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fakename
Guest
…even if a minority does not have enough stuff according to their station in life?
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SwizzleStick
Guest
Hmm. Depends. Does your use of the word “given” mean that wealth should be “taken” from someone to be given to another? Does your use of the word “stuff” mean just stuff as in “wants” or does it mean “needs?”
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Seeker1961
Guest
If you live in a consumer based economy you want the largest number of your citizens to have adequate spending power. Jobs are created by supply and demand, and if the largest group of people in your society are not “demanding” then there is no need to supply-and therefore no jobs.
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pangaious
Guest
Are we accusing a part of the Bible of be communist? Is it fair to transfer it to our time, what we read in the Bible, all of it? How do we do it? If capitalism has failed for sooo long to solve the problem we have, economic, what can we do? We know communism does not work? But, it is not communism that it was advocated in scripture. Also, have you guys looked at the Venus Project . com? We do not need money. what we need is the resources to be available to us for the benefit of everyone. We have enough for everyone. It is just the monetary system that gets in the way.
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MidnightSun12
Guest
Why not? Individuals in a society that conformed to God’s graces would naturally take that additional wealth and use it to generously serve and care for the poor. We all have the choice to sin or to practice virtue. God gives us wealth and we are absolutely entitled to that wealth… it’s what we do with our money and how we use it to serve others that we will be judged on!
Wasting the riches that God has given us on ourselves or getting the government to take possession of it are not going to be things that will stand up on judgment day…
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Hunter24
Guest
Should anything be given to anyone without reason? charity is one thing but are you suggesting something like distribution of resources? this seams oddly Marxist… COMMIES!!!
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redletters
Guest
Personally, I think fairness demands that we each support our government with a fair taxation for all, from the top to the bottom. A flat tax on all income, no deductions at all, would mean most people would pay less, though the top percent would pay more, but nobody would pay onerous rates. It would generate more income to run the country than the present system generates and that would be wonderful, as there are so many needs the fed and state govts are unable to address at this time.
Failing that, I think the tax break gravy train needs to come to a screeching halt, for rich folks, corporations, everyone. While it may not make the poor rich, at least it will enable social aid programs to continue helping the least among us.
Failing that, I think the tax break gravy train needs to come to a screeching halt, for rich folks, corporations, everyone. While it may not make the poor rich, at least it will enable social aid programs to continue helping the least among us.
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JIB
Guest
The average American tax burden is over $16,000. The reality is that the poor in America do not pay their “fair share”.
I would suggest cutting government spending in lieu of more punitive taxes on anyone.
I would suggest cutting government spending in lieu of more punitive taxes on anyone.
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redletters
Guest
While I don’t agree that the poor are skating by w/o paying enough into the system that helps them survive, I would like to see cuts in defense spending, pensions for retired federal judges and elected officials, and secret service protection for former presidents and their families. And I would especially like to see tax hikes for those earning over $250K annually; they can certainly kick in a bit more.
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JIB
Guest
It’s not really up for debate. The bottom quintile of income earners receive something along the lines of 5 dollars for every tax dollar they pay. You may debate the morality of that, but you can’t debate the facts.
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kentuckyliz
Guest
Does Christianity exist to justify our economic system/beliefs?
Is that why Christ died on the Cross?
Is that why Christ died on the Cross?
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SamH
Guest
What do you mean by “station in life”?
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kkollwitz
Guest
Thinking of my own adult children, the government impulse to forcibly take money from those who earn it and give it to those who don’t has already sapped the initiative of one of them (and his indolent friends); and is likely to do the same to another.
As long as society doesn’t distinguish between the lazy and the needy where gov’t largesse is concerned, lives will continue to be ruined under the guise of “morality.”
As long as society doesn’t distinguish between the lazy and the needy where gov’t largesse is concerned, lives will continue to be ruined under the guise of “morality.”
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Seeker1961
Guest
And who determines the difference between the “lazy” and the “needy”?
Every 4 years the myth of the welfare queen returns, as she drives her new Escalade to the grocery store, buys filet mignon and lobster with her food stamp card-struggling to get it out of her Gucci wallet with her freshly manicured nails. (and the bonus point goes to who can pick her racial makeup!)
It’s a wonderful story, because everyone gets to feel all righteously indignant and superior-but it isn’t true. The majority of people who receive public assistance are children, and unless you would relish a return to child labor, they’re not getting jobs to pay taxes. Most of the rest have at least one job, some have 2 or 3. (you can look up the welfare statistics for your state if you like, the federal government makes them easily available as well)
Better yet, spend some time at your local food pantry, get to know the folks who come in at the end of the month when that $4 a day they get runs out and they can’t buy food for their children. You can call them lazy to their faces.
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fakename
Guest
This is significant for my question. A person’s station in life is their social status that is, what seems becoming to them. It includes what everyone needs to survive plus what they need to live becomingly and not to appear (I suppose) either stingy or prodigal.
Now to a great extent, I think that station-in-life is based on how others perceive you. If that’s the case, then if the majority or vast majority have greater wealth, then that makes you seem even less wealthy and the way you live, less becoming. Therefore it would seem immoral for the vast majority to benefit to the extent that fewer and fewer people benefit with them.
This means that either most or everyone should have less wealth or few people should benefit from the economic system.
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white_sheep
Guest
Too much loaded language. Exactly what does benefit mean?
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kkollwitz
Guest
“Better yet, spend some time at your local food pantry, get to know the folks who come in at the end of the month when that $4 a day they get runs out and they can’t buy food for their children. You can call them lazy to their faces.”
Thanks for that advice: I worked Saturday lunch at a soup kitchen as a part of my parish commitments for about 6 years. Most of the people there were indolent and lazy like my son, and were being enabled in that laziness and indolence by an abundance of handouts. And the folks who ran out of food at the end of the month were easy to distinguish by their gratitude, politeness, and cleaning up after themselves.
Thanks for that advice: I worked Saturday lunch at a soup kitchen as a part of my parish commitments for about 6 years. Most of the people there were indolent and lazy like my son, and were being enabled in that laziness and indolence by an abundance of handouts. And the folks who ran out of food at the end of the month were easy to distinguish by their gratitude, politeness, and cleaning up after themselves.
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Seeker1961
Guest
That’s really sad. I’ve worked in food pantries in three different states since I was in college and I have never had an experience like that. I have watched grown men cry because they can’t provide for their families, I’ve seen people that I’ve fed come back a few months later and donate because they’re back on their feet and I’ve heard the phrase “I never thought this could happen to me-I went to school, I worked hard!” too many times to count. I have honestly never met anyone that was “indolent” or “lazy”. Guess I’ve just been really lucky.
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Bill_Martin
Guest
“You cannot legislate the poor into freedom by legislating the industrious out of it. You don’t multiply wealth by dividing it. Government cannot give anything to anybody that it doesn’t first take from somebody else. Whenever somebody receives something without working for it, somebody else has to work for it without receiving. The worst thing that can happen to a nation is for half of the people to get the idea they don’t have to work because somebody else will work for them, and the other half to get the idea that it does no good to work because they don’t get to enjoy the fruits of their labor.”
–Adrian Rogers
–Adrian Rogers
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