Yep, ignorance fits your ideology too

The question:
Why are republicans blocking the payroll tax cut? Isn't this the kind of tax shift that would be likely to create jobs while maintaining a balanced budget? Trickle-down economics is the centerpiece of republican economic strategy, isn't it? Isn't it a shorter "trickle" from employer to workforce than from investor to workforce?


My answer:
Not when you consider the fact that the tax increase included in the package is likely to land squarely in the lap of the small business owners/job creators. It has to be a tax cut that is across the board for the trickle-down concept to even be relevant. All the current proposal does is bail water out of one sinking boat by dumping it into another simply because it isn't sinking quite as fast.


And, of course, it went on from there. We'll call my sparring partners Fred and Ed to protect the innocent unprepared other guys.


Fred: 
It is hardly congruent with reality to say that someone's boat is sinking when they make over $1million a year.


Me:
Is it congruent with reality to say that the person who makes less than $1million deserves a tax cut that is subsidized by someone whose only mistake is too much success?
For example, my father-in-law owns a bakery. If the bakery makes over $1million in a year, the included tax increase will affect him. As do the ever increasing business taxes. Giving him a payroll tax cut is barely a drop in the bucket that would reverse the oppressive tax burden he is already under. Every time his taxes (business or personal income) he has to weigh the following options: take a personal loss, raise prices, fire someone, or work extra hours to avoid having to hire someone new. Every single one of his options is detrimental to the local economy. If he makes less, he spends less. If his prices go up, his customers have to pay more or he loses business. If he fires someone, the become a drain on the economy by becoming eligible for unemployment. And if he cannot hire anyone, he cannot help to decrease the number of people drawing unemployment currently.


Ed: 
1. The proposed tax plan would save your father-in-law a lot of money, because it would cut his payroll tax in half.
2. Corporate income taxes haven't increased since 1993. Didn't Glenn Beck tell you that?


Me:
The bakery is in Illinois, where the business taxes increased 22% just last year. And what good is a payroll taxcut if they more than compensate by gouging him on his personal income taxes? 
And to assume that since I disagree with you I must be listening to conspiracy theories only proves that ignorance is available to fit all ideologies


And that was when Fred and Ed decided it would be best to discontinue the conversation...