Life in Obamamerica

" But in addition, the tax plan he lays out--involving increased taxes on the rich, a group which consists primarily of producers--shows he doesn't understand or care that his plan will hurt productivity."

But what do these people produce? Most of the real value added to the GDP is not by people who make millions per year. Our GDP is currently very heavy on financial instruments. Many of which the current value is in question.

A finance heavy GDP, btw, has been an aspect of the last days of the great economic powers in history. Hope that is a coincidence.

Jose

it doesn't mean people making "millions of dollars per year." It means people making either at least $250,000 a year or $200,000 a year. Or if you listen to Biden it's $150,000 a year.

But I think you missed what I was saying. It seems to me that when politicians talk about raising taxes on the rich that they are appealing to a charicature that resides deep in the national psyche; that "the rich" are indolent spendthrifts who either inherited their wealth or somehow stole or cheated to obtain riches. But "The Rich" is not a group composed primarily of what used to be known as "coupon clippers". Read the book "The Millionaire Next Door"; most of the "rich" are people who started a small business, are thrifty, and don't live the high life. But these are the people who will bear the brunt of increased taxes.

Not sure what you mean by our GDP being very heavy on financial instruments. The financial industry constitutes a smaller portion of the total U.S. economy than manufacturing does: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/3/33/Sectors_of_U S_economy_-_firms_with_payrolls_-_sales_vs_employees_in_200 2.gif

I don't have any data to confirm or deny your last sentence. From what I have read, though, the primary aspect of the last days of great empires is increased centralization of government power coupled with redistribution of wealth (bread and circuses) to placate the populace.

It went down to $120K with Richardson and then there was speculation that Obama himself said $80k.

Why doesn't he just say what it really is. Rich means that you make $42K, just like he voted for.

I knew there was a challenge in discussing this. The money you are talking about is a spit in the ocean.

A nice graph of Income distribution. It will be a while before I can reel my mind back in from trying to grasp this.

http://www.lcurve.org/index.html

Freak? Is this a euphymistic interjection along the lines of "Frick!", or are you resorting already to puerile name-calling?

Anyway, in answer to your weblink, which itself claims to be written by "no economist", I offer this link:
http://mises.org/liberal/ch1sec5.asp

One key passage: "Only because inequality of wealth is possible in our social order, only because it stimulates everyone to produce as much as he can and at the lowest cost, does mankind today have at its disposal the total annual wealth now available for consumption. Were this incentive to be destroyed, productivity would be so greatly reduced that the portion that an equal distribution would allot to each individual would be far less than what even the poorest receives today."

Fret over what lives others are leading, if you wish. I shall concern myself with my own business. I don't need to have the government steal from people to be happy.

.....flea markets