Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Michael, the amount of economic ignorance of the general public
boggles my mind. It might help if you read or
recited eye Pencil to everybody every day.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
It would help. Holy crap, do you know what I
have teed up to play in just a minute? Oh
do tell I do? Eye pencil is coming up in
just a minute. I came back in. I rushed through
my little pea walk and came back in because I thought,
I've got to go back to this because this text
(00:33):
message is really bugging me. It truly is bugging me.
So let me go back to it. And I want
you to hear some of the responses too, because the
responses are somewhat encouraging. So here's what set me off, Mike.
I agree with you at almost all tax levels. I
(00:53):
do not believe that at the very top taxes make
it through to the economy. Let me think about what
you wrote. What are you saying there taxes don't make
it through to the economy. Well, do any taxes make
it through to the economy or do you actually mean
(01:15):
wages or wealth? Because you go on to say that
Elon's extra zeros, you know, behind his whatever billions he's worth,
are not being spent at circle K. Now what I
didn't read to you at the last hour was the
rest of the text message. Cut the taxes on businesses
(01:37):
and individuals below five hundred million dollars, but raise taxes
on those I guess he means above five hundred million
dollars they benefited the most from inflation. Can you you
be number sixty seven to ninety one? I'm being serious here.
Can you send me another text message and explain to
(01:59):
me how in your mind you believe that a billionaire
or a millionaire, a ten millionaire, one hundred millionaire, or
a billionaire, how they benefited from inflation. I'd like to
know how they benefited, because again, they buy groceries, they
(02:22):
buy maybe they don't you know, well, they do buy gas,
you know, or they pay electric bills to charge their
you know, electric vehicles. They they they're human being, so
they consume the things that we do. Do they consume.
Let's take Donald Trump for example. Donald Trump, a billionaire.
(02:47):
They joke about he has a button on his desk
to bring him diet cox. He loves diet coke. Well,
when he's at mar Lago, guess who pays that dike?
He does so the billionaire is he may not be
going to Circle K like I do. He's got a
(03:08):
butler to bring him a diet coke. Now when he's
in the West Wing, that's probably part of the office expenses. Now,
when he's in the residence and he wants a diet coke,
that's probably part of their expenses that they pay. Because
the president pays for his groceries that the chefs use
(03:29):
to cook the family meals. So the billionaire Donald Trump
buy his groceries just like you and I do. Now,
maybe I shouldn't phrase it that way, because they don't
go to King Supers. They have someone do the shopping
for them and it probably gets delivered. And because it's
the secrets, because it's the going into the White House,
actually the Secret Service probably does the shopping and then
(03:50):
they check all the food before it comes into the
White House. But the point is that money is spent
at a grocery store in Washington, DC or in West
Palm Beach. The money. I don't get where you're coming.
I can't wrap my head around what you're trying to
say here. Let's go back to the sentence. I do
(04:14):
not believe that at the very top taxes make it
through to the economy. Do you mean that you don't
believe that it's the very top their money makes it
through to the economy because they're taxes. First of all.
Let's and I don't know that I can get the
most recent numbers National Taxpayers Union. Let's see tax shares
(04:43):
in year twenty twenty two. Let's see. I can't let
me keep I'll keep digging through this in a minute.
But you know, the top five Somewhere I'll find the
(05:04):
exact figures. But something like the top five or ten
percent of taxpayers in the country pay well over seventy
to eighty percent of all federal income taxes, of all taxes.
So the well, So when Elizabeth Warren wants the wealthy
to pay their fair share, what's their fair share? Ninety
(05:24):
ninety nine percent or just one hundred percent? I I
just am bumfuzzled by this. Every person, whether they're a
billionaire or they're working stiffs like you and me, Our
money that we spend goes to support the economy. So
(05:50):
when I stopped at Circle K this morning, I walked
in and I was the only one there. The door deans,
you know, to indicate so this his kid comes from
out from behind wherever he was sleeping or taking a nap,
to make sure I wasn't, you know, going to rob
the store if I needed help. Well, he's being paid,
(06:11):
I don't know. Let's just say he's being paid twelve
bucks an hour. The dollar whatever it is at Circle K.
Now I don't pay attention, but whatever it is, let's
just say it's a buck fifty. So the buck fifty
that I paid for that diet coke this morning helps
cover all of the costs of operating that Circle K,
(06:33):
all of the costs, and for every person that stops
at that Circle K today, that's what keeps that store open.
Go back to the story about the restaurants. Restaurants are
closing because they're being forced to pay more than minimum wage.
Their food costs are going up. They're operating on margins
(06:53):
of somewhere between two and five percent at best, and
when their costs go up, the the minimum wage alone,
according to Colorado Restaurant Association, imposed an additional eighty two
thousand dollars costs on that restaurant. How do they make
that up? Well, if they were, let's just say that
(07:15):
it was a small mom and pop restaurant, and let's
just say that they netted one hundred thousand dollars a
year as profit from that restaurant. Take a small, little
family owned Mexican restaurant they make, husband and wife working
it together. After paying all their employees, they net one
(07:37):
hundred thousand dollars fifty thousand dollars each. Now it's going
to cost them an extra eighty two thousand dollars. How
can they stay in business? They won't stay in business.
The idea that somehow it will go back to the
whole point about taxes. So Democrats are already and I
(08:01):
knew they would do this. Democrats are already bitching about
extending the Trump tax cuts. So when the tax cuts
were implemented back in twenty seventeen or whenever they were that,
those became the new tax rates, and those became the
new tax brackets. And that's what we've all been using
(08:24):
to when we file our taxes, and that's resulted in
X amount of revenue to the treasury. Congress has been
spending more than that. Now they want to figure out
a way to in order here's the Democrats position, in
order to continue those tax rates I'm not going to
(08:44):
call them tax cuts anymore, because those are now the
new rates. In order to continue those new rates and
not let them expire and have the rates increase, you
have to figure out how to pay for that. Well,
wait a minute, I'm already paying for it, and you're
already taking that into account when you put together your
so called federal budget. So all you're wanting to do
(09:07):
is you're wanting to cut You want to increase spending
by letting the tax cuts expire, so that you'll have
more money to spend, and you'll spend more money than
what that increase is. Anyway, this is the stupid season
that I think that this country lives in when it
(09:28):
comes to economics and insofar as that billionaires and everybody
contribute to the economy. Let's go to the record that's
lead pencil.
Speaker 3 (09:41):
There's not a single person in the world who could
make this pencil remarkable statement, not at all. The wood
from which it's made, for all I know, comes from
a tree that was cut down in the state of Washington.
Speaker 2 (09:54):
Now, who pays the people that cut down the tree
in say, the state of Washington. Well, the paper mill
company that hires the people to go cut the trees.
That pays their salaries. But who buys the pencil? Well,
I bet that Elon Musk probably has a pencil somewhere.
(10:17):
Is vast businesses. I bet they buy pencils. They're helping
to pay the salary of the guy that cut the
tree to do the pencil. But I digress.
Speaker 3 (10:26):
Person in the world who could make this pencil remarkable statement,
not at all. The wood from which it's made, for
all I know, comes from a tree that was cut
down in the state of Washington. To cut down that tree,
it took a saw to make the saw. It took
steel to make the steel, It took iron ore. This
(10:48):
black center we call it lead, but it's really graph
compressed graphite. I'm not sure where it comes from, but
I think it comes from some mines in South America.
This red top up here, the eraser bit of rubber,
probably comes from Malaya, where the rubber tree isn't even
native who was imported from South America by some businessmen
(11:11):
with the help of the British government. This brass feral,
I havn't the slightest idea where it came from, or
the yellow paint or the paint that made the black lines,
or the glue that holds it together. Literally, thousands of
people cooperated to make this pencil. People who don't speak
(11:32):
the same language, who practice different religions, who might hate
one another if they ever met. When you go down
the store and buy this pencil, you are in effect
trading a few minutes of your time for a few
seconds of the time of all those thousands of people.
(11:53):
What brought them together and induced them to cooperate to
make this pencil. There was no commissar sending out offices,
from sending out.
Speaker 4 (12:01):
Orders from some central office.
Speaker 3 (12:03):
It was a magic of the price system, the impersonal
operation of prices that brought them together and got them
to cooperate to make this pencil so that you could
have it for a trifling sum.
Speaker 2 (12:17):
That is why.
Speaker 3 (12:20):
The operation of the free market is so essential, not
only to promote productive efficiency, but even more to foster
harmony and peace among the peoples of the world.
Speaker 2 (12:34):
And I would be just to be cross about it.
To produce the products that I want and that I'm
willing to take. So I come in here, I come
into this building six days a week, and I produce
a product for a company that pays me a salary
(12:55):
plus additional revenue. So I've got additional revenue streams, and
I take that salary in those additional revenue streams, and
I pay my income taxes, my property taxes. Every time
I buy something, I pay my sales taxes. And whenever
I buy a product or buy a service, I'm helping
that retail outlet or that wholesale outlet, or that you know,
(13:20):
that plumber or that you know electrician. I'm helping them
stay in business because I have done something to earn
some money to hire them to go do something which
allows and we're all doing that. And billionaires are no different.
Billionaires are doing exactly the same thing. They just might
have other people doing it for them. But their money,
(13:44):
not all of it, because well actually all of it
probably does unless they're stashing it in a mattress somewhere.
But you think Elon must just use his billions in
a mattress in a pillow case somewhere hiding in a closet. No,
he puts that money to work. He takes that money
and he puts it into his companies, or he puts
(14:06):
it into you know, he buys stops and bonds, and
that allows other companies to grow, and that allows those
other companies to produce products or services that other people buy.
And so why should he be any different than anybody else. No,
he may not himself go to Circle K, but I
bet he drinks. In fact, I know he drinks diet coke.
(14:26):
Have you seen a photograph of heu? He took a
photo He was in a hotel room somewhere and he
took kind of a selfie of the side table next
to the bed, and they were like eight cans of
diet coke sitting there. We do you think that somebody
just gave him those diet cokes? No, somehow he paid
for those diet cokes. So don't tell me this bull
(14:49):
craft about how Elon Musk with all those zeros is
not going to the seven eleven. Somebody went to a
coke distributor or went down to the the little snack
bar in the hotel and bought him six can, eight
cans whatever it was, a diet coke and took it
up to his room. Oh, by the way, and he
probably tipped the guy that brought the diet coke to
(15:11):
the room. Seems to me somebody's got some wealth in
thee or something. I'm just astonished, and I don't want
you to be ready to because the Democrats the Marxists
are going to start playing this game on tax rates,
on leaset tax cuts. You know, I'm all for reducing
(15:35):
income taxes. In fact, I'm to the point where I
know we got the fair tax, we got the flat tax,
and we have a national sales tax. I would go
for any of those, as long as we got rid
of the income tax, the current iteration of the income tax.
And quite honestly, I would prefer a national sales tax,
not a value added tax, not of that, but a
(15:58):
straight national sales tax. You know why because now I
control how much tax I pay. Because let's just say
I want to buy a new car. Well, if I
buy a new car that's valued at just fifty thousand dollars,
I'll pay sales tax on fifty thousand dollars. Now, when
I look at that figure and I go, I don't
(16:18):
want to pay that much in sales tax, well I
can go buy a either a cheaper model of a car,
or I could buy a used car that is valued
at less, So I'll pay less sales tax. Now, I'm
in control of how much tax I pay. Now you
can argue that I'm in control of how much tax
I pay based on how much I earn. Well, so
(16:39):
what do you want me to do? How about if
I you get pissed off because there weren't three hours
of the podcast posted. You get pissed off when I
take a day of vacation. So what if I take
decide that I use up all my vacation time and
I still want to take more time. I want to
become Johnny Carson. I just I just want to work.
I'm tired of work six days a week. I just
(17:01):
want to work four days a week. So I'm not
gonna do the Saturday show and I'm not gonna do
I'm not gonna work on Fridays or Mondays, one or
the other anymore. Help. People will be piste off about that.
And by the way, I'd also have less money. I
probably wouldn't be able to be by as many diet cokes,
and eventually eventually the Circle Gay might go out of business.
(17:22):
Oh my god, people, let's just pencil eye pencil. We'll
watch it.
Speaker 5 (17:36):
Yeah. The stupid, oh Michael, the stupid minimum wage in
Denver is what's doing it. And then I get my
semi annual sidewalk bill for seventy five dollars last night.
Denver sucks literally sucks the lifeblood and your money out
of you.
Speaker 2 (18:00):
Okay, I'm not gonna argue with any of that. This
is not right I intended to go today. But I
think it's really I think it's very very important, particularly
considering that you're going to start hearing an awful lot
about the expiration of the Trump tax cuts. Now, remember
(18:22):
when those when that bill passed back in seventeen, eighteen,
seventeen or eighteen, whatever year it was, that reduced tax rates.
So it shifts the brackets, but it reduced the tax rates.
That's what we've been paid. This is twenty twenty five,
so people would be paying their twenty twenty four taxes
(18:42):
this year. So those twenty four twenty twenty four taxes
are based upon rates that have been in effect for
the past seven years. Now, Democrats, of course, because they
rely on the ignorance of the American public, are going
to start You're going to start hearing about, oh my god,
(19:03):
how if we extend these tax cuts, how are we
going to pay for them? What do you mean, now
we're going to pay for them. We're already paying that rate.
If we leave those tax rates in place, you don't
have the argument that we have to figure out a
way to pay for it falls flat because there is
(19:25):
no additional cut in which you would could you could
argue that, oh, we're going to reduce federal revenues by
a dollar, so we have to figure out a way
to make up that dollar. That's that's that's now im material.
Now if Congress wants to go further and further reduce
the corporate and the individual tax rates, then you can
(19:48):
have the debate about whether we should pay for that
or not. I would argue, let's do the calculation and
see how much increased revenue you will get because you're
going to reduce the tax rate, so there will be
an incinity for people to make more money. But you know,
because that's the Laffer curve, which is actually legitimate, although
(20:11):
it's been demeaned by everybody, by the Marxists in our society.
It's been demean but if you go back and you
look at the Reagan tax cuts that everybody says, oh
my god, it's going to destroy the country, it actually
increased the amount of revenue into the treasury. But the
problem is it also allowed Congress to say, oh, look
(20:32):
we got extra money. We can spend even more money now.
I mean, it's insane. It's like it's like me telling
Tamra hey, I got a thousand dollars a month raise. Okay,
that means now we can spend an extra two thousand
dollars a month. No, it does not mean that. But
if Tamar actually said that, she'd make a damn fine congressman,
wouldn't she of course a Democrat congressman, been a Democrats
(20:55):
a congressman. Nonetheless, that's how people think. I mean, it's
utter insanity. I honestly can't get my head around it.
Other than Democrats just want to spend, spend, spend, because
they know better how to spend your money than you do.
I hate that attitude. Now let's go back. I'm going
(21:16):
to go back to the to the text message. I
do not This was sixty seven ninety one. I do
not believe that at the very top taxes make it
through the economy. And my argument is, yes, they do
in one way or another. But he sixty seven ninety
(21:37):
one comes back for the explanation. First, the lower the
income level, the higher the amount of their income that
goes directly into the economy. Let me re that's basically true,
but let me rephrase it in a different way. The
(21:59):
lower income level, the more of your income you spend
directly on things like groceries, utilities, car payments, that sort
of thing. But that doesn't mean that the more money
that you make, that your money doesn't go directly into
(22:25):
the economy. It does go directly into the economy. And
here's why, because Elon Musk, in fact, I looked it
up because I was really curious. Elon Musk doesn't take
the amount of money that he makes, or that his
wealth increases every year. He doesn't take that and just
(22:49):
keep that in a you know, a bank account that
earns you know, one point two percent APR. No, he
doesn't do that. What does he do with his wealth.
He invests that. He takes that wealth and he invests it. Now,
(23:12):
he may pay himself a salary. I don't know whether
he actually does him. Now, he may pay himself a salary,
so he's going to pay income tax on that salary.
But he takes his wealth and he invests it in
other companies, in other endeavors, in other ways that he
(23:33):
can make that money grow. So let's just take one
of his companies, the Boring Company, because I love the
name of it. That's the company that it's an infrastructure
company that it does underground tonally construction services. Now that
he has five point seven billion dollars invested in that
(23:56):
started in twenty sixteen, as of this is as of
April twenty two, is worth five point seven billion dollars. Well,
he took his money from other companies, invested around one
hundred and two million dollars into that company. What did
(24:18):
that What does that company do? Well, that company hires engineers, lawyers, secretaries,
heavy equipment operators, it has, it has it probably has
any any number of people that are involved in the
(24:40):
actual boring of a tunnel, heavy equipment operators, people you
know that operate that operates specialized equipment. Every one of
those people benefit from the one hundred and two million
dollars he invested in that company. And then that company
charges to do the boring, to do the tunneling, so
(25:03):
they get income from that too. They get income from
Elon Musk himself, and they get income from the services
that they provide. Now, every person that works for that company,
maybe not every person, but a majority of them are
(25:23):
manual labor individuals. They stop at the seven eleven and
get their coffee, They buy groceries, they pay electric bills,
they pay property taxes, they do everything. So yes, it
may not be that his one hundred and two million
dollars went directly into the convenience store, but it went
(25:44):
indirectly into the convenience store because he hired people that
go buy groceries and go buy diet cokes. I just
don't get or you can't get that through your head.
I think I truly believe as somebody else that on
the text line, I think you're listening to too much CNN.
(26:05):
He doesn't sit around, as I said, with that money
in a pillow case somewhere. You know, he goes, he
takes what does he do. He takes them. He takes
the profits that he gets from the boring company, and
he takes that down. He gets a big fat check
at the end of the year, and he takes that
down to the bank and cashes it and sticks that
all of those dollar bills into a pillow case somewhere
(26:28):
and hides it, No, he invests it, and that allows
that boring company to hire engineering. Think about the engineers
they buy nice big houses. Maybe they have a nice
big house built. Well, what does that do. That hires carpenters,
that hires electricians, that hires plumbers, that hires architects, that
hires designers, that hires landscapers, and all of those people
(26:51):
are directly involved in the economy. So don't tell me
this bull crap to somehow Elon Musk is not involved
in the everyday economy. He is. My god, what what
am I missing here? Somebody explained to me what I'm
a missing? I just I think it's wealth envy. I
don't I think you don't look. I don't. I don't
(27:12):
give a ratsass with I don't know Elon Musk. I
don't know whether he's a good guy or a bad guy,
and I don't care. I'm certainly am I envious of
his billions?
Speaker 3 (27:24):
What?
Speaker 2 (27:24):
I love to be a billionaire like him? I'm not
really sure, to be honest, maybe a half a billionaire
like him. I'm not sure I want to be the
richest person in the world, because oh, they've got everyday
problems he's got, you know, relationship problems, he's got family problems,
he has probably medical issues. He has everything that he
(27:47):
and I have, but just on a different scale, and
he's easier able to deal with some things. He's got
a medical problem. Does he give a rat ass about insurance?
Probably not. Well, mister know, mister musk, it's gonna cost us.
You want you want a tummy tuck, It's gonna cost
you fifty thousand dollars. Okay, Well, can we schedule it tomorrow?
Speaker 3 (28:07):
No?
Speaker 2 (28:08):
Uh, well, if I paid you one hundred thousand dollars,
can be scheduled tomorrow? Yeah, okay, we can get your
tummy tuck done. Oh by the way, if he doesn't
tummy tuck, you wouldn't believe why I thought about tom
tummy tucks? Would you drag him? Did you ever think
about that? Yeah? Why that? Yeah, that conversation we had
this morning. Oh maybe he could be. Could be. So
(28:32):
when when he does a tummy tuck or facelift, or
he goes to advance hair and gets hair implants done,
do you think he what do you think he's doing?
He's paying those people for that service, and that's directly
into the economy. Go back to those planes. I've made
the plan. To me, the planes seem to be the
most obvious. Now, I don't know. Does Musk have a
(28:55):
primary residence, Like, does he have one place he spends
more time than any other place? I don't know. But
let's say he's got a dozen houses. Every one of
those houses is consuming electricity, maybe solar panels, I don't know,
maybe some natural gas. They've got landscaping, he's got maintenance
needs to be done. He's probably got housekeepers. He's probably
(29:15):
got you know, all sorts of he's probably got a
service guide that does nothing but just, you know, maintain
the house. Seventy two thirty two and then I'll take
a break. Does the texture think billionaires just put their
money under a mattress? No, they invested, which is where
venture capital comes from for others to start or expand
(29:37):
their businesses. That's a huge benefit to the economy, in
addition to the massive taxes they pay. Or one more
two nine seven zero, Michael, speaking as a working stuff,
we should not let envy inform our tax policies. Politicians
leverage that, which is one of the many things that
make most of them despicable. Human beings. That's a good
(30:00):
point to take a break.
Speaker 4 (30:02):
Good morning, Michael. As Mike Rosen always told us, you
could tax all of us, especially to billionaires and millionaires,
at one hundred percent, and it still wouldn't pay off
what we're spending.
Speaker 2 (30:16):
So we don't have a tax problem.
Speaker 4 (30:19):
We definitely have a spending problem, and that's the bigger issue.
Speaker 2 (30:23):
In fact, let me take it one step further. You
could also confiscate all of the wealth of everyone in
this country, and you couldn't pay off the national debt,
which is now what thirty two thirty three trillion dollars,
So we're essentially bankrupt. Sixty two eighty eight, Mike, kill out,
(30:47):
or you'll be advertising for high blood pressure medication. Oh
I could already do that. Let's see, now sixty seven
ninety one comes back. Now I'm totally Now, I'm totally confused.
Sixty seven ninety one about where the hell you're going, Mike,
you're correct, this is the same listener that started out
(31:12):
with Elon Musk's money doesn't go it directly into the economy.
You're correct, not saying that some of the money that
Elon gets doesn't go back into the economy. Well, that's
what you said. For the record, I believe in Austrian economics.
I am a free market absolutist. I have to pause here.
(31:33):
I find it really hard to believe based on what
you first sent in as a text message, I find
that you've You've gone one hundred and eighty degrees. Now,
let me let me compare, let me compare them. Let
me get these messages all in one place you started
out this morning with. I agree with you at almost
(31:54):
all tax levels. I do not believe that at the
very top taxes make it through to the economy. I
just but they do. Elon's extra dollars are not being
spent at circle K. Cut the taxes on businesses and
individuals below five hundred million dollars and raise it on
them they benefited the most from inflation. Did I get
(32:16):
a further explanation? And let me get to the last explanation. Mike,
you're correct not saying that some of the money that
Elon gets doesn't go back into the economy. For the record,
I believe in Austrian economics. I am a free market absolutist,
believe that the right tax rate is zero and want
to end the FED just saying that the majority of
(32:38):
the money printed over the past fifteen years went to
the wealthiest people. So how do we put the genie
back in the bottle? How did the majority of the
money printed over the past fifteen years go to the
wealthiest people? Now, over the past fifteen years, the wealthier,
(33:02):
the wealthiest got wealthier, and there is an income any
income equality gap. Is that what you're worried about? Are you?
Are you? Do you think that these are oligarchs and
that they somehow control everything? I mean, I don't square
(33:23):
that you're an Austrian economist, a free market absolutist, at
the same time that you're bemoaning that somehow the wealthies
their money is not benefiting the economy. I can't square
those two in opposite conclusions. So I think that concludes
(33:47):
today's economics lesson, at least I hope it does, because
I had a bunch of other stuff I kind of
wanted to talk about, So maybe we'll swerve into some
of that nex
Michael, the amount of economic ignorance of the general public
boggles my mind. It might help if you read or
recited eye Pencil to everybody every day.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
It would help. Holy crap, do you know what I
have teed up to play in just a minute? Oh
do tell I do? Eye pencil is coming up in
just a minute. I came back in. I rushed through
my little pea walk and came back in because I thought,
I've got to go back to this because this text
(00:33):
message is really bugging me. It truly is bugging me.
So let me go back to it. And I want
you to hear some of the responses too, because the
responses are somewhat encouraging. So here's what set me off, Mike.
I agree with you at almost all tax levels. I
(00:53):
do not believe that at the very top taxes make
it through to the economy. Let me think about what
you wrote. What are you saying there taxes don't make
it through to the economy. Well, do any taxes make
it through to the economy or do you actually mean
(01:15):
wages or wealth? Because you go on to say that
Elon's extra zeros, you know, behind his whatever billions he's worth,
are not being spent at circle K. Now what I
didn't read to you at the last hour was the
rest of the text message. Cut the taxes on businesses
(01:37):
and individuals below five hundred million dollars, but raise taxes
on those I guess he means above five hundred million
dollars they benefited the most from inflation. Can you you
be number sixty seven to ninety one? I'm being serious here.
Can you send me another text message and explain to
(01:59):
me how in your mind you believe that a billionaire
or a millionaire, a ten millionaire, one hundred millionaire, or
a billionaire, how they benefited from inflation. I'd like to
know how they benefited, because again, they buy groceries, they
(02:22):
buy maybe they don't you know, well, they do buy gas,
you know, or they pay electric bills to charge their
you know, electric vehicles. They they they're human being, so
they consume the things that we do. Do they consume.
Let's take Donald Trump for example. Donald Trump, a billionaire.
(02:47):
They joke about he has a button on his desk
to bring him diet cox. He loves diet coke. Well,
when he's at mar Lago, guess who pays that dike?
He does so the billionaire is he may not be
going to Circle K like I do. He's got a
(03:08):
butler to bring him a diet coke. Now when he's
in the West Wing, that's probably part of the office expenses. Now,
when he's in the residence and he wants a diet coke,
that's probably part of their expenses that they pay. Because
the president pays for his groceries that the chefs use
(03:29):
to cook the family meals. So the billionaire Donald Trump
buy his groceries just like you and I do. Now,
maybe I shouldn't phrase it that way, because they don't
go to King Supers. They have someone do the shopping
for them and it probably gets delivered. And because it's
the secrets, because it's the going into the White House,
actually the Secret Service probably does the shopping and then
(03:50):
they check all the food before it comes into the
White House. But the point is that money is spent
at a grocery store in Washington, DC or in West
Palm Beach. The money. I don't get where you're coming.
I can't wrap my head around what you're trying to
say here. Let's go back to the sentence. I do
(04:14):
not believe that at the very top taxes make it
through to the economy. Do you mean that you don't
believe that it's the very top their money makes it
through to the economy because they're taxes. First of all.
Let's and I don't know that I can get the
most recent numbers National Taxpayers Union. Let's see tax shares
(04:43):
in year twenty twenty two. Let's see. I can't let
me keep I'll keep digging through this in a minute.
But you know, the top five Somewhere I'll find the
(05:04):
exact figures. But something like the top five or ten
percent of taxpayers in the country pay well over seventy
to eighty percent of all federal income taxes, of all taxes.
So the well, So when Elizabeth Warren wants the wealthy
to pay their fair share, what's their fair share? Ninety
(05:24):
ninety nine percent or just one hundred percent? I I
just am bumfuzzled by this. Every person, whether they're a
billionaire or they're working stiffs like you and me, Our
money that we spend goes to support the economy. So
(05:50):
when I stopped at Circle K this morning, I walked
in and I was the only one there. The door deans,
you know, to indicate so this his kid comes from
out from behind wherever he was sleeping or taking a nap,
to make sure I wasn't, you know, going to rob
the store if I needed help. Well, he's being paid,
(06:11):
I don't know. Let's just say he's being paid twelve
bucks an hour. The dollar whatever it is at Circle K.
Now I don't pay attention, but whatever it is, let's
just say it's a buck fifty. So the buck fifty
that I paid for that diet coke this morning helps
cover all of the costs of operating that Circle K,
(06:33):
all of the costs, and for every person that stops
at that Circle K today, that's what keeps that store open.
Go back to the story about the restaurants. Restaurants are
closing because they're being forced to pay more than minimum wage.
Their food costs are going up. They're operating on margins
(06:53):
of somewhere between two and five percent at best, and
when their costs go up, the the minimum wage alone,
according to Colorado Restaurant Association, imposed an additional eighty two
thousand dollars costs on that restaurant. How do they make
that up? Well, if they were, let's just say that
(07:15):
it was a small mom and pop restaurant, and let's
just say that they netted one hundred thousand dollars a
year as profit from that restaurant. Take a small, little
family owned Mexican restaurant they make, husband and wife working
it together. After paying all their employees, they net one
(07:37):
hundred thousand dollars fifty thousand dollars each. Now it's going
to cost them an extra eighty two thousand dollars. How
can they stay in business? They won't stay in business.
The idea that somehow it will go back to the
whole point about taxes. So Democrats are already and I
(08:01):
knew they would do this. Democrats are already bitching about
extending the Trump tax cuts. So when the tax cuts
were implemented back in twenty seventeen or whenever they were that,
those became the new tax rates, and those became the
new tax brackets. And that's what we've all been using
(08:24):
to when we file our taxes, and that's resulted in
X amount of revenue to the treasury. Congress has been
spending more than that. Now they want to figure out
a way to in order here's the Democrats position, in
order to continue those tax rates I'm not going to
(08:44):
call them tax cuts anymore, because those are now the
new rates. In order to continue those new rates and
not let them expire and have the rates increase, you
have to figure out how to pay for that. Well,
wait a minute, I'm already paying for it, and you're
already taking that into account when you put together your
so called federal budget. So all you're wanting to do
(09:07):
is you're wanting to cut You want to increase spending
by letting the tax cuts expire, so that you'll have
more money to spend, and you'll spend more money than
what that increase is. Anyway, this is the stupid season
that I think that this country lives in when it
(09:28):
comes to economics and insofar as that billionaires and everybody
contribute to the economy. Let's go to the record that's
lead pencil.
Speaker 3 (09:41):
There's not a single person in the world who could
make this pencil remarkable statement, not at all. The wood
from which it's made, for all I know, comes from
a tree that was cut down in the state of Washington.
Speaker 2 (09:54):
Now, who pays the people that cut down the tree
in say, the state of Washington. Well, the paper mill
company that hires the people to go cut the trees.
That pays their salaries. But who buys the pencil? Well,
I bet that Elon Musk probably has a pencil somewhere.
(10:17):
Is vast businesses. I bet they buy pencils. They're helping
to pay the salary of the guy that cut the
tree to do the pencil. But I digress.
Speaker 3 (10:26):
Person in the world who could make this pencil remarkable statement,
not at all. The wood from which it's made, for
all I know, comes from a tree that was cut
down in the state of Washington. To cut down that tree,
it took a saw to make the saw. It took
steel to make the steel, It took iron ore. This
(10:48):
black center we call it lead, but it's really graph
compressed graphite. I'm not sure where it comes from, but
I think it comes from some mines in South America.
This red top up here, the eraser bit of rubber,
probably comes from Malaya, where the rubber tree isn't even
native who was imported from South America by some businessmen
(11:11):
with the help of the British government. This brass feral,
I havn't the slightest idea where it came from, or
the yellow paint or the paint that made the black lines,
or the glue that holds it together. Literally, thousands of
people cooperated to make this pencil. People who don't speak
(11:32):
the same language, who practice different religions, who might hate
one another if they ever met. When you go down
the store and buy this pencil, you are in effect
trading a few minutes of your time for a few
seconds of the time of all those thousands of people.
(11:53):
What brought them together and induced them to cooperate to
make this pencil. There was no commissar sending out offices,
from sending out.
Speaker 4 (12:01):
Orders from some central office.
Speaker 3 (12:03):
It was a magic of the price system, the impersonal
operation of prices that brought them together and got them
to cooperate to make this pencil so that you could
have it for a trifling sum.
Speaker 2 (12:17):
That is why.
Speaker 3 (12:20):
The operation of the free market is so essential, not
only to promote productive efficiency, but even more to foster
harmony and peace among the peoples of the world.
Speaker 2 (12:34):
And I would be just to be cross about it.
To produce the products that I want and that I'm
willing to take. So I come in here, I come
into this building six days a week, and I produce
a product for a company that pays me a salary
(12:55):
plus additional revenue. So I've got additional revenue streams, and
I take that salary in those additional revenue streams, and
I pay my income taxes, my property taxes. Every time
I buy something, I pay my sales taxes. And whenever
I buy a product or buy a service, I'm helping
that retail outlet or that wholesale outlet, or that you know,
(13:20):
that plumber or that you know electrician. I'm helping them
stay in business because I have done something to earn
some money to hire them to go do something which
allows and we're all doing that. And billionaires are no different.
Billionaires are doing exactly the same thing. They just might
have other people doing it for them. But their money,
(13:44):
not all of it, because well actually all of it
probably does unless they're stashing it in a mattress somewhere.
But you think Elon must just use his billions in
a mattress in a pillow case somewhere hiding in a closet. No,
he puts that money to work. He takes that money
and he puts it into his companies, or he puts
(14:06):
it into you know, he buys stops and bonds, and
that allows other companies to grow, and that allows those
other companies to produce products or services that other people buy.
And so why should he be any different than anybody else. No,
he may not himself go to Circle K, but I
bet he drinks. In fact, I know he drinks diet coke.
(14:26):
Have you seen a photograph of heu? He took a
photo He was in a hotel room somewhere and he
took kind of a selfie of the side table next
to the bed, and they were like eight cans of
diet coke sitting there. We do you think that somebody
just gave him those diet cokes? No, somehow he paid
for those diet cokes. So don't tell me this bull
(14:49):
craft about how Elon Musk with all those zeros is
not going to the seven eleven. Somebody went to a
coke distributor or went down to the the little snack
bar in the hotel and bought him six can, eight
cans whatever it was, a diet coke and took it
up to his room. Oh, by the way, and he
probably tipped the guy that brought the diet coke to
(15:11):
the room. Seems to me somebody's got some wealth in
thee or something. I'm just astonished, and I don't want
you to be ready to because the Democrats the Marxists
are going to start playing this game on tax rates,
on leaset tax cuts. You know, I'm all for reducing
(15:35):
income taxes. In fact, I'm to the point where I
know we got the fair tax, we got the flat tax,
and we have a national sales tax. I would go
for any of those, as long as we got rid
of the income tax, the current iteration of the income tax.
And quite honestly, I would prefer a national sales tax,
not a value added tax, not of that, but a
(15:58):
straight national sales tax. You know why because now I
control how much tax I pay. Because let's just say
I want to buy a new car. Well, if I
buy a new car that's valued at just fifty thousand dollars,
I'll pay sales tax on fifty thousand dollars. Now, when
I look at that figure and I go, I don't
(16:18):
want to pay that much in sales tax, well I
can go buy a either a cheaper model of a car,
or I could buy a used car that is valued
at less, So I'll pay less sales tax. Now, I'm
in control of how much tax I pay. Now you
can argue that I'm in control of how much tax
I pay based on how much I earn. Well, so
(16:39):
what do you want me to do? How about if
I you get pissed off because there weren't three hours
of the podcast posted. You get pissed off when I
take a day of vacation. So what if I take
decide that I use up all my vacation time and
I still want to take more time. I want to
become Johnny Carson. I just I just want to work.
I'm tired of work six days a week. I just
(17:01):
want to work four days a week. So I'm not
gonna do the Saturday show and I'm not gonna do
I'm not gonna work on Fridays or Mondays, one or
the other anymore. Help. People will be piste off about that.
And by the way, I'd also have less money. I
probably wouldn't be able to be by as many diet cokes,
and eventually eventually the Circle Gay might go out of business.
(17:22):
Oh my god, people, let's just pencil eye pencil. We'll
watch it.
Speaker 5 (17:36):
Yeah. The stupid, oh Michael, the stupid minimum wage in
Denver is what's doing it. And then I get my
semi annual sidewalk bill for seventy five dollars last night.
Denver sucks literally sucks the lifeblood and your money out
of you.
Speaker 2 (18:00):
Okay, I'm not gonna argue with any of that. This
is not right I intended to go today. But I
think it's really I think it's very very important, particularly
considering that you're going to start hearing an awful lot
about the expiration of the Trump tax cuts. Now, remember
(18:22):
when those when that bill passed back in seventeen, eighteen,
seventeen or eighteen, whatever year it was, that reduced tax rates.
So it shifts the brackets, but it reduced the tax rates.
That's what we've been paid. This is twenty twenty five,
so people would be paying their twenty twenty four taxes
(18:42):
this year. So those twenty four twenty twenty four taxes
are based upon rates that have been in effect for
the past seven years. Now, Democrats, of course, because they
rely on the ignorance of the American public, are going
to start You're going to start hearing about, oh my god,
(19:03):
how if we extend these tax cuts, how are we
going to pay for them? What do you mean, now
we're going to pay for them. We're already paying that rate.
If we leave those tax rates in place, you don't
have the argument that we have to figure out a
way to pay for it falls flat because there is
(19:25):
no additional cut in which you would could you could
argue that, oh, we're going to reduce federal revenues by
a dollar, so we have to figure out a way
to make up that dollar. That's that's that's now im material.
Now if Congress wants to go further and further reduce
the corporate and the individual tax rates, then you can
(19:48):
have the debate about whether we should pay for that
or not. I would argue, let's do the calculation and
see how much increased revenue you will get because you're
going to reduce the tax rate, so there will be
an incinity for people to make more money. But you know,
because that's the Laffer curve, which is actually legitimate, although
(20:11):
it's been demeaned by everybody, by the Marxists in our society.
It's been demean but if you go back and you
look at the Reagan tax cuts that everybody says, oh
my god, it's going to destroy the country, it actually
increased the amount of revenue into the treasury. But the
problem is it also allowed Congress to say, oh, look
(20:32):
we got extra money. We can spend even more money now.
I mean, it's insane. It's like it's like me telling
Tamra hey, I got a thousand dollars a month raise. Okay,
that means now we can spend an extra two thousand
dollars a month. No, it does not mean that. But
if Tamar actually said that, she'd make a damn fine congressman,
wouldn't she of course a Democrat congressman, been a Democrats
(20:55):
a congressman. Nonetheless, that's how people think. I mean, it's
utter insanity. I honestly can't get my head around it.
Other than Democrats just want to spend, spend, spend, because
they know better how to spend your money than you do.
I hate that attitude. Now let's go back. I'm going
(21:16):
to go back to the to the text message. I
do not This was sixty seven ninety one. I do
not believe that at the very top taxes make it
through the economy. And my argument is, yes, they do
in one way or another. But he sixty seven ninety
(21:37):
one comes back for the explanation. First, the lower the
income level, the higher the amount of their income that
goes directly into the economy. Let me re that's basically true,
but let me rephrase it in a different way. The
(21:59):
lower income level, the more of your income you spend
directly on things like groceries, utilities, car payments, that sort
of thing. But that doesn't mean that the more money
that you make, that your money doesn't go directly into
(22:25):
the economy. It does go directly into the economy. And
here's why, because Elon Musk, in fact, I looked it
up because I was really curious. Elon Musk doesn't take
the amount of money that he makes, or that his
wealth increases every year. He doesn't take that and just
(22:49):
keep that in a you know, a bank account that
earns you know, one point two percent APR. No, he
doesn't do that. What does he do with his wealth.
He invests that. He takes that wealth and he invests it. Now,
(23:12):
he may pay himself a salary. I don't know whether
he actually does him. Now, he may pay himself a salary,
so he's going to pay income tax on that salary.
But he takes his wealth and he invests it in
other companies, in other endeavors, in other ways that he
(23:33):
can make that money grow. So let's just take one
of his companies, the Boring Company, because I love the
name of it. That's the company that it's an infrastructure
company that it does underground tonally construction services. Now that
he has five point seven billion dollars invested in that
(23:56):
started in twenty sixteen, as of this is as of
April twenty two, is worth five point seven billion dollars. Well,
he took his money from other companies, invested around one
hundred and two million dollars into that company. What did
(24:18):
that What does that company do? Well, that company hires engineers, lawyers, secretaries,
heavy equipment operators, it has, it has it probably has
any any number of people that are involved in the
(24:40):
actual boring of a tunnel, heavy equipment operators, people you
know that operate that operates specialized equipment. Every one of
those people benefit from the one hundred and two million
dollars he invested in that company. And then that company
charges to do the boring, to do the tunneling, so
(25:03):
they get income from that too. They get income from
Elon Musk himself, and they get income from the services
that they provide. Now, every person that works for that company,
maybe not every person, but a majority of them are
(25:23):
manual labor individuals. They stop at the seven eleven and
get their coffee, They buy groceries, they pay electric bills,
they pay property taxes, they do everything. So yes, it
may not be that his one hundred and two million
dollars went directly into the convenience store, but it went
(25:44):
indirectly into the convenience store because he hired people that
go buy groceries and go buy diet cokes. I just
don't get or you can't get that through your head.
I think I truly believe as somebody else that on
the text line, I think you're listening to too much CNN.
(26:05):
He doesn't sit around, as I said, with that money
in a pillow case somewhere. You know, he goes, he
takes what does he do. He takes them. He takes
the profits that he gets from the boring company, and
he takes that down. He gets a big fat check
at the end of the year, and he takes that
down to the bank and cashes it and sticks that
all of those dollar bills into a pillow case somewhere
(26:28):
and hides it, No, he invests it, and that allows
that boring company to hire engineering. Think about the engineers
they buy nice big houses. Maybe they have a nice
big house built. Well, what does that do. That hires carpenters,
that hires electricians, that hires plumbers, that hires architects, that
hires designers, that hires landscapers, and all of those people
(26:51):
are directly involved in the economy. So don't tell me
this bull crap to somehow Elon Musk is not involved
in the everyday economy. He is. My god, what what
am I missing here? Somebody explained to me what I'm
a missing? I just I think it's wealth envy. I
don't I think you don't look. I don't. I don't
(27:12):
give a ratsass with I don't know Elon Musk. I
don't know whether he's a good guy or a bad guy,
and I don't care. I'm certainly am I envious of
his billions?
Speaker 3 (27:24):
What?
Speaker 2 (27:24):
I love to be a billionaire like him? I'm not
really sure, to be honest, maybe a half a billionaire
like him. I'm not sure I want to be the
richest person in the world, because oh, they've got everyday
problems he's got, you know, relationship problems, he's got family problems,
he has probably medical issues. He has everything that he
(27:47):
and I have, but just on a different scale, and
he's easier able to deal with some things. He's got
a medical problem. Does he give a rat ass about insurance?
Probably not. Well, mister know, mister musk, it's gonna cost us.
You want you want a tummy tuck, It's gonna cost
you fifty thousand dollars. Okay, Well, can we schedule it tomorrow?
Speaker 3 (28:07):
No?
Speaker 2 (28:08):
Uh, well, if I paid you one hundred thousand dollars,
can be scheduled tomorrow? Yeah, okay, we can get your
tummy tuck done. Oh by the way, if he doesn't
tummy tuck, you wouldn't believe why I thought about tom
tummy tucks? Would you drag him? Did you ever think
about that? Yeah? Why that? Yeah, that conversation we had
this morning. Oh maybe he could be. Could be. So
(28:32):
when when he does a tummy tuck or facelift, or
he goes to advance hair and gets hair implants done,
do you think he what do you think he's doing?
He's paying those people for that service, and that's directly
into the economy. Go back to those planes. I've made
the plan. To me, the planes seem to be the
most obvious. Now, I don't know. Does Musk have a
(28:55):
primary residence, Like, does he have one place he spends
more time than any other place? I don't know. But
let's say he's got a dozen houses. Every one of
those houses is consuming electricity, maybe solar panels, I don't know,
maybe some natural gas. They've got landscaping, he's got maintenance
needs to be done. He's probably got housekeepers. He's probably
(29:15):
got you know, all sorts of he's probably got a
service guide that does nothing but just, you know, maintain
the house. Seventy two thirty two and then I'll take
a break. Does the texture think billionaires just put their
money under a mattress? No, they invested, which is where
venture capital comes from for others to start or expand
(29:37):
their businesses. That's a huge benefit to the economy, in
addition to the massive taxes they pay. Or one more
two nine seven zero, Michael, speaking as a working stuff,
we should not let envy inform our tax policies. Politicians
leverage that, which is one of the many things that
make most of them despicable. Human beings. That's a good
(30:00):
point to take a break.
Speaker 4 (30:02):
Good morning, Michael. As Mike Rosen always told us, you
could tax all of us, especially to billionaires and millionaires,
at one hundred percent, and it still wouldn't pay off
what we're spending.
Speaker 2 (30:16):
So we don't have a tax problem.
Speaker 4 (30:19):
We definitely have a spending problem, and that's the bigger issue.
Speaker 2 (30:23):
In fact, let me take it one step further. You
could also confiscate all of the wealth of everyone in
this country, and you couldn't pay off the national debt,
which is now what thirty two thirty three trillion dollars,
So we're essentially bankrupt. Sixty two eighty eight, Mike, kill out,
(30:47):
or you'll be advertising for high blood pressure medication. Oh
I could already do that. Let's see, now sixty seven
ninety one comes back. Now I'm totally Now, I'm totally confused.
Sixty seven ninety one about where the hell you're going, Mike,
you're correct, this is the same listener that started out
(31:12):
with Elon Musk's money doesn't go it directly into the economy.
You're correct, not saying that some of the money that
Elon gets doesn't go back into the economy. Well, that's
what you said. For the record, I believe in Austrian economics.
I am a free market absolutist. I have to pause here.
(31:33):
I find it really hard to believe based on what
you first sent in as a text message, I find
that you've You've gone one hundred and eighty degrees. Now,
let me let me compare, let me compare them. Let
me get these messages all in one place you started
out this morning with. I agree with you at almost
(31:54):
all tax levels. I do not believe that at the
very top taxes make it through to the economy. I
just but they do. Elon's extra dollars are not being
spent at circle K. Cut the taxes on businesses and
individuals below five hundred million dollars and raise it on
them they benefited the most from inflation. Did I get
(32:16):
a further explanation? And let me get to the last explanation. Mike,
you're correct not saying that some of the money that
Elon gets doesn't go back into the economy. For the record,
I believe in Austrian economics. I am a free market absolutist,
believe that the right tax rate is zero and want
to end the FED just saying that the majority of
(32:38):
the money printed over the past fifteen years went to
the wealthiest people. So how do we put the genie
back in the bottle? How did the majority of the
money printed over the past fifteen years go to the
wealthiest people? Now, over the past fifteen years, the wealthier,
(33:02):
the wealthiest got wealthier, and there is an income any
income equality gap. Is that what you're worried about? Are you?
Are you? Do you think that these are oligarchs and
that they somehow control everything? I mean, I don't square
(33:23):
that you're an Austrian economist, a free market absolutist, at
the same time that you're bemoaning that somehow the wealthies
their money is not benefiting the economy. I can't square
those two in opposite conclusions. So I think that concludes
(33:47):
today's economics lesson, at least I hope it does, because
I had a bunch of other stuff I kind of
wanted to talk about, So maybe we'll swerve into some
of that nex
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