Comment · Tue, July 24, 2012
Super rich hiding up to $32 trillion offshore, which amounts to roughly the US and Japanese GDP combined. Up to $280bn is lost in tax revenues. Some of the world's biggest banks are involved: HSBC, Citigroup, Bank of America, UBS, Credit Suisse
What they were answering
[deleted] · 1 points
Explain this to me. How can we get more out than we put in, if the government can only use what we give it?
Well really there are two issues here:
* We're bankrupting our system, putting ourselves in massive debt. It's like someone who puts $10K/month on his credit card and pays off $5K/month. He is getting more out of his credit card than he is putting into it.
* Economics is not a zero-sum game. We are all better off for living in a civil society. Without our society (including our government), the rich would not be rich. Also, the poor would generally be even worse off than they are today. This makes it even worse that we are ruining our system-- whereas we've traditionally gotten more out than we put in, when everyone is trying to avoid contributing, then we all end up with less.
Or are you saying that the rich do carry the economy, and everyone else is just getting more out of it than they put in?
No, the rich do not carry the economy. The rich are carried to riches by the economy. The poor homeless guy in the soup kitchen is ironically the person who probably benefits least.
If management was running it into the ground, there is no way I would invest more into it.
Well yes, if you had no faith in the business, then it makes no sense to invest at all. Pull your money out!
In the same sense, if you have no faith in the United States, go live someplace…
u/MisterYouAreSoDumb
I agree about the bankrupting of our system, it's wrong. However, no corporation has ever succeeded in saving their failing business, by increasing the price to their customers to account for their bad practices. They need to restructure, fix the bad practices, then they can recover. Increasing the prices to their customers (in our analogy, the US citizens), the company just fails faster. This is what we are seeing now with the US government. They need to stop wasting money and restructure before anyone is going to be willing to invest back in it.
In the same sense, if you have no faith in the United States, go live someplace else!
The government is not our home or our land. I can disagree with the way the system is being run, and not be willing to invest more into it, without relocating to another part of the world. I think what you fail to realize is that people do not like doing things against their will. Humanity has seen it time and time again. For a governmental system to work, it must have the support of the population. If a government does not account for that, it can and will fail.
But people shouldn't avoid paying their fair share, expecting that the government will improve by denying it resources, any more than you would expect your business to improve by pulling your investment in it.
Just like people should not expect the government to improve by giving it more resources. Throw more money into a fire and all you get is a bigger fire.