The KGB Oracle Forums General Public Discussion (SPECIAL ACCESS) KGB Political Debate Central Iceland

Why is an increase in taxes "inevitable" when private companies go belly up?

On the one hand I applaud them for being willing to work to feed their families, and then on the other you find out that they are working multiple jobs so they can support "very high standards of living." So, if they want to live modest "normal" lives they can work a normal 40 hour week?

Are these real jobs or are these propped up by government spending?

Come with me in a year and let's ask them first hand!

Derid, when we talk about US healthcare, you always tell me that other countries, especially small European ones, are not comparable to US.

Guess what?

Iceland is not comparable to US as far as outcomes of financial crisis. Crash&Burn of Icelandic Banking System has negligible effect on global economy. Worldwide Manufacturing, Agriculture, Transportation will not cease to operate when Iceland "wiped clean" banking. As such, after "wiped clean" they can rejoin global community and start trading again with only minimal penalties. The same could not be said for US, there won't be global community left to rejoin if US to do the same.

I am constantly amazed how you can be so overly optimistic in your US market failure predictions. It does reinforce your ideological position, but at least consider that your position wasn't even considered as "best-case-outcome" at the time of financial crisis in the US.

Kaotic - Taxes, probably because as a small country the temporary loss of a segment of banking industry dropped tax revenue by a good margin.

Standard of living - From what I understand, the islanders have something of a case of "keep up with the Joneses"

Job - tourist I believe is pretty organic. Not sure about the green jobs TBH.

In a nutshell they did some thing differently than I would have. But still, they manage to do pretty well without having a central govt backed by 300 million ppl telling them how to live. Nor is anyone to big to fail or too big to jail. Not perfect, but they do better than us despite having significantly less resources with which to work.

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Donk, Iceland? Eve Fest?

Nah, the line you are thinking of is the line peddled by those who had the most to lose had they not been propped up.

In fact for Iceland is was more dangerous, because they are far more dependent of foreign mfg. - its not like the bankers and pundits there werent decrying that the same scenario of doom you predicted for USA would not come to Iceland 10x. The USA has no need of the rest of the world, the worst case outcome for global trade grinding down had it even happened... is more expensive TVs for a bit, and some other consumer products.

The rest of the world would most likely have thanked us, in retrospect, had we allowed the economic hegemony to fall.

I very much disagree. USA without the rest of the world is probably looking at some drastic quality of life cuts. Thankfully, we won't starve, but that is about it.

Possibly, but only temporarily. Improved fundamentals leads to improved economic wealth in the mid and long term.

Sure, short term there may be pain - but as long as the fundamentals are good there is always improvement.

Should a opiate addict go through painful withdrawal and kick the habit? Should they just keep the habit, live with the degenerating quality of life over time and hope the habit doesn't kill them? Should they just be incarcerated, having the govt completely manage their lives - thereby losing the habit in exchange for their freedom?

That is the analogy that seems to most fit our economic situation.

You are talking about fundamentals as if it has some set baseline. Improved fundamentals at 95% loss are still a lot worse off than festering and long-term stagnation at 5% loss. What you are describing will take generation to recover from.

You really need to re-examine your assumptions of "long term" and realize that scenario you are describing is likely "lost generation", with our kids maybe getting a chance to get to where we started. Ideological purity will not feed and house you, and you cannot build infrastructure, education and push scientific progress with it.

Not if doing so will force this opiate addict to lose both legs and getting fed from the tube for the rest of the life, in such abstract case you are better off to sticking with the habit.

Your analogy fails because you assume that withdrawal will short-term eventually bring you to equal or better level than with the habit. Global economy is not like that, you can permanently (for generations) fuck it up. Fall of Rome showed this to us.