Open Thread

Make that “Georgetown professor”. I’m thinking too much of my engineering work.

Sam;

Man, what has gotten into you? If you disagree with someone,you don’t have to make it personal.

As for the percentage of people paying the federal income taxes, please see this:

http://kenhoma.wordpress.com/2009/04/13/everyone-should-pay-income-taxes/

The man who wrote this article is a Georgetown processor. Is this guy an inbred moron too, or simply someone with whom you disagree?

As for the rich leaving NYC: guys who are rich have multiple residences. Take Trump, Bloomberg, Madonna, you name it. Sure, they’ll always have a pied-a-tere (sp?) in NYC, but will they set up shop here and pay the taxes? NYC used to be home of the great majority of the corporate headquarters of the Fortune 500. During the 60’s and 70’s, the city fathers had the same attitude: they’re not going anywhere, we can tax them as we wish. Well, they sure found out the hard way as GE, Texaco, Pepsi, Exxon, American Airlines and many,many others left.

legion: you are one sick little puppy.
get over it, pay your damn taxes, everybody pays taxes, ESPECIALLY the little people. I have paid taxes every year of my adult life, from when I was a student holding down part time jobs to now. If you really think most americans do not pay taxes you are living in a brainwashed never never land of inbred morons.
on another topic: the truly wealthy will NEVER leave NYC. Never. they may threaten like a three year old threatening to hold his breath, but they live and breathe for the social prestige, cachet, and ego-trip that only comes from being rich in gotham.
where would they go for a similar high? Chapel Hill? I don’t think so.

Just back from sending in my taxes. To add to Benson’s statement about having a “stake in government”, as a populace. It is well understood that the road to disenfranchisement in the running of government is for the people to become totally dependent on the government. Slopefarm, while pointing out the fact that many do pay taxes, misses the larger point about the role of government and taxes in our lives.
As I initially stated, the idea of taxes was originally intended to set up a central government to serve the states in the union better, by centralizing a national defense and maintaining roads for interstate commerce. Somewhere along the road from Paul Revere’s ride two hundred thirty three years ago to today, we are now expected to pay for the poverty problems of other sovereign nations, for the defense of half the planet from rogue dictators and for the lawyers of “enemy combatants” now entitled to constitutional rights while shouting “death to America”, all through our taxes.
What’s more, with president Obama’s latest budget and spending bills (spending more than all previous presidents combined in the first three months of office), we are assured to be dependent on big daddy government for generations to come.
This is a BAD thing, because it saps all incentive from people to achieve. It replaces the idea of arriving legally from another nation, driving a cab, buying that cab, then two more,then buying a fleet and starting an entire new company, in a single generation. Or perhaps inventing a new vaccine through venture capital, or perhaps walking on the moon (who will fund a mission to Mars now that we are too busy worrying if the baby boomers will get enough depends from their Advantage Medicare program). It replaces that dream with the tepid and soul crushing mediocrity of; you will get enough cheese and your teeth pulled in due time if you should require it.
Don’t believe me? You are all New Yorkers, ask a Russian about the old Soviet system. Don’t tell me you don’t know one, this is New York.

“Better to die on one’s feet, than live on one’s knees…”
Catch-22