We won’t reach the goal of sunsetting Social Security without substantial public support. Although the moral arguments are strongest, they can also take a while to be broadly accepted. In the short term, one step in generating additional support could be to increase awareness of the fact that we are actually taxed at twice the rate shown on our paystubs; something that I don’t think is widely understood.
In addition to the FICA deduction, your employer pays the same amount again on your behalf, as EFICA. However, the way the law is now, employers are forbidden from showing EFICA on your paystub. Such an implementation of the tax was clearly chosen as a way of hiding its magnitude from those who pay it.
I’d love to see that law expunged, and to have employers report not just EFICA on your paystub, but all other fees that they pay for you. Even better would be to abolish the EFICA deception all together; but that's a much bigger step than a simple change in reporting. The message would be clear, and the motivation for change selfish: if your employer didn't have to pay EFICA, your take-home pay could be higher.
Morally, forbidding companies from showing EFICA requires them to commit a form of fraud; companies are being forced to deceive their employees about the true nature of their wages and the related deductions.
Even if such a law change wasn’t passed, the debate alone has the potential of generating substantial public awareness by exposing the deception.
Wednesday, 26 January 2011
Saturday, 8 January 2011
Why is pride a sin?
The Oxford English Dictionary has two relevant definitions for pride:
1. A feeling of deep pleasure or satisfaction derived from one‘s own achievements, the achievements of one’s close associates, or from qualities or possessions that are widely admired
2. The quality of having an excessively high opinion of oneself or one's importance
It seems to me that the Christian sin is the second one.
For the first form, it seems to me that pride has to be earned; it's not something that one can just feel whenever one wishes. I can see how false pride would be a bad thing, but that's really a form of arrogance.
Aristotle considered pride the greatest of all virtues. It's a big leap from there to the worst of all sins.
For me, pride is a psychological reward that we earn from living our values; from being just, honest, having integrity, and so on. Living unethically destroys the chance for pride -- so I don't understand how that goes along with pride being a sin.
Perhaps it's that in order to feel pride, one must live for themselves? Is that the aspect that's sinful?
1. A feeling of deep pleasure or satisfaction derived from one‘s own achievements, the achievements of one’s close associates, or from qualities or possessions that are widely admired
2. The quality of having an excessively high opinion of oneself or one's importance
It seems to me that the Christian sin is the second one.
For the first form, it seems to me that pride has to be earned; it's not something that one can just feel whenever one wishes. I can see how false pride would be a bad thing, but that's really a form of arrogance.
Aristotle considered pride the greatest of all virtues. It's a big leap from there to the worst of all sins.
For me, pride is a psychological reward that we earn from living our values; from being just, honest, having integrity, and so on. Living unethically destroys the chance for pride -- so I don't understand how that goes along with pride being a sin.
Perhaps it's that in order to feel pride, one must live for themselves? Is that the aspect that's sinful?
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