Green Energy News. - Page 4

cheez-its? c'mon! Gold fish are WAY better!

You mean immigration policy. Actually, the immigration policy of Hong Kong is pretty open. It was easy for me to settle here and become a permanent resident. Likewise for mainlanders, probably the closest analogy to Mexican immigrants in our system.

Hong Kong does not have less regulation. That's a myth.

We have a health department that shuts down restaurants just like you do. We have regulation of firearms where you don't. We have districting and property restrictions and building codes (it's actually a big issue right now). We ban pornography, FFS. We have safety regulations for employment and housing and an employment ordinance and a mandatory provident fund for all workers. We have education policy and set curricula and we BAN home schooling. We have trade regulation, banking regulation, you name it.

You really don't know much about Hong Kong, do you?

You must be thrilled! Would you want this same policy in the US also?

Don't be shocked when others don't listen to your say or consider your say to be uninformed or hypocritical. That is the point.


What do you contribute as an expatriate?


Exactly!


The U.S. could easily put it's house in order but folks like you and your ilk keep voting for debt and dependency. Your vote for Obama has cost us about $5 trillion. You are sheltered from the ramifications of your own decisions by living abroad.


I agree. One of the first cuts we should make is tax credits for expatriates who pay foreign taxes and thus demand credit for those taxes against their U.S. taxes. They want to exist in two societies, let them be double taxed.


The reality is you vote for bad choices and are sheltered from those bad choices. I've said a half dozen time if you had to live under your choices, you'd change them. That is the point.


Exactly!


He basically straddles a line and takes advantage of both sides. Those of us who don't straddle that line don't care to listen to him.

So please explain to me the basis for your assumption that I am unwilling to pay higher taxes in order to have a responsible social policy? Your response was that I was living in Hong Kong and taking advantage of low taxes here.

Seems it's you with the comprehension problem. Or just plain logic.

These cheeze it crackers are excellent. What a snack to watch tonton get utterly destroyed on a beautiful Monday afternoon

<soda>

I claim that because you're not paying more taxes. You are free to do so. You are also free to give 50% (or more) of your income to the causes like providing healthcare or transportation or education for people. No one is stopping you from doing these things.

It seems NPR disagrees with you.

LMFAO! You really don't get it, do you?

1. The us cuts tax treaties, then all the other countries do as well.
2. The US earns more in taxes from foreign workers in the US than US expatriates pay in taxes overseas. MUCH MORE.

So what you're proposing not only would harm diplomatic relations, but it would reduce US tax income, as foreign people stop coming to the US to work (And pay taxes) and US companies stop sending people overseas to work, and trade is absolutely destroyed. North Korea here we come! What fun!

Wait a second. Changes in tax policy affect people's behavior? Whodathunkit.

Seems you have a SERIOUS comprehension problem. Aside from a backlash against visiting mainland mothers giving birth here, what on Earth does that article have to do with immigration policy?

I don't presume to know more about Hong Kong than you do. I don't live there. But I didn't say Hong Kong was not regulated at all, just less regulated than the States.

Do you know how long it takes to get a business license and incorporate in Hong Kong? 4-7 working days.

In the U.S.? It depends on the city, but in New York City it takes from 2 weeks to several months just to get a business license.

Sorry, but I'm with Warren Buffett on this one. It's not whether we give independently. It's whether we implement a fair policy where everyone gives. Otherwise, our independent contribution is nothing. There's no way independent contribution can balance the budget.

Wow. I can only imagine how folks in the US would react to people in the US doing something like this:


And this is exactly the same kind of concern that exists in the US:


The parallels are amazing.

That's not regulation. That's inefficient bureaucracy. There's a vast difference, you know.

I'm all for fixing the bureaucracy.

No, I get it: It's not whether you pay more...it whether everyone else pays what you think they should pay.

Yes, Warren Buffett is a hypocrite, too.

Pretty much. He's calling for higher taxes that he would not end up paying. If for no other reason because he'll be dead.

No, you are. You're claiming the only reason I push for higher taxes is because I don't have to pay them (which is false).

What's Warren Buffett's reason? Why doesn't every rich businessman have the same reason then?

Oh he's got a few good decades in him. And progeny. I guess he doesn't care about them.

Rupert Murdoch will die long before Warren Buffett does.

So tonton, I'm curious. Would you also ban home schooling in the US? I ask because you mentioned as one of the many wonderful things in HK.

A few decades? I wouldn't bet on ONE more decade.

I have no doubt he's structured things for any inheritors to avoid as much taxation as possible.

Regulation is not the same as bureaucracy?

From the NYC website:


Hong Kong's economic freedom has nothing to do with the fact that it has low taxes and less regulations. They're just more efficient at processing business license applications.

What does it have to do when the article notes that mainlanders are making up 40% of the births which means ever more rights and payouts to people who claim those rights. It also notes the cultural disconnect, in otherwords paying money to people who do not share the same values or feel the need to honor the same social contract.


He fails to notice that all the places the bureaucracy happens to be so big and unfixable just happen to be blue states.


Exactly and the point is when this is addressed, when these mainlanders want their children to push his own child out of the way, there is no way he would take it lying down.


So are you claiming to be the one percent? All the tax increases here have been aimed at the 1%.


He'd be too busy enlightening all the 12 year olds as to what they are going to do with their vagina's regardless of what their actual choices may be. He will be busy forcing them to take HPV vaccines to protect the herd.

I wonder how Hong Kong is going to cleanly careful and provide for the 40% increase (minimum) in new citizens they will start having in a few years. I wonder if he will support giving said citizens benefits not only to support them but their mainlander parents who likely won't qualify but should be their to help raise their child and thus need something. I wonder what will happen when the schools want his child to learn something different to accommodate the new students. Let's see how he feels when it comes down on his kid.

Are you going to let your child pledge loyalty to the Communist Party tonton?

NYTimes.com


Just write her a check out of your savings tonton. Better still write it out of your daughter's savings. Just take out a nice credit card, cash advance it to pay her and then your daughter can pay it off when she goes to work. That's exactly what your vote for Obama is doing for American children.

Telegraph.co.uk


This clearly is just getting started.


A fraying social safety net due to extensive need and use related to influx of new people. Why I've never heard of that happening. Why soon some of those heartless assholes will probably want to take their money and keep it to pay for their private services since they are getting less benefit from the public services due to those who abuse the rules.

Chicago Tribune


Why in Hong Kong, only those with skin in the game even get to pick the leader.


Well let's not worry about those. Let's just have about 4 million or so mainlanders straddle the fence and claim the goodies they want from Hong Kong with their citizenship but still also keep whatever they want and demand from mainland China. The little people who get hurt in the middle, they are just racist assholes who aren't sophisticated enough to realize why they should be ripped off.

Better still let's triple his and her energy costs to make sure they properly fund the green technologies that might attempt to make all these mainlander citizens and their needs possible. I'm sure they will avoid those costs by using dirty energy on the mainland and just wander over when it is time to collect a right or benefit.

Right, except you don't support fair polices. You support policies where only the rich get soaked. The almost rich pay dearly, as does upper middle class. Everyone else pays nothing and gets free everything.

The government has nothing to offer that it does not first take from individuals. The government cannot create. At best, it can only redistribute property and resources. Most of the time, it destroys property and resources.

Who's "affections?"

The real question is why are these needed?

Agreed. But it seems like a good idea to eliminate any and all unnecessary friction. The point here is the government is putting up speed bumps.

You have a tough road to hoe in making that case. Government does not make things legal...it makes them illegal. And government funding comes from the taxpayer, so we need to choose priorities carefully. Medical and scientific research through universities should be priority, as should national infrastructure. But venture capital into private firms? No.

Government regulations also cost far more than you cited in this thread. For example, Obama's new regulations alone cost a total of $46 billion. I know people in business, and the amount of regulations that business face is staggering. Just the paperwork requirements alone are overwhelming.

And why not simply invest yourself, privately and leave taxpayers out of it?

Of course. I haven't claimed otherwise. However...you go too far...


I completely disagree. Nearly all of the major innovations and advancements in our world have come from the private sector and even if they didn't (the internet is the classic example some give) they almost certainly would have without government support if it was a desired and necessary innovation.

I can't think of any kind of research that truly requires government support in order to advance.

But put more simply, this is not even the role of government. The role of government is to protect the life, liberty and property of its citizens. Period. Anything beyond that is superfluous and risks actually violating that first and primary responsibility.

Do you ever wonder why brand new buildings and bridges collapse in China?

No. But I do wonder how you think licensing someone to business has anything to do with buildings and bridges collapsing.