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Ldir

Platinum Member
Jul 23, 2003
2,184
0
0
I would challenge that. I think quite the contrary, in general the more successful you are, the more you've benefited from taxpayer-funded infrastructure and services. Consider roads, for example. If you are an ordinary worker, roads enable you to get back and forth to work. If you are a business owner, however, not only do they let you get to work, they enable your employees to get to work and your customers to get to wherever your products are offered. They allow your suppliers to deliver materials, and your shipping department to get products to market. The value a business owner gets from roads is compounded many times over.

The same applies to education, public safety, health services, utilities, etc. While individual workers get personal benefit from these services, business owners get compounded benefits. Your education qualifies you personally for a better job. But a good educational system ensures businesses have a steady supply of educated workers, thus helping them be profitable in the first place.

This is doubly true for our financial system, the courts, and the military. The average worker has modest need for a financial system, little more than basic banking. Businesses need a robust and diversified financial system (and of course that's a huge business in and of itself, creating amazing fortunes for a fortunate few). The court system is of only minor interest to most workers. Serving as a juror is likely the most common exposure to our courts for a good 95% of Americans. Businesses, in contrast, are relatively heavy users of our courts.

And then there's the military. While the military certainly provides some benefit to all Americans, it's really America's elite who gain the greatest benefit by far. Not only do they have the most to lose, but America's military is far more focused on protecting our business interests abroad than it is defending our homeland.

Finally, there's welfare. Ignoring corporate welfare, which directly benefits the businesses, there are various forms of welfare for individuals. Yes, they do directly benefit those individuals, at the expense of taxpayers. There is also an overall societal benefit, however, in providing a minimal standard of living to avoid widespread theft and civil unrest. Even more, for certain businesses like Wal-Mart, our welfare programs subsidize employers whose employees are so poorly paid they qualify. This puts money into the pockets of billionaires like the Walton heirs. They get a quite handsome return on their tax dollars.


I accept your argument about sincere disagreement, but that doesn't change that their motives are simple greed. That's not necessarily evil; we're all motivated by self interest to some extent. But society has no obligation to indulge greed, and those who have benefited so greatly from our extraordinary physical, financial, and educational infrastructure need to recognize they "didn't build that" all by themselves. Whether they want to acknowledge it or not, their great success was built in significant part due to the opportunities fostered by America's amazing system. That costs money, there are bills to pay, and it's not unreasonable for those who've built the greatest success to pay proportionately more for the privilege of building in our amazing system.

IMO, of course.

This. Someone gets it.
 

crashtestdummy

Platinum Member
Feb 18, 2010
2,893
0
0
Unless you're Kim Kardassian who released a sex tape or someone who won the lottery, you generally don't become rich by yourself in this country.

"If you used a cheap camcorder to film a sex tape, that--you didn't build that."

:biggrin:
 

dank69

Lifer
Oct 6, 2009
35,726
29,610
136
I feel the same way. I have a few friends who I hold in high regards, and they voted for Romney and fully believe in his agenda. We actually had several good discussions, and really, it boils down to this simple conclusion as I have observed:

Their conservatism is motivated by selfishness. They believe that under Obamacare and social welfare, people will not be able to break out of the middle class because the government is going to take all their money. They do not think about the country as a whole, and instead of viewing society with an altruistic eye, their views are more along the line of "don't take away the money I earned". I understand that part, because I would not want people taking my hard earned money and give it to some lazy slob with 8 kids. However, I have to question the word 'earned' because a lot of the CEOs in this country who became billionaires in this country off of the sweat and blood of the laborers that work under them.

Unless you're Kim Kardassian who released a sex tape or someone who won the lottery, you generally don't become rich by yourself in this country.
Haha, yep, taxes are what's keeping them from being millionaires. Lolconservatives.
 

Bowfinger

Lifer
Nov 17, 2002
15,776
392
126
Haha, yep, taxes are what's keeping them from being millionaires. Lolconservatives.
Indeed, that's always been one of the most ridiculous -- yet sadly effective -- myths of the right, that they would be wealthy too if only those damn taxes weren't holding them down. A little simple math exposes the con, yet people eat it up because the alternative, that they haven't done enough personally to become wealthy, is simply too unpalatable.
 

MooseNSquirrel

Platinum Member
Feb 26, 2009
2,587
318
126
Benghazi, the gift that never gave.

Solyndra, the scandal that never was.

Obama, the leftist that never existed.
 
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