MemberlistThe Library Index  FAQFAQ   SearchSearch   RegisterRegister   ProfileProfile   Log in to check your private messagesLog in to check your private messages   Log inLog in 
Varsity Blues (NEW CONCEPTS)
Reply to topic Goto page Previous  1, 2, 3 ... 20, 21, 22, 23  Next
View previous topic :: View next topic  
Grant



View user's profile
Reply with quote

http://freakonomics.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/05/25/who-spends-more-on-social-welfare-the-united-states-or-sweden/

Interesting article here which shows that the difference between the US and Europe is actually not that great.

It's likely that every society has to devote about a quarter of its GDP on welfare of one sort or another.
Send private message
Ishmael


In: Toronto
View user's profile
Reply with quote

Mick Harper wrote:
Asking Ishmael to forgo his political preconceptions....


I already did that.
Send private message
Mick Harper
Site Admin

In: London
View user's profile
Reply with quote

Of course, poppet, anything you say.
Send private message
Ishmael


In: Toronto
View user's profile
Reply with quote

berniegreen wrote:
Please, take a step back, think outside the box, and, if you still think that my idea doesn't hold water, well OK, but tell me why you think that.


When your best idea amounts to self-congratulatory horse-shit, it's probably best to get a new idea.
Send private message
Ishmael


In: Toronto
View user's profile
Reply with quote

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=psosLpDALuA
Send private message
nemesis8


In: byrhfunt
View user's profile
Reply with quote

What a coincidence, I love Hayek..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rh0rut5Qv2U&list=QL&playnext=1&feature=bfnav
Send private message
Mick Harper
Site Admin

In: London
View user's profile
Reply with quote

You have no business loving anybody. Read, digest, move swiftly on.
Send private message
berniegreen



View user's profile
Reply with quote

Ishmael wrote:
berniegreen wrote:
Please, take a step back, think outside the box, and, if you still think that my idea doesn't hold water, well OK, but tell me why you think that.

When your best idea amounts to self-congratulatory horse-shit, it's probably best to get a new idea.

What a very silly little squirt you are sometimes, Ishmael.
Send private message Send e-mail
berniegreen



View user's profile
Reply with quote

Ishmael wrote:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=psosLpDALuA
How pathetic!
Send private message Send e-mail
berniegreen



View user's profile
Reply with quote

Following up on Grant's post, I note two things:

Firstly, the referred article is comparing outcomes with respect to welfare payments in USA and Sweden, whereas we had been speaking of attitudes to taxation and attitudes to the money spent on welfare. If you google/bing/ixquick for "attitudes to taxation" you find that attitude surveys consistently report a much higher level of antagonism towards taxation in the USA than in most European countries.

Secondly, I suspect that there is an error in the argument by which Prof Fishback seeks to show that USA's spend on welfare in NET GDP ranks alongside the nordic countries. It is true that Sweden taxes welfare payments as income whereas USA does not. If you apply standard tax rates across the board to this then Fishback's arithmetic may well be correct. However if you take into account that welfare payments are skewed towards those who are below the tax threshold and those who are paying the lowest rates of tax, then Fishback's conclusions are probably far too optimistic in the USA's favour.

I previously suggested an underlying cause for the different attitudes which Ishmael (our resident non-adolescent!) rejects out of hand without any attempt to justify his sweeping contempt for the idea. If anybody has any other proposal to explain the facts I would be extremely interested to hear it.
Send private message Send e-mail
nemesis8


In: byrhfunt
View user's profile
Reply with quote

Well, maybe the attitude, is in part because the US historically has favoured lefty progressive direct taxation. Europe finanaces its welfare much more through indirect taxation such as sales tax, and other stealth taxes.

I keep on making this point.
Send private message
Mick Harper
Site Admin

In: London
View user's profile
Reply with quote

One reason for the difference is not ideological but practical. The US (and Britain) have developed cultures where there is a relative lack of corruption and people tend to pay their taxes. Continental Europe, certainly southern Europe, has not historically been in this blessed position. So European governments have developed taxes that are difficult to evade rather than 'fair', 'non-regressive' and so forth. Value-Added-Tax is the great recent example of this (but has spawned wondrous criminal enterprises based on it nevertheless!).
Send private message
Mick Harper
Site Admin

In: London
View user's profile
Reply with quote

It might also be pointed out that 'stealth' taxes are good precisely because they are stealthy ie we don't know we are paying them. In this respect there might be a cultural difference between US and Britain. I couldn't help noticing that everytime I bought something in America I was forever being told told "plus sales tax" or whatever. I never heard this when we had a similar Purchase Tax even though the latter was far higher than the former. It's the same with VAT, a Mars Bar costs 50p because that's how much a Mars Bar ought to cost!
Send private message
berniegreen



View user's profile
Reply with quote

nemesis8 wrote:
Well, maybe the attitude, is in part because the US historically has favoured lefty progressive direct taxation. Europe finanaces its welfare much more through indirect taxation such as sales tax, and other stealth taxes.

I keep on making this point.

This is indeed true and is further complicated by the fact that in the US sales taxes are levied at the State and/or City level. It seems to me that attitudes to Sales tax and other US locally based taxes differs from that towards Federal Taxes. Probably because people relate more positively to locally based spending (my taxes at work!) but also because it is, to some extent a matter of choice. For example if you live in Massachusetts and dislike paying Sales tax you can move up the road to New Hampshire which doesn't have one.
Send private message Send e-mail
berniegreen



View user's profile
Reply with quote

While on the point of stealth taxes you might like to know that New Caledonia is a really good place to live. France has applied the VAT rate as payable in metropolitan France and completely abolished income tax. And has so shifted a major portion of the tax burden onto the tourist. Ah Vive les crafty frogs!
Send private message Send e-mail
Display posts from previous:   
Reply to topic Goto page Previous  1, 2, 3 ... 20, 21, 22, 23  Next

Jump to:  
Page 21 of 23

MemberlistThe Library Index  FAQFAQ   SearchSearch   RegisterRegister   ProfileProfile   Log in to check your private messagesLog in to check your private messages   Log inLog in 


Powered by phpBB © 2001, 2005 phpBB Group