@birdguy I am not the only one monitoring this topic! 

On 11/6/2021 at 4:49 PM, johnbow72 said:

Nothing free back in the 70's . 😖😖

Dunno about that, if you were poor in the States in the early 1970s and couldn't afford college, you were pretty much guaranteed to get  a free 12 month trip to Vietnam.

21 minutes ago, Chock said:

Dunno about that, if you were poor in the States in the early 1970s and couldn't afford college, you were pretty much guaranteed to get  a free 12 month trip to Vietnam.

I got lucky , I got a draft number but the war ended . I had to pay for my community college and state college tuition ; and we were a average middle class family .

 

Edited November 8, 20214 yr by johnbow72

Not guaranteed at all Alan. Being poor didn't necessarily have anything to do with it. The system was a lottery in 1969-1972 and early 1973. You only went in the service if your number came up. And even then you weren't "guaranteed" to go to Vietnam. The "poor" problem came when we went to all-volunteer service in late 1973. And even then going to Vietnam wasn't guaranteed. Over 60% of the troops who served in Vietnam, of all categories, were volunteers. If I sound a little hot about this it's because I am. I lived through it.....Doug 

P.S. And, BTW, the tour for the U.S. Marine Corps was 13 months, not 12. And we were all volunteers.

Edited November 8, 20214 yr by W2DR

24 minutes ago, W2DR said:

P.S. And, BTW, the tour for the U.S. Marine Corps was 13 months, not 12. And we were all volunteers.

I volunteered for the U.S. Army in 1967. After Basic and AIT, I had orders to 'Nam. Upon arrival and in-processing at Ft. Lewis, WA I was surprised to have my orders changed to instead receive assignment to Camp Casey, Korea. Apparently they needed another Field Radio Repairman urgently.

I spent a delightful 13 months there and had to be dragged kicking and screaming back to CONUS, where I was unceremoniously dumped into a non-TOE Battalion for the remainder of my four year enlistment. I merely had to make formation in the morning, eat breakfast, and then toddle off to the motor pool and spend my day sitting in my duce and a half repair van reading sci-fi novels.

8 minutes ago, n4gix said:

spent a delightful 13 months there and had to be dragged kicking and screaming back to CONUS

Lucky man...🙂

1 hour ago, Chock said:

Dunno about that, if you were poor in the States in the early 1970s and couldn't afford college, you were pretty much guaranteed to get  a free 12 month trip to Vietnam.

And a free 12 month course in combat training before you got there.

Noel

39 minutes ago, n4gix said:

I merely had to make formation in the morning, eat breakfast, and then toddle off to the motor pool and spend my day sitting in my duce and a half repair van reading sci-fi novels.

They also serve who merely sit and wait.

Noel

3 hours ago, dave2013 said:

There are a few exceptions, such as the Scandinavian countries, but most are heavily in debt and their citizens make meager incomes.

As I pointed out, your statement is false. The vast majority of First World industrialized nations have lower debt-GDP ratios than the US. We are the exception, along with Italy, Greece and a few others - all of which have much less wealth than the US and a far less efficient government.

The correct models are the northern European and english-speaking nations; they combine a vigorous social safety net with lower debt/GDP and higher personal wealth - along with a strong desire that government should be efficient and effective and when it's not, fix it rather than abandon the space. There's a reason why people don't want to mention them; they make the US status quo look very, very poor in comparison.

 

42 minutes ago, Luke said:

The vast majority of First World industrialized nations have lower debt-GDP ratios than the US.

Here are the highest.  Since there are 193 countries in the world (not including the Papal States and the State of Palestine) you can see the United States has a substantial Debt to GDP Ratio.  So, what's different about the United States?  I think most of us know.

Noel

2021 Population
Japan	237.00%	126,050,804
Greece	177.00%	10,370,744
Lebanon	151.00%	6,769,146
Italy	135.00%	60,367,477
Singapore	126.00%	5,896,686
Cape Verde	125.00%	561,898
Portugal	117.00%	10,167,925
Angola	111.00%	33,933,610
Mozambique	109.00%	32,163,047
United States	107.00%	332,915,073

18 hours ago, sightseer said:

how about not forcing people with multiple disabilities into homelessness because our gov would rather give tax breaks to billionaires than help a multiply disabled person get food and shelter.

My Dad is disabled from the Vietnam War. He’s not homeless. He has food. He has great medical care. He has a caregiver paid for by the Govt. Tell me something, if large corporations (billionaires) pay higher taxes, do they pass them off in increased costs on products that they provide us? Have you seen the rate of inflation this year? 

2 hours ago, Chock said:

Dunno about that, if you were poor in the States in the early 1970s and couldn't afford college, you were pretty much guaranteed to get  a free 12 month trip to Vietnam.

I normally read past your long winded rants. My father is a disabled Vietnam vet. He was the oldest of 7 kids living in a 2 bedroom home. He still could have went to college but chose to do his duty. His college was paid for by the US Govt.  

1 hour ago, Luke said:

As I pointed out, your statement is false. The vast majority of First World industrialized nations have lower debt-GDP ratios than the US. We are the exception, along with Italy, Greece and a few others - all of which have much less wealth than the US and a far less efficient government.

The correct models are the northern European and english-speaking nations; they combine a vigorous social safety net with lower debt/GDP and higher personal wealth - along with a strong desire that government should be efficient and effective and when it's not, fix it rather than abandon the space. There's a reason why people don't want to mention them; they make the US status quo look very, very poor in comparison.

 

No, my statement is not false.  The majority of European countries are heavily in debt, **despite their high taxation on the middle class and wealthy**.  The U.S. debt to GPP ratio is about 105%, and most European nations are either higher or not far below that.

It is true that the Northern European countries do a better job at managing their public expenses and debt.  I would beg to differ that they promote personal wealth as their taxes are very high on the middle class.

Let's take Sweden as an example.  They have flat municipal income tax rate of 32% on all income with a personal deduction of only $1,600 up to $4,200.  An additional 20% national income tax is levied on income above $61,000.  Investment income, like interest, dividends, and capital gains, are taxed at a flat 30%.  The Sales tax rate is 25%, 12% for food and drugs.  Property tax is a maximum $984 or 0.75% of the property value per year.  Sweden has a very low corporate tax rate of 20.6%, lower than the U.S.  Scandinavian countries treat their businesses well.

Sweden's debt to gdp ratio is 37%.  This is very good compared to most countries, but it is still high considering the very high tax rates and very low military spending of 1.2% of GDP.

U.S. taxes for the middle class are much, much lower.  Income tax is 10-12% for income <$80,000 for married with a standard deduction of $25,000.  Sales taxes are <10%.  Investment taxes are also much lower. Payroll taxes are employee 7.6% and employer 7.6%.

We can debate which system is better till we're blue in the face.  There are pros and cons to both systems, that is, the U.S. and European tax and welfare systems.  The U.S. has high social welfare spending as well, actually.  The problem is that we don't pay for it.  For example, Social Security and Medicare will run out of money within a decade, but many politicians don't want to raise taxes to shore up the system.  Right now, payroll taxes which fund those programs are only levied on a maximum income of $147,000.  One can argue that wealthier people who make for example $300,000 a year should be paying those taxes on all of their income, despite the fact that they pay higher income tax rates.  Anyway the fix for this is easy, but like I said before, no one wants to pay for anything, even people who by any standard are doing very well financially.

Dave

Edited November 8, 20214 yr by dave2013

I see we have progressed PAST Free College and now discussing the social economic conditions in the world. 🤔

1 hour ago, Camsdad13 said:

large corporations (billionaires) pay higher taxes

The idea is not to increase corporate taxes, but rather to increase personal taxes of the uber-wealthy.

Unfortunately, the "dirty little secret" is that those particular non-taxpayers don't have any "personal income" to tax! Instead they don't collect any salary per-se, but rather live off of their investments which are structured in such a way as to be tax-free.

See: How The Super Rich Avoid Paying Taxes (topaccountingdegrees.org) for a detailed explanation of how these sneaky methods actually work.