Percentage doesnt matter. The still end up paying 1000X more tax than the middle class, as they do now.

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http://www.fairtax.org

Elminate all taxes on income and replace with a national sales tax.

Goober doesn't like the FairTax because we won't be able to punish people enough for producing. So try not to encourage him by pointing out that millionaires could choose to live like paupers.

Ironic huh? Under the whole class envy paradigm, they're pissed at successful people having more than them ("no one needs five cars!") but hate a plan that would, by their theory, incentivize the wealthy to stop consuming as much.

Boggling.

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-Eric

"For whoever habitually suppresses the truth in the interests of tact will produce a deformity from the womb of his thought." -Sir Basil H. Liddel-Hart

Self-composed.com

Without a middle class a country has no democratic foundation. Stop taxing ownership or capital gains and obviously the power of the very rich in the economy increases.

There are other ways to distribute capital fairly while keeping an incentive to strive for maximum returns (and thus, an efficient economy). Pension funds for example.

How so?

__________________
-Eric

"For whoever habitually suppresses the truth in the interests of tact will produce a deformity from the womb of his thought." -Sir Basil H. Liddel-Hart

Self-composed.com

Only the middle class votes?
I didn't know capital was distributed. Is there a local distribution office near me? I'd like to get some.

No the lower class votes too.
But if you reduce the middle class too much the lower class elects Hugo Chavez.

The Fair Tax is a ridiculous fantasy, based on sloppy math.
It leaves things out, like the Federal Budget would increase, because everything the Federal government buys would go up 30%.

Notice how Fair Tax Defenders shy away from facts and use slogans and insults to defend the policy.
That should give you a clue of the firm intellectual footing it's on.

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“ The subjects of every state ought to contribute towards the support of the government, as nearly as possible, in proportion to their respective abilities; that is, in proportion to the revenue which they respectively enjoy under the protection of the state.”

Adam Smith , The Wealth of Nations 1776

"We have always known that heedless self-interest was bad morals; we know now that it is bad economics"
FDR's second Inaugural Address

The middle class is a large group of people with reasonable wealth. They are the only group that can stand up for change for the entire people without throwing a country into chaos. Everywhere where a middle class emerges, politics change for the better.

Democracy is much more than voting.

Capital is distributed. All sorts of organizations, induviduals and processes influence it. Companies, shareholders, unions, the free market, negotiations, regulations, taxes, subsidies, media. Thats reality.

The price of everything would decrease by about that much as the cost of corporate taxes and compliance would no longer be passed down to the consumer. Things wouldn't cost much more than they do now.

Also, in the first place, if the government had an aircraft carrier built, I'm not sure whether it would pay itself the taxes on that or not.

__________________
-Eric

"For whoever habitually suppresses the truth in the interests of tact will produce a deformity from the womb of his thought." -Sir Basil H. Liddel-Hart

Self-composed.com

I see what you mean. The lower class votes for those politicians who promise to give the most of other peoples' money to them. I wonder if we have a corollary for this in the US. I wonder who the lower class will choose next November.

But on a serious note, given that "lower", "middle", and "upper" class are simply subjective measures of amorphous classes, isn't there always a middle class? And isn't that middle class always larger than either the lower or upper classes?
That's funny coming from a guy who has presented zero facts and zero math. And when he tried to do math he got it completely wrong.

Tell me, goober, does this sum up your opposition to the FairTax:

1) You don't like it when people confuse you with big words and hard math,
2) It doesn't screw those evil rich "enough",
3) You don't like conservation and recycling.

Also, what is the maximum amount any person should pay to support the government? 50%, 75%, 100%?

Why don't you want to answer these simple questions?

Isn't there always a middle class?
Cool, but this doesn't answer my question. Where can I get my capital distribution? Can I just walk into any company and demand my distribution, or are there special companies set up for it?

You saw his comment about the budget increasing because the government would have to pay itself more taxes right?

__________________
-Eric

"For whoever habitually suppresses the truth in the interests of tact will produce a deformity from the womb of his thought." -Sir Basil H. Liddel-Hart

Self-composed.com

Yea, I've explained it to him at least twice and he still doesn't get it. I realize I'm wasting my time, but I love watching him flounder.

A tax rate on income is a tax on spending. In fact with a little bit of effort you could duplicated that current tax system under a consumption tax and subsidization scheme. An even easier task would be to duplicate the fair tax proposal under an income tax system.

There are some economic justifications for some of the write-offs, particularly those related to businesses.

I expect statistically you would only find a weak relationship between the two.

What is math if not logic? Much of the fundamental characterization of Microeconomic Theory deals with math that looks like formal logic. With math one is able to define a logical framework on which to carry out analysis.

You claim that there is anything meaningful about which axis is used for what is meaningless. It is a merely a pictorial representation of a series of functions.

Applied economics is particularly useful. What good is a theory if you don't know if it is actually true. This is particularly true when looking at more complicated theories. It is not possible to observe the effects of certain monetary policy choices yet we have a series of models that look as though they are consistent with the choices people make. How do we evaluate them. Do we just somewhat arbitrarily pick which we believe to be the best.