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Spanish Revolution
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Gilles
Posts: 16
Joined: Jul. 19 2010
From: Amsterdam
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 RE: Spanish Revolution (in reply to Pgh_flamenco)
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Snap! I wish my first post would have been on practicing bulerias in anticipation of the great SanLucar get-together.
..and I certainly don’t want to be seen as siding with New Age opinion to market economics as voiced by some… but I strongly feel that while everyone is entitled to their own opinion, no one is entitled to their own facts.
With all respect, I read the CBO numbers slightly less demagogic. And frankly, I find the income inequality and the relatively low tax burden shown by CBO to be more telling than the fact that poor people pay fewer taxes.
CBO shows distribution of income and tax burden in quintiles (steps of 20%) and does not refer to deciles (steps of 10%): (source: CBO presentation to Congress, December 2010)
* Top 20% income households do pay 70% of federal tax revenues. On face value this fact may seem exhorbitant, but this same group of households simultaneously earns 55% of all income (average income $265 000, average tax rate 20%). The top 1% income households pay 28% of federal tax revenues and earn 19% of all income (average tax rate 30%). So abstracting from that top 1%, the penultimate (?) 19% earning households pay 42% of tax revenue whilst earning 36% of all income.
* Middle quintile pays 9% of all federal taxes whilst earing 13% of all income (average income $65 000, average tax rate 14%).
Surely, this picture is not as bad as you described. Even considering the whole (skewed) top quintile, the average tax rate for this group is 20% and can hardly be considered punitive, excessive, or even discouraging. At least by European standards, excluding Greece where apparently no taxes are paid at all  .
All in all, the percentage paid in taxes pretty much tracks the percentage earned in income. And yes, those poorest 20% (share of income 4%, share of taxes less than 1%, average income $18 500, average tax rate 4%) hardly earn enough to be able to pay income taxes, but they do pay the other components of federal tax revenue(payroll/social security, corporate and excise taxes). Overwhelmingly this group consists of elderly people who don’t work or households with an income below $20 000. I don’t particularly begrudge them their fiscal ‘freeloading’.
Next post will be on topic. Probably along the lines of how the hell I can participate in the Sanlucar fin de fiesta and not have to ‘mime’ the part where they go in and out of the cambio! I can never hear when they go to the E7 and once I am in I can’t anticipate when they go back to A (via C7-F), so I sort of strum that part apogando and try to catch up later.
Cheers,
Gilles
http://cboblog.cbo.gov/?p=1656
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Date May 22 2011 21:03:14
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Gilles
Posts: 16
Joined: Jul. 19 2010
From: Amsterdam
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RE: Spanish Revolution (in reply to Pgh_flamenco)
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John and Stephen,
Thanks for the welcome (and thanks for the tip on the dynamics of the fin de fiesta).
O boy, I can now see how these off- topic threads veer off… so I’ll keep it short.
quote:
It’s not incorrect to use deciles and even smaller subdivisions of data…
My issue wasn’t so much on how you read the data, but that you properly cite the data. My impression was that you cited CBO on the statistic that the top 10% income earners pay 70% federal taxes.
But in fact, CBO states that the top 20% contribute that 70% of federal tax revenue.
A huge difference (no matter how you slice it in deciles, quintiles or other stats) and that was my main point to keep the discussion clear.
Aaah, economics. That social science that tries so desperately to be acknowledged as an exact science. This thread has some life in it, still  .
For a better delineation of the topics of national debt, financial bailouts, the causes and possible remedies of this great recession I highly recommend this blog entry by Brad DeLong.
Considered a flaming liberal in the US, he is slightly right of centre by European standards and this post is a very readable and condense hop-skip-jump over the relevant issues. It provides some red meat for the ‘hang ‘em high’- crowd as well as some ammo for the ‘govmint is the problem’- libertarians.
Off to relearn my left hand grip on the fingerboard. Unfortunately I have been lazily holding my guitarneck in the cup of my thumb-joint all these years and now I still have very limited reach, strength and precision on the melody-side of my guitar.
Probably easier to fix then the economic crisis, though.
Best,
Gilles
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Date May 23 2011 9:17:11
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marrow3
Posts: 166
Joined: Mar. 1 2009
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RE: Spanish Revolution (in reply to Pgh_flamenco)
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When protesters come together in large numbers, to be fair in your response, you have to lay out all the relevant facts in presenting an argument, to either support or denigrate their demands.
So the distribution of burden of taxation only makes sense when put together with the distribution of wealth then you see why it is so, at least that is my opinion. Innovation, hard work, risk taking (with new technology), and being frugal with resources in business can make or help with success, okay. But there are other processes, which are less sympathetic, such as asset stripping, market monopolisation, short selling, housing bubbles, bubbles built on misuse of financial instruments and pyramid schemes through which a few can become wealthy at the majority expense.
As I understand it, the slogan 'no les votes', comes from the fact that countries with the familiar bipartisan politics, both sides are basically enacting policies which benefit corporate interests (through lobbying and the deep pockets politicians need for campaigning) whilst paying only lip-service to voters values. For this reason the main political parties don't represent their core values either conservative or socialist and the words themselves have become unusable. IMO, for right or wrong, this sentiment is echoed in demonstrations in the UK and other countries, but not really in mainstream media.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wealth_in_the_United_States).
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Date May 23 2011 15:35:32
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BarkellWH
Posts: 3458
Joined: Jul. 12 2009
From: Washington, DC
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RE: Spanish Revolution (in reply to estebanana)
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Spain, like Greece, is discovering that a country, just as an individual, cannot continue living beyond its means. In both cases, the national government has to reign in spending in order to maintain a reasonable credit rating. If they don't, their bonds will be junk, they will be unable to pay interest on their debt (much less the principal) and they will be unable to raise financing on the international markets.
When Prime Minister Zapatero assumed power seven years ago, he was true to his Socialist principles and implemented programs that, over the long haul, were bound to fail. Some programs were legitimate and some were beyond the pale. He raised the minimum wage and extended health insurance to cover virtually everything, including sex-change operations! He made scholarships available to everyone, and he granted rent subsidies (called "emancipation" money) to young adults. (When I was 20 I would have liked the U.S. Government to subsidize my apartment, too, instead of having to earn the money to pay my monthly rent.) Mothers received the equivalent of US$3,500 for the birth of each child, and children attended free nurseries. Proudhon and Saint Simon could not have imagined a more inclusive Socialist paradise of goodies. Problem is, it all had to be paid for, and the crunch has come.
Just a word about Germany as the engine of so much of the bailout for Greece. The German Government recently raised the age of full retirement to 67. Greece, whose full retirement age is now 61, recently suggested raising the age of full retirement to 63, and the greeks had violent demonstrations. Guess which one is the fiscally responsible adult and which one is the whining child throwing a tantrum?
I think this is the situation that Spain, with good reason, is trying to avoid.
Cheers,
Bill
_____________________________
And the end of the fight is a tombstone white,
With the name of the late deceased,
And the epitaph drear, "A fool lies here,
Who tried to hustle the East."
--Rudyard Kipling
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Date May 23 2011 17:54:11
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XXX
Posts: 4400
Joined: Apr. 14 2005
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RE: Spanish Revolution (in reply to Estevan)
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quote:
Spain, like Greece, is discovering that a country, just as an individual, cannot continue living beyond its means.
What about banks?
Of course you can live with a lot of debts. Germany has debts which will never be paid back. But Germany, as a state, can apply economic pressure, and the banks profit from its debts too. US can apply military pressure and obviously has not much problem to get funds to spend for "freedom" or "peace missions" all over the world. The rules for a country are obviously not the same as companies, let alone individuals. There is an increasing number of regulations to take care of, the less economic impact you have, from high impact on the state's side, over systematic importance on the banks' side and low impact when it comes to 90% of the people, who, ironically, are the condition for everything (the system) to work more or less against them. 
_____________________________
Фламенко
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Date May 23 2011 19:38:16
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