speaking of taxes

[lovepat906]

Where are you on this chart?
                    
                         MCCAIN Plan              OBAMA Plan
Income               Avg tax bill                   Avg. tax bill
Over $2.9M       -$269,364 (-4.4%).        +$701,885 (+11.5%)
$603K and up      -$45,361(-3.4%).        +$115,974 (+8.7%)
$227K-$603K        -$7,871 (-3.1%)                +$12 (+0.0%)
$161K-$227K.       -$4,380 (-3.0%)             -$2,789 (-1.9%)
$112K-$161K        -$2,614 (-2.5%)             -$2,204 (-2.1%)
$66K-$112K          -$1,009 (-1.4%)             -$1,290 (-1.8%)
$38K-$66K              -$319 (-0.7%)              -$1,042 (-2.4%)
$19K-$38K ....         -$113 (-0.5%)                 -$892 (-3.6%)
Under $19K ...           -$19 (-0.2%)                 -$567 (-5.5%)

[allaboutmary]

Don't forget we need those people. Our teacher, firemen, police, janitors etc.... It's just not possible for everyone to move up the ladder. Take the single working mother. She works and 8 hour day and maybe a part time job to make ends meet, then the rest of her time is spent cooking , cleaning and taking care of her children(making sure their homework is done, school projects etc. )  It's just not as simple as you make it sound.  You are talking about a small part of our population, that doesn't work hard to get ahead.

[VicUser]

We could argue about who deserves how much of a tax break till we are both blue in the face and not come to an agreement. We just don’t see eye to eye here . Read “The Fair Tax” and then we can discuss it and the merits, and pitfalls,  of such a structure, who knows maybe we can join forces for the greater good of all.

I do have a question that you may or may not want to address. Why do you think that the guy or gal  that makes $20,000 only makes $20,000? We know that it is possible for someone of little or no means to get ahead. Look at Obama, his story is one of rags to riches, so is Bill Clinton’s.  At the community college I attended for the first two years there were a lot of people like me working their way through school to get ahead.

I work with now, and have worked with in the past, a lot of people that are in the lower income level. They are offered chance to take classes that will increase their value at their present job and anywhere else they would choose to go. Instead they choose to bowl, play volleyball, hang with their buddies or what have you. Then when it is raise time or a job opens up that requires skills they don’t have complain that they don’t get as much of a raise or are passed over for a promotion for the person that gives 110% and it putting forth the effort to learn and better themselves. It is all choices we make in life.

[sterling_silver]

lol

[lovepat906]

"The Tax Foundation"  is hardly an unbiased group.

Founders-  Alfred P. Sloan, General Motors Corporation, chairman
Donaldson Brown, General Motors Corporation financial vice president
William S. Farish, Standard Oil Company, President
Lewis H. Brown, President of the Johns-Manville Corporation

Current leadership- Scott A. Hodge is President of the Tax Foundation

Past associations include:

Citizens for a Sound Economy- Founded by Koch Industries( the largest privately-held company in the United States, with annual sales of $90 billion. Koch Industries is also a major polluter). CSE has been funded by  Amoco, Bell Atlantic, Citibank, General Electric and General Motors  and more. CSE has been described as one of many mercenary groups that function as surrogates when industry feels it's not advantageous for it to speak directly.
  
Heartland Institute - Opposied to the the Kyoto protocol , supports the privatization of public services;opposes tobacco control measure such as tobacco tax increases and denies the health effects of second-hand smoke; and it promotes the deregulation of health care insurance, hosts PolicyBot, a data base containing 22,000 documents from 350 U.S. right-wing think tanks and advocacy groups.

There's more but I think this is enough proof of bias. The major thrust of this organization and it's affiliates is to promote deregulation . Nuff said?

[lovepat906]

The table I posted showed the  percentage of income paid in taxes in those high income catagories. It did not show the % of  total US taxes paid by that income group.
The source was the congressional budget office- not a biased media outlet. I will take a look at your source and see if their information is reliable.

But using ball park figures, an income tax break of 4.4%  for some one at the bottom of that highest bracket would put about $20,000 back in their pockets. A .2% break for a person at the bottom would give them an extra $15 bucks to spend. Now, who is in most need of $$ to pay for basic needs? The guy that makes $ 20,000 a year. ot the guy that makes close to $400,000 a year?

[VicUser]

let's try this table. It is from "The Tax Foundation"  not a biased news group. http://www.taxfoundation.org/taxdata/show/250.html

Tax year 2006
Income        Share of Income Taxes      Min Income to be in Group
Top 1%                 39.89%                               $388,806        
Top 2-5%                 20.25%                               $153,542
Top 6-10%                 10.65%                               $108,904
Top 11-25% 15.47%                               $  64,702
Top 26-50% 10.75%                               $  31,987
Bottom 50%   2.99%

The top 10% of wage earners pay 70.79% of the tax burden.

If you would do the math you would also see that the 4.4% tax cut for those that pay a high rate like 22% yields close to percentage tax cut as the .2% tax cut for those that pay 3%


I am not a rich guy, but by the same token I have never been employed by a poor guy.

BTW the book is call "The Fair Tax" it is not a flat tax, it is a consumption tax, aka sales tax. At first glance I was like no way, but after reading the book it is fair to the poor, middle class and the rich. It is not complicated but too much to go into here, please read the printed book or listen to the audio book.