tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7884128379999766348.post3053721416708402158..comments2024-03-28T22:02:16.520-04:00Comments on Politics and its Discontents: UPDATED: The 'Robin-Hood Tax' Gains TractionLornehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15741324981120408977noreply@blogger.comBlogger7125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7884128379999766348.post-9191195001282675732014-05-21T11:32:35.869-04:002014-05-21T11:32:35.869-04:00I have to confess, Anon, that being a Canadian I a...I have to confess, Anon, that being a Canadian I am not really conversant with the IRA accounts except that I know they are vehicles for retirement. I don't think targeting such vehicles is the intention of the tax although I realize that taxing transactions on institutional traders would likely filter down to the individual paying more in brokerage fees, etc. I guess it is ultimately a matter of perspective as to whether the benefits of such a low tax would outweigh the drawbacks.Lornehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15741324981120408977noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7884128379999766348.post-67175739603639579852014-05-21T11:04:06.644-04:002014-05-21T11:04:06.644-04:00You can take middle & lower income peoples IRA...You can take middle & lower income peoples IRA accounts & put a transacation tax on them. That is against income sharing.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7884128379999766348.post-33271039080187167692014-05-11T20:02:14.501-04:002014-05-11T20:02:14.501-04:00@LD - addressing income inequality does not mean i...@LD - addressing income inequality does not mean imposing income equality. Some inequality is warranted due to genuine merit and market-considerations. It is when inequality becomes excessive, as is happening today, that intervention is needed. As noted by Krugman, Piketty and other economists too much income and wealth today is inherited meaning that the rich, by virtue of being rich, get ever richer while the poor, in consequence, grow ever poorer. Along the way, political power is likewise appropriated from the ordinary public to the wealthiest. Once economic and political power are "captured" you either must forcibly reverse it or democracy must be abandoned. Or else you just settle back before the giant flat screen with another cup of soma.<br /><br />I just got a steal on a new copy of "Capital in the 21st Century" that, along with about half a dozen other books, I'm wading through.The Mound of Soundhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09023839743772372922noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7884128379999766348.post-89876284300340563822014-05-11T13:02:08.239-04:002014-05-11T13:02:08.239-04:00All very true, Mound. Unfortunately, our present s...All very true, Mound. Unfortunately, our present system, which fosters insatiable greed, prevents Lincoln and Roosevelt's logic from having any chance at a fair consideration. It also promotes the rabid absolutism espoused by so many, reflected, of course, in the terrible imbalances that exist today.<br /><br />In all things, moderation. There is no reason that couldn't have been the economic rule today, if we hadn't turned over the keys to the reprobates who think of themselves as Masters of the Universe.Lornehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15741324981120408977noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7884128379999766348.post-4698185270157967502014-05-11T12:54:49.186-04:002014-05-11T12:54:49.186-04:00I don't disagree with your pessimism, LD. But ...I don't disagree with your pessimism, LD. But the more voters who know about the possibilities, the greater the prospect for change. Lornehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15741324981120408977noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7884128379999766348.post-22212441333834545492014-05-11T11:52:45.348-04:002014-05-11T11:52:45.348-04:00Lorne, income equality is a dream. Unfortunately t...Lorne, income equality is a dream. Unfortunately the rich have a good grip on society and politicians. To make that dream reality does not look attainable -especially in North America. Sorry to be pessimistic. LeDarohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12526776746689708239noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7884128379999766348.post-29518232089272454832014-05-11T11:52:25.415-04:002014-05-11T11:52:25.415-04:00Theodore Roosevelt, quoting Abraham Lincoln, put i...Theodore Roosevelt, quoting Abraham Lincoln, put it this way, "Labor is prior to, and independent of, capital. Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed if labor had not first existed. Labor is the superior of capital, and deserves much the higher consideration."<br /> <br />'If that remark was original with me, I should be even more strongly denounced as a Communist agitator than I shall be anyhow. It is Lincoln's."<br /><br />Roosevelt continued:<br /><br />"One of the chief factors in progress is the destruction of special privilege. The essence of any struggle for healthy liberty has always been, and must always be, to take from some one man or class of men the right to enjoy power, or wealth, or position, or immunity, which has not been earned by service to his or their fellows.<br /><br />"At many stages in the advance of humanity, this conflict between the men who possess more than they have earned and the men who have earned more than they possess is the central condition of progress. In our day it appears as the struggle of freemen to gain and hold the right of self-government as against the special interests, who twist the methods of free government into machinery for defeating the popular will."<br /><br />'Every dollar received should represent a dollar's worth of service rendered - not gambling in stocks, but service rendered. The really big fortune, the swollen fortune, by the mere fact of its size acquires qualities which differentiate it in kind as well as in degree from what is possessed by men of relatively small means."<br /><br />Roosevelt's "Square Deal" speech contains the blueprint for a healthy, stable democracy. It also demonstrates that there is nothing remotely radical in the very moderate policy advocated by the Pope. The only thing at all disturbing is to listening to the pro-oligarchic rhetoric of the FOX News shills. <br /><br />It all begins with the acceptance that, in a democracy, labour must be the superior of capital. The Mound of Soundhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09023839743772372922noreply@blogger.com