A very interesting question Afaust.

I don't think Scott Adams has lost any measurable earnings from having controversal views. But I also think its an apples and oranges comparison.  Scott Adams is literally the force behind Dilbert.  By contrast, I am one person of ~60 people at Stardock. Those 60 people have lots of different opinions.

To put it in perspective, it would be like someone not buying Microsoft Office 2007 because Bill Gates expresses some political belief (like support for very high estate taxes) that others don't agree with. 

Even if it was costing sales, I wouldn't stop writing what I want to write about.

JeremyG, I am taxed substantially more than everyone else.  My federal income tax rate is 35% already.  There are those who think that it should be even higher.

Feel free to name these tricks.  I always hear about these tricks from people who, naturally, just happen to not be able to use them.  Since you are so certain they exist, please specificlaly name some so I can take it up with my accountant.

How easy it is for you to say that when you pay a tiny fraction of what I pay for in taxes.

Moreover, if you read carefully what I wrote, the problem is the obliviousness of people to the fact that our society relies on people like me to drive it economically.

How many  jobs are lost if people like me cut their hours back in response to tax increases?  It's rarely measured because it's poorly understood.  Even as-is, without a tax increase, if I lowered the number of hours I worked to say 45 hours per week, I would have to lay off approximately 5 employees because of the decrease in revenue our company made.  Because our employees are so sharp, they'd find new jobs.  But that would still tighten the labor market ever so slightly. 

But imagine if say 100,000 of people like me did the same thing, how you're talking 500,000 lost jobs (or even more since there are plenty of people who dwarf what I produce).

No Texas Wahine, your husband doesn't work for the government 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year.

Secondly, your husband is paid for his services, correct?  You may have noticed the title of my article: SLAVERY for the government.  The hours I mentioned "working" for the government were unpaid. Slavery.

Cacto writes:

This represents a world view in which propserity is a zero-sum game.  Which is not the case. There isn't some queue for prosperity. The domestic capital in Jakarta would have almost certainly occurred anyway -- except it would have been ADDED to the Chinese capital to provide even greater prosperity. The idea that people sit on their hands waiting their turn to have a bite at the apple of prosperity is more sad than absurd but still both.

It would be like saying someone out there is just waiting for me to get out of the way to start up their own JoeUser site. That if only I'd take JoeUser down, some other "Entrepreneur" would finally have their opportunity to set up their own blog community to replace it.  Which is, of course, nonsense. The market doesn't work like that.  If JU went down, it would go down. The people would go and find some other existing site and new sites would emerge organically as they would have otherwise.

Another problem with the belief that it's a zero-sum game is the idea that entrepreneural people are simply waiting their chance to put up something as good or better than what is there.  In basic market economics, the best product or service will normally win in the long term.  If that leading product goes away, then sure, a new product may come in to replace it but by definition it won't be as good or better as the original product because if it were, it would have been released in competition.

It should be pretty obvious that what you say isn't the case.  If you wiped out every player in the NBA, you would certainly be able to "replace" the players. But the new players would not be as good as the old ones (because if they were, they'd have been in the NBA already).  But your belief seems to indicate that there's these great second-tier basketball players who are just as good but just need the opportunity to play which is nonsense.

You then say:

That's why you're an "impoverished journo", Cacto.  Because you not only don't understand economics but you don't understand humanity very well.  Managers != entrepreneurs. Perhaps you should do some profiles on successful business owners sometime.

In addition, what you don't realize is that what I describe happens in the real world. I know because I've spoken to many successful business people who, reaching a certain level, simply pull back because there are too many disincentives for them to keep working so hard.

This is just an asanine statement.  What kind of discussion would we have if every topic discussed in which someone disagrees with a governmental policy or whatever was to tell them to move?  What about the people who want universal health care? Why not tell them to just move to Canada. How constructive would that be?  Besides the obnoxiousness of your statement, the argument is simply stupid. Less stressful to relocate ones family to another country is less stressful?

If you think I'm whining, then I feel sorry for you for not having the capability to read the underlying statement. So I'll spell it out: Don't worry about me. I'll be fine.  But the reality is, as opposed to your socialist fantasy, is that at some threshold, people will work less than and it will cost jobs and no, someone else won't step up to replace them because if there were these people, they'd be attempting to do so right now. 

Moreover, all human beings have a threshold of when they feel something is no longer worth the effort.  My post is not a "whine" it is an attempt to communicate with those who see "the rich" as an endless source of golden eggs that that is not the case. That at some point, they will kill that goose.

Taxes are a disincentive to work. 

My post was written so that people could recognize these fundamental truths:

1. That most wealthy people are wealthy because they work far more than the average person.
2. The real-world effect of existing progressive taxation
3. People don't consider the unintended consequences of their beliefs

Cacto, I think you're an intelligent guy but I also think that you aren't able to make the distinction between intelligence and experience.

Statisticlaly you're wrong, Mason.  You can claim to work 100 hours per week. But it doesn't change the fact that on average, the top 10% in income earners work substantially more hours per week than the rest of the population.

There are only two variables in effect here that I'm trying (and failing) to communicate:

1st are the number of hours per week someone is LABORING. Not on call (I'm on call 24/7 too TW, but I don't claim to be working 24/7. I do sleep, eat, and even occasionally bathe but I don't claim I'm working when I do those things).

Secondly, the rate, as a percentage, that someone's labor is being taxed.

What I write here applies just as much to the factory worker who does double shifts as it does to me. In a typical week in the Winter, I will work between 60 and 70 hours per week. If my taxes come out to be 50% of what I earn, that means I am forcibly working (you do understand this TW? Not volunteering for the military but literal forced servitude) for the government 30 to 35 hours during that time.

Similarly, the factory worker pulling double shifts on a regular basis who ends up up doing 60 hours per week is likely paying close to 45% (nearly the same) and hence is laboring for the government nearly 30 hours per week.

But our economy -- our current way of life -- as a society absolutely rests on the assumption that the tiny % of people who do a disproportinate amount of the actual labor keep working. If they cut back, odds are that there will not be people to pick up the slack or who can do what they do as well (depending on the job).

That is why when people argue we should raise taxes, they do not recognize the unintended consequences of what they advocate. At some threshold, people decide it isn't worth it.

To use a military example -- what percent of current military volunteers would still have volunteered if they the minimum deployment was 6 years? My guess is would be some percentage considerably less than 100%. And what would happen to our military if it were that percentage smaller or less effective? And yet would anyone deny that this is precisely what would happen if the government decided that deployments would be at least 6 years and nothing less?

Which is the same as it is in the private sector. If the government were to decide that if I wanted to continue to make what I currently make I would need to work more hours, there is some threshold where I might value my free time more than the material gain from working.

If I currently work 30 hours a week for the government without a choice and then was sold that now I would have to work 35 hours per week, I suspect I and many others would simply pull back. The hardest working factory workers might pull fewer shifts. I might decide to work a little less, lay off a few workers to deal with the decreased revenue, and take up gardening as a hobby.

It always saddens me how quickly liberals are to fall into class warfare arguments. They see my post and think "Oh, poor rich boy" without recognizing that my argument is about labor, not wealth.