Tax rates

[barretcreek]

There's two sides to this one like everything else. It is often quoted that the uber wealthy pay roughly half of all the revenue collected by IRS, and the bottom X% pay nothing. The flip side is go to an airport near a resort area. Do you think those jets are being paid for out of someone's personal income or as a business expense and being absorbed by the rest of us? The tax code needs to be completely overhauled so that only capital reinvestment is deductible. If you make airplanes, it's a write off. If you make toilet seats, the plane isn't. Our high corporate tax rate is diluted by being able to deduct the jet, the executive dining room and wine steward, two tiered benefit plans (or none for the worker bees) and by the time all that stuff is bought there's no money left to upgrade the factory. Worked a while for a US UK Japanese outfit. When there were cutbacks, the top dogs in Osaka took the biggest pay cuts, and the guy pushing the broom took none. Which of course shamed him into working harder to compensate for not taking a cut.

[togor]

This invites, the question...what fundamental changes do people want to see in the tax burden? Shift it around? Everyone pays more? Everyone paying less sounds nice, except when you look at the federal expenditure pie and have to get agreement on whose slice gets reduced and by how much.

[Sako]

My vote would go to a flat rate tax. This was brought up back in the 70's and indicated that if everyone paid 10% the government would receive more taxes than existed with the structure in place. Everybody pays including churches since any one can open a church and be tax exempt. No loop holes, no write offs, no depreciation. It would be plain and simple for the majority never having to go to a tax preparer again. The tax would be on profits for businesses so expenses could still be deducted.

.

Without depreciation it wouldn't be possible to afford the great amount of cost to start a new business or upgrade an old one.

[Vern Humphrey]

My vote would go to a flat rate tax. This was brought up back in the 70's and indicated that if everyone paid 10% the government would receive more taxes than existed with the structure in place.

I've said this many times before -- we cannot intelligently discuss taxes until we first deal with spending. When the government squanders the peoples' money -- as this government does -- there is no fair system of taxation. It is all theft, pure and simple. And proposed changes to the tax system are simply proposals to steal a bit more from this guy, and a bit less from that guy.

The Balanced Budget Amendment

1. If the Federal debt is higher at the end of the calendar year than it was at the beginning of the calendar year, or the United States shall default on its obligations, the budget is not balanced.

2. If the budget is not balanced, Congress shall take a temporary twenty percent pay cut for five years. This money, and all other public money due to members of Congress, plus twenty percent of all other income, from any source, public or private, shall be placed in an interest-bearing account. If the budget is balanced at the end of the fifth year, the money with interest shall be returned to the members of Congress. If the budget is not balanced, the money shall be forfeited to the Treasury, and the cuts and taxes on Congress shall be permanent. For the next five years there shall be a further twenty percent cut under the same rules. This process shall continue until the budget is balanced.

3. The power to tax is exclusively reserved to the people, and no tax or other revenue-enhancing measure shall be created, and no existing tax or other revenue-enhancing measure shall be increased except by a vote of the majority of the people at a regularly scheduled Federal election.

4. The highest rate of the income tax will not be more than twenty times the lowest rate, and if there is any level of income not taxed, or for which the taxes are rebated under any pretext, the lowest rate will be deemed to be zero, and no one will pay income tax.

5. In time of war or grave emergency, the people may suspend the requirement for a balanced budget by majority vote in a Federal election, but no such suspension shall be in effect for more than two years.

[dogtag]

Balanced budget ? Wow, that's a new concept.

[Allen]

When the government squanders the peoples' money -- as this government does

Meanwhile

http://time.com/money/5492873/nancy-pelosi-speaker-of-house-salary/

[togor]

That BB amendment as written would make for some interesting politics. Rural voters in less populous states would be outgunned in the national popular vote on levies by their urban fellow citizens. The language for the ballot would have to be heavily simplified too, so people aren't voting over fine-print, which tends to produce 50-50 outcomes. That's the big advantage of representative democracy over direct democracy, that complex issues have a fighting chance of being deliberated in depth in a manageable way.

[PWC]

Back around the time of 911, one of the managers at Honeywell made a statement at lunch the we should look at the gov't's defination of wealthy. I don't remember the numbers nor the website but the gov't break point for "wealthy" americans was around $40K. The govt site was, I THINK, bureau of labor and stastics. Any way, I was surprised at the information available and how the govt defined the different income strata and socio-economic and race breakdowns. It was an eye opener; when the libs were talking about going after the rich to increase their taxes, I thought they meant like Trump Pelosi, Schumer (all the gov't millionaires) Soros, Jack Welch, all the usual suspects. Surprise...It was me too, and anyone making over $40K.

[S.A. Boggs]

Back around the time of 911, one of the managers at Honeywell made a statement at lunch the we should look at the gov't's defination of wealthy. I don't remember the numbers nor the website but the gov't break point for "wealthy" americans was around $40K. The govt site was, I THINK, bureau of labor and stastics. Any way, I was surprised at the information available and how the govt defined the different income strata and socio-economic and race breakdowns. It was an eye opener; when the libs were talking about going after the rich to increase their taxes, I thought they meant like Trump Pelosi, Schumer (all the gov't millionaires) Soros, Jack Welch, all the usual suspects. Surprise...It was me too, and anyone making over $40K.

Monetary, there are more of us then of the other, this is reality. Does one realize that the "rich" talk about taxing themselves, yet who actually pays? The common person cannot afford a tax the rich scheme of the NSDWP.
Sam

[Vern Humphrey]

Monetary, there are more of us then of the other, this is reality. Does one realize that the "rich" talk about taxing themselves, yet who actually pays? The common person cannot afford a tax the rich scheme of the NSDWP.
Sam

True. Consider if you will, how popular the idea of the Corporate Tax is. Yet anyone with an IQ above room temperature can understand that corporations don't PAY taxes, they COLLECT taxes and forward them to the government. It is the consumer, the man in the street who pays virtually ALL the taxes.

[togor]

True. Consider if you will, how popular the idea of the Corporate Tax is. Yet anyone with an IQ above room temperature can understand that corporations don't PAY taxes, they COLLECT taxes and forward them to the government. It is the consumer, the man in the street who pays virtually ALL the taxes.

Actually, economists disagree with this. They point out that prices are set by supply-and-demand, and that different corporate entities will be taxed differently depending on the state or country of origin, even as prices do not. Corporations cannot just raise prices to cover taxes because they will be undercut by competition to whom the taxes do not apply. (The current regimen of import tariffs are a great example of an unevenly-applied tax that has to be eaten in order to remain competitive in the marketplace.)

So if the consumers don't pay the tax, who does that leave? The workers and shareholders. It works in reverse, too--the Trump corporate tax cuts. We saw bonuses to workers, and dividends or stock buybacks to shareholders. We did not see price reductions.

[S.A. Boggs]

President Truman once stated that if all economists would be laid end to end they would point in all direction. Dad told me 60 years ago that the state of the economy was told by how much money Dad had in his wallet. True then and true now, "experts" are good at feathering their own nest. Like the guy at the bank who will help you manage your money. If they are so good why are they working for a bank and not out on their own?
Sam

[togor]

OK, substitute the noun "business owners" if you prefer instead of "economists". The message remains the same, and we have the benefit of two major recent events, the tax cuts, and the import tariffs, that demonstrate the point. In a competitive market situation, corporate taxes go most directly to workers and shareholders, not consumers, because supply-and-demand limits what a company can do with price. It should be obvious but nonetheless some will disagree because togor posted it.

[togor]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RWTic9btP38

This vid may be of particular interest to Louisiana residents, but it gets at another side of the corporate tax picture.