The American Constitution

[Alan Klein]

Yep. it anchored the US in 1776.

Nothing has changed since 1776 or 3000 years ago.  The Rights of Man are eternal. 

[Alan Klein]

Perhaps I'm getting more cynical in my dotage, but it seems that constitutions and bills of rights, while fine aspirational (and inspirational) documents, are increasingly becoming works of fiction. Was it always that way?
By this I mean that in many countries the constitution is simply ignored by the rich, by corporations, and by governments when it gets in the way of their power. I include all of North and South America, and much of Europe. Can't speak for Asia or the Middle East.

You're right.  A Constitution has value directly in proportion to the respect it has from the people.  In many countries where the constitution is basically ignored, the people lose their rights.  One of the concerns I have, is that our Supreme Court that interprets the Constitution has become a political arm of the US government.  As more and more people see it making conclusions that appear based on political viewpoints, ignoring the constitution's original intent, the Court will lose is power and respectability.  It's decisions will be ignored.  We'll then become like those other countries.

[James Clark]

True, about the French revolution, Bart, but in relation to what I said, irrelevant. Didn’t matter what the people “wanted.” The fact is that they cheered the tumbrils as they rattled toward the guillotine. There’s always an ignorant mob waiting to pounce when they’re stirred up by political stirrers. Again: Salem witch trials and southern lynchings, to name just two of many examples. That's true democracy at work.

Indeed. 

https://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/413050-trump-rally-chants-lock-her-up-after-in-wake-of-bomb-threats-to

with more subtlety...

https://thehill.com/opinion/campaign/411765-conspicuous-irony-lecturing-to-a-trump-rally-against-mob-rule

[Slobodan Blagojevic]

... Then the 'third estate', that is paying all the taxes and who have to run multiple jobs to even earn a living wage, may attempt to pick one of these figureheads...

And... off he goes into a phantasy land. Bon voyage, Bart!

Top 10% pay 70% of all taxes.

[Alan Goldhammer]

Nothing has changed since 1776 or 3000 years ago.  The Rights of Man are eternal.

Wow, did you ever step in doo-doo with this post.  Of course it is a truism that women, until the 20th century, often had no rights at all.  Abigail Adams cautioned John about not including women when drafting the Constitution but was ignored.

[Slobodan Blagojevic]

Wow, did you ever step in doo-doo with this post...

Man, you are hard to push out, no matter how hard I try

[Jeremy Roussak]

Wow, did you ever step in doo-doo with this post.  Of course it is a truism that women, until the 20th century, often had no rights at all.  Abigail Adams cautioned John about not including women when drafting the Constitution but was ignored.

As Churchill observed in this context, man (or Man) embraces woman.

Jeremy

[rabanito]

Wow, did you ever step in doo-doo with this post.  Of course it is a truism that women, until the 20th century, often had no rights at all.  Abigail Adams cautioned John about not including women when drafting the Constitution but was ignored.

Now now, this is growing into a byzantine discussion.
I understand very well "man" as belonging to the humans species.
I go to the doctor, not to the "she-doctor", whatever gender she or he may belong to.

Look what happened in Harvard to professor Sullivan. One should be careful not to overdo it IMHO

[jeremyrh]

Nothing has changed since 1776 or 3000 years ago.  The Rights of Man are eternal.

Unless they're black, of course.

[James Clark]

Now now, this is growing into a byzantine discussion.
I understand very well "man" as belonging to the humans species.
I go to the doctor, not to the "she-doctor", whatever gender she or he may belong to.

Look what happened in Harvard to professor Sullivan. One should be careful not to overdo it IMHO

The point though, is that in 1789 that was NOT “well-understood,” just as slavery WAS “well understood” to mean that people who were literally owned by other people were worth precisely 3/5 as much when accounting for representation.   Which is why, (amongst other reasons) unlike Goldhammer, I absolutely do hold strict originalists in contempt, not only for their inevitable hypocrisy, but for their retrograde ideas that are inflexible when they shouldn’t be and flexible when politically convenient. 

Of course it’s not just originalists that are guilty of the latter, it’s just that they loudly trumpet such a moral base while doing so.

[Bart_van_der_Wolf]

And... off he goes into a phantasy land. Bon voyage, Bart!

Top 10% pay 70% of all taxes.

Do they? Any sources for that assumption? It does stand to reason that only paying a small percentage of one's sizeable income does amount to a sizeable amount of money, but it would remain a small percentage of income. For those with minimal free spending power, each tax dollar weighs more heavily.



The top 10% apparently do have 70% of the wealth, while the rest is having less and less. In fact, the bottom 50% have something in the order of 1% of the wealth ...
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/the-richest-10-of-households-now-represent-70-of-all-us-wealth-2019-05-24

And the gap is widening.

Cheers,
Bart

[Alan Klein]

Do they? Any sources for that assumption? It does stand to reason that only paying a small percentage of one's sizeable income does amount to a sizeable amount of money, but it would remain a small percentage of income. For those with minimal free spending power, each tax dollar weighs more heavily.



The top 10% apparently do have 70% of the wealth, while the rest is having less and less. In fact, the bottom 50% have something in the order of 1% of the wealth ...
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/the-richest-10-of-households-now-represent-70-of-all-us-wealth-2019-05-24

And the gap is widening.

Cheers,
Bart

Da, it is true Commissar.  Ve should take all the rich people's money and spread it around.  Dat seems like a fair solution.

[Alan Klein]

Unless they're black, of course.

A terrible decision that has haunted us since.  However, we fought a brutal Civil War over it, the Constitution was amended, corrected even when slaves were freed and blacks given equal status as were women allowed to vote in another Amendment.  The point is the Constitution was a brilliant document that limited government power and recognized the rights of man being innate.  The Amendment process allows the document to be improved.  No one said it was perfectly written but it left openings to be perfected.  Only God is perfect. What more can you ask of Man?

[Slobodan Blagojevic]

Do they? Any sources for that assumption? It does stand to reason that only paying a small percentage of one's sizeable income...

Yes. And it is not my assumption, just statistics. Look it up, it is easy. Your "small percentage" amounts for the 1%-ers to twice as much as all taxpayers pay.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-10-14/top-3-of-u-s-taxpayers-paid-majority-of-income-taxes-in-2016

[Bart_van_der_Wolf]

Your "small percentage" amounts for the 1%-ers to twice as much as all taxpayers pay.

As I said, that stands to reason, but you keep avoiding the simple fact that that still leaves them with a sizeable amount of free spending power, unlike the lower income brackets where every dollar counts. The formal definition is called "discretionary income". And things have not improved since 2016.

To put it in a French Revolution context, it's harder to be taxed a cow when you only have one cow than it is to be taxed a few cows when you already took a herd of cows from others.

Cheers,
Bart

[RSL]

As I said, that stands to reason, but you keep avoiding the simple fact that that still leaves them with a sizeable amount of free spending power, unlike the lower income brackets where every dollar counts. The formal definition is called "discretionary income". And things have not improved since 2016.

To put it in a French Revolution context, it's harder to be taxed a cow when you only have one cow than it is to be taxed a few cows when you already took a herd of cows from others.

Cheers,
Bart

Bart, you seem to believe that wealthy people rathole spendable cash away in their basements. You really need a serious course in economics.

If you start cleaning out wealthy people you’ll soon put an end to productivity because productivity requires investment. You evidently believe that capital is spendable cash. It’s not. It’s stuff like the machinery in an auto plant. If you don’t have capital investment you’re screwed. Communists (and I hope you’re not one of them, though I can't tell from your posts) believe that government can invest people’s money in a smarter, more productive way than individuals. They’ve managed to demonstrate the catastrophic fallacy of that idea over and over and over, but leftists still don’t believe it.

Believe it!

[kers]

..
Believe it!

Amen

[David Sutton]

Yes. And it is not my assumption, just statistics. Look it up, it is easy. Your "small percentage" amounts for the 1%-ers to twice as much as all taxpayers pay.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-10-14/top-3-of-u-s-taxpayers-paid-majority-of-income-taxes-in-2016

I think that data a bit misleading Slobodan. I looked up the Bloomberg article and then the 2016 data sheet it refers to.
Those earning $100,000 to $500,000 dollars in the US account for over 40% of tax payments.
Not including corporate tax.
The income from the $10,000,000 bracket looks impressive until you factor in what everyone else pays.
Then there is the issue of tax avoidance by the super wealthy, estimated at $200 billion yearly by someone who has number crunched data:
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2019-05-23/the-wealth-detective-who-finds-the-hidden-money-of-the-super-rich

Now I agree that the ultra rich are the wealth creators of society, but the problem is that the created wealth goes in their own pockets.
They don't do capital investment. Over the last 20 years I've seen little proper capital investment worldwide, apart from China. And even that may be debt funded, heaven help us.
What I have seen is that the greatest wealth generators for most folks are small business owners. It's the small business owners who provide the most jobs in most nations. They tend to strengthen social networks and give cities more resilience by paying rates and spending and employing locally.
I don't begrudge anyone their material goods, but IMHO you could get rid of the really wealthy and life would go on just as well, but lose sight of your small businesses and the values they represent, and watch your financial system head straight to 1929.

[Slobodan Blagojevic]

... the issue of tax avoidance by the super wealthy, estimated at $200 billion yearly...

Tax avoidance is completely legal and everyone who has ever filed taxes, including myself, is doing it to the fullest extent of the law. Tax evasion, however, is illegal.

Taking both into account, avoidance (legal) and evasion (illegal), doesn’t change the fact one bit that the rich pay the majority of income taxes. Add that to the the fact that about 45% of the population doesn’t pay income tax at all (that would be the lowest paid ones).

[David Sutton]

Tax avoidance is completely legal and everyone who has ever filed taxes, including myself, is doing it to the fullest extent of the law. Tax evasion, however, is illegal.

I see where you're coming from. What you call "tax avoidance", we tend to call tax minimisation. But "tax evasion" is, of course, what I meant. They're all somewhat weasel words.

Taking both into account, avoidance (legal) and evasion (illegal), doesn’t change the fact one bit that the rich pay the majority of income taxes. Add that to the the fact that about 45% of the population doesn’t pay income tax at all (that would be the lowest paid ones).

Taking into account those in the US who don't pay tax may shift the data.
But according to the IRS 2016 spreadsheet referenced and linked by the Bloomberg article, of those who pay tax, the "rich" pay the highest tax per head, but their total contribution is 8% of the total, while those who earn $100,000 to $500,000 contribute 43.9% of the total. Have a look at the source figures. Happy to be corrected.