<p>I understand that the top 1% of our country could pay more taxes (a higher capital gains tax, and/or closing loopholes) while I also hear the argument that their money would simply be transferred offshore (and there’s already a lot overseas).</p>
<p>But… this debate involves reducing US debt (and only by a tiny amount, barely even useful)… What exactly does this have to do with the protesters who are frustrated with the slow economy? How would rich people paying more taxes spur income growth for the other 99%?</p>
<p>I’m in good faith… I just want to understand what these people are thinking. At the moment, the best explanation I see is emotional: “since we’re struggling, you should struggle more”. Is that it?</p>
<p>No, it’s not about making the top percentage of earners “struggle”, it’s about having them pay their fair share. Families in the bottom 90%, on average earn between 32-50K per year. That’s per family. The idea that my family (we are barely in the top 10% of earners but we are there), would be put on their level of struggle by paying higher taxes is just ludicrous. I have no problem with our taxes going up if it means that everyone in the top 10% of earners has their taxes go up. I’m more than willing to bite that bullet.</p>
<p>No one in this country gets rich on their own. They rely on the military, federal emergency resources, local police, local fire fighters, federal highways and local roads. They rely on public schools for an educated work force and, far too often, rely on state programs to pay for the health care needs of their employees. It’s about paying back and paying it forward.</p>
<p>It’s also about how the top ten percent in this country controls a large majority of the money while the bottom ninty percent fights over the left overs. People are tired of it and, my goodness, I truly do not understand how anyone can blame them.</p>
<p>Lastly, it’s about the impossibility of paying down the debt without more tax revenue. The Tea Party may be a lot of things but economical geniuses they are not.</p>
<p>The wealthiest also have a lot more loop holes and much of their income is not taxed. Look at self-employment tax, for example, that has a cut-off at which any income above that level is not taxed; as a pastor, I have to pay self-employment tax on every penny (and the pastors still in parsonages pay 15.23 % of 130% of their income for SE tax). My millionaire sister pays less taxes than I do.</p>
<p>^^to clarify, since you never quite know how a link is going to show up, the link is for Robert Reich explaining the economy in less than 2 minutes, 15 seconds. With lots of fast doodling.</p>
<p>I disagree. My family is nowhere near the top 1% or even top 10% but there is no way a rich person should pay a higher tax percentage than a poor person. The USA was built on the basis of capitalism and it was a proving grounds for a growing economy until about the 1970s when USA slowly started becoming socialist. That was a change that only worked to reduce the state of the economy and it, to this day, is still destroying our economy.</p>
<p>"The hubbub is just starting to pick up after NZZ Online’s report yesterday on a University of St. Gallen study that shows stock market traders display similarities to certified psychopaths. The study, authored by MBA students Pascal Scherrer and Thomas Noll, compares decisions made by 27 equity, derivative and forex traders in a computer simulation against an existing study of 24 psychopaths in high-security hospitals in
Germany. Not only do the traders match their counterparts, but, as Der Speigel*succinctly puts it, the “stockbrokers’ behavior is more reckless and manipulative than that of psychopaths.”</p>
<p>The traders, according to Noll, were fixated on gaining more than their competitors in the computer simulation – to the extent that they “spent a lot of energy trying to damage their opponents.” He compared the behavior to bashing a neighbor’s fancy car with a baseball bat in order to make your own car the nicest in the neighborhood."</p>
This is historically inaccurate. Income tax rates were much more progressive [higher earners paid higher rates] before the 1970’s than they are now. </p>
<p>Income tax is the only tax that wealthy people pay a somewhat higher percentage of their income for; almost all other taxes take a higher percentage of the income of middle class and poor people. The net result is that Americans in all income brackets end up paying pretty close to the same percentage of their income in taxes overall - upper middle class workers pay a little more; the very wealthy, working class and the poor a little less, but not by much. It’s just that income tax gets all the press. ;)</p>
<p>Interesting Reich video - I saw there was a “rebuttal” to it by some guy named Bob Murphy, who starts by waving around a chart of government revenues as a percentage of GDP to “debunk” what Reich says. Only one problem: Whenever I hear something like that I always check it against the Federal budget records (it’s not hard to do - they’re available online), so I paused the video and did that. His chart doesn’t actually correspond to the data. I don’t know where he got it, but it’s not an accurate representation of actual “on-budget” federal revenues as a percentage of GDP - not even close. I stopped watching Mr. Murphy at that point. :rolleyes:</p>
<p>I guess you can’t even trust what some random guy says in a Youtube video anymore. :D</p>
<p>– which is why the pressure is on for the top 1 % to pay more – since they OWN about 40% of this nation’s wealth. No other industrialized nation allows such a tiny percentage of its people to own so much and pay so little in taxes for it.</p>
<p>I talked to my CPA today and I was shocked to hear how low my taxes are for 2010. Nothing like long term capital gains on trades that are held for milliseconds to one day…
Looks like I’m all paid up for 2011…</p>
<p>So…I am going to pay for lap dancing for my closest friends…
Well…what can I say? Traders are psychopaths.;)</p>
<p>I really appreciate the fact that I pay less in taxes than those that make the same money and work harder…although to be fair…i do have to wake up at 3:30. That is a drag.</p>
<p>The protestors are protesting the economy. They all have different reasons to be there. Today, in fact, the pilots from United and Continental came to wall street to protest the fact that it is taking so long for the merger to happen and for them to get their new contract.</p>
<p>The economy is a mess. If the economy wasn’t a mess, they’d all be at work.</p>
<p>Apparently some believe this problem can be solved by raising taxes. I say, “have at it.”</p>
<p>Clergy living in a parsonage must pay social security taxes on the value of living in their parsonage. Clergy might earn 50K in salary, but have to pay SE tax on 65K. Also, since most clergy are considered self-employed, they must pay both the employer and employee portions of SE tax, so 15.23% of 65K.</p>
<p>Another thing that doesn’t end well is when the middle class shrinks. The 400 wealthiest families in the US are worth more than the bottom 60 percent of US households. The middle class is disappearing, along with the prosperity and stability that it brings. The tax advantages enjoyed by those who need them least contribute to the problem. Requiring the wealthiest to pay at least as much tax as the rest of us do wouldn’t solve it, but it’s a step away from oligarchy.</p>
<p>Okay guys, I understand that they need to pay more taxes. I fully agree. But how exactly will that improve the economy? I mean it might help the US government budget slightly, but that has nothing to do with the state of affairs out here in the real world. You understand what I’m saying, right? It’s a good problem to pursue, but when we might be in for a double-dip recession, shouldn’t we be focused on boosting the economy, rather than paying down the debt?</p>
<p>That’s what I don’t understand about “Occupy Wall Street”. It’s all good, the US needs a stronger middle class, but I just don’t see how rich people paying more taxes will either
Strengthen the economy, or
Strengthen the middle class.</p>
<p>I realize that income inequality would decrease… but wouldn’t it only be because of a less wealthy super-upper class, rather than a wealthier middle class? How does that actually change anything?</p>
<p>Can anyone explain the economics of that?? I’m genuinely trying to understand these arguments.</p>
<p>The government can take the money from higher taxes and</p>
<p>Use that money to decrease the deficit…which might make people feel better about the economy…see Christina Romer’s work.</p>
<p>Or use that money to get rid of the social security shortfall…which could again increase confidence…SS, on average, is worth about 300,000 to 500,000 per person…that is what it would cost to buy an annuity in the private sector that does the same thing as SS. Since the average family is worth about 100,000…you can see the importance of SS. </p>
<p>Or use that money for public works…with all the rhetoric about creating
private sector jobs…there hasn’t been any jobs created in the private
sector in the United States for about 10 years. Check this out.</p>
<p>Or just shift the money to the lower or middle class…the multiplier effect is higher in the lower and middle class than the upper middle or upper
class so the economy would be larger…check this out in economics text
books instead of political blogs.</p>
<p>Or…this might help prevent a little social unrest…some day…the middle class is going to get fed up and really want to take from
the wealthier people…</p>
<p>Plus the wealthiest have benefitted the most from the tax cuts over the last 30 years…And that is where a large amount of the money is…</p>
<p>Having said this…I am starting to really like these low taxes…and all these tax breaks…especially the tax breaks for trading futures…getting long term gains for short term trades is appealing to me…let’s me pay less in taxes than others who makes the same amount of money as I do.
This makes me think that what I do is worth more than others who make the same amount or less. This makes me think better of myself. </p>
<p>So let’s keep the tax structure the same same or tax capital even less…So I can have more money…</p>
<p>Thanks for supporting tax breaks…I appreciate it. Really.</p>
<p>Huh? Sorry, but what does “15.23% of 130%” mean? </p>
<p>Pastors who live in parsongages have to pay Self Employment taxes for their cash salaries, and also for the privilege of living in employer supplied housing. That sounds fair, at first, but it leaves them cash poor. </p>
<p>For a pastor who lives in a parsonage and earns a cash salary of $30,000, the self-employment tax of 15.23% is taxed on $40,000 (cash salary plus an additional 30%).</p>