This is scary but could it happen here...?

[Sherry_Giskie]

They should pay MORE...those rich bastards! I am sick of being poor lol!

[Bubba]

Originally Posted by Highwayman

The upper 20% of income earners pay 85% of all income taxes.

Please state your source, and remember you can make any statistic show the outcome you want if you arrange it right.

How about this excerpt from an article in the New York Times with a reporter that interviewed Warren Buffett.

Put simply, the rich pay a lot of taxes as a total percentage of taxes collected, but they don’t pay a lot of taxes as a percentage of what they can afford to pay, or as a percentage of what the government needs to close the deficit gap.

Mr. Buffett compiled a data sheet of the men and women who work in his office. He had each of them make a fraction; the numerator was how much they paid in federal income tax and in payroll taxes for Social Security and Medicare, and the denominator was their taxable income. The people in his office were mostly secretaries and clerks, though not all.

It turned out that Mr. Buffett, with immense income from dividends and capital gains, paid far, far less as a fraction of his income than the secretaries or the clerks or anyone else in his office. Further, in conversation it came up that Mr. Buffett doesn’t use any tax planning at all. He just pays as the Internal Revenue Code requires. “How can this be fair?” he asked of how little he pays relative to his employees. “How can this be right?”

Even though I agreed with him, I warned that whenever someone tried to raise the issue, he or she was accused of fomenting class warfare.

“There’s class warfare, all right,” Mr. Buffett said, “but it’s my class, the rich class, that’s making war, and we’re winning.”

[Army_of_One]

Originally Posted by Sherry_Giskie

They should pay MORE...those rich bastards! I am sick of being poor lol!

...so what are you doing about not being poor? Are you waiting on someone to give you something or are you going to earn it?

[Army_of_One]

Originally Posted by Bubba

Please state your source, and remember you can make any statistic show the outcome you want if you arrange it right.

Distribution of the Tax Burden

Just in time for tax season, the Congressional Budget Office has released new data on distribution of the tax burden. Contrary to popular belief, they show that taxes on the wealthy have risen over time and that the Bush tax cut in 2001 barely kept it from rising further.

A convenient starting point is 1984. The Reagan tax cut was then fully phased in (which reduced the top statutory income tax rate from 70 percent to 50 percent) and the 1983 Social Security tax increase had already taken effect (which raised the OASI tax rate from a combined 9.5 percent to 10.4 percent). In that year, those in the bottom quintile (20 percent of households) paid an average federal tax rate (individual, payroll, corporate and excise) of 10.2 percent.

Those in the top quintile paid 24.5 percent, the top 10 percent paid 25.2 percent, the top 5 percent paid 26.1 percent, and the top 1 percent paid 28.2 percent. Thus, those at the top paid about two and a half times more than those at the bottom.

Fast forward to 2001 (latest year in the CBO study). The top statutory income tax rate has fallen to 39.1 percent and the total payroll tax rate has risen from 14 percent to 15.3 percent. If one knew these figures in 1984, almost all economists would have projected a sharp decline in taxes paid by the rich and an increase in those paid by the poor.

In fact, the data show that those in the bottom quintile are only paying about half what they did 20 years ago: 5.4 percent. This is down from 6.4 percent just the year before, owing to the Bush tax cut.

Those in the top quintile did pay a little less in 2001 than they did in 2000: 26.8 percent versus 28 percent. But this is still well above the average tax rate they paid in 1984. Interestingly, those at the very top saw virtually no cut at all, even though liberals constantly say that they got the lion's share of the 2001 tax cut. Between 2000 and 2001, those in the top 10 percent of households saw a drop from 29.7 percent to 28.6 percent and those in the top 5 percent saw a decline from 31.1 percent to 30.1, but those in the top 1 percent saw their effective tax rate virtually unchanged: 33.2 percent versus 33 percent.
All of those in the middle 3 quintiles paid less in 2001 than they paid in 1984. In other words, between 1984 and 2001 average tax rates for the wealthy substantially increased, while at least 80 percent of households paid considerably less. Progressivity rose as the wealthy now pay about 6 times more than the poor.
Looking at the share of taxes paid shows a similar pattern. From 1984 to 2001, those in the bottom quintile reduced their share of the total tax burden from 2.4 percent to 1.1 percent. Those in the top quintile saw their share rise from 55.6 percent to 65.3 percent. Among the ultra wealthy, the top 10 percent increased their share from 39.3 percent to 50 percent, the top 5 percent raised their share from 28.2 percent to 38.5 percent, and that of those in the top 1 percent went up from 14.7 percent to 22.7 percent.

In short, the poor paid half as much of the federal tax burden in 2001 as they did in 1984, while the rich paid about 50 percent more. Those in the middle paid about a third less.

One would think that those on the left would be happy about this trend. Instead, they constantly demagogue the wealthy as deadbeats unwilling to bear their "fair share" of the tax burden, and berate the Bush tax cuts for having "slashed" taxes for the wealthy while the rest of us pay more. As is so often the case, the truth is exactly the opposite of that portrayed in the liberal worldview.
Unfortunately, all taxpayers pay a price for the steeply graduated tax system that has evolved. A new study by economists Steven Cassou and Kevin Lansing shows that a flat rate tax would add significantly to economic growth. Published in the April issue of Economic Inquiry, it concludes that real per capita gross domestic product might rise by 0.143 percentage points per year. This may not sound like much, but it's the difference between doubling in 33 years instead of 36 years.
The Cassou-Lansing study found that flattening the marginal tax rate schedule causes most of the economic gains, which explains why tax burdens on the rich rose as their statutory rates fell. Raising statutory rates on the rich, as John Kerry proposes, likely would reverse this trend, causing taxes on the poor and middle class to rise.
Bruce Bartlett - Distribution of the Tax Burden

[Bubba]

Originally Posted by Army_of_One

Distribution of the Tax Burden

Please go back and re-read post number 12! Pay particular attention to this part...

It turned out that Mr. Buffett, with immense income from dividends and capital gains, paid far, far less as a fraction of his income than the secretaries or the clerks or anyone else in his office. and this.....“There’s class warfare, all right,” Mr. Buffett said, “but it’s my class, the rich class, that’s making war, and we’re winning.”

[Army_of_One]

Originally Posted by Bubba

What I don't understand about that is why are you so for the rich not getting taxed? Are you a closet millionaire? Did you inheret some big fortune? I know for you can't get rich on a non-com's pay in the military, so you must have gotten rich some other way.

If you were the middle-class like most of the rest of us, you would be tired of supporting the whole country on your back, because the middle-class pay more in taxes and support the country more than any other class.

I say it's time the middle class gets a tax break and the rich start to pay their fair share to support the country. Do some research on the big tax cut that Bush gave. They spin it to make it look like it was a huge tax cut. In reality, the rich and big business got a huge tax cut, while the middle-class got their $100-$500 check in the mail and that was it.

I'm not a millionare in or out of the closet. I'm a poor bastard just like everyone else....BUT I have't bought into the class warfare that the liberal preach and grind into peoples head day in and day out. In reality the Wealthy didn't get a big tax cut in 2001....read the last post. I am just a firm believer that success should not be penalized in our country and it is. People that make much much money have to find loopholes because Uncle Sam is taking 39% or more of their money. Bush cut taxes on Capital Gains taxes for investments and the LIbs screamed that was for the wealthy. Last time I checked the stock market, mutual funds, cd, savings accounts etc that produce capital gains was open to EVERYONE. The middle class doesn't pay that much in taxes compared to high earners. If you have less than about $40,000 in taxable income, own a home and have a couple of kids you probably get back more than you pay in federal taxes.

I feel that if someone busts their ass, goes to school and becomes successful and are in the top 5% or so of wage earners why should they be penalized for their success with higher taxes. You rob from those that have and give to the have nots. They have some responsibility but you mentioned paying their...fair share....Who determines what a fair share is? Is it fair that the guy who is successful pays healthcare for the guy who dropped out of school and smokes weed daily?

[Highwayman]

Warren Buffett likes the tax system because he played it to make millions off the little guys. You see one of his major holdings is insurance and he made a lot of money selling life insurance to small business folks to protect their assets from the inheritance taxes. At the same time small businesses that were being sold to pay inheritance taxes he picked up for pennies on the dollar. No, Buffett doesn’t want tax reform.

[Army_of_One]

Originally Posted by Bubba

Please go back and re-read post number 12! Pay particular attention to this part...

He's winning...meaning he's made money off of the little guy. Would you say Bill Gates has made his BILLIONS off of the little guy? I would say somewhat......but that doesn't make it bad for someone to make a lot of money.

What income would you consider someone to be wealthy Bubba?

[Bubba]

Originally Posted by Highwayman

Warren Buffett likes the tax system because he played it to make millions off the little guys. You see one of his major holdings is insurance and he made a lot of money selling life insurance to small business folks to protect their assets from the inheritance taxes. At the same time small businesses that were being sold to pay inheritance taxes he picked up for pennies on the dollar. No, Buffett doesn’t want tax reform.

I believe you also need to re-read what Warren Buffet said in that post. Pay particular attention to this quote by him about the tax that the rich pay.

“How can this be fair?” he asked of how little he pays relative to his employees. “How can this be right?”

[JayhawkMom]

Bill and Melinda Gates also give back alot of money through their foundation, which supports improving education in inner city schools, helping under privileged kids get to college, etc. They make a lot, but they give back a lot as well.................