This was great and cracked me up... the radiated crawfish made me laugh out loud.
However I personally favor giving money to everyone and then taxing the wealthy. Programs that benefit everyone get more support—and I believe it’s better to err on the side of helping people vs. using means testing that is often outdated (a lot changed after people’s 2019 taxes).
Our income is right around the amount where the stimulus and child tax credit phase out. We got a reduced amount for the first round and nothing for the second. It was demoralizing to find out that we didn’t qualify when our friends were celebrating on social media. (We are fine without it but could use the money. For one thing, our minimum student loan payments are $48k per year.)
A check would have been a nice psychological boost—even if the full amount got added to our taxes later. Or better yet, just tax us at a high rate in general so we don’t notice we’re paying it back.
I... came here to say something pithy about means testing, but have now lost my train of thought and can only ask: is "sex model" a way to evade machine-learning-based comment moderation, a non-native-English-speaking idiosyncrasy, or a new euphemism release from the language police that I somehow missed?
Uh, anyway. I agree with you that it's probably practical to have some kind of means testing, and I highly endorse the idea of automatically flagging people for all income-based assistance they qualify for once they're in the system, but I don't love the idea of it being a tax form. I seem to recall a few articles that point to lower-income people getting audited disproportionately, and it's way harder than it needs to be to file -- even if your return is simple (which it won't be if you've got more than one crappy job or are working intermittently). If you go to TurboTax, for example, it's (deliberately) not straightforward to file for free despite being heavily advertised as fast & easy. Since there's been talk about simplifying taxes my entire lifetime, I don't see that changing anytime soon so I'd rather have something separate.
progressives push for, say, universal student loan forgiveness instead of selective student loan forgiveness; I see that as a right-wing position, because the benefits go mostly to the rich."
That's because it's not an ideological position, it's a handout to their voting electorate. The people that have lots of student loans make up their voting constituency, so of course they're going to push for that. A good chunk of people I know who are Bernie Sanders supporters, if you get them to be really honest, say they are because he says he'll get rid of their student loans. People will overlook ideological inconsistencies if they're benefit that greatly from it.
This is a fine analysis of the trade-offs of policy design. If we look at the success record of widely-popular social programs, they are imprecise and universal, *because* they are regressive.
When Mr. Suburban Golf Pants gets his "free" government cheese, his panties don't get caught in nearly as many bunches when Mr. Urban Low Riders gets the cheese he needs. I know this because I have conservative friends, and this is how they all think. All of 'em.
Which makes sense, if you think about it! Regressive social policies match our increasingly regressive culture!
This was great and cracked me up... the radiated crawfish made me laugh out loud.
However I personally favor giving money to everyone and then taxing the wealthy. Programs that benefit everyone get more support—and I believe it’s better to err on the side of helping people vs. using means testing that is often outdated (a lot changed after people’s 2019 taxes).
Our income is right around the amount where the stimulus and child tax credit phase out. We got a reduced amount for the first round and nothing for the second. It was demoralizing to find out that we didn’t qualify when our friends were celebrating on social media. (We are fine without it but could use the money. For one thing, our minimum student loan payments are $48k per year.)
A check would have been a nice psychological boost—even if the full amount got added to our taxes later. Or better yet, just tax us at a high rate in general so we don’t notice we’re paying it back.
I... came here to say something pithy about means testing, but have now lost my train of thought and can only ask: is "sex model" a way to evade machine-learning-based comment moderation, a non-native-English-speaking idiosyncrasy, or a new euphemism release from the language police that I somehow missed?
Uh, anyway. I agree with you that it's probably practical to have some kind of means testing, and I highly endorse the idea of automatically flagging people for all income-based assistance they qualify for once they're in the system, but I don't love the idea of it being a tax form. I seem to recall a few articles that point to lower-income people getting audited disproportionately, and it's way harder than it needs to be to file -- even if your return is simple (which it won't be if you've got more than one crappy job or are working intermittently). If you go to TurboTax, for example, it's (deliberately) not straightforward to file for free despite being heavily advertised as fast & easy. Since there's been talk about simplifying taxes my entire lifetime, I don't see that changing anytime soon so I'd rather have something separate.
"I honestly find it bizarre when far-left "
progressives push for, say, universal student loan forgiveness instead of selective student loan forgiveness; I see that as a right-wing position, because the benefits go mostly to the rich."
That's because it's not an ideological position, it's a handout to their voting electorate. The people that have lots of student loans make up their voting constituency, so of course they're going to push for that. A good chunk of people I know who are Bernie Sanders supporters, if you get them to be really honest, say they are because he says he'll get rid of their student loans. People will overlook ideological inconsistencies if they're benefit that greatly from it.
This is a fine analysis of the trade-offs of policy design. If we look at the success record of widely-popular social programs, they are imprecise and universal, *because* they are regressive.
When Mr. Suburban Golf Pants gets his "free" government cheese, his panties don't get caught in nearly as many bunches when Mr. Urban Low Riders gets the cheese he needs. I know this because I have conservative friends, and this is how they all think. All of 'em.
Which makes sense, if you think about it! Regressive social policies match our increasingly regressive culture!
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https://www.erome.com/