They do, and they will continue to do so under every tax plan out there. Fuzzy math. Under a 10% flat tax someone making 1,000,000 would have $900,000, not $990,000, left over. That means he/she would pay $100,000. Seems like a good chunk to me. I'll give it a shot. Because it's unfair. Progressive taxation is complete arbitrary, what constitutes fair? 40%? 60%? At what point does it become unfair? You know, if you want to get all nit-picky, a flat tax isn't even the absolute fairest taxation out there. The most strict definition of fair would be every paying the same amount, say $5,000, regardless of income. That's fair. A flat tax ensures that those who make more, pay more. And it sends the lobbyists packing their bags by removing distortions in the tax code. I make under $50K and I invest.
How about rolling back the self-employment penalty, hmmmm? I'm about to join the ranks of the self-employed, and my reward is going to be paying a 15% payroll tax, instead of 7.65%. Even if you throw in the corporate contribution, there's still a 1.5% penalty for being self-employed. Cut THAT back, and then we can talk. We had out this whole argument before, on a different thread. My tax cut is under $500. I paid that much to my landlord this year when my rent increased. When Bush actually talks about anything that'll put more money in my pocket, then I'll be all ears. But he's not going to. Not one thin dime. And I'll keep on voting against him and everything he does and everything he stands for. I don't mind him taking my money. I really mind him taking my money, giving it to Colin, and then telling me I benefit from it.
I hope you're emphasizing "for the most part" 'cause the rest is insulting and ************************ to boot. I'm sick of working shods buying into the plutocratic lie spewed by both parties.
A portion of the "rich" have their money from inheritance. 95% of the rest got their money because they worked hard and/or were smart. There is nothing insulting about that statement unless of course you are jealous of people who have money. Andy
Not fuzzy math. It was a typo. I meant to write $900,000. And $100,000 for someone making a cool million isn't as significant a drop in the bucket as $1,000 is for someone making $10k, or as signficnant as $5,000 is for someone making $50k. How would it be fair for EVERYONE to pay $5k, regardless of income? That doesn't even make sense. You're definitely an exception. Most people who make less that that amount do not invest. Look, I hate paying taxes. But I know that's part of what it takes to keep a government running. And we are the government. Each and every citizen.
Wait, you talk about getting a tax cut but then also said that there is no more money in your pocket, which is it? There is certainly more money that you would have without the tax cut. Stop by my seat at a United game and I'll buy you a beer to make up for it. I'd like to point out that tax cuts don't give me any of your money, rather they just let me keep more of mine, but I'm not sure that matters to you.
That's why most flat tax plans would exempt the first 30K or so of income. Fair means treating everyone exactly the same. Think about it. And if I thought we were at a point where government was hurting so bad that it didn't have enough money to achieve its critical tasks, I'd have some sympathy. But the government operates on a budget of something on the order of 2 trillion dollars. That's mind-boggling, a thousand billion dollars. You're going to have to work pretty hard to convince me that they're a charity case that would put the money to better use than I could. Remember, we're not talking about repealing taxes, we're talking about cutting them. I'll still pay tax regardless and life, I'm pretty sure, will still go on.
I have money. I got lucky and happened to get into the computer field because I loved working with the things, and then, all of a sudden out of the blue, people wanted to throw money at me for it. I'm making a decent wage, and I feel it is my responsibility to pay more, as in a higher percentage, of my income in taxes. The republicans continue to believe that anyone without money is a drain on the economy and as such should be trampled underfoot by those of us who were lucky enough to rise above the median income in salary. The republicans also continue to believe that a representative government has nothing to do with the people it represents, and that somehow the government is separate from the people and should therefore be shunned. The republicans continue to believe that paying taxes to support the government is not a duty, but a burden. Those attitudes are an ugly combination of disgusting and insulting.
Most of the people I know with money are smart and have worked hard. I have no idea (outside of blind jealousy) why you think that if people who have money are smart and work hard, that automatically means that people who don't have money are dumb and lazy. There are plenty of people who don't have money who perform incredibly hard (both with either their minds or physically or both) jobs including teachers, and policemen etc etc etc and I am sure they would not appreciate you calling them dumb and lazy. Andy
Where did you get this 95% figure? What study was it from and how did they calculate what constituted "working hard or being smart"? Is it possible that there are people in this country who are smart and work hard but are not rich?
So I still don't know what your problem is. I will list my thoughts one more time and then you can tell me what your issues are 1) I believe most people who have money earned it by being either smart, hard working or both 2) I believe there are plenty of people who are smart and or hard working or both who don't have money due to the field they chose to do their work in. I don't get what is so out of whack with these thoughts that you have to resort to name calling. Andy
Here's your quote again that peaked my ire: "No, for the most part, they got rich because they were smarter and worked harder than the next guy." What's wrong with this picture? I for one, know abstractly the demographics of rich, middle and poor in this country. Now, if we were an income-quintile-flattened demographic your statement would not pose a problem. However, today there is a very small, very rich elite, a shrinking middle and a growing working-class to poor quintile. Think about it. Your implication is that to be rich today one must be smart and/or have worked hard. Knowing that, there really aren't that many rich people in comparison to "the next guy" as you say. Other than that, I work hard, think I'm smart and I wish I made more money. I should just give up now.
95% of wealth in America is owned by just over 3000 families. That tells me that the truly rich do have their money mostly through inheritance.
I am sorry this disturbs you so much but it is how I feel. It is why I continue to educate myself and continue to put in a ton of hours at work. I figure by doing both I am going to have a higher chance of retiring early and paying for my daughters college education (my two main financial goals), than if I did not. Andy
Bill Gates, Paul Allen, Larry Ellison, Philip Anschuntz, John Kluge, Michael Dell, Jerry Yang, Pierre Omidyar, Warren Buffet, Steven Ballmer, H Ty Warner and a huge amount of others would find this comment interesting to say the least. Andy
Fuzzy logic. Given that the necessities of life will cost the same for the rich and the poor, that $100,000 hit to the millionaire does not hurt as much as the $2,000 hit to the $20,000 MLS rookie. If you're going to go all the way to the insane lunatic fringe, the least you could do is send a postcard. Although it would be refreshing to see someone campaign on a poll tax. Newborn babies and millionaires would both pay not merely the same rate, but the same amount. Although this would be political suicide, it does show a flaw in plutocratic thinking towards taxes. "Fair" does not necessarily mean "identical." Is now a good time to point out that the stock market is just Las Vegas with more expensive hookers?
OK. $3,000 is a lot more valuable to someone making $30k than $100,000 is to someone making a million. A flat tax plan is simply unfair to the poor. Is a progressive tax plan unfair to the rich? Possibly, but they have more disposable income, so can therefore can afford to pay more tax. No, fair means treating everyone in a way that makes sense within their income level. There's no thinking about it that will EVER convince me that a flat tax is a workable or good idea. Oh please. The government indeed wastes money, but that is YOU wasting money. We live in a country with a representative government, one in which we, the people, ARE the government. And yes, in spite of the propaganda Rush Limbaugh sends out over the airwaves, it does take two trillion dollars to run the federal government. Mind-boggling? Yep, but that's the way it is. I really get sick of this attitude that somehow the government is not the citizenry, but is somehow against the citizenry. It's downright un-American and unpatriotic. We're talking about cutting taxes during economically rough times, when unemployment rates are high and the budget surplus is gone. So we're going to cut taxes and go into a deeper deficit and this is going to help the economy how? I don't believe that "trickle down economics" can work. I don't believe it ever has worked. I don't believe it ever will work.
And yet most people believe the Republican Big Lie that the rich pay most of the taxes. Everybody pays the 15%, either directly or indirectly. The poor and middle-class pay suffer from a huge tax burden and may never receive a penny in SS benefits, especially if they're young.
The following article has some data about this issue. Lots of interesting factoids. http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/business/65709_rich09.shtml "The wealthiest 5 percent pay more than half, but people in the bottom half pay just 4 percent." "For 1999, the most recent year for which complete Internal Revenue Service statistics are available, 6.3 million taxpayers whose incomes were in the top 5 percent paid more than 55 percent of all income taxes. They had incomes above $120,846 a year -- meaning two spouses could each earn a bit more than $60,000 and be considered among the nation's richest." "The wealthiest 1 percent -- those earning $293,415 and up -- paid more than a third of the taxes" "Looking ahead, the 10-year, $1.35 trillion tax cut enacted last year reduces income taxes in three steps, with the final step coming in 2006. In that year, according to the congressional Joint Committee on Taxation, taxpayers earning more than $100,000 a year will pay almost 59 percent of all income taxes." Andy