[teaboy]

[quote=gandalf]These are some insightful posts.[/quote]

How ironic, gandalf.

tb

[teaboy]

[quote=gandalf]These are some insightful posts.[/quote]

How ironic, gandalf.

tb

[teaboy]

[quote=CA renter]…nobody wants to cut from their own fat.[/quote]

CAR, I respectfully disagree. I know of at least one person (myself) who would accept to be the recipient of less benefits from the government, for the greater good.
Incidentally, I would accept modest, justified tax increases, too.

What makes me willing to do this is the fact that I believe wholeheartedly all the rhetoric about “mortgaging our children’s future” with all the huge deficits and unfunded future liabilities (of public pensions, medicare, etc.)

I would hope that more considerate discussion of the cost/benefits of government (and less digression to hyped up political talking points) might convince others to accept these realities (or “sarcrifices”, or “responsibilities”, or whatever you want to call them), too.

I can dream, right…?
tb 😉

[teaboy]

[quote=CA renter]…nobody wants to cut from their own fat.[/quote]

CAR, I respectfully disagree. I know of at least one person (myself) who would accept to be the recipient of less benefits from the government, for the greater good.
Incidentally, I would accept modest, justified tax increases, too.

What makes me willing to do this is the fact that I believe wholeheartedly all the rhetoric about “mortgaging our children’s future” with all the huge deficits and unfunded future liabilities (of public pensions, medicare, etc.)

I would hope that more considerate discussion of the cost/benefits of government (and less digression to hyped up political talking points) might convince others to accept these realities (or “sarcrifices”, or “responsibilities”, or whatever you want to call them), too.

I can dream, right…?
tb 😉

[teaboy]

[quote=CA renter]…nobody wants to cut from their own fat.[/quote]

CAR, I respectfully disagree. I know of at least one person (myself) who would accept to be the recipient of less benefits from the government, for the greater good.
Incidentally, I would accept modest, justified tax increases, too.

What makes me willing to do this is the fact that I believe wholeheartedly all the rhetoric about “mortgaging our children’s future” with all the huge deficits and unfunded future liabilities (of public pensions, medicare, etc.)

I would hope that more considerate discussion of the cost/benefits of government (and less digression to hyped up political talking points) might convince others to accept these realities (or “sarcrifices”, or “responsibilities”, or whatever you want to call them), too.

I can dream, right…?
tb 😉

[teaboy]

[quote=CA renter]…nobody wants to cut from their own fat.[/quote]

CAR, I respectfully disagree. I know of at least one person (myself) who would accept to be the recipient of less benefits from the government, for the greater good.
Incidentally, I would accept modest, justified tax increases, too.

What makes me willing to do this is the fact that I believe wholeheartedly all the rhetoric about “mortgaging our children’s future” with all the huge deficits and unfunded future liabilities (of public pensions, medicare, etc.)

I would hope that more considerate discussion of the cost/benefits of government (and less digression to hyped up political talking points) might convince others to accept these realities (or “sarcrifices”, or “responsibilities”, or whatever you want to call them), too.

I can dream, right…?
tb 😉

[teaboy]

[quote=CA renter]…nobody wants to cut from their own fat.[/quote]

CAR, I respectfully disagree. I know of at least one person (myself) who would accept to be the recipient of less benefits from the government, for the greater good.
Incidentally, I would accept modest, justified tax increases, too.

What makes me willing to do this is the fact that I believe wholeheartedly all the rhetoric about “mortgaging our children’s future” with all the huge deficits and unfunded future liabilities (of public pensions, medicare, etc.)

I would hope that more considerate discussion of the cost/benefits of government (and less digression to hyped up political talking points) might convince others to accept these realities (or “sarcrifices”, or “responsibilities”, or whatever you want to call them), too.

I can dream, right…?
tb 😉

[teaboy]

[quote=jimmyle]We all know that we need a government. The only debate is that how big should it be? Currently, the majority of people think that the government has gotten too big and too wasteful. Our sales tax started out at 0%, and now it is approaching 10% and they still want to squeeze in another half percent and people are tired of this.[/quote]

Yes, sales tax may well be one of the more visible forms of tax to many people. But on a forum like this I would hope that we can look at the cost/benefits of government more subjectively, rather than digressing to a few distracting talking points. Isn’t that what our politicians are for?

Here’s the way I look at it:
My 1st assumption is that most reasonable people would agree that over a single “economic cycle” the budget should balance (i.e. total tax revenue = total spending).

Therefore, if lower spending = lower taxes then shouldn’t we be looking at the major spending categories?
I believe the major spending categories are something like:
Medicare, Medicaid, etc (33%)
Social Security (21%)
Defense (20%)

So, if this is where the majority of tax dollars are spent, why are we wasting our time on this board talking about this vague “big government” boogie man which the “majority of people” is wasting their life worrying about?

Or do we think that those 3 main spending categories have much less $$ fat to trim than others?

Or is it possible that we actually all need to and soon will end up paying more tax than we already do, but the only way to make that palatable to ourselves is to expend 90% of our efforts to reduce our spending (and we therefore assume our tax bills) by $1.50 per year each. Big whoop.

tb

[teaboy]

[quote=jimmyle]We all know that we need a government. The only debate is that how big should it be? Currently, the majority of people think that the government has gotten too big and too wasteful. Our sales tax started out at 0%, and now it is approaching 10% and they still want to squeeze in another half percent and people are tired of this.[/quote]

Yes, sales tax may well be one of the more visible forms of tax to many people. But on a forum like this I would hope that we can look at the cost/benefits of government more subjectively, rather than digressing to a few distracting talking points. Isn’t that what our politicians are for?

Here’s the way I look at it:
My 1st assumption is that most reasonable people would agree that over a single “economic cycle” the budget should balance (i.e. total tax revenue = total spending).

Therefore, if lower spending = lower taxes then shouldn’t we be looking at the major spending categories?
I believe the major spending categories are something like:
Medicare, Medicaid, etc (33%)
Social Security (21%)
Defense (20%)

So, if this is where the majority of tax dollars are spent, why are we wasting our time on this board talking about this vague “big government” boogie man which the “majority of people” is wasting their life worrying about?

Or do we think that those 3 main spending categories have much less $$ fat to trim than others?

Or is it possible that we actually all need to and soon will end up paying more tax than we already do, but the only way to make that palatable to ourselves is to expend 90% of our efforts to reduce our spending (and we therefore assume our tax bills) by $1.50 per year each. Big whoop.

tb

[teaboy]

[quote=jimmyle]We all know that we need a government. The only debate is that how big should it be? Currently, the majority of people think that the government has gotten too big and too wasteful. Our sales tax started out at 0%, and now it is approaching 10% and they still want to squeeze in another half percent and people are tired of this.[/quote]

Yes, sales tax may well be one of the more visible forms of tax to many people. But on a forum like this I would hope that we can look at the cost/benefits of government more subjectively, rather than digressing to a few distracting talking points. Isn’t that what our politicians are for?

Here’s the way I look at it:
My 1st assumption is that most reasonable people would agree that over a single “economic cycle” the budget should balance (i.e. total tax revenue = total spending).

Therefore, if lower spending = lower taxes then shouldn’t we be looking at the major spending categories?
I believe the major spending categories are something like:
Medicare, Medicaid, etc (33%)
Social Security (21%)
Defense (20%)

So, if this is where the majority of tax dollars are spent, why are we wasting our time on this board talking about this vague “big government” boogie man which the “majority of people” is wasting their life worrying about?

Or do we think that those 3 main spending categories have much less $$ fat to trim than others?

Or is it possible that we actually all need to and soon will end up paying more tax than we already do, but the only way to make that palatable to ourselves is to expend 90% of our efforts to reduce our spending (and we therefore assume our tax bills) by $1.50 per year each. Big whoop.

tb

[teaboy]

[quote=jimmyle]We all know that we need a government. The only debate is that how big should it be? Currently, the majority of people think that the government has gotten too big and too wasteful. Our sales tax started out at 0%, and now it is approaching 10% and they still want to squeeze in another half percent and people are tired of this.[/quote]

Yes, sales tax may well be one of the more visible forms of tax to many people. But on a forum like this I would hope that we can look at the cost/benefits of government more subjectively, rather than digressing to a few distracting talking points. Isn’t that what our politicians are for?

Here’s the way I look at it:
My 1st assumption is that most reasonable people would agree that over a single “economic cycle” the budget should balance (i.e. total tax revenue = total spending).

Therefore, if lower spending = lower taxes then shouldn’t we be looking at the major spending categories?
I believe the major spending categories are something like:
Medicare, Medicaid, etc (33%)
Social Security (21%)
Defense (20%)

So, if this is where the majority of tax dollars are spent, why are we wasting our time on this board talking about this vague “big government” boogie man which the “majority of people” is wasting their life worrying about?

Or do we think that those 3 main spending categories have much less $$ fat to trim than others?

Or is it possible that we actually all need to and soon will end up paying more tax than we already do, but the only way to make that palatable to ourselves is to expend 90% of our efforts to reduce our spending (and we therefore assume our tax bills) by $1.50 per year each. Big whoop.

tb

[teaboy]

[quote=jimmyle]We all know that we need a government. The only debate is that how big should it be? Currently, the majority of people think that the government has gotten too big and too wasteful. Our sales tax started out at 0%, and now it is approaching 10% and they still want to squeeze in another half percent and people are tired of this.[/quote]

Yes, sales tax may well be one of the more visible forms of tax to many people. But on a forum like this I would hope that we can look at the cost/benefits of government more subjectively, rather than digressing to a few distracting talking points. Isn’t that what our politicians are for?

Here’s the way I look at it:
My 1st assumption is that most reasonable people would agree that over a single “economic cycle” the budget should balance (i.e. total tax revenue = total spending).

Therefore, if lower spending = lower taxes then shouldn’t we be looking at the major spending categories?
I believe the major spending categories are something like:
Medicare, Medicaid, etc (33%)
Social Security (21%)
Defense (20%)

So, if this is where the majority of tax dollars are spent, why are we wasting our time on this board talking about this vague “big government” boogie man which the “majority of people” is wasting their life worrying about?

Or do we think that those 3 main spending categories have much less $$ fat to trim than others?

Or is it possible that we actually all need to and soon will end up paying more tax than we already do, but the only way to make that palatable to ourselves is to expend 90% of our efforts to reduce our spending (and we therefore assume our tax bills) by $1.50 per year each. Big whoop.

tb

[teaboy]

Thanks for the info, fsbo.
I also just signed my re-fin loan doc and it did not have such a notice in it.

However, I did take a quick look at the full text of “California Civil Code – Section 2947-2955.5 :: Article 2. Mortgage Of Real Property” here: http://law.justia.com/california/codes/2009/civ/2947-2955.5.html

The law dictates that the loan company must not disburse the loan on a Monday or immediately after a holiday (which would mean accruing >1 day’s interest) unless the borrower specifically requests it, so I’m not too worried.

Is HLS on vaca or what?

tb 🙂

[teaboy]

Thanks for the info, fsbo.
I also just signed my re-fin loan doc and it did not have such a notice in it.

However, I did take a quick look at the full text of “California Civil Code – Section 2947-2955.5 :: Article 2. Mortgage Of Real Property” here: http://law.justia.com/california/codes/2009/civ/2947-2955.5.html

The law dictates that the loan company must not disburse the loan on a Monday or immediately after a holiday (which would mean accruing >1 day’s interest) unless the borrower specifically requests it, so I’m not too worried.

Is HLS on vaca or what?

tb 🙂

[teaboy]

Thanks for the info, fsbo.
I also just signed my re-fin loan doc and it did not have such a notice in it.

However, I did take a quick look at the full text of “California Civil Code – Section 2947-2955.5 :: Article 2. Mortgage Of Real Property” here: http://law.justia.com/california/codes/2009/civ/2947-2955.5.html

The law dictates that the loan company must not disburse the loan on a Monday or immediately after a holiday (which would mean accruing >1 day’s interest) unless the borrower specifically requests it, so I’m not too worried.

Is HLS on vaca or what?

tb 🙂

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