Brad Wardell's views about technology, politics, religion, world affairs, and all sorts of politically incorrect topics.
Published on December 23, 2008 By Draginol In Politics

Obama joke

 

So my tax bill for April is starting to come together and it's looking pretty bad. I've been paying estimated taxes all year but we had a particularly good year this year and since many of our projects run under S-corporations, their profits get tied to my personal return (like most small business owners).

Our company has around 70 people in it. We'd have more but we literally can't fit anyone else in the building.  We're in the process of building out other parts of the building we own but of course, that requires a lot of money.

Some of these projects will have to be put off until mid next year or later depending on how well Demigod, Sins of a Solar Empire: Entrenchment, Object Desktop 2009, and ironically, how well our partner Dell does (buy Dell computers! ).

The reason they have to be put off is not that we don't have the capital to build out more of the building and hire more people, we do. It's that that money is going to go to the government instead in the form of income taxes -- almost $2 million of it in fact.

Now obviously, the government needs money to pay for vital services. I don't begrudge paying taxes on principle.  But too often, people forget where government money ultimately comes from. Worse, they are totally unaware of the consequences of taxation.

Taxes should always be kept as low as humanly possible because when you tax, you are literally taking from the people who are the most productive with capital and often giving it to the least.

Stardock, for instance, is based in the Detroit area of Michigan. So there is a certain sense of irony that the $2 million the government is taking from us is going to be given to the Auto companies and other companies have have absolutely demonstrated that they are terrible with capital.  Heck, our $2 million probably was used up in the hearings leading up to the vote on the bail out for the auto industry which Bush ultimately and unwisely decided to ignore.

So instead of using that $2 million to hire workers to build out another 8000 square feet so that we can hire an additional 24 more people this next year (to open more development teams to work on more projects for OEMs, gamers, and general consumers) we'll have to wait until we make enough money from the sales of our projects next year.  Way to go government...


Comments (Page 2)
10 Pages1 2 3 4  Last
on Dec 25, 2008

I don't know how anyone can read the original post and figure it as anything OTHER than complaint about BAILOUT. He isn't complaining about taxes, he isn't saying infrastructure investment is bad, he isn't saying he wants more money. He is saying that bailing out means taking from the most successful companies who know how to use money and would otherwise expand, and giving to the LEAST successful companies who have demonstrated they don't know how to manage money and are going to lose it all.

on Dec 25, 2008

I don't know how anyone can read the original post and figure it as anything OTHER than complaint about BAILOUT.

This is how:

The reason they have to be put off is not that we don't have the capital to build out more of the building and hire more people, we do. It's that that money is going to go to the government instead in the form of income taxes -- almost $2 million of it in fact.

 

Sounds to me as though poor Brad is kvetching about paying taxes and secondarily how those taxes are being used.

A point to be made:

We can define success in many ways: making something useful that people need v making something useful that people don't need; making something people want that has value v making something people don't want that has value; making something useless that people want v making something uselss that people don't want.  Unfortunately, many things fall into the category of "making useless things that people want" thereby wasting valuable resoucres for nothing useful at all. I put the gaming industry into this category. 

Many industries do not have the same labor and supply problems other industries have.  Here's the thing, though, every industry will come upon hard times, even the entertainment industry.  My fervent hope is that the gaming industry will fail sometime sooner than later.  I see no redeeming value in it at all.

 

 Be well.

 

 

 

on Dec 25, 2008

little-whip

How is that his fualt of any honest companies that are trying to make it fualts
First of all, it's FAULT, not fualt.

Secondly, I never stated it was Brad's fault.

Here, I'll make it simple for you.

I refuse to feel sorry for any more millionaires/billionairs/ or  those who make so much money that they have everything they could possibly need in life and still indulge in 'conspicuous consumption.'

Bread and circuses are what prevent us from revolting against the state, executing those responsible for our current crisis, and setting things to right.

Brad (via the products he makes) happens to be part of the circus.

When you run out of bread, eat your video game, mmk?

 

I still cant see how its justifyable to take money from people/companies that earned the money and give it to someone that has not.

 

Lets just be straight here... I am by no means rich... I make under 30K a year with a family of 4. I can live decent... and I understand that if I want to make more money I can do so with a bit more hard work.

 

 

on Dec 25, 2008

I refuse to feel sorry for any more millionaires/billionairs/ or  those who make so much money that they have everything they could possibly need in life and still indulge in 'conspicuous consumption.

This is a reaosn why you're poor, LW.  You don't understand what money is used for.

High taxes don't affect me personally in the slighest. It affects you and people like you.  

The first thing tht gets cut isn't my salary. It's hiring new workers and expanding our business.  That means fewer jobs available.

And how are those taxes being used? They're being used to give to people who have clearly no idea how to use business (bail outs and such).

I am not sure how you could possibly read what I wrote as asking for some sort of sympathy. Sympathy for what? That there's fewer jobs for middle class people? 

on Dec 25, 2008

We can define success in many ways: making something useful that people need v making something useful that people don't need; making something people want that has value v making something people don't want that has value; making something useless that people want v making something uselss that people don't want.  Unfortunately, many things fall into the category of "making useless things that people want" thereby wasting valuable resoucres for nothing useful at all. I put the gaming industry into this category. 

Many industries do not have the same labor and supply problems other industries have.  Here's the thing, though, every industry will come upon hard times, even the entertainment industry.  My fervent hope is that the gaming industry will fail sometime sooner than later.  I see no redeeming value in it at all.

Well good, in the meantime, you can get the hell off my site, asshole.

on Dec 25, 2008

(Sodaiho has been exiled, blog removed). (Don't crap on the people who provide your free blog)

Incidentally, most of our revenue does not come from games. I just notice that losers like to fixate on game development as a way to belittle the source of our economic success.

One thing that history shows is that small minded people will always assume that they hold a monopoly on wisdom and that the average person is too stupid to know what's best for them and thus they and others like them should control what is and isn't allowed in society.

At the end of the day, it's irrelevant whether my business produces cars, widgets, software, food, or books. It produces a product/service that people voluntarily choose to pay for.  The production of those products/services involves employing people which provides them opportunity to pursue their own goals.

 

on Dec 25, 2008

We can define success in many ways: making something useful that people need v making something useful that people don't need; making something people want that has value v making something people don't want that has value; making something useless that people want v making something uselss that people don't want.  Unfortunately, many things fall into the category of "making useless things that people want" thereby wasting valuable resoucres for nothing useful at all. I put the gaming industry into this category. 

Many industries do not have the same labor and supply problems other industries have.  Here's the thing, though, every industry will come upon hard times, even the entertainment industry.  My fervent hope is that the gaming industry will fail sometime sooner than later.  I see no redeeming value in it at all.

What kind of person goes onto someone's site, on Christmas day, and tells him that what he does has no redeeming value at all? 

The word despicable doesn't even begin to describe such a person. Sodaiho, I hope you are able to get the help you desperately need. You clearly are an extremely bitter unhappy person.

on Dec 25, 2008

Some of the comments here are case points why there are not more successful people in the U.S.

on Dec 26, 2008

Games are useless but the auto industry is very important? I strongly disagree!

I would say I was playing devils advocate but it isn't the truth. I am a GAMER, I spend A LOT OF TIME AND MONEY on games. To see my beloved hobby belittled like that is insulting. (although I imgaine it was more insulting towards brad, and on christmas, ouch)

1. Games are the basic method of learning for all mammals, they are used to teach hand eye coordination as well as stimulate brain activity, providing a slew of benefits from less car accidents to improved tactical capacity to reduced alzheimer occurance. (according to various research).

2. The auto industry is a polluting wasteful inefficient drek that only exists in the way it does because they legally bribed US congress to NOT build a public transit system. Every other country has it, but the US doesn't. In fact the best is probably in germany, which was built BY the us as part of post WW2 reconstruction, at the same time the US decided to build a highway system and NOT build ANY public transit systems.

3. Even if you ignore the educational and mental benefits of games and assume they are a complete luxury that is useless (which they aren't), like say jewlery. Those luxuries are a VERY important economic force. People work FOR luxuries, they can bum and make due with less necessities, but if you want that Xbox that by god you are getting it, I know plenty of people who only work so that they can have more computer stuff while they live in a trailer park! Heck i'd be a hermit myself if it wasn't for my toys. And even for people who WOULD be working anyways, so called "luxuries" increase a person's morale and make them more productive in society; and more likely to push for more productive positions to get more money to have more luxuries (for example, open a business or get a degree). Without a degree, working on minimum wage you can EASILY fulil ALL your "basic necessities". The only POSSIBLE reason to bother making MORE money than minimum wage is to spend it on luxuries, the only reason the vast majority of people (including me) go to college than is for luxuries.

There are only two systems I am aware of when someone works for nothing but base necessities and not for luxury items... communism and slavery.

4. As brad mentioned, stardock makes more than games, it also makes a variety of OTHER useful programs (games are useful). Many of which fall into the morale / ease of use / productivity increasing bracket.

on Dec 26, 2008

You know what, I just thought of something, when obama makes due on his promises of wealth redistribution and other uses for "the government's money", the only remaining incestive to work rather then being a leech IS luxury items... Food, housing, even healthcare are all provided... so why work?

Heck you can just borrow heavily and than get handouts for that too. but working and producing allows you to buy MORE fun stuff.

on Dec 26, 2008

For the record.  Avodah is Sodaiho. I said nothing about the person, Toughlove, only that the gaming industry produces useless products that people want.  Games have little to no redeeming value.  They detract from real education, useful and productive activity, and drain dollars from families, For this opinion, I am banished.  so much for free speech on the right.

 

BTW, Brad knows as well as I that dollars invested in business reduce his tax burden. Even sole proprieters know that they are taxed only on dollars after the cost of doing business is deducted.

 

Believe me, if Brad's baby stardock, was in jeopardy, he'd be first in the bailout line.

 

Be well.

on Dec 26, 2008



For this opinion, I am banished.  so much for free speech on the right.

It's not really a free speech issue. You're using his website, for which he pays from his own pocket, for all of us to use, to take a dump on what he loves doing, and what made it possible in the first place for him to have this site.

It feels a lot to me like the host of an free party kicking out a rude guest from his house.

on Dec 26, 2008

(and just in case it's not clear that I don't post much here, I made it painfully obvious by messing the quote)

on Dec 26, 2008

You know, Temescal, a friend wrote to me about this very thing.  This was my reply to him:

I was not referring to JU, nor to Brad himself, but to to the gaming industry. He might use his company's money (or maybe his own) to provide a discussion forum, but it is hardly altruistic.  He gets to deduct that money from his company's income (or his own) to reduce his tax burden; JU provides advertising for his company's products (the portal is Stardock remember), and his company (or he) benefits from income derived from the Google ads which are everywhere.  Moreover, he provides himself with a forum to spread his ideas and introduce his products to a targeted audience.

Now, it very well may be, in retrospect, that he foots the bill for the forum himself, but I do not agree that having an opinion about the usefuness of a product such as violent wargames, is being rude. This is a forum for discussion of ideas and opinions, not someone's home.

Be well.

 

 

 

on Dec 26, 2008

so much for free speech on the right.
I learned long ago that speech is free only if you happen to own the server on which it's hosted.

*Every* site has its prejudices and undergoes its own "natural selection" process. Most people whose opinions differ from the site norm simply fade away. I mean who needs the abuse, particularly when there's no thing that you can say that will change anyone else's opinion. It's only when someone refuses to see the "writing on the wall" that the need for an actual banning arises. In the end such bannings probably reduce the total amount of grief on both sides.

The mistake is that the internet is often viewed as a forum i.e. a medium for the open discussion of subjects of public interest when in fact it's really more of a platform for the expression of a specific self selected set of opinions as if they are fact.

If people at least acknowledge their own prejudices then that's about all you can hope for, but even that's usually too much to ask.

10 Pages1 2 3 4  Last