http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-14533987

Warren Buffet discusses his NY Times op-ed, "Stop Coddling the Super-Rich" with Charlie Rose

http://www.charlierose.com/view/interview/11845

too bad noone listens to him and keep the Taxes low..

If he wasn't 80 years old i'd say we should make him our next president.

If he wasnt 80 years old, do you think he would be asking for a Tax Increase if he were a lot younger?

I'm all for closing loopholes. However when Buffet says something like this, what do you suppose he means? His money is already considered in wealth and is no longer income. He has investments, which put him in the capital gains area. So, can he possibly even mean income taxes?

Really, he isn't for higher taxes, or he would have called for them long ago. He is for pulling up the ladder behind him so nobody else can become rich. But, if he truly believes what he says, why doesn't he start paying his fair share right off without the government forcing him? He can write a 5 billion dollar check if he so chooses, so why doesn't he?

You did not even read the article. Go back to your hole.

That article? Which part matters?

"He called for a tax rise for those earning more than $1m (£600,000), and a higher rate for those on over $10m"

You know, not him again.

"his income came entirely from investments rather than from employment,"

Have you seen how much of his investments are tax free? (I would call that a loophole, but apparently you don't know what that means)

"He pointed out that the effective tax rate paid by the highest earners was much higher in the 1980s and 1990s"

Effective is the key word there! Can anyone tell me the definition of a loophole around here?



What about that article was not addressed in my post? If I'm in a hole, you must be in a cave.

I am also confused on why liberals are trumping one guys opinion here. He donated to Obama last election, so...it would be like John Kerry calling for more taxes in my eyes. Why the big headlines over some guy, who used loopholes his entire life to get away from taxes and now wants them closed. I didn't hear him calling for those changes 3-4 decades ago did I?

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...-made-milli_n_251546.html

I mean, even huffington post is on him about this. He is just another big government guy that makes his billions because he knows the right people. Why I should listen to him is beyond me. The least any liberals could do is bring up Bill Gates.

Massive corporations and super rich people tend to love high tax rates and massive regulation...the better to thwart anyone else getting to their 'class' in life.

Yeah....what would Warren Buffet, possibly the most successful investor in US history, know about fiscal responsibility and good financial management..... :-/

*facedesk*

Inconsistency again... Paraphrasing...

on the one hand: "We should let the wealthy keep more of their money because they have demonstrated they know how to put it to the best use"

on the other hand: "Why are we listening to this incredibly wealthy and arguably most successful investor in history about the most effective use of money?"

CK: It will be interesting to see if your political views are identical 30-40 years from now as they are today. Unfortunately, I just cannot stand to listen to you that long.

I would rather be in a cave than a hole.

he used loopholes cause he could, he was smart enough to use them.. he probly isn't against or for closing loopholes, what he's been saying for a long while is... tax the rich. it won't keep them from investing and it certainly won't hurt the job market.

I don't think CK's political views are consistent from day to day, let alone over a period of several years. That's the fun thing about tea baggers - their opinions shift to suit their biases :-)

Steven Cobert 2012!! Woooooooooo... Wooooooooo Wooooooo

This is the same reason Trump doesn't make good financial sense. Exploiting loop holes and finding companies to invest with are different from government.

Your failure to understand freedom does not make me inconsistent. On the one hand we should keep it in the private sector and on the other we shouldn't listen to a guy that has received billions from the government and pay more taxes. Seems pretty consistent to me.

To clarify, if Thomas Sowell says something, I run it through my own brain before I accept it. If Jason Lewis espouses his opinion on a subject, I use common sense and my own thinking before his words any day. In short, I don't do anything because someone else says I should, I use my own brain. If Buffet wants to take away my freedom, why should I listen? If you start with freedom and work from there, generally you cannot go wrong.

You ask me if I will have my same views, well I could ask you the same thing. When Europe falls like dominoes because of social entitlement programs, pensions and general business stifling regulations, will you learn from history and change your tune?

The proof is in the pudding and Europe will fall due to their own financial policies. America isn't so close yet because we aren't as socialist, but we are following. Freedom, lower taxes and regulations are almost always followed by increased prosperity and an increase in the general welfare of the population, not the other way around. When people understand that, we can finally move forward in this world. Until that time we sit here spinning in circles.

CKHustler made me log in ahead of time before my post can collect a free bonus!

You say Europe and group together a whole bunch of countries. You probably mean EMU (European Monetary Union) since that is mentioned in US media. But even there we see huge differences between the different member countries.

What about Sweden? It is probably rather socialistic in the eyes of americans (even when our rightwing parties are in government). We got a low public debt, we got high taxes (although corporate taxes are rather low especially when factoring in accounting stuff), we are probably world famous for our "socilistic" entitlement programs, pensions and regulations (and public healthcare...). We had learned from our mistakes in the late 80s and early 90s crisis and regulated our banks. Those regulations helping to prevent our banks from doing the same lousy stuff like US and other banking institutions around the world.
Those social entitlements we have for unemployed were extremely helpful to help prevent Sweden from falling off the cliff like USA did. It kept the purchasing power up, making sure the population could buy stuff, thus helping companies produce and keep employees instead of sacking as many as they otherwise would have.

All in all our so called socialisticaly run country, with regulations, high taxes and all that stuff prevented Sweden from sinking like USA and southern europe. US media even pointing at Sweden when trying to figure out what to do to get out of the crisis. Sweden came out strong from the financial crisis, got called having a Tiger Economy. No matter if we got a left wing government, right wing government, minority government, majority government or what ever, our government still run Sweden in a fiscally responsible way.

Clearly, our so called socialist ways must be very wrong indeed.

Btw, Sweden is in Europe and a member of the European Union (EU), but still not a member in the European Monetary Union (EMU).

shh, Henrik - Tea baggers dislike credible fact, and prefer to follow their gut and own common sense.

CKHustler, I dont know what else you have said, but here you are making sense and being consistent.

Henrik, congratulations on your countries success, but sorry if you want to compare Sweden to other economies then do the full comparison. You have the population of Arizona, but it is almost exclusively the same ethnic and religious populations, living almost exclusively in urban environments. Your largest city - with 22% of your population - has a smaller metro population than Orlando - not counting the tourist in to see Disney. You have the GDP of North Carolina - but that is dominated (70%) with an internal service industry so international trade and competition issues have less effect than on any US State. Your population growth is almost level and you really dont do ethnic/racial/religious minorities or immigrants. Most of your country is contained in 3 major cities spread out over a land area about the size of South Carolina. Internationally you are protected by location and NATO keeping your military expenses very low. (CIA world factbook; US Census data if you want to check my sources)

There are certainly things to compare, but to give a blanket comparison is not at all accurate.

What is a much better comparison is to look state-to-state within the US. Still a lot of variance but sharing much more of the internal problems. There the evidence is clear: states that have reduced regulation and taxation have done much better than the high-tax / high social welfare states.

NOW3P, interesting that you neglect to provide any facts - credible or not - in your dismissal of CKH. Instead you rely on name-calling and your own prejudiced opinion. Do you actually know anyone who has even been to a Tea Party rally, let alone read what the goals of the movement are? Or do you simply sit back and believe everything they tell you on MSNBC?

G.O.: just out curriousity, which states do you consider to be high social welfare states?

My list would be as follows (states that get back atleast $1.10 for ever $1 paid in federal taxes):

Alabama
Alaska
Arizona
Arkansas
Hawaii
Idaho
Iowa
Kansas
Kentucky
Louisiana
Maine
Maryland
Mississippi
Missouri
Montana
New Mexico
North Dakota
Oklahoma
South Carolina
South Dakota
Tennessee
Virginia
West Virginia
Wyoming

24 states that the rest of the country has too support, and coincidentally mostly states with strong tea party movements.

The fact is that the "Red" states and Hawaii are the welfare states in this country.

22 of the 24 voted for Bush in 2004
19 of the 24 voted for McCain in 2008 (Utah, Texas, and Georgia are the only states not on this list that went to McCain, and Utah barely missed the list)

Now take a close look at that list - Almost all of those states are "low regulation" states. The most regulated states - CA, CT, MA, NJ, and NY all get back around or less than $0.80. Perhaps the states with reduced regulation are doing better because the rest of us poor saps are subsidizing the hell out of them.

ponderer, you can say that but you will gladly eat the cheap food we grow in those states. You will gladly drive with the cheap gas made with oil pumped from those states. Ya, you loose your argument any time you come up with a list of high social welfare states and CA is not #1. After all it is the GREECE of America.

DH: that food would a hell of a lot cheaper if we weren't paying massive subsidies to maintain a price floor.

Also, you'll note that Texas is not on that list. Alaska is mainly on that list due to the expense of providing services to a large area with low population density. Louisiana is on that list for many reasons, but disparate distribution of wealth is a big one. I pumped "cheap" gas today at $3.73/gallon, but that gas was probably refined within 20 miles of that pump. Then again, I use public transit for my work commute, and aside from the 400 miles I drove yesterday for a family reunion, I typically drive less than 15 miles a week.

Finally, CA would not be in the hot water it's in if the state wasn't losing 22% of it's federal tax money.

Greece's problems are as much on the revenue end as the expenditure end. Tax evasion is the national sport. I believe the comparison you're looking for is either Germany or France - California is going broke paying the bills for the rest of the county, and didn't cut its own bills fast enough.

The biggest reason for the return on federal taxes paid is that most income taxes are paid by a small minority of the population. And the states you list do not have a lot of the top quintile 'rich' people who pay 80% of all taxes. That skews any review of taxes by state because with so few people paying most of the taxes the states where the majority of those people live are never going to get their 'fair share' back.

One could also wonder why the most regulated states also have the most super-rich... perhaps because government regulation always favors those who can pay for it and punishing those who cannot?

But that whole argument misses the point of the Tea Party. The movement is saying that overall the government is too big, too wasteful, cost too much and is grossly inefficient in doing much of what it does. Big government favors the rich and powerful (who can afford to buy access to lawmakers, lawyers to find loopholes and litigate, etc...) but a smaller with more local responsibility is easier for more people to keep track of. And fewer, simpler regulations are less expensive to administer, easier and less expensive to comply with and are more fairly applied (ie: fewer pages to build loopholes for those with lawyers and $$).

Country Pop Immigrations/year

Sweden 9m 100k
US 300m 1mil

We dont do immigrants Garry Owen? Whats even worse is that we're taking them in over stuff that the US has caused anyway this is the 2010 stats i found on google and looks to me that we're taking in more then the US are compared to population which you liked to compare us too

Ivanfluff

Ivan: there's a big difference between taking in immigrants all from one general area vs a whole lot of different areas. The US and Canada both take in and spend a *lot* of money and resources bringing in and recruiting immigrants as well as to trying to ensure they aren't ghettoized or things degrade into sectarian violence. This is something that Europe hasn't been very successful at for a variety of reasons.

Canada: 30 million. Immigration (on average) 250,000 per year every year. And by immigration it's people who initiate the process to become full citizens. Sweden averages around 30K btw:P
However I should add that Canada probably has an additional 50-100K illegal immigrants per year and the us probably has 4-5 times that many. It's very hard to actually stop that.

~~~~

Regarding the money transfer, ponderer is right. However giving the tea party what they are asking for is not giving them what they think they are asking for. imo federal spending should be even per capita across all states. We have a similar problem in Canada. Part of what causes this is we both have a legislative system that is partly skewed in favor of rural errors. Be it the Senate in the US or the way our parliament is elected in Canada. What angers me is not the idea of reducing taxes/government. The issue is that it's only ok when it comes to everyone elses services but not their own. I'm all for local control as soon as money isn't transferred from one locality to another. If you want to go the local control route then the area where I live pays $20 billion in taxes, it should receive $20 billion in services back and not the $10 billion it currently receives.
However, that's not the way the GOP or the tea party (or the Conservative movement in Canada) actually work. Don't cut my services simply so you afford to subsidize something else.. That's not fiscal conservatism at all and it's morally bankrupt.

Just for the sake of being absolutely accurate :)

From Sweden's Statistiska Centralbyrån (central bureau of statistics):
I'll skip listing gender (booo we get fewer female immigrants!)

2005
Population 9 047 752
Immigrants 65 229

2006
Population 9 113 257
Immigrants 95 750

2007
Population 9 182 927
Immigration 99 485

2008
Population 9 256 347
Immigration 101 171

2009
Population 9 340 682
Immigration 102 280

2010
Population 9 415 570
Immigration 98 801

2011 (first half year)
Population 9 446 812
Immigration 43 800


Immigration for both 2009 and 2010 being from 49+ countries.

Top 10 list of countries:
1. Serbia
2. Somalia
3. Afghanistan
4. Iraq
5. Kosovo
6. Eritrea
7. Iran
8. Russia
9. Macedonia
10. Mongolia (I didn't expect that one!)

Ah, right, my bad. The top ten list being only for those immigrants via asylum, which seem to be the figur Martianed refered to though.

2005-2011 being the totals though.

Well the US seeems to do rather poorly on the ghetto front? :P and I think 49 countries qualifies as a lot of different areas but from the numbers ive seen on here it doesnt appear that the US or canada takes in that many more then sweden based on current population

Also as a side note, most of the immigrants seems to come from countries whos infrastructure the US has bombed to pieces if they like bombing places so much perhaps they should also take care of the population

never use wikipedia as a source:P

If we are going to count the same way that you are then I should list the following:

http://www.cic.gc.ca/.../facts2010-summary/01.asp

Which puts 2010 at 280,000 for 30 million :P
also
http://www12.statcan.ca/...a/97-557/table/t1-eng.cfm
We haven't compiled the 2011 census yet.
But the rankings are
1) china (PRC)
2) India
3) Phillipines (pinoys ftw)
4) Pakistan
5) USA
6) South Korea
7) Romania
8) Iran
9) UK
10) Colombia

If you go back you find that the listing and ranking of countries changes a lot form year to year:P
I think we win:P

The US and the ghetto front isn't due to immigration. Or at least not recent legal immigration.
Add 25% to those totals if you want combined legal and illegal immigration (best guess)
also
http://www12.statcan.ca/...97-557/figures/c2-eng.cfm

we are special:P

As I said, I posted the statistics for accuracy (instead of using whaterver source), not to say who wins or not :D

Although, if you put it that way, the percentual ratio between immigrants and population is higher in Sweden than in Canada from 2006 to 2010 (which is listed in your table), if one count with Canada having a population of 30 million :)
(IF wikipedia is correct hehe, then canada had 31M in 2001 and growing) :D

well actually our tax rates are the lowest they have been since before FDR.

And effective tax rate also are lower: and that is you make x amount of income divide by the amount of tax you actually pay after taking all your deduction gives you the effective tax rate.

Ponderer - you have a problem with Tea Pariters I take it...

I am a multi-millionaire. Not bragging, just setting the stage. I am a very successful attorney (successful in the professional sense, not monetarily as I have alrady covered that). I live in a a state not on your list. I live in a state that has weathered the financial turmoil better than any other. I am highly educated. I went to high school at one of the top prep schools in the country. I went to undergrad at Columbia, and I have an MBA and a JD from Harvard.

I am a Tea Partier. There is simply one tenet of the Tea Party movement - fiscal responsibility. I abide by it in my personal life, and I expect my country to abide by it too.

You equate the Tea Party movement to the social welfare states. That may be true. However, I would argue that the welfare RECIPIENTS are liberals. The fact that there are so many of them in those states have driven the fiscally responsible to the Tea Party movement.

You cannot argue the premise of the Tea Party movment, you can only make vague inferences. Grow up child.

AE: I thought the main tenant of the Tea Party was shrinking government, and weakening the control of the central government, and putting historically government provided services and regulation back in the hands of private industry?

Or is the Tea Party not quite as libertarian as I thought? My main issue with the libertarians is that the while the government is terrible at regulating private industry, private industry is worse at regulating itself. If you want an example of that, look at the Schools Construction Corporation in New Jersey. It was run by construction company executives, who returned to their prior employment after they siphoned the money away. McGreevey gets the blame for it (and he definitely deserves some of it for leaving the foxes in charge of that particular hen house).

That and the social conservatism of the majority of the candidates the tea party backs (as the son-in-law of a lesbian couple, "protection of marriage" is a non-starter for me, and as someone who was raised in Judaism, trying to sell me a christian based government for our christian based society is not the way to win my vote).

To set the stage, I am a moderately successful professional (not an attorney, and not as financially successful as you) who in addition to serving private clients also does quite a bit of public sector contracting (providing professional services), at all levels (municipal, county, state, interstate, and federal). I am also closely involved in reviewing my municipality's budget (a role I volunteer for). On that basis I have a pretty good idea of how government functions, and where it is efficient, and where it isn't. I also see a hell of a lot of waste, an awful lot of which benefits certain lobbies and interest groups which are either publicly backing or bankrolling the tea party movement (again in my state, may be different at the local level).

While it may not be true of the national movement, the local tea party seems to be pretty interested in passing the buck down the line - here it's passing it from the state government to local governments (which in my experience tend to be less well run, and more at risk for corruption, and more profitable for those with the right connections, which here means to right attorney).

As a professional who gets most of my work based on the merits of my ability, rather than political connections, I would rather work with many of the state agencies that the local tea party is trying to shut down, because they are far more competent than the many of the local governmental entities I've worked for.

Ponderer, you are a Tea-Partier at heart. :)

The real heart of the tea party movement is that government should be limited and watched. The bigger government gets, the harder it is for 'The People' to do any realistic oversight and therefore it breeds more corruption and ineffeciency.

So we have the example of the bloated federal government. It is not the point of the tea party to turn 'historically government provided services and regulation back in the hands of private industry' so much as to get government out of things that it should not regulate in the first place. And to put the regulatory oversight at the appropriate level of government.

For example: schools. Education is not a federal issue. Not in the constitution and historically not controlled / directed / funded at the federal level. The feds got involved when the states were hurt in the 70's recession and the feds could deficit spend. The states avoided the hard choice of how to fund what is an essential state service and shifted the tax burden from local to federal. With federal management we have much more regulation, tons of wasted money, lower achievement and less control and oversight by the local people. That was a federal power grab with very little good to show for it (IDEA is a good thing, but could have been achieved with other legislation and without the huge DofED bureaucracy). And, in addition to the federal regulations we have a huge funding mess that virtually every state must deal with (and spend a lot of extra money on) that still avoids the issue of how to appropriately pay for education services.

Are the Tea-Party members mostly social conservative? Yes, but not all and those issues certainly are not the driving force being tea-party events and candidates. I am confused by your Jewish/Christian issue, since most references are to 'Judeo-Christian' values, referencing things like personal responsibility, property rights, rule of law, private charity etc...

Ref your concern for local government corruption: if we had less regulation and what we had was more common-sense instead of huge loophole ridden bills then we would have fewer lawsuits and special interests... That is the theory at least. But how much worse could it be than the armies of professional thieves we have now?


Bottom line is that I think you have a lot of goals in common with what the tea-party is all about. Esp with your work at local government oversight you are a Tea Party member in all but the bumper sticker. :)

aw, this thread went quiet amd i need my weekly bonus points! :)

France's mega-rich sign a petition saying they want higher taxes: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...-taxed-more_n_934354.html