As for the question if investment in stocks helps to create more jobs, the answer is absolutely yes. A company’s stock price affects their ability to raise cash and their cost of borrowing. The money is necessary to grow their business which typically either creates more jobs or allows them to maintain the current workforce. It’s a good thing that helps us little people too. Maybe it’s not totally fair to everyone, but get over it. Life ain’t fair period.

Listen DP, don’t play coy with me…you know exactly what you’re doing because you consistently do it. Again, I don’t appreciate it. I don’t want to have to deal with this 90% of the time I read a comment from you. It’s not worth my time.

And by the way Brian, good comment. That’s one. Let’s make it a pattern.

However…

There’s a role reversal. The government takes money from you first and then moves it around. Cuttung back taxes doesn’t mean money that the government was holding gets “given back� to people, it means the money is never taken in the first place.

I’m sorry, but if the government is cutting taxes, that means they’re deciding to have less revenue coming in from taxes. That means they have to find ways to cut their expenditures. That means that social programs are going to get cut. The whole, “it wasn’t taken in the first place” does not address the reality of the budgetary situation.

And lastly, if you’re so concerned with how people will decide to spend their money, then let’s talk about how the government can incentivize and penalize people who don’t spend their money for certain things like healthcare, etc. But let’s not have the ridiculous discussion about the middle and lower classes spending their money on things they don’t need. The very reality that these people have LESS money means they have to spend their money more wisely and go without things. The rich actually have the means to spend a lot of money, so it follows that they’ll actually spend more money on frivilous luxury items than anybody in the other two groups, right?

Those of you claiming that they are great, and that the budget will be balanced by 2008 or 2009? I’m sorry, but it seems like you all might be on drugs.

Show me statistics claiming the budget deficit is growing. It is possible to increase tax revenues while lowering tax rates if there is more economic growth. Facts make great drugs apparently.

I’m wondering when we’re actually going to see the fabled benefits from this theory.

One example here . Another here . Remember this simple equation, Wealth=Technology. Whether you are talking about a computer or a brick, taking raw materials with little or no value and converting them through ideas and labor into an item of greater value is technology. The overall value is represented by currency.

When new technology comes out, it makes the old technology cheaper and more affordable to the poor. It is why the poor in america more-than-likely have cars, cell-phones, color T.V’s, own homes and are obese. 100 years ago, they starved to death in squalid tenement buildings, or had to wait for it to rain in order to take a bath in an abandoned pickle-barrel. The most significant, civilization-changing technology requires huge amounts of investment, which a wealthy entrapreneurial class can bring. Besides, as Brian said, its their money, they earned it, they get to do what they want with it.

America is mostly middle-class, with low unemployment right now. You might feel stress trying to make ends meet, but the quality of life for the average American (including me with my meager wages) is pretty damn good. Go to Bangladesh where haggard 30-year-old widows will beg change from you while suckling their infants if you want to know what real struggle is.

Taking out of pockets? Yes. Mismanaging? Not neccesarily. However, plenty of people manage to succeed in this country through their own hard work and chutzpah. The public school system at current is not effective at even making those in the system literate beyond an 8th grade level. The welfare money that we already dole out has helped a miority of it’s recipients because a blank check with no direction doesn’t help those who don’t spend the money properly. The idea that mere funds can fix these problems is shortsighted.

“I’m not saying they’re efficient stewards of tax money, but when money goes back into people’s hands, the inevitable is that the same money is cut from somewhere else. In essence, they’re taking money from programs that help the poor and give that money to the wealthy.”

There’s a role reversal. The government takes money from you first and then moves it around. Cuttung back taxes doesn’t mean money that the government was holding gets “given back” to people, it means the money is never taken in the first place. SO the question we have to ask is whether the actual problem is the funding or the system. I feel it is the system, FDR started the welfare state decades ago and its an ineffective now as it was then. Its a cash vacuum for public expenditure.

It could be not just that the “rich” have more money, but they are also more skilled at retaining money. If you give 5 people of the same financial status 200 bucks and one saves 150, one saves 100, one saves 50, one spends it all, and one spends it + 50 extra dollars, it doesn’t matter how much you increase the amount you give because the behaviors of the people dictate that funding is not the problem.

“Ha…do you honestly think that people in the upper class won’t spend that money on booze, cigarettes and a big gulp down at Snucky’s either? What a ridiculous argument and what a disdainful attitude for the middle and lower class. Speaks volumes to where your head is at.”

I am a member of the middle class, so I get to bash my own class, its like my family/ Trust me, not everyone spends wisely and those are usually the ones who end up on welfare. Sure it would help if we were all born rich, but even assuming we redistributed EVERY CENT, in 50 years we’d still have rich people and poor people.

We cannot afford to lose money to programs when the government already took money out of our pockets to pay for those programs in the first place.

How can we have any type of earnest conversation when you characterize taxes as money that the government is taking out of our pockets and mismanaging it? I’m not saying they’re efficient stewards of tax money, but when money goes back into people’s hands, the inevitable is that the same money is cut from somewhere else. In essence, they’re taking money from programs that help the poor and give that money to the wealthy.

You contribute to a political website proclaiming to be moderate, the idea that you will not face opposing viewpoints from those either rightward or leftward of you is therefore ridiculous.

Brian, for you to make this claim shows your ignorance of my contributions to this site. I have had, am having and will continue to have discussions with people of all political stripes. But I’m tired of your tone and rhetoric. It’s tiresome and I’m fed up.

But to your points, I have no problem with people making money. None whatsoever. But when tax cuts we can’t afford are being passed through with little regard for those who actually NEED more money, those being the middle and lower class, yeah…I have a problem with that. It’s not only fiscally irresponsible, but it’s actually the class warfare Republicans shout down Dems with all the time. Especially this investment income cut. In other words, it’s completely hypocritical and if there’s anything that a moderate/centrist/reformer hates, it’s hypocrisy.

Do you honestly no anybody who would spend that money on investment on securities rather than booze, cigarettes, and a big gulp down at Snucky’s? Poverty itself is not the problem, people mismanaging their funds is. It is better to have limited funds and good sense then unlimited funds and poor sense.

Ha…do you honestly think that people in the upper class won’t spend that money on booze, cigarettes and a big gulp down at Snucky’s either? What a ridiculous argument and what a disdainful attitude for the middle and lower class. Speaks volumes to where your head is at.

Again, I don’t understand why you post here. Your comments are rarely thoughtful, and often full of rhetoric and partisan hackery. I’m not asking you to change, but I’m completely tired of dealing with it.

By the way, do any of you make that much money, or even close to that much money? I’m guessing you don’t, and you never will, so I’m wondering why you would be defending the people that do.

Politicians and “republicans (with and without money)” have been making these “trickle down economics” arguments for the past 20 years. I’m wondering when we’re actually going to see the fabled benefits from this theory.

You call can slam poor people all you want (and no, they don’t all spend their money on booze and cigarettes for God’s sake), but it is true that the middle class, which all of us probably are a part of, suffers the most when we give these tax cuts. And, the reason why we never see results from higher taxes and economic redistribution, in my opinion, is that some other people come into power and reverse it all by giving tax cuts and spending recklessly (ahem . . . Bush administration for example). Clinton had us close to being in the black by the time he left, and look where we are now. Balanced budget by 2008. Sure.

We cannot afford to lose money to programs when the government already took money out of our pockets to pay for those programs in the first place. Therefore, you demand more be taken away from people and siphoned to goverment programs whose issues stem deeper than financing.

In other words, we CAN afford to have our money mismanaged by the government, but we CANNOT afford to keep the money we earned in the first place. Whatever you say.

You contribute to a political website proclaiming to be moderate, the idea that you will not face opposing viewpoints from those either rightward or leftward of you is therefore ridiculous. Moreover, whether they are “Republican talking points” or not is irrelevant, unless of course you interpret any Republican point as wrong simply by the fact Republicans use it.

Shifts in the market affect all investors, if you have the same securities as the rich you will get the same gain or loss as they do as a percentage. However, let us assume we do redistribute all this wealth. Do you honestly no anybody who would spend that money on investment on securities rather than booze, cigarettes, and a big gulp down at Snucky’s? Poverty itself is not the problem, people mismanaging their funds is. It is better to have limited funds and good sense then unlimited funds and poor sense.

Taxes are money the government takes from you at gunpoint to redistrubute elsewhere. To make it sound as if the rich are unduly benefitting from money they stole is ridiculous, they EARNED the money and therefore should be free to use it.

Brian, frankly, your comments are getting tiresome. They’re hacky and they very rarely accurately address the points I made in an earnest way, besides parroting Republican talking points. If you want to comment here, then do so in a spirit of genuine debate. This Coulter routine is not welcome.

Same for you DP. I know you’re just trying to push my buttons and I’ve warned you about your inflamatory comments before. And how do I put this…well…both you and I know why I’ve been more lenient with you, so please Join the coversation and quit throwing darts at me.

How dare THEY, who MAKE MORE MONEY, get bigger savings when the RATE goes down.

Why, its almost as if when you make 100,000 and save 10% you save 10 times as much as when you make 10,000 dollars and save 10%.

AMAZING.

Taxes are money the government takes from you at gunpoint to redistrubute elsewhere. To make it sound as if the rich are unduly benefitting from money they stole is ridiculous, they EARNED the money and therefore should be free to use it.

Why should the rich have to foot the bill for everyone else? Why does success have to be punished?

The middle class benefit the most from tax rate reductions, they have more money in their pocket that isn’t being redistributed to the bottom of the barrel that just leeches off the system.

The public school system is a failed system, throwing more money at into a failed system does not fix the system, it just creates a cash vacuum. And of course, the next time it comes up and the system is still a failure, we say “we need more money” and all of a sudden we start going after the rich again? Why? Its easy to blame the rich for not paying out the dough, its hard to actually do something about the failed system.

(and a smiley face!)

For percentage of total tax revenues recieved based on economic class:
http://www.optimist123.com/.shared/image.html?/photos/uncategorized/taxpctfedtotiit.gif

For percentage of Americans’ income paid out to the government based on economic class:
http://www.optimist123.com/.shared/image.html?/photos/uncategorized/taxpctagi.gif

For the overall effect the tax cuts have had on our economy:
http://www.optimist123.com/.shared/image.html?/photos/uncategorized/deficittrend200603.gif

The richest 1% contribute a higher percentage of total tax revenue to the American federal government than in any other industrialized nation in the world. When you look at the charts you realize the situation is not doom and gloom, nor highway robbery for the lower classes. Everyone benefitted from the tax cuts rather proportionately, and the result will be a balanced budget in 2008 or 2009.

And that’s just one way wealthier people can game the tax system.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not concerned with creating a tax code that “progressively” redistributes wealth away from the wealthy in order to provide more services to the poor. I am, however, very concerned with creating a more fair tax code.

The middle class gets burned under the current system. The tax code is full of breaks for the wealthy at the expense of the middle class who not only don’t have the level of income required to trigger the breaks (i.e. a big mortgage or investment income) but also don’t have the fancy accountants who can exploit the loopholes.

The middle class deserves a more fair tax system. “Tax reform” has unfortunately become a code word for “give more money to the rich,” but real tax reform would benefit the middle classes most.

A lot of people call the taxation issue class warfare. You know what? They’re right. And the middle and lower classes are losing the war in a big way. Because for every dollar that goes back into an investor’s pocket, it represents a dollar not being spent on making our public school systems better or any number of programs that help the poor, disabled and barely making it.

My name is Justin Gardner and I am a Marxist.
Hi, Justin. :)

Getting over the denial is the first step. When you find your higher power, you will be making true strides.

In any case, if investment has become more profitable because of tax rate cuts, then more money will be invested - that’s evident. While a reduction in savings may follow, why the hell not? Why save money when I can make better interest from investing it instead?

WRT your remark that the rich are that way because of their investments, not because of the labor that they do - where do you suppose their investments come from? Some people inherit money, but most wealth people make their money. Once made - through labor, I should point out - they can invest it, and if their investments do well, it is because they have been either consistently lucky (do you buy that?) or because they have applied knowledge and effort to their investments - which translates as skilled labor.