[EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: >I loved your quote Ellen, that Doug brought up on his show on Thursday: >"The rich today don't just want to pay less taxes. They want to be paid >tribute!" Thanks, but I was slow on the uptake. I SHOULD have said, they are paid tribute and, having extracted their pound of flesh, don't want it taxed away from them. What are dividends, after all if not tribute to dead capital? > >Needless to say, I think the key to persuading students it to get out of >this box. It rigs the debate. But it rests on the hegemonic idea that >everything that people gain in the private sector is somehow theirs >without the government's help. Which is nonsense. The society, never >mind the economy, wouldn't exist in its present form without the >government. And people who make more have hence profited more from the >government's existence. I agree and I think Smith's argument -- that the rich, as the beneficiaries of the social order, by definition, should pay for the upkeep of the social order -- is a good one. But I don't see that flying in the US, circa 2003. The ideology says that the rich prosper despite the government and, thanks to their thrift and innovation, the rest of us prosper as well.
By the way, Dick Cheney had a great quote in today's papers: "The president and I understand thta the government does not create wealth and it does not create jobs, but government policies can and should create the enviroment in which firms and entreprenuers will take risk, innovate, invest and hire more people." > > Ellen
