Should slavery be reinstated?

[DanielX]

Making prisoners perform work robs Union Workers of a well-paid job.  Or would in an ideal world where everyone was protected by a union.

Your the only guy I know who wants a Prisoners' Union.

No, that's not what I said.  I don't want the prisoners doing any work, because it would take good jobs away from non-prisoner union members.  For example if people want the highways cleaned, let them pay a fellow $25/hour to do it.  With benefits.

If that happened, inflation would drive up the cost of living sixfold, and the guy will be earning effectively minimum wage.

Either that, or you'd have the government subsidizing 5/6th of the worth of a good, and cause the marginal tax rates to be gigantic. I assume since you want to actually pay low-income workers money, then high-income workers will end up with 95% income tax or something. Or you force businesses to lose money on everything they sell, the businesses fail, and the nation is overall much worse off.

[Citizen James]

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[senatortombstone]

Wow, we have some extreme bigots on here.

Bigots against criminals?

Well, leave it to a closed-minded liberal to automatically associate slavery with black people.  Look at history and slavery has existed everywhere and everywhen, and most slaves have not been black.

The history channel has a new series on conquerors and my gosh, what happened in England under the tyrannical reign of William the Bastard was something out of Hitler's Germany or Saddam's Iraq.  Men have killed men since there have been men. 

[Ebowed]

Men have killed men since there have been men. 

Doesn't make it right.

[senatortombstone]

Men have killed men since there have been men. 

Doesn't make it right.

nope, and it certainly doesn't make the atrocities commited against indians and africans any worse than the ones that were commited against europeans.

[opebo]

Making prisoners perform work robs Union Workers of a well-paid job.  Or would in an ideal world where everyone was protected by a union.

Your the only guy I know who wants a Prisoners' Union.

No, that's not what I said.  I don't want the prisoners doing any work, because it would take good jobs away from non-prisoner union members.  For example if people want the highways cleaned, let them pay a fellow $25/hour to do it.  With benefits.

If that happened, inflation would drive up the cost of living sixfold, and the guy will be earning effectively minimum wage.

Either that, or you'd have the government subsidizing 5/6th of the worth of a good, and cause the marginal tax rates to be gigantic. I assume since you want to actually pay low-income workers money, then high-income workers will end up with 95% income tax or something. Or you force businesses to lose money on everything they sell, the businesses fail, and the nation is overall much worse off.

No, I'm quite certain that increasing wages would drive an increase in productivity.  Also I wouldn't mind taxing the higher income levels at say 70% or so, though 95% sounds a bit high.  Keep in mind people at these levels are owners, not workers.

[dazzleman]

No, I'm quite certain that increasing wages would drive an increase in productivity.  Also I wouldn't mind taxing the higher income levels at say 70% or so, though 95% sounds a bit high.  Keep in mind people at these levels are owners, not workers.

You do recognize that owners create jobs, right?  They also take risks to create jobs.  As always, you propose to take away any potential reward for those risks.  Clearly, you didn't learn about the risk/reward relationship when you were in school.

I guess under your scenario, you just tax away the owners' income.  The reality is that this would mean that the owners would never create the jobs in the first place, and there would be a more general impoverishment.

The only good thing about the policies you recommend is that, had they been in place, your family never would have made any money, and you'd be lucky to have a job in Burger King.

[opebo]

No, I'm quite certain that increasing wages would drive an increase in productivity.  Also I wouldn't mind taxing the higher income levels at say 70% or so, though 95% sounds a bit high.  Keep in mind people at these levels are owners, not workers.

You do recognize that owners create jobs, right?  They also take risks to create jobs.  As always, you propose to take away any potential reward for those risks.  Clearly, you didn't learn about the risk/reward relationship when you were in school.

No, I recognize the risk/reward relationship, which is why I suggest a top tax rate of no more than 70%.  The 30% that they get to keep should be plenty to motivate the rich to engage in the easy task of investing.  What else are they going to do?  Put it under a mattress?

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No, my family's money came from the post war Keynesian boom.   Like virtually everyone else, they were poor in the 1930's - though they did own some then worthless farmland.  As it turned out that farmland was made valuable as it was in the path of Keynesian driven suburban development.  Easy money, high wages - it was a breeze to build and sell to the new middle class, and then repeat.  By the time the dream was over - circa late seventies/early eighties, they had enough money to really be Republicans, and live in denial of how they got it ('hard work' don't you know).