From: kane@buast7.bu.edu (Hot Young Star)
Newsgroups: talk.politics.misc,alt.politics.usa.misc,alt.politics.clinton
Subject: Re: Why Do Soak the Rich Schemes Always End Up Picking
	     Everyone's Pocket?
Date: 15 Oct 92 21:31:46 GMT
	    <1992Oct15.172448.26837@cbnews.cb.att.com>
	    <JASON.92Oct15144542@ab20.larc.nasa.gov>
Followup-To: talk.politics.misc
Distribution: usa
Organization: Astronomy Department, Boston University, Boston, MA, USA

In article <JASON.92Oct15144542@ab20.larc.nasa.gov>
Jason C. Austin <j.c.austin@larc.nasa.gov> responds to this:

>->10% (the rich) hold 90% of the wealth in this country. If what you say
>->is true, then something is very wrong with our "tax" system. Those who
>->have the least pay the most. I propose we tax the "holdings" of the
>->rich and shake some of that 90% loose to cover the tax bill.

>-> 			John Miller

>Think about what you're saying.  People, especially people
>that are going to keep it, don't hold wealth; they spend it in order
>to build on it.  When they spend money to expand their companies, they
>hire more people and buy more products from other companies.  If you
>tax these ``rich'' and take away a big chuck of that money, they are
>not going to spend as much.  Less spending means less expansion and
>less jobs.

True. But add a little context: Wealthy individuals who employ large
numbers of individuals have companies that are/were part of the military-
industrial complex. Large corporations that don't feel the effects of
perfect competition because they're virtual monopolies.

What happens when you end a 50 year military build up? The military all
of a sudden has drastically less need for industrial contracts, and the
industries have to lay off workers because the corporate leaders are
too short-sighted to diversify and to retrain workers to conract for, say,
scientific or technological endeavors.

All these laid off workers could be retrained, but instead they have to
take by and large unskilled jobs. By and large they don't have enough
money or economic smarts to start their own small businesses. This is
understandable: the government has been preferring big business for
a long time now; it's no wonder there is not enough money to keep
small businesses forming and thus adding to the pool of competition.

For the sake of product quality and diversity we should encourage
small business, not big business.

Unfortunately, the people who could once easily help small businesses
start, have a much harder time lending money to those who want it, because
of the S&L debacle. The deregulation that caused the savings and loan
institutional bankruptcies was intended to favor big business. But it
backfired and through greedy money making schemes, these institutions lost
their money to unwise speculators.

It's a dilemma. How do we get the money to encourage small business without
closing tax loopholes on big business, thus forcing them to lay off workers
in order to afford the taxes they were supposed to pay in the first place?

I think we can't just tax the rich without doing something at the same
time. We have to give some tax incentive which counters this new tax to
reward companies that retrain workers so they can survive in a scientifically
oriented (versus militarily-oriented) economy. If they can change gears,
they can perhaps get lost business back.

The details are up for discussion.
Newsgroups: talk.politics.misc,alt.politics.usa.misc,alt.politics.usa.constitution,misc.legal