Wall Street Protests

[TheMercenary]

Originally Posted by DanaC

How is it a failed plan?

Even if you confiscate all the money from the top 1% it will not pay for the spending that has happened since Obama took office. We have become an entitlement society. Everyone wants the federal government to provide everything for them, free healthcare, free education, free, free, free. As long as someone else pays for it. But when you talk about a consumption tax or a tax where everyone pays into it then you get the whine about making someone else to pay. Yea, lets get the 53% who already pay the most pay more, just don't take it out of my pocket. These protests are becoming more comical by the day with some knew rant or some group wanting more...

[DanaC]

Originally Posted by TheMercenary

Even if you confiscate all the money from the top 1% it will not pay for the spending that has happened since Obama took office. We have become an entitlement society. Everyone wants the federal government to provide everything for them, free healthcare, free education, free, free, free. As long as someone else pays for it. But when you talk about a consumption tax or a tax where everyone pays into it then you get the whine about making someone else to pay. Yea, lets get the 53% who already pay the most pay more, just don't take it out of my pocket. These protests are becoming more comical by the day with some knew rant or some group wanting more...

But you don't have all that stuff for free. And the wealthy haven;t been subjected to higher taxes. What redistribution of wealth has occurred in the last ten years has done so in the other direction. What the protestors are seeking hasn't been tried in America for a very long time, therefore it isn't a 'failed' anything. It's a hypothetical maybe.

[TheMercenary]

Originally Posted by DanaC

But you don't have all that stuff for free. And the wealthy haven;t been subjected to higher taxes. What redistribution of wealth has occurred in the last ten years has done so in the other direction. What the protestors are seeking hasn't been tried in America for a very long time, therefore it isn't a 'failed' anything. It's a hypothetical maybe.

The wealthy pay almost all of the total tax in this country now, federal, state, and local combined.

What are the protesters seeking? There are a hundred answers to that question.

[TheMercenary]

Occupy Wall Street in chaos: Money disputes, freeloaders imperil protest

CHICAGO, October 25, 2011 – Organizing a global anti-capitalist revolution is not as easy as one might think – at least that is what Occupy Wall Street leaders are discovering.

From money squabbles and freeloading ex-cons to the complaints of New Yorker residents and the specter of public health code violations, protesters are being given a crash course in Government 101, whether they like it or not.

Recently, Occupy Wall Street organizers have found themselves besieged with problems from all corners. Questions are now being raised about the $500,000 in donations Occupy Wall Street’s Finance Committee has collected since the protests began.

The irony of the situation is not lost on Occupy Wall Street campers, who claim that Finance has yet to “redistribute the wealth.” According to news sources, drummers requested $8,000 to replace musical instruments that had been destroyed by vandals in Zuccotti. Occupy Wall Street leadership denied the request and now some protesters are threatening a split


Associated Press
“I hope Mayor Bloomberg gets an injunction and demands to see the movement’s books. We need to know how much money we really have and where it’s going,” said disgruntled protester Bryan Smith.

Smith, who has been raising money for Occupy Wall Street, also criticizes the lack of basic provisions for his fellow protesters. “So many people need things, and they should not be going without basic comfort items -- and I was told to fill out paperwork. Paperwork! Are they the government now?” said Smith.

But Occupy Wall Street’s financial red flags and internal conflicts are just the tip of the protester iceberg. By offering free food, shelter, and medical care to anyone who signs up, the organization has also made itself a beacon to every homeless person - and every freeloader.

Scores of vagrants and criminals have unofficially joined the protesters’ ranks. One of them, ex-con Matthew Maloney, 49, was released from prison on September 30. Maloney, a convicted thief, has spent the last three decades in and out of prison and says he learned about the protests on television.

But others are here because they cannot afford their rent or do not like the homeless shelters.

The strange brew of humanity has created unexpected security issues for the "Occupiers." Public drunkenness, knife fights, and theft are more and more commonplace. With the seasonal shift, campers are also dealing with dropping temperatures and rain. Dry clothing – even socks – are in short supply, and protesters are irritated with the "takers."

"If you're going to come here and get our food, bedding and clothing, have books and medical supplies for no charge, they need to give back," said Lauren Digioia, 26, told the New York Daily News."There's a lot of takers here and they feel entitled."

But, Tea Party leaders argue, isn’t this socialism at work? Inadvertently, Occupy Wall Street has created what it says it is demanding, albeit on a much smaller scale: free food and shelter for the less fortunate and free medical care for all. It is a system where some are working and others, taking. Even theft, arguably, is a “redistribution of wealth” the campers have listed in their anti-Wall Street demands.

"People are waking up to the plain facts that socialism does not work. There is only so much you can "redistribute" before there is nothing left," said Joe Terrell of Northern Illinois Tea Party. "A popular paraphrase of Prime Minister Thatcher says, 'The only problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of everyone else's money.' I think that quote sums it up perfectly."

Associated Press
http://communities.washingtontimes.c...es-freeloader/

[Undertoad]

But I think a far more important question to ask and answer is about the lowest two quintiles. Forty percent of our population is living on these kinds of dollars.

ME!!! My income, for the last three years, has been lowest quartile. This year, though a good deal of effort -- starting a business with no money down, during a recession -- I will move into the second one. I have gotten through by family and other charity. When you imagine the lowest quartile, think of me, won't you?

OUR REPRESENTATIVE GOVERNMENT DOES NOT REPRESENT THESE PEOPLE

SAME AS IT EVER WAS, but speaking as one of them, I voted and had more of my selections win than ever before in my life! Wheeeee!!

IT IS ENTIRELY IN OUR SELF INTEREST, ALL OF US, TO RAISE THE STANDARD OF LIVING FOR OUR FELLOW CITIZENS AT THIS END OF THE SCALE, THE "LESS FORTUNATE".

THE ONLY WAY TO DO THAT IS THROUGH ECONOMIC GROWTH, as a rising tide lifts all boats.

Where will he eat? Jail? Under a bridge? At a shelter?

Well, tonight it will be in front of the TV, watching "Jeopardy!" like everyone else. Thanks for asking!

[BigV]

Originally Posted by TheMercenary

The wealth envy protests are not going to change a dam thing.

Wealth redistribution is a failed plan to fix what ails us.

It's not wealth envy.

It's poverty antipathy.

Be wealthy! Yay! But your country, your economy, your society, your future and mine will be better in every way if we're successful in reducing the ranks of the "less fortunate", as UT so delicately puts it.

Is the wealth redistribution from 2007 to 2009 illustrated in UT's chart an example of a failed wealth plan? Is the wealth redistribution from 1986 to 2007 an example of a failed plan?

Wealth redistribution... It's reviled as "wealth redistribution" when a person's relative share goes down; it's hailed as "upward mobility" when a person's relative share goes up. More hypocrisy.

[TheMercenary]

Originally Posted by BigV

More hypocrisy.

Absolutely, as long as I don't have to pay for it I don't care how much it costs, tax the shit out of them! Just get me my free stuff!

[SamIam]

Originally Posted by classicman

Easy Sam ...
I just thought his was an interesting tale. Primarily BECAUSE of when he went to school. (president at the time irrelevant)

I can associate with him on a couple things. I too went back to school that year and graduated in 2000 with 2 degrees. I worked 3 jobs to support my family and pay my own way at the time. Yet here I sit day after day looking for a real job and trying to figure out wtf I did wrong.


ETA - thanks for helping to support me Mr. noideawhoyouare.

That's nice that you found a pic of someone who could have been in your graduating class. But the man in the pic HAS a job and calls those who DON'T have a job in these difficult times worthless blood suckers he resents having to support. I'm supposed to give up MY social security and MY medical care for this spiteful jerk? I don't think so. I have paid into social security faithfully since the age of 16, and I still pay into it now. I worked to get through college - BA in Biology from the University of Colorado, then an MA in Library and Information Science from the University of Denver. Not only did I work, I got scholarships, and my parents helped when they could.

After I got my degrees, I worked for another 30 years in my profession, and I put aside money for my retirement, had IRA's, savings, the whole nine yards. Then I got sick. No one could figure out what was wrong, and I got sicker. I eventually was forced to quit my fairly high paying job. I used up all my reserves on medical expenses and living expenses until I was left with nothing but a small disability check.

Now the Republican Party wants to take that, too, along with my medicaid and my housing assistance. They don't just want to put the old girl to pasture, they want to send her to the glue factory. Me and thousands if not millions like me. Mad? Mad doesn't even begin to describe my feelings.

[BigV]

Originally Posted by TheMercenary

The wealthy pay almost all of the total tax in this country now, federal, state, and local combined.

What are the protesters seeking? There are a hundred answers to that question.

I want to say "Liar", but I'll content myself by saying "Cite".

And while you're at it, why don't you give us all *your* answer to your oft-repeated question "What constitutes 'wealthy'"?

Here's my cite.

But how many people know that households making less than $75,000 collectively paid more federal income tax than those making $1 million or more?

Or that income taxed at the next-to-lowest rate, 15 percent, brought in more government revenue than all capital gains taxes plus the two top brackets, which apply only to the top 2 percent of earners?

Or that almost half of the top 1 percent made less than $500,000? Or that five out of six made less than $1 million?

The fact is that the government relies far more on the bottom 99 percent than the top 1 percent for federal income taxes.

[TheMercenary]

So let me ask you, we should redistribute wealth to the government so Obama can send money to Solyndra? How about to GE? They paid little to no tax, and Obama employs the CEO with our tax dollars. Maybe they should give them to the public sector unions?

Wealthy in this day and age is anyone who has more than "you" or has more stuff than "you" that you could never hope to have. If you are unemployed, wealthy may be the person who has a job while you have none. Wealthy may be the person who makes 2 million a year while you make 600k. Wealthy may be the welfare mother who has 6 children from 6 different babies daddies and gets more in public assistance than you, since you only have one kid. It is wealth is wealth envy.

The wealthy pay almost all of the total tax in this country now, federal, state, and local combined.

In 2009 Federal Income tax paid:

Top 1% PAID an adjusted rate of 24.01%

Bottom 50% paid 1.85%
(source IRS)

Total Income tax paid 1980 - 2009:

In 1980 the top 1% paid 19.05%, in 2009 they paid 36.73% (this is nearly a 100% increase in the amount of taxes paid)

In 1908 the bottom 50% paid 7.05%, in 2009 they paid 2.25% (this is more than a 100% reduction)

Look at percent of AGI paid by top 1% and the bottom 50%!

http://www.taxfoundation.org/news/show/250.html

Yea, I am correct.

What are the protesters seeking? There are a hundred answers to that question.

There is no single group or person who can elicit what these people want. None. This is, as I have said numerous times before, just like the WTO protests. It is comical.

I want to say "Liar", but I'll content myself by saying "Cite".

Why would anyone question the Great and Powerful Oz?

[classicman]

Is anyone else getting nervous that these protests are going to lead to something like this?

[classicman]

Originally Posted by SamIam

But the man in the pic HAS a job and calls those who DON'T have a job in these difficult times worthless blood suckers he resents having to support.

referring to me.

I'm supposed to give up MY social security and MY medical care for this spiteful jerk? I don't think so.

Where did you get that opinion? Did I lead you too think that was how I felt somehow? (confused)

Me and thousands if not millions like me. Mad? Mad doesn't even begin to describe my feelings.

I gathered that long ago. You must have me confused with someone else. I am not exactly the happy guy right now either.

[Pico and ME]

Classic, she is just referring to the picture, not you because you posted it.

[classicman]

Originally Posted by TheMercenary

BLAH BLAH BLAH ...

Take it to the tax thread. >>>>>>

[TheMercenary]

Originally Posted by classicman

Take it to the tax thread. >>>>>>

Just answering the Great and Wonderful Oz!

Ummmm... and no. I will take this fight to where ever it may take me to make sure OBAMA is never re-elected. BY ANY LEGAL MEANS!