From: usenet@transfer.stratus.com (Mr. Network News)
Newsgroups: ne.politics
Subject: Re: Tax the POOR, not the rich!
Date: 31 Aug 92 18:31:59 GMT
Reply-To: Dave_Wetzel@vos.stratus.com
Organization: Dave_Wetzel

In article <DuH9PB1w165w@buscard.fidonet.org> murph@buscard.fidonet.org 
(Brian Murphy) writes:

> Mr. News is misleading when he calls for the wealthy paying "their fair
> share" of taxes.

Sorry about the confusion on the name.  My transfer server seems to keep 
replacing my name...

> Poor people break more laws.

No, poor people get convicted of breaking more laws.  And when the wealthy 
get convicted do they receive equal justice?  Talk to to me about 
celebraties who can even go as far as striking a police officer and not do 
major time (if a kid from Watts had tried slapping an LAPD officer, s/he 
would probably have been shot!)!  Talk to me about those insider traders 
and S&L kings who are getting out of jail after a pitifully few years and 
get to keep much of their millions (and billions) at the cost of the 
taxpayers.  Sorry, the wealthy get benefits that we all pay for.

And how about those tax breaks the wealthy get (which was in fact the 
point)?  Certain investors (mostly overseas for some strange reason) pay 
less than 1% tax. Is that a fair share when the middle class pay 30%??

I encourage everyone to read Bartlett and Steele's "America: What Went 
Wrong".  Take a look at the tax data.  It's pretty obscene.

> I favor a flat tax rate - EVEN at 10-15% and higher - providing there are
> absolutely NO exceptions and deductions.  A flat tax is fairer and will
> encourage greater compliance.

The only exception I favor is inability to pay.  If paying your taxes puts 
you into poverty (and therefore increasing the strain on the system), then 
at least some portion should be waived.

> As the tax code is now, tax breaks for the wealthy are necessary if you 
expect
> these same wealthy people to provide the jobs that everyone else needs.

No, supply-side economics doesn't (in my worthless opinion) work.  Or at 
least not as well as demand-side economics.  Giving the wealthy all the 
money and hoping they'll do the right thing with it is ridiculous and 
dangerous.  It encourages production of luxury items that few can afford.  
And being supported by the tax burdens on the middle and lower classes, 
the whole system is vulnerable to the emotional factors of those groups.  
If the middle and lower classes stop buying because they're concerned 
about their jobs, then all the investment in the world isn't going to help 
the economy.

Demand-side works much better.  Let the poor and middle-class benefit from 
reduced tax burden and then they'll go out and spend money, creating 
demand.  The demand will be filled because the wealthy investors want to 
make money.  The investment creates jobs, employing more poor and 
middle-class workers.  These new works now have money to spend, creating 
demand... and so on.  Everyone's happy.  Utopia.  Life is swell.

And to other posters who have accused me of advocating "soak the rich", I 
find that an unusual definition for "let's have everyone pay taxes".  Face 
it, the rich get all the benefits of our current tax code.

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Dave_Wetzel@vos.stratus.com
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