First Successful Argument Against "Those aren't allowed here, you have to leave"

[Mono]

23 hours ago, scubadragosan said:

I am tired of state/local bureaucrats ignorant of the very laws/regulations they are supposed to enforce. I was on Golden Gate Bridge one time and a patrol cop on bicycle told me that I can't ride my KS16S there because it is considered an e-scooter. According to Bill 604,

313.5. An “electrically motorized board” is any wheeled device that has a floorboard designed to be stood upon when riding that is not greater than 60 inches deep and 18 inches wide, is designed to transport only one person, and has an electric propulsion system averaging less than 1,000 watts, the maximum speed of which, when powered solely by a propulsion system on a paved level surface, is no more than 20 miles per hour. The device may be designed to also be powered by human propulsion.

So why does the bridge has a sign at the entrance to prohibit use of e-scooters while bicycles are allowed? Anyone wants to join me going back to Golden Gate Bridge to challenge this ban of e-scooters or EUCs on the bridge

The law sounds pretty decent. I'd prefer a weight of a power limit, which is in particular relevant for self-balancing devices, but otherwise it looks pretty good to me.

___
There are two fundamentally different EUCing cultures populating this globe.
One for which 40 km/h is not exactly speeding and the other for which surpassing 25 km/h is simply off limits. Always good to keep this in mind  The speed 42 km/h has 3 times the kinetic energy of 24 km/h.

[ir_fuel]

20 hours ago, Joker10 said:

If I start getting taxed like that, I am going to quit working. 

Welcome to Europe  

On the other side, in my country:

- university students don't graduate with $200K in debt on their shoulders, 

- going to the dentist to get a tooth fixed costs you $20 (oh and all medical + dental costs for children is 0),

- sending your children to a good school doesn't cost you $30K / year per child.

- as an employee you have 20 days of holiday you can take whenever you want during the year on top of the 10 official holidays (in our country it's even MANDATORY to take them, so an employer cannot pressure you into not taking them)

- you get paid a double salary in June and in December.(so, with a bit of maths you end up getting paid 14 months to actually work 10.5 months)

- when you're ill, the first month is completely covered by your salary. You don't lose a penny if you need to stay home for a week because of the flu (no idea how this works in the US BTW)

 

It's a different way of organising society. There are pros and cons to both systems, and people that love and hate both systems, on both sides of the ocean. I suppose the European system is better for people with very low wages (their taxes are also less since we have a progressive scale, and they can "enjoy" the benefits that people with a higher income pay for. This is something that tends to frustrate people with higher wages), and the US system is better for people with very high wages since they give less money to the government and have enough cash left to cover the things described above either by just paying up or getting private insurance.

 

23 hours ago, Marty Backe said:

Isn't the point of having lower taxes so that you can decide what do do with your money and save/invest in the future so that you can pay for your own health care and retirement?

I know you're exaggerating when you say "I have 0 to show for it", but it's just common sense that with lower taxes you'll get less "free stuff"

All depends on how low they are and what you get back. From what I recall (but please correct me if I am wrong) people in California already pay quite a lot of tax, isn't that somewhere around 45% all things considered?

And if I am not mistaken your property taxes are A LOT higher than in Europe (for my normal house I pay $500 / year in taxes in Belgium).

[ir_fuel]

On 12/18/2019 at 8:08 AM, Marty Backe said:

.s. We almost were not allowed back on the trail because Chris had been vaping, and apparently that's one step removed from child abuse in California. Chris couldn't even have his vaper on his person - they thought that he might use it when they couldn't see us. He had to place it behind a trash bin. I'm really not exaggerating the negative reaction that this state employee had towards vaping.

Is smoking allowed on the streets?

[Marty Backe]

2 hours ago, ir_fuel said:

Is smoking allowed on the streets?

Generally yes. But it's often restricted in specific locations, even if outside.

To be fair, California is particular rigid when it comes to smoking in wilderness areas because of the extreme fire danger that is ever present in our state.

[Joker10]

11 hours ago, ir_fuel said:

Welcome to Europe  

On the other side, in my country:

- university students don't graduate with $200K in debt on their shoulders, 

- going to the dentist to get a tooth fixed costs you $20 (oh and all medical + dental costs for children is 0),

- sending your children to a good school doesn't cost you $30K / year per child.

- as an employee you have 20 days of holiday you can take whenever you want during the year on top of the 10 official holidays (in our country it's even MANDATORY to take them, so an employer cannot pressure you into not taking them)

- you get paid a double salary in June and in December.(so, with a bit of maths you end up getting paid 14 months to actually work 10.5 months)

- when you're ill, the first month is completely covered by your salary. You don't lose a penny if you need to stay home for a week because of the flu (no idea how this works in the US BTW)

 

It's a different way of organising society. There are pros and cons to both systems, and people that love and hate both systems, on both sides of the ocean. I suppose the European system is better for people with very low wages (their taxes are also less since we have a progressive scale, and they can "enjoy" the benefits that people with a higher income pay for. This is something that tends to frustrate people with higher wages), and the US system is better for people with very high wages since they give less money to the government and have enough cash left to cover the things described above either by just paying up or getting private insurance.

 

All depends on how low they are and what you get back. From what I recall (but please correct me if I am wrong) people in California already pay quite a lot of tax, isn't that somewhere around 45% all things considered?

And if I am not mistaken your property taxes are A LOT higher than in Europe (for my normal house I pay $500 / year in taxes in Belgium).

I pay more in property taxes.  Why should others pay for my college, dental work, medical bills etc.  If payroll taxes get over 50% I will quit working.  I am responsible for myself and family.  This is not to say that I do not give to charities, but I give to the ones that I chose to, not the ones that I am forced to at the barrel of a gun.  If you actually break it down Americans pay over 50% in taxes.  If we buy a product we pay sales tax, the company that shipped the product paid taxes on the vehicle, gas, payroll, etc etc.  The company that made the vehicle paid taxes on property, material, payroll etc etc.  The company that built the product paid taxes getting the material, payroll taxes property taxes etc etc. Fuel, alcohol, tobacco and I would assume vaping products have “sin” taxes added on.  Companies don’t pay the taxes, the consumer pays them.  You see where I am going with this.  Add that to the payroll taxes and it’s got to be over 50%.

[Nic]

If the top 1% have over 90% of the wealth, then they just need to give up 10% (which they won't even notice) and the 99% will be twice as well off. This will solve the debt problem and give the economy a massive boost as people will have money to spend. Would this work?

[mike_bike_kite]

1 minute ago, Nic said:

If the top 1% have over 90% of the wealth, then they just need to give up 10% (which they won't even notice) and the 99% will be twice as well off. This will solve the debt problem and give the economy a massive boost as people will have money to spend. Would this work?

It might be worth starting by working out your own total wealth (value of home, car, business, pension, bank accounts etc) then give 10% of that to someone random that looks less well off than you. If you're not immediately wondering who the lucky recipient will be then you may well of answered your own question  

[atdlzpae]

2 hours ago, Nic said:

If the top 1% have over 90% of the wealth, then they just need to give up 10% (which they won't even notice) and the 99% will be twice as well off. This will solve the debt problem and give the economy a massive boost as people will have money to spend. Would this work?

No, they won't be twice well off.
Let's for the sake of argument assume that net worth = cash (it's not true). And let's take top 10 US billionaires:

Quote

114+106+80.8+69.9+65+55.5+53.5+53.4+51.7+51.6 = $701.4 billions

$701.4 billions * 10% = $70.1 billions

$70.1 billions / 327.2 million US citizens = $214 per person

Hell, even if you take ALL net worth of top 10 billionaires each US citizen would get only $2142. Not a life changing amount, and you'd completely ruin the economy.

In reality, I'd be surprised if you can get 10% of a billionaire's net worth without bankrupting them. Most of them are major stockholders in companies, which would plummet instantly if the news of big selloff would get out. Please, read about the stock market to understand how it works.

Also, you'd see a lot of them immediately change their citizenship to St. Kitts and Nevis. Rich people are most mobile. In 2016 around 12,000 millionaires left France due to 75% tax.

Every millionaire you lose is a detriment to citizens. Rich people own companies which employ people. No rich people = less companies and way less employment opportunity. Less production = less goods on the market.

Edited December 20, 2019 by atdlzpae

[jonm42]

Can we get back on topic, please?

[Nic]

5 hours ago, atdlzpae said:

No, they won't be twice well off.
Let's for the sake of argument assume that net worth = cash (it's not true). And let's take top 10 US billionaires:

Hell, even if you take ALL net worth of top 10 billionaires each US citizen would get only $2142. Not a life changing amount, and you'd completely ruin the economy.

In reality, I'd be surprised if you can get 10% of a billionaire's net worth without bankrupting them. Most of them are major stockholders in companies, which would plummet instantly if the news of big selloff would get out. Please, read about the stock market to understand how it works.

Also, you'd see a lot of them immediately change their citizenship to St. Kitts and Nevis. Rich people are most mobile. In 2016 around 12,000 millionaires left France due to 75% tax.

Every millionaire you lose is a detriment to citizens. Rich people own companies which employ people. No rich people = less companies and way less employment opportunity. Less production = less goods on the market.

There are over 2,600 billionaires and over 14 million millionaires in the world. Hedge funds invest in the stock market, the wealthy do not create jobs ... they look for ways to avoid taxes and hide their money overseas. Your numbers don't add up.

Ok, as you point out it's not as simple as it seems because net worth is not income or cash, but it seems that its the average man that pays for all the bail outs and who gets hit when the economy tanks, while the rich just keep getting richer by squeezing the middle class more and more and paying them less and less.

Now we can go back to the main topic...

Edited December 20, 2019 by Nic

[ir_fuel]

19 hours ago, Marty Backe said:

Generally yes. But it's often restricted in specific locations, even if outside.

To be fair, California is particular rigid when it comes to smoking in wilderness areas because of the extreme fire danger that is ever present in our state.

Makes sense, then again, I guess the risk of vaping causing a wildfire is pretty low  (Not mentioning that it smells A LOT better than cigarette smoke).

[ir_fuel]

9 hours ago, Joker10 said:

Fuel, alcohol, tobacco and I would assume vaping products have “sin” taxes added on.

Want to talk fuel taxes?  In my country fuel price is:

VAT:17%
Fuel Tax:44%
Profit Margin:10%
Purchase price:29%

so you sell $1 of fuel, $0.1 goes in the pocket of the petrol station as profits and $0.61 to the government ... (and on all profits that petrol station makes it pays approx 30% as company tax, so that $0.1 ends up being $0.07, with yet another $0.03 to the government).

[ir_fuel]

On 12/18/2019 at 8:08 AM, Marty Backe said:

We could hear them talking and about 5-minutes later I heard what I never thought I'd hear. "OK, you are allowed on the trail". Our argument actually worked! I'm still amazed as I type this.

 

BTW you think you can use this to access other trails too? 

[Marty Backe]

4 hours ago, ir_fuel said:

BTW you think you can use this to access other trails too? 

Doubtful, unless they know each other. Every location/park/forest, etc is different with different rules. It's best to ride where there are no rangers patrolling.

[Mono]

On 12/20/2019 at 4:23 PM, atdlzpae said:

and you'd completely ruin the economy.

LOL, where did you get this idea from?

On 12/20/2019 at 4:23 PM, atdlzpae said:

Most of them are major stockholders in companies, which would plummet instantly if the news of big selloff would get out.

Sell off? Maybe I misunderstood something, but there is nothing to be sold. The idea is not that the billionaire owners would get money for their stocks. Just, the stocks would be distributed to a million people instead of remaining in possession of a single person. Besides, if selling stocks at their current price is not possible, they are actually overpriced. A plummet occurs only when people consider the announcement of a big sell as a sign of wrong assessment of the current price in the first place. If the stock is sold for less than what people think it is worth, its price will immediately raise back. It is only worth the price at which it can be sold.

Now here is an interesting question: let's assume I own an Apple stock worth $1k. Now I sell the stock (which decreases the value of Apple) and buy an Apple computer for $1k (which increases the value of Apple). Now, has overall the worth of Apple increased or decreased? What if 1000 people do the same. What if 100,000 people do the same?

Or in other words, to increase the value of a company (or to create new jobs in the company), is it more effective to buy their products or to hold (and not sell) their stocks? OK, putting it like this the answer is blatantly obvious  And which of these actions one would expect from 100,000 poor people holding each 1k of stocks compared to a billionaire holding alone 100 million worth of stocks?

On 12/20/2019 at 4:23 PM, atdlzpae said:

Please, read about the stock market to understand how it works.

Good idea

On 12/20/2019 at 4:29 PM, jonm42 said:

Can we get back on topic, please?

Yeah, back to topic: it's great to have successful arguments 

Edited December 21, 2019 by Mono

[Nic]

Just for the record ... I actively trade both stocks and Forex markets.

[Joker10]

Then just give up 10% of your wealth (you won’t even notice) and solve everyone else’s problems. 

[Nic]

53 minutes ago, Joker10 said:

Then just give up 10% of your wealth (you won’t even notice) and solve everyone else’s problems. 

You probably don't realise, but attitudes like this are behind ALL of the worlds man made problems. Just join the dots...

[jonm42]

TOPIC! STAY ON TOPIC!

[mike_bike_kite]

Unfortunately I think we've found something far more interesting to debate. Nic wants the top 1% to give 10% of their wealth to the rest of the world but doesn't appear too willing to start giving himself. Google tells me that if you earn over $32K (£24k) then you're in the top 1% of world earners. It's a little more difficult to be in the top 1% of wealthy but it's still only $770K (£600k).  I'd assume that Nic, if he "actively trades both stocks and forex", would sit in both groups. So I'm still curious whether he's feeling the urge to start handing out 10% of his own money to anyone else less fortunate than himself.

The grand idea of cancelling debts is also not particularly economically sound as the current world economy is actually based on debt. Cancelling debts would actually be detrimental to the world economy (a readable explanation). If you want to have less personal debt then the simplest thing to do is to just stop buying things.

[Mono]

[OFF-TOPIC] I could be wrong, but to my understanding Nic doesn't argue for optional contributions, so why would you ask him to donate 10% of his wealth? It seems kind-of exactly his point that contributions should not be optional, because the possibility donation already exists and there would be nothing to argue.

Second, poverty and wealth depends on where we live and cannot be compared world wide in absolute income numbers.

Edited December 24, 2019 by Mono

[Marty Backe]

Please guys, move the off-topic discussion to another thread.

[atdlzpae]

I agree. Let's move the discussion here.

[Nic]

14 hours ago, Mono said:

[OFF-TOPIC] I could be wrong, but to my understanding Nic doesn't argue for optional contributions, so why would you ask him to make an optional contribution? It seems kind-of exactly his point that contributions should not be optional, because optional contributions already exist and there would be nothing to argue.

Second, poverty and wealth depends on where we live and cannot be compared world wide in absolute income numbers.

Correct, now lets get back to topic.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/apr/12/wealth-inequality-reasons-richest-global-gap

https://www.taxpolicycenter.org/briefing-book/how-do-taxes-affect-income-inequality

None of us here (myself included) are experts in economics. but we can all see that there is a problem and its one for the politicians to solve.