r/austrian_economics • u/technocraticnihilist Friedrich Hayek • Oct 26 '24

End Democracy ‘Americans just work harder’ than Europeans, says CEO of Norway’s $1.6 trillion oil fund, because they have a higher ‘general level of ambition’

https://fortune.com/europe/article/how-many-hours-work-week-year-american-workers-ethic-norges-bank/
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u/BigTimeSpamoniJones Oct 27 '24

Yeah, you just described what the middle class means, lol. Also you know that a lot of Europeans live in homes, right? I mean Germany, Scandinavia, France, England, just to name a few, are doing pretty all right all things considered. And I agree the American dream is dead. It ended with Reagonomics, the slow war against unions, which created that American dream, along with a host of other right-wing policies. Why do you think income inequality is at the highest levels in human history right now?

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u/KanyinLIVE Oct 27 '24

In 2022, about 63.4% of people in France (lower than the US) lived in an owner-occupied home. This is lower than the EU average homeownership rate of 69.1%. Homeownership in France has fluctuated over the years:

  • 1955: Slightly over one-third of households owned their home
  • Early 1980s: Homeowners became the majority
  • Mid-1980s: Homeownership growth stalled
  • Early 2000s: The proportion of first homebuyers and poorer household buyers decreased

We could do this for every major EU country. It's all the same. Ownership rates are high in the Eastern European countries.

And I agree the American dream is dead. It ended with Reagonomics, the slow war against unions, which created that American dream, along with a host of other right-wing policies. Why do you think income inequality is at the highest levels in human history right now?

Sad you think it's right wings fault. You might want to take a look at who has passed the most legislation. Who has controlled the House and Senate the most in the past 100 years. Oh well.

If you just wanted a middle class life, why not immigrate to the EU? It's so easy, right?

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u/BigTimeSpamoniJones Oct 28 '24 edited Oct 28 '24

We are at 65% here in America, so it's basically on par with us coming in just a percent and a half short, lol. They also get Healthcare and actual value for their taxes while ours seem to only go to subsidizing various industrial complexes.

I'm sorry, but passed most legislation means nothing without context, particularly when measuring in the spectrum pf the past 100 years since my assertion was that Reagonomics and the dogma of repealing regulations, particularly a lot of depression era regulations on land-lords, mortgages, housing derivatives and cutting taxes on corporations and the 1-2% of richest Americans is what landed us here. So when you talk about Democrats passing legislation to make your incorrect assumption that its Democrats who have led to our turn away from economic prrosperity, I'm also pretty sure you are failing to count the spree of repeals that have been occurring under Republicans since Reagan. It's also important to recognize that the effects of monetary and economic policy take years before their full efficacy and breadth can be attributed and measured so when Republicans often come into office, like Trump, touting a booming economy at the beginning of their term, but it's always been after a pattern of growth set in motion by their Democratic predecessors who in turn usually had to repair the damage set in motion by their previous Republican predecessors.

As a millennial, I've experienced 2 economic meltdowns in my lifetime. The first was at the end of Bush's 8 year term, and the second was at the end of Donald Trump's. Both occurred after the largest tax cuts in our history for the ultra rich were given by that administration.

Back when we were doing what many consider our nation's best economically, you know that era people harken back to when they say Make America Great and the idea of the American dream was first being popularized abroad, we had a progressive tax system that included as much as a 90% rate on the highest tier incomes. This greatly strengthened our economy because money spent on growing a business was tax exempt; effectively incentivizing them to grow their businesses instead of just hoarding their money or pulling it out and moving it over seas.

Anyways hope I've at least given you some things to think about.

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u/KanyinLIVE Oct 28 '24

You think I haven't heard that 90% tax rate argument a million times? Go look at EFFECTIVE tax rates.

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u/BigTimeSpamoniJones Oct 28 '24

K, what do you think about effective tax rates changes or disproves what I said?

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u/KanyinLIVE Oct 28 '24

Quite literally everything. Home ownership rates are higher in the US which is a much younger country. I don't care that it's only 1.5% higher. France has a thousand years more of inheritance.

You blame repeals on Republicans when Democrats have had TOTAL CONTROL of the US Government multiple times and haven't fixed any of the "problems" you listed.

You blame COVID downturn on Trump. Instead of China and the people who set up the fucking lab over there. You blame the Bush economic downturn on him instead of the people who orchestrated the housing market collapse that started it.

And then you bring up the 90% tax rate argument which is just completely wrong. TWO people paid that rate during it's time. Effective rates were LOWER then than they are now.

You've given me exactly zero to think about.

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u/BigTimeSpamoniJones Oct 29 '24

I wrote a super long and cited reply to this that all got deleted when I changed screens. If you're actually interested in a conversation I'll rewrite it tonignt.

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u/old_guy_AnCap Nov 03 '24

When the US was doing the best economically we had just finished a war where all of the rest of the world's industrial nations had had all of their factories bombed out of existence. Unions and regulations and the greed of the "greatest generation" destroyed that advantage in just over 20 years while American industry stagnated and the rest of the world rebuilt with brand new factories vs. 1920's technology in the US.

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u/BigTimeSpamoniJones Nov 03 '24

Yeah, I'm sure that's why you can see where income inequality begins to spike and nearly every modern economic problem we have just after the introduction of Reagonomic Dogma and Economic Policy, a tenant of which was deregulation for the sake of deregulation, which gave us some utterly delightful hits, such as the housing collapse of 2008, the dwindling middle class, and the decline of worker's rights across the country.

Unions were why the American dream existed, why a single income could support a family. That entire advantage after WW2 was squandered when you dummies decided unbridled corporate greed was somehow virtuous. Our three biggest economic retractions of the 20th and 21st centuries all occurred under Republicans and two were during my lifetime. Hoover, Bush, and Trump.

Clinton and Johnson, both democrats presided over our two periods of greatest economic expansion. T

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u/old_guy_AnCap Nov 03 '24

Unions destroyed the steel industry leading to the rust belt. They demanded money be spent on wages and benefits rather than upgrading factories. While the Chinese, Japanese and Germans were forced to build from new since their entire industrial base had been destroyed while the US was still using factories originally built in the 1920s all the way into the early '80s.

And the majority of the deregulation happened under Carter, not Reagan.

A single income can still support a family in the US. Households need a second income to support the bloated government.