<p>Of course, the problem is not “income inequality”. The problem is poverty. I don’t advocate that lower income people should pay more in taxes at all, some should probably pay less. But the illusion that these rich guys at the top are making people poorer is ridiculous. Instead of promoting that propaganda, people should be honest. Number one path to poverty? Become a single parent, especially when you’re young.</p>
<p>Busdriver11, when did you study economics?</p>
<p>Once again, Goldenpooch hits the nail right on the head. You can’t have half the people with no skin in the game. Everyone has to care about how much government is spending, are programs run efficiently, are they effective, etc.</p>
<p>You are right about the path to poverty, busdriver - don’t become a single parent, especially when you are young and, also finish high school.</p>
<p>I got my PhD in it last year, dstark. Just kidding. I’m merely stating the obvious, which sometimes needs to be said.</p>
<p>Ha! As if economists actually have the answer.</p>
<p>Dadinator, what did Ronald Reagan say about taxing the poor? What did Ronald Reagan do?</p>
<p>This thread is way off course now…
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<p>Troublemaker</p>
<p>Busdriver11, if your taxes were doubled would that have an affect on you?</p>
<p>Taxes have an effect, right?</p>
<p>If Harvard lost their tax exemptions, that would have affect Harvard, right?</p>
<p>What a person is paid makes a difference, right ?</p>
<p>If a person is more likely to spend money rather than save money, that makes a difference to the economy.</p>
<p>Where resources are allocated makes a difference. </p>
<p>There is a multiplier effect.</p>
<p>If we are giving somebody food stamps, does it make sense to tax them? Is that efficient use of people’s time?</p>
<p>Somebody qualifies for $4,000 in food stamps. Does it make sense to tax that person $300 and then give that person $4300?</p>
<p>Reagan and the first George Bush would say no. </p>
<p>When we cut rates for richer people, taking poor people off the Income tax rolls was part of the deal. It was a packaged deal. Some people get lower tax rates. Others no longer have to pay income tax. You might be too young. I voted for Reagan.</p>
<p>Taxing poor people is stupid. Uneconomical. Inefficient. It goes Reagan and Bush’s agreement with society.</p>
<p>If wr are going to start taxing poor people on their paltry incomes, we should also go back to rhe old tax rates for the rich. It is only fair. </p>
<p>All this stuff could be looked up online or in an economics text book
This thread has gone way too far. It should be closed.</p>
<p>So those who want these low-income workers to have “skin in the game” in the form of income taxes are in favor of a higher minimum wage–right? Or do you just think the working poor should be somewhat poorer than they are now?</p>
<p>Believe it or not, I agree with you, dstark. I don’t think that taxes should be raised on lower income, and I think the desired effect you would like would be achieved by taxing everything as ordinary income. But for those whom are already paying much of their income at 40-50 percent, no, I don’t think that should be increased to even more confiscatory rates.</p>
<p>Personally - I always felt businesses should decide what they pay. I had an epiphany last week when I started working on my taxes when I started looking at the EIC worksheets and thought some more about ACA subsidies and went darn! That is such an inefficient scheme when Govt has to collect all this money and then give it back or pay someone else.</p>
<p>After reading all the articles like this, it doesn’t seem like raising the minimum wage is the great idea that some think it is:</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2013/02/who-earns-the-minimum-wage-suburban-teenagers-not-single-parents”>http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2013/02/who-earns-the-minimum-wage-suburban-teenagers-not-single-parents</a></p>
<p>When you raise the price of something, you get less of it. When you raise the minimum wage, you get less entry level jobs.</p>
<p>Funny, in an ironic way, texas.</p>
<p>I look at large companies like mine who are paying single digit tax rates because of write offs and capital expenditures, and small ones like your who are paying through the nose, and it’s just not right.</p>
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<p>Dependent on the area. A higher federal minimum wage will affect Mississippi very differently than it will affect Connecticut. I think it’s better that Mississippi have a minimum wage appropriate for Mississippi and Connecticut have a minimum wage appropriate for Connecticut. </p>
<p>Though, yes, it’s getting very off topic. </p>
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<p>That’s fair, but having some minimum wage does have positive results practically. </p>
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<p>Part of the offset is that the additional income now low wage workers get is spent, which helps stimulate the economy more than if that just sits somewhere going without use. The issue is that if it’s raised too high, the value of their work will be under the minimum wage and then they will be out of the job. That’s why the minimum wage has to be appropriate for the area where the worker works. The reason for a minimum wage at all is that employers often have some amount of monopoly power. What I’ve read is that the empirically best minimum wage (on some measure of keeping unemployment relatively low, decreasing poverty, and increasing production - don’t know exactly what weighting they used) is 40-45% of the median wage. But that’s why federal minimum wages are so bad. The 40-45% range is $6.49-$7.30 in Mississippi, and $11.55-$13 in Connecticut. There is no minimum wage that works for all states. </p>
<p>I’m bemused by the idea that if the working poor had “skin in the game” in form of income taxes, they’d be less likely to support higher taxes for rich people. Why would that be? Wouldn’t they be just like the current rich people, who want somebody else to pay more taxes so they can pay less? I can certainly see the argument that if low-income people become a large majority that votes, that spells trouble for high-income people.</p>
<p>Busdriver11, think about what you are saying. You dont think poor people should pay income taxes, but then you complain they dont have skin in the game. You have to choose. I think you are going to choose poor people do not have to pay income taxes. That is the Reagan choice. :)</p>
<p>Overall, I think our tax level is ok for awhile. i would like to see some loopholes closed like carried interest which is just a gift. From what you write, I think you agree on that.</p>
<p>I would like to see the estate tax changed. Too many loopholes. Cut the rates and end all these ridiculius trusts. There is a lot of wealth that is never taxed once because of how the wealth is generated. That is not fair to all the hard working Americans that make their money by using their own labor. </p>
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<p>Incorrect. The number one path to poverty is being born into poverty. Period. Doesn’t matter so much if you’re born to a single parent or to a married couple. If you’re born poor, chances are pretty good you’ll remain poor most or all of your life. There’s far less social mobility in this country, upward or downward, than our collective mythologies would have us believe. Relatively few non-poor people “fall into” poverty–even by becoming single parents. Most single parents are already poor and remain so. But then most poor people who do not become single parents also remain poor. It’s true that among adults, poverty rates are highest for families headed by single women, but it’s far less clear what’s the cause and what’s the effect, especially since our welfare policies effectively discourage the formation of two-parent households among those receiving assistance, and because incarceration rates among low-income black males are shockingly high. What is clear is that poverty rates are far higher for children (22% of U.S. children are poor) than for adults (15%). Those children didn’t “become poor” by “becoming single parents,” they became poor by being born into poverty, through no fault of their own. Most of them will remain poor their entire lives, and many will beget additional generations of children born into poverty, in many cases as single parents. But there’s little evidence that single parenthood made the adults poor; in most cases, poor is where they were starting from before they ever became single parents.</p>
<p>“small ones like your who are paying through the nose”</p>
<p>Not exactly. I work for a company with 300k + employees. I work on the board of a religious non-profit for which I earn a big fat zero!</p>
<p>I do agree with Vladenschlutte on the regional differences. It does make no sense to have the same wage across the country, may be some local cost of living adjustment would be better rather than fight for an across the board increase. </p>
<p>They’d be less likely to support larger government programs if they are ineffective and inefficient and new government programs that don’t make sense, because they would not want their taxes to go up to pay for government program that either don’t work or don’t make sense.</p>
<p>Bigger government and more government is great…as long as you are not the one who has to pay for it…</p>
<p>I think it is pretty simple to understand why it is problematic when more than half of the country doesn’t pay federal income tax. If our representatives are elected by an increasing percentage of voters who pay no income tax, it will be no surprise when these representatives are more responsive to the demands for more entitlements and subsidies from non-payers than to the taxpayers who are concerned with exercising greater spending restraint.</p>
<p>“Busdriver11, think about what you are saying. You don’t think poor people should pay income taxes, but then you complain they don’t have skin in the game”</p>
<p>When did I complain about that? You are making up your own assumptions, not based upon what I actually said.</p>