Maybe liberals on the forum can explain this to me and others

The answer is "it depends"....

I don't know enough about how the US operates but in the case of the UK, quite a lot of the foreign aid comes in the form of export guarantees and/or funding which comes back to the UK in the form of sales for UK industries. I would be shocked if at least some of the US aid doesn't come with some of the same strings attached.

Other aid is provided because it's sometimes cheaper to placate with money instead of having to deal with a problem politically and/or militarily somewhere on down the line.

Sometimes you're in a bidding war with other powers. Right now China is investing a ****-load of money in Africa on infrastructure projects. The intent is two-fold. Firstly they want and need a large slice of Africa's natural resources and this is a cost effective way of obtaining it. Secondly they are buying influence in those countries. The US is perfectly entitled to sit back and let this happen on the grounds that the US has access to plenty of natural resources and they don't need influence with African countries but that may turn out to be a shortsighted view a few years or decades down the line.

Sometimes funding a proxy-war is the most cost effective way of waging war in a region when you don't want to have the cost, both financial and political, of putting boots on the ground.

Actually that seems not to be the case. The middle class seem to do better (i.e. have a greater share of wealth and enjoy greater economic and social mobility) when taxes are higher. That's true comparing different countries at the same time or the same country over time. The 1950's are the "golden years" as far as the middle classes are concerned in the US and taxes were very high for the very rich back then. Interestingly, back then corporate taxes accounted for around 30% of federal tax receipts, today it's well under 10%.

Lower taxes favour the very wealthy and tend to concentrate wealth, increase inequality and reduce economic mobility.

The middle class in the US is smaller and proportionately less well off now than it was 40, 50 or 60 years ago and the situation is getting worse, not better.

 

He is even worse than that. What he wants is less government. Imagine cashing in some government for some freedom. It is strange concept, is it not?

 

How many rich people's minds have you read?

 

I don’t have to read their minds to see their actions.

 

You see their motivation?

 

When they donate money to “charities” that don’t actually help people, their motivation clearly isn’t to help people.

 

I don't disagree that the probability is that you're right about name people. Especially celebrities.

 

Global Warming funds have to be there most lame.

 

Well good for you. I am a tradesman and got tired of layoffs, so I became an entrepreneur and a general contractor. It's more work than working by the hour but I made that choice. Choose to work hard, choose to grow profits, choose to kick back, choose to panhandle....aren't choices great?

 

Show how you come up with those statistics. I personally know more wealthy people that give than that don't. There is no such thing as a tax dodge. If the government lets you keep some of your money legally....you would be a fool to not take advantage of it!

 

An awful lot of the poor use "programs"to subsidize their lottery tickets, drugs, and tattoos. I see it all the time. If the government wasn't enabling an awful lot.....they might be motivated to work.

 

Oh....you called me stupid. You win.

 

You make some good points in the first part of your post. In the latter, I have to disagree. I do believe large companies who hire illegal labor (in America) have driven the middle class down. My trade as a bricklayer used to pay better than most school teachers. In Arizona I have seen countless jobs regarding masonry performed by contractors that use illegal help. Most of them are not good tradesman. They send the money they earn back home. They work cheap and pay no SS or workmans comp.
Masons used to make up part of the middle class. Not any more. Build the wall. Imprison employers who hire illegals. Let us keep more of our money and we will start new businesses. Since taxe rates have been lowered in the U.S. tax revenue has gone up. It always does.

 

The quote you are looking for didn't come from Jefferson. It came from Henry David Thoreau, in his essay, Civil Disobedience, something conservatives tend to disapprove of.

 

Early in life I read a book, that explained how no one ever got rich keeping their head down at the grindstone. It greatly affected the way I planned my life. Most of my money has come from my creativity.

 

Choices=Liberty

 

But not the main reason. Unless you call stupidity, irresponsibility and/or laziness a disability?

 

Jefferson said this and Washington called it a "necessary evil". Sure Thoreau probably said it too.

 

I think that may be wise....but sometimes you create and it does take a lot of work, but because you created it, it is more enjoyable.

 

The highest form of art is getting paid.

 

Why do we give our hard earned money to foreign countries at all??

 

Do you have proof that they do??

 

Im saying that community and collectivism is voluntary. Meaning, if people decided not to participate in your utopian version of society, these people (the spoiled rich kids as you put it, conveniently not hard working people) will barter and trade in a format that sustains themselves.

Fact is, the have- nots need the haves, not the other way around.

 

They paid you. You didn't "give" anything.

 

The US currently has (historically) low tax rates and has done since at least George H W Bush was president. During that time, income and wealth inequality has soared, the middle class has shrunk and social and economic mobility has shrunk. It's not just the reduction in tax rates that are to blame, there's also the attack on organised labour and institutional shareholders giving a clear message that executives can help themselves but it is a major factor.

Blaming immigrants (legal and illegal) is a very old tactic, but very successful tactic, which has been used for at least 150 years. It distracts from the true causes of lower wages and gives those who have suffered as a result, a scapegoat to blame. We're almost going back to the situation during the Industrial Revolution where automation and wholesale changes to the shape of the economy are driving down wages (after all, employment is at an all time high, in the past this has led to healthy wage growth - not this time) and it wasn't until labour started to get organised that the situation began to improve.

The tax take has gone up, but not in real (inflation adjusted) terms and not as quickly as it was going up before the tax cuts. Lowered taxes do not inevitably lead to increased tax take - it depends where you are on the Laffer Curve.

As I said upthread, those countries with lower taxes, or more specifically less progressive taxes, have higher levels of inequality and lower social and economic mobility than countries with a more progressive tax regime. Countries with lower taxes, or more specifically less progressive taxes, have higher levels of inequality and lower social and economic mobility than they did when their takes were more progressive.