Government workers more likely to die

[RangerM]

.....than be laid off or fired.

 

Some federal workers more likely to die than lose jobs

Federal employees' job security is so great that workers in many agencies are more likely to die of natural causes than get laid off or fired, a USA TODAY analysis finds.

 

Death — rather than poor performance, misconduct or layoffs — is the primary threat to job security at the Environmental Protection Agency, the Small Business Administration, the Department of Housing and Urban Development, the Office of Management and Budget and a dozen other federal operations.

 

The federal government fired 0.55% of its workers in the budget year that ended Sept. 30 — 11,668 employees in its 2.1 million workforce. Research shows that the private sector fires about 3% of workers annually for poor performance, says John Palguta, former research chief at the federal Merit Systems Protection Board, which handles federal firing disputes.

 

The 1,800-employee Federal Communications Commission and the 1,200-employee Federal Trade Commission didn't lay off or fire a single employee last year. The SBA had no layoffs, six firings and 17 deaths in its 4,000-employee workforce.

 

When job security is at a premium, the federal government remains the place to work for those who want to avoid losing a job. The job security rate for all federal workers was 99.43% last year and nearly 100% for those on the job more than a few years.

 

HUD spokesman Jerry Brown says his department's low dismissal rate — providing a 99.85% job security rate for employees — shows a skilled and committed workforce. "We've never focused on firing people, and we don't intend to start now. We're more focused on hiring the right people," he says.

 

San Francisco State University management professor John Sullivan, an expert on employee turnover, says the low departure rates show a failure to release poor performers and those with obsolete skills. "Rather than indicating something positive, rates below 1% in the firing and layoff components would indicate a serious management problem," he says.

 

The government laid off 385 people in reorganizations last year — a 0.02% rate, or one in every 6,000 employees. No comparable private sector layoff rate is available.

 

USA TODAY analyzed the Office of Personnel Management's database to examine job security in the federal workforce. Firings are for all reasons, including poor performance, stealing and sexual harassment. The Postal Service and uniformed military personnel are not included in the data. Departures from seasonal jobs, such as Census taker, are not counted.

 

"The notion that you can't fire federal workers is a myth because we do it. But it doesn't happen frequently," says Palguta, vice president of the Partnership for Public Service, which advocates for a high-quality government workforce.

 

Palguta says some federal workers quit before they are fired, so the data underestimate how many poor performers are weeded out. Efforts to streamline the government cause few layoffs because federal law gives preference to certain workers, such as military veterans, making it hard to match protected workers with the skills needed, he says.

 

USA TODAY found that nearly 60% of firings occur in the first two years of employment, mostly workers on probation and outside the federal job protection system. Blue-collar workers are twice as likely to be fired as white-collar employees. The federal government's 12,700 food preparation workers had the highest rate of getting fired last year — 2.5%.

 

White-collar federal workers have almost total job security after a few years on the job. Last year, the government fired none of its 3,000 meteorologists, 2,500 health insurance administrators, 1,000 optometrists, 800 historians or 500 industrial property managers.

 

The nearly half-million federal employees earning $100,000 or more enjoyed a 99.82% job security rate in 2010. Only 27 of 35,000 federal attorneys were fired last year. None was laid off. Death claimed 33.

[retro-man]

It's obvious then that the government is doing a much better job than the private sector. Ask any of the 8,000,000 or so unemployed.

[RangerM]

I'd call it planned obsolescence.

 

But, I suppose it's nice when you get your children's and grandchildren's moneys worth.

[silvrsvt]

I work with Government Employees as a contractor..and some of them are pretty useless, since they know its next to impossible for them to get fired, etc. I have another friend who is a gov employee and he says he has several people where he works at referred as RIP....Retired in Place!

 

We are also involved with the BRAC and several gov employees are just showing up to work at the post that is closing and are riding the gravy train till September 15 when they close down..and the last two weeks they don't even have a place to show up for work!

[aneekr]

It's obvious then that the government is doing a much better job than the private sector.

Isn't it the other way around?

[retro-man]

Isn't it the other way around?

What? Kicking good hardworking people to the curb by the millions like so much rubbish is superior performance in your book? What kind of Orwellian upside-down nonsense passes for truth these days? You'd rather be thrown out in the street, left to fend for yourself like some kind of wild dog, than to have secure employment? (Oh I know, you're quite the alpha dog - you'll do just fine thank you - screw everybody else. Well aren't we special?) It seems to me that the government is doing a much much better job than the private sector at providing secure employment and a good quality of life for its employees. I said it tongue in cheek - but looking at it from that narrow viewpoint it is entirely true. The private sector - as it currently stands, with its "efficiency at any cost" (irony intended) ethic has failed. Roughly 15.1 million people are unemployed in the US at the moment. Is 15.1 million broken lives too great a cost for "efficiency"? Yes, yes it is. Economic rationalism is a morally and ethically vacuous credo to hang your hat on.

 

"Whatsoever therefore is consequent to a time of Warre, where every man is Enemy to every man; the same is consequent to the time, wherein men live without other security, than what their own strength, and their own invention shall furnish them withall. In such condition, there is no place for Industry; because the fruit thereof is uncertain; and consequently no Culture of the Earth; no Navigation, nor use of the commodities that may be imported by Sea; no commodious Building; no Instruments of moving, and removing such things as require much force; no Knowledge of the face of the Earth; no account of Time; no Arts; no Letters; no Society; and which is worst of all, continuall feare, and danger of violent death; And the life of man, solitary, poore, nasty, brutish, and short." ~Thomas Hobbes, "Leviathan" 1651

Reflect on that for a moment; that our life expectancy is actually growing shorter in this country [LINK LINK] - here in the US, at the beginning of the 21st Century - and has been since the early 1980s (are you willing to make a correlation? I am), and that the majority of even those who are not among the 15.1 million unemployed are living in "continuall feare, and danger" - if not of violent death, at least of bankruptcy and destitution. Our society and our economy is failing. No, we have not hit rock-Somalia-bottom yet (perfect example of a country with no government by the way), but we are certainly sliding backwards.

Edited July 22, 2011 by retro-man

[aneekr]

What kind of Orwellian upside-down nonsense passes for truth these days?

Post #2 in this thread, apparently.

[retro-man]

Post #2 in this thread, apparently.

Perverse, isn't it?

[Roadtrip]

What? Kicking good hardworking people to the curb by the millions like so much rubbish is superior performance in your book? What kind of Orwellian upside-down nonsense passes for truth these days? You'd rather be thrown out in the street, left to fend for yourself like some kind of wild dog, than to have secure employment? (Oh I know, you're quite the alpha dog - you'll do just fine thank you - screw everybody else. Well aren't we special?) It seems to me that the government is doing a much much better job than the private sector at providing secure employment and a good quality of life for its employees. I said it tongue in cheek - but looking at it from that narrow viewpoint it is entirely true. The private sector - as it currently stands, with its "efficiency at any cost" (irony intended) ethic has failed. Roughly 15.1 million people are unemployed in the US at the moment. Is 15.1 million broken lives too great a cost for "efficiency"? Yes, yes it is. Economic rationalism is a morally and ethically vacuous credo to hang your hat on.

 

 

Reflect on that for a moment; that our life expectancy is actually growing shorter in this country [LINK LINK] - here in the US, at the beginning of the 21st Century - and has been since the early 1980s (are you willing to make a correlation? I am), and that the majority of even those who are not among the 15.1 million unemployed are living in "continuall feare, and danger" - if not of violent death, at least of bankruptcy and destitution. Our society and our economy is failing. No, we have not hit rock-Somalia-bottom yet (perfect example of a country with no government by the way), but we are certainly sliding backwards.

 

It must really suck to walk in your shoes and think the way you do.

 

Our country was built on and made great by persons in far more dire economic straits than you. The settlers who travelled west and eventually populated your own home town packed their belongings, with the very real threat of Indian attacks, not knowing what their future held, with the purpose of building a future for themselves. They were risk takers.

 

Tens of millions of immigrants throughout the last couple of centuries packed up what they could and risked everything to come to this country for the opportunities it represents.

 

Every single day, hundreds, if not thousands, of people risk their very lives to come here for the opportunity to make a better life (most of them illegally). I doubt they have the luxury of griping on the Internet about what an unjust economic system we have. I doubt it even occurs to them.

 

The economy is a harsh thing. With its billions upon billions of transactions between consenting parties that occur on a daily basis, the economy is very much like a force of nature. Our government has intervened in and attempted to manipulate the economy in numerous ways since the advent of the Central Reserve Bank (whose dual mandate as established by Congress is to maintain "maximum employment" and "stabilize prices") and passage of the 16th Amendment, which gave way to the current U.S. tax code. Both of which were signed into law by President Woodrow Wilson, a noted progressive.

 

Your current predicament as an out-of-work architect can be traced to the creation of Fannie Mae in 1938, by another of your progressive heroes, Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Freddie Mac was created in 1970. Both entities carried an implicit government guarantee of mortgages, being the "government sponsored enterprises" that they were and still are. And the corruption in these two "enterprises" makes Enron look like a misdemeanor. Google the two names "Franklin Raines" and "Jamie Gorelick," two long-time Democrat kleptocrats who, as CEOs of Fannie and Freddie, made tens of millions of dollars while falsifying the balance sheets of their respective organizations. When banks were forced to abandon traditional lending standards, because of political correctness and Bill Clinton's enforcement of the Community Reinvestment Act, they were willing to oblige, only because they knew they could bundle and unload the "bad paper" onto Fannie or Freddie. Don't take my word for it. Read "Reckless Endangerment" by Gretchen Morgenson (of the New York Times) and Joshua Rosner.

 

Government intervention in the housing market created a decades-long, slow-inflating bubble. As an architect, you were the beneficiary of artificially induced demand for housing -- demand created by liberal ideology. You should rejoice in the prosperity you gained while you could. But now that the bubble has deflated, maybe it's worth an objective look at the causes and effects of your own predicament.

 

As with nature, it's not nice to fool with the economy.

 

It's your choice: You can gripe, you can blame the system or whatever; or you can move on, and take some risks. The economy is like a force of nature, and it doesn't take "no" for an answer. History demonstrates, however, that the economy responds favorably to people who answer "yes," as in "Yes, I can."

Edited July 23, 2011 by Roadtrip

[Edstock]

You can gripe, you can blame the system or whatever; or you can move on, and take some risks.

And do like Benjie and the gang did back in 1776 — change the system.

[retro-man]

It must really suck to walk in your shoes and think the way you do.

It does. So how about a little compassion? Oh, right, republican........... It must be really nice to be able to wash your hands of other peoples troubles by pinning the blame all on them and their flawed characters, and none on a system that creates more and more uneven results every year. The miracle of the immaculate conscience.

 

Our country was built on and made great by persons in far more dire economic straits than you. The settlers who travelled west and eventually populated your own home town packed their belongings, with the very real threat of Indian attacks, not knowing what their future held, with the purpose of building a future for themselves. They were risk takers.

I'm not sure about your people roadtrip, but I'm kinda thinking my ancestors came here hoping that their descendants wouldn't have to go through the same hardships they did. I'm kinda thinking they came here hoping for a better life, not just the same old shit every 4 generations or so. I know I'm hoping that for my own kids and have done everything possible to give them a better life than I had (they didn't have to work graveyard shift at the roof truss factory to get through college for example). If our ancestors were the type of people to make excuses for a rotten system, I'm sure they would've just stayed put where they were.

 

Tens of millions of immigrants throughout the last couple of centuries packed up what they could and risked everything to come to this country for the opportunities it represents.

And tens of ....... well, tens of tens have realized that golden opportunity. And that window just keeps getting narrower and narrower every year, but that doesn't bother you, does it?

 

Every single day, hundreds, if not thousands, of people risk their very lives to come here for the opportunity to make a better life (most of them illegally). I doubt they have the luxury of griping on the Internet about what an unjust economic system we have. I doubt it even occurs to them.

New arrivals reached their postwar peak in 1993. Starting in 2009 numbers of legal and illegal immigrants began to decline. Looking at the situation with Asia (an area where I am fairly knowledgeable), in 2008, for the first time since the 14th century, the number of Japanese University students going overseas to China exceeded the number going overseas to the US. This is one of many many indicators - both large and small - of the end of American exceptionalism. The canary in the coal mine stopped singing a couple of years ago, and I think we can all agree that this is not a short-term predicament. But keep jingoing away if it makes you feel good. The fact that we may yet, in good years (not the last couple), seem preferable to staying right next door in Mexico or Guatemala is not that comforting to me.

 

The economy is a harsh thing. With its billions upon billions of transactions between consenting parties that occur on a daily basis, the economy is very much like a force of nature. Our government has intervened in and attempted to manipulate the economy in numerous ways since the advent of the Central Reserve Bank (whose dual mandate as established by Congress is to maintain "maximum employment" and "stabilize prices") and passage of the 16th Amendment, which gave way to the current U.S. tax code. Both of which were signed into law by President Woodrow Wilson, a noted progressive.

 

Your current predicament as an out-of-work architect can be traced to the creation of Fannie Mae in 1938, by another of your progressive heroes, Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Freddie Mac was created in 1970. Both entities carried an implicit government guarantee of mortgages, being the "government sponsored enterprises" that they were and still are. And the corruption in these two "enterprises" makes Enron look like a misdemeanor. Google the two names "Franklin Raines" and "Jamie Gorelick," two long-time Democrat kleptocrats who, as CEOs of Fannie and Freddie, made tens of millions of dollars while falsifying the balance sheets of their respective organizations. When banks were forced to abandon traditional lending standards, because of political correctness and Bill Clinton's enforcement of the Community Reinvestment Act, they were willing to oblige, only because they knew they could bundle and unload the "bad paper" onto Fannie or Freddie. Don't take my word for it. Read "Reckless Endangerment" by Gretchen Morgenson (of the New York Times) and Joshua Rosner.

 

Government intervention in the housing market created a decades-long, slow-inflating bubble. As an architect, you were the beneficiary of artificially induced demand for housing -- demand created by liberal ideology. You should rejoice in the prosperity you gained while you could. But now that the bubble has deflated, maybe it's worth an objective look at the causes and effects of your own predicament.

This is a one-sided interpretation of events. Are you going to tell me that the shadow banking system, runaway greed, and gutting of regulatory protections had nothing to do with it? Are you going to pin all the blame on poor people - minority and otherwise - trying to get a house, and their advocates, and let the bankers and traders - whose trillions in profits make Franklin Raines millions pale by comparison, and who might have some presumption of professional responsibility in the events leading up to this - off scot-free? I can tell you as an Architect, when I build a house and it collapses, I'm going to be held responsible, period. But when this gigantic real estate bubble collapses, those who built it - who invented and profited most from the derivatives - get bailed out by the taxpayer and get their giant salaries and bonuses and start snapping up assets from their cash-rich position while millions suffer? I'm not excusing excesses on either side - but in our rush to stake a position in this debate, let us not be blinded to the bigger picture. Nothing is solved that way.

 

As with nature, it's not nice to fool with the economy.

As with nature, it's nice to erect a few walls and a roof to keep out the bad stuff too - not just let it blow through and wreak havoc however it will.

 

It's your choice: You can gripe, you can blame the system or whatever; or you can move on, and take some risks. The economy is like a force of nature, and it doesn't take "no" for an answer. History demonstrates, however, that the economy responds favorably to people who answer "yes," as in "Yes, I can."

It's your choice: You can be an apologist for greed and excess, shrug your shoulders and call it "a force of nature" (which is easy enough to do when it's not your house that has been blown down); or you can be a champion of the suffering and downtrodden and vow to build a better more equitable system. Laissez Faire is not going to get you there. Laissez Faire is the law of the jungle, where "forces of nature" really do prevail. I have nobler aspirations for my country and society. Edited July 23, 2011 by retro-man

[rn4]

It does. So how about a little compassion? Oh, right, republican........... It must be really nice to be able to wash your hands of other peoples troubles by pinning the blame all on them and their flawed characters, and none on a system that creates more and more uneven results every year. The miracle of the immaculate conscience.

 

I'm not sure about your people roadtrip, but I'm kinda thinking my ancestors came here hoping that their descendants wouldn't have to go through the same hardships they did. I'm kinda thinking they came here hoping for a better life, not just the same old shit every 4 generations or so. I know I'm hoping that for my own kids and have done everything possible to give them a better life than I had (they didn't have to work graveyard shift at the roof truss factory to get through college for example). If our ancestors were the type of people to make excuses for a rotten system, I'm sure they would've just stayed put where they were.

 

And tens of ....... well, tens of tens have realized that golden opportunity. And that window just keeps getting narrower and narrower every year, but that doesn't bother you, does it?

 

New arrivals reached their postwar peak in 1993. Starting in 2009 numbers of legal and illegal immigrants began to decline. Looking at the situation with Asia (an area where I am fairly knowledgeable), in 2008, for the first time since the 14th century, the number of Japanese University students going overseas to China exceeded the number going overseas to the US. This is one of many many indicators - both large and small - of the end of American exceptionalism. The canary in the coal mine stopped singing a couple of years ago, and I think we can all agree that this is not a short-term predicament. But keep jingoing away if it makes you feel good. The fact that we may yet, in good years (not the last couple), seem preferable to staying right next door in Mexico or Guatemala is not that comforting to me.

 

This is a one-sided interpretation of events. Are you going to tell me that the shadow banking system, runaway greed, and gutting of regulatory protections had nothing to do with it? Are you going to pin all the blame on poor people - minority and otherwise - trying to get a house, and their advocates, and let the bankers and traders - whose trillions in profits make Franklin Raines millions pale by comparison, and who might have some presumption of professional responsibility in the events leading up to this - off scot-free? I can tell you as an Architect, when I build a house and it collapses, I'm going to be held responsible, period. But when this gigantic real estate bubble collapses, those who built it - who invented and profited most from the derivatives - get bailed out by the taxpayer and get their giant salaries and bonuses and start snapping up assets from their cash-rich position while millions suffer? I'm not excusing excesses on either side - but in our rush to stake a position in this debate, let us not be blinded to the bigger picture. Nothing is solved that way.

 

As with nature, it's nice to erect a few walls and a roof to keep out the bad stuff too - not just let it blow through and wreak havoc however it will.

 

It's your choice: You can be an apologist for greed and excess, shrug your shoulders and call it "a force of nature" (which is easy enough to do when it's not your house that has been blown down); or you can be a champion of the suffering and downtrodden and vow to build a better more equitable system. Laissez Faire is not going to get you there. Laissez Faire is the law of the jungle, where "forces of nature" really do prevail. I have nobler aspirations for my country and society.

 

 

Very well put!

[Roadtrip]

I have nobler aspirations for my country and society.

 

And what would those "nobler aspirations" be? A planned economy? A command economy? In an effort to create a "more equitable system," please explain why it is noble for the government to take property (whether in the form of income or accumulated wealth) from party A and give it to party B. Otherwise, how else could you or the government reconcile a "more equitable system" that also respects and protects property rights? Or, are property rights a less-than-noble consideration in the grand scheme of your "nobler aspirations?"

[retro-man]

No - I have explained this before, I think property rights are very noble. Ownership contributes to stable, long-term communities and stewardship of place - which lead to a higher quality of life*. I just think more people ought to have a chance to own some of it - that's all. Our economy right now, compared to a generation or 2 ago, is on a trend toward a very few people owning all the wealth, and very many owning none. That's simply the way it is moving, there's no disputing that. There is a redistribution of wealth going on in this country. I will not re-post Warren Buffet's own words on that topic - you can look them up. The following have clearly and markedly decreased in this country in the last 2 generations:

1.) Income equality (in 1960 the average CEO earned 50X the average hourly worker, today it is something North of 600X I believe.

2.) Social and financial mobility from generation to generation (if you are born poor in Sweden today for instance, you are more likely to rise up out of poverty than you are if you are born poor in the US - despite their crushing taxes. How does the Cato Institute explain that one away?)

3.) Life expectancy - as mentioned above.

and many others: scientists graduated, patents awarded, etc. etc.

 

There are some "planned economies" in this world that are kicking our ass right now, and there are others that, even if not kicking our ass, are at least enjoying lower unemployment, longer lifespans, and greater social and economic mobility (things that our system is supposed to be providing).

 

 

 

* The Financial Elite aren't interested in this. They are interested in the interchangeability and commoditization of labor. They don't care if communities wither and die, if families are broken up and shipped apart, or just broken period. You are a unit of production - to be bought, sold, and shipped wherever you can do the most good (for their portfolios). I am not saying these people are all evil to the core. I'm just saying that it is very easy for them not to care. They see numbers. They don't see the suffering their "unearned income" causes. (Please contemplate that term and its meaning for a minute, because it pertains directly to this issue of taking from party A and giving to party B - only we are not talking about taking money in the form of taxes - we are talking about sweat and toil, and the hours of ones life that are being taken from the laborer and diverted into the pockets of the idle rich.) And they set up the game (because they control it) to pit you against the most destitute labor in the world, to see who is the hungrier and who will work the harder for them. And they export the pollution - the unbreathable air and the undrinkable water - to fatten their profits. And it's all a big game, to see how high they can get those numbers. Look, I enjoy a good steak too, but I probably wouldn't quite so much if I had to go out to the pasture and look into the big brown eyes of the creature that was going to be slaughtered to feed me. Maybe some of these "stakeholders" should have to do community service, like one weekend a month, helping foreclosed families whose jobs were off-shored pack what's left of their lives into boxes - just to connect some faces and stories with those numbers. Maybe, when they fly to China to check on their investments, they should have to stay in a factory dormitory instead of the Intercontinental.

Edited July 24, 2011 by retro-man

[Edstock]

And what would those "nobler aspirations" be? A planned economy? A command economy? In an effort to create a "more equitable system," please explain why it is noble for the government to take property (whether in the form of income or accumulated wealth) from party A and give it to party B. Otherwise, how else could you or the government reconcile a "more equitable system" that also respects and protects property rights? Or, are property rights a less-than-noble consideration in the grand scheme of your "nobler aspirations?"

Greedy people are so oblivious. They devoutly believe their good fortune is 100% their own creation, and that there are no other considerations. MINE! ALL MINE!

 

Well, maybe these fortunate people might pause and reflect that the biggest part of their good fortune was being born in the US, where they could take advantage of opportunities, like an educated work force courtesy of public education, like the state college system set up in the 19th century.

 

 

The concept of maybe paying back something to your country is anathema to the greedy. MINE! ALL MINE!

 

 

[xr7g428]

Maybe you and Edstock can form your own company and put your ideas to work.

 

Be careful what you ask for: You have to know that a lot of people are sick of hearing about how evil capitalism is and they are choosing not to participate. That means they are not investing. Count me in here both as a participant and a casualty. Who in their right mind whats to go through the pain and suffering of building a business so the results can be redistributed to a bunch of people who did not earn any of it.

 

Retro, sincerely, you are not cut out for self employment. You are so wrapped up in how things ought to be that you have lost touch with the fact that you are the one in charge. I think that you would be infinitely happier going to a job where you don't have to deal with the realities of the market. There are lots of government positions that you would be well suited to and they have great benefits.

 

Here is a link: Federal Government Architect

[retro-man]

Maybe you and Edstock can form your own company and put your ideas to work.

 

Be careful what you ask for: You have to know that a lot of people are sick of hearing about how evil capitalism is and they are choosing not to participate. That means they are not investing. Count me in here both as a participant and a casualty. Who in their right mind whats to go through the pain and suffering of building a business so the results can be redistributed to a bunch of people who did not earn any of it.

 

Retro, sincerely, you are not cut out for self employment. You are so wrapped up in how things ought to be that you have lost touch with the fact that you are the one in charge. I think that you would be infinitely happier going to a job where you don't have to deal with the realities of the market. There are lots of government positions that you would be well suited to and they have great benefits.

 

Here is a link: Federal Government Architect

Thanks xr7g428, but seriously I have never been happier than I have been working on my own for my own clients. I do wish I could expand to the point where I would have enough work for 2 or 3 people. That'd be nice - but maybe I can address that with shared space. A lot of people are doing that right now. Yes, I am an idealist. I have seen your record as a serial entrepreneur. I don't know if any of your enterprises have required "outside investors". When I bitch and moan about parasitic investors and "unearned income", I am not talking about someone who pours their heart and soul and ingenuity into an enterprise. They have, as many on the right are so fond of saying, "skin in the game". I am talking about "unearned income" on a different level - people whose sole purpose is to make loads of money off of somebody else's labor. Yes, a certain amount of investment is necessary to take certain businesses to the next level - yes, there is a legitimate price to be paid for, as David Korten terms it "the temporary use of their excess money". I am only criticizing the trend. If we could lead the world in every respect with a GINI coefficient of 35 in the 1960s, and now - when it is almost 45 (nearly converged with Mexico as a matter of fact) and our economy is in the worst shape since the 1930s, with millions out of work and in foreclosure - and only avoiding mass shantytowns precisely because of the protections put in place under Roosevelt - is it not legitimate to ask what the hell we have been getting for our trickle-down? Tax cuts in 2003, meltdown in 2007? WTF?

[Roadtrip]

Greedy people are so oblivious. They devoutly believe their good fortune is 100% their own creation, and that there are no other considerations. MINE! ALL MINE!

 

Well, maybe these fortunate people might pause and reflect that the biggest part of their good fortune was being born in the US, where they could take advantage of opportunities, like an educated work force courtesy of public education, like the state college system set up in the 19th century.

 

 

The concept of maybe paying back something to your country is anathema to the greedy. MINE! ALL MINE!

 

Here we have another glimpse into the mindset of leftists who are blinded by their ideology of class hatred -- that anyone who is successful or accomplished is therefore greedy.

 

And "maybe paying back something to your country" is not such a foreign concept to those evil, successful people.

 

According to the Tax Foundation, from data gleaned from the Internal Revenue Service, for the year 2008 (the most recent year for which data is available):

 

The top one percent of households (households making an Adjusted Gross Income of $380,354 or more) paid 38.02 percent of all federal income tax receipts.

 

The top 10 percent of households (with an AGI of $113,799 or more) paid 69.94 percent of all federal income tax receipts.

 

The top 25 percent of households (with an AGI of $67,280 or more) paid 86.34 percent of all federal tax receipts.

 

The bottom 50 percent of households (with an AGI of $33,048 or less) contributed 2.7 percent to total federal income tax receipts, while the top 50 percent contributed the remaining 97.3 percent.

 

http://www.taxfoundation.org/news/show/250.html#Data

 

What's more, not only do many of those in the bottom 50 percent pay zero income taxes, they receive additional revenue from those who do pay in the form of Earned Income Tax Credit.

 

So I put this to you, Edstock: Given that the top 10 percent of all income earners pay 70 percent of all federal tax receipts, how much more should they have to pay to satisfy your (quite frankly, absurd) concern that they are not paying back something to their country?

[retro-man]

LINK

 

If you look at all taxes - federal, state, local, payroll, you will get a different picture - particularly as a percentage of income.

Edited July 25, 2011 by retro-man

[Roadtrip]

LINK

 

If you look at all taxes - federal, state, local, payroll, you will get a different picture - particularly as a percentage of income.

 

OK. Thanks for the red herring. I'll put the same question to you: If the top 10 percent of all income earners pay 70 percent of all federal income tax receipts, how much more -- as a percentage of all federal income taxes -- should those top-10-percenters pay to satisfy you? 80 percent? 90 percent? 100 percent? 150 percent? (Hey, why not! It could pay down the deficit in no time!) Place yourself in the role of the official arbiter -- the gatekeeper -- and tell us how much more you would like to soak "the rich."

 

And then give us your rationalization as to why capital flight is a non-existent and meaningless threat to our economy. Should be interesting.

[retro-man]

Income earners should pay taxes in proportion to the income they earn. Somebody making $25k / yr., is going to pay a much higher percentage of their income on taxes (sales tax, gas tax, excise tax, payroll tax, etc.) than somebody making $25m / yr.. Capital flight exists because we allow it to, not because we cause it to. Companies grow big and rich here with workforces and educated in our public schools and state universities, light their offices and run their factories on our TVA power, transport their goods and employees on our Interstate highways, protect themselves and their earnings with our police and military, then first chance they get, offshore production and hide earnings in some third world or near third world hell-hole to avoid paying their share? Screw them. Anybody who makes their living in China should be living in China (oops..... that would include me at the moment...... - but at least I pay my taxes without whining like a little girl about it.)

 

However, back on topic, I don't believe anybody - public or private - should be fire-proof. In fact, there have been people that I wished would spontaneously combust ...... but it never happened.

[Edstock]

Here we have another glimpse into the mindset of leftists who are blinded by their ideology of class hatred

That's what you think. I am not blinded by any class hatred, because I don't care.

 

Really. It's not my problem, I'm just pointing out that these financial distortions have a social cost, however stridently you feel that the GOP way is the only way. I'm 62, single, no kids, so the future's all yours, have it your way. If you and the GOP want to give the rich even more of the pie, go for it. Maybe a good famine or a war and you can get rid of a lot of those nasty, rude, crude, ignorant poor people — they don't pay taxes, so use 'em for cannon fodder, whatever makes you feel good.

 

Yet the numbers show that everybody but that top 10% has been screwed over the last 30 years, and you think this is a good thing, and knee-jerk with "the Russians are coming!", when anyone suggests that a more equitable taxation system might benefit the society as a whole.

 

An indication of the new 3rd world financial set-up in the US is the decreasing social mobility over the last 30 years. It's never been easy to climb out of the poorhouse, but the GOP elite have gamed the system to make it even harder. Increasingly, "socialist" Europe is starting to offer better chances of upward mobility than the land of Horatio Alger. Sad.

 

MINE! ALL MINE!!!!

 

 

 

[retro-man]

As of 2006, US citizens had less economic mobility from generation to generation than citizens of France, Germany, Sweden, Canada, Finland, Norway, or Denmark. Danish citizens were 3 times more mobile than US citizens. Only the UK came in lower than us. And today, men in their 30s have less income than men in their fathers' generation. Families have more - that's because we have put all the womenfolk to work - however income growth for families is slowing down. Mind you, this is as of 2006. I'm pretty certain the situation has collapsed since then.

 

I am posting this link once again. It is an important document. READ IT oh blind ones.

 

LINK

 

It was a joint, non-partisan project, whose contributors included such left wing radical groups as the American Enterprise Institute and The Heritage Foundation.

 

The Economic Mobility Project is a unique non­ partisan collaborative effort of The Pew Charitable Trusts and respected thinkers from four leading policy institutes — The American Enterprise Institute, The Brookings Institution, The Heritage Foundation and The Urban Institute. While as individuals they may not necessarily agree on the solutions or policy prescriptions for action, each believes that eco­ nomic mobility plays a central role in defining the American experience and that more attention must be paid to understanding the status and health of the American Dream.

 

The study concludes:

One thing is clear. A society with little or no absolute mobility is one in which for every winner there is a loser. It’s a zero sum game (bolding mine). And a society with little or no relative mobility is one in which class, family background or inherited wealth loom large. Equal opportunity is a mirage. Recalling the three hypothetical societies, it is easy to envision why, for these reasons, high levels of both absolute and relative mobility are desirable. Society should strive for both.

 

But no, let's just keep shoveling all the money uphill and see how that works out.

Edited July 25, 2011 by retro-man

[xr7g428]

Retro, Far and away, the best predictor of individual mobility is the ability of the individual to start their own business. I doubt that you can find any one that thinks it is easier today than it was in the past. The problem is not Wal Mart. The problem starts at city hall, and then builds through every imaginable layer of government. When people are saying that government is the problem, this is what they are really talking about. They have probably just learned that there is no chance to start that new company in their garage, that they will be required to file more paper work than they can comprehend, and that the fees and permits will add thousands to the cost of start up. I just discovered that the permits and fees to build a patio cover will be several times the cost of the cover itself. Now how does that effect the guys that sell these things?

 

While I found the document interesting, it leaves out some huge details. In particular, it compares the earning of men, while not mentioning the HUGE change in the earnings of women. The other absolutely monstrous change is the nature of the households that are being compared. The number of single parent households today was unimaginable in 1990, and incomprehensible in 1970. Did you ever expect that children born and raised by their married birth parents would be in the minority? The liberation of the 60's comes with a few unintended consequences and a price to be paid.

[Edstock]

In particular, it compares the earning of men, while not mentioning the HUGE change in the earnings of women.

Canadian stats indicate that women still aren't paid anything like men in most salaried positions, receiving something like 25-30% less than their male co-workers for positions of equal seniority. Please supply details about this "HUGE" change.