OT: Scary Graph

[Tom Gardner]

On 19/10/19 17:04, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:

On Sat, 19 Oct 2019 08:04:02 +0100, Tom Gardner
spamjunk@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote:

On 19/10/19 03:19, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Sat, 19 Oct 2019 00:05:30 -0000 (UTC), Cursitor Doom
curd@notformail.com> wrote:

On Fri, 18 Oct 2019 10:19:29 -0700, John Larkin wrote:

Economists, like any other market commodity, are for sale.

That is *so* true. And I've learned over many decades that whenever I
hear a newsreader announce, "a panel of 34 eminent economists all agree
that [insert claim of choice here]" I know they've been hired to say it
and whatever they're predicting will simply *not* come to pass. I've seen
it over and over and over and over again.

"If you want ten opinions on an economic issue, ask five economists."

Ditto engineers, if they are any good and include a "it
depends on whether..." caveat.

But we build stuff and, if it doesn't work, pay consequences.



They write papers and do calculus and win Nobel prizes for their
theories. But macroeconomists can't experiment to test their theories.
And their predictions are miserably, uselessly predictive. So their
world is all about concensus and fad and politics. Group, tribal
delusion.

Lots of "sciences" are like that.

Not just economics, unfortunately.

Concensus is not reality. The fuzzy "sciences" wander all over the
place, about once a generation on average, but do tend to converge on
self-interest.


That's captured in the very old semi-serious joke, probably
in the excellent "A Random Walk in Science" or its successor.

A physics student meets his professor in a corridor and asks
him to explain an experimental graph. The professor confidently
gives an explanation.

The student notes the professor is holding it upside down,
and rectifies that. The professor confidently gives another
explanation.


Microeconomics is subject to experiment. But hardly anybody wants to
be a microeconomist, and they don't get much glory. Economists want to
turn the big knobs.

The unavoidable problem is that they can never repeat an experiment, since the
conditions will have changed.


That's ironic, because macroeconomics is just the sum of all
microeconomics.

Not necessarily; emergent phenomena scupper that hope.

The physics of a pile of sand is not the physics of an
individual grain. If you can locate where the 35degree
half-angle of a pile of sand is encoded in an individual
grain of sand, you would win awards.

To make a useful predictive model of a pile of sand, you have to
understand the grains. Smooth round sand grains will stack differently
from irregular jaggy ones. A simulation or math analysis must start
with grain behavior. Even experiments have to control for grain
characteristics.

Not quite.

My point is that you can't determine the angle of repose
from considering a single grain in isolation. It emerges
when there are multiple grains.

Plus other factors, of course; sometimes the sand can
behave much like a liquid.

None of that implies I have too much faith in economists,
but I would prefer to blame them for things that are
their fault.

"If you're an economist, how come you ain't rich?"

Amusing, but lucky timing has a lot to do with
becoming rich.

 

On Sat, 19 Oct 2019 18:52:55 +0100, Tom Gardner
<spamjunk@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote:

On 19/10/19 17:04, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Sat, 19 Oct 2019 08:04:02 +0100, Tom Gardner
spamjunk@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote:

On 19/10/19 03:19, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Sat, 19 Oct 2019 00:05:30 -0000 (UTC), Cursitor Doom
curd@notformail.com> wrote:

On Fri, 18 Oct 2019 10:19:29 -0700, John Larkin wrote:

Economists, like any other market commodity, are for sale.

That is *so* true. And I've learned over many decades that whenever I
hear a newsreader announce, "a panel of 34 eminent economists all agree
that [insert claim of choice here]" I know they've been hired to say it
and whatever they're predicting will simply *not* come to pass. I've seen
it over and over and over and over again.

"If you want ten opinions on an economic issue, ask five economists."

Ditto engineers, if they are any good and include a "it
depends on whether..." caveat.

But we build stuff and, if it doesn't work, pay consequences.



They write papers and do calculus and win Nobel prizes for their
theories. But macroeconomists can't experiment to test their theories.
And their predictions are miserably, uselessly predictive. So their
world is all about concensus and fad and politics. Group, tribal
delusion.

Lots of "sciences" are like that.

Not just economics, unfortunately.

Concensus is not reality. The fuzzy "sciences" wander all over the
place, about once a generation on average, but do tend to converge on
self-interest.


That's captured in the very old semi-serious joke, probably
in the excellent "A Random Walk in Science" or its successor.

A physics student meets his professor in a corridor and asks
him to explain an experimental graph. The professor confidently
gives an explanation.

The student notes the professor is holding it upside down,
and rectifies that. The professor confidently gives another
explanation.


Microeconomics is subject to experiment. But hardly anybody wants to
be a microeconomist, and they don't get much glory. Economists want to
turn the big knobs.

The unavoidable problem is that they can never repeat an experiment, since the
conditions will have changed.


That's ironic, because macroeconomics is just the sum of all
microeconomics.

Not necessarily; emergent phenomena scupper that hope.

The physics of a pile of sand is not the physics of an
individual grain. If you can locate where the 35degree
half-angle of a pile of sand is encoded in an individual
grain of sand, you would win awards.

To make a useful predictive model of a pile of sand, you have to
understand the grains. Smooth round sand grains will stack differently
from irregular jaggy ones. A simulation or math analysis must start
with grain behavior. Even experiments have to control for grain
characteristics.

Not quite.

My point is that you can't determine the angle of repose
from considering a single grain in isolation. It emerges
when there are multiple grains.

Angle of repose is meaningless for a single grain of sand!

Plus other factors, of course; sometimes the sand can
behave much like a liquid.


None of that implies I have too much faith in economists,
but I would prefer to blame them for things that are
their fault.

"If you're an economist, how come you ain't rich?"

Amusing, but lucky timing has a lot to do with
becoming rich.

That are very bad at that, too.



--

John Larkin Highland Technology, Inc

lunatic fringe electronics

 

[amdx]

On 10/19/2019 11:10 AM, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:

On Sat, 19 Oct 2019 08:48:13 -0500, amdx <nojunk@knology.net> wrote:

On 10/18/2019 9:34 PM, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Fri, 18 Oct 2019 22:27:59 -0400, krw@notreal.com wrote:

On Fri, 18 Oct 2019 19:21:23 -0700, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com
wrote:

On Fri, 18 Oct 2019 20:21:42 -0400, krw@notreal.com wrote:

On Fri, 18 Oct 2019 10:22:43 -0700, John Larkin
jlarkin@highland_atwork_technology.com> wrote:

On Fri, 18 Oct 2019 10:36:13 -0400, krw@notreal.com wrote:

On Fri, 18 Oct 2019 14:20:26 +0000 (UTC),
DecadentLinuxUserNumeroUno@decadence.org wrote:

Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote in
news:29e69d9f-8308-49fe-8b95-e11a79a1d170@googlegroups.com:

Trump's corporate tax cut was touted as if was such a stimulus,
but in fact it was just Trump giving rich people - like him -
extra money at the expense of regular tax payers.


That is EXACTLY what it was. +1

It's amazing that you can *always* be wrong, AlwaysWrong. Truly
amazing. Not amazing at all that you and Slowman would be in a
circle-jerk, though.

I don't think either has a job. Certainly neither designs electronics.

After the tax changes, we were able to instantly expense a couple
million in building improvements and equipment. Affordable
productivity.

I work for a living (own no corporation) and have about as simple of a
tax filing as you can imagine. I saw about a $3600 reduction in my
taxes last year from the year before (year-end payment/refund plus
withholding, something most forget).

Did you form an S-corp or an LLC? I think that qualifies you for a
huge tax break now.

How do I pull that off? I'm a salaried employee.

Oh, misunderstood. I thought you might be self-employed.

You'd have to have outside income to benefit from s-corp or LLC
status.

Even sole proprietorships benefited from the 20% pass through.
Mikek

It's a huge incentive for people to start up things. And some of those
things will grow. T's tax changes are about the only pro-business
thing the feds have done in decades [1]. The real benefits will kick
in slowly.

[1] there were some accelerated depreciation changes for small
businesses that were helpful, but the numbers were small.

To late for my wife and I, we closed our very small business the day
Hurricane Micheal blew it away, so I only got use of the changes for the
one year. I do plan on taking advantage of the low tax brackets and
transfering as much a I can using Roth Conversions before I start SS and
Required Minimum Distributions.
This helps the economy short term, I'm pay taxes I don't need to, but
hopefully if I live long enough, it saves me taxes over the long term.
And, depending on stock market returns over the next 30 years, might
even save something for the kids.
Odd to me, we lost our whole source of income and there was nothing
in the tax code for me to write off to save on taxes. Well, ya,
everything was already written off. But still!
Another oddity, because of the special circumstances of the Hurricane,
the state allowed self employed people to collect unemployment. My wife
applied, I'm a little cranky and didn't want to, but after being prodded
by the wife, (even if you don't want it, give it to the kids) I applied.
I sent in basically all the same paperwork showing our business (same
pages), including SS cards and drivers license, I was denied! And she
collected.
I always have this question in the back of my mind, is it because she is
a minority.

It's just as well, I had no interest in going back to work, with my
wife, she wasn't so sure. It didn't take her long to figure out she
still didn't have enough time to get everything done even without a job.
Mikek

 

[Cursitor Doom]

On Sat, 19 Oct 2019 09:29:06 -0700, jlarkin wrote:

Sadly, almost anyone who spends his/her entire "working" career in
politics gets sucked into the big government pass-more-bills
spend-more-money mentality.

That's why if we ever get the chance to change things in future with some
truly meaningful electoral reform, we need to consign the concept of a
"career in politics" to the historical garbage can.




--
This message may be freely reproduced without limit or charge only via
the Usenet protocol. Reproduction in whole or part through other
protocols, whether for profit or not, is conditional upon a charge of
GBP10.00 per reproduction. Publication in this manner via non-Usenet
protocols constitutes acceptance of this condition.

 

[amdx]

On 10/19/2019 12:52 PM, Tom Gardner wrote:

On 19/10/19 17:04, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Sat, 19 Oct 2019 08:04:02 +0100, Tom Gardner
spamjunk@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote:

On 19/10/19 03:19, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Sat, 19 Oct 2019 00:05:30 -0000 (UTC), Cursitor Doom
curd@notformail.com> wrote:

On Fri, 18 Oct 2019 10:19:29 -0700, John Larkin wrote:

Economists, like any other market commodity, are for sale.

That is *so* true. And I've learned over many decades that whenever I
hear a newsreader announce, "a panel of 34 eminent economists all
agree
that [insert claim of choice here]" I know they've been hired to
say it
and whatever they're predicting will simply *not* come to pass.
I've seen
it over and over and over and over again.

"If you want ten opinions on an economic issue, ask five economists."

Ditto engineers, if they are any good and include a "it
depends on whether..." caveat.

But we build stuff and, if it doesn't work, pay consequences.



They write papers and do calculus and win Nobel prizes for their
theories. But macroeconomists can't experiment to test their theories.
And their predictions are miserably, uselessly predictive. So their
world is all about concensus and fad and politics. Group, tribal
delusion.

Lots of "sciences" are like that.

Not just economics, unfortunately.

Concensus is not reality. The fuzzy "sciences" wander all over the
place, about once a generation on average, but do tend to converge on
self-interest.


That's captured in the very old semi-serious joke, probably
in the excellent "A Random Walk in Science" or its successor.

A physics student meets his professor in a corridor and asks
him to explain an experimental graph. The professor confidently
gives an explanation.

The student notes the professor is holding it upside down,
and rectifies that. The professor confidently gives another
explanation.


Microeconomics is subject to experiment. But hardly anybody wants to
be a microeconomist, and they don't get much glory. Economists want to
turn the big knobs.

The unavoidable problem is that they can never repeat an experiment,
since the
conditions will have changed.


That's ironic, because macroeconomics is just the sum of all
microeconomics.

Not necessarily; emergent phenomena scupper that hope.

The physics of a pile of sand is not the physics of an
individual grain. If you can locate where the 35degree
half-angle of a pile of sand is encoded in an individual
grain of sand, you would win awards.

To make a useful predictive model of a pile of sand, you have to
understand the grains. Smooth round sand grains will stack differently
from irregular jaggy ones. A simulation or math analysis must start
with grain behavior. Even experiments have to control for grain
characteristics.

Not quite.

My point is that you can't determine the angle of repose
from considering a single grain in isolation. It emerges
when there are multiple grains.

Plus other factors, of course; sometimes the sand can
behave much like a liquid.


None of that implies I have too much faith in economists,
but I would prefer to blame them for things that are
their fault.

"If you're an economist, how come you ain't rich?"

Amusing, but lucky timing has a lot to do with
becoming rich.

I'll agree with that.
Even though we saved and did well over 30 years,
The next 6 years in the stock market (Obama years) 2012 thru 2018
doubled our net worth. Our timing was good but also Lucky.
Mikek

 

[amdx]

On 10/19/2019 11:38 AM, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:

On Sat, 19 Oct 2019 09:46:40 -0500, amdx <nojunk@knology.net> wrote:

On 10/19/2019 12:25 AM, Bill Sloman wrote:
On Saturday, October 19, 2019 at 1:29:04 PM UTC+11, jla...@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Fri, 18 Oct 2019 20:24:40 -0400, krw@notreal.com wrote:

On Fri, 18 Oct 2019 08:31:23 -0700, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com
wrote:

On Fri, 18 Oct 2019 14:20:26 +0000 (UTC),
DecadentLinuxUserNumeroUno@decadence.org wrote:

Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote in
news:29e69d9f-8308-49fe-8b95-e11a79a1d170@googlegroups.com:

Trump's corporate tax cut was touted as if was such a stimulus,
but in fact it was just Trump giving rich people - like him -
extra money at the expense of regular tax payers.


That is EXACTLY what it was. +1

No. It allows small businesses to invest in employees and in growth.
Business building is slow: it takes decades and generations of
investment and learning to build most businesses. A modest tax cut,
compounded over many years, will be good for the economy.

Most people don't understand "money." Business investment is not "at
the expense of regular tax payers." Billionaires mostly hold stock
shares in their companies, not sacks gold under their beds.

Can you imagine how destructive the Democrat's dream of a "wealth tax"
would be? Real, dynamic, cash leaving the economy to pay the taxes on
all that static "wealth"?

I don't understand how that would work, and I don't think they do
either.

Take a Gates or a Bezos or a Zuckerman. Their "wealth" is mostly stock
shares, which aren't even certificates any more; just bits on a hard
drive somewhere. So the government takes away half their shares. Then
what does it do, try to sell them? That drives down the market, which
takes wealth from retired people and pension funds and such. That's a
middle-class tax!

The European examples take of the order 1% rather than half.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wealth_tax

You do have to have an appreciable amount of wealth before you have to pay the tax at all, and the house you live an pension funds do seem to be exempted.

Which I suppose is what the elites really want, to steal everyone's
savings.

The US scheme seems to be to stop the lower and middle classes from ever getting enough to be able to save.

I didn't find that to be true. I always thought I had a lower middle
class income and probably did for 19 of the 37 years included in our
wealth accumulation period. The last 15 years we had a higher income,
but never up to a $100k.

Anyone not starving can save some, and certainly not rack up credit
card debt. I have saved all my life, starting with my first job at 85
cents per hour.

What are you some 'young' punk kid, I started at 65 cents an hour.
1969, I was 14 and worked at a kids park running rides. All not legal,
but it was good for me. I worked my way up to $1 an hour over 3 summers.
This reminds me of a story, my grandfather and his wife rented a home
very close to the kiddie park the last year I worked there. I had
cleaned up something don't even recall, but I had many beer bottles in
my trunk, to be returned for the deposit, she happened to see them and
comment she wouldn't tell anyone I was drinking. I was so flabbergasted
that I didn't even respond. I wasn't drinking, didn't drink those, but
didn't think I'd be believed if I did deny it.

Our inflation adjusted income over 37 years is about $71k, a little
higher than the mean.
We managed to save and invest our way into the 95 percentile while
having two kids and putting them through college.
So, my advice is very simple, "live below your income"
That first year of marriage we saved 30% of our income.
So what you say is just not true.
In fact the tax code gives you lots of ways to pay very little in
taxes, I had many years when I only paid 2% to 4% of my gross income
in federal taxes.


The real income of the bottom 99% of the income distribution hasn't
gone up for decades,

and the top 100% has appropriated pretty much all the growth of the US
economy since Reagan came to power.

Immigration has flooded the market with cheap, often off-the-books
labor, which has hurt working-class people. Cheap imports, ditto.

Around here, painters and construction guys used to be mostly
Irish-American citizens. Now a few of them own businesses, but employ
mostly Spanish-speaking new immigrants.

Ya, after the Hurricane, the area was flooded with Spanish only
speakers, it was great fun to watch them use Google to translate
so they could communicate with the contractors. I had one very good
Mexican crew and one not so good.
I had a crew of 4 working and one spoke some English. They played
there Mexican music while they worked, when at some point I ask, what
happened to the music, he told me that the guy had somehow deleted all
the music he had on his phone. I showed the guy my phone and brought up
the streaming of several Mexican stations, he liked it, so I downloaded
the app onto his phone and then he could play music from a dozen Mexican
radio stations on his phone. The phone plugged into a Dewalt speaker system.

Ya, such a bad place to live we are putting up walls to keep people
from leaving. Oh, wait, those are to keep illegals from breaking in.
What you say has some truth, but all that top 1% of wealth is
concentrated in a few stocks and and would only hurt the middle class if
they were forced to liquidate that stock. Just because the wealthy are
doing better doesn't mean the middle class is not also doing well also.
There is plenty of info to say we are doing extremely well, just look
at what society is arguing about.
Gender identity, what bathroom to use, social media, a kneeling
football player, Flat earthers, 6000 year old earth, and even attacking
area 51. Americans are doing so well, they have time, energy and money
to push for almost any cause.
Do people that are truly hurting buy 42" TV's and pay a monthly $130
cable bill, have internet and at least one computer if not several.

And not one is missing their cellphone.
It seems odd but these people under government guidelines, would be
considered be poor.
You should come for a visit, we have it made here.
Oh, I might add, even what I consider the least wealthy of my immigrant
relatives drives a nice BMW. The relatives came here legally, several of
them would be considered millionaires even though they still speak poor
English. Things are just not bad, they are great! These ARE the good times.
Mikek

Some people do manage to wreck their lives with drugs, debt, or
climate anxiety or equivalent neuroses. Progress doesn't much change
our nature.

Ya, keeping up with the Jones can create real life problems.
Financial stuff is my interest, I try to spread the word that, it makes
a huge difference to "Live under your income" I see people that make
good money but have a need to spend it all, going deeper and deeper in debt.
This page, not presented as well as possible, but it shows even though
middle class wealth increase, they just keep taking on more debt.
> https://personalfinancedata.com/2017/05/21/net-worth-of-the-middle-class-from-1992-2013/

Mikek

 

[Tom Gardner]

On 19/10/19 19:56, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:

On Sat, 19 Oct 2019 18:52:55 +0100, Tom Gardner
spamjunk@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote:

On 19/10/19 17:04, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Sat, 19 Oct 2019 08:04:02 +0100, Tom Gardner
spamjunk@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote >>>> None of that implies I have too much faith in economists,
but I would prefer to blame them for things that are
their fault.

"If you're an economist, how come you ain't rich?"

Amusing, but lucky timing has a lot to do with
becoming rich.

That are very bad at that, too.

Economists don't have to be - that's the province
of traders.

Traders don't have to see the big long-term picture;
they are only concerned about what other traders will
think in the next 1min-1day. Cause and effect are
irrelevant; it is similar to a game of poker.

It is a weather vs climate distinction, but you've
made your position on that kind of distinction quite
clear.

 

[Tom Gardner]

On 20/10/19 00:48, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:

On Sun, 20 Oct 2019 00:43:48 +0100, Tom Gardner
spamjunk@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote:

On 19/10/19 19:56, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Sat, 19 Oct 2019 18:52:55 +0100, Tom Gardner
spamjunk@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote:

On 19/10/19 17:04, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Sat, 19 Oct 2019 08:04:02 +0100, Tom Gardner
spamjunk@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote >>>> None of that implies I have too much faith in economists,
but I would prefer to blame them for things that are
their fault.

"If you're an economist, how come you ain't rich?"

Amusing, but lucky timing has a lot to do with
becoming rich.

That are very bad at that, too.

Economists don't have to be - that's the province
of traders.

Traders don't have to see the big long-term picture;
they are only concerned about what other traders will
think in the next 1min-1day. Cause and effect are
irrelevant; it is similar to a game of poker.

It is a weather vs climate distinction, but you've
made your position on that kind of distinction quite
clear.

Are you suggesting that economists, or climate modelers, are usefully
predictive?

Climate modellers start from physics and chemistry.

Economists start from human behaviour and game theory.

Traders start and finish with game theory, plus
some inside knowledge - if they can get away with it.

 

On Sun, 20 Oct 2019 00:43:48 +0100, Tom Gardner
<spamjunk@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote:

On 19/10/19 19:56, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Sat, 19 Oct 2019 18:52:55 +0100, Tom Gardner
spamjunk@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote:

On 19/10/19 17:04, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Sat, 19 Oct 2019 08:04:02 +0100, Tom Gardner
spamjunk@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote >>>> None of that implies I have too much faith in economists,
but I would prefer to blame them for things that are
their fault.

"If you're an economist, how come you ain't rich?"

Amusing, but lucky timing has a lot to do with
becoming rich.

That are very bad at that, too.

Economists don't have to be - that's the province
of traders.

Traders don't have to see the big long-term picture;
they are only concerned about what other traders will
think in the next 1min-1day. Cause and effect are
irrelevant; it is similar to a game of poker.

It is a weather vs climate distinction, but you've
made your position on that kind of distinction quite
clear.

Are you suggesting that economists, or climate modelers, are usefully
predictive?



--

John Larkin Highland Technology, Inc

lunatic fringe electronics

 

[Bill Sloman]

On Sunday, October 20, 2019 at 1:46:37 AM UTC+11, amdx wrote:

On 10/19/2019 12:25 AM, Bill Sloman wrote:
On Saturday, October 19, 2019 at 1:29:04 PM UTC+11, jla...@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Fri, 18 Oct 2019 20:24:40 -0400, krw@notreal.com wrote:

On Fri, 18 Oct 2019 08:31:23 -0700, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com
wrote:

On Fri, 18 Oct 2019 14:20:26 +0000 (UTC),
DecadentLinuxUserNumeroUno@decadence.org wrote:

Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote in
news:29e69d9f-8308-49fe-8b95-e11a79a1d170@googlegroups.com:

Trump's corporate tax cut was touted as if was such a stimulus,
but in fact it was just Trump giving rich people - like him -
extra money at the expense of regular tax payers.


That is EXACTLY what it was. +1

No. It allows small businesses to invest in employees and in growth.
Business building is slow: it takes decades and generations of
investment and learning to build most businesses. A modest tax cut,
compounded over many years, will be good for the economy.

Most people don't understand "money." Business investment is not "at
the expense of regular tax payers." Billionaires mostly hold stock
shares in their companies, not sacks gold under their beds.

Can you imagine how destructive the Democrat's dream of a "wealth tax"
would be? Real, dynamic, cash leaving the economy to pay the taxes on
all that static "wealth"?

I don't understand how that would work, and I don't think they do
either.

Take a Gates or a Bezos or a Zuckerman. Their "wealth" is mostly stock
shares, which aren't even certificates any more; just bits on a hard
drive somewhere. So the government takes away half their shares. Then
what does it do, try to sell them? That drives down the market, which
takes wealth from retired people and pension funds and such. That's a
middle-class tax!

The European examples take of the order 1% rather than half.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wealth_tax

You do have to have an appreciable amount of wealth before you have to pay the tax at all, and the house you live an pension funds do seem to be exempted.

Which I suppose is what the elites really want, to steal everyone's
savings.

The US scheme seems to be to stop the lower and middle classes from ever getting enough to be able to save.

I didn't find that to be true. I always thought I had a lower middle
class income and probably did for 19 of the 37 years included in our
wealth accumulation period. The last 15 years we had a higher income,
but never up to a $100k.
Our inflation adjusted income over 37 years is about $71k, a little
higher than the mean.
We managed to save and invest our way into the 95 percentile while
having two kids and putting them through college.
So, my advice is very simple, "live below your income"
That first year of marriage we saved 30% of our income.
So what you say is just not true.

It's not true for you. but as a generalisation over the whole population it is correct.

In fact the tax code gives you lots of ways to pay very little in
taxes, I had many years when I only paid 2% to 4% of my gross income
in federal taxes.

For you.

The real income of the bottom 99% of the income distribution hasn't
gone up for decades,

and the top 100% has appropriated pretty much all the growth of the US
economy since Reagan came to power.

Ya, such a bad place to live we are putting up walls to keep people
from leaving. Oh, wait, those are to keep illegals from breaking in.

You started off well, but since 1787 other people have observed how you got it more or less right, copied the good bits and left out the bad bits, and are now doing better.

The US managed to built up a huge mass of investment in infra-structure and human capital while it was better run than it's comptetitors. It's now a lot less further ahead than it was and dropping back rapidly. It's still marginally ahead on average income per head, but not on median income per head

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Median_income

What you say has some truth, but all that top 1% of wealth is
concentrated in a few stocks and and would only hurt the middle class if
they were forced to liquidate that stock. Just because the wealthy are
doing better doesn't mean the middle class is not also doing well also.

I'm not talking about wealth, but income. US middle class income has stagnated in real terms for the last few decades, and the real income of the top 1% of the income distribution has more than doubled.

There is plenty of info to say we are doing extremely well, just look
at what society is arguing about.

So it every other advanced industrial country.

Gender identity, what bathroom to use, social media, a kneeling
football player, Flat earthers, 6000 year old earth, and even attacking
area 51. Americans are doing so well, they have time, energy and money
to push for almost any cause.

Politicians love to distract the population with controversies about minor matter.

Do people that are truly hurting buy 42" TV's and pay a monthly $130
cable bill, have internet and at least one computer if not several.

Technology has made 42" TV's, conpuyters, and cable content remarkably cheap.

The US health care system isn't, and your life expectancy figures are impressive.

> And not one is missing their cellphone.

Again - technological progress.

It seems odd but these people under government guidelines, would be
considered be poor.
You should come for a visit, we have it made here.

You should come to Australia for a visit. We do too, and our health care system works rather better. The Dutch health care system works even better.

Oh, I might add, even what I consider the least wealthy of my immigrant
relatives drives a nice BMW. The relatives came here legally, several of
them would be considered millionaires even though they still speak poor
English. Things are just not bad, they are great! These ARE the good times.

Not so much if you aren't in the top 1% of the income distribution.

https://worldhappiness.report/ed/2019/changing-world-happiness/

The US comes in at 19th. The Netherlands is 5th and Australia 11th

--
Bill Sloman, Sydney

 

[Bill Sloman]

On Sunday, October 20, 2019 at 3:10:22 AM UTC+11, jla...@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:

On Sat, 19 Oct 2019 08:48:13 -0500, amdx <nojunk@knology.net> wrote:

On 10/18/2019 9:34 PM, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Fri, 18 Oct 2019 22:27:59 -0400, krw@notreal.com wrote:

On Fri, 18 Oct 2019 19:21:23 -0700, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com
wrote:

On Fri, 18 Oct 2019 20:21:42 -0400, krw@notreal.com wrote:

On Fri, 18 Oct 2019 10:22:43 -0700, John Larkin
jlarkin@highland_atwork_technology.com> wrote:

On Fri, 18 Oct 2019 10:36:13 -0400, krw@notreal.com wrote:

On Fri, 18 Oct 2019 14:20:26 +0000 (UTC),
DecadentLinuxUserNumeroUno@decadence.org wrote:

Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote in
news:29e69d9f-8308-49fe-8b95-e11a79a1d170@googlegroups.com:


It's a huge incentive for people to start up things.

Not necessarily a good thing. Four out of five startups don't last more than few years.

> And some of those things will grow.

Which ones doesn't really have much to do with the corporate tax rate.

Most start-ups are started up by egomaniacs with an inflated idea of their own competence. Some get lucky. About 80% don't. You went through three before you got lucky.

T's tax changes are about the only pro-business
thing the feds have done in decades [1]. The real benefits will kick
in slowly.

It wasn't pro-business. It was pro-wealth.

there were some accelerated depreciation changes for small
businesses that were helpful, but the numbers were small.

--

Bill Sloman, Sydney

 

[Bill Sloman]

On Sunday, October 20, 2019 at 3:04:52 AM UTC+11, jla...@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:

On Sat, 19 Oct 2019 08:04:02 +0100, Tom Gardner
spamjunk@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote:

On 19/10/19 03:19, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Sat, 19 Oct 2019 00:05:30 -0000 (UTC), Cursitor Doom
curd@notformail.com> wrote:

On Fri, 18 Oct 2019 10:19:29 -0700, John Larkin wrote:

Economists, like any other market commodity, are for sale.

That is *so* true. And I've learned over many decades that whenever I
hear a newsreader announce, "a panel of 34 eminent economists all agree
that [insert claim of choice here]" I know they've been hired to say it
and whatever they're predicting will simply *not* come to pass. I've seen
it over and over and over and over again.

"If you want ten opinions on an economic issue, ask five economists."

Ditto engineers, if they are any good and include a "it
depends on whether..." caveat.

But we build stuff and, if it doesn't work, pay consequences.

You have the advantage that you can test it in the lab, and can be fairly confident that if it works there it will work in the field. Economists have a more difficult problem.

They write papers and do calculus and win Nobel prizes for their
theories. But macroeconomists can't experiment to test their theories.
And their predictions are miserably, uselessly predictive. So their
world is all about concensus and fad and politics. Group, tribal
delusion.

Lots of "sciences" are like that.

Not just economics, unfortunately.

Concensus is not reality. The fuzzy "sciences" wander all over the
place, about once a generation on average, but do tend to converge on
self-interest.

John Larkin thinks that any non-experimental science is "fuzzy". He doesn't seem to have clue how observational science work, and probably thinks that astronomy is "fuzzy".

That's captured in the very old semi-serious joke, probably
in the excellent "A Random Walk in Science" or its successor.

A physics student meets his professor in a corridor and asks
him to explain an experimental graph. The professor confidently
gives an explanation.

The student notes the professor is holding it upside down,
and rectifies that. The professor confidently gives another
explanation.

Microeconomics is subject to experiment. But hardly anybody wants to
be a microeconomist, and they don't get much glory. Economists want to
turn the big knobs.

The unavoidable problem is that they can never repeat an experiment, since the conditions will have changed.


That's ironic, because macroeconomics is just the sum of all
microeconomics.

Not necessarily; emergent phenomena scupper that hope.

The physics of a pile of sand is not the physics of an
individual grain. If you can locate where the 35degree
half-angle of a pile of sand is encoded in an individual
grain of sand, you would win awards.

To make a useful predictive model of a pile of sand, you have to
understand the grains. Smooth round sand grains will stack differently
from irregular jaggy ones. A simulation or math analysis must start
with grain behavior. Even experiments have to control for grain
characteristics.

Up to a point

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angle_of_repose

It is still collective behaviour.

None of that implies I have too much faith in economists,
but I would prefer to blame them for things that are
their fault.

"If you're an economist, how come you ain't rich?"

There's more to getting rich than understanding how the economy works, and you can be rich (or at least appear to be) when you have a very defective understanding as Donald Trump illustrates perfectly.

--
Bill Sloman, Sydney

 

[Bill Sloman]

On Sunday, October 20, 2019 at 5:56:55 AM UTC+11, jla...@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:

On Sat, 19 Oct 2019 18:52:55 +0100, Tom Gardner
spamjunk@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote:

On 19/10/19 17:04, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Sat, 19 Oct 2019 08:04:02 +0100, Tom Gardner
spamjunk@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote:

On 19/10/19 03:19, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Sat, 19 Oct 2019 00:05:30 -0000 (UTC), Cursitor Doom
curd@notformail.com> wrote:

On Fri, 18 Oct 2019 10:19:29 -0700, John Larkin wrote:

<snip>

Not necessarily; emergent phenomena scupper that hope.

The physics of a pile of sand is not the physics of an
individual grain. If you can locate where the 35degree
half-angle of a pile of sand is encoded in an individual
grain of sand, you would win awards.

To make a useful predictive model of a pile of sand, you have to
understand the grains. Smooth round sand grains will stack differently
from irregular jaggy ones. A simulation or math analysis must start
with grain behavior. Even experiments have to control for grain
characteristics.

Not quite.

My point is that you can't determine the angle of repose
from considering a single grain in isolation. It emerges
when there are multiple grains.

Angle of repose is meaningless for a single grain of sand!

Which was exactly the point that Tom Gardner was making, and the point that you are clearly incapable of taking on board. Are you planning on colonising krw's niche?

Plus other factors, of course; sometimes the sand can
behave much like a liquid.


None of that implies I have too much faith in economists,
but I would prefer to blame them for things that are
their fault.

"If you're an economist, how come you ain't rich?"

Amusing, but lucky timing has a lot to do with
becoming rich.

That are very bad at that, too.

How would you know?

--
Bill Sloman, Sydney

 

[Bill Sloman]

On Sunday, October 20, 2019 at 7:02:14 AM UTC+11, Cursitor Doom wrote:

On Sat, 19 Oct 2019 09:29:06 -0700, jlarkin wrote:

Sadly, almost anyone who spends his/her entire "working" career in
politics gets sucked into the big government pass-more-bills
spend-more-money mentality.

John Larkin spends too much time listening to James Arthur, and absolutely none thinking about what government can and should do.

That's why if we ever get the chance to change things in future with some
truly meaningful electoral reform, we need to consign the concept of a
"career in politics" to the historical garbage can.

Why? Politicians have specific skills, mostly to do with working out what everybody else wants, and those skills will always be valuable.

What the US, the UK and Australia need in the way of electoral reform is proportional representation and multi-party coalition government.

This does get rid of the uncompromising dogma-driven sort of politician who can't negotiate compromise solutions, but the people who are good at representing their electorate will still have secure careers.

--
Bill Sloman, Sydney

 

[Bill Sloman]

On Sunday, October 20, 2019 at 10:48:13 AM UTC+11, jla...@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:

On Sun, 20 Oct 2019 00:43:48 +0100, Tom Gardner
spamjunk@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote:

On 19/10/19 19:56, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Sat, 19 Oct 2019 18:52:55 +0100, Tom Gardner
spamjunk@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote:

On 19/10/19 17:04, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Sat, 19 Oct 2019 08:04:02 +0100, Tom Gardner
spamjunk@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote >>>> None of that implies I have too much faith in economists,
but I would prefer to blame them for things that are
their fault.

"If you're an economist, how come you ain't rich?"

Amusing, but lucky timing has a lot to do with
becoming rich.

That are very bad at that, too.

Economists don't have to be - that's the province
of traders.

Traders don't have to see the big long-term picture;
they are only concerned about what other traders will
think in the next 1min-1day. Cause and effect are
irrelevant; it is similar to a game of poker.

It is a weather vs climate distinction, but you've
made your position on that kind of distinction quite
clear.

Are you suggesting that economists, or climate modelers, are usefully
predictive?

Of course they are. James Arthur doesn't want to believe it, but his thinking isn't evidence-driven (otherwise he'd have a more realistic appreciation of the skills of the founding tax-evaders) and neither is yours.

"Usefully predictive" isn't "100% accurate".

--
Bill Sloman, Sydney

 

On Sun, 20 Oct 2019 01:01:56 +0100, Tom Gardner
<spamjunk@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote:

On 20/10/19 00:48, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Sun, 20 Oct 2019 00:43:48 +0100, Tom Gardner
spamjunk@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote:

On 19/10/19 19:56, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Sat, 19 Oct 2019 18:52:55 +0100, Tom Gardner
spamjunk@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote:

On 19/10/19 17:04, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Sat, 19 Oct 2019 08:04:02 +0100, Tom Gardner
spamjunk@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote >>>> None of that implies I have too much faith in economists,
but I would prefer to blame them for things that are
their fault.

"If you're an economist, how come you ain't rich?"

Amusing, but lucky timing has a lot to do with
becoming rich.

That are very bad at that, too.

Economists don't have to be - that's the province
of traders.

Traders don't have to see the big long-term picture;
they are only concerned about what other traders will
think in the next 1min-1day. Cause and effect are
irrelevant; it is similar to a game of poker.

It is a weather vs climate distinction, but you've
made your position on that kind of distinction quite
clear.

Are you suggesting that economists, or climate modelers, are usefully
predictive?

Climate modellers start from physics and chemistry.

Economists start from human behaviour and game theory.

But does that make their calculations usefully predictive?



--

John Larkin Highland Technology, Inc

lunatic fringe electronics

 

[Bill Sloman]

On Sunday, October 20, 2019 at 2:12:16 PM UTC+11, jla...@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:

On Sun, 20 Oct 2019 01:01:56 +0100, Tom Gardner
spamjunk@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote:

On 20/10/19 00:48, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Sun, 20 Oct 2019 00:43:48 +0100, Tom Gardner
spamjunk@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote:

On 19/10/19 19:56, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Sat, 19 Oct 2019 18:52:55 +0100, Tom Gardner
spamjunk@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote:

On 19/10/19 17:04, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Sat, 19 Oct 2019 08:04:02 +0100, Tom Gardner
spamjunk@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote >>>> None of that implies I have too much faith in economists,
but I would prefer to blame them for things that are
their fault.

"If you're an economist, how come you ain't rich?"

Amusing, but lucky timing has a lot to do with
becoming rich.

That are very bad at that, too.

Economists don't have to be - that's the province
of traders.

Traders don't have to see the big long-term picture;
they are only concerned about what other traders will
think in the next 1min-1day. Cause and effect are
irrelevant; it is similar to a game of poker.

It is a weather vs climate distinction, but you've
made your position on that kind of distinction quite
clear.

Are you suggesting that economists, or climate modelers, are usefully
predictive?

Climate modellers start from physics and chemistry.

Economists start from human behaviour and game theory.

But does that make their calculations usefully predictive?

Obviously not. The fact that John Larkin thinks that it was worth posting the question does make it clear that he hasn't got a clue.

It could also indicate that he might not have a clear idea of what might constitute a joke.

Either way, it's waste of bandwidth.

--
Bill Sloman, Sydney

 

[Cursitor Doom]

On Sat, 19 Oct 2019 16:01:57 -0500, amdx wrote:

What are you some 'young' punk kid, I started at 65 cents an hour.
1969, I was 14 and worked at a kids park running rides. All not legal,
but it was good for me. I worked my way up to $1 an hour over 3 summers.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=26ZDB9h7BLY


--
This message may be freely reproduced without limit or charge only via
the Usenet protocol. Reproduction in whole or part through other
protocols, whether for profit or not, is conditional upon a charge of
GBP10.00 per reproduction. Publication in this manner via non-Usenet
protocols constitutes acceptance of this condition.

 

[amdx]

On 10/20/2019 1:22 PM, Michael Terrell wrote:

On Saturday, October 19, 2019 at 5:01:55 PM UTC-4, amdx wrote:
On 10/19/2019 11:38 AM, jlarkin wrote:
On Sat, 19 Oct 2019 09:46:40 -0500, amdx wrote:

On 10/19/2019 12:25 AM, Bill Sloman wrote:
On Saturday, October 19, 2019 at 1:29:04 PM UTC+11, jlarkin wrote:
On Fri, 18 Oct 2019 20:24:40 -0400, krw wrote:

On Fri, 18 Oct 2019 08:31:23 -0700, jlarkin wrote:

On Fri, 18 Oct 2019 14:20:26 +0000 (UTC),
DecadentLinuxUserNumeroUno@decadence.org wrote:

Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote in
news:29e69d9f-8308-49fe-8b95-e11a79a1d170@googlegroups.com:

Trump's corporate tax cut was touted as if was such a stimulus,
but in fact it was just Trump giving rich people - like him -
extra money at the expense of regular tax payers.


That is EXACTLY what it was. +1

No. It allows small businesses to invest in employees and in growth.
Business building is slow: it takes decades and generations of
investment and learning to build most businesses. A modest tax cut,
compounded over many years, will be good for the economy.

Most people don't understand "money." Business investment is not "at
the expense of regular tax payers." Billionaires mostly hold stock
shares in their companies, not sacks gold under their beds.

Can you imagine how destructive the Democrat's dream of a "wealth tax"
would be? Real, dynamic, cash leaving the economy to pay the taxes on
all that static "wealth"?

I don't understand how that would work, and I don't think they do
either.

Take a Gates or a Bezos or a Zuckerman. Their "wealth" is mostly stock
shares, which aren't even certificates any more; just bits on a hard
drive somewhere. So the government takes away half their shares. Then
what does it do, try to sell them? That drives down the market, which
takes wealth from retired people and pension funds and such. That's a
middle-class tax!

The European examples take of the order 1% rather than half.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wealth_tax

You do have to have an appreciable amount of wealth before you have to pay the tax at all, and the house you live an pension funds do seem to be exempted.

Which I suppose is what the elites really want, to steal everyone's
savings.

The US scheme seems to be to stop the lower and middle classes from ever getting enough to be able to save.

I didn't find that to be true. I always thought I had a lower middle
class income and probably did for 19 of the 37 years included in our
wealth accumulation period. The last 15 years we had a higher income,
but never up to a $100k.

Anyone not starving can save some, and certainly not rack up credit
card debt. I have saved all my life, starting with my first job at 85
cents per hour.

What are you some 'young' punk kid, I started at 65 cents an hour.
1969, I was 14 and worked at a kids park running rides. All not legal,
but it was good for me. I worked my way up to $1 an hour over 3 summers.
This reminds me of a story, my grandfather and his wife rented a home
very close to the kiddie park the last year I worked there. I had
cleaned up something don't even recall, but I had many beer bottles in
my trunk, to be returned for the deposit, she happened to see them and
comment she wouldn't tell anyone I was drinking. I was so flabbergasted
that I didn't even respond. I wasn't drinking, didn't drink those, but
didn't think I'd be believed if I did deny it.


Our inflation adjusted income over 37 years is about $71k, a little
higher than the mean.
We managed to save and invest our way into the 95 percentile while
having two kids and putting them through college.
So, my advice is very simple, "live below your income"
That first year of marriage we saved 30% of our income.
So what you say is just not true.
In fact the tax code gives you lots of ways to pay very little in
taxes, I had many years when I only paid 2% to 4% of my gross income
in federal taxes.


The real income of the bottom 99% of the income distribution hasn't
gone up for decades,

and the top 100% has appropriated pretty much all the growth of the US
economy since Reagan came to power.

Immigration has flooded the market with cheap, often off-the-books
labor, which has hurt working-class people. Cheap imports, ditto.

Around here, painters and construction guys used to be mostly
Irish-American citizens. Now a few of them own businesses, but employ
mostly Spanish-speaking new immigrants.


Ya, after the Hurricane, the area was flooded with Spanish only
speakers, it was great fun to watch them use Google to translate
so they could communicate with the contractors. I had one very good
Mexican crew and one not so good.
I had a crew of 4 working and one spoke some English. They played
there Mexican music while they worked, when at some point I ask, what
happened to the music, he told me that the guy had somehow deleted all
the music he had on his phone. I showed the guy my phone and brought up
the streaming of several Mexican stations, he liked it, so I downloaded
the app onto his phone and then he could play music from a dozen Mexican
radio stations on his phone. The phone plugged into a Dewalt speaker system.



Ya, such a bad place to live we are putting up walls to keep people
from leaving. Oh, wait, those are to keep illegals from breaking in.
What you say has some truth, but all that top 1% of wealth is
concentrated in a few stocks and and would only hurt the middle class if
they were forced to liquidate that stock. Just because the wealthy are
doing better doesn't mean the middle class is not also doing well also.
There is plenty of info to say we are doing extremely well, just look
at what society is arguing about.
Gender identity, what bathroom to use, social media, a kneeling
football player, Flat earthers, 6000 year old earth, and even attacking
area 51. Americans are doing so well, they have time, energy and money
to push for almost any cause.
Do people that are truly hurting buy 42" TV's and pay a monthly $130
cable bill, have internet and at least one computer if not several.

And not one is missing their cellphone.
It seems odd but these people under government guidelines, would be
considered be poor.
You should come for a visit, we have it made here.
Oh, I might add, even what I consider the least wealthy of my immigrant
relatives drives a nice BMW. The relatives came here legally, several of
them would be considered millionaires even though they still speak poor
English. Things are just not bad, they are great! These ARE the good times.
Mikek

Some people do manage to wreck their lives with drugs, debt, or
climate anxiety or equivalent neuroses. Progress doesn't much change
our nature.

Ya, keeping up with the Jones can create real life problems.
Financial stuff is my interest, I try to spread the word that, it makes
a huge difference to "Live under your income" I see people that make
good money but have a need to spend it all, going deeper and deeper in debt.
This page, not presented as well as possible, but it shows even though
middle class wealth increase, they just keep taking on more debt.
https://personalfinancedata.com/2017/05/21/net-worth-of-the-middle-class-from-1992-2013/

My first job was at 13, in 1966 for $1 an hour. I finally got my first credit card, this year. I always lived with the principal of, If I can't pay for it, I don't need it for anything less than a house or a new vehicle.

I agree with your, "If I can't pay for it, I don't need it". We never
even financed any of our auto purchases, but none of that stopped us
from having a credit card or two!
Mikek

 

[Michael Terrell]

On Saturday, October 19, 2019 at 5:01:55 PM UTC-4, amdx wrote:

On 10/19/2019 11:38 AM, jlarkin wrote:
On Sat, 19 Oct 2019 09:46:40 -0500, amdx wrote:

On 10/19/2019 12:25 AM, Bill Sloman wrote:
On Saturday, October 19, 2019 at 1:29:04 PM UTC+11, jlarkin wrote:
On Fri, 18 Oct 2019 20:24:40 -0400, krw wrote:

On Fri, 18 Oct 2019 08:31:23 -0700, jlarkin wrote:

On Fri, 18 Oct 2019 14:20:26 +0000 (UTC),
DecadentLinuxUserNumeroUno@decadence.org wrote:

Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> wrote in
news:29e69d9f-8308-49fe-8b95-e11a79a1d170@googlegroups.com:

Trump's corporate tax cut was touted as if was such a stimulus,
but in fact it was just Trump giving rich people - like him -
extra money at the expense of regular tax payers.


That is EXACTLY what it was. +1

No. It allows small businesses to invest in employees and in growth.
Business building is slow: it takes decades and generations of
investment and learning to build most businesses. A modest tax cut,
compounded over many years, will be good for the economy.

Most people don't understand "money." Business investment is not "at
the expense of regular tax payers." Billionaires mostly hold stock
shares in their companies, not sacks gold under their beds.

Can you imagine how destructive the Democrat's dream of a "wealth tax"
would be? Real, dynamic, cash leaving the economy to pay the taxes on
all that static "wealth"?

I don't understand how that would work, and I don't think they do
either.

Take a Gates or a Bezos or a Zuckerman. Their "wealth" is mostly stock
shares, which aren't even certificates any more; just bits on a hard
drive somewhere. So the government takes away half their shares. Then
what does it do, try to sell them? That drives down the market, which
takes wealth from retired people and pension funds and such. That's a
middle-class tax!

The European examples take of the order 1% rather than half.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wealth_tax

You do have to have an appreciable amount of wealth before you have to pay the tax at all, and the house you live an pension funds do seem to be exempted.

Which I suppose is what the elites really want, to steal everyone's
savings.

The US scheme seems to be to stop the lower and middle classes from ever getting enough to be able to save.

I didn't find that to be true. I always thought I had a lower middle
class income and probably did for 19 of the 37 years included in our
wealth accumulation period. The last 15 years we had a higher income,
but never up to a $100k.

Anyone not starving can save some, and certainly not rack up credit
card debt. I have saved all my life, starting with my first job at 85
cents per hour.

What are you some 'young' punk kid, I started at 65 cents an hour.
1969, I was 14 and worked at a kids park running rides. All not legal,
but it was good for me. I worked my way up to $1 an hour over 3 summers.
This reminds me of a story, my grandfather and his wife rented a home
very close to the kiddie park the last year I worked there. I had
cleaned up something don't even recall, but I had many beer bottles in
my trunk, to be returned for the deposit, she happened to see them and
comment she wouldn't tell anyone I was drinking. I was so flabbergasted
that I didn't even respond. I wasn't drinking, didn't drink those, but
didn't think I'd be believed if I did deny it.


Our inflation adjusted income over 37 years is about $71k, a little
higher than the mean.
We managed to save and invest our way into the 95 percentile while
having two kids and putting them through college.
So, my advice is very simple, "live below your income"
That first year of marriage we saved 30% of our income.
So what you say is just not true.
In fact the tax code gives you lots of ways to pay very little in
taxes, I had many years when I only paid 2% to 4% of my gross income
in federal taxes.


The real income of the bottom 99% of the income distribution hasn't
gone up for decades,

and the top 100% has appropriated pretty much all the growth of the US
economy since Reagan came to power.

Immigration has flooded the market with cheap, often off-the-books
labor, which has hurt working-class people. Cheap imports, ditto.

Around here, painters and construction guys used to be mostly
Irish-American citizens. Now a few of them own businesses, but employ
mostly Spanish-speaking new immigrants.


Ya, after the Hurricane, the area was flooded with Spanish only
speakers, it was great fun to watch them use Google to translate
so they could communicate with the contractors. I had one very good
Mexican crew and one not so good.
I had a crew of 4 working and one spoke some English. They played
there Mexican music while they worked, when at some point I ask, what
happened to the music, he told me that the guy had somehow deleted all
the music he had on his phone. I showed the guy my phone and brought up
the streaming of several Mexican stations, he liked it, so I downloaded
the app onto his phone and then he could play music from a dozen Mexican
radio stations on his phone. The phone plugged into a Dewalt speaker system.



Ya, such a bad place to live we are putting up walls to keep people
from leaving. Oh, wait, those are to keep illegals from breaking in.
What you say has some truth, but all that top 1% of wealth is
concentrated in a few stocks and and would only hurt the middle class if
they were forced to liquidate that stock. Just because the wealthy are
doing better doesn't mean the middle class is not also doing well also.
There is plenty of info to say we are doing extremely well, just look
at what society is arguing about.
Gender identity, what bathroom to use, social media, a kneeling
football player, Flat earthers, 6000 year old earth, and even attacking
area 51. Americans are doing so well, they have time, energy and money
to push for almost any cause.
Do people that are truly hurting buy 42" TV's and pay a monthly $130
cable bill, have internet and at least one computer if not several.

And not one is missing their cellphone.
It seems odd but these people under government guidelines, would be
considered be poor.
You should come for a visit, we have it made here.
Oh, I might add, even what I consider the least wealthy of my immigrant
relatives drives a nice BMW. The relatives came here legally, several of
them would be considered millionaires even though they still speak poor
English. Things are just not bad, they are great! These ARE the good times.
Mikek

Some people do manage to wreck their lives with drugs, debt, or
climate anxiety or equivalent neuroses. Progress doesn't much change
our nature.

Ya, keeping up with the Jones can create real life problems.
Financial stuff is my interest, I try to spread the word that, it makes
a huge difference to "Live under your income" I see people that make
good money but have a need to spend it all, going deeper and deeper in debt.
This page, not presented as well as possible, but it shows even though
middle class wealth increase, they just keep taking on more debt.
https://personalfinancedata.com/2017/05/21/net-worth-of-the-middle-class-from-1992-2013/

My first job was at 13, in 1966 for $1 an hour. I finally got my first credit card, this year. I always lived with the principal of, If I can't pay for it, I don't need it for anything less than a house or a new vehicle.