Posted on 06/16/2004 5:59:30 AM PDT by wmichgrad
No, they weren't born here. They have friends or family living in and around Detroit. When it's about time for them to deliver, give a few months, they fly over from Saudi, deliver their baby and after a few weeks, fly back home. They are not citizens of America.
They found a gravy train and the lawmakers don't know how to stop it.
Was it at least a public course?
"I" get you now! The BABY is an automatic Citizen! Yep. Pretty good, eh?
I espouse no such thing and never have. You are the one espousing higher taxes and more government control - as long as it does not hit your wallet or your business practices.
I do however advocate shifting the tax burden from businesses to taxes on luxuries like tobacco. So long as it doesn't impact demand appreciably.
Please, stop with the semantics.
At no time have I ever advocated higher taxes, unlike you, who always advocates them, provided they are imposed on someone other than you.
This particular cigarette tax is to cover medicaid, you favor increased cigarette taxes, ergo you are supportive of this tax increase to cover medicaid because it doesn't impact upon you.
I think you may need reading glasses. I said its better to cut medicaid rather than increase the cig tax. I also offered that the folks would still get care because there are DR's who will continue to serve them. Please leave your preconceived ideas out of this.
Fine, I stand corrected.
As to my preconceived ideas.........you have given them to me by your advocacy of higher tobacco taxes to ease your tax burden.
If the proposal was to raise the cig tax in order to lower the business tax AND if the current price is still below what people are paying in other states, then I would support this.
Yet last week you were advocating the cigarette tax be raised in the low tax states in order to stop smuggling to high tax states.
Why not advocate lowering the high tax to stop the smuggling?
No matter how you try to spin it you want to see higher taxes on cigarettes so your tax burden is eased. As a smoker it should not be my responsibility to ease your tax burden. What do cig taxes have to do with business taxes anyway?
good question, I don't know I'll have to find out..
A state gets its revenues from many sources. The less it relies on business tax the better it is for business and therefore jobs etc. To the extent taxes on luxuries like cigarettes can bring in revenue for necessary expenses the lower will be business taxes and the overall growth of the states economy increases.
Then after everyone quits smoking, or buys elsewhere, where will the state go for the extra money needed for the budget?
You advocate higher taxes that don't have an adverse impact on you.
How about a real conservative idea.....advocate less government spending rather than higher taxes.
I'm sick and bloody tired of so-called conservatives such as yourself advocating more government regulation and higher taxes on people you disagree with.
You are either for lower taxes, less government pork spending and less government regulation or not..........picking and choosing what taxes, regulations, and pork you approve of just doesn't cut it.
I didn't advocate more spending. On the contrary I advocated less. I did however advocate SHIFTING the burden to luxuries so long as the market could bear it. The result is a better environment for business.
The trick is to keep the increase just below the level where it actually changes behavior. If the increase in tax caused more people to quit than the revenues from the remainder then the tax would be too much. So far even at 4 per pack the market has reached its potential cap.
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