conservation of Euros

How bad do you think it would be, really, if we just let the existing totally collapse and start over? Worldwide, I mean.

*Maybe*. The deficit for just April was $83B. Note that April is also the month when the government intake is *highest*, do to the April 15 tax filing date. In 43 of the last 56 years April has been a net surplus month.

Is it going to get any better since we're rewarding fiscal irresponsibility? Eventually it has to bust, somewhere.

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A 10% VAT gives Obama $125B more/month to fritter away on nothing. (Enough for break-even, not enough to pay off any debt.)

Of course that assumes people continue to buy stuff at the same rate, which they won't. They won't work at the same rate either. Better make it 18%, like Europe. And, naturally, that won't be enough either. He'll spend more.

That said, Obama won't push a VAT--it doesn't redistribute wealth. Deficit spending does.

James Arthur

choose

Yep, it looks like Bear-Sterns and AIG volume 2.

Your states don't have legislatures and governors?

No Spanish-speakers? The EC spends a lot of money on translating its public output into all the official languages of the EC. All the senior politicians speak English, most of them speak French (which is a tribute to French linguisitc chauvinism) and German. Language differences don't present communications problems - though they can be a source of intra-community conflicts, as in Belgium at the moment.

The economists and the bankers - who are the only people truly relevant to a discussion of the stability of the euro - all speak English, because they have to talk to their American equivalents.

ly know

Actually, I know that it isn't important - if you have a tertiary qualification from a European educational institution, you are going to be fluent in English. What I don't know is why you think otherwise

- I could ask you to explain, but I don't fancy being directed to the irrational output from some right-wing propaganda mill.

-- Bill Sloman, Nijmegen

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Actually, VAT does redistribute wealth - away from the poor towards the rich. The poor spend most of their income on buying stuff, which attracts VAT.

The rich divert a larger part of their income into investment, which doesn't attract VAT. Technically speaking, this makes VAT is a regressive tax.

-- Bill Sloman, Nijmegen

Check out the Great Depression from the early 1930's. It wasn't much fun.

-- Bill Sloman, Nijmegen

ty?

Most recessions shake out a bunch of fraudsters, but never enough.

-- Bill Sloman, Nijmegen

They aren't allowed to print money or regulate big financial institutions. Most must balance their budgets. The trouble that California is in now will be fixed by California. The trouble that Greece is in now will be fixed by Germany.

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So, you don't know much about the world.

John

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True.

Naturally. As a nation, we spend 10% of our time and creative energy figuring out how to pay our taxes, and 5% (maybe more) planning the course that minimizes them.

In the US we have a proposal called "The Fair Tax," a simple 23% national sales tax. It would replace all of our federal tax system (personal and corporate income tax, Medicare, Social Security, etc), and eliminate all the credits, deductions, receipts, bookkeeping and time spent dodging & gaming the various income taxes. The latter costs us hundreds of billions a year, not to mention human energy wasted unproductively.

A simple "prebate" makes the Fair Tax progressive.

I love the simplicity, I like the "flat" part, I adore the one-point collection no-records-needed part. I'm not sure about the mechanics of the prebate--prone to political games, ISTM, but then, what isn't?

James Arthur

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Do pay attention. The trouble that Greece is now in will be fixed by Greece. The EU - as a whole - will under-write Greek borrowing until that happens. The Germans have had quite a lot of influence on the requirements imposed on the Greeks in return for the guarantees, but the Greeks have to do the work.

urely know

Or so you'd like to think. You still haven't told me why you think that language is important in this context, but retreated behind your earlier - unsupported - claim. Bankers have been managing financial trasactions across linguistic boundaries for the past few thousand years. It isn't difficult, and they've had lots of practice.

So you haven't - as usual - adduced any evidence to support your fatuous claim, which has - as usual - more to do with your over- optimistic desire to be seen as someone who knows what they are talking about, rather than any real-world fact.

-- Bill Sloman, Nijmegen

Do pay attention:

Quote: "Members of the Bundestag, Germany's lower house, approved a state-backed guarantee for the loan ..."

[...]

--
Regards, Joerg

http://www.analogconsultants.com/

"gmail" domain blocked because of excessive spam.
Use another domain or send PM.

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Dream on. The prebate reduces the load on the lower income groups - but since they have to jump through bureaucratic hoops to establish that they qualify for the prebate, it just shifts the book-keeping load from the rich to the poor - but because it is a tax on consuption, rather than income, it still collects more from the poor than the rich, and remains regressive.

Search on "the poverty trap" sometime, where the poor end up facing a relatively high marginal rate of tax when they cross some threshold where they no longer qualify as poor.

Of course you love it. You are a right-wing nitwit, and enthuse about every proposition that favours the rich, as "The Fair Tax" most certainly does.

-- Bill Sloman, Nijmegen

I'd explain, except that you told me just above not to explain.

But since you understand the world so well, it should be obvious.

John

The phrase "under-write Greek borrowing until..." is interesting.

"Until" might include "the Germans elect a right-wing government."

John

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Just exempt basics, like sensible food, reasonable rent, generic medicines, public transport, education, stuff like that. Use tax policy to steer behavior.

John

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Nope.

Wrong. No bookkeeping. If you exist, you get a prebate check, same amount no matter what. Rich man & poor man get the same, though it means more to the latter, obviously.

Supposedly the design specifically prevents that.

The real poverty trap is that the government takes their retirement savings before they can save it, and now their health care money, and so forth, such that a family earning 10% above break-even is reduced to break-even. That means they can't save, can't accumulate capital, can't get ahead, and have no margin of safety in an emergency.

Your remarks about the Fair Tax are uninformed.

As to the class envy stuff, naturally you think everyone should make exactly the same wages and have exactly the same amount of stuff, no matter how hard they work, no matter what they sacrifice, or for how long. And if they work harder, any excess they earn should be confiscated, and divided amongst the voluntarily poor, certainly.

Noted.

This guy makes your case for you:

James Arthur

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Yep. That's better, though it means the rate would have to be higher. The problem with the prebate check is...everyone getting a check.

James