Creepy Condescending Wonka

kinda liked this one

Thanks. I had that deep thought last night after I got a statement from the social security administration showing how many tens of thousands of dollars I've paid out in just payroll taxes for 2 programs in the last 10 years. I could have paid off my house with that money.

Figured only the people who pay should be voting, not the people who are only voting for what they can get from other people. If you run on a platform of entitlements, you are essentially 'bribing' votes from beneficiaries, and welfare has expanded to the point that over 50% of the US population is receiving some form of welfare.

Plus, it would help encourage the sizable slice of the population who can work but choose not to to go back to work instead of living off those of us who work multiple jobs because we believe in self sufficiency.

It wouldn't happen overnight, but I believe it would eventually mostly eliminate the 2 sets of people who pose the greatest drain on our society. Or at the least, rebalance political power back to only those to contribute.

What about stay at home moms/dads, physically disabled people, the college student that can only work part time, retired people, or the homeless. I used to be a core driller but, the market is bad so it is really get a job drilling right now. I went 8 months without work, not from lack of trying, I sent out tons of applications and talked to many drillers I know but, no one was hiring. I eventually had to pick up some shifts at the bar I go to. My wife is a student/stay at home mom/artist, she sells her art in local studios and they take like 30/50% and then you pay taxes, this is not a 36 hour/week kind of job. By your suggestion neither my wife or I would be allowed to vote. I'm not trying to be a jerk, I just think it is a terrible idea also, pretty sure it is unconstitutional.

I have to upvote you for the great comment, my wife said similar things, and you are absolutely correct. But that also makes for great discussion. Would different criteria be better? How about instead of working full time, we do only those who do not receive government assistance? Need a fairly easy way to filter out the unproductive and non contributing members of society. Of course, like you said, there could be a constitutional issue as well.

I understand that you want everyone to contribute to society but, I don't think taking away their rights is the proper way to do it. As for no one receiving government assistance getting to vote, I don't think that would work either. The VA is technically government assistance, there are also many government grants for students. If you start making distinctions between different types of government assistance the race card will inevitably be pulled and I think we can all agree there is enough of that going on already.

discussion ... what? *gasp* you all, are awesome! carry on.

if i could add a thing or two here ... at the risk of sounding like a "radical anarchist" ...

i grew up on a farm, in a community of farms. we didn't need police. we policed ourselves. we grew and/or harvested from the woods most of what we ate. we didn't have much, but there was always family, food and cheer. unless you didn't contribute, then you didn't get to eat. ;) sometimes i ponder ... if many, smaller types of groups/organizations were set up like that, everywhere ... folks would be housed, be fed, be looked after health-wise and be schooled and such as long as they contributed, and some i believe, would find their happiness going on to doing other things (government service, infrastructure, mass-transportation, military service, scientific research, etc), while others would find their happiness in helping grow/evolve the core groups/organizations of housing/agriculture/health/education. all of this would require a shift in how we all think about individualism versus the collective. personal resources versus shared resources, etc. and i'm talking about sharing, i.e. "mutual aid", as individual local communities see fit to do for themselves, not some over-reaching government entity "taking" and redistributing to a 1-dimensional standard formula that could never meet the needs of vast diversity, even with boundaries of many states. this is of course, all "pie in the sky" type contemplations. i'm curious what y'alls thoughts would be on them.

in my heart, based on my life experiences ... i believe approx 80% of people "get it". that is, they don't need external forces to make them behave appropriately. out of the remaining 20%, approx 80% of those are "on the fence", if you will. that is, they can go either way, depending on their environment. the remaining 20% of that 20% are the true, "bad apples". arguably, the types of folks that be mainly running our governments at the moment. we need to stop elevating folks like that to places of power, and get back to making them hide under rocks, where they belong. just my personal opinion.

well, just some ideas to add to already awesome discussion going on here. cheers!

perfect