Taxing the rich to give to the poor

Mr Tharman Shanmugaratnam is one of the MPs that I respect for his sensibility and logical thinking. There aren't many in the PAP that I know of that's at the same level he's playing at.

This is one of the video that came from the election rally of him explaining the tax system:

Mr Tharman Shanmugaratnam explains about our tax system and how it has benefited our middle income and low income residents in Singapore at the Holland Bukit Timah GRC & Bukit Panjang SMC Rally tonight.Listen to the end about whether GST will be increased in the next 5 years.Video Credits: Toggle.Sg#GE2015 #PAP4SGGet breaking news, live updates, and exclusive content, on the go, please click: http://bit.ly/pap_link_up

Posted by People's Action Party on Saturday, 5 September 2015

A lot of people have commented that the government should tax the rich more. I feel the same way too but the thing is, the effect return you get from the tax will not significantly increase.

In the video, Tharman explained that the rich are able to move money around. So if you increase the tax, those rich people will just move their money around, reclassify their earnings, or do whatever their tax lawyers advise. At the end, you're not going to get a lot of out of them.

If you don't understand why taxing the rich is not the best solution, then you're probably not in the rich tier. I'm not in the rich tier either, but I do know that, yes, you make money so that they are not taxable.

In the end, it will be the middle income who will end up paying more taxes if more social benefits are to come from the government. Because it's this huge group of people who don't have the financial intelligence to do what the rich do.

35 seconds too late for election

Related stories:

• 35 seconds (theonlinecitizen.com)
• GE: Team planning contest in Tanjong Pagar GRC did not meet deadline (channelnews
• Walkover in Tanjong Pagar GRC (channelnewsasia)

To quote LKY:

It's a feeble effort to show that they wanted to contest. But everybody knows, you want to contest, you go before 12 o'clock!

Clearly, this incident has illustrated the fact that not everybody knows. Either that or some people are not too smart to know, don't have the common sense to know, or for whatever reason.

There's no difference between 1 second late, 35 seconds late or 1 day late. It's still late. In that 1 second, you could have missed your flight, failed your IPPT, lost the 100-metre dash to your opponent, etc. This is the elections we're talking about, not about waiting for your friend for dinner.

I cannot understand why the opposition would want to put themselves in a position to submit the papers late.

There's absolutely no excuse at all for submitting the papers late, short of an act of god - such as a freaking tsunami were to hit Singapore - or even if there is an act of god.

There are rules and regulation. Know them and use them to your advantage.

In this case, nothing is as important as meeting the deadline.

I want to sympathize with the opposition but I can't.

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