1% taxes VS the bottom 20% taxes WOW

reply to post by neo96

Hmmm.....a direct, unaportiorned tax on wages.....now what was it the constitution had to say about that?

Originally posted by neo96
Bs Half this country doesn't pay taxes.

www.huffingtonpost.com...

Seriously sitting there saying the bottom pays more in taxes?

Yeah someone who makes 30k a year is paying the more than a person who makes 100k

Freaking Ridiculous.

proportionally, they might actually be doing so. People who claim 51% of people (or whatever it is) pay no taxes tout a misleading figure - they do not pay federal income tax because they make too little money. They still pay state, local, and sales taxes...

Originally posted by mnemeth1
The rich pay low taxes because they are the business owners and producers.

Let me clue you in on something, you can't tax the rich.

Crap rolls down hill, and the working man is at the bottom.

Any tax on business will immediately be passed through in the form of higher prices.

Any tax on investors will immediately be passed on to the back of working people in the form of fewer PRODUCTIVE jobs. The State will simply spend the money on cronyism or adding more useless bureaucrats to its payrolls.

Fewer productive jobs means less people making washing machines and more people issuing parking tickets. Parking tickets do not improve people's lives. The washing machine on the other hand does.

edit on 5-2-2012 by mnemeth1 because: (no reason given)

I think this a bit of a questionable argument. There are many moderately wealthy people who own SME business, yes, but the number of people earning over 400,000 $pa (or whatever the threshold is for the 1%) are far more likely to be people working as executives within larger organisations rather than owners of businesses. Indeed, probably the most prolifically wealthy have part ownership in equity (stocks, et c) but not true 'ownership' like a person who has built a business from the ground up.

A low corporate tax is probably a good idea, but the argument that if you stopped taxing the biggest earners, that they would then indulge in a splurge of investment - probably just isn't that true, because the vast majority of highest earners don't have a large enough personal stake in their business to want to invest, nor do they probably have the funds to make a significant difference (i.e. a manager or more senior member at an investment bank, for instance, working inside of a large organisation will make alot of money, but will have neither the desire to invest it, nor probably even the means or will to receive that cash, since these businesses operate on such huge budgets...)

in any case, taxing just one single element of society is not going to be the solution to our problems. it is extremely difficult to operate or formulate a reasonably prudent budget however when the idea of taxation has become political anathema ... it is absurd.

reply to post by duality90

How about going back to the way our founding fathers intended as laid out in the constitution, tax the income of the big corperations and not ANYONES wages.

reply to post by MsAphrodite


I meant big business, not small businesses. I should have been more specific. I think small businesses, who keep a large portion of the middle class employed, should pay lower taxes. Those small businesses pay a higher tax rate than the mega international corporations who are more damaging to society.

I am in the private sector construction trade and its tough to keep a company running when you have to deal with ever increasing tax rates, insurance rates, licensing requirements and code requirements. A lot of construction companies have been going under in recent years not only due to the economic crisis, but as a result of what i described above.

Originally posted by ajay59
reply to post by duality90

 

How about going back to the way our founding fathers intended as laid out in the constitution, tax the income of the big corperations and not ANYONES wages.

Well, to be honest, if we did that (I don't think the founding father's were able to foresee the explosion of commercial growth with industry) the coffers would be broke. Many businesses and indeed many businesses with high turnover in the US are not subject to corporate tax as partnerships... I remember the WSJ saying in a recent article that something like 80% of all business in the US is not amenable to corporate taxes (presumably because they aren't actually corporations but one of the variety of partnerships that is permissible).

DOn't get me wrong, I obviously don't like losing my money to gov't, but taxation for as much of a pain in the bum as it can be, does have its uses.

reply to post by XPLodER


Maybe it's because I'm considered middle class but Oregon income tax is absolutely insane. It says Washington has one of the highest income tax burdens but um ... Washington doesn't have an income tax? This study makes no sense to me.

i would like to clarify an argument,
this is about how do you tax every evenly,
after all under law all should pay thier fair share,
this is where it gets complicated,

but my definition is everyone is free to succeed from a society,
those that succeed are not more human than those that dont,
ie all are still equal,
if it is concidered good for society to pay personal income taxes,
then the only fair way i can see is that you pay a percentage of your income as tax,
everybody is equally in percent paying their fair share,

then the argument goes, "but that means that the rich are paying more and that is unfair"
and "the rich create jobs"

and both arguments are correct to a point,

but the only fair way to proportion a tax is equally among those that have the ability to succeed and fail,
meaning all people are equal reguardless of how much money they have,

remember that success was in the society and from the society,

a second opinion is that corperations should be taxed on profits at a much higher rate than they are today,
the argument is that "the costs of doing business and paying the new tax will be levied on the population because costs are simply handed on",

IF THE PROFITS OF A CORP ARE TAXED then that is after every is accounted for,
so the only REAL reason to put up prices on goods and services is to increase after tax profits.
SIMPLY DEMAND THAT taxes are extracted in the PROFITS STAGE and before the BONUS STAGE.

no tax feed back loop.

while im at it,
why do speculators pay much less tax than drain layers?
or plumbers?

why are the "money changers" (speculators) who are non productive in the "real" economy allowed to profit of the acual work of labourers and savers while only paying minimal taxes?

some things to think about

xploder

Originally posted by Rockpuck
reply to post by XPLodER

 

Maybe it's because I'm considered middle class but Oregon income tax is absolutely insane. It says Washington has one of the highest income tax burdens but um ... Washington doesn't have an income tax? This study makes no sense to me.

i will respond with a question,

Income tax
No income tax in Washington State
Washington State does not have a personal or corporate income tax. However, persons that engage in business in Washington are subject to business and occupation and/or public utility tax. These taxes are based on gross receipts of the business.

wa.gov site

i beleive what you are seeing is the fact that washington has no DIRECT INCOME TAX,
but uses indirect taxes to the same effect,
i do understand some of this is quite complex.

as in some of the examples ONLY DIRECT INCOME TAX rates have been compiled by the authors, and the case of washington is a slightly different case as the tax law there is completly different.

if you would like i can try to explain the differences involved with DC

xploder

Originally posted by neo96
Bs Half this country doesn't pay taxes.

www.huffingtonpost.com...

Seriously sitting there saying the bottom pays more in taxes?

Yeah someone who makes 30k a year is paying the more than a person who makes 100k

Freaking Ridiculous.

This idea that poor are not paying any Federal income tax is a scam all by itself. I am broke. I have been broke. I have also been working. Let me tell you how it works, for a single guy, with no dependents.

Every week I get a paycheck. The Government, State and Federal, takes taxes out of each paycheck before I ever receive it. Then at the start of the year, I file my taxes. Because I am broke, I am entitled to a refund, but I never get back as much as I paid in. So in the end, the Federal Government is keeping some anyway. Just because I dont send them a check every year, does not mean I am not paying taxes.

Follow the links of the OP and you don't get very far. These "taxes" are never defined. If you want to talk about federal taxes, talk about federal taxes. If you want to talk state taxes, talk about state taxes. Here Washington is on the top of the list, yet it has no state income tax at all. So how does Washington get to the top of the list? You'd be hard pressed to tell from this graph. But don't think this graph is the final say in all this or that no one is going to question what is behind the numbers. I don't really care of you made less than $30K and "only" got back $8.00. What did you pay in? Not very much. Here's your average federal tax rates:



This pic shows the overall tax rate. What we ususally talk about is the "marginal" tax rate, the amount you pay for the next dollar you earn. here's how that works out: ATS doesn;t do tabkles very well so I'll get it as even as I can

Married Filing Jointly
Marginal Tax Brackets

Tax Rate Over But Not Over
10.0%--------- $0----------$17,000
15.0%------ $17,000------$69,000
25.0%------ $69,000-----$139,350
28.0%---- $139,350---- $212,300
33.0%---- $212,300-----$379,150
35.0%---- $379,150

So when you work all this out, how much do you pay?

100%: 139,960,580 returns paid taxes of $1,031,512mil for 100% AGI for 100% of taxes
Top 1%: 1,399,606 returns paid $392,149mil for 20.70% AGI for 38.02% of taxes
Top 5%: 6,998,029 returns paid $213,569mil for 34.73% AGI for 58.72% share
Top 10%: 13,996,068 returns paid $721,421mil for 45.77% AGI for 69.94% of taxes
Top 25%: 34,990,145 returns paid $890,614mil for 67.38% AGI for 86.34% of taxes
Top 50%: 69,980,290 returns paid $1,003,639mil for 87.25% AGI for 97.30% of taxes
Bottom 50%: 69,980,290 returns paid $27,783 mil for 12.75% AGI for 2.59% of taxes.

Now if you want to argue that the poor pay more in other kinds of taxes, by all means let's go after them, but NO ONE is going to mingle state and federal taxes--ever. Deal with the taxing authority. The funny thing about Washington is that it has a high sales tax, above 8% total, but no sales tax on food. It has one of the lowest property taxes in the country at 1% + special levies Its gas tax is among the highest in the nation, but what are all these other taxes? You can't tell because these guys don't show their work. And if they don't show their work, they're suspect from the word go.

So when I hear that you want MORE taxes from me, when at a Federal level my group pays about 70% of all income taxes and the bottom half pay a whopping 3%, I say NO. You've stolen quite enough from me already.

reply to post by XPLodER


Business and occupation taxes are gross income taxes for businesses (and are extremely low).

Washington has absolutely no income tax. There is a 8%+ sales tax on consumer goods (excluding food stuff) and property tax.

So how can Washington be on the top? Makes no sense? Where as Oregon is way down at the bottom when they have the second highest personal income tax in the nation (including the poor) as well as the second highest corporate tax. Personally I have to write a huge check every year to those bastards.. I end up paying about as much in Oregon Income tax than I do Federal income tax. Even the poor don't get refunds from Oregon, they pay a higher percentage than most of the country .. that's a fact .. so where is this site getting it's facts from?

reply to post by schuyler


Great info!

Washington does have a high sales tax (I live in Washington, work in Oregon) but compared to other states it's over all taxes are incredibly low. For instance I used to live in Ohio, where they had an income tax and each city made their own sales tax. The city I lived in was 8.3%, actually higher than most of Washington (I know Seattle is 9.5%) and I had to pay income tax ontop of that. As for businesses and the wealthy Washington has been pulling business from Oregon and California at an impressive rate.. they are one of the fastest growing economies in the nation, Oregon on the other hand raised taxes significantly 2 years ago on anyone making over $50k a year, and even more for businesses. I'm so lost on how this site claims Washington is a tax hostile state when it's one of the best states to live in for tax purposes.

reply to post by schuyler


i must amit the more i follow the info the "holes" i find,
the fact that the perameters are not well defind and the more i look the more discrencies make this look like a selected data set,

or a fabrication of statistics and selective definition of taxes

i have said i wound not have believed it if i hadent seen it,

i am now starting to see that this data could have been scewed for the benifit of the audience,

i am having serious doubts this is acual factual or correct,

in a way im glad this is NOT the case for americans,
as the figuars tend to show that the poor were being horriably soaked by unevenly applied taxes (unequally proportioned)

mmm

xploder

reply to post by XPLodER


The fact is, across the country, the poor pay very, very, very low taxes. But they are effected more by sales taxes than wealthier people because it's a percentage of the consumed item. But, if you're poor, how much can you really spend on consumer goods to put a huge dent in your income? If you lose say 8% of your income in sales taxes you would have had to spend 92% of your entire net income on consumer goods (not including food)? In most cases the poor actually make money off of taxes.. once credits and deductions are counted they usually end up with far more than they paid in. Not so for the middle class.

The wealthy pay a higher percentage than the poor in practically all cases, however, they usually pay significantly less than middle income workers. Usually the wealthy pay less because they make most of their income from capital gains taxes, but most of their tax savings come from loopholes and evasion that the middle class and poor cannot. That site is a lot of misinformation, but I get what they're trying to say.. even if it's an unethical way of saying it.

Taxing wages is immoral!!


A fair pay for a fair days work!....End of!!



Tax electrical gadgets like phones, ipods, laptops and playstations!!


Tax all luxury goods to the hilt!.....Luxury cars, boats , holidays and clothing!!.....TAX the effing lot to the HILT!!!!


But do not touch my wage I get from exchanging my sweat and blood!!

reply to post by Rockpuck

The wealthy pay a higher percentage than the poor in practically all cases, however, they usually pay significantly less than middle income workers. Usually the wealthy pay less because they make most of their income from capital gains taxes, but most of their tax savings come from loopholes and evasion that the middle class and poor cannot. That site is a lot of misinformation, but I get what they're trying to say.. even if it's an unethical way of saying it.

so would it be fair to say that the poor are disavantaged from not having the income to afford to look for loopholes and because their income was smaller they could not exploit the loopholes as much as the rich.

well that would show a BIAS against fair taxes by way of volume of income allowing for etensive loophole dollar value discrepencies.

close the loopholes and therfore the need for the expensive tax atternies.

i must admit to disagring with fake "shock" infografics to get a message accross,

but from our discustions i know now the problem lies in the loopholes and the people using them.
and the inability for everyone to use them equally
hence the name "loophole" instead of "tax law"

xploder

reply to post by XPLodER


Why would the poor need loopholes to begin with? They don't pay much taxes to begin with? They make money from taxes, credit etc.. they get refunds. They are "disadvantaged" in the simple fact that they're poor and have less money.. but for tax purposes they have it made.

The middle class is severely disadvantaged because they don't get half as many credit and rebates as the poor and the wealthy, and they also lack the resources to find the loopholes like the wealthy. I have no sympathy for the poor or the rich when it comes to taxes.

Originally posted by Rockpuck

I have no sympathy for the poor

Is that you, Mitt?