toomuchtime_
Gold Member
- Dec 29, 2008
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hmmmm--We live in an economy where the idea is to earn money but if you do really well at it you have to give it back ??? Makes sense to me--not.
It's all a matter of perspective. If you've done really well, one could argue you've benefited more from the structures of society, government, that set the conditions for your success and other government structures help you protect your wealth so shouldn't you pay more to keep those government structures in place?
To me the relevant questions are how much do you have to pay so that everyone feels he/she has a stake maintaining the society and at what point are taxes taking so much money away from investment in the private sector that everyone begins to suffer?
Exactly. The term "wealth redistribution" is bandied about as evil. I don't think the framers had in mind by "We The People" a divided society of haves and have-nots.
The founding father would certainly have considered the idea of wealth redistribution, especially the redistribution of their wealth, evil. There were few paupers at the Constitutional Convention. Not only did they envision a society that contained haves and have nots, but they envisioned one and the Constitution they wrote provided for one, that contained have nothings, slaves.
They American dream they envisioned provided for equality of opportunity, not equality of outcome, a meritocracy in which talent and industry would be rewarded with power and wealth. They considered poverty evidence of moral deficiency and not paying your debts a crime almost the equal of robbery. While they would nave acknowledged a moral obligation to provide charity to the needy, they would have been appalled by the idea that anyone had a right to demand it.
However, these were practical men of affairs and they understood that for them to prosper and to protect their wealth there must be police and courts and a general currency and treaties to protect trade and roads, etc., and to provide these necessities taxes must be levied in such a way that, to put it succinctly, will not cause another armed rebellion, and that meant, in most cases that those who had the most to protect paid the largest share of the cost of maintaining the government. On the other hand, if the founding fathers had been presented with Obama's health insurance plan, there would have been a second American Revolution.