Nope. Foreign speculation has already moved to Toronto, which doesn't have this new tax, and it won't be applied to domestic speculation.

Real estate speculation is a problem in Canada, but it's not even the main one. The biggest problems are poor zoning, developers overbuilding single-occupancy housing, derivatives trading, and wide availability of high LTV mortgages due to government-provided mortgage insurance (obvious moral hazard is obvious). Out of these problems, Canadian governments have only made a token effort to correct the last one (a strongly worded letter).

The Canadian economy is going to go nuclear before housing prices are normalized.

Ok so now I'm confused about who the rich are. We need a little "definitions" page on here somewhere so we can be talking about the same thing. Generally around here people call you rich if you're living in a nice house driving a luxury car. I don't agree with that definition. I think the Obama administration considers you rich if you're a family making more than $250k a year. I don't agree with that definition either. Neither one considers how much you actually own -- what your assets are; it only considers your income. I would maybe start considering someone rich if they had a million dollars in assets plus a considerable income, or some combination. A lot of people in those dark blue areas are at or way above those levels. None of this sounds like factories making factories. Jon I think your definition is not in line with that of most Americans.

I'm kinda pissed off at the people protesting, just like I did when people were protesting Obama when he won (twice). I know that it is their right but it is totally unproductive. I don't like that Donald Trump won, but I recognize he won fairly, that this wasn't a rigged election, there was no voter fraud. I want to give him the benefit of the doubt before I start bashing him as President.

It certainly isn't but it's a good definition for what is actually rich/wealthy. The problem is the descriptions are all subjective. There are people living in poverty that would consider me rich. I might consider the guy that earns over twenty grand a month rich but that guy could invest his money for thousands of years and never become George Soros rich.

The problem when having these discussions isn't agreeing on the definitions of words but more not using language that avoids nebulous terms such as rich or wealthy. I'm certainly guilty. I use the word conservative all the time but I'm not sure you can get two people here to agree on a definition of it.

It's only unproductive if you're assuming the point is to contest the result of the election or change it somehow. Expressing large-scale opposition to the policies and attitudes that Trump represents (and may attempt to implement) is worthwhile.

I'm all for protesting but it'd be nice to see them doing so in the areas that actually voted for Trump (bum**** *, suburb *, etc.) instead of causing traffic jams for Clinton supporters. I hope that their energy translates to them voting in the midterm elections.

I agree that my definition isn't the same as most folks', but I think it is the only useful definition.

The problem with defining rich in terms of liquid income is that high liquidity tends to be a regional effect, not a personal one. What I mean is that, $250k jobs are very common in places like Manhattan and Palo Alto, but even top executives will never get that salary in Montana. But a ranch in Montana that returns 4% is worth just as much as a software company in Palo Alto that returns 4%, in the long run.

When you concentrate liquidity, it causes severe inflation of, like, land and ****. New York and San Francisco are colloquially considered "rich person ghettos" where even people with mid-6 income salaries are living hand to mouth in a run down luxury apartment building. What little you have left gets flushed down the toilet, because social pressures and the hedonic treadmill make you buy other luxuries like BMWs and Mercedeses. Much of this is purchased on debt.

That's why I'm uncomfortable calling high salaried people rich.

Someone ran around on the UCR campus spray painting "**** donald trump" on a bunch of buildings

Because, you know, a place of higher learning in a densely populated area in a blue state is the place that should be vandalized for trump support.

Its impotent anger.

Interesting. I've contemplated many things but I must confess, I've never thought about the plural form of the word Mercedes.

You realise he just spent 18 months very publically campaigning on a platform based on bigotry and general reprehensiveness, right?

Facebook has been a platform for commercialized racism until today, will that make you stop using them? And do you think the timing of them pledging to stop is a coincidence?

Don't just bash Trump from the first day he takes office. The advent of the Clinton family's rise to power in the 90s ushered in an era of hubris by self-righteous economic and moral supremecists, which we might say culminated in the unholy alliance between neoliberal apologists and "SJWs", stuck in a feedback loop of privilege and smugness.

We can offer the suffering white and black males who are being left behind in the wake of a perpetual media circus that cares more about Caitlyn Jenner than it does about racial and economic justice and unity, while neither accepting, nor being distracted by, the elements of bigotry which have been with us for a long, long time.

It would seem that technology is a catalyst for a feedback loop in which inequality and hatred are being accelerated, and we shouldn't fall for it.

BLM and Trump are symptoms, and we need to address the underlying illness without being distracted by the ugliness of the disease, if we are going to avoid amputation or sepsis.

I don't understand your complaint. The Clintons were never especially novel; they didn't introduce neoliberalism, and they weren't responsible for the shifting economic overton window. The fact is that neoliberal policies were too popular to discount at the time, they were too well-liked by congress, and the negative consequences weren't well known yet. There also has never been a neoliberal/progressive coalition. The Democrats give Wall Street lots of love, but they don't really do anything to deserve or retain the leftist or progressive vote. Leftists and progressives still lean Democratic, but only because there aren't good alternatives, and at the end of the day that's just not enough to convince them to reliably turn out to vote.

Of course the Clintons don't deserve all the blame, but they certainly were no revolutionaries, and I don't think the history books will be too kind to them for embracing what turned out to be disasterous trends, however unfair this is in hindsight.

It's water under the bridge at this point, but I would like to see the Democrats turn a new leaf instead of latching onto the very same smug narrative that probably had a big hand in undoing the Clinton campaign. And I feel like the media is going to play right into the hands of those who are all to eager to exploit a season of unproductive bitterness. Yes, bigotry is ugly, but we don't want to shout at bigots as an excuse for accelerating a feedback loop of media sideshows and distractions.

I really hope the Sanders people sieze on this moment to shape the narrative in a positive direction, and listening to a public radio discussion this morning, it really does seem like they "get it". The older woman who said she was a Clinton supporter, who called in from a wealthy college town and admitted she didn't know a single Trump supporter, and was droning on about how qualified Clinton was, and how unfairly she was treated, on the other hand....

Caveat emptor: anyone who still bothers to read my posts at this point probably recognizes my pattern of melodrama and shallow thinking in an effort to piece together tenuous ideas in a seemingly insightful way. I'll admit that, but those are my thoughts. Maybe take it as evidence for a human need to have an easy narrative, which we're going to need anyway for the next election.

love it when u **** all over urself, bb. second only to when reid does it.

I mean I still had to beat Roger Spruce to the punch to salvage some of my dignity, I guess. But I'm definitely prone to romantic thinking.

Edit: please somebody reassure me I at least make more sense than that self-medicating, fanfic-writing pothead who seems to have been banned. :-P

While I am remain on the topic of casting aspersions on the nebulous SPECTRE of "neoliberals", if we look back to the aftermath of the Soviet Union, in which Washington think tanks exhibited typical hubris in uncritically projecting market ideology onto the post-Soviet economic calamity, with what was called "shock therapy" at the time, we can trace the rise of Putin to the national embarrassment that was Boris Yeltzin, who is widely seen as a tool for West (if I'm not mistaken).

And now we are hearing reports that Trump may really be the Manchurian candidate--somebody which Putin's Kremlin has recruited as an "asset", completely powerless to resist blackmail from Putin.

Perhaps what comes next is:

1. ceding of Middle Eastern influence to Russia
2. a trade war with China, leading to recession
3. meddling in Iran, to distract from the economy
4. ballooning national debt fuelled by recession, war, and unprecedented tax cuts for the wealthy
5. a collapse of global American hegemony and the dollar as the reserve currency of the world
6. complete disregard for the environment and a futile attempt to revitalize the working class through the energy sector
7. failure to enforce compliance of climate agreements, in light of our own energy policy
8. runaway climate change

#4, really? Like it hasn't been happening every year since forever?

The exponential function works better when you kick it into overdrive, if your goal is to precipitate the ultimate currency crisis in our own lifetime.

You do realize that he has at most 2 years to do this in right? If he screws up that bad control of the house or senate will change in the next election.

I hope midterm elections are different this time around, as a reaction to the DNC's seismic defeat, but historically, Republicans have better turnout.

I don't think "historically" matters if the country is being run into the ground.

We're still feeling the reverberating effects of the decisions of Bush 43, and will be for the next century, so long as we're still here. There certainly is a good chance that Trump will at least appear incompetent, which might be enough to push him out, but it's hardly the case that the ramifications of his policy decisions will fully bloom in time for the next couple of elections.

Apparently he missed the discussion on wealth earlier as well.

It is estimated that Trump's proposed tax cuts will cost between four and six trillion dollars.

First, tax cuts don't cost money. Second, the wealthy aren't taxed.

ok i'm just going to use this moment to announce that i plan to run for president in 2020... i would have done it this year but i'm a year shy of the age requirement

my campaign slogan will be "**** kanye" i will run on a platform of all people deserve an equal opportunity to be trampled beneath my boot

Don't be pedantic. And if the wealthy aren't taxed, explain to me how NPR can report that his proposal would increase incomes of the top 1℅ of earners by something between 10 and 15 percent, eliminate the estate tax, among other things, resulting in 4 to 6 trillion dollars of lost revenue over a decade.

You must have skipped our discussion about wealth.

Well to be honest I'm not even sure what we are arguing about.

You guys can't possibly believe that tax cuts for the wealthy won't decrease tax revenue??

Wealthy people have >99% unrealized capital gains and the rest is offset by capital losses; they do not pay income taxes because they do not have a liquid income to tax.

But cutting taxes on high-salary doctors and lawyers, sure, that'll decrease revenue.

Note for future reference:

Wealth is STUFF, especially stuff that makes more stuff.

Income is CASH FLOW.

I did read your discussion on the distinction, btw. I still think it's irresponsible for Trump to propose a tax plan which will further add to the debt, whether or not it is right for a doctor in Manhattan making $250K to be struggling because of her tax burden.

Am I really wrong to think badly of Trump voters who are doctors making lots of money but spending it on real estate and private schools? Surely the fiscal health of the country is more important than their ability to make ends meet while remaining in an urban environment with inflated real estate and schooling?

Of course, I suppose prohibitive taxes in these areas could simply create a place like those parts of London, where even the "rich" can't afford an apartment, being outbid by those with genuine wealth (by the definition of this thread), such as foreign oil sheikhs, etc.

Higher taxes does not always equal greater government revenue raised. Also, I think it is important to note that "tax" is another term like "rich" or "wealth" that we all ascribe our own meaning to. For most of this discussion it appears that we're visualizing income tax but that's certainly not the only tax but let's stay with it generally.

If higher taxes raise more revenue why should we be concerned with corporations moving in whole or part to other parts of the world? I mean if we have a higher corporate tax rate, we'll lose money if we lower it. We don't lose money if we choose not to and corporations leave, right?

If we want to raise revenue by choosing to tax an economic activity such as income, clearly a higher tax rate will result in the most revenue raised, right? Generally speaking, if you want less of a thing, tax it more. The more money we remove from people, the less money they have to participate in economic activity, the less money being taxed. To a point, that is. Lower taxes too far and the revenue raised is negligible. Raise them too high and you discourage activity.

These things aren't linear, they're curves. I'm not saying Trump's tax plan is great. I don't care about it in the least because it's not even his plan and it hasn't been through the process where it will likely morph into God knows what anyway.

But let's explore this idea that his tax plan will "cost" money. To even try to make that idea work we have to visualize that all tax payers are the employer, government is the employee, and our tax cut is a pay reduction to our employee. This still doesn't make sense but it's about as close as we can get it to. So our pay reduction, now considered an expense, means that our employee, the government, is going to go deeper in debt by running higher deficits (because we just can't ever even consider living within the boundaries of an income). Problem is that happens anyway. The national debt is a curve growing faster and ever steeper by the year. I'm pretty sure if we go back four and eight years McCain's and Romney's plans were supposed to cost trillions more than Obama's and I'm also pretty sure that Obama wasn't running on the promise that under his plan the national debt was only going to double to about twenty trillion dollars by the end of his second term.

So, in other words, "we're no worse than the Democrats".