I really hate writing about this guy, which I personally like and admire… actually it’s probably because I like him that I do… anyhow, yes Ben Carson is full of….! (at least on these points đŸ™‚
I would like to stress I have no qualms against is positions, just his **reasoning**, which to a certain extent makes things worse.
That said, please do watch the entire speech which is quite enjoyable and really is not what media nuts (or even my post title) make it out to be. As far as I am concerned a lot of what he said is quite sensible.
This is in reaction to the *portion* highlighted by Cavuto in in which he makes a couple of claims:
A) The fact that his is a Doctor does not limit his ability to comment on Policy
B) He and others are quite successful in using fact-driven analysis to solve numerous problems
C) A flat tax is fair.
D) God gave a 10% across the board tithing system which should be imitated.
Naturally I agree with A & B. Yes demonstrably intelligent people should be solicited. Except that intelligent people are equally if not disproportionately capable of hubris. To that effect, intelligence is like any other asset. The more you have of it, the more you have to be careful.
This business of proportionality actually is at the heart of my argument. As a general concept, there is nothing fair about a flat tax. At least it is as fair as having all fighters compete in the same weight category. If that sounds fair then fine. Case closed. I dare say a majority would agree with me.
How does that apply to taxing “The Rich”? My statement is as follow:
The richer you get, the more disproportionately you are able to take advantage of what a country offers.
Simple example:
Say the price of nut bolts is $10 a Kilo. You find an opportunity to buy it at $1, however seller only wants to sell in large enough quantities.
If you are business minded poor person, you will have to pass that up because you don’t have access to credit. Most likely your friends are also poor and won’t be able to help.
If you are middle class, you might be able buy a stock, either by making a personal loan or getting some friends to pitch in or what not. Even if it takes you a while, you might make a cool 10 or 100 Grands.
If you are well off. You can buy the entire stock. Drive other sellers out of business, control the supply of bolts of an entire region, branch into other activities etc… all that without any risk to your personal livelihood, credit and health.
Am I mistaken here? This seems rather straightforward to me… Its not about wanting to hurt the Rich guy, no not at all it’s just that life is not proportional at all.
Money is to power, what speed is to energy
If you think for a minute that a car going twice as fast carry just twice the amount of energy you are so mistaken and unfit to read this post.
Lastly point D). Mr Carson, tithing is NOT taxing. Tithe never meant to build roads, maintain troops in other countries, put a man (or woman) on the moon and stimulate cancer reaserch.
Tithing is akin contributing to an opera house. The priests just like the opera house are not meant to foster wealth.
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That too it seems to me is rather straight forward and I have a hard time understanding how very educated people can stray at such a basic level.
Is it that hubris disproportionality issue? Again, I am not saying we should or should not tax progressively. I am saying let’s not fool ourselves.
PS: By the way, the war of 1812 was NOT started by the British… correct me if I am wrong.
cafeproz 
The declaration of war is not necessarily the “start” of war. More importantly, one cannot take another “out of context” unless one quotes another to put him in context.
When does war ever start? (sigh)
Actually my understanding is that America went to war against Britain thinking of liberating northern cousins! At any rate, while the story told is beautiful, in its own right… I am not sure the facts surrounding the war and its intents are as glorious. Granted, I might need to review my history…
What were we often told by our parents and mentors during our childhood when life didn’t always go our way? Life is not fair.
On a parallel to the “fairness” that people often confuse with an inappropriate sense of entitlement…whether or not this subsequent story is true…a college professor in economics, per his students’ request apparently, tested the socialist theory of equalizing the poor and the rich:
“The professor then said, “OK, we will have an experiment in this class on Obama’s plan”.. All grades will be averaged and everyone will receive the same grade so no one will fail and no one will receive an A…. (substituting grades for dollars – something closer to home and more readily understood by all).
After the first test, the grades were averaged and everyone got a B. The students who studied hard were upset and the students who studied little were happy. As the second test rolled around, the students who studied little had studied even less and the ones who studied hard decided they wanted a free ride too so they studied little.
The second test average was a D! No one was happy. When the 3rd test rolled around, the average was an F.
As the tests proceeded, the scores never increased as bickering, blame and name-calling all resulted in hard feelings and no one would study for the benefit of anyone else.
To their great surprise, ALL FAILED and the professor told them that socialism would also ultimately fail because when the reward is great, the effort to succeed is great, but when government takes all the reward away, no one will try or want to succeed. Could not be any simpler than that.”
Sorry… since your post was not a response to my post, I deleted the link back… feel free to engage in an actual discussion. That said, I must in the strongest terms say that Obama is socialist only to those who do not bother learning what socialism is.
Dr. Carson was in error when he said, “God gave a 10% across the board tithing system which should be imitated.” That statement is far from truth.
The ONLY people in the Old Testament that were commanded to tithe were those who INHERITED THE PROMISED LAND WITH EVERYTHING ON IT. They got the land, house, animals, crops, etc. ALL FREE AND CLEAR. No mortgage payment or rent to pay. And THEY were commanded to tithe on the crops and animals and take it to the Levites who INHERITED the tithe INSTEAD OF the promised land with everything on it. No one else tithed. Wage earners did not tithe. Jesus did not tithe as a carpenter. Paul did not tithe as a tent maker. Peter did not tithe as a fisherman. Leviticus 27:30-33, Numbers 18.
Every three years a tithe went to the poor. The poor did not pay tithe, they ate from the tithe. Deut. 14:28-29.
Hi thanks for the clarifications… however, I am not sure I was able to find where it states that wager earners were not to pay tithe…. Is it because tithe is specifically tied to enherited property (which then indirectly absolves wage earners from tithing)?
Would a wage earning who own 10 sheep be absolved from tithing?
Wages were not tithable. The scriptures do list what is not tithed from but rather what to tithe from. God specified in Leviticus 27:30-33 where the tithe was to come from. That doesn’t mean that a farmer who also has wages wouldn’t tithe from the farm produce or animals. The number of sheep owned was not relevant. But if there were ten NEW BORN animals during the year, the tenth one counted would be the tithe.
If you truly are a good business minded poor person, i would assume that you have more than enough capability of building capital and profit by beating out the weak competition in the little league first
Being good is necessary but not sufficient to succeed. That said, even going with your statement, if the earnings of the poor person are too small with respect to what they need to live then they can keep doing that forever and still be hungry at night. That’s not even getting into the issue of operating margin…
“Being good is not sufficient to succeed” is a platitudinous statement. Who wouldn’t agree with that? What you need to give here is examples and facts. Can you blame General Motors for taking over the transportation industry and starving the #1 horse and buggy business at that time, and then see General Motors almost taken out by Toyota? If i wanted to, i could name hundreds if not thousands of examples of start-ups that overcame the odds.
Look, i am a web developer with my own business. It’s just me. I’ve been in business for 6 years. I have large national companies that compete against me. i have probably the largest web development company in the US in my very city. I also have highly resourceful and respected local firms that i compete against. On top of all this, i have to compete against resources online that provide FREE websites. SHESH! Yet, here i am 6 years later.
Of course it is a platitude but it is in direct proportion to your initial assertion : “if they are good they will succeed”
That said i’m not sure what your point is… Some people can play guitar beautifully with just their feet, but as the article is about general policy, that’s not a valid line if argument.
The point of the example is to show the lack of proportion. If you have some some sort of safety net you are in a very different game than if you are betting your last dime. That too is a platitude but yet we are talking about it.
Yes you will earn in proportion the quality of your business and capital but if you don’t have access to enough capital you wont be able live off of it.
I’m not sure how any society can abundantly produce successful businesses while alleviating the consequences if their idea stunk, or they became lazy, or they hired bad people, or they marketed all wrong. How do you propose forcing owners to thoroughly plan and forcefully execute their business proposition if you alleviate the consequence for failing? There’s no precedent that i am aware of that shows if you decrease the reward for success and increase the penalty for failing that this type of market produces success.
Again from that perspective you are preaching to the choir… there is nothing in what I said that remotely states that people should not bare the consequences of the their choices.
So far I am under the impression that you responding to a very different post.
My point in the article is very simple: The relationship between money and purchasing power is not linear. Period. That is the only point I am making.
In practice this means this a person living on 100K a year does not have 10 times the purchasing power as the one living on 10K a year but more like 20 to 50 times more.
Now of course we can discuss all related matters, but I would just like to make sure my position is clear.