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Journal eglamkowski's Journal: the federal deficit 26

Journal by eglamkowski

Read and discuss:

http://www.townhall.com/opinion/columns/walterwilliams/2006/04/19/193985.html

I certainly like his closing anyways: That means someone else decides how four months' worth of the fruits of the average taxpayer's labor will be spent. The taxpayer is forcibly used to serve the purposes of others ... This situation differs only in degree, but not in kind, from slavery. After all, a working description of slavery is the process where one person is forcibly used to serve the purposes of another. The difference is a slave has no rights to what he produces each year, instead of just four months.

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the federal deficit More

the federal deficit

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  • If the federal government consumes $2.4 trillion of what Americans produced in 2005, it must find ways to force us to spend $2.4 trillion less privately in 2005. In other words, the federal government can't spend today what's going to be produced in the future.

    This is zero-sum economics. The concept that economics is zero-sum (that wealth gained by one entity must come at the expense of another) is provably false. Williams seems to be suggesting that in order for the government to spend $x, some else must

    • I totally and completely agree that economics is not zero-sum, but taxation is not economic (which is not the same as saying it doesn't affect economics). The government procures production from others to consume how they see fit, rather than the producer. A true economic echange is a win-win, where party A acquires something from party B in exchange for something party A has that party B wants. If the trade were perceived as disadvantageous by either party, it would not occur. Each party views itself a

      • Actually, governments DO destroy wealth. For every $1 they take in taxation, they are NOT providing $1 worth of services. And if the government decides to wage war, then it REALLY destroys wealth, even if it is mostly some other country's wealth (though some of its own will be destroyed in the process as well).

        Governments can only transfer OR destroy wealth, not create it.
        Hence my sig:
      • Multiplier effect [wikipedia.org]. Seriously, there are econ classes past 101 and 102.

        One thing I haven't seen studied is if there is a 'divider effect'. IOW, does taking a dollar in taxes 'cost' more than that one dollar?
      • Where does government investment in things like infrastructure (roads, airports, ATC, etc), R&D (ARPA, NASA, etc), and education of its citizens fit into the equation?

        Seems to me that all of these activities have created plenty of wealth, far in excess of any taxes used to pay for them initially.
    • I can prove money is zero-sum. It takes one molecule of ferous material to store one bit of information. Since there is somewhat less than an infinite amount of ferous material in the universe, ultimately money, as an information bearer, is zero-sum. The same thing happens regardless of what material you use to store the information.

      Of course, in a ridiculous attempt to control inflation and deflation, most governments also set limits on their money supply, which is also a limit on wealth. Which usuall
      • If you're talking about representation of numbers, then the same bit can be reused. You don't have to give everyone a universe full of ferrous material in order to handle all the currency they may one day have - you could do the same with some arbitrarily large number of bits, and overwrite the number after each transaction with the new value. Furthermore, information is metaphysical in nature - we create it out of nothingness, and when it's gone we put it back into nothingness. The means of transfer is not
        • If you're talking about representation of numbers, then the same bit can be reused.

          Not without destroying the historical record....thus destroying the information that bit contains.

          You don't have to give everyone a universe full of ferrous material in order to handle all the currency they may one day have - you could do the same with some arbitrarily large number of bits, and overwrite the number after each transaction with the new value.

          Yes, you could, but at the cost of wiping out the lessons of his
          • If it were truly zero-sum, the value of one's economy could never increase.
            • If it were truly zero-sum, the value of one's economy could never increase.

              The total sum value of the entire world economy doesn't increase. It just gets transfered from the poor to the rich. To support 2000 families earning over a billion a year, you need 4 billion people earning under $600 a year.

              But the good news is that value is imaginary anyway; just a shared myth. We can adjust the limits on the zero sum game in such a way that the difference between the rich and the poor is almost nothing; or w
              • Those four billion poor weren't making more than $600 a year before we had billionares. Also, "adjusting" the rules of the game, so that you equalise everyone doesn't bring everyone up to the top, it mires everyone down equally. You'll be hard-pressed to find people willing to do so, in fact, you yourself obviously don't do so. That computer is no necessity, why don't you sell it and donate it to some poor family, you'll have doubled their income for the year.
                • Those four billion poor weren't making more than $600 a year before we had billionares.

                  Adjusted for inflation they were making about twice as much, as far as it goes; but it fails to recognize that to earn money, you need to take it from somebody else in some way.

                  Also, "adjusting" the rules of the game, so that you equalise everyone doesn't bring everyone up to the top, it mires everyone down equally.

                  Also true- but poverty is a RELATIVE term, one is only poor when one is able to compare oneself to som
                  • Of course they can become rich, where do you think the rich come from? I'll grant you that the majority of people won't become rich, but there is nothing keeping you from starting your own company and "oppressing some poor foreigners"* except a lack of motivation. If you think about it, with proper motivation and long-term view, one can move ones family a social class every generation. If you are born penniless, you can work very hard and pull yourself out of penury into the middle class - not a bad prospec
                    • Of course they can become rich, where do you think the rich come from?

                      Mainly from those who have genetic or marital links to old European nobility.

                      I'll grant you that the majority of people won't become rich, but there is nothing keeping you from starting your own company and "oppressing some poor foreigners"* except a lack of motivation.

                      I tried that- I found out there were barriers to entry into the market- that the so-called free market isn't free.

                      If you think about it, with proper motivation and
                    • It amuses me that you think that your un-ambitious redistributionist utopia is going to have the wherewithal to engage in genocide against my descendent's ambitious war machine.
                    • It amuses me that you think that your un-ambitious redistributionist utopia is going to have the wherewithal to engage in genocide against my descendent's ambitious war machine.

                      The only way we'll ever get a distributist utopia is if we're able to engage in genocidal behavior against any family that threatens the utopia. The best way to do this would be to draw the lines along natural defenses- and then strengthen those defenses until nothing biological can get through.
                    • Except that your redistributionist utopia is based on hunter-gather societies that have no selective pressure to advance technologically. Further, you don't see advanced military technology advances coming out of the third world, therefore, it stands to reason, that your third-world utopia (let's call it what it really is) won't be able to defend itself against a technologically advanced invader. You can engage in systematic genocide against all the people you deem threats, and all that will do is catalyse
                    • Except that your redistributionist utopia is based on hunter-gather societies that have no selective pressure to advance technologically.

                      You don't need selective pressure to advance technologically- the Persians had no selective pressure to build boats and start trading (nobody had done anything like it before they did) yet they still did it.

                      Further, you don't see advanced military technology advances coming out of the third world, therefore, it stands to reason, that your third-world utopia (let's call
                    • I don't believe that we are competitive beings naturally- I think that has been forced on us as a mutation by a parasitical totalitarian government.

                      Then you're woefully misguided. One look at nature proves that competition is the natural state of living. Our closest relatives in the Great Apes compete amongst themselves even within their own species. Why should we be any different?
                    • Our closest relatives in the Great Apes compete amongst themselves even within their own species.

                      Actually, both bonobos and chimpanzees form tribes, with cooperation within the tribe. This is what indicates to me that mankind was never meant to form governments where participants in the government are anonymous to each other (in other words, any government greater than say, 500 individuals). Yes, they do compete within the species- but within the tribe, it's an atmosphere of cooperation.

                      I don't see tha
  • What a piece of garbage! Let me take this bit by bit:

    By the way, it's sheer constitutional ignorance to say that President Bush spends or lowers taxes. Article I, Sections 7 and 8, of the U.S. Constitution gives Congress authority to spend and tax. The president only has veto power that Congress can override.

    The President sets the framework for budgets by submitting his proposal to Congress, which basically kicks off the yearly exercise, so he has a great deal of input into the budget. Kick in the fact th
  • That means someone else decides how four months' worth of the fruits of the average taxpayer's labor will be spent. The taxpayer is forcibly used to serve the purposes of others ... This situation differs only in degree, but not in kind, from slavery. After all, a working description of slavery is the process where one person is forcibly used to serve the purposes of another. The difference is a slave has no rights to what he produces each year, instead of just four months.

    With modern computers and extra
    • I like this idea, but I don't know how wise it would be to allow the taxpayer to allocate ALL of their taxes. Some might argue it would be fairer to do so (certainly sounds good on the surface), but I dunno I would have to think about it. I certainly wouldn't have a problem with being able to allocate some portion (30% maybe?) however.
      • You can already choose to allocate $3 of it....to the Presidential Campaign Fund ( I haven't seen a President I thought was good enough to deserve this in my lifetime ).

        It seems to me a better way to do this would be to have a "Congressional General Fund" category which you can donate taxes to if you think the government does a good job of spending your money- or if you're too lazy to actually notice how much you're paying. In other words, the tax form GUI should be written that your full taxes are automa

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