If you HAVE to subsidize something subsidize free fishing polls, not free fish.
What a great quote. Did you hear that from somewhere, or did you just come up with it?
I think you hit on a pretty good point about our economy - there is a very long tail of employers and producers in our country. When people think of the 'corporations' or the 'rich', they think of Exxon Mobile and Bill Gates, and fail to realize that the vast majority of our employers, 'rich', and GDP producers are not these companies or people but the small business owners. It's easy to sell higher taxes on Exxon Mobile and Bill Gates, but it's the local pet store owner, or community bank is who is ultimately affected the most by taxes.
well ideally we would have no subsidies at all. if investors were taxed less there would be more investment money for small businesses and we wouldn't need the government stepping in. It bothers me the extent to which government creates problems and then justifies its existence by stepping in to 'solve' them. Hacker News is a natural environment for free market ideology because anyone that has ever tried to start a small business has immediately realized how inimical the state is to commerce. It's been so bad for so long that we all have Stockholm syndrome.
but yes, I just came up with that fish bit, and will be using it again in the future :)
I don't get the fascination with taxes. Being a business owner my fascination is with sales and revenue. If my taxes are cut I don't create jobs or give raises, quite honestly, that doesn't even enter into the equation. My goals is to do the most work with the fewest jobs. If my sales increase and my employees can't do their job then I add jobs. Job creation is a function of sales and productivity. Not taxes.
Taxes dictate how many new sales you have to make to hire another person, and vice versa. Just because you're ignoring them when running your business doesn't mean they're not affecting you.
At an individual level it is hard to gauge the effect of lowered taxes on productivity and employment. This is why we have to step back and look at the aggregated data across all businesses. For the theory to work, there must be at some point businesses who are on the edge of whether to hire or not. High volume low margin businesses I would think have the most direct relationship between taxes and employment.
There's another aspect to hiring that we should consider. If you receive a tax break, you can pass the savings on to customers in lower prices or bring more customers in through advertising. You are right, just because you have the money doesn't mean go hire more people. Smart business owners know that hiring people should only be done when the value they could bring the business outweighs the cost. The point is that lower taxes can let you expand or market to more customers, and as business grows, you will employ more people to keep up with demand.
What a great quote. Did you hear that from somewhere, or did you just come up with it?
I think you hit on a pretty good point about our economy - there is a very long tail of employers and producers in our country. When people think of the 'corporations' or the 'rich', they think of Exxon Mobile and Bill Gates, and fail to realize that the vast majority of our employers, 'rich', and GDP producers are not these companies or people but the small business owners. It's easy to sell higher taxes on Exxon Mobile and Bill Gates, but it's the local pet store owner, or community bank is who is ultimately affected the most by taxes.