Fighting liberalism: A fun fact on the "wealthiest 1%".

[malkusm]

I woke up this morning and had an idea. So I did 10 minutes of research on the internet, and I thought I'd share with you what I came up with. Note that the statements below fit the character limit of Facebook, if you wish to re-post.

There are 228 million people of working age in the U.S. The wealthiest 1% of these, which the left wishes to tax, would be 2.28 million. As of 2008, the U.S. Census lists 2,312,368 businesses in America which employ at least 5 people, employing a total of 114.8 million (half the workforce). Wonder how many of the business owners fall in that "top 1%", and how many of the 114.8 million will suffer?

[Matthew Zak]

My brain isn't working properly due to a severe lack of sleep. In other words, this went over my head.

[Yieu]

My brain isn't working properly due to a severe lack of sleep. In other words, this went over my head.

2.28 million people in the top 1% of earners. 2.31 million businesses in America. Correlation? Possibly. I believe that is the point.

The point being that it would hurt the employers, which would hurt the employees, keep wages down, and keep unemployment high as the employers would have less capital to employ or reward employees with. Thus, taxing the rich is bad for the common worker, and less taxes for all helps the little guy more than any taxes at all.

The compassionate position that helps the working class the most is thus to be against taxation, for any earning group.

[fisharmor]

Anyone capable of connecting these dots is more likely than not already mostly agreed with us, at least on the issue of taxes.
It's the 51% or better of the population which either isn't employed by these people or lack the intellectual capacity to deduce whose mob-rule-type votes we need to worry about.

[Romulus]

It's the 33% that live off the system that depend on its survival.

[AZKing]

Anyone capable of connecting these dots is more likely than not already mostly agreed with us, at least on the issue of taxes.
It's the 51% or better of the population which either isn't employed by these people or lack the intellectual capacity to deduce whose mob-rule-type votes we need to worry about.

I was watching MSNBC the other day and apparently 80% of people want to tax the top 1% more ._. Talk about oppressing a minority with democracy.

[malkusm]

2.28 million people in the top 1% of earners. 2.31 million businesses in America. Correlation? Possibly. I believe that is the point.

The point being that it would hurt the employers, which would hurt the employees, keep wages down, and keep unemployment high as the employers would have less capital to employ or reward employees with. Thus, taxing the rich is bad for the common worker, and less taxes for all helps the little guy more than any taxes at all.

The compassionate position that helps the working class the most is thus to be against taxation, for any earning group.

Yep, you got what I was going for.

Additional fact: There are 22.5 million government employees as of 2008 (roughly 10% of the working population). This means that the 2.31 million businesses mentioned before account for roughly 55.9% of private sector employment.

[TonySutton]

Has anyone ever seen statistics on how many private sector jobs it takes to pay for 1 public sector job? It would also be nice to know how many private sector jobs it takes to pay for 1 person on government subsistence.

[Freedom 4 all]

Anyone capable of connecting these dots is more likely than not already mostly agreed with us, at least on the issue of taxes.
It's the 51% or better of the population which either isn't employed by these people or lack the intellectual capacity to deduce whose mob-rule-type votes we need to worry about.

Lol, so true. Well thought out logical arguments are only valuable in convincing those intelligent enough to understand and appreciate them. We need to find some way to convince people who AREN'T smart enough to understand stuff like that. There are a lot of them, and they vote.

[ChaosControl]

I doubt changing their taxes is going to have any real effect on the workers. There have been periods in history where their tax rate was higher and the workers got on fine.

I think there is a point that such would not be true and tax rates would affect more people, but I doubt a small change in the marginal rates on the top 1% would have any affect.

If we're going to get the budget under control, we have look at multiple options and one of those is raising the rates on the top 1%, although realistically that isn't going to bring in enough which is why spending cuts really have to account for the largest change.

[IBleedNavyAndOrange]

So let me get this straight... my boss, who has never shorted my paycheck or ever been late with it is the bad guy? Can you explain how the government making him poorer by taxation makes me richer? Won't he be even less likely to give me a raise if he has less money?
And do you really think you're going to be the beneficiary if he is taxed more?

That usually turns on the light pretty quickly.

[enoch150]

I think most of us would like to privatize significant amounts of the government. This would include selling off government assets to private investors.

I think most of us also agree that there is a certain financial elite that benefits from government enforced monopolies, trade restrictions, barriers to competition, and Fed funny money printing. They bribe the politicians and sometimes write the laws themselves.

I'm not talking about the people who became rich by making a better product, of course. These people I speak of are crooks. Their money isn't honestly earned. Would justice be served if we allowed them to steal so much money and then privatized so much of the government that they would be among the very few with enough money to bid on the assets? And if not, how could the problem be fixed?

I have never seen an answer to this that I've been satisfied with.

[Fox McCloud]

Has anyone ever seen statistics on how many private sector jobs it takes to pay for 1 public sector job? It would also be nice to know how many private sector jobs it takes to pay for 1 person on government subsistence.

In some ways, I don't want to know--it may be too depressing. =p

That said, I think it would be more accurately stated "how many jobs are lost due to the existence of 1 government job".

[speciallyblend]

f the irs is my solution

[idirtify]

Well thought out logical arguments are only valuable in convincing those intelligent enough to understand and appreciate them. We need to find some way to convince people who AREN'T smart enough to understand stuff like that.

How about this? “The best way to help the middle class is to improve the economy, and overtaxing employers damages the economy.”

[mczerone]

Yep, you got what I was going for.

Additional fact: There are 22.5 million government employees as of 2008 (roughly 10% of the working population). This means that the 2.31 million businesses mentioned before account for roughly 55.9% of private sector employment.

So, to kill two birds with one stone, we advocate allowing the public sector unions their "rights", but we push to take suffrage from anyone employed by the public sector? Anyone that works for a sector of the government should not be allowed a vote in determining their own pay/scope/policy. So anyone that works for the federal government cannot vote in federal elections, anyone who works for a state cannot vote in state or federal elections, and anyone that works for a municipality can't vote in any election in that municipality or above (however if a person was employed in one county, but lived in another, they would still be able to vote in their county, but not in state elections).

Radical, I know. But what defense can be raised against this limitation? It gives more power to those who are not directly benefiting from pure government growth, but only benefit if the policies discourage public sector waste and encourage a growing economy. Plus it would recenter economic policy on the will of those who actually are affected by the government policies, and discount those who would benefit personally whether the policies win or lose.