| Why do people try and live off of minimum wage?
Posted: 4/13/2005 1:32:16 PM | "Its the fear, the violence, the disenfranchisement that makes people feel poor. The percieved lack of opportunity."
That's the kind of rich, leftist thinking that tries to rationalize why people don't take responsibility for themselves. It's never their fault for not doing what it takes to be rich, it's always society tha has it in for them. Poor people don't think they're poor because they have a feeling of "disenfranchisement" and "violence". They feel poor because they don't have money. Sorry, slurpee, but I don't buy it. | |
|
| Why do people try and live off of minimum wage?
Posted: 4/13/2005 1:32:58 PM | yes, I am. I was making the point that I have had to do some underhanded dealings in order to get myself in the position to be able to take these oppurtunities.
School does no good when you have to work all the time just to pay the bills, and I use social aid as a last and most final resort. | |
|
| Why do people try and live off of minimum wage?
Posted: 4/13/2005 1:33:34 PM |
Watchman: since you are so proficient at economics, why can't you figure out that 50% of the taxpayers who now pay 1% of the tax burden would have to pay 98 times that to pay as much as the top 50%?
Let's keep it simple for your simple mind ok?
Let's say the tax base is 100 and we have 100 people in the country.
Top 50 people pay $99 (not 98 like you suggest, we have 100% of a tax base right?)
The bottom 50 people pay $1
This means that the top 50 people pay $1.98 each
This means the bottom 50 people pay $0.02 each
You're suggesting that the bottom 50 people pay 98 times what they pay now.
That would be 98 X .02 or $1.96 each.
$1.96 x 50 people equals $98.00
As you can clearly see, the bottom 50 people paying 98 times the 1% is still not as much as the top 50 people pay. The top 50 people pay $1.98 each.
Now what I am saying is that ALL 100 people pay $1.00 each.
I'm sure I'd lose your feeble mind if I attempted to do any type of earning curve so we'll just call it quits here. Thus endeth your last lesson...
One thing I've learn in this life is that a lot of smart people fail because they give up. They don't realize how important persistance is. There is always a way to navigate the beauracracy so long as you don't give up.
That is sound advice Kadmus. One thing I've learned is that the people who cry the loudest about what they don't have are the ones who do the least...
(Oh and you missed 'bearuacracy' as well, it's 'bureaucracy'.) | |
|
| |
| |
| Why do people try and live off of minimum wage?
Posted: 4/13/2005 1:39:17 PM | But watch man not all 100 people own 1% of the pie. Those top 5% own 60% and so should pay 60%.
You are talking income, I am trying to talk ownership. If one of your 100 owns nothing how can he pay the $1? | |
|
| Why do people try and live off of minimum wage?
Posted: 4/13/2005 1:40:19 PM | Yep, I've overcome my inability to spell. It's been tough but I've preservered.
Good thing my job didn't give me a spelling test else I would be making minimum wage. | |
|
| Why do people try and live off of minimum wage?
Posted: 4/13/2005 1:44:00 PM | According to the Census Bureau, the top fifth of households now claim 49.2 percent of national income while the bottom fifth gets by on 3.6 percent.
www.census.gov ("income" at Table H-2).
In 1998, Disney CEO Michael Eisner received a pay package totaling $575.6 million, 25,070 times the average Disney worker's pay. | |
|
| Why do people try and live off of minimum wage?
Posted: 4/13/2005 1:47:43 PM |
You are talking income, I am trying to talk ownership. If one of your 100 owns nothing how can he pay the $1?
Sorry Trewq, I didn't want to confuse poor elwood any more than he already is so I didn't even get into income curves.
The point is that the top 50% of tax payers paid over 94% of all taxes since 1990, and 96% from 2000-2002.
It's hardly fair that they should be asked to pay even more. Why is 50% of America only paying 4% of the taxes? That is the percentage that needs to be increased... | |
|
| Why do people try and live off of minimum wage?
Posted: 4/13/2005 1:47:51 PM |
According to the Census Bureau, the top fifth of households now claim 49.2 percent of national income while the bottom fifth gets by on 3.6 percent.
www.census.gov ("income" at Table H-2).
Actually, that means the bottom fifth does a lot better than I thought they would. I mean think about it, the bottom fifth has some homeless folks in it. And still, they are 3.6 percent of the total pie. Those number really aren't that f-ed up. | |
|
| Why do people try and live off of minimum wage?
Posted: 4/13/2005 2:02:31 PM | The world's 200 richest people more than doubled their net worth in the four years to 1999, to more than $1 trillion, for an average $5 billion each. Their combined wealth (the top seven are Americans) equals the combined annual income of the world's poorest 2.5 billion people.
United Nations Human Development Report 1999, | |
|
| Why do people try and live off of minimum wage?
Posted: 4/13/2005 2:13:08 PM | These absurdities means that someone making $10,000 pays tax at a higher rate than someone making $5,000, while someone with no other income than the interest on $100 million in tax-free munis pays nothing.
http://www.opinioneditorials.com/freedomwriters/rlewis_20041115.html | |
|
| Why do people try and live off of minimum wage?
Posted: 4/13/2005 3:02:40 PM | The world's 200 richest people more than doubled their net worth in the four years to 1999, to more than $1 trillion, for an average $5 billion each. Their combined wealth (the top seven are Americans) equals the combined annual income of the world's poorest 2.5 billion people.
United Nations Human Development Report 1999,
So what? They work hard, made smart investments and made a lot of money. I have the same opportunity they do...
while someone with no other income than the interest on $100 million in tax-free munis pays nothing.
Do you understand that Municipal Bonds are directly responsible for their building of schools and infrastructure that the poor need and use? The rich invest in building these projects by giving what amounts to a tax free loan and you want to penalize them for it?
I'm sure you would be screaming even louder when the rich stop investing in Municipal Bonds. Where will the new schools, city water and sewer projects come from then?
| |
|
| Why do people try and live off of minimum wage?
Posted: 4/13/2005 3:29:23 PM | Watchman: okay.. .so that means you'd have the bottom 50 people pay 50 times what they're paying. 
Tell me that's workable now?
You see, Mr. Economics... the bottom 50 are paying more than 2% of their income in taxes NOW.. and 50 times that in most cases would be much more than they make...
So tell me again... sharpen your pencil..
You do this for a living you say?
 | |
|
| Why do people try and live off of minimum wage?
Posted: 4/13/2005 3:57:02 PM | Just say you're wrong elwood, it's ok everyone reading this thread knows it anyway.....sport...
I said I didn't want to confuse your simple mind with earnings curves in that example, for what would be very obvious reasons to everyone but yourself. | |
|
| |
| |
| Why do people try and live off of minimum wage?
Posted: 4/13/2005 4:27:27 PM | You said:
[quote]
The rich ARE paying their fair share. If the 50% of America that only pays 2% of the tax revenue were to start paying THEIR fair share then I could keep more of my own money...
[/quote]
I said
[quote]
SO watchman thinks 50% of the taxpayers should pay ninety-eight times the rate they're paying now OR he thinks the federal government should cut spending by 98%...
[/quote]
then YOU said:
[quote]
Sport, you've already demonstrated your inability to comprehend the economy and most topics that have to do with rational thought.
I'm not about to give you a second semester of Economics 101 after you so miserably failed the first one...
[/quote]
then I said:
[quote]
We COULD cut the government spending to make it so EVERYONE ELSE pays the same as the bottom 50%... but then you'd have to cut government spending by 98%... right?
1 + 1 makes 2... or don't your figures agree?
[/quote]
You're suggesting that the bottom 50 people pay 98 times what they pay now.
That would be 98 X .02 or $1.96 each.
$1.96 x 50 people equals $98.00
As you can clearly see, the bottom 50 people paying 98 times the 1% is still not as much as the top 50 people pay. The top 50 people pay $1.98 each.
Now what I am saying is that ALL 100 people pay $1.00 each.
[/quote]
then I said:
[quote]
You see, Mr. Economics... the bottom 50 are paying more than 2% of their income in taxes NOW.. and 50 times that in most cases would be much more than they make...
[/quote]
then you lie and say:
[quote]
Just say you're wrong elwood, it's ok everyone reading this thread knows it anyway.....sport...
[/quote]
toilet cleaning?
You're it, genius | |
|
| Why do people try and live off of minimum wage?
Posted: 4/13/2005 4:53:48 PM | Interesting post. IMHO. people take these low paying jobs because THEY NEED IT!
Face it. There are poor counties in this nation folks. In East Texas, probably one of the most backwoods areas in the south, there are counties with a population of 23,000 and job bases of 1500. Their top employers are the hospital and the school.
I hope I am not knocking them. It is the geographic location that is against, and their close knit family mentality, that hinder their development. They are off the major accesses, have no shipping port, and no airports on a major airlines schedule.
What do these people do? They work for whatever they can get. And in these areas, businesses come and go at the discretion of those who can afford one. These are what are called the Wa-Mart and McDonald's towns. When one of the majors comes in the local businesses lose money.
Do a search of the job you do in the files of your employment commission if you want a picture of what various employers in your state pays. The disparity is incredible. A journeyman electrician on the coast of Texas starts at $17.25, in East Texas he might make $13. But in the valley, the area around the Mexican border, he will get as low as $5.50.
Statistics aren't the real world as is stuff. | |
|
| Why do people try and live off of minimum wage?
Posted: 4/13/2005 5:17:22 PM | commenting simply on the initial post...there does seem to be a lack of accountability (certainly in canada and by the post made here in the us as well)
now don't get me wrong. i really and truly appreciate the social welfare net that canadians choose to operate with their tax dollars. health care and various social services are vital and i don't mind my tax dollars going to the efficient management and operation of said services to deserving canadians who just happen to need a bit of help or are a bit down and out thanks to a capitalist system where the minimum wage idea must thrive.
HOWEVER, i keep coming across this "other" mentality that seems to stem directly from the social welfare net. we all claim that we have rights and freedoms - among them, the right to make choices for our lives. and yet, if we consistently make bad choices, apparently, the government (and thus canadian taxpayers) then is responsible for the consequences of these bad choices. why is that? what happened to personal accountability? personal freedoms come with personal responsibilities, do they not?
this does not pertain to the person who loses their job due to downsizing and then collects unemployment while he's being re-trained. or the family that lives on minimum wage taking advantage of universal healthcare. or the disabled who cannot work collecting disability.
i am aiming this personal accountability directly at those who are physically/mentally capable of working and who take advantage of the system. those who blame the government for not taking care of them. i had to pay my own way through university working 2 jobs, taking a student loan (which i paid back) and going to school part time. i pay my taxes and work in my community...and hold myself accountable for what i do. why do we now shy away from personal responsibility in favour of not offending people who have made bad choices and don't want to own up?
| |
|
| Why do people try and live off of minimum wage?
Posted: 4/13/2005 5:58:55 PM |
why do we now shy away from personal responsibility in favour of not offending people who have made bad choices and don't want to own up?
As much as I push for personal responsibility in my posts, if I fail at something, sometimes my first reaction is to blame someone, or something, else. If I get fired from my job for smoking a joint in the office, I might blame the "stupid office policies" instead of myself. If society reinforces this notion, by giving me welfare, then I might be more apt to do it again, or not care to follow the standards of why we work and so forth. | |
|
| Why do people try and live off of minimum wage?
Posted: 4/13/2005 7:10:14 PM | Poverty, or working for minimum wage, is NOT A MORAL FAILING. We, that is me and you, cannot hold others accountable to our way of doing things when we are dealing with human beings who have, and exercise, a multiplicity of choice.
There are too many variables we are missing. Personal resources, lack of education, geographic location, are the biggest that come to mind.
We, me and you, are blind to many of the problems that keep them back.
Final thought: When the blind lead the blind.....get the hell out of the way! | |
|
| Why do people try and live off of minimum wage?
Posted: 4/14/2005 5:04:48 AM | I don't think anyone is saying that working for minimum wage is some sort of moral failing.
I do think that anyone that works for minimum wage and complains about it, expects the Government to step in and subsidize that wage doesn't deserve the help if they are not actively trying to better their own lives.
It's easy to place blame on someone else, 'I didn't get that job and I deserve it' . But it's what we do after rejection and during a crisis that makes us successful. When all is said and done, people have to want to be successful. The Government cannot make a lazy individual content with minimum wage a success... | |
|
| |
| Why do people try and live off of minimum wage?
Posted: 4/14/2005 9:40:25 AM | ECONOMIC ISSUES OF GENERAL PAYROLL TAXES
by
Jonathan R. Kesselman
September 1996
CRESP Discussion Paper: DP-41
Department of Economics Discussion Paper No.: 96-27
CENTRE FOR RESEARCH
ON ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL POLICY
DEPARTMENT OF ECONOMICS
THE UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA
VANCOUVER, CANADA V6T 1Z1
http://web.arts.ubc.ca/econ/
Labour incomes or payrolls are one of three major types of tax base on flows of economic
resources; the other two are capital income and consumption.1 These three bases, plus a
related concept of cash flows which is an alternate way of implementing a consumption
base have important interrelationships. The capital income base includes returns to the ownership of business, investment, and property assets. Another tax base, total income,
consists of the sum of two of the three generic bases, labour incomes plus capital incomes.
The consumption base equals total income minus current savings.2 Neither the payroll
base nor the consumption base (or its twin cash-flow base) taxes the ordinary returns to
capital, so that neither directly affects the incentives for savings, the allocation of capital
resources, or lifetime consumption choices. All three tax bases place a wedge between the
amount employers pay and what employees receive and hence potentially distort incentives
in the labour market. However, a tax base that does not apply to capital sources will need
to impose a higher rate and greater distortions on the labour market. | |
|
Home
login 
