The Economic Collapse Blog

There's a much deeper question on the whole concept of taxation in general. What is it for and where should the limits be?

If you really look around you'll quickly learned that everything is taxed. Everything. Politicians have gotten very good at finding all sorts of areas where they can insert a probe and extract "blood". From gasoline to telephones, communications, dogs, cars, food, air travel, tobacco, etc. Here's one attempt at a list:
http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/archives/taxed-enough-already

Here in California it is not uncommon to hear of more hair-brained schemes to levy taxes on more things. A little-bit here and a little-bit there and politicians have collect billions to keep their gravy train going.

Regardless of whether we are talking about personal or corporate taxes, or taxes in general, it is important to always keep in mind what the "mission statement" might be for taxes. Lately the lines on this have blurred.

In general terms taxes should be used to run the government, military and reasonable social services (the last one being debatable).

Lately, at least in California and other similarly-afflicted states, a huge percentage of taxes are being dedicated to supporting a ridiculous pension infrastructure and a bloated government and public employee sector. Tax increases are being proposed with the sole purpose of finding funding for union pensions. We, then, exist to ensure that the union "class" gets to live happily every-after with their…

Letting the banks fail doesn't entail doing nothing and letting people suffer. Hank Paulson's bank bailout proposal got rammed through Congress by the Bush Administration without much consideration of any alternatives. Paulson's plan helped banks and bankers at the expense of everybody else. There were lots of other proposals that got ignored by the press. Here's three different approaches. While I personally favor the third approach, I think its very important to dispel the idea that we didn't have any choice but to bailout the banks, so I want to illustrate a variety of approaches:

(1) Steve Keen suggested a debt Jubilee: "monetary injections by the Federal Reserve not into the reserve accounts of banks, but into the bank accounts of the public--but on condition that its first function must be to pay debts down. This would reduce debt directly, but not advantage debtors over savers, and would reduce the profitability of the financial sector while not affecting its solvency" quoted from http://www.debtdeflation.com/blogs/2012/07/22/the-crisis-in-1000-words-or-less/

(2) Mortgage assistance: put a moratorium on foreclosures; freeze rate hikes in adjustable rate mortgages; help homeowners refinance their mortgages; or replace home borrowing with renting.

(3) Ron Paul proposed we abolish the Fed. While the Fed's profits belong to the federal government, the Fed itself is owned by the nationally chartered banks. Therefore, it's power to create money is used to benefit the…

>> I just don't see that this is what we are currently approaching with automation, etc, but rather huge poor masses and an middle class in decline.

> Can you support claim with some facts?*

Well, but how about just looking around you? Because arguing for obvious facts gets tiresome after a while.

http://www.dailyfinance.com/2010/10/17/disturbing-statistics-on-the-decline-of-americas-middle-class/

http://finance.yahoo.com/tech-ticker/the-u.s.-middle-class-is-being-wiped-out-heres-the-stats-to-prove-it-520657.html?tickers=%5EDJI,%5EGSPC,SPY,MCD,WMT,XRT,DIA

http://www.businessinsider.com/22-statistics-that-prove-the-middle-class-is-being-systematically-wiped-out-of-existence-in-america-2010-7

http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/archives/30-statistics-that-show-that-the-middle-class-is-dying-right-in-front-of-our-eyes-as-we-enter-2012

Yes, this is the game played by most people who complain about the "middle class in decline" or "increasing poverty". They increase the definition of "middle class" more rapidly than the living standards of the middle class actually increased, and then whine when reality hasn't met their artificial benchmark.

It's not a game --it's how society works. Definitions change according to the social reality. Would you consider YOURSELF middle class if you only had access to what a '50's middle class family had? A 1920's one?

The site is a thin veneer over an attempt to use people's panic to get them to buy:

gold coins: http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/gold-coins
silver coins: http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/silver-coins
emergency food: http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/emergency-food
water filters: http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/water-filters
alternative energy 'sources': http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/alternative-energy
home 'security': http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/home-security
personal 'security': http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/personal-security

and truely wtf...

macbooks: http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/macbooks
and
netbooks: http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/netbooks

Here is my visualization of the 16 Trillion Dollars bailout given by the Federal Reserve to the Banks that cannot fail:

http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/archives/have-you-heard-about-the-16-trillion-dollar-bailout-the-federal-reserve-handed-to-the-too-big-to-fail-banks

http://www.forbes.com/sites/traceygreenstein/2011/09/20/the-feds-16-trillion-bailouts-under-reported/

US Population : About 314 million
Bailout : USD 16 Trillion
= 16000 billion
= 16,000,000 million
Hence loading factor per person: 16,000,000 / 314
= about 50000 dollars.
I.e. The Federal Reserve Loaded every US citizen with an additional burden of USD 50,000

Don't worry. We'll lock down campaign contributions so much that only the six major corporations that control the mainstream media in the U.S can cover their campaigns.

>Back in 1983, approximately 50 corporations controlled the vast majority of all news media in the United States. Today, ownership of the news media has been concentrated in the hands of just six incredibly powerful media corporations.

http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/archives/who-owns-the-media-the-6-monolithic-corporations-that-control-almost-everything-we-watch-hear-and-read