[quote]orion wrote:
LIFTICVSMAXIMVS wrote:
To the owner class everything is a tax write off. Their personal income is nil compared to the revenue their enterprises bring in. So to the extent that they pay consumption taxes it is almost completely made up for by the fact that they can write off most of their business and living expenses.
I agree with Mr. Robert’s assessment: there is “well off” and then there is mega rich. The mega rich probably do not even know how much they are worth but at least they keep lawyers, accountants, and countless other professionals, and laborers employed – even if they are not paying income taxes.
The middle class (most of us whom are employed by the owner class) pay the bulk of of our incomes out via income and consumption taxes. The more well off we are the more we will pay in taxes as long as we remain outside of the owner class.
That is because you are vulnerable because you need to market your skills.
“Rich” people live off of their money and they can invest it somewhere else if the government starts to fuck with them.
This is not about fairness but about who you actually can rob without repercussions.
[/quote]
Yep. Which is why I plan on buying: car washes, laundry mats, bars, fast food franchises, low rent housing, gentleman’s clubs, and adult book stores. I am going to cater to the slave class and become part of the owner class in the process. Heck, most of my employees will be unskilled, minimum wage laborers.
[quote]LIFTICVSMAXIMVS wrote:
orion wrote:
LIFTICVSMAXIMVS wrote:
To the owner class everything is a tax write off. Their personal income is nil compared to the revenue their enterprises bring in. So to the extent that they pay consumption taxes it is almost completely made up for by the fact that they can write off most of their business and living expenses.
I agree with Mr. Robert’s assessment: there is “well off” and then there is mega rich. The mega rich probably do not even know how much they are worth but at least they keep lawyers, accountants, and countless other professionals, and laborers employed – even if they are not paying income taxes.
The middle class (most of us whom are employed by the owner class) pay the bulk of of our incomes out via income and consumption taxes. The more well off we are the more we will pay in taxes as long as we remain outside of the owner class.
That is because you are vulnerable because you need to market your skills.
“Rich” people live off of their money and they can invest it somewhere else if the government starts to fuck with them.
This is not about fairness but about who you actually can rob without repercussions.
Yep. Which is why I plan on buying: car washes, laundry mats, bars, fast food franchises, low rent housing, gentleman’s clubs, and adult book stores. I am going to cater to the slave class and become part of the owner class in the process. Heck, most of my employees will be unskilled, minimum wage laborers.[/quote]
[quote]orion wrote:
LIFTICVSMAXIMVS wrote:
orion wrote:
LIFTICVSMAXIMVS wrote:
To the owner class everything is a tax write off. Their personal income is nil compared to the revenue their enterprises bring in. So to the extent that they pay consumption taxes it is almost completely made up for by the fact that they can write off most of their business and living expenses.
I agree with Mr. Robert’s assessment: there is “well off” and then there is mega rich. The mega rich probably do not even know how much they are worth but at least they keep lawyers, accountants, and countless other professionals, and laborers employed – even if they are not paying income taxes.
The middle class (most of us whom are employed by the owner class) pay the bulk of of our incomes out via income and consumption taxes. The more well off we are the more we will pay in taxes as long as we remain outside of the owner class.
That is because you are vulnerable because you need to market your skills.
“Rich” people live off of their money and they can invest it somewhere else if the government starts to fuck with them.
This is not about fairness but about who you actually can rob without repercussions.
Yep. Which is why I plan on buying: car washes, laundry mats, bars, fast food franchises, low rent housing, gentleman’s clubs, and adult book stores. I am going to cater to the slave class and become part of the owner class in the process. Heck, most of my employees will be unskilled, minimum wage laborers.
Thats bad.
Unskilled strippers are the worst.
[/quote]
I said most will be unskilled laborers – and anyway, strippers would be considered independent contractors. They will pay me for the privilege of dancing naked on my property and collecting their paychecks in the form cash.
[quote]DoubleDuce wrote:
pittbulll wrote:
Let�¢??s see who pays the greater percentage after we factor in all taxes, not just Federal Income tax. Things like Gas taxes (some states) taxes on groceries, state tax, and sales tax, all the taxes and fees on cable and phone bills, I could go on .
The rich are still going to pay a higher amount of taxes like sales, property, capital gains, est. [/quote]
I agree higher amounts , but not a higher percentage
[quote]orion wrote:
Bill Roberts wrote:
One of the things you don’t understand, as you proceed to inform Americans about what is the case in America, is that to Congressmen and Senators of the type that love increasing taxes as well as to Obama, “rich” doesn’t start at anything like I would guess, from what you write, that you used the term for. (Magnates and investors with assets of $100 million or something like this.)
To them, a professional couple that has nothing but some equity in their home, whatever amount their cars are paid off, some personal possessions, and a modest amount in a retirement account but between the two of them make $250,000 per year is rich and supposedly is “not paying their fair share of taxes.” Though their total tax payments may be $100K or more.
The small business owner who has say 3 modest sized retail stores, which in total could sell for a couple million perhaps but he has no intent to sell, and is making a profit of a few hundred K per year is “rich” and his taxes need to be increased.
He was considering opening a 4th store, which of course would create new jobs if successful, but now he’s thinking to himself, if it’s successful, such a high percentage of resulting increased income would just go to taxes, but if it’s not successful, the losses are out of his own pocket. (No, he does not get to deduct the lost amount from the dollar figure he would otherwise owe in taxes, which would mean no risk. He simply “gets” to pay the same rate on his new, lower net income.) So what with all the coming tax increases – on top of what is already very heavry – and demands that he pay health care for even part time employees and so forth, hmmm: not worth the risk when taxes are like this.
Oh sure, someone like John Kerry and his wife for example (she’s a billionaire) manage to make what is undoubtedly tens of millions of dollars per year in true income come out on paper to less and pay (using his 2003 figures) $700K in taxes, which was only about 10% of even their tricked-out-by-accounting claimed income.
That does go on.
But with regard to millions of Americans who in fact pay horrendous tax rates and dollar amounts for being “rich” – in other words about 99% of the time – what you write has zero applicability.
Of course it has, because even the small business owner can decide what “income” and whether he has an income at all.
If he wants to he can pay himself 50000$ a year and thats it.
Plus, unless American tax laws are very extra special this is really fundamental stuff.
[/quote]
You don’t know WTF you are talking about.
Here’s a hint: As an American who has been paying taxes for decades and has most certainly dealt with the forms and laws all that time, and who is categorized as operating my own business (I am an independent contractor) I do know what I am talking about on this.
If you think I can have my housing costs, transportion costs, food, etc all paid for somehow at any lesser tax rate you, being over there in Austria, just don’t have a clue.
Ditto for the type of small business owner I talked about above. If you think he can live a life of the sort a wage-earner on the same income can live, without paying the same onerous taxes, you are wrong. (As usual when you talk about America.)
[quote]DoubleDuce wrote:
orion wrote:
DoubleDuce wrote:
orion wrote:
The obvious bias of this clearly escapes you, huh?
The top tax payers pay the most taxes, huh?
Corporate taxes, like the VAT are payed by the customers, not the owner of the company. If they pay their dividends into a trust fund or do not pay them out at all the rich do not pay anything at all, except for the relatively small amount they need to live off, because they cannot escape consumption taxes and capital gains taxes.
Who pays the taxes is mostly the middle class, i.e. those who actually have, an need, an income.
And yes, the really “rich” pay very little taxes, relatively speaking. Their tax rate is actually regressive.
I’m assuming this is income tax?
If that’s the case, the taxes payed by corporations wouldn’t be included (though lots of smaller business would).
The point was that even corporate taxes are paid by the consumer. The fact that the company sends the treasury the money does not change that.
So corporations do not really pay any taxes at all.
So, those that do not need an “income” because they own “corporations” can only be taxed insofar as they need money to spend.
Compared to their assets that can be very little.
So, in case of the really “rich” the progression of the income tax is irrelevant. They don’t care, they will just make sure not to have “income” as defined by the tax code.
All that a welfare state really does is shifting money around in the middle class.
Yeah, I was actually reading some pretty interesting stuff on how industrial taxation/regulation benefits the larger corporations. Taxes, compliances, fines, codes are more easily weathered by larger corporations eliminating the competition of smaller business while they pass on costs to consumers. Though I hadn’t really thought of individuals in the same light.[/quote]
There is but one ECONOMIC LAW and it shines over all economic entities.
[quote]Bill Roberts wrote:
orion wrote:
Bill Roberts wrote:
One of the things you don’t understand, as you proceed to inform Americans about what is the case in America, is that to Congressmen and Senators of the type that love increasing taxes as well as to Obama, “rich” doesn’t start at anything like I would guess, from what you write, that you used the term for. (Magnates and investors with assets of $100 million or something like this.)
To them, a professional couple that has nothing but some equity in their home, whatever amount their cars are paid off, some personal possessions, and a modest amount in a retirement account but between the two of them make $250,000 per year is rich and supposedly is “not paying their fair share of taxes.” Though their total tax payments may be $100K or more.
The small business owner who has say 3 modest sized retail stores, which in total could sell for a couple million perhaps but he has no intent to sell, and is making a profit of a few hundred K per year is “rich” and his taxes need to be increased.
He was considering opening a 4th store, which of course would create new jobs if successful, but now he’s thinking to himself, if it’s successful, such a high percentage of resulting increased income would just go to taxes, but if it’s not successful, the losses are out of his own pocket. (No, he does not get to deduct the lost amount from the dollar figure he would otherwise owe in taxes, which would mean no risk. He simply “gets” to pay the same rate on his new, lower net income.) So what with all the coming tax increases – on top of what is already very heavry – and demands that he pay health care for even part time employees and so forth, hmmm: not worth the risk when taxes are like this.
Oh sure, someone like John Kerry and his wife for example (she’s a billionaire) manage to make what is undoubtedly tens of millions of dollars per year in true income come out on paper to less and pay (using his 2003 figures) $700K in taxes, which was only about 10% of even their tricked-out-by-accounting claimed income.
That does go on.
But with regard to millions of Americans who in fact pay horrendous tax rates and dollar amounts for being “rich” – in other words about 99% of the time – what you write has zero applicability.
Of course it has, because even the small business owner can decide what “income” and whether he has an income at all.
If he wants to he can pay himself 50000$ a year and thats it.
Plus, unless American tax laws are very extra special this is really fundamental stuff.
You don’t know WTF you are talking about.
Here’s a hint: As an American who has been paying taxes for decades and has most certainly dealt with the forms and laws all that time, and who is categorized as operating my own business (I am an independent contractor) I do know what I am talking about on this.
If you think I can have my housing costs, transportion costs, food, etc all paid for somehow at any lesser tax rate you, being over there in Austria, just don’t have a clue.
Ditto for the type of small business owner I talked about above. If you think he can live a life of the sort a wage-earner on the same income can live, without paying the same onerous taxes, you are wrong. (As usual when you talk about America.)
[/quote]
You do not get it.
IF you are middle class, pretending to be incorporated, you are still middle class.
When you are rich enough so that your money works for you the rules change.
Doubledouce actually got it, because he compares it to a similar phenomenon.
Seriously, this is just so pedestrian stuff and you get so pissed.
I must debate you on steroid chemistry some time. I will dispute the most basic stuff until you explode. Not that I would know what the most basic stuff was, but that is kind of the point.
[quote]orion wrote:
Bill Roberts wrote:
One of the things you don’t understand, as you proceed to inform Americans about what is the case in America, is that to Congressmen and Senators of the type that love increasing taxes as well as to Obama, “rich” doesn’t start at anything like I would guess, from what you write, that you used the term for. (Magnates and investors with assets of $100 million or something like this.)
To them, a professional couple that has nothing but some equity in their home, whatever amount their cars are paid off, some personal possessions, and a modest amount in a retirement account but between the two of them make $250,000 per year is rich and supposedly is “not paying their fair share of taxes.” Though their total tax payments may be $100K or more.
The small business owner who has say 3 modest sized retail stores, which in total could sell for a couple million perhaps but he has no intent to sell, and is making a profit of a few hundred K per year is “rich” and his taxes need to be increased.
He was considering opening a 4th store, which of course would create new jobs if successful, but now he’s thinking to himself, if it’s successful, such a high percentage of resulting increased income would just go to taxes, but if it’s not successful, the losses are out of his own pocket. (No, he does not get to deduct the lost amount from the dollar figure he would otherwise owe in taxes, which would mean no risk. He simply “gets” to pay the same rate on his new, lower net income.) So what with all the coming tax increases – on top of what is already very heavry – and demands that he pay health care for even part time employees and so forth, hmmm: not worth the risk when taxes are like this.
Oh sure, someone like John Kerry and his wife for example (she’s a billionaire) manage to make what is undoubtedly tens of millions of dollars per year in true income come out on paper to less and pay (using his 2003 figures) $700K in taxes, which was only about 10% of even their tricked-out-by-accounting claimed income.
That does go on.
But with regard to millions of Americans who in fact pay horrendous tax rates and dollar amounts for being “rich” – in other words about 99% of the time – what you write has zero applicability.
Of course it has, because even the small business owner can decide what “income” and whether he has an income at all.
If he wants to he can pay himself 50000$ a year and thats it.
Plus, unless American tax laws are very extra special this is really fundamental stuff.
[/quote]
but often, that small business owner is not actually able to pay himself a decent wage because he is so stretched. Also he is working 100 hr weeks so even if he paid himself a ‘decent’ wage, once you divide through by hrs worked he is not making much $. He doesn’t do it just for the $ though, he does it for the pride in working for himself and making something. Also, the wages he pays his staff are also generating tax revenue as are their purchases with the money they earn.
Orion, no, you do NOT know what you are talking about when it comes to taxes that must be paid by American small business owners.
How could you? You have never seen any type of 1040 or other American tax form in your life, let alone filled one out, let alone have you ever operated an American small business. You are just, as usual, sitting there in Austria telling Americans they are wrong about how things work in America, and as usual, yet again wrong in what you think is the case here.
Can’t you even figure that your trying to correct and educate Americans on the American tax code makes you appear to be operating under delusions? Delusions of grandeur perhaps, or something else… most certainly a delusion of believing you know more than you do about some things you choose to try to correct us on.
[quote]orion wrote:
countingbeans wrote:
Bill Roberts wrote:
You don’t know WTF you are talking about.
Thank you.
I assume he is in college and has had an intermediate accounting course. Because I can’t fathom where else he is pulling this shit from.
You do not learn that in accounting courses and I have had quite a few.
Combined with some in economics and business administration, business and tax law and political sciences.
And they do not tell you these things in any of those courses.
If you just happened to put it all together, there is actually a picture.
So, what is it?
Are you that sure that what I wrote is wrong or is there the possibility that you do not get it?
[/quote]
lol… Nope I don’t get it.
I only work in tax for roughly 1,500 billable hours a year, the other 1,200 is in audit. 5 years in (that is roughly 7,500 hours of experience in tax alone, not including self study) and you have enlightened me on how the system works…
Thank you so much.
You want to know what they don’t teach what you have posted here? Because it’s a bunch of bullshit. Once you live in the real world you will understand this, assuming you are not an employee your entire life (NTTAWWT).
If its prosperity we want, then income taxes should be highly REGRESSIVE. Punish people for being lazy and stupid. We could make exceptions for the old, teens, and the disabled. But having higher rates at the low end would make people bust their asses to get into the next bracket. Make it so there is no tax at all above, say, 5 million per year.
Poor people greatly exploit the people above them anyway. Workers exploit capitalists endlessly (workers would starve and/or kill each other if no one created a job FOR them). Wealth is generally created by brainpower and the poor get the benefit of the brainpower of high earners. So fuck the poor and tax hell out of 'em.
[quote]orion wrote:
jsbrook wrote:
orion wrote:
Loose Tool wrote:
orion wrote:
Loose Tool wrote:
orion wrote:
The obvious bias of this clearly escapes you, huh?
The top tax payers pay the most taxes, huh?
Corporate taxes, like the VAT are payed by the customers, not the owner of the company. If they pay their dividends into a trust fund or do not pay them out at all the rich do not pay anything at all, except for the relatively small amount they need to live off, because they cannot escape consumption taxes and capital gains taxes.
Who pays the taxes is mostly the middle class, i.e. those who actually have, an need, an income.
And yes, the really “rich” pay very little taxes, relatively speaking. Their tax rate is actually regressive.
The top-earning 25 percent of taxpayers (adjusted gross income over $66,532) earned 68.7 percent of the nation’s income, but they paid more than four out of every five dollars collected by the federal income tax (86.6 percent). The top 1 percent of taxpayers (adjusted gross income over $410,096) earned approximately 22.8 percent of the nation’s income, yet paid 40.4 percent of all federal income taxes. That means the top 1 percent of tax returns paid more in federal individual income taxes than the bottom 95 percent of tax returns.
Follow the link for the data tables.
Yes, it is about income taxes. And income is defined by the tax code.
If you however plough your money back into your company and only take out a relatively small part of that as “income” you only pay taxes on that “income”.
Your company however may be worth more a few million dollars, tax free. You would only pay taxes when you sell your company and at least in Europe even that can be avoided easily.
The percentages I quoted are only with regard to individual income taxes, not corporate. So what bearing does the corporate bias have on the percentages?
None, but people present it as if the “rich” pay an extraordinarily high percentage of taxes, which they don’t and never will.
That is not the point. The point is that people that make a nice living and have a good income are falsely categorized as ‘rich’ and pay a high percentage of income tax. Maybe the percentage is justified. Maybe not. But the top 1% cannot truly be categorized as rich. A nice lifestyle sure. But after paying for college and various other things, there is really not a huge amount of surplus money floating around. The truly rich do not pay a high percentage of income tax.
I agree.
[/quote]
So why are you arguing with Bill? Everything he says is right for 99.9% of people. To the extent it does not apply to the megarich .1% (all 1000 of them) who are able to avoid paying a high percentage of taxes through tax shelters and other loopholes, that is irrelevant. They represent such a small percentage, and it does nothing to change the fact that the vast majority of the top 1% income bracket pays a high percentage of taxes.
[quote]Bill Roberts wrote:
Orion, no, you do NOT know what you are talking about when it comes to taxes that must be paid by American small business owners.
How could you? You have never seen any type of 1040 or other American tax form in your life, let alone filled one out, let alone have you ever operated an American small business. You are just, as usual, sitting there in Austria telling Americans they are wrong about how things work in America, and as usual, yet again wrong in what you think is the case here.
Can’t you even figure that your trying to correct and educate Americans on the American tax code makes you appear to be operating under delusions? Delusions of grandeur perhaps, or something else… most certainly a delusion of believing you know more than you do about some things you choose to try to correct us on.
/end[/quote]
Can you figure out that nobody cares what form you can fill out and whether you can deduct tooth picks at business dinner when it comes to the “Gestalt” of a tax system?
What are you actually disagreeing with?
What is it that I have posted that is objectively, factually, wrong?
Unless, you disagree with my definition of “rich”.
But if my point remains that being “rich” means being able to manipulate the height of your “income” at will and that corporate taxes are not actually paid by the corporations what else could you draw form this?
Yeah, I know the define the middle class as being rich. What does that take way from my post?
[quote]jsbrook wrote:
orion wrote:
jsbrook wrote:
orion wrote:
Loose Tool wrote:
orion wrote:
Loose Tool wrote:
orion wrote:
The obvious bias of this clearly escapes you, huh?
The top tax payers pay the most taxes, huh?
Corporate taxes, like the VAT are payed by the customers, not the owner of the company. If they pay their dividends into a trust fund or do not pay them out at all the rich do not pay anything at all, except for the relatively small amount they need to live off, because they cannot escape consumption taxes and capital gains taxes.
Who pays the taxes is mostly the middle class, i.e. those who actually have, an need, an income.
And yes, the really “rich” pay very little taxes, relatively speaking. Their tax rate is actually regressive.
The top-earning 25 percent of taxpayers (adjusted gross income over $66,532) earned 68.7 percent of the nation’s income, but they paid more than four out of every five dollars collected by the federal income tax (86.6 percent). The top 1 percent of taxpayers (adjusted gross income over $410,096) earned approximately 22.8 percent of the nation’s income, yet paid 40.4 percent of all federal income taxes. That means the top 1 percent of tax returns paid more in federal individual income taxes than the bottom 95 percent of tax returns.
Follow the link for the data tables.
Yes, it is about income taxes. And income is defined by the tax code.
If you however plough your money back into your company and only take out a relatively small part of that as “income” you only pay taxes on that “income”.
Your company however may be worth more a few million dollars, tax free. You would only pay taxes when you sell your company and at least in Europe even that can be avoided easily.
The percentages I quoted are only with regard to individual income taxes, not corporate. So what bearing does the corporate bias have on the percentages?
None, but people present it as if the “rich” pay an extraordinarily high percentage of taxes, which they don’t and never will.
That is not the point. The point is that people that make a nice living and have a good income are falsely categorized as ‘rich’ and pay a high percentage of income tax. Maybe the percentage is justified. Maybe not. But the top 1% cannot truly be categorized as rich. A nice lifestyle sure. But after paying for college and various other things, there is really not a huge amount of surplus money floating around. The truly rich do not pay a high percentage of income tax.
I agree.
So why are you arguing with Bill? Everything he says is right for 99.9% of people. To the extent it does not apply to the megarich .1% (all 1000 of them) who are able to avoid paying a high percentage of taxes through tax shelters and other loopholes, that is irrelevant. They represent such a small percentage, and it does nothing to change the fact that the vast majority of the top 1% income bracket pays a high percentage of taxes.
[/quote]
First of all, that effect comes in sooner than at 100m.
Let us say 10m.
If you have 10m in liquid assets you are pretty loaded.
Those people own almost all of America and yet can avoid taxes EASILY.
I am not saying that this is wrong.
I am saying that that whole income tax debate is a diversion.
I agree with the conclusion of that diversion though, that the upper middle class gets anally raped.
Just saying, you had a revolution to get rid of the untaxed aristocracy?
How is that working for you?
It is the whole premise of the welfare state, to soak the rich.
[quote]countingbeans wrote:
orion wrote:
countingbeans wrote:
Bill Roberts wrote:
You don’t know WTF you are talking about.
Thank you.
I assume he is in college and has had an intermediate accounting course. Because I can’t fathom where else he is pulling this shit from.
You do not learn that in accounting courses and I have had quite a few.
Combined with some in economics and business administration, business and tax law and political sciences.
And they do not tell you these things in any of those courses.
If you just happened to put it all together, there is actually a picture.
So, what is it?
Are you that sure that what I wrote is wrong or is there the possibility that you do not get it?
lol… Nope I don’t get it.
I only work in tax for roughly 1,500 billable hours a year, the other 1,200 is in audit. 5 years in (that is roughly 7,500 hours of experience in tax alone, not including self study) and you have enlightened me on how the system works…
Thank you so much.
You want to know what they don’t teach what you have posted here? Because it’s a bunch of bullshit. Once you live in the real world you will understand this, assuming you are not an employee your entire life (NTTAWWT).[/quote]
You bill 1500 hours and yet you do not know how to avoid taxes?
Such things as incorporating businesses above a certain size, preferably in Nevada, never occurred to you?
[quote]jsbrook wrote:
What’s rich? The top 1% pays a very high percentage of income in taxes. Don’t know that I would consider that rich. The top .1% pay a surprisingly low percentage of income in taxes compared to the top 1% as a result of tax shelters, writeoffs and various other financial arrangements.[/quote]
Wait, you wouldn’t consider the top 1% of income earners in the richest country in the world to be rich? I realize we’re just arguing semantics here, but come on, give me a break. “I make more than 99.9% of the world, and 99% of my countrymen…but it’s that .1% man, they’re rich.”
[quote]orion wrote:
jsbrook wrote:
orion wrote:
jsbrook wrote:
orion wrote:
Loose Tool wrote:
orion wrote:
Loose Tool wrote:
orion wrote:
The obvious bias of this clearly escapes you, huh?
The top tax payers pay the most taxes, huh?
Corporate taxes, like the VAT are payed by the customers, not the owner of the company. If they pay their dividends into a trust fund or do not pay them out at all the rich do not pay anything at all, except for the relatively small amount they need to live off, because they cannot escape consumption taxes and capital gains taxes.
Who pays the taxes is mostly the middle class, i.e. those who actually have, an need, an income.
And yes, the really “rich” pay very little taxes, relatively speaking. Their tax rate is actually regressive.
The top-earning 25 percent of taxpayers (adjusted gross income over $66,532) earned 68.7 percent of the nation’s income, but they paid more than four out of every five dollars collected by the federal income tax (86.6 percent). The top 1 percent of taxpayers (adjusted gross income over $410,096) earned approximately 22.8 percent of the nation’s income, yet paid 40.4 percent of all federal income taxes. That means the top 1 percent of tax returns paid more in federal individual income taxes than the bottom 95 percent of tax returns.
Follow the link for the data tables.
Yes, it is about income taxes. And income is defined by the tax code.
If you however plough your money back into your company and only take out a relatively small part of that as “income” you only pay taxes on that “income”.
Your company however may be worth more a few million dollars, tax free. You would only pay taxes when you sell your company and at least in Europe even that can be avoided easily.
The percentages I quoted are only with regard to individual income taxes, not corporate. So what bearing does the corporate bias have on the percentages?
None, but people present it as if the “rich” pay an extraordinarily high percentage of taxes, which they don’t and never will.
That is not the point. The point is that people that make a nice living and have a good income are falsely categorized as ‘rich’ and pay a high percentage of income tax. Maybe the percentage is justified. Maybe not. But the top 1% cannot truly be categorized as rich. A nice lifestyle sure. But after paying for college and various other things, there is really not a huge amount of surplus money floating around. The truly rich do not pay a high percentage of income tax.
I agree.
So why are you arguing with Bill? Everything he says is right for 99.9% of people. To the extent it does not apply to the megarich .1% (all 1000 of them) who are able to avoid paying a high percentage of taxes through tax shelters and other loopholes, that is irrelevant. They represent such a small percentage, and it does nothing to change the fact that the vast majority of the top 1% income bracket pays a high percentage of taxes.
First of all, that effect comes in sooner than at 100m.
Let us say 10m.
If you have 10m in liquid assets you are pretty loaded.
Those people own almost all of America and yet can avoid taxes EASILY.
I am not saying that this is wrong.
I am saying that that whole income tax debate is a diversion.
I agree with the conclusion of that diversion though, that the upper middle class gets anally raped.
Just saying, you had a revolution to get rid of the untaxed aristocracy?
How is that working for you?
It is the whole premise of the welfare state, to soak the rich.
And yet, they never achieve that.
It is always the middle class.
[/quote]
Ok. But this thread wasn’t about corporate taxation. It was about taxation of individual income. And to the extent what you say about big corporations exploiting the tax system is true, it still doesn’t apply to small business owners.
As far as individual income goes, maybe something should be done to close loopholes that are exploited by the megarich (who still actually pay billions in taxes because of the sheer amount of their wealth even if they are able to manipulate the system to pay a lower percentage of income in taxes than those less well-off). But that’s another issue. You can quibble about what percentage of taxes this small segment of megarich pays and how much of America’s wealth they actually own. but that is still a sideshow.
The fact remains that the vast majority of the top income bracket is NOT superich, does not have the ability avoid taxation through tax loopholes, and does pay a high percentage of income tax. You don’t disagree with that. Because you can’t. Because it’s true.
[quote]Gambit_Lost wrote:
jsbrook wrote:
What’s rich? The top 1% pays a very high percentage of income in taxes. Don’t know that I would consider that rich. The top .1% pay a surprisingly low percentage of income in taxes compared to the top 1% as a result of tax shelters, writeoffs and various other financial arrangements.
Wait, you wouldn’t consider the top 1% of income earners in the richest country in the world to be rich? I realize we’re just arguing semantics here, but come on, give me a break. “I make more than 99.9% of the world, and 99% of my countrymen…but it’s that .1% man, they’re rich.”
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No, I wouldn’t. Sorry. I make $160K without bonus (which may not exist in this economy). That’s close to the top income bracket. I’m comfortable. I have a nice lifestyle. But I don’t consider myself rich.
In the later years of my adolescence, my parents probably made a joint income of $300K. It doesn’t go as far as you think. We lived a nice lifestyle and never wanted for anything. But there wasn’t buckets of extra money to throw around. You know how expensive college and grad school is? My sister and were fortunate enough to go through without loans, and that is a blessing. But most parents in the lower end of the top bracket of taxable income who are able to do that for their children and give them that start aren’t going to be rolling around in extra dough.
I can also say with great confidence that most of these pay pleny of taxes and dont have the means to have a staff of accountants to help them figure out how to exploit tax loopholes.