$10 Trillion In Added Debt Shows Bush And Trump Tax Cuts Broke Our Modern Tax Structure

Why are you waiting for the government to force you to pay your fair share? Why not lead by example and pay your fair share without being forced and then argue that the taxes on your rich compatriots need to be raised?

By the way, how far off from your fair share are you? Do you need to pay 10% more, 50%, double, triple?

 

Prisoner's Dilemma is the answer. An individual may conclude that it would be socially good for both players to pay more in taxes but that it is individually suboptimal and that the worst individual outcome is to pay taxes and have nobody else do it.

Prisoner's dilemma - Wikipedia

 

I don’t think Prisoner’s Dilemma applies here. The individual who pays his fair share of taxes pays the same, regardless of whether the other individuals pay their fair shares. Their lack of paying doesn’t cause him to pay more.

 

But it results in paying more while getting less while the other guy pays less to get more. You are ignoring the benefits of taxation, which is what the money is spent on in this game. The structure is a Prisoner's Dilemma. You have a socially optimal amount of investment, you have individual incentives to shirk, and you have an equilibrium in which neither invests despite positive returns.

 

Bottomline…in George W’s eight years in office, the debt increased by $4.2 trillion (primarily due to 9/11 and resulting in the launch of the War on Terror) and Obama added 7.6 trillion in his two terms as he was still dealing with the fallout of 9/11 and also with his decision to counter the Great Recession with a $830 billion stimulus package and at the same time, a corresponding $850 billion in tax cuts.

 

and when the dipshits blow through your2T getting themselves elected on more false promises then what’s next? Another 2T ? F it. Why not just go all In and confiscate 75%. Imagine what we could do with that loot? The first tax was 3% and look how far we’ve come. Oh wait. Never mind. These aren’t taxes. They’re ‘investments in our future’.

 

Haven’t been on this board in a while but this post may be one of the best I’ve read on the site in years. Sorry had to comment directly since a “winner” rating seemed not enough.

 

So how do you think things would look if we had no social security and no Medicare? Describe the alternative scenario that you think would be better.

FWIW probably every first world country in the world has a government funded retirement and old age health care system.

 

So I take it you think forcing citizens to pay taxes is wrong and immoral? What do you propose as an alternative?

 

I’m scratching my head trying to figure out how in the world you got that out of my post. Of course we have to have taxes to fund the country. They also support progressive income tax.

City had told us that the rich need to pay more taxes and informed us that he is one of those rich people. So I was wondering why he doesn’t choose to pay his fair share instead of waiting for the government to make him do that.

 

What a tired, stupid argument.

 

I refrained from posting the exact same thing, but I have been hearing that argument for decades and it is among the most illogical and childish arguments I see.

 

I would start by saying the idea of social security isn’t horrible, albeit they force people to contribute and save their own money. But government does what government does and they spent it all because they simply cannot stand to have money in the bank when they can use it to get elected by promising something else. Now it’s all gone and the only way to solve it is by suggesting they start all over and confiscate more money ( raising caps). Had any evil business did what they did (spent it all) they would go to prison ( see Madoff) .

 

Social security has always been a pay as you go system where one generation supports the prior in retirement. The only reason that there was an excess was the demographics of boomers working then retiring. That temporary excess as primarily depleted by income tax cuts.