🎓 Doc Freemo 🇳🇱 @freemo@qoto.org

@fedops

tariffs can be used for a lot of things, unfair practices are one, just like taxes they can and should be used proportionally to discourage undesired behavior, such as buying foreign goods over local.

Since tariffs should never be lifted I dont see much relevance in discussing the effects of lifting them.

Like taxes tarrifs can of course be used to target things unfairly. The assumption with any tool is that it in order for it to benefit society it must be used properly, and that means not using it to target the wrong sorts of companies or resources.

@randahl

@toriver

Simply saying a thing doesnt make it true. We have decades of economic theory and models that say otherwise.

@Paulos_the_fog @randahl

@fedops

No more so than everyone looses with taxes in general. I mean sure you hear people make the argument "everybody looses" and taxes are theft all the time. But the reality is, we need taxes to function and tariffs are a better way to get them than income tax.

Oh and by the way 28% of all goods entering the EU are taxed under a tariff... hardly the whole "only one advisory" and "its a trade war"...

@randahl

@Paulos_the_fog

I disagree with your premise that wealth disparity is contrary to the happiness of a society.

Rule number one of economics is that wealth is not a zero sum game. Others having more does not mean you must have less. The existence of ultra rich in no way implies more poor people or that poor people suffer more, in fact quite the opposite, rich people produce the most wealth which, in a healthy economy (read a fair market) it benefits everyone.

@randahl

@randahl

Sure, thats not a bad thing. With income tax I have to pay tax for the money I make, but that money gets re-taxed on the way out too, in other words, all tax tends to work in both directions, its a feature not a flaw. The important part is that we distribute the taxes across behaviors we want to discourage. No one should be discouraged from earning a lot of money (income tax), but generally we want to discourage spending (sales tax and tarrifs), ideally in a way that puts more tax burden on luxury items.

So anything we can do to move taxes from an income tax to a tarrif/import tax/sales tax is a good thing. The fact that it works both ways is normal and expected and shouldnt discourage that.

@randahl You mean a European tariff on USA goods? Yea I expect that to be the case. We tax incoming foreign goods, they tax from us. Import/export tax is pretty common to go both ways. Just another way to collect money and superior to income tax IMO.

@randahl

If we are cutting income tax and offsetting that with tarrifs I am all for it. Taxes need to be levied somewhere and any taxes we can move off income tax and apply more towards taxing expenses the better.

That said I doubt Trump will execute things well, he rarely does.

@knittingknots2

Not all of us agree, dont lump me in with them :)

@mttaggart I want quality content. While often that doesnt come from AI I wouldnt care if it did, in theory.

Thoughts on the new company logo?

#CleverThis #GraphicDesign

@johnabs

These were actually sold for a few hundred around that time. I've seen prices as high as $300 around 1920ish or so for similar models.

So I am guessing that isnt the real value it is sold at. I tried to find info about it but couldnt really find any.

@kopimi

@kopimi Thanks, I will

My "new" freemason pocket watch from 1902. It's a fully working Howard 17 jewel movement.

#Freemason #Frreemasonry #Watch #Watches #PocketWatch #Antique

@magicalthinking

I dont doubt for a second there are plenty of people who lie about it. Its the sort of thing i expect people to make up.

But I'd be curious what the actual numbers are around that.. cause at ~1% of people alive today (and 0.25% of people alive at the time) thats a pretty massive section of the population.

I never met a single person who had claimed to go to Woodstock, so my personal experience differs, but thats another matter.

@chris

@chris

If we take this a step farther...

One can assume most of the people who attended woodstock were under the age of at the time and that most of the people alive today would have been people under the age of 30.

The US population is about 25% under 30. We could also eliminate anyone under the age of maybe 15 or so since they would be too young to attend, but thats another matter.

As a rough estimate we can assume about 1% of people alive today probably went to woodstock if they were alive at the time.

@chris

Is there an actual study on this trying to quantify it?

The population of the usa in '69 was 200 million, so at almost half a million people at woodstock that would mean that 1 in 400 people alive in '69 had attended the festival... Thats pretty huge when you think about it. 0.25% of the entire population at a single festival, thats massive!

@RubenWA

Yes freemason's require you to be religious and recognize the overlap. Nothing wrong with sticking to religion.

That said I do find 95% of religious will say these words but not live by them in the least. Freemasons actually love by it. More importantly these teaching are more the focus and more central