Current Events

Re: Greek Crisis Update

Marko — Sun, 02 May 2010 11:59:07 GMT

Maybe you "un-intentionaly" mixed up "ex-USSR shity countries" with "rich and developped western european countries and EU"?

Who are you quoting here?

Re: Greek Crisis Update

KOBALT — Sun, 02 May 2010 00:22:40 GMT

There cannot be anything economical about taxation, as it is not exchange, and as such no economic evaluations can be made about the goods being distributed through the process.

@nandnor: kindly refer to the article published in "The Free Market, the von Mises Institute Monthly", available on "von Mises Institute" website : http://mises.org/freemarket_detail.aspx?control=367. This article will explain you what are "externalities" about and why sometimes market is inefficient. If you still think there is absolutly no link ever between "taxation" and "economy" (virtuous or vicious link), please just try to explain why externalities can dare to exist, if Free Market is all-perfect (while all other systems on this planet can fail sometimes) and please explain how can market itself fix problems it's contributed to generate at the initial step?

Tax are just one way, if applied on a clever way and under strict conditions. How do you plan to finance Police, Army, Justice in a real world without taxes and still reach the general optimum???? Any existing example of success of functional "0% tax country" that could validate your hypotesis maybe?

Re: Greek Crisis Update

nandnor — Sat, 01 May 2010 18:33:30 GMT

I just specified that "taxes" are just one economic tool among others, and can help to finance goods and services, and consequently under specific conditions taxes can make the market more efficient, and provide wealth and weel being. i repeat "under specific conditions", i'm not fan of taxes either, but i don't deny that in some cases it can be efficient and usefull, and i'm convinced that the lower need for taxes the better.

There cannot be anything economical about taxation, as it is not exchange, and as such no economic evaluations can be made about the goods being distributed through the process.

Re: Greek Crisis Update

z1235 — Sat, 01 May 2010 18:30:43 GMT

The Germans are already on the hook for Greece's debt. The decision has been made long ago, when German banks bought the Greek bonds loaded into their books. The question now is whether German taxpayers pay for (1) a direct Greek bailout, or for (2) a roundabout bailout of their own banks after a Greek default destroys the values of their Greek bond holdings. Option (1) saves the banks but it's blatantly obvious to -- thus rejected by -- the voters. Option (2) is riskier and it also involves the banks, BUT is more complex, thus more amenable to pulling wool over the voter's eyes. Lean back and get your pop-corn.

Re: Greek Crisis Update

KOBALT — Sat, 01 May 2010 18:03:58 GMT

(You're right, my posts are damn too long. thx for pointing it out. i'll make it short from now. sorry about that)

@kokagu: Please stay Sir. No need to get furious whenever sbdy is not agreeing with you. As for me, some of your sources are wrong. Try to convince me...

@bbnet: 1) checked OCDE website and you're right here. The gap is about 4%. I'm interested to know if the labour productivity in the US compared to France's is always higher or if it's variable? Even then, these guys who go often on strike, live longer, suffer less stress and lower criminality, have 5 weeks of holidays per year, etc. and still their productivity is almost the same as in the US? Amazing... 2) i never mentioned "godforsaken USA": i respect all countries and USA is a great country amongst others. Do you think other countries can be not so bad either? Pluralist democracies are plenty you know... Free countries also. 3) I liked your teasing. As you know well "100% egalitarian tax" system benefits only to the richest quantile in the population, as the poorer you are the higher share of your income you would have to give as taxes to the Gov. (i. e. you will mainly tax middle and low income population). but i think here you mix "equality" (= "the same for all", that i dislike for economic issues) and "equity" (= refers to justice and efficiency). 4) well, if you really believe Continental Europeans are living as "house cat" and prefer to live "longuer than free", i can't help with such a dumb point of view, it's too funny and/or irrealistic. If you really prefer "freedom" more than "the USA always whatever it is", then you'll be delighted to visit others developed countries, where also some good things can be source of inspiration to get more freedom, including in the USA...

Re: Greek Crisis Update

KOBALT — Sat, 01 May 2010 17:11:51 GMT

@Kokagu:

sorry you take it this way. I don't know if i'm "snobish" but I prefer to talk about ideas and theories including if people don't share the same, than to do personal bashing without any solid support except unverified information or unaccurate information, as it seems you are doing.

I just specified that "taxes" are just one economic tool among others, and can help to finance goods and services, and consequently under specific conditions taxes can make the market more efficient, and provide wealth and weel being. i repeat "under specific conditions", i'm not fan of taxes either, but i don't deny that in some cases it can be efficient and usefull, and i'm convinced that the lower need for taxes the better.

Actually i've been a studient some years ago but not anymore for a long while. But i'm earning my life working 10.5 months a year (where does this 6 months come from? please precise your sources??? in which country is this possible i just want to move there? :) ) and you can check the condition of infrastructures like roads and railways in western EU: it's exactly the same as in NYC and i assume you know that most of the roads in NYC are in a good condition.

In most of western European countries (except mediterranean and eastern countries which are in crisis now), people do pay healthcare taxes and if they want they can pay an extra health insurance too (about 30 USD per year for the lower rates, what a big deal?), and they generaly got very good health services. Some explaination: the healthcare taxes covers most of the essential hospital and doctor's costs, and the health insurance just ensure you can recover the extra amount of costs which is not covered and generally corresponds to non-essential health services or medication, that you can decide to buy from your own will and without real need for your health or without scientificaly proven effect but that you would like to get anyway (like if you want a precise brandt of medication instead of others, etc). You can check all that on the web, in official websites as well as in health NGO websites. Again you probably missunderstood what you heard on TV and mixed the situation in the UK in te 1990's with the high level of services available in continental western Europe.

For a blood exam as you talk about it, you don't even need to book any date, just come and have it done. You'll generally get your blood test results after 1 to 7 days, according to the complexity of the tests to be completed. By the way, to go to see a generalist doctor of high level in western Europe costs to the client about 30 USD for a normal consultation. You generally got it 90% personnaly reimbursed (from the state services to your bank account) by the healthcare taxes system. The remaining 10% are covered by your personnal health insurance.

Maybe you "un-intentionaly" mixed up "ex-USSR shity countries" with "rich and developped western european countries and EU"? Again, i'm not talking about ideology of taxes (as you are doing), but ONLY about efficiency of economical tools to promote a better wealth and well-being of nations.

So long too then.

Re: Greek Crisis Update

Joe — Thu, 29 Apr 2010 19:37:44 GMT

I think a lot of posters here suffer from forum asperger's syndrome

Re: Greek Crisis Update

bbnet — Thu, 29 Apr 2010 18:42:01 GMT

Kobalt sez, "...productivity is higher here than in the US (Fr > US in productivity dude, so they can go to strike and still produce the same wealth per capita, and moreover they enjoy in average 2 more weeks of legal holidays per year than the average US worker ! :) )"

OECD sez - France is 3.8% less productive

Kobalt sez, "you (folks in the godforsaken USA) have a very low and unequalitarian tax system"

NTU sez - top 1% of income earners pays over 40% of income taxes (if low taxes are bad, what's wrong with an extremely egalitarian 100% tax burden for everybody?)

Kobalt implies you can get free services if you pay taxes but can't decipher TANSTAAFL and would seemingly rather live 80.7 years as a house cat rather than 78.2 years as a bobcat.

Keep the faith Kakugo, your presence will be missed.

Back to topic - it seems the IMF will be there to help Greece ... in a a Dr. Kervokian kind of way (to paraphrase Max Keiser)

Re: Greek Crisis Update

Sphairon — Thu, 29 Apr 2010 18:16:44 GMT

Kakugo, as previous speakers have already mentioned, your posts are being appreciated and looked forward to here by a great number of users. It would be a heavy loss for these boards if you decided not to frequent them anymore!

Please rethink your decision.

Re: Greek Crisis Update

wilderness — Thu, 29 Apr 2010 17:05:23 GMT

Kakugo:
So long people.

You damn well better be joking! So many people including me love your posts. You don't know how many times I've read what you've said and applied to when talking to other people on the internt outside of this forum and to other people I make contact with outside of the computer arena. And it's not that I take from you as gospel faith, but it fits so darn well with current events in news articles and such, that I read. This was only one poster Kakugo. No need to engage the poster if you don't want to. I'm sure others here in this forum would love to pick up on the debate. I don't find your posts Kakugo as intended to be a debate. They are more informative posts with a different intention. And that's what I love about the posts you make here. I really enjoy going into these threads in which you comment to gather information instead of having to get bogged down into deconstructive arguments.

Do what you will, but don't think a lot of people will not miss your posts. Many will. Well, I know I will and I've read many posters here that say often to you that your posts are something they look forward to and enjoy a lot.

Re: Greek Crisis Update

Smiling Dave — Thu, 29 Apr 2010 14:18:25 GMT

"Moderators please delete this post and delete my account since I am obviously wasting everybody's time. I am serious."

You must be joking.

If you benefit just one person, you have contributed to the sacred cause of freedom.

Count how many posts have expressed appreciation. Please think again.

Re: Greek Crisis Update

Kakugo — Thu, 29 Apr 2010 07:40:21 GMT

OK I got it all wrong. Sorry to have doubted the EU and the euro and sorry to have wasted your time.

Moderators please delete this post and delete my account since I am obviously wasting everybody's time. I am serious.

Kobalt, one thing. When you talk about "don't like to pay any taxes" you sound like a snobbish university student. Evidently you have no idea what it means to work more than six months a year to have only broken roads and long lines at the hospital. You have no idea what it means having to to pay an heatlh insurance on top of healthcare taxes to be sure not to waste too much time when needing something as simple as a blood exam.

So long people.

Re: Greek Crisis Update

Marko — Thu, 29 Apr 2010 06:00:38 GMT

I recall Russia lent Iceland 4 billion when the crisis made landfall. But that was before the crisis moved to Russia, I don't think they would be in position to do so again now.

Re: Greek Crisis Update

KOBALT — Wed, 28 Apr 2010 23:24:57 GMT

"But I agree with him both the EU and the euro won't see the end of the decade in the present form. Too many unsettled issues popping up one after another. I don't remeber if it was Marc Faber or Jim Rogers who said that Europe will be the one place on earth that will take the worst beating from the present economic crisis. He was spot on. Even Milton Friedman (who I don't like) warned multiple times about the foolishness of the euro."

=> you think the Euro is a bad idea. Really? 1) EU area forms a group of countries sharing 80% of the commercial business inside the EU community, so economically speaking to have a common currency under such conditions is an efficient way to optimize transactional costs and to support free market and free movement of capitals, goods, and services. Euro supported the construction of a strong and free "domestic" european market, which has been proven to be one of the bigger in the world in term of supply, demand, investments, etc. even if they are now 27 countries to manage together.

=> Till now the USA suffered much more than the EU from the crisis, in terms of increasing debts, rising unemployement, dropping activity, bankrupts, etc. Obsviously, USA or EU are nothing to compare with the heat fell by developing countries with bad governance, high public deficits and high dependance to industrial production for exportation (ex: China, etc.). Talking about the EU, you're right if you consider just England and the mediterranean countries (Greece, Spain, Portugal) and ex-soviet countries (Poland, Balt Countries, czeck, romania, etc.) : these two bands regrouping several countries that have been freed from dictatorship in the 1970-80s (mediterranean countries) and in the 1990s (Eastern europe countries). Their economy (and society) are still recovering from this dark period, among other things thanks to EU loans and subsidies to build up a solid infrastructure (ports, roads, banking sector, etc) and thanks to a lot of measures to free their markets and productions and to reduce the overweighing bureaucracy they inherited from the commies states (all custom fees have been canceled, reduction of protectionims, stronger banking sector, the number of public servants dropped, etc). These countries even had the faster GDP growth (till 2 digits for some) in all the EU since their could free the potential capacities of their markets... well, till the present crisis... But for the remainig countries of the EU, the "oldies western european countries that form the core of Europe Union (France, Germany, Belgiup, Luxemburgo, etc) they are still in good shape even if also suffuring any direct nor indirect damanges of the crisis, as any other country but with lower social impacts.

"The one issue that bothers me the most is popular unrest. While Europeans don't move a muscle when stripped of the most basic civil liberties they will be very ready to take to the streets when they'll see their privileges threatened."

=> please detail what are the civil liberties Europeans citizen have lost because of the EU??? Citizens in Europe are more free than in the US, more ever since US gov adopted post 2001 law packages... And if you refer to "days of strike per capita" of French of Spanish, remenber that productivity is higher here than in the US (Fr > US in productivity dude, so they can go to strike and still produce the same wealth per capita, and moreover they enjoy in average 2 more weeks of legal holidays per year than the average US worker ! :) )

"China and India will very soon catch up in the high tech game European companies have played for the past few decades and will be able to offer the same goods at much inferior prices: when I tell this people usually laugh but then I remember how they used to laugh at Japanese cars and radios".

=> well, i thought the same was happening in the US, even if there you have a very low and unequalitarian tax system, am i right? Please detail what's the relation you make between the EU social (or tax) system and the rise of high tech companies in South East Asia then as this relation also seems valid replacing "the EU" by "the USA"??? Just for fun (but it's true information) in the last 5 years a lot of european born companies re-located their production in the EU, after suffuring several big troubbles of illegal copying of their productions and of "leakages" of their technology expertise... They reckonned the total cost generated by these illegal piracy and considered that it would be cheaper to produce again in EU than in China or else :)

"Then they turn the question to "slave labor", which is quickly becoming the last refuge of the scoundrel. But who are the slaves: Chinese factory workers or us toiling over half a year just pay taxes?".

This is just provocation from yours i think: "slave labor" applies and only applies of work under slavery conditions, like to work 10h a day with no weekend living at 10 per room and with no health insurance and physical brimade: welcome to China... You don't like to pay any tax don't you? I assume however that you have a mobile phone in the US, and that maybe you also buy extra additional services sometimes (paying services). Well, to pay tax is the same concept: 1) first off all, people doesn't like to pay taxes and "tax evasion" is an national sport in EU, as in any other country. However, people here in its majority accept to pay tax (and support this system) because we pay taxes but we have a lot of advantages attached as "paying services" provided to you : you get free (and high quality) education for children till 14 yo, and sometimes till 18, you get very good price university degree and then allow all good brains even if born in a poor familly to get their potential expended and used in the economy, you got free or almost emergency health services, full or almost reimbursement of your medications fees (after controled by your registered doctor), of course you also got the triptic justice/military/police services for free, but consider you also benefit from subsidised public transportations (european cities are dense and with small streets, forget about finding a place where to park your car, it's a nightmare), and a lot of free and make-your-life-easy stuff int he same packages. Conclusion: your lifespan (expenctancy at birth) higher than in the US! :) well, even if it's not the only cause, it has its importance.

Re: Greek Crisis Update

econ student — Wed, 28 Apr 2010 21:56:40 GMT

Kakugo, I consider the above posts among the best and most informative I have ever seen on this site. I'm actually moving to Paris in a few months and, consequently, have taken a stronger interest in European affairs. I'm curious of what you think the effect will be once Iceland joins the EU. I also read an article on the Financial Times website; the author, perhaps tongue-in-cheek, mentioned the possibility of Russia - or even China (!) - bailing out Greece. I am not sure what to think of that proposal. Russia still has its own internal problems to deal with, let alone the EU's. But perhaps China could play a role, albeit indirectly through the IMF. The country has voiced its desire for more clout on international organizations, and a desperate Europe might be more conciliatory. At any rate, what are your thoughts on Russia and China in this regard?

I look forward to your response!