Kinja reply list

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Flying Squid (I hate me more than you do.)Hamilton Nolan
7/13/16 9:45am
Tax every financial transaction .001%, save a hell of a lot more than that.
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  Peter ThielFlying Squid (I hate me more than you do.)
  7/13/16 10:00am
  The greatest damage Bernie Sanders has done is given vapid ideas like these actual merit. A buffoon like Bernie would never understand such a nuanced issue -
  
  http://taxfoundation.org/blog/bernie-sa…
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  Flying Squid (I hate me more than you do.)Peter Thiel
  7/13/16 10:01am
  It’s such a vapid idea that half of Europe will be adopting it this year, but thanks for the libertarian take that no one will care about there, Petey.
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bourbon.p.millerHamilton Nolan
7/13/16 10:15am
I was in Ecuador a couple of weeks ago and an associate asked me if we had any stray dogs living on the street in the US. I responded, “No, pretty much all strays are picked up and taken to shelters. Many are then adopted by well-to-do families and given nice lives. The only creature living on the streets in the US is the homeless. Some of them will adopt stray dogs themselves to attract sympathy.” He was just floored that we had enough money to shelter animals, but that the community allowed struggling people to live on the streets.
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  Just another Gawkfugeebourbon.p.miller
  7/13/16 10:19am
  My takeaway: Kill all the stray dogs and convert the animal shelters into homeless shelters.
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  Misteaks were madebourbon.p.miller
  7/13/16 10:28am
  Dogs are cheaper to shelter/feed than a full size human.
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DubayaTeeEffHamilton Nolan
7/13/16 9:35am
The weed funding organized crime meme is and has been bullshit. Organized crime weed is mexican schwag, and no one smokes vacuum packed schwag. They get their goddamn money from meth et. al.
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  Hamilton NolanDubayaTeeEff
  7/13/16 9:44am
  https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2…
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  smellslikeassDubayaTeeEff
  7/13/16 9:47am
  You seriously need a new dealer then
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SplatworthyHamilton Nolan
7/13/16 9:59am
I just don’t think you should tax weed. Or alcohol. Or gasoline (Yet. The infrastructure to provide alternate means of transportation, especially in rural areas, just doesn’t exist yet.) These are taxes that are carried disproportionately by the poor. These are products of the common working people. Tax the ridiculously wealthy instead. There is plenty of wealth to go around so long as the people at the top don’t have outrageously large amounts and the people at the bottom don’t have outrageously small amounts. This should be our focus.
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  VoteyMcVotefaceThePartyVoteDriverSplatworthy
  7/13/16 10:01am
  Ok, have fun trying to get that through any Congress no matter who is running the show.
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  SplatworthyVoteyMcVotefaceThePartyVoteDriver
  7/13/16 10:07am
  Alternately: have fun orchestrating real change after thoroughly convincing yourself your efforts are utterly futile. There are always people trying to tell everyone else something is impossible, and they are very often proven wrong. What do you hope to accomplish by declaring to the world your philosophy of despair, futility, hoplessness, and defeatism? Do you just want everyone to stop believing and trying? And why on earth would you want that?
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Misteaks were madeHamilton Nolan
7/13/16 10:01am
Then tax gasoline, tobacco, alcohol, and the rich to help the homeless as well. We’ll get through this together.

My alcohol is taxed enough in PA thanks. A 18% level of thievery to pay for a flood that was paid off in the 1940s, a 6% sales tax and the PLCB’s 30% markup. Thankfully I can deny PA its greed by driving 15 minutes to DE.

Gas taxes for our crumbling roads, a road use tax for electric vehicles and tobacco taxes for whatever.
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  David RuddockMisteaks were made
  7/13/16 10:27am
  Most states do tax gas, and extensively by American standards. California’s is the 5th highest in the nation, around 40.5 cents on the gallon. Your state, by the way, has the nation’s highest gas tax, at 50.4 cents per gallon.
  
  https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuel_taxe…
  
  Of course, this is a pittance compared to most developed European nations. The national gas tax in France is equivalent to nearly $4 per gallon. Imagine floating an effective 100% gas tax in the US. There’d be riots in the streets.
  
  http://www.afdc.energy.gov/data/mobile/10…
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  Misteaks were madeDavid Ruddock
  7/13/16 10:35am
  Which is why so many cars in the EU are diesel. Cheaper to buy and now are being attacked for emissions reasons. You just cannot win.
  
  I forgot about my state’s gas taxes until I go to NJ and see what I’ve been fleeced with. Getting gas in NJ isn’t nearly as easy as getting alcohol in DE otherwise I’d do that too.
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cattleprodHamilton Nolan
7/13/16 9:45am
Colorado:

Licensed and regulated marijuana stores in Colorado sold $996,184,788 worth of recreational and medical cannabis in 2015, according to new data from the state Department of Revenue.

And:

Colorado also collected more than $135 million in marijuana taxes and fees in 2015 — more than $35 million of which is earmarked for school construction projects.

Go get that $$, LA.
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  Nickcattleprod
  7/13/16 9:56am
  Colorado taxes 24%. They let voters decide to tax it a lot or a little and we, including me, chose a lot. You can always depend on drugs and alcohol to sell.
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  Thisisnttheaccountcattleprod
  7/13/16 9:57am
  So damned proud of the role my state played in showing how to legalize right
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I Curse Zoidberg!Hamilton Nolan
7/13/16 9:33am
In Colorado, we decided to tax weed to pay for building new schools. 200 million dollars of the initial marijuana tax revenue is ear-marked for school construction and maintenance.
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  EvenBaggierTrousers4I Curse Zoidberg!
  7/13/16 9:41am
  As someone who remembers when lotto money was supposed to fund all of the schools in Illinois... wait until the check clears to celebrate. Although Hickenlooper is kinda cool so... maybe
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  I Curse Zoidberg!EvenBaggierTrousers4
  7/13/16 9:50am
  Ya, Colorado has a very unique set of tax and spending requirements due to TABOR. I won’t bore you with the details, because you could literally take an entire college course to understand the complexities and fucked-upness of TABOR, but the general gist is that if you want to raise new revenue for anything, you typically have to earmark it for a specific purpose. Further, any new tax increase has to be approved by a majority of voters, which is very rare.
  
  These marijuana funds are and will continue to go towards schools. But, of course, this means that the other general budget funds that would have gone to schools are now opened up, and there is a lot of debate about what to do with these funds. By law, these would potentially be part of a “surplus” and therefore have to be returned to the taxpayers, but the current legislators have done a good job of fancy accounting to try and keeps these funds in the state budget for as long as possible.
  
  So the long and the short of this is yes, the funds do actually go to schools, but also it is possible that other newly freed-up funds could be returned to tax payers in the form of a rebate, which would negate the net effect of the extra marijuana tax revenue.
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GrumpyEagleHamilton Nolan
7/13/16 10:07am
Wait - $40 for a “medical consultation” - on top of what you’ll pay for the weed? I’ve never seen that one before. Usually the “consultation” has been a part of the experience, at least at the places that I've visited in Colorado. Is this a legal requirement as part of the medicinal designation?
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  belly83GrumpyEagle
  7/13/16 10:46am
  Yes you have it right, that’s on top of the weed. California’s system is essentially unregulated but they technically only have medical legalization (for the moment). That means to purchase at a (legit) dispensary you need a doctor’s recommendation that cannabis will help alleviate some ailment. The joke is that unscrupulous doctor’s set up shop in places like Venice Beach and sell recommendations for $40-$50 a pop. They churn through people - probably 4-5 and hour in some cases. I even had a colleague from the east coast obtain a medical recommendation there, even though you are supposed to be a CA resident. New laws were passed last year to regulate the system but thay won’t be implemented fully until 2018.
  
  Similar things go on in all states with legal medical cannabis, to varying degrees. In Colorado, I imagine you went to a retail shop that can serve anyone over 21 and they were giving you general advice about the products (well-trained employees will not give you medical advice, as they are not allowed to legally). If you were a CO resident you could find a doctor to give you a recommendation and could then shop at separate dispensaries where you will be subject to less taxes (2.9% compared to 12.9% for regular consumers) and have access to higher-potency edibles and other products not available on the general recreational market.
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  GrumpyEaglebelly83
  7/13/16 12:16pm
  Interesting, and good to know. Before a recent trip out to CO, I asked my doctor for something for my anxiety because driving out there always makes me nervous and I’m menopausal as hell right now. The doctor hemmed and hawed and said that she didn’t feel comfortable prescribing something like that and maybe we could have a discussion when I got back. After a ten hour drive (with some delightful angst-related GI issues), I got to Denver. My friend and I headed to the local dispensary where I explained my issues, the friendly “budtender” recommended a few products of which I purchased a couple, and I spent the rest of the week having a great time - not crazy buzzed or fried-beyond-functional, but happy and relaxed. I wish I had more time out there to explore the other strains and wish I could have taken some back but the cops in adjoining states have gotten pretty skilled at pulling over and searching cars coming out of Colorado. Still haven't gotten back to that doctor as yet.
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ThatGuy524Hamilton Nolan
7/13/16 11:37am
HamNo, trust me Tobacco is plenty taxed. edit out that brain fart
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  theunseenoneThatGuy524
  7/13/16 12:02pm
  It’s crazy that people don’t think 1000%+ taxes on tobacco aren’t enough.
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  ThatGuy524theunseenone
  7/13/16 12:10pm
  I mean at some point, either just make them illegal or make taxing them to infinity illegal.
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Sid and FinancyHamilton Nolan
7/13/16 9:40am
It’s magic, just like how the lottery gives us fantastic public schools and there are no more homeless in Colorado, Wahington and Alaska.
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  PetehammerSid and Financy
  7/13/16 3:01pm
  (waits until homeless guy leaves library computer) And Oregon!
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