Comments on: You’re not paying the tax rate you think you are

By: ProfMagyar

ProfMagyar — Mon, 27 Feb 2012 03:03:45 +0000

Greatly appreciate your work DCJ; especially – Free Lunch: How the Wealthiest Americans Enrich Themselves at Government Expense (and Stick You With the Bill). The problem is that most people in the US who don’t benefit from our current system either refuse to accept this as fact, don’t have time to stop working minimum wage jobs to read up on the issue, or can’t connect the dots because of the subpar education so many US citizens receive. The best example of this is when a recent push to tax the very wealthy in the state of Washington was voted down. This wasn’t surprising given the lobbying against it. What was surprising was the language coming out of blue collar workers who were so upset about the wealthiest paying more in taxes to bridge the funding gap needed to support education – health care – police/fire service – etc. Faced with this, how can there ever be hope that things will change???

By: buckaroo5

buckaroo5 — Sun, 26 Feb 2012 04:27:48 +0000

we have to ask, At what point does this country stop running trillion-dollar deficits? When are we going to understand that now is a good time to become fiscally responsible? We have lived off our children and grandchildren long enough. It’s time to turn things around.

We’ve shifted from a culture of celebrating and encouraging those who are productive and hardworking, to a culture where handouts, bailouts, freebies and entitlements dominate. Why am I paying the freight for those who have been reckless and irresponsible, whether it’s on Wall Street or in Washington or anywhere else in the community? I think we’re becoming a very different nation.”

By: getbach

getbach — Sat, 25 Feb 2012 15:28:52 +0000

If you’re not producing children, you’re doing it wrong. What I find infuriating is that we non-breeders get the real short end of the stick. I will post some of my real numbers up here but I think everyone knows what I’m talking about. Especially on the earned income credit. Also many “job creators” these days hire people on a contract basis which is yet another ripoff.

By: zhanz

zhanz — Fri, 24 Feb 2012 10:41:02 +0000

The fact is that you are totally being ripped off. When you include sales tax, luxury tax, and inflation tax, you are being fleeced for half your money. Even with raises the real income has declined over the past 30+ years. There is no law mandating an unconstitutional income taxw. The reason you pay income tax is to pay the privately oned federal reserve interest that is owed by the technically insolvent US government. You should not be paying any income tax just like before 1913. Watch the documentary Freedom to Fascism. Wake up before you are left penniless.

By: CapitalismSays

CapitalismSays — Thu, 23 Feb 2012 14:47:33 +0000

I believe we’re having a bit of a misunderstanding. At no point have I mentioned taxing the poor to solve the deficit problem. As you have mentioned, it won’t do any good (aside from being morally detestable). My point is that having 40% of our population dependent on government assistance is unhealthy for both an economy and a society. Instead of fixing the deep structural problems that have caused this, the government has opted to just redistribute income via the tax code. All that does is perpetuate the cycle and breed resentment on both sides of the equation. Apparently that’s the best we can do. I find that infuriating.

By: WouldChuk

WouldChuk — Thu, 23 Feb 2012 05:41:57 +0000

It’s easy to simply everything that all the debate is about today. Make the Tax Code plain at whatever level is “enough” (and what does that mean?) tax to run the government and eliminate thousands of pages of exceptions aexclusions, yada, yada… Start with this: Congress you take a 10% cut in pay and benefits, then to every “I MEAN EVERY” department of government cut your expenses next year by 10%. Then raise retirement age to 75…why is it still 65?? All this sound too simple? I think it comes close to balancing the budget and we all participate. I’m for that.

By: bitbyt

bitbyt — Thu, 23 Feb 2012 01:22:10 +0000

And how many retail employees get 40 hours a week? Hospitality? Food service? The average workweek for non-supervisory non-farm employees in the private sector is 33.8 hours. How much should these people be paying and how much of an impact on the deficit would it make? And what does it do to clear up corruption, the very heart of the problem? If you want to be condescending you should back your voice up with some meaningful statistics. Google would be a good place to start.

By: CapitalismSays

CapitalismSays — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 22:04:45 +0000

Two people making 9$/hour, working 40 hours/week with two weeks unpaid vacation make $36,000/year. That’s above the bottom 40% of households. They’d be paying taxes. I’ll just leave it at that.

Its amazing what you can learn with Google and a calculator.

By: Teddyrux

Teddyrux — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 21:05:45 +0000

Let’s see how much we are getting taken for a ride?
Mandatory expenses of being an American

Sales tax- 10 pct
State income tax 3pct
Fed tax 15 pct
Health and dental 3600 a year ( cheap)
Car registration 500 per year
Property tax 1200 per year

In the end you are paying well over fifty percent of your income to uphold a government that frankly doesn’t give a damn about you, is patronizing and stagnant.
I am thinking about jumping the border to retire in Mexico

By: bitbyt

bitbyt — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 20:17:35 +0000

@CapitalismSays

Let’s be realistic, how are you going to squeeze any more out of people making $9/hour? They may not pay income tax but I assure you, unless mathematics has changed since I last checked, that a much larger percentage of their income goes to taxes on gas, food, clothing, utilities, etc. Should they receive money from the tax system? No, but ‘broadening the base’ will do nothing but bankrupt the millions who are already barely scraping by.