Who or what is the middle class?

[nraforlife]

That's nice but here in Boston where income is generally higher costs are generally higher as well.   

Hmmmmm, I have spent a fair amount of time in Boston & N.H. the past 3 years. Yeppers you folks have a somewhat higher wage structure than we do (in government mostly), BUT.........the prices & taxes utterly outstrip any higher pay.

[Pepsi]

Hmmmmm, I have spent a fair amount of time in Boston & N.H. the past 3 years. Yeppers you folks have a somewhat higher wage structure than we do (in government mostly), BUT.........the prices & taxes utterly outstrip any higher pay.

That's the point I'm making.   Cost of living has to be taken into consideration when considering what income levels are what level of income class in society.

[ivanm]

WHY would anybody shell out $30K for preskool??? Out here in the Real America a very good fullday preschool can be had for about a quarter of that amount. Decent family daycare for much less than that.

I agree, and why is it the taxpayer's place to fund schooling for someone making that kind of money? 
I believe in letting a child be a child  because he is only young once.  Then about 5 or 6 it is time for schooling to begin.  Maybe folks don't have time to spend with their kids like they used to.  I left my kid's mother when they were small so I didn't get in on those years.

[Pepsi]

Maybe folks don't have time to spend with their kids like they used to. 

Once again why are you ignoring your own question

So why would a high wage earner want to vote for expensive government social projects that will increase their tax burdens even more? 

Again, let's look at child care as an example.

If you're a high wage earner you're going to be someone who goes out and works in order to make that high wage.  And if you gotta work you gotta put the kids somewhere.  And if you live someplace where high net worth earners tend to live, you are going to have to pay a lot of child care.     Hence, you are going to have to pay for child care at the prevailing rate in your area.

If one's taxes were higher but there was a "public option" for child care, that would be cost effective from a high wage earner who had kids and lived in a high wage earner location.

You agree that one shouldn't have to shell out $30k a year for pre-school?  Me too, but that is "reality" for the people you are talking about.

[ivanm]

Once again why are you ignoring your own question
 

Again, let's look at child care as an example.

If you're a high wage earner you're going to be someone who goes out and works in order to make that high wage.  And if you gotta work you gotta put the kids somewhere.  And if you live someplace where high net worth earners tend to live, you are going to have to pay a lot of child care.     Hence, you are going to have to pay for child care at the prevailing rate in your area.

If one's taxes were higher but there was a "public option" for child care, that would be cost effective from a high wage earner who had kids and lived in a high wage earner location.

You agree that one shouldn't have to shell out $30k a year for pre-school?  Me too, but that is "reality" for the people you are talking about.

So the rest of us are supposed to support your life of luxury with more tax dollars?  Look at what you have just written, sounds like a hog under a gate.

People need to make some hard decisions.  If their career and lifestyle is to come before children then maybe they shouldn't have any kids. You are into expensive watches and such.  I am betting what you blow on those status symbols could put a kid in this glorified day care environ you speak of. 

Where does it end? Socialists like you want to rape and plunder the top 1% under the pretense of playing Robin Hood and handing it to the bottom feeders but your sham is becoming more evident every post you make.  You want it for yourselves so you can edge closer to the top 1%.

Talk about class envy, you are one fucked up puppy. You are wanting to use public moneys to further your own selfish ends. 

[johnhp]

Ivan

In what sense is the public option, as it has recently been discussed legislatively, the use of public funds?

[ivanm]

That's the point I'm making.   Cost of living has to be taken into consideration when considering what income levels are what level of income class in society.

That is your choice to make Pepsi and your problem, not the taxpayers problem.  I probably can live as well as you and our income is very modest.  But I understand your predicament, good computer jobs don't occur out here in the sticks.  That is why I settled in Dallas after I got out of the service and started my civilian career.

Can't you see, your real standard of living is relative.  Suppose you have a six figure income but your living costs eat up much of that.  So what have your really accomplished in the way of accumulating wealth?  I could go out and buy a Rollex watch and pay cash for it but who really gives a shit and how many people even know the value of such a status symbol. My 30 dollar Timex suits me needs quite well for everyday use and I do have a nicer watch I could wear for dress occasions, but why should I as long at the Timex keeps time and is attractive?

I have a nice DTS Cadillac and could have paid cash for it.  Was I stupid enough to fork out 52,400 for the cost of a new one.  Nope.  I bought a used one, 17 months old, for half the price.  I live in a 3,000 square foot home and have paid out 80,000 in cash for improvements over the past 4 years.  Am I in hawk up to my ass just so I can have a status symbol.  Nope, the house was paid for soon after we moved in here in 1996. And now we are asking 275,000 for it.  In Boston the damned thing would probably bring much more than that.  I watch the home show on TV and see people looking at shacks and cracker boxes advertised at 350 k and above.  My reaction, what a bunch of dumb assed people. Where is their sense of value?

My '04 Chevy Crew Cab is still in nice shape and it is paid for, and always was.  Do I need a new diesel status symbol that rivals my Caddy in price?  Hell no, my truck has less than 46k miles on it and it gets me there.

We don't have HD TVs because we already have 6 analogs in the house.  Am I supposed to trash them and bring home a monster home entertainment center just so I can keep up with the neighbors?  

My point is this Pepsi, you cannot buy happiness. My ex tried that and failed.  She met her end by sitting down in a closet, putting a .38 in her mouth, and blowing the top off her head. If that is the price I must pay for status symbols then I will pass on that bargain.  

I don't mean to be bragging on what my wife and I have managed to accumulate, and the intent was to show you what people can do if they just get their shit together and keep it that way. We both played the corporate rat race game for about 25 years each and finally decided we were seeing diminishing returns. The traffic got heavier and the cost of keeping a dependable car(actually two cars) on the road for commuting reached the point that we were spinning our wheels, so we both retired early and have never regretted it.

But you cannot do that unles you plan ahead and start resisting the urge to keep up with the Joneses.  Edna ane I lived in a mobile home where our workmates suffered with their overblown status symbols.  Real estate taxes in Texas on a nice home can reach a thousand a month if you are hell bent on having the biggest and the best on the lake front in a gated community.  And what do you have but a place to sleep and to keep your junk?

We didn't suffer.  Not at all.  We had nice clothing, nice cars, and my honey had plenty of furs and diamonds.  But we socked away about 4,000 a month for a few years and bought high quality tax exempt bonds, and
that was our ticket out of bondage, so to speak.

When it reaches the point that a high roller has to look to the government for a handout then there is something tragically wrong with the mentality of this society.  That my friend is one of the most corrupt socialist orders you can imagine and it serves to make the promise of socialism to the low income crowd a  damned lie.  Shame on you Pepsi.  I always knew that Vel has known damned well what he was advocating but for you to fall for that snake oil is pathetic.  You have been had my good man.

[johnhp]

Ivan

You are making an assumption about the public option.  Please lay out where the public option involves a subsidy for a person of means.

[ivanm]

Pepsi, I have always like you in spite of your socialist leanings, and maybe it is because we share a
common interest in architecture ann in computing.  I was a FLW fan where you weren't.  I was a mainframe analyst/programmer, where you work with toys.   But at least we had a common basis where we could talk shop and enjoy each other.  

It is my understanding that your people were very conservative and that you for some reason rebelled against that and went the other way.  Have you really improved your lot by doing so?  

You need to read up on the Bolshevik Revolution and the French Revolution(s), and pay particular attention to the objects of scorn.  It was mob rule Pepsi and high rollers like you were favorite targets.  Why?  Because they had something to lose, or to sacrifice for the noble cause of the elitists who headed up the movements and stirred up miscontent so the peons would take to the streets, raising hell and destroying things that belonged to the middle class. The upper class and nobility were untouchable so they took it out on the merchants and tradesmen who enjoyed a decent lifestyle.

So if you want to keep more of what you have then don't sell out to those what will someday take every last dime you own, and if that isn't enough they will come after your property.  The enemy is within us they say, and how true it is.  If you cannot see Vel for what he is then you are lacking somewhere.

[johnhp]

The upper class and nobility were untouchable....

In the French Revolution?

Tell it to this guy:







Or these people:

[Pepsi]

People need to make some hard decisions.  If their career and lifestyle is to come before children then maybe they shouldn't have any kids. You are into expensive watches and such.  I am betting what you blow on those status symbols could put a kid in this glorified day care environ you speak of. 

[/quote]

expenses are such these days that very typically you need 2 incomes.   Me, I'm actually pretty good with budgeting.   My watches are relatively cheap Chinese copies of real watches.   the Omega Seamaster I'm wearing is actually a $125 reproduction (shh, don't tell anyone  )

Where does it end? Socialists like you want to rape and plunder the top 1% under the pretense of playing Robin Hood and handing it to the bottom feeders but your sham is becoming more evident every post you make.  You want it for yourselves so you can edge closer to the top 1%.

Talk about class envy, you are one fucked up puppy. You are wanting to use public moneys to further your own selfish ends. 

Nowhere did raising taxes on any particular group come into play in this conversation.   Your question was why would high income earners want to pay more in taxes for more government services.    That's the question I'm trying to help answer for you.

[Pepsi]

Pepsi, I have always like you in spite of your socialist leanings, and maybe it is because we share a
common interest in architecture ann in computing.  I was a FLW fan where you weren't.  I was a mainframe analyst/programmer, where you work with toys.   But at least we had a common basis where we could talk shop and enjoy each other.  

I like you too in spite of your falsely accusing me of being a socialist all these years     I'll put my capitalist creds up against anyone.    I'm real proud that I have been a key contributor to a company which has grown from 275 employees to 1200 in the last 5 years.   We've gone public, listed in NYSE.   We are a US based company who does a lot of business in Europe and Asia.     We bring money into this country and have been hiring for years bucking the trend and I'm real happy about that.

Some things are better done by the government than the private sector.   Is anyone who supported the US (federal) interstate highway system a socialist?   It's not a black or white proposition, it is the shades of gray we are dealing with.   [/quote]

It is my understanding that your people were very conservative and that you for some reason rebelled against that and went the other way.  Have you really improved your lot by doing so?  

My conservative parents worked for the government all their lives (school teacher, cop).   Their liberal son is much more successful than they were and never worked for the government, nor have I worked for a private company whose main business is servicing the government.    This liberal is much more of a capitalist than his conservative parents ever were.   

[ivanm]

I like you too in spite of your falsely accusing me of being a socialist all these years     I'll put my capitalist creds up against anyone.    I'm real proud that I have been a key contributor to a company which has grown from 275 employees to 1200 in the last 5 years.   We've gone public, listed in NYSE.   We are a US based company who does a lot of business in Europe and Asia.     We bring money into this country and have been hiring for years bucking the trend and I'm real happy about that.

Some things are better done by the government than the private sector.   Is anyone who supported the US (federal) interstate highway system a socialist?   It's not a black or white proposition, it is the shades of gray we are dealing with.  

My conservative parents worked for the government all their lives (school teacher, cop).   Their liberal son is much more successful than they were and never worked for the government, nor have I worked for a private company whose main business is servicing the government.    This liberal is much more of a capitalist than his conservative parents ever were.  

You have liberal leanings and are on a slippery slope.  Socialism is like a creeping cancer in that those who purvey it are not going to advocate an outright revolution like happened in Russia or in France.  
Their way is gradualism, which is the ulterior motive of the progressive crowd.

"Some things are better done by the government than the private sector.   Is anyone who supported the US (federal) interstate highway system a socialist?   It's not a black or white proposition, it is the shades of gray we are dealing with. "

Such matters as defense are best done by the government, and education has traditonally been financed by state and local governmental units or taxing bodies, so I will grant you that much off hand.  However, to say or to think that healthcare is best done by the government just doesn't ring true for me because of my personal experience with medical and dental problems in the service (USAF) and in the VA system. I have told the VA story more than once but don't remember talking about losing four front teeth due to AF fuckups. More later on this fiasco.
 
As to the interstate hiway system, that is paid for in large part by the motorists, which is how it should be.  Why should an oldster who doesn't use the system pay for it?  Indirectly that oldster may benefit from the system but in a capitalist economy it is fairest to have the users of the system bear the primary burden. How about our railways or the private sector hiway freight systems, the 18 wheeler people?  We all in a sense benefit from that but should we subsidize them?  These are for-profit undertakings.

I was in tech school at Keelser AFB and my lower center teeth, the incisors, became impacted for some reason.
I went to the dentist for a root canal but he wouldn't see me due to time restraints.  My mouth swelled up to the point that I could not eat or speak, and when I went to the first sergeant it got his attention right quick.  I had gone down town to a civilian denstist, who felt sorry for me because I didn't have the money to pay him, and he gave me a prescription for an antiobiotic injection.  I took that prescription to the hospital to have it filled and it set off alarms. Within minutes I was seeing a dentist at the hospital rather in the clinic where I had been turned away.  To make a long story short I lost those four teeth and ended up with a permanent bridge.

So much for government healthcare.  Say what you will, but the profit motive is important in healing just as it is in many other fields, and a doctor or dentist with half a brain will do what is needed to heal or take care of the patient, that is if he or she is a conscientous person.  The point is this, cost is not a determinate factor in the private sector to the extent that it is in govenment healthcare.

Just to give a recent example of that, a hospital in Clay Center, Ks. is progressive and has its own MRI machine. I am speaking of a small rural town of probably 3,000 people in a rural sparsely populated county. Contrast that to the VA center at Topeka, Ks., which is a large installation. I couldn't get my imaging done at Topeka because of two reasons, either they did not have the equipment or they did not have a radiologist to read the test results.
 
Pepsi I am not talking ideology here, I am talking about getting quality care in a timely manner.  I farted around with the VA over 6 months and still didn't have a resolution on my kidney impairment. So I pulled the plug on them and went commercial.  Within three days I had an MRI from a mobile unit, right up the road about a mile, and not 120 miles away like I had to travel to get my VA imaging done.  I then got in to see a crack specialist  25 miles away, at Christmas time no less, within a few weeks, and in one visit he gave his opinon and I got on with the treatment.  Sure it cost, 180 bucks for an hour of his time, and right at 1,000 bucks for the MRI, but the point is this.  I had a death sentence lifted off me and could get on with my life and to be a productive individual rather than waiting in fear that I wasn't going to live long.  And my insurance covered all but 20% of the costs.  I use BC/BS plus Medicare, and neither is free to me. I pay about 90 a month for the BC/BS and a similar amount for the Medicare premiums.

Traditionally, government services that did not involve interstate commerce were paid for by the state and local tax authorities and the concept worked ok.  General Ike promoted the interstate system, supposedly to have a dependable network of roads to move his military gear in case the need arose.  So in that sense the government was justified in using taxes to create something that benefited the people in general and not some special interest group or groups.

When a president comes out on TV and knocks hell out of the insurance companies, as abusive as they may seem to be, that is piss poor statesmanship to my way of thinking.  My stepdaughter spend over  a month in the hospital with pneumonia, and it if weren't for the marvels of modern technology we would have lost her.  She was on a ventilator for thirteen days, and for a few days was totally dependent on the machine to sustain her life.  That little visit cost the insurance company some 260,000 dollars, so I don't want to hear about their exorbitant profits.  If that it what it takes to keep them in  business then I will gladly pay my premiums and won't bitch. It is the have nots that are bitching and not those of us who are trying to make it on our own.

The insurance company, which was Aetna, did not ask for her to be critcially ill, nor did it ask for the humongous bill, so I would like to shove that bill up Obama's ass.

Once again, my wife and I have an excellent standard of living on about 40k a year and have plenty left to piss away on fun things and luxuries.  So why can't someone making 80k or more a year also have a good life without government handouts?  If it is a matter of getting back some of what you paid for then I understand that but if that bothers you then stop supporting candidates who want to clean out your pockets for the sake of their careers.

[ivanm]

Once again why are you ignoring your own question
 

Again, let's look at child care as an example.

If you're a high wage earner you're going to be someone who goes out and works in order to make that high wage.  And if you gotta work you gotta put the kids somewhere.  And if you live someplace where high net worth earners tend to live, you are going to have to pay a lot of child care.     Hence, you are going to have to pay for child care at the prevailing rate in your area.

If one's taxes were higher but there was a "public option" for child care, that would be cost effective from a high wage earner who had kids and lived in a high wage earner location.

You agree that one shouldn't have to shell out $30k a year for pre-school?  Me too, but that is "reality" for the people you are talking about.

What question of mine are you referring to?  I will admit that sometimes I lose continuity in the discussions.
Sorry, but that comes with age. 

[ivanm]

Pepsi and others.  I have less of a problem with what our people need than how it is to be financed.  It is an issue of fairness.  I have yet to see a government financed program that did not benefit a special interest group at the expense of the rest of us. In a way that is to be expected but politically speaking it has to be equitable in some fashion or it will not fly. 

Some more anecdotes.  I attended Census training with a guy who had been a helicopter specialist for 34 years.  He pulled down 45 bucks an hour plus very generous tax exempt bennies when he went offshore or away from his home work station, and he did this frequently.  He mentioned getting back 19k in income taxes this year and I liked to crap my jeans.  A lot of people don't even make that much in a year.  

My son is a civilian contractor in Iraq and is in his second or third year of it, don't remember which.  It appears that he does very little at times and he pulls down about 150 k a year, much of which is tax exempt.  As long as he stays out of country a certain number of days a year I know for a fact that 80 k of his taxable salary is not subject to federal income taxes.

If the kid was back in Dallas he couldn't even hold a job, due to his attitude towards management and owners of businesses where he has worked, with a spotty record. So it is any wonder our defense budget is what it is, given jokers like my son and the chopper specailist?

Once again, the government is a huge trough where hogs go to slop, and it don't matter where or what it is, for the most part, even census workers like me.  The cost overruns are simply mind boggling.  To me this is not a partisan issue but a matter of good stewardship.  Is it any wonder our annual budgets are deeply in the red and yet we still have deserving people needing a hand?

It is not all together how much you got to work with but how you use it.  And government is not a model of prudent spending or thrift.  If that is partisan then excuse me because being prudent has served me quite well and I am living proof that it works.