Take from the rich...

[spoonbill]

quote:Originally posted by Conan71

Flat tax sucks.  National retail tax is where it's at.

You rock!  

It's the only thing that makes sence, therefore it will infuriate some.  Makes it hard for some politicians to "politic".

[cannon_fodder]

I would be whole heartedly in favor of a national sales tax EVEN THOUGH it would exempt everyone from poverty level taxation and would result in a greater system of progressive tax than we have now.  It would close loopholes, stop favoritism (ie. oil company tax breaks, this or that tax breaks), and make people aware of how much the government actually takes in taxes.

Also, I hope people think I'm arguing against higher taxes.  While I would GREATLY prefer to see reduced spending to higher taxation, if we insist on spending ridiculous sums of money taxes must rise to meet expenditures.  However, the manner in which those taxes are raised seems to be a point of disagreement... also, I do not want to raise taxes (on anyone) only to see more spending (on anything).

and finally, MichaelC, our current economic policy is and has been strongly geared AGAINST inflation.  It has been held below 6% for many years even during the Dot Bomb years (see: stagflation).  The notion that we are growing our economy by inflation is patently false according to the Federal Reserve, the World Bank, the UN and every economist on the planet that I am aware of.

and still... no one has enlightened me as to why someone who worked hard in college, spent a hundred thousand $ more to go to medical school for 4 years, then spent another 6 years on a residency to get his MD and specialty in order to work "call" hours for 60 hours a week should then have a higher percentage of his earnings taken away then the guy who graduated from high school and started pumping gas?  What did he do wrong that he should be punished for?  For what virtuous act is the other guy being rewarded for?  I simply don't get it.

[MichaelC]

Our economy is not growing because of inflation.  Our economy grows because it has to.  It's a natural occurrence.

Yes, domestically, the fed is working very hard to maintain some reasonable level of inflation.  Internationally, that's where were hurting.  Borrowing money on weak currency, to pay interest on debts we're too irresponsible to pay ourselves.  Where companies in China and Japan are floating on billions of US dollars, and making sure they don't spend it in fear that the US economy might collapse.  All of that will comeback to haunt us domestically.  It would be hurting us now, if the Fed wasn't working so hard, and foreign countries weren't interested in keeping us afloat.

We'd have to raise taxes just to be responsible for the gov't we have now.

[Conan71]

quote:Originally posted by MichaelC


We'd have to raise taxes just to be responsible for the gov't we have now.

Not necessary.  Start trimming back the gov't to match the revenue streams we have now.  Somehow that message doesn't make it past the lobbyists in Washington though.

[Chicken Little]

quote:Originally posted by cannon_fodder

And no, the rich are not richer than they ever have been.  The great wealthy men in the past control solid percentage points of our GDP:  Astor, Ford, Vanderbilt, Rockefeller.  The wealth of even the richest American's today pales in comparison to the old when viewed with regard to the rest of our wealth, let alone to the aristocrats of yesteryear.

They may not have broken any records yet, but they are closing:

quote: The IRS reports that the wealthiest 1 percent of Americans accounted for 21 percent of all income in 2005.

That is the highest level of wealth concentration in the U.S. since before the Great Depression and World War II, according to economic studies.

[MichaelC]

quote:Originally posted by Conan71

Not necessary.  Start trimming back the gov't to match the revenue streams we have now.  Somehow that message doesn't make it past the lobbyists in Washington though.

It's not going to happen.  The most conservative folks in the gov't, the anti-gov't folks, they still need a job, and they still need a target.  Cut the gov't, cut your own reason for being.  It's a better career choice to complain while doing nothing at all.

The gov't hasn't grown at the pace of the economy, probably a good thing.  And technically, much of the tax cuts may have been useful.   Some weren't, and you can't cut taxes every few months through infinity.

[Double A]

The only tax cuts I will ever support are cuts or outright tax exemptions on overtime pay, food, and   medicine. Senator Kenneth Corn recently announced he will introduce legislation this session to end the state income tax on overtime pay.

[USRufnex]

quote:Originally posted by Conan71

quote:Originally posted by USRufnex


How dare you compare this proposal to Marx, Lenin, Mao, Hugo, Fidel, and Pol Pot???

Take a Xanax Ruf, they tell me it's a miracle drug.

CF's post implies this is some sort of pinko communist legislation... I've never been fond of liberals who compare conservative legislation to facist dictators either...

"How dare you" is my opinion and perfectly fits in this case...

Clinton era = surplus.
Bush era = deficits.

Difference between the two... massive tax cuts for the wealthy under the Bush administration.  And those tax cuts have been sustained in a time of war.

When Dick Cheney says Deficits don't matter, he fails to mention that it only applies  when a Republican occupies the White House...

[USRufnex]

quote:Originally posted by guido911

Spoken like a typical "have not". Well, some of the "haves" out there worked damn hard to get where they are in life and do not believe that they should be punished for their success by higher tax.

As for your BS military service comment, this "have" has served. Do I get a waiver of the 4% tax then?  

If you do not like your lot in life, do better. That's what this country is supposed to be about.

And I've worked just as "damn hard" as you did to get what I got in life..... typical of a "have" to blame the "have-nots" and insist they're all LAZY.  My grandfather was a "have-not" who worked for MaBell for decades and fought for his country in WWII... back when we had a more progressive tax system... my stepfather was a "have-not" who grew up in a welfare home and fought in 'nam...

I am fully in favor of a meritocracy in this country.  I am not in favor of entrenched wealth.  And I believe there has been some "trickle-down" class warfare in the last 20 years in this country...  

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/05/15/national/class/OVERVIEW-FINAL.html

quote:There was a time when Americans thought they understood class. The upper crust vacationed in Europe and worshiped an Episcopal God. The middle class drove Ford Fairlanes, settled the San Fernando Valley and enlisted as company men. The working class belonged to the A.F.L.-C.I.O., voted Democratic and did not take cruises to the Caribbean.

Today, the country has gone a long way toward an appearance of classlessness. Americans of all sorts are awash in luxuries that would have dazzled their grandparents. Social diversity has erased many of the old markers. It has become harder to read people's status in the clothes they wear, the cars they drive, the votes they cast, the god they worship, the color of their skin. The contours of class have blurred; some say they have disappeared.

But class is still a powerful force in American life. Over the past three decades, it has come to play a greater, not lesser, role in important ways. At a time when education matters more than ever, success in school remains linked tightly to class. At a time when the country is increasingly integrated racially, the rich are isolating themselves more and more. At a time of extraordinary advances in medicine, class differences in health and lifespan are wide and appear to be widening.

And new research on mobility, the movement of families up and down the economic ladder, shows there is far less of it than economists once thought and less than most people believe. [Click here for more information on income mobility.] In fact, mobility, which once buoyed the working lives of Americans as it rose in the decades after World War II, has lately flattened out or possibly even declined, many researchers say.

Mobility is the promise that lies at the heart of the American dream. It is supposed to take the sting out of the widening gulf between the have-mores and the have-nots. There are poor and rich in the United States, of course, the argument goes; but as long as one can become the other, as long as there is something close to equality of opportunity, the differences between them do not add up to class barriers.

http://www.nytimes.com/packages/html/national/20050515_CLASS_GRAPHIC/index_03.html

Murphy's Law of economic policy: "Economists have the least influence on policy where they know the most and are most agreed; they have the most influence on policy where they know the least and disagree most vehemently." --- Princeton's Alan Blinder

[Conan71]

^^ Feh, that's an editorial which reads like an idealistic freshman comp essay.

There are always going to be people who choose to go to Vo-Tech to learn their chosen career and those who choose to go to med school.

An economy needs people who are willing to work in the professional ranks and those who are willing to get their hands dirty.

The path is there for whichever an individual chooses regardless of what "class" they came from.  There is a reason some jobs pay vastly more than others.  Why should a picker in a warehouse be paid the same as the CEO of the company?

[USRufnex]

quote:Originally posted by cannon_fodder

and still... no one has enlightened me as to why someone who worked hard in college, spent a hundred thousand $ more to go to medical school for 4 years, then spent another 6 years on a residency to get his MD and specialty in order to work "call" hours for 60 hours a week should then have a higher percentage of his earnings taken away then the guy who graduated from high school and started pumping gas?  What did he do wrong that he should be punished for?  For what virtuous act is the other guy being rewarded for?  I simply don't get it.

So, as a doctor, will you be making over $200K per year?  Also, I'm surprised you're studying for an MD, since you seem to act like an expert in economics....... if we start cutting government programs, maybe we should start with those "socialistic" college grant & student loan programs, those little loan-guarantees that most college students have to rely on at some point... govt programs in the 80s that cut my grants in half one year, in half again the next year... and congress decided to also cut my eligibility for an NDSL loan the following year... thank you, Gramm-Rudman...
http://www.chessconsulting.org/financialaid/history.htm

I take responsibility for my actions.  I wish I hadn't bit off more than I could chew by going above and beyond my scholarship requirements a few semesters by playing in two orchestras, singing in two choirs and doing a lead role in an opera while working 15-30+ hours with a full-time course load every week...  

I am VERY, VERY appreciative of the wealthy donors who've helped me over the years, but I'm also respectful of someone like Charlie Rangel who's been around the pike in Congress for almost as long as I've been alive...

WHY CLASS WAR IN AMERICA WAS WRITTEN
Chuck Kelly
http://www.kellysite.net/whycw.html

http://www.kellysite.net/progtax.html?

quote:When arguing the merits of a progressive income tax, don't take the usual approach that "the rich can afford it," or that "it won't hurt them as much."

    Republicans love to attack reasons like these, because of "fairness," no less. Instead, point out that our richest citizens have benefited most from the policies that right wing extremists have been implementing for the past 25 years. The wealthy caused these policies and they benefit the most from them.

    Sure, Republicans work hard--at getting right wing politicians elected. And they're successful, because those politicians bias our economy to greatly favor them.

    Especially since the '80s began, conservative politicians have made corporations more profitable, they've increased the wealth of the already wealthy, and they've forced huge sacrifices on middle and low income Americans. They accomplished this by:

Forcing workers to compete with the most brutalized workers in the world,

Loading the courts with Republican judges,

Manipulating the prime rate, and by

Passing all kinds of anti-worker legislation.

    It is only fair that those who caused these conditions (by getting America's right wing extremists elected), and benefited from them, pay their fair share of the costs that they generated.

A second argument for the progressive tax
   
    Never in recent history has greed been so richly rewarded. Between 1942 and 1962, the tax rate for our richest Americans was at least 88%, and as high as 91%.

    In those days, when CEOs considered firing thousands of workers for a million dollar bonus, the moral condemnation didn't seem to be worth it. After taxes, it only amounted to, say, only $120,000. Today, when a CEO fires thousands of workers, he gets a two million dollar bonus, and he gets to keep a million of it. Suddenly, we're talking serious money. And when he retires he can move to one of our country's many guarded communities with his millionaire cronies, and he gets virtually no moral condemnation from his golfing buddies.

    So, let's go back to the tax rates we had for our richest citizens between 1942 and 1962. Or, at least, we could go to the rates we had from 1962 to 1982, when it was at least 70%.

    And by the way, over that period of forty years between '42 and '82, none of the bad things that conservatives warn about happened. We didn't have massive unemployment, we didn't stifle innovation, and, above all, we didn't become communists.

[USRufnex]

quote:Originally posted by Conan71

^^ Feh, that's an editorial which reads like an idealistic freshman comp essay.

Why should a picker in a warehouse be paid the same as the CEO of the company?

Feh back at ya', Cascia boy...

Who argued that "a picker in a warehouse be paid the same as the CEO of the company"?

Please show me anywhere in this discussion where that was argued.  

Maybe the Xanax you're taking is causing you to hallucinate?  [}:)]

[HazMatCFO]

Rangel's proposal is interesting and should be considered, not rejected out of hand.

I noticed the reduction in the top tax rate for corporations while raising the rates on persons making over $ 200k a year. An interesting idea that needs more study.

Also, the part to close the loophole that allows fund managers to pay long term capital gains rate taxes ( 15% ) on earnings is something I agree with.

If the Congressman is truely intent on reducing the deficit, then along side the tax changes, he should propose a bill to limit growth in federal spending to the rate inflation and GDP. Spending is out of hand by the Federal Government and there needs to be some limit on it or else the Congress will continue to buy votes in the form of new programs and earmarks and just raise taxes to pay for it. Some limitation will force them to think hard about what is necessary and what is waste.

[guido911]

quote:Originally posted by USRufnex

quote:Originally posted by guido911

Spoken like a typical "have not". Well, some of the "haves" out there worked damn hard to get where they are in life and do not believe that they should be punished for their success by higher tax.

As for your BS military service comment, this "have" has served. Do I get a waiver of the 4% tax then?  

If you do not like your lot in life, do better. That's what this country is supposed to be about.

And I've worked just as "damn hard" as you did to get what I got in life..... typical of a "have" to blame the "have-nots" and insist they're all LAZY.  My grandfather was a "have-not" who worked for MaBell for decades and fought for his country in WWII... back when we had a more progressive tax system... my stepfather was a "have-not" who grew up in a welfare home and fought in 'nam...

Again, spoken like a typical have not.

[USRufnex]

quote:Originally posted by guido911


Again, spoken like a typical have not.

Spoken like a typical Tulsa conservative elitist...

You know, I've spoken to many "haves" over the years... in quite a few different cities, different social circles... the president (or maybe he was VP) of an oil company, the wife of a university president... an affluent and extremely successful graduate of Culver Academy, a uniquely talented freshman at Harvard, arts donors, etc, etc, etc...

"The man of great wealth owes a peculiar obligation to the State, because he derives special advantages from the mere existence of government.  Not only should he recognize this obligation in the way he leads his daily life and in the way he earns and spends his money, but it should also be recognized by the way in which he pays for the protection the State gives him."

"I don't pity any man who does hard work worth doing. I admire him. I pity the creature who does not work, at whichever end of the social scale he may regard himself as being."

"Probably the greatest harm done by vast wealth is the harm that we of moderate means do ourselves when we let the vices of envy and hatred enter deep into our own natures."

---Theodore Roosevelt


"It is an unfortunate human failing that a full pocketbook often groans more loudly than an empty stomach."

"Don't forget what I discovered that over ninety percent of all national deficits from 1921 to 1939 were caused by payments for past, present, and future wars."

"Here is my principle: Taxes shall be levied according to ability to pay. That is the only American principle."

---Franklin D. Roosevelt