If you include state, property, gasoline, payroll, import, alcohol, air travel and countless "hidden" taxes, it's much more than that. These have all crept up over the years. Also, practically no one paid the 60-70% tax rates of years past. The pre-'86 code offered many ways to drastically lower it. And if you know any history, the original top marginal tax rate was 7%, and it was never supposed to get much higher than that.
The interesting thing is that it appears that special interests are attempting to alter the US into the China model (maybe they already have). In that model, supposedly a garden of Capitalism is supposed to flourish on top of the toxic waste dump of Socialized (gov't-supported) TBTF banks. The big banks are, of course, ok with that (though they never mention it proudly in any press conference). Neither do any Senators or Congressmen mention it. So while a structural foundation of "Capitalism" is uprooted, they discuss other stuff. What's happening with Snooki lately?
there seems to be a consensus on this board, we all like capitalism, and we don't mind a few socialist programs, but we all hate fascism or crony capitalism.
Agreed. However, because views on Capitalism are often associated with political leanings, there is less often a mention of which political individuals actually either support, or are silent, about the US transforming into the China model. And when was the last time you saw a politician pressed hard and repeatedly by the media on where they stand, and what they are doing about it?
That is not the definition of socialism. But anyway, most people like "socialist" programs, like social security. The NFL is the most socialist sport in the USA, and happens to be the most popular, in part because the socialist nature of it allows it to be more even and fair (as compared to baseball for example). The US is a corporate plutocracy. Now even corporations like the socialist characteristics, namely when they are bailed out using public money. So although socialism has a bad reputation in the US, everybody likes it when it goes to getting something for nothing.. Oh by the way, have I mentioned welfare queen farmers with their subsidies???
yeah, there's not a dimes bit of difference between a republican and a democrat. Like the man said, we'd have to go a long way to the left before we ever become less than the most capitalistic country in the world, but we are still young, and most older countries become more and more socialist. Hong Kong is a trip. For a brief while there they had no constraints, and the policy was low taxes high profits. The more mature USA becomes, the more socialist it will get. China is hard to read, are they ancient? Or are they young? And Russia is not far behind. Maybe Egypt will be our little laboratory. Talk about ancient, I can even read about them in my Bible if I want to. Hard to be the land of opportunity without untapped natural resources though. Hell if we had as much cod now as we did in 1776, we could just tax them at a penny a pound and that would pay for medicare.
you sure about that? It's hard to buy a team. Who would you rather root for, the Reds or the Bengals? and as far as welfare, we kind of looked at the situation and figured babies were not vital to our national interest, but beans were