The US fiscal cliff - would it really be a bad thing?

[amused]

There seems to be a gleeful welcoming of total collapse among the so-called survivalists. I think that is a retreat from responsible citizenship. It takes hard work to make a society.

[Warren Dew]

There seems to be a gleeful welcoming of total collapse among the so-called survivalists. I think that is a retreat from responsible citizenship. It takes hard work to make a society.

Why should the survivalists be the only ones to work hard?

[amused]

[Coito ergo sum]

The so-called fiscal cliff is probably a good thing. Let it happen.

The only "bargain" that they will strike between now and 12/31 is to kick the can down the road and claim that they averted a catastrophe and are heroes. Of course, they created the mess in the first place, so it's sort of like a protection racket.

[Seth]

The last resort, when people stop spending, is to tax assets.

Good luck with that. Hiding assets is easy.

There was a furious debate when income tax was originally introduced as a short-term measure.
It's ingrained in the system now. Sales taxes take the pressure off income tax and are easy to collect.

And sales taxes is how the government should be funded...and ONLY sales taxes. This ties government revenues (and therefore spending if a balanced budget amendment is passed) directly to the health of the economy. Any such tax should be limited to not more than 19 percent for all taxes, federal, state and local, by the Constitution.

But an asset tax would be a great instrument for stability. The government could always guarantee to pay it's bills. And the asset tax could go up or down, depending on the financial situation.

If there was a deep recession, and the government decided to bring it in, people would start spending, rather than get taxed on assets, which would lift the economy out of recession, removing the need for taxing assets.

They'd just move or conceal their assets. Besides, you couldn't hire enough agents to verify claimed assets, that would cost more than the tax would raise. There's a business asset tax in Colorado now, and you're supposed to send the state a list of everything in your store/shop/business like chairs, tables, copiers, computers etc. so they can tax you on it. Only the very large corporations even bother, and it's the most unpaid tax in the state, and the state has no way to enforce it against the vast majority of people.

The fiscal cliff would be a great time to bring it in. Don't think it would get through the congress though.
Unless the government was broke and people weren't getting paid. Like Greece. But the greeks haven't resorted to it yet.

Impose an asset tax on me and I won't report any assets, and they'll never find the stuff I do have. It's that simple.

You CANNOT tax your way out of a recession or depression. The only way to recover is to free business to create wealth by lowering taxes and stripping away regulations that impede business and giving business tax certainty into the future. Only then will companies start spending all those trillions in capital they have sitting in the bank, because only then can they make plans and make money...and create jobs for people to work at.

[Seth]

There seems to be a gleeful welcoming of total collapse among the so-called survivalists. I think that is a retreat from responsible citizenship. It takes hard work to make a society.

Fuck this society. It's done anyway. I did everything I could to convince people not to vote for the Progressive/Socialist party and for dependence on government. They did it anyway. Let them suffer the consequences of their bad judgment I say. Those of us who planned ahead, seeing what was coming, will be fine, and we'll pick up the pieces and do it better next time, and all the rest of you socialist fuckwits will end up starving in the dark, and it's exactly what you deserve.

You idiots think money comes from the money fairy and that government creates wealth. It doesn't. Never has, never will. Being dependent on government and raping the productive class has but one predictable outcome: total social and economic collapse when the productive class decides to quit being productive and leaves the dependent class swinging in the wind.

I'd say I'm astonished at the idiocy of socialists, but I'm no longer surprised at their bone-headed dependency culture and inability to understand simple economic facts.

I hope you all die in agony. It'll be a better world without socialist dependency.

[amused]

There seems to be a gleeful welcoming of total collapse among the so-called survivalists. I think that is a retreat from responsible citizenship. It takes hard work to make a society.

Fuck this society. It's done anyway. I did everything I could to convince people not to vote for the Progressive/Socialist party and for dependence on government. They did it anyway. Let them suffer the consequences of their bad judgment I say. Those of us who planned ahead, seeing what was coming, will be fine, and we'll pick up the pieces and do it better next time, and all the rest of you socialist fuckwits will end up starving in the dark, and it's exactly what you deserve.

You idiots think money comes from the money fairy and that government creates wealth. It doesn't. Never has, never will. Being dependent on government and raping the productive class has but one predictable outcome: total social and economic collapse when the productive class decides to quit being productive and leaves the dependent class swinging in the wind.

I'd say I'm astonished at the idiocy of socialists, but I'm no longer surprised at their bone-headed dependency culture and inability to understand simple economic facts.

I hope you all die in agony. It'll be a better world without socialist dependency.

[Wumbologist]

You have to survive the spasm of mindless violence and chaos that will occur about a week or so after the food deliveries to major metropolitan areas come to a halt when the fuel supplies are disrupted. We're no longer 30 days away from starvation and riots, we're about a week because grocery chains no longer have large local food distribution warehouses, they now depend on "just in time delivery" systems that leaves but three days worth of supplies in any given store once the trucks stop rolling. This is exactly what's happening in NYC and New Jersey right now, and the only thing that's preventing widespread rioting and looting is the determination of the nation to bail out the afflicted area. When that stops, as it will in a depression/crash, every major metropolitan area will be completely on its own, and even the military won't be able to supply enough food, water, medicine or shelter. People are going to die by the tens or hundreds of millions in the collapse as the rural food-producing areas fort-up and deny food to outsiders.

It'll all go very local and feudal, and those with the arms, ammunition and willingness to use them will be the Kings.

But initially it's going to be necessary to survive (or evade) the worst of the rioting, for a few months during which vast numbers of urban dependent class drones will starve to death, riot, and eventually start eating each other.

Only then can the rebuilding begin on a local basis, and the eastern seaboard is NOT the place to be. Too many people chasing too few goods...and food...and each other. I'm headed for the wide-open spaces where game is plentiful and people are few.

I'll take my chances with the Eastern seaboard. More people to serve in my merciless horde, and what not.

[amused]

Meant to include this above:

http://www.cnn.com/2012/11/12/opinion/f ... index.html

America is not a society divided between "makers" and "takers." Instead, almost all of us proceed through a life cycle where we sometimes make and sometimes take as we pass from schooling to employment to retirement.

The line between "making" and "taking" is not a racial line. The biggest government program we have, Medicare, benefits a population that is 85% white.

President Barack Obama was not re-elected by people who want to "take." The president was re-elected by people who want to work -- and who were convinced, rightly or wrongly, that the president's policies were more likely to create work than were the policies advocated by my party.

The United States did not vote for socialism. It could not do so, because neither party offers socialism. Both parties champion a free enterprise economy cushioned by a certain amount of social insurance. The Democrats (mostly) want more social insurance, the Republicans want less. National politics is a contest to move the line of scrimmage, in a game where there's no such thing as a forward pass, only a straight charge ahead at the defensive line. To gain three yards is a big play.

[JimC]

Do get a fucking grip, people...

It's trendy to be all gothic and apocalyptic as a teenager, but then one grows up...

[Coito ergo sum]

The drum beat of "fiscal cliff, fiscal cliff" is a sales pitch.

It is the lament of the used car salesman, who tells you that you have to make the deal today, because these deals won't be available tomorrow.

The lawmakers bought this line in 2008 and 2008, when we were all sold the bill-of-goods that if we didn't "act now" utter catastrophe would occur.

Remember when Bernanke came over from the Fed and reported to the President and to Congress that he somehow just learned that morning that the entire United States economy was on the brink of a depression to make the Great Depression look like a small pothole? We had to "act now" -- "NOW NOW NOW!!!" to avert the certain catastrophe -- the banks would all go under and our whole country would all apart. The lawmakers bought it, hook, line and sinker and we just wrote a blank check.

Fine. That is water under the bridge.

They're at it again.

It's a fiscal cliff!!!! Oh, no!!! If you go over a cliff you fall and blow up like in the movies!!!! We have to "act now" to "avert" the coming disaster!!!!!

Sounds like another salesman telling me I need to spend money now, or else....

Look - it's very simple. Stop spending money we don't have. I'm not saying you have have $0 deficit spending, but we have to actually do what Obama said he was going to do:

Go program by program and cancel redundancies and increase efficiencies. We all know the government wastes hundreds of billions of dollars a year. It's a staggering, immoral waste of money. Bring in the department heads, and get them to cut costs. Fuck, the government can't even give money away efficiently.

We spent $120,000,000,000 more than we took in during the month of October, which starts us off 1/12 of the way through the 2013 fiscal year. Not a good start. Deficit spending up 22%. If that's how they want to address the "fiscal cliff" then let's just drive the bus right over it.

[amused]

Except.... This situation was intentionally created in late 2010 in order to force a compromise in order to avoid the fiscal cliff, a term coined later. Both sides knew that one or the other will have won this recent election, giving one side or the other the ability to lead. Now they are here and Obama gets to lead the process.

[laklak]

Yep, they purposely kicked the can down the road till after the election. They'll likely do the same thing again. Which is good, in some ways. Gives people more time to convert debased cash assets to something real. Cigarettes, alcohol, toilet paper and ammunition will be currencies of choice.

I hope there will be zombies.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

I think it would be a good thing. Run the fucking bus off the cliff, we're all Bozos on it anyway.

My shoes are inflated.

[Coito ergo sum]

Except.... This situation was intentionally created in late 2010 in order to force a compromise in order to avoid the fiscal cliff, a term coined later. Both sides knew that one or the other will have won this recent election, giving one side or the other the ability to lead. Now they are here and Obama gets to lead the process.

Who cares?

The fiscal cliff is not the catastrophe they're making it out to be.

Oh, there will be big, draconian spending cuts? Good!

If that happens, i'll take the tax increases. I've had it. Fuck it.

It's time we took our medicine.

If I were the Republicans, I would agree to the marginal federal tax rate increase on incomes over $250,000 a year in exchange for agreed upon and immediately implemented spending cuts - if anything is "left to be hammered out in the future" do not trust the Democrats, because you'll never get the spending cuts. However, if they can get a real spending cut that really reduces the deficit by, say 25% or more, then agree to it. And, I don't mean a "reduction in projected future spending increases..." I mean less money spent in 2013, than in 2012. That - we either cut the budget, or drive the bus over the so-called cliff.