Soaking the rich doesn’t work
 

http://www.detroitnews.com/story/opi...work/22178585/

In making his pitch to soak the rich, Obama didn’t mention the more than 20 tax hikes on the wealthy he’s already imposed (some of which also hit the middle class).

He’s increased the top income tax bracket to 39.6 percent from 35 percent; increased the capital gains tax to 20 percent from 15 percent; and phased out tax credits and exemptions for wealthy families.

To fund Obamacare, he’s imposed on top earners an additional 3.8 percent tax on investment income, a .9 percent increase in the Medicare payroll tax, as well as other new levies.

The government may have got richer from the new taxes, but average Americans have lost ground.

That’s because the government is an inefficient Robin Hood. When it raises taxes on the wealthy, they tend to look for ways to shield their earnings from the taxman. Revenues to the government get a short-term boost, but the historic pattern is that they fall in the years after a major tax hike.

AMEN!

This is more an indictment of our current tax system than it is the rates. The rich will always have accountants to shield their earnings, regardless of rates, and you can be sure than the GOP will help to ensure the perpetuation of such tax breaks for the wealthy. They talk a good line about simplifying the tax code, but they have no real plans to do so because these breaks are a quid pro quo for campaign contributions (for both sides).

Can someone explain how having the manager of an investment fund pay a lower tax rate than his secretary is soaking the rich, pandering to the rich is more like it.

Taxing the rich is good for the economy
 

http://www.marketplace.org/topics/ec...h-good-economy

Congress levies the taxes, not the President. I thought you knew that.

I agree, let's not soak the rich.

Let's move the tax rates back to the lowest level when Reagan was in office.

many of those taxes discussed in the article are from Obama's signature piece of legislation - Obamacare, or the PPACA. I thought you knew that.

PPACA was a specific legislation, not an executive order correct and who passed it?
The tax increases you are referring to were probably a result of the Bush tax cuts expiring. Who allowed that? And who put those sunset clauses and why?

The title of the article in itself is meant to be misleading. It's the wages and not the tax burden alone that is hurting the middle class.

How do you know? It's never been done.

Yes, it has, in the 1950s and it worked.

John

Republicans have started to care about income inequality

"Which brings us to an uneasy question: If Republicans have pivoted to care more about the poor, and Democrats have pivoted to care more about the middle class, who’s left to look out for America’s newly neglected rich?"

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinio...y.html?hpid=z3

Answer: As long as this concern for the middle class and the poor stays in the talking stage (similar to Israel-Palestine peace talks), and never talk about revising the tax code (settlements)...............

I'd rather we stick an apple in their mouths and fire up the smoker, baste them up with some sweet BBQ sauce. Then feed 'em to a pack of abandoned ravenous dogs roaming the wastelands of Detroit.

What can I say, we're living in the neo Gilded Age and I'm tired of hearing how the rich amongst us are sorely put upon by the rest of the nation.

Drone much Whelly? :rolleyes:

When Income Was Taxed at 94%: How FDR Tackled Debt and Reckless Republicans
 

Americans making over $250,000 in 1944 — over $3.2 million today — paid 69 percent of their total incomes in federal income taxes, after exploiting every loophole they could find. In 2007, by contrast, America’s 400 highest earners paid just 18.1 percent of their total incomes, after loopholes, in federal taxes.


read more here.

Hmmm...wasn't there a World War going on in 1944 that we were trying to finance our participation in? Not that a little thing like that would make any difference in tax policy and revenue collections.... :rolleyes:

I'm tired of the gummint telling us that they can create jobs and stimulate the economy while coming up with tax policies that are ostensibly aimed at the "rich" but end up biting the rest of us in the ass.

Here's how I drone, Bobby. :p

https://dronewarsuk.files.wordpress....g-missile4.jpg

http://www.csmonitor.com/Business/ne...n-World-War-II


And that's just for Iraq. Then we have Afghanistan.

Didn't Whelly's fearless leader Bush the Lesser tell the nation to go shopping while instituting tax cuts? Then Cheney went on to proclaim deficits don't matter. :rolleyes:

Too funny Mike. Spoken like the HR drone you truly are. Bootlick much? :rolleyes:

BTW dipshit,
http://www.politicalchat.org/showthread.php?t=7542

By starting the Iraq war, Bush/Cheney engineered a massive transfer of taxpayer dollars to their pals in the Military Industrial Complex, while at the same time pushing through huge tax cuts so that those same pals could keep all of that money. This brought about huge deficits which the right wing is now using as an excuse to come after our Social Security and Medicare.

Yup, Halliburton, KBR and that shape shifting scumbag private security firm BlackWater were such paragons of corporate greed.

I was reading how the USSC is finally going to hear the case of a dead US soldier who was electrocuted in his barracks shower due to shoddy electrical wire.

To the OP (and anyone else): Do you honestly believe that there are rich people who would willingly forgo tax breaks at 35%, but would start looking for them when the top marginal rate hit 39.6%. Same question for capital gains: How many rich people are going to forgo investments in equities when the cap gains rate goes from 15 to 20% (still half the rate of taxation on ordinary income).

If you believe either, you either have no clue about human behavior, taxation or investment strategies.

Back when 'Clinton lowered' capital gains the government economists had a pretty good idea how much more tax revenue it would generate, so yes, the rate matters. It's also known that money flows from high tax rate areas to low ones. I find the argument that rates don't matter to be an interesting one.

Pete

Even the (in)famous Laffer curve says that revenues go up until somewhere around a marginal rate in the middle between 0 and 100%. Looks like around 50% to me.;)

http://www.struggledrive.com/wp-cont...ffer-curve.jpg

Ah so, thanks. So we need to figure out the sweet spot? No wonder it keeps changing.

Pete

Low wages for our workers is what doesn't work. Colossal fortunes stashed in offshore accounts by greedy pigs who are afraid someone other than themselves might benefit from it is what doesn't work. Giving tax cuts to people who don't need them and most likely, will just stockpile it in the Caymans with the rest of their loot is what doesn't work.......

That's what we've watched go on for the last few decades as the country swirls down the commode.

Do you realize what a total Putz you are?

Dave

For the GOP, the sweet spot is always below what it currently is, even though the current rate is less than it was under St. Ronnie, peace be upon him.;)

No shit.

Heil Ronnie!

Dave

Gipper akbar!

Bonzo's keeper is rolling over in the grave.

This is one putz who believes all cannot be made right by tax & spend.

Pete

While I don't disagree, it's better than increasing spending while decreasing taxes, a Republican specialty.

Yeah, the left likes to keep pointing this out. It's an analogy that lacks context though. The only way the analogy works is if we also bring back Carter era run away inflation and double digit interest rates, and push the unemployment rate back up above 8%.

Raising the cost of converting capital and increasing the disincentives to take the risk of opening / expanding businesses just might get us there. Where's my Gerry Ford WIN button?

What it does show is that the sweet spot on the Laffer Curve (an article of faith in the GOP), is at least as high as St. Ronnie's highest marginal rate (i.e., revenues will go up if we raise the top marginal rate to 39.6, not down).

Some example of the 1% actually starting a new business please?

When the GOP tries to rein in spending, the left pitches a fit and lets the government shut down instead.

I do agree, a politician never met a dollar he didn't like. But the time of reckoning is coming.

Pete

Except they seem to be highly selective at cost cutting and they usually seek to cut it from where it's needed the most in the name of putting it where it isn't needed at all.:rolleyes:

Dave

You need to get out more. For example, where do you think some of the money comes from to fund start ups, or to fund rapid expansion of existing firms?

http://www.forbes.com/sites/alexkonr...nture-capital/

Right, because the economy really sucked back in the 1950's when the top bracket was 90%.:rolleyes:

I would argue that under-taxation leads to over-investment, as a casino mentality goes wild. Remember right before the last crash, when housing developments were mushrooming, and big retail boxes were sprouting up every mile in the 'hot' suburbs?

Wannabe 1-percenters looking for the big score. I say taking away some of the incentive for THAT leads to sounder investment.