Sir william gates

[Baron von Beer 0]

Denoir, you're a fiscal fairy? Well, I shall leave my tax forms under my pillow tonight, and I expect you to come leave a nice bag of cash in its place.

[m21man 0]

Quote[/b] ]Much more. I'm fiscally fairy conservative and I think Bill should keep his money.

The Tax Fairy!

[denoir 0]

Denoir, you're a fiscal fairy? Well, I shall leave my tax forms under my pillow tonight, and I expect you to come leave a nice bag of cash in its place.    

LOL. Ok. It was supposed to be "fairly"  

As I'm already writing something here, I might as well point out  that Bill won't be allowed to use the "Sir" title. It's reserved for British citizens. He will however be a "Knight Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire". Noted should be that this title was introduced in 1917, when there wasn't too much left of the Empire  

[Dauragon 0]

How about progressive fines?

http://www.cnn.com/2002/WORLD/europe/01/15/nokia.fine/index.html

103000USD speeding ticket, not bad.

wow finland is a f"cked up country

[denoir 0]

How about progressive fines?

http://www.cnn.com/2002/WORLD/europe/01/15/nokia.fine/index.html

103000USD speeding ticket, not bad.

wow finland is a f"cked up country

I'd say that it's a brilliant law. Fines are supposed to be an incentive not to break the law again. If they're too small, then you'll just ignore them. So making them proportional to the income is exactly the right thing.

[Koolkid101 0]

How about progressive fines?

http://www.cnn.com/2002/WORLD/europe/01/15/nokia.fine/index.html

103000USD speeding ticket, not bad.

wow finland is a f"cked up country

I'd say that it's a brilliant law. Fines are supposed to be an incentive not to break the law again. If they're too small, then you'll just ignore them. So making them proportional to the income is exactly the right thing.

I dunno what your smoking but 100 isn't small.

[OmniMax 0]

100 isn't small to you.

But some bighshot CEO to Nokia or Motorolla, it is.

Hm, interesting.

I suppose the money goes to gov't treasury anyway.

Ah, pull over more CEOs!

[denoir 0]

Koolkid101:

The 100k is with a income proportional fine system. Somebody earning less would pay a much smaller fine. And I'm saying that it is a good system.

What you are talkning about eludes me however. Where did I say that 100 was small? It all depends on your income and that's the whole point of such a system with fines that are proportional to your income.

[Tydium 0]

After appealing court lowered his fine to 35000 FIM which is approximately 5900 EUR

Source: Iltasanomat (In Finnish)

[EiZei 0]

How about progressive fines?

http://www.cnn.com/2002/WORLD/europe/01/15/nokia.fine/index.html

103000USD speeding ticket, not bad.

wow finland is a f"cked up country

I fail to see whats wrong with this. Too bad these got lowered though.

[crashdome 3]

I have to side w/ bn880 on this one.

There is absolutely no amount of work that one can do that is worth the amount of money he (and others) make annually. If you think he has worked hard for this, think again. It is a matter reinvestment. I imagine at one moment in his life he was working very hard and obtained a large sum of money. Now, he probably has multiplied the amount he (for arguments sake) "deserved" by simply "borrowing" it to his own company. He then maintains more profits from the other employees because of the amount he owns. If 2 billion people invested $10 into Microsoft and everyone received a $1 dividend for their investment - that is fair. To corner a company and buy all of it's stock to reap in $2 billion is in reality completely UN-necessary for basic survival and does nothing but prevent 2 billion people from earning $1.

His donations and charities all provide tax breaks, so if he gives out $1 million in charity he doesn't have to pay (up to) that amount in taxes.

Imagine I owe $5000 in taxes this year. Now, say that is 20% of my income ($25000). $500 is food and housing for one month for me. I can't get any cheaper housing without living *free* in a cardboard box. I couldn't even afford a home. Now pretend 20% of Bill's income of (let's just say $2 billion) is what he owes in taxes. That is $400 million. As much as that is probably his housing and food for a month, he could easily return that $400 million in investments/donations without lifting a finger. He could even perhaps lower his living standards without even noticing a difference. I would be taxed a much larger sacrifice for less good ($500 wouldn't buy the gov't a box of pencils) yet Bill would be worry free and own 10 houses, 40 cars, and be set for his next 10 lives. If you think that is fair, you have got to be kidding me.....

I agree that my $500 and his $400 million are purchasing the same amount of gov't services for him and I, but one months worth of my food and rent versus a fraction of the homes and cars he already owns???

[Stag 0]

EDIT: I do believe inventions and good services/products should be rewarded, but not like this (1 person owning millions of others), however this new Knighthood is a plus.

And how could you possibly reward somebody to that extent? Mediocre rewards produce mediocre results. Somebody may be prepared to work their asses off for peanuts, but nobody with the brains to be really effective. Kalashnikov lives near the poverty line today; a fat lot of use being called a Hero of the Soviet Union did him.

Meanwhile his basic design has remained unchanged since 1945. Basic soundness has a lot to do with that; but could it be that the incentive to produce something truly revolutionary isn't there?

EDIT2: You know, I have lived under both, Communism and Capitalism, and to speak purely on the conceptualization of both, I would have an easier life under communism if it was not corrupted.  On the other hand US Capitalism is corrupted so...  heh

Yes, well the unfortunate fact of life is that conceptualizations are just that; and don't last 5 seconds once applied to human beings. there has NEVER been a successful socialist government of any significance. it's all turned to crap, and that includes Chile, if you intend to cite that as an example. It wasn't the Americans that threw that guy out, it was the Chileans. You can claim all the conspiricies you like, but at the end of the day, that's the fact, not the conceptualization. "If it was not corrupted?" if that was the least bit possible we wouldn't have needed some clueless old fart of a theoretician to lay down the rules of Socialism. We'd just do it.

EDIT3:  It is not usually the best inventions/minds that get the enormous rewards in pure capitalistic systems, it is the best business man.  Does anyone here really think we should be rewarding business oriented people more than say scientists?  I sure as hell do not.

Scientists get knighthoods too. Businessmen tend to make their own rewards as far as cash goes.

Good night, I will dream of the responses    

I dream of the day when people will realise what a load of bullshit pure Communism/Socialism is and get on with a more realistic life.

[denoir 0]

there has NEVER been a successful socialist government of any significance. it's all turned to crap

I think that's overstating the facts a bit. Mostly because no system is completely socialist or completely raw libertarian capitalism.

If you define a socialist government as a government where a socialist party is in power, then you're very wrong. More than half of Europe has social-democratic parties in power right now. Plus, socialism has affected all our political systems the last century. Even if you look at the most hard-core right wing parties, there are few that would for instance completely like to abolish social security. Equally, there are very few in the world today who are suggesting that a command economy is a good idea. Even communist countries such as China or Cuba are transforming into market economies.

The general opinion today is that a mix between socialist and capitalist principles is desirable. People disagree however on the ratio. USA for instance is leaning far more in the capitalist direction than for instance Europe.

Sweden is a good example of a working socialism/market economy merging. The social democratic party has been regularly elected for almost 70 years now (with a couple of years of non-socialist rule now and then). We have an income tax so high you'd think it's mother had been rogered by an omnibus. Our government is spending so much money on its self-administration and spending it so badly that they make Nick Leeson look like a brilliant investor.

I'll give you an example. You have three levels of government in Sweden: national, district and county. The county administration is responsible for two things: medical services and public transportation. The county here in Stockholm has an annual budget of 4 billion euros. 2 billions are used up on county administration.

Ok, those are the bad things. The good thing is that we have an excellent educational system, public health care, social security etc We have a 99.999% literacy rate, the highest in the world. Less than 0.01% of our population is below the poverty line (compared to about 13% in USA). We have a very good national economy and are one of the very few countries in the world that doesn't have any debts at all. We give most help to underdeveloped countries per capita.

At the same time we have a regular capitalist market-economy. The big difference there is that there is a serious protection of employee rights. Unions are very strong and work tightly with the government and the industry. As a result of that, your employer can't just fire you at will. Also, we have for instance a minimum five weeks paid vacation (six weeks is actually the standard now).

I used to be very critical about the Swedish system, until two-three years ago when the current EU-USA tensions began. I took a long hard look at our system, compared it with the American and decided that for all its flaws that a dose of socialism was healthy and that our system was so much more humane. I'd still never vote for the socialists, as it goes against every bone in my body, but I've certainly gone far more to the left than I was before. I do disagree with the concept of a big-brother state which presumes it can think for all its citizens, but I'm equally not fond of of catch as can  principle of laissez faire as implemented in the US. The society needs to provide protection for its citizens, especially for the weakest ones. There is no need at all for people to live in poverty, as the society has more than enough resources to give everybody a decent life, reardless of their situation. This has to be balanced so that work performance and ambitions are rewarded.

[Stag 0]

I stand Corrected. There's never been a successful Socialist government or "Capitalist" government, for that matter, where the democratic process has been overidden.

A dose of socialism is healthy, I agree. I'll hazard a guess there's a fair few Swedish millionares around as well though, and they are not taxed up to their eyeballs.

But anyone who thinks that extreme polarity of either Capitalism or Socialism has any chance of survival is living in cloud-cuckoo land.  An extreme Socialist government which attempted to put limits on the capitalist sector would go one of two ways; Either piss off the populace so much that they rose up and threw the socialists out, Or piss off the populace so much that they'd have to shoot a few thousand or so just to keep them in line. If things are sooo good under Communism, how come shitloads of people were trying to get out of it? I can't seem to recall boatloads of our Commies trying to get across the border to the USSR. Man, I really wish they'd tried.

Extreme capitalism wouldn't last much longer either. Take the French and Russian Revolutions as the truth of that. it's patently obvious that the best solution is a balance between the two.

IMO, Picking on people like Bill Gates or Richard Branson is just another bullshit diversion; find someone to blame for the worlds ills, and say things would be different if "You" had "Your" way.

For all their money, it wouldn't be a drop in the ocean compared to what would really be needed to put the world to rights.

[CrunchyFrog 0]

there's nothing money can't buy

............... except for a secure version of Microsoft Windows.

Isnt that what microsoft just invested alot of money in, to make windows more secure...?!

[turms 0]

Quote[/b] ]There's never been a successful Socialist government

Cuba?

edit:Oh btw, communism and cosialism are 2 diffrent things

[crashdome 3]

But anyone who thinks that extreme polarity of either Capitalism or Socialism has any chance of survival is living in cloud-cuckoo land.

I don't think anyone suggested the idea (or did I miss something again?).

IMO, Picking on people like Bill Gates or Richard Branson is just another bullshit diversion; find someone to blame for the worlds ills, and say things would be different if "You" had "Your" way.

Bill isn't the world's big problem. This nonsensical notion that the worlds democracies are currently working just dandy and the larger nation's economies are doing fine is the problem.

I still say higher taxes for higher incomes. I've seen people work 12 hours a day for less than needed to live on. perhaps they are not working hard enough? Perhaps Bill is "Super-Laborman"!

[Stag 0]

But anyone who thinks that extreme polarity of either Capitalism or Socialism has any chance of survival is living in cloud-cuckoo land.

I don't think anyone suggested the idea (or did I miss something again?).

Seems to me that that was Bn880's idea of heaven.

IMO, Picking on people like Bill Gates or Richard Branson is just another bullshit diversion; find someone to blame for the worlds ills, and say things would be different if "You" had "Your" way.

Bill isn't the world's big problem. This nonsensical notion that the worlds democracies are currently working just dandy and the larger nation's economies are doing fine is the problem.

I still say higher taxes for higher incomes. I've seen people work 12 hours a day for less than needed to live on. perhaps they are not working hard enough? Perhaps Bill is "Super-Laborman"!  

I know very well how well democracy works. And I also know very well how the alternatives don't. Higher taxes for hgher incomes? Good idea. Not even particularly new. But when talking of stripping any successful entrepreneur of the majority of his earnings, you're going to be destroying their incentive to work and create thousands upon thousands of jobs. If all you have to show for creating multi-national success is a pat on the head from unrealistic cretins, why put yourself out? Sit on your ass or do the barest minimum, and you will achieve exactly the same result, only without the pat on the head.

[crashdome 3]

Quote[/b] ]But when talking of stripping any successful entrepreneur of the majority of his earnings, you're going to be destroying their incentive to work and create thousands upon thousands of jobs.

I don't see how?

The majority of earnings for the highest 10% are not based on work related income? Also, I did express that the investment into business (i.e. your idea of job creation) can be supplemented by small amounts of investments spread out amongst more numerous people. It is no different than one person investing all of his/her money. The difference is in how many people benefit and by how much.

If you know how well democracies work, you are aware of the numerous failed democracies and corrupt governments there are in this world then?

[Stag 0]

Quote[/b] ]But when talking of stripping any successful entrepreneur of the majority of his earnings, you're going to be destroying their incentive to work and create thousands upon thousands of jobs.

I don't see how?

The majority of earnings for the highest 10% are not based on work related income? Also, I did express that the investment into business (i.e. your idea of job creation) can be supplemented by small amounts of investments spread out amongst more numerous people. It is no different than one person investing all of his/her money. The difference is in how many people benefit and by how much.

The thing is, that Gates or Branson didn't start in the highest 10% of earners. they got there by working towards it. I can really see that much effort being put into something if the person who is the driving force gets the same share is the cretin who's there to spout good Socialist dogma. But given time, such a company will produce something that everyone can use... like the Trabant.

If you know how well democracies work, you are aware of the numerous failed democracies and corrupt governments there are in this world then?

Proportionally a hell of a lot less than "Pure Socialist Utopias" that have gone tits up.

[Stag 0]

Quote[/b] ]There's never been a successful Socialist government

Cuba?

edit:Oh btw, communism and cosialism are 2 diffrent things

And I wonder what will happen there when Castro dies?

[drewb99 0]

another Ghost Recon expansion

[m21man 0]

Quote[/b] ]Cuba?

A wonderful place to be! As long as you can leave...

[crashdome 3]

Quote[/b] ]The thing is, that Gates or Branson didn't start in the highest 10% of earners. they got there by working towards it. I can really see that much effort being put into something if the person who is the driving force gets the same share is the cretin who's there to spout good Socialist dogma. But given time, such a company will produce something that everyone can use... like the Trabant.

The idea is to eliminate that top (current)10% of wealthy because of the large gap there is. I cannot and will not believe they would have worked less for $200 million than for $20 billion. I know that there will always be a top 10%, but can we keep it from being top 10% = 99% of the wealth of the world.

Your arguments against socialism are to the extreme and I cannot imagine that extreme capitalism is any different - it's called a "monopoly".

Keep in mind I am simply arguing that a higher tax rate on higher incomes actually does more than "spread the wealth" and I believe an economy with such a policy isn't strictly "socialist" because of that.

Quote[/b] ]Proportionally a hell of a lot less than "Pure Socialist Utopias" that have gone tits up.

You have numbers? Based on your definition of a socialist nation that you stated above, I bet you'd be very surprised. There wasn't many "Pure Socialist Utopias" that I remember.

[bn880 5]

But anyone who thinks that extreme polarity of either Capitalism or Socialism has any chance of survival is living in cloud-cuckoo land.

I don't think anyone suggested the idea (or did I miss something again?).

Seems to me that that was Bn880's idea of heaven.

I'm just going to say you need to relax a bit. I am not the issue, I am neither bullshitting or thinking of heaven. Well I am thinking of heaven as in space exploration, but wtf can I do without 40 billion dollars. ;) Bill, that dumb f***. Anyway...

I am not even picking on Bill, i talk of Bill to meet everyone here on the same playing field, I have other experiences with wealthy people. The whole point is, I am stating facts, being when you create people with that much capital, you will also create a gap and a bunch of poor guys. So I would like to see how one person can have say 40million bucks, or 40 billion, and at the same time how everyone in Asia in Africa can be fed if this money is invested in large corportations interested in more profit?