Eeyore wrote:

The Natural Philosopher wrote:

Eeyore wrote:
Don't enforce a minimum wage. Remove income tax. And subsidise EVERYONE.
History shows this just hurts the poor.

No, it would actually improve matters.

Instead of cheap labour being in China,it would be right there on your
doorstep.

Do you seriously think reducing western labour rates to a couple of dollars a DAY would help
the poor ?

Yup. If they and everyone else are getting $150 a day anyway to do
nothing. And whatever they get doesn't affect that, nor does it get
taxed.. Paid for out of taxes on consumption of luxury goods with a high
energy of manufacture..

In the end what a country produces and what proportion goes to whom is
one issue: Socialism today redistributes it all by state handouts to the
supposedly needy, and subsidisng basic services, paid fr out of tacing
the people who ARE doing something constructive. This is complex and
expensive.

All I propose is that the redistribution mechanism simply cuts through
te bull****, and shifts the tax burden away from working, to
consumption. Then everybody* gets a payment, yea right up to bill gates,
of a basic living wage.

Thenet result would be that any income-for-work would be tax free, so
employment is de facto completely casual, and can run almost
unregulated: If you don't like it, walk away.

In a country like the USA, the net effect would be to raise the prices
of imported new goods and make them relatively cheaper to produce
locally. A good thing.

The final effect is to reduce consumption of things people want, but
increase production of what people need, and also the overall
productivity of the country, since a huge parasitic bureaucracy would be
wiped out. There would BE no personal tax at all. Just personal
benefits. stick your citizens ID cash card in the wall and draw your
weekly stipend.


If you tax something, yuou make it less economically desirable: Taxing
work makes it less economically desirable. Subsidising work makes it
very desirable.

Cutting out parasitic bureaucracies merely forces unproductive
bureaucrats to find something more useful to do.


* who is actually a citizen of the country of course. Illegal immigrants
may not get it.

You're utterly MAD. This is where right wing thinking goes completely berserk.

Graham