We previously discussed the exodus from France of top earners after the imposition of a confiscatory 75% tax rate. Now England is facing the same shift, according to a new report. More than 16,000 people declared an annual income of more than £1 million during 2009-10. That number fell to just 6,000 this year. This appears to be a combination of people leaving Britain and concerted efforts to avoid income.
We continue to disagree on this blog on tax policy. I opposed the moves in France and England as economically unwise. I also oppose aspects of the Obama plan, though I agree with the need to increase revenue. I believe both Obama and Congress have been incredibly reckless with their budgets and continue to spend wildly without any sense of priority in spending.
Cities like New York also report declines in top earner following heavy tax bills.
George Osborne, the Chancellor, announced this year that the 50p top rate will be reduced to 45p from next April.
Source: Telegraph
to both Stephen and Tony C:
if a brain is injured how can we compare it to a normal brain? The little I know about the brain seems to suggest the entire organ is physically integrated with every other part, front to back; top to bottom; left to right.
An injury to one area of the brain has the potential to effect other areas, or so it seems to me based on my limited knowledge.
So Tony C, I am not sure you can make any sort of valid comparison?
@Stephen: But that the historical rationalization by advocates, to stop or decrease others’ pain.
No it isn’t.
@Stephen: Is there an objective and rational standard for what we should value more than our own life?
No, nor is one necessary, nor can one be developed. What is important to people is virtually always emotionally important; people are emotionally driven. Reason exists to serve the emotional person and help them achieve their emotional goals; whether that is security, safety, prosperity, intellectual achievement, charity or whatever else. People are driven by emotion informed by reason.
And that is backed up by science. The real science, not your fake science with your pre-determined conclusions to be reached, the real thing, derived from studies of people with brain injuries (or tumors) that impair or eliminate their ability to feel emotions.
Zombie
>Tony C.
1, December 13, 2012 at 8:54 am
@Stephen: The first concern of selfless people is to enjoy success.
See above. I wrote: The first concern of selfless people is avoiding pain….The first concern of selfish people is enjoying life.
Tricksy 1, December 11, 2012 at 8:56 pm
funny you should mention ‘green’.
as i followed the posts i have been thinking of kermit the frog who made famous the lyrics ‘it’s not easy being green”.
shameful to admit, i am still searching for the connection.
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Tricksy, If you spent any time trying to get a Green Party member on a ballot, in the media, in a debate, or elected, you know exactly why “it’s not easy being green”. I think Kermit is a closet GP member.
@Stephen: The first concern of selfless people is avoiding pain.
No, it isn’t.
@Stephen: Note the split between “what I love and my life.”
Yes, you should note that, because they are not identical. Valuing something more than my life does not mean I place no value on my life at all. You are a victim of absolutist thinking and absolutist reasoning, there is plenty of room to value my life more than most things, without valuing my life more than anything.
You continue to live your life in self-centered cowardice, valuing your own life more than anything else leads directly to your enslavement and subjugation, as well as a wasted life of endless fear in anticipating your inevitable death. Which is probably well-deserved, so carry on.
Zombie
@Stephen: The first concern of selfless people is avoiding pain.
No, it isn’t.
But that the historical rationalization by advocates, to stop or decrease others’ pain.
@Stephen: Note the split between “what I love and my life.”
> You are a victim of absolutist thinking and absolutist reasoning,
Apart from your curious thinking-reasoning split, the evasion of the absolute reality of reality certainly provides an intellectual wormhole for all sorts of non-absolutes, almost, but not quite, as if the universe was affected by your thinking. Hey, isnt that the schizo experience?!
>there is plenty of room to value my life more than most things, without valuing my life more than anything.
Rand says that most people are not so suicidal as to be consistent w/sacrifice. Is there an objective and rational standard for what we should value more than our own life? If no such standard, how can man avoid murderous conflict in society as different groups and individuals claim different standards? Eg, a war between liberals who want the state for enforce sacrifice to society and conservatives who want the state to enforce sacrifice to God.
>valuing your own life more than anything else leads directly to your enslavement and subjugation
Youve been reading The Bible, you lapsed mystic, you. I look forward to your joining the increasing ranks of religious scientists, depressed and anxious over the implications of materialism, an historically important, historical sequence. Even the Greeks returned to mysticism after their democratic war against Syracuse brought Spartan domination. Aristotle wrote after the peak of Greek cultural rationality. It seems that Greece had some trouble with clever relativists (non-absolutists). Some things never change, not that Im a conservative, mind you.
@Stephen: On the contrary, it is the relief of psychological pain, because I have already decided on the correct courses of action in situations where a choice might be between what I love and my life. You just cannot understand it because you do not feel love for anyone but yourself, you have no principles, friends, mates or children more important to you than your own life, you are an absolute, 100% coward. So of course, rather than face your cowardice and see yourself for the fearful wretch you are, you will deride those with the courage and intelligence to be at peace with a finite existence.
What a thoroughly pointless and empty life you must lead, Stephen.
Zombie
>>not holding your own life as your highest value is the valuing of your own death, with the necessary psychological pain.
>On the contrary, it is the relief of psychological pain,
The first concern of selfish people is living life. The first concern of selfless people is avoiding pain. Pseudo-scientific, materialist behaviorism is a rationalization for evading the self and self-judgment. But since the self exists and has needs, religion fills the intellectual vacuum (at the price of thinking that the self is an emenation of the supernatural with no natural function).
>I have already decided on the correct courses of action in situations where a choice might be between what I love and my life.
The first concern of selfless people is avoiding pain.
Note the split between “what I love and my life.”
> at peace with a finite existence.
But since the self exists and has needs, religion fills the intellectual vacuum (at the price of thinking that the self is an emenation of the supernatural with no natural function).
You fail, once again, to successfully rationalize your evasion of the hierarchy of reasoning. Sacrifice is, in fact, and therefore in reasoning, based upon the desire for death, regardless of rationalizations. This cannot be escaped regardless of how many nuances are placed between sacrifice and the desire for death. This is the logic of your ideas, ie, a common human experience, not a personal attack. If you think it a personal attack, that is a personal matter for your self-consciousness, the self-consciousness whose judgment you have indirectly and, against your intentions, caused, and which you evade in your zombie theories. For evidence, consider Munch’s ,”The Scream,” and your response. Or the increasing liberal concern with compassion and the lack of meaning. If you want to sacrifice yourself, that is your personal concern, of no interest to me. But when you publically rationalize it as requiring a govt which violates my rights, that is my concern. And, with Rand’s philosophy of Objectivism, I have a rational alternative to persuade others to respect individual rights.
In your continuing personal attacks, you merely confess the lack of ideas and presume that the the desire for sacrifice is a common human experience, causing guilt if rejected. But it isnt and it doesnt. I do note, however, that psychosis, the lack of volitional control over mind, is part of your “science.”
It must be a source of some, transitory, relief to think that the Devil made you do it.
Zombie,
>I am honestly just not all that afraid of death or non-existence.
Because not holding your own life as your highest value is the valuing of your own death, with the necessary psychological pain.
@Bron: Why wouldnt anyone value their life above every other persons? [Most] of us want to live.
Most of us want to live, only sociopaths and psychopaths want to live no matter what it takes, no matter who it hurts, no matter what the ramifications are to others.
My life is finite, my enjoyment of life is finite. As a worker, I put an explicit dollar value on my life. Because my life is finite, the value of my life is finite, and therefore it is possible for me to consider other things more valuable than my own life. As I do. As my life is used up, the value left to be extracted diminishes, and it becomes easier for me to imagine exceeding that value.
So no, I do not think that my life is more valuable than all other lives, and there exist individuals that I would trade my life to save.
I think putting an infinite value on your own life is irrational. I am an atheist, but even for those religionists that believe in an afterlife, life on Earth in a corporeal body is a finite experience with a finite value. Even if we cannot put our finger on that value precisely, most humans at some time in our lives believe that value is exceeded by something of greater emotional value, such as a principle or relationship, even if that particular trade is never executed.
My own life may be in my top ten list, but it isn’t number one and I would literally rather die than sacrifice some of the people, emotions and principles I find more important. Their preservation would be more valuable to me than some finite number of additional years for myself. I am honestly just not all that afraid of death or non-existence.
Tony C… YOU are absolutely CORRECT on ALL accounts here….
and this hit the nail RIGHT on the head….
It is not the “promotion of self-reliance” to let somebody die because you cannot be bothered to help, it is not the “promotion of self esteem” to let some girl live life as a sex slave because you cannot be bothered to come forward as a witness to her abduction. Yet your philosophy of never being obligated to do anything you have not agreed to do leads to precisely those conclusions, that you can let people die or suffer in slavery because even the tiniest sliver of your time is more valuable than their entire life.
That, Bron, is psychopathy.
Remember the founders rebelled because of a small tax and because they wanted representation.
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NO…. they rebelled because they were paying taxes to England… and it was not to their benefit in America…..
Taxation without representation does NOT mean TAXES are unjust….
it means that people do not want to pay taxes and not get any benefit from them….. which is perfectly reasonable…..
Bron….
people risk their lives EVERYDAY to save other people…..
Are you saying that if you saw a child in the middle of the street who was about to get hit by a car, you would not risk your life to save that child?????
Tony C:
Although I was told by an Objectivist that if you are in peril and there is only room enough for one in the life boat all bets are off. I was taken aback because I would have tried to figure out how to have the lifeboat support 2 people.
If you couldnt make the life boat support 2 then what do you do? Draw straws? Kill the other person or kick him out? Survival of the fittest? Women and children first?
What is best for the individual? Jefferson said “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” And that is best for society. Because society is made up of individuals.
Remember the founders rebelled because of a small tax and because they wanted representation.
Rand and Locke have much in common, were our founders sociopaths/psychopaths?
tONY C:
Why wouldnt anyone value their life above every other persons? Must of us want to live.
@Bron: I think I understand it fine. You do not value life if you put zero value on self-sacrifice to preserve life. That is the package deal. What Objectivists value is their own life above all other life, look at Stephen’s rhetoric. That is the definition of selfishness, it is the definition of Rand’s philosophy, that is the definition of psychopathy: Me first, nobody second.
Objectivists do not give a crap about life, liberty or happiness in general, they care only about their own life, their own liberty and their own happiness, and their entire philosophy is engineered to promote the lie that if they act just as selfishly as they please then everybody else’s life, liberty and happiness will be taken care of automatically, so they needn’t worry their little minds about that. It is a sociopathic, psychopathic philosophy that other people’s well being is none of their concern, as long as they are happy.
Tony C:
that was some rhetoric, wow.
Tony C:
I dont think you understand Objectivism enough to properly criticize it.
All Objectivists believe in the principles of our founding and in the concept of limited government. Objectivists are not anarchists.
I am pretty certain the majority of Objectivists would fight and die, if necessary, to oppose tyranny.
Objectivists value life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
But when you value life, human life, you are valuing liberty, reason, happiness, it is a package deal.
@Bron: As always, you purposely miss the point. Psychopaths are people without empathy willing to harm others for personal gain. That is what Objectivists promote, despite their protestations to the contrary; their philosophy “values” selfishness so highly they are willing to let others literally suffer and die. The philosophy itself is psychopathic, it puts zero value on the life or well-being or happiness of any other person. As you yourself have said, echoing Ayn Rand, even in a hypothetical situation where you could save a child’s life with a single word you would feel no obligation to do so; that is putting the value of an entire other life as being less important to you than the value of half a second of your own life; that is close enough to zero value to be effectively zero value on the lives of any other person.
It is not the “promotion of self-reliance” to let somebody die because you cannot be bothered to help, it is not the “promotion of self esteem” to let some girl live life as a sex slave because you cannot be bothered to come forward as a witness to her abduction. Yet your philosophy of never being obligated to do anything you have not agreed to do leads to precisely those conclusions, that you can let people die or suffer in slavery because even the tiniest sliver of your time is more valuable than their entire life.
That, Bron, is psychopathy.
Stephen Grossman:
I was having a conversation with my wife and she was telling me about brainwashing and welfare dependency. She is a teacher and is helping a child with a term paper so she has been reading some of the papers found on the web about brainwashing and welfare.
She said that brainwashing is hard to do with people who are not dependent on someone else. It is also hard to do with people who have self esteem. Dont Objectivists promote self reliance and self esteem? Arent self reliance and self esteem necessary elements for doing well in life?
She also said something else I found interesting, namely why would anyone promote dependency in another person? She thought the promoting of dependency was necessary to brainwash people into a cycle of misery and despair so they would be beholden to the government for their existence.
I dont know about you but it seems to me that anyone who would promote dependency, misery and despair would be evil.
Based on this, I am really unclear as to why Tony C and others would consider Objectivists sociopaths/psycopaths for promoting self esteem and self reliance among other positive human traits.
She said that brainwashing is hard to do with people who are not dependent on someone else. It is also hard to do with people who have self esteem. Dont Objectivists promote self reliance and self esteem? Arent self reliance and self esteem necessary elements for doing well in life?
————————————-
then how do you explain all of the Religious people in the USA????
Tom Cruise is pretty darn wealthy yet, he is quite brainwashed by Scientology……
Do you know that MOST of the people on welfare, WORK for a living???
They are just paid terribly poor wages……
@Stephen: Value drinking rat poison. Life requires that living organisms value their life more than all other values to maintain living. You value eating, a value objectively needed to remain alive.
I see, more of your Aynish redefinitions, in which “valuing” something means you must immediately do that thing yourself. What a crock.
Those of us that speak plain English CAN put some value in drinking a poison without immediately drinking any poison, because some of us that speak plain English do put value in the right of others to end their lives if they so desire, and some of us that speak plain English value the bravery and patriotism of a soldier that drank rat poison to kill himself rather than be tortured into revealing information that would be used to kill his fellow soldiers.
We that speak plain English can put value in eating and therefore NOT eat, for example by skipping our meal so that a child can eat instead.
And it is obviously not necessary to value one’s life above all others in order to continue living; many a fireman or cop or soldier or spy is alive precisely because they risked their life to save another life, and that favor was later returned to them by their brothers-in-arms saving their life.
That becomes a general truth, because we are always stronger in groups whose members are all willing to risk life, limb and fortune to protect each other, and to pursue common goals as a group.
How far do you think our founding fathers would have gotten if they had not been willing to risk (and suffer) death to separate from British rule?
Your psychopathic philosophy of personal life preservation over all else prevents the collective action that leads to collective rewards, like the American Revolution or any other revolution or war that has led to a free country or preserved one.
Without putting other lives ahead of their own, no soldier goes to war to stop psychopaths from overrunning their country. We would all be the subjects of Nazis, or dead at their hands. Or more precisely, we would all be subjects of kings and strongmen and dictators willing to kill us if we disobey, disarmed, enslaved, and herded like cattle.
All in all the idea that “life” is the highest value is just a misguided, childishly fearful and short-sighted philosophy. Under that philosophy, it is better to be a shackled slave living on bread and water, working under constant threat of death to make a master rich, than to risk death for one’s freedom. It is better to endure the beatings, endure the rapes, and never fight back because the alternative risks death, and your philosophy values your life above all other values.
Ayn’s pathetic logic never stands up to scrutiny. Some of us that speak plain English understand there ARE things more valuable than our own lives, and that has been true throughout history. It is the reason you were not born as the property of some king or emperor to do with as he pleased.
There have been lots of threads that devolved into 3 party discussions and why they aren’t viable. Well, here’s a different take.
excerpts:
John Reed is New Green Mayor in Fairfax
Thursday, December 6, 2012
On December 5th, John Reed became Mayor of Fairfax, the fourth Green in a row to be Mayor there. Reed is also the fourth Green on the five member Fairfax Town Council, where Greens have made up a majority since November 2009.
Appointed by unamimous vote by his Town Council colleagues, Reed succeeds fellow Greens Pam Hartwell-Herrero (2011-2012), Larry Bragman (2010-2011) and Lew Tremaine (2009-2010) as Fairfax’s Mayor, and joins Gayle Mclaughlin (Richmond) and Bruce Delgado (Marina) as one of three current Green mayors statewide.
Since 1993, when Raven Earlygrow (Point Arena) became the state’s first Green Mayor, thirty-three California Greens have served in that role.
……
It didn’t take Reed long to move on this agenda. At his first meeting as Mayor, he announced that $300K in funding had just been secured for some long needed bike lanes and pedestrian improvements in the center of downtown.
Fairfax is one of four U.S. cities where Greens have had a city/town council majority, three of them in California – Fairfax, Sebastopol (2000-2008) and Arcata (1996-1998.)
funny you should mention ‘green’.
as i followed the posts i have been thinking of kermit the frog who made famous the lyrics ‘it’s not easy being green”.
shameful to admit, i am still searching for the connection.
Zombie,
>psychopaths are drawn to the psychopathic philosophy of Rand;
You imply that a rational psychology is a danger to a living organism whose basic method of survival is reason. And that the selfless hatred of one’s own survival is psy. healthy, ie furthers life. Thus youre left claiming that self-hatred is a survival mechanism. There is no corner of the universe where contradictions escape the rest of the universe. The universe is consistent w/itself, whatever your rationalizations. Your contradictions will not affect it.
It is.