Left/Right ending the Bush tax cuts on the wealthy/ the Buffet tax

[JanS]

excuse me..I distract from the topic..no..I’m just responding to someone who throws in “Obama is responsible for everything that affects this country” every single post.

Superiority and sarcasm..a great combo. No matter what one says about it, if they don’t agree with you, they’re wrong, and you belittle them. What’s the point? It won’t change your mind.

Oh, and it’s a public forum…it takes twists and turns at times…like irrelevant things like the title of the thread…get over it.

Done…gone !..whoosh !

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[kootchman]

He promised to end it. He didn’t. He promised unemployment below 8 per cent if he was given a trillion. It didn’t happen. He diverted stimulus money to reward donors and special interest groups. We have reached that point where we have to make cuts in the grand entitlement state. His gimmicks are thin and they don’t pass scrutiny. It’s like having a credit card debt of 10 million, and having a gross income of a million, and trying to get square with a part time job as a Wal Mart greeter. That is the Obama stick it to the rich plan, It makes no economic sense. You won’t even make the interest payments. If he raised the 5 billion a year.. by raising the tax rate on the wealthy. The net effect? Nothing. We will pay more on the debt. The pain in the left is palpable.. they elected an unqualified candidate. It shows. They cannot come up with a plan that makes sense that does not involve massive cuts in entitlements. Including, a massive reset in defined federal pension plans. Every party has an ending. Obama has admitted his tax the rich is not a solution,.. it’s just a “fairness” appeal…. I want to see a plan. It’s not just the politicians that lack the courage.. it’s an electorate that plugs their ears and refuses to hear what is true. The only horse in the stable that can solve the problem is that engine of private enterprise. Jan.. if he was all that qualified… we would be better off than we were…. he is not the Messiah. He comes from a long long list of political hacks who appeal to the lowest common denominator.. something for nothing.

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[kootchman]

Maybe we have passed a trillion so far we have lost the concept; So.. what I want to hear is… from the left.

this is a trillion dollars

It would take 44,080 eighteen-wheel trucks carrying a load of 25 tons each to transport a trillion dollars (in single bills. It would take 1 2per cent of all the tractor trailers registered in the USA to haul the national debt Thats a line of trucks 626 miles long…filled with dollar bills. The total federal deficit would be over 1800 miles long…about 200 miles short of Chicago. That is just for the last three and 1/2 years… OK liberals… his tax increases on millionaires MIGHT raise 8 billion… his Buffett rule. How big is 15 trillion dollars? 15 trillion $1 bills, laid end to end, side to side, would pave every interstate, highway, and country road in America—twice. Now… how are you going to solve it?

The Buffett Plan.. 8 billion dollars… i billion = 1102 tons, space… means one tractor trailer carries 25 tons. …. that’s 44 tractor trailers.. times eight … average length, 75 feet… 44 x 8 = 352 tractor trailers… 352(75 feet) = 26400 feet / 5280 ft per mile = that is about 5 miles… you couldn’t get to Mercer Island.

There ya go…that’s the magnitude of the problem. Remember half of us don’t pay any income taxes. How do you solve it from a liberal progressive side….. or is waiting until the inevitable happens a viable strategy? Just ignore and add 7 trillion more?

My point and click calculator may have manual entry errors,.. sooo

http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_much_does_a_billion_one_dollar_bills_weigh

http://www.defeatthedebt.com/understanding-the-national-debt/millions-billions-trillions/

http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_much_does_one_trillion_dollars_weigh

Denial is not a river in Egypt

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[JV]

No answer then, huh Jan? I’m not blaming you, there isn’t one because the math on more taxes doesn’t work.

Ready to start looking at spending cuts yet?

Or just take the Obama approach; wait for somebody else to propose a serious budget then attack it.

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[JoB]

Skeeter..

tax day put hubby and i clearly in the top whatever percent.. not high enough to be in the top 1%, not high enough to shield our capital gains, but high enough that had we had more than standard deductions to fly we would likely have been caught by the alternative minimum tax.

So.. explain to me why we should pay a larger percentage of our income in taxes than say Warren Buffet.. or .. than my best friend and her husband who make twice what we cleared this year?

Therein lies the problem.

We Americans were asked to sacrifice tax income from the rich so that they could use those funds to produce jobs.

anyone who thinks that actually worked needs a major reality check.

Today i heard an alarming figure.. approximately half of Americans are either seriously poor, working poor or income insecure..

the correlation between the increase in wealth of the top 1% and the siphoning of wealth and financial security from the middle class is alarming at best.

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[JoB]

kootch..

you know, it’s funny. You never talk about revenue production.. just spending cuts…

and then only if those spending cuts don’t support the bottom line of corporate America.

I’ll gladly match you spending cuts for revenue production as long as we leave those that benefit the 50% of Americans who now rely on government programs for basic survival alone.

JV…

I am so over your need to be spoken to in the manner you think you should be spoken to being more important than the actual issues.

i honestly didn’t realize you didn’t have a basic grasp of them

or i would never have engaged in this little exercise.

no misdirection..

just some direct questions for you.

Can you explain to me why hubby and i should pay a substantially larger percentage of our hard earned income in taxes than say Warren Buffet… or my best friend and her husband who currently make about twice what we do?

Can you explain to me why the Republicans in congress refuse to end the Bush Tax Cut ..

you do understand what a tax cut means, don’t you? …

for the wealthy in spite of the fact that it is not producing the results it was tendered to produce?

Just those two questions

answered without once blaming the democrats or Obama

Yes… i know it’s a challenge

but do your best

i promise to attend to your efforts regardless of the language you use.

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[JoB]

JV..

this math on more taxes crap is crap.

No-one is asking the wealthy to pay more than they did before the tax cuts engineered by President Bush to stimulate the economy and create jobs.

tax cuts that should have expired twice.

as for the idea that creating revenue

it’s called tax revenue by the way

won’t change a thing?

tell me.. does that work in your house?

I am guessing if your income goes up

one of two things happens

either you spend more

or your bottom line gets healthier

it’s that way for the good old USA too.

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[redblack]

Maybe their plan can work if we tax the rich 200%!!

JV: AHH HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!!!1!!1!

ahem.

sorry.

my god, that was funny.

maybe our plan could work if you would stop pretending that you guys can cut $1.1 trillion from a $3.6 trillion budget AND pay down the debt that you guys racked up.

here’s the issue, and i want you to address it directly. no obfuscation. no bullshite:

even if you cut $1.1 trillion from the federal budget, you will never cut enough to pay down the debt.

to simplify this for you, since you guys seem long on polemics and short on mathematics:

in order to fulfill the “tea party’s” campaign promises and stated goals, you need to balance the budget AND pay down the debt. in other words, the federal budget needs to shrink to around $2 trillion.

i want

specific.

effing.

answers.

[picture me banging my giant union thug ham-fist on your desk here]

on how you will cut a $3.6 trillion budget by $1.6 trillion.

did i say that enough? did i use the <bold> tag enough?

no more generalizations about how the government is too big, or how liberals tax and spend.

MAN UP. give me numbers. give me specifics. tell me what you would cut.

do it, or you’re fired.

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[JanS]

JV…here is my answer…read my post #26..it concludes with “Done…gone !..whoosh !”

I was talking about me…

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[JoB]

skketer

i was too tired last night to do any dipping for a better fact filled article for you.. so i pulled this one this morning.

I am sure there are better articles.. but this one is full of tables and analysis… even if it was the the first article on my search of .. Bush tax cut how did it work? …

http://www.tax.com/taxcom/taxblog.nsf/permalink/chas-89lpz9

it’s not light reading bu the bottom line adds up to billions :(

and that was before the proverbial s..t hit the fan cutting the middle class contribution to our tax revenue. this analysis covers only the first year of the great recession…

current conservative figures double the number of Americans now living in poverty.

take time to click on the pdf for the wage analysis.. it’s sobering.

“The tax cuts did not spur investment. Job growth in the George W. Bush years was one-seventh that of the Clinton years. Nixon and Ford did better than Bush on jobs. Wages fell during the last administration. Average incomes fell. The number of Americans in poverty, as officially measured, hit a 16-year high last year of 43.6 million, though a National Academy of Sciences study says that the real poverty figure is closer to 51 million. Food banks are swamped. Foreclosure signs are everywhere. Americans and their governments are drowning in debt. And at the nexus of tax and healthcare, Republican ideas perpetuate a cruel and immoral system that rations healthcare — while consuming every sixth dollar in the economy and making businesses, especially small businesses, less efficient and less profitable.

This is economic madness. It is policy divorced from empirical evidence. It is insanity because the policies are illusory and delusional. The evidence is in, and it shows beyond a shadow of a reasonable doubt that the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts failed to achieve the promised goals. “

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[JoB]

JanS…

No! No! I will haunt your balcony and sing protest songs in the dark if you leave.

a cat howling in heat would be preferable ;->

charla already blinked out on most of these conversations

if you do so we will all have to drink more just to converse…

come to think of it.. happy hour isn’t such a bad solution ;)))

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[skeeter]

JoB- Warren Buffet pays a smaller percentage of taxes than you and I because the majority of his income comes from dividends. The income was taxed once at the corporate level (35%) and then taxed again at the investor level (15%.) The total effective tax rate is 44.75%.

Calculation: Corporation earns $100. Corporation pays $35 in income tax. Corporation has $65 remaining. Corporation pays dividend of $65 to investor. Investor pays 15% income tax ($9.75.) Total tax is $44.75 on $100 of pretax earnings.

I’m not saying it’s right. I’m not saying it’s wrong. But the primary reason for cutting taxes on qualified dividends is because the earnings are taxed twice – once at the corporate level and again at the individual level.

The other income category with earnings capped at 15% at the individual level is capital gains. Capital gains have had lower tax rates than earned income for many decades. The thinking in Congress is that free flow of capital is essential to job creation and capital investment. Again not saying it’s right or wrong, but that is the thinking.

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[JoB]

skeeter..

i understand the rationalization. it’s the same process that allowed my friend and her husband to pay less on more.

and no.. that doesn’t make it right.

the increased tax rate on higher incomes was intended to compensate for the difference between the way wage earners are taxed and those who make their money investing their assets are taxed.

the Bush tax cuts undercut that.

We really don’t mind paying our fair share. In fact, when we gulped at the amount of our tax burden this year.. hubby quipped that we had joined the ranks of the 2%.. the bottom end of the 2% to be sure.. but still… we are fortunate.

As for the reasoning behind taxing capital gains at a different rate …

if taxing capital gains at a lower rate actually resulted in investment in American job creation and capital investment as it once did …

i would have no problem with that..

but it no longer does.

and btw.. the dissonance in effective tax on income isn’t as simple as wages versus capital gains because those with assets have more access to tax strategies that reduce the amount they are taxed on their wage income as well as the amount they are taxed on their capital gains.

my friend and her husband earn most of their income the old fashioned way…

but reduce that income substantially with the expenses from a couple of side businesses…

Paying our tax bill this year has convinced me that it is time we invested in a few tax strategies of our own ;(

I am a happy renter.. i really don’t want to own another house. Home ownership hasn’t been a good gamble for us. But it looks like i am once again househunting :(

and not in West Seattle :(

I am not a happy camper.

btw.. i have one other observation to make

it has been my observation in a lifetime of working with charitable causes that there is a direct correlation between the percentage of one’s actual income one donates to charity and the percentage of that income they pay to taxes…

i know.. the rich give far more in way of actual dollars to causes large and small.. but the real backbone of boots on the ground charitable giving is the little engine that could…

the middle income American taxpayer.

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[kootchman]

Back to the issue. JoB you and hubby would be paying 15 per cent.. if..your income was derived from capital gains. You would be an investor. My capital gains comes from after tax income. That is, after I was hooked once, I get hooked again. Why are you paying more? Because you have a progressive, 87,000 page tax code. It is full of exceptions, all manner of things, A simple, enforceable tax flat tax. Too many “progressives” are shielded from the consequences of their decisions. They whine and whine about “fairness”. Keep federal spending low, your taxes are low. Ya want all the government benefits, programs, .. pay for them. You all want the programs, you just want others to pay for them. It’s the foundation of the Democratic Party. Forget about trying to talk to liberals about the role of capital formation and jobs. The don’t get it. When given the truth,,, the stark reality of how it really is… the conversation of substance stops. You want to tax away the very foundation of the jobs you have, and the retirement you may live to enjoy. You are eating the seed corn in the midst of a poor harvest… and then what? Beyond todays meal…? Leave it to everyone that follows behind you to figure it out… you got yours. 16 Trillion… how ya gonna fix it? You cannot tax your way out of it,, it’s too big. Did ya ever consider that during the “Blame Bush Era”… growth was so crappy because like the current administration…. deficits spending reigned supreme. Ethanol or Solyndra take yer pick… both were useless, market defying pork. You think it’s bad now eh? Another 5 trillion in deficits will make it better? My problem is we have one budget… the Senate has broken federal law by not having one in over 3 years. We have two options.. support the Ryan plan, don’t support the Ryan plan. As it stands, no plan or the Ryan plan? I will support the Ryan plan. Got no other options. Murray and Cantwell want nothing to do with a budget.. they are content to let er’ slide. No Senate Democrat wants to go on record that some cuts have to made. Republicans have been burned before..they raise taxes, congress spends it faster and they are not going to raise taxes one cent… until there is some meaningful cuts.

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[skeeter]

JoB – are you saying you are going to buy a house just for the tax deduction even though you are happy renting? That makes no sense to me. For every dollar in interest you spend, you will reduce your taxes by a maximum of 35 cents. You’re still 65 cents in the hole in the best case scenario. Just say no!!

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[kootchman]

JoB and interestingly enough your observations are contradicted by statistics. Conservatives, and the wealthy pay far more as percentage of income than liberals or the middle class. Cited it before. You are my dear, a rare exception. You make co-existence with progressives a good thing ( as long as you are about 1% of the voting population :-; ) I run a business exactly as a counter tax strategy to higher income salaries..lots and lots of ways to duck the taxman. Most importantly though… I can direct my charitable giving. On the grandest scale… that is exaclty what all those foundations do… they don’t trust passing along billions to the federal government…. Buffet or Gates, Annenberg, Pew, are all tax dodgers… they don’t trust the government anymore than the middle income taxpayer that gives the Salvation Army a couple of grand a year, or their church 10% of the pre-tax income…. The Salvation Army isn’t funding Solyndra….

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[JanS]

JoB…yes, Happy Hour is so much more fun than some other things I can think of. I am not leaving the fora…but I am not going to participate in a discussion where the title of the discussion is the first topic, and I am not going to participate na discussion with anyone who simply feels that the rest of us peons do not, and never will , know what we”re talking about. Head on brick wall..is more appealing. If you notice..there are maybe 4-7 people who participate in these discussions, no more. It’s the same people. The rest of the lurkers on here do not even bother, and that disturbs me. Why don’t they? Because they know better. If they say something they will be belittled, or called a twit, as I was, or treated sarcastically. So, what’s the point. Sorry to whoever is reading this, it’s off topic. In the end, we don’t change anyone’s min. In other words…me leave these forums? Blasphemy, lady! lol..but this thread? oh, yeah..

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[JV]

Redblack, that union thug bit is some frightening stuff! Out of sheer fear, I will answer your question! =)

“How do you cut 1.6 trillion?” First, I’d take 10% off of every federal program as the starting point. No exceptions. Even Defense spending.

Next I would work on a bi-partisan plan to raise the retirement age by 2 or 3 years. Like the Paul Ryan plan, it wouldn’t change for people over 50.

There isn’t an easy answer, and you can’t just cut, you have to broaden the tax base. You also have to bring more people into the “tax payer” line, and get them out of the “gov’t check” line. When 50% of our country pays no federal income tax, that’s a problem. Well, it’s a problem for America anyway…it seems to be working fine for the political party who relies on class warfare for votes.

Those are just a few things for starters. Redblack, I’m sure you were taking the Obama strategy of waiting for somebody to propose a plan so you can attack it, so have at it.

But you should try answering questions too once in a while. I’m curious to hear your answer on how much you think “the rich” should have to pay. Do you think that the top 10% should pay more than the 70% they currently pay? Don’t you think it’s an obvious lie when politicians say the rich aren’t paying their fair share?

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[JV]

Jan, we will miss your thoughtful input on this topic.

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[redblack]

skeeter: you cited the statutory corporate tax rate, which is 34%.

the effective corporate tax rate is less than half of that.

and corporate taxes account for around 10% of total federal revenue.

JV:

When 50% of our country pays no federal income tax, that’s a problem.

you guys keep repeating this, and i keep telling you that every single person who earns a paycheck in this country pays income tax, FICA, and medicare.

it should disturb you that 49% of income-earners get a tax refund equal to or greater than their withheld taxes, though, because that means that we have a nation where almost half of us live at or below the poverty line.

but go ahead. tax those at the bottom who earn small enough incomes that their tax burdens are lower than the standard deduction. do you know how much aggregate income and wealth they have – and therefore what a paltry sum it would add to the revenue stream?

all that does is further punish the working poor.

But you should try answering questions too once in a while. I’m curious to hear your answer on how much you think “the rich” should have to pay.

regarding income taxes, i’ve said this before, and it goes something like this:

keep the rates on income below $250,000 where they are. (by the way, the average small business owner’s income is around $140,000 per year. and that’s the liberal estimate. some sources put it at more like $80,000.)

incomes from $250,000 to $1 million should be taxed at 40%.

income from $1 million to $100 million at 45%.

income above $100 million at 50%.

how about an even higher bracket for billionaires?

it’s kind of like jan schiakowsky’s (D-IL) proposal. mine is far more comprehensive, though. republicans shot it down, of course – even as tame as it was.

now, the vast majority of people in this country derive their income from labor. without looking it up, i’d ball park it at about 98% of us. however, there is far more money changing hands at the top of the income scale, and it isn’t derived from labor. (however, it is originally derived from our pensions, 401(k)’s, IRA’s, etc., as well as our consumerism.) those forms of income should be taxed at the same rates as everyone else’s income. they should also be subjected to a progressive tax scale.

but they’re not.

Do you think that the top 10% should pay more than the 70% they currently pay?

70% of what? the total revenue stream?

the top 2% pays about 1/3 of the 40% of government revenue that is generated from income taxes. why? because they have a greater share of the nation’s total income.

your question implies that you think that the top 10% should pay 10% of total tax revenues – even though they have more income and wealth than the bottom 80% combined.

Don’t you think it’s an obvious lie when politicians say the rich aren’t paying their fair share?

no. because they pay lower rates than you and i do, and they have far more money. our tax code favors them.

one of the reasons is that over half of congress themselves are millionaires, and that actually goes double for the tea party caucus: they are the richest voting bloc in congress.

here’s a question back at ya’:

do you think that a congress full of millionaires can fairly govern and tax a nation of people whose median income is around $45,000 per year?

i mean, just look at that! half of the greatest country on earth lives on less than $2000 per month. ever try to save with an income that small? buy a house? go to college? retire?

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[kootchman]

40% of someone else’s income? Crap on that… just on the face of it I’d say screw that… I quit. Send my my entitlement check too. Tht fairness thing again. The fairest thing I know is to keep as much as your time, talents, and hard work have blessed you with. Depends on the industry redblack…the highest paying indiustries? Manufacturing. Your disappearing, high wage, low skill, jobs. Sorry, but those are the facts. Fine.. let’s not raise the taxes of the lower 50 per cent,, bty Medicare and SS are not income taxes dude… Let’s just cut programs. When you finally discover the middle class was taxed out of eistance to support the lucrative lifestyle of government employees… maybe a few cuts will work their way through congress…. If half the income earners in the USA get more back than they pay… it does not mean they are in poverty. It means they pay no income taxes. All taxes, everyone, pays the same percentage. The rich pay more, the poor pay less. Seems fair as hell to me. Astonishing we have descended to this level of dependency and lack of initiative.. that 10 per cent would have to carry 70%. So much for the old adage of work hard, study hard, save…. are we that weak a people that we are now in handouts as a lifestyle?

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[redblack]

i, the people of the united states of america…

right, kootch?

bty Medicare and SS are not income taxes dude…

i didn’t say they were. note the use of commas in my statement.

but FICA and medicare are deducted from payroll, they are deducted from all wage earners’ gross incomes below $107,000, and they are paid to the government.

40% of someone else’s income?

40% of their income over $250,000, yes.

and, actually, everyone is already taxed the same on income below $250,000. i.e. 98% of us already have a flat tax.

Crap on that… just on the face of it I’d say screw that… I quit. Send my my entitlement check too.

bye.

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[kootchman]

50 per cent f ya have no tax. By the time ya take the earned income tax credit.. you suck in more oxygen than you put in. “You” the taxpayers? “Us” the tax takers… does not make we the people. The dogma of progressive taxation has failed. 16 trillion in deficits proves it.

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[TanDL]

Somehow we have to level the playing field to make taxation fair for all Americans. You say the wealthy pay 70% of all taxes in this country, but what percentage does each individual 1 percenter household pay vs each individual 99 percenter household? The combined totals of taxes paid by the 1% may equal 70% and God bless em for making all that money and paying up, but individual households aren’t paying a 70% income tax rate.

There is no easy answer. You’re right about that. But ya gotta start somewhere and build on it. Broadening the tax base is one way. Taxing the wealthy a little more, another possibility. Maybe think more about a flat tax or slightly altered flat tax system like Kootch has suggested in some past postings… yes, I’ve been reading through the tedium of the past. Cut a few more corporate loopholes, maybe institute a national lottery, cut back on donations to religious insitutions. There are dozens of ways to share the pain of getting our debt under control. Again though…you have to start somewhere and keep the playing field as level as possible. Americans don’t like unfair advantage. We’re too into sports not to quickly pick on who has an unfair advantage.

Getting people off gov’t paychecks? What paychecks are you talking about and who will make those decisions? If you mean cutting funds to the elderly and disabled, a bunch of us are going to do our darndest to push back because we feel it’s immoral to leave our weakest citizens in the gutter. If you are talking about cutting loopholes for oil companies who are making billions in profits, I’m listening. But one cut or one tax increase by itself isn’t going to magically fix everything and that’s what the Pres has been saying, if anyone would take the time to listen. It’s going to take a combination of things. The key is to start somewhere, not just block and negate everything so one side or the other can win a disagreement or election.

Seems like it’s all about winning elections now, not governing or coming together to accomplish great things. It would be nice to rise above politics for once and actually start hammering out some of these issues, but for now we remain stuck and focused on winning the next election. What a sad state of affairs for a once great and thriving country.

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[JV]

but go ahead. tax those at the bottom who earn small enough incomes that their tax burdens are lower than the standard deduction

I don’t want to tax those at the bottom, I want to elevate them by providing an opportunity for employment, so they can contribute!! BUSINESSES DO THAT…NOT GOVERNMENT!!

do you think that a congress full of millionaires can fairly govern and tax a nation of people whose median income is around $45,000 per year?

It depends. Not on how much money they have, but on how they became millionaires. I don’t think somebody like a Kennedy or a Rockafeller who inhereted their money knows the first thing about the world you and I live in. On the other hand, I’d trust somebody who built a successful business and became rich, or invented something useful and is now a millionaire. (I’m sure the person who invented the Sham-WOW! is a multi-millionaire now, but had to sell the damn thing at the fair for years!

i mean, just look at that! half of the greatest country on earth lives on less than $2000 per month. ever try to save with an income that small? buy a house? go to college? retire?

Yes, actually. My mom raised us on less than that for several years when I was growing up. Only a couple times did she take any kind of government assistance, (food bank, etc.) but she damn sure didn’t make it into a lifestyle. I guarantee she could have made more money by not working and going on government assistance, but that isn’t in her nature, and that’s why she is no longer in poverty. (and she is now paying taxes)

The beautiful thing about America is that if you work hard and stay out of trouble, poverty doesn’t have to be a trap. The trap is when you start thinking that the government owes you something, and you start to depend on it, and accept low expectations of yourself.

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[Author]

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