[was RE: [PEN-L:33226] Re: Re: Re: Re: Bush Administration On The Poor: Pay More Taxes!]
> Ellen Frank wrote:
> >But shouldn't living standards be determined by
> >what people contribute? And shouldn't people who
> >contribute more get more? Rather than being
> >penalized for their hard work and success?
Doug asks:
> Are you channelling your students, or your own inner thoughts here?
> I'm guessing the former, because I can't believe you think there's
> much relation between "contribution" and reward, or hard work and
> success.
from what Ellen has said before, it's the former.
> I'll bet lots of your students work their butts off, and
> come from families that do too. And what do they have to show for it?
> Though I suppose there's a psychological angle here - they're
> ambitious, want to join the upper ranks, and think that they'll be
> able to someday by virtue of their hard work, since virtue is
> rewarded. But it isn't. Most people die in the same income quintile
> they were born into, or very close to it.
another thing: my students are post-adolescents who are still rebelling against -- or definng themselves as different from -- their parents. This encourages a very individualistic perspective (at least in the US during the last century or so, where individualism reigns), rejecting notions of community and standards of justice, while rejecting the alleged paternalism of the government. That they tend to do so in the same way as all of their peers indicates a contradiction in their world-view.
in a separate message, Ellen writes:>
What people deserve is exactly the issue the right wing will
raise -- the rich deserve their luxuries and the poor have no
right to take what others have earned fairly (I guess they'll
want to leave Ken Lay out if it). How do supporters of
a progressive tax respond unless they are willing to say the
existing distribution of income is fundamentally unjust? <
how about the fact that those with lots of wealth benefit most from the government's activities, which mostly involve the protection of established property rights?
Jim
