orcrist
@orcrist@lemm.ee
- Comment on What good thing just happened in your life? 1 day ago:
First time today … meaning after that more times today?
- Comment on Is it really possible to tax the rich? 2 days ago:
There are already large numbers of treaties in place for countries to cooperate in tracking down tax evasion. It might not be as expensive as you think. If you think of it from a practical standpoint, we have lists of the richest people in the world. That’s an excellent starting point, isn’t it?
If some billionaire is claiming that they actually aren’t a billionaire, and that the lists are wrong, when some government is trying to tax them at an exorbitant rate, it’s likely that they will give all of their banking details to said government to prove it. Or they will hide those banking details, and they’ll be forced to pay the taxes.
- Comment on Is it really possible to tax the rich? 2 days ago:
In point of fact, mark to market taxation already does exist for various individuals and certainly for large numbers of businesses. Your long comment suggests that you don’t know what that is, and if you’re interested you could read up on it.
The short story is that depending on the situation, a person or a business might pay taxes each year on the value of their assets, assuming said assets had been purchased on January 1st and sold on December 31st, even though in reality nothing was bought or sold. This system is already in place in various ways. It exists. There’s no theoretical problem with expanding it.
- Comment on Is it really possible to tax the rich? 2 days ago:
Of course that’s not true. We have data from around the world showing it’s not true. It’s not even true within the United States if you look at state taxes.
- Comment on Is it really possible to tax the rich? 2 days ago:
Why are you arguing against reality? In the world today, some states and countries tax the rich at higher or lower rates than other states and countries, and it’s certainly not true that the rich all leave the high tax rate places. The data doesn’t lie. You can argue about why they don’t all leave, but the facts are there for you to see.
You don’t need uniformity around the United States or the world in order to tax the rich effectively. But people like to say what you said, so that you don’t even try to tax them.
But I think it would be fun to run an experiment. Why don’t we jack up taxes on the ultra-rich across the United States. If the ultra rich move to Venezuela, then all of the savings they have in the US stock market will be taxed at an even higher rate and we will actually get more money from them. And if they were working any cushy CEO jobs, those jobs will now be open for other American citizens, and I’m sure there were plenty of people willing to apply… Of course it doesn’t have to be the US. Pick any country, try the same experiment, and get back to us.
- Comment on US Elections question: Bernie Sanders said that the Democrats abandoned the working class, and the working class abandoned them. How is this true? 1 week ago:
Ah, but didn’t Biden throw the train union under the bus? I think he did. And neither Biden nor Obama pushed to raise the minimum wage to a living wage, and also to key it to the cost of living.
Even though Biden’s regulators did take some positive action, a lot of that was this calendar year. Why did he wait so long? A cynic would say he didn’t believe in what he was doing, but even a non-cynic would say that it was a bad way to campaign, because you can’t erase 3 years of incompetence with 1 year of regulation.
- Comment on US Elections question: Bernie Sanders said that the Democrats abandoned the working class, and the working class abandoned them. How is this true? 1 week ago:
It’s not hard to explain. It’s not about vibes. The DNC is pro-corporate, which means they’re anti-worker. They push few policies that benefit the average person.
Take the housing plan, for example. Raise the limit on the tax break for first-time home owners. Is that good? Sure it’s better than nothing, but if a home that used to cost $200K now costs $800K, an extra $30K won’t make it affordable. But more money might help the banks a little bit. Or take the federal minimum wage. It should be $25, but it’s not, because the DNC just doesn’t care, and they never will.
- Comment on US Elections question: Bernie Sanders said that the Democrats abandoned the working class, and the working class abandoned them. How is this true? 1 week ago:
Maybe so, but if it’s guaranteed shittiness vs. possible improvement, obviously people will make their own decisions about gambling.
I think it’s a bad gamble, but I understand it. And also, one major point is that many people think “it’s going to suck either way, fuck it, I’m staying home”.
- Comment on US Elections question: Bernie Sanders said that the Democrats abandoned the working class, and the working class abandoned them. How is this true? 1 week ago:
Of course you didn’t provide your own. That’s typical, sadly enough. We all know there are varying definitions, and if you’re going to undercut someone else’s, which may be a reasonable thing to do, why not bring yours to the table? … But only if you care to continue the conversation.
- Comment on Can Trump pardon himself even though he did criminal stuff outside of office? 1 week ago:
It’s legally unclear if he’s able to pardon himself for state crimes. He’s the president of the United States, not the president of New York.
But I hope he tries to pardon himself for anything, just so we can get this before the Supreme Court, because I think they would side with him but I sure want to see it play out. In reality he’s in such bad health and so old that I think he’s probably going to die before he would face any prison time, so the best we can hope for is that the Supreme Court makes greater fools of themselves, or somehow miraculously surprises us and does the right thing, which I don’t expect but you know it’s theoretically possible.
- Comment on Serious statement: I don't understand the argument that not voting for Harris was the morally correct thing to do, because of Gaza. Why does anyone believe this? 1 week ago:
What Harris could have done is besides the point. What she did and didn’t do is a matter of record.
But look, focus on what I wrote. If it’s your friend or family member then of course you are going to have a simple and strong reaction. It’s fine to try to explain away the badness, and there is some truth to what you wrote, but if someone just lost their cousin, or their daughter’s house was just bombed, they aren’t going to listen to you. That’s natural; that’s reality.
- Comment on Serious statement: I don't understand the argument that not voting for Harris was the morally correct thing to do, because of Gaza. Why does anyone believe this? 1 week ago:
I said the same thing about people like you before the election, and I’ll repeat it again. The laser focus on single issue voters was and will always be mostly an excuse to blame someone else.
To look at it another way, if this one issue actually decided the election, why didn’t Harris change her strategy two months ago? … Maybe it’s because this wasn’t the determining issue. Or it was, and her staff was incompetent. Take your pick.
- Comment on Serious statement: I don't understand the argument that not voting for Harris was the morally correct thing to do, because of Gaza. Why does anyone believe this? 1 week ago:
If you have a friend or family member, living or dead in Palestine, how could you vote for her? Even knowing Trump would probably be worse, it’s hard to imagine the pain it would cause to choose her name, knowing what she supported, and would have continued to encourage.
(Others mentioned other reasons, and I won’t repeat theirs.)
- Comment on How do Americans win their country back? 1 week ago:
I think that is an oversimplification. He won the popular vote, but that’s the majority of voters, not the majority of people, right? So we cannot accurately say that the majority is fascist. We can only say that the voting majority is fascist.
And then we need to look at who was conned, and how. Of course people who got conned need to work harder to avoid that in the future. We all agree on that. At the same time, the con artists and the people who enable the con, we also need to identify them and figure out what’s making them successful. If we talk about major newspapers and TV networks failing to cover how bad Trump actually was, or putting Harris on unrealistic pedestal, newspaper owners refusing to allow newspaper editors to endorse a candidate, the way Fox News preys on people who grew up trusting TV news and now have only watched Fox for the last two decades, open lies about who’s eating cats and dogs, a DNC that pushes centrist candidates even after 2016 when the weakness was exposed, and it’s clear that many left-wing voters are wildly unhappy, those are all things that smaller groups have done to help create the situation that we saw yesterday. And that’s just a short list.
So what I hope we can do, is I hope we can avoid saying something trite like, this is what the American people wanted, full stop. If you want to make that a conversation starter, go for it. But it shouldn’t be a dismissive conversation ender, because it ignores what actually happened and What will continue to happen in the future.
- Comment on I will vote for whomever bans happy birthday. 2 weeks ago:
Just go on a trip every birthday. It works for me.
- Comment on If Trump wins the election thru fraud how can the democrats refute it and prove they won? Or will it just be like another Jan 6 and four years of whining like Trump? 2 weeks ago:
First, don’t panic. Harris and her staff, and Democrats around the country, they have planned for many shady actions on Trump’s part. Details are scarce because they don’t want Trump staff to have a heads up.
And then everything depends on the details.
But remember, anything that looks like a coup d’etat could easily get the military or spy agencies involved. And if they move, it doesn’t matter what SCOTUS says. As a result, it’s very hard to predict what would happen in various extra dramatic situations. There is no precedent; precedent wouldn’t mean anything anyway.
- Comment on What is stopping the vice president from ever murdering the president? 2 weeks ago:
That’s not what the Supreme Court said, though. Only official acts have absolute immunity. Murder is not usually an official act.
And as always, if you’re talking about a coup d’etat, the question is if the military or spy agencies will kill you before, during, or after it. When the rule of law is out the window, you must expect physical violence.
- Comment on There are Minimum Wages, Why Not a Maximum Wage? 2 weeks ago:
Also immediately redefine income more broadly.
- Comment on Is it offensive for me as a man to dress as a male version of a female fictional character for Halloween?' 2 weeks ago:
I feel there’s a potential suicide joke here, but it would probably end up in bad taste.
- Comment on Is it offensive for me as a man to dress as a male version of a female fictional character for Halloween?' 2 weeks ago:
I have a question for you that needs answering first. Offensive to whom?
- Comment on Is it okay to take drugs to make yourself a better person? Does it make a difference if "better" is mental or if it's physical? 2 weeks ago:
I think you answered your own question. If taking drugs actually makes you a better person, of course it’s OK. That’s true for both physical and mental considerations.
But look, you put everything into one definition. What is “better”, who decides, and how do they decide? If you don’t have anywhere to go, you probably won’t get there. Or maybe you will get there but you won’t realize it.
- Comment on What is the argument for making poor/working class folks shoulder the burden of taxes? 2 weeks ago:
I think you need to take a step back and stop talking about income tax. Instead, talk about wealth distribution overall. What about businesses? What about corporations? What about passive income? What about savings that’s passed to children? What about inheritance tax? What about tax fraud and tax evasion? And I meant to separate those explicitly, because there are many weak points in the tax code that allow for companies to take advantage of the ability to send money overseas, for example.
If all you’re doing is adjusting the standard deduction or the base exemption or the top threshold for social security payments, you’re ignoring the gigantic high-dollar figures that are happening with the billionaires and the largest corporations in the world. And if you ignore them, then there’s no way you can fix the corruption that’s plaguing modern society.
Of course I think you were trying to keep your focus narrow, which is a reasonable thing to do, but it’s also worth noting in at least one comment that the big picture involves much more important questions about how we should allow wealth to be redistributed.
- Comment on What is the argument for making poor/working class folks shoulder the burden of taxes? 2 weeks ago:
You didn’t tell us what you meant by “shoulder the burden”. Maybe you should have, or at least if you did it would allow more focused answers.
Some people that I have spoken with are fans of a flat tax. They think that income tax should be 10% on everyone, no matter what. They think that is fair.
In order to maintain that belief in fairness, they also need to magically forget about: the ultra rich, passive income, capital gains, the existence of businesses that have a different tax code, and the fact that they probably actually endorse various tax breaks.
On a side note, I think one of the underlying causes of people being willing to try to forget all of these obvious facts of life is the gut assumption that big banks and ultra rich people who are running scams or finding loopholes are doing so in a very complicated way, so there’s no chance we could figure out what’s happening and stop it. But what forensic accountants point out from time to time is that many of the scams and loopholes are new variations on old tricks. We can understand how they work, but it takes effort, because the names change and the money moves in slightly different ways.
- Comment on Hypothetical: Can a person "citizen's arrest" themself? And if so, how (and why) would that even work? 3 weeks ago:
The specific rules vary by state. Where do you live, what are you going to do, and can you stream it for us?
- Comment on Netflix raises prices as password boost fades 4 weeks ago:
The Pirate Bay will always be with us.
- Comment on Bandai Namco reportedly tries to bore staff into quitting, skirting Japan’s labor laws 4 weeks ago:
Yes, of course some companies are using it. That’s what the article is about. The point I’m making, and it matters to employees in Japan, is that if employers want to use this strategy and avoid losing lawsuits, they have to be very careful about exactly what they do. Many judges have and continue to side with employees over employers. But filing lawsuits is expensive and time-consuming, and somewhat risky financially because you might lose, so sometimes companies get away with these shady tactics.
And depending on how much money you were making, you might just be better off using a couple of months of that boring time to prepare your resume and apply to other jobs, and then quit once you’ve lined one up.
Anyway, if your boss does this to you, and you go to your union and that doesn’t work, and you eventually hire a lawyer and file a lawsuit against them, the judge is going to ask the company to justify all of the decisions they made. If the company says that they’re trying to convince the employee to quit out of boredom, you will win your lawsuit. If the company can provide some kind of plausible explanation for the adjustment in the duties that they’re asking you to do, the specific facts are going to come into play, and you might win or lose, depending on them.
- Comment on Bandai Namco reportedly tries to bore staff into quitting, skirting Japan’s labor laws 4 weeks ago:
That sounds like a set of rules that could create, but in reality it’s actually hard for them to pull it off. If you violate some of the rules, like if you’re sitting in a room with nothing to do and then you pull out your phone and start texting, they could try to reprimand you and start the ball rolling on firing you. But then you get the union involved, and then you can gather evidence about the reasonableness of their effort to fire you. At some point it will go before a judge and the judge will ask your boss why they have to block you from having a cell phone if you were just sitting there doing nothing. When your boss can’t answer, then you will win your lawsuit.
In other words, companies that try this tactic have to be very careful about exactly how the implement it, because labor law has a surprisingly large number of protections.
- Comment on Bandai Namco reportedly tries to bore staff into quitting, skirting Japan’s labor laws 4 weeks ago:
At most companies in Japan, them firing you would not eliminate your severance or pension. Those are typically mostly paid based on years worked, and not on how your employment terminates.
There tend to be extra payouts if you die on the job, at many companies, so it’s not true to say that your termination status has zero impact, but typically it’s a small adjustment.
- Comment on Bandai Namco reportedly tries to bore staff into quitting, skirting Japan’s labor laws 4 weeks ago:
Exactly! You accidentally hit the nail on the head here.
The goal of the company is to get rid of employees. But they have permanent hire, so the bosses can’t simply fire them without cause (and the bar for cause is very high in Japan). They want employees to quit, or they want employees to clearly fail to perform their duties.
What the employees want is to keep doing decent work at that company, probably until they retire at age 65. Permanent hire is highly treasured, for good reason. The reason permanent hire exists, and is so widespread as required by law, is that Japan values employee well-being more than it values the bosses’ well-being. It’s hard to get a big loan (for a house or apartment) if you don’t have permanent hire. Many companies will not give you good positions if you’re over the age of 35, too, which makes changing employers in your 40s-60s very challenging.
- Comment on Bandai Namco reportedly tries to bore staff into quitting, skirting Japan’s labor laws 4 weeks ago:
In the past, many employees have won wrongful termination lawsuits for this type of behavior. In Japan, employers have a legal duty to give their employees some kind of work.
(The authors were lazy here. This is not a secret thing.)