I think, perhaps, instead of tax refunds, I'd like to see all that money go into a trust to pay dividends to tax-payers... Like a reverse-automatic bond program...
If this were a situation where our government was not in debt, it would make total sense and I would agree. It'd be like Norway, or Alaska. But basically refunding money that could be used towards paying down our national debt in order to establish a fund to give people money... it's really borrowing from our future.
Well, they're doing refunds anyway--wisdom or not. It seems foolish to waste it on credit maintenance fees... I'd be a way to help teach people to fish, I think, instead of just giving "fish dinners"...
But it would require a different attitude from gov't--reform of finance and actual monitoring and enforcement. Otherwise, I really see these tax rebates as throwing good money into an abyss. I mean, in five years, how much does it really help the average American to have gotten back $500 here or $750 there? I think it'd be better to shore up things like various social insurances and pay a small dividend regularly. That money isn't working for the average American--they just hand it over to the economic oligarchs and it works for them, instead...
Oh, yeah! And I totally agree about rail--why isn't there a bullet train connecting Boston, Chicago, Philadelphia, New York and Washington DC (at least!) on the East and San Diego, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Portland and Seattle on the West?? This is insanity!
I think it works for China better, though, [than it would work for America] because they have less developed inland air traffic... Also, China can just force it's population out of the way for those kinds of building and infrastructure projects and it just wouldn't work in the American cultural landscape. I think the main point is that the focus is on developing mass transportation infrastructure and I agree that America should look at that more. I read an article a few years ago about expected changes in air traffic in America and I think we should look more closely at that--flying trains, just imagine it (and no pesky long legal process for moving citizens out of the way), and I think it'd be a very becoming way to take a page from our own history book (as you mention
If we had high speed rail, I think more people would consider traveling by rail instead of by plane. As fuel prices rise, even without high speed rail, regular rail would remain an economical means of travel. Worse comes to worse, trains can also run on natural gas or steam (coal or even wood).
True. China's gonna have problems if it doesn't continue to grow and it is already experiencing major unrest. More and more migrants from the interior are migrating to the cities in search of jobs that aren't there.
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But it would require a different attitude from gov't--reform of finance and actual monitoring and enforcement. Otherwise, I really see these tax rebates as throwing good money into an abyss. I mean, in five years, how much does it really help the average American to have gotten back $500 here or $750 there? I think it'd be better to shore up things like various social insurances and pay a small dividend regularly. That money isn't working for the average American--they just hand it over to the economic oligarchs and it works for them, instead...
I duno... It's only a half-risen dough...
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I think it works for China better, though, [than it would work for America] because they have less developed inland air traffic... Also, China can just force it's population out of the way for those kinds of building and infrastructure projects and it just wouldn't work in the American cultural landscape. I think the main point is that the focus is on developing mass transportation infrastructure and I agree that America should look at that more. I read an article a few years ago about expected changes in air traffic in America and I think we should look more closely at that--flying trains, just imagine it (and no pesky long legal process for moving citizens out of the way), and I think it'd be a very becoming way to take a page from our own history book (as you mention
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Have you seen The Crash Course?
http://poetpaladin.livejournal.com/759657.html
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