An article by the mysterious “Tyler Durden” focuses on the political dilemma. About 48% of the population is on welfare of some kind.
We want to see the welfare state rolled back. Voters say they do — bit not for the programs that help them.
Government benefits total 65% of the federal budget — not the military, federal courts, or the FBI. We are talking about $2.5 trillion, or 15% of the GDP.
How do we persuade voters to wean themselves from the federal milk cow?
And yet some people out there still think these people, long since indoctrinated to do little but mooch off the welfare state (which will continue subsidizing its existence so long as debt rates are so low that the government can issue trillions each year without fears of consequences) will halt their iTunes purchases, will voluntarily stop subsisting on the government’s teat, or will rebel against a government which is their only source of income? Why? Especially since something tells us that there will be a peculiar overlap between this 50% and the 50% of Americans that pay zero taxes.
They do pay taxes. The pay sales taxes. They pay Social Security taxes (FICA). They just don’t pay income taxes.
He includes some good charts. We can see the huge increase in direct payments. These charts are worth the price of admission.
But there is still the question. How can we persuade people to vote for politicians who will cut their payments? The answer ids clear: we can’t.
This means that deliverance will either not come or else come through a Great Default. I think it will be the latter. Washington’s checks will finally bounce.
simply: you don't pay taxes, you don't vote. watch as the entitlement democrat party withers away!
Sound good to me ! Does that include senior citizens on social security with minimum incomes ?
I agree completely with the article. But there's one important aspect of this that wasn't mentioned. This outcome (of roughly half of the people receving more tax money than they pay in) was acheived largely thru tax CREDITS. What conservative could be against a tax credit? Let people keep more of their money, right? This seems to have been a brilliant strategy (whether conscious or not) to accomplish permanent income redistribution; and one that I also don't see how we can ever recover from.
Flat tax, get rid of the IRS, felons and welfare recipients have no right to vote because their judgement is highly questionable, not to mention illegal aliens who ARE illegally voting, and go from there. No more buying the votes of parasites.
Here is the entire problem in a famous quote:
A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves largesse from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates promising the most benefits from the public treasury with the result that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy, always followed by a dictatorship. The average age of the world's greatest civilizations has been 200 years.
Fair tax or Flat tax is better than what we have now! That is what I would call "TAX REFORM"!!!
Obama says everyone should pay their fair share. I would ask him, what would be the fair share of the %50 that pay no "TAXES"????
Actually there is a way to get them to vote against their benefits. Many Democrats. like many Republicans, are 1 or 2 issue voters. The candidate must key into issues that attract voters that are non-fiscal issues.Republicans do that all of the time during their own presidential primaries, they just do not think about doing that to Democrats. Libertarianism, the philosophy of our Founding Fathers, works best for hitting key issues for Democrats, even though Libertarianism is Far-Right on the conservative scale. Peace is a good Democrat issue, as is freedom. Ron Paul hits many issues that draw Democrats very well.
robert…….Why would you ask such a stupid question……..seniors are NOT on welfare just because they collect social security, most have paid into the fund…….concentrate on the issue………that is, deadbeats who only have their hand out.
That is what will be the wake up call for all these people that are on welfare and don't really have to be….when all the checks stop, because the piggy bank runs out of money!!!!! The USA will be a third world country and then what? Keep your lead dry and in large supply, it will hit the fan in large chunks.
Why are 47% not paying taxes? There's a combination of reasons: Bush's tax cuts enabled those who were on the fringe of paying taxes not to pay any because of increased credits given out by Bush and Obama, a huge recession meant a lot of people that were working full-time are now working part-time or not working at all (you don't pay taxes if you're not making money), and then there are the wealthy who can avoid paying taxes by putting their money in municipal bonds or in off-shore accounts. In addition, I don't consider those like hedge fund managers and others living off their investments and paying only 15% in taxes to be paying taxes. So there are a lot of people not paying taxes — not just the poor.
If it were up to me, we would get rid of Bush's tax cuts and everyone who be paying some taxes (unless you're out of work).
Tea Party Fight Coming…. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SKkDHiZ2fOU&fe…
Union Violence Against Tea Party http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YKkahXJ8BdY&fe….
A Fair tax or Flat tax would be fine; if you make sure that there are no back door loop holes!
I'm a conservative/libertarian but I have constantly wondered why repubs keep bringing abortion or other personal liberties issues into the argument. You're right, you could divide an conquer with one or two issues, 1 or 2 issues that in the bigger scheme of things don't mean anything.
Abortion is a choice between a woman and her greater power. Someday she'll have to face the music. It is NOT for our government to decide, and our govn't should stay the hell out of it.
Since conservatives claim to be all for fiscal responsibility, why is it I almost never see any call from the (wrong) Right to end CORPORATE welfare? This squanders a significantly larger portion of our nation's budget than any kind of public assistance. Plus the added "benefit" that NONE of the corporate welfare does the economy any good while PUBLIC assistance generates at LEAST $1.40 for every dollar doled out. This actually stimulates the economy where corporate welfare is just one of the anchors preventing forward movement. Some of the others?: Issa, Cantor, Boehner, McConnell, y'know… the ones KEEPING corporations on welfare and continually threatening to further to tank the economy (again) if we don'y give in to their hissy fits. Traitors.
Stopping America's thirty-year slide into third-world status has a simple solution: repudiate the fallacy of and destruction caused by supply-side economics and stop voting for those who won't.
Wow. Logic. Facts. Clear thinking. I'm surprised we get through. I wonder how much longer that'll last.
A flat tax is inherently unfair. At 10% someone making $10,000/yr then nets $9,000/yr. Take out $650/mo for rent leaves $200/mo for food, gas, car insurance, etc. And if/when the car breaks down? Needs new tires? God help the poor guy. Your boy R-money gets over $20,000,000/yr. Doing nothing productive. Do you really think that Willard will be hurting as much from paying out that $2,000,000 in taxes? Somehow I doubt it will make much difference in whether he should eat or make a car insurance payment. Call it a hunch.
There is no reliable record of Alexander Tytler's having made the statement. In fact, this passage actually comprises two quotations, which didn't begin to appear together until the 1970s. Not only that, it is factually inaccurate. Even a BRIEF search would have shown an intelligent person that.
Good luck finding anyone who pays NO taxes. You'll need a vivid imagination pumped up by more hallucinogens than you're on now.
End supply-side economics. That's all that's required.
Tea Party’s Dilemma: ___% of Tea Partiers Are on the Dole
I must have failing eyesight to go with my lack of intelligence. Please document here where I attributed this quote to Alexander Tytler or any author for that matter. If it is as you say, the combination of two passages into one passage it certainly does not negate the validity of it's enduring acclaim.
p.s. I don't hide behind a screen name, my real name is here and I am easy to find thru google or facebook.
What about the baby who is being murdered, Infidel? Who stands up for the baby's right to life? Who protects the baby that cannot protect itself?
Last year I was sick with cancer and could not work. I still made about 20k and paid 10% Federal income tax after rebate so the Idea that 48% do not pay taxes means they work for the government or not at all ! Show the proof and not the BS !
Having a doctor as a friend would not hurt either ! Gold will be worthless !
Exhausted and ill from the effort of enacting the Obama healthcare plan, an elderly Senator goes to the doctor. Doctor says, "I have bad news, good news, and bad news, Senator. The bad news is that you only have six months to live. But the good news is that there’s an operation that is 100% successful in curing this illness." "That sounds great, Doctor," says the Senator, "but what’s the other bad news?" The Doctor replies, "The Department of Health and Human Services says the first available slot is seven months from today."
The $50 Lesson
Recently, while I was working in the flower beds
in the front yard, my neighbors stopped to chat
as they returned home from walking their dog.
During our friendly conversation, I asked their
little girl what she wanted to be when she grows up.
She said she wanted to be President some day.
Both of her parents, liberal Democrats, were standing
there, so I asked her, "If you were President what
would be the first thing you would do?"
She replied… "I'd give food and houses to all
the homeless people."
Her parents beamed with pride!
"Wow…what a worthy goal!" I said. "But you don't
have to wait until you're President to do that!" I told her.
"What do you mean?" she replied.
So I told her, "You can come over to my house and
mow the lawn, pull weeds, and trim my hedge, and
I'll pay you $50. Then you can go over to the grocery
store where the homeless guy hangs out, and you
can give him the $50 to use toward food and a new
house."
She thought that over for a few seconds, then she
looked me straight in the eye and asked, "Why
doesn't the homeless guy come over and do the
work, and you can just pay him the $50?"
I said, "Welcome to the Republican Party."
Her parents aren't speaking to me.
What these people don't understand no matter who they vote or in Nov. they will remain on the welfare rolls, food stamps etc. that will not change. But I hope it will be harder to get on the rolls and the Gov. will investigate those applying more carefully, legally here or immigrants, urine test for drugs, trade school for the young men or mother on the rolls and babysitter until she finished and birth control to control size of family, you will never get off of welfare if you have 6-10 kids on welfare, time for the Gv. to go after the men who fathered these children. No father's name no welfare. ( and stop those life time career students who can't seem to find a profession that suits them and take job training or college course after college course to find themselves at taxpayer expense.).
Why aren't 47% paying taxes: I'm retired on SS and my husband, with a small income from mutual funds.
We pay no taxes on SS or income on retirement funds. We paid our taxes and saved. We are part of the 47%.
We paid our taxes when we only earned $5,000 a year in early 1960's, yes that was a long time ago.
as we made more money, we paid taxes on earnings of $15,000, $20,000, $30,000, $40,000
and used our deductions allowed by law. Even as a small business owner we paid our taxes on income,
bought equipment, and used whatever deductible allowed by law, and we still paid our taxes.
The last 3 years have been hell trying to stay in business, many companies we had business with closed,
or buying minimum of supplies to stay in business.
So as of May1st , 2012, I will no longer be a scrap goat for the many regulations, rules, high business taxes, inventory taxes, overhead, corp. fees, I will let 5 people go, none want to buy the business & prefer to take chances on a no jobs market available and collect unemployment.
So that will be 7 people not paying into SS or paying taxes in 2012/2013
It is obvious that this article did not get proofread as well as spell checked. I love Gary North articles but, somehow, this one slipped through.
The end is near for governments and civilizations. The world over, under the oceans, over the lands, under the jungles, and under the deserts that cover one third of the continents [and are growing some 40 square miles daily] ruins of ancient cities can be found. What distroyed the majority of them? Perhaps a growing lazy population that relied on their governemnt to protect, maintain and provide for them. One would think that once a civilization formed, it would maintain itself. No, 65 percent of the federal budget is for benefits, and some 50 percent of the people pay no income tax. How long will this last until America goes the way of prior countries and civilizations. America was a land of savages – and again will become a land of savages, as it has so many times before.
Social Security was initially an insurance fund. You paid into it, you got some form of benefit from it. But, the Demoncratz changed a good deal of that, and put many parasitical programs on it, and have stolen from the fund for decades. __Are there people sucking off the Federal teat through SSI and the SSDI programs? You bet your gluteus maximus they are. But it's the incredible entitlement programs which are the real culprits, the Food Stamp fraud alone is noted at nearly a billion dollars, but that's only the government estimate. (The real costs, as per Fed Gov typical analysis, is much much higher). The welfare fraud, the WIC programs, the underwriting of asinine loans to Demoncrat backers, the entire establishment of much of Washington D.C. has its foundation in corruption. It's all a house of cards and will crash. Someone famous told us not to build our houses on sand.