kruker wrote:

pacino wrote:i would not be for making everyone pay federal income tax

I'm talking nominal amounts. Behavioral economics has taught us a lot about how people will pay more attention even when they just have to put a $5 check in the mail. If you want to increase civic activism, people caring about government, it's an easy way. It's ridiculous that a very large swath of the public doesn't have to even think about federal taxes. It's not about the dollars, it's about getting the rest of the population into the discussion.

well, a lot of people pay the income tax off their check then get it back and then some at the end of the year. would you change how that is done? how's that one get past congress?

JUburton wrote:Hard disagree on the tax thing. And basically no one mails the government a check anyway. The money just disappears.

Gee whiz, don't take that so literally. Anyway, I think the research is there to back up my idea and I think it's only equitable to make everyone have to deal with the byzantine tax code and will only help improve it and government at large by increasing involvement. Again, it's not about the $. It's about making whatever (50% is the number I've heard thrown around) of non-payers have to think about it. Hard to get change when a large part of the population isn't impacted.

pacino wrote:

kruker wrote:

pacino wrote:i would not be for making everyone pay federal income tax

I'm talking nominal amounts. Behavioral economics has taught us a lot about how people will pay more attention even when they just have to put a $5 check in the mail. If you want to increase civic activism, people caring about government, it's an easy way. It's ridiculous that a very large swath of the public doesn't have to even think about federal taxes. It's not about the dollars, it's about getting the rest of the population into the discussion.

well, a lot of people pay the income tax off their check then get it back and then some at the end of the year. would you change how that is done? how's that one get past congress?

Wait, are your issues with the idea or the implementation? Tell me what I'm arguing against here. If the fallback is just, it's tough to pass in Congress, then there are tons of issues we should just drop talking about.

kruker wrote:

CalvinBall wrote:

Phred wrote:

CalvinBall wrote:Trump in Michigan today to announce roll backs on fuel efficiency regulations. Who does that help? People really pining for the days where your truck would get 8 miles to the gallon?

Gas companies.

I guess, but is a consumer going to be like hell yeah give me that non-full efficient car! Maybe there is a sizable cost difference, but at this point technology is pretty far along, no?

Not so far along that VW et al feel the need to cheat the regs. Honestly, if you want to do encourage higher mpg vehicles/evs on the road, build it into gas prices. Purchases of trucks/suv's--rather high mpg vehicles (including fuel efficient trucks/suvs) tracks gas prices. It's easier to enforce and impossible to cheat.

i don't disagree but i don't see Congress voting to raise the gas tax. they haven't done that in a generation and it was involved in an omnibus. there's little out there to believe something like that would be involved in one in this Congress.

kruker wrote:

JUburton wrote:Hard disagree on the tax thing. And basically no one mails the government a check anyway. The money just disappears.

Gee whiz, don't take that so literally. Anyway, I think the research is there to back up my idea and I think it's only equitable to make everyone have to deal with the byzantine tax code and will only help improve it and government at large by increasing involvement. Again, it's not about the $. It's about making whatever (50% is the number I've heard thrown around) of non-payers have to think about it. Hard to get change when a large part of the population isn't impacted.

Sorry been looking a lot into (clinical) studies and limitations in their designs so I'm in find the flaw mode.

It's just when the federal minimum wage puts a low annual 40 week salary at like 15k/year, the federal government taking any of that just seems wrong. Any more than SS, Medicare etc. that is

kruker wrote:

pacino wrote:

kruker wrote:

pacino wrote:i would not be for making everyone pay federal income tax

I'm talking nominal amounts. Behavioral economics has taught us a lot about how people will pay more attention even when they just have to put a $5 check in the mail. If you want to increase civic activism, people caring about government, it's an easy way. It's ridiculous that a very large swath of the public doesn't have to even think about federal taxes. It's not about the dollars, it's about getting the rest of the population into the discussion.

well, a lot of people pay the income tax off their check then get it back and then some at the end of the year. would you change how that is done? how's that one get past congress?

Wait, are your issues with the idea or the implementation? Tell me what I'm arguing against here. If the fallback is just, it's tough to pass in Congress, then there are tons of issues we should just drop talking about.

i don't agree with the idea because people already pay a variety of taxes (and there are some people on SSI or TANF or who have no money that i'd definitely not want to pay income tax), but i also don't see how this would be implemented. we're probably at a fundamental disagreement on the idea.

I get that. Just saying it's a better solution. I'm not a politician, implementation isn't something I really care about or would have any skill arguing. Just hate this, congress won't do it, so let's go with the dumb idea without even trying. Gotta try.

I think the eco ratings are more to appease the car companies. I've found out in my hybrid search that the reason that ford stopped making the escape hybrid after 2012 is because at that point they had met the numbers for some federal mandate for fuel efficient vehicles and didn't need to produce any more. Apparently the margin on them is way less than the dino-only cars, to the point where ford said they didn't make any money off of them.

kruker wrote:I get that. Just saying it's a better solution. I'm not a politician, implementation isn't something I really care about or would have any skill arguing. Just hate this, congress won't do it, so let's go with the dumb idea without even trying. Gotta try.

hey, i'm the one that wants to counter this AHCA proposal with expanding medicaid/medicare, so i know about tough ideas.


as far as the gas tax thing, i'd like to see if there was a study in PA since our tax has been raised. we have the highest in the nation but prices have overall still been low. i wonder if there's been any impact on the demand side from consumers.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-health ... ?mod=e2two

Heroes at the WSJ editorial board come out in favor of the AHCA

pacino wrote:

kruker wrote:

pacino wrote:

kruker wrote:

pacino wrote:i would not be for making everyone pay federal income tax

I'm talking nominal amounts. Behavioral economics has taught us a lot about how people will pay more attention even when they just have to put a $5 check in the mail. If you want to increase civic activism, people caring about government, it's an easy way. It's ridiculous that a very large swath of the public doesn't have to even think about federal taxes. It's not about the dollars, it's about getting the rest of the population into the discussion.

well, a lot of people pay the income tax off their check then get it back and then some at the end of the year. would you change how that is done? how's that one get past congress?

Wait, are your issues with the idea or the implementation? Tell me what I'm arguing against here. If the fallback is just, it's tough to pass in Congress, then there are tons of issues we should just drop talking about.

i don't agree with the idea because people already pay a variety of taxes (and there are some people on SSI or TANF or who have no money that i'd definitely not want to pay income tax), but i also don't see how this would be implemented. we're probably at a fundamental disagreement on the idea.

I get all that. I just think that making everyone have to deal with it, bringing everyone into the full system, can only be beneficial in terms of affecting change. Heck, if anything, I think it would help us get to a simplified code (or maybe that's a pipe dream). I'd hope if 50 million or whatever people had to deal with the forms and jump through the hoops they'd help push for reform and pay a bit more attention to where there money is going. But, ever the optimist.

CalvinBall wrote:Trump in Michigan today to announce roll backs on fuel efficiency regulations. Who does that help? People really pining for the days where your truck would get 8 miles to the gallon?

He really is trying to take us back to the '50s, isn't he?

cant wait for leaded gas

kruker wrote:It's ridiculous that a very large swath of the public doesn't have to even think about federal taxes.

It's ridiculous that CEOs are paid hundreds of times what their least-paid fulltime employees are

because "It's not about the dollars, it's about getting the rest of the population into the discussion"

drsmooth wrote:

kruker wrote:It's ridiculous that a very large swath of the public doesn't have to even think about federal taxes.

It's ridiculous that CEOs are paid hundreds of times what their least-paid fulltime employees are

because "It's not about the dollars, it's about getting the rest of the population into the discussion"

Then somehow manage to pay less (or no) taxes, or some significantly lower amount in percentage then those on the lower rungs of their companies.

Jeffrey Lord on CNN walked away from AHCA. That guy is all for anything from the WH all the time.

If you looked at what Senator Bill Cassidy, MD (R-LA) has said, general policywise, about ACA, you'd think he was just another glassy-eyed ideologue.

When you listen to him talk about the emergence of biosimilars, you quickly realize that there's much more to him than the typical pedestrian R talking points and bullshit ACA repeal nonsense (including some veiled appreciation for the value ACA has had for advancing appropriate, systematic changes in treatment protocols). He DEFINITELY believes in free-markets fairy dust, but he has at least a scoche of rationality in him:



for a specific example of him articulating his "philosophy" re: caree of Medicaid patients, skip to about minute 19. You may agree or disagree with him, but you'll hear a physician, a Republican physician, explaining in graphic detail his feeling that, basically, it's just fine to treat the health concerns of the poor differently than the health concerns of the better off except in pretty extreme circumstances; their ease & convenience may be, essentially, completely disregarded because, hey, they can't pay.

Or at about minute 24, his view of accelerating approval of untried Rx: he speaks specifically about Vioxx, discounts deaths that it's premature marketing caused, and expresses concern that delaying the release of this medication, or medications like it, would cause "huge opportunity costs" - never at all suggesting that, ok, fine, let's then impose a "reserve requirement" on manufacturers of, oh, about 80% of total revenues for such products until such time as post-marketing review of patient health demonstrates the stuff isn't killing them in unusual numbers. That omission speaks volumes: if asked, I imagine Cassidy blinking like an owl, betraying that he would never consider such a prudent, patient-centric precaution for a second because how could THAT ever be a feature of a free market?

thephan wrote:Then somehow manage to pay less (or no) taxes, or some significantly lower amount in percentage then those on the lower rungs of their companies.

you're peering through the wrong end of the telescope, but fine

the head of Newsmax, a loony far-right website, called for Medicaid for all.

This is amazing.

garbage liberal vox:

The hard part comes if the EPA and Department of Transportation later decide to rewrite the fuel economy standards for 2022-’25 to be less strict. They can’t just abolish the standards altogether, because of the underlying laws involved. Instead, they might try to relax the schedule for efficiency improvements, or make compliance easier by giving automakers more credit for non-engine improvements. Yet any changes would require the EPA to write a new regulation, which has to go through the formal rulemaking process and could be challenged in court.

Bob Sussman, a lawyer who was senior policy counsel at the EPA under Obama, explains that Trump officials would have to make a detailed case that the Obama-era standards are too costly to meet — say, because they depend on selling large numbers of electric vehicles that consumers are unwilling to buy. “It’s not an easy case to make,” Sussman says. “It’s very fact-intensive and highly technical.”

Assuming the EPA and the Department of Transportation can pull that off, however, there’s still another potential hurdle. Remember, California received a waiver from the EPA to pursue its own stricter standards if the federal government pulls back — and states like New York would likely adopt California’s rules. Automakers loathe this possibility, because it would mean a messy patchwork of standards across different states.

California, California, here we cooooome