Healthy soil and sustainable growing

["John D'hondt" <dhondt@eircom.net>]

We have a 23 % tax on goods and services here Dan. It is called value added 
tax or VAT.
The thing is that nobody here notices this doing any good for the commons. 
It does allow our top politicians to have higher wages (and massive perks) 
than your president though. For the commons there is austerity.
John

> I agree with you , John. But then again, I'm a misanthrope ("You can tell 
> you're a misanthrope when you can't understand why solitary confinement is 
> considered punishment." -Florence King, "With Charity Toward None")
>
> I look at it from the capitalist standpoint that has been drilled into my 
> head since birth. If you have two competitors for a product, and they have 
> equal shares of the market, their prices will be equal and they will more 
> or less keep equal power in the community. If the balance starts to change 
> (an ill store owner, for example), then the stronger one completely takes 
> over the market and in the end, there is only one source for that product.
>
> In the U.S., most states have a sales tax between 4 and 10% on products 
> and services. To the customer buying a product, that represents 95% for 
> capitalism and 5% for the commons. Income taxes are kept as invisible as 
> possible.
>
> In capitalism, almost every mandate starts at the purchase point. In order 
> for societal risks and needs (government) to be equally represented 
> alongside corporate influence, there would have to be a sales tax of 100% 
> so that for every purchase of resources, an equal amount would go toward 
> protection of the commons, and the cost of that purchase would be 
> representative of its effects on the future.
>
> The difference between a 5% sales tax and 100% sales tax is the gulf 
> between the fantasy of civilization and the reality of resource depletion.
>
> Dan C.
>
> On 3/29/2014 11:00 AM, livingontheland-request@lists.ibiblio.org wrote:
> > Date: Fri, 28 Mar 2014 22:25:43 -0000
> > From: "John D'hondt"<dhondt@eircom.net>
> > To: "Healthy soil and sustainable growing"
> > <livingontheland@lists.ibiblio.org>
> > Subject: Re: [Livingontheland] Why industrial farming may be the most
> > INefficient farming method
> > Message-ID: <C0222F21972345E38A86A32A5FAAC037@Targadc5fefe82d>
> > Content-Type: text/plain; format=flowed; charset="iso-8859-1";
> > reply-type=response
> >
> > It is just with these two links that I have some problem Paul. I fear 
> > they
> > are cruelly over optimistic.
> > We already spoke about how much run in time is needed before you can
> > realistically expect to be able to live of a piece of land by growing 
> > crops.
> > But further let's just look around us and at the diseased and medicated
> > masses. I can not imagine that even a small part of those will be able to 
> > do
> > anything useful for themselves except maybe kill off those of us who can
> > grow food.
> > Also in the Middle ages the earth was still mostly pristine and fertile 
> > and
> > without persistent environmental toxins and radioactive contamination. 
> > And
> > the population was much smaller. And even then there were famines.
> >
> > I feel quite pessimistic about "going over the cliff". We are not going 
> > to
> > land very softly and just pick ourselves up I'm afraid.
> > I think it likely we are already in freefall and from time to time as I
> > tumble as in a dream I can see glimpses of sharp rocks at the bottom.
> > John
>
>
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