National Liberal Coalition Policy Discussion

[Verily]

-Prayer allowed in public schools but not sanctioned; no "prayer time", no proselytizing

That's the only part receiving my disapproval. Public schools should be 100% secular, and you do what you wish with private schools.

Perhaps you are misunderstanding my point; children are allowed to pray during recess, for example, but "I'm busy praying" is no excuse for not paying attention in/being in class. I'm not sure how we could actively forbid students (or teachers/faculty, in environments with no students present) from being religious in school as long as no one is forcing anything religious on anyone else.

[Hash]

-Prayer allowed in public schools but not sanctioned; no "prayer time", no proselytizing

That's the only part receiving my disapproval. Public schools should be 100% secular, and you do what you wish with private schools.

Perhaps you are misunderstanding my point; children are allowed to pray during recess, for example, but "I'm busy praying" is no excuse for not paying attention in/being in class. I'm not sure how we could actively forbid students (or teachers/faculty, in environments with no students present) from being religious in school as long as no one is forcing anything religious on anyone else.

I did misunderstand you, and I hope your text quoted is the official policy on secularism in school.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

I favor neutrality toward religion when it comes to government supported education.  For those Regions which choose to include school vouchers among their methods of funding education, I have no problem with including religious schools among voucher choices for parents to select among, so long as they aren't the only choice, and the schools have to meet the same standards as other schools concerning the non-religious aspects of education..  I also have no beef with extracurricular religious clubs/activities being allowed at public schools on the same basis as non-religious clubs/activities.

[bullmoose88]

Where do we stand on labor?

And sub issues such as "Right to work," "Right to organize," wages etc...

[Verily]

Where do we stand on labor?

And sub issues such as "Right to work," "Right to organize," wages etc...

A complex issue, and one to which I want to give due time. However, I'm going to keep going in order on to taxation, which Rockefeller Republican brought up earlier. (Secularism in public schools has been covered, I think, and vouchers should probably wait until we get to broader education topics.)

Now, on to taxation. Afleitch had a solid idea proposed in his campaign, the reorganization of tax brackets, though I am afraid pulling out the bottom 20% may remove slightly too much funding for necessary programs; pulling out, say, the bottom 10% might be more reasonable.

Some other ideas... I like the idea of sliding taxes rather than tax brackets, where taxes increase constantly with income rather than jumping up as soon as you cross a certain threshold. This creates the complication of calculating exact tax brackets, but, so long as the calculation were simple enough, it doesn't seem unduly problematic, and is certainly more fair and reasonable (no need to keep your income below a certain line so as not to suddenly have to pay far more in taxes than otherwise). Obviously, there would be an upper and lower bound on the slide. This is just an idea, though, and I'm not sure how feasible it would be.

I can't say I favor raising corporate taxes, at least not more than incrementally, as corporate taxes greatly discourage business ventures within Atlasia from which the entire country benefits (and driving large corporations out to tax havens would ultimately reduce revenue rather than increasing it). Clearly, if corporate taxes are to be raised, however, it should be large businesses which bear the burden.

As an example of what sliding taxes would look like:

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[Small Business Owner of Any Repute]

Now, on to taxation. Afleitch had a solid idea proposed in his campaign, the reorganization of tax brackets, though I am afraid pulling out the bottom 20% may remove slightly too much funding for necessary programs; pulling out, say, the bottom 10% might be more reasonable.

Some other ideas... I like the idea of sliding taxes rather than tax brackets, where taxes increase constantly with income rather than jumping up as soon as you cross a certain threshold. This creates the complication of calculating exact tax brackets, but, so long as the calculation were simple enough, it doesn't seem unduly problematic, and is certainly more fair and reasonable (no need to keep your income below a certain line so as not to suddenly have to pay far more in taxes than otherwise). Obviously, there would be an upper and lower bound on the slide. This is just an idea, though, and I'm not sure how feasible it would be.

Well, that's not exactly the way the tax system works, though.  There's no real tax "jump" once you pass a marked dollar line.

Ignore the standard deduction for a moment.

For a single filer in 2006 (our tax rates are constantly changing throughout the decade because of the Bush tax cuts), the first $7,550 in taxable income is taxed at 10%.  The amount you make over $7,550 but less than $30,650 is taxed at 15%.

So, at $7,550 in income, your taxes are $755.
If you make $7,551 in income, your taxes are 10% on the first $7,550 ($755), plus 15% on that next dollar.  So, your taxes are then $755.15, not $1,132.65.

Making the effective tax rate at $7,551 of income 10.0007%.  This slowly increases as you make more money, hitting 15% at $30,650.

We already have a sliding scale.  The full tax tiers are here.

Now, let's reintroduce the concept of the personal deduction and standard deduction (i.e., minimum deduction) for a moment, since not all income is really taxable.  In 2006, the standard deduction was $5,150.  You also get a $3,300 personal deduction (plus more if you have dependents) on top of that.  That means the first $8,450 of Atlasian income is essentially taxed at a 0% rate for a single person like myself.

What afleitch is proposing, basically, is hiking the personal deduction.  I could find myself supporting that, so long as the math works out right, and it doesn't wind up being a massive hike on the upper middle class, like often seems the case.  (I'll run the numbers in a separate post.)

Our tax system is confusing as hell, but the more familiar I get with it, the more I like it.  I used to be one of the flat taxers, but now that I'm actually working (and not making that much), I think a progressive "sliding" tax scale works very well.  The real debate is more along the lines whether or not to lock in the "Bush Tax Cuts" which have been grandfathered into Atlasian law, and my own pet issue, figuring out what to do about the unique impending Atlasian "Carbon Tax Crisis" I talked about in my campaign.

As far as business taxes are concerned, I'm for the status quo.

[Small Business Owner of Any Repute]

Going by 2005 data, 8.64% of households make $9,999 or less a year.
21.66% make $19,999 or less.

If the basic amount people get deducted is $8,450; taking the bottom 10% out of the tax system is more than feasable—if you include things like the Earned Income Tax Credit (more complexity, yay!), we're probably already AT 10% or better.

I'm against tax hikes, but I don't mind tax reorganization.  I think the taxation plank should be deliberately vague, perhaps a line or two in support of progressive taxation tiers, or an opposition to a flat tax/national sales tax.  Perhaps even shifting the tax burden away from the lower class, and closing business tax loopholes.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

As an example of what sliding taxes would look like:

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I hope you don't mean that the tax rate on the entire income rather than the marginal income would slide.  That would cause marginal tax rates to be very high at the upper end of the scale.  For example,  comparing 34.9999359% of $399,999 vs, 35% of $400,000 shows that the marginal tax rate on that 400,000th dollar would be 60.64%.

Getting that out of the way, given that taxpayers who have taxable incomes lower than the top bracket have to use tax tables anyway, so it wouldn't be an added complication for tax payers.

[Verily]

Now, on to taxation. Afleitch had a solid idea proposed in his campaign, the reorganization of tax brackets, though I am afraid pulling out the bottom 20% may remove slightly too much funding for necessary programs; pulling out, say, the bottom 10% might be more reasonable.

Some other ideas... I like the idea of sliding taxes rather than tax brackets, where taxes increase constantly with income rather than jumping up as soon as you cross a certain threshold. This creates the complication of calculating exact tax brackets, but, so long as the calculation were simple enough, it doesn't seem unduly problematic, and is certainly more fair and reasonable (no need to keep your income below a certain line so as not to suddenly have to pay far more in taxes than otherwise). Obviously, there would be an upper and lower bound on the slide. This is just an idea, though, and I'm not sure how feasible it would be.

Well, that's not exactly the way the tax system works, though.  There's no real tax "jump" once you pass a marked dollar line.

Ignore the standard deduction for a moment.

For a single filer in 2006 (our tax rates are constantly changing throughout the decade because of the Bush tax cuts), the first $7,550 in taxable income is taxed at 10%.  The amount you make over $7,550 but less than $30,650 is taxed at 15%.

So, at $7,550 in income, your taxes are $755.
If you make $7,551 in income, your taxes are 10% on the first $7,550 ($755), plus 15% on that next dollar.  So, your taxes are then $755.15, not $1,132.65.

Making the effective tax rate at $7,551 of income 10.0007%.  This slowly increases as you make more money, hitting 15% at $30,650.

We already have a sliding scale.  The full tax tiers are here.

Thank you for enlightening me on that. (Having never moved from one tax bracket to another, I just never understood how it works.) It sounds reasonable, though the numbers could be smoothed from the current odd jumps.

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Interesting. According to what I could find, though, 20% of the population would bring us well into the $20,000 range, probably far too high.

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Perhaps we could simplify some of the confusion by removing some of the different brackets, rising only in three or four different brackets (perhaps from 10% to 18.3% to 26.7% to 35% at, say $20,000, $75,000, $150,000 and $350,000; that's just an example). Reducing the number of brackets would greatly simplify the tax code without necessarily changing tax rates substantially.

[Small Business Owner of Any Repute]

Perhaps we could simplify some of the confusion by removing some of the different brackets, rising only in three or four different brackets (perhaps from 10% to 18.3% to 26.7% to 35% at, say $20,000, $75,000, $150,000 and $350,000; that's just an example). Reducing the number of brackets would greatly simplify the tax code without necessarily changing tax rates substantially.

Honestly, unless you want to scrap the whole thing and move to a flat tax, cutting out some tax brackets isn't going to really make the tax code that much simpler.  As long as we have more than one, people will still need to use those infernal tax tables.

Though I suppose it'd make the job of whomever makes those tax tables for the IRS a little bit easier.

As creative a mind as I have when it comes to this sort of thing, only the wettest of conservative (or libertarian) wet dreams will make tax time any simpler.

[Verily]

Perhaps we could simplify some of the confusion by removing some of the different brackets, rising only in three or four different brackets (perhaps from 10% to 18.3% to 26.7% to 35% at, say $20,000, $75,000, $150,000 and $350,000; that's just an example). Reducing the number of brackets would greatly simplify the tax code without necessarily changing tax rates substantially.

Honestly, unless you want to scrap the whole thing and move to a flat tax, cutting out some tax brackets isn't going to really make the tax code that much simpler.  As long as we have more than one, people will still need to use those infernal tax tables.

Though I suppose it'd make the job of whomever makes those tax tables for the IRS a little bit easier.

As creative a mind as I have when it comes to this sort of thing, only the wettest of conservative (or libertarian) wet dreams will make tax time any simpler.

All right, I suppose we should settle for supporting the status quo with openness to future simplification suggestions. Tax law is just as boring as trade law, though. So much for positive tax reform (unless anyone else has any ideas).

Bullmoose mentioned labor earlier, so we'll go there next. Now, "right to work" has always sounded somewhat silly to me; you have the right to work so long as you do something that someone is willing to pay you for. Fortunately, everyone (save those covered under other issues: retirement, disability, education/child care, etc.) can do something that someone is willing to pay them for (albeit sometimes not much, we'll get to that), it's just a question of willingness.

Certainly, there exists a "right to organize". It's there in the Constitution: peaceable assembly. Of course, unions and unionization do not, or should not, have the power to unilaterally override corporations. On the other hand, unions do not seem to be too powerful today, and current union law seems sufficient in my view. There are corrupt union bosses, but there is nothing the government can do to stop other workers from supporting them.

Minimum wage... this might be an interesting one. Again, I am more or less in favor of the status quo, though indexing the minimum wage to inflation to prevent future battles over raising it seems prudent.

[Small Business Owner of Any Repute]

I'm rather supportive of unions, but I do oppose "card check."  Businesses and unions should be on an equal playing field when it comes to the bargaining table.

It's already been ruled, IIRC, that the Senate has no power to regulate a minimum wage.  I'd probably support a constitutional amendment allowing one, but honestly, I think it's a matter best left to the regions.  Any minimum wage should definitely be indexed to the CPI, though.

[Verily]

I'm rather supportive of unions, but I do oppose "card check."  Businesses and unions should be on an equal playing field when it comes to the bargaining table.

It's already been ruled, IIRC, that the Senate has no power to regulate a minimum wage.  I'd probably support a constitutional amendment allowing one, but honestly, I think it's a matter best left to the regions.  Any minimum wage should definitely be indexed to the CPI, though.

Ah, yes, I found that case just now while going through the list of Atlasian laws. Well, we can support a reasonable minimum wage at the regional level.

[Verily]

A flurry of recent activity has pushed this onto the second page, which really won't do. We'll move on to electoral reform. The current PR-STV proposal is intriguing, and I think I favor it, though the problem of what to do in the event of a vacancy has paralyzed Senate discussion.

Anyone else have thoughts about electoral reform?

[Colin]

Well I think my opinion on electoral reform is rather clear. I am for proportional representation and I have supported the expansion of the Senate in the past. Beyond the reforms proposed by Jas and myself through the Proportional Representation bill and the Ending the Districts Amendment I don't see much else that you could do under the current system electorally. Personally I've always thought that Atlasia has a choice between empowering the President further to turn this into a full presidential system or get rid of the presidential elements and becoming what we basically are now, a parliamentary system.

[Jaggerjack]

Well I think my opinion on electoral reform is rather clear. I am for proportional representation and I have supported the expansion of the Senate in the past. Beyond the reforms proposed by Jas and myself through the Proportional Representation bill and the Ending the Districts Amendment I don't see much else that you could do under the current system electorally. Personally I've always thought that Atlasia has a choice between empowering the President further to turn this into a full presidential system or get rid of the presidential elements and becoming what we basically are now, a parliamentary system.

This sounds really weird, but how about 2 senators per region and district?

[Verily]

The problem that arises with STV is the issue of vacancies. The leftists don't want countback because they may be replaced by centrists, but the rightists don't want by-elections because it's very difficult for them to be elected in a single-member election nationwide. Personally, I think both are merely "partisan" objections, and that either by-elections or countback would be an acceptable solution.

Two-member Districts are too small for reasonable STV elections, and there aren't yet enough Atlasians for three-member Districts.

[Colin]

Two-member Districts are too small for reasonable STV elections, and there aren't yet enough Atlasians for three-member Districts.

Also you have to consider that most districts now have trouble finding two candidates to run in an election. With DWDL's exit from the race no district in this election had more than two candidates.

As for the by-election method I don't really care as long as some form of proportional representation is put in place.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

no interest in electoral reform on my part.  The Senate spends too much time shuffling the deck chairs and not bothering about where Atlasia is headed.  Of the six items on the floor now, only one, the Educational Funding Clarification Bill, is about what the government does, the other five are all about how the government does it's business.

[Small Business Owner of Any Repute]

Well, it looks like we're not going to come to a consensus on too much by way of electoral reform.

Personally, I haven't made up my mind on PR-STV.  I think I'm leaning against it at this point.  I do know that I don't like countback, and would vote against that.

no interest in electoral reform on my part.  The Senate spends too much time shuffling the deck chairs and not bothering about where Atlasia is headed.  Of the six items on the floor now, only one, the Educational Funding Clarification Bill, is about what the government does, the other five are all about how the government does it's business.

I think you're right, that is a problem right now—the Senate floor is starting to get jammed up with its own reforms.  It looks like just a temporary pipeline thing: there's plenty of non Senate reform stuff coming up soon.

[afleitch]

As most attempts at electoral and constitution reform end up being voted down by the Senate or by the people, it's very difficult to bring suggestions to the table that haven't, in one form or another been suggested before. Voting reform based on proportional representation or pooled/list voting are probably the furthest we could go. There will be objections if Senates do not represent geographic areas, which in truth really shouldn't be an issue as unfortunately very few Senators respond to regional/district issues anyway.

Again reality can cause problems. If we had two 5 seat lists for example, each elected every two months, we would like to think we would have 10 candidates for each and a proper race, but realistically we'd be lucky to muster 6, at which point there would be no need to campaign at all.

I'd agree that its difficult to get 2 candidates in each seat as it stands unless we shift the focus of the game from an election sim, to a government sim with higher participation, two houses etc. Other than this, we can only really patch up what we've got.

[Јas]

Although I'm not a member of the NLC, if I may, I would like to comment on the PR-STV legislation and on the forum affairs agenda generally as I have something of an interest in both.

Some here have lamented the fact that forum affairs matters are currently taking up the Senate's time. I would underline to them that in the previous Presidential election, such reform was the major campaign issue of the Wixted/Jas ticket; that on every poll I can remember in Atlasia, forum affairs issues are those which most concern the population; and that given the context within which Atlasia operates, forum affairs matters produce the most tangible effects of any form of legislation.

I recall all to well when the Senate chamber was clogged up with free trade bills, the issues before the Senate change on a week by week and a month by month basis. Just because a cluster of related issue bills appear at any one time, doesn't mean they are not important in their own right.

On PR-STV specifically, to those who have stated that the current Senate discussion is proving unproductive, I would disagree. Positions are becoming more clear and achieving consensus in Atlasia has always been difficult. I firmly believe progress is being made and that a solution is possible. What's more I'm not going to give up on the reforms because there has been some difficulty. I believe the reforms are worthwhile (particularly the PR-STV legislation) and will produce tangible benefits for Atlasia as outlined when I first introduced the matter and highlighted here. In simple terms these include:
More Competitive Elections;
More Voter Choice;
Possible Return of Regular Party Primaries;
Ends the Need for Re-Districting;
Retains Regional Representation;
Fewer 'Wasted' Votes

I am not going to give up on the reforms simply because of a disagreement over vacancy filling. There are many aspiring Atlasian politicians within the NLC, I would advise them that they should not give up when they encounter the sort of difficulties the PR-STV bill has hit. Worthwhile change is not easy. Trying to get through any piece of legislation through the Atlasian Senate is no mean achievement, trying to do so by achieving a consensus all the more so (especially the current 20th Senate) - but I believe it can be done, and I will continue to work and hope that it will be done.

[Verily]

Two-member Districts are too small for reasonable STV elections, and there aren't yet enough Atlasians for three-member Districts.

Also you have to consider that most districts now have trouble finding two candidates to run in an election. With DWDL's exit from the race no district in this election had more than two candidates.

Well, I think we might have more candidates if more people considered it possible for themselves to be elected. Right now, no left-winger would run against, say, Earl because they agree on most issues and only one could be elected, but, with this system in place, both could run and conceivably both win seats.

Also, thank you Jas for your words, all of course true and powerful.

[Verily]

Okay, I'm going to start drafting a full platform within the next few days on the issues already discussed, and then we will continue with further issues such as education, health care, the military, agriculture, etc.

[Verily]

Here's what we've got so far, I think:


Immigration
The National Liberal Coalition supports the expansion of legal immigration, especially the refocusing of immigration away from family connections and towards desire to enter Atlasia. The National Coalition believes that illegal immigration is primarily the by-product of unnecessarily restrictive immigration laws, and therefore also believes that illegal immigration that would continue after legal immigration is been eased is of a far less benign nature than currently. Because of this, in tandem with easier legal immigration, the National Liberal Coalition supports expanded border security measures, though it opposes the expensive posturing of constructing a wall.

Trade
The National Liberal Coalition supports the expansion of Atlasia’s international trade connections, and advocates free trade agreements with other interested parties, with reasonable exceptions.

Taxation
The National Liberal Coalition is largely supportive of the current taxation system. We are always willing to consider strategies to reduce the tax burden on the middle and lower classes, but out-and-out tax cuts can be fiscally irresponsible, and the National Liberal Coalition would prefer to balance the budget before offering tax breaks.

Religious Freedom
In a public school, court, or other government environment, the National Liberal Coalition supports the desires of the individual to participate in religious activities. However, the National Liberal Coalition opposes any and all spending in such areas directed towards religious belief or the installation of any overtly religious iconography in said government buildings.

Labor
The National Liberal Coalition is broadly supportive of the status quo in labor issues, except for the issue of the minimum wage, where the National Liberal Coalition opposes the decision of Bono v Atlasia and advocates the return of the minimum wage and its indexing to inflation.

Electoral Reform
The National Liberal Coalition is broadly supportive of efforts to reform the voting system in such a way as to make it more democratic and to encourage personal and party participation while not currently endorsing any particular plan to do so.

Euthanasia
The National Liberal Coalition supports the legalization of euthanasia through living wills or active consent.




Now, let's move on to more issues. Next up: education. This includes voucher programs, education funding, district sizes, etc.