Phred - You mix and mingle reasonably true points with obvious inconsistencies and idiocies.

You assert that corporations don't pay taxes, consumers do when they buy the corporation's goods and services, yet at the same time you contend that there is nothing wrong with excessive compensation paid to executives, it costs consumers nothing, since it comes out of shareholders' pockets.  I hope you can see that these assertions are completely contradictory.  Both taxes and excessive compensation are costs, although one clearly has a more defensible purpose.  I prefer that they bear a reasonable cost for public services.

Corporations and their lobbyists often make the rhetorical argument that they shouldn't be taxed because they will just pass the costs along to consumers.  On that theory, I shouldn't be taxed because that just means I will demand higher wages and pass the costs along to someone else.  Corporations will make as much profit as they can.  They are not in the business of merely passing costs along.  They will still charge as much as they can for their products or services regardless of whether you save them tax dollars.

Fled wrote:

Phred - You mix and mingle reasonably true points with obvious inconsistencies and idiocies.

You assert that corporations don't pay taxes, consumers do when they buy the corporation's goods and services, yet at the same time you contend that there is nothing wrong with excessive compensation paid to executives, it costs consumers nothing, since it comes out of shareholders' pockets.  I hope you can see that these assertions are completely contradictory.  Both taxes and excessive compensation are costs, although one clearly has a more defensible purpose.  I prefer that they bear a reasonable cost for public services.

There is a major difference between taxes and executive salaries.  Taxes are assessed across the board to all corporations.  So, if you tax all the car companies, the cost of cars will go up to cover the taxes paid to the government.  Hence, all corporate taxes are paid by the consumer.  Now, executive salaries are different.  Each company can negotiate these salaries and, presumably, the one who has the best management for the lowest price can undercut the competition.

Zook wrote:

Ever hear of tax brackets?  If earning a little more is just enough to put you in a higher tax bracket you do indeed net less by earning more.  That's inherent in a progressive tax plan.

Zook, if you understood progressive taxes you would know that only the amount of your earnings that fall into the higher bracket are taxed at the higher rate.  There is no way that earning more will net you less after taxes, in the U.S. at least.  Some European countries have tax brackets exceeding 100%. 

Wilber Cunt wrote:

All the very stupidest economic theories begin with a similar affirmation of the deterministic power of market forces. Markets determine nothing. The fix has been in forever - the agora is owned.

Take my advice and invest in that tinfoil hat.

tojo2000 wrote:

On the radio yesterday they brought up a scary point.  We haven't seen the end of the collapses.  We still haven't seen any fallout from hedge funds.  They have massive amounts of money invested, but people can only withdraw funds once a quarter.  When the quarterly window comes up we could see a run on hedge funds.

Many hedge funds heavily invested in Mortgage backed securities have already posted their lossses and shut down. A friend of mine was a hedge fund manager. The same thing happened to his Bond fund in the dot com bubble. They started to see a large loss acruing with no upside coming and moved to dissolve their fund and return what they could to shareholders.

phreddy wrote:

Fled wrote:

Phred - You mix and mingle reasonably true points with obvious inconsistencies and idiocies.

You assert that corporations don't pay taxes, consumers do when they buy the corporation's goods and services, yet at the same time you contend that there is nothing wrong with excessive compensation paid to executives, it costs consumers nothing, since it comes out of shareholders' pockets.  I hope you can see that these assertions are completely contradictory.  Both taxes and excessive compensation are costs, although one clearly has a more defensible purpose.  I prefer that they bear a reasonable cost for public services.

There is a major difference between taxes and executive salaries.  Taxes are assessed across the board to all corporations.  So, if you tax all the car companies, the cost of cars will go up to cover the taxes paid to the government.  Hence, all corporate taxes are paid by the consumer.  Now, executive salaries are different.  Each company can negotiate these salaries and, presumably, the one who has the best management for the lowest price can undercut the competition.

That is what they call a distinction without a difference.  They are both costs of the corporation, whether you are discussing one or all corporations.  You can say they are paid by the consumer (increased prices), or they are paid by the shareholder (reduced dividends, etc.), but it is still the same principle. 

If you believe that highewr executive bonuses somehow necessarily lead to better management and lower prices, I think you are operating on pure faith.  Recent evidence does not appear to support you.

Last edited by Fled (2008-09-23 18:44:09)

You miss my point, Phleddy.  It is that both taxes paid and bonuses/compensation paid are costs to the corporation.  They are exactly the same in the sense that they can increase prices or reduce dividends or both.  Your mistake was in (1) saying that taxes go to price, while (2) bonuses come out of dividends that otherwise would be paid to shareholders.  However, taxes and bonuses are just like other costs.  In your most recent post, you acknowledge that both may factored into pricing.

I was addressing an inconsistency between two of your earlier posts.  The phlegmy thickness may stay in your hand.  Apply it as you wish.

Billmon brings knowledge

Chicken Little would have found a great audience here.

:P yourself.

And now, to your astonisment, I will append the full text of the song of Fat Freddy's Cat.
(I wish I could find the comic...but I can't...Dusty?)

I'm Fat Freddy's Cat
And I'm mean and tough
And I take no guff
When I strut my stuff

I'm so ornery
And so full of piss
If I don't like your looks
I'll hit you with THIS!

If you see me coming
Better step aside
A lot of cats wouldn't
And a lot of cats couldn't
Hand a lickin' to a chicken
Or a razzing to a rat
After they finished messing around
With Fat Freddy's Cat!

Heeerre kitty kitty kitty kitty kitty kitty!
(I'm Fat Freddy's CAT and I ain't no KITTY)

Heeerre kitty kitty kitty kitty kitty kitty!
(Don't embarrass me in the middle of the city)

Heeerre kitty kitty kitty kitty kitty kitty!
(I can make it rough on you if you're gonna act shitty)

I'll track your records up with my paws
I'll pop your waterbed with my claws
I'll shed more fur every time you sweep
And I'll sit on your face when you're asleep

I'll shit in your shoe
And I'll pee in your hat
And I'll spray the whole house
With "essence of cat".

Do you wanna eat some Krunchies?
(Do you wanna buy a duck?)
C'mon kitty--eat some Krunchies!
(C'mon Fatty, let's EAT!)

Last edited by WilberCuntLicker (2008-09-24 03:41:15)

Fled wrote:

On another front, what if the same standards applied on High-Street?

I knew cops liked to throw every charge at you to see what stuck, but battery on an officer for farting? That isn't a standard, it's an exception.

orangeplus wrote:

it's worse than we thought

OK, I'm a little confused. These are predictions by and for people who believe in a calendar system that's due to end in 2012?

The best part is this plan has been on the table for over a year, natch they weren't interested in discussing it until the Shock Doctrine could be deployed.  Check out Marvin Barth's interview on Bloomberg TV from Monday.

****Can anyone make this work????*****

Edit:  Yes.  --tojo2000

Last edited by tojo2000 (2008-09-24 21:15:36)

orangeplus wrote:

see ya WaMu, we hardly knew ye

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid= … refer=home

largest bank failure in US history

WaMu came to my workplace as recently as this past Tuesday, shilling for new accounts. I was actually quite tempted, as I'm not really satisfied with either bank I have. JPMC is buying them, but I figure that just means I already HAVE a "pre-absorption" WaMu account. Woo-hoo.

Torches and Pitchforks time:

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,428641,00.html

Concise capsule obit of investment banking.

WilberCuntLicker wrote:

I could go on, but then I'd run the risk of turning into pENIx.

Great, not only are you the arbiter of when conversations are done, you also believe you have some sway over the length of each post? Such passive-aggressive censorship is going to get you into trouble one of these days.

pALEPHx wrote:

WilberCuntLicker wrote:

I could go on, but then I'd run the risk of turning into pENIx.

Great, not only are you the arbiter of when conversations are done, you also believe you have some sway over the length of each post? Such passive-aggressive censorship is going to get you into trouble one of these days.

Damn pENIx, you're so touchy these days. I don't care if you write novellas - I don't have to read them. This isn't Chimere, old friend, there's no politesse, and everyone takes their lumps. And the more you react, the more you generally receive. You know all this - why are you being such a jew-fag?

G. Gordon Liddy and Andrew Sullivan? Who'd of thunk it?

orangeplus wrote:

G. Gordon Liddy and Andrew Sullivan? Who'd of thunk it?

Must be from back in the prison days...

The bailout and the pundits.

pALEPHx wrote:

We're in a worse state than the Depression, and it seems like no one wants to admit it.

So where are all the soup lines?

pALEPHx wrote:

Zookeeper wrote:

So where are all the soup lines?

Just because you're not currently getting Food Stamps doesn't mean that other people suddenly stopped,  y'kno.

Let's hear the stats showing the dramatic rise in food stamps in the last six months. 

For crying out loud, the current economic facts don't even qualify for a recession yet let alone a depression.  Saying things are as bad as the Great Depression at this rate is asinine.

pALEPHx wrote:

There are more channels of respite than existed during the earlier Depression. Jobs are harder to get, towns are drying up, and people in lower brackets are being taxed to the limit of their existence. The current state of affairs isn't all about banks and big businesses.

Go read a book about the 1930s and come back and tell us how it's as bad now.  Sheesh.

Historical Perspective?

Zookeeper wrote:

Scary.  Pale, again go read a book about the 30's.  Or at least take a trip to Wikipedia.  Unemployment rates shot up to 25% (it's just above 6% currently).  But go ahead, spring your dastardly trap and explain exactly how "We're in a worse state than the Depression".

Describing the current condition to the depression is pretty dumb. We haven't had an official declaration of ressession (although one would guess September will likely have had negative GDP growth) and well, any number of scary thangs that happened then haven't happened. I will take issue with your number though. If we went by the standards of how unemployment was measured in the 30s, our unemplyment would be around 11-12%. That's the U6 rate from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Auto-edited on 2020-08-02 to update URLs

Panic

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/27045699/?