I've never actually been to Alabama. But it sounds like a place full of poors.

They are fixed if you want to maintain a comfortable quality of life.

cliffnotes: $250k is the ABSOLUTE MINIMUM to maintain a $250k lifestyle.

Cool story bro.

So the effects of your policy choices make no difference whatsoever in your decision making process?

I mean christ, how could you possibly be comfortable wearing OFF THE RACK suits???

Everyone has the lifestyle of themselves, Henry.

Straw man? I didn't make you say there were fixed costs. You said that. Like one post ago.
What argument do you find offensive? You have literally no idea what's going on, Henry. No idea.

AFAIK, when last we returned to the subject of the thread, you agreed with me that Henderson was being absurd.

What are you talking about? Even if I did think that, why the **** do you care so much about MY personal definition of rich?

tailoring crazy expensive too yo

Henry is right now contemplating the sacrifices he'd have to make if he got knocked down to $249k... Ditch the Krug for Cristal or step down to made-to-measure suits? Brutal.

Just to add a little bit of context to Henry endless sympathy for the benighted souls trying to raise a family on $50k, the median household income in the US is around $45k. More than half the people in America live that life or worse.

So Hank wants to talk about being offended at $250k being labelled rich.

1) I'm offended he labeled $400k rich lolz! Eh I can't even manage to parody this because I have no idea what is "offensive" about that.

2) One of the consequences of living a comfortable life is that to be a properly socialized individual one must have the self-awareness of how fortunate you are and not do things like write articles whining about cutting your cell phone if the top bracket rate goes back to the Clinton administration rate. It is, if not offensive, uncouth and socially awkward to brag about how high your fixed costs are. Especially when those costs include bottle service once a month.

I hate to intrude on such a fascinating discussion, but I would like to cordially invite you to the next scheduled Politards debate involving first principles, morality, ideology, and any other topic that touches upon the philosophic foundations our institutions are built upon. It'll probably be sometime in early November. Hope to see you there!

I think a far more important element of politics is, can it work. Lofty principles are interesting and thought provoking, that's for sure. They can give us new means of analysis for the everyday world. But, they cannot tell us how to run a dole or welfare society in the modern world. X, Y, and Z philosopher from hundreds of years ago can give us insight. But they do not make good arguments on who to vote for in an election.

If you approach policy from principles outcomes take care of themselves. Outcomes also inform the formation of theory. My point is that policy is not jet a matter of picking the outcomes you happen to like and just making whatever policy you think will bring those about. Anyone who thinks of politics in that way is not worth talking to.

lol yeah. Are you going to teach me about taxes again? That you continue to post after making such an embarrassing argument is funny.

Except that was never what we disagreed about. We disagreed about the question of is $250,000 as family income rich. You are carefully avoiding taking a position on this so I am going to ask you directly -- Is it your position that a family income of $250,000 is rich?

You're opening position was that $250,000 in family income is rich so your definition of rich is very much relevant. If you are going to claim something is X where X is somewhat subjective then you need to actually be willing to define what X is to you.

Henry, I still don't think you get the tax issue, by the way. I mean, you could probably do the math if I asked you because now you know to Google a tax calculator, but it's not clicking in context of the whole discussion.

The last sentence is the conclusion of the post. Do you get it now?

IOW, it wasn't that I was going through the internet when suddenly I was struck by the need to TELL EVERYONE that I think the 1986 tax reforms perfectly set the start of the top bracket to the objective definition of rich.

The thread has always been about taxes. "Rich" is a meaningless subjective term, but whining about how $250k barely covers the fixed cost of living is beyond parody of an out of touch rich guy.

Yeah, that's what I'm getting at. If you've micromanaged the discussion down to whether the line where "rich" begins is at $251k or $400k, you've lost. It doesn't make a lick of difference if that's the range. They're both effectively rich. This is so fundamentally obvious it shouldn't have to be said.

That doesn't work. It just leads to people yelling at each other. If you want a policy to be legitimate you need to justify it with public reasons. If you want people with different ideologies to be swayed by your arguments you need to advance more than that you want a specific outcome and this policy will bring it about. If they shared that you'd already be in agreement and if they don't nothing you can say is going to impact that. You will just talk past each other which for the most part is all I see. I might have had more to say about this if it was earlier but I'm tired so going to bed.

That what? People complain about taxes? No ****. You implied that it would have no impact which clearly it does. If you want to pretend like he was overstating the impact it because he can just chip off some of his gold bar to pay for it then fine but given how much worse you overstate stuff in this topic you have no right to criticize anyone.

You claim that $250,00 is rich and that it is insulting to claim otherwise. You then state that you will pretend that it isn't then spend the next two years arguing that it is.

I don't even understand why it matters who counts as rich. Nobody is saying to like, eat the rich and so it's important to slide under that "rich" line. (People who don't know how taxes work DO THINK it is important to slide under the line, but lol at them)

Reasonable people can differ over the appropriate tax rates and how to raise revenue to run the government.

It's just sad and hilarious that this thread is hundreds of pages of people whining about how nice their house is. Well, not their house. Rich people's houses.

The minimum income you have to make before I'll listen to a sob story about your fixed costs without smirking is way below $250k. In this crazy mixed up world there are actual poor people, with actual financial problems. Whining about how tough it is to pay for private school AND vacations is not a good line to get sympathy.

I don't think you know how taxes or implications work,.

Man this topic has legitimately unhinged Henry, either that or he got into the Cristal pretty hard for a weekday.

You make no sense. You're arguments make no sense and aren't even arguments. The other topics in politics were pretty bad but this is so low that I've decided to not participate further in this area of the site. If a bunch of lunatics want to rant and yell at each other then I'm going to leave you guys to that. You are way too delusional and angry to engage.

I'm rich because I have looooooooooove!

Honestly you contribute nothing to this forum or anywhere else on twoplustwo. You think you are better than everyone else and you think you must show that in every single post you make. Please gtfo of politics and never come back, we don't need you nor do we get anything out of you being here and insulting everyone.

I find Henry to be entertaining.

My honest critique of Henry though is that if he's going for realism he's failing. The gimmick and his shtick are quite entertaining though.

OK, next time, you can decide not to participate at the moment you realize you have no idea what's going on. There's no need to make 15 posts aggressively berating other posters as being "delusional and angry"(deluded about what? Angry about what?) because you're confused.