The Wealth-Cap Economic System

[HolySpirit]

People who play dirty is pretty vague. What is your criteria for being dirty.

 

[Augustinian]

The focus needs to be on blaming the unethically wealthy,

What’s “unethically wealthy”?

Many very wealthy individuals are real innovators, whether its Gates or Jobs from this generation or Carnegie and Frick from the previous.

 

[Xanthippe_Voorhees]

I’d like to get back to the original post about a wealth cap.

The focus needs to be on blaming the unethically wealthy, not blaming the poor for being poor.

A cap may not be necessary after we first go after the people who play dirty in order to get and stay wealthy. Ways of going after them may include making them pay the same kind of taxes that we do, getting them out of Congress and the lobbyist circle (Gates and Bezos pretty much wrote the tax laws for Washington State), weaning them from the corporate welfare teat, and compelling them to treat their workers justly with living wages, safe working conditions, and public transparency, (esp. with oversees factories).

I’m open-minded to the idea of a cap but think we need to try the aforementioned first.

I can agree to some of the things you say.

I think a simplified universal tiered tax with minimal exemptions would be ideal.

We need to pull our cheap labor from China and put it in Central America, stopping the flood of illegal labor as they now have jobs that pay sufficient money in their countries.

Congressional term limits and end to lifetime politicians. Universities are figuring out you need people with real-world experience to teach–why haven’t we figured out we need real-world people to lead our country?

End to business taxes and a start to direct accountability–roads, schools etc, sponsored by the businesses with expected outcome levels. (This could cut useless town fees, too)

But when it comes down to it, you aren’t going to attack the super elites. You are going to kill the middle class…just like obama care did.

 

[Rasoleil]

Why weep or slumber America
Land of brave and true
With castles and clothing and food for all
All belongs to you
Ev’ry man a king ev’ry man a king
For you can be a millionaire
But there’s something belonging to others
There’s enough for all people to share
When it’s sunny June and December too
Or in the winter time or spring
There’ll be peace without end
Ev’ry man a king

1935 Huey P. Long

Partial to this song being a fan of the great Senator and Governor of Louisiana Huey P. Long

 

[Xanthippe_Voorhees]

Xanthippe_Voorhees:

Doritos are freaking $3+ for a bag. That’s literally a meal for my entire family…maybe more.

Doritos aren’t that filling either. A pound of rice or pasta is less than a buck.

They don’t need to be cooked. Rice and Pasta do.

But even a bag of plain tortilla chips is often twice the size for $1 and you can deli meat and cheese.

2 bottles of $1 off-brand salad dressing, a $2 head of cabbage chopped, $2 cheapest chopped deli meat, $1 cheap cheese, $1 crunchy onions or croutons, whatever’ on sale…I make a cabbage salad that makes probably 20 servings of a very filling food. No cooking.

However, there is gut bacteria that craves junk food the more you eat it. I avoid junk food at all costs and rarely crave it. So I’m fine with eating cabbage salad. But most people won’t eat it becasue they find it ick.

 

[blackforest]

Let’s try this criteria on for size: Going against Church teaching in order to become wealthy. Do you think any wealthy person has ever done this? Or does it never happen?

I would also add that taking welfare money from the government is unethical when you have wealthy corporation. Welfare should be for the needy.

 

[QContinuum]

I’d support distributism where land ownership is a fundamental right…

Same here. Distributionism, with an emphasis on subsidiarity in government.

 

[Xanthippe_Voorhees]

I would also add that taking welfare money from the government is unethical when you have wealthy corporation. Welfare should be for the needy.

Then you have to understand what stage you are operating on. Are American corporations wealthy compared to American citizens? Yes. But they are often in need of help compared to corporations around the world and how the governments sponsor them. If we want to keep jobs in America, we need to compete on a world stage.

 

[QContinuum]

If we want to keep jobs in America, we need to compete on a world stage.

Not disputing your point, but I’d rather have more American-owned businesses and companies, and even employee owned businesses, than just jobs.

 

[Pup7]

Your link sounds more like the middle class and wasn’t targeted toward the poor.

For whatever it’s worthy, Doritos are actually, (and unfortunately), a lot cheaper than fresh produce . . .

Fresh produce isn’t fresh. It’s weeks old and denigrated greatly by the time it reaches the grocery store. Frozen is far better and pretty cheap. You can buy massive bags of frozen vegetables at Walmart for far less than a bag of empty calories in the chip aisle.

People do it every single day and manage just fine. And no, I don’t mean people in my demographic. A bag of Doritos is almost five bucks where I live. A massive bag of frozen corn (and I do mean huge) is about $3 at Walmart. And yes, I’ve looked at that.

I know if you’re homeless there’s a whole other piece to that puzzle. But if you have a roof over your head and the capability to cook, you can seriously make your dollars go far. And yes, that ability varies by location. With the exception of Hawaii and San Diego, this is the most expensive place I’ve ever lived. It’s possible even here, depending on your living situation.

I also feed my family for about half of a food stamp budget on a regular basis in a HCOL area. I put my money where my mouth is.

This.

Junk food is just cheaper than the fresh and healthy stuff. It’s unfortunate but true.

Not if you shop correctly - or just don’t buy it to start with. I don’t buy it because it’s crap, plain and simple.

Again, fresh is not necessarily what you want anyway.

 

[Pup7]

Not disputing your point, but I’d rather have more American-owned businesses and companies, and even employee owned businesses, than just jobs.

She has a point, though. Competing on a world stage doesn’t just mean shipping jobs overseas. It means giving companies the breaks on their home turf that they get overseas (I don’t mean borderline slave labor, I mean tax breaks and incentives - even in Europe sometimes they do far better there than they do here).

 

[Xanthippe_Voorhees]

Xanthippe_Voorhees:

If we want to keep jobs in America, we need to compete on a world stage.

Not disputing your point, but I’d rather have more American-owned businesses and companies, and even employee owned businesses, than just jobs.

I think we’re speaking to same point. American-owned businesses need to have the same tools that those in other countries do. Our tech companies are working on the world’s stage, not just the big ones. Many of the tax breaks they get are the reason they are adding jobs and innovation to the world.

 

[QContinuum]

As I said, not disputing that. I’d just like to see a lot more emphasis on helping people create and grow their own businesses. Make more Americans owners versus workers.

 

[QContinuum]

Yes, exactly.

 

[Pup7]

LOL looks like all three of us were on the same page.

I’d just like to see a lot more emphasis on helping people create and grow their own businesses. Make more Americans owners versus workers.

I agree, that would be great as well. It’s small but I do try to buy local where I can. The best part is up here in a major city that gets easier to do.

I’m out of likes or you’d get one.

 

[HolySpirit]

Which Church teachings, and what criteria would determine if I was dirty. How much is dirty?

 

[Xanthippe_Voorhees]

Yes, exactly.

What @blackforest was alluding to in post 20 shows a lack of understanding of what competing on the world stage really means.

Should a corporation with 200 workers get free TSA Pre passes, reimbursed Security clearance, tax discounts? I think that poster would say no.

However, in reality, that company’s competition is not in the US. They are competing with Germany and Canada and India and others.

 

[angelic06]

Wealth cap.

Absolutely not. I am willing to work my rear off so that I can achieve my goals in life - be a medical missionary in the future being one of them, and working with injured musicians being another - and have a few good things, such as a large Easter feast for my children and a trip to Poland, arguable the most Catholic country in the world, for my family.

Put a cap on wealth and you take away that incentive.

I will do everything lawful in the sight of His Majesty our God and King to attain my desires.

I suggest everyone here do the same.

 

[IWantGod]

The wealth cap sounds like socialism.

Not as i present it it’s not. My wealth-cap still acknowledges the individuals right to create their own wealth, it just presents a limited version of property rights as opposed to an unlimited version that ignores the common good which everybody has a God given right to as explained in the OP…

Socialism in my eyes is essentially an extreme form of the common good to the extent that it removes everybody’s individual right to property.

See how a limited right to property is doing in China. Not so good.

What does China’s economy have to do with my argument?

Even with a wealth cap you’re still going to have poverty. You can’t fully distribute it down.

Why?

For the same reason you can’t find Doritos on food stamp day.

I don’t see how this relates to what has been presented in the OP.

In my conception of a Wealth-Cap, there would be no such thing as unemployment because the unemployed,. except for those who are unable to work due to disability, would essentially be working on behalf of the government and would be payed by the wealth-cap-tax. The government would create Jobs for them.

poverty mindset without people wanting that change.

If you don’t have a good reason to not work you wouldn’t get payed. And everybody wants to get payed despite your pessimistic attitude toward the poor. What they don’t want is a wage that doesn’t reflect their dignity as human beings in the current economy…

 

[Lemuel]

Would never work.