on the ultra-wealthy? Of course not--Executive Orders cannot levy new taxes; only Congress can do that. Even if that measure passes the House do you think it will pass the Senate? Of course it won't--why would those people, the vast majority of whom are all millionaires, raise their own taxes?
They aren't paying the full income tax they should though.
If an ultra-wealthy person is complying with existing tax law, then they are already paying everything they should. Why should they pay more than that? Even if you overpay your taxes, the IRS is required by law to refund the overpayment to you.
At least Democrats are now finally giving actual numbers to show how much they think ultra-wealthy people should be paying. For years I kept asking "how much is fair?" or "define 'fair'" and never got an answer.
Taxes cannot be retroactive, so even if Bernie gets the taxes he wants these people will simply move their money before those changes to the tax code take effect.
A few arguments - Taxes aren’t defined in any particular way to prevent the government from issuing them. An income tax and sales tax are utterly different. A wealth tax can, by extension, be different still without issue.
Second point - I don’t think it matters how many “dips” there are. If I tax you X amount so that you have Y left afterwards, is that any different than me taxing you 1/3x 3 separate times, also leaving you with Y? Not fundamentally.
The idea of a Wealth tax is attempting to address the issue @Grond0 mentioned. Is it perfect? Surely not - but I do think it’s a reasonable attempt to mitigate the loopholes and methods used by the very rich to avoid paying as much as possible.
However, I don't think it's realistic to suggest that British rule was the sole cause of religious conflict.
Of course they are not the sole reason, but they played a HUGE role. And they did it on purpose. The British Raj did a lot of nasty things to ENSURE that it happened.
Persecution by a certain king or emperor of his opposite religion and deaths during an invasion were mostly what happened before (it's not that I don't condemn them). However, with the British Raj, came a whole new brand of religious violence and in a scale that was not seen before. COMMUNAL RIOTS. Now, common people of either religion (not kings and rulers) who have been brainwashed by the British Raj came out armed and fought each other in the lanes of the suburbs and villages. It keeps on happening even today, with the difference being that the brainwashers are now these corrupt politicians. It just happened yesterday in Delhi as well, and is not fully in control yet.
You can make a plausible argument that this was made worse by the British as a result of encouraging political groupings to form around religions.
Not just encouraging, but also ensuring. They did everything they could to make it happen. They even bribed and patronized corrupt and influential people in either communities to spread intolerance and hatred against the other community. Gandhi did a LOT to stop that from happening, but he couldn't prevent the Partition of India despite all his efforts.
However, you can also make a case for saying it was inevitable that, once political groupings were allowed, they would form around existing strong community identities.
Well, the way in which history took course doesn't mean that it was inevitable. In fact, we were dragged down this path of history by the rulers in power, and I blame the British Raj the most. As @Rigel mentioned, we did have other rulers who did a lot to ensure communal tolerance, unity and peace, and those are not values and notions that were alien to the Indian culture and the Indian way of life. We have a phrase here from our old Sanskrit Upanishads, "Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam", which means in English, "the world is one family". It is values like these that Hinduism taught us, not this hate-mongering bullshit that Modi and Shah and others in the BJP/RSS/Hindu Mahasabha Alliance preach. Whatever this is, this is NOT Hinduism. If you see the music video I linked earlier, it would be even more clear.
As I said, I agree with you that Modi's politics does not represent the main thrust of Hinduism, but I don't think Modi was the result of the British Raj.
@Rigel referred to Akbar and I agree that he had a very enlightened attitude to religion - but he partly stands out precisely because that was so unusual both for his time and the dynasty he came from. His successors did not display the same tolerance and about 50 years after Akbar's death, Aurangzeb took the throne and instituted something of a reign of terror against non-Muslims.
I accept that the attitude of the ruler of a country has a big effect on the attitudes of the citizens, but I don't think that changes the basis of the argument. You're suggesting that the way the British ruled makes them very largely responsible for religious intolerance in India; I'm just pointing out there was a long history of such intolerance before the British ever arrived (there's nothing unique about India there of course - most long-established countries have a history of religious intolerance).
You also suggest that the British deliberately politicized religious divisions. It's worth pointing out though that the two main parties at the end of the Raj were the Indian National Congress and the Muslim League. While the Muslim League had a specifically religious agenda, the INC did not. They claimed to represent all Indians, of all faiths and had a secular, liberal agenda. They won 58% of the seats in the 1946 elections (which were the precursor to independence and the drafting of the constitution). More radical parties, such as the Hindu Mahasabha Party, got no seats at all - not what you would expect if the British had been deliberately stoking religious tensions.
I'll also note that in your original post you were pointing out the virtues of the Indian constitution. That's fine, but that constitution grew out of the political process overseen by the British. Significant parts of it were lifted wholesale from the British system (such as the electoral process, parliamentary and legislative processes, rule of law and the role of courts) and much of the rest reflected UK politics at the time (such as the emphasis on liberal social values, freedom of expression and respect for minority religions).
I'm not trying to argue here that the British were not at fault, or that the Indian constitution did not represent a huge achievement. I am though arguing that seeing religious conflict and Partition as the result of a deliberate act of malice by the British is a misconception. Partitions of various sorts have a poor history of solving community tensions, whether those are religious in origin or not. Examples in Ireland, Germany, Vietnam, Korea etc, don't suggest that separating people is a good way to help them understand and accept each other. I agree with you that you get better understanding through living and talking together, but that is not necessarily an achievable solution in the short term.
Partition was not something that the British supported until very close to independence (which is part of the reason for the lack of preparation that caused so much chaos). The Muslim League had been campaigning for an independent Pakistan for some time and there was also support for this idea from more radical Hindus. However, prior to WWII the British had shown no interest in this. After the war though, when the Muslim League gained the vast majority of Muslim votes in the 1946 elections, the British were forced to take the idea more seriously. Still though, their favored proposal was not a full partition, but a federal system in which provinces had significant autonomy. The Muslim League accepted this, but the INC rejected it in 1946 on the grounds they wanted a greater degree of central control.
From that point religious violence started to become much more common. Mountbatten was appointed as the last Viceroy of India in 1947, with a brief to achieve independence for India by the following year. His instructions were to maintain a united India, but with the worsening violence he soon concluded that it would not be possible to both achieve independence on the desired timescale and maintain a united India. Instead he chose to try and cut short the violence by bringing forward the date for independence to August 1947, while maintaining as much of a united India as he could. His proposed arrangements for Partition were agreed by all the main Indian leaders (Sikhs and Dalits, as well as the Muslim League and INC) in June 1947. While Gandhi himself was not in favor, most of the INC leaders were. They were fearful (rightly I think) about the potential difficulties of achieving a consensus over a constitution and future political arrangements in a united India - and thought a full legal separation would make it easier to establish a liberal, secular constitution in the large remaining area of India (covering about 330 of the then 390 million population).
The footage of Muslims literally fleeing their neighborhoods with their belongings on their backs that I saw this morning is almost indistinguishable from the Jews being marched into the ghettos.
Second point - I don’t think it matters how many “dips” there are. If I tax you X amount so that you have Y left afterwards, is that any different than me taxing you 1/3x 3 separate times, also leaving you with Y? Not fundamentally.
Except a wealth tax will keep dipping year after year until you’re left with the maximum the government says you’re allowed before being taxed. I’d rather go bet it all on Black at a charity casino to give it to someone who will actually spend it wisely.
And there is a lot of ‘wealth,’ once transferred to other goods, such as gold or vintage wine, that can raise in value. Does the government get to apply a wealth tax to that? If I drink said vintage wine in one multimillion dollar bender am I still on the hook?
I should only be taxed when I sell the gold (or property), or auction the wine making an income(we can debate if I should be taxed if I sold the items at a loss however). And the person giving me money for it, and in turn, that person should be taxed for the sale.
Second point - I don’t think it matters how many “dips” there are. If I tax you X amount so that you have Y left afterwards, is that any different than me taxing you 1/3x 3 separate times, also leaving you with Y? Not fundamentally.
Except a wealth tax will keep dipping year after year until you’re left with the maximum the government says you’re allowed before being taxed. I’d rather go bet it all on Black at a charity casino to give it to someone who will actually spend it wisely.
And there is a lot of ‘wealth,’ once transferred to other goods, such as gold or vintage wine, that can raise in value. Does the government get to apply a wealth tax to that? If I drink said vintage wine in one multimillion dollar bender am I still on the hook?
I should only be taxed when I sell the gold (or property), or auction the wine making an income(we can debate if I should be taxed if I sold the items at a loss however). And the person giving me money for it, and in turn, that person should be taxed for the sale.
So what about the estate tax?? That money is, in fact, being transferred to another person who has never paid any taxes on it. It is no longer the property of the person who died, it's the property of someone else. If a transfer of money by sale initiates another round of taxation, why should handing it to someone be any different?? The fact that it's a family member to me seems immaterial. All it does is allow generations of the same family to keep passing down the same money without contributing anything more.
A few arguments - Taxes aren’t defined in any particular way to prevent the government from issuing them. An income tax and sales tax are utterly different. A wealth tax can, by extension, be different still without issue.
Second point - I don’t think it matters how many “dips” there are. If I tax you X amount so that you have Y left afterwards, is that any different than me taxing you 1/3x 3 separate times, also leaving you with Y? Not fundamentally.
The idea of a Wealth tax is attempting to address the issue @Grond0 mentioned. Is it perfect? Surely not - but I do think it’s a reasonable attempt to mitigate the loopholes and methods used by the very rich to avoid paying as much as possible.
Sales taxes, levied at the municipal or State level, are their own thing. I was talking specifically about Federal taxes on income and/or wealth--the Federal Government does not *need* that revenue to pay for its programs since it simply print the money it needs to pay for them. Those taxes exist only to restrict the money supply to hedge against devaluation but Bernie is trying to use them as a weapon against the ultra-wealthy as if they somehow deserve to be punished for being wealthy. That makes no sense-- in fact, it is economic discrimination.
I concur--it doesn't matter how many or how often the dips occur; we normally only concern ourselves with the annual tax rate even if it gets paid montly or quarterly.
Congress can close tax loopholes right now if it wanted to. If the law allows them, though, they are both permissible and legal. If Bezos pays a lower nominal rate than I do then he is clearly able to afford really good CPAs who know all the shelters and loopholes, which is legal. Actual tax cheats--peopel who simply don't pay at all like Wesley Snipes or Nicholas Cage--wind up either in prison or having assets seized and garnished.
At some point, they are probably going to start talking about doing away with Roth IRAs, as well. You pay the tax up front and then the money just keeps growing until you cash it in, either at retirement or before then by paying a modest penalty.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm pretty sure just "printing money" is how you end up with gallons of milk that cost $1000.00. I asked this question in social studies when I was 13 years old, and the answer I received was, essentially, inflation.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm pretty sure just "printing money" is how you end up with gallons of milk that cost $1000.00. I asked this question in social studies when I was 13 years old, and the answer I received was, essentially, inflation.
Did you not see the part where I said why taxes exist now--they restrict the money supply so that inflation (or currency devaluation and/or hyperinflation) does not occur?
Our Federal Government does not tax first then pay for things; instead, it pays for things first and then taxes us to keep the money supply relatively constant.
2043 billionaires in the US with average income $200m/year x 0.02 (2% tax)= wait for it...
$8.2 billion - not enough to provide shit
This is not difficult math. Warren is full of crap and so is Bernie when he says these things. I have no problem with Democrats wanting to provide extra services, but I call bullshit that a 2% tax on billionaires is going to pay for it. There simply are not enough of them for their income to pay for any of these progressive policies. Tell me the fucking truth and let me decide, Elizabeth. At least Bernie admits that everybody is going to have to pony up...
Maybe I'm misunderstanding it, but I believe it's a 2 cent wealth tax. Not income tax. So they arent taxing the income of those billionaires. They're taxing their wealth. Also, it's not just on Billionaires, but also on Millionaires. The Billionaires have a wealth tax that's higher, like 5 cents or so.
I understand that you dont like feeling lied to, but there's always a chance that you're just misunderstanding the proposal.
Edit - and the income tax on this would also stand up. Also the corporate tax would be raised again (Reversing the Trump tax cut that was mostly focused on enriching corporations).
I saw an article the other week that the reason Bloomberg is in the race and spending insane amounts of money is because he will lose WAY more under Warren and Sanders. Bloomberg owns something like 88% of his company, and it made something like 60 billion dollars last year (For some reason, the figure `3 billion is sticking in my head, but I dont remember specifically what number he'd pay). When all the tax plans are added up, Bloomberg will end up paying well over a billion a year (Still making 60ish billion, so it's hard to feel bad for him). So far, he's spent like 350 million in ads. It's practically a no-brainer to spend his money trying to buy the presidency rather than let Sanders or Warren become president.
Ok then, if by chance my total wealth gets over a million dollars then some IRS agent is going to send me a bill for $20k? If that's really what Warren is talking about then screw her. That's theft, not taxes. Where does it stop? 2%? 5%? 10%? It's whatever some president says it is? Count me out...
They aren't paying the full income tax they should though. Not to mention they more tax breaks than everyone else, along with paying less taxes proportionally. If trying to get them to pay what they actually owe is theft, than so is every single tax anyone pays ever.
Anything that causes wealth to rise above what it was the year before is 'income'. That includes increases in investments, collectibles, their homes, whatever. It isn't that difficult to define. It is hard to quantify however...
Second point - I don’t think it matters how many “dips” there are. If I tax you X amount so that you have Y left afterwards, is that any different than me taxing you 1/3x 3 separate times, also leaving you with Y? Not fundamentally.
Except a wealth tax will keep dipping year after year until you’re left with the maximum the government says you’re allowed before being taxed. I’d rather go bet it all on Black at a charity casino to give it to someone who will actually spend it wisely.
And there is a lot of ‘wealth,’ once transferred to other goods, such as gold or vintage wine, that can raise in value. Does the government get to apply a wealth tax to that? If I drink said vintage wine in one multimillion dollar bender am I still on the hook?
I should only be taxed when I sell the gold (or property), or auction the wine making an income(we can debate if I should be taxed if I sold the items at a loss however). And the person giving me money for it, and in turn, that person should be taxed for the sale.
Technically - if they never attempted to earn any money and hid it all under their mattress - yes. They’d be taxed down to 50 million - but that’s not likely to be the case for really anyone. Furthermore - in that extreme example, they’d still be wealthier than almost anyone on the planet.
As a side note - the ultra wealthy are free to give their money away to avoid paying taxes. They already do that, and if they want to drop to 50 million to do it: great. Donate.
Edit - there are some awful charities out there, ones where like 5% of the money donated actually serves the purpose for why it was donated.
A few arguments - Taxes aren’t defined in any particular way to prevent the government from issuing them. An income tax and sales tax are utterly different. A wealth tax can, by extension, be different still without issue.
Second point - I don’t think it matters how many “dips” there are. If I tax you X amount so that you have Y left afterwards, is that any different than me taxing you 1/3x 3 separate times, also leaving you with Y? Not fundamentally.
The idea of a Wealth tax is attempting to address the issue @Grond0 mentioned. Is it perfect? Surely not - but I do think it’s a reasonable attempt to mitigate the loopholes and methods used by the very rich to avoid paying as much as possible.
Sales taxes, levied at the municipal or State level, are their own thing. I was talking specifically about Federal taxes on income and/or wealth--the Federal Government does not *need* that revenue to pay for its programs since it simply print the money it needs to pay for them. Those taxes exist only to restrict the money supply to hedge against devaluation but Bernie is trying to use them as a weapon against the ultra-wealthy as if they somehow deserve to be punished for being wealthy. That makes no sense-- in fact, it is economic discrimination.
I concur--it doesn't matter how many or how often the dips occur; we normally only concern ourselves with the annual tax rate even if it gets paid montly or quarterly.
Congress can close tax loopholes right now if it wanted to. If the law allows them, though, they are both permissible and legal. If Bezos pays a lower nominal rate than I do then he is clearly able to afford really good CPAs who know all the shelters and loopholes, which is legal. Actual tax cheats--peopel who simply don't pay at all like Wesley Snipes or Nicholas Cage--wind up either in prison or having assets seized and garnished.
At some point, they are probably going to start talking about doing away with Roth IRAs, as well. You pay the tax up front and then the money just keeps growing until you cash it in, either at retirement or before then by paying a modest penalty.
I don’t really understand your argument. You admit that printing money is a solution, but that it causes inflation. Taxing controls the money supply, preventing that inflation. So if we increase government spending (by offering programs that raise the quality of life of poorer people), and we want to ensure we don’t cause inflation we must... increase taxes.
The overall point I was trying to make is that if you listen to politicians they make it seem as if government (at the Federal level) must increase taxes *first* and only then is it able to pay for programs. They make it seem as if the Federal Government is destitute, existing only on the scraps we give it, and if only we would all give it more then it could do more things for us. In reality, the Federal Government could just start paying for things and then we had damned sure better give it some money to destroy before the money we have left becomes worthless.
My *preference* would be "less expansive Federal Goverment, lower taxes". Relying on the government for a majority of our needs--it pays your basic minimum income, it pays for your eduation, it pays for your healthcare, and so on--relegates us all back to being young children who are entirely dependent upon essentially all-powerful parents. Try to ask a 6-year-old child what they would do if their parents kicked them out of the house--they cannot comprehend that situation because the concept of "no bed to sleep in, no food for dinner, no toys, and no shelter from the environment" is more than they could imagine....presuming they don't actually comprehend it and just start crying.
Why are so many people so insistent that we all become children, entirely dependent upon the government for everything?
In normal circumstances, that is correct--tax then spend, spend then tax--the numbers work out the same. The situations some Democrats are proposing are *not* normal, and that is the problem.
Relying on the government for a majority of our needs--it pays your basic minimum income, it pays for your eduation, it pays for your healthcare, and so on--relegates us all back to being young children who are entirely dependent upon essentially all-powerful parents.
And yet countries that are way higher on the happiness index have much stronger social safety nets than the United States and the countries with the most problems have less Government involvement and social safety nets.
Could be your guess about government services providing a minimum floor for all citizens doesn't turn people into young children? Seems uh debatable at best and certainly not a basic premise to just gloss over.
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Norway: 7.594.
Denmark: 7.555.
Iceland: 7.495.
Switzerland: 7.487.
Netherlands: 7.441.
Canada: 7.328.
New Zealand: 7.324.
Sweden: 7.31
Trump's deregulation spree has the United States ranked No. 18 — falling four spots from last year and five from two years ago (counted in 2018).
Yes, I am certain that people receiving lots of "free stuff" from their government are happy--children are often very happy at Christmas. I would rather have no benefits from the government but keep more money in my pocket....but I must deal with the world as it exists, not as I would like it to exist. I am always giving that advice to other people; the least I can do is follow my own advice.
Yes, I am certain that people receiving lots of "free stuff" from their government are happy--children are often very happy at Christmas. I would rather have no benefits from the government but keep more money in my pocket....but I must deal with the world as it exists, not as I would like it to exist. I am always giving that advice to other people; the least I can do is follow my own advice.
Maybe a happy productive society is a good thing? Especially compared to Mad Max style anarchy though in the bottom rung. Maybe you can show that an unregulated no daddy society is better somehow. I kinda doubt it because...
You, I, or anyone may be strong young men today. But that's not going to last. One auto accident and you could be paralyzed. Your mom could get cancer. Your neighbor could rape your wife. It's better to live in a society that can address things. It costs money, it just does.
I'm not surprised. The Supreme Court is now a partisan hack job and all but irrelevant.
Conservative justices should recuse on everything because they just blindly follow the Republican company line on everything. Total sellouts.
Justice Thomas's wife is compiling an 'enemies list' of government employees who are not sufficiently brainwashed and don't blindly follow the Republican party line in order to purge those employees. Literally happening.
McConnell, Trump, and the Republican party have turned federal courts into kangaroo courts. They are literally trying to turn America into a one party state where the only requirement for the party is obedience and loyalty to the party leader. They already have a vast propaganda network working on it too.
This guy, has a malicious aversion to the reality.
He is not even trying to live in reality. Everything must be spun. We're totally screwed when coronavirus gets loose. He can't even be trusted to say - anything.
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Maybe I'm misunderstanding it, but I believe it's a 2 cent wealth tax. Not income tax. So they arent taxing the income of those billionaires. They're taxing their wealth. Also, it's not just on Billionaires, but also on Millionaires. The Billionaires have a wealth tax that's higher, like 5 cents or so.
https://elizabethwarren.com/plans/ultra-millionaire-tax
There's a source for it.
I understand that you dont like feeling lied to, but there's always a chance that you're just misunderstanding the proposal.
Edit - and the income tax on this would also stand up. Also the corporate tax would be raised again (Reversing the Trump tax cut that was mostly focused on enriching corporations).
I saw an article the other week that the reason Bloomberg is in the race and spending insane amounts of money is because he will lose WAY more under Warren and Sanders. Bloomberg owns something like 88% of his company, and it made something like 60 billion dollars last year (For some reason, the figure `3 billion is sticking in my head, but I dont remember specifically what number he'd pay). When all the tax plans are added up, Bloomberg will end up paying well over a billion a year (Still making 60ish billion, so it's hard to feel bad for him). So far, he's spent like 350 million in ads. It's practically a no-brainer to spend his money trying to buy the presidency rather than let Sanders or Warren become president.
Honestly that's what Trump did. He ran as an outsider and if he lost like he thought he would he planned to bitch about being cheated and hey you come buy a Trump condo. So if he lost he would have had a new grievance marketing angle and if he won well we're seeing that.
He won, and his main accomplishment was cutting his own taxes. He cut the top rates (his rates) by a hell of a lot, he gave us a slight cut, and halved the corporate tax rate. Tax cuts for him and his buddies was the most important thing for him, because he's rich.
Another thing he did was double the estate tax exemption, which of course only applies to people with estates like him. The exemptions are doubled to $22.36 million dollars.
Anyway, Bloomberg who is objectively much richer is trying to do the same thing as Trump - buy the Presidency. We truly don't need another racist New York Billionaire president very badly.
Ahh, such fond memories... of oppression, of torture, of a wonderfully systematic drainage of our wealth and economy. So romantic, isn't it? Oh wait, them British imperialists also gifted us something! You want to know? What, you think it's modern education? Ha ha, no!
1905. Lord Curzon divided Bengal, the heartland of our freedom struggle. My Bengal. Our Bengal. On what basis, you ask? Into an Eastern part in which there lived a somewhat larger Muslim population, and a Western part in which there was a larger Hindu population. But that was only the beginning. After they had bled our resources dry, they decided it was time to leave us in shambles, but not before etching another couple of bloodied borderlines on the map of our country. The Partition of India happened, on the same basis, religion.
What was for the British just one of their many loathsome strategies to divide our movement and struggle for Independence, ended up hurting us very badly. We got our Independence in 1947, but India was divided. Not just into today's India, Pakistan and Bangladesh, but into a more eerily haunting segregation of Hindus and Muslims, who didn't really know WHY they should hate each other, except the fact that their British overlords taught them so, and who ingrained that thing into their very brains, through propaganda... and whiplashes... and gunshots. That was their "gift" of communal hatred and intolerance for us.
But our founding fathers fought. They fought hard to unite our people. And they put it in the Preamble of our Constitution (the longest one in the world), the words, clearly in bold letters: "SECULAR" and "DEMOCRATIC". We came a long way since then. We did our best to heal the wounds, the marks of those whiplashes and police batons, and be a united people once again.
Ahh, but what would politicians not do to come and stay in power? Came in Narendra Modi (that goddamn psychopath who's our Prime Minister right now), who first rose to power after the 2002 Gujarat Riots, which, by the way, was organised and orchestrated by him and his fellow psychopaths, in an attempt to instigate communal hatred and violence, and they were very successful, so successful that Modi stayed in power in Gujarat as the unquestioned Chief Minister right upto 2014, when he became the PM of India. He turned the BJP (Bharatiya Janata Party) into an aggressive Hindu Nationalist party, and based his campaigns on communal intolerance and hatred, exactly the same way Hitler did back in the 1930s. Hitler said: "Jews bad." Modi says: "Muslims bad."
12 December, 2019. The BJP majority Union Government passes the Citizenship Amendment Act. An Act which sounds like a harmless attempt to give "non-Muslim" refugees from neighbouring countries asylum in India. The truth is far from that. They coupled the CAA with the NRC (National Register of Citizens), which is supposed to be a process to determine who is a rightful citizen and who is an "illegal" migrant, but the fact is that, they kept the NRC procedure vague and unclear and did not define who is an "illegal migrant"! So, it can be ANYBODY they want! Just anybody that they want. And you guess what? "Muslims bad!" So? "Muslims are illegal migrants!" And Hindus and other religions are practically immune to the "illegal migrant" sticker, because, well, the CAA gives "asylum" to all "non-Muslim" immigrants!
This beats the very spirit of our Indian Constitution that our founding fathers had so painstakingly made to ensure freedom, liberty and justice to all. Any legislation that treats one religion differently than others is completely against our Constitution! But, who cares? When you want to create a Reign of Terror based on falsehood and hatred, it's not that hard. Police brutality, buying the media for yourself, and all kinds of underhanded tactics has been used by the Modi government, and the country is in a state of deep turmoil. They also keep rigging the elections, manipulating results, threatening voters so that they would not vote, and doing everything they can to suppress our Democratic Rights. Do people die in America on Election Day because of violent assaults? No, right? Well, here in India, they do. Lots of them. Every time.
But we, the people, are fighting. We are fighting against this corrupt Fascist (or should I rather plainly say "Nazist") government. If you want to read and know about the incidences of police violence and the whole lot of atrocities by the government on intellectuals and students who question and protest against this aggressive Hindu Nationalist bullshit, go to the r/india subreddit. It's by far the best non-censored source of information available regarding the situation out here.
I belong to a Hindu family (though I personally am an Agnostic Atheist), but Hinduism doesn't teach us to hate other religions and kill people, neither does Islam. I hate Modi's Hindu Nationalist bullshit. He and his goons are besmirching all the philosophies that Hinduism stands for! (If you want to know some of the philosophies, read the subtitles in this music video.) It's dirty politicians like him that turn religion into instruments of violence and terror, and use it to instigate communal hatred and intolerance, all based on false propaganda. They make it appear as if Muslims are the ones who do all the crimes and are responsible for all the problems in the society, exactly the way Hitler did with Jews back in his time.
Modi has built concentration camps too! He just calls them "Detention Centres". He and Amit Shah (his right hand man, in office as Home Minister of India, actually is more than that; also Shah not to be confused as a Muslim surname, it's a Hindu one, and he's another aggressive Hindu Nationalist), these two are the ones who are the masterminds behind all of this.
They are running an authoritarian Fascist regime and are turning our vibrant democracy, the world's largest one, into a police state. Things are bad here. Our capital Delhi is plunged in communal riots, and things are really bad there. It was instigated by those aggressive Hindu Nationalist goons, who did it right in the aftermath of Trump's visit to India, so as to make it appear that Muslims are causing violence and vandalism, while it was those Hindu Nationalist mobs who burned down at least two mosques in Northeastern Delhi and attacked and killed Muslim children.
In preparation for Trump's visit, Modi also built a massive wall to hide the slums in Gujarat, so as to create a false image of wealth and modernisation. It also triggers me so hard that Modi's spending so much money on Trump's worthless arse in order to appease that absolute psychopathic criminal, so that he would not talk about the annexation of Kashmir by India (YES, IT WAS AN ANNEXATION!) as well as ignore this whole turmoil and crisis created by the CAA-NRC. They both are like: "You suck my nuts, I suck yours." Simply amazing, isn't it?
I hate Fascists so much, I do. I can't help it. Because I, a normal person on Earth, am affected adversely by these people. My family is, my friends are, my society and my country, and other countries too, everyone is affected adversely.
By the way, my American friends, I request you, please get yourselves a better President this time. As someone who, not being an American, is STILL affected by Trump's bullshit (IN ADDITION to Modi's bullshit), I hold the American people responsible for being irresponsible in choosing a sane President. Please don't repeat your mistakes. Thank you.
[Edits: Added more links.]
And, for the record, this is why Tulsi Gabbard was persona non grata to alot of people paying attention. Because she is tied at the hip with Modi more than any other politician. It's not the least bit surprising that Trump and Modi are collaborating in an elaborate con-job for the world media. They're two peas in a pod.
@Rik_Kirtaniya I agree with your main point that Modi's approach to Hindu nationalism is pretty terrible. I also agree that the British have a lot to answer for in the way they ran India. However, I don't think it's realistic to suggest that British rule was the sole cause of religious conflict. There had been a history of religious violence in India for many hundreds of years before the British arrived. You can make a plausible argument that this was made worse by the British as a result of encouraging political groupings to form around religions. However, you can also make a case for saying it was inevitable that, once political groupings were allowed, they would form around existing strong community identities.
India is a very complex subject and nowadays Modi's populist fascism is really worrying. But it has its parallel in a lot of other countries around the world - we seem to be living in an era of nationalism awakening, and all the old universal values are depreciated. There may be some good reasons for that, and one is that the fact that these same universal values were used by European colonialist to dominate other people around the world. I read recently a nice polmical book from Pankaj Mishra on this subject, "Age of Anger" I do not agree with all he said, but there are interesting perks in his book.
When I read Amartya Sen book on The Argumentative Indian a couple of years ago (he already talked about Modi, who was as just a fanatical regional politician), I was startled to discover India's fascinating history of religious tolerance (I mean, at school, I learned about the fanatics, the massacres, etc) particularly during the Moghol era, and the reign of Ackbar (not "It's a trap" ...). I already knew the old story of Ashoka, but not of Ackbar and his open tolerant politics towards all religions, and his even strange tentative to create some kind of new syncretism. Unfortunaltely, it did not last long, but this is a milestone in the complex and difficult story of attaining to a balance between different religions.
Ok then, if by chance my total wealth gets over a million dollars then some IRS agent is going to send me a bill for $20k? If that's really what Warren is talking about then screw her. That's theft, not taxes. Where does it stop? 2%? 5%? 10%? It's whatever some president says it is? Count me out...
However, if we’re talking about taxing money I get from investments, or bank saving programs, then sure, tax that because it is a form of income. Anything that increases a persons wealth should be taxed if labour is taxed.
But once again, the one thing Trump has shown is that if there is enough money for pet projects like a Space Force and a vanity wall then there is enough money for Medicare for All or other social programs. Remember Mexico will pay for it.
Of course they are not the sole reason, but they played a HUGE role. And they did it on purpose. The British Raj did a lot of nasty things to ENSURE that it happened.
Persecution by a certain king or emperor of his opposite religion and deaths during an invasion were mostly what happened before (it's not that I don't condemn them). However, with the British Raj, came a whole new brand of religious violence and in a scale that was not seen before. COMMUNAL RIOTS. Now, common people of either religion (not kings and rulers) who have been brainwashed by the British Raj came out armed and fought each other in the lanes of the suburbs and villages. It keeps on happening even today, with the difference being that the brainwashers are now these corrupt politicians. It just happened yesterday in Delhi as well, and is not fully in control yet.
Not just encouraging, but also ensuring. They did everything they could to make it happen. They even bribed and patronized corrupt and influential people in either communities to spread intolerance and hatred against the other community. Gandhi did a LOT to stop that from happening, but he couldn't prevent the Partition of India despite all his efforts.
Well, the way in which history took course doesn't mean that it was inevitable. In fact, we were dragged down this path of history by the rulers in power, and I blame the British Raj the most. As @Rigel mentioned, we did have other rulers who did a lot to ensure communal tolerance, unity and peace, and those are not values and notions that were alien to the Indian culture and the Indian way of life. We have a phrase here from our old Sanskrit Upanishads, "Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam", which means in English, "the world is one family". It is values like these that Hinduism taught us, not this hate-mongering bullshit that Modi and Shah and others in the BJP/RSS/Hindu Mahasabha Alliance preach. Whatever this is, this is NOT Hinduism. If you see the music video I linked earlier, it would be even more clear.
Religions are philosophies, but when they are not understood by the common people, but rather left in the hands of the corrupt preachers for them to interpret as they find profitable, and then brainwash the common people by instigating some kind of vague communal identity, that's when the problem arises. This is a generalization for all religions. They are philosophies and should be treated as such, and not some medal or badge that one hangs over one's apparel. That is the problem.
I think in a lot of European country it is a bit the same. Corbyn in the UK planned to have such a tax installed (according to my family there - and they were not very happy about it, even if they have always voted Labour).
This is one of the significant problems with income tax. At most people's level, defining income is normally pretty easy, but that's not the case when you're a billionaire. There are plenty of ways that you can increase your wealth that are not counted as income for the purpose of tax. Hence when you look at rates of tax paid, it's not just that very wealthy people pay a lower share of their declared income, they also have potentially much lower proportions of their increasing wealth counted as income in the first place.
They aren't paying the full income tax they should though. Not to mention they more tax breaks than everyone else, along with paying less taxes proportionally. If trying to get them to pay what they actually owe is theft, than so is every single tax anyone pays ever.
But that’s part of the point.
If I can proclaim in one year I had 1 billion dollars, and then the next year I had 3 billion dollars, my ‘income’ would be 2 billion.
It doesn’t matter if I purchased something with some of the money because whatever I purchase should have already be taxed with the purchase. Key word is should. A good chunk of the time it isn’t.
If some shmuck is getting money taken away from him because he is flipping burgers (al la income tax), then I don’t see why a person can’t pay 2 cents on the dollar when the banks calculate compound interest in savings accounts.
That is not how taxes have worked for almost my entire life, at least at the Federal level. Why do people still think that this is how taxes work?
If the government needs $10 billion to pay for something it can just issue the money for it, call it valid, and pay for it; they don't need your tax revenue to do that. The *reason* for Federal taxes now is so that the government can restrict the money supply as a check against currency devaluation and inflation which occur when the government issues new money.
Just for the sake of discussion, let us presume that Sanders wins the White House, the Democrats retain the House, and Republicans retain the Senate. Can Bernie implement new taxes on the ultra-wealthy? Of course not--Executive Orders cannot levy new taxes; only Congress can do that. Even if that measure passes the House do you think it will pass the Senate? Of course it won't--why would those people, the vast majority of whom are all millionaires, raise their own taxes?
If an ultra-wealthy person is complying with existing tax law, then they are already paying everything they should. Why should they pay more than that? Even if you overpay your taxes, the IRS is required by law to refund the overpayment to you.
At least Democrats are now finally giving actual numbers to show how much they think ultra-wealthy people should be paying. For years I kept asking "how much is fair?" or "define 'fair'" and never got an answer.
Taxes cannot be retroactive, so even if Bernie gets the taxes he wants these people will simply move their money before those changes to the tax code take effect.
Second point - I don’t think it matters how many “dips” there are. If I tax you X amount so that you have Y left afterwards, is that any different than me taxing you 1/3x 3 separate times, also leaving you with Y? Not fundamentally.
The idea of a Wealth tax is attempting to address the issue @Grond0 mentioned. Is it perfect? Surely not - but I do think it’s a reasonable attempt to mitigate the loopholes and methods used by the very rich to avoid paying as much as possible.
As I said, I agree with you that Modi's politics does not represent the main thrust of Hinduism, but I don't think Modi was the result of the British Raj.
@Rigel referred to Akbar and I agree that he had a very enlightened attitude to religion - but he partly stands out precisely because that was so unusual both for his time and the dynasty he came from. His successors did not display the same tolerance and about 50 years after Akbar's death, Aurangzeb took the throne and instituted something of a reign of terror against non-Muslims.
I accept that the attitude of the ruler of a country has a big effect on the attitudes of the citizens, but I don't think that changes the basis of the argument. You're suggesting that the way the British ruled makes them very largely responsible for religious intolerance in India; I'm just pointing out there was a long history of such intolerance before the British ever arrived (there's nothing unique about India there of course - most long-established countries have a history of religious intolerance).
You also suggest that the British deliberately politicized religious divisions. It's worth pointing out though that the two main parties at the end of the Raj were the Indian National Congress and the Muslim League. While the Muslim League had a specifically religious agenda, the INC did not. They claimed to represent all Indians, of all faiths and had a secular, liberal agenda. They won 58% of the seats in the 1946 elections (which were the precursor to independence and the drafting of the constitution). More radical parties, such as the Hindu Mahasabha Party, got no seats at all - not what you would expect if the British had been deliberately stoking religious tensions.
I'll also note that in your original post you were pointing out the virtues of the Indian constitution. That's fine, but that constitution grew out of the political process overseen by the British. Significant parts of it were lifted wholesale from the British system (such as the electoral process, parliamentary and legislative processes, rule of law and the role of courts) and much of the rest reflected UK politics at the time (such as the emphasis on liberal social values, freedom of expression and respect for minority religions).
I'm not trying to argue here that the British were not at fault, or that the Indian constitution did not represent a huge achievement. I am though arguing that seeing religious conflict and Partition as the result of a deliberate act of malice by the British is a misconception. Partitions of various sorts have a poor history of solving community tensions, whether those are religious in origin or not. Examples in Ireland, Germany, Vietnam, Korea etc, don't suggest that separating people is a good way to help them understand and accept each other. I agree with you that you get better understanding through living and talking together, but that is not necessarily an achievable solution in the short term.
Partition was not something that the British supported until very close to independence (which is part of the reason for the lack of preparation that caused so much chaos). The Muslim League had been campaigning for an independent Pakistan for some time and there was also support for this idea from more radical Hindus. However, prior to WWII the British had shown no interest in this. After the war though, when the Muslim League gained the vast majority of Muslim votes in the 1946 elections, the British were forced to take the idea more seriously. Still though, their favored proposal was not a full partition, but a federal system in which provinces had significant autonomy. The Muslim League accepted this, but the INC rejected it in 1946 on the grounds they wanted a greater degree of central control.
From that point religious violence started to become much more common. Mountbatten was appointed as the last Viceroy of India in 1947, with a brief to achieve independence for India by the following year. His instructions were to maintain a united India, but with the worsening violence he soon concluded that it would not be possible to both achieve independence on the desired timescale and maintain a united India. Instead he chose to try and cut short the violence by bringing forward the date for independence to August 1947, while maintaining as much of a united India as he could. His proposed arrangements for Partition were agreed by all the main Indian leaders (Sikhs and Dalits, as well as the Muslim League and INC) in June 1947. While Gandhi himself was not in favor, most of the INC leaders were. They were fearful (rightly I think) about the potential difficulties of achieving a consensus over a constitution and future political arrangements in a united India - and thought a full legal separation would make it easier to establish a liberal, secular constitution in the large remaining area of India (covering about 330 of the then 390 million population).
Except a wealth tax will keep dipping year after year until you’re left with the maximum the government says you’re allowed before being taxed. I’d rather go bet it all on Black at a charity casino to give it to someone who will actually spend it wisely.
And there is a lot of ‘wealth,’ once transferred to other goods, such as gold or vintage wine, that can raise in value. Does the government get to apply a wealth tax to that? If I drink said vintage wine in one multimillion dollar bender am I still on the hook?
I should only be taxed when I sell the gold (or property), or auction the wine making an income(we can debate if I should be taxed if I sold the items at a loss however). And the person giving me money for it, and in turn, that person should be taxed for the sale.
So what about the estate tax?? That money is, in fact, being transferred to another person who has never paid any taxes on it. It is no longer the property of the person who died, it's the property of someone else. If a transfer of money by sale initiates another round of taxation, why should handing it to someone be any different?? The fact that it's a family member to me seems immaterial. All it does is allow generations of the same family to keep passing down the same money without contributing anything more.
Sales taxes, levied at the municipal or State level, are their own thing. I was talking specifically about Federal taxes on income and/or wealth--the Federal Government does not *need* that revenue to pay for its programs since it simply print the money it needs to pay for them. Those taxes exist only to restrict the money supply to hedge against devaluation but Bernie is trying to use them as a weapon against the ultra-wealthy as if they somehow deserve to be punished for being wealthy. That makes no sense-- in fact, it is economic discrimination.
I concur--it doesn't matter how many or how often the dips occur; we normally only concern ourselves with the annual tax rate even if it gets paid montly or quarterly.
Congress can close tax loopholes right now if it wanted to. If the law allows them, though, they are both permissible and legal. If Bezos pays a lower nominal rate than I do then he is clearly able to afford really good CPAs who know all the shelters and loopholes, which is legal. Actual tax cheats--peopel who simply don't pay at all like Wesley Snipes or Nicholas Cage--wind up either in prison or having assets seized and garnished.
At some point, they are probably going to start talking about doing away with Roth IRAs, as well. You pay the tax up front and then the money just keeps growing until you cash it in, either at retirement or before then by paying a modest penalty.
Did you not see the part where I said why taxes exist now--they restrict the money supply so that inflation (or currency devaluation and/or hyperinflation) does not occur?
Our Federal Government does not tax first then pay for things; instead, it pays for things first and then taxes us to keep the money supply relatively constant.
Anything that causes wealth to rise above what it was the year before is 'income'. That includes increases in investments, collectibles, their homes, whatever. It isn't that difficult to define. It is hard to quantify however...
Technically - if they never attempted to earn any money and hid it all under their mattress - yes. They’d be taxed down to 50 million - but that’s not likely to be the case for really anyone. Furthermore - in that extreme example, they’d still be wealthier than almost anyone on the planet.
As a side note - the ultra wealthy are free to give their money away to avoid paying taxes. They already do that, and if they want to drop to 50 million to do it: great. Donate.
Edit - there are some awful charities out there, ones where like 5% of the money donated actually serves the purpose for why it was donated.
I don’t really understand your argument. You admit that printing money is a solution, but that it causes inflation. Taxing controls the money supply, preventing that inflation. So if we increase government spending (by offering programs that raise the quality of life of poorer people), and we want to ensure we don’t cause inflation we must... increase taxes.
The order in which is happens seems immaterial.
The overall point I was trying to make is that if you listen to politicians they make it seem as if government (at the Federal level) must increase taxes *first* and only then is it able to pay for programs. They make it seem as if the Federal Government is destitute, existing only on the scraps we give it, and if only we would all give it more then it could do more things for us. In reality, the Federal Government could just start paying for things and then we had damned sure better give it some money to destroy before the money we have left becomes worthless.
My *preference* would be "less expansive Federal Goverment, lower taxes". Relying on the government for a majority of our needs--it pays your basic minimum income, it pays for your eduation, it pays for your healthcare, and so on--relegates us all back to being young children who are entirely dependent upon essentially all-powerful parents. Try to ask a 6-year-old child what they would do if their parents kicked them out of the house--they cannot comprehend that situation because the concept of "no bed to sleep in, no food for dinner, no toys, and no shelter from the environment" is more than they could imagine....presuming they don't actually comprehend it and just start crying.
Why are so many people so insistent that we all become children, entirely dependent upon the government for everything?
In normal circumstances, that is correct--tax then spend, spend then tax--the numbers work out the same. The situations some Democrats are proposing are *not* normal, and that is the problem.
And yet countries that are way higher on the happiness index have much stronger social safety nets than the United States and the countries with the most problems have less Government involvement and social safety nets.
Could be your guess about government services providing a minimum floor for all citizens doesn't turn people into young children? Seems uh debatable at best and certainly not a basic premise to just gloss over.
Top
Norway: 7.594.
Denmark: 7.555.
Iceland: 7.495.
Switzerland: 7.487.
Netherlands: 7.441.
Canada: 7.328.
New Zealand: 7.324.
Sweden: 7.31
Trump's deregulation spree has the United States ranked No. 18 — falling four spots from last year and five from two years ago (counted in 2018).
https://www.cnbc.com/2018/03/16/these-are-the-top-10-happiest-countries-in-the-world.html
Unhappiest:
South Sudan.
Central African Republic.
Afghanistan.
Tanzania.
Rwanda.
Yemen.
Malawi.
Syria
Meanwhile....the Second Circuit Court of Appeals just reversed a lower court decision preventing the Trump Administration from withholding law enforcement grant money from "sanctuary" cities. The money in question comes from Edward Byrne Memorial Justice Assistance Grant Program, not all Federal money. I am surprised that the appeal has not already been sent to the Supreme Court.
You, I, or anyone may be strong young men today. But that's not going to last. One auto accident and you could be paralyzed. Your mom could get cancer. Your neighbor could rape your wife. It's better to live in a society that can address things. It costs money, it just does.
I'm not surprised. The Supreme Court is now a partisan hack job and all but irrelevant.
Conservative justices should recuse on everything because they just blindly follow the Republican company line on everything. Total sellouts.
Justice Thomas's wife is compiling an 'enemies list' of government employees who are not sufficiently brainwashed and don't blindly follow the Republican party line in order to purge those employees. Literally happening.
https://crooksandliars.com/2020/02/ginny-thomas-and-groundswell-making-firing
McConnell, Trump, and the Republican party have turned federal courts into kangaroo courts. They are literally trying to turn America into a one party state where the only requirement for the party is obedience and loyalty to the party leader. They already have a vast propaganda network working on it too.
It's the democratic debates. hahaa snowflake.
This guy, has a malicious aversion to the reality.
He is not even trying to live in reality. Everything must be spun. We're totally screwed when coronavirus gets loose. He can't even be trusted to say - anything.