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What Would You Do?

DeaconCav06

DeaconCav06

Dickie Hemric
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Lets just take it as a given that deficit reduction will come as a result of a combination of revenue increases and spending cuts.

If you don't believe that's the case then don't bother responding to this question because you are a moron and I have no interest in your point of view.

Obviously the GOP is going to hold the debt ceiling hostage unless spending cuts are made. This is the biggest chip that they have.

What would your solution be for forcing both sides to come to the table and make meaningful cuts as well as tax reforms?
 
A) Publicly funded elections

B) Fix the gerrymandering problem

C) Withhold Congress' pay
 
A) Increase taxes on those over 500k

B) Tax capital gains like ordinary income

C) Raise age requirement and means test social security

D) Cut Military spending by 10%

E) Cut all other government programs by 5%
 
I'm also curious as to how you would make this happen.

I'm reading an article about how this Congress will likely be even more divisive than the last.
 
DeaconCav06 said:
I'm also curious as to how you would make this happen.

I'm reading an article about how this Congress will likely be even more divisive than the last.
Click to expand...

Is that possible?
 
WFFaithful said:
Yes. Boehner said he is no longer going to negotiate with Obama.
Click to expand...

Obama vs. Boehner, pay per view actual fight on the floor of the Senate, proceeds go to deficit reduction.
 
Les Grossman said:
A) Increase taxes on those over 500k

B) Tax capital gains like ordinary income

C) Raise age requirement and means test social security

D) Cut Military spending by 10%

E) Cut all other government programs by 5%
Click to expand...


Hah! Why not just let the sequester take place then if you're going to arbitrarily cut 5% from different gov't programs?
 
WFFaithful said:
A) Publicly funded elections

B) Fix the gerrymandering problem

C) Withhold Congress' pay
Click to expand...

D) Cut military spending by 20 percent, including getting out of bad contracts with politician-owned defense contractors ASAP. Most of that money can probably be cut by simply reallocating "nation-building" in Afghanistan to "nation-building" in the United States, as well as shutting down undermanned military bases in locations that are no longer strategic.
 
1) Audit the Federal Reserve (which is currently forbidden) and educate members of Congress about the Feds actions with monetary policy and the impacts.

2) Withdrawal all troops from Afghanistan and further reduce footprint in Iraq (ie reduce the size of Green Zone and consolidate bases).

3) Allow Bush tax cuts to expire and return to Clinton era levels

4) Reform the tax code so that Capital Gains are taxed like regular income for people that earn $50,000+ in capital gains annually; keep rates low on people that are small time investors (less than above amount earned).

5) Close other tax loopholes (or greatly reduce those) that benefit primarily the wealthy ($500K+ earners)

6) Require the President to seek Congressional approval for all future foreign engagements, either through designated committee with special powers or through regular procedures.

And that's just a start...
 
I would build an aggressive and sticky social democracy with the following steps:

1. Big ole VAT replaces income tax.

2. Pigouvian tax on income inequality (excluding land rents, which will be taxed separately at 100%). Starts at like 10% of income over $500k and then 15% over $1MM and then 25% over $1.5MM and then 30% over $3MM and then 50% over $5MM and 60% over $10MM and then goes asymptotically to 100% blah blah blah. What up BKF?

3. Georgist tax on land rents

4. Tax all rents.

5. Pigouvian tax on lobbying expenditures (is that legal? If not, new constitution).

6. Carbon price (yet another Pigouvian tax).

7. ALL THE PIGOUVIAN TAXES.

8. Death panels.

9. Lower Medicare eligibility age to conception.

10. Federal universities (important supply-side measure).

11. Cut military spending.

12. Restructure Federal Reserve so that member banks only get 3 of 9 seats on the regional bank's Board instead of the current six. Academics get three newly open seats.

13. Cut spending on automatic stabilizers by growing the economy.

Think that's a good start.

How to bring people to the table? Single-district winner-take-all elections are, by their nature, polarizing. They raise the returns to gerrymanders and create situations where a member has a "safe" district and has to worry only about challenges from the left/right and not the interests of the median state or national voter. We have to get rid of those. You can't rely on "gerrymander reform" if you're not going to reduce the incentive to gerrymander. Obviously we can't do that in states that only have one seat in Congress. So let's make Congress bigger (1,200 reps ought to do it) and have proportional representation super districts. The pressure to bargain will be intense with different electoral dynamics.
 
Tuff, no other nation has a VAT only. To have that would be highly regressive and would devastate business. In fact all of the European G8/G20 nations and Japan have higher personal tax rates and a 14-19% VAT. A VAT only will be a horrible idea.

When you add you Medicare for life into, the VAT concept is even worse.
 
We already have taxes on real estate. Taxing rent is more onerus on those who can least afford it.
 
RJKarl said:
We already have taxes on real estate. Taxing rent is more onerus on those who can least afford it.
Click to expand...

Generally those who can least afford taxes do not live on parcels with a very high land rent. A Georgist tax has always been a progressive tax.
 
DeaconCav06 said:
Lets just take it as a given that deficit reduction will come as a result of a combination of revenue increases and spending cuts.

If you don't believe that's the case then don't bother responding to this question because you are a moron and I have no interest in your point of view.

Obviously the GOP is going to hold the debt ceiling hostage unless spending cuts are made. This is the biggest chip that they have.

What would your solution be for forcing both sides to come to the table and make meaningful cuts as well as tax reforms?
Click to expand...

oooohhhh
 
TuffaloDeac10 said:
Generally those who can least afford taxes do not live on parcels with a very high land rent. A Georgist tax has always been a progressive tax.
Click to expand...

Regardless of what the rates are they will increase rents in lower income areas and dramatically in places that aren't low income.
 
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