fimchick said:
Yes, we need to be some serious changes in the current retirement system. We need companies to be responsible for their behaviors so we can avoid disasters like Enron. There's a lot of work that needs to be done, but we can't rely on just social security. All too many people do that, and they're going to get really hurt in the end.
I agree that companies need to be more responsible for shirking taxes and for working the system, but there will always be a way to circumvent laws and regulations in place. We just have to be careful not to go the way of a utopic vision.
From each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs.
But that's regulatory. That's "big government." I thought the whole purpose of supply-side economics was to let business run free? After all, only lazy and stupid people don't foresee their company running off with their retirement funds.
You will notice that, throughout this entire debate, I have never rejected capitalism in favor of communism. I hate communism, and I agree with anyone's perceptions that it is a failure. However, I am equally opposed to supply-side capitalism, because rampant deregulation leads to the abuses that we see.
The deregulation of the 1980s and 1990s has gone too far. Rather than bitching about your taxes, bitch about your wages. Up to 1986, corporations were punished with something like a 25% tax if they had what was deemed to be "excessive profits." You might roll your eyes on that, but the idea behind the tax was not to collect 25% of arbitarily-determined "excessive profits," but to force businesses to both invest in themselves and pay their labor equitable wages to avoid paying the tax completely. It worked. But after 1986, we have companies running themselves into fiscal irresponsibility and declaring bankruptcy multiple times after a stock panic or two, and wages have run stagnant ever since. After all, if you raise wages, it's "inflation." Actually, prior to 1982, the primary indicator of inflation was consumer prices. That's why Carter had hyperinflation: oil prices were consumer prices. Then Reagan had the definition changed, and all the numbers looked "rosy" again.
I'm all for personal responsibility. But I'm also for an equitable playing field, rather than one that is always geared towards fattening corporate profit margins, and punishing Americans for getting raises.
Melon