In a restaurant, if a meal I order comes with more food on the plate

[MineralMan]

than I can eat, I do not complain that there's too little on the plate. I do not expect that more food should be added to the plate. If I cannot eat it all, I will leave it, or ask for a box at the end of the meal.

America's rich people have far more money than they need on their current plates. And yet, they are demanding more, through tax reductions. That, in the face of vast numbers of people who do not have nearly enough to meet their own needs. That is just stupid.

If I demand more food at the restaurant than I can possibly eat, it will either be wasted or I will take the excess home, and will probably end up not eating it anyhow. For the rich, excess money does not provide more needed funds. Additional tax breaks will only serve to reduce the amount available for the non-rich who need more just to survive.

Greed sucks. Gluttony sucks. Avarice sucks. It's time to end such excess for those who already have far more than they need. Restaurants often serve meals that are too large for most people to finish. Governments often give the rich more money than those people need.

Let's stop doing that, in both cases. I don't want to be served more food than I can eat in one sitting. The rich should not want to be given more money than they need, either. There are hungry people and people without enough funds to make ends meet. Let's solve those things. Let's stop wasteful excess.

[Binkie The Clown]

1. Lao Tse (or Lao Tsu, or Laozi, depending on your preference) said it best:

"He who knows that enough is enough will always have enough."

-- Tao Te Ching Chapter 46 (translation by Gia-fu Feng and Jane English)

edit for context: The whole verse goes:

There is no greater sin than desire,
No greater curse than discontent,
No greater misfortune than wanting something for oneself.
Therefore he who knows that enough is enough will always have enough.

[MineralMan]

3. A good aphorism.

[dixiegrrrrl]

6. In all seriousness, I have found that to be true in my long life.

Wanting "More" seems to be endemic among the rich greedy.

Trump is a bigly example. His hell is here on earth, because he will never have a contented moment;
he is an prime example of enough never being enough.

[Binkie The Clown]

59. Once a year friends anf family ask me what I want for my birthday, and...

I honestly can't think of a thing I need or want. I'm happy and content with what I have. I guess that means I lack ambition.

[GeorgeGist]

30. I'll take the 2nd and 4th line ...

and leave the rest for the dead.

[MichMan]

2. Are you proposing a maximum wage ?

Is that determined by occupation? Or anything beyond a certain income level is taxed at 100%?

[MineralMan]

4. I'm proposing a sense of adequacy that is satisfactory.

I'm proposing that people have needs. When those needs are satisfied, wanting more is excessive. I have a car. I bought it new. It's a cheap car. Rich people have cars. They buy them new. They're expensive cars. At some point, there is a limit to the cost of a car. Buying a fleet of cars is excessive.

Let the rich person buy whatever car he or she wishes to buy. I don't mind, if they have the income for it. However, nobody needs a garage full of expensive vehicles. That's excessive and is an indication of blind avarice.

We should not be supporting avarice and greed on the backs of people who do not have their basic needs filled. That is unjust and intolerable.

[slumcamper]

10. I believe what you're referring to is what Thorstein Veblen

termed "Conspicuous consumption." Veblen was writing in the 1890-1910 period, so he witnessed plenty of it. It was excessive then and is excessive now.

Regarding the matter of food, a few years ago while attending a conference in Kansas City I ate at Jack Stacks. While delicious, half the portion ended up in a box. On the way back to the hotel I walked through a park, spotted a homeless veteran, and offered him the still-warm container. We began to chat and I learned of his tour in Vietnam and subsequent bureaucratic mistreatment. As I recall this it disgusts and infuriates me to think that while that man was enduring the hell which he recounted to me, the draft dodger-in-chief (who insists that you respect the American flag) was pretending bone spurs and engaging in college sports and man-whoring.

All the wearers of the sacred red hat..nationalists who wrap themselves in the flag...and faux Christians who embrace this monster: my oh my, what have you wrought?

[MineralMan]

15. Now that I'm 72, and less physically active, I eat less to maintain my weight

at something like a normal weight. I have taken, now, to ordering appetizers as main courses in many restaurants, along with a side salad or the soup du jour, much of the time. Portions in most restaurants are excessive for my appetite these days.

I'm trying hard not to create waste with my money. I keep my grocery bags (paper) and deliver them to a thrift shop, which saves by using them at its checkout counter, instead of purchasing bags.

I drive our car about 5-6,000 miles per year, mostly for short distance local trips. So, I bought an inexpensive small car that was comfortable to drive. It's not particularly "cool" or interesting, but it's a nice car with a warranty. Turns out it was the least expensive car that seats four comfortably that was available.

I'm offended by excess, pretty much. It smacks of avarice to me.

I wan't peple to voluntarily eschew excess, and that includes the wealthy. What I want, however, is not of much concern to those people.

[brush]

78. Thanks for sharing your thoughts and insight. Are you a religious man?

[MineralMan]

83. I'm an atheist. Have been since 1965. So, no.

[brush]

88. I'm almost there except that I tend to believe the force/God religions worship/search for...

Last edited Thu Oct 26, 2017, 09:25 PM - Edit history (1)

is the entirety of nature — the tie that binds.

[hunter]

17. Taxes ought to be steeply progressive...

... the wealthiest paying the greatest percentage, approaching 100% in some cases, because they get the most benefit from this economy.

The people at the very bottom should pay no taxes at the very least.

If we were smart we'd actually be paying people to experiment with lifestyles having a very low environmental footprint.

Our current world economy is unsustainable and that will be a demonstrated, a scientific and historical fact, when it collapses.

If we can't quit fossil fuels the consequences will not be pretty. Global warming has already contributed to refugee crises and it's only going to get worse.

It's very likely we are going to see more and more of the U.S.A. become uninhabitable and the people displaced will not be welcomed elsewhere in the nation.

Okie was not a term of endearment during the Dust Bowl. It looks to me as if our nation is already beginning to tear itself apart.

[MineralMan]

20. Well, they once were, and not so long ago, really.

I remember those days.

That has systematically changed to become the reverse. The people at the bottom currently pay no income tax. I don't. I do pay the self-employment tax, of course, because I work for myself.

We all pay, however, sales taxes, and most of us pay property taxes, either directly or indirectly. Those taxes are generally not progressive.

Unless we revise our political alignments and unite, we will see this trend continue. If we do not succeed in stopping the Republican oligarchs from having power, the differences between the rich and everyone else will continue to accelerate. That is the most dangerous risk we face at this moment. If we do not fix that within the next decade, the system will be change to prevent it ever from being fixed.

That process is underway right now. We have one last chance, I think, to correct the direction. If we do not do so, we will revert back to a sort of aristocracy with the very wealthy and the poor making up most of society.

I'll be gone then. Will you? If not, then it's time to unite and halt that process. If we do not, we will lose the opportunity to do so very soon.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

38. The great income & wealth inequality is reaching levels where revolutions happen.

It must be addressed. Now. If not sooner.

[PaulRevere08]

5. It's no longer about money but about establishing control and creating a class structure

that will keep the top at the top no matter what happens. Look at the last financial crisis, only the little people were hurt.

I am amazed at how cheap these politicians will sell off our country for.

[dixiegrrrrl]

11. It's about ego, too. I wonder if all rich guys have tiny....hands.

Guys do measure their egos by money, women, and power.

Not all guys, of course.

[packman]

7. I do believe the rich are afraid

of becoming poor or lowering their life style. If they vacation in Mexico and live in a rented condo for that vacation, they dream of a Paris vacation in a suite with an Eiffel Tower view. If they drive a BMW, they hunger for a Rolls. They are chasing money and want to make sure their sons and daughters are sent to the best schools so they too can get the very best (in their view) out of life - and that involves money, money and more money.

Greed and gluttony have little to do with it - it is wanting to preserve their lifestyle. All of us , I think , want to improve our lives - it just that the rich have an edge over us in power due to their wealth.

[MineralMan]

9. Becoming poor...no, not really. They are afraid of not being as rich.

Because they have excess funds, they spend those funds on excessive things, like $20,000 marble bathtubs for a guest bath, and properties in all the places they like to go. Except, like most people, they become bored with those places, so they buy yet another property somewhere else, because they have excessive funds.

BMWs are upper middle class cars. Rolls Royces, Lamborghinis and Ferraris are rich people's cars. They cost $1 million or so. BMWs are run-of-the-mill nice cars that their kids get when they turn 16. But one car isn't enough, and neither are three cars, so they have even more cars, because they have excessive funds.

[dixiegrrrrl]

44. Become bored....

That really does explain the addiction to money.
Every single patient/client I worked with in Sub. Abuse treatment, even the staff who were in recovery, said....I got bored, so that is why I used. Then in sobriety, they blame boredom as their reason to relapse.

Explains why the thrill of flaunting your millions does not last long, so you have to search for more things to buy.

[BigmanPigman]

8. You do not understand the principle concept.

Every day on the news I hear GOP members (I can spot one within two or three sentences after hearing the GOP BS rote propaganda by now) go on and on about how tax cuts benefit us all blah, blah, blah. They have been saying the same schtick since the 1980s during Reagan's successful trickle down economics theory.
The rich know it is BS since they have become the 1% due to relaxed regulations and have become the GOP's backers and financiers. They know that since Reagan the masses have been dumber than dirt and still buy this crap hook, line and sinker so they stick with it as they have for 30+ years...it makes them richer and even more greedy. They never want to share, they want to keep it all and they will never have enough money.

We are living in a system that is becoming an oligarchy (much like Russia). RIP USA?

[MineralMan]

12. Oh, our system has been an oligarchy for some time.

More's the pity.

[BigmanPigman]

16. I am more and more curious to see what

the history books will print about this current period and how it will be perceived as a catalyst for our country's political and social future 100 years from now. I am glad I will not see it....seems pretty dismal to me.

[MineralMan]

18. Many people in this country aspire to be wealthy.

It's a common dream, but one which few will achieve. That is the difference between our culture and the cultures of the past. We appear, however, to be moving toward becoming more an more similar to the aristocracies of the past. The separation in income between the "middle class" and the wealthy is widening. It is likely to widen further. The middle class is becoming narrower and narrower in income range, I think. We may become, most of us, peons again, subsisting at some sort of minimal level, so the wealthy class can prosper beyond all reasonable limits.

I don't know. I'm 72 years old. I'll be dead before another two decades pass, so I won't probably see the culmination of the current trend. There may also be other forces that come into play before the final stages of this society are apparent.

It's not looking good, frankly, for the average person, down the road. Not good at all. I'll be gone. I have no offspring, either, by choice. I decided not to reproduce because it seemed clear that increasing population would not support the kind of democratic societies that had become the ideal. So...I will not see this, nor will my offspring.

[BigmanPigman]

24. Me too.

That is one thing I am grateful about. I am a realist, like my dad, and for many unselfish reasons I made the choice as a teenager and I know it is the best decision I have ever made. I do feel badly for my niece though. Oh well, at least I won't have the guilt of creating a person who will have to deal with this crap when I die.

[mr_lebowski]

66. I knew there was a reason I like you two ...

Childless here by choice, due to the world population issue as well.

My wife isn't quite on the same page but with her at 42 and me at 51, the only way that changes is via adoption, and I think even the time for that has passed for me.

I like kids, love my nieces and nephews, but ... never felt like I NEEDED a child, and since, well, 99% of everyone else in the world appears to NEED them, which is already FAR FAR too many 'children' for this planet to sustain, I elected to 'opt out'.

I'm also glad I didn't create a person who's going to have to deal with the shitstorm that's coming ... due to the confluence of peak-everything, general environmental destruction & rampant pollution, climate change ... oh, and the 1% owning pretty much everything, and the purposeful dumbing-down of this Nation.

Basically, 'stuff' is going to start REALLY SUCKING for a LOT of Americans ... very soon. It couldn't be more obvious. Glad I don't have to worry about leaving a child behind to deal with it all

[FiveGoodMen]

81. "go on and on about how tax cuts benefit us all"

Benefit us all in the same way that slavery created "happy slaves" according to some of these same people.

They must think we're awfully stupid.

But we keep electing these lying POS types, so maybe we ARE that stupid.

[SunSeeker]

13. K & R

[AtheistCrusader]

14. Money doesn't decay like food.

There's certainly an income imbalance issue in this country, but I don't know if the analogy is quite right. I might stockpile money in a manner that appears gluttonous to one person, and not to another. Maybe I want to buy a house without slaving for a bank for 30 years?

But yes, there is a scope/scale even an abusive element to it. Sure.

[MineralMan]

19. I have had a very modest income all my working life.

That was my choice. However, I have purchased two homes with cash. Things involve priorities. I have chosen not to live beyond my means, pretty much. That was my choice. Others make other choices.

[c-rational]

73. You are simply complying with the eternal law (Sanatana Dharma) of Not Stealing...defined as taking

more than you need. Thoroughly enjoy your posts Mineral Man.

[MineralMan]

74. Prohibitions against taking what is not yours are pretty much

universal. It's an easy thing to understand by anyone who has any sort of possessions, and so is part of almost all societies' rules. Extending it to include taking more than you need is more unusual, and is not universally recognized, though. That's a more enlightened definition, to be sure.

Thanks very much for your reply!

[AtheistCrusader]

75. Modest to you, is grossly wealthy to others.

Many people dream of just scraping together enough for a down payment, let alone purchasing a home outright.

It's all a matter of perspective.

[yuiyoshida]

21. Then Don't attend a Chinese Wedding...

The ten course meal lasts forever!!! And yes, you are expected to try everything!

[MineralMan]

23. Oh, I can do that. I eat very small samples of every course.

I know how to do that, and enjoy it very much. A small end of the wing of the chicken and a flake or two of the whole fish. A nibble of each course. That is how to survive a multi-course feast.

Please invite me to the next such feast. I will demonstrate.

[yuiyoshida]

25. If Juju and I get married for real...

Expect it!~~

[JuJuYoshida]

31. We will feast for DAYS haha! kiss

[yuiyoshida]

32. We might have to buy an extra

Refrigerator...

[JuJuYoshida]

34. NOT BIG ENOUGH

[yuiyoshida]

37. HEH...

ikr?

[JuJuYoshida]

29. Yeah baby, that's a steamboat. My family has those a lot! yummy!

[Doreen]

40. Will they invite me?

[yuiyoshida]

57. It helps to know the groom or bride

to get an invitation. The last one I went to, they generously gave out red envelopes filled with 20 dollar bills. Its seems its good luck for the parents to give money away for a wedding.

[Doreen]

58. Yeah, yeah, it is just that food looked so good.

[BadgerMom]

22. K/R

[Eliot Rosewater]

26. People who do that are by their nature disgusting people, neither you or I could

be greedy if our lives fucking depended on it.

We would take care of family and those in need and always vote for higher taxes, without hesitation.

But we arent deplorable filth, either

[Saviolo]

27. And we've heard all the excuses before:

Why are you trying to punish success?
I can decide better what to do with my money than the government.
If the wealthy pay fewer taxes, they've got more money to invest in small business, or purchase goods that leads to employment.

It's all spurious, of course. To imagine that the tiniest percentage of the population is a larger economic driver than the VAST MAJORITY of the population is so far removed from reality that I can't understand why most people who believe it believe it.

The right wing has dragged the Overton Window so far to the right that sensible economic policy is now looked at as extreme fringe socialist ideology (by people who have no idea what the word "socialism" means). And the way they do it is by proposing increasingly extreme and fringe right-wing ideas, then "compromising" on a little bit of it, and saying, "There's the middle ground. That's the centre, and if you don't meet me there, you're a left-wing extremist."

So, it's time for the left to do that, too. Propose a 100% tax on incomes over $1million/year. When that is pointed out to be left wing extremism, "compromise" and say, "Okay, then it'll only be a 90% tax on incomes over $1million/year. That's now the compromise and the ideological centre. Failing to meet us there means you are a right-wing extremist."

People keep crowing about how USA is such a wealthy nation. How can a wealthy nation still have people starving on the street in abject poverty? It would take so little from people with so much.

[Beartracks]

48. +1 n/t

[KPN]

61. Yup.

[HopeAgain]

28. We live in the age of unfettered capitalism fueled by the religion of consumerism

[JuJuYoshida]

33. and water is wet *rolleyes

[NRaleighLiberal]

35. Greed - "too much-ness" - is indeed a disease. I've got friends who have been infected.

The more they get, the more they want, the more "cheap" (tips, generosity) they become. Sue and I have a very few family members that are the same way.

It disgusts us.

[Phentex]

41. Many don't realize it's greedy...

for them, it's cool. For many, it means success. It's a way of life that people should strive for.

I am not comfortable around people like this but they don't seem to hurt for friends... people who are just like them.

[NRaleighLiberal]

43. indeed.

[guillaumeb]

36. But..............

job creators, and
trickle down, and
explosion of growth, and
balanced budgets.

And all of the other supply side claims.

[Honeycombe8]

39. The view of the rich

The view of the rich is not merely that they want more. Their view is that it's theirs, to begin with. So quit taking MY money. It's mine. I earned it.

Restaurant: Waiter brings you some food on a plate. But you had worked earlier in the day for a certain number of steaks. The waiter brings you one. So the rich guy wants to know where are his other 2 steaks that he worked for. The waiter says they are keeping the other 2 to pay for the operating expenses of the restaurant. The rich guy says he's only going to contribute 1 steak toward that. So give him his other steak.

That's his (incorrect) view.

[SammyWinstonJack]

42. Pretty sure that Gates at 89 billion and Bezos at 81 billion DON'T

need tax cuts. Obscene and disgusting. And that's just two examples of the greedheads wanting more and more. It's a sickness.

[KPN]

62. As is fucking Amazon.

Amazon is greed and avarice in itself, sold as efficiency, innovation and good for consumers -- trademarks of "competition", the very thing that Amazon is destroying Break Amazon up into little itty bitty parts. Our society is already unsustainable. We need to do this stuff soon.

[KY_EnviroGuy]

45. Mineral Man, we're in the same boat (I'm 70)

Raised by country folks that nearly starved during the Great Depression, they taught me to be thrifty but never stingy. In retirement, we spend much of out time helping others in need. The downside is that I absolutely cannot throw anything away that can possibly be used (the wife has to dispose of stuff behind my back, LOL).

I'm a light eater, and so usually get two meals out of one typical restaurant meal. Don't know why they serve so damn much, as many times it seem to the point of being unhealthy! Researchers say the USA wastes something like 40% of our food supply. We have no excuse for people here going hungry.

I would be in favor of a national limit on income, to a point that is reasonable per individual. That's because human greed cannot be easily contained without massive suffering of others, and because our planet simply cannot support this level of excess forever.

I also believe that money equals power, and those having excess money have disproportional amounts of control and power (leverage).

Any income past a certain amount could go into a national non-profit endowment for education!

Thanks for bringing up this topic.

[WinkyDink]

46. MEGA-BUNKERS COST A FORTUNE:

MEGA-BUNKERS:

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/01/30/doomsday-prep-for-the-super-rich

https://www.forbes.com/sites/jimdobson/2015/06/12/billionaire-bunkers-exclusive-look-inside-the-worlds-largest-planned-doomsday-escape/#3d0127b7306f

https://www.cnbc.com/2017/01/25/the-super-rich-are-preparing-for-the-end-of-the-world.html

[Mr. Ected]

47. Preach it, Mineral Man!

A wonderful analogy.

[BobTheSubgenius]

49. At what level of income or accumulated wealth...

...do you think would be required so that a person who has enormous excess could hypothetically lose, say 90% of it and not notice any change in their day-to-day life? All that money above that line does is allow them to play Real Life Monopoly. Surely one's time can be enjoyably occupied doing ANYTHING AND EVERYTHING IN THE WORLD, which is what vast riches open up for you.

Any damned thing you can think of.

[MineralMan]

50. Only the amount above the threshold would be taxed at that rate.

That's how it used to work. I'm not competent to set such a threshold amount really. I'd think about $10 million a year or in an estate might be about right, but I'd entertain arguments about that.

[TheBlackAdder]

51. It sounds like "A Model of Christian Charity," the original principles sermoned by John Winthrop.

.

While it was supposedly Ronald Reagan's favorite read, he got it wrong, by saying "shining city on a hill," when Winthrop only wrote about "city on a hill." Reagan mentioned that during his last national address. To this day, all of the stupid Republicans continue to misquote that line.

Well, that sermon played more into the checks and balances of starting a new country, in an attempt to prevent the poor from overthrowing the wealthy. The wealthy were not supposed to be hard on the poor, and the poor would not break the yoke of their masters.

In that, the wealthy were supposed to give away their excesses at least once a year to those more in need. If someone were in distress, beyond their ability to repay, they should be forgiven, and others should provide beyond their ability to help them.

So, when asshole Republicans talk about returning America back to its root, that was the original root.


https://archive.org/stream/AModelOfChristianCharity/AModelOfChristianCharity_djvu.txt

.

[MineralMan]

52. Yes.

That has been distorted beyond all recognition.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

53. The point of being super-rich is not to have money in order to buy things.

You can live in only one house at a time; you can drive only one car at a time; you can only wear one designer outfit at a time. That doesn't mean you can't have more than one house or one car or a whole closet full of expensive clothes and shoes, or that you can't eat at a different four-star restaurant every night. But that isn't the point. If you have all those things you're hanging out with other people who have those same things in the same measure. That isn't important.

What's important is that a whole shit-ton of money proves you're better than everyone else - smarter, more important, more resourceful. It means people will suck up to you. It means you can make things happen. The Koch brothers didn't amass money so they could have mansions and Maseratis; they did it so they could be sucked up to by politicians who want their contributions, and of course they will contribute only to those who will do what they want. And what do they want? A tax and financial system that gives them more money, so they can be even more important and more sucked-up-to. Being sucked up to by important politicians and even presidents must be an incredible rush, even better than sex for some people.

But basically, it's not so you can buy stuff. It's so you can be important, buy influence, and inflate your ego.

[MineralMan]

54. Influence and power are stuff, too.

Less tangible, perhaps, but still stuff.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

55. True. But what most of us little people think of about rich people,

and why being rich would be cool, is that they have lots of cool, tangible stuff - mansions, cars, airplanes, yachts, etc. People dream about winning the lottery so they can have nicer cars and houses and clothes - and many lottery winners find themselves bankrupt in 5 years or so because they bought too much stuff - that's what they think it is to be rich.

Influence and power are intangible things that money can purchase to an almost infinite degree and it never gets old. Even an extremely expensive car is still just a car. I can go just as far in my old Saturn (and as fast, if speed limits are to be observed) as Richie Rich can go in his new Lamborghini. I can sleep as comfortably at night in my small, plain old house as the richest person in the world can sleep on silk sheets in his multi-million-dollar mansion in Palm Beach or Greenwich (unless he has cats). But I can't buy a Congressman (not that Keith Ellison is for sale) and I can't finance a PAC.

[MineralMan]

56. Funny. Like most people, my wife and I have mused

about what we'd do with a big lottery win. We've decided we'd keep enough to ensure us a comfortable lifestyle a little better than our current one for as long as we survived. The rest would go to causes we feel strongly about.

Since we have no dependents, our estate would go to the same causes.

Of course, since we don't buy lottery tickets, it's just a mental exercise.

[murielm99]

64. Security.

I would be happy to have a lottery win because it would provide financial security. But that is all I need: enough, and no more.

Providing more security for my grown children would be good, too. But they are doing well on their own.

How much is enough? Enough to have a home, food, medical care, adequate transportation, a bit for recreation. That is enough for me.

[Doitnow]

60. I keep hearing the words of Ted Kennedy when he asked

"When does the greed stop?"

[KPN]

63. Good thread Mineral Man.

Last edited Thu Oct 26, 2017, 07:01 AM - Edit history (1)

You are right on.

More importantly, talk like this is how to unify the party and re-recruit wandering ex-Dems in my view. Would that everyone share your sentiments. Do we? I have to wonder at times.

[pansypoo53219]

65. way too much. i eat enough & i usually have 2-4 more small meals for 2.

and 1/2 the time i have to 'fix' stuff. make it better.

[lostnfound]

67. Money is power to them. Separate money used for consumption from ownership / control of companies

Often no connection.

Imagine that it traded in two independent currencies. What would you pay for control of 1/10 of Comcast or google or Ford or Whole Foods?

It's an unfortunate side effect that control of companies is so inflated compared to money for individual life.

[dansolo]

68. Don't think of the rich as being merely greedy

I think to the wealthy, their goal is more to keep it away from everybody else. That is why they want to starve the treasury, or direct it to the military. That way they can force the elimination of programs that help the poor and middle class.

[Alpeduez21]

69. The christian party

always ignores: "It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the gates of heaven"

Personally, I don't care if you're filthy rich living the 24/7yacht life. I care if your dirt poor and barely making it.

Saw a bumper once: Houses, everyone should have one before anyone has two.

[Saviolo]

71. They've all been corrupted by the "Prosperity Gospel."

The idea that the wealthier and more successful you are, the more God smiles upon you. It's the sort of thing that Joel Osteen teaches.

Wikipedia has a decent precis of it here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prosperity_theology

[Oneironaut]

70. Gaining more wealth becomes a contest, imo.

If they’re multi-millionaires, they want to surpass 100-million. If they have over 100 million, they want to get over 500 million, and then one billion. Then, you have the list of the richest people in the world ranked by wealth - that’s a constant ego-fueled contest.

Then, there’s the need for more vacation houses on top of the ones you already have just so you can brag that you have them.

It becomes an all-consuming sickness, I believe. There is no such thing as “enough” to some people. Making money becomes an obsession, and they never stop to take a look at how much they already have.

[wiggs]

72. more money for the wealthy is one of the least stimulative things you can do as a

govt. Much more stimulative to build demand by lifting up middle and lower incomes.

Plus...two other bad things happen when the wealthy have more...speculative investing, which creates bubbles; and investing in corruption of officials by donating to the GOP.

[muntrv]

76. Or this...

[DFW]

77. The definition of what constitutes "rich"

That seems to be the rub. SO many ideas of how to tax whom, but at any rate, "the rich." And who decides how that money, once collected, is distributed? Who gets to play Robin Hood? If you have $1000 to your name, $100,000 seems rich. If you have $100,000 to your name, but ongoing debts, kids in school away from home, car payments, whatever other obligations, then maybe anything under $1 million isn't rich. Obviously Bill Gates is rich, but the richest guy in the country is by definition rich.

"Greed sucks. Gluttony sucks. Avarice sucks." No argument from me there. But what if you get rich without any of all that? Is Oprah rich because she is greedy, or as a natural outcome of deals she made when she was a budding TV personality that became hugely lucrative as her popularity and success grew? I think that to some degree it has to be left up to an individual to decide what to with whatever he or she has earned, if done so honestly.

Look at the EU. A bunch of faceless bureaucrats award themselves high salaries, perky expenses and huge tax-free pensions for sitting in offices in Brussels and Strasbourg and making up rules for other people to follow. Health care isn't all the Europeans get for their high taxes. In the States, Gates and Clinton have set up their charitable foundations. I certainly wouldn't have the means to do anything like that. That doesn't make me better than they are (or vice-versa), just poorer. If Gates wants to buy himself a Lamborghini, he can go ahead for all I care. I'm not jealous, and I neither want or need such a car (maybe he doesn't either, I have no idea what vehicle/s he owns).

I am wary of blanket solutions to the issue of excess. I am averse to governments taking more than half what a person earns, if it is earned honestly. All too often, it leads to capital flight. If I want to donate what I don't need to cancer research, Greenpeace, Doctors Without Borders, Amnesty International, the ACLU and the Southern Poverty Law Center--I prefer that to Dick Cheney using the money to invade Iraq. Governments are not always benevolent. I also have a wife and at least one daughter who earns relatively little for the area she lives in. I want to leave them something, too, if the proverbial piano falls on me tomorrow. I have heart issues, so it could, too.

I am not saying anyone should let Trump, Adelson, the Kochs and their friends get away with the awful things they have been getting away with up to now, much less what they are planning for the near future. I am saying that we must be careful with all-encompassing solutions to questions to which more nuanced thought is required, and to which single simple answers do not universally apply. Here in Germany, it is hard to forget that about 80 years ago, "Enteignung" was practiced--with popular approval--on a group of people that, according to the prevailing government sentiment at the time, had "too much." Justice was not served.

[Tobin S.]

80. The problem is that many people in America do not have economic security

or adequate health care. And things are rapidly getting worse due to the insatiable greed of a handful of billionaires. No Democrats have a problem with people being wealthy or having more than other people. It's when they do it at the expense of the rest of us and actually wage a war against the interests of ordinary people that it becomes a problem.

[DFW]

82. So far, so good

But, to pick some figures out of the air, say you have 200 people with ten billion dollars each, and I don't know if that figure is anywhere accurate, confiscate all of it, and say it will be redistributed evenly among 120 million Americans, roughly a third of the population, that leaves less than $17,000 per person, or less than $1700 per person per year if spread out over ten years. If you take everything they own, turn it to cash, that's it, you can't do it again next year. You got it all the first time.

There needs to be a fundamental rethinking of how our society takes care of its less well-off, and not just a wholesale confiscation from a few because their mansions are too big, or they are nasty right wingers.

[Tobin S.]

84. Are you really that out of touch, DFW?

We're not talking communism here, but we will be if things keep going at the current rate. Do you understand what is currently happening to the tax code in the U.S.? The politically moderate health care reform that Obama enacted and still left many without adequate health care is still being sabotaged, and will likely be rendered completely useless before Trump ends his term. Medicare and Medicaid are currently under direct assault and Social Security likely will be soon well.

If things keep going this way the pitch forks are going to come out. Go tell that to all your rich buddies.

Now if you excuse me, I'm going to start my 10 hour work day without the benefit of getting time and a half for overtime so I can just scrape by while my wife is enemployed and can't find work.

[DFW]

85. I wish I had only a ten hour workday

I suppose you get enough days when you have to get up at 4:30 AM like I do, but don't think you're alone. My buddies are all over the map, by the way, income-wise. We have friends who barely scrape by and some who are in the stratosphere. As of this year, I can even include a daughter in that category, but she earned it all on her own, so, good for her. I'll never make that kind of bread. Her sister is barley scraping by with her job in danger of disappearing, but she isn't about to come back here to Germany to demand her sister spring for a living. Income doesn't figure into who is our friend and who isn't. That's not how we choose our friends.

We see what is going on in the States, and are mighty glad one of us (my wife) isn't an American citizen who has to deal with it. As for the tax code, frankly, you're right, I don't really have a handle on what is happening with it, and from what we can tell, neither does anyone else. It seems from here like a lot of blind people throwing darts at a board fifty feet away. Trump and his buddies want to get away with no taxes, and push the burden upon everyone else, or else create a budget deficit that will tank our economy by Independence Day. They may try, but I don't think the budget hawks in their own party will let them get away with most of it--if any of it. Go ahead and sharpen your pitchforks if it makes you feel better, but I doubt things will get to the point where you'll be sticking them into too many people. I don't think the Republicans will muster enough votes to triple the deficit.

As for your wife, my best wishes that she finds some kind of work while she still can. After two bouts of cancer (and I hope your wife never has to go through THAT), and having reached age 65, mine looks good, but she is basically unhirable even if she wanted to find a job, and her German pension of €850 a month is not exactly a sign of government largesse. I see our (i.e. Democrats') greatest enemies at this point as being resignation and apathy, neither of which are our style--nor yours, I would hope.

A few years ago, over half of DU used to sign off with "NGU." Never Give Up. I wish that would come back into style.

[Tobin S.]

90. Here's the deal

What is happening in the U.S.is an outright assault on working class people and poor people. People just like me. And it is coming out of our hides to benefit people who are already ultra wealthy. It will cause a great deal of suffering and economic hardship. It will shorten lives, and people will die of things that would ordinarily be treatable. If something is not done to change things, I will never be able to retire.

We are getting destroyed right now because some very wealthy people want to be even richer and they have a stranglehold on our government.

So you will have to forgive me if I don't respond pleasantly to a guy who has more than I can ever possibly hope to have come on here and start defending rich people.

I'm not the kind of guy who will ever see the interior of the White House. The president of United States is not going pose with me in photographs. I've got $640 to my name right now. I take the work as I can get it. I can't afford to make a political contribution of any kind. This woe is me stuff from someone who has much more advantage than I ever will rings hollow.

The situation in America right now is dire. This country is going insane amd it is dying. So when you see people like me trying to move the party left, it is in an effort to save this place from becoming a wasteland. It is for the common good and you need to get on board. If we don't accomplish this the Democratic Party is going to die and what will rise is something much further to the left. Ordinary people do not need rich people, but rich people need us. What I've just told you is for the benefit of everyone, rich people included.

[Gothmog]

79. Great post

[taught_me_patience]

86. Who gets the arbiter of what constitutes "excess"

Some people on DU think any income over 100k is "excess".

[MineralMan]

87. I'd set it at the 90th percentile of wealth or

maybe lower. Using a percentile of wealth scale would compensate for economic variation. That's how I'd do it. Filthy rich.

[taught_me_patience]

89. 90%for wealth is 1.1M

Hardly filthy rich. Thanks for clearly illustrating the problem of who gets to be the arbiter of wealth. I'll pass.