Behold...Libertarian hotties!

[phillybri]

http://www.rachelmills.com/calendar.html

One of these gals is running for office here in North Cackalackey...

[trotsky]

1. The ultimate punishment for libertarians...

would be to make them live in their own utopia. IMHO.

[Tina H]

2. you mean the US, prior to the Constitutional Amendment

authorizing personal, federal income tax?

I don't know. That might not have been such a bad utopia, at least for white people (in other words, not for me).

Now that the fed / state gov't takes 35% of our income (as income tax and/or sales tax), things are better in some ways (gov't assistance) and worse in some ways ("defense" budget).

[trotsky]

6. In a way, I guess.

The US prior to the income tax amendment was also the US prior to child labor laws, environmental protections, worker safeguards, and everything else that has given us such a high quality of life.

I notice you don't provide any sources for your 35% tax rate. That's interesting.

[Tina H]

9. the tax rate:

it is an estimate, based on the following:

1. wealthier people are supposed to pay about 35% in combined fed /state taxes on their income (although they keep lowering the capital gains tax, so some wealthy people try to work things so they take advantage of that and pay a lower rate).

2. for less wealthy people, their income tax rate is less than 35%, BUT: a high proportion of their income generally goes to pay property tax and sales tax and car tax and all the rest of it. This means that the less wealthy people are taxed up toward 35%, too.

Obviously, that is a generalization, but it is probably a good generalization.

I am a big fan of child labor laws, environmental protections, worker safeguards and antitrust protections, so I would probably not be too happy in the "utopia" that the U.S. was in 1910. I guess that means I am not a libertatrian, because I still think at least some libertarians would be happier there.

Final note: child labor laws, environmental protections, worker safeguards and antitrust protections are a very small part of our expenditures. The bulk of that "35%" gets spent on: (1) military spending; and (2) assistance programs. Of course, both military spending and assistance programs are necessary to some extent. On the otehr hand, both these types of spending (especially military spending) have been abused on occassion by power hungry politicians.

This means that everybody has their opinion on whether "35%" is the opimal level of spending or whether this number should be higher or lower. It would be nice if we could increase the rate for wealthy people and decrease the rate for less wealthy people, which is called progressive taxation.

However, President Clinton didn't really push progressive taxation as a policy to any significant degree. It is not clear whether Candidate Kerry will embrace tax progressivity beyond arguing that Bush has made the tax structure more regressive and he will try to bring tax progressivity more into line with where it was during the Clinton years.

[trotsky]

10. The NY Times did a study a few months ago.

And found that when all is said and done, when you add up all the taxes and writeoffs, just about everyone pays between 14% and 19%. Nowhere near your 35% figure. (http: //graphics7.nytimes.com/images/2003/01/20/business/21DOUBLE.chart.jpg)

The poor get benefits like the earned income tax credit; the middle class gets to write off mortgage interest; the rich get their writeoffs for pretty much everything they buy or do.

Clinton's 1993 tax hike was only on the top bracket. It kicked off the longest peacetime expansion of our economy in history. The top rate was 70% in the 60s and 90% in the 50s, and yet our economy did fine (and the middle class did great).

And when you're calculating where all that money is going, never forget that a huge portion of it (somewhere between 25% and 35%, IIRC) is going towards paying interest on our national debt.

[Tina H]

11. Thank you!

Your informantion helps me to think about the issues in a productive way. Speaking for myself, I think my personal tax rate was nearer 35% most years, but that is because my brief experiment with home ownership didn't work out. I am happy to use 17% (aka the Steve Forbes (boo!) index) when I think in terms of global approximation of the tax rate.

I am not sure how I feel about the national debt portion of the money. Sometimes Republicans get concerned about this portion. At other times (like now) Democrats get concerned about this portion. I do not really know how to feel about it.

[trotsky]

12. That's not a "global" approximation.

Sorry if I wasn't clear. It's the average effective tax burden for Americans. The Forbeses of the world who want a flat tax realize that such a tax will be less for THEM and more for virtually everyone else (because the lower and middle classes lose their meager deductions).

Everything we have in place right now gives the U.S. an effective flat tax rate. So every move done by BushCo to further lower the taxes on the rich makes things less fair - more regressive.

As far as deficit spending / national debt goes, sometimes it's needed. When you build a long-term public good like a road or a bridge or a park, it's fair to amortize the cost of that expense over the generations of taxpayers who will be benefiting from it. But when you're putting wars and tax giveaways on the national credit card, you've got a problem.

[Tina H]

13. I understand that there is some progressivity in the tax structure . . .

I just don't think there is nearly enough. Your article cite is surprising forthe degree of uniformity of effective tax rates, rather than for their wide spread.

I think I would have a pretty big disagreement with Forbes on this point, which is why I said (boo!) after the Forbes name in my previous post.

However, I understand you to be pointing out that 17%, or 17% plus or minus a few percentage points is just an approximation to be used in high level thinking. I especially know that because I personally am so far from the averages discussed in the article you cited to.

[BiggJawn]

15. Your "American Dream" turned into a nightmare, too, eh?

"...my brief experiment with home ownership didn't work out..."

Me neither. I relocated only 2 years after buying a house, so I was top-heavy on the mortgage and lost the place in a bankruptcy...

When I see stuff like where it said in her "platform", "regulatory compliance is a business expense that needs to be reduced..." I get frightened. Isn't that what the ReTHUGs want, too? No more Clean Air Act, no more labour laws, no more 40-hour week for a decent paycheque...

OK, so I don't have a beautiful, successful spouse, 4 dogs, and a "modest" (I'll bet it's half a megabuck if it's a dime) mortgage. does that mean I should be some "beautiful person" like Rachel's SERF???

[Tina H]

17. actually, I misspoke

it didn't work out in the sense that I had to sell.

It did work out in the sense that I ended up good money from selling the house -- more than I had paid in mortgage (and I got to live in the house). Sure came in handy when I was unemployed (16 mos.)

also, the "profit" money from the house wasn't taxed.

so, during the years I owned the house and after I sold it, my effective, all-taxes-considered tax rate may have been somewhere in the 17% range.

For most of my life (and now), this rate is much higher.

On edit: as my replies on this thread make clear, I want lots of progressivity in the tax structure, and I am therefore no libertarian. This being the case, I am not going to try to talk anybody into agreeing with the objectives of the pin-up girl. Doesn't mean we shouldn't try to understand her perspective, so long as we don't buy into it.

on 2d edit: an effective tax rate of 17% (see other threads) doesn't seem that high to me. This is another reason I am in profound disagreement with the pin-up girl.

[BiggJawn]

18. But you made money...

So, compared to MY "experiment", yours was prettty successful. you bought a house, lived there, sold it, made enough to retire the mortgage AND live for 16 months between jobs.

I bought the house, relocated 2 years later, went through THREE incompetent realtors, paid over $1100 a month on 2 residences (only one of which I was living in) on a 35 kilobuck salary, burned through what little I had set aside, lost the house, now I live in a little flat where they didn't run a credit check when I rented it (thankfully!) and besides, I get to hear my neighbour coming her head off 3X a week. Who needs HBO with that?

Wish my "experiment" hadn't worked out in the same way yours "didn't".

You can ALWAYS buy another house, no?

[Tina H]

19. agreed

that was why I said I "misspoke" and clarified that my house experience was successful in some meaningful sense.

Your burdens are clearer greater than mine, and I do empathize with your difficult situation.

[BiggJawn]

21. It's getting easier, thanks!

Will get a WHOLE lot easier once this corrupt bunch is chased back under their rock for another 8 years or so...

[THUNDER HANDS]

3. heehee

North Cackalackey

that's a funny name

[RandomKoolzip]

4. All libertarians are fucking nutzo.

They may be hot but I wouldn't even fuck any of these women with another man's dick. Nothing less sexy than a woman obsessed with tax codes, or a woman who approved Grey Davis's recall effort.

Liberal women are much hotter, they're sane and they've got BRAINS too, which is the ultimate turn-on.

Sure, this is a sexist post. Flame on!

[blindpig]

5. yup, and they have no consideration for the environment

as they deny the existence of the commons. They are greedy, egotistical fools.

[Tina H]

14. You are quite the Larry David n/t

[Taverner]

16. Not always - most are Disillusioned Dems

Perfectly understandable. I mean, with how many Dem Senators voted for such assaults on our liberties like the PATRIOT act and the Iraq war, its perfectly understandable.

I have a libertarian friend (who plans to vote for Kerry btw) who would pretty much agree with us all here on this board. Calls himself a 'Practical Libertarian." Just means he puts individual liberties above mass hysteria.

Now there are the Ayn Rand-ites out there who are NUTZO, but many are just disillusioned with both parties, and find the greens to be fringe leftists.

I lean Lib on many issues myself: guns, obscenity and the drug war for starters. But I understand who represents who - John Kerry represents me much more than Bush, and much more than whomever is running on the Lib ticket.

[sendero]

22. Count me in agreement...

... on all points.

Libertarianism is the worst idea since Communism, and shares the same simplistic approach and total disregard of human nature.

Hate Enron? With Libertarians in power, there would be one a day instead of one a decade. Fooey.

[sus]

7. i thought that said librarian hotties

and i got all excited.

oh well...

[BiggJawn]

8. Gawd, did you read her BIO??????

It's a miracle she's made it to twenty-something without GAGGING to death on that damn silver spoon she was born with!

And I'll bet she and her hubby drive Vovlo SUV's, donate to NPR and spend their evenings looking in the mirror going "Yep, we're beautiful people, that's for sure!"

[Dogmudgeon]

20. Libertarian = Hipster Conservative

Sorry, Rachel, but working for WorldCom, calling yourself an "engineer" because you took half-a-dozen corporate-sponsored online courses, opposing taxes and stating (actually lying) that HMOs were "invented by the Democrats in 1973" (wrong; Nixon sponsored the HMO act in 1972 which became law in '73, and before that, HMOs were developing along less bureaucratic lines in Europe and Asia) and writing a tenth-grade-level screed supporting the death penalty doesn't make you a Friend of Liberty.

It makes you a spoiled chick with a hot body and a passion to be one of The Man's tools.

"Oooh! A golden apple for the Prettiest One? Why, that must be me!"

In the words of that immortal pop songwriter whose name I can't remember, "Come back / When you grow up, girl."

--bkl

A government strong enough to kill all the A-Rabbs
is strong enough to kill all the Americans.
-- Harry Whitewater

PS -- FYI: George Bernard Shaw was a Socialist.

[phillybri]

23. Great post!

You nailed it!!!